Page 95 of Every Deadly Suspicion

Hanna smiled, glad he was coming along, and drove to Dry Oaks Library. The talk with Betty helped her thought process. She agreed with Jared and knew it was futile to lament the past. It just dug into her like a spur how much both she and her father had lost because of a lie. The lie would never end because there were so many copies of Marcus’s book out there. As much as she hated the thought of reading it, Hanna knew that she had to.

Together, she and Jared found two copies. Sitting across from one another, she began to read exactly what had been written about Joe.

CHAPTER 49

MURDERS ATBEECHER’SMINECABINWASa difficult book for Hanna to read for a lot of reasons. Marcus had a clunky way of writing, and he was very wordy.

The nineties were a time of excess—excess greed, excess rock and roll, excess partying, and excess drugs to fuel the parties. Joe Keyes was the chef du jour of the meth trade in Tuolumne County.

He went line by line through Joe’s early arrest record and talked about Blake and Sophia being his partners. Most of the descriptors he used for Joe were harsh:opportunistic, crafty, unscrupulous, corrupt, evil. According to Marcus, Joe was also very jealous, threatening any guy who looked at Paula in what he considered “the wrong way.”

Her mother was also mentioned a lot, and not in a great light. According to Marcus, Paula was a heavy drug user until she found out that she was pregnant. Besides that, he alleged that it was Paula who pushed Joe to cook meth because it was so lucrative.

Hanna found it hard to believe that about her mother. WhenHanna was growing up, Paula was strict about a lot of things. One item she drilled into Hanna’s mind was how bad drugs were for everyone. She liked her alcoholic cocktails, but her mother was not into drugs. What Marcus wrote clarified for Hanna why Paula was so mad when the book came out. Marcus the Muckraker fit.

The nineties were a drug-crazed period; Hanna knew that from her own law enforcement training. Like Betty said, during the nineties meth or crack was the drug of choice, and many clandestine labs sprung up in a lot of rural areas. They were dangerous cesspools of hazardous materials.

The only pages of the book that really caught her attention was a chapter titled “The First Attempt.” There, Marcus alleged that Joe had tried to kill his partners Blake and Sophia six months before the incident at Beecher’s Mine cabin. It was the trailer incident. Marcus saw it as intentional. Joe blew it up on purpose and fled, leaving Blake and Sophia to die.

In the book, they survived because of Blake’s quick thinking, but Sophia was badly burned. Hanna sat back after she read the chapter. This was the incident Betty referred to.

Jared looked up. “What?” he whispered.

“Marcus asserts that Joe murdered Blake and Sophia in a premeditated fashion.” She pointed to her open page. “Supposedly he’d missed once, so he made sure of things at Beecher’s Mine cabin. I’d heard a version of the story before, and I saw the crime report in my father’s file about the meth lab fire. Blake, Sophia, and Chase were mentioned tangentially in that report.”

“Yeah?”

“But Joe didn’t kill Blake and Sophia. The way Marcus writes this account, the detail about the trailer, makes me think that he did have inside information. I can’t believe he got this from my mom.”

“Do you think he played a bigger part in the drug scene than anyone knows?”

“He had to, Jared. Betty said that he was friends with Blake. Even though Betty didn’t think so, druggies tend to hang with other druggies.”

“We have questions; let’s go to the source.”

Hanna sat up. “Yes, let’s. I just want to look at a little more of this.”

Jared nodded. “You got it.”

Hanna skimmed through the rest of the book. After about fifteen more minutes, she decided she’d read enough. She wanted to hear it clearly from Marcus.

While she’d never seen evidence that Marcus was a drug user, she did know that he had a record. Misdemeanor stuff like obstruction and one DUI a long time ago, nothing drug-related.

She closed the book, then she and Jared replaced them back on the shelf. It was time to talk to Marcus. She wasn’t on duty, she was driving her personal vehicle, and she was with Jared. When not out irritating law enforcement, Marcus worked out of his home. Hanna decided she’d pay him a surprise visit and turn the tables and interrupt his life this time.

CHAPTER 50

WHILE NOT AS HIGH ASthe Buckley compound, Marcus’s house sat at an elevation overlooking the valley.

“He sure has a beautiful view,” Jared commented as Hanna neared the house.

“He does. I haven’t been out here in a while. He used to tell my mom that when his book became a bestseller, he’d buy us a great big house. He never mentioned that he would inherit one from his mom.”

Surrounded by large pine trees, with a few water-starved shrubs for privacy, the Victorian had seen better days. Unlike most people who lived close to the forest, he had no clear defensible space between his house and the greenery.

Jared gave a long low whistle. “All the trees and shrubs are horribly dry. His yard is a tinderbox. If we’d been here for an inspection, he’d have been cited.”

“Betty said that he has let the house go. Stands to reason he’d ignore the yard as well.”

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