Mobius - Chapter 22-26

Chapter 22

Trevor hadn’t dared open the Ziplocked notebook. It sat on the passenger seat as he scrolled through university websites in search of a conservator. Most places were distant, busy, or too formal. Then he found Professor Rory MacTavish—an ancient text expert, and friend at CU Denver, with a knack for bookbinding on the side.

They had met years ago at a TED talk. Fran had gone with him. Of course at that time, they’d been pre-college, and really weren’t sure what they wanted to focus on. Trevor had been interested in old religious literature preservation, and Fran (Frank at the time) had accompanied him to the talk. They both found themselves fascinated by some of the ideas that MacTavish had, and eagerly listened to every seminar he spoke at. They spoke to him after his last seminar and developed a kind of rapport. Trey especially, read every article he found on the professor, and often commented online regarding his YouTube videos.

So, when he emailed a brief explanation of the discovery of the notebook, MacTavish responded with keen interest.

“A well-point pipe?” the professor wrote. “Now that’s deliberate preservation. I’d be honored to restore it—and if you’re willing, I’d like to share the process with one of my classes. Could be a rare teaching moment.”

Trevor agreed.

The next day, he met MacTavish—broad smile, corduroy jacket with chalk smudges on the sleeves. The professor handled the bagged diary like a relic.

Trevor explained, “I’m staying at the DoubleTree until morning. I doubt you’ll finish overnight, but if you do, give me a call.”

“Well, Rev’ren Trey, my class isn’t until Thursday,” MacTavish said, eyes twinkling. “But I’ve got some ideas that won’t wait. I’ll keep you posted.”

Trevor smirked. “It’s probably a kids’ club journal—rules, secret handshakes, notes about which girls aren’t allowed.”

“If so, it’s still history. No harm looking. Besides, my class’ll get a kick out of it.”

Trevor grabbed some fast food on his way to the hotel, plating it with mock dignity under the TV to minimize Trish’s hypothetical disapproval. He scanned the paper, found nothing noteworthy, then settled in to draft Sunday’s sermon. Sleep came easily.

-=#=-

The phone shrilled before sunrise. Trevor considered launching it at the wall, then remembered hotel drywall wasn’t built for punishment—and maybe Bakelite phones didn’t even exist anymore.

But it wasn’t the front desk.

It was MacTavish, sounding exhilarated.

“I did a CT scan of the book,” the professor said. “My students can be a bit... enthusiastic. So I ran it through a program I’ve been developing—AncientRead. You commented on it when I showed some results from it online.”

“I remember,” recalled Trey. “It seemed pretty rudimentary at the time.”

MacTavish laughed. “It’s come a long way. It produced PDFs showing the notebook’s contents unrolled and enhanced. Text interpretations, sketches—everything.”

Trevor sat up groggily, blinking at his watch. “Professor... do you know what time it is?”

A pause. “I’m really sorry, Rev’ren. I got so into it, started scanning after you left and... well, I haven’t slept.”

Trevor relented, voice softer. “So what did the kids call their club?”

MacTavish chuckled. “If it was a club, one of their mothers was running it. The handwriting is female. This isn’t a rulebook—it’s a diary.”

Turning serious, MacTavish continued. “I know a diary’s sensitive, but if my guess is true, this is both personal and historical.”

Trevor inhaled slowly. “Can you email me the PDFs?”

“Of course,” MacTavish said, then hesitated. “Rev’ren... I have a friend I’d like to share this with. She’s a psychiatrist. She may be familiar with the writer.”

Trevor hesitated. “Would the author be okay with that? These are private thoughts.”

“I sincerely doubt she’d mind,” MacTavish replied.

“Why?”

“Because I believe she’s dead—and she names my friend as her psychiatrist.”

-=#=-

Later that day, Trey arrived at the Ventur Police Department at noon. He felt like a nap, but he wanted to tell Fran what he’d found out. The station was quiet—the kind of quiet that made papers settle on their own and floorboards hum with their age.

“The desk’s yours.” Fran hadn’t even looked up from her computer screen.

Trey tilted his head. “You bought a desk?”

“Six months ago. Told the commissioners I’d probably need it.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Guess I should’ve taken the hint.”

She typed another line, then finally looked up. “It’s not a paid position, you know. You’re still the ‘officer/consultant’ you swore I didn’t need.”

Trey grinned. “You kept the desk anyway?”

She shrugged. “I figured I’d need it.”

His earlier fatigue dissipating, Trey set his coat down on the desk and took in the equipment. There was a state of the art desktop computer, and a phone. An old pushbutton bakelite thing with the old red hold button and four landline buttons in a line across the bottom.

The phone rang.

Fran, still mid-log entry, lifted her pen. “Get that for me,” she said flatly, voice edged with sarcasm.

Trey eyed the phone like it might bite. The row of white buttons at the bottom blinked, daring him. He pressed the flashing one—click—and lifted the receiver. He struggled to hold it between his shoulder and ear while grabbing the notepad and a pen.

“Venture Police Department,” he said.

Fran smirked faintly, picking up her phone to take a picture. “Want me to call in a senior citizen to show you how that’s done??”

He didn’t answer.

“East side of Beaver Pond…” he repeated slowly, pen already moving. “Guy says he was fishing. Saw a boot first.”

Fran stopped writing.

Trey kept his voice steady, but his grip shifted. “No movement. Floating. Said the face looked… wrong.”

Fran’s eyes lifted to meet his. The blinking light on the phone stilled. The moment stretched long.

“Chick wonders if it might be Ross,” Trey said. “Or Parker.”

Neither moved.

Then, as if a silent cue hit them both, they stood—Fran already reaching for her jacket, Trey turning toward the door.

“I’ll call Trish,” he said.

Fran nodded, voice tight. “I’ll get the sheriff.”

The desk was forgotten. The phone went quiet. And the station, which had started the day waiting for something, finally got it.

-=#=-

Fran, Trish, and Trevor arrived at the lake to find two painfully pale men sitting stiffly in an equally pale Grand Cherokee, parked just shy of the flooded gravel. The water had risen well past its usual edge, swallowing half the north-side parking lot and lapping against the remains of the beaver dam, which had been obliterated by spring runoff. What held the lake back now was a snarled barricade of debris — broken trees, insulation, and twisted metal — jammed against the washed-out shoulder of Highway 7.

Trish pulled up in her Explorer, already calculating angles and access points. Fran’s F-150 followed, its bed empty but ready. Trevor stepped out last, surveying the scene with quiet dread.

The two men climbed out when the first sheriff’s vehicles rolled in. Rick and Brad — weekend anglers turned accidental witnesses — explained what they’d found. They’d been heading toward the flooded brush to look for catfish, figuring the surge had stirred up the bottom feeders. Hence the canoe. They’d packed lunches and extra clothes, just in case the boat tipped.

But as they neared the Oregon Grape thicket, the smell hit them — thick, sour, and wrong. They’d assumed it was an animal, maybe something that had wandered onto the ice and gone under. It was the right time of year for things to float up.

Rick had tied a shirt around his face. Brad had tried to keep eating until the stench made that impossible. He tossed his sandwich overboard. “Better the catfish eat it than me,” he’d said.

The body was face down, bobbing slightly with each paddle stroke. That motion made it worse. Rick lost his breakfast — chorizo and eggs — into the bottom of the boat. Brad, steadier, used his fishing gear to loop a rope around the corpse. As they backed out of the thicket, the body followed — except for one arm, which had tangled deep in the Oregon Grape and refused to come.

When it tore free, the boat jerked. Rick dry-heaved again.

Trish stepped forward, voice calm but firm. “You’re to be commended for trying to help,” she said. “But we need to know if this was an accident or a crime.”

Brad bristled. “Come on! You know how bad the weather was in March. He probably got lost and wandered onto the lake.”

Fran raised an eyebrow. “Without a coat?”

Brad hesitated. “Maybe it rotted away.”

Fran shook her head. “His shirt and pants didn’t. Most coats around here are waterproof.”

Trish turned toward the water. “I need to see if there’s any evidence that wasn’t disturbed.”

Brad pointed reluctantly. “There’s an arm that wouldn’t come.”

Rick gagged again.

Trish glanced at Rick, then back at Brad. “Your friend’s not going to be much help. I guess you’re elected.”

She walked to her Explorer and began unstrapping her boat from the roof rack. Brad paled.

“Wait a minute! I’ve already been out there. I don’t want to go back.”

Trish didn’t look up. “I’m not asking.” She paused, then added, “Come on, waterboy. Time to help.”

Brad turned to Trevor, desperate. “Reverend, can’t you do something?”

Trevor shook his head. “She’s wonderful when she’s playing piano or leading choir. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned since we got married — don’t argue with her on this. You won’t win.”

Fran, meanwhile, had spotted a wallet floating near the body. She fished it out carefully, flipped it open, and froze.

“It’s Parker,” she called out.

Trish snapped around, instantly alert. “Ross could be out here too.”

Trevor nodded. “So could Julie. Maybe even Millie.”

Trish turned to Goldman. “You bring wetsuits?”

Goldman looked sheepish. “No.”

Trish waved him off like a scolded child. “Then go get them.”

Goldman and a deputy scrambled into their Expedition and peeled away.

Fran stepped closer. “You want my help out there?”

Trish glanced at Brad, who was now visibly green. “Waterboy can get us there, but he’s not going to be much help. You and Trey come with me. If that arm’s tangled in Oregon Grape, we’ll need force to get close.”

Trevor nodded. “And we might see someone else. One of the others. Or someone we don’t know about.”

Rick turned toward Trevor, then away again — retching into the reeds.

Trish climbed into her boat, followed by Trish and Trevor. Reluctantly, Brad got in and grabbed a paddle.

They glided slowly across the freezing water away from the smell of the putrefying corpse on the bank, but as they got closer to the line between bullrushes and bushes that would normally not be in the water, they reached what seemed to be a wall of stench. Brad worked on keeping down his breakfast, and even Trey went slightly green, but they kept moving into the thicket of bushes.

As they moved deeper, the razor sharp, holly shaped leaves seemed to reach out to grab them, and Trish and Fran had their hands full moving the branches out of the way. Trevor held the branches to the side as Brad used the paddle to push against the ground just a couple of feet under the boat.

Finally, Fran pointed to their right. “There!” She exclaimed.

Almost hidden from view was a meter long piece of flesh, partially covered in a white shirt sleeve. It was bobbing slowly as the ripples from the boat reached it. Fran and Trey grabbed poles and pushed at the ground and bushes on their left side. Brad helped with the paddle he held, and Trish pushed branches out of the way as they moved closer to the grisly object.

Finally, Trish was able to grab the thing, and pull it into the boat. She tagged it and put it in an evidence bag, then tore off a piece of surveyor's tape to mark the spot they had retrieved the arm from.

Suddenly they heard a shout echo across the water. Deputy McBride had put on a wetsuit and gone to the debris jammed against the highway road bed. “Another Body!”.

Trish's head jerked up. "Where?”

“In the debris,” McBride called back.

“We’ll come back,” she said to those in her boat, voice low. “Right now, we need eyes down there.”

They paddled hard back to the launch site, Fran steering while Trey kept an eye on the deputy still bobbing beside the ruined culvert. By the time they reached shore, Goldman had the Sheriff’s boat prepped. A closed-circuit underwater camera was rigged up to a cracked but functional monitor wedged against the dash.

Trish climbed aboard and grabbed the joystick, guiding the tethered camera into the silt. The screen flickered, catching dull outlines of broken trees, twisted fencing, and sludgy currents pushing in slow loops. Then — a pale mass.

It rocked slightly, anchored in place. Pieces of flesh floated nearby, and the face was bloated and distorted beyond recognition. Only the body size and fragments of clothing gave them a clue.

Goldman leaned in. “Is it Ross?”

Trish nodded slowly. “Maybe what’s left of him.”

Trey exhaled. “Can’t even tell it’s human. Just looks like he never had a chance.”

Trish straightened. “Trey, can you get Ralph out here? He might be able to rig something for us to lift the body out.”

Trey nodded, already pulling his phone from his coat pocket. He moved a few steps back from the boat, shielding the receiver from the wind. Trish watched the monitor, jaw clenched, as the pale body drifted slightly — tethered by a mess of root and shrapnel lodged against the roadbed like nature had built a coffin out of broken infrastructure.

Fran leaned closer. “If we try to move that by hand…”

“We’ll tear him apart,” Trish finished. “Whatever held him there wants to finish the job.”

She reached into the supply bin for fresh marker flags. “We’ll need scaffold footing, vertical lift — pressure-treated everything. I’m not letting him come up in pieces.”

Goldman exhaled through his teeth. “Ralph’s not gonna thank us for dragging him into this.”

Ralph stepped down from Sheriff Goldman’s cruiser before the tires stopped crunching gravel. He didn’t wait for full introductions — just nodded once at Trevor, took the site map from Trish, and started walking like the water owed him explanations.

Construction crews had begun to gather, carpooling in from the west. Their trucks didn’t bother with the north parking lot where the fishermen usually staged — this wasn't fishing. This was a repair wrapped in urgency. They parked up near the bend on Highway 7, just east of the dam, where runoff had chewed through the pavement and peeled away chunks of shoulder like tissue paper. Orange cones were scattered like afterthoughts. The bridge crew had laid boards across puddled access ruts, prepping forms, pouring base.

Trish clocked them as she descended toward the washed-out edge, her boots thudding against exposed earth.

The culverts weren’t just clogged. They were shattered — twisted metal buried beneath runoff and splintered dam debris, backlogged into a temporary lake that shouldn’t exist.

She signaled Goldman to follow.

“Sheriff,” she said briskly, “we need that crew to stop work. Now.”

Goldman frowned, glancing toward the cement mixer idling at the edge. “Bridge prep’s already underway.”

Trish pointed at the hollowed ground where the stream now braided around fallen logs and sodden insulation. “This is overflow. Julie could’ve washed through here. If she’s caught in the debris, every concrete pour and rebar set could bury her.”

Goldman opened his radio. “You want the whole crew halted?”

“I want the east bank quiet and untouched until we finish the search,” she said. “If she’s out there and we miss her, I don’t want concrete as the reason.”

Up at the bend, Ralph was already pulling out his cell, dialing Joe. He spoke without greeting.

“We need scaffolding and vertical lift capability yesterday. Bring posts, dimensional beams, pulleys. Pressure-treated, we’re working in standing water. Don’t forget harness kits — it’s unstable terrain.”

Thirty minutes later, Joe’s flatbed rumbled into view, forklift grumbling behind it like a bad idea turned brilliant. Crews spilled out — boots, tool belts, men whose expressions said this wasn’t just a construction job. It was something heavier.

Joe hopped down and scanned the slope. “Ground’s scoured clean,” he said. “We’ll anchor on both banks.”

He didn't wait for instruction. The diagram was in Ralph’s hand, but the execution was already in Joe’s mind. Down at the stream’s edge, the culvert looked more like a broken throat — torn open, waiting.

Joe crouched at the eastern bank, driving a post sleeve into the mud with mechanical precision. The waterline surged around his boots, soaking through the canvas like it knew time was limited.

Chick arrived with a coil of ratcheting straps and his old hammer he'd sworn was “luckier than most marriages.” No one argued. He slung it onto a belt loop and started setting ground anchors like he was patching drywall in floodlight.

“Run the uprights in pairs,” Ralph called out, unfurling the site sketch against the hood of the flatbed. “We want a tension frame, not a trapeze act.”

Joe nodded. “We’ll need spreaders above the high-water mark. Rope’s not enough. I brought pressure-treated beams — Chick, you remember the notch spacing?”

“Four on the long side, staggered cross, two-inch offset from center,” Chick said, already drilling pilot holes like he’d dreamt it. “Same as that gear room wall.”

Trish paced a safe distance from the tangle of Oregon Grape, scanning the thicket like it owed her something. The scaffold would give them a raised search platform, room to run sonar gear and lower probes into the deeper pockets of mud and pooled debris.

The build came together like muscle memory:

Pulleys rigged with marine-grade rope

Crossbeams fastened with torque clamps and rustproof brackets

Joe measuring load capacity out loud like a teacher who forgot he didn’t have students

By dusk, the scaffold stood over the ruined culvert like a statement — not elegant, but solid. Trish stepped onto it slowly, gloves gritted from thorn scratches, eyes narrowed on the debris field below.

You sure this’ll hold?” she asked.

Joe gave a grin that hadn't seen daylight in weeks. “If it doesn’t, Chick’s gear room goes with it. And I’m pretty sure that thing’s bombproof.”

Joe squinted into the light slanting off the scaffold frame, wind nudging the ropes that traced toward the apex. No words—just a slow shift of motion as he pulled gloves tighter and hooked into the ladder rungs bolted along the tripod’s leg.

The climb wasn’t graceful. Every step groaned, each rivet tested. The platform below narrowed into silence—Trish held her breath, Ralph adjusted nothing. Joe ascended, one deliberate notch after another, until the crossbeams met like ribs beneath a sternum. He hooked his boot under the frame, steadied himself, and hauled the 4x4 upward—a weathered timber still damp from where it had rested against the boat’s stern.

Fingers callused from knot-tying and oil changes worked the fasteners by feel. A socket slipped once. He didn’t flinch. Just repositioned, secured the ratchet, and drove tension into the frame. Sweat coursed along his temple as he leaned forward, back bowed, posture folded around the task like prayer. The 4x4 locked into place with a hollow thunk.

Below, nobody cheered.

Joe didn’t expect them to. He adjusted the final clamp, tugged twice on the support line, and began his descent—slower now, like the weight he’d carried up was only part physical.

As soon as Joe told the others that it was done, Ralph muttered, “Time to ‘Raise the Catstrophic’”.

Trevor nodded, “You got that right.”

Ralph glanced at him. He didn’t think anyone heard what he said.

-=#=-

A pale haze of breath lingered above the dam as the sheriff’s boat nudged against the scaffold. Everything felt hushed—no wind, no birds, just the lap of cold water and the faint groan of timber under tension.

Joe’s crew stood tight-lipped along the scaffold platform, each one clasping a pulley rope, knuckles white. From the central crossbeam, three support lines hung motionless over the pool—suspended above the darker current, where runoff had carved the streambed deep, more than three meters down. The water there was unusually clear but deceptively fast, scouring past layers of moss and sunken branches.

On the boat’s edge, Trish and Trevor prepped the stretcher. The nylon webbing was taut and reinforced, with Joe’s ratchet straps looped around its frame like a makeshift cradle. Trish checked each buckle twice, then passed it wordlessly to Ralph.

Two deputies—Carlson and Wagner—adjusted their regulators and gave the signal. A ripple spread out as they slid beneath the surface, swallowed by shadow.

Below the dam, visibility collapsed into murk and motion. Carlson descended first, fighting a slight undertow. The water was cold enough to bite through his wetsuit, and deeper than he’d expected—a trough etched clean by storms that had surged through weeks earlier. He caught himself against a branch, its bark stripped clean, a smooth wound in the dam’s rib cage.

The corpse hovered ahead. Bloated, black, and tangled in sticks—the body looked almost grown into the wall, like it had always been there. A splintered rod had pierced the skull and exited through the left cheek. The left hand was conspicuously absent. Carlson turned away instinctively, then reached for a panel of mesh from his gear pouch. Above him, Wagner drifted sideways, pressing screen between two root-like limbs, securing it with repurposed zip ties. Their hands shook—not just from cold.

Carlson moved closer, threading mesh behind the shoulder blades, hands finding grooves by feel alone. Dam walls loomed to either side, thick with limbs and silt. When the body twitched in the current, it wasn’t sudden—but it was real. A foot shifted, caught in a warp of branches. Wagner hesitated, then shoved one free, just as the smallest toe cracked loose and vanished into the flow.

They gave the signal: two tugs on their lifelines. At the surface, Joe’s crew leaned into their pulleys, tightening rope just short of taut. Above them, the scaffold creaked. The body was held in place by more than branches now, and if something came loose, it would be pulled up with the rest. Goldman watched the screen wired to the motorized camera, face pale.

“I never want to do this again,” Wagner muttered as he surfaced, half-stripped of rescue gear.

Carlson nodded, and said to Goldman, “You’ll never be able to give me enough hazard pay to do something like this again.” He handed over his shears and went back under.

The second descent was worse.

Twice the current dragged them off axis, forcing Carlson to wedge his shoulder against the dam itself. Wagner caught the edge of the stretcher in the gloom, maneuvering it around the torso with slow deliberation. The ratchets cinched with a dull click. When they moved the body forward, it resisted—caught against a twig embedded near the scapula. A shift. A crack. Carlson didn’t look back.

The final pull was deliberate. One signal. Then two.

Above, Joe’s men walked the ropes backward like riggers in a theater pit. The body rose slowly, swaying inside its nylon cradle, water streaming off its limbs in cold rivulets, but Carlson noticed something was wrong. Grimly, he turned toward the dam, and saw the horrible, terribly important remnant held in place by another stick, this one not impaling it.

Trish guided her boat under the stretcher, breath held as droplets fell onto Greg, who recoiled instinctively.

Wagner climbed aboard the sheriff’s boat and dropped like a stone. Carlson remained seated on the gunwale, clutching the stick and its prize, looking like he wanted to chuck it at the coroner.

As the body cleared the water, silence reclaimed the scene. No one commented on the depth, or the smell, or the bits of pale sediment on their boots.

But every glance to the darkened trench beneath the dam acknowledged the flood’s memory—and the wreckage it had left behind.

Chapter 23

MacTavish hung up the phone. Again. He’d been trying to get in touch with Tamara for some time. He wasn’t sure if the writer of the diary was the person he was thinking of, but he knew the person had lived north of them, and Venture certainly counted as that.

Peg. Was that the one? He couldn’t be sure. He’d never known the name. He wasn’t supposed to know her name. She’d been a patient, and while some married folk were transparent where privacy came into play, he’d always tried to observe what he was supposed to.

He’d asked Trevor if he could show the diary to his friend. He didn’t say anything about Tamara being his ex, but they were still friends, so he figured it counted.

He decided to call back and leave a message. He told her that he had something that should interest her, then he called Trevor.

Trevor said he’d be down the next day to retrieve the notebook.

MacTavish set his cell down and carefully picked up the old spiral notebook, preserved in a lexan case. In a typical blue cover, it looked like something one of his students might have carried to and from his classroom. Enduring the tedious job of translating what MacTavish said into notes that might make sense to the student at the end of semester so they could pass an exam.

Only in this notebook, the notes were completely different. The brittle pages held the thoughts of a woman who was suffering her mind slowly deteriorating.

He picked up the hard copies. He had built a copy of the original. He didn’t recommend trying to read the real one, so he’d printed copies of the pages, and then bound them into a spiral notebook that matched the one preserved in the case. He’d printed them as close to the real pages as he could. They were originally printer paper, but now, they looked like they came with the spiral cover. There had been some moisture damage, but AncientRead had figured out which pages had what information on them. Maybe a human could have done it faster, but a human would have had to open the notebook, risking ripping the pages in question.

He hadn’t read much. In fact, that wasn’t true. He’d read it all, but in a way he didn’t intend to allow him to remember it. He only read so he could verify that AncientRead was doing its job. He’d worked long and hard making that program, and so seeing its work so well done was satisfying.

But his verifying of the program's work allowed him to see Tamara’s name, and some of the things said in the text made him think this could be the one that disturbed Tammy so much.

A man hung, and his wife accused of killing him. The diary mentioned something along that line, but the ramblings of the writer didn’t make it easy to understand.

-=#=-

Trish had spent a couple of days going over the remains of the two bodies. Neither was in good shape, but she wanted to make sense of the crime scenes.

When she finished, she made her way to the police station in Venture. What she found didn’t make any sense of the scenes, however.

She walked into the police station, still reeling from what she’d found.

Trey was at his desk, going over some things with Sheriff Goldman. As soon as the sheriff saw Trish, he jumped up and offered her his chair, then went across the station and grabbed another from beside the conference table where Spotless Solutions’ computer still sat.

Fran turned her chair to face the others, and rolled it a bit closer.

“What’s the verdict?” she asked.

Trish shook her head, clearly confused. “We’re right about the identities. The first is definitely Parker, and the second is Ross.”

“Good,” Goldman approved. “But still no sign of Julie.”

“No.”

Trey cocked his head. “You’re usually not this unsure,” he commented.

“Well, the IDs are about the most certain thing going on here.”

Goldman screwed up his face quizzically. “You wanna explain that?”

“If I could, Sheriff, I would. I’ll tell you what I found, but it's up to you three to make sense of it.”

She opened her briefcase, pulled out some photos and tossed them down on Trey’s desk. “Parker: Ligature marks on his wrists and ankles. Deep, uneven, and partially healed before new ones were made.” She pulled a small ziplock bag from her case and tossed it beside the pictures. “Hemp rope. Like you’d use for climbing or for livestock. These fibers were embedded in his skin, especially at the wrists.”

Fran seemed to be searching for words. “Wait a minute,” she finally got out. “Partially healed?”

“That’s what I said,” Trish said nodding.

“Uh… So some of the marks were made a while before he died,” Trey said.

“Was he into BDSM?” Goldman wondered.

“Was Millie?” Fran speculated.

“If she was, maybe they were having a threesome and it got out of hand,” Trish said. “It was a lot harder to tell, but Ross was the same way.”

They sat in stunned silence for a moment, then Trish said, “They both had scopolamine in their blood.”

“WHAT???!” Fran exploded.

“No,” Trey said forcefully. “I don’t buy it. Look at all of the blood at the scenes.”

“I don’t know, Trey,” Trish said, shaking her head. “Maybe Millie wanted them to disappear and have it look like murders. Maybe she wanted a couple of slaves.”

“That’s disgusting,” Trey said, shaking his head.

“It gets stranger,” Trish said. “The volume of blood in the bodies was way off. They lived quite a while after they disappeared.”

Fran didn’t look happy. “I thought the amount of blood from the arterial spray indicated they couldn’t have survived.”

“It seemed to,” Trish agreed. “But we saw what appeared to be a large amount. In white snow, a little blood can go a long way.”

She paused and looked each of them in the eye. “The fact is, there are no wounds – no bullet holes, stabs, punctures. Well, there is the puncture in their butts where the scopolamine was injected, but that’s it. My guess is that some blood was removed to spray around the crime scene, but then they were taken somewhere and kept alive until they were dumped into the hot springs.”

“Hot springs?” Goldman asked.

“Yeah. They both had minerals in their lungs. They were both dumped in or near “Crab Pot.”

The county was known for volcanic features, especially the “Crab Pot,” a hot spring a few miles upstream from the beaver pond where the bodies were found. The name was given to the spring by a transplant from Maine in the last century, even though the nearest crab was probably over two thousand miles away.

“Drugged, restrained, and then dumped like trash,” Goldman said, shaking his head in disgust.

“They drowned in the water,” Fran said, not as a question, but as a statement.

“They breathed some of the water in,” Trish said, nodding. She looked at her notes for a moment, then specified, "Sulfur, silica, arsenic. Definitely the seasonings in Crab Pot.”

“Someone wanted the evidence to just melt away in boiling water,” Goldman said, staring at the photos, but it seemed as though he wasn’t looking at the bodies on the trays. More at the last moment of the people they’d been.

“They almost got their wish,” Trey nodded.

“If the runoff hadn’t broken the dam, they would have,” Fran said.

Goldman nodded. “It’s like someone tried to erase their bodies.”

Chapter 24

Trevor arrived back in Venture and again stopped in at the found Trish and Fran discussing the missing Julie.

“I see three possibilities,” Trish said as she stood and made her way to her husband. She gave him a deep kiss, welcomed him home, then turned back to Fran.

“Well, four, I suppose,” she said as she made her way back to her chair.

“Hi, Trey,” Fran said brightly, then she looked at Trish. “Four?”

“Yeah. She could have been dumped into the Crab Pot and just wasn’t as lucky as Ross or Parker.”

Trey made a face as if he was holding back from throwing up. “How can you be less lucky than them?”

“Admittely, that’s not easy, but her body could have completely deteriorated.”

“Ugh!” Fran said.

“Then again, skeletal remains might be lodged somewhere we can’t see. Those pools don’t go straight down, so he could be lodged somewhere in the plumbing.”

Trey looked at his wife, then back at the door. “Maybe I’ll just head home. I’m not sure I’m up to this conversation right now.”

“I know it’s not a wonderful conversation to come home to, but we’ve got subs on order,” Fran said hopefully.

“And that’s supposed to make me want to stay​?”

“Well…” Fran said, clearly not convinced herself. “What else?” she asked Trish.

“She could have washed out just like them, and we haven’t found her,” Trish answered.

“She could have been dumped elsewhere,” Trey said, deciding to get into the conversation himself.

“That’s also a possibility,” Trish said.

“Or,” Fran said, “she wasn’t killed. Maybe her blood was a ruse, just like Ross’s and Parkers’.”

-=#=-

After they ate their subs, Trevor got in his car and drove to the sheriff’s office. His job wasn’t the same, but in many ways, he felt like he was carrying bad news to Goldman. The diary was definitely his late wife’s, but he knew she’d been sick from dementia when she died. He hadn’t wanted to pry, but he delicately asked MacTavish if the writing showed that.

The affirmative nod made Trevor wonder if perhaps it should simply be forgotten, but no… He couldn’t do that either.

He got out of his blazer and picked up the package. He glanced around at the spring day. It didn’t seem fair to take something so heartbreaking to Goldman on such a fine afternoon, but he needed to. He couldn’t be the judge of whether Charlie read his wife’s disjointed ramblings or not.

He shut the car door and took a moment to make sure it was locked. Did he really need to lock his blazer at the sheriff’s station half a mile from the county courthouse in Grade? No. But it took a moment, and even a moment was a nice delay of his task.

But, he had to. He and Goldman had been developing a rapport since they had been working together, and they had been developing a genuine friendship. He slowly walked in and knocked on his friend’s office door.

“Come!” came Charlie’s voice.

He slowly pushed the door open, and walked in.

“Hey, Trevor. What’s up?”

“You heard about the notebook we found?” he asked.

“Yeah. I’m not sure where it came from. I sure didn’t sink a well-point there. How old is it?”

“The notebook is Peg’s, Charlie.”

“Really?” Goldman was astonished. “She must have hid it when she was a kid,” he said smiling.

“No, Charlie. It’s from when she was dying.”

“Oh?” Goldman didn’t know what to say.

“It’s pretty disjointed, Charlie.”

“How bad?”

“I haven’t read it. I got my information from Professor MacTavish,” Trey said slowly. “The program he used to recover it is brand new, and he… Well, he needed to know it works. He’s been working on it for a long time.”

“It’s okay, Trey,” Goldman said, holding up his hand to stop Trey’s apology. “I’m not worried about you reading it.”

“Thanks, Charlie. But still.”

Goldman reached out to take the package, and as he did, Trey placed his hand on top of Charlie’s, holding it there for a moment. “MacTavish told me there’s a bit of… well, for lack of a better term, rambling about Cynthia’s and Dennis’s deaths.”

The slight smile Charlie had on his lips faltered. “Dear God, I don’t want to revisit that.” Tears started to form at the corners of his eyes.

“No, I didn’t think you did. Was Peg aware of Cynthia’s confession?”

“No, and honestly, I don’t think Cyndi did it. But I’ve got no proof.”

Trey looked at the package and released his grip on it. “You don’t think Peg…”

“No,” Charlie scoffed. “Absolutely not. She was more of a pew sitter than you are.”

Trey nodded, smiling softly. “If you need to talk at all, give me a call.”

Charlie didn’t say anything, but he nodded.

Chapter 25

June 28th, 2028

7:26PM

MacTavish was sitting, quietly going over some papers. Honestly, what people tried to get away with anymore. As he was reading through one, he noted some obvious quotes from a book he’d recently reviewed. There were no footnotes. Absolutely no citing of sources at all, yet the book was clearly in the bibliography. Oh well… That would be several points subtracted.

He added up the points that would need to be deducted and looked at the name of the writer. Oh boy… Registrar’s daughter. He grabbed a bottle and poured some scotch into his coffee.

He reached for the paper, but his phone rang, relieving him from having to write the extremely low grade on the paper.

“Hello?”

“Hello, Sweetie,” came Tamara’s completely sloshed greeting. “How are you today?”

“I’m fine, Tammy. How are you?” He heard her giggle, then a man’s response, and he wondered if her honeymoon was completely finished. “How’s the honeymoon?” he asked, if only to remind her he was on the line.

“It’s wonderful, Dah-ling.”

I love ya, Tammy, but you are certainly no Zha Zha, he thought as she giggled again.

“And how’s…” She’d just married an uppercrust doctor from Boston, complete with New England accent and receding hair line. He had to be careful not to say Winchester… “Ted?”

“Mah-velous, Dear. He’s Mah-velous. We just got (hic) back from Monoco, you know. (hic) We had a Mah-velous time!”

Mah-velous, MacTavish thought to himself as she giggled again, presumably at her hiccups, but he wasn’t completely sure it was that or something… He didn’t want to think about it.

“The plane just landed, and I (hic) decided to call you.”

“Tell you what, Tammy. I’ve got papers to grade, so you finish what you’re doing, and call me back tomorrow.”

“Okay, Dah-ling. Ciao!”

Before he could say ‘bye’ the line clicked dead, which was probably best, he thought as he opened the registrar’s daughter’s paper. Suddenly, he didn’t feel so bad about the low mark he was about to write. He even took out some of his frustration from Tamara’s untimely phone call by writing a scathing note about what he thought of plagiarism. It felt good.

-=#=-

Charles Goldman sat down on his recliner. He didn’t know if he wanted to read the diary or not. It certainly wasn't something he had expected to be doing when he got up that morning.

He wanted something to numb his nerves as he read, but he wasn't sure what would work best. He opened the book and settled his eyes onto the print, but his eyes refused to focus.

He rubbed his hand over his forehead, then pushed his palms into his eyes, trying to keep the tears from leaking out. Neither gesture helped at all.

He sat there, quietly shaking, silently sobbing for the woman he had loved more than anyone. She had been a stabilizing force in his life, and this glimpse into her mind when it had been failing just tore him apart.

He closed the diary, not with finality, but with trembling hesitation. It felt heavier now, as if the pages had absorbed his sorrow.

He stood slowly, knees stiff, heart heavier than the book in his hand.

The house was quiet. Too quiet. The kind of quiet that made him feel like a ghost in his own skin.

He walked to the door, paused, and looked back at the recliner. The indent where he’d sat still held his shape.

Then he stepped outside.

-=#=-

“Hello?” MacTavish looked at his clock. 7:52 AM. Who would…

“Hi, Rory,” came the weary, clearly hungover voice of Tamara.

He smiled. Perhaps it was cruel, but after yesterday's call, he felt he deserved a bit of retribution.

“Hi, Tammy,” he said, forcing massive amounts of cheerfulness, not to mention volume, into his voice. “How’s it going?”

“Not so loud!” she managed. “Ted! Can you get me some tylenol? Oh that hurt!”

“Sorry,” he lied, but he was able to manage a somewhat convincing tone.

“What’d you need?” she asked. “Thanks, Honey,” she added, clearly for Winchester… ah… Ted.

“Nothing terribly important,” he said, wondering if he’d let her suffer enough.

“Then why’d you leave 2 messages?”

Yeah, he should probably ease off.

“You remember those kids – police officers? One is the chief of police in Venture, and one is a pastor there.”

“Venture?” Her mind was being understandably slow.

“Yeah. North of here. Wyoming… One state up…” She’d really done a number on herself.

“Wyoming? Oh! You’re in Denver still,” she murmured.

“And you’re in Lala land,” he countered.

“No I’m not! I’m in Boston,” she argued.

“Sorry,” he apologized. “The pastor… He brought a notebook he’d found in a pipe underground. I was able to restore it, somewhat.”

“And what does this have to do with me?” she asked, starting to sound a little more with it.

“The writer mentions you as her therapist.” He heard her take a sip of something. Hopefully water.

“Really? Well, I guess it must be someone I worked with.” she admitted.

Yes, thought MacTavish. There is that possibility. For the life of him, he couldn’t understand why he loved her so much, as dumb as she seemed sometimes, but this time it could be the hangover.

“That’s what I figured,” MacTavish told her. “Margaret Goldman? Does that sound familiar?”

“Margaret Goldman? No. Oh! Peg. PEG Goldman.” She sounded pleased that she’d figured it out. “Yes, I knew her. She died awhile back.”

“Yes. I thought so.”

“Oh? Why?” Tamara’s voice was starting to gain strength. The Tylenol must be taking effect, MacTavish noted.

“They wanted your opinion on her mental health when she died.”

“Oh, yeah. They did, didn’t they.” It was starting to come back now. A flood of events that she didn’t want to relive, but did at the same time. Perhaps to find out more of what had shaped those final years of Peg’s life.

“Can you send me the text of the journal?”

“Yeah. I’ll email it to you. It’s in a series of pictures AncientRead extrapolated from the scans I made of the notebook.”

She was a bit more alert now, sipping on a cup of coffee Ted had brought her. “AncientRead is doing pretty good, huh? Is it trustworthy?”

“I think so, but you can tell me what you think, once you read this.”

-=#=-

Trey's hand automatically went to his ancient bakelite handset when the phone rang.

“No, I haven't heard anything from him,” he said into the instrument.

He listened a bit more. “I dropped the diary off last night. You were there, Carlson.”

There was a pause and Fran looked expectantly at him. “It wasn't great, no.” Another pause and then, “I'll keep a lookout.”

He hung up and Fran gave him a quizzical look. “What's up?”

“Charlie's not at the station today, and the guys can't get ahold of him.”

“How’d he take the diary?” Fran asked.

Trey considered. “He wasn’t happy, but he didn’t seem destructive, if that’s where you’re headed.”

Fran tilted her head. “Then where is he?”

Trey shrugged, but it was the kind of shrug that carried weight. “Could be anywhere.”

“That’s not helpful.”

He rubbed the back of his neck. “Look, he read enough to know it wasn’t going to be easy. But he didn’t slam it shut, didn’t throw it, didn’t… you know.”

Fran’s brow furrowed. “Didn’t what?”

Trey didn’t answer right away. “Didn’t seem like a man who was going to vanish.”

Fran picked up her phone and called Denise. “Hey, Neecee, Have you heard from your Grandpa?” she asked, putting the call on speaker.

“Not exactly,” Denise said after a pause.

“What do you mean, not exactly?”

“Well, Aunt Sylvie called earlier. She said Grandpa dropped the diary with her to give to me, and made her promise not to tell anyone he’d gone.”

“He’d gone!?” Fran’s voice was half question, half disbelief.

“She wasn’t sure,” Denise went on, “but she said people would worry. She thought reading the diary just… reminded of too many things. And that he wanted to leave the area.”

Chapter 26

July 29th, 2028

8:02 AM

The first call came into the police department just after 8 a.m.—a technician from General Alarms reporting a widespread fault in their security system. No one, it seemed, could set their alarms. Residential, commercial, municipal—every panel was throwing errors.

General Alarms launched a full diagnostic sweep. Their lead programmer, a quiet man named Gustav Halvorsen, began combing through the codebase, expecting a simple configuration error. But the system appeared clean. No corrupted files, no broken logic.

Frustrated, Halvorsen decompiled the live binaries, hoping to catch something that hadn’t surfaced in the source. That’s when he saw it—lines of code he didn’t recognize. They weren’t part of any approved build.

He traced the calls. The rogue code was designed to send daily emails—encrypted packets containing fresh override codes. The destination? An address registered to Ross.

Halvorsen stared at the screen. The implications were staggering. Ross had embedded a backdoor into the system, one that allowed him to bypass any alarm installed by General Alarms.

Every day, the system generated new codes. Every day, it sent them to Ross.

Even the residential units weren’t exempt.

He decided he needed to call the police.

Twenty minutes later, he was staring at the images of several police, a deputy from the sheriff’s office, Chick Birdlander, the mayors of both Grade and Venture, as well as the DA and Judge Gutierrez, all on a secure video call.

The DA, Benton Quade, looked like he was about to blow the proverbial gasket. He was practically apoplectic when he heard that his own office was on the list of buildings that weren’t safe.

Fran, one of the officers on the call, watched as the attorney’s face struggled to settle on a color.

It started out a normal shade—if slightly gray, presumably to match the hair at his temples. Then it went pink. Then bright red, as his blood pressure surged along with his voice.

“You’re telling me Ross had access to my office? The courthouse? The sheriff’s department?” His tone and coloring shifted with every word. “For how long!?”

A moment later, he grabbed what appeared to be a nebulizer, started it running, and began breathing deeply through the mouthpiece.

“Benton, settle down!” the judge ordered. “The last thing we need right now is you springing a leak from your blood pressure. God knows we’ve had enough problems in this county lately. We don’t need another.”

Quade gave the screen a look that would give Atilla the Hun pause, but sat back and kept quiet except for the rhythmic wheezing.

A moment later, Halvorsen cleared his throat. “It’s still active. Well, it was until the poor coding took the system down. Now, nothing’s working.”

“Do you know if anyone’s been getting the mail?” Chick wondered.

“Ross is dead,” Judge Gutierrez pointed out.

“Yeah, Diego,” Chick agreed, “But that doesn’t mean someone isn’t getting his emails.”

Halvorsen nodded slowly. “I checked the mail server logs. The packets were still being sent until about 6:42 this morning. After that, the system crashed.”

“Do we know if they were received?” Chick asked.

“Not yet,” Halvorsen admitted. “Ross’s account is locked, but if he set up any forwarding rules, aliases, or remote access—someone else could be pulling them.”

Quade wheezed louder, then pulled the mouthpiece away just long enough to growl, “Then find out who.”

“One would assume,” Fran said, “that Parker and Graves received carbon copies from Ross.”

“That makes sense,” Trey said from his vantage point beside her. She turned her laptop slightly so more than just the left side of Trevor’s face appeared on everyone’s screen. “I’d also assume that Debra would have made sure she was receiving a carbon copy from her brother.”

“Her twin or the other one?” Quade rasped.

“Why not both?” Fran replied, unfazed.

“Which means,” Trey said, “we’ve got at least one recipient whose whereabouts are still unknown.”

“This is not good, this is not good!” moaned Tilda Wright, the mayor of Venture.

“That’s the basic idea,” said Ray Calder, her counterpart from Grade.

Wright seemed to realize what she’d said and stopped herself, but the frightened look didn’t leave her face.

Ray couldn’t resist. “Afraid of a little blackmail, Your Highness?”

“Ray!” Judge Gutierrez thundered. “That’s enough!”

“The systems aren’t setting, but we can still manually lock and unlock buildings,” Deputy Carlson observed. “Can we do anything to manually turn on the sirens and bells for the alarms? At least we’d have the appearance of them being set.”

“Most residential alarms won’t manually set, but almost all commercial ones will,” Halvorsen nodded.

“It seems to me, everyone present here has the upgraded residential model,” Chick said. He’d personally recommended it to them all.

“But that doesn’t help our constituents,” Wright pointed out.

Halvorsen adjusted his glasses. “We can simulate alarm activity on commercial panels—lights, sirens, even timed lockouts. But residential units are harder. They’re designed to resist manual overrides for liability reasons.”

Chick nodded grimly. “Which means the people most vulnerable—the ones without backup systems or private security—are the ones flying blind.”

Wright’s voice was quieter now. “We need a public statement. Something reassuring. If word gets out that the alarms aren’t working—”

“We’ll have panic,” Quade rasped through the nebulizer. “And opportunists.”

Judge Gutierrez leaned forward. “Then we keep it quiet. For now. Chick, Halvorsen—you’ll coordinate a patch or workaround. Ray, Tilda—start drafting a statement that says nothing but sounds like everything.”

Fran glanced at Trey. “And what about the codes? If someone’s still receiving them…”

Halvorsen didn’t look up. “Then we need to find them before they use one.”

-=#=-

“How do we find Reggie?” Fran asked Trey just before the phone rang. She sighed, then picked up the receiver. It was Judge Gutierrez.

“Do you have any idea where Sheriff Goldman is?” he asked without preamble.

“I wish I knew, Judge,” Fran answered.

“Because General Alarms is not just in Venture, we have a federal cyborg on her way.”

“A cyborg?” Fran asked.

“Can you think of a better way to describe someone from the FBI who deals with computer crime?”

Fran thought a moment. “Not really, Sir. When is the cyborg supposed to arrive?”

“Tomorrow morning. I’ve heard rumors as to why the sheriff isn’t available. Are they true?”

“What have you heard, Judge?”

“Are you trying to dodge the question?”

“Not at all. How can I confirm if what you’ve heard is true, if I don’t know what you’ve heard.”

“Hm hmm,” the judge grudgingly acquiesced. “Does this have to do with a journal that Trevor found?”

“It may, Sir.”

“I’ve talked to his sister, and she seems to think it probably does.”

“Then, Sir, I would say you know more than I do.”

“I see.” He paused for a moment, then resumed thoughtfully. “This whole mess is going to need someone who has a real head on their shoulders to run the investigation.”

Fran figured she knew what he was going to say and turned on her phone speaker. When the judge continued, she was somewhat correct, but he still surprised her.

“I want you to run this investigation from your office as it seems to revolve around two businesses in your town. If he agrees, the rest of the commissioners and I agree that Trevor should be temporarily placed in the position of Sheriff.”

“What about Carlson and Wagner?” Trey wanted to know.

“They’re good at their jobs,” Gutierrez told him, “and I trust them, but this has been blown way beyond the county. I’ve looked, and both of you have dealt with the FBI before. I’m not sure Carlson or Wagner could tell you what FBI even stands for.”

“How will they feel about me taking the position of sheriff? I could be the liaison between the offices.”

“Yes, you could, and don’t think we didn’t consider that. But the fact is, I want you to do the job for now, and honestly, Chick recommended you for the job.”

He waited a moment, and when there wasn’t a response, asked, “Do any of you have a problem with that?”

“No,” Trey responded after glancing at Trish for her response.

“Well,” Fran said, “I just got Trevor a desk here in my office, as well as a special phone line. It just seems a waste to not need them anymore.”

Judge Gutierrez gave a low chuckle, then said, “Tell you what. Work out a cooperative setup. You help the Sheriff’s office when they need you, and he helps your office when you need him.”

Fran nodded, but then blanched when he continued. “I know where Chick got that phone, Trey. He can probably get another one for the sheriff’s office for when Fran is there.”

“Judge,” Trey said carefully, “You sound like you’re not expecting Sheriff Goldman to return.”

“Son,” Gutierrez returned, “I’ve known Charlie for a long time, and he’s good people. He’s been sheriff for a long time, but he’s nearing retirement age, and frankly, if this journal has affected him, I think he’s probably needing a break. I’ll not force him out if he wishes to remain, but I’m not going to force him back into the position if he doesn’t want to return. And I’ll be honest. One way or another, the position will be open before long, and it’s a lot harder to vote out a sitting officer than to vote in a new one. If you are appointed sheriff now, there’s a higher chance that you’ll remain in the position than if you are placed on the ballot as a newbie when Charlie voluntarily retires.”

“Whether Carlson and Wagner know what FBI stands for or not, how will they respond to me taking the position of sheriff right now?” Trey wondered.

Gutierrez laughed. “Are you going to take the job or not, Trevor?”

“Yes, Judge, I will. I need, however, to know that the people I’m to be working with have no ill will toward me for taking the job.”

Fran could almost see the judge nodding.

“I understand,” he said, “and I’m glad to know you’re perceptive enough to be concerned about it. Carlson has a bit more seniority than Wagner. If one was to be promoted just on the merit of seniority, it would be him, but I’ve talked to him about you taking the position. He already knows, and he agrees. He’ll help you as much as he can.”

Trey liked the judge, but he also knew that Gutierrez could be shrewd. He was probably the only person in the county with enough guts to disagree, even privately, with Chick Birdlander. So was he telling the truth or manipulating? Trey suspected the latter, but he wasn’t going to call him on it.

After a couple more words of encouragement, Gutierrez rang off. Trey turned to look at Trish and Fran. “Well, then. I suppose I should go down to the office and review the troops.”