We had been in the air for twenty minutes. Renz finally ended his phone call with Taft, and I had written down the latest questions we would field to law enforcement at our remaining sites. I’d sent off those same questions and asked for opinions from the sheriff’s offices in Montana and Utah. Short of finding ranches in every state that bought and sold cattle at livestock auctions, I had no idea how to proceed. Even if we got a list of names, I doubted that the killer’s name would be on it. Someone who kept an unknown number of teenagers on their ranch and did who-knew-what to them had to stay under the radar, was a recluse, and likely dealt with few outsiders. That made me think the person in charge was hauling the cattle himself. Another thought popped into my head, and I needed to share it with Renz.
“Got a minute?”
“You mean from me catching an hour of shut-eye?”
“Sorry, but it’s important, and I need feedback. I have to write this stuff down and discuss it, or it’ll evaporate from my mind.”
Renz stretched, sat up straight, and gave me his attention.
I smiled. “Thanks, pal.”
“Sure, go ahead.”
“Several things. First, the whole cattle-hauling thing could be a ruse.”
“Aimed at who and for what purpose?”
“To avoid having a cattle trailer searched. Even if he said he was going back to wherever he lives with an empty trailer, do you think anyone is going to enter said trailer if there’s the chance of cattle crap everywhere? There could very well be a hidden compartment beneath the floorboards. I’ve seen things like that before on TV crime shows.”
“Sure, but if he’s only moving a few bodies at a time, he wouldn’t need to go to that extreme. He could be using a personal vehicle instead.”
I frowned. “I guess there is that.” I swatted the air. “Back to the cattle-trailer theory.”
Renz yawned. “Yep, go.”
“If the guy is a rancher, he’d likely own a shit ton of land, right?”
“Not sure how much qualifies as a shit ton, Jade. Is that three hundred, three thousand, or three hundred thousand acres? I hear ranchers in Montana own miles and miles of land. They even own mountains. Can you imagine that?”
“You’re getting off track, Renz. So if said rancher owns so much land, then why not bury the bodies on his own property? Who would ever find out?”
Renz cocked his head. “Good question.”
“Right, so hear me out. If he really does have a cattle ranch, he’d need a lot of helpers to maintain it, and when a helper pisses him off, he might possibly kill them, load them up with the cattle, and dump them in a different state. The chances of getting caught are nearly zero.”
“So you don’t think we’ll catch him?”
I shook my head. “That isn’t my point, Lorenzo. I’ve been on cases where bodies were buried on the person’s property. Sooner or later, the landowner gets caught. Dumping bodies on the side of a quiet highway late at night as he’s passing through anyway makes sense to me.”
“Yeah, I guess it does. What was the other point you wanted to make?”
“Okay, if that guy actually buys or sells cattle at livestock auctions, why not stick to his own state? Why would anyone travel through five different states to sell their livestock?”
“Better prices?”
“No, dummy, because he wants to keep a very low profile and stay under the radar. He doesn’t want the locals to know who he is. It isn’t like the person who runs an auction house in Kansas is going to shoot over to Mr. Killer’s ranch in Montana and yack it up over a beer.”
“You’ve got a point.” Renz chuckled. “As much as your brain is always on overdrive, I can’t believe you don’t solve cases before they even happen.”
“Asshole.” I rolled my eyes. “Seriously, don’t you think some of those ideas have merit?”
“Sure I do. Write all of that down, and we’ll discuss it with Taft.” He pointed his chin at my laptop. “Meanwhile, pass that bad boy over here, and I’ll see where the auction houses are located in those five states. That’s probably the best place to start.”
I couldn’t help grinning. Renz was a good joker, but I believed he was taking me seriously and found my ideas valid. For everyone’s sake, I hoped they were. I knew one thing—if the whole cattle-hauler angle was right, Amber was going to get a side of beef for her birthday in two weeks.
We landed in Wichita at three o’clock with a nearly forty-mile drive to Wellington, Kansas, which was south and a few miles west of Interstate 35, or the Kansas Turnpike. Once we were settled in our rental, I pulled the contact information from my briefcase and looked up the deputy’s name.
“You know it isn’t a coincidence that all the cases go through the sheriff’s office instead of a police department.”
“Right, but that’s to be expected,” Renz said.
“Because the bodies are dumped along the interstate?”
“Yep. Most interstates pass through the outskirts of town, not directly through them unless it’s a big city. Don’t forget, the killer plans his dumps. He knows how far away from towns he’ll do it, he waits until it’s late at night and the traffic is really low, and he chooses areas around small towns, not big cities.”
I shook my head. “Then why bother? If he lives far off the beaten path, he can still get rid of the body even if it’s twenty miles from his home. He can do it one at a time in his own vehicle, like you said.”
“A messed-up personality combined with crazy makes for good murderers. They’re risk takers, adrenaline junkies, plus they’re all nuts. Mix that with a demented personality and somebody who was likely abused as a kid and you’ve got the killer cocktail. Why do easy and boring when you can do risky and exciting?”
I grinned. “You do realize you’ve begun a profile, don’t you?”
Renz shrugged. “Maybe, but we’ve got a long way to go.”
I found the name of our contact—Deputy Jerry Bales. “Looks like he was one of the first deputies on scene.”
Renz frowned. “And he’s meeting with us now? He obviously works the overnight shift.”
“Don’t know. Maybe the sheriff called him in so we could talk to him.” I glanced at the map on my phone to see the approximate time we would arrive in Wellington. “Looks like we’ll get there around four fifteen. I’ll give the sheriff’s office a call now and let them know. The report says the body belongs to a male and the dump site is six miles south of town. As long as Bales is ready to go, we can knock out that location today, get some feedback on my new list of questions, and go from there.”
Renz looked out at the flat farm fields as we made our way south. “Sounds like a plan.”