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Ryan pulled up to the modern nearly four thousand square foot home on the west side of Warner. He remembered the talk when he was in high school of the rich family who had bought the old Gallagher place and were tearing down all the buildings and putting up new.
The three-car garage had what looked to be an apartment over the bays. He stopped in the circular drive in front of the walkway leading to a massive wood door. Walking up the pebbled concrete walk, he studied the well-manicured flower beds with spring flowers beginning to poke up out of the dirt.
He rang the doorbell. Two dogs began a chorus of yapping.
“Charmaine, Douglas, stop that noise,” a woman’s voice said, moments before the door opened.
Ryan held up his badge. “I’m Detective Greer with the Weippe County Sheriff’s Department. I’m here to speak with Mr. and Mrs. Dalforth.”
The two small, white, long-haired dogs began sniffing his feet and pant legs.
“I’m Mrs. Utley, their housekeeper. Come in, I’ll see if they are taking visitors.”
He stepped into the foyer and before he could say they had to see him, the tap of the woman’s shoes faded, and she disappeared.
The two dust mops stayed behind sniffing his pant legs. He knelt and scratched them behind the ears. “You two are smelling Sheba. She would squash you if you tried to play with her.”
“Detective, they’ll see you in the conservatory.” The woman had approached quietly.
Ryan shot to his feet and followed the woman down a short hall and into a warm, moist room filled with plants.
“Mr. and Mrs. Dalforth, Detective Greer,” The woman introduced them and left, the dogs each jumped up on the older couple’s laps.
“Detective Greer, why are you visiting us at dinner time?” Mr. Dalforth asked.
“I’m afraid I have some bad news.” He studied the two and judged them to be in their late seventies or early eighties.
“Bad news?” Mrs. Dalforth stopped stroking the dog on her lap and studied him. “Does this have to do with why Roger hasn’t come home yet?”
“I’m afraid it does. He was found behind the Art Quad this afternoon. He’d hit his head on the wall and...”
“He complained every night that the custodian at the school wouldn’t listen to him about the icy walkways.” Mrs. Dalforth’s face grew red. “We should have that man fired!”
“He didn’t fall because of the ice. Someone pushed him. His death is a homicide.” Ryan studied the old man. His facial features didn’t even twitch.
“Oh my! Dead! Who would want to kill poor Roger?” Mrs. Dalforth’s voice rose in pitch.
“Dear, don’t get hysterical, the man is only doing his job.” Mr. Dalforth reached across the short distance between their chairs and patted his wife’s arm. He stared at Ryan. “Do you know who did it?”
“I’m talking with people and getting a picture of how his day developed. Had he said anything to you about anyone other than the custodian at the school?” Ryan opened his notebook.
Mr. Dalforth shook his head. “Roger enjoyed working at the school. He didn’t have much to say about the people he worked with.”
“Except that custodian. He seemed to have a run-in with him every week,” Mrs. Dalforth added.
Ryan had a feeling it was because Mr. Shepard interrupted his groping of the students. “I’d like to take a look in his room if I may.”
“He lives over the garage.” Mr. Dalforth picked up a bell and rang it.
The housekeeper entered the room.
“Mrs. Utley, would you take the detective out to Roger’s quarters, please.” Mr. Dalforth held the woman’s gaze for a moment.
“Yes, sir. Follow me, Detective.” The woman made an about-face and headed out of the conservatory.
Ryan fell in step behind her. At the door, Mr. Dalforth called out, “I expect to be kept up to date on what you learn.”
Ryan spun about. “From what I’ve gathered so far, I’m not sure you would appreciate what I’ve dug up.”
The old man nodded. “I would still like a full report.”
“That I can do.” He continued following the housekeeper down the hall and to a side door that opened on a staircase.
“Roger lived up there.” The woman pointed and stood firmly at the door.
“What did you think of the man?” Ryan asked before moving up the stairs.
She glanced back down the hallway. “He was a sex-crazed little prick. I told Mr. Dalforth what I’d discovered while cleaning and how just stepping into that place gave me uneasy feelings. He said I didn’t have to clean the rooms.”
“I take it Mr. Dalforth knew about his grandson’s perverted ways?” This was interesting. And yet, he’d made the provision for his grandson to work at a high school.
“Yes. He’d tried several therapists, but they all gave up within a few months. Mrs. Dalforth doesn’t know about any of it. Roger was all she had left of children and grandchildren.”
“I’d like the names of the therapists.” He handed her a business card. “You can call or email.”
The woman nodded and headed back the way they’d come.
Ryan climbed the stairs wondering what he’d encounter. At the top, he opened the door and was hit with the aftermath of a spicy, musky cologne. Stepping inside, he discovered an orderly room. The furniture was more expensive than he could afford on his deputy’s salary and more than a teacher could afford. Either the man had a trust fund, or his grandparents had paid for his décor. The artwork had soothing landscape scenes.
He flipped the book on the short kitchen island open with his pen. One page of phone numbers in the front were for a dentist, doctor, and a car dealership. The back was a small date book with nothing written on any of the days. He checked the kitchen cupboards. Cans of soup, cereal, and bread. The refrigerator had milk, beer, cheese, and apples. It appeared the man ate dinner with his grandparents.
Off the living room was one door. Ryan opened the door and the musky cologne scent intensified. He tried to remember if he’d noticed the scent on the victim as he’d investigated. He didn’t remember but the body had been outside for a good hour by the time he came upon it.
Ryan crossed to the window by the bed and opened it. Fresh air would make it easier to stay long enough to check through his bed stands, dresser, closet, and bathroom. Digging through the drawers in the bedroom, he didn’t find anything out of the ordinary. The closet had solid bifold doors.
The doors opened to a ten by ten walk in closet. The clothes were slacks, button-up patterned shirts, sweaters, and three suit coats. Shoes stood side by side in a neat line on the floor. There weren’t any old shoe boxes or storage boxes on the shelves. He ran a hand along the shelf and didn’t even come up with dust. If the housekeeper wasn’t cleaning his apartment had Huntley been this fastidious?
He turned to exit the closet and spotted a corner of what looked like a photograph sticking out of the folded doors. Closing the doors revealed photos of the women who’d told him earlier that day they believed Huntley had been stalking them. The proof was taped to the backs of the closet doors.
Ms. Trainor walking out of a grocery store and one of her doing a dance stretch. Ms. Miller carrying grocery bags into her house and her talking animatedly to someone in her class room. The photo was taken a distance back from the classroom door. Ms. Tait watering plants in her apartment window and one of her undressing at another window. There were also photos of female students outside of school and other women who Ryan assumed were the other teachers who had filed complaints and left the school. There was one young woman who must have been Jennifer from the school kitchen. He had a photo of her arching her back in front of an industrial sink.
Ryan pulled out his phone and called dispatch. “Charles, I need a deputy to the Dalforth residence ASAP.” He rattled off the address and wandered into the bathroom to see what else he could find. There were four bottles of a high-end men’s cologne in the medicine cabinet. An over the counter sleeping aid and aspirin. The man had appeared to be healthy.
The camera! If Huntley took all the photos where was his camera? Ryan started back through the apartment looking everywhere he thought the camera could be hidden. Nothing.
A knock on the door in the kitchen, and Deputy Trapp entered.
“What was the need for a deputy?” Ron asked, eyeballing the tidy kitchen.
“I found evidence that could lead to who killed the school teacher. Stay here while I run down to my SUV and get my camera.” Ryan took the stairs two at a time down to his vehicle. He grabbed his forensics backpack and headed back to the apartment. He noted a flicker of a curtain on one of the downstairs windows in the main house.
Trapp was standing in the middle of the living area. “Where did you find evidence? This place is cleaner than my grandmother’s antiseptic room at the care center.”
Ryan walked into the closet.
Trapp followed.
Closing the doors, he revealed the photos.
Trapp whistled. “That’s some harem he’s collected.”
Ryan clicked pictures of the doors and how the photos were displayed before he one by one placed them in evidence bags. “Take these back to the station and put someone to work discovering who these women are.” He handed the bagged photos of the women he didn’t know to Trapp. “And these, can go in the case file. I’ve met them already and know who they are.”
Trapp nodded. “Do you want this place off limits?”
“No. We have all the evidence we need.” Ryan didn’t like the thought that one of the student’s fathers killed the teacher. However, seeing the photos and knowing what he did about the victim, he would have had a hard time controlling his anger if his daughter were being sexually harassed and stalked by Huntley.
~*~
Sheba barked, drawing Shandra out of her thoughts. She hated that the families of so many girls were going to be turned upside down when she and Ryan visited them tonight.
Ryan entered the house. He looked as if he were as lost in thought as she’d been.
“How did it go?” she asked, standing and walking toward the kitchen to retrieve the pizza she’d pulled out of the oven over an hour ago.
“Kind of as I’d expected. The women were right. He had been stalking them. I found photos in his closet.”
Shandra stopped at the door into the living room. The pizza in her hands shook as she reined her emotions in. “He had photos of them? Just them or...”
“There were some students and other women.” He dropped his jacket on the back of the couch and walked into the kitchen. He returned with a soda and a glass of wine for her.
“Were any of them in compromising poses?” She shuddered to think what would happen to the women and girls’ sense of security if they had been photographed doing intimate things.
“Only two. Ms. Tait removing a blouse and a student was naked. The photo was of her backside—head to below the bottom. Not something a father would want to know a pervert like the victim had.” Ryan placed the drinks on the end table and sunk down onto the couch.
Shandra slammed the pizza tray onto the coffee table. “If I had known he was that perverted I would have told you about his behavior. I honestly just thought he was a little cockerel trying to get the hens to pay attention to him.” She wrung her hands.
“Sit. Eat. We need to go visit the parents who had a run-in with him recently.” Ryan grasped her hands and pulled her around the table and onto the couch beside him. He rubbed a thumb across her forehead. “This is dredging up bad memories.”
“Yes. But more than that, I worry about the young women that man...” She couldn’t believe she hadn’t picked up on it when he’d given her the creeps.
“You say he didn’t make any advances on you?” Ryan took a sip of his drink, but his gaze remained locked on her face.
“None. Like I said, he came off to me as a wannabe sex symbol, and I knew the kids made comments about him behind his back, but he didn’t push any advances on me. And I think it was because I was taller than him and pretty much ignored him. I only made friends with the people I felt I’d keep in touch with after I left.”
“How many of the women he harassed are you friends with?”
She studied Ryan. He was wanting to know who all besides Boyd she was going to champion. Which led her to... “You didn’t say anything about going to see Boyd tonight. Are you planning to have him pulled in to the station?” She understood the young man championing his younger brother. Travis had become dear to her in the short time she’d worked with him.
“I requested the whole family be brought to the station to interview.”