“Paavola’s Jeep isn’t here,” Dross said.
They stood in front of the kind of cabin Cork was very familiar with. There were so many fishing cabins just like it nestled among the trees on the shoreline of Iron Lake. It was small, probably only two or three rooms, built decades ago and showing its age.
“Doesn’t mean the place is empty,” Cork said.
“Let’s put on those vests I brought,” Dross said. “And by the way, I’m officially deputizing you.”
After he donned a Kevlar vest, Cork took his Winchester from the lockbox in the back of his Expedition. He slid in five cartridges and fed one of them into the chamber. Dross had already drawn her service weapon.
“Cabin or trailer first?” Cork asked.
“Trailer,” Dross said. “I’ll approach, you cover me.”
Dross had her weapon up and readied as she walked slowly toward the Jayco. Cork watched for any movement at the windows, the rustle of a curtain, the peek of a face. Dross knocked on the trailer door and shouted, “Police! Open up!”
Nothing happened. Dross reached out and tried the knob on the door. She glanced back at Cork, then waved him over. He joined her.
“Unlocked,” she said. “Ready?”
“Let’s do this,” Cork said.
The place was deserted and in mild disarray. Bottles of alcohol sat on the kitchen counter in various degrees of emptiness, along with several glasses. Dishes were piled in the sink, and flies buzzed over the crusted food. Magazines, some of them pornographic, were scattered on the dining table. A red tank top and shorts lay thrown on a chair. Cork opened the refrigerator.
“Pretty full,” he said.
They went through the trailer slowly. There was one bedroom, the sheets on the queen bed a rumpled mess and in need of washing. A box of Trojan BareSkin Raw condoms was on the nightstand along with a vibrator.
They opened the door to the closet, which was empty, except for a number of hangers fallen to the floor.
“Looks like someone grabbed things quick and flipped those hangers off the rack,” Dross said.
They checked the drawers of the dresser. Empty. In the bathroom, they found cosmetics and hairbrushes and toothbrushes. Towels hung on the racks, still slightly damp to the touch.
“Gone, but not all that long ago,” Dross said.
“Cabin next?” Cork asked.
“Same as before. You cover me.”
They stepped down from the camper and Dross approached the cabin, Cork covering her. She didn’t knock this time, just tried the knob. The door opened. She stepped to the side and waved Cork to join her. They entered together.
It was small and smelled of old cabin, not an unpleasant smell to Cork. He’d been in so many Northwoods cabins filled with the same scent, a combination of damp and must and woodsmoke. There was a table with a Formica top and three chairs, the padded seats covered in plastic that matched the Formica. There was a sofa with thin cushions. A cast-iron stove stood against one wall, and along the wall opposite it was a sink flanked by wooden counters. Thin checkered fabric curtained the windows.
A big muskie mounted on a lacquered board hung on the wall along with some framed photographs, mostly pictures of a man holding various fish, but a couple in which he stood with a kid. Cork looked closely to see if he could spot the kid’s damaged ear but he couldn’t. The place wasn’t in disarray in the same way as the Jayco, but there were beer cans and bottles on the counter next to the sink. Playing cards were on the table, laid out in three hands, as if someone had been in the middle of a game.
Off the one main room were a small bedroom and a bathroom. They checked the bedroom. A single bed with unmade sheets. A box of condoms on the nightstand. In the top drawer of the old dresser were some articles of lingerie, frilly bras and lacy underwear. In the drawers beneath were additional linens and blankets. Cork sifted through and found a pad of drawing paper slipped beneath the folded blankets. He pulled out the pad and flipped through the pencil sketches while Dross looked over his shoulder.
“Quite an artist,” she noted.
There were sketches of the lake, of the Jayco, of several young women. Then Cork stopped flipping. “Look familiar?”
“Mathias Paavola,” Dross said.
Cork flipped a couple more pages. “Adrian Lewis.”
There was only one other sketch of a male, unfamiliar to Cork. He was drawn in a way that made him appear both handsome and dark.
“Look at those eyes,” Dross said. “They’re like…”
“The eyes of a predator,” Cork finished.
“Billy Bones, you think?”
“It’s not Paavola or Lewis. So could be him.”
Cork’s cell phone rang. When he answered, Daniel told him, “If you locate Lewis’s trailer, be careful. Paavola and Billy Bones might be there.”
“We’ve found the trailer at a cabin Lewis owned on Little Trout Lake. No one’s here. But they were. It looks like this is where they did their trafficking. What did you find out?”
“Billy Bones is probably William Boyle, Irene Boyle’s ex-husband.”
Cork told Daniel about the pencil sketches and the one that he and Dross speculated might be Billy Bones.
“Fawn Blacksmith was quite a talented artist,” Daniel said.
“So she was probably here before she was killed,” Cork said.
“Any sign of any other girls?”
“Whoever was here, it appears that they cleared out pretty quick.”
“We checked the address for Boyle on file at Sizemore School,” Daniel said. “It’s clear that he flew the coop a while ago. But we spoke with Candyce Osterkamp, Irene Boyle’s friend at the school. She said it’s possible Irene is hiding out at the place where she grew up in Aitkin. You told me you tracked it down when Erno Paavola hired you to find his niece and nephew. You wouldn’t happen to have the address? We’re not that far away, and it might be worth checking out.”
“Not off the top of my head, but it’s in the files I keep at Sam’s Place. Annie’s at home. Give her a call and see if she can pop over and check it out.”
Dross had wandered to the front door of the cabin and stood looking out into the morning sun. She suddenly called, “Cork, someone’s in the woods!”
“Gotta go,” Cork said and slipped his cell phone into his pocket.
He joined Dross at the door. She’d holstered her weapon earlier, but now it was out again.
“Where?” he said.
“See that sumac? In there.”
The stand of sumac was fifty yards to the south, between a grove of birch near the shoreline and the mixed hardwood and evergreen that ran up to the main road. Although it was only July, some of the sumac leaves were already showing the blood red that usually came in late August. The stand was thick, and though Cork didn’t see anything, he had no doubt that Dross had spotted someone.
“How do you want play this?” he said.
“Let’s try being reasonable first.” She leveled her weapon at the sumac. “You in the woods. This is Sheriff Marsha Dross. Come out now with your hands up.”
There was sudden movement, a shiver among the sumac bushes, then everything went still again.
“They’ve run,” Cork said.
Dross holstered her weapon. “Let’s go.”
Although the undergrowth along the shoreline was dense, they broke through at a sprint. Branches slapped at Cork’s face and arms, and vines tugged at his legs. As he leapt over the trunk of a storm-toppled tree, his trailing foot caught in a dense tangle of brush and he went down. It took him a few moments to disentangle himself and to grab his rifle from where it had fallen. When he came up, he could no longer see Dross. He could, however, hear a woman screaming.
It took him nearly another minute to work his way to the source of the screams. He came out of the trees at the edge of the water, where the ground dropped suddenly a half dozen feet into the lake. Dross was already there, shedding her Kevlar vest. Twenty yards out, amid a great splashing of water, a young woman fought against going under. Dross divested herself of her belt and holster, knelt, and in a blaze of finger wizardry, unlaced and removed her boots in a flash. Then she leapt into the water feet first and swam toward the struggling woman.
Cork watched from the shoreline, ready if help was needed. But it was clear to him that Dross was handling the situation. She approached the woman from behind, grabbed her in a cross-chest carry, and despite the woman’s flailing arms, managed to swim her back to shore. Cork grabbed the belt Dross had shed, leaned over the lip of the drop-off, and let the belt dangle.
“Grab it!” he called to the young woman.
Which she did, with both hands. Cork hauled her up, and she fell, wet and exhausted, on the wild grass near his feet. He let the belt dangle for Dross and helped her up as well. She sat breathing heavily next to the young woman, who lay with her face to the sun, her eyes closed. Except for the rapid rise and fall of her chest, she looked very much like a drowned kitten.
“Nice work,” Cork said to Dross. “Where’d you learn lifesaving?”
“Three summers as a lifeguard on Gull Lake in high school,” she said between gasps.
Cork assessed the young woman. She seemed to him more child than adult. She was clearly Native, her black hair short and tinted blue, and she wore only a halter top and shorts. Her feet were bare and were bleeding from her dash through the woods.
“What’s your name?” Cork asked.
She opened her eyes, stared at him defiantly, and made no reply.
Dross sat up. “Why did you run?”
“You were going to arrest me.”
“If you were being trafficked, no,” Dross said. “You’re the victim in this.”
“Right,” the girl said, clearly not buying it.
“How old are you?” Cork asked.
She only glared at him.
“Sixteen? Seventeen?” Dross said. She spoke gently.
“Eighteen come August.”
Dross nodded toward the girl’s bleeding feet. “Can you walk?”
“I been hurt worse than this.”
“Let’s go back then,” Dross said.
“Rather not.”
“It’s all right. No one’s there who’ll hurt you.”
“You don’t know who you’re dealing with, lady.”
“Are you afraid of Adrian Lewis?” Cork asked.
The name made her flinch.
“He’s dead,” Cork told her.
“Good,” the girl said.
“Okay to go back now?” Dross said. “Our vehicle’s there.”
The girl thought about it, then nodded. She stood up, but when she tried to walk, it was clear she was in pain.
Cork handed Dross his rifle, turned his back to the girl, and crouched. “I’ll piggyback you.”
The girl hesitated.
“Go on,” Dross said. “He’s one of the good ones.”
The girl must have believed this, because in the next instant, Cork felt the weight of her settle onto him.