The deputy sat at her desk in the station. The glow from her computer screen was the only light in the building. She watched the two and a half minutes of security footage from Crazy Carl’s over and over again. Surprisingly, Carl had had little reaction when Dani’d asked for the video. He’d barely uttered a word as he’d downloaded the footage to a flash drive and handed it to her. Unfortunately, he had no real information on either Kenny or Step. He just knew the two from their monthly visits to stock up on Porter 100s. They always paid in cash. Kenny was a bit of a chatterbox, and Step was all business.
The truck was registered to a Stephen Walden Crawford. The address put him on the outskirts of Maiden Falls. The only priors were a couple of assault and batteries a number of years ago that didn’t stick.
“Wha’cha watching?” her uncle asked from behind her.
Dani screamed and turned quickly with the intent of throwing a punch, but in the turning she realized who the voice belonged to. “Holy shit, Uncle Otis! You just about gave me a heart attack.”
“Well, it’s no wonder. All the lights are off, and ain’t nobody else around. You’re locked onto that computer screen like a fish staring at a worm.”
She was too shocked to even attempt to hide the video on the screen. All she could do was pause it.
“What is that? Some kind of ghost video or something?”
She looked at the screen and then back at her uncle. “It’s a porno,” she said, knowing her uncle would want to watch if it were a ghost video.
“Porno?” He looked at the screen closely. “There ain’t nothing but three fellas there.”
Dani put on a fake grin. “I know. A friend sent it to me. Says it’s the darnedest thing she’s ever seen. You want to see?”
He stood up straight and shook his head. “There’s a couple things wrong with that right off the bat. I’m not in the habit of watching pornographic movies with my sister’s little girl, and while I have no objection to the concept of a man diddling another man, I don’t particularly wanna witness a thing like that.”
“Suit yourself,” she said. “What brings you down to the station after hours?”
“You,” the sheriff said, pulling a chair over from Deputy Friar’s desk. “Got a call from an irate Stan Rucker close to supper time.” Otis sat in the chair and made himself comfortable.
“Oh, that,” Dani said.
“Yeah, that. You mind telling me what was going through your mind when you accused the man of botching up an investigation in his own backyard? A thing like that just shouldn’t be done, Dani.”
“For the man to have botched up an investigation, there’d have to have been an investigation, Uncle Otis.”
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying a girl went missing in his jurisdiction, and he didn’t do nothing about it.”
“First off, what’re you doing calling about a missing girl case in Rock Hollow?”
“The mother came up to me at the rally at the high school.”
Otis laced his fingers together over his belly. “Now there’s your first problem right there. Mothers of missing girls can get a tad unstrung. Emotions will make them believe and do unreasonable things.”
“I thought the same thing, Uncle Otis. I swear I did, but I’m telling you right now I caught Stan Rucker in a lie. He fed me some story about the girl. When I called him on it, he nearly tore my head off.”
“Rucker’s got a cactus-up-his-ass disposition. It ain’t hard to set him off.”
“When I first called, he acted like he didn’t know nothing about a missing girl. Then all of a sudden he says he gets calls about her all the time. That’s two ends of a claim that don’t go together at all, Uncle Otis.”
The sheriff pursed his lips and studied his niece’s face. “What’s this girl’s name?”
Dani smiled. “Kate Lynn Farrow. Went missing about four years ago.”
“What’s Rucker’s story?”
“He says she got hit by a train. They found her remains two days after her mother reported her missing.”
“Train?”
“What?”
“Well, if she was struck by a train in these parts, I would have gotten a safety alert from the state. Happens every time someone gets run over by a locomotive. Law enforcement is supposed to make the rounds to all the churches and schools with safety tips and whatnot. You know how our government is better at reacting as opposed to acting.”
“So can you check to see if you got an alert around the time Kate went missing?”
“I could, but I don’t have to. We haven’t had something like that going on five years now. A boy up in Locke County got run over. I remember it clear as day.”
Dani clapped her hands and smiled. “I knew it! I told you he was lying! That sneaky bag of shit!”
“It is peculiar, little deputy,” Otis said, standing. “Get this girl’s mother on the phone. Ask if she’d mind a visit from me and you in the morning ’round about ten.”
“Really?”
“I wouldn’t put it out there if I didn’t mean it.”
“It ain’t our jurisdiction.”
“Well, as far as I know, curiosity ain’t got no jurisdiction. We’re just being good neighbors.” He started to walk away. “To that end, we’re going as civilians. No uniforms or black and whites. I’ll pick you up in your aunt’s Honda Civic.”
Dani frowned. She’d rather go in an official capacity. Walking into the living room of a woman with a missing child as Deputy Dani Savage was much easier than doing the same thing as just plain old Dani Savage. The latter wasn’t very good at connecting with other people. But, her uncle was going out on a limb he didn’t usually go out on, so she wasn’t about to make requests that might cause him to back off. She quickly turned her frown to a grin and nodded.