SEVENTEEN
WHILE SHERIFF VERPLANK took a call from his wife in his office, Cassie set up the computer and monitor from the A-frame on an empty desk in the squad room. She appreciated him giving her such free rein when she knew he could have easily asserted his authority over the chain of custody of the evidence and sent her away.
She used the time it took for the computer to boot up to call one of the two motels in town and make a reservation. The woman on the other end laughed and said, “Reservation? You’ll have the run of the whole place. I’ll give you our best cabin…”
The motel owner described the virtues of the motel unit while Cassie focused on the monitor.
“You’ve got your own kitchenette, a queen-sized bed, free Wi-Fi … all for seventy-five dollars per night.”
“It’s a deal,” Cassie said. She was distracted and she terminated the call.
*
IT TOOK A WHILE to get the hang of the video folder system Bodeen had set up. There seemed to be no rhyme or reason why certain folders were where they were and the labeling didn’t help. The folders contained at least three years of digital video from when the system was installed. Bodeen didn’t appear to use the computer for much of anything else except accessing the Internet.
Before opening any of the folders, she downloaded them all onto a 128-gigabyte thumb drive she’d brought in her purse. That way, they’d have a clean backup of all of the files on Bodeen’s entire hard drive in case she accidentally deleted anything. The data on the thumb drive would, she hoped, insulate Sheriff Verplank from being accused of planting or manipulating evidence.
She quickly determined that the “Cam#1” folders were clips taken from the outside camera, while the “Cam#2” folders were made up of raw unedited videos taken in the women’s bathroom. Except when they weren’t.
She thought she found the folder for Cam#1 for September but it turned out to be what she thought of with disgust as a “Best of” anthology of woman after woman using the bathroom over the past few years. Bodeen must have spent hours amassing the collection and putting them into a sequence that pleased him.
Like the close-up of the victim in the hayfield, she couldn’t un-see it afterward.
*
SHE PROCEEDED BY IGNORING all the Cam#2 folders entirely and she focused on the Cam#1 files. She was heartened to see that the surveillance video provided a time stamp in the lower left corner and she was able to zero in on the right dates even though the video quality was very poor.
When she found a series of Cam#1 files starting with September 9 she slowed down her search and became more methodical.
When Cam#1 went live it was programmed to take a wide-angle shot when a customer pulled into the pumps. She guessed it was triggered manually by Bodeen inside when he heard a vehicle arrive. Bodeen then had the capability to zoom the camera in on the vehicle and focus on the plates in back or on the fuel dials on the pump itself. After that, she noticed, he usually turned the camera off.
Some days he had as few as four customers, others as many as twenty.
Most of the cars captured on video were ranch and utility vehicles that she guessed were local. Montana offered a slew of different license plate designs—from Montana Livestock Board to Montana Quilters to Montana Hunter to Support the NRA—but every fifth or sixth vehicle was from out of state. South Dakota, Wyoming, North Dakota.
When she reached September 16 she took a deep breath. The first customer was a Montana rancher or cowboy in a new-model GMC pickup. The second was a group of local students, likely high school, pooling their cash and putting four dollars and cents worth of unleaded into their older SUV. The kids did a round of “paper-scissors-rock” to determine the loser who had to go inside the station and hand over the change to Bodeen.
The third customer drove a battered beige crew-cab Ford pickup with North Dakota plates. The bed of the truck was piled high with duffel bags, full black trash bags, and tools.
She could see the silhouettes of two people inside the cab—a man and a woman. The angle of Cam#1 made it impossible to see further inside the vehicle.
A man got out of the driver’s side and quickly turned away but not before there was a split-second view of his face lit up by early morning sun. The driver wore a bulky tan coat and baggy jeans and a ball cap pulled down low.
He inserted the fuel dispenser into the gas tank and stepped back while it filled. He stretched, removed his cap for a moment, and smoothed his hair before pulling it back on.
When he was done filling the tank he said something to the woman inside the truck and he vanished from the frame.
To pay Bodeen, she thought.
She wished she could see the woman better but the angle of the camera prevented it. At least she thought it was a woman.
But something about the man triggered recognition in Cassie. The stiff way he moved, his posture, his squared head.
“No,” she said loud enough for Sheriff Verplank to hear her through the glass and look up. “No.”
*
IT TOOK A FEW MINUTES to figure out how to run the video back and freeze it. Her fingers trembled on the keys while she did. Her heart whumped in her chest.
Five times, then six, she watched the driver exit the vehicle and turn away. The flash of sunlight fuzzed out a clear view of his face but each time she viewed the clip she thought she could see more: wavy black hair, bushy eyebrows, prominent cheekbones set in a face that had gone to fat. Huge hands, stocky build.
And something on a lanyard hanging from his neck when he got out that wasn’t there when he went into the office. Obviously, he’d zipped up his coat while filling up so it couldn’t be seen.
Before sliding back behind the wheel, the man turned slightly and addressed the back of the cab. Did he have a dog back there?
Cassie sat back and rubbed her eyes. She could barely breathe.
When Sheriff Verplank tapped her on the shoulder she jumped.
“What is it?” he asked, obviously surprised at her reaction.
“I think my mind is playing tricks on me,” she said.
“Meaning what?”
“This guy who got fuel on September sixteenth looks a hell of a lot like the Lizard King.”
She turned in her chair. Verplank had a confused look on his face. He indicated his skepticism by closing one eye like he was trying not to chuckle.
“He’s dead,” he said. “You of all people should know that.”
She said, “I have my doubts about that.”
“Why do you think it’s him?”
“I’m one of the few who have ever seen him up close,” she said.
She turned back around and ran the clip. This time, she managed to freeze it before the driver turned away.
Frozen, she thought, it looked less like him than she imagined. But when he was moving, that stiff but sure gait …
“Now I’m not so sure,” she confessed.
“Who else is in the truck?”