The smile was still there but it was a sad smile and Kathryn Dance realized that his cause was one with which she, as a mother and Major Crimes agent who’d worked plenty of rape, assault and homicide cases, could empathize.
“This’s added another wrinkle.” He gestured around him. “It’s much harder to track down victims and family members in a cold case. Herron was killed about ten years ago. I was thinking…” Nagle’s voice faded and he was frowning, though inexplicably a sparkle returned to his eyes. “Wait, wait…Oh my God, Pell didn’t have anything to do with the Herron death, did he? He confessed to get out of Capitola so he could escape from here.”
“We don’t know about that,” Dance said judiciously. “We’re still investigating.”
Nagle didn’t believe her. “Did he fake evidence? Or get somebody to come forward and lie. I’ll bet he did.”
In a low, even tone Michael O’Neil said, “We wouldn’t want there to be any rumors that might interfere with the investigation.” When the chief deputy made suggestions in this voice people always heeded the advice.
“Fine. I won’t say anything.”
“Appreciate that,” Dance said, then asked, “Mr. Nagle, do you have any information that could help us?
Where Daniel Pell might be going, what he might be up to? Who’s helping him?”
With his potbelly, wispy hair and genial laugh, Nagle seemed like a middle-aged elf. He hitched up his pants. “No idea. I’m sorry. I really just got started on the project a month or so ago. I’ve been doing the background research.”
“You mentioned you plan to write about the women in Pell’s Family too. Have you contacted them?”
“Two of them. I asked if they’d be willing to let me interview them.”
O’Neil asked, “They’re out of jail?”
“Oh, yes. They weren’t involved in the Croyton murders. They got short terms, mostly for larceny-related offenses.”
O’Neil completed Dance’s thought. “Could one of them, or both, I guess, be his accomplice?”
Nagle considered this. “I can’t see it. They think Pell’s the worst thing that ever happened to them.”
“Who are they?” O’Neil asked.
“Rebecca Sheffield. She lives in San Diego. And Linda Whitfield is in Portland.”
“Have they kept out of trouble?”
“Think so. No police records I could find. Linda lives with her brother and his wife. She works for a church. Rebecca runs a consulting service for small businesses. My impression is they’ve put the past behind them.”
“You have their numbers?”
The writer flipped through a notebook of fat pages. His handwriting was sloppy and large—and the notes voluminous.
“There was a third woman in the Family,” Dance said, recalling the research she’d done for the interview.
“Samantha McCoy. She disappeared years ago. Rebecca said she changed her name and moved away, was sick of being known as one of Daniel’s ‘girls.’ I’ve done a little searching but I haven’t been able to find her yet.”
“Any leads?”
“West Coast somewhere is all that Rebecca heard.”
Dance said to TJ, “Find her. Samantha McCoy.”
The curly-haired agent bounded off to the corner of the room. He looked like an elf too, she reflected.
Nagle found the numbers of the two women and Dance wrote them down. She placed a call to Rebecca Sheffield in San Diego.
“Women’s Initiatives,” the receptionist said in a voice with a faint Chicana accent. “May I help you?”
A moment later Dance found herself speaking to the head of the company, a no-nonsense woman with a low, raspy voice. The agent explained about Pell’s escape. Rebecca Sheffield was shocked.
Angry too. “I thought he was in some kind of superprison.”
“He didn’t escape from there. It was the county courthouse lockup.”
Dance asked if the woman had any thoughts on where Pell might be going, who his accomplice could be, other friends he might contact.
Rebecca couldn’t, though. She said that she’d met Pell just a few months before the Croyton murders—and she was just getting to know him and the others when they were arrested. But she added that she’d gotten a call from someone about a month earlier, supposedly a writer. “I assumed he was legit. But he might’ve had something to do with the escape. Murry or Morton was the first name. I think I’ve got his number somewhere.”
“It’s all right. He’s here with us. We’ve checked him out.”
Rebecca could offer nothing more about Samantha McCoy’s whereabouts or new identity.
Then, uneasy, she said, “Back then, eight years ago, I didn’t turn him in, but I did cooperate with the police. Do you think I’m in danger?”
“I couldn’t say. But until we reapprehend him, you might want to contact San Diego police.” Dance gave the woman her numbers at CBI and her mobile, and Rebecca told her she’d try to think of anyone who
might help Pell or know where he’d go.
The agent pushed down the button on the phone cradle and let it spring back up again. Then she dialed the second number, which turned out to be the Church of the Holy Brethren in Portland. She was connected to Linda Whitfield, who hadn’t heard the news either. Her reaction was completely different: silence, broken by a nearly inaudible muttering. All Dance caught was “dear Jesus.”
Praying, it seemed, not an exclamation. The voice faded, or she was cut off.
“Hello?” Dance asked.
“Yes, I’m here,” Linda said.
Dance asked the same questions she’d put to Rebecca Sheffield.
Linda hadn’t heard from Pell in years—though they’d stayed in touch for about eighteen months after the Croyton murders. Finally she’d stopped writing and had heard nothing from him since. Nor did she have any information about Samantha McCoy’s whereabouts, though she too told Dance about a call from Morton Nagle last month. The agent reassured her they were aware of him and convinced he wasn’t working with Pell.
Linda could offer no leads as to where Pell would go. She had no idea of who his accomplice might be.