Page 17 of Shadow of Death
In the car, Amy drove and Hunter put a call through to Andy Mason and asked if any progress had been made in the search for Carey Allen’s friend Donald Blake.
“All right, so,” Andy told them over speakerphone, “Don Blake had the day off when he went hiking with Carey Allen. He was not reported missing at work because he was supposed to be heading out to Las Vegas for a sales meeting. He did not make the meeting. At this time, his whereabouts are unknown. His phone goes straight to voice mail, and police did a wellness check at his home. Nothing is out of order and his car is not in his driveway. There is nothing to suggest he met with any foul play at his residence, but neither is there anything that suggests he’s all right.”
“Okay, I know teams are tearing apart the caverns. If he’s in there, they will find him,” Amy said. “We’ve gotten lists of the identified victims. We’re heading to your offices—we’ll see what is known about them. According to our lists, the police are notifying the next of kin. It will be brutal news for people to take in, but we’re going to have to start interviewing them.”
“Andy, have your heard anything about strange cults in the area?” Hunter asked.
“Cults?” Andy asked.
“The medical examiners haven’t found human remains in the stomach contents of any of the victims. They were bitten by human beings, but not by any of the people they were with while in the pit,” Amy explained. “You’ll be getting Adler’s reports. He’s getting them out to our offices and the police departments. Strange behavior like that suggests the victims might have been part of a ceremony, something with a leader who appears to be a messiah of sorts preparing his flock for the days to come.”
“Wait. People bit the victims—not just in a fight, but as in biting to take a chunk out?” Andy asked. “And not because they were desperate in the pit, but desperate—”
“Right,” Hunter said. “We’ll be in soon to find out what we can about the various victims, and then we’ll start interviewing family and friends.”
“Good,” Andy said. “I’m here, conference room three, and I’ll have one of our amazing tech researchers in here with me. What she can find on social media is extensive and awesome. She has helped us out many a time.”
“Great,” Hunter said. “We’re almost there.”
They ended the call, and Amy saw Hunter staring straight ahead. He shook his head and glanced her way. “I—I should understand. My parents aren’t stupid people. My mother was naive and caring, but where we were...the bad happened undercover. And when they knew the truth, they were ready to get out. And I guarantee you, my folks would nothave gotten involved with anything that had to do with human sacrifice. But there are people out there...”
“Who will believe anything. If it’s on the internet, and it agrees with what they think, they accept it—against any display of fact and logic. We know that,” Amy said quietly. “And usually, there’s someone out there who knows their every word is a lie, but if you repeat a lie often enough—”
“You make it a truth. Notthetruth. Butatruth as seen by many,” Hunter said. “I think we need to concentrate hard on the victimology. I don’t believe random people were chosen. If this is a cult at work—and you’d seldom get a group of people who wanted to take chunks out of other people—there would have to be an underlying reason, a belief, as in a reason brought to them by a charismatic cult leader.” He hesitated and grimaced. “Remember during the witchcraft trials, hanging a witch was a good thing. And torturing someone into admitting they were a witch wasn’t a bad thing. People can believe they’re doing something ordained, no matter how horrible it is, if they believe they are involved in a righteous cause.”
“And now we know they were either crazy or happy to believe because of land deals or whatever else,” Amy said.
“The point is, there were people who were true believers and they thought Satan was trying to infiltrate their lives,” Hunter said. “Then,” he said with a shrug, “it was probably the norm. But again—”
“People often believe what they choose or what works for them,” Amy said. She let out a soft sigh. “I wish we had something on Donald Blake. I’m going to need to go by the hospital and see Carey Allen again. I promised I’d keep her in the loop on everything happening.”
“You don’t have anything good to tell her.”
“Well, in this, I’m going to need to stick with the truth—thetruth—and notatruth,” Amy said. “But I said I’d keep her informed. And... I don’t know. Maybe there is something else she’ll think of at some point that might help. I think we need to find out if anything else was going on at their work. At Barrington Advertising.”
“Of course. Let’s meet with Andy. We’ll stop at the hospital after, and maybe take a cruise by Barrington Advertising and see how cooperative folks there want to be. If he wasn’t taken at the caves—and he is involved somehow—he might have slipped up with a friend at the company. Or maybe someone at the company is involved. Anyway, we’ll get what we can at the offices and then move on.”
“Perfect,” Amy told him.
They reached the offices and were quickly led to the conference room where Andy Mason was waiting, a large screen already showing images projected from a computer being controlled by a young man in the room. Andy quickly rose and the young man rose as well, shaking hands as they were introduced. He was in his early twenties, wearing a suit and tie, but still looking boyish with a shaggy haircut and clean-shaven cheeks.
“Jay Hughes, agents,” the young man said.
“Young and brilliant. The young and brilliant manage to do great things with tech,” Andy said.
“I don’t know about brilliant, but I try—and I work in an office. You guys in the field have my utmost admiration.”
“Thank you,” Hunter told him. “But the field work couldn’t exist half the time without the leads you find, so we make a team.”
“Sure. Great,” Hughes said. “Anyway, I obviously need more time for deep digs into these people. But so far, we’ve identified five of our missing persons. We’ve got the most recent pictures they had taken before their deaths, have their work info, etcetera, more on some than on the others. If you’re ready?”
“We are,” Hunter assured him.
“Take a seat. It’s like a movie with commentary,” Andy said.
Amy grinned and took a seat opposite the screen and then Hunter did the same. The picture of a man with shaggy hair, a mustache and trimmed beard appeared on one side of the screen with a lineup of writing on the other.
Jay Hughes read aloud. “This is Gavin Peterson. Forty-six years old. He was a professor at the local community college, married, two children, but recently separated. His secretary is the one who reported him missing; but his wife, Loretta, lives in the area and works at the library. Both children, Ted and Candy, go to out-of-state colleges. Adler’s report suggests he was one of the first to go into the pit—he disappeared almost six months ago.”
