The Patrick Bowers Files - 05 - The Queen Read Online Free PDF Page A

down.”
    â€œWhere?”
    â€œTomahawk Lake. Just outside of Woodborough.”
    A chill swept over me. That was only fifteen miles from my brother Sean’s home in Elk Ridge.
    He’s a snowmobiler.
    The moment went deeper. “Who? Do we have a name?”
    â€œIt’s not Sean, Pat. Don’t worry.”
    Her words caught me by surprise. I couldn’t remember ever mentioning Sean’s name to Margaret, or even indicating to her that I had a brother, so unless she’d been reviewing my personnel files I was at a loss as to how she made the connection so quickly.
    A random snowmobile accident would be an issue for local law enforcement to look into, not something for the FBI to investigate. Also, here was the Bureau’s director rather than my direct supervisor on the line. There had to be more or she never would have called me. “What else?”
    â€œA rather astute young deputy took pictures of the tracks and emailed them to the FBI Lab. We identified the type of snowmobile—a Ski-Doo 800 XL—and that led us back to the owner. Forty minutes ago the sheriff’s department found the man’s wife and daughter at the house. Both dead. The woman shot in the back. The girl in the chest.”
    My brother didn’t have a daughter, so the dead woman wouldn’t have been his wife Amber, but still I sank onto one of the chairs in Reiser’s trailer. “What are their names?”
    â€œI assure you, Patrick, this has nothing to do with Sean.”
    â€œMargaret, what are their names?”
    A small pause. “The missing man is named Donnie Pickron. His wife is Ardis. Their four-year-old girl’s name is Lizzie.”
    I felt a deep stab of pain. Knowing their names made the crime all the more real, and hearing Lizzie’s age was almost unbearable.
    I tried to process Margaret’s words. It seemed highly unusual for a sheriff’s deputy to call on the FBI in the first place, and even more unusual to ask for their help with something like this right off the bat. “Margaret, I’m not sure I see what this has to do with the Bureau.”
    Only after I’d finished my sentence did I realize I’d been calling her by her first name this whole conversation. Over the last eighteen months as she’d moved up the career ladder it’d taken me a long time to get used to referring to her by her title rather than her first name, and I still wasn’t used to calling her Director Wellington. Probably never would be.
    â€œDonnie was ex-military, and the Navy is pressuring us to have someone investigate it. They want to know if this was a murder/suicide, or if his death was accidental.”
    â€œSo his death was confirmed?”
    A pause. “No. Not yet.”
    â€œSo he might still be alive?”
    â€œWe don’t know much of anything at this point.” She dodged my question. “That’s why I want you to look into this.”
    I imagined that the pressure from the Navy had a lot to do with her decision to make this a Bureau matter, but still, I couldn’t figure out why she’d mentioned the snowmobile accident first, considering it was much less serious than a double homicide. Things just weren’t adding up here. “I want you to go up there,” she went on, “have a look around. I’m sending Jake with you. He’s good at what he does.”
    It went unstated, but I guessed she’d added that last comment because she was aware of my history with Jake Vanderveld, how reticent I was to work with him. I left the topic untouched.
    â€œI can’t leave the Reiser case right now, Margaret,” I said. “We’re closing in. He’s in the area.”
    â€œTorres and his team will find him. I need you in Woodborough.”
    â€œI work serial offenses, Margaret, not—”
    â€œYou’re the most experienced agent anywhere in the area,” she told me bluntly.