Down a Dark Road--A Kate Burkholder Novel Page 2

  “You can’t be—” Realizing I’m kidding, he bites off the words and gives up a chuckle. “I’m glad one of us has a sense of humor about this.”

  “I can step up patrols. Work with County, persuade Sheriff Rasmussen to do the same.”

  “That’s a start, Kate. I want those little bastards caught. I want them arrested. Forty hours of community service ought to show them the error of their ways. Let’s see how they like spending their Saturdays out here painting over swastikas.”

  I consider pointing out the fact that the last time I caught someone out here defacing the covered bridge—a senior at Painters Mill High and a football player to boot—the boy’s parents lodged a complaint and eventually the charges were dropped. But I don’t mention it. It’s part of being a small-town cop. It’s my job to arrest people for breaking the law. The rest is up to the courts. I’d just as soon stay out of any back scratching that happens along the way.

  Making a sound of irritation, Auggie crosses to one of the ancient oak beams and slaps his hand against the wood. “Could you imagine driving all the way from Columbus for some wholesome sightseeing and instead getting that?”

  “There are quite a few teenagers out here just about every weekend,” I tell him. “I’ll park an officer down the road at that little turnaround. If we can catch them in the act and make an example of them, it’ll stop.”

  Even as I say the words, we both know it will be me who parks down the road and stays up all night. My small police department consists of only four full-time officers, including me. Pickles is getting on in years and went part-time last summer. That’s not to mention my budget, which leaves me no funds for overtime. And even if we’re lucky enough to catch some numbskull artiste in the act, chances are—if he or she is a juvenile—Judge Siebenthaler will cave when the parents complain.

  I make eye contact with Auggie. “I wouldn’t be doing my due diligence as chief if I didn’t remind you that a budget for OT would be helpful.”

  He makes a face I can’t quite decipher. “I know you’re operating with a skeleton crew, Kate. You know I’m in your corner. I’ve been trying for years to get the council to increase your budget. Rest assured, I’ve got the bean counters working on it.”

  That’s one of the things I like about Auggie Brock. While he is a political animal, I know he cares.

  “In the interim,” he says, “let’s get some volunteers out here.”

  I nod. “I bet Jim over at the hardware store will donate the paint.”

  “Good thinking,” Auggie says. “Jim and I are in Rotary together, so let me get with him on that.”

  My phone chooses that moment to erupt. I check the display. Curiosity sparks when ODRC pops up on the screen. The Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections.

  “I gotta take this,” I tell Auggie.

  He looks at his watch. “I’ve got a meeting, anyway.”

  “Don’t forget to talk to Jim.” Giving him a wave, I turn away and answer with, “Burkholder.”

  “This is Jerry Murphy, Chief Burkholder. I’m the deputy warden out at Mansfield.”

  The Mansfield Correctional Institution is a maximum-security state prison about a hundred miles north of Painters Mill.

  “What can I do for you?” I ask.

  “There was a security breach involving an inmate last night,” the deputy warden tells me. “You’re on our notify list, Chief Burkholder.”

  A notify list contains the names of individuals—law enforcement, officers of the court, witnesses that testified during trial, family members, and victims—that are to be contacted when the status of an inmate changes. For example, when an inmate is paroled. I suspect this call has nothing to do with a formal discharge.

  “Who?” I ask.

  “Joseph King.”

  The name impacts my brain with a solid punch that leaves me breathless. I was eight years old when I met Joseph. He was Amish and lived on the farm next to ours. My older brother, Jacob, and sometimes my sister, Sarah, and I would meet Joseph and his two brothers after our chores were finished. There was a wooded area and a creek between our farms—prime real estate for a group of bored Amish kids.

  Joseph was full of mischief, a born explorer, and a master teller of tall tales. He was funny and ornery and always ready for fun and games. Even with our many chores, we somehow always found time to play. Cowboys and Indians in the woods. A swim in the deep part of the creek. When I was nine, Joe set up a baseball diamond in a paddock, and I learned how to play baseball. In winter, we’d meet at nearby Miller’s Pond to skate. When I was ten years old, Joseph taught me how to play hockey. I was competitive for an Amish girl—a trait that was frowned upon by my datt and brother. Not Joe. He liked me all the more because I was a tomboy, a sore loser, and I never shied away from a little rough-and-tumble.

  I was twelve when I fell in love with him. It was an innocent Amish-girl crush, but to me it was a mile wide and as deep as the ocean. I never told a soul; not even my best friend. It was my secret, and I held it tightly. But it was the first time I had my breath taken away by a boy. It was my first bittersweet taste of love, and it was as powerful and formative as my first steps.

  Joseph’s datt was killed that fall when a drunk driver plowed into his buggy. He stopped coming over, and I didn’t see him much after that. But I heard the stories. The rumors that said he’d lost his way. He’d lost the light in his eyes and opened his heart to some waiting darkness I had no concept of. They said he’d traded his happy-go-lucky persona in for a new model of brooding—and sometimes rage.

  Two years ago, I received word that Joseph King had shot and killed his wife in their farmhouse while she slept. I’m not easily shocked, but I had a difficult time believing that the boy I’d once known could partake in such a vicious act. I’d actually been tempted to go see him, but life intervened and I never got around to it. I followed the media blitz of a trial. In the end, he was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison.

  “Chief Burkholder? You still there?”

  The deputy warden’s voice jerks me from my reverie. “Yeah.” I mumble something about our connection. “What happened with King?” I ask.

  “He escaped custody sometime after headcount last night and as of this time, we’ve not been able to locate him.”

  I almost can’t believe my ears. It’s rare for an inmate to escape. There are too many layers of security and even more in the way of checks and balances. Without help from the outside, it’s an almost impossible feat.

  “I was on the notify list?” I ask.

  “That’s correct,” he replies. “He’s got ties to Painters Mill.”

  After Joseph’s conviction, I remember hearing that his five children went to live with his wife’s sister here in Painters Mill. “Rebecca and Daniel Beachy adopted them.”

  “Since the kids are living near your jurisdiction, we wanted to give you a heads-up in case he tries to make contact. We’ll be notifying Holmes County, too.” He pauses. “I understand you’re part of the Amish community there.”

  “I used to be,” I tell him. “I know where the Beachys live. They don’t have a phone, so I’ll drive over and let them know about King.”

  “Appreciate it.”

  “Has King made any threats against any of them?” I ask, knowing that when kids are involved, emotions can run high.

  “Not that I know of,” he tells me. “That doesn’t mean he won’t try to make contact. Or harm them or the family. From what I’ve heard, Joseph King is a cold-blooded son of a bitch.”

  The words disturb me more than they should. In some small part of my brain, I still think of him as the footloose boy who couldn’t bring himself to scale a fish without first knocking it unconscious.

  “We’ve got a BOLO out with the highway patrol. Richland County Sheriff’s Department is all over this. We got dogs on scene. I suspect BCI will get involved, too.”

  Which means that my live-in lover, BCI agent Joh
n Tomasetti, will be getting a call, too, if he hasn’t already.

  “Can you text or e-mail me a recent photo of King?” I rattle off my e-mail address.

  “We’re blasting his mug shot to all law enforcement agencies in the four-county area, including Cuyahoga.”

  “I appreciate the heads-up.”

  “You bet.”

  I disconnect and slide my phone back into my pocket, troubled. I haven’t seen or heard from Joseph King in twenty years, but I heard the stories. Not only from the Amish, but from law enforcement as well. Evidently, King was a troubled man with a marriage on the rocks, a litter of kids he didn’t want, and a loose interpretation of his marital vows.

  I vividly recall the day I learned his wife had been found dead—and Joseph was arrested and charged with first-degree murder. I couldn’t believe the kid I’d known—the one with the toothy grin and big laugh—could do something so horrific. But no one knows better than me how profoundly life can change people—and that too often those changes are not for the best.

  I’d wanted to talk to him, ask him myself if he’d done it. But I knew it was only that tiny part of my heart that remembered what it was like to be thirteen years old and in the throes of my first crush. The part of me that was loyal to a fault and still believed people were fundamentally good. I never went to see him.

  I did, however, follow the investigation and trial. Joseph King, his wife, and their five children lived on a small farm near Middlefield, Ohio, which is about two hours northeast of Painters Mill. The night of the murder, King claimed to have gone fishing on Lake Erie. Since his destination was too far to travel via buggy, he’d paid a local Yoder toter to drive him to a cabin. During the night, someone walked into his unlocked home, picked up his shotgun, and shot his wife in her bed while their five children slept across the hall. Come morning, the children discovered their mother’s body. Two days later, Joseph was arrested and charged with murder.

  Throughout the trial, Joseph proclaimed his innocence. He claimed to love his wife and swore he’d never harm her. No one believed him. His temper was common knowledge around town. Worse, he had a criminal record that included two domestic-violence convictions. His prints were on the shotgun and the shells. One of his jackets, found at the scene, had gunshot residue on it. No one at the lake remembered seeing King at the cabin. The crime scene was a virtual smorgasbord of evidence—both circumstantial and physical—and the prosecutor offered up every juicy morsel.

  The trial lasted three weeks, a spectacle that drew tourists from as far away as New York. In the end King was convicted of first-degree homicide and sentenced to life in prison. He maintained his innocence right through the day he was led from the courtroom in shackles. No one believed him, including me.

  The case was high-profile not only because King was Amish but because of the level of brutality—and the fact that the children were in the house at the time of the murder. It brought to light the reality that domestic violence transcends culture and religion. And it drove home the fact that all the warning signs had been there, but for whatever reason everyone missed them, including law enforcement, family, and the Amish community.

  Naomi King had been just twenty-nine years old. A pretty Amish mother whose life was cut short by a jealous, controlling, and sometimes violent husband. A family destroyed, countless lives ruined, and for what?

  Graffiti forgotten, I walk to the Explorer, slide behind the wheel, and call dispatch.

  My first-shift dispatcher, Lois, answers with a perky “You didn’t throw Auggie off the bridge, did you?”

  I can’t help it; I laugh, and the cloud that had been hovering over me dissipates. “I need you to call everyone in for a quick meeting.”

  “This about that BOLO for Joseph King?”

  I shouldn’t be surprised that she’s already heard; news travels fast in a small town. And with the police radio, it’s not unusual for my dispatchers to know things before I do.

  “Meeting in an hour.” I tell her about my conversation with the deputy warden. “I’m going to head over to the Beachy farm to let them know.”

  “ODRC think he’s coming here?”

  “I don’t think so, but the family needs to know he’s out, and we need to cover all our bases just in case.”

  CHAPTER 2

  I call Holmes County sheriff Mike Rasmussen on my way to the Beachy farm.

  “You calling about Joseph King?” Mike begins without preamble.

  “Is everyone a mind reader?” I mutter, and then say, “I’m on my way to talk to Rebecca and Daniel Beachy.”

  “Good. I think it’s probably best if you’re the one to talk with them since you know the language and whatnot. Every time I’ve been out there, they just sort of nod their heads and ignore everything I say.”

  “It’s that whole separation thing, Mike. They hear you just fine; they just pretend they don’t.”

  “Must come in handy.”

  I chuckle. “Did ODRC mention how King escaped? I didn’t think to ask when I was on the phone with them.”

  “I just hung up with the sheriff up there in Richland County. From what I understand, King sawed through some kind of steel plate, crawled through an unsecured plumbing tunnel to the roof, and then rappelled to the ground using a rope made from sheets.”

  “Never underestimate the power of ingenuity,” I say, my mind working over the information. “Do they think he got help from someone?”

  “He didn’t saw through that steel plate with his toothbrush.”

  “Someone inside?”

  “The sheriff wasn’t real forthcoming.”

  Even though he can’t see me, I roll my eyes. “You going to put a deputy out at the Beachy place?”

  “I’ll step up patrols, Kate. I don’t have the manpower to cover their farm twenty-four seven.”

  “Mike, I’m perpetually understaffed.”

  “Look, if I was facing life in prison, I sure as hell wouldn’t come down to Painters Mill. I’d get as far out of Dodge as possible.”

  “Canada?” I say.

  “Or Mexico.”

  “Unless he wants to see his children.”

  He sighs. “People do get touchy when it comes to their kids.”

  The words ring uncomfortably in my ears. “I’ll let you know how it goes with the Beachys.”

  “I appreciate that.”

  “Let me know if you hear anything else.”

  “You got it.”

  * * *

  Rebecca and Daniel Beachy live on a dirt road three miles outside Painters Mill proper. Their farm is sandwiched between the heavily wooded floodplain of Painters Creek to the west and a checkerboard of soybean, hay, and corn fields to the east.

  I’m not unduly worried that Joseph King will show up here. I’ve got a pretty good handle on the Amish community; King is probably well aware that he doesn’t have any friends, English or Amish, in Painters Mill. With every law enforcement agency in the area actively looking for him, chances are he’ll be apprehended quickly. Still, I worry. Rasmussen is right about people and their children. King’s kids could be a powerful draw. That’s not to mention the fact that King was Amish. Even ostracized, the urge to return to the only thing he knows could be strong.

  I pass by an overgrazed pasture to my left and the dark woods that run along the creek to my right as I idle down the lane. The farm is isolated, which could also be attractive to a man on the run. Chances are the Beachys don’t have a phone. If something happened, they wouldn’t be able to call for help.

  Following the driveway around a bend, I end up on the back side of the house. I park behind an ancient manure spreader heaped with wood shavings, muck, and straw. Beyond, there’s a tumble-down barn with peeling white paint and a rusty tin roof. Next to it, a massive silo gazes out over the property like some aging sentinel. In the side yard, an old-fashioned clothesline holds a mishmash of children’s clothes—dresses and trousers and shirts—all hung neatly and flapping in the breeze
.

  I get out of the Explorer and wade through a dozen or more fat red chickens pecking the ground and make my way to the back door. Before I can knock, the screen door swings open. A little boy of about six years of age gapes at me with wide, impossibly blue eyes. He gives a single yelp and takes off running toward the barn with a lumbering puppy in hot pursuit.

  “Levi! Go help your brother give that dog a bath!” a female voice calls out from inside. “He smells worse than that old boar!”

  The words make me smile. My own mamm only had three children, but we were a handful—especially me—and she used to bark out orders like a boot camp sergeant. I catch the door to keep it from slamming and find myself staring into an unsettlingly familiar set of brown eyes. Joseph’s eyes, some long-buried remembrance whispers. They belong to a boy about eight or nine years of age. He’s standing in the mudroom, straw hat, blue work shirt, trousers rolled up to skinny knobby knees, revealing dirty bare feet.

  “Hi.” I offer a smile. “I’m Kate. Are your parents home?”

  Never taking his eyes from mine, he calls out, “Mamm! Mir hen Englischer bsuch ghadde!” We have a non-Amish visitor!

  I step aside and the boy blasts past me, making his escape through the door.

  “Can I help you?”

  I turn my attention to the Amish woman standing in the kitchen doorway, a red-and-white-checked towel in her hands. I guess her to be in her mid-thirties. She’s wearing a light blue dress with a white apron and kapp. She’s small, barely over five feet tall, with dark brown hair and eyes. A buttermilk complexion and a smattering of freckles on a turned-up nose.

  “Mrs. Beachy?”

  “Ja.” Her eyes sweep over my uniform. “What’s wrong?”

  I identify myself and show her my badge as I step into the mudroom. “I’d like to talk to you and your husband for a few minutes. May I come inside?”

  Concern tightens her expression. She starts toward me. “Has something happened?”

  “It’s about Joseph King,” I tell her. “Is Mr. Beachy home?”