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TWENTY-SIX
It was good to be away from the office on a summer’s day, and Rowley buzzed down his window and inhaled the fresh breeze coming from the lowlands. The scent of summer wouldn’t last long. Ahead, the landscape had become a sea of wheat-colored grasses, whipped into waves by the wind. Occasionally a dust devil would escape the vast openness and dance across the blacktop as if playing chicken with the traffic. As soon as he and Rio drove into the parking lot of the meat-processing plant, the air would be filled with the smell of livestock and hot blood. He turned to Rio, who was riding shotgun. “The phone signal is pretty sketchy in this area. If you need to make a call, I suggest you use your satellite sleeve.”
“Okay.” Rio snapped the sleeve over his phone and looked at him. “I’ve read a case file about the owner of this processing plant going crazy and stuffing people into a shredding machine and turning them into fertilizer. He nearly got you too, didn’t he?”
The horror of that particular case slid into Rowley’s mind like a nightmare he’d rather forget. He headed for the parking lot and pulled into a space opposite the main entrance. “Yeah, I came close to being fertilizer, but Jenna threw herself onto the conveyor belt and pulled me off just in time.”
“I sure hope the new guy in charge is cooperative.” Rio checked his iPad and smiled at him. “It was closed for a time. Where did people go to get their kills processed?”
Thinking for a beat, Rowley shrugged. “I’m not a hunter, so I’m not sure. I guess most hunters are capable of processing their own kills. Although, I do recall the processing plants at Louan running a pickup service during the hunting season. They have a refrigerated storage building, which is really good for the tourists. They can donate their meat to the local charities. It’s frozen and stored in an easy place for them to go pick it up.” He climbed out from behind the wheel and headed toward the office.
The office was spread out into different departments. As luck would have it, signs on each wall pointed to the various departments within the complex, and Rowley found the manager’s office on the ground floor. The strong smell of disinfectant wafted toward them as they turned the corner and sidestepped a cleaner mopping the tiled floors. They edged their way around the wet patches and went into the manager’s office. A woman in her thirties wearing a cream blouse and gray skirt looked up at them from her desk, and her eyes widened. Rowley smiled to put her at ease. “Ma’am, we’re looking for Joshua Salmon. Could you check the roster and see if he’s working today?”
“I’m not sure I’m allowed to give out that information.” She indicated toward the office door behind her. “You’ll have to speak to Mr. Wiley about staff issues. Wait a moment, I’ll go and tell him you’re here.”
The woman stood with a scrape of her chair, and after knocking on the door marked manager set out in black letters on a copper plate, she went inside. Through the frosted glass panel, Rowley could make out the woman’s outline and a figure seated behind a desk. A few moments later, the secretary came out and waved them inside. He glanced over the rotund man behind the desk. A round face with a pencil mustache and small beady eyes looked up at him. From his expression, he didn’t like speaking to law enforcement. Rowley cleared his throat. “I’m sorry to trouble you, Mr. Wiley, but we need to speak to Joshua Salmon. I’m afraid it can’t wait until he finishes his shift.”
“I’ve asked my secretary to have him come here. It might take a few minutes. He works on the kill floor. We’re processing cattle at the moment and have very stringent health rules. Employees aren’t allowed to move from one area to the other without taking the necessary precautions.” Wiley leaned back in his chair and his eyebrows rose. “He’s not in any trouble, is he?” His expression was indignant. “We don’t encourage troublemakers to work here, although I have to admit the odd one does slip through the net.”
“We’re not at liberty to discuss why we’re here.” Rio took a notebook from his pocket. “Is there a spare office where we can talk to him in private?”
“Yes. We have an interview room right next door.” Wiley stood and led the way through the office and down the hallway. He flung open a door to a small room containing a desk and a few chairs. “If you’d like to wait here, I’ll send him along when he arrives.”
Rowley turned to Wiley. “Thank you for your cooperation. When we’re through, we’ll see ourselves out.”
He leaned against the wall beside Rio and waited. Twenty minutes or so later, Joshua Salmon arrived wearing white coveralls and rubber boots. He waited at the door, staring at them blankly. Rowley waved him to a seat. “Thank you for coming. We’d like to ask you a few questions about your hobby.”
“My hobby? I have a current license, so what’s the problem?” Salmon pushed his hands into the pockets of his coveralls but didn’t sit down. He just stared at them with an incredulous look on his face.
“Where do you get the animals that you use?” Rio dropped into a chair and looked up at him. “Sit down. You’re making my neck ache.”
“Roadkill mostly. Some are from neighbors. They bring their pets to me because they can’t stand the idea of burying them.” Salmon reluctantly sat down. “I specialize in birds but all of them I find I report to the wardens before I use them. I don’t kill anything for my hobby.”
Rowley nodded. “Did you have any reason to stop in town early on Thursday morning?”
“Yeah, I had an early shift, so I would have gone through town before six.” Salmon scratched his cheek and narrowed his gaze at them. “Ah… I know what this is about. It’s all over town about finding the body on the carousel in the park opposite Aunt Betty’s Café? I didn’t stop—not even for coffee. I just drove straight through and came here. You can check my entry in the book at the front door. We all have to sign in and out of this place. It’s date and time stamped.”
“So cast your mind back to Friday morning. Did you work on Friday?” Rio leaned forward in his chair and stared at him. “Or did you happen to drop by the landfill?”
“As it happens, I did drop by the landfill on Friday morning, but I was turned around by an FBI agent and sent on my way. I dropped my garbage by there the following day.” Salmon shrugged. “There must have been twenty or so vehicles lined up on the landfill approach road. Before you ask, I don’t remember anybody in particular.”
As he was cooperating, Rowley pushed a little harder. The times he had given them put him at the scenes of two crimes. “So, you leave for work in the early hours most days? On Monday you would have driven past the welcome to black rock falls sign?”
“Yeah, I would have driven past there just after five on Monday morning.” Salmon’s eyes shifted from one to the other and he moved around restlessly in his chair. “So did about one hundred people on their way through town. What’s the big deal?”
Taking his time, Rowley scribbled the time in his notebook and then lifted his attention back to Salmon. “Did you happen to notice a woman standing by the side of the road?”
“Can’t say that I did.” Salmon rolled his eyes to the ceiling as if seeking divine intervention. “I’m not in the habit of picking up hitchhikers. They’re nothing but trouble.”
“Would you mind coming outside and showing us your vehicle.” Rio stood and motioned him toward the door. “We’re not planning on searching your vehicle, but we would like you to move it a few feet out of the parking space if you don’t mind?”
“Sure. I have nothing to hide.” Salmon stood and ambled toward the door.
Rowley walked beside Salmon, meeting him stride for stride. The suspect was in the right place at the right time on three consecutive occasions and used formaldehyde. This made him a person of interest. If they found a patch of fresh oil under his vehicle, it would be a slam dunk. When Salmon backed the truck out of the parking space, Rowley bent to examine the ground and found nothing. Without an oil slick beneath the vehicle, they only had circumstantial evidence against him and not enough to take him in for further questioning. He waved at Salmon to drive his truck back into the parking space and then bent to peer in through the driver’s side window. “Thank you for your cooperation. That’s all we need for today, but don’t leave town. We might have questions for you later.”
He followed Rio back to his truck and climbed behind the wheel. “I thought we had a suspect, but without the oil slick we have nothing.”
“Maybe we’ll have better luck with Big John Oates. The plant where he works is only a few minutes’ drive away.” Rio was scanning his iPad. “The business manufactures different types of adhesives used in making furniture. Formaldehyde is a component of just about all of them, so I would imagine it wouldn’t be too difficult to steal some from his workplace. Although, this guy was recently released from jail, so he’d be stupid to risk a parole violation. If he knows anything or has seen someone stealing formaldehyde, he might inform on them. Trust me, most of them will talk rather than doing the rest of their sentence.”
Big John Oates was well named and big was an understatement. Standing around six-five and weighing in at around four hundred pounds, he would be a force to be reckoned with. It didn’t surprise Rowley that he had taken down seven men in a fight at the Triple Z Roadhouse and caused a ton of damage. Once they’d located him, he agreed to go to the parking lot and speak to them. Rowley ran through the same set of questions he’d given Salmon and the only positive response was that he’d driven past the black rock falls sign on his way to work. He took the same route Monday to Friday and recalled seeing the Sheriff’s Department cruisers on the side of the road on his way to work the previous Monday. They checked his vehicle for oil leaks and found none. Rowley had only one more question for him. “Do you ever pick up hitchhikers?”
“Sometimes but never women.” Oates let out a long sigh. “With all the killings happening around town of late, I don’t want anyone pointing the finger at me. I did my time for a stupid mistake and I’m not going back inside again.”
Finding Oats to be honest and straightforward, Rowley gave him a nod. “Thank you for your time. If there’s any problem with your boss for speaking to us, just get him to give me a call.” He handed him his card. As they headed back to his truck, he turned to Rio. “He looks clean to me. What do you think?”
“It’s not him.” Rio tipped up the rim of his Stetson and sighed. “He’s way too noticeable to get away with dumping bodies around town. It’s reasonably busy from the early hours and someone of his size wouldn’t go unnoticed. I say we take him off the list.”
Rowley laughed and slid behind the wheel. “I figure we’ll run it past Jenna first.”
“Yeah, good idea.” Rio grinned at him. “I do believe being left in charge for a couple of days has gone to my head.” He chuckled. “It was sure nice while it lasted.”
