Manhunt On Mystic Mesa

“A prophet and his followers in the wilderness.” Ryan shook his head. “That sounds so—I don’t know—Old Testament.”

“He isn’t that kind of prophet,” Randall said.

“What do you mean?” Ryan asked.

“No beard or robe in sight,” Randall said. “He’s the son of a wealthy industrialist and supposedly inherited the family fortune. Most of his followers are young people, searching for something.”

“A lot of them are really beautiful young women,” Ethan said.

“So you think he’s killing some of them?” Ryan asked. “But it doesn’t sound like the women who disappeared were part of his group.”

“They weren’t, but we know that at least one of them—Lucia Raton—had expressed an interest in Metwater’s writings,” Ethan said. “And it’s a weird coincidence that she and Jennifer Lassiter were last seen near his camp.”

Ryan’s phone vibrated and he glanced at the screen. “This says Alicia Mendoza disappeared when the group she was traveling with stopped for water at a spring at the base of a mesa that ran north-south,” he said. “The people she was traveling with didn’t know a name and couldn’t be more precise than that.”

“Mystic Mesa runs north-south,” Randall said. He pointed to a spot on the map. “And there’s a spring right at the base of it. The only one for miles.”

“That’s only a stone’s throw from Metwater’s camp,” Ethan said.

“Too much of a coincidence,” Ryan said.

“Then I guess you know who else you need to talk to.” Randall clapped Ryan on the shoulder. “Have fun,” he said. “Metwater may or may not be a murderer, but he’s definitely a pain in the backside.”

* * *

JANA LASSITER GRIPPED the steering wheel of her Jeep and studied the barren landscape where her sister, Jenny, had disappeared. Red-rock chimneys and hoodoos jutted up from a flat plain of yellowed bunchgrass and dusty green piñon trees, their soot-gray trunks stunted and gnarled from years of fighting harsh winds and scorching sun. Dry washes and deeper canyons made fissures in the dusty surface of the land. Jenny had texted that she loved this place—that the remoteness and wildness of it made her feel so free. But the vast emptiness put Jana on edge. Compared to this great expanse, a single human was insignificant. With no signposts or roads or buildings, she already felt lost. Was that what had happened to Jenny? Had she wandered away from her group and simply forgotten where she was? Or had something more sinister taken her away?

Fighting a feeling of dread, Jana got out of the Jeep and was immediately buffeted by a stiff breeze. She held on to her straw sun hat and started toward the white pop-up canopy she had been told indicated the archaeologists’ base of operations, dodging to avoid an honest-to-goodness tumbleweed and muttering a prayer that there be no snakes lurking behind the clumps of sagebrush she skirted.

A tall, graying man with a deeply pockmarked face looked up from a clipboard as she approached, his mouth turned down in a frown. She recognized Jeremy Eddleston, Jenny’s supervisor. “I’m Jana Lassiter,” she said, before he could order her away. “We met briefly at my sister’s orientation.”

His face relaxed, and he set the clipboard on the folding table in front of him and walked out to meet her, extending both hands. “Ms. Lassiter, it’s good to see you again, though not under these circumstances. I’m so sorry for your loss.”

She froze at his words, anger warring with panic in her chest. She opted for anger. “Is there some news I don’t know about?” she asked. “Is my sister dead?” She had to force out the last word.

Eddleston’s face turned the color of the iron-infused sandstone around them. “Of course not. I mean, we don’t know... I only meant...”

She decided to let him off the hook. “It’s always difficult to know what to say in a situation like this,” she said.

The stiffness went out of him, his shoulders slumping so that he appeared several inches shorter. “Exactly. We’re all so terribly worried about Jenny. She was such a valuable part of our team, and so well liked. We can’t imagine what happened to her.”

“What did happen to her?” Jana asked. “That’s what I came from Denver to find out.”

“We don’t know.” Eddleston turned and gestured toward the mesa that rose up a quarter mile or so away, its slopes heavily pocked with large boulders and clumps of scrub oak and juniper. “We’ve been excavating in this area all summer. Jenny, as you probably know, joined us at the beginning of June. She was helping to sift through some of the material we had recently extracted and after lunch said she was going to take a short break to stretch her legs. Her friends thought that meant she was going to use the portajohn.” He indicated the bright blue portable toilet under a tree to Jana’s left. “Everyone was so engrossed in the work no one noticed she hadn’t returned until the team began packing up for the day a couple of hours later. They called and looked everywhere, but she didn’t answer and no one could find a trace of her.”

“Why didn’t you call the police right away?” Jana asked. “I understand they didn’t get out here until this morning.”

“There’s no phone service out here,” Eddleston said. “It’s a ten-mile drive over rough roads to get a signal. By the time anyone realized Jenny was missing, it was getting dark. As you might imagine, this place is almost impossible to find at night. There’s only the Jeep trail we’ve made and no lights at all.”

Jana shivered, trying not to imagine Jenny out here in that darkness, hurt and alone. But the images of her sister in danger rushed in anyway.

“I was away at a meeting I had to attend,” Eddleston said. “But the rest of the team searched until they couldn’t see their hands in front of their faces while others went for help.”

“It’s true.” A young man who had been standing nearby joined them. “We shouted for her until we were hoarse. This morning the park rangers and the county sheriff brought out a search dog. They even flew a helicopter, searching for any sign of her. But they didn’t find anything.”

Jana scanned the area again. “I don’t understand,” she said. “How could someone just...vanish? Jenny isn’t some flighty, irresponsible schoolgirl. She’s smart and sensible. She wouldn’t simply wander off.”

Eddleston was nodding his head like a bobblehead doll. “I know. I’ve said the same thing myself. I wish I had answers for you, but I don’t.”

Jana opened her mouth to ask another question, but was silenced by the distinctive low crackling sound of a vehicle slowly making its way across the rocky track that passed for a road to the dig. She and Eddleston turned together to watch the approach of a black-and-white FJ Cruiser, light bar on top. The cruiser parked beside Jana’s Jeep and two men in khaki uniforms and Stetsons exited.

The passenger was closest to Jana—a broad-shouldered, sandy-haired guy who would have looked right at home on a beach with a surfboard. He was clean shaven, and dark aviator glasses hid his eyes, but she had the sense he was checking her out, so she stared boldly back at him.

The driver, a slim, dark-haired man, spoke first. “I’m Officer Reynolds and this is Officer Spencer, with the Ranger Brigade. We’re looking into the disappearance of Jennifer Lassiter and wanted to interview the people who were with her the day she disappeared.”

“I’m Professor Jeremy Eddleston, lead archaeologist on this dig and Jennifer’s supervisor.” Eddleston stepped forward and offered his hand.

“Ma’am.” The blond Ranger—Officer Spencer—touched the brim of his hat. “Did you work with Jennifer, also?”

“No. I’m her sister. I drove from Denver for the same reason you’re here—to talk to people and try to find out what happened.”

“When was the last time you talked to your sister?” Officer Spencer asked.

“We spoke the day before yesterday. She was in good spirits, enjoying her work and excited about some finds of pottery they had made.” She glanced at Eddleston. “She said she liked the people she worked with.”

“So she didn’t mention anything that was troubling her?” Spencer asked.

“Nothing was troubling her, I’m sure,” Jana said.

“Would you say you and your sister are close?” Spencer asked.

“Yes. We shared an apartment in Denver the first part of this summer, before she started the internship.”

“Do you have any other siblings?” Spencer asked. “Parents?”

“Our mother and father both passed away some years ago,” she said. Her mother had succumbed to cancer while Jana was still in high school, her father killed a few years later in a car accident on an icy road. “We don’t have any siblings.”

“And you’re sure nothing was troubling your sister?” he asked again.

“Nothing was troubling her. If it had been, she would have told me. Why are you even asking these questions?”

Spencer glanced at his partner, who was deep in conversation with Eddleston. “We need to eliminate any obvious reason for your sister to walk off the job and disappear. Unfortunately, a certain percentage of missing persons are people who have chosen to run away from their responsibilities or even commit suicide. We look for things like depression, troubled relationships or financial difficulties as possible motivations. Once we eliminate those, we consider other explanations.”

“Well, you’d better start considering those other explanations now. My sister wasn’t depressed, she didn’t have any debt, and she got along with everybody.”

Spencer removed his sunglasses, the sympathy in his blue eyes catching her off guard. “What do you think happened to Jennifer?” he asked.

“I have no idea,” she said. “You’re supposed to find that out.”