I leave them to their work and hit my lapel mike. “Jodie, can you 10-79?” Notify coroner.
“Roger that.”
I glance over my shoulder to the place where I left Paul Borntrager. A firefighter kneels at his side, assessing him. I can’t see the Amish man’s face, but he’s not moving.
Firefighters and paramedics swarm the area, treating the injured and looking for more victims. Any cop that has ever worked patrol knows that passengers who don’t utilize safety belts—which is always the case with a buggy—can be ejected a long distance, especially if speed is a factor. When I was a rookie in Columbus, I worked an accident in which a semitruck went off the road and flipped end over end down a one-hundred-foot ravine. The driver, who’d been belted in, was seriously injured, but survived. His wife, who hadn’t been wearing her safety belt, was ejected over two hundred feet. The officers on scene—me included—didn’t find her for nearly twenty minutes. Afterward, the coroner told me that if we’d gotten to her sooner, she might have survived. Nobody ever talked about that accident again. But it stayed with me, and I never forgot the lesson it taught me.
Wondering if Mattie was a passenger, I establish a mental grid of the scene. Starting at the point of impact, I walk the area, looking for casualties, working my way outward in all directions. I don’t find any more victims.
When I’m finished, I drift back to where I left Paul, expecting to find him being loaded onto a litter. I’m shocked to see a blue tarp draped over his body, rain tapping against it, and I realize he’s died.
I know better than to let this get to me. I haven’t talked to Paul or Mattie in years. But I feel something ugly and unwieldy building inside me. Anger at the driver responsible. Grief because Paul is dead and Mattie must be told. The pain of knowing I’ll probably be the one to do it.
“Oh, Mattie,” I whisper.
A lifetime ago, we were inseparable—more like sisters than friends. We shared first crushes, first “singings,” and our first heartbreaks. Mattie was there for me during the summer of my fourteenth year when an Amish man named Daniel Lapp introduced me to violence. My life was irrevocably changed that day, but our friendship remained a constant. When I turned eighteen and made the decision to leave the Plain Life, Mattie was one of the few who supported me, even though she knew it would mean the end of our friendship.
We lost touch after I left Painters Mill. Our lives took different paths and never crossed again. I went on to complete my education and become a police officer. Mattie joined the church, married Paul, and started a family. For years, we’ve been little more than acquaintances, rarely sharing anything more than a wave on the street. But I never forgot those formative years, when summer lasted forever, the future held infinite promise—and we still believed in dreams.
Dreams that, for one of us, ended tonight.
I walk to Andy Welbaum’s truck. It’s an older Dodge with patches of rust on the hood. A crease on the rear quarter panel. Starting with the front bumper, I circle the vehicle, checking for damage. But there’s nothing there. Only then do I realize this truck wasn’t involved in the accident.
I find Andy leaning against the front bumper of a nearby Holmes County ambulance. Someone has given him a slicker. He’s no longer crying, but he’s shaking beneath the yellow vinyl.
He looks at me when I approach. He’s about forty years old and balding with circles the size of plums beneath hound-dog eyes. “That kid going to be okay?” he asks.
“I don’t know.” The words come out sounding bitchy, and I take a moment to rein in my emotions. “What happened?”
“I was coming home from work like I always do. Slowed down to turn onto the county road and saw all that busted-up wood and stuff scattered all over the road. I got out to see what happened.…” Shaking his head, he looks down at his feet. “Chief Burkholder, I swear to God I ain’t never seen anything like that before in my life. All them kids. Damn.” He looks like he’s going to start crying again. “Poor family.”
“So your vehicle wasn’t involved in the accident?”
“No ma’am. It had already happened when I got here.”
“Did you witness it?”
“No.” He looks at me, grimaces. “I think it musta just happened though. I swear to God the dust was still flying when I pulled up.”
“Did you see any other vehicles?”
“No.” He says the word with some heat. “I suspect that sumbitch hightailed it.”
“What happened next?”
“I called nine-one-one. Then I went over to see if I could help any of them. I was a medic in the army way back, you know.” He falls silent, looks down at the ground. “There was nothing I could do.”
I nod, struggling to keep a handle on my outrage. I’m pissed because someone killed three people—two of whom were children—injured a third, and left the scene without bothering to render aid or even call for help.
I let out a sigh. “I’m sorry I snapped at you.”
“I don’t blame you. I don’t see how you cops deal with stuff like this day in and day out. I hope you find the bastard that done it.”
“I’m going to need a statement from you. Can you hang around for a little while longer?”
“You bet. I’ll stay as long as you need me.”
I turn away from him and start toward the road to see a Holmes County sheriff’s department cruiser glide onto the shoulder, lights flashing. An ambulance pulls away, transporting the only survivor to the hospital. Later, the coroner’s office will deal with the dead.
I step over a chunk of wood from the buggy. The black paint contrasts sharply against the pale yellow of the naked wood beneath. A few feet away, I see a little girl’s shoe. Farther, a tattered afghan. Eyeglasses.
This is now a crime scene. Though the investigation will likely fall under the jurisdiction of the Holmes County sheriff’s office, I’m going to do my utmost to stay involved. Rasmussen won’t have a problem with it. Not only will my Amish background be a plus, but his department, like mine, works on a skeleton crew and he’ll appreciate all the help he can get.
Now that the injured boy has been transported, any evidence left behind will need to be preserved and documented. We’ll need to bring in a generator and work lights. If the sheriff’s department doesn’t have a deputy trained in accident reconstruction, we’ll request one from the State Highway Patrol.
I think of Mattie Borntrager, at home, waiting for her husband and children, and I realize I’ll need to notify her as soon as possible.
I’m on my way to speak with the paramedics for an update on the condition of the injured boy when someone calls out my name. I turn to see my officer, Rupert “Glock” Maddox, approaching me at a jog. “I got here as quick as I could,” he says. “What happened?”
I tell him what little I know. “The driver skipped.”
“Shit.” He looks at the ambulance. “Any survivors?”
“One,” I tell him. “A little boy. Eight or nine years old.”
“He gonna make it?”
“I don’t know.”
His eyes meet mine and a silent communication passes between us, a mutual agreement we arrive upon without uttering a word. When you’re a cop in a small town, you become protective of the citizens you’ve been sworn to serve and protect, especially the innocent, the kids. When something like this happens, you take it personally. I’ve known Glock long enough to know that sentiment runs deep in him, too.
We start toward the intersection, trying to get a sense of what happened. Delisle Road runs in a north-south direction; County Road 14 runs east-west with a two-way stop. The speed limit is fifty-five miles per hour. The area is heavily wooded and hilly. If you’re approaching the intersection from any direction, it’s impossible to see oncoming traffic.
Glock speaks first. “Looks like the buggy was southbound on Delisle Road.”
I nod in agreement. “The second vehicle was running west on CR 14. Probably at a high rate of speed. Ble
w the stop sign. Broadsided the buggy.”
His eyes drift toward the intersection. “Fucking T-boned them.”
“Didn’t even pause to call nine-one-one.”
He grimaces. “Probably alcohol related.”
“Most hit-and-runs are.”
Craning his neck, he eyeballs Andy Welbaum. “He a witness?”
“First on scene. He’s pretty shaken up.” I look past him at the place where the wrecked buggy lies on its side. “Whatever hit that buggy is going to have a smashed-up front end. I put out a BOLO for an unknown with damage.”
He looks out over the carnage. “Did you know them, Chief ?”
“A long time ago,” I tell him. “I’m going to pick up the bishop and head over to their farm to notify next of kin. Do me a favor and get Welbaum’s statement, will you?”
“You got it.”
I feel his eyes on me, but I don’t meet his gaze. I don’t want to share the mix of emotions inside me at the devastation that’s been brought down on this Amish family. I don’t want him to know the extent of the sadness I feel or my anger toward the perpetrator.
To my relief, he looks away, lets it go. “I’d better get to work.” He taps his lapel mike. “Call me if you need anything.”
I watch him walk away, then turn my attention back to the scene. I take in the wreckage of the buggy. The small pieces of the victim’s lives that are strewn about like trash. And I wonder what kind of person could do something like this and not stop to render aid or call for help.
“You better hide good, you son of a bitch, because I’m coming for you.”
Also by Linda Castillo
Sworn to Silence
Pray for Silence
Breaking Silence
Gone Missing
About the Author
Linda Castillo is the New York Times bestselling author of the Kate Burkholder novels, including Sworn to Silence and Breaking Silence, crime thrillers set in Amish country. Sworn to Silence was recently adapted into a Lifetime Original Movie titled An Amish Murder starring Neve Campbell as Kate Burkholder. Castillo is the recipient of numerous industry awards including the Daphne du Maurier Award of Excellence, the Holt Medallion, and a nomination for the RITA. In addition to writing, Castillo’s other passion is horses, particularly her Appaloosa, George. She lives in Texas with her husband.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
LONG LOST. Copyright © 2013 by Linda Castillo. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.minotaurbooks.com
Cover design by David Baldeosingh Rotstein
Cover photograph of woman by Kamenetskiy Konstantin / Shutterstock.com
Cover photograph of buggy and landscape by Delmas Lehman / Shutterstock.com
eISBN 9781466836884
First Edition: May 2013
Linda Castillo, Long Lost
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