Page 108 of Silent Bones
“No, he blames everyone. It was a joint effort to cover this up.”
“How long has Bill known Dale was out here?"
"Couple weeks, maybe longer," Noah said. "Started noticing things. Boot prints near the creek. A coffee cup left on his backdeck. Cigarette butts on the ground. Thought it might be hunters at first, but the timing was off. He said Dale was waiting for him to come home. He approached multiple times to discuss the incident but Bill refused to listen."
“I guess Dale found a way to get his attention,” McKenzie said.
The front door opened and Bill Calder emerged. His shoulders carried the weight of a man who'd spent the last few hours watching his daughter's abduction become front-page news. Dark circles rimmed his eyes, and his usually pressed uniform shirt hung wrinkled and loose.
"Detective," Bill said, his voice hoarse. "Found anything yet?"
"You mentioned the boot prints were mostly along the back property line?"
Bill nodded, gesturing toward the treeline behind the house. "Creek runs through there, about fifty yards back. Good cover, clear sightlines to the house. If someone wanted to watch..." He trailed off, the implications hanging in the cold air. He groaned. “I should have listened to him. I should have…” he trailed off.
Noah studied the terrain. The house sat on a gentle slope, the backyard transitioning from mowed grass to wild brush to dense forest. A small creek meandered through the trees, its banks lined with deadfall and thick undergrowth. Perfect concealment for someone patient enough to wait.
"We'll start wide and work our way in," Noah said to his team. "Look for anything that doesn't belong. Disturbed earth, broken branches, anything that suggests regular movement through the area."
McKenzie pulled on latex gloves and shouldered his pack. "What's the timeline we're looking at?"
"Bill first noticed signs about three weeks ago," Noah said. "But Dale could have been watching longer. He's patient.Methodical. This wasn't impulse. My guess is he was watching this place even when he wasn’t here."
“Trail cams?” McKenzie asked.
“Maybe.”
They spread out in a rough line, Noah taking the eastern edge near a cluster of birch trees, Callie moving through the center toward the creek, McKenzie angling west toward a rocky outcrop that overlooked the entire property. The morning was still and cold, their boots crunching through frost-stiff leaves.
Noah moved carefully, eyes scanning not just the ground but the trees themselves. Dale had been a ranger. He'd know how to hide a trail camera, how to position it for maximum coverage while minimizing detection. The morning light filtered through bare branches, creating a patchwork of shadows that could hide almost anything.
Twenty minutes in, McKenzie's voice crackled through Noah's radio. "Got something. West side, about forty yards from the house."
Noah changed direction, pushing through a tangle of wild raspberry canes that caught at his jacket. He found McKenzie standing at the base of a mature white pine, staring up into the branches about twelve feet above the ground.
"There," McKenzie said, pointing.
At first, Noah saw nothing but bark and branches. Then his eyes adjusted, and he spotted it, a small rectangular shape pressed tight against the trunk, wrapped in camouflage fabric and secured with black zip ties. A trail camera, positioned with a clear view of the Calder house's back deck and kitchen windows.
"Professional grade," McKenzie said, already pulling on climbing gear from his pack. "Motion-activated, probably wireless capable. He could have been monitoring this remotely."
"Can you get it down without damaging anything?"
"Give me two minutes."
McKenzie scaled the pine, his boots finding purchase on the rough bark. He photographed the camera's position before carefully cutting the zip ties and lowering it down in an evidence bag.
Callie jogged over from the creek, her field kit bouncing against her hip. "What've we got?"
"Trail cam," Noah said, accepting the bag from McKenzie. "Positioned for surveillance of the house. Let's see what it recorded."
They gathered around Callie's laptop over by her cruiser, the screen reflecting the gray morning sky. She inserted the camera's SD card and navigated to the video files, the folder showing dozens of clips spanning the last three weeks.
"Start with the most recent," Noah said.
Callie clicked on a file dated one night ago, 9:47 PM. The footage was grainy black-and-white infrared, but clear enough to make out the details. For the first few seconds, nothing moved except wind-stirred branches. Then a figure entered the frame from the left.
Dale Thurston emerged from near the water like a ghost, moving with the careful precision of someone who knew exactly where every security light and window was positioned. He disappeared out of frame then re-emerged five minutes later. He was carrying something heavy over his shoulder, a person, limp and unresisting.
