“I can outlast the whole lot of you. And I know that terrain better than anybody. It’s my own backyard.” Loftus rose to his feet. Although his hair was silver and his face deeply creased from decades in the outdoors, he looked as sturdy as any man in the room. “Let’s make quick work of this. Before someone else gets killed.” He shoved his hat on his head and walked out.
As the others began to file out as well, Jane spotted the social worker rising to her feet, and she called out: “Ms. Weiss?”
The woman turned as Jane approached. “Yes?”
“We haven’t actually been introduced. I’m Detective Rizzoli.”
“I know. You’re the folks from Boston.” Cathy glanced at Gabriel and Sansone, who were still pulling on their coats. “You people have made quite an impression on this town.”
“Can we go someplace and talk? About Julian Perkins.”
“You mean right now?”
“Before they use him and our friend for target practice.”
Cathy looked at her watch and nodded. “There’s a coffee shop right down the block. I’ll meet you there in ten minutes.”
IT WAS more like twenty minutes. When Cathy finally swept into the coffee shop, her hair wild and windblown, she brought in the smell of tobacco on her wrinkled, smoke-permeated clothes, and Jane knew she had been sneaking a quick cigarette in her car. Now the woman looked jittery as she slid into the booth where Jane was waiting.
“So where are your two guys?” asked Cathy, glancing at the empty seats.
“They went to buy camping gear.”
“They’re joining the search party tomorrow?”
“I can’t talk them out of it.”
Cathy gave her a long and thoughtful look. “You people have no idea what you’re dealing with.”
“I was hoping you could tell me.”
The waitress came by with the coffeepot. “Fill it up, Cathy?” she asked.
“Good and strong, I hope.”
“Always is.”
Cathy waited for the waitress to leave before she spoke again. “The situation is complicated.”
“They made it sound simple in that meeting. Send out the posse, hunt down a cop-killer.”
“Right. Because people always prefer things simple. Black and white, right and wrong. Julian as the evil kid.” Cathy drank her coffee straight, gulping down the bitter brew without a wince. “That’s not what he is.”
“What is he, then?”
Cathy fixed her intense gaze on Jane. “Have you ever heard of the Lost Boys?”
“I’m not sure what you’re referring to.”
“They’re young men, mostly teenagers, who’ve been cast out of their homes and families. They end up abandoned on the streets. Not because they’ve done anything wrong, but simply because they’re boys. In their communities, that alone makes them fatally flawed.”
“Because boys cause trouble?”
“No. Because they’re competition, and the older men don’t want them around. They want all the girls for themselves.”
Suddenly Jane understood. “You’re talking about polygamous communities.”
“Exactly. These are groups that have nothing at all to do with the official Mormon Church. They’re breakaway sects that form around charismatic leaders. You’ll find them in a number of states. Colorado and Arizona, Utah and Idaho. And right here in Sublette County, Wyoming.”
“The Gathering?”
Cathy nodded. “It’s a sect led by a so-called prophet named Jeremiah Goode. Twenty years ago, he started attracting followers in Idaho. They built a compound called Plain of Angels, northwest of Idaho Falls. Eventually it grew into a community of nearly six hundred people. They’re completely self-sufficient, grow their own food, raise their own livestock. No visitors are allowed in, so it’s impossible to know what’s really happening behind their gates.”
“They sound like prisoners.”
“They might as well be. The Prophet controls every aspect of their lives, and they adore him for it. That’s the way cults operate. You start with a man like Jeremiah, someone who attracts the weak-minded and the needy, people who desperately want someone to accept them. To give them love and attention, to fix their pitiful broken lives. That’s what he offers them-at first. That’s how all cults start, from the Moonies to the Manson Family.”
“You’re equating Jeremiah Goode with Charles Manson?”
“Yes.” Cathy’s face tightened. “That’s exactly what I’m doing. It’s the same psychology, the same social dynamics. Once a follower drinks the Kool-Aid, they’re his. They give Jeremiah all their property, all their assets, and move into his compound. There he exerts total control. He uses their free labor to maintain a number of highly profitable businesses, from construction to furniture making to mail-order jams and jellies. To an outsider, it looks like a utopian community where everyone contributes. In return, everyone is taken care of. That’s what Bobby Martineau probably thought he saw when he visited Kingdom Come.”
“What should he have seen instead?”
“A dictatorship. It’s all about Jeremiah and what he wants.”
“And what’s that?”
Cathy’s gaze hardened to steel. “Young flesh. That’s what The Gathering is all about, Detective. Owning, controlling, and fucking young girls.”
A woman in the next booth turned and glared at them, offended by the language.
Cathy took a moment to regain her composure. “That’s why Jeremiah can’t afford to keep too many boys around,” she said. “So he gets rid of them. He orders families to shun their own teenage sons. The boys are driven to the nearest town and abandoned. In Idaho, they were dumped in Idaho Falls. Here, they’re dumped in Jackson or Pinedale.”
“And these families actually cooperate?”
“The women are obedient little robots. The men are rewarded for their loyalty with young brides of their own. Spiritual brides, they’re called, to avoid being prosecuted for polygamy. Men can have as many as they want, and it’s all biblically sanctioned.”
Jane gave an appalled laugh. “Yeah? Which Bible?”
“The Old Testament. Think about Abraham and Jacob, David and Solomon. The old biblical patriarchs who had multiple wives or concubines.”
“And his followers buy in to it?”
“Because it satisfies some burning need inside them. The women, maybe they yearn for security, for a life where they don’t have to make hard choices. The men-well, it’s obvious what the men get out of it. They get to take a fourteen-year-old to bed. And get into heaven.”
“And Julian Perkins was part of all that?”
“He has a mother and a fourteen-year-old sister who still live in Kingdom Come. Julian’s father died when he was only four. The mother, I’m sorry to say, is a total flake. Sharon dropped out of her kids’ lives to go find herself, or whatever bullshit you want to call it, and she dumped them on their grandfather, Absolem.”
“The mountain man.”
“Right. A decent guy who took good care of them. But ten years later, Sharon reappears, and woo-hoo! She’s got a new man, plus she’s discovered religion! The religion of Jeremiah Goode. She takes her kids back, and they move into Kingdom Come, the new settlement that The Gathering is building here in Wyoming. A few months later, Absolem dies, and Sharon ’s the only adult left in Julian’s life.” Cathy’s voice took on a razor-sharp edge. “And she betrays him.”
“She threw him out?”
“Like a piece of trash. Because the Prophet demanded it.”
The two women stared at each other, a gaze of shared rage that was broken only when the waitress returned with the coffeepot. In silence they both sipped, and the hot brew only worsened the angry burn in Jane’s stomach.
“So why isn’t Jeremiah Goode in jail?” Jane asked.
“You think I haven’t tried? You saw how they reacted to me at that meeting. I’m just the town scold, the annoying feminist who won’t stop talking about abused girls. And they don’t want to listen anymore.” She paused. “Or they’re getting paid not to listen.”
“Jeremiah’s bought them off?”