Things began to come together for the Security Task Force. They had first names and descriptions of the men now and soon they'd have a site to survey if Collin can pick it out from the boat. All that and more came pouring out of Collin after he told his story to Mr. Thomas and recounted it to Agent Campbell. Collin was relieved that he was able to talk about his ordeal to someone else, besides his Big Brother Mr. Ken. Even though he was a bit embarrassed he was able to get through it without too many tears. He was also happy that Mr. Campbell listened to Ken about his going out on the boat to see if he could identify where he had been the night he was almost killed. Collin even gave a good description of the boat Mark took him on, to kill him, so they now had another feather with which to work. Unfortunately, all Campbell's reports went across a certain person's desk who copied them for his own possible use, later on.
The weekend came, and Ryan stayed to give Collin some company. The two were like long lost buddies who hadn't seen one another for ages. The added teenager gave Mr. Ken some free time for himself to work on some badly neglected projects. Upstairs, the two teens were talking about themselves, the estate, and Mr. Ken and of course, Chief.
"Ryan, how did you meet Mr. Ken and get involved here?" asked Collin.
"It is a very long story, but I'll try to give you the highlights. I used to stop by here every day, to watch them build this huge place, and one day Big Bro, ahh that's Mr. Ken, came by to check on its progress, too. But I didn't know who he was at the time. As we each stood there looking over the construction site, this night watchman came after the both of us. Chief, but that wasn't her name, yet, saved us from that madman by attacking him.
"The cops came and arrested the guard, and Bro got a Vet to take care of Chief. The cops called their boss, Chief, and every time someone said that name the dog responded. So, we decided to call her Chief. A few days later, Bro talked to my mom about me taking pictures and videos of the construction, since I was stopping by every day anyways. He convinced my mom, and I got to be here everyday, taking pictures of everything that happened. I had my own Hard Hat, too. It was as if I was part of the crew. I got to know everyone and they showed me a lot about construction. I want to be a mechanical engineer, one day."
"What is it that you do, now?" inquired Collin.
"Well, even before he moved into the house, Mr. Ken had bought a few boats for his tiny marina and asked me to be his ships keeper. He also wanted me to take care of the beach and docks and anything that dealt with that part of the property. He pays me $9.50 an hour, now, but he says when I have learned how to run all the boats, he will increase my pay.
"I took sailing courses this past summer, and I learned how to use the Ski-Do, but I can't operate them without adult supervision. In Texas, you have to be 16 to drive them by yourself. Just like a car. Bro has taken me out on the big cruiser a few times, and I am learning about its operation. When I am eighteen, he says I can use it for my dates. He's a real cool guy. At first, my mom was afraid he'd molest me or even rape me, ohh fuck fuck… damn … I'm sorry about that, Collin, I … I wasn't thinking. Please forgive me? Won't cha?"
Collin laughed at the quick apology by Ryan and said, "Yea, I know you didn't mean anything by that. You got caught up in the story. Keep goin'!"
"Anyways, my mom was concerned he was a guy who liked … you know … little boys. I was only thirteen when we first met. Shit, he hardly ever saw me, and when he did, it was always with one of the other construction bosses or workers around. Mom got to know him better and then she began to like him. Besides, once he found out she was an interior decorator, he gave her the job to decorate the entire place. Awesome! She did a good job, don't cha think?"
Collin laughed at that last part as Ryan's pride in his mom's work came out. They discussed some of the things she did to get the house decorated as it was. They talked about Ryan's room and a few other things Collin had seen and had questions about.
"Back to the story, he gave me a Canon SLR Digital Camera and a HD Video Camera to use to take all the pictures and videos I could think of. He also gave me a laptop computer to store all the stuff I took and he paid for the fast internet line and cable TV for the house. I would email him the pictures I thought showed special details. Doing all that was awesome. All my friends were jealous of me.
"After the place was finished, he had promised I could choose any room to be mine whenever I stayed. He's even allowed me and my friends to stay over and use the Theater and indoor pool and we've had some great cookouts. Bro even treated us to water skiing lessons and has taken us out for a late night boat ride on the cruiser. Mom now likes him even more and is very happy he's in my life. He is sort of a Big Brother to me, and through it all, he has helped me focus on important things. He's taken me and mom on trips, too. I sure hope this isn't a dream."
"Ryan, funny you should mention you look up to him as your Big Brother. In a way … well, I do, too. He isn't old enough to be a parent, except maybe to a small kid, but ever since he began to take care of me he ... he's treated me like a teenager and not some rotten, spoiled kid. He's told me what he thought I needed to know, even though I never asked him. He said I needed to be aware of what was happening before it happened so I wouldn't be taken by surprise. He never makes me leave him alone and I can, well, I can get a hug from him whenever I want them. That was something my dad stopped giving me when I turned thirteen. … Ryan, Ken even cried with me a few times when I was hurting so bad. He told me he prayed that night he found me because … because he was afraid he wouldn't be able to save me. I really look up to him for all that … and more!
"Hey, Ryan … why does he call this place Three Finger Cove? I could never figure it out and I always seem to forget to ask him."
"Well, come on, let's look out the window. See that, where the shore line begins, over by that cement culvert, that pipe empties the rain water into the lake from the streets in that subdivision over there. It also empties water from the top of Mr. Ken's property starting at the Guard Shack and his driveway. That entire fence line over there is where his property begins. Anyway, you see how it then curves in where the beach is? Then there is a small island that he expanded some and built a picnic area to balance it out some. Now, follow the area of the dock and it is like a big "U". Then over there it falls back in and around to the other end of his property line."
"But I still don't see the correlation of what the shore looks like from here and the name, Three Finger Cove."
"Ok, look at it this way. Take your left hand. No your left hand not your right. It won't look right. (The two teens both laughed.) Ok … now close it … and make a loose fist. Open the thumb. Open the index finger. Now open the middle finger. Spread the thumb away some from the fist. Peel under the outer part of the extended fingers a little so that only the large part of the finger next to the hand is visible. Now spread those away from each other. Looking at the back of your hand, hold it up to the window and place it where your thumb covers the pipe. Place the index finger to cover the picnic island. Now place the middle finger over the left side of the dock. There you have it - the thumb, a cove, the index finger, a cove, the middle finger. Three Finger Cove at your service!" Seeing it now in that way, Collin laughed at the simplicity of it.
Sunday morning, Agent Campbell got the Ok to show Collin the opposite shore line and Mr. Ken said they'd use the 38 foot Commander. They agreed that way the lad could stay hidden below deck and they could also take more people. Ken, Collin, Ryan, Campbell and three other officers all dressed like fishermen with fishing poles and the works got in the large boat. It was all for show. It took almost an hour for them to motor east away from Three Finger Cove so they could cross over to the other side of the lake and come back along the far shore. Once they came up to a point where the rocks jutted out from the hills, they began to slowly troll along the shore, supposedly looking for fish.
Collin sat in the lower portion looking out through the port holes. He'd asked Mr. Ken to slow some whenever he thought he recognized something. It was a long and tedious process and a few times they turned around and re visited an area just to be sure. Then Collin remembered seeing some dim lights across from where he fought Mark in the boat. He asked Ken where there may have been lights like the ones he described. Immediately both Mr. Ken and Ryan knew exactly where he wanted to be.
Ken picked up speed and found himself across from his place but down a few hundred yards along the far shore from there. Then Collin spotted a place he felt he was familiar with. Ryan began taking pictures of the area as if he was shooting the other fishermen in case anyone was watching. Of course, he made sure he got the entire area from water line to the top of the hill. He also had the video camera set up in the cabin to film the entire area as well, in case he missed something.
Collin said he thought he was about a hundred yards off shore when he was in the boat that night. That still left the boy almost a mile away from Ken's estate. No one could figure out how the lad could have swum that distance, unless he was much further out. But even then he would have to have swum at least a half mile to three quarters of a mile in the freezing cold water. The men on that boat began to admire Collin. Not just at the teens' tenacity and courage but also at his shear determination to survive!
Finally, back at the house, Ryan downloaded his pictures and videos into the computer server so they could look at them using the large screen in the Theater. It wasn't long before Collin shouted that the picture on the screen was the place. He told them of the jutting rocks and how they made a platform of sorts and that that was the place he remembered from that night. Ryan told the computer to print the picture and he went to retrieve it. Then they played the video and saw different angles of the same area, but this time they noticed there was some sort of hidden structure. It looked like a 'fort'. Like the kind kids would build? Agent Campbell couldn't take anything for granted and he took two of his men and they drove over to that area to begin a search.
It took them almost two hours to drive over to the location as there was no easy way to get to the site. Once they arrived, they called their support team at the Cove and then began to search the area. It wasn't long before they found some old food cartons and some kids' clothes. Finding that and more, Agent Campbell called his boss in Washington with the news and a forensics team was dispatched and would arrive in four or five hours. More and more of this mystery was beginning to unravel.
Meanwhile, Mr. Thomas took a phone call from the local hospital while Campbell was at the site. An emergency room nurse, Joanne Kirby, offered information about a man coming into the emergency room during the late morning after the storm. The man said he got a piece of glass in his side and showed the glass. Miss Kirby said the wound appeared to be a knife wound to her but the man insisted a piece of glass had done it. She explained she remembered that the wound was a 'slice' not a tear that would come from that ragged piece of glass. She told Mr. Thomas it didn't register to her to call the police that afternoon, because they were simply swamped by all the casualties from the storm.
Now, almost six weeks later, she recalled the oddity when she finally saw the flyer that came in asking about a knife wound from that storm and she just then figured it out. Trouble was, she never saw the flyer until recently as things seem to get posted over each other in that department. She did call as soon as she could, though. She told him the man's name was Mark Coleman. She explained she verified his info by checking his insurance card and driver's license. She even had the address. What luck!
Ken immediately called Phillip and relayed he had vital information and he needed to get it to him. Unfortunately, cell phones could be monitored and that was all he could tell Phil at the time. Everyone became more aware that this was a fast closing investigation and before long they would have all the people involved in the killings and torturous abuse of and attempted murder of one Collin Wilkinson.