keith morrison: and so according to his friends, mark stover spent the late summer and early fall of 2009 in a state of mortal fear. even escaped secretly to montana, says teresa. he would only use cash. he would call me from pay phones. he was very worried. and he even called me and said, you know if things happen, this is what i want you to do. and i said, mark, how will i know if something happens to you? and he said, you ll know. keith morrison: and now, of course, she did. now everyone knew something happened to the dog trainer to the stars. and they might never have known more than just that, a mystery unsolved, except for the strange events in a remote parking lot and two sharp eyed women who now had a story to tell. coming up. he s bent over and he has his arms around a big roll of clear plastic, and my brain goes,
and she was obviously hurt. she was growling. and so i started talking to her nicely, thinking oh my god, what is she doing here and what s gone on? and i backed down the driveway. keith morrison: at about the same time, the phone rang in the kennel. it was mark s fiance, teresa. when they told me ding was out, there was blood, ding is never out, ever. she s either in the house or she s with mark. she s not just out barking at people. keith morrison: no mark, injured dog. teresa frantic now, called the skagit county sheriff s department. all of those circumstances were very suspicious. keith morrison: this is detective dan luvera. oh, i immediately thought foul play. this is huge. there s more to the story, and there definitely was. keith morrison: coming up, more to the story? yes, there apparently was, starting with a secret history.
he had found the place that was going to be perfect for him. and it was going to be all his. and i think he was very much looking forward. he wasn t looking back. keith morrison: eventually there was also her. her name is teresa. on our third date though, he let me know that he wanted to marry me. keith morrison: third date? and i was pretty shocked, yeah. keith morrison: what was it about you that he liked? he liked that i listened. and that i was careful with the information that he gave me. not just information, but with his heart. keith morrison: which had been really badly damaged, and he worried about that. didn t want it to happen again. he saw safe harbor in you. i think so. keith morrison: safe harbor, well maybe she was, as they made plans for a life together.
these former lovers were afraid of each other. what happened to that marriage? the one on the heavenly island. in fact, there was a record the detective discovered. and it was more hell than heaven. well, mark had issues with linda and linda had issues with mark. keith morrison: to put it mildly. here s the story mark s fiance, teresa, told the detective. the story she said mark told her. that linda seemed to be doing her level best to destroy mark s dog training business. she had been calling key clients and saying really horrible things about him to damaging the business. she called and tried to shut the website down, tried to shut his phones down. keith morrison: which is why, again, this is the story teresa said mark told her, why he snooped in her garbage one march morning in 2008. this was a three-hour drive from his own house. he went there, said teresa, to look for a paper trail to prove linda wanted to destroy his business.
but for mark, he had dozens of guns. he loved his guns. it was a passion for him. he loved his hunting. keith morrison: no, guns no contact with linda. and mark agreed. here s what teresa says mark told her. this will make it all stop. keith morrison: in other words, he was telling you, i m going to let her win. he said that was important. that she needed to win. keith morrison: was he afraid of her? oh, yes. keith morrison: still, after that, things seemed to settle down. mark s business thrived in his new location here in anacortes. he continued to service his clients in seattle. and of course, by then he had found teresa. but then, in the summer of 2009, two strange 911 calls came into the skagit county sheriff s office. an anonymous male caller claimed mark stover was transporting drugs in his car. anonymous caller: there is a crime that s going to take place in the morning.