The discovery of a body believed to be that of a missing Skagit County woman, and news that a Lynden man allegedly admitted to her killing, confirms the fears of Gina Good and Christy Dills, who have spent the last 15 months leading the search for their friend.

Dawn Ruger, 45, was reported missing in February 2007, about a month after she left on a trip to Baker Lake with her on-again, off-again boyfriend, Benjamin Price, 28. Price walked into Bellingham Police Department Monday and reportedly told police he had killed Ruger, then led police to the remains of a woman in a shallow grave on Paradise Valley Road.

Price likely will undergo a mental health evaluation — he told police that he was confessing because “he is afraid to see others as Lucifer.” That doesn’t surprise Dills, who let Ruger stay at her Sedro-Woolley home for more than a year while Ruger and Price were dating.

“It’s like there were two different Bens,” Dills said. “All of us have different phases about us, but his was different people. His was him and a bad person.”

Those two personalities even had names — Michael and Ben. In the months before Price was jailed in 2005 for repeatedly violating a protection order against a Bellingham woman, Price told Good and Dills that he was the Archangel Michael. He also said that Ruger was Lucifer and that God had given him a mission to punish Lucifer.

But Ruger’s friends said Price’s apparent mental illness didn’t always show. Price would stay with Ruger at Dills’ home for weeks at a time in 2004 and 2005 and treated Ruger well.

“Dawn loved him,” Good said. “I think Dawn wanted to fix him …. He was a nice, quiet guy in his right mind. The real Ben would never do something like this.”

Dills met Ruger at The Old- Timers Inn, a bar in Sedro- Woolley, and they quickly became friends. Dills said Ruger was in an abusive relationship with a previous boyfriend. When things got too violent, Dills invited Ruger to live at her house.

“There was something about her that I knew I needed to help, because I had been through that,” Dills said. “I showed her that that’s not the way to be and to stand up for what you want.”

While living with Dills, Ruger developed a painful form of rheumatoid arthritis that occasionally left her bed-ridden and unable to walk. Ruger received government assistance checks because of the disabling ailment. On bad days, Dills carried her from place to place in the house.

Between the arthritis and the abusive relationships, Dills and Good said Ruger was a bit of a “damaged” person who often kept to herself. Dills said Ruger was still mourning the recent death of her mother.

Price, whom Ruger had known before meeting Dills and Good, had a similar personality — good-natured but private. He got along well with Dills’ teenage children and raved about his own child with the woman in Bellingham.

But Price’s demeanor began to get more erratic in the months leading up to his arrest for violating the no-contact order. Two days before he was arrested, Dills said Price stole her .22-caliber pistol and threatened to kill her. Dills, a 39-year-old who said she saw herself as a mother figure to Price, talked him out of the situation.

“I would stand up to that scary part of Ben,” Dills said. “That part would go after weaker people … Dawn was a weaker person.”

Dills talked with Price about his mental instability, but they didn’t think Price could afford to see a doctor.

“I said, ‘You really need to get some help,’” she said. “He said, ‘I don’t have a job and I don’t have insurance. Who’s going to take their time to look at me?’ ”

While in prison, Price and Ruger exchanged letters in which Price apologized for his behavior and continued courting Ruger.

“He said, ‘Thanks for not giving up on me,’” Good said. “He’d say that she was beautiful and that he couldn’t wait to smell her hair and lay behind her and watch TV … real sweet stuff.”

During this period, Ruger moved out of Dills’ home and had been living with other friends. Dills and Good said earlier media reports about Ruger’s disappearance had insinuated that Ruger was using methamphetamines during this period. Though they described the friends as “shady,” Dills and Good said they didn’t see any drug use first-hand and doubt it had anything to do with Ruger’s disappearance.

Price’s 15-month sentence was handed down in March 2006. Washington State Department of Corrections spokesman Chad Lewis said Price was released in August 2006 due to credit for time served and having one-third of the sentence dropped for good behavior.

When Price got out of prison, he and Ruger began dating again, despite objections from Good and Dills.

“She said it didn’t sound like he hated her anymore,” Good recalled. “My last words to her were ‘He hates your guts, don’t go back to him.’ ”

In late December 2006, Price and Ruger left on a trip to Baker Lake. Neither Good nor Dills worried too much when they didn’t see Ruger for several weeks afterwards, since Ruger was living with other people and was known to change locations for weeks at a time.

In the days after the disappearance, Dills recalls Price coming to her house and trying to convince her to go places with him. Disturbed by his erratic behavior, Dills refused. Looking back, she wonders if Price intended to kill her as well.

When Ruger’s disability checks started piling up and friends noticed that she hadn’t taken her overnight bag of make-up and toiletries with her, Good filed a missing persons report on Feb. 1, 2007.

The Skagit County Sheriff’s Office had considered the case suspicious and questioned Price about Ruger’s whereabouts several times, but no arrests had been made. Good said she was told by police that it would be hard to prosecute anyone without a body, something that frustrated Good.

“I didn’t want this to be a cold case where someone trips over the bones 10 years later,” she said.

Good said the thing Ruger loved most in the world was her two sons from a previous marriage who now live in the Arlington area. She notes the irony of Price reportedly confessing to the murder the day after Mother’s Day. Dills also said she takes comfort in knowing that Ruger is with her own mother in the afterlife.

“The only good that could possibly come out of this is that she is with her mom,” Dills said. “She loved her so much.”

Though they’re angry at the loss of their friend, both said they see Price’s apparent confession as a call for help.

“There’s still some Ben in there,” Dills said. “For him to walk in and do that took a lot of strength … He had too many demons, but Ben knows what he did.”