A Deadly Blessing

by Kathy Bennett

talking to you for about two minutes and you've been everywhere but here."

  "Yeah, well I've got a lot on my mind these days."

  "I was telling you to take the shoulder when we merge with the 405 Freeway. Put on our emergency lights to blow by some of this traffic. At this rate, we won't get to the crime scene until midnight."

  I did as my partner had directed and we began to sail past the streams of commuters. While I'm sure our actions frustrated the other motorists, if they knew how hard I had to concentrate while driving on the shoulder, they might be more understanding. Even at moderate speeds, 'gutter sniping' can be dangerous; there's all kinds of crap at the side of the road.

  Twenty minutes later, we were free of traffic and rolling at about eighty up Interstate 5.

  We had nothing but time and we were alone. It was now or never. I cleared my throat. "So, why don't you tell me about you and Heather McCall?" I kept my eyes on the road, but with my peripheral vision, I watched my partner's reaction. For an instant his whole body tensed. Then he relaxed.

  "What are you talking about?"

  "I found a picture of you and her on the Internet. You're drunk and she's wearing little more than her birthday suit."

  Darius twisted in his seat to face me. "I don't know what you saw, but you're mistaken."

  I turned my head and caught his gaze with mine. "Really? Is that the approach you're going to take?"

  "You know Maddie, you run around like you've got your shit together. But I'm the one who cleans up your mess when you screw up or shoot off your mouth to the bosses. I've saved your ass on more than one occasion and I can't believe you'd see something on the Internet and accuse me, your partner, of playin' around with someone we're now searching for."

  This was not going well. I'd anticipated a number of responses, but flat out denial was at the bottom of the list.

  "I'll tell you what partner; I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt until we get back to the office and I show you the picture. Once we confirm it is Heather McCall's body out here in the desert, we'll go back to PAB, take a look at the photo and then we'll talk about whose mess needs cleaning up. Forget I even said anything." It was tough to put Darius's reaction to my allegation out of my mind, but the last thing I wanted divulged to the other law enforcement agencies was that my partner and I weren't getting along.

  The crime scene was located in the southern-most part of Kern County, in the Antelope Valley. We were in the jurisdiction of the Kern County Sheriff. I'd been out this way once before. I remembered the valley as large and wide, sloping gently to meet with the Tehachapi Mountains. In the dark, the flat valley floor and the high-powered lights from the crime scene made it easy for us to see our destination miles before we got there. But if we hadn't been paying attention to our directions, we'd have missed the weathered, wooden, white street sign painted with black lettering announcing 254th Street West. Rabbits darted across the asphalt road and into the scrub while our headlights dissected the blackness.

  "It sure is dark out here," I said, eyeing the inky sky bejeweled with twinkling stars. I tried to keep the Crown Vic's speed up on the unfamiliar road.

  "What's the matter, you scared?"

  "I don't want to be out here all night. It's taken us an hour and half to get out here and there's no telling what we're going to find once we get to the scene."

  "It's going to be awkward," said Darius. "I'm sure the county mounties aren't going to welcome us barging into their murder investigation."

  "Well, that's just too darn bad. Heather McCall is our missing person and now she's dead." I slammed on the brakes. "Oh for Pete's sake." The asphalt ended and a dirt road began. I edged our car off about a two-inch lip and onto the soil. Decades of desert-dweller vehicles traveling on the same stretch of dust had hardened the road to a washboard conduit.

  "I hope our city ride doesn't shake apart," Darius said with a grimace as our vehicle bounced along, leaving a wide trail of dust behind us.

  We continued for about a mile and a half and finally arrived at the mobile command post emblazoned with KCSD in bold green and gold lettering. Several black and white cruisers were parked at odd angles in the brush to allow for additional vehicular traffic. The same held true for at least half-a-dozen plain-wrap cars as well.

  "Well, we might as well join the party," I said, pulling out of the lane and into the arid desert.

  Darius surveyed the area. "Perfect place for a body dump," he said, handing me my flashlight and a bottle of water. Even though darkness had set in, the temperature in the high desert was well into the nineties.

  As we approached the command post, several sheriff deputies wearing polo shirts and khaki pants met us. I immediately noticed they were all wearing combat boots. The one who'd introduced himself as the lead homicide investigator noticed me eyeing their footwear.

  "We wear the high-top boots for the snakes out here."

  I felt my eyes bug out as I scanned the ground around my feet.

  "Don't worry," said another deputy. "We've been out here for hours, so we've probably scared off all the Mojave Green rattlers."

  I'm sure Darius worried I'd embarrass him by freaking out, so he started the introductions. By the time we were done, we'd all exchanged business cards, and that included a pair of FBI agents who'd arrived before us. I didn't recognize them from any of our previous meetings in LA, and I asked them how they'd gotten out here before us.

  "Actually, we were returning from a training seminar in Bakersfield. One of the agents in our LA office gave us a call and asked us to take a look on our way back to LA. It's only about an extra thirty miles. Saves them from driving out here."

  Darius turned to the deputies. "How about showing us the crime scene and body?"

  "Well, we'd like to, but the body is gone."

  "What!" I said, closing my eyes in frustration.

  "Yep, the Coroner's van left about a half hour before you arrived."

  Perhaps trying to avoid my imminent meltdown, the FBI agents said they'd seen what they needed to see and were taking off.

  Good riddance, I thought, watching them retreat to their four-door sedan. Their cohorts handling the case were too lazy to come out to the crime scene.

  One of the deputies, sensing my annoyance, tried to make the long trip worthwhile. "I think those Feds were afraid we were going make them start searching around the crime scene. We were tempted, but knew it would never fly." He waved for us to follow him. "I'll walk you down to where the body was found, and we can show you some of the photos we took. Those are in addition to what our lab guys took. We've got to walk a little ways."

  Trudging along the dirt road, I kept my eyes open for a coiled rattler waiting to strike.

  "Did you find any additional evidence with the body?" Darius asked, moving his flashlight in a wide arc.

  While my partner's question was perfectly logical, I wondered if there was another reason he was asking it.

  The deputy shook his head. "When you see the location, you'll understand."

  As any cop will tell you, once you've smelled a 'stinker' dead body, it's an odor you don't forget. However, the stench from the area we approached was so horrific I couldn't imagine how one decomposing female body was responsible.

  As our flashlights cut swaths of light on the ground in front of us, the road suddenly dipped at a sloping angle. Then I saw the problem. Heather McCall had been tossed in a garbage dump.

  "Ah, geez," I moaned, holding my hand over my nose and mouth. "No one deserves to be thrown away like garbage."

  The deputy nodded. "This ravine is where locals illegally dump anything they don't want anymore. They've been doing it for decades. I'm sure this victim isn't the first body to be dumped here, and won't be the last."

  "How'd she get discovered?" I asked, taking in the rotting piles of waste, furniture, and construction material.

  "A couple of teenagers were screwing around shooting at the old refrigerators and washing machines in
all this crap. All of a sudden a coyote comes running up the gully carrying an arm. The kids stop shooting, climb down to take a closer look, see the victim's head and high-tail it home. Luckily, the house actually had a landline to call us. There's no cell service this far out of town," the deputy said, motioning us to move back toward the command post where the air didn't carry the stink.

  "Our boss said she was shot in the head. Was that the only injury?" asked Darius.

  "As far as we could tell. There wasn't too much left of her."

  "How'd she get identified?" I asked.

  "When the kids started yelling, the coyote dropped the arm. Enough of one of her fingers was intact for prints. We drove the prints immediately back to Bakersfield to run through AFIS. We got a hit. Several years ago, the victim applied for a child care license."

  "That's right. I saw on her rap sheet she'd applied for her license when I ran her," I remembered. "Was there anything at the crime scene that might have been left by the suspect?" I knew it was a stupid question, but it was one that had to be asked.

  The homicide guy smiled. "Detective Divine, you're lucky we had enough of your missing person to get her identified." His face sobered with seriousness. "We had all of our detectives from Bakersfield out here as well as mutual aid from the CHP and LA County Sheriff. If her body had been left a hundred yards south, this would be an LA County case. We did right by the victim searching this gulch, but we didn't find anything that pointed to a suspect."

  I couldn't imagine sifting through a garbage dump in hundred-degree weather. I knew the searchers had probably been made to wear Haz Mat suits, which in the high desert in the middle of summer probably felt like a turkey-roasting bag. The searching cops had really earned their pay today. Undeterred, I tried again. "Any chance someone saw something? A car in the middle of the night? Somebody hearing a gun shot or screams?"

  The deputy shook his head.

  "No sign of another body or bodies, right?"

  "Nope, and we thoroughly searched that dump about a half mile each way."

  "Any idea how long she'd been out here?" Darius asked.

  "With the heat and the conditions it's hard to say," he said, motioning us back toward the command post. "People out here mind their own business. Cars come and go at all hours of the night and no one would look twice at a car near the ravine—and if they did look twice, they'd forget what they saw. That's just the way it is out here."

  "Maybe the bullet in her head will give us a clue," Darius said, but his tone of voice betrayed his disbelief in the statement. "What kind of photos you got?"

  After the homicide detective showed us the photos he'd taken, we knew the case wouldn't be solved on his end. He had nothing other than a few remnants of what used to be Heather McCall. It was going to be up to us to find Heather's killer by delving into her life and discovering who wanted her dead.

  After thanking everyone and shaking hands, we got in our car and headed back toward the City of Angels. Tense silence filled the car. I just wanted to get back to the office and show Darius the picture I'd seen. I wanted him to have a logical and legal explanation why he hadn't told me about knowing Heather McCall.

  My mind raced and my knuckles were white while we flew down Interstate 5 back to Los Angeles. I was furious with Darius. If we caught whoever killed Heather, our whole case could be blown because of whatever relationship he'd had with her. We'd worked together for over three years, we shared a mutual respect for each other, and every now and then a hint of attraction would pop up but we'd both pretend not to notice. We weren't only partners; we were friends. But, right now, my friend was acting like a suspect. Lost in my anger, I nearly jumped out of my skin when he spoke.

  "Technically, our missing person has been found so we can close our case," Darius said over the sound of the air conditioning.

  "Are you kidding? This may be related to Tiffany Truesdale's disappearance."

  "We don't have any evidence to support that."

  "What are the chances that two women connected to the governor go missing within days of each other?" I asked. "Besides, I don't think that homicide dick is going to work too hard on this case. He doesn't have anything to go on."

  "Like I said earlier, partner. It's the perfect place to dump a body."

  We rode the rest of the way to downtown in silence.

  TIFFANY – 60

  After Brenda ran off, Tiffany made her way near the main house and hid behind a tree as Drejohn and about a dozen other men on the patio gathered their weed-filled blunts and assorted bottles of alcohol and headed toward the house. From what little she heard of the conversation as the men went inside, she realized it was a party to watch Brenda's porn debut. Through the wall of glass at the back of the house, she watched the men laughing and joking about their own sexual exploits as they moved into the house. They made their way down a staircase hidden behind a wooden panel off the kitchen. Tiffany assumed there was a home theater down there.

  More troubling, it sounded to her like Drejohn was selling time with Brenda after her performance. Tiffany couldn't be sure though, because they talked in jargon she didn't understand. Either way, she had to do something.

  Leaving her hiding place behind the tree, she couldn't believe her eyes. One of the men in Drejohn's group had left an expensive-looking lighter lying on the table outside. She ran and scooped it up before he realized where he'd left it and came back. I can use this. I just need a few more things.

  Slinking into the house through the side door, she went immediately to the kitchen pantry looking for anything flammable. She pulled two cans of cooking spray off the shelf and dumped them into her tote along with the nail polish remover she'd gotten earlier. Hearing voices approaching, she darted to the refrigerator and pulled open the door as if searching for something to eat.

  It was Ginger and Vegas. "Hi Tiffany," Ginger said. "You been laying low?"

  She nodded. "I'm starving," she said, picking up a greasy slice of pizza and taking a bite.

  "Vegas and I are going out to the dorms," Ginger said. "They've got a big flat screen out there. This new girl with huge boobs is doin' her first show. Wanna come? Anyone who isn't working is gonna watch. They usually tank their first time out, but with her big tits I'm sure she'll do okay."

  Tiffany shook her head. "I think I'll take your earlier advice and make myself scarce. Besides," she said rubbing her shoulder, "I'm still kind of sore from Tank." Closing the fridge, she took the pizza and headed toward the stairs. Ducking into a powder room, she listened as the girls grabbed some snacks and left.

  After throwing the pizza in the trash, Tiffany searched the cabinet beneath the sink and found some rubbing alcohol. The straps of her tote bag cut into her flesh with the additional weight as she left the bathroom and made her way back to the kitchen.

  Suddenly, the entrance to the basement opened and a skinny white guy emerged, the odor of alcohol and marijuana wafting from behind him. Tiffany dropped to her knees behind the car-size center island. She held her breath wondering if he'd seen her. Apparently he hadn't, because he passed through the kitchen and went outside.

  On all fours, she peered around the corner of the cupboard. She could see the guy searching the table and ground where she'd picked up the lighter. Worried he might see her, or that others might be coming up the stairs, she quickly crawled back to the powder room and locked the door. She stashed her flammable items under the sink just in case someone demanded entry to the bathroom and found her. At least they wouldn't find her arson kit. Standing quietly, she found some tabloids in the trashcan. She put them under the sink as well.

  A minute or so later, she heard the patio door open and then heard hoots and hollers coming from the basement. The skinny guy must have gone back downstairs.

  She retrieved her bag and hustled toward the studio. While hiding in the bathroom, it had occurred to her that it would be better if she could somehow sabotage the studio. Maybe that would wreck the TV reception as w
ell. If she destroyed where the porn was filmed, NTL productions would at least be out of business for a little while. Besides, if the fire was big enough, the fire department would come and maybe even the police and she'd be rescued!

  Running to the back of the studio, she wasn't afraid of being seen, as the only windows in the building were the ones in the front lobby area. She also noticed there didn't appear to be any security cameras back here either. Looking around, she saw a door that looked like it might hold supplies or, she hoped, an electrical panel. She yanked the door open. Bingo!

  Her heart pounded and her hands shook as she folded pieces of the gossip magazines and slid them into the crack of the electrical panel housing. She was scared to death and feared she might blow herself up. Now all she had to do was add the flammables. She opted to coat the paper with the cooking spray as well as pour the other ignitable liquids over the photographs and stories about stars. For once, the self-absorbed stars could do something useful. All she had left was to set her work on fire. With fumbling fingers she picked up the lighter.

  SECTION SEVEN (Chapters 61 – 70)

  TRAVIS – 61

  Pulling his truck into the garage and seeing Maddie's car gone, Travis wasn't surprised Maddie hadn't returned home yet. If there were good leads on her case, she might even work through the night.

  Travis was beat. He'd spent a couple of hours at the gym and after he'd showered and changed, he'd run some errands. Thinking back to his appointment with Doctor Stevens, he snorted with disgust. He'd had no intention of getting emotional and telling the shrink about how he'd killed Dave. And yet he'd spilled his guts like a first-time juvenile arrestee.

  Travis watched the rolling metal door of his garage lower like a theater's red velvet curtain. He might be emotionally depleted, but he still had his survival skills. You always watch to see no one follows you into the garage after you park your car.

  Moving into the house, Travis turned on lights as he did his usual walk-through, gun in hand, ready to blast any threat. Finding nothing amiss, he returned his gun to his holster and went into the kitchen to find something to eat. After rummaging through the refrigerator, he opted for a salad and some of the spaghetti he'd made for Maddie last night. He poured himself a generous glass of red wine to go with his meal. Sitting at the breakfast bar, he reflected on his meeting at BSS while he ate.

  After he'd cried like a four-year-old and told the doc about Dave, she'd done a lot of talking to him about his profession. She'd said all policemen, and especially S.W.A.T. officers, knew the job was dangerous and accepted that fact from the first day in the academy.

  She'd asked him questions about how he'd been coping. He hadn't exactly told her the truth about how much he was drinking, and he'd hedged about his feelings of being ready to explode. He