Dead End

by Mariah Stewart

  An hour later, his ears ringing from too many repetitions of “I Love the Nightlife” and Blondie’s “Heart of Glass,” Evan slumped into a booth opposite Joe and leaned against the hard wooden back. They had a basket of chips and a bowl of peanuts between them, and a couple of beers. Just like a hundred other nights they’d shared in this booth, in this bar, after their shift together as detectives in the Broeder Police Department. Those were the good old days, Evan was thinking as he grabbed a handful of peanuts.

  “Getting too old for this kind of partying, Sullivan,” Evan told Joe.

  “Hey, I know what you mean. Nights when I’m not working, I’m asleep by now.” He glanced at his watch. “I should probably get going soon. Rosemary and Joey are leaving early in the morning, and all the commotion always wakes me up.”

  “All what commotion?”

  “Oh, you know, getting everything out into the car, the dog starts barking… though I have to say, they’re getting better at it. It doesn’t take ’em as long to get on the road as it did when they first started.”

  “Started what? I’m confused. What are they doing?”

  “Didn’t I tell you? We’ve been looking for something for Joey to get into, something he could do, so on a whim back in November, we took him to this dog show down near Philly, the big one, at the big expo center. Honest to God, Evan, you never saw so damned many dogs in your life. And all of them just groomed so nice, better than a lot of the guys in here tonight, I gotta tell ya.”

  Joe took a sip of his beer.

  “Anyway, this show is what they call benched, which means that the dogs are all up on these tables for most of the day, and you can walk back there, see them, ask questions, and learn about the different breeds. It was interesting, I gotta admit, but Joey, he was just beside himself. They have these kids, they call them junior handlers, who compete in the rings with their dogs. He started talking to a couple of them, got interested, and next thing we know, he’s asking if he can do it, too. How do you like that? We spent years shuttling him to soccer, baseball, football-all that stuff he hated and didn’t do well at. And here he gets all psyched up about showing dogs.”

  “So what did you do? How does a kid get started in that?”

  “While we were there, he talked to someone in one of the local kennel clubs, who took a shine to him. This woman, she’s a breeder out near Reading, she invited him over, taught him the ropes, worked with him all winter. She’s a terrific lady; she and Rosie have gotten to be good friends. Anyway, she offers to let Joey show one of her dogs in one of these junior handling competitions back in the spring. He doesn’t win, but he does okay. Next thing I know, it’s every weekend.” Joe rested his arms on the table and laughed. “It’s a pain in the ass, vacuuming all that damned dog hair out of the back of the car-I had to buy Rosie one of those big SUVs to carry around the dog and the equipment, you wouldn’t believe all the crap you have to cart around-but it’s been worth it. The kid is happier than I’ve ever seen him. Doing better in school, too. It’s like a miracle has occurred.”

  Evan felt a twitch start somewhere low in his gut, the twitch that was the equivalent of a light going on or a distant bell starting to ring. He stared at his beer, not wanting to analyze the twitch, or look into the light, or hear the bell.

  “So did you buy him a dog?” Evan didn’t want to look at Joe, didn’t want to let his imagination take him further than he wanted to go.

  “Naw, didn’t have to. The breeder has an older dog she lets him show. Dog stays in our house, sleeps in his bed. This big, hairy thing. Clumber spaniel, you ever seen one of them? Rare, this breeder is the only one in this part of the state. Great dog, though, gentle as a lamb. Loves Joey, Joey loves him. It’s been great for the kid.”

  “That’s great, Joe, that you found something for your son to enjoy.” Evan couldn’t even raise his eyes to look at Joe. If he was wrong…

  Evan prayed he was wrong.

  He’d known Joe for fifteen years. He’d danced at his wedding, he’d held his son in his arms at the hospital on the day he was born. For years, he’d watched Joe’s back, and Joe had watched his.

  “Yeah, it’s been real good for him.” Joe nodded and popped a few more peanuts into his mouth.

  “Hey, I’m going to hit the men’s room,” Evan told him. The gnawing at his insides was unbearable. “Don’t go anywhere. I’ll be right back. I might ask you for a ride home. I’m feeling a little woozy after all those beers. I’m not used to drinking so much anymore.”

  “I hear you, buddy.” Joe nodded again. “I’ll be here.”

  Evan walked to the back of the bar and down the short hall that led to the restrooms.

  It could be coincidence, he told himself with every step. It probably doesn’t mean a thing, and I’m blowing this whole conversation out of proportion because I want so badly to solve the case. The thought of Joe being involved was ludicrous, wasn’t it?

  Evan could think of only one way to find out.

  At the very end of the hall was a door that opened to the parking lot. Evan pushed the door open and stepped outside; at the same time he was taking his phone out of his pocket and speed-dialing Annie’s home phone.

  “Annie,” he said when she picked up, “did the full lab reports ever come back on the trace from my girls?”

  “I miss you, too, sweetie,” she said, yawning, her voice groggy from sleep.

  “Sorry, babe, I’m in a hurry”-he tried to disguise his impatience-“and this is important.”

  “The trace from the FBI lab on the girls?” she asked.

  “Yes. You were going to have them run a full analysis on some dog hairs that were found on the bodies.”

  “Oh. The dog hairs. Yeah.” She yawned again. “I saw that.”

  “Annie, it’s important. Where’s the report now, do you know?”

  “Probably in my briefcase. What is it you needed to know at one thirty in the morning?”

  “I need to know what kind of dog the hair came from. I hate to ask you to get out of bed to look for the report, but I really need to know.”

  “That’s all you need? The breed of dog the hair was from?”

  “Yes. And I need it now. So could you please go get the report and look it up?”

  “I don’t need to, I remember. It was a dog I never heard of, and I actually called the lab back to double-check because I thought maybe there was a typo or something,” she told him. “It was hair from a Clumber spaniel. You ever hear of that breed?”

  “Yeah. Unfortunately, I just did. Thanks, babe. I’ll call you in the morning.”

  Evan went back into the bar and slid into his seat. Joe was on his cell, explaining to his wife that he might be a little late.

  He looked up when Evan sat and told him, “Rosie said to tell you hi, and that she’s proud of you.”

  “Thanks, Rosie.” Evan’s throat was tight, and he wondered how in the name of God he was going to be able to do what he was about to do.

  He stared at his beer while Joe completed his call, then, when he’d hung up and put the phone back into his jacket pocket, Evan asked quietly, “Why’d you do it, Joe?”

  “Why’d I do what?” Joe frowned.

  “The girls. Why’d you get involved in that whole thing?”

  Joe’s face froze for several long minutes, then he said, “What girls are you talking about, Evan?”

  “Joe, for the love of God, don’t.” Evan closed his eyes, squeezed them tightly shut. He couldn’t bear to look at his former partner, even as he accused him. “Don’t even try to talk around it, okay? I know you were part of it. I need to know what part, and I need to know who else.”

  “Jesus, Evan, how could you even think I’d…” Joe tried to stand, but Evan’s arm shot out and grabbed him by the throat.

  “Talk to me, Joe. Talk to me now.”

  “I got nothing to say. Let go of me.”

  Evan tightened his grip.

  “You raped and murdered three little
girls, Joe. You-”

  “No, no.” Joe went white and shook his head vehemently. “No, I didn’t have a hand in none of that. I would never… no, God no, I never touched those girls, Evan. You have to believe me.”

  “How did the hair from a Clumber spaniel get on their bodies, Joe? You just told me how rare the breed is, how there’s only one breeder in this part of the state.” Evan’s voice rose to a near shout. “How did the dog hair get on their bodies?”

  The music had been lowered as the crowd had thinned, and those standing close to the booth turned, wide-eyed, as even-tempered Evan Crosby pulled his former partner out of his seat and slammed him against the bar.

  “How did the dog hair get on their bodies?” Evan repeated.

  “I didn’t kill them, I swear to you.” Joe was beginning to shake. “I only moved them.”

  “Moved them from where to where?” Evan demanded.

  “From the place where they were… from where I was told to pick them up, to where I left them.”

  “Jesus God, Joe, how could you?”

  The two men began to struggle, and the startled bystanders intervened to subdue Evan and to surround Joe with questioning eyes.

  “I didn’t kill them, I didn’t rape them. I never harmed those girls,” Joe said, looking from one man to the next, wanting them to understand that his role had been limited to taking care of the girls after the fact. “I tried to help them, see? I left them where they’d be found right away, I made them look like that other guy had done them, so they’d get some press, maybe someone would recognize them and they’d go back to their families. I tried to do the best I could for them…”

  He turned to Evan, tears running down his face.

  “I tried to do the best I could so they’d be found, so they wouldn’t be lying out in the rain. I couldn’t stand to think of them lying out in the rain, all alone like that…”

  27

  “Here. Catch.” Annie stood on the back steps of Evan’s townhouse and tossed him a bottle of water.

  “Thanks,” he said, catching it in one hand. “The sun is brutal today.”

  She looked up and squinted. “I don’t think this is a good time to be planting roses. We’re better off waiting until later in the day, when the sun drops down a little. I read someplace that you’re not supposed to plant in the heat of the day.”

  “Hey, that works for me.” He jammed his shovel into the overturned dirt in the flower bed they’d spent the morning preparing and wiped his brow with the hem of his T-shirt. “I’d just as soon wait until it gets a little cooler.”

  “We can still finish getting the bed ready, dig the holes, put in that stuff you bought that’s supposed to be good for the roots.”

  “Or we could wait until later and do everything when it cools off.” He grinned hopefully.

  “I say we dig now, plant later.” She walked to the side of the yard, where four rosebushes stood, still in their black pots, in the shade. “The poor rosebushes have already been waiting an extra week to be planted. It’s a miracle they’re still alive.”

  “They look awfully comfortable there, in the shade. Are you sure we should move them?” Evan opened the water and took a long drink.

  “It’s going to be overcast tomorrow morning, then rain for the rest of the weekend. Planting them tonight will be perfect.”

  He took another drink, then replaced the plastic cap and set the bottle on the fence, between pickets, where it tottered unsteadily.

  “I am worried, though, about them drying out while we’re in Santa Estela.” Annie frowned.

  “Maybe I can get Amanda to stop out a few times during the week to water them.”

  “Good idea.” Annie pulled her hair back behind her ears and looked for the container of root food she’d left near the fence.

  “How do you think that’s going to go, meeting the girls’ parents?” she asked.

  “I hope it goes okay, at least with two of the families.” He leaned on the handle of the shovel. “The police suspect that the third girl, the one who still hasn’t been identified, was probably sold by her family in the first place. They aren’t likely to come back now and claim the body.”

  “Maybe by the time we get down there, they will have.” She pulled on her gardening gloves and tossed a handful of granules into the first hole Evan had dug.

  “I still can’t get over John pulling all those strings, getting the locals down there to start showing the girls’ pictures around until they located the families. Arranging for the bodies to be transported back to Santa Estela, and for us to accompany them…”

  “John understands how important it is for you to take them home, sweetie. And if you want to look beyond that, I think it’s important for the new government down there to assure the people that every effort is being made to find their lost children and to bring them home. It’s a brilliant PR move on the part of the new president of Santa Estela, and a goodwill gesture on the part of our government.”

  “For whatever reason, I’m grateful. And I’m really happy that they’re sending Don Manley as well. He’s so grateful for the chance to go, to take his vics back. It was good of John to suggest it. If it weren’t for Don’s girl, and the little vial of bean seeds around her neck, we never would have been able to put this all together.”

  “That’s what happens when everyone pools their info. Things get done.” She smiled and added, “I’m really looking forward to the trip. I just know this will be something I’ll always remember.”

  “Yeah, real romantic vacation.” Evan stopped digging and looked at her almost apologetically. “Ten days in a hot, steamy, third-world country whose most lucrative export is its kids. With luck, maybe we’ll even get some mosquito netting for our tent. Maybe the piranhas will be migrating and we’ll be able to get in a swim.”

  “It’ll be the best vacation either of us ever had, you wait and see.” She wrapped her arms around his waist. “We’ll still be talking about this when we’re old and gray. You will always have the memory of having returned those children to their families, to be buried with love and respect. I’m proud of you, that you cared enough to take that on when no one else seemed to give a damn about them.”

  “John said something like that when he offered me the job.”

  “Are you still thinking about that?”

  “No. Right now, I’m thinking about planting a garden with my best girl, and taking a trip with her through a snake-infested jungle. I’ll think about the job offer when we get back.”

  “Fair enough.” She gave him a tap on the butt before getting back to work, measuring another spoonful of fertilizer and dumping it into the next hole.

  “Two more,” she told him, pointing to the rest of the plot, where holes had not as yet been dug.

  “Here?” he asked, the shovel poised to dig, and she nodded.

  “Hey,” he said, “while I dig these last two holes, why don’t you plant those geraniums in that big planter at the end of the deck?”

  “Wouldn’t you rather wait until you finish the deck?” She frowned. “If I plant this up now, you’ll have to carry it up onto the deck, and it’s going to be heavy.”

  “No big deal.” He shrugged. “Just go on and plant the flowers, we’ll worry about moving it later.”

  “Okay, if you say so.”

  Annie carried the pot of geraniums and ivy to the large planter Evan had left at the foot of the deck, and poured in a bag of potting soil. Next she pulled the plants from their pots and started to transplant the ivy. When she started on the geraniums, he heard her exclaim, “Oh.”

  She looked at him from across the small yard.

  “There’s a little box in the bottom of the geranium pot.”

  “Is there, now?” He stuck the shovel into the dirt and started walking toward her. “Well, maybe you should open it.”

  She shook the small dark blue box from the pot and opened it.

  “Evan,” she said softly, meeting his eyes as he wal
ked toward her. “Evan.”

  “What do you think, Annie?” he asked. “Think it’s time to make it legal?”

  She nodded.

  “Well then, let’s see if it fits.” He took her hand, then took the ring from the box and slid it onto her finger. “What do you think? Does it fit all right?”

  “It fits perfectly.” She had not taken her eyes from his face.

  “Do you like it?”

  “I love it.”

  “You haven’t even looked at it.”

  She looked at her hand, at the simple gold band with the round diamond and nodded. “It’s perfect. I love it.”

  “So, I guess this means yes?”

  “This means yes.”

  He gathered her in his arms and kissed her.

  “Will this get me out of digging for the rest of the afternoon?”

  “Probably not”-she laughed-“but it might get you a bonus at the end of the day.”

  “I like the sound of that.” He kissed her again, then said, more seriously, “I’m thinking a Christmas wedding might be really nice, you know? All those red flowers they always put in the church-”

  “Oh! Bad timing on my part. Sorry, guys.”

  Annie and Evan looked up to see Grady Shields walking down the drive that ran behind the house.

  “Hey, Grady,” Annie called to him. “This is a surprise.”

  “Yeah, well, I just wanted to drop by to see you before I left. I wanted to thank you and Evan for what you did to bring that bastard Luther Blue in.” He turned to Evan. “The only thing I’m sorry about is that you didn’t blow his head off when you had the chance. He’s still trying to make deals, you know that? Still offering to give up other members of the kidnapping and trafficking ring in exchange for a reduced sentence.”

  “Maybe the feds will offer him something on the kidnapping, but he’ll still have to face murder charges in Montana,” Annie assured him. “I spoke with Sheriff Brody a few days ago. I had promised I’d call if we found Melissa’s killer. He understands the situation very well, but he’s willing to wait his turn to prosecute Luther for Melissa’s death. He won’t be getting away with it, Grady. It may take a while, but he will stand trial in Montana.”