by J. A. Jance
CHAPTER 31
TEN MINUTES LATER, DEB HOWELL’S TAHOE AND JOANNA’S YUKON were parked on the grassy parking strip in front of Abby Holder’s house. The house still looked the same as it had the first time Joanna had seen it. Now she was struck by the fact that all this time, while Abby had been caring for her mother, she had also, without her knowledge, been harboring the person ultimately responsible for her husband’s death.
“How do you want to handle this?” Deb asked.
“Elizabeth Stevens is in a wheelchair. Go around to the back and see if there’s a ramp from the back porch.”
Deb was back in under half a minute. “Twelve steps at least,” she said. “So if she’s in there, this is the way she has to come out.”
“Okay,” Joanna said. “Let’s do it.”
Joanna walked up the steps while Deb followed the seemingly meandering path of the wheelchair ramp up the steep incline. By the time she reached the porch, Joanna was already ringing the bell.
What seemed like a long time passed before there was any sign of movement inside the house. “My daughter isn’t here right now,” Elizabeth said from behind the closed door. “You’ll need to come back when she’s home.”
“It’s Sheriff Brady,” Joanna said. “We need to speak to you.”
“Why?”
“We have a few questions,” she said. “About Debra Highsmith.”
That was an out-and-out lie, but it was enough to get Elizabeth to open the door and let them inside.
“That woman never appreciated Abby,” Elizabeth said. “I’m sorry she’s dead, of course, but she could have treated Abby decently.”
“What about you?” Joanna asked.
Elizabeth frowned. “What do you mean?”
“How do you treat your daughter?”
“Me? I thought we were talking about Abby’s boss.”
“Let’s talk about you for a moment,” Joanna said. “First, however, we need to read you your rights. Turn on the recorder please, Detective Howell, and then, if you’d be so good as to Mirandize Mrs. Stevens here, I’d really appreciate it.”
“Read me my rights!” Elizabeth exclaimed. “You’re both crazy. I’m in a wheelchair, in case you haven’t noticed. I read all about Debra Highsmith’s murder. She was shot to death somewhere out along High Lonesome Road. There’s no way I could do that in a wheelchair. No way at all.”
Undeterred, Deb did as she was told.
“I don’t know what this is all about,” Elizabeth said when the recitation of rights was completed. “You can’t possibly believe that I had anything to do with Debra Highsmith’s murder.”
“I don’t,” Joanna said. “I’m here to arrest you for conspiracy in the murder of Freddy Holder and of my father as well.”
“This is utterly ridiculous,” Elizabeth sneered. “How anyone could believe something so far-fetched—”
“I have a witness,” Joanna said. “In actual fact, I have two.”
“That’s not possible …”
“Does the name David Fredericks mean anything to you?”
“Nothing,” Elizabeth said aloud, although the expression on her face told a different story.
“I’m surprised,” Joanna said. “Because he’s the guy you hired to kill my father when it looked like he had enough evidence to charge you with conspiring with Mad Dog Muncey to kill your son-in-law.”
“Mother!” Abby Holder exclaimed. “Is this true?”
Unheard by the three women in the living room, Abby Holder had noiselessly entered the house through the back door and was standing in the kitchen doorway. Her face was dangerously pale, but her dark eyes blazed with anger.
“Abby!” Elizabeth exclaimed, looking first at her watch and then at her daughter. “What are you doing home so early?”
“Because of what happened to Ms. Highsmith, we only kept the kids for half a day today,” Abby answered. “What’s going on?”
Joanna was the one who answered. “A guy by the name of Edward Muncey, Mad Dog Muncey, told my father in a dying confession that he was responsible for your husband’s murder and that your mother had paid him to do it. Shortly after that, my father also died when he was hit by a speeding drunk driver in what was always considered to be a tragic accident. Except I’ve learned just recently that it wasn’t an accident at all. That supposedly drunk driver was hired to do the job by someone named Liz Hanson.”
“Liz Hanson,” Abby repeated. “That’s your maiden name.”
“Don’t listen to her,” Elizabeth advised. “None of this is true. She’s making it up as she goes along. Sheriff Brady here is as much of a fruitcake as her father ever was. D. H. Lathrop told your father all about Mad Dog Muncey’s wild story. Nobody believed it then, and nobody will believe it now.”
But Abby Holder’s body suddenly seemed to stiffen. She stood straighter. “I believe it,” she said.
“You can’t possibly,” Elizabeth objected. “After all, I’m your mother.”
“That’s exactly why I do believe it,” Abby declared with heat entering her voice. “You are my mother. You’ve lived here all this time, accepting my charity, all the while knowing that you had taken away the one person in the whole world who ever really loved me.”
“Abby, this is ridiculous. Don’t be silly.”
“I’m not being silly. I’m dead serious.”
“So am I, Mrs. Stevens,” Joanna said. “You’re under arrest. Cuff her, Deb.”
Elizabeth’s jaw dropped in amazement. “This is utterly astonishing. You’re all making a terrible mistake. I demand to see my lawyer. Abby, give Burton a call, would you?”
“No,” Abby said. “Burton Kimball is a friend of ours, and he’s also a capable defense attorney, but I’m not calling him, Mother, and I won’t pay for his services, either. You’ll need to use whatever attorney they give you for free—one who’s appointed for you, because you won’t be able to afford one on your own.”
“You can’t do this to me, Abby. You can’t abandon me like this!”
“Watch me,” Abby Holder said. “I can and I will. You disgust me, Mother. Get her out of here,” she said to Deb. “I can’t stand the sight of her.”
Joanna helped Deb wheel Elizabeth down the ramp. At the bottom they patted her down for possible weapons before loading her into Deb’s Tahoe for transport. Once they drove away, Joanna went back up to the house where she found Abby Holder sitting on the couch staring vacantly across the room.
“Are you going to be all right?” Joanna asked.
“Yes,” Abby said quietly. “I think I will. Knowing the truth is better than not knowing.”
Joanna nodded, thinking of her mother and Mona Tipton.
“Yes,” she said. “I think so, too, but here’s my card just in case. If you need anything—anything at all—please call me. I lost my husband, too, you know,” she added. “I know how this feels.”
Abby looked at Joanna with tears brimming in her eyes. “Even after all this time?” she asked.
“Even after all this time,” Joanna repeated. “It never goes away.”
CHAPTER 32
MUCH LATER THAT NIGHT, WHILE JOANNA LAY CUDDLED NEXT TO Butch’s body in their queen-size bed, she told him the whole story.
“So it sounds like you made the right call after all,” Butch said. “The right call for everyone concerned.”
“My mother really surprised me,” Joanna said. “I never expected that she’d unbend enough to give me permission to notify Mona Tipton.”
“Miracles do happen,” Butch said.
“Not only that,” Joanna continued, “Mom’s decided that she should send the remaining art league cookies to Maggie Oliphant’s funeral reception. She arrived at that conclusion all on her own. If I had suggested it, it would have gone over like a pregnant pole vaulter, so maybe we’re both finally learning not to boss each other around.”
“As I said before,” Butch muttered, “miracles do happen, but speaking of funerals, tha
t reminds me. Sue Ellen Hirales called late this afternoon. She told me to tell you that Isadora came through her hip surgery with flying colors, but she was really calling to talk to Jenny.”
“To Jenny?” Joanna asked. “Why?”
“It seems Isadora showed Jenny’s eulogy to her great-grandson. Sue Ellen said Michael would like Jenny to read it at the funeral on Friday. The service is going to be held in the high school auditorium with Father Morris from St. Dominick’s officiating.”
“What did Jenny say?” Joanna asked.
“She said yes, of course. She’s asked me to coach her on it so she can recite it rather than read it. I told her that’s a lot more effective. She called your mother and asked if Eleanor would take her to Tucson tomorrow afternoon and help her find the right kind of dress. She says she doesn’t have anything that would work for a funeral.”
Joanna was dumbfounded. “Are you kidding? Tomboy Jenny wants to wear a dress?”
“That’s what she said.”
“What was it you were just saying about miracles?” Joanna asked.
“They happen,” Butch mumbled sleepily. “Now shut up and go to sleep.”
EPILOGUE
IT WAS A BUSY WEEK AT THE COCHISE COUNTY SHERIFF’S Department. There were mountains of paperwork to attend to. After seeing the evidence, Arlee Jones agreed that there was enough to charge Elizabeth Stevens with conspiracy to commit not one but two homicides. Her court-appointed attorney asked for bail, which was granted. Like David Fredericks before her, she wasn’t able to raise it. Instead, she stayed in jail, railing at everyone who came near her, complaining about the food, the bed, the air quality, and anything else she could think of. The more she complained, the better Joanna liked it.
Subsequent interviews with David Fredericks and with Nelda Muncey made it seem that Liz had been acting alone and without her husband’s knowledge when the hits were arranged on both Freddy Holder and on D. H. Lathrop. It turned out that Wayne Stevens hadn’t gotten away with murder because he hadn’t committed murder.
Detective Keller, still on loan from the Bisbee Police Department, spent hours going through Debra Highsmith’s two computers.
When he finished, he came into Joanna’s office. “Find anything?” she asked.
Keller shook his head. “After the ‘Die, Bitch’ posting turned up on the Web, her browsing history shows that she looked up several articles on facial-recognition software programs, but none of those articles mentions James Cameron by name.”
“What about her getting the dog and the gun?” Joanna asked. “Do you think she understood there was a specific threat?”
“I think her grandparents had convinced her that there would always be a threat,” Keller answered. “After decades of being paranoid about it, the dog and the gun were more of the same.”
“It turns out that Debra Highsmith wasn’t wrong to be paranoid, and neither were her grandparents,” Joanna said. “Too bad it wasn’t enough to save her.”
At one o’clock on Friday afternoon, the high school auditorium was filled to capacity with the overflow crowd listening to the service in the cafeteria, where it was broadcast over the school’s public address system. The stage was awash in flower arrangements. In the middle of the stage stood a simple lectern with a microphone. Next to that stood a black-draped table that held a funeral urn and a three-foot-tall copy of Debra Highsmith’s yearbook photo.
Because Jenny was one of the speakers listed in the program, Joanna and Butch sat next to her at the end of the second row. While a pianist played introductory music, the Hirales family filed down the aisle, with Augusto pushing Isadora in a wheelchair and Sue Ellen and Nancy walking behind him. At the very end was Michael, wearing a suit and looking somber, while at his side walked a magnificent Doberman.
“That’s Giles,” Jenny whispered as the dog padded past. “Isn’t he gorgeous?”
Joanna thought Giles was far more fearsome than he was gorgeous, but his coat was brushed to a high sheen, and he was also exceptionally well behaved. When Michael Hirales sat, Giles sat, and at a hand sign from his new master, the dog settled into a contented down-stay, lying at Michael’s feet, completely unconcerned that he was next to a busy aisle.
Joanna meant to pay attention to the service, but she was too distracted, too worried about how Jenny would do—would she remember what she and Butch had practiced for hours on end, or would she forget and flub her lines?
When Father Morris finally called on Jenny to come to the microphone, she walked up onto the stage in her sophisticated new black dress exhibiting a degree of composure that took Joanna’s breath away. It wasn’t until Jenny turned to speak that Joanna realized she didn’t even have a copy of the eulogy with her. Instead, she spoke the words by heart and from the heart, and when she finished, Joanna joined everyone else in giving her a standing ovation. Jenny, however, seemed totally unfazed by the thunderous applause. Instead, she walked back down the stairs and then stopped in the aisle long enough to give Giles a reassuring pat on the head.
Butch was still applauding along with everyone else, but he leaned over long enough to nudge Joanna. “That’s our girl,” he mouthed with a wide grin. “That’s our girl!”
After the funeral a reception was held in the high school cafeteria with William Farraday holding forth as though he was mourner in chief. It was all Joanna could do to keep from rolling her eyes.
Joanna went looking for her mother. “Beautiful dress,” Joanna said. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” Eleanor replied, “but it takes a beautiful girl to make a dress beautiful. You must be very proud.”
About that time, Jenny came bustling up. “Cassie’s parents had to leave early. I told her we could take her home; is that all right?”
So things had changed for the better between Cassie and Jenny. Joanna was still perturbed by Cassie’s passing along the photo, but it seemed right to let that go.
“Of course,” Joanna said. “We’ll be glad to give her a ride.”
An hour later, as they were driving Cassie back to her parents’ place near Double Adobe, Joanna was still marveling over Jenny’s performance when something Cassie was saying in the backseat penetrated her woolgathering.
“So Marty broke up with Dena,” Cassie was saying. “Just like that. Wouldn’t even tell her why. Maybe it’s like one of his father’s rules or something.”
Unseen by the girls in the backseat, Butch Dixon reached over, took his wife’s hand in his, and squeezed it.
“It’s possible it has to do with Dr. Pembroke’s rules,” he said, sending a knowing smile in Joanna’s direction, “but I doubt it.”
“It’s terrible,” Cassie said. “It’s the worst thing that could possibly happen.”
“Don’t be so sure,” Butch counseled. “A couple of years from now, Dena Carothers may look back and decide that it was the best thing that ever happened to her.”
“Are you teasing us?” Jenny asked.
“No,” he said. “I’m not teasing in the least. I mean every word, and I’m betting your mother agrees with me.”
“Yes,” Joanna said, leaning back and closing her eyes. “In this case I believe you’re absolutely right.”
At Cassie’s house, Jenny asked if she could stay for a while, and they let her. When Joanna and Butch got back to High Lonesome Ranch, a large wooden crate stood in front of the garage door, blocking the entrance.
“What’s this?” Joanna wanted to know.
“It’s this year’s birthday/Christmas/anniversary present all rolled into one,” Butch said. “I guess you need to open it. Hold on. I’ll go get a crowbar.”
While he went to his toolbox, Joanna examined the crate. It was marked M. L. COLEMAN, SUNSET PASS STUDIOS.
“It’s a painting?” Joanna asked as Butch returned and started dismantling the crate.
Butch nodded. “It used up a big chunk of my next advance,” he said with a grin.
“It’s that expensive and they
just dropped it off like this?”
“I arranged for Carol to be here to sign for it.”
Eventually the wooden packing and the hard plastic foam peeled away. Inside was a gold-framed oil painting, four feet by five and a half, of the flower vendor across the street from their honeymoon hotel in Paris. It was breathtaking. The flowers glowed in the sunshine, while the pavement in front was still shiny from what must have been a passing shower.
“It’s stunning!” Joanna exclaimed. “Absolutely stunning.”
“You like it?”
“I love it. I thought it was smaller, though.”
“You’re right. The one they had at the auction was much smaller,” Butch explained. “I thought about buying it during the auction, but then the auction didn’t exactly go as planned. On Sunday, I called your mom and had her ask Mr. Coleman if he had a larger one. He did—this one—but it was back home in Sedona. He agreed to sell it to me and still give the art league their cut of the purchase price.”
“So that’s what Mother meant when she said you helped her.”
Butch nodded. “I wanted it to be a surprise, and I was afraid she had given it away.”
“It’s a surprise, all right,” Joanna said. “I had no idea, but where on earth are we going to put it?”
“I thought about that,” Butch said. “I guess it’ll have to go in the living room. It’s way too classy to go with my model trains.”
“Let’s take it in and hang it, then,” Joanna said.
Butch looked at his watch. “I thought you said you were going back to work for a while after the funeral.”
“I changed my mind,” Joanna told him. “The kids are gone. The dogs are gone. I’ve got better things to do this afternoon than go back to work.”
“Amen, sister,” Butch Dixon said, picking up the painting and following her into the house. “So do I!”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
J. A. JANCE is the New York Times bestselling author of the J. P. Beaumont series, the Joanna Brady series, the Ali Reynolds series, and four interrelated thrillers about the Walker family. Born in South Dakota and brought up in Bisbee, Arizona, Jance lives with her husband in Seattle, Washington, and Tucson, Arizona.
