Paradise Lost jb-9

by J. A. Jance

  Stung by the anger and betrayal in Jenny’s voice, Joanna retreated. A few minutes later she was outside by the Crown Victo­ria, struggling to fasten her Kevlar vest, when Butch came out of the house.

  “Jenny will be all right,” he assured her, once he had unloaded the luggage. “You go do what you have to. Don’t worry about her.”

  Tears welled in Joanna’s eyes. “Jenny blames me for what happened. I told her last night that I was sure Dora would be safe, but I was wrong. She wasn’t safe at all, goddamn it! She’s dead.”

  “No matter what Jenny said, Joey, and no matter what you may think, what happened to Dora Matthews isn’t your fault,” Butch said.

  “I think you’re wrong there,” Joanna told him. “I’m not first in line for that; I’m second—right behind my mother.”

  As soon as Joanna was back on the highway, she looked at her watch. Almost two hours had passed since she had last spoken to Frank Montoya. In the world of crime scene investigation, two hours was little more than a blip on the screen.

  Picking up her radio microphone, she called in to Dispatch. “Is Chief Deputy Montoya still out at the crime scene on High way 90?” she asked.

  “He sure is, Sheriff Brady,” Larry Kendrick told her.

  “Good. Let him know I’ve left High Lonesome Ranch, and I’m on my way.”

  As she drove, Joanna battled to control her churning emotions. Under most circumstances, where someone else’s crisis was concerned, Sheriff Brady could be calm and completely unflappable. To her dismay she was now learning that her law enforcement training counted for little when her own family was threatened.

  It still shamed Joanna to recall how completely she had fallen apart in those first awful minutes when she had come home to High Lonesome Ranch to find her dogs poisoned and her own home virtually destroyed by the frenzied anger of a drug-crazed woman. Joanna had surveyed Reba Singleton’s rampage of destruction with her knees knocking, her heart pounding, and with her breath coining inn short harsh gasps. It had taken time for her to separate the personal from the professional before she could gather her resources and go out and deal with the troubled woman herself.

  Driving from the ranch to the crime scene, Joanna once again had to make that tough transition. She had to put her own worries about Jenny aside and focus instead on finding Dora Matthews’s killer and Connie Haskell’s killer, knowing that once the perpetra­tor—or perpetrators—were found, Jenny—her precious Jenny—would no longer be in danger.

  An hour later, as she approached the clot of emergency vehicles parked along Highway 90, she felt more in control. Slowing down, she noted a road sign announcing that Sierra Vista was twenty-three miles away. As she made her way through the traffic backup, Joanna found herself wondering how it was that Dora Matthews—a thirteen-year-old with no driver’s license—had made it more than twenty miles from her foster home in Sierra Vista to here. She sure as hell didn’t walk, Joanna told herself.

  Minutes later, she parked behind Frank Montoya’s vehicle, a Crown Victoria that was a twin to hers. Deputies had coned the roadway down to one lane and were directing traffic through on that single lane while investigators clustered in the other lane and on the shoulder. Walking in the traffic-free left-hand lane, Joanna stopped beside Detective Ernie Carpenter, who stood staring off the edge of the highway.

  “Hello, Sheriff,” Ernie said.

  “What’s going on?”

  “The victim’s still down there,” he said. “Jaime’s just finishing taking the crime scene photos. Want to take a look before they haul her out?”

  The last thing Joanna wanted to see was a young girl’s lifeless body. “I’d better,” she said.

  Had she tried, Joanna probably could have seen enough without ever leaving the roadway. Rather than taking the easy way out, though, she picked her way down the rocky embankment. At the bottom, standing with her back to the yawning opening of a culvert that ran under the highway, Joanna looked down at the sad, crumpled remains of Dora Matthews.

  Totally exposed to the weather, the sun-scorched child lay faceup in the sandy bed of a dry wash. Her lifeless eyes stared into the burning afternoon sun. Her long brown hair formed a dark halo against the golden sand. She wore a pair of shorts and a ragged tank top along with a single tennis shoe and no socks. A knapsack, its contents scattered loose upon the ground, lay just beyond her outstretched fingertips. The ungainly positions of Dora’s limbs sickened Joanna and made her swallow hard to keep from gagging. Her twisted arms and legs lay at odd angles that spoke of multiple broken bones inside a savagely mangled body.

  Breathing deeply to steady herself, Joanna turned away and joined Frank Montoya and George Winfield, who stood just inside the opening of the culvert, taking advantage of that small patch of cooling shade. “What do you think?” she asked.

  “Looks like a hit-and-run to me,” Frank said. “I’ve had deputies looking up and down the highway in either direction. So far we’ve found no skid marks, no broken grille or headlight debris, and, oddly enough, no tennis shoe. Whoever hit her made no effort to stop. I wouldn’t be surprised to find we’re dealing with a drunk driver who is totally unaware of hitting, much less killing, someone”

  Like a drowning victim, Joanna wanted to clutch at the drunk driver theory, one that would mean Dora’s death was an awful accident. That would mean Jenny wasn’t really in danger. But Joanna didn’t dare allow herself that luxury. Instead, she turned to George Winfield.

  “What about you?” she asked.

  “You know me,” George Winfield said. “Until I have a chance to examine the body, I’m not even going to speculate.” He looked at his watch and sighed impatiently. “Jaime Carbajal drives me crazy. He’s slower than Christmas. Even I could take those damn crime scene pictures faster than he does.”

  It was Sunday. Joanna suddenly realized that George’s impa­tience with Jaime was probably due to the fact that this crime scene call was keeping Eleanor Lathrop’s husband from attending one of his wife’s numerous social engagements. Joanna’s simmering anger toward her mother, held in check for a while, returned at once to a full boil. Rather than lighting into George about it, Joanna simply turned and walked back up to the roadway. Frank Montoya, read­ing the expression on her face, followed.

  “Something wrong, Boss?” he asked.

  “My mother’s what’s wrong,” she said heatedly. “That little girl wouldn’t be dead right now if Eleanor Lathrop Winfield hadn’t opened her big mouth and gone blabbing around when she shouldn’t have.”

  “You don’t know that for sure.”

  “I don’t know it, but it’s a pretty fair guess. There are times when private citizens should mind their own damned business. Now, please bring me up to speed.”

  “Don’t be too hard on private citizens,” Frank counseled. “One of them may have just saved our bacon.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Someone found Connie Haskell’s car. The call came in from Tucson a few minutes ago.”

  “Where was It?”

  “At the airport in Tucson. Some little old lady, on her way to Duluth to see her daughter, made a 911 call on Saturday morning. She reported what she thought to be blood on the door of the car parked next to hers in the airport lot. The call got mishandled, and nobody bothered to investigate it until a little while ago. The woman’s right. It is blood, and it’s also Connie Haskell’s Lincoln Town Car. It’s being towed to the City of Tucson impound lot. I tried to get them to bring it down to Bisbee, but that didn’t fly. Casey Ledford is on her way to Tucson to be on hand when they open the trunk. She’ll be processing the vehicle for us. Not that I don’t trust the Tucson crime scene techs,” Frank added. “But they don’t have quite the same vested interest in that Town Car that we do.”

  “Well, at least we’re making progress somewhere,” Joanna said. “Is it possible Connie Haskell’s killer could be the carjacker after all?”

  Frank shook his head. “I doubt it. The UDAs who
were picked up in the other hijacked cars sure weren’t heading for any airport.”

  Joanna considered his answer for a moment. “All right then,” she said. “Let’s assume for the moment that whoever’s doing the carjackings isn’t involved with this. What do we know about Connie Haskell’s husband? Are we sure Ron Haskell is actually in residence at Pathway to Heaven? Or, if he was there, do we know if he still is?”

  “It’s called Pathway to Paradise,” Frank corrected. “And we think he’s there. The guy who runs the general store in Portal says one of the residents came in on Thursday morning and hit him tip for some telephone change.”

  “That could have been Haskell, all right,” Joanna said.

  Frank nodded. “But when Jaime and Ernie tried to gain admittance to Pathway, there was an armed guard who wouldn’t let them inside. He also refused to verify whether or not Haskell was there. He said all patient records are confidential and that only authorized visitors are allowed on the grounds. In the process he made it abundantly clear that police officers aren’t authorized under any circumstances.”

  “Unless they have a court order,” Joanna added.

  “Right.”

  “What about checking with the airlines to see if somebody named Ron Haskell flew out of Tucson between Thursday night and the time the car was found?”

  “I’m sure we can check on that tomorrow,” Frank said.

  Joanna thought for a minute, then made up her mind. “Let’s go then,” she said. “You’re with me, Frank. There’s no sense in our standing around second-guessing Jaime and Ernie. They both know what they’re doing.”

  “What about the press?” Frank asked. “They’re going to want a statement.” Frank Montoya’s duties included serving as the depart­ment’s media-relations officer.

  “For right now, forget them,” Joanna told him. “Until we locate Sally Matthews and notify her of her daughter’s death, you’ve got nothing to tell the media. Besides, the longer we keep Dora’s death quiet, the better.”

  “Where are we going then?” Frank asked.

  “To Paradise,” Joanna said.

  “But why?” Frank asked. “We still don’t have a court order. Judge Moore won’t be back until tomorrow”

  “We don’t need a court order,” Joanna said. “We’re not going there to question Ron Haskell. This is a humanitarian gesture—a matter of courtesy. We’re going there to notify the poor man of his wife’s death—assuming, of course, that he isn’t already well aware of it.”

  “What makes you think we’ll be able to get inside Pathway to Paradise when Ernie and Jaime couldn’t?” Frank asked.

  “For one thing, they weren’t wearing heels and hose,” Joanna said.

  Frank Montoya glanced dubiously at Joanna’s grubby crime scene tennis shoes. “You aren’t either,” he ventured.

  “No,” Joanna Brady agreed. “I may not be right now, but my good shoes are in the car. By the time we get to Paradise, I will be. Now how do we get there?”

  Pointing at the map, Frank showed her the three possibilities. Portal and Paradise were located on the eastern side and near the southern end of the Chiricahua Mountains. One route meant tak­ing their Arizona law enforcement vehicles over the border and into New Mexico before crossing back into Arizona’s Cochise County in the far southeastern corner of the state. Potential jurisdictional conflicts made that a less than attractive alternative. Two choices allowed them to stay inside both Arizona and Cochise County for the entire distance. One meant traveling all the way to the southern end of the mountain range before making a lung U-turn and heading back north. The other called for crossing directly through the Chiricahua Mountains at Onion Saddle.

  “It’s getting late,” Joanna said. “Which way is shorter?”

  Frank shrugged. “Onion Saddle’s closer, but maybe not any faster. It’s a dirt road most of the way, although, since there’s been no rain, we shouldn’t have to deal with any washouts.”

  “We can make it over that even in the Civvies?” Joanna asked.

  “Probably,” Frank replied.

  Joanna nodded. “I choose shorter,” she said. “We’ll go up and over Onion Saddle. Did Ernie or Jaime mention who’s in charge at Pathway to Paradise?”

  Frank consulted a small spiral notebook. “Someone named Amos Parker. I don’t know anything more about him than his name and that he wasn’t interested in allowing Ernie and Jaime on the premises.”

  “Let’s see if we have any better luck,” Joanna told him.

  More than an hour later, with the afternoon sun slipping behind the mountains, Joanna stopped beside the guard shack at the gated entrance to Pathway to Paradise. The shack came complete with an armed guard dressed in a khaki uniform who pulled on an unnec­essary pair of wraparound mirrored sunglasses before strolling out-side. Joanna rolled down the window, letting in the hot, dusty smells of summer in the desert.

  “Like I’ve told everyone else today,” he said. “We’re posted no hunting, no hiking, no trespassing. Just turn right around and go back the way you came.”

  Joanna noted that the guard was middle-aged, tall, and lanky. A slight paunch protruded over the top of his belt. As he leaned toward Joanna’s open window, he kept one hand on the holstered pistol at his side. A black-and-white plastic name tag identified him as Rob Whipple.

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Whipple,” Joanna said carefully, opening her identification wallet and holding it for him to see. “I’m Sheriff Joanna Brady,” she said. “Frank Montoya, my chief deputy, is in the next car. We’re here to see Mr. Parker.”

  “Is Mr. Parker expecting you?” Rob Whipple asked. “Don’t recall seeing your names on this afternoon’s list of invited guests.”

  Rob Whipple’s thinning reddish hair was combed into a sparse up-and-over style. A hot breeze blew past, causing the long strands to stand on end. The effect would have been comical if the man’s hand hadn’t been poised over his weapon.

  “Chief Deputy Montoya and I don’t have an appointment,” Joanna said easily. “We’re here on urgent business. I’m sure Mr. Parker will be more than willing to see us once he knows what it is.”

  Whipple’s eyes may have been invisible behind the reflective glasses, but Joanna felt them narrow. A frown wrinkled across the man’s sunburned forehead. “Does this have anything to do with those two detectives who were by here yesterday?” he asked “Like I already told them. This here’s private property. No one’s allowed inside unless Mr. Parker or his daughter gives the word. Mr. Parker’s last order to me was that no cops were to enter unless they had themselves a bona-fide court order.”

  “We’re here to speak to Mr. Parker,” Joanna insisted. “And since he’s not a suspect of any kind, we don’t need a court order for that. Would you call him, please, and let him know we’re here? You can assure him in advance that we won’t take up much of his valuable time.”

  “If you don’t mind, ma’am, you’d best tell me what this is in regard to,” Whipple countered.

  “I do mind,” Joanna replied with an uncompromising smile. “My business with Mr. Parker is entirely confidential.”

  Shaking his head, Rob Whipple sidled back into his guard shack. Joanna saw him pick up a small two-way radio and speak into it. What followed were several of what appeared to be increasingly heated exchanges. Finally, shaking his head in disgust, Rob Whipple slammed down the radio and then emerged from the shack, carrying a clipboard.

  “Miss Parker says you can go in,” he growled. “Sign here.” Taking the clipboard, Joanna quickly scanned the paper. Blanks on the sheet called for date, time of entrance, time of departure, name, and firm, along with a space for a signature. Joanna noted that the first date mentioned on that sheet was May 22. Several of the listed firms were companies that delivered foodstuffs and other supplies to her department back in Bisbee, but of the names of the eighteen delivery people listed, Joanna recognized no one. Nowhere on the sheet was there any listing for Constance Marie Haskell. Ernie Carpe
nter’s and Jaime Carbajal’s names were also conspicu­ous by their absence.

  “Are you going to sign in or not?” Whipple demanded. He was clearly angered by being countermanded. Joanna filled in the required information, signed her name, and handed Whipple his clipboard. As soon as she did so, the guard slapped a VISITOR sticker under her windshield wiper. “Wait right here,” he ordered. “Someone’s coming down to take you up.” Still brandishing his clipboard, he stomped back to have Frank Montoya sign in as well.

  It was several long minutes before a sturdy Jeep appeared, mak­ing its way down a well-graded road. The vehicle was totally enclosed in dark, tinted-glass windows that allowed no glimpse inside. When the door opened, Joanna expected another uni­formed guard to emerge. Instead, the woman who stepped out wore a bright yellow sundress and matching hat. The ladylike attire stood in stark contrast to the rest of her outfit, which consisted of thick socks and heavy-duty hiking boots. Punching the button on an electronic gizmo, she opened the gate. Then, returning to her vehicle, she waved for Joanna and Frank to follow in theirs. They drove up and over a steep, scrub-oak-dotted rise and then down into a basin lined with a series of long narrow pink-stuccoed build­ings complete with bright red-tiled roofs.

  The Jeep stopped near the largest of the several buildings, one that was fronted by a wooden-railed veranda. The wood may have been old, but it was well maintained with multiple layers of bright blue paint. Joanna’s first impression was that they had strayed into some high-priced desert resort rather than a treatment renter. On either side of the front entrance stood two gigantic clumps of prickly pear, both of them at least eight feet high. Joanna may not have heard of Pathway to Paradise until very recently, but it certainly wasn’t a new establishment. Those two amazing cacti had been there for decades.

  The woman in the yellow dress led Joanna and Frank up onto the veranda. Once in the shade, she removed her hat. Without the hat brim concealing her face and hair, Joanna realized the woman was probably well into her fifties, but she was tan and fit with a farce whose fine lines and wrinkles revealed a history of too much time in the sun. The smile she turned on her visitors, however, was sur­prisingly genuine and welcoming.