Downfall

by J. A. Jance

  George Mason Winfield was a trusted colleague and friend long before he became my stepfather. Born and raised in Duluth, Minnesota, George was a physician who was helpless when it came to saving his own wife and daughter from the ravages of cancer. Those terrible losses, only a few years apart, left him mentally and spiritually depleted and unable to continue practicing medicine as he had done for many years. Instead, he sent himself back to school and trained to become a medical examiner.

  That’s how I knew him initially—when he hired on to be Cochise County’s ME. He was tasked with bringing what had been a shoestring operation into the modern world. He was easy to work with, didn’t put on airs, and was always patient in dealing with investigators. What I liked most about him—what I respected most—was the unwavering kindness with which he treated the bereaved family members he came in contact with every day.

  I have no doubt that it was that very trait—his unfailing kindness—that attracted my mother to him in the first place. George never had kids who attended Bisbee schools, but he was nonetheless a big supporter. When someone came up with the idea of holding a most-eligible-bachelor auction to raise money for a new sound system in the high school auditorium, he signed up right away, and who was it who outbid everyone else? My mother, of course, Eleanor Lathrop Winfield.

  It’s easy, sometimes, to think that things will always be the way they’ve always been. My mother had been a widow for so long that it was impossible for me to think of her as anything else. When I first heard about her winning auction bid, I sort of laughed it off. And then, when she and George started going out, I figured it was nothing more than a passing fancy. But it wasn’t.

  George and I were on our way to a crime scene, driving between here and Douglas, when he told me that he and my mother had eloped to Vegas a few days earlier. When I heard the news, I very nearly wrecked my patrol car. And that’s how George Winfield, the Cochise County medical examiner, became George Winfield, my stepfather.

  Surprisingly enough, our working relationship didn’t change that much, but my mother thought it was high time George quit working so they could enjoy their golden years—and that’s exactly what they did, traveling back and forth to George’s cabin on Minnesota’s Big Stone Lake in an RV. Knowing how soon those golden years would be cut short, I’m sorry now that they didn’t start enjoying them sooner.

  So what can I tell you about my mother?

  Joanna’s fingers came to a sudden halt. The clicking keyboard went ominously silent. What should she say about her mother? What was it Marc Antony had said about his pal Julius? “I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.” The truth is, people expected praise during funerals, but right off the bat Joanna could think of very little to praise. She and Eleanor had been at war for most of their lives together. Was that something that should be acknowledged or glossed over? And what about her brother—a child born out of wedlock and given up for adoption long before her parents married? If Eleanor had been overjoyed to welcome Bob Brundage into her life, didn’t he need to be publicly acknowledged, too?

  And then there was Joanna’s father’s long-term mistress, Mona Tipton. After George and Eleanor married, George had come upon years’ worth of journals kept by D. H. Lathrop. It was only through reading her father’s diaries that Joanna had learned about his relationship with Mona. Only days before his tragic death, D.H. had come down on the side of hearth and home, breaking away from Mona in favor of Eleanor and Joanna. His sudden death had left behind two terribly bereft women who continued to live in the same town and who, of necessity, occasionally encountered one another in public. Eleanor’s heartache over the loss of her husband had manifested itself more as anger than grief, while Mona, with no obvious justification for the depth of her loss, had simply suffered in silence.

  At last Joanna’s fingers moved again, more slowly this time and much more tentatively:

  My mother was a woman of passion. My parents met when they were in high school. It was a first love that wouldn’t be denied. Not even an unexpected pregnancy dissuaded them from pursuing that love. Their first baby, my brother, Bob Brundage, was given up for adoption all those years ago. He and his wife, Marcie, are here with us today, seated next to Butch and the kids.

  Once my mother was old enough to speak for herself, she defied her parents and married my father anyway. Her family immediately disowned her. I never knew my mother’s parents, and I can’t say that I’m sorry. As for Bob? When he came seeking his birth family a number of years ago, my mother welcomed him joyfully. He was raised by other people, good and loving people, but for my mother, he was always her firstborn, and for me he will always be my only brother.

  Once again Joanna’s moving fingers stuttered to a halt and then rested on the keyboard as she read back through the paragraphs she had just written. Yes, Eleanor had been angry when Joanna got pregnant with Jenny. Joanna could still remember that confrontation—the pinched expression on her mother’s white face; the cold fury; the angry words.

  But why wouldn’t she have been angry? Joanna thought. Eleanor must have seen history repeating itself. Only it hadn’t, Joanna realized suddenly and for the first time, because Eleanor Lathrop had seen to it. Her mother hadn’t stood in the way of Joanna’s marrying Andy. She had given her tight-lipped consent and had helped arrange what was regarded as a scandalous hurry-up wedding. Eleanor hadn’t forced Joanna to leave town for the duration of her pregnancy nor had she insisted that Jenny be given up for adoption. Given her own history, Eleanor could very well have done unto her daughter what had been done unto her. But she had not. The buck had stopped right there—with her.

  Joanna still couldn’t help resenting the fact that in the course of those many years, the ones before Bob showed up in their lives, her mother hadn’t once hinted to her daughter that she, too, had gone through the awful uncertainties of an out-of-wedlock pregnancy. But maybe that was her prerogative. People around town had been nice enough to Joanna and Andy and Jenny—at least to their faces. Eleanor, the parent left standing, along with Andy’s parents—Jim Bob and Eva Lou—were the ones who had been forced to face down the gossip mills. Thinking back on those times, Joanna could guess what was said: “What a shame Eleanor Lathrop can’t get that daughter of hers under control.” Or maybe some version of that old saw about apples not falling far from the tree.

  And what about Jenny? Right now, at age eighteen, she was already older than Joanna had been when her daughter was born. Jenny was young and naive in many ways, just as Joanna had once been young and naive. And that was the thing about being young—you did stupid things. Wasn’t that what this whole day of investigation had been about—unfortunate young people who had been caught up in emotions that had gone horribly and stupidly wrong?

  And if, as sometimes happens, another apple failed to fall far from its parental tree, what would happen then? If Jenny suddenly turned up pregnant and unmarried, how would Joanna react? Would she be more like Colonel Karenna Thomas or Allison Stock, or would she model her reaction after Jeremy’s—with no forgiveness in his eyes or compassion in his heart?

  It came home to her then, in a visceral way, that faced with that kind of turn of events, she could do far worse than follow in Eleanor’s footsteps—by soldiering on, by facing down the gossips, by doing what needed to be done, and by helping a pair of scared young people make the best decisions for their lives, their futures, and their baby’s future as well.

  Joanna realized that she would have to stand very tall and stretch very high to live up to her mother’s example in terms of steadfastness and strength. When it came to kindness? Well, maybe not that so much. And perhaps, considering her own hurtful past with her mother, she would be able to help Jenny while avoiding being as unwaveringly judgmental as Eleanor had always been. Maybe.

  Sudden tears clouded Joanna’s eyes, eventually dripping off her chin and onto the keyboard. “Sorry, Mom,” she murmured aloud. “I’m so sorry for everything.”

  Once her tea
rs abated, she took a deep breath and returned to the keyboard:

  My mother never really approved of my father’s entry into law enforcement—or mine, either, for that matter. I think her objections in both instances were founded on a very real fear of losing us.

  My mom was left to raise me on her own, and it wasn’t easy. The other kids I knew all had two parents. I had only one. I was angry about that, and I’m afraid I took it out on her—blaming her for my father’s absence, because she was alive and my father was dead. That wasn’t fair of me. If I could take any of it back now, I would, but what I can tell you is this—whenever the chips were really down, Eleanor Lathrop Winfield was always there for me and always in my corner—whether or not I appreciated it or even noticed it at the time.

  George and Eleanor died together last week when a troubled youngster decided to try out his sniper skills by shooting at moving vehicles on I-17 south of Sedona. They died as a result of injuries suffered in the incident. Subsequently the shooter died as well.

  But standing here before you today, I can tell you straight out that having them go together, almost in an instant, was and is a blessing. It spared them both the longtime pain and grief that accompanied the losses of their first spouses.

  Neither of them had to endure the long good-bye of a terminal cancer diagnosis or spend years alone after the unexpected loss of their beloved. At the time of the attack, George and my mother were together, doing exactly what they wanted, and traveling the country in that humongous RV of theirs. They were hurrying home to help host a barbecue planned as a send-off celebration for their granddaughter, Jenny, as she headed out for her freshman year of college.

  Jenny is here today, and we’ve decided as a family that a barbecue is still the order of the day. It won’t be at all the same kind of send-off party any of us wanted, but we’re having it anyway. It’ll be later on this afternoon and evening out at High Lonesome Ranch. You’re all welcome to drop by, and I hope you will. Butch and Bob have assured me that there’ll be plenty of food to go around.

  When Dennis, my son, heard we were having a party in honor of his grandpa George and grandma Eleanor, he wanted to know if there would be balloons. We told him, yes. We’re bringing lots of balloons, and you’re welcome to do the same.

  I think both George and my mother would approve.

  A ringing phone—her private landline—startled Joanna out of her fugue of concentration. Looking around, she was surprised to see that the sun was down and the desert landscape outside her window had gone dark. The lights were off in the reception room, which meant Kristin had left for the day without interrupting her.

  “Do you know what time it is?” Butch demanded. “As of right now, you’re officially late for dinner. Again.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said hurriedly. “I finally had a quiet moment to work on the eulogies, and I completely lost track of time.”

  “Come home now,” Butch said. “Everybody else is already here, but they won’t mind waiting a few minutes longer.”

  “I’m on my way,” she said, hurriedly saving the document, closing the laptop, and reaching for her briefcase. “I’ll be right there.”

  Once the laptop was stowed and the briefcase closed, she grabbed her purse and shut out the lights before stepping outside. She turned and started toward her car. She never got that far. When the Taser darts hit her in the back of the shoulder, Joanna had a split second in which she recognized what they were. She along with all her officers had been hit with Taser darts as part of their training.

  So she knew what it was as it happened, but that was all she knew. She had no remembrance of her purse and briefcase flying out of her hands and into the air; of falling flat on her back; or of cracking the back of her head on the sidewalk. That’s when everything went dark.

  CHAPTER 30

  JOANNA HAD NO IDEA OF HOW MUCH TIME PASSED BETWEEN THE time the Taser hit and the moment she came back to her senses. She was dazed and confused. She noticed the pain in her shoulder first—something was sticking her, and it hurt like hell. Then she remembered—she’d been Tasered, and the darts were still in her shoulder

  With that realization, her confusion evaporated. Oh my God, she thought in growing panic. What about Sage? Was she all right? Had she survived that terrible shock when thousands of volts of electricity had shot through both their bodies?

  Joanna knew that there were instances when Tasering had been blamed for inducing premature labor. Now she tried desperately to calm herself and slow her racing heart long enough to pay attention to her body. This was her third pregnancy. She knew something about labor pains, and there was nothing like that happening right now—no grinding pressure in her belly; no gush of water between her legs. But what terrified her even more was the fact that there was nothing happening down there at all—she sensed no movement from Sage whatsoever. In a matter of seconds, panic and despair changed to absolute fury and to a desperate need to take action.

  Forcing her mind back to the present, Joanna tried to sort out exactly where she was—behind a wire-mesh screen, imprisoned in what she realized had to be the back of a speeding patrol car. Her hands were cuffed behind her back, most likely with her own handcuffs. Her service weapon was missing from its holster, and so, no doubt, was her phone.

  Tentatively, she lifted her right leg a few inches off the floorboard, and a flood of relief washed through her body. With her pregnancy putting more and more pressure on the waistbands of her clothing, she had switched her reserve weapon from its usual place in a small-of-back holster to an ankle holster. Initially, walking with those extra twenty ounces attached to her right leg had been a problem, but then, like a prisoner forced to wear shackles, she had grown accustomed to the added weight. In his hurry to make good his escape, her unidentified captor had somehow overlooked the presence of her reserve weapon. Now, even though she couldn’t reach her new Glock 43, she knew it was there, while the bad guy did not. That gave her a small edge—an edge with six 9-mm hollow-point shots—and that was far better than no edge at all.

  It was dark, and Joanna was seated directly behind the driver. All she could see was the back of a head, outlined in the glow of the dash lights and the occasional headlights of an approaching vehicle. With no glimpse of a profile, she had no idea who her captor might be. He had to be a cop of some kind, obviously, or someone pretending to be a cop . . . Then she plucked a familiar voice out of the background chatter on a police radio—Tica Romero, her nighttime dispatcher. That awful moment of recognition sent a layer of gooseflesh skittering over her entire body. The guy wasn’t a pretend cop, he was a real one, and most likely one of hers. That led to the next question: Which one? Who would do this, not just to her, but to Sage as well? Who?

  “I was supposed to go straight home,” she said, finding her voice and forcing it to remain steady. “Butch is expecting me for dinner. He’s bound to raise an alarm. When they find my Yukon still parked behind the building, they’ll put out an APB. As for the AFIDs from your Taser? Once someone examines the microdots, those little suckers will lead straight back to you.”

  “Doesn’t matter,” the voice from the front seat said calmly. “It’s too late for that.”

  As soon as the man spoke, Joanna recognized his voice—including the unfamiliar hard edge that had been present the last time he had spoken to her. The guy behind the wheel of the speeding SUV was none other than Deputy Jeremy Stock.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” she demanded. “Stop this vehicle and let me out.”

  “Not gonna happen,” he replied, but even as he spoke, the vehicle slowed. For a brief moment, as he activated the turn signal, Joanna thought Jeremy had come to his senses and was going to comply with her wishes. Instead, he swung a fast left turn off Highway 80 and then sped south on the Warren Cutoff.

  “What’s too late?” she asked, going back to what he had said before.

  “It’s too late for me,” he said. “My life is over. What is it pe
ople say sometimes—something about going out with a bang instead of a whimper?”

  You’re right, buddy boy, Joanna thought. Life as you know it is over! But that’s not what she said aloud. Over the years she’d taken a number of hostage negotiation classes, without ever once thinking that at some time in the future she and her baby would be the hostages in question. Even so, the same rules applied: engage the guy in conversation, try to establish a connection, and get him to listen to reason.

  “What happened to Travis is not your fault,” she said quietly. “You can’t blame yourself for that, Jeremy, and you can’t blame Travis, either. All of that is on Susan Nelson’s head, and she’s dead.”

  “So at least I did something right,” he muttered.

  It was a throwaway comment, spoken under his breath and barely audible, and at first Joanna didn’t believe her ears. Had Jeremy Stock just confessed to murdering Susan Nelson? But what good would a confession do if she was the only one who heard it? It took a moment to come to grips with the implication of that offhand confession. He had told her because it didn’t matter what she knew or didn’t know. This had to be a suicide mission, plain and simple. Jeremy intended to take his own life and most likely Joanna’s as well. If that was the case, she could just as well go for broke. She had nothing to lose by trying to draw him out.

  “You’re saying you killed both of them?” Joanna asked. “Susan Nelson and Desirée Wilburton?”

  “Had to,” Jeremy replied nonchalantly. “I drove Susan in the back way, from the rifle range. I figured that made for the least chance of being spotted. I had no idea anyone else would be there. Susan screamed like crazy when I pushed her off the cliff. Pretty soon I saw a flashlight darting around down below and some other woman calling up, asking me what was wrong and did I need help? I told her I did. That my girlfriend had fallen and I needed help getting her down.”