The Trophy Hunter

by J. M. Zambrano

  But when Darren had looked into her eyes and murmured “Kendra Blair pales before you,” Jess had laughed out loud. “She sure does,” Jess had fired back. Kendra Blair, the black super model, had a white mother. Everybody knew this, but Darren never did seem to get the joke.

  It was only after their lovemaking—delayed by Jess’s laughter—and her return home did Jess find it odd. The coincidence of Darren’s bringing up Kendra, who was Linc’s long-time companion, practically her sister-in-law, disturbed Jess. What was Darren doing? Checking up on her while she checked him out? What the hell. She’d vowed then to use his body and not worry about what went on in his head.

  But then he’d dropped her like last night’s trash. She didn’t want to believe it. Was that the real reason her mind kept putting him in that HUNTER 2 truck?

  The thought that she could really waste time thinking about him in that context so jarred her that she was upon the turn-off to the Strickland residence before she realized it.

  Chapter 31

  After meeting with the security company and waiting while the technicians completed the repair work on her alarm system, Diana arrived at her office at ten-thirty instead of her usual eight-thirty a.m. The relief that a functioning security system was in place made the hours lost from work worth while.

  Her first order of business was to have Tamara run off a list of all her cases within the last five years. As she scanned the list, the names of a number of disgruntled people popped out at her. Not dissatisfied clients. Diana’s clients were generally pleased, sometimes overjoyed with the results of her representation. It was the folks on the other side, the sore losers, that might form a pool of prospects sick enough to put a camera in her bathroom.

  One in particular, Jurgen Warner, seemed a likely candidate. Jurgen had posted nude pictures of his six-year-old daughter on the internet. In spite of this, a Denver judge had granted him unsupervised visits with the child. Diana, representing his ex-wife, had succeeded in getting the matter heard by a different judge who reversed the order. Pressure from Diana had gotten the D.A. to reopen the criminal case against Warner and he’d ended up serving a term in Canyon City for molesting his girlfriend’s four-year-old child.

  Maybe he was out by now. Diana logged onto the internet, to see if Warner appeared on the sex offender list. She was interrupted by a buzz from Tamara. “Marge Lane on line one, Diana.”

  Marge was an Assistant D.A. whom Diana had worked with on a number of cases. Not Warner, however. “Hello, Marge. What can I do for you?”

  A smoker’s cough preceded Marge Lane’s request. Diana wanted to say something about that, but succeeded in keeping her opinion to herself. Marge was a good ally, but not a close enough friend that she could counsel her on her health habits.

  “I’m looking for a guardian ad litem. Are you interested?”

  “That depends. I might be. What’s the story?”

  “You heard about Duane Clifford’s plane going down a couple months back?”

  “Sure. Who hasn’t?” Diana recalled the Clifford matter. A wealthy corporate executive had died when wind shear tossed his private plane into a remote section of the Rockies, crushing the aircraft and its occupants like discarded soft drink cans. He’d left children by three wives. And wife number three appeared to be little more than a child herself.

  “Some of the adult children seem to think they’ve been slighted in his will. Our office has come into some information that they’re offering the widow an incentive that may not be in her children’s best interest. The presiding judge asked me if I could recommend somebody to represent these youngsters. I thought of you. Is this something you’d consider?”

  “I seem to remember the widow was a child bride herself. Now, with two pre-schoolers. Babies, actually.”

  “Actually, three babies, including the mother. But she has her own counsel. The minor children need someone.”

  “Let me take a look at the file. Can you send it over as an email attachment?”

  “Within the hour. Thanks, Diana.”

  “Glad to do it.”

  After finishing up with Marge, Diana returned to her search of the sex offenders list. She did discover that Warner had been released from Canyon City. But he was listed as residing in Durango—not a handy drive to Denver.

  Back to the client list, she found a number of others who might be mad enough and sick enough to have done the deed. But she felt herself ruling out Joe Flannigan. It didn’t seem to fit his style. Blowing up her house, maybe, but now she wasn’t even sure that she’d seen a silver truck that night. Her brain might have just filled in what she was programmed to see, not what was actually there.

  And as for Darren Rogart having any involvement in the invasion of her privacy, she could imagine no possible motive. In fact, as she mentally replayed her last conversation with him, her self-righteous condemnation of his views on his daughter’s ordeal—well, now her lecture sounded up-tight and prudish in retrospect. Even the lipstick writing on her bathroom mirror seemed to shrink in importance. Lori was emotionally wounded and insecure.

  On a whim, she picked up the phone and pressed in Darren’s number. At the sound of the fourth ring she realized she had no idea what she was going to say to him. When his answering machine picked up her call, she was relieved and hung up without leaving a message.

  Chapter 32

  The approach to the Strickland house was up a winding dirt road only wide enough for one vehicle. Jess swerved to miss a pair of magpies feasting on a rodent carcass at the side of the road. The only green in sight came from pine trees. In this mountain town, spring would be at least a month behind Denver in arriving.

  Jess checked her weapon before making the final turn that brought her up to the summit of the small hill on which the brown, one-story house sat. Its weathered cedar siding shouted neglect. Window boxes contained the dried remains of last year’s flowers that the wind and snow hadn’t managed to carry off. The vent of a wood stove sprouted from the roof, maybe the only heating. Maybe not. Jess spied a dirty white propane cylinder off to the south side of the building. But no sign of a vehicle of any description.

  As she pulled the Camaro up by wooden front steps, Jess saw a curtain move in the front window. When she got out of the car, she noted that the house was built about three feet off the ground. Probably no basement. Not in these rocks. Brown lattice stretched between the house and its granite base.

  Jess zipped up her leather jacket against the chill of the mountain air as she climbed the steps. There was no doorbell. She knocked briskly, glancing at the curtain that had moved. A dingy off-white, it now hung motionless. She knocked again.

  Like the house, the woman who answered the door was weathered. A tall blonde, her ice-blue eyes darted from under white-blond brows and lashes. Though she wore no makeup and the Colorado sun had obviously done a number on her complexion, Jess guessed she’d once been beautiful.

  The pale eyes now looked Jess up and down like they’d never seen a black person before. “Whatever it is you got, go peddle it somewheres else.” Penelope Strickland spoke the words with authority backed by an old Winchester that she held easily by the barrel.

  Jess backed up a step before offering up her best people-pleaser smile. “I’m not selling anything, Mrs. Strickland. I’m Jess Edwards. I have some news about your daughter.”

  Penelope slowly lowered the rifle to the floor. “Patty?”

  “You have more than one daughter?” asked Jess.

  Penelope shook her head. “Just Patty.” No trace of affection spilled through her tone.

  Jess looked past the woman, into the room. A bighorn sheep mount looked back at her from the opposite wall. As her gaze drifted back to the rifle in the woman’s hand, she asked, “Is that thing loaded, Mrs. Strickland?”

  “Damn straight it is. But I’m probably not goin’ t’ shoot you. Let’s see some I.D.”

  Probably? “I’m not with the police. I’m a private investigator workin
g for Darren Rogart.”

  It seemed to take the woman a moment to process that information. “Oh, well … a driver’s license oughta do it.”

  Jess removed hers and flashed it at Penelope.

  “Jessica Edwards,” the woman mumbled as she squinted at the document.

  Wow, it even reads. Jess was getting bad vibes, but physical danger from the woman wasn’t one of them.

  “So tell me what’s new with Patty. I didn’t know it was you that found her.” The woman’s voice sounded annoyed more than anything. She moved aside so Jess could enter. Then she leaned the rifle against a gun case.

  Puzzled at her unexpected attitude, Jess stepped inside and shot a quick glance across the rest of the room. From another wall elk and deer heads gave her the glassy eye.

  Blondie’s eyes narrowed as she continued before Jess could come up with an answer. “If she sent you to ask if she could come home, I already told Darren no way.”

  Aren’t you a real gem of a mother?

  “Didn’t Darren fill you in?” asked Jess, looking farther into the room. She could see dirty dishes on a countertop through an open doorway behind the woman.

  “Dare didn’t tell me you’d be showing up.”

  Dare? Oh, why should this surprise me? “Your daughter’s pregnant.”

  The woman’s shoulders sagged as she settled into a vinyl-covered chair. “I know. That’s why she can’t come back.”

  You are a real piece of work. Even I have more motherly instincts … scratch that …. “Don’t you want to know how your daughter is? Where she is? Aren’t you interested in your grandchild?”

  Blondie shook her head slowly, like it was too heavy for her slender neck. Jess watched the sinews in it tighten and release.

  “I’ve got enough on my mind with Larry dead. Patty brought this on herself.”

  Jess winced, then listened as Larry Strickland’s widow railed on. “She made a choice to get herself knocked up. Now she’s turned eighteen, she can damn well sleep in the bed she’s made. I can’t take care of her, much less a kid. Larry didn’t leave no insurance. I’ve got what you see around you. And the propane bill’s due.”

  “But, aren’t you excited about becoming a grandma?” Jess pasted on a big, phony smile, stubbornly trying to get a human reaction out of Penelope.

  “’bout as excited as I’d be over a case of the crabs.” Penelope showed a glint of tooth at the corner of her sneer.

  Jess shivered mentally, aware of another discovery. Absence of maternal instinct didn’t look so pretty on somebody else.

  As if as an afterthought Penelope added, “Dare didn’t tell me when she’s due.”

  “What exactly did he tell you?”

  Jess watched Penelope’s expression grow shrewd. Her denim eyes narrowed as she asked, “Didn’t you say you were working for Dare? One’d think you’d know … all he knows about Patty. Or Trisha as she calls herself now.”

  “Your daughter was prostituting herself down in Denver. Didn’t Dare tell you?”

  Penelope shook her head.

  “I guess he didn’t want to scare you.”

  “But you don’t mind.” Penelope removed a cigarette from a pack on the scarred table beside her. She lit it, took a drag and looked at Jess. “That don’t sound like Patty. And it don’t seem like she’d get many takers in her condition.”

  “Yeah. I understand the baby’s due soon,” said Jess.

  Blondie took another nervous drag on the cigarette, exhaled smoke through her nose.

  Something about the woman’s lack of comment made Jess wonder if she knew more than she was letting on. “Who’s the father?” asked Jess on a hunch.

  Penelope’s pale, dry complexion reddened suddenly as she stood up from the chair. “Larry’s dead. Can’t defend himself.” The words gurgled from her throat.

  “I didn’t say—”

  “You didn’t have to. I know what they’re sayin’ in town.” The woman’s eyes glinted maniacally. Nose to nose, she and Jess were almost the same height. “I’ve heard the whispers. After she found her daughter, they think Brandi Rogart killed Larry because of what she thought he done, an’ her old man is hiding her. Larry’s never gonna get justice.”

  Old man could mean husband or father. Just for the hell of it, Jess turned the question around to get Penelope’s reaction. “You think Darren is hiding his wife?”

  Penelope’s outrage was palpable. “Course not! Dare would never do that. Old man Flannigan’s who I mean.”

  “You seem to think your husband’s the victim here.”

  “He’s dead ain’t he?”

  “But how do you explain a thirteen-year-old stashed in his cabin?”

  “They all had keys to the goddamn cabin. You think a one of ‘em would admit it? Blame it on the dead man.”

  “Did you tell the sheriff about the keys?” asked Jess.

  “You bet I did. A lotta good it done.”

  Nothing in the reports. “Did Darren tell the cops about the keys?” Jess strove to keep her tone even.

  Penelope frowned. “I’m sure he must’ve.” She tilted her head back, as if trying to remember, and exhaled a plume of smoke into the stale air. “They’ve all had keys for years. Used our cabin for when the weather got bad and they didn’t want to come back to town.”

  “That’s why the chain,” Jess thought aloud.

  “Huh?”

  “The chain on the door was to keep out the men with keys. Except for the one who took the Rogart kid.” Maybe the woman was right. Maybe Larry was a victim.

  Penelope stubbed out her cigarette in a metal ashtray. “They’re never kids. Not from the time they sprout tits and start wigglin’ their asses.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “This’s a real small house, Ms. Edwards. She didn’t even bother to cover herself when goin’ from bed to bath.”

  Who’s she talking about? Not Lori Rogart. “Who’s the father of Patty’s child, Mrs. Strickland?”

  “Get out of here.” Penelope seized the barrel of the Winchester with her left hand and hefted the stock up to her shoulder with her right.

  She thinks it’s her husband. Jess backed away. “Before you do anything dumb, listen up. I just left the sheriff’s station. The deputy on duty knows where I was headed. So you may want to put that gun down.”

  Penelope lowered the gun, but still kept a loose grip on it.

  Jess edged toward the door, but she wasn’t quite through. She hadn’t even broached the truck thing. But the paternity angle was bugging her unexpectedly. “So you don’t think the father is Joe Flannigan?”

  “That old goat?” Penelope’s lips curled back in what might have preceded a laugh, but none followed.

  “You don’t share the theory about Joe and Larry exchanging Lori and Patty for sexual purposes?”

  Now Penelope did manage a dry laugh. “That’s a new one.” She shook her head, further puzzling Jess.

  “You never discussed such a theory with Darren?” Jess continued, softening her tone.

  “There wasn’t no exchange. I should tell this nice man his precious daughter’s a little hussy? He’d never—” She cut off the comment abruptly.

  Jess watched a blush creep up the woman’s neck again. He’d never pay you any more attention, would he? This was never about finding Patty. She smiled sweetly as she asked, “You and Darren…” She trailed off, giving Penelope the chance to frame the rest of the question.

  A new blush. “He’s been so helpful. Nobody in this town gives a rat’s ass. He’s the only one who cares.”

  He always is. “I know what you mean.” Jess couldn’t resist. Penelope’s eyes bugged for a second, then receded beneath the hooded brows.

  Jess had one more question, the one she’d come about in the first place. “How’d Larry and Joe end up with matching trucks?”

  “Huh?”

  “You know. Hunter one and Hunter two.”

  “Oh, the Rams.” Penelope shook her head.
>
  Duh.

  “They all had ‘em. Larry, Joe and George. The three of ‘em drew ram tags back in 1991. Then, they all got theirs.” She nodded at the ram mount on the wall. “Larry was so proud. Then they all went out and bought new Dodge Rams and vanity plates. They weren’t satisfied till they went and got their hood ornaments on eBay.” She smiled as if remembering better days.

  Jess moved toward the door. “Anything you want me to tell your daughter if I see her?”

  Penelope shook her head, pursed her lips and said, “Tell Dare I appreciate what he’s tryin’ t’ do, but like I said, she’s made her bed.”

  “But you can’t blame him for trying. He’s a real sweetie,” Jess baited.

  Blush and nod. “That’s Dare.”

  Her brain must be on dial-up.

  As she started down the steps, Jess looked again for a silver Dodge Ram … or a garage, even. Perhaps someone else was already filling Larry’s slot. And driving his truck.

  Penelope followed her as far as the top step, puffing on a new cigarette.

  “What happened to your husband’s truck?”

  “Sold it. Like I said, Larry didn’t leave much. Dare’s gonna pick me up somethin’ cheap I can get around in. He’s a sweetie, all right.”

  Jess grinned back at her from the bottom of the stairs. “You fill out a change of registration for the truck?”

  “How could I? Didn’t own the truck. Larry did. I got me a check. Truck’s gone. So shoot me.”

  Don’t tempt me.

  “Do you remember the name on the check?”

  “I remember it cleared the bank. Don’t care whose name was on it.”

  Why did I even ask.

  “You wanna know who really took the Rogart girl?” Penelope’s voice rasped down at Jess’s retreating back.

  Jess turned back slowly, not really expecting anything insightful.

  “Last July. We all got together at Darren’s for the fourth. She was only twelve then, but that little Lori sure knew how to flirt. His wife didn’t like it one little bit.”