Blanco County 04 - Guilt Trip

by Rehder, Ben

  Marlin, on autopilot now, told Sid he was looking for a woman named Jenny Geller or Gilmer.

  “I know a Jenny Geiger. She does some work for me now and then.”

  Marlin’s ears perked up. Was it the same woman? “Did you ever send her to work for a man named Vance Scofield?”

  “Name doesn’t ring a bell, chief.”

  “The job was selling tickets for a Rotary Club raffle.”

  Sid laughed. “Not one of my jobs, that’s for sure. I only deal in high-end appearances, minimum fee of a thousand bucks a girl. Mostly for the black-tie crowd. Benefits, fund-raisers, that kind of thing.”

  Marlin heard a car horn. He could picture Sid driving a sports car in downtown Austin, wearing pointy-toed boots and one of those trendy silk shirts buttoned all the way up to the neckline. Marlin said, “But Jenny could’ve arranged it on her own, right? Or through another agency?”

  “Yeah, I guess, if she’s lowered her standards.”

  “Is Jenny Geiger in her early twenties?” Marlin asked. “Nice-looking, maybe five-ten?”

  Sid snorted. “They’re all tall and good-looking.”

  There was a beep on the phone line. Darrell was attempting to come through on the intercom.

  “Brunette?” Marlin asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “Blue eyes?”

  “I don’t know, maybe,” Sid said. “Big jugs?”

  “Well, yeah.”

  “Sounds like the same Jenny. You want her number?”

  According to Sid, Jenny Geiger lived in an apartment on the south side of Austin. She was attending Austin Community College, studying marketing, paying her way through as a cocktail waitress, income that she supplemented by occasionally working for Sid.

  Marlin dialed the number and got an answering machine:

  Hi, it’s Jenny. I’m gone until Saturday, but leave a message and I’ll get back to you. Have a great day!

  As Marlin was listening to the recording, Darrell knocked and poked his head into Marlin’s office. There was a beep on the woman’s machine. Marlin waved the dispatcher in and said, “Hi, Miss Geiger, my name is John Marlin, and I’m the game warden in Blanco County. If you could give me a—”

  He stopped in midsentence. Darrell had just slid a note onto Marlin’s desk: Body found in the Pedernales.

  Marlin hung up without finishing the voicemail.

  12

  HE TOOK HIS truck north on Highway 281, Nicole Brooks riding along beside him. When Marlin had told Garza and Tatum the news, Garza had said, “Take Brooks with you. I want to see how she handles herself.”

  Now, in the truck, Nicole’s first words were “Got stuck with the new kid on the block, huh?”

  Marlin looked over at her. “Makes no difference to me. I imagine you saw plenty in Mason County.” He realized how silly that sounded. Mason County was as quiet and relatively crime-free as Blanco County. She didn’t seem to notice.

  They drove in silence through the tiny town of Round Mountain, then, just south of Marble Falls, he swung the truck south-east on Highway 71.

  “How long have you been in Blanco County?” Nicole asked.

  “All my life.”

  Marlin cracked a window. Only April, and already it was damn warm outside. Humid, too. “How about you?” he asked

  “Six weeks,” she said, sounding puzzled.

  “No, I mean, where’re you from?”

  “Born in Seguin, but I’ve lived all over the state. I was with the department in Mason County for seven years. Before that, my first job was up in Amarillo for five years.”

  Twelve years on the job, Marlin thought.

  “I’m thirty-five,” Nicole said, “if that’s what you’re wondering.”

  “No, I wasn’t trying—”

  “Let me ask you something, and please don’t take this the wrong way. Did I do something to piss you off?”

  The question caught Marlin off guard. “What? Not at all. Why would you ask that?”

  She seemed to consider her words carefully “When I first got here, for a week or two, we seemed to have a pretty good rapport. Joking around and stuff. But since then—it’s like you’ve been avoiding me.” She laughed. “Or maybe I’m just being paranoid.”

  He could feel her looking at him, but he kept his eyes on the road. She was damn sharp. “I think that’s probably it,” he said. The alternative was telling her the complete truth. That he had been very attracted to her right from the start. That he had been considering asking her out, until that day in the Super S, when he had stopped to pick up a few groceries. That’s when he had seen Nicole and Ernie Turpin shopping together. Ernie—young, single, and handsome—had already made his move.

  “So I haven’t done anything to get us off on the wrong foot?” she asked.

  “Absolutely not.”

  A mile went by slowly.

  “Okay, that makes me feel better,” Nicole said.

  Another mile, and then she said, “Heard you went to Dallas.”

  “Yeah, last weekend.”

  “You have a special friend up there?” She was using the same tone she had used when he’d been holding Stephanie Waring’s photograph. Teasing him.

  “Well…no. Kind of. Long story, but I was up there for a wedding.”

  Nicole gave him an appraising look but didn’t respond.

  Ten minutes later, now in western Travis County, Marlin turned left on FM 2322, the road to Pace Bend Park (known to longtime locals as Paleface Park) on Lake Travis.

  There was a quiet little community out here called Briarcliff, with an eclectic variety of homes nestled in cedars and live oaks, some of the houses widely spaced along a ragtag nine-hole golf course once owned by Willie Nelson. Marlin seemed to remember that Willie still owned a recording studio out here somewhere. Or maybe he sold it. Hard to keep track, considering Willie’s troubles with the IRS back in the nineties.

  Three miles later, near the entrance into Briarcliff, Marlin went left on Old Ferry Road, which paralleled several miles of the Pedernales as it made a few more abrupt twists before it reached the lake.

  Down in this quiet rural area—that’s where the body was found. Stuck under a fishing dock, according to Mike Werner, one of four game wardens in densely populated Travis County. Marlin had known Werner since their days together at the academy.

  Marlin matched a mailbox to the address he was given and turned down a winding dirt driveway. He followed it for two hundred yards and came to a rustic stone cabin sitting on a bluff above the river. No deputies’ cruisers or other county vehicles on site yet, just a small sedan, probably the homeowner’s.

  Marlin and Nicole stepped from his truck and made their way to the back of the house, where they could see down to the river. Below, two figures were on the riverbank, standing beside a body on a tarp. A Parks and Wildlife boat was tied to a small dock.

  Marlin led the way down the heavily treed slope on a rugged switchback path where the dirt was packed hard and worn smooth, dry as a bone, even after the rain earlier in the week. Mike Werner saw them coming and met them at the foot of the path. Werner was a slender man with a rambunctious sense of humor, but today he looked stone-faced.

  “Thanks for coming, John,” he said, extending his hand. He introduced himself to Nicole. “I’m pretty sure it’s your man,” he said to both of them. “Judging by the height, weight, age, all that. No other missing-persons reports in the area, so…”

  The landowner, a paunchy, bespectacled man in his fifties, appeared at Werner’s elbow. He was pale. “Are you all done with me for now?” he asked. “I’d just as soon go back up to the house.”

  “That’s fine, Mr. Ritts,” Werner responded. “Thanks for calling it in. There’ll be some deputies here soon, some detectives, too, and someone from the medical examiner’s office. They’ll have some questions.”

  Ritts nodded and headed up the hill.

  As the men walked toward the corpse, Marlin saw that Ritts had covered the head w
ith a towel. The rest of the body—stripped of clothes by the violent floodwaters—was heavily scratched and abraded, coated with a thin layer of mud. Werner said, “Mr. Ritts pulled him out of the water. I haven’t touched him. No signs of trauma that I could see, beyond what the river did to him.”

  Werner bent and removed the towel that was covering the head. Marlin found himself staring at the face he was having trouble remembering just a few days ago. He’d seen pictures since then, though, and even with the bloating and the beginnings of decomposition, it was clearly Vance Scofield.

  Driving the Honda, with Stephanie sleeping again, Lucas was able to calm down and think a little more clearly. Now that the damn Ecstasy had cleared out of his system.

  It made perfect sense that the cops would try to contact Stephanie. No matter where they thought she went or what she was supposedly doing, they’d want to talk to her. After all, she dated Vance. They’d be able to find that out pretty quickly. So that’s probably all it was—they wanted to question her. She probably wasn’t a suspect at all.

  But what would happen when she didn’t come home? What would they think then? Would they think she did it?

  All of this mess for a scumbag like Vance.

  Lucas remembered a conversation he’d had with Vance late one night, the only time he’d really ever talked with the guy one on one. He and Stephanie had partied with Vance in Austin, and afterward they’d crashed at his place. Well, Stephanie had crashed, but Lucas and Vance had stayed up until sunrise drinking.

  “I’m thinking about staying with Stephanie for a little while,” Lucas had said, testing the waters. “Until I can find a cheaper place to live. Place I’m living at now, the rent’s too high.”

  “Yeah, really?” Vance answered. “That’s cool.” Then his eyes narrowed. “You’re not banging her, are you?”

  Before Lucas could say, Hey, we’re just good friends, Vance let out this big laugh, letting Lucas know he was only kidding. “Just fucking with you, dude,” he said.

  Har de har har.

  At the time, it made Lucas want to punch Vance in the face.

  Now it just made him feel queasy.

  13

  IT WAS ABOUT eight o’clock that night when she came into the bar, and for a second, Red thought his knees were going to buckle. He got a funny feeling in his belly and he had to lean on his pool stick for support.

  She was just as pretty as he remembered—hair the color of smoked sausage, wearing an oversized Dallas Cowboys T-shirt, stirrup pants, plenty of makeup to cover the fine dark hairs that grew along her jawline. She was a sight for drunk eyes.

  Then she passed right by the pool table, looking for a place to sit.

  That’s when Red realized it wasn’t Loretta at all. The gal looked almost exactly like his wife or ex-wife or whatever she was, but it simply was not her.

  About then, Billy Don slammed the eight ball into the corner pocket and looked up to gloat, but Red couldn’t take his eyes off the woman, now seated at the bar.

  Billy Don saw who he was looking at and said, “Hey, Red.”

  Red said, “Yeah, I know.”

  Billy Don stood next to him. Red glanced over and saw a look of total disappointment on the big man’s face. “Ain’t her, is it?” Billy Don asked.

  “Nope.”

  “Looks like her, though.”

  “Sure enough does.”

  This woman had a different way of sitting. Loretta was always hunched over, like the world had beaten her down. This new gal sat up straight, with her chin out, like she could handle anything that came her way.

  “Just as purty,” Billy Don said softly.

  “You think?”

  “Don’t you?”

  Just then, the woman looked up from her beer and scanned the smoky room. Her eyes came to rest on Red and Billy Don, and she gave them a knowing smile, the kind that said, Yeah, I’ve met a million guys just like y’all. Then she looked away and lit a cigarette.

  “Damn sure is,” Red said.

  Billy Don broke the moment, digging into his pocket, coming out with some quarters. He held them out to Red. “Loser racks.”

  Red should’ve known what Billy Don was up to. He should’ve remembered that the loser pays, too, and that Billy Don wouldn’t normally part with that money any more than he’d part with a bucket of fried chicken.

  But Red wasn’t thinking clearly. He took the coins and bent down to insert them into the little slots. He pushed the tray in and the balls came tumbling down into the trough at the end of the pool table. When Red stood up, he realized his mistake.

  Billy Don was already across the room, leaning against the bar, talking to the gal who looked just like Loretta.

  Lucille saw the two scruffy pool players checking her out, and she knew they’d be heading her way shortly. Sure enough, less than a minute later, she heard a voice at her elbow.

  “Howdy. My name’s Billy Don.”

  She turned to look, and Lord, the man was as big as an outhouse. The smell, to be honest, came pretty close, too. She gave him a cool nod, hoping he’d take the hint and leave her alone.

  But he didn’t.

  “Buy you a drink?” he asked. “What you got there, a beer?”

  A real rocket scientist.

  “It don’t look like vodka, does it?” she said.

  Billy Don laughed and sat on the stool to Lucille’s left. “No, ma’am, it don’t. Hey, Sylvia,” he called to the bartender, “can we get a couple beers?”

  Now the other pool player—the smaller one—showed up, nestling in to Lucille’s right. “This big ol’ boy bothering you, miss? ‘Cause if he is, I’ll make some calls and get his parole revoked.”

  “He’s just funnin’ with you,” Billy Don said. “You been skipping your AA meetings, Red?”

  “That’s hilarious, Billy Don, but I’m afraid your medication ain’t doing its job.”

  “Speaking of medication,” Billy Don said, “how’s that Viagra working out?”

  “Whyn’t you call your mama and ask her?”

  “I think I’d have to call your mama too for a full report.”

  Lucille didn’t know if this was some stupid routine the two had worked out, thinking it was cute, or if they really were this annoying.

  Sylvia slid two large mugs of beer onto the bar, and Billy Don removed his wallet, which was chained to his belt. But the smaller one beat him to it, plunking a twenty down. “One for me, too, Sylvia. And keep the change, darlin’.” He returned his attention to Lucille. “Now where were we?”

  “You was telling us how you can’t get it up too good,” said Billy Don.

  “Only when the wind blows,” said Red.

  “Speaking of blowing—”

  Lucille held her hands up and said, “If y’all keep it up, I’m gonna have to smack you both. Honestly, you’re giving me a headache. Now, if you wanna drink some beer, sit down and do it quietly. But if you’re gonna keep this bullshit up, do me a favor and take it outside.”

  There was a pause, then the big one said, “I think I’m in love.”

  “I saw her first,” replied the smaller one. He leaned in and said, “I’m Red O’Brien. Who might you be?”

  When Marlin got home, he called some of the volunteers from the Blanco County Search and Rescue Team to let them know Scofield had been found. Then he called David Pritchard, figuring the Rotarian had probably already heard anyway. News crews had shown up at the scene just minutes after the Travis County homicide detectives, shooting footage from boats on the Pedernales River. Bill Tatum had sent Ernie Turpin to inform Scofield’s father hours earlier, so Marlin felt comfortable relaying the facts to Pritchard. The homicide team had examined the scene and the body carefully, and the unofficial conclusion, pending the Travis County medical examiner’s report, was that it had been an accident.

  “Christ, what a waste,” Pritchard said. “I guess he drowned, then?”

  “Looks that way, but I can’t say for sure at this point
. Not until the autopsy.”

  “Now I feel kind of stupid,” Pritchard said. “Implying that he might’ve taken off in the car. The drugs and all that.”

  “No, you did the right thing,” Marlin said. “Don’t doubt yourself for a second.”

  Pritchard sighed. “I can’t figure how Vance got himself into trouble like that. He’s lived along that river long enough to know how dangerous it is.”

  Not if he was as high as a kite, Marlin thought. Marlin figured the autopsy would show that Scofield had drowned, but it would be several days before toxicology reports revealed whether he had been doped up at the time. “People make mistakes,” he said. “The water can be hard to judge, especially at night.” In Marlin’s experience, it was the people who crossed through high water on a regular basis who most often got swept away. They became comfortable taking risks until they took a fatal one.

  Pritchard said, “I don’t mean to be a complete jerk asking this right now, but any clue about the Corvette?”

  That was the one thing that still bothered Marlin. How had the Corvette disappeared? He supposed it was still possible that Scofield had moved it to another location and Pritchard simply didn’t know it.

  But it also nagged at him that Stephanie Waring happened to leave town at the same time the car went missing. Then again, according to Nicole, Stephanie couldn’t drive a stick shift. “We talked to the dealership,” Marlin said, “and now we’re listing it as stolen.”

  “Aw, crap,” Pritchard muttered. “That’s really gonna screw up our ticket sales.”

  Marlin started to say good-bye, but instead he said, “Hey, tell me about this little hunting expedition out at Chuck Hamm’s place.”

  Pritchard groaned. “Boy, was that a mess. I shot the wrong deer, I guess, and Chuck was really mad about it.”

  “Mad at you?”

  “At Vance. He was sitting in the blind with me and was supposed to tell me which deer to shoot. He pointed one out, but I guess I screwed up and shot the wrong one. I tried to tell Chuck it was my fault, but he kept blaming Vance. Weird, huh?”