Smith's Monthly #6

by Smith, Dean Wesley

  She forced herself to take slow, deep breaths of the warm air and stay in detective mode.

  Andor banged on the screen door that hadn’t seen a screen in a decade, let alone paint. The rest of the house looked just as bad, and the windows hadn’t been cleaned in a decade. Moisture-stained drapes hid any look at the inside the house.

  Julia stayed behind Lott, since there wasn’t room for all three of them on the small concrete slab that served for a step up into the house.

  She and Lott both scanned the front of the house in both directions. Old training kicking in, clearly.

  After a moment a young man answered, maybe college age at most, swinging the door wide open.

  “Yes?” he asked, his voice deep and exactly like Stan’s voice.

  Julia gasped and stepped back. The kid in front of them could have been Stan when she met him. Same dark hair, same dark eyes, same voice. This kid had on a UNLV tee shirt and jeans.

  He was going to the same school as Jane, his half-sister.

  Lott glanced back at her, clearly worried at the sound and more than likely the shocked look on her face.

  “Your mother or father home?” Andor asked, flashing his badge.

  Julia noticed that as Andor introduced all three of them as detectives, he made sure that he flashed his gun under his jacket in the process.

  The kid stammered for a moment, then turned and shouted, “Mom?”

  A woman about Julia’s age appeared. She had bleached-blonde hair pulled back and was wearing a MGM Grand Hotel room service uniform. She was very thin and clearly smoked, since through the open door and hole where the screen used to be, a smoke-smell wafted over them.

  Andor again introduced all three of them as she stood there, nodding.

  “Are you Denise Miller?” Lott asked.

  “I am,” she said, nodding.

  “You own that van?” Lott asked, pointing at the van.

  “I do,” she said. “But it mostly goes only between here and MGM. It’s seen its day. Why?”

  “We’re actually looking for information about a man who used to drive it by the name of Stan Rocha.”

  At that, Denise Miller did something Julia would have never thought would be a response.

  Denise laughed. A smoker’s laugh, rough and ending in a cough.

  Then Denise Miller said something that sent Julia back one more step.

  “Someone finally dig up the body of that worthless husband of mine? After twenty-two years, it’s about damn time.”

  Then the kid beside Denise asked Lott, “You found my father? Really?”

  All Julia could do was gasp for the thin hot air and try to focus, as she had learned how to do over decades as a detective.

  In fact, without that training, more than likely she’d just be sitting on the sidewalk right now.

  She felt like doing that anyhow, but managed to remain standing and staring at a woman that had been married to her husband at the same time she was.

  And had a son with him as well.

  Luckily, that son-of-a-bitch husband of theirs was dead. He wasn’t the type to face this kind of thing easily, even though this was all his mess.

  And mess didn’t begin to describe this.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  September 2014.

  Just off the Boulder Highway

  Las Vegas, Nevada

  ANDOR, PUTTING ON HIS CHARM OFFENSIVE as Lott had seen him do many times over the years, asked Denise Miller if they could talk with her.

  She said sure. She said she had an hour before she had to be to work. She indicated they come in and took her son’s arm and pushed him back inside away from the front door.

  Lott stepped back and took Rogers’ elbow. Then he whispered to her. “You okay? You want to wait in the car?”

  She shook her head and took a deep breath, clearly finding a way to center and ground herself as all good detectives could do. “I’ll be fine,” she whispered back.

  Lott wasn’t so sure how fine she would be. She had just learned that her former husband had been a bigamist and had a son. That kind of news would send anyone spinning. And from what he could tell from Rogers’ eyes, she was clearly in slight shock.

  “You sure?” he asked.

  “Fine,” she said, her voice firm. With that she came back into her eyes and looked into his.

  He nodded. With that she squared her shoulders, took a deep breath, and stepped up and followed Andor into the smoke-smelling small living room.

  She stood to one side, leaning against the wall near the door as Lott followed Andor around and sat on the cloth couch that had seen far more wear than Lott wanted to think about as he sank down into the soft brown cushions.

  Denise sat in a big, worn recliner facing a large-screen television and the kid went over and stood behind her and to one side. She didn’t pop up the footrest, but instead sat almost sideways in the big chair, facing the couch.

  The room was cluttered with old music albums and a few other chairs covered in papers and a couple of shirts.

  The place was clearly lived in and seldom cleaned. The drapes over the two windows kept out any hint of sunshine and the smell of bacon mixed with the smoke smell.

  “We need some basics, first, if you don’t mind,” Andor said, putting his nicest smile that had a way of making people relax a little, especially women about his age. He took out a notebook and opened it to a blank page.

  Lott didn’t move and neither did Rogers. It was normal for only one detective to take notes in situations like this. This time it would be Andor. Lott was glad he was, since Lott was worried about Rogers.

  Denise smiled at Andor and said, “Sure, fire away.”

  Lott managed to not laugh. Andor could charm a woman without hardly trying, so when he turned it on, the women he interviewed seemed to just melt for him. And it certainly wasn’t because of his looks.

  “You were married to Stan Rocha from when to when?” Andor asked.

  “From the spring of 1988 to the day he disappeared in 1992,” she said. “I guess technically I’m still married to the jerk unless you find his body or something.”

  “I’m sorry to have to tell you, but Stan Rocha was killed in May of 1992,” Andor said fairly bluntly. “He was shot and left in a warehouse downtown.”

  “Shit,” the kid said, his voice rough.

  Denise just shook her head. “I always sort of knew he was dead, but didn’t hear about that. I don’t read the papers much. I figured one of his lost mines had killed him with a cave-in or something.”

  “Lost mines?” Andor asked.

  Lott was very glad Andor asked that question or he would have. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Rogers stand up away from the wall.

  “Sure, that’s all he did. He searched for lost treasure and lost mines. He called it his job and figured that any day he would strike it rich. He was sometimes gone for a month out there in those deserts. So he was shot, huh? And I assume, since you are here now, you never found out who did it.”

  Lott started to open his mouth, then closed it. He glanced over at Rogers who looked just as shocked as he felt. Why would an old buried treasure or lost gold mine get Rocha executed?

  “Anyone who would want him dead back then?” Andor asked.

  Denise shook her head. “He was a freeloader, of that there was no doubt. He hated anything that looked or smelled like real work. But he was a general nice guy, docile as a lamb, too much at times.”

  Lott again noticed that Rogers was nodding slightly. That was similar to some things Rogers had said about Stan as well.

  “Unless he ran across something in the desert that he shouldn’t have,” Denise said, “I can’t imagine why anyone would kill him. He didn’t gamble and had no money except what little I gave him to keep him going searching for mines.”

  “You have any of his research material,” Andor asked. “That might help us a lot discover what got him killed.”

  “Oh, sure,” Denise said. “B
oxes of the stuff that was in his closet, his desk, and mostly the van. We sold all his picks and shovels and stuff, but kept all the paperwork.”

  “So you ever try to figure out where he vanished?” Andor asked.

  Denise laughed. “He’d been gone almost two months when I really started to think something was wrong. When I looked at his paperwork, he was digging into lost treasures all over Nevada and into Idaho and Utah. No clue where he was. And he never told me much of anything, to be honest. Tight-lipped guy. When he didn’t come back, I just figured he either had bailed on me and his new baby, or a cave-in got him.”

  “Sorry to bring you the bad news,” Andor said, keeping his charm on full burn. Lott figured it was going to be lucky they got out of there without this woman offering to take Andor into the back room by the time he was finished. Over the years, Andor had had a lot of those offers, but never once took a woman up on it. He had been devoted to Helen, his now-dead wife, and never once gave any of the offers even a second thought.

  Denise just shrugged. “As far as we were concerned, he’s been dead a long time.”

  The kid nodded, but Lott could tell he was shocked. Before this visit he had a father lost in a mine cave-in, not shot in a murder.

  “If you wouldn’t mind getting all of Rocha’s stuff for us,” Andor said, smiling and standing. “We’ll let you get on to work.”

  She smiled and stood, giving the look to Andor that Lott knew was a “I’m single, call me” look.

  “Do you know where my dad is buried?” the kid asked.

  Lott nodded. “I’ll have the directions brought over.”

  Denise patted her son’s arm, clearly understanding that he was having some trouble with all this.

  “Come on, Roger,” she said to her son. “Let’s get your father’s stuff for these detectives.”

  Lott started to open her mouth, then said nothing. He turned to Rogers, who was staring at the kid.

  Then she said softly to Lott, “I’ll wait in the car.”

  After she was out the door, Lott turned to Denise. “I don’t mean to pry, but why did you name your son Roger?”

  “Stan said it was on old family name and I liked it,” she said. “Roger wasn’t even a year old when his father disappeared.”

  “Sorry, for the bad news, kid,” Andor said.

  “Just find who killed him,” Roger said.

  “That’s what we hope to do,” Lott said. “And we’ll keep you informed when we do.”

  “Thanks,” Denise said, leading them to a closet at the end of a narrow hallway where she had stored the six boxes of Stan Rocha’s work.

  Boxes that might just get them closer to who killed him. If they were lucky.

  And Lott knew at this point they were going to have to be very lucky.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  September 2014.

  Off the Boulder Highway

  Las Vegas, Nevada

  AS THEY CARRIED OUT THE BOXES from Denise Miller’s house to his car through the warming morning air, Lott decided he had a couple more quick questions to ask Denise.

  “Did Rocha have another car besides using your van?”

  “Sure,” she said, nodding as they reached the back of the Cadillac and he got the back gate open. “It was a 1985 Chevy Impala. Nasty green color. But he liked taking the van when heading out in to the desert for any kind of long trip. He said it allowed him to sleep in the van if he needed to.”

  Andor nodded to Lott at the answer to that question as he put a box in the back of the Cadillac and turned to Denise. “So he took the Impala the day he left here and never came back?”

  “He did,” she said, nodding as she took a box from her son and handed it to Andor to put in the back of the Cadillac.

  Rogers was turned around slightly in the back seat listening. Lott hoped she was doing all right. He would know soon enough, but he couldn’t imagine how she could be. Her dead husband had another family and had named his son after her. Didn’t get much weirder than that.

  “So do you know if he had any family other than the Rogers?” Lott asked.

  “Oh, sure,” Denise said, smiling at Andor. “His parents and brother live in Boise. I called them a few years ago to see if they had heard from Stan and they hadn’t. They were both still alive, as well as Stan’s brother, still in Boise. Now I know why they hadn’t heard from him. But honestly, he and his parents were never close, at least that’s what he told me.”

  “You got their number and names?” Andor asked, giving Denise his biggest smile.

  “Sure, come on back into the house and I’ll get it for you with the last couple of boxes.”

  Andor nodded and followed Denise and her son back into the house.

  Lott watched him go and hoped that Denise would let Andor out of there with his pants on.

  Rogers was shaking her head. She got out and moved around behind the Cadillac with Lott. He wanted to touch her elbow, but it was clear she had her footing again and was doing all right.

  Or at least as well as possible considering all the weird things she had just learned.

  “This is making no sense at all,” she said, glancing back to make sure Denise and Andor had not yet come back out of the house. “How come on the police report I was listed as his wife? And she was never notified?”

  “I honestly don’t remember,” Lott said. “But I agree, we need to find that out. It doesn’t make sense. Not a lick of sense, actually, since she was here in town.”

  At that moment, Andor and Denise came back out, both carrying another old brown file box.

  Lott took the one from Denise and put it in the back of the Cadillac while Andor did the same with the other box. They all just about filled the back area of the SUV.

  “One more question if you don’t mind,” Lott said, remembering one more detail they needed to know. “Did Rocha have any family in Salt Lake or Winnemucca?”

  Denise looked puzzled, then shook her head. “None that I knew of. He said his best friend, a woman by the name of Julia, lived in Reno. But he didn’t say much else beyond that about any other family or friends outside of Boise.”

  “Thanks,” Andor said, reaching out and shaking her hand and smiling, holding onto her hand just a little longer than he needed to, another of his many tricks. “I hope you don’t mind if I call you if we need more questions answered.”

  “Any time, detective,” she said, smiling back at Andor as Lott took Julia’s elbow and got her around to the back seat and then closed the door. She looked to be in complete shock, and Lott didn’t blame her at all.

  Andor waved at Denise from the passenger seat as Lott got them headed down the road.

  Then Andor turned back to stare at Rogers. “You all right?”

  “I’ve been better,” she said, her voice firm and clearly angry. “But I’ll be fine. The bastard’s been dead for over twenty years after all. Lucky for him.”

  “Yeah,” Andor said, turning around and giving Lott a high-eyebrow look. “Doesn’t’ make it sting any less.”

  “Got that right,” Rogers said.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  September 2014.

  Off of the Boulder Highway.

  Las Vegas, Nevada

  JULIA FELT LIKE SHE WAS IN SHOCK as Lott took them back through the subdivision toward her car. She wasn’t completely sure she could drive at the moment, and she needed to get her feet under her from all this new information about her former husband.

  She always knew she had never really known him, but now she was questioning everything about her own judgment.

  How could she have missed so much?

  What in the world had been wrong with her?

  She needed answers now a lot more than she had when she suggested they start down this road.

  Lott glanced back at her, then said, “Anyone up for some lunch?”

  “Wendy’s,” Andor said. “One about a half mile in toward town.”

  Rogers smiled. He was taking care of her.
And right now she really appreciated that.

  Lott laughed and then looked back at her. “You like Wendy’s hamburgers, Rogers?”

  “Not so much,” she said, “but I love their chicken sandwich and their baked potatoes. So it sounds perfect. Thanks.”

  “Wendy’s it is,” Lott said, nodding. He went past the parking lot with her car and turned onto the Boulder Highway.

  In ten minutes they were ordering and were shortly tucked off at a table to one side. The lunch rush was still a good forty-five minutes away, so no one was sitting close to them at all.

  She was very glad for this idea of lunch. She was already feeling better. Lott really seemed to already know her. And part of her really liked that, and that he cared enough to figure out something to help like this.

  They all made small talk for a few minutes while they dug into their sandwiches and hamburgers and fries. Cops were notorious for not eating well and clearly the three of them weren’t that concerned even after decades of being in the field. But she had to admit, Wendy’s food was one of the best in the fast food world. But it was still fast food.

  Finally Lott reached down and pulled up the yellow legal pad he had brought in with him. “We need to get a plan going on this.”

  “We’re making a ton more progress than I thought we would,” Andor said, also getting out his notebook. Then he looked at her. “Sorry, Rogers, for the hit this is causing you.”

  “Lott asked me if I wanted to open up this part of my past,” she said. “I know digging into cold cases is often like turning over a pile of rotted and molding boards and seeing what bugs scatter. So I can handle it. Just ignore me if I stagger for a moment.”

  Andor laughed.

  “Deal,” Lott said.

  “So what’s next?” she said before taking another bite of her chicken sandwich. She was surprised that it actually had some chicken flavor to it and a nice light pepper kick. She remembered it being good, just not this good. Not something you normally get in fast food.