Scratchgravel Road: A Mystery

by Tricia Fields

  “The cabinet that’s visible on the security tape? The one Brent got into?”

  “Yep. It’s a crystal that had been dissolved in water. It has no odor, but it’s toxic by ingestion. It’s what ate up Santiago’s insides.”

  Josie grimaced at the thought. “So, the Feed Plant is in the clear,” she said.

  Otto nodded. “Marta has Cassidy Harper in the conference room Leo was in. Marta’s already entered Leo’s laptop and the keys into evidence.”

  Josie patted Otto on the arm. “We’re close.”

  “By the time you finish with Cassidy I’ll have paperwork finished for tonight.” He smiled and sighed. “Home is on the horizon.”

  * * *

  The interrogation room smelled of sweat and day-old coffee, and the air-conditioning was on the blink. Josie figured it had to have been close to eighty degrees. Cassidy’s face was bright red from the heat and her lingering sunburn, and the curls around her face had turned to frizz. She looked surprised when Josie entered the room, and Josie figured she was waiting for the hammer to drop. Josie, however, was exhausted and too tired for anything but the truth. She pulled the chair out across the table from Cassidy and sat down.

  “I suppose you heard,” Josie said.

  “Leo’s in jail.”

  “What do you think about that?”

  Cassidy lifted a shoulder. “When I went to my parents’ house, after I called you? My dad asked me why I keep hooking up with rejects.”

  Josie smiled at her dad’s description, but Cassidy’s expression remained serious.

  “I keep thinking about that. It wasn’t that Leo was a bad guy.”

  Josie groaned and allowed her head to fall forward in frustration.

  Cassidy grinned. “Okay, I didn’t mean it that way. In the beginning he wasn’t bad. He was just miserable. And I thought, I can help him feel better. If he just had someone to believe in him, maybe he could get better. Feel good again. You know?”

  Josie stared at her, struggling to remain quiet.

  “But it didn’t really matter what I did, he was still miserable. I could make a nice dinner, dress up, or lay on the couch and eat potato chips. It didn’t matter. He could fake it, but I could tell, on the inside he still hated himself. And he probably hated me too.”

  “What now?”

  “I’ll move back in with my parents. Dad said he’d help me find an apartment as soon as we know Leo’s gone for good.”

  “There’s little doubt. Leo is gone. At least for now.”

  Cassidy nodded. “My dad’s all worried that he’ll come back for me after he gets out of jail. Like some stalker. I tried to explain to him though, Leo doesn’t care about anyone enough to stalk them. He’d probably be happier being the one stalked.”

  Josie smiled and thought it was one of the most perceptive things she’d ever heard Cassidy say. There was hope for her after all.

  * * *

  Josie finished with Cassidy and found Otto talking with Maria in the command center.

  “You get her straightened out?” he asked.

  A tolerant smile spread across Josie’s face. “I’ll keep my fingers crossed.”

  “What about her withholding information?” Otto asked.

  “The prosecutor would never press charges against her. I just hope she learns something out of this mess.”

  They fell into silence for a moment.

  “Are we done here?” he asked.

  Josie gave him a weary smile. “I sure hope so. Let’s go home.”

  * * *

  It was ten o’clock before Josie finally clocked off and drove toward home. The air outside was damp with the retreating rain, almost balmy. She rolled the windows down and allowed the night air to blow through the jeep. The forecast claimed the rain would subside for the next forty-eight hours, and she hoped it would be enough to allow the flood level in the Rio to drop. For now, it just felt good to be dry.

  She left the radio off, preferring silence, and considered her options for the night. She’d already canceled with Dillon. She could eat popcorn and zone out in front of the TV for an hour. Or, she had a new Harlan Coben book on her bedside table she could start. She briefly considered calling her mother, whom she hadn’t talked to in months, but discounted that idea.

  Josie craved time alone, but once she got it, the emptiness closed in around her, and the desire to be alone would be replaced by a deep sense of loneliness. She wondered what a shrink might make of her behavior but decided she really didn’t care to know.

  She turned onto Scratchgravel, heading toward Schenck Road, and saw the dark shadow of the watchtower in the distance. As she drove closer she spotted a car parked on the side of the road, in roughly the same place she had found Cassidy Harper’s car a week before. She felt a heaviness overtake her. She was too exhausted to deal with more drama. She pulled her jeep behind the car, her headlights revealing Teresa Cruz’s little white Honda Civic. Josie sighed heavily and turned her jeep’s engine off. She grabbed her flashlight, checked her sidearm, got out of the vehicle, and locked up. She shone her flashlight in and around the car and saw no signs of disturbance, and then picked up a single set of footprints in the wet sand leading out toward the direction the body had been found. A nauseating sense of déjà vu came over her.

  Josie called in her location to Brian, the night dispatcher, and took off walking toward the grove of bushes. It occurred to her that Teresa might be visiting the Hollow, the doper hangout, but the kids parked their cars in an off-road arroyo to keep from being seen. If she was partying, Josie assumed Teresa wouldn’t be naïve enough to park her car on the side of the road.

  As she walked toward the bushes she was thinking through the information that had been made public. Very few people knew the location of the body. She couldn’t imagine why Marta would have told her daughter, or what connection Teresa could possibly have had with the dead man.

  As Josie approached the bushes she stopped and shone her flashlight around the area, then walked back around to where the body was found.

  “Teresa?” Josie called.

  After several seconds she heard, “Chief Gray?”

  Josie directed her light over the large boulder and saw Teresa crouching beside it.

  “What’s going on?” Josie asked.

  Teresa was wearing dark jeans, a T-shirt, and her hair was pulled behind her head. She squinted into the beam of the flashlight and looked younger than her sixteen years, like a kid caught misbehaving.

  “Is there something you want to tell me?” Josie asked.

  “I don’t know.” Her voice was timid, not a typical response.

  “You know it’s not safe out here by yourself,” Josie said. “What are you doing out here?”

  She began to cry and slumped back onto the rock behind her. “I don’t know. I don’t even know who I am anymore.”

  Josie paused for a moment. She was mentally and physically exhausted and her patience with people was at a low. She refused to play word games with the girl.

  “You know what? I always thought that was a bullshit statement. I think that’s a way for cowards to get out of moving forward in their life. I think you know exactly who you are.”

  Teresa sniffed and wiped her eyes with her T-shirt.

  Josie pointed to the ground where the body had lain when Cassidy found it. “As far as you know, do we have the right person in jail for killing the man we found out here?”

  Teresa looked up suddenly. “I don’t know who killed him.” It was too dark for Josie to read her expression, but her words sounded sincere.

  Josie nodded, relieved. “Is there anyone else we need to question? Someone who was involved in killing that man that we don’t know about?”

  “I don’t know.” She hesitated again, obviously still confused by the questions. “I don’t think so.”

  “Do you have any additional information that would change the guilt or innocence of anyone related to this case?”

  Teresa
shook her head, as if finally understanding the line of questioning. “No.” Her response was resolute this time.

  Josie nodded then and looked out toward the Chinati Peak, in the direction of her home. She took a long while to gather her thoughts. “I don’t know any human being who doesn’t grow up making mistakes. Sometimes big mistakes. Someday, when you’re looking back on your life, you’ll probably decide those mistakes are what changed you. Made you a better person.” She glanced at Teresa. “Now’s your chance.”

  She nodded and stared at Josie as if preparing to tell her something.

  “The people who fail in life are the ones who keep making the same mistakes. They never learn anything. Don’t be that person.”

  The anxiety came back into Teresa’s expression and she started to speak, but Josie cut her off.

  “Look. Take your confession to your priest. Beyond that, it’s time to move on. I don’t want to see you out here again. You leave Enrico and this mess behind you.” Josie pointed in the direction of the Hollow and saw the surprise in Teresa’s expression. “Is that who you are? Are those the people you want to hang out with?”

  She shook her head no.

  Josie pointed to the place on the ground where the body was found. “Is that who you are?”

  “I know who I am. I know right from wrong,” Teresa said. Her tone was humble and sincere. “But when you start making bad decisions you start wondering when it’ll stop. Who says I won’t do it again?”

  “An old friend told me that scars are nature’s way of making sure we remember all the stupid stuff we do.”

  Teresa nodded and rubbed her thumb along her jawline. “When I was eleven, Mom told me I wasn’t allowed to play in the drainage ditch across the road from the house because it was dirty. It had rained though, and the ditch was full of water. Me and a bunch of kids went swimming in the ditch. I fell on a metal pipe and cut my jaw open. I ran home with blood dripping down my face. She had to drive me to the doctor. I had to get stitches.”

  “Did you play in the ditch after that happened?”

  “Never went back.”

  Teresa turned her head to the side and Josie could see the small line of raised white flesh along her jawbone. Josie watched the girl run her finger along the hard edge and they sat quiet for a time. Josie thought about her own scars, and whether she ever learned from them. Maybe Dell was right. Maybe it was fear that kept her from moving forward in life, and fear that made her keep repeating the same mistakes. Maybe it was time to have a little faith.

  ALSO BY TRICIA FIELDS

  The Territory

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Tricia Fields lives in a log cabin on a small farm with her husband and two daughters. She was born in Hawaii but has spent most of her life in small-town Indiana, where her husband is a state trooper. Her first mystery, The Territory, won the Tony Hillerman Prize and was named a Florida Sun-Sentinel Best Mystery Debut of the Year.

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  A THOMAS DUNNE BOOK FOR MINOTAUR BOOKS.

  An imprint of St. Martin’s Publishing Group.

  SCRATCHGRAVEL ROAD. Copyright © 2013 by Tricia Fields. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

  www.thomasdunnebooks.com

  www.minotaurbooks.com

  Cover design by David Baldeosingh Rotstein

  Cover photograph by Surkov Vladimir/Shutterstock.com

  ISBN 978-1-250-02136-6 (hardcover)

  ISBN 9781250022783 (e-book)

  First Edition: March 2013