Dead Wrong Read online

  Meg's eyes narrowed. Was there some history here of which she was unaware? Damn it, had the young Trina Giallombardo had a crush on Will? If so, should she be jettisoned from the case?

  But they didn't know that this had anything to do with Will.

  Please God.

  "I came out here when I was a teenager," she heard herself say. She was distantly aware that the other two were gaping. "With Will's father."

  After what she realized was an appalled silence, Giallombardo said, "Um…I suppose almost everyone in Elk Springs has."

  The coroner looked up at Meg with shrewd eyes. "You sure Mendoza is still locked up?"

  "We should have been informed if he came up for parole." Meg stared down at the body. "Let's roll her."

  Between rigor mortis and freezing, the job wasn't easy. Despite the cold, Giallombardo looked green by the time they were done.

  The backside revealed lividity and more bruising, nothing else.

  Meg raised her voice. "Let's bag her. People, has anyone found anything?"

  General shakes of the head. No tracks, no discarded clothing, no convenient cigarette butts that didn't look as if they'd been left last summer. Truthfully, Meg hadn't expected anything different. The unknown subject—or UNSUB, to cops—had driven out here with the dead woman likely in his trunk. Maybe at night, maybe this morning. He'd carried her a few feet up the slope of the lava cone, splayed her limbs, adjusted the jockstrap like a man adding a flourish to his signature and left.

  How in hell had he known every detail? Had he seen the body? Could there have been two murderers? Had he stumbled on the body before the cops found it? Or, she thought with a jolt, was this killer a cop?

  And, whoever he was, why had he waited six years to imitate the previous rape and murder?

  "Lieutenant?"

  She knew on one level that Sanchez was talking to her, but still she stared down at the body and asked herself the one question she'd been avoiding.

  What if Ricky Mendoza's protestations of innocence were real? What if he didn't do it?

  And what if the real killer had been shocked by what he'd done? What if he'd been able to suppress his sexual perversion for six years—until something triggered his rage?

  Something, say, like the fact that Will Patton had just moved back to Elk Springs?

  Common sense revolted. No! Damn it, they had Mendoza cold. She'd been sorry, because she liked the kid, but he had to have been the killer. She was letting a mother's fear intrude, and if she couldn't think with the cool logic of a cop instead, she'd be the one who had to step back from this investigation.

  "Sorry," she said, forcing herself to look up. "What's your question?"

  * * *

  "HEARD ANYTHING LAST NIGHT? Or early this morning?" As withered as the winter sagebrush, the old woman stared suspiciously through the six-inch gap between door and frame. Either she was worried about keeping the heat in, or this intruder out.

  "Yes, ma'am," Trina said politely.

  "We're to bed by nine o'clock."

  Trina wouldn't have minded being invited inside. She was freezing on the doorstep with the sun sinking fast. This was the fourth house she'd stopped at, and at only one had she been asked in and offered coffee. The few swallows she'd managed were a distant, tantalizing memory.

  She strove for a conversational tone. "You must not get much traffic out on Butte Road at night."

  The old woman looked at her as if she were simple. "Saturday nights, it's like living next to Highway 20. All those young hands that work the ranches, they come hootin' and hollerin' by, two, three in the morning. Lean on their horns, stereos blasting to shake the windows. They even race sometimes." Her mouth thinned. "They turn onto our property, we get out the shotgun."

  Trina considered mentioning that the law did not entitle a property owner to shoot someone for turning into his driveway.

  Instead, she surreptitiously wriggled her fingers inside her gloves to see if they still functioned and said, "Last night wasn't Saturday."

  "Some of them get drunk other nights, too."

  Heaven send her patience.

  "I'm sure they do." She shook her head as if scandalized. The old biddy. "Was last night one of those nights? You hear anybody heading home late?"

  "Might have."

  "Can you recall what time that was?"

  Mrs. Bailey's lips folded near out of sight, as if it pained her to give a straight answer. Finally she sniffed. "Two-thirty-five. On a Thursday night. Then the fool turned around and went back to town. Bars shouldn't be open that late."

  Despite her surge of excitement, Trina pointed out, "Someone might have been giving a friend a ride home."

  Silence, followed by a grudging, "Might have been."

  "Are you certain you heard the same vehicle coming and going?"

  "Course I am! Wouldn't have said it if I hadn't meant it."

  Maybe it was perversity that had her suggesting, "One pickup truck sounds an awful lot like another."

  The woman didn't like explaining herself. After crimping her lips and thinking about it, she said, "This one sounded like my Rufus out there. Don't bark often, but when he does, you best jump."

  "A deep, powerful engine."

  "Isn't that what I said?"

  Her own lips were going numb. "Did you notice when the truck came back?"

  "Didn't look at the clock." She chewed it over. "Twenty minutes. Half hour."

  The timing was just right.

  "Mrs. Bailey, do you think you've heard this particular engine before?"

  "Can't say."

  "Would you recognize it again?"

  "Might."

  Trina gave her most winning smile, which considering she couldn't feel most of her face might look more like a death mask. "You've been a great help, Mrs. Bailey. We may need to speak to you again. In the meantime, I appreciate your cooperation."

  With no "You're welcome," or even a "Mind you don't slip on the steps," the old lady slammed the door shut in Trina's face. A dead bolt lock thudded home.

  If she wasn't so darn cold, Trina would have laughed. She hurried to the Explorer she was driving, started it and cranked up the heat. Intermittent shivers wracked her. But at least she'd learned something that might be useful, she thought with a small glow of triumph. Useful enough, maybe, that Lieutenant Patton would let her keep working the case.

  She couldn't believe her luck to have been singled out today, and by Lieutenant Patton, of all people. Trina had become a cop because she wanted to be just like Meg Patton and her two sisters, the one Elk Springs police chief, the other an arson investigator. From the time she was eleven or twelve she'd read about their exploits in the newspaper, and since Will went to the high school people had talked, too. Lieutenant Patton had been the county Youth Officer back when Trina was in high school, so she'd talked at assemblies or in Trina's classes a couple of times a year. Trina thought she was amazing—beautiful and brave and smart. Everything Trina wanted to be.

  In her interview for the promotion to detective Trina had almost blurted out something about how much she'd always admired the lieutenant. Thank goodness she'd been able to stop herself. Even if it was true, it would have sounded like the worst brown-nosing.

  Now here she was, hardly a month later, partnered with her. Despite her shivers, Trina still marveled. Junior partner, of course. The lieutenant had gone back to the station to find out whether the killer from six years ago had somehow gotten out of prison and also to try to discover whether other jurisdictions had had murders with this same M.O. Lucky Trina had been assigned one patrol officer to help her canvass the houses along Butte Road.

  But it had to be done, and she was pretty excited to have actually learned something. Maybe. Unless the deep-throated pickup or SUV had just been dropping some drunk ranch hand back at the Triple B or the Running Y. Except she'd stopped at the Triple B herself and no ranch hands had admitted to being out late last night. She'd find out from Officer Buttram whether
the same was true at the Running Y. Those were the only two working ranches past the Bailey's place.

  An hour and a half later, she hadn't learned a thing. Buttram and she agreed to meet back at the station.

  There, he shook his head. His ruddy face glowed. "Bitch of a night."

  "I would have traded my right arm for a thermos of coffee."

  "With a dash of whiskey." He took off his sheepskin-lined gloves. "Nobody heard nothing."

  "I found somebody who did. A Mrs. Bailey."

  Her sense of triumph dimmed at the sight of his face.

  "There's a nasty one."

  "She calls in complaints?"

  "Once a month or so." He shook his head. "Hates the neighbors, hates teenagers, doesn't much like cows. You believe her, somebody is always being noisy or trespassing."

  Noisy? "I don't remember a house near hers."

  "She has damn fine hearing."

  Trina quizzed him about who he'd talked to at the Running Y, then went to Lieutenant Patton's office.

  Through the glass inset, she saw the lieutenant lift her head at the sound of the knock. She waved Trina in.

  "You look cold."

  "Yes, ma'am."

  Her superior scowled. "Quit ma'aming me."

  "Sir…"

  "That isn't any better. You make me feel old."

  "Lieutenant."

  "A slight improvement." She sighed. "I suppose that was an exercise in futility?"

  "Actually, I did get one report of unusual traffic."

  Brows rose. "Really?"

  Trina repeated what Mrs. Bailey said. "I understand she's something of a crank…."

  "She?"

  "Mrs. Bailey?"

  "Not Luella Bailey! She's a thorn in the side of anyone who has dealings with her. Daniel—my brother-in-law—counts his blessings daily that his place isn't beside hers. Pete Hardesty of the Running Y gets hell every time a steer finds a fence break."

  Crushed and trying to hide it, Trina asked, "Does that mean she's not reliable?"

  "Hmm." Meg Patton rubbed her chin as she thought. "Well, she's not delusional. When she says a steer is eating her dahlias, by God there it is. Kids do drag race out on Butte Road. So…no. She might actually be a good witness. Most folks out there wouldn't pay any mind to a passing vehicle. Luella, though, lives to find grievances." Her gaze sharpened. "Tell me again what she said."

  Trina did.

  "Twenty minutes to half an hour. That would be about right."

  Trina nodded at the phone. "Did you learn anything?"

  "Ricky Mendoza is right where he should be. That lets him out. No sign of Amy's Kia. I sent someone to check her apartment complex and the lots outside the brewhouses and restaurants that seem like the most obvious choices. Otherwise, I've put out calls. Any kind of match through VICAP will take time." The federal database was a godsend to local law enforcement. Unfortunately, it had limitations; many small jurisdictions didn't input crimes.

  Trina nodded.

  "I've already talked to Amy Owen's parents. They still live here, only a few blocks from where I grew up in the old town."

  "She hadn't married, then?"

  "Married and divorced. The ex is next on my list."

  "He's around?"

  The lieutenant consulted her notes. "Doug Jennings. He's a ski bum, according to the parents. Amy wanted to think about buying a house, starting a family. He wasn't interested."

  "So the divorce wasn't ugly?" From what she'd read, Trina was willing to bet this killer and Amy had been strangers, anyway, but you had to consider all possibilities.

  "Not according to them. They say he'll be broken up to hear about her murder. I went by his place and he wasn't home." Meg Patton rose. "What say we go talk to him now, then take a look at her apartment."

  "Am I going to stay on the case, then?" Trina asked, rising, too.

  The lieutenant looked surprised. "I tagged you, didn't I?"

  This didn't seem the moment to ask why. "Thank you, ma…um, Lieutenant."

  Exhilaration wiped out her weariness. Her mind buzzed. She'd want to read the file on the six-year-old murder. Look for details that were the same—and ones that were different. Talk to whoever found that body. The cops who worked the murder. If this one was as similar as Lieutenant Patton claimed, this killer had to be close in some way to the previous crime. Copycats had a motive. What was this one's?

  Wow, she thought, feeling giddy. I'm a detective. A real detective.

  Not even missing the cup of coffee she hadn't yet poured, she followed Lieutenant Patton out.

  CHAPTER TWO

  WILL'S RESOLVE to move home to Elk Springs wavered from time to time. Pretty well daily, in fact. Tonight was a definite plunge in the Mood-O-Meter.

  He was staying at his father's while he looked for a place to live. Their relationship was pleasant but cool, thanks to Will's long-held belief that his parents in their professional capacities were responsible for the scum who'd killed Gillian being out on the street and therefore free to rape and mutilate. If they'd done their jobs…

  But they hadn't, for reasons he understood intellectually if not emotionally. Now, six years later, he also understood that his anger had mostly been misplaced. But things once said couldn't be taken back, and much as he regretted the fact, Will knew he couldn't have back what he'd lost that night.

  This week, his father was away at a conference for sheriffs and police chiefs. With him gone, Will was able to relax a little. He got along well with Beth, his dad's wife, and with her kids.

  Stephanie was a senior in high school this year, a really smart girl who had applied to private colleges like Whitman and even Vassar back east. Pretty, with her mother's dark hair and blue eyes, she was the same serious kid she'd been when her mother married Jack Murray, Sheriff of Butte County.

  Redheaded Lauren, fourteen, was in contrast currently grounded because she'd been caught cutting classes. She was a cheerleader and, according to her mother, a social butterfly who was a teenager with a capital T. Will could see what she meant. Lauren was all giggles and glow one minute, sulky the next. He sympathized, since he remembered his own teenage angst when his mom and he moved to Elk Springs so he could finally get to know his father. One minute, he'd believed he could clear Juanita Butte in a single bound, and the next he'd been sure his mother was trying to ruin his life.

  So far, both girls seemed pleased to have their stepbrother around.

  He'd been okay earlier, watching a TV movie with Steph and explaining to her why the whole trial scene was crap. Lauren had wandered in once, curled her lip, said, "That looks boring," and gone off to instant message with the friends she was banned from seeing out of school until next Wednesday. "An eternity," she'd moaned at dinner, after Beth had declined to release her from purgatory.

  But after the movie, when Steph disappeared to her room and Beth went to the den to work on orders for her stationery business, Will sat in the empty living room and thought, What am I doing? I must be nuts.

  The room, the house, got to him. He'd helped his dad strip these floors and the woodwork and then stain and refinish them. They'd both learned as they went, repairing plaster walls, painting, plumbing, even rewiring. Maybe because he'd been without a father for the first fourteen years of his life, Will had been more eager to spend time with his than most of his buddies were. Now this big old Queen Anne style house made him edgy. Aware of times past, of lost trust and easy affection.

  The house was part of his history with Gillian, too. She'd spent weekends and school breaks here with him. They'd had incredible talks right here in the living room, made passionate love upstairs in his bedroom. They'd had that last fight in his bedroom, too, one that had been quiet but intense until she'd walked out on him. He'd run after her and, not caring who heard, stood on the porch and yelled, "Go! I don't give a shit!"

  But he'd given a shit when the cops were on his dad's doorstep the next morning to inform him that his girlfriend had been found raped
and strangled in Deschutes Park. He'd given a shit when they politely and inexorably questioned his whereabouts during the night even as his gut roiled with disbelief and horror and guilt, because he'd let Gilly stalk out without trying to stop her.

  From where he sat right now, in a leather club chair, he could see the entry. Empty, but for ghosts. A rangy, carefree version of himself with Dad, scraping thick layers of varnish from the stair banister. He and Gilly, tiptoeing in after going out with some of his high school friends, stifling giggles, pausing to make out just inside the front door, two or three times on the staircase, barely getting the bedroom door shut before shedding their clothes. A slightly older Gillian screaming, "We're done! Over!" before she flung open the front door to leave. Two officers wearing the familiar Butte County Sheriff's Department green, saying, "I'm sorry to inform you…"

  He groaned and laid his head back, his eyes closed. He didn't even know why he felt compelled to leave cosmopolitan Portland for this small town that held so many complex memories. He loved Elk Springs, but he hated it, too.

  Even for himself, the best explanation he could come up with for accepting the job in the Butte County prosecutor's office was that he needed answers. Closure. Understanding.

  He had an uneasy relationship with both his parents, although Gilly and his accusations had gone un-mentioned on all sides for five years or more. Mad because he'd hurt his mom, his aunt Abby hardly spoke to him, he didn't know his own half-brother and -sister the way he should, and the stories about his grandfather Patton had begun to seem apocryphal. Had he been anywhere near as bad as they said? Even if he was, did that justify both Meg Patton and Jack Murray being so soft on a troubled young kid that they let him slide out of taking responsibility for one crime after another?

  And Gilly…Why hadn't she just driven back to Salem? Why did she have to go to a bar? Was she getting in her car with the intention of returning here, maybe to say, "I'm sorry," when a hand closed over her mouth from behind? Had she thought Will might still come after her? Somehow save her?

  Still caught in that hazy nexus of past and present, he wondered with a dull ache why he hadn't gone after her. Her parents grieved to this day. They claimed not to blame him, but they must.