Valley of Shadows

by Cooper, Steven

  “Water.”

  He heads to the fridge trying to intuit a distant vibe, too distant, vexing. He fills a glass with ice and water and returns to the office. “Sorry,” he tells the reporter. “I don’t do bottled water anymore. I’m trying to save the planet.”

  She laughs.

  “I’m serious,” he insists.

  “I’m sure you are.”

  “What did you want to see me about?” he asks her. He sees a lion approaching. He sees Aaliyah taming it to a sudden deference. The animal goes down on all fours, purring mightily but submissively to this woman who dances across the plains like strikes of lightning.

  “As I said, I was not completely honest with you the other day. I failed to admit that I sought you out specifically because I know you work with the detective investigating the Viveca Canning case.”

  “I see you do your homework.”

  She smiles weakly. “It’s no secret, with Beatrice Vossenheimer’s book, and a simple Internet search. I guess I was hoping you’d be my bridge to Detective Mills,” she explains. “If I gave you information, maybe you could give it to him. That would keep me out of it.”

  Gus listens to her, then to the silence that follows, then to the immediate voice of his that says, no. It’s one of the swiftest chimes of intuition he’s ever had. No. Of course not.

  “Alex doesn’t really work that way,” Gus says. “He needs what you might call a chain of custody of information, not hearsay. He’ll respect your privacy, Aaliyah. You can probably make the conditions. But you’ll need to contact him yourself.”

  She settles back. She studies Gus. She nods, understanding. In her eyes, a migration of angels, both dark and light, move across the horizon. “Could you make the introduction?”

  “Yes,” he tells her. “I’d be willing to do that.”

  She’s gone a few minutes later, and Gus stands at his open front door searching her wake for necessary clues.

  A wall rises in the distance. It billows in towers of pink and beige. It’s a moving mountain range, building before his eyes, as it crawls toward him from the southwest corner of the valley. Mills is only a quarter mile from headquarters; he’ll probably make it back before the dust storm reaches him. But he can hear the first flourish of pebbles under his car. And then comes the no-see-ums of dirt, the splatter of tiny specks of sand against the windshield, a familiar warning. In minutes all visibility might be gone. He steps on the gas as he watches the behemoth grow. From here, the wall cloud seems to dwarf the skyscrapers of the Central Corridor. He calls Kelly but gets no answer. He tries the landline at home. No answer there either. He then remembers her doctor’s appointment, takes a deep breath. This will be over by the time she’s done. She won’t get caught up in the pestering storm. The faster he drives, the more he hears the commotion of dirt outside. By the time he reaches the parking lot, the wind is rocking the car. On his way inside, he pushes against the force of the storm, leaning in, and shields his eyes.

  He runs into Preston in the elevator.

  “We got out of that church just in time,” Preston says.

  “How do you mean?”

  “The dirt lots out there. Our cars would be buried.”

  When they reach the third floor, they find just about everyone at the windows watching the tsunami of debris that’s swallowing the valley, the view peppered with excited expletives. But not Morton Myers. Myers is leaning on a cubicle outside Mills’s office, waiting. Unlike him to ignore a crowd or a spectacle. “What’s up?” Mills asks him.

  “We’re barely into her computers,” Myers says. “But I knew where to look first.”

  “Of course you did,” Mills says, waving him in. Preston follows. The men sit at his desk, opposite him.

  “I just searched for her will and there it was in a file ‘Will.’ Easy peasy,” Myers explains. “Don’t know if it’s up to date or the final thing, you know, but she left everything to the church.”

  “Not a total shock,” Mills says. “Some people do that. I’ve seen it before.” Preston nods soberly. Like a grandfather.

  “Yeah, well, maybe this will shock you,” Myers says. “Her estate is worth over three hundred million dollars.”

  “It says that in the will?” Mills asks him.

  “No. There was another file called ‘Assets.’ Again, she made it easy for me,” he says with a snorting laugh.

  “I imagine the artwork is worth probably half of that,” Preston says.

  “The three hundred million doesn’t include her artwork,” Myers tells them. “She left all of that to the Heard.”

  Mills almost gulps.

  “Toldya it would shock you,” Myers says.

  “I’ll need those files,” Mills tells him.

  “No problem,” Myers says. “I guess this eliminates the kids if we’re looking at inheritance as a motive.”

  “Assuming they knew the money was going to the church,” Preston interjects. “If they didn’t know, they’re still in play and so is a motive.” “Same goes for the church,” Mills says. “There’s motive there, too, if the victim made her wishes public. We’ve got to dig in, boys. Make a bunch of people nervous.”

  He hears a roar outside. He turns to the window.

  “Jesus Christ!” Myers screeches.

  Preston gets up, moves to the glass.

  The three of them stare out as pillars of dust round the corners of downtown and join on the street below, merging in perfect collaboration. In an instant, the invigorated storm hides the building across the street. It just disappears. Mills can’t see a thing. Dust whirls and slaps against the window. And then, the grand entrance and grand exit in one salutation, the haboob, as some weather geeks like to call it, leaves almost as fast as it came.

  12

  Mills has tried to reach Bennett Canning for two days now. He’s left messages. He’s texted the guy. He’s tried to get his attention on Twitter, for Christ’s sake, and Mills avoids social media the way most people avoid the sun on a 111-degree day in Phoenix (which it is outside presently). Yeah, social media is a necessary evil, eh, not so evil, when it comes to tracking people down; it helps, and it has really become an asset for cops, but man, the shit you have to weed through can pretty much knock your brain out of commission. Really numbing, all the minutiae people care about. And the pets! Jesus, the pets! He’s got nothing against animals, but come on, do you really, really think your cat can lip synch the words to “Dancing Queen?” Or should? Really?

  He can’t put it off any longer. He pushes himself from his desk, and it’s out into the oven of Phoenix. Midday, no less. Preston joins him for the drive out to The Cliffs Resort and Spa. It’s far north in Scottsdale, abutting Thompson peak. But it might as well be anywhere. With its sun-splashed paint job, its tile roof, the palm trees and brick thoroughfares, the place looks cut from the very same cookie mold as so many other resorts in the valley. There are fountains everywhere cascading over Mexican tile and sculpture, as if water were as plentiful here as zinc oxide. Handsome and stately palms line the driveway to the check-in lobby and valet where Ferraris and Maseratis and one social-climbing BMW wait for their owners. At the front desk, they’re asked to wait for a hotel manager. Mills observes the guests and members come and go. It’s the low season, but judging by the business suits, capitalism can take the heat. Lots of tans and jewelry. A woman approaches. “I’m Nicole Harper,” she says. “I hear you’ve been asking about an employee.”

  “Former employee,” Mills tells her. “Bennett Canning.”

  “Right. Mr. Canning no longer works here.”

  Mills introduces himself, then Preston. She seems disinterested to know them. Her eyes and the tightness of her face suggest she’s already onto the next meeting in Outlook, as if she’s about to charge into a conference room and cut ten percent of the staff.

  “Care to tell us the circumstances of his departure from the Cliffs?” Mills ask her.

  “I’m sure you know that’s confidential.”<
br />
  “Sorry. We thought you’d might want to cooperate with the law.”

  She smile-frowns and clasps her hands in front of her waist. “All I can say is that Mr. Canning’s work ethic was not compatible with our policies and priorities here at the Cliffs.”

  “Can you give us an example, or three?” Preston asks.

  “No,” she says, batting her eyelashes, her annoyance well-crafted and implied. “I’m not at liberty to do that. If you wish, you can contact our legal team.”

  “I don’t think that will be necessary,” Mills tells her. “We’d just like to know more about him. I’m sure we can find some of his former colleagues who might be more forthcoming. Unless, of course, you have some kind of corporate gag order.”

  “We don’t. That’s ridiculous.”

  “What’s ridiculous is that we’re trying to find out who killed Bennett’s mother and you seem unwilling to help us,” Preston says.

  “Like I said, you’re welcome to contact our legal team if you want access to Bennett Canning’s employment records.” She predicates her thought with a double cough, the suggestive, mocking kind.

  “I see where you’re coming from,” Mills assures her. “We’ll be on our way.”

  “Can I treat you two to lunch?” she asks.

  Mills says thanks, but no thanks, and offers the woman a cordial handshake.

  Out in the car, the air-conditioning blasting, Mills says, “Let’s go find Bennett. He gave us two addresses. What do you think? The Bilt-more condo or the house in Arcadia?”

  “He has a house in Arcadia?”

  “Gus’s neighborhood,” Mills says. “I don’t see Bennett there. I don’t know why. But it’s too adult. He’s a high-rise condo kind of guy. Floor to ceiling windows. Wears his sunglasses inside.”

  Preston belts out a laugh. “I think you nailed him! To the condos we go.”

  At the condos, a cluster of midrise buildings of unimaginative steel and glass, they find nothing except for a cheery concierge and cheery foliage in the lobby. And, of course, a fountain, floor to ceiling, sucking even more water from the Colorado River. They take the elevator to the eleventh floor. The hallway smells perfumed. Mills knocks. A woman answers the door, wide-eyed, her mouth agape, as if she’s never answered a door in her life. Kind of bunker looking. Agoraphobia lurking on her face. Mills guesses she’s in her early twenties. Five-three. Maybe five-four. No makeup. Long, limp blonde hair. Beautiful in her simplicity, striking even. Mills flashes his badge and asks if Bennett Canning’s at home.

  “No,” she says. “He doesn’t live here, really.”

  “Do you know him?” Mills asks.

  “I know Bennett,” she says. “But he doesn’t live here. He lives in Arcadia.”

  “What’s your name, ma’am?” Mills asks her.

  “Ashley. Ashley Pepper. Opposite of salt.”

  Mills doesn’t have the heart to tell her that pepper, technically, is not the opposite of anything. Instead, he introduces himself and asks her how she knows Bennett Canning.

  “We dated for a while. He got me this place. His parents didn’t approve of us living together at his house.”

  “But you lived together here?” Mills asks.

  “No. I told you he lives in Arcadia. That’s not to say he didn’t spend many nights here. I’m not going to lie.”

  “So, I take it you’re no longer dating?” Preston asks.

  She leans into the doorframe. It’s only now Mills realizes she’s standing there in a camisole and panties. It strikes him, not because of her stage of undress and her lithe physique, but because he hadn’t noticed, because she was, ultimately, just another face at another door among the blur of thousands of faces he’s seen and thousands of doors he’s knocked on.

  “Why are you interrogating me?” she asks.

  “We’re not interrogating you,” Mills says. “I’m sorry if we made you feel that way. That wasn’t our intention.”

  “I don’t know why we broke up. I just think it wasn’t working. And I also think that he’s a player. You know, the minute he settles down with you he’s already on to someone else.”

  “Understood,” says Preston. “How did you meet?”

  “At church.”

  “Church of Angels Rising?” Preston asks.

  “That’s the one.”

  Preston asks if she’d give them her phone number, says he might want to follow up with her later. She recites it and both men enter it into their phones, thanking her. “So sorry to disturb you, ma’am,” Preston says.

  The Lady of GPS directs them to Bennett Canning’s address in Arcadia. This is the swanky part of Arcadia, not Gus’s part of Arcadia, which is more Arcadia Light than anything (modest, older homes, with great vegetation but outdated façades, respectable but certainly not luxurious); this part of Arcadia, however, is where money goes to relax against the mountain, Camelback, to be specific, not far from Aunt Phoebe, but not high up there intruding on the beast. This is what Gus Parker calls “the lap of the camel.” In the lap sit modern ranch homes behind walls and the occasional gate. Big windows gaze up to the mountain. Slanted roofs at clean angles salute the sun, commemorating the work of Frank Lloyd Wright. Completing the tribute are decks and railings and the tendency for these homes to sort of disappear into the terrain. Except they don’t fully disappear. The owners make concessions to their own vanity and make sure the walls aren’t too high. What’s the point of making all this money if you can’t show it off? Sure enough, Bennett Canning’s Mercedes, as gleaming as it ever was, sits in the circular driveway at his Arcadia address. Mills can hear movement inside the house after they ring the bell. The movement is distant, but it’s there. He rings again. The sound from within comes closer. There are footsteps and then the door swings open, revealing a diminutive woman with dark eyes and a hesitant smile. She’s wearing an apron.

  “We’re here to see Mr. Canning,” Mills tells her.

  “Mr. Canning? I believe he’s still sleeping.”

  Mills looks at his watch. Twelve-forty-five.

  “And you are?” Mills asks her.

  “Juanita. I’m Mr. Canning’s housekeeper.”

  He flashes his badge and she blanches. He identifies himself, mentions Preston.

  “I see,” she whispers. “Well, I’m making his breakfast. I was planning on waking him soon.”

  “Could you wake him now?”

  “Yes, of course,” she says. She bows her head. “Please wait here.” She closes the door and Mills turns to Preston and says, “Must be nice to sleep past noon on a weekday.”

  “Well, his mom did just croak,” Preston reminds him, to which Mills responds with a shrug.

  They wait a while. A while longer than Mills would have expected. It’s not such a large house. How long can it take to get someone out of bed? When Bennett Canning appears in the doorway, Mills gets his answer. It could take a long time to drag this deadbeat scarecrow from slumber and bring him back to life. Black circles surround his eyes like bruises. His hair is straw and matted. The insignia of sleep stretches across his face in the form of sheet and pillow lines. His lips are chapped. His breath is atrocious when he opens his mouth and says, “What are you doing here so early?”

  Mills can’t help himself. He laughs. “Seriously, Bennett. It’s past noon.”

  “Thought you might be out job hunting,” Preston says.

  The guy drops his head to his chest, rolls it from one shoulder to another, and blows out another torrent of sewer breath. “You’d expect me to be looking for a job at a time like this? I mean cut me some slack.” “No, that’s not what we’d expect,” Mills assures him, fully aware that this overindulged scarecrow has been given a lifetime of slack. “We need to follow up on something, Bennett. May we come in?” Bennett leads them in and asks them to wait in the sunken living room, a square of chrome, glass, and leather befitting a gigolo. It’s all image for Bennett Canning, an aspiring GQer, who obviously uses this room itself as
part of his seduction. But today he’s not seducing anyone; he smells like he hasn’t showered since last summer. “You mind if I clean up a bit? It’ll only take me a minute.”

  Mills suspects it will take longer than a minute for the scarecrow to transform himself into the Mercedes-driving, tennis-pro ladies’ man, but he says, “Fine.”

  The magazines under the coffee table: Men’s Journal, Architectural Digest, Town & Country, Condé Nast Traveler, and, aha, GQ. The art on the walls is big and abstract, the kind that Mills has seen in museums but doesn’t understand. What is it about a small purple circle on a big white canvas that makes this thing art? Or the one where the painter apparently tripped over her can of paint and decided the accident, like colorful blood spatter, was a masterpiece?

  The housekeeper reappears and asks if the men would like some iced tea, maybe, or even a cocktail. The men decline. Bennett returns. He’s sprayed down his hair with something and he’s slicked it back. His tight t-shirt, emblazoned with an image from The Walking Dead (so appropriate, but probably lost on Bennett Canning), shows off his trim waist and bulging pecs and biceps. “Rough night?” Preston asks him.

  “No. I’m mourning. Remember?”

  “So, you haven’t left the house?” Mills asks.

  “I didn’t say that,” Bennett replies, taking a seat on a slender leather recliner. “Why don’t you tell me why you’re here?”

  “I’ve been calling and texting you,” Mills says. “But you never replied. So I had no choice but to show up.”

  The guy nods but says nothing.

  “We’re here to follow up on a few things,” Mills tells him. “First, the jewels.”

  “I told you. I took them,” Bennett says. “I couldn’t just leave them in the house with all your people picking over her stuff like it was some kind of garage sale.”

  “That’s what we do,” Preston says. “We pick over stuff. It’s called a homicide investigation, young man.”

  Bennett leans forward, shaking his head. He utters a laugh, then says, “Rule number one, don’t condescend to me. OK?”

  Mills leans forward as well to neutralize the space and says, “As far as the investigation into your mother’s death goes, my friend, we make the rules. Now why don’t you tell us where the jewels are?”