It was enough distraction for Isa to pull away, brandishing the knife in front of her, Pilar and the children cowering in the corner behind her. Panic crossed the faces of both men, brutes but cowards. They cursed again, but ran from the kitchen leaving the screen door to clatter behind them.
Isa stood still for a moment, unsure what had happened, fright washing over her at last in a delayed wave, making her knees weak and her hands shake. She placed the knife carefully on the counter and traced the break in the stone as she tried to collect her thoughts and stop her heart from racing. She was finally brought around by Ignacio, one hand pulling persistently on the hem of her shirt, the other holding the forbidden keys.
“Tia Isa, when will the police come? I know what I’ll say.”
Isa scooped him up in a hug Ignacio thought would never end.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
JUNE 14, AFTERNOON
I was deep in thought, pondering a request from a Hollywood producer to assist as medical advisor for a new medical thriller. It was one of the occupational hazards of my position and notoriety, and provided a lucrative source of income for the Center, though working with directors that had little aptitude for taking direction themselves made for a challenge. At least in these days of electronic media, I could consult from the comfort of my very own book-lined office if I wanted, checking in on distant sets by videoconferencing.
It had the added advantage of letting me mute the rantings of various creative types when I told them something they didn't want to hear. This script was unusual, well crafted by someone who actually had some understanding of medicine. I wondered how the director would manage to foul it up, but it intrigued me enough that I was inclined to accept the job.
I had just turned the page to the climactic scene when Tina put a call through. It was Pilar speaking in rapid-fire Spanish. Although my high school fluency had improved greatly since opening up a halfway house for assorted Mexican immigrants, I still relied a lot on gestures and visual cues. Trying to follow Spanish over the phone was still impossible, and Pilar was clearly excited. My “Despacio, por favor!” got lost in a current of words that I couldn't begin to separate. Except for “Isa,” “Nacio” and “Pelirojo.” And “Policía.” I dropped the phone, yelling for Quick, Lucy, Norman, Ben — anyone — to give me a ride back to the house.
Norman came through, tossing me a helmet that I put on as we barreled down the back stairs to the alley where he kept his motorcycle. It’s only three blocks up and one over to my house, but it seemed like an eternity before we reached the drive, and Norman broke every speed and traffic law he encountered on the way. Fortunately for us, the marshall and his deputy were already occupied at my big, green Victorian manse. I tossed back the helmet with thanks and waved Norman off, not even breaking stride as I rushed up the back stairs and into the kitchen.
I have a big kitchen, but it was full to overflowing. Pilar and the three children were off to one side, the children sitting wide-eyed on the side counter, Pilar interrupting their conversations—in excited, high-pitched Spanish rather than their carefully acquired English — with stern and maternal tones. Isa was standing at the counter by the window, which I noticed with passing dismay, was rent by a huge crack through the middle. The marshall was half-seated against one of the barstools at the center island, talking with a tall and courtly Latin man while a shorter man, obviously a working man in stained shirt and dirty jeans, stood by with fearful eyes. I noticed his hands were cuffed behind him, but he stood quietly in the custody of a wiry deputy about his own height and weight, but as Anglo as he was Latin.
There was blood on the counter and on the floor, and I looked around again in panic. None of mine seemed to be injured, and I wondered with now detached concern what the bloodshed had been.
Only one way to find out.
“Grant,” I addressed the marshall, whose back had been to me. He turned and stood up, extending a hand.
“Doc. I was going to call you, just hadn’t got to it yet. How’d you know what happened?"
“I don’t.” I inclined my head towards Pilar, who shifted her weight so that I could see the telephone on the counter next to Pablo. “Pilar called me. All I heard was Isa’s name and Pelirojo. And ‘police.’ What happened?”
The sensitivity police would probably have my innards for not asking if everyone was all right, but dammit, I could see that. I wanted answers.
Isa spoke up.
“Pelirojo. He sent men to frighten me. To harm me.” She paused, glancing at the children to make sure Pilar had them sufficiently occupied, then dropped her voice to a whisper and added, “To kill me.”
The bottom dropped out of my stomach, very much the way it had when they’d called me to tell me about John. When once you realize that “kill” and “dead” are not just terms reserved for other people, it has a way of reorienting your life, and not in a pleasant way. I felt my face go white and pulled out one of the chairs to sit before I fell. I had come to Telluride because it was so distant and so safe. I’d read the police blog in the daily paper. No one died here, at least not by another person’s hand. This was supposed to be an oasis of civility and safety. Nice theory not borne out by facts, at least not lately.
I looked at Grant. “And....?” I said. “Who are these guys? Are they the ones? And what about the blood?"
My temper suddenly flared, fear replaced by rage.
“No,” he indicated the taller, older man, “Gus is the foreman on a job down at the end of town. Diego here works with him, along with two other fellows. Gus saw them leave the site at noon, figured they were up to no good, followed them. He saw them, all three, come up on to your back porch, then a few minutes later, heard an alarm go off, then saw them all run out of the house like bats out of hell. He caught Diego here, but the other two got away. Called 911 on his cell.”
He glanced at Diego. He must have seen the anger in my face, because he backed up a step and began to speak rapidly.
“No, Señora, it’s not like that. The other two, they were the ones. They made me come along, but I didn’t come in, I stayed back. I didn’t do it.”
His face was pleading. I looked at Isa.
“It’s true. He wasn’t one of them.”
Her face was pitying but not angry. Diego was a coward, perhaps, but at least in Isa’s eyes, not a thug.
My gaze went to Gus. I knew it was Grant's job to sort this out, but my pushy nature hadn’t been improved by the fact that had these thugs succeeded, I would have been in charge of the death scene. In my own kitchen.
“I saw him go on to the porch. I saw nothing else.”
Gus shifted his weight, but met my eyes and kept his confident bearing.
“When the alarm went off, he was the first one to run away. And the easiest to catch.” He shrugged. “One of the others limped, the other was holding his arm. This one is unmarked. Perhaps he is telling the truth.”
There was that alarm again. Although the house was equipped with an alarm system, I’d never activated it. Not only was Telluride a place I thought safe, I’d never thought that the house contained anything precious enough to protect, least of all me. Looking at Isa, Pilar and the children, and thinking about Ben, I realized with a start that it did house something — in fact, a great deal — that I did not want to lose. I resolved to call the company in the morning. A panic button would be a nice touch.
“Alarm?” Now I was truly confused.
Grant chuckled, pointed over to Ignacio, now thoroughly occupied, as were the others, with a cookie that Pilar had quietly produced from the jar on the counter.
“That little rascal got hold of your car keys and pressed the alarm button. When I showed up, he ran right up to me to tell me I took too long, the bad men got away. Smart kid. Nervy.”
I shook my head, not really able to take it all in.
“So what about the others?”
“We’ll get ‘em. I’ve got two of the deputies off looking for them, and Tom Pat
terson has his guys on the lookout. Called Montrose, too. Diego here tells me that’s where they all live.”
Indeed. The gray ranch house on the edge of town. They might run, but sooner or later, one of Telluride's finest, or San Miguel County's best, would bring them to heel. Good.
Grant stood up, motioned to the deputy.
“Let’s go, get Diego locked up.”
He glanced back at me. “Will you bring these two down to make a statement? Send your crew up to take blood samples? When I catch those guys, I want to be able to tie this up nice and tight, no escape.” He rolled the toothpick that was perpetually in his mouth from one side to the other. “I hate men who bully women.”
“Sure thing.”
My cell phone was already in hand, dialing the office for Norman to come back up, and I watched as Grant Holmes and his deputy escorted Diego out of my kitchen. Gus followed at a respectful distance, pausing in the door and turning back to me.
“I hate them too,” he said, then added something in Spanish to Isa and Pilar that I didn’t catch. Whatever it was, from the looks on their faces, it was exactly the right thing.
**********
Norman showed up with Ben a few minutes later. I was pleased that my last-born was concerned enough to check in on his mom and those he now regarded as his “bonus” family. He greeted the children with hugs and chocolates from his desk-drawer stash, and sandwiches I had asked him to pick up from Baked in Telluride, Telluride’s all purpose bakery and sandwich shop that was down the street from the Center. I had finally convinced Pilar that any attempt on her part to finish making lunch might compromise the police’s ability to convict the men that had threatened them.
Reluctantly, she abandoned the kitchen to Norman and we all went onto the back porch to eat. We’d fill Ben in later, after the children were fed and tucked in for an afternoon nap. No sense in causing them any more stress by rehashing the day’s events in front of them. I’d already called Father Matt to alert him, and had no doubt that he was even now arranging appropriate counseling for Isa, Pilar and the children.
Good thing. I was lousy at that, I had discovered to my own dismay. It was a wonder my own children had recovered so well from their father’s death. I’d certainly been no help. Pilar had taken the children upstairs, and Ben had wiped the last of the mayonnaise from the scraggly, pale mustache he was trying to cultivate in an effort to be hip or be more adult—I wasn’t sure which—when I got a call from the marshall.
“Got ‘em.”
No one could accuse Grant Holmes of verbosity.
“Picked ‘em up just outside Ridgway, off the side of a side road.”
He chuckled.
“Two flat tires. Nails from the construction site. Who says God doesn’t have a sense of humor?” A pause, then, “Thought you’d want to know.”
“Thanks,” I replied. “What about Diego? Isa was pretty insistent after you left that he wasn't involved.”
“It wasn’t him,” she’d said. “He’s a good man, a kind man, just a scared one, a weak one. Pelirojo has so much power, Diego is afraid. We all are. But he likes me, he’s kind, he wouldn’t hurt me.”
I could visualize Grant shaking his head as he answered.
“No go. Diego was there. Gus caught him red-handed. I’m inclined to believe Isa, but I’ve got to let the judge sort it all out. From where I stand, it looks like a three-man conspiracy. The other two say that Diego was part of it from the start, that he was on his way in when the alarm went off and he got scared and ran.”
That part fit, at least. The scared and ran part.
“When’s arraignment?”
“Tomorrow. Don’t forget to get those ladies down for a statement.”
“Be there within the hour.”
I pocketed my phone and looked over at my son, explaining what had happened. He looked at me, perplexed.
“Why don't you just take the video down to the marshall’s office?”
“Video?” It was my turn to look perplexed. “What video?”
Ben pointed up to the overhang of the porch. There, in the corner of the eave was a tiny camera, pointed out over the back of the house.
“There are six or seven of them all around the house. They work on motion detectors, see?”
He stood up, moving across the porch, and sure enough, a tiny light came on and the camera swiveled to follow him. Bless Tommy Berton, he’d really done the system up right.
“I never activated the alarm system, Ben,” I said. “Too bad, it would have been a big help.”
Ben rolled his eyes in exasperation, that how-do-you-find-the-door-in-the-morning-without-my-help look that I thought had passed with his entry into college. Apparently not.
“This is part of the system, but it isn’t monitored by an alarm company. It feeds into a recorder that probably cycles through its memory every week or so. It’s in the back closet in the laundry room; haven’t you noticed it?”
“Of course, I noticed it. I just didn’t know what it was. Is.”
“Oh, Mom.”
It was a never-ending source of amazement how much disdain my kids could work into that one syllable when the situation called for it.
“So how do we look at the tape?”
Another eye-roll.
“No tape. This is digital. I’ll find a disc and burn a copy for the marshall. You can save it to the hard drive on your own computer, too. Come on, I’ll show you.”
I followed my son back into the house, to the closet that housed the little black box that linked up to my silent sentries. Odd, how one criminal’s paranoia might send another to jail, I thought, as Ben slipped a disc into the system and pressed a few buttons. Not two minutes later, we were sitting at my computer, watching a video of my side door. I saw two men mount the steps, motioning to a third, who came slowly, reluctance and fear obvious in his bearing. I saw the two disappear into the house, while Diego stayed behind, shifting, agitated, his eyes casting about the porch, but making no move to enter. In fact, I saw him straighten his spine and start for the steps, only to stop, looking around, startled. The alarm must have sounded. But when it did, he was already on his way off the porch, not on his way into the house.
“Nicely done, Ben.” I said. “Who knew? This is great.”
Ben shrugged his thin shoulders in his nonchalant way.
“I can’t believe you didn’t know that was there. You see everything.”
Not everything, I thought. Somehow I failed to see how competent you’ve become, how thoroughly capable.
“Yeah, well, we all have our off days.” I said. “Besides, this is computer stuff, not crime scene stuff.”
Ben grinned. “It was this time, and you,” he emphasized his statement by pointing at me with both hands and finishing dramatically, “missed it. You’re losing your touch, old woman.”
“And you’re going to lose your cushy job and soft life if you keep that up. I’m still your mom.” I smiled to telegraph that I was proud of him. “How about taking that down to the marshall’s office? I’ll be along with Isa and Pilar in a bit.”
“Sure thing. Want me to save the file first?”
He was already punching keys in anticipation of my response.
“Please.”
If Ben saved it, I knew it would be there. When I did it, I was never quite sure. Computers were my lifeline, but it was definitely a love-hate kind of relationship, and my ability to erase, lose and never really save important files was legendary among my family, friends and associates. So legendary they referred to any sort of IT disaster as the “Wallace Effect.”
As he was leaving, a thought crossed my mind.
“Ben, would the surveillance cover the back parking area where Kessler was shot?”
“I think so. It wouldn’t make sense to set up the system and not cover the parking areas. I can check.”
“Would it still be on the tape?”
“Hard drive.”
“Whatever. Would it stil
l be there?”
“Probably. Probably. Maybe. I don’t know,” he finally admitted, but the significance of the discovery was beginning to dawn on him. We almost ran back to the laundry room to download the rest of the data.
It took a few minutes to pick out the input from that particular camera. The lens covered the porch, but in the distance, I could see the parking lot and a portion of the adjacent road. Ben fast-forwarded through the images until we saw Kessler standing in the gravel of the drive, looking down over the backyard, probably enjoying the view and the sound of the creek. The image was blurrier than the one from the porch; it was in fading light rather than the broad light of day.
“Go backwards,” I barked. “Now. I don’t want to see the rest.”
It had been enough to find Kessler dead; I didn’t need to see it. What I wanted was to find out whether the video feed would give any clues to his killer.
Ben obliged. The images were intermittent because the system only activated when someone wandered into the actual perimeter of the drive. Even so, that meant there was a record of some of the traffic on the day, including images of Eoin bundling me into the 4Runner and taking me to the clinic. I was shocked; did I really look that frumpy? It was clear I needed a good haircut, and fast.
Scolding myself for vanity, I concentrated on the time between my departure and Kessler’s appearance. Because of the angle and the off-on recording, some of the images were fragmentary; I saw portions of legs and arms passing out of edge the frame in the distance. I recognized the shorts of one of the girls who had brought Ivanka down from the trail. The best images followed a dog’s appearance in my drive: several young men, one of whom hurried up to retrieve the errant canine from my porch. Amazing what went on in my absence, I reflected. As he pulled the dog back with him to the road, I caught glimpses of several others heading up the road, including Ivanka herself, her bulky pack on her back, walking with determination.
Dying For Revenge (The Lady Doc Murders Book 1) Page 24