Exit Wounds

by J. A. Jance

  Just then the outside door opened, and two people walked in—a man and a woman. The man was short and dark but fine-featured and handsome. Despite the heat, he wore a starched white shirt and a carefully knotted tie under an expensive lightweight blue silk blazer and exquisitely tailored camel-colored slacks. On his feet were a pair of hand-tooled snakeskin cowboy boots that Joanna estimated could easily have set him back five hundred bucks.

  The woman, two or three inches taller than Joanna, was pushing forty and good-looking. Her hair was pulled back in a long smooth ponytail. She wore dangling silver-and-turquoise earrings. Silver rings, heavy with chunks of turquoise, decorated several of her fingers. She was dressed far more casually than the man in what looked like freshly pressed Levi’s topped by a cowboy shirt and a Western-cut jacket. She might have been modeling Western attire if it hadn’t been for her boots. Unlike the man’s highly polished snakeskin footwear, the woman’s worn Judson’s bore the dusty sheen and telltale marks of someone accustomed to working in barns and corrals and dealing with the business end of horses and cattle.

  Randy Trotter stood to greet the new arrivals. “You must be Mr. Ortega,” he said, holding out his hand. “It’s very good of you to come all this way on such short notice. And this is Sheriff Joanna Brady,” he added, gesturing in Joanna’s direction. “She’s from Cochise County, Arizona, our neighboring county to the west.”

  Mr. Ortega shook hands first with Sheriff Trotter and then with Joanna. “Glad to meet you,” Diego Ortega said gravely.

  Randy Trotter continued with the introductions. “And this is Detective Cruikshank, Sheriff Brady.”

  Until that moment, it hadn’t occurred to Joanna that Detective Johnny Cruikshank was a woman rather than a man. The two women sized each other up briefly. Then, after nodding in Joanna’s direction, Detective Cruikshank retreated into the other room and returned pushing two additional desk chairs in front of her.

  “We won’t be able to get into the morgue for another half hour,” she explained. “Dr. Lawrence didn’t want to pay any more overtime than absolutely necessary. He told me not to call Bobby Lopez to let us in until after Mr. Ortega was here.”

  “Is Bobby on his way?” Sheriff Trotter asked.

  Johnny nodded. “Yes, but he’s out at the ranch. He says it’ll take him that long to get here.”

  “Thanks for bringing the chairs, then,” Randy said to his detective. “I guess we should all take a load off.”

  “It was very kind of you to send Miss Cruikshank to pick me up,” Diego Ortega said, settling himself onto one of the two rolling chairs and carefully easing the knees of his trousers so as to avoid bagging them and spoiling the crease.

  “Under the circumstances, it’s the least we can do,” Trotter returned.

  “My coming was an absolute necessity,” Diego Ortega replied with a grim smile. “Otherwise, my mother would have killed me. Carmen’s her baby—the youngest. And yesterday was Mom’s birthday. Carmen travels a lot. At times Mama may not hear from her for weeks on end, but when it came to birthdays, no matter where she was, Carmen was always the first to call, usually first thing in the morning.

  “By noon yesterday, when Carmen still hadn’t called, Mama was worried. By six o’clock last night she was frantic and on the phone to my brother, Carlos, who happens to be a lieutenant with the LAPD. He’s the one who entered the missing-persons report. Even though it was a holiday, someone from LAPD got through to Fandango Productions. They told us Carmen and Pamela were in Arizona. They also said Carmen and Pamela were expecting to interview Carol Mossman—”

  “Who’s also been murdered,” Joanna put in.

  Diego Ortega nodded. “So I’ve been told,” he replied. “Once we knew Carol Mossman was dead, it was the weapon connection Sheriff Trotter told me about that brought me here. I told Mama I’d fly out today and make sure, one way or the other. I think not knowing is harder on her than knowing will be. And since I fly my own plane, I didn’t have to mess around with airline schedules. Flying into someplace this small…”

  Joanna knew that Lordsburg, New Mexico, like Bisbee, Arizona, was a long way off the map for any regularly scheduled flights. The two cities’ tiny municipal airports were good for little else than serving as bases of operations for local general aviation enthusiasts.

  “Tell me about Fandango Productions,” Joanna said.

  Diego Ortega studied Joanna appraisingly. “It’s a woman-owned and-operated outfit,” he explained. “It’s run by the well-connected daughters of several old-time television producers. They sell original material to cable channels like Oxygen and Lifetime. That’s where Carmen and Pamela met. A year or so ago, they were assigned to do a story together on pedophile priests. They met at work, and they’ve been partners ever since.”

  “In life and work?” Johnny Cruikshank asked.

  Diego Ortega nodded. “That was pretty tough for my mother to accept at first. She’s pushing seventy, and she’s pretty old-fashioned about things like that. But when she finally realized Carmen was happier living with Pamela than she’d ever been in her whole life, Mama just sort of got over it. We all did.”

  “I know from Carol Mossman’s grandmother that Carol was always short of cash,” Joanna said. “So did Fandango Productions pay for the interview with her?”

  “That’s how we first learned Carol Mossman’s name,” Diego replied. “It was on a check requisition that Pamela put in prior to their leaving for Arizona—a check for five thousand dollars. Pamela had the check in her possession when they came to Arizona. As I understand it, the check wasn’t found with the bodies, but as far as anyone knows, it has yet to be cashed.”

  Joanna Brady let her breath out. That was why she had come to Lordsburg—to find out if there was some other connection, beyond the ballistics report, between the New Mexico victims and the homicide in her jurisdiction. With Diego Ortega’s revelation about the existence of the missing check, that possible connection moved from theory to reality.

  “Do you know where your sister and Pamela Davis were staying?” Joanna asked.

  “The Willows Inn in Sierra Vista,” Ortega answered. “I talked to Candace Leigh, the CFO from Fandango about that. She was kind enough to check the transaction records on their company credit cards. They checked into The Willows on Sunday night and booked the room for a whole week. Although they haven’t been seen back at the hotel since Tuesday morning, the hotel clerk said no one was particularly worried about them since it appeared the room continued to be occupied with luggage, clothing, and the like. When they checked in, they said they were working on a story and would be in and out. The last credit card transaction is dinner Monday night at a place called The Brite Spot. They had breakfast at the hotel on Tuesday morning. After that, nothing.”

  “We’ll need records of all phone calls made from their hotel room,” Johnny Cruikshank said. “I’m assuming they both have cell phones?”

  Diego nodded.

  “We’ll need those records, too,” the detective added.

  Diego Ortega nodded. “Of course,” he replied. “Ms. Leigh may not have all the information you need at her fingertips, but she’ll be able to find someone who will.” When he gave Johnny Cruikshank a list of Candace Leigh’s telephone numbers, Joanna jotted them down as well.

  “What kind of stories did they work on?”

  “Pam and Carmen more or less specialized in children’s sexual-abuse cases—that and child pornography. It was something they both had in common.”

  “Child pornography?” Randy Trotter asked.

  “No, no. Sexual abuse. Carmen was victimized by a parish priest when she was a little girl, although we didn’t find out about it until much later. And Pamela was abused, too, by an older relative, I think. An uncle, maybe, or perhaps a cousin. I don’t know the details. But that’s why, when they were assigned to work the pedophile priest story, they really clicked together. On any number of levels.”

  Randy Trotter looked at Joann
a. “Do you have any information that Carol Mossman was involved in that kind of thing?”

  “Not really,” Joanna replied. “I know she had a troubled family life and that, as an adult, she had a hard time keeping it together. Periodically her grandmother would have to pitch in and help out. At the time Carol Mossman was murdered, she was living rent-free in her grandmother’s mobile home.”

  “Hey,” Detective Cruikshank objected, “I live rent-free in a place my grandmother owns. What’s wrong with that?”

  The last thing Joanna wanted to do was offend the detective. “Nothing,” Joanna said quickly. “Nothing at all.”

  She was saved by the ringing of a telephone. Randy Trotter reached over to answer it. “Sure enough, Bobby,” he said. “We’ll finish up here and be at the morgue in ten minutes or so. Thanks for coming all the way into town for this. It’s a big help.”

  It was only a matter of blocks from Randy Trotter’s office to the morgue. After a short discussion, they decided to walk. A hot, dusty wind blew in their faces, but off to the south Joanna spotted a bank of clouds building on the horizon. The summer rains had missed Bisbee’s Fourth of July fireworks display, and so had Joanna Brady; but it looked as though the monsoons might come—sooner rather than later.

  The Hidalgo County Morgue consisted of two rooms carved out of a basement corner of the Lordsburg Funeral Home. “Hello, Bobby,” Sheriff Trotter said to the middle-aged man waiting just inside the front door. “This is Mr. Diego Ortega. We believe he knows both victims. One of them is believed to be Mr. Ortega’s sister.”

  Bobby Lopez nodded gravely. “Are you ready?” he asked.

  “Yes,” Diego said softly, squaring his shoulders. “Let’s get this over with.”

  Bobby Lopez opened a door to usher them into an interior room. Joanna hung back. “Are you coming?” Randy asked.

  Joanna shook her head. “Identifying victims isn’t a spectator sport,” she said. “And Mr. Ortega doesn’t need an audience. If you don’t mind, I’ll wait right here.”

  “Good thinking,” Randy said. “I believe I’ll join you.”

  Detective Cruikshank and Diego Ortega, looking decidedly pale, were back in the lobby in less than a minute. “It’s them,” Diego said shakily. “It’s Carmen and Pam. Now, if you’ll excuse me for a moment,” he added, taking a cell phone from his pocket, “I need to call my mother. From the descriptions, we were pretty sure, but she’s back home in Garden Grove hoping against hope that we were wrong.”

  He turned back to Bobby Lopez. “Any idea when the bodies will be released so my mother can start planning a funeral?”

  The ME’s assistant shook his head. “Dr. Lawrence will perform the autopsies on Monday. It’ll be several days after that.”

  “I understand,” Diego said. Holding the phone to his ear, he stepped outside. Joanna and the others stayed where they were.

  “We’ll need the other victim’s next of kin as well, Sheriff Trotter,” Bobby Lopez said.

  “Right,” Randy said. “We’ll try to get it for you.”

  Diego remained outside for several long minutes. Joanna was more than happy to be out of earshot. It was bad enough to have seen the despair on Diego’s face as he emerged from the morgue’s back room. She didn’t want to bear witness to the phone call that would finally shatter all of a grieving mother’s hopes and dreams for her daughter.

  When Mr. Ortega returned to the waiting room, he seemed to have regained control. “All right,” he said. “What next?”

  “We’ll need to gather some more information, if you don’t mind,” Johnny Cruikshank said. “There’s a little coffee shop just around the corner. Maybe we could go there and talk.”

  Esther’s Diner was a long, dingy place with a counter on one side and a string of booths on the other. At mid-afternoon on a Saturday, the place was virtually deserted. Even so, Johnny led them to a booth in the far corner. With no peanut butter anywhere on the menu, Joanna settled on ordering a tuna sandwich. Johnny Cruikshank ordered key lime pie, while Randy Trotter and Diego Ortega had coffee.

  “Please tell us about your sister,” Johnny urged Diego once their gum-chewing waitress had departed with her order pad.

  Diego’s eyes dimmed with tears. “She was always such a cute little kid,” he said. “She was what my mother called an afterthought—one of those babies that come along when women think their childbearing days are over. My brothers and I were all in high school or college when Carmen was born. My parents were good Catholics. They wanted to have a whole bunch of kids, but after I showed up, Mama had several miscarriages in a row. The doctor told her she’d never have another child, but he was wrong. When Mama was forty-two, along came Carmen.

  “When she was born, things were different from the way they had been when the rest of us were little. For one thing, Dad was making good money by then. We older kids always had to make do with secondhand clothes and hand-me-downs. But then we were all boys, so that made a difference, too. Everything Carmen got was brand-new, from her crib to her clothing.

  “The truth is, I think my brothers and I all resented her a little—thought she was spoiled rotten. And she was, too, but it wasn’t her fault. Dad and Mama just worshiped her and wanted her to have the very best. Which is how Carmen ended up going to St. Ambrose, a private Catholic school, while all the rest of us went to public schools. One of the parish priests at St. Ambrose is the one who molested her.”

  “But she didn’t tell the family about it right away,” Johnny Cruikshank put in.

  “Of course not,” Diego agreed. “That’s not the way child abuse works. When it came time for Carmen to go to high school, Mama and Dad were ready to enroll her in another private high school, but she wasn’t having any of it. She wouldn’t go. In fact, she absolutely refused. About that same time, she stopped going to church, too. She wouldn’t attend mass or go to confession. It broke my mother’s heart. But Mama’s never been one to take something like that lying down. She insisted that they go to counseling. That’s when she first learned that Carmen was…well…different.”

  “You mean that she was a lesbian?” Johnny asked.

  Diego nodded. “It’s also where Carmen first told our mother about what had happened to her all those years ago when she was in second grade. Mama was furious. She went to the bishop and found out that the priest had been transferred to another parish—one right here in New Mexico, I think.”

  “Right,” Randy Trotter said. “It’s common knowledge that for a long time the Catholic Church used New Mexico as the dumping ground of choice for pedophile priests.”

  “Sure enough, the priest was still up to his old tricks,” Diego Ortega continued. “Mama hired a lawyer and took her case first to the bishop and then to the cardinal. I think she would have gone all the way to Rome itself, except the Church settled. It was one of the early settlements, the ones that came complete with a nondisclosure agreement. In other words, they paid, but the terms of the deal kept all parties from revealing the amount of the settlement or even that a settlement existed.”

  “Hush money,” Joanna murmured.

  Diego nodded again. Their food order came then. Joanna’s tuna sandwich was surprisingly good, but she had to edge herself into the far corner of the booth to keep from smelling everyone else’s coffee.

  “The settlement was large enough that it paid for Carmen’s education, with some left over, but Mama always said it wasn’t enough. She’s convinced the abuse Carmen suffered is what made her turn out the way she is. I don’t think that’s true, and neither does…” He paused and took a deep breath. “Neither did Carmen,” he corrected. “She told me once that she always knew she was different. But Mama’s set in her ways, and none of us are about to try convincing her otherwise.”

  Joanna nodded. “Good plan,” she said.

  “So, anyway,” Diego continued, “when Fandango wanted to do a piece about the pedophile priest scandal, Carmen went knocking on their door and begged them to let her wor
k on it. She had done some other freelance work for them prior to that. They hired her for the project and teamed her up with Pamela. Carmen told me that when she and Pam met, it was love at first sight for both of them.”

  “Tell us about Pamela Davis,” Johnny Cruikshank urged. She had finished her key lime pie and was taking detailed notes.

  “Her father, Herman Davis, was an executive for one of the big studios,” Diego Ortega said. “Herman died of a stroke years ago, but I understand he was one of the off-screen movers and shakers behind launching that first Star Trek series. Her mother, Monica Davis, is in her eighties now. In her heyday, before she married Herman, she made a decent living as a bit actress in B-movies.”

  “Do you know how we can get in touch with her?”

  Diego nodded. “She lives in an assisted-living facility in Burbank. It’s called Hidden Hills, and it’s exclusively for movie and television folk. I can get you the number if you want, but I’m not sure it’ll do you any good. She’s an Alzheimer’s patient, and she’s pretty well out of it. If you contact her, she probably won’t know who you’re talking about.”

  “But the facility may have a list of other people—other relatives of Pam’s—who should be notified,” Johnny persisted. “And don’t worry about the number. I’m sure I can get it from directory assistance.”

  “Did Ms. Leigh say what kind of a story Pam and your sister were working on here?” Joanna asked. “Not more pedophile priests, I hope.”

  “Bigamy,” Diego Ortega answered.

  “Bigamy?” Johnny Cruikshank demanded.

  “They spent the better part of two weeks up in northern Arizona, in both Page and Kingman. Ms. Leigh said they made several trips to a place called the Arizona Strip investigating a breakaway Mormon group called The Brethren. From what I understand, The Brethren practice bigamy quite openly.”