Left for Dead

by J. A. Jance

  “There are cameras at those checkpoints?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ll try to get a look at the films and see if I notice anything out of line. Maybe we can convince Sergeant Dobbs to help me out with that. What time was this again?”

  “Late afternoon. The time should be in the report.”

  “If and when said report surfaces,” Detective Rush said.

  “I have it on good authority that it’s been located and sent along to Pima County.”

  “I’m puzzled about those cigarette burns,” she said thoughtfully.

  Al had thought of little else. The deliberate burns on the victim’s skin had haunted his nightmares for two nights. How could someone do that to another human being? “Burns and cuts both,” he said. “What about them?”

  “Fresh?”

  “I’m no expert. Maybe a day old, but it could be more or less.”

  “You found her on Friday afternoon. If the burns were part of what could be called an ‘enhanced interrogation,’ what were her assailants looking for? Presumably, Chico, her pimp, was dead by then. So was this recreational torture only, or were they looking for specific information, something she knew and no one else did?”

  Detective Rush pulled out her cell phone. She punched in a number and held it up to her ear. Al was surprised. There were plenty of places in this expanse of desert where cell phone communication was either spotty or nonexistent. Evidently, this wasn’t one of them.

  “I want you to check something for me,” she said into her phone. “Go into the ViCAP database. I’m looking for unidentified female homicide victims with evidence of cigarette burns.” She paused. “Let’s say the last five years.” Another pause. “No, anywhere in the country. Get back to me as soon as you can.” Closing her phone, she looked back at Al. “You say this road dead-ends at a fence?”

  Al nodded.

  “Let’s walk, then,” she said. “You take one side; I’ll take the other.”

  “What are we looking for?”

  “Anything that doesn’t belong.”

  Several yards short of the fence line but within view of the other road, Al came to a sudden stop. “When you say something that doesn’t belong, would you mean like maybe a cigarette butt?”

  Ariel hurried over to where he was standing. The filtered butt lay on the weedy shoulder of the track. “Looks relatively fresh,” she told him. “Way to go. Good spotting. It’s too far from the fence to have been tossed out by a passing vehicle, which means whoever dropped it was walking here.”

  Extracting an evidence bag from her jacket pocket, she collected the stub and examined it before slipping it into the bag and back into her pocket, along with the bagged cockle burr.

  “Like I said, lots of illegals walk through here,” Al cautioned.

  “Yes,” Detective Rush agreed. “I’m sure they do, but how many of them smoke filtered Camels?”

  “They took off in a hell of a hurry when I showed up,” Al said. “It doesn’t seem likely they’d have taken time out for a smoke.”

  “Maybe not as they were leaving,” Detective Rush said, “but what about on the way in?”

  When Al and Detective Rush reached the fence, they found one additional bit of useful trace evidence. A tiny thread, similar to the one on the burr, dangled from one of the barbs on the wire.

  “See there?” she said triumphantly. “They were in a hurry, and they got careless.”

  “Assuming they parked here,” Al said, “how did they transport her from here to the wash? Did she walk there under her own steam?”

  Detective Rush looked at Al questioningly. “How big is she?”

  “Hard to tell, but not very. Five-five or so. Maybe a hundred and twenty pounds.”

  “So most likely, one guy couldn’t carry her that far by himself. It would take two, at least, to cover this much distance.”

  With Detective Rush in the lead, they started back the way they had come. When her phone rang, she stopped to answer and listened for a time.

  “Okay,” she said finally. “If you’ve got any connections across the line in Mexico, you might see if there are any similar cases down there. In the meantime, we’ve got another victim with similar injuries. Only so far, this one isn’t dead.”

  “What?” Al asked when she closed her phone.

  “So far we’ve found three similar cases. Unidentified victims. Cigarette burns. Found in areas frequented by illegals. One in New Mexico, one in southern California, and another one over by Yuma, here in Arizona.”

  “So it’s a serial killer?”

  “That’s my first guess.”

  “What happens if the killer finds out Rose Ventana isn’t dead?”

  “Maybe we’d better go try to talk to her, and to that nun you told me about, and let her know that the patient might be in danger.”

  “I think she already figured that out,” Al said. “Last night, when I showed up unannounced, she pulled a Taser on me.”

  Detective Rush stopped short. “Really? A Taser?”

  Al nodded.

  “My kind of nun,” Detective Rush said with a laugh. “Definitely my kind of nun.”

  “Are we going to stop by Pima County and let them know that the delayed assault report may be connected to a series of homicides?”

  Rush thought about that before she answered. “I think we’ll just let it sog for a while. So far all Pima County has is an attempted homicide on their books. I have more than that in my jurisdiction because the victim, Mr. Hernández, is dead. The last thing I need is to be caught up in some kind of jurisdictional pissing match when I really want to clear my case. And I don’t want anyone swooping in and screwing up my trace evidence. If Pima County comes online and starts working the case, we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

  “What do we do next?” Al asked.

  “We’re going to stop by your office and see about getting a look at those checkpoint videos.”

  “And meet Kevin Dobbs?” Al asked.

  Detective Rush grinned at him. “Remember what I said about people like that?”

  “You mean you go around them or over them?”

  “With Sergeant Dobbs,” she said, “I’m choosing the go-around option. Since you’ll be working with him after I leave, that’ll be a better choice than a direct confrontation.”

  Doesn’t matter, Al thought. No matter how you slice it, Kevin Dobbs is going to be pissed as hell!

  37

  11:00 A.M., Monday, April 12

  Tucson, Arizona

  For Ali, pulling the pieces together for the drive to Patagonia was a lot like herding cats. When Teresa had said she’d call her uncle Tomás, it sounded easy, but it wasn’t. Tomás Kentera was Maria Delgado’s brother. Unlike her, he had a cell phone and no landline. Unfortunately, he had forgotten to recharge the battery. As a consequence, his cell phone wasn’t working. Ali had to drive to his house on the far west side of town to find him and then convince him to ride along with her to retrieve Teresa’s minivan.

  They were on the freeway and headed for Patagonia when Ali’s phone rang.

  “We closed the restaurant right after breakfast and gave ourselves some extra time off,” Edie Larson announced. “The agreement is signed, sealed, and delivered. The Sugarloaf is sold. Your father is over the moon, and so am I. Can you believe it?”

  “I do believe it,” Ali said. She couldn’t remember her mother ever sounding so excited. “Congratulations.”

  “In the meantime,” Edie continued, “we’ve got an appointment later this afternoon to take a look at the available units at Sedona Hills. Since we really will be moving in a matter of weeks, we need to get our ducks in a row about where we’re going. One thing is for sure—we’ll need to have a yard sale or two.”

  “What about the mayor thing?” Ali asked.

  “Yes,” Edie said, “the mayor thing is still on. Your father hasn’t exactly come around, but I’m guessing he will eventually.”

&nbs
p; Ali thought so, too. “He usually does.”

  “Now, wait a minute,” Edie objected. “When you say it that way, you make your father sound henpecked.”

  “What I’m really saying is that you deserve each other,” Ali said. “You both have your moments.”

  “All right, then,” Edie said, changing the subject. “How are things on your end? How is your friend doing?”

  “Better,” Ali said, looking at Teresa’s uncle, sitting in stolid silence in her front seat. “Better but not completely out of the woods.”

  A few miles later, Ali’s next call was from Leland Brooks. The cement pour had gone well. Neither of the Askins nominees had RSVPed, but it was early days, the two teas were almost a whole week away. As for the garden? The long-term weather report indicated that some of the hardier items could start being planted the following week.

  “So things are moving forward?” Ali asked.

  “Absolutely, madam,” he said. “You didn’t think I’d let you down, did you?”

  “No,” Ali said. “Actually, I didn’t.”

  Feeling guilty about carrying on not one but several telephone conversations in her passenger’s presence, Ali switched her phone off. By then they had turned off I-10 onto Highway 83. Ali was trying to figure out how to initiate a conversation with this relative stranger when Tomás Kentera did it for her.

  “Why do you think Sheriff Renteria ordered his people to stay away from the hospital?” Tomás asked.

  “He what?” Ali demanded.

  “I know lots of people in Nogales, and that’s what they’re saying—that Sheriff Renteria ordered his people to stay away from the hospital and from Jose.”

  Ali was astonished. “That can’t be.”

  “Have you seen any people from the sheriff’s department at the hospital?”

  “No, but—”

  “Someone should ask the sheriff about this,” Tomás said. “I would really like to know.”

  “Believe me,” Ali said determinedly, “so would I.”

  Teresa and Jose’s mobile home was located in a housing development that had mostly failed to develop. Ten acres had been divided into ten one-acre lots, seven of which remained empty. Two other mobile homes, one obviously a derelict, were situated on the property. The Reyes lot was the only one that was completely fenced.

  It was just past noon when Ali stopped at the gate. Tomás got out to open it. The minivan sat in a free-standing carport at the back of the house. Teresa had told Ali that the car keys were in a drawer in the kitchen and that a spare house key could be found under an empty flowerpot sitting next to the front steps. The key wasn’t there, but by the time Ali reached the front steps, she realized no key would be necessary, because the front door stood ajar.

  Ali knew that Duane Lattimore had executed a search warrant on the house, but it seemed unlikely that he would have gone off leaving it unsecured. She suspected that an enterprising burglar might have decided to take advantage of the current uproar in Teresa and Jose’s lives. If so, it was possible the intruder might be inside the home.

  Holding up one hand and motioning for Uncle Tomás to stay where he was, Ali eased her way up the wooden steps. By the time she was ready to pull the door open the rest of the way, she had her Glock 17 out of its small-of-the-back holster.

  Ali peered around the door frame and came to an abrupt stop. During the time she had worked with the Yavapai County Sheriff’s Department, she had seen the messy aftermath of several executed search warrants. This wasn’t anywhere close to messy. Everywhere Ali looked, she saw wanton destruction.

  Living room and dining room furniture had been overturned and the upholstery shredded, spilling fill into snowdrift like piles of cotton. Lamps had been flung to the floor and broken; a glass coffee table had been smashed into thousands of shards. In the kitchen, the fridge had been tipped over on its side, spilling contents into a sticky, broken-jarred mess on the floor. Drawers had been removed from the cupboards, dumped, and then stomped apart. Dishes and glassware had been pulled out of cupboards and smashed to pieces. Something that looked like super glue covered the glass stove top. What appeared to be a collection of cookbooks had been thrown to the floor, and something wet and sticky, like Karo syrup, had been poured over them, swelling the covers and sticking the pages together in a sodden mass.

  Picking her way through the debris field as carefully as possible, Ali searched the remainder of the house, feeling more and more heartsick as she went. In the room Jose and Teresa had prepared for Carmine’s nursery, Ali found the wreckage of a crib and mattress as well as a demolished changing table. Diapers, tiny clothing, and piles of receiving blankets had been thrown on the floor and then covered with a thick substance that appeared to be a mixture of the contents of two Costco-size containers, one of baby powder and one of lotion. The last bedroom—the one at the far end of the mobile, which evidently belonged to Lucy and Carinda—seemed to have been spared, making Ali wonder if the intruder had run out of time or energy or both.

  On the opposite end of the house, in Teresa and Jose’s master bedroom, the level of destruction once again escalated. Gaping holes had been slashed into the mattress and box spring. Clothing had been pulled from the closet, ripped apart, dumped on the floor, and soaked with bleach from an empty two-gallon jug that lay nearby. Bottles of still-tacky nail polish had been spilled onto the torn bedding, sparing none of it. Bottles of shampoo and conditioner and lotion had been poured into an oddly flowery-smelling soup in the bathtub. Chunks of jaggedly broken glass left in the bottom of that mixture presented a cutting hazard for anyone trying to clean up the mess.

  After searching the house from end to end and finding no intruders, Ali returned to the living room, where she found Tomás Kentera standing dumbstruck, staring at the destruction.

  “Who would do such a thing!” he exclaimed. “And why?”

  Ali had no ready answer for that question. Shaking her head, she put away her Glock, pulled out her cell phone, turned it on, and dialed 911.

  “Nine-one-one,” the operator replied. “What are you reporting?”

  “A burglary,” Ali said. She read the address Teresa had given her to program into the GPS. “That’s just north of Patagonia, between Patagonia and Sonoita.”

  “I’m aware of where it is,” the operator said. “Is anyone injured?”

  “No. Someone broke into the house while no one was home.”

  “And the intruder is no longer at that location, is that correct?”

  “Yes,” Ali said, “but—”

  “That address is in the county, so responders would be coming from the Santa Cruz Sheriff’s Department. However, many of their personnel are currently involved in a complex emergency situation. If there’s no immediate threat to life or property at your location, I’ll need to take a report. They’ll send someone out as soon as a deputy becomes available. What is your name, please?”

  Ali gave her name, but before she could say anything more, the operator interrupted.

  “I’m sorry. I’m going to need to take another call. Someone will be there as soon as possible.”

  With a click, she was gone. When Ali turned to look at Tomás, he was bent over and reaching into a pile of what looked like the debris of a kitchen junk drawer. He pulled out a key fob, held it up, and waved it triumphantly in the air.

  “Look what I found,” he said. “The minivan keys. Why didn’t they steal it?”

  “That’s what I’d like to know, too,” Ali said.

  She scrolled through the numbers on her phone and dialed the one listed as Juanita Cisco’s office number. She was astonished when Juanita answered her own phone.

  “What’s up now?” the defense attorney asked. “Has Lattimore showed up at the hospital for a return engagement?”

  “This is something else,” Ali said. “I’m standing in the middle of Teresa and Jose’s house in Patagonia. It’s a wreck.”

  “Maybe Teresa’s not a good housekeeper,” Juanit
a suggested cheerfully. “After all, if someone came into my house unannounced, they’d say the same thing about me—that my house is a wreck. Give the poor woman a break. She’s got an armload of little kids. What do you expect?”

  “You don’t understand,” Ali said. “This isn’t a housekeeping problem. This is a breaking-and-entering problem. Maybe not so much breaking. Teresa told me there was a spare key hidden outside. It wasn’t there when I got here, but someone has torn the place apart.”

  “What about the search warrant?” Juanita asked. “Maybe Lattimore’s DPS guys are responsible for what you’re seeing. Do you want me to ask him?”

  “You can if you want,” Ali returned, “but I don’t think we can lay this at Lieutenant Lattimore’s door. He’s a cop. He may be a jerk, but from what I could see, he pretty much goes by the book. This looks like a frenzy of absolute destruction with a whole lot of malice thrown in on the side. I’m talking about broken dishes, smashed furniture, sliced mattresses, dumped food. Someone went through this house in a deliberate fashion, systematically destroying everything they could lay hands on.”

  “Have you reported it?”

  “I tried,” Ali said. “It turns out the local sheriff’s department is totally preoccupied with something else at the moment. Believe me, once I leave here, I’m going directly there and then to Sheriff Renteria himself.”

  “If Teresa is released from the hospital tomorrow, will she be able to go home?”

  Ali looked around at the ugly mess. “No way. The place looks like what you’d expect in the aftermath of an F5 tornado. Everything is wrecked—food, clothing, furniture.”

  Juanita sighed. “All right,” she said. “If you’ll handle the police report, I’ll be responsible for letting Teresa know what’s happened. I’ll try to find out who carries her homeowner’s insurance and see if I can get them to call out an adjuster. I’ll also let Teresa know that she’ll probably need to make other arrangements for a place to stay once she leaves the hospital.”