Rocky Mountain Mystery

by Cassie Miles

  "The trial transcripts were interesting," he said. "It didn't seem to me like there was enough hard evidence to convict Eddy Adderly."

  Her review of the forensic data led to the same conclusion. "Go on."

  "On the other hand, his confession was full and detailed. With information he couldn't have known unless he was the killer."

  "You're tightening up again," she said. "Relax."

  "Right."

  She could have massaged him for hours, enjoying the pleasure of touch. And she wanted his hands on her body, returning the favor. Blair exhaled a sigh. "What's your conclusion? Is Eddy Adderly the Fisherman?"

  "I don't know." David's head lolled to one side. "But I mean to find out. That's why I contacted CCC. I need to know, once and for all, who killed my sister."

  "When you have your answer, what happens?"

  "Revenge," he said darkly.

  The edge in his voice worried her. There was no easy cure for his wound. His pain went deeper than muscle, deeper than bone. He'd been stabbed through the heart with grief. Still bleeding after five years, he was more crippled than she would ever be.

  She lightly stroked his shoulders with her fingernails. "Done."

  He sat up straight, stretched and yawned. "Nice job, Doctor. I feel human again."

  She took a few steps away from him and clasped her hands behind her back. Her fingers tingled, and she felt flushed all over.

  He slipped into his shirt. "Unless you want beer for breakfast, we'll have to grab fast food on the way to Ted Hurtado's house."

  She picked up her blazer and headed toward the door. "Coffee is enough for me until lunch."

  Outside, on another gorgeous spring day, she climbed into the passenger seat of his car and fastened her seat belt, still uncomfortable with someone else behind the wheel. Not that she had a choice. Forensics had impounded her car.

  They crossed the city on Speer Boulevard to north Denver, entering an older, genteel area with aging residences on spacious lots. David parked outside a sprawling house of dark-brown brick. Trapped in the shadows of two towering spruce trees, the house was enveloped in permanent gloom. There were signs of neglect: a broken sidewalk, weeds among the iris, chipped paint above the wide porch.

  "Doesn't seem right for Ted Hurtado," David said. "I never knew him well, but his columns were always hip and witty. This house looks like Dracula might keep a coffin in the basement."

  Blair remembered Ted as a neat, well-dressed man with thick brown hair combed back from his forehead. Not bad looking. He'd made a play for her while she was dating Jake. "Didn't he take some time off from the newspaper to write a novel?"

  "That explains it," David said as he opened his car door. "Novelists are weird."

  On the porch, a coating of dust covered wicker furniture and matching urns of dead flowers and weeds. David pressed the bell.

  The door opened immediately, as if the person inside had been waiting for them. She was petite, dressed in skintight leopard-patterned pants and a deep-purple blouse that showed a lot of cleavage.

  "I'm Doris." She smiled through thick scarlet lipstick. "Teddy's mother. Please come in. We'll have tea."

  "Thank you, ma'am." David introduced them both. As a reporter, he'd trained himself not to form hard-and-fast opinions based on first impressions. Though Doris Hurtado, Ted's mother, Had a platinum-blond hairdo taller than she was, though she wore wacky clothing, it didn't mean the woman was color-blind or crazy. However, as he and Blair followed the bustling little lady into her house, David couldn't help wondering if her offer of tea included a drop of gin.

  To the left of the marble-tiled foyer was a formal parlor. Unlike the shabby exterior of the two-story brick house, this room was impeccable with fancy, claw-footed Victorian furniture, ornate picture frames and shelves full of weird little keepsakes all dusted and shiny. Above the fireplace mantel was a huge portrait of an angry-looking man in a black suit.

  "Nice place you've got here," David said. "Who's the gentleman in this picture?"

  "That's Daddy." With mincing steps, Doris bounced up to the picture and blew him a kiss. When she tilted her head to behold the portrait, her towering curls were strangely immobile. "Daddy passed away seven years ago but is never forgotten. Not for a minute."

  When she turned back toward them, her squinty raisin eyes were damp, and she dabbed away the moisture with the sleeve of her purple shirt. "Teddy told me that you'd be visiting, David. But I didn't know you'd be bringing your girlfriend."

  Blair said, "I'm not his girlfriend. We're colleagues."

  "Do you work at the newspaper?" Doris asked.

  "I'm a medical examiner," Blair said. "A coroner."

  "A doctor." Doris beamed. Tiny wrinkles crackled across her face. It was impossible for David to guess this woman's age. She could have been a hard-living fifty-five or a well-preserved seventy-five.

  Doris chirped, "Remind me, Doctor, to tell you about a pain I have in my tummy, right above my boom-boom. But first, we'll have tea."

  As she set out toward the kitchen, David followed. He was curious to see the rest of her domain. "Allow me to help, Mrs. Hurtado."

  "Call me Doris. All my boyfriends do."

  They passed through a formal dining room, also immaculate, into a disaster area of a kitchen. Clutter and gunk covered the countertops. Cupboard doors hung open. The sink was full of dishes. But the chaos didn't seem to bother Doris at the least. She gestured toward a cookie sheet encrusted with scorched blobs. "My muffins," she said, "didn't quite turn out."

  "We already ate," David said quickly.

  As she placed a chipped enamel teapot on the stove to boil, Doris picked through the mess in the sink. Filmy water lapped around the sloppily stacked dishes. It looked like a breeding pond for mosquitoes. "Let me see," Doris said, "I'll need to find cups."

  "Please don't trouble yourself," said Blair who had followed them. "We'll just chat with you until Ted shows up."

  "That wouldn't be proper." Doris continued to hover at the sink, poking at glasses with one long fingernail. "I always offer refreshments to my visitors."

  Unless David missed his guess, most visitors—those who survived—were smart enough to decline the offer. "We're fine, Doris. Let's go back in the other room."

  When she lifted out a cup, coated with unnamed globules, David took action. He grasped her arm. "Step away from the sink."

  "Well, well." She beamed up at him. "Aren't you the he-man!"

  "We're going back to the parlor."

  As he escorted her, Doris rubbed herself against his arm. Was this loony little woman flirting? Her tiny eyes beamed up at him. "I've seen you on the television, David. You're very cute."

  "Thanks, ma'am."

  In the parlor he tried to seat her in a chair, but she insisted on sitting beside him on the sofa. When he moved to the far edge, she stuck with him. She was so close that he could smell her cloying perfume.

  "Tell me about Ted," David said. "He's been writing a book."

  "My Teddy is a genius. He should be on television, too."

  The front door swung open, and Teddy the Genius came inside. He had his mother's squinty little eyes which he rolled when he saw Doris plastered up against David.

  "Here's my darling boy!" Doris said as she sprang to her feet and ran to her son. She tugged on his sleeve until he lowered his face so she could kiss his cheek, leaving a smear of lipstick.

  "Sorry," Ted said to David. "I was running late."

  "Teddy." His mother still clung to his arm. "David was making a pass at me."

  He glanced apologetically toward David and Blair, then gazed down to his mother and said, "That's what happens when you're the prettiest lady in Denver."

  "You're silly!" she said.

  "Mom, you'll have to excuse us," Ted said. "We have some work to take care of."

  After a few more compliments to his fawning mother, he extracted them from the tidy parlor. They went across the foyer into an office with a sliding
wood door. Ted closed it and pointed to a couple of modern chairs.

  His office, like the parlor and dining room, was sleek and functional. He sat behind the desk. "Mom can be a little over the top, but she means well."

  "Do you live here?" Blair asked.

  "Every time I move out, Doris has a crisis." He shrugged. "It's not so bad. There's a guest apartment over the garage where I can grab some privacy."

  "This is a big place," she said. "It seems like a lot for your mother to take care of."

  "I have a cleaning service twice a week."

  It was hard for David to believe that the disaster in the kitchen had accumulated in just a few days. "So, Ted. I understand you took some time away from the paper to write a book."

  "A thriller. The manuscript is with an agent and we're optimistic about finding a publisher. In the meantime, I went back to The Post. It's been about six months." He glanced at his wristwatch. "What can I do for you, David?"

  "I'm working with Colorado Crime Consultants, looking into the Fisherman murders."

  "The current thing?"

  "I'm leaving that to the cops," David said carefully. After FBI Agent Gary O'Hara's warning, he didn't want anybody to think he was going to mess up the ongoing investigation. "I'm more concerned with the past."

  "Why?"

  "Eddy Adderly is dying in prison. Before he goes, I want to be sure he's the man who killed my sister."

  Ted frowned. "You shouldn't get involved, David. You're too close to the crime."

  "It's been five years," David said. Not that he had to justify his decisions to anybody.

  "My advice? Let somebody else do the investigating."

  "As it so happens," David said coolly, "I'm the best person I know for conducting true crime interviews. That's my job."

  "And we all know you've been real successful." Ted didn't bother to disguise the bitterness in his voice. "Jake always tells us about your accomplishments. Ohh, did you see David on television? Aah, David got quoted in Vanity Fair. But those investigations are different. You're not personally connected to those crimes."

  David reined in his temper. "Thanks for your concern. Do you mind answering a couple of questions?"

  Ted paced to a file cabinet, pulled it open and took out a folder. "These are copies of all the notes the Fisherman sent to me. There were ten in all."

  David had already reviewed copies of the notes that had been printed in the newspaper. Most were taunts along the line of "You'll never catch me." Or threats, stating when the next victim would appear.

  "I'm more interested in your impressions," David said. "Did you ever get the idea that he knew his vic-tims? Maybe that he stalked them before he attacked?"

  Ted plucked one sheet from the file and read it aloud, "Cops are stupid. I'm not. Next mermaid comes on Friday. Do you see? You are dumb." Ted looked up at them. "The first letter of the first word in each sentence spells out CINDY, and that was the next victim."

  "So he knew," Blair said. "He already had selected her."

  "And we were all too stupid to understand his little code," Ted said. "Not until after the murder."

  "Were there other clues like that?"

  Ted shook his head. "Far as I can tell, it was the only time he gave a name in code."

  "There were references to food," David said. "Like 'she's sweet as pecan pie.'"

  "I think those were meant for me." Ted straightened his shoulders, preening a bit. "I was writing restaurant reviews at the time, and the Fisherman must have read them."

  His rationale answered a question that had been bothering David. Why Ted? Why not an investigative reporter with a front-page byline? "You think he selected you because he was a foodie?"

  "The cops thought so," Ted said. "They staked out the restaurants I reviewed."

  From outside the office, David heard Ted's mother shuffling around. It sounded as if the front door opened and closed.

  Blair must have heard it, too, because she said, "Maybe I should go check on Doris."

  "She's fine," Ted said.

  "About the current murder," David said. "Do you think it's him, the same guy as before?"

  "No way. Eddy Adderly is the Fisherman, and he's in jail."

  There was a hammering on the office door. In a high-pitched voice, Doris squealed, "Teddy, come quick. Oh, dear. Teddy, hurry."

  He stalked to the sliding door and opened it. "What's wrong, Mother?"

  "The mail!" She held up a plain white envelope, addressed to Ted. "I didn't mean to open it, but I just did. And this was inside."

  Her hand trembled as she waved the sheet of lined notebook paper toward them.

  Ted took the paper and read. "I'm fishing again. I want more mermaids and you can't stop me. The next one comes on Friday."

  Chapter Seven

  With one hand, Ted patted the quivering shoulders of his mother who had plastered herself against his chest. With the other, he held out the threatening note so David could study it.

  "Don't touch," Ted warned. "There might be fingerprints."

  David leaned, close to scrutinize the scribbled words. Like the other notes from the Fisherman, it was written in pencil with blockish letters. Though it would take a handwriting expert to determine if this note was written by the same person who penned the other threats, it looked similar. "Same guy? What do you think, Ted?"

  "At first glance it's the same."

  "Not quite." Blair—who was much more conversant with forensics than either of them—held a copy of a previous note beside the new one for comparison. "The new one has more capital letters. Look at the word mermaid. Both the A and I are written small but are uppercase."

  "A code," David suggested.

  "Or a purposeful misdirection," she said.

  "It's different in other ways," Ted said. "Very brief and to the point. And there's no mention of food."

  "It's not so sneering," David said. The other notes made derogatory comments about cops and the media. He repeated the catchphrase from several other notes. "'You can't catch me.' That was a more challenging tone."

  "More direct," Ted said.

  "I can't believe you two," Blair said. "You're critiquing a threat note from a psycho."

  Doris sobbed loudly against her son's chest. "Oh, Teddy. What will we do? He's going to kill us."

  Blair stepped in, gently touching the older woman's shoulder. "Come with me and sit down, Doris. This has been a terrible shock for you."

  She tightened her grasp on her son. "That's right. A terrible shock."

  "Come with me," Blair repeated. "I'm a doctor, remember?"

  When Doris transferred her grip to Blair, who carefully escorted her to the other room, David breathed a little easier. How the hell did Ted put up with this woman? Doris Hurtado took the concept of clingy to a whole new level. "Weren't the other notes sent to you at the newspaper?"

  "That's right. Addressed to me personally and marked Private."

  So this was another deviation from the original pattern of the Fisherman. Though it seemed like a small change, David didn't downplay the significance. Serial killers generally followed the same ritual down to the last detail. "Why would he do it different this time?"

  Ted rubbed at his shirtfront, which was smeared with his mother's lipstick. "Look at this mess! It's a Hugo Boss shirt. Probably ruined."

  "Maybe this killer is a copycat, after all."

  "That would be my analysis." Ted looked up from his shirt, clearly irritated. "If you ask me, the whole thing is a pain in the rear."

  "That's an interesting take on the brutal murders of several women," David said coldly. Ted wasn't exactly the King of Empathy.

  "Don't moralize with me," Ted snapped. "This isn't my beat."

  "It could be." David was a little surprised that Ted hadn't already cashed in on his unique position as the recipient of the Fisherman's threat notes.

  "You're right," Ted murmured. "I could do a couple of TV interviews. I should call my agent."

&nb
sp; David read the note again, memorizing it. The next killing would take place on Friday. Only four days from now. If he was following the pattern of the original Fisherman, the next victim would work for the news media or would be a medical person. Like Blair.

  Doris wailed from the other room, and Ted exhaled a long-suffering sigh. "You have to leave, David. I need to take care of my mother and call the cops."

  "And your agent?"

  "I could follow in your footsteps," he said. "You seem to have turned serial killers into a full-time profession."

  Wallowing in violent crime hadn't been David's original intention. He'd wanted to use his investigative reporting to heal himself and others. Now, his profession disgusted him. It might be time to get out. "Thanks for your time, Ted."

  Staring straight into David's eyes, Ted's attitude was confrontational. "Like I said before, it's a bad idea for you to dig into these crimes."

  "And I told you that—"

  "Stop!" Ted held up his hand, palm out. "Leave the investigating to the professionals at CCC."

  "Actually, they're not pro. They're citizen experts. Like you and me."

  "Whatever. You ought to back off. You'll only get hurt."

  If David had been pursuing these killings as an investigative reporter, he would have made more of an effort to leave Ted Hurtado on a positive note. But this was his own private hunt, and he could be honest. "I don't need your advice, Ted."

  "Because you're so smart?"

  "Because you know nothing about me. Or my life."

  With a quick pivot, Ted turned his back and went into the other room where Blair sat on the sofa beside his mother, patting her hand and listening as Doris rattled on about her physical ailments and how this terrible shock would probably kill her.

  David stood with the front door half-open, waiting while Blair extricated herself. Quickly as possible, she joined him. On the porch, she shuddered from head to toe. "That is one weird family."

  "Agreed."

  "People like Doris are one of the reasons I became an M.E. for the Coroner's Office. Dead people don't talk back."

  Side by side they walked down the sidewalk to the car. "What's next?" she asked.