Montoya stared into the bottom of his empty iced tea glass. His expression was solemn.
“They were not a happy family, although Mr. Bruce tried to be a good father. He bought his son everything he asked for, but ‘things’ do not take the place of a mother, or love.” Rousing himself, Montoya shook his head. “So much sadness.”
“Are you still in touch with Agnes Parker?” Malloy asked. It was clear that he was going to need to speak to the woman. Maybe she could shed some more light on things.
“If you mean have I seen her recently, no. We spoke on the phone when I sold the Gardens for her,” Montoya answered. “She told me to have the check deposited into her bank account.”
“When was that?” Malloy asked. He had his notepad out and was making notes accordingly now.
Montoya didn’t have to pause to think. He remembered exactly. “Four weeks ago.” He looked from the detective he was talking to to the woman sitting beside him. “Is something wrong?” he asked, then immediately jumped to the only conclusion that he could. “Did Mr. Anson come back?”
Malloy was tempted to tell the man the truth. Montoya had been straightforward with them and answered all their questions, not to mention that he’d been hospitable when he could have just as easily been hostile. But the case was still open, and the investigation was ongoing. That meant that details had to be kept secret until the crime was solved.
“Not exactly,” was all Malloy could say. “But we need to get in touch with Miss Parker. Would you have her address as well as her phone number handy?”
“Yes, of course. Let me give it to you.” Montoya reached into his pants pocket and, after a moment, tugged out a cell phone. “My daughter, she wants me to be part of the modern world as she calls it. Half the time, I forget where I put this thing, so now she makes me carry it with me.”
He shook his head, as if the whole concept of having a cell phone still mystified him. “I like holding something in my hand that feels like something,” he said. “This is like a toy,” he complained, opening the phone. Muttering something under his breath, he swiped through pages, attempting to get to the right section.
It took him several tries. His fingers were undeniably thick. He kept hitting the wrong keys by accident.
Finally, he opened the window he was looking for. “Here it is,” he declared, holding the phone out to Malloy for his perusal.
Malloy took the cell from him and keyed the phone number and the address onto his own phone.
“Thank you,” Malloy said, putting his phone away. Then he offered the cell phone back to the older man.
Montoya shoved the cell phone back into his pocket.
What the man said next surprised Malloy. “I realize that you are not able to say anything right now—” Montoya smiled brightly when they both looked at him. “I watch television,” he explained. “I know about investigations. But when you are able to tell me what is going on, will you?” he requested with genuine sincerity. “I would appreciate getting a call from either of you explaining why you are so interested in the nursery and the people I worked for. I can assure you right now that nothing exciting ever happened at Prickly Gardens. Not in all the years that I worked there.”
Malloy restrained himself from exchanging glances with Kristin. Instead, he told Montoya, “For now, let’s just call it tying up loose ends.”
“And later?” Montoya asked, curious. “What will you call it later?”
“We’ll let you know,” Kristin promised.
It was time to wind this up. Malloy had a feeling that the man had told them everything he knew.
“Thank you for the information and for your hospitality,” Malloy said, rising to his feet. Kristin instantly followed his lead and rose to hers. “But we need to be getting back.”
“Yes, of course,” Montoya agreed, quickly standing up, as well. “It is a long drive back to Aurora.”
He accompanied them through the backyard and then, taking the side yard, he walked them out to the front.
“When you see Miss Agnes,” he requested, “please, give her my best.”
“When was the last time you saw her?” Kristin asked, her curiosity aroused.
“More than a year ago. I helped her move her things from the old trailer, where she used to live, to the new place. I think they call it a ‘bed and board.’ It is really a warehouse for old people, but it is a nice warehouse,” he added tactfully.
Montoya stopped by their vehicle, and after a moment, he confided in a lower voice, “Miss Agnes did not look well.”
Kristin had a feeling that the man was referring to something other than just the natural progression of old age and the aches and pains that it ushered in.
“Do you know what was wrong with her?” she asked the man.
The broad, wide shoulders rose and fell in a vague movement. “If you mean what the doctors called it, it was something with a name I don’t remember. But I think it was more than that.”
“Oh?” Kristin urged him on.
“I think something was eating away at her, from inside.” Montoya tapped his chest with his fist for emphasis. And then he shrugged. “But maybe I am just imagining things,” he added.
“What do you think it was?” Malloy prodded him, wanting to get the nurseryman’s take. Right now, every little bit could either add to the puzzle or help to solve it.
“When we get older,” Montoya said, “we have regrets. Things we didn’t do. Things we did. Who is to say?” The next moment, his reflective mood was gone, and his warm smile had returned. “I hope I have been helpful.”
“That you have,” Malloy said as they got into his car. “Thank you,” he repeated.
A moment later, they were pulling away from the curb. Montoya stood by the curb, thoughtfully watching them until they disappeared from view.
Chapter 21
“Thoughts?”
The sound of Malloy’s voice slipped into the silence in her darkened bedroom, competing with the elevated beating of her heart.
Kristin raised her head from his chest, just enough for her eyes to meet his.
The trip back from San Diego had been nothing short of exhausting.
Traffic on both ends of the journey, first in San Diego, then in Aurora, had been far heavier than they’d anticipated. Consequently, they had agreed, long before they entered the city proper, that paying Agnes Parker a visit should be moved to their next day’s agenda.
Because it took so long to get back, it was far too late to pay the older woman a call at this hour of the evening.
What hadn’t been touched on was how the evening would end. She had just assumed that they would each go to their separate residences, get whatever sleep they could and resume the investigation—hopefully bringing it to some sort of a conclusion—in the morning.
But when Malloy had brought her to her car in the police parking lot, he didn’t just drop her off, then pull out and continue home the way she thought he would. He waited for her to start up her car, and then, as he had done twice before, he went on to follow her home.
She knew better than to presume anything when it came to Malloy, so after she’d parked her car in her driveway and got out of the vehicle, she’d approached his, prepared to ask questions.
She might have been prepared to ask them, but she’d never gotten the chance to voice them because the second Malloy had gotten out of his car, he’d swept her into his arms and kissed her. Kissed her until her head was spinning.
And that had answered all the immediate questions that never got the opportunity to make it off her tongue.
There’d been no verbal exchange between them as Kristin had somehow managed, while still locked in his embrace and her lips very much sealed to his, to unlock her front door so that they could get into her house.
&
nbsp; Once the door was closed, separating them from the rest of the immediate world, they lost no time in separating one another from their clothing.
Things escalated from there.
Passion and heavy breathing effectively took the place of words.
Satisfaction was met not once, but twice, until exhaustion finally resurfaced again, and they collapsed in one another’s arms.
Thoughts?
The single word that Malloy had just uttered—in the form of a question—was the first one she’d heard from him in what seemed like hours.
“Regarding anything in particular?” she asked him, playfully running the tip of her finger along the outline of his lips. She wasn’t fooling herself. This was Malloy Cavanaugh, and however intense this time between them felt right now, she knew it would end. But for now, she intended to enjoy it. “As in my thoughts as to whether or not you’re the world’s greatest lover?”
He was almost too tired to laugh.
When he tucked her against him, Kristin thought she could feel laughter rumbling within his chest, but the sound didn’t fully emerge. Malloy apparently was shoring up his energy.
“Nice guess—we’ll revisit that thought later,” he promised. “But what I’m asking you is what your thoughts are about what we found out from Montoya today.”
He wasn’t being totally clear, Kristin thought. “You’re not asking me if I think Montoya killed all those girls, are you?”
Malloy tucked one arm under his head as he reflected on their visit to the former nursery employee. “No. I don’t think he did. But we’ve got three more players in this thing we really didn’t know about before.
“What if,” he began, drawing her even closer against him, “Parker Senior was the serial killer? He was killing these young girls all along, burying them on an undeveloped section of his property. Then one night, Junior stumbled across his secret. He threatened to go to the police and, panicked, Senior killed Junior to keep him quiet. Then, when he realized what he’d actually done, Senior went through the motions of reporting his son missing. Playing the grieving father, he pretended to try to locate him. It didn’t take long for his guilt to get to him—after all, he’d killed his only son and heir—and Senior started drinking until he eventually wound up killing himself.”
“That would definitely explain why we found Anson’s body with the others,” Kristin agreed. “The problem is, how do we go about proving this?”
“Hey, I can’t do everything,” Malloy pretended to protest. “I came up with the theory.”
“A theory,” she corrected. “You came up with a theory. We really don’t know if that’s the right one,” Kristin reminded him.
Malloy suddenly pulled her down so that in one short movement, she was beneath him again. “Hey,” he asked, pivoting himself on his elbows as he looked down at her face, “have you always been this picky?”
She laced her arms around his neck. “Always,” she whispered, her eyes alluding to things that she refrained from putting into words.
“Oh. Okay, then.”
And then the room fell into silence again as Malloy took full advantage of the invitation that he saw in her eyes.
* * *
Agnes Parker’s advanced infirm condition had forced the once active, strong-willed woman to finally surrender her principles, as well as her desire for independence, and accept the assistance she needed in her day-to-day life.
Since a personal caregiver came with a prohibitive price tag in her region, she had opted to move into a board-and-care facility in Shady Canyon, a city located some fifty miles from Aurora and the nursery where Agnes had spent a good part of her adult life for almost the past forty years.
The board-and-care facility was another name for a regular two-story house that had been converted to a six-bedroom home in order to follow certain state guidelines. Agnes Parker resided in one of the larger bedrooms. It came with its own entrance to the patio and afforded her a view of the garden.
Agnes kept her curtains drawn, leading Kristin to speculate that the woman had had her fill of gardens. She couldn’t help wondering why.
“What do you mean I have visitors?” Agnes demanded sharply of the young male caregiver who had brought them into the old woman’s room. “I never have visitors. There’s nobody left to visit me now that Enrique’s moved away,” she declared, stating the rather sad fact without any accompanying emotion.
Showing emotion, the woman had been heard to say, was a waste of time and effort.
Malloy was quick to introduce himself and Kristin to the former nursery owner. “I’m Detective Cavanaugh and this is Dr. Alberghetti,” he told her. In addition to stepping forward, he had also raised his voice in case the woman had trouble hearing. “We’re from the Aurora Police De—”
He got no further.
Agnes’s long, thin, blue-veined hand spread out like a fragile spider web, covering her heart. For a moment, she appeared to turn even paler than she already was.
“I knew it,” she cried, her voice going up. “I knew this day would come.” Regaining control over herself, Agnes’s bright blue eyes swept over her visitors. And then, in a resigned voice, she asked, “You found them, didn’t you?”
Under ordinary circumstances, Malloy would have asked the woman to elaborate on that question by asking one of his own, specifically, “Found what?” But in this case, he had the impression that he would get further if he allowed the woman to believe that her worst fears had been realized.
“Yes, we did,” he told her.
Agnes took in a long, deep breath and then shook her head. “Finally. It’s over.” Her eyes shifted back to Malloy. “All the bodies?”
Feeling that specifics actually were called for, Kristin spoke up.
“We found twelve,” she told the woman. “Were there more?”
Agnes sighed. The sound seemed to come from deep within her soul.
“No, that’s all of them. God forgive me,” she murmured to herself. “That’s all of them.”
Agnes was seated in her wheelchair. Malloy pulled up the lone chair in the small, furnished room for Kristin. He was more than prepared to stand, but the aide who had showed them into Agnes’s room had returned with a folding chair and offered it to him.
“Thanks,” he told the man, taking the chair from him. He then closed the door behind the caregiver as the latter left the room.
When Malloy turned around toward the woman in the wheelchair, he saw that Kristin had taken Agnes’s thin hands into her own in an obvious gesture of comfort, just as she had done with Professor Sullivan.
Pulling up the folding chair close to Agnes, he asked, “Would you like to tell us about it?”
“Confession is good for the soul, is that it?” Agnes asked. She appeared to be growing steadily wearier. “Well, the soul that could have really benefited from that never had the chance to confess, and that’s on me,” she told them sadly. “That’s all on me.”
“What happened, Agnes?” Kristin prodded gently.
Agnes’s eyes were bright with anger—and exasperation—because she hadn’t been able to right the wrong.
“I caught him, that’s what happened,” she stated flatly. “I caught him burying that poor girl.”
Rather than question Agnes as to the “him” she was referring to, they allowed the woman to tell her story at her own pace.
“At first, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. I’d always felt there was something wrong with my nephew, but I kept hoping that he’d change, that he’d grow out of it. But he didn’t,” she said bitterly. “He just got worse. But I never thought...” She shook her head, still in shock even after all these years. “It didn’t seem real...”
“What didn’t seem real?” Malloy pressed, leaning forward and creating an air of intimacy.
“He laughed at me for asking. Then he told me to go home, that it was none of my ‘damn business’ what he was doing.” Her face darkened with anger she had no way of channeling. “He killed another human being—a lot of other human beings it turned out—and it was none of my business,” she cried incredulously. “He was a monster.” There were unshed tears glistening in her eyes as she made the unyielding pronouncement.
“When you saw what he was doing, why didn’t you call the police?” Malloy asked.
“I was going to,” she answered. “I told him that. Told him he was sick and that he needed to get help. I remember the rage in his eyes when I said that.” For a moment, she was lost in the long-ago event. And then she returned to the present and her narrative. “That was when he came at me. He was holding that shovel, swinging it around like it was a weapon, trying to bash me in the head with it.”
Trembling, Agnes pressed her lips together and closed her eyes. She was reliving the scene. When she opened her eyes again, she seemed to be seeking, if not forgiveness, then understanding.
“He was really such a scrawny boy, little, like his mother. I was heavier than he was—and taller. I got the shovel away from him, and he started screaming at me.” She ran her tongue along the outline of her mouth, trying to dispel the parched dryness that reliving all this had created. Her lips felt as if they were sticking together as she spoke. “I knew at that moment, scrawny or not, he was going to kill me with his bare hands.” She paused to catch her breath, as if remembering the scene had stolen her breath from her.
“He came at me, and I hit him with the shovel with all my might. I only meant to stop him,” she said with all sincerity, her voice hitching. “But he wouldn’t wake up, and I couldn’t find a pulse. I panicked then, and wound up burying Anson with the girl he’d killed.”
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