“Those kids,” she said, “If it’s not one thing, it’s another.”
“Kids?”
“Amanda and Jake. Not going to be easy on them, replacing the vehicle. I’m sure they won’t get enough of a settlement to help any.”
I glanced at the surrounding tables. Two were empty now and at the third were a group of construction workers who were totaling up their bill and getting ready to leave. I leaned in closer to Michaela.
“Financial problems?” I asked.
“The usual stuff young couples get into today. Credit cards, second mortgages.”
My eyebrows must have raised a notch.
“Mary Beth over at the title company is my neighbor. They did a second mortgage a couple months ago to cover some credit card stuff, that’s all.”
I guess there’s something to be said for living in a big, impersonal city where you don’t know any of your neighbors. I wrestled between the ethics of listening to gossip versus learning all I could about my client. But it turned out not to matter. Michaela drained the last of her coffee, patted the table top, and stood up.
“Gotta go,” she said. “Lots to do today.”
I poked at the scrambled eggs on my plate. The diner had almost cleared and Jo finished ringing up a sale then came around again with the coffee pot.
I motioned her to sit when she got to my table. With an eye toward who might overhear, I asked, “Who do you know that drives a red pickup around here? Or maybe a red Suburban or something big like that?”
She leaned back in her chair, taking a couple of minutes because it obviously felt good to be off her feet. Her reddish brows knitted and she blew a puff of breath upward, fluffing her bangs for a second.
“Gosh, hadn’t really thought about it,” she said. “Lot of trucks around here. You might have noticed from outside.” She tilted her head toward the parking area, which had largely cleared by now. But it was true, the lot had been full of trucks just a half hour ago.
The tiny bell at the door tinkled and she turned, ready to rise for a new customer. The stringy guy with long hair wore a sleeveless black T-shirt with some kind of heavy-metal band logo on it. Jo pulled herself to her feet and picked up her carafe.
“That guy’s brother has a red truck,” she whispered, leaning close to me.
“Who’s he?”
“Billy Rodman.”
Rodman, Rodman. “Rocko Rodman?”
“That’s Rocko,” she said, tilting her head toward the newcomer who had taken a seat at the counter. Her voice dropped to a slight whisper. “Had a rock band when he was a teenager.” She rolled her eyes. “No, it’s his brother, Billy, who has the truck.”
She scooted off to pour him some coffee and to cash out another customer. I spread jelly on my toast and watched Rocko’s back as he gave Jo his order and stared up at the TV set in the corner. His voice sounded polite as he exchanged a little banter with Jo. He said please and thank you, and despite his rough appearance seemed a nice enough guy. I lingered with another cup of coffee and my final piece of toast, watching for a sign of a guy who would fly into a jealous rage over his girlfriend, but it didn’t come out while I was looking.
He whipped through a plate of bacon and eggs, wiped his mouth and paid his bill. A fine, upstanding citizen. I watched him walk out the door and climb onto a Harley. It roared out of the lot as I gathered Rusty’s to-go meal and paid for everything.
Out in the car, it took some effort but I managed to convince Rusty to wait until we’d gotten back to the motel before opening the container with his breakfast in it. Although the journey was less than half a block, the anticipation was killing him. I paid—drops of doggy drool spotted my car seats by the time we arrived. I opened the box on the porch of our cabin and let him go at it. In less time than the drive over from Jo’s, he’d polished off every scrap.
As I picked up the food box and headed toward the trash basket inside, I wondered about Rocko and whether there was some connection between his brother’s truck and last night’s incident. There must be.
The beauty of a small town phone directory is that few people go to the trouble or expense to get unlisted numbers, the way they do in a big city—strange, because aren’t you a lot more anonymous when at least a dozen other people share your last name? But at any rate, Billy Rodman was listed and I matched the address with the one Michaela had given me yesterday, on one of the town’s little side streets. A cruise-by wouldn’t hurt, would it?
Rusty wasn’t thrilled by the idea of getting right back into the car, but I wasn’t going to leave him on his own at the motel.
“It won’t take long, I promise.”
He balked when I opened the back door for him and I spotted his leash on the back seat.
“Okay, okay. A walk would do us both good.” I retrieved the leash and clipped it to his collar. He immediately perked up.
A woman and her dog, out for a walk. Now that couldn’t draw too much attention, could it? We followed the main street for three blocks, then turned right. For the first time, I noticed a little bookstore on the corner and promised myself that I would get back there before my visit was over. Rusty managed to sniff every shrub and flower pot along the way but he was thoughtful enough not to yank my arm off in the process.
One block north of Main Street, we made a left turn and found ourselves on Quarter Horse Road, a side street of depressing little houses with short chain link fences around their small front yards. The Rodman house was number twelve and I managed to spot it without any great difficulty. The house was a small box with a pitched roof, two windows and a door showing on the front. Beside it, a detached garage was nearly the same size as the house. Both were painted a deep green with flaky patches revealing the gray wood beneath. The Harley was in the front yard but the place looked otherwise quiet. I gave it a long stare, to be sure it was the same bike, and at that moment the front door opened.
Rocko came out, striding purposefully toward his bike and he caught me looking. He watched me closely and our eyes met for a second. I gave a tiny wave and fell back into woman-out-walking-dog mode. Rusty would have paused for a visit but I firmly pulled him back in line and kept a steady pace to the end of the block.
Behind me I could hear the Harley rumble to life and felt the ground quiver as it passed me. Rocko didn’t look back. I turned right at the next corner and aurally followed his progress in the opposite direction.
Rusty and I circled the block and found ourselves back on Rodman’s street. Well, we knew where Rocko was, didn’t we? And we could be pretty sure we’d know if he returned. And there was that garage, just waiting to be explored. I gave a quick glance up and down the narrow dirt street and stepped through the ungated chain link fence.
“Be really quiet,” I whispered to Rusty, as if that would make a difference.
The front door of the garage, actually two swinging doors that met in the middle with a large hasp and padlock, looked impenetrable without tools and the cover of darkness, so I walked around to the side. A grimy window was meant to let in light, I felt certain, but it was blocked with stacks of junk inside and was dirty enough to filter out any attempt at effective peering. The back of the building afforded no access at all, so it was the fourth side, the one facing the house that would interest me and would surely be most dangerous.
From the back corner, I glanced toward the house, saw no sign of life, and edged quickly to the walk-in door that connected, via a short sidewalk, to the back door of the house. A quick test showed that it was unlocked, so I twisted the knob and stepped in, pulling the unsuspecting Rusty with me. I silently apologized to him for leading him into this life of crime; it was, after all, his first breaking and entering offense, although it was by no means mine.
The red pickup truck filled most of the space, except for a workbench that ran along the back wall and stacks of boxes along the side, accounting for the window blockage that thwarted me from outside.
I knew what I was after and I cr
ossed to the right front fender. A long scrape gave testimony to the contact last night with Amanda Zellinger’s Blazer. The damage was surprisingly little, considering what hers looked like, and it probably would attract no notice once a layer or two of dirt covered it. The rest of the truck wasn’t exactly pristine, with dents and bungles in several places. With the paint sample from Amanda’s wreckage, a pretty good case could be built, I guessed. Sheriff Michaela would be glad to know she could wrap this one up quickly.
My smile of self congratulation faded though as a distinctive sound began to register, coming from outside. The Harley.
My stomach did a big lurch and I dashed to the side door. Through the glass in its top panel, I saw Rocko dismount and pull a small grocery sack from his saddlebag. He looked up, toward the front door of the house, and exchanged words with someone. A second later, another man—a larger, if better dressed, version of Rocko—stepped off the front porch and headed toward the garage, a ring of keys dangling from his fingers.
Shit!
Rocko went into the house and the padlock on the front of the garage began to rattle.
A low growl rumbled in Rusty’s throat and I shushed him before he decided to bellow forth with raucous barking.
“Hush,” I cautioned. My mind went into overdrive. There was no innocent explanation for my being here. Sorry, I’m a stranger in town and just got lost. No, it wasn’t going to work. I heard the padlock leave the hasp and the hasp grind back with a small squeak.
Was Rocko in the house at this moment, standing at the kitchen window, putting his groceries away? My odds probably favored exactly that. Meanwhile, Billy began pushing one of the doors aside and light streaked into the dusty garage. No choice. I grabbed the knob of the side door and pulled it open.
Cinching Rusty’s leash in as tightly as I could, I ducked through the door with the dog at my side. Close the door, Charlie. At the last second I did, and in one smooth motion dashed around to the back of the garage building. I leaned against it for a second, remembering to breathe again and hoping like hell that no windows of the house looked out this direction. A cautious glance assured me that I was, at least temporarily, out of sight.
The relief was shattered a moment later when I heard a shout, disturbingly close.
“Billy!” Rocko must be standing on the back porch. He couldn’t be more than twenty feet from me right now.
Rusty’s growl started again and I reached down to touch him on the muzzle.
I’m dead, I’m dead, I thought.
But Rocko’s shout was answered from the front part of the garage.
“What?”
“Your boss is on the phone.”
“Tell him I left five minutes ago.”
I held my breath, hoping that would be the extent of the conversation. When the truck roared to life a minute later, I breathed again. I bided my time until he backed out, tapped my toe while I listened to him go back and close the garage doors, and relaxed slightly as the truck drove off down the road. I glanced toward the house and finally risked a peek toward the back of it. The door was closed again and I could faintly hear the sounds of a television set.
“Okay, let’s play this cool,” I said to Rusty.
We circled the garage and made our way out the gap in the fence without being yelled at, jumped or shot. At the street again, I resumed my dog-walking role, taking the direction that would get me back to the motel the fastest.
My heartbeat managed to return to normal after the close call at the Rodman house, although the altitude was still doing a number on my breathing. I puffed my way up the final incline and noticed that even Rusty had slowed down. We got to the room and both partook of long drinks of water.
I dialed the sheriff’s office, hoping in a way that Michaela wouldn’t be there and that I could simply leave a message suggesting that she take a look at Billy Rodman’s vehicle. The sheriff had already dropped the hint that she wasn’t especially keen on my presence here in town.
“Sheriff’s department, can I help you?” It came out as ‘kina hep ya’ in a high female voice of indeterminate age.
I asked for Michaela and was informed that ‘she’s gone downta lake.’ I left a message with the information about the red truck.
“She ain’t gonna get this real soon,” the receptionist said. “They’re pulling a car out.”
Chapter 9
The dispatcher would have been willing to go on, speculating all day long, but I could tell after a couple of questions that she really didn’t know more than she’d already told me. I thanked her and hung up.
“This could get interesting,” I told Rusty.
I grabbed a jacket and my purse and his leash. He eagerly preceded me to the Jeep and hopped up into the back seat.
The highway curved around the lake on two sides, north and west, the east side being bordered by forest and the south open to the natural valley between two ranges of mountains. A dam, built in the early twentieth century, blocked the water at its narrow point, and formed the deepest part of the lake. Winter snows and spring rains normally kept the water level stable, but we’d had three years of drought conditions. The dry seasons provided my husband with work, I had to admit, but it also changed conditions for all the lakes and rivers statewide. Along the edge of Watson’s Lake, a clear border showed that the waterline was at least twenty feet lower than normal, I noticed as I cruised slowly along the road watching for signs of activity.
There were only three or four little roads leading off the highway toward the lake, but I wasn’t familiar enough with the area to know which one to take. Michaela could be anywhere, including somewhere out in the middle on a boat. About the time I’d decided to just start guessing, an ambulance roared past me. This being what investigators call a clue, I sped up and followed it.
It turned off at the marina road and bumped its way over the washboarded gravel road. I dropped back to avoid flying rocks and a faceful of dust. At the marina—loosely named such because it consisted of only a little convenience store-gas depot and a few rental fishing boats—a uniformed officer waved the ambulance down a secondary road that followed the lake’s edge. He stopped me and asked what I was doing here. I introduced myself and saw that my name made no impression on him.
“I was just on the phone with Michaela’s office. I have a message for her.” All of that was true.
He gave a weary nod and waved me through, not piecing together the fact that any message of importance would have surely come to the sheriff by radio, not via some out-of-town woman civilian. However, I didn’t intend to question his laxity and I wasted no time in following the ambulance over a slight rise and down the opposite side, getting myself out of the officer’s sight.
The narrow lane served as access to three or four boat ramps, little single-car concrete pads that people used as launching points for their personal boats. The ramps were each about a hundred yards apart, on my left-hand side. On the right, open space provided parking for vehicles and boat trailers. We passed two such ramps and a half-dozen parked, empty trailers before I spotted the cluster of activity at the third ramp. I pulled to the right and parked the Jeep well out of the way.
The sheriff’s brown and gold cruiser and the ambulance were the only vehicles on the boat ramp. A few other vehicles had made it this far, most of them private pickup trucks with removable emergency strobes and Watson’s Lake Volunteer Fire Department license plates. I sidestepped through knee-high sage and wild grasses that grew along the road and edged my way through the muddle of people and trucks. Woody’s tow truck sat beside the road, beyond the ramp. I spotted Woody himself at the edge of the hubbub, hands in pockets, staring out over the water.
“What’s going on?” I asked him.
“Car in the water,” he said. “Me and a fisherman found it ’while ago.”
“Really? Somebody overshoot the ramp?”
He shrugged. “Could be. Did it a long time ago, though. Car’s been in there awhile.”
It took some doing but I finally pulled out the details. Woody and a customer had been fishing about twenty yards off shore, right where the water depth drops off quite a bit. The man, ‘some damn fool city dude,’ got a very expensive lure snagged on something and was ready to jump into the water to retrieve it. When Woody steered the boat in closer it bumped something hard under the water. The customer—‘acted like he thinks he’s Indiana Jones or something’—jumped in to unhook the lure and found himself standing on the hood of a car.
“Damn thing was barely submerged,” Woody said.
“Do they know how it got there?”
His steady stare let me know what a stupid question that was. “Well, ma’am—” dumb city-slicker lady “—I’d guess he drove it in.” He relaxed the put-down tone in his voice. “People do that. Go to back their boats in, don’t quite know when to stop. Trailer gets rolling, won’t stop, whole car goes in. Ground drops off pretty quick out there.”
“But wouldn’t the guy just have it towed out? I mean, surely he wouldn’t just go off and abandon his car.”
Woody shrugged. “Too embarrassed to report it? Water’s always been real deep here. Maybe he thought they’d never get it out.”
Or the other awful possibility. The guy went down with the car. The ambulance’s flashing lights finally registered with me; that must be exactly what had happened.
One of the volunteer firemen came over and got into a discussion with Woody about whether the fishing was any good lately. I left them and edged closer to the boat ramp, watching Michaela in action. She looked less grandmotherly than ever as she directed a couple of divers in dry suits and scuba gear. I couldn’t hear their words, but it looked as if the divers had already been down, were passing on some information, and were now being directed to go back.
Michaela stepped to the back of the ambulance and spoke to the paramedics. They opened the back doors and lifted a stretcher out. I felt my stomach twist.
At the water’s edge, the two divers were walking slowly up the ramp, progress made awkward by their rubber swim fins and by the heavy burden they were struggling with. An unrecognizable lump, six feet long and draped in soggy, muddy clothing, was all I could see. I stared in horrified fascination as they dragged it through the bobbing wavelets, where someone had spread out a black bag on the edge of the concrete. They flopped the lump onto the center of the body bag and zipped it quickly inside. The paramedics got it onto their stretcher, shoved it into the ambulance, and slammed the doors in under two minutes. I turned aside in fear of losing my breakfast.
Obsessions Can Be Murder: The Tenth Charlie Parker Mystery Page 6