Fowler’s smile changed from a long thin line to a big O, and he stared like he had sleepwalker’s eyes.
“If you’ll excuse me,” Malin said, grabbing her cell phone and heading for the door.
She didn’t turn back when he called after her, didn’t tell the impact sergeant where she was going either. The air smelled like rain and the outside wall of the building pulsed with the reflection of an emergency beacon. A black Charger pulled up, strobe light streaking on the dash.
“Boy, am I glad to see you,” she said to Temeke as he swung off the door frame of Lieutenant Alvarez’ car.
“You look flushed, love. Doesn’t she look flushed, Luis?”
“It’s Fowler,” Malin interrupted.
Luis shouted something about parking his car round back and drove off in a cloud of smoke, brakes screeching as he made a U-turn.
Malin caught the fragrance of citrus, the same scent she remembered when she had fallen asleep on Temeke’s shoulder in a helicopter once.
“I’ll haunt that stanky-ass Romeo until the day he sticks a gun in his mouth and pulls the trigger.” Temeke stepped back suddenly and seem to study her for a while. “Do we need a rape kit?”
“Where were you?”
“In the Duck. Where do you bloody think I was?”
“It felt like I was being held hostage. He just doesn’t give up.”
“I’ll ask a couple of the lads to have a go at him. Damage his morale... knees―”
“Don’t even think about it!”
“Please yourself. Good will to men and all that swaddling.”
“Talked about my computer.” Temeke’s face seemed to screw in concentration and she felt a frisson of unease. “Look, I know you never believe anything I say. So I taped it. He asked me if I was getting some extra tuition after-hours. I thought he was being suggestive, but now I’m wondering if he’s stalking me.”
Temeke rammed a cigarette in his mouth and blistered the end with his lighter. “Listen, love, Fowler’s a cock of the walk, looking for a promotion and not caring who he treads on in the process. He wants you out. He wants me out. But I’m damned if I’m going to let him do it on his terms. He should have other things to occupy his fertile mind.”
“I assume you mean Detective Suzi Cornwell?”
“I do. Word is she’s been looking for a transfer. Just bought a Pulte home nearby in Boulder Trail. If it takes the searchlight off you, love, then all the better. Now, drive me to the Delgado house and keep your mind on all those questions you’re going to ask.”
“You do the asking, sir.” Malin didn’t feel much like talking. “I’ll look around.”
Better inhale the last of the fresh air, she thought, as they headed toward the car. Gripping the steering wheel, she watched Temeke as he took one last drag of his cigarette and threw it in a wide arc over the back wall.
“No,” he said, pointing in the air, “this calls for a little strategy.”
Malin shook her head, put the car in gear and realized she was embarrassing herself. “Probably not worth talking about small fires. They usually go out all by themselves.”
“Not if some stupid bastard starts pouring gasoline all over the place like they apparently did this morning.” There was a sour look on his face. “Who’s Fowler’s assistant?”
“Sandra Buckingham, why?”
“Smart bird that Sandra. Time she brought him some lunch.”
SIX
The wind soughed through a stand of cottonwoods, bordering a small group of houses off Camino Vega Verde on the west side of the river. Bazan Loop was a cozy neighborhood with a variety of large adobe style houses with tar gravel roofs.
The Delgado house was a two-storey villa with dark wood shutters and a roof straddled with terracotta tiles. Temeke estimated it was well over three thousand square feet sitting on a half-acre lot. The number 283 was barely visible behind a palm tree at the front gate and the yard was immaculate, suggesting the presence of a Homeowner’s Association.
He studied a painting on the kitchen wall of two heavy draught horses pulling a plough through long trenches of soil and then glanced through an archway at the spacious living room beyond. The aroma of fresh coffee made his mouth water and the stocky woman who handed him a cup was in her early fifties, brightest eyes he’d ever seen.
“It’s been over a week now,” Valerie Delgado said. “I saw Lily last Friday evening at a little before seven. She went out to get the mail and never came back.”
“So, where did you find the letter, ma’am?”
“I was doing the laundry.” Valerie pointed at the kitchen counter, to a single sheet of paper which appeared to have been torn from a notebook. “And I found this.”
Temeke’s eyes locked on the page and he instinctively put his hand out. “May I see it?”
He saw Valerie hesitate, knew how it must have felt to surrender anything from a family member. The writing was cursive like every school student’s.
I can make anything happen just by wishing it. Look what happened to Alice? You wouldn’t want that happening to you. D.
“Who’s D?”
Valerie’s eyes dropped to the floor, breaking the visual connection for a second. “I don’t know anyone called D. I even looked through her address book.”
“Alice have any suicidal symptoms, depression?” He passed the note to Malin.
“After Alan died, she said she heard voices. Said there were things flapping around in her room and on the staircase.” Valerie went silent for a while, noticed the tilt of Malin’s head and the tight frown. “Frightened the life out of Lily. This note sounds like a threat, Detective.”
“Would you say the girls were close?”
“Very.”
Temeke followed Valerie into the living room, eyes grazing over six silver framed photos on the mantelshelf. Family pictures, individual headshots, nothing out of the ordinary.
“Alice’s death must have been a shock,” he said, taking a seat next to Malin on the couch. “Lily behave differently after that?” It was a direct question, one that Temeke felt he needed to ask.
“Her headaches got worse, probably stress. She’d stay out late, but she’d always call.” Valerie dabbed her eyes. “I’ve left messages. I think she must have been kidnapped.”
Temeke studied that pale face and wondered how many nights she lay in bed replaying events, daring it to be a kidnap because she couldn’t bear it to have been any other way.
“She could have run away,” he said. “Young people do.”
Valerie frowned and bit her lip. “She had everything, Detective. A President’s scholarship to Gibson. A loving home.”
“You spoke to Captain Fowler?”
“He was a little rude. Said the note wasn’t proof of anything and it certainly wasn’t worth sending out good detectives.”
“Yet he sent us.” Temeke shot a look at Malin who was bagging the note. “Should have filed a complaint, ma’am. Still can, you know.”
Valerie wiped a curl of auburn hair from her cheek and attempted a smile. “I just want all of this to go away. All the nightmares. Is there anything you can do?”
“There’s always something we can do,” Temeke murmured, abandoning his cup on the coffee table. “Full birth name?”
“Lilith Ann Delgado.”
“Do you have a picture of her?”
Valerie lifted down one of the photographs from the mantel, only this one was tucked behind the rest and framed in ebony. Two girls sitting on a wall, both frozen in a faraway stare. Temeke studied the first. Lean, with a narrowly sculptured face and thick, red hair cut to the jaw in a swinging bob. Lily Delgado.
It was Alice’s face that brought a prick of unease. Wisps of hair gusted across a striking face and narrow eyes that seemed to judge her audience from beyond the grave. She wasn’t smiling either. Cheeks dotted with the same freckles Lily had, only that’s where the similarity ended. He handed the picture to Malin.
“Who too
k the photo?”
“Her father,” Valerie said.
“Evidence.” He waited for her approval, searching those eyes as if there was only a faint residue of pain. “When was this taken?”
“A month before Alice died.”
“School?”
“Los Poblanos Academy. I thought both girls would do better in a private school. There was music and drama, things we couldn’t offer them.”
“If you don’t mind telling me, what are the fees now? Roughly?”
“They were seven thousand a semester when Alice started. Ten thousand now.”
“Quite a jump.”
“I wanted the girls to have the best education.” Her eyes watered as she said it, chin pointing to the ground.
Valerie Delgado clearly had money to burn, he thought, giving the house a thorough look this time. “We’d like to see Lily’s room, if you don’t mind.”
They followed Valerie upstairs to a medium sized bedroom overlooking the back yard and a lavender field. Clothes hung over a wing back chair, regal, he thought, like a queen’s throne. Keys, purse, make-up, perfume, all there on the dressing table. Nothing obvious missing.
While Malin familiarized herself with the contents of the closet and chest of drawers, Temeke studied Valerie Delgado. You could tell a lot by a mother’s face.
Intuition was a prompt that frequently told him something he already knew, and now it was telling him Valerie wasn’t too keen on Malin digging around her daughter’s belongings. If he had lost a child, he’d be leaning over a police officer’s shoulder, willing her to find something he’d missed.
“Did your girls have any boyfriends?” he said.
“Not Lily. Alice liked someone. Nothing came of it.”
Her reference to someone indicated a crush, a short-lived liaison that merited no further scrutiny. “I understand Lily is now the beneficiary of a sizeable trust fund, her father being the donor. Who was the trustee?”
“A rep from Midas Mutual and a friend of Alan’s. It was money held in trust with substantial accrued interest. Alan’s will was very specific. He knew car racing was dangerous, made ample provision for his family in case of an accident. Alice would have received the same amount had she lived.”
He could smell the faint trace of orange blossom... patchouli, a fragrance his wife adored. “What perfume did Lily wear?”
It was an intimate question and one Valerie would have no trouble remembering. She mentioned a well-known brand with a happy name. There was no sign of a bottle on the chest of drawers.
Temeke knew world renowned racing drivers received at least six figures and as for the house, it was worth a buck or two. “Anyone call you? Lily’s friends... someone she was close to.”
“One friend called to see if I’d had any news. Asha Samadi.”
“The pianist?” Temeke recalled sleek dark hair, a grand piano and one of the best concertos he had ever heard.
“Played two years ago at Popejoy Hall.” Valerie gave the flicker of a smile and nodded. “I had three hang-up calls yesterday. Call it a mother’s intuition, but I think it was Lily.”
“Could have been a salesman,” Temeke said. It slipped out, and it stung. He could see it in her eyes. “But we’ll look into it.”
“I know it’s her.” Valerie gave Temeke a look of such implicit trust, he didn’t have the heart to contradict her. “The man who’s got her... He’ll let her go soon, Detective. When he’s ready.”
It was bad enough Temeke had to dredge up the past and here he was thinking of a way to convince her Lily had likely taken off with all that money. “Does she have a car?”
“It’s in the garage.”
“I’ll take a look,” Malin said. The en-suite bathroom no longer held her interest and she slipped out through the open door.
Temeke could see Alice’s room was untouched, south facing and blinds drawn to keep the sun off. He gave the bookcase a cursory glance, opened the closet door to find her clothes had been covered with garment bags, shoes and boots neatly arranged on a stackable rack. It was pitiful to see.
He sensed the uncanny silence that even the barest whisper of the air conditioner couldn’t hide. Alice’s residue was there, still in charge, still directing the show, probably witnessing each victim’s suffering and final death.
“Her clothes are all there,” Valerie said, pointing to the chest of drawers. “I can’t bring myself to look at them.”
She turned her back and waited in the corridor. It gave Temeke the time he needed to open each drawer and gaze upon the intimate leftovers of a dead girl. All flawlessly folded with no sign or feel of anything hidden.
There was an array of china cats on a corner shelf and a black Mimbres vase crafted by an ancient culture known for their stylized imagery of animals and human figures. Books, stacks of them.
Valerie led him back to the kitchen and sat at a wood dining table, finger absentmindedly tracing grooves and saw marks on the surface. Temeke decided the piece was nothing more than a fashionable take on salvaged lumber and he studied that polished finger as it caressed a large bolt in the joint. A homey aroma of spruce wafted from a cultured stone fireplace and on the mantle, a votive candle flickered in a draft.
“Were you expecting any visitors on Friday evening?” he asked.
Valerie took a while to shake her head, hands lying flat against the tabletop now.
Under different circumstances, he might have taken in the beauty of the house and a crackling fire, sunlight filtering through floor-to-ceiling windows and a skylight that provided a nighttime opportunity to gaze at the stars. Dust motes circled around a grieving mother and a detective who tried to reconstruct the events of that fateful day.
“Tell me something,” he said. “Lily have any idea how to live on the streets? Because if she has, she’d have an awareness of danger, heightened instincts that could help her survive.”
“She’s an innocent, detective. She has no idea about anything.”
Temeke nodded, but couldn’t entirely agree with the assessment. All young people had some idea about something, and very few were innocent. “We’re extremely concerned for Lily’s safety. There’ll be a full investigation and we’ll be drafting men from other units to help. Before I take such steps, I want to eliminate the person you think who’s got her. Do you have a name?”
“I didn’t mean to make it sound like I knew him.”
“Let me be blunt, Mrs. Delgado. It will save time. You mentioned something about a man letting her go when he was ready.”
“I was just imagining it was a man. That’s all. I don’t know anyone who would do such a thing.”
“Right. If you hear anything, you’ll let us know? We’ll call you in a day or two. You take it easy now.”
He found Malin in the hall, followed her outside and grabbed a smoke from his jacket pocket as they walked to the car. “Anything?”
“There’s a laundry closet behind the kitchen, more cupboards, mainly towels, detergents and a door marked broom closet. It was locked. The photo album in the master bedroom was interesting.”
“Digging deep.”
“Just a feeling.” Malin leaned back in the driver’s seat and he heard the click of her seatbelt. “A Halloween party they had a few years back. Usual ghouls, pirates, princesses, a tiger, four emo boys. Lily wasn’t dressed as anything. Just thought it was odd, that’s all.”
“I know how she feels, all trussed up like a turkey for the sake of an old wives’ tale.” Temeke looked back at the house as they pulled out of the driveway. “See any sign of Lily’s perfume?”
“Not the one you were asking about. Makes you wonder if she took it with her.”
“A bit odd Mrs. Delgado mentioned a man. Why would she think Lily’s been kidnapped?”
“What if she had Lily kidnapped?”
“Nah, she’s got enough money of her own. And those weren’t crocodile tears.”
“You believe her?”
Temeke s
ucked on his cigarette and squinted. “Naturally, I’m a gullible fool and swallow everything without question. Of course, I bloody believed her.”
But Malin’s comment made him think.
“Almost an entire family wiped out in less than three years,” he muttered as he flicked the cigarette through a crack in the window.
“Two cars in the garage, both unlocked, sir. A white BMW 4 Series registered to Alice Delgado and a black Lexus IS 350 F Sport registered to Lily Delgado.”
“Better get them impounded for a thorough workup, Marl.”
“There’s a study at the back of the house,” Malin said, resting the palms of her hands against the steering wheel. “Bookshelves, desk, filing cabinet. There was a book beside the computer, pages marked with a red pen. Medium Minds, it was called. And there was a one-eight-hundred number on a pad, so I dialed it. The call connected to a psychic called Kirsty Atwell.”
“I hope she told you where Lily Delgado was.”
Malin gave a small chuckle. “With two family members gone, I think Mrs. Delgado’s quite familiar with parapsychology. I also think these psychics earn a fortune from broken women like her.”
“Looks like the whole lot of them are flying with the bloody pigeons.”
Malin slowed down at the stop sign on Alameda and gave him a long hard stare. “All of them, sir?”
SEVEN
It was six o’clock on Monday evening when Gabriel parked his van about fifteen feet from the front gate of a well-lit cemetery. The place was empty now. No more people milling around like there had been yesterday.
He peered through his zoom lens, watched the backhoe cutting into the cold, hard ground and read the stone marker that leaned against the trunk of a large cottonwood. Gray polished marble inscribed with a fitting epitaph.
Poonam Eva Kapoor, 1978 - 2013.
Past Rites Page 3