“And?”
“And what?”
“And what is your personal involvement, Ms. Lakeland, if that’s your real name? There’s a fire in you about this, finding me and all.”
There was a give-and-take developing between the two women, and PJ knew she couldn’t expect to do all the taking.
“The detective,” PJ said. Her lips were tightened into a line, challenging the woman to take the questioning a step further. To her relief, Darla simply nodded.
“My turn,” PJ said. “I ask you again: Why did you think Libby sent me? The first time you answered that question, you hadn’t even admitted to being Darla.”
There was a long pause, and PJ didn’t think Darla was going to answer her.
“Eleanor liked her big brother,” Darla said. “Especially after she found out he was actually her daddy. She wanted to do something for him. She wanted to get Libby to leave him alone. Release him from the incest so he could make a life for himself. When she got pregnant by Clarence, she saw an opportunity.”
“What opportunity? Did Clarence really love her, by the way?”
“Oh, yeah. The two of them were good for each other. They would have made it out, away from the family and everything. But Eleanor wanted to help Jeremiah, kind of like a parting gift before she took herself out of the family’s affairs. So she thought up a way to blackmail Libby into letting go. She told Libby that unless Libby let Jeremiah alone starting right then and there, she was going to announce to the whole world that Elijah had molested her and that he was the father of the baby inside her. On top of that, she was going to say that Elijah molested children at the Wee Belong centers, where he sometimes worked as a handyman. At the very least, it would have meant the end of the business.”
“Holy cow.”
“Holy shit is more like it. Another beer?”
PJ shook her head. “So both Elijah and Libby had reason to want Eleanor to shut up.”
“Jeremiah, too,” Darla said. “Don’t forget that he loved Mama. He wouldn’t want to see her hurt.” She blew smoke up toward the ceiling. “Such is the power of love.”
“What about you? How did you stand in all of this?”
“Me? I just wanted out. Way out. If you had a family like that, would you want to hang around?” Darla lit another cigarette with the one she had smoked nearly all the way down. “When Eleanor got herself killed, it wasn’t much of a surprise to me. I was already planning to get out, and that was one hell of a motivator. I stayed for the trial ’cause I didn’t want the police thinking I was running away out of guilt.”
“None of this came out at the trial,” PJ said. “Why didn’t you open up then?”
Darla gazed at her in silence, and PJ answered her own question. To tell everything would have made Darla as vulnerable as Eleanor. All she could do was keep quiet and hope to take herself out of the circle of danger.
“How do you know all this, anyway?” PJ asked.
“A fair question. I was born with good ears and a lot of common sense,” Darla said. “I still got ’em both. Besides, Eleanor liked to confide in her big sister. She and I were close. I knew she was pregnant practically before she figured it out herself.”
“Why are these killings happening now, years after Jeremiah’s conviction? Why didn’t all this erupt after the sentencing?”
“I guess nobody ever thought he’d really die, that he’d get out on appeal or get a life sentence instead. Mama and Pop loved Jeremiah, you know, although they may have picked strange ways of showing it. I suppose I did, too, in a beaten puppy way.”
“Did he really do it? Kill his own daughter?”
“I’ll be damned if I know,” Darla said. “What difference does it make now, anyway? He died for the crime already. All I want is to be left alone.” Her expression closed up, and PJ felt she was hiding something.
“It makes a lot of difference to me. Somebody is taking revenge for Jeremiah’s death, and a person I care a great deal about is swept up in it.” PJ put her hand on the gun in her lap, making it clear that she wasn’t going to put up with lies or withheld information. She saw Darla pick up on the threat. “The man I care about is not going to pay the price for the sickness in your family.”
“Sickness. Well, I guess you could put it that way. A bit unkind, but what the hell.”
PJ let the silence drag out, but didn’t yield a bit. Tension crackled between the two women like lightning along power lines.
“Shit,” Darla said finally. “There’s one more thing.”
Darla stood up again, and PJ came alert immediately. She stood up to face Darla. The gun fastened itself on the woman’s chest. PJ wondered if she’d really pull the trigger.
“Take it easy, Ms. Lakeland. You want your answers or not?”
PJ thought of Schultz waiting around for a killer to make a move against him, and her eyes flashed with determination. “Yes. Just tell me what you’re going to do before you do it.”
“I’m going to my bedroom to get something out of my closet.”
“Something?”
“A letter. Jeremiah wrote me a letter from death row. I never opened it, but you might want to.”
PJ’s heart and hopes soared. Jeremiah’s own words might make sense of the tangled mess of the Ramsey family relationships. She followed Darla into the bedroom and stood by nervously while the woman rummaged around in some boxes on the shelf in the closet. PJ watched closely, knowing that people sometimes kept guns in that kind of location.
True to her word, Darla came up with a sealed business-size envelope. She gave it to PJ, who inspected it.
“I thought letters that convicts wrote were read by prison officials before they were sent out,” PJ said. “How come this one still looks like it has the original seal?”
“Turn it over. You’ll see there’s no postmark. Jeremiah gave the letter to the prison chaplain and he passed it on to me privately, like a last wish thing. The chaplain probably figured it was a confession, and confession was good for the soul.” Darla snorted, sending plumes of cigarette smoke out of her nostrils. “Nobody’s read it.”
“You weren’t curious what your own brother had to say before he was executed?”
She shrugged. “I suppose I already knew what was in it, or maybe I just didn’t want to find out.”
Back in the living room, PJ slipped the envelope into her purse, along with the gun. She turned off the tape recorder, too. To her chagrin, the off button made an audible click.
“Got it all on tape, I see,” Darla said. “Well, what the hell. You really from the police?”
“Yes.”
“I’m going to ask you for something.” Darla’s eyes showed the cold fire PJ had seen earlier. “I’m going to disappear again. Don’t come after me. You got everything you need from me.”
“I can promise you that if anybody finds you again, it won’t be me.” PJ started to walk out the door. She felt Darla’s hand on her arm, a delicate but remote touch, like cold mouse feet.
“Good luck with your man,” she said.
Thirty-five
SCHULTZ WAS RESTLESS. HE’D gotten word that Elijah Ramsey was holed up in a motel room. The bastard was probably sitting around eating Doritos, sucking up Cokes from the vending machines, and watching HBO. Schultz wanted to make something happen, and he didn’t think he’d do it by being a prisoner in his own house.
There was no telling what Elijah’s timetable was. He could have hired somebody to watch Schultz’s house and let him know when the rabbit was out of the burrow. Schultz thought about the woman across the street, with the spotting scope. He wondered if she had any debts she needed paid off.
Strolling into his living room, he opened the drapes that faced the street. He stood there for a few minutes looking out, aware that he was a good target for a sharpshooter, and he had no doubt that Elijah fit that bill. When he was sure the lady across the street had gotten a long look, he left the house by the front door, walking in a leis
urely fashion down his front walkway to his resurrected Vega. The car was so dusty he couldn’t tell where the dust ended and the shit-brown paint color began. He’d moved the car out of the garage that faced the alley behind his house and parked it at the curb. A good thunderstorm or two would remove the dust, and Schultz was content to wait. He’d never been one for wasting labor on car washing when nature could do the job for him.
He’d been forced to use his own old, unreliable—but paid for—car since the one assigned to him by Vehicles still hadn’t been returned after the hit-and-run. Most likely he’d never see that faded red-orange Pacer again. He couldn’t decide if that was cause for celebration or not. He’d grown accustomed to it.
He was wearing a summer-weight sport coat that covered his shoulder holster but didn’t completely conceal the outline. On his belt was a small pouch that held PJ’s cellular phone. The tracking transmitter taped to his chest itched.
Every inch the modern cop, he thought.
In a little while, the itching would get worse as sweat worked its way around and under the tape on his chest. He knew from past experience it would hurt when it was ripped off, too. He blocked out the whole idea.
Schultz didn’t have a destination, but he figured that moving around might jar Elijah into action, if he was having Schultz watched. If not, then at least Schultz wouldn’t spend the day cooped up.
After reintroducing himself to the joy of driving a stick shift with a reluctant second gear, he ended up at the art museum in Forest Park. He supposed he’d been followed by a police tail, but he hadn’t been able to pick it up in his rearview mirror. He could barely see anything out of the mirror because the back window was so dirty, so there could have been a tail right behind him in a Mack truck and he might have missed it.
The art museum was a grand old building, at least from the front. There was a modern wing, but Schultz liked the original part best. He climbed the steps and looked out over Art Hill, where kids sledded in the winter, then sat down in the shade, feeling the cold stone of the steps on his rump. A slight breeze stirred the long hairs that worked overtime trying to cover his bald spot. It was more comfortable sitting there than driving around in the Vega, which did not list air-conditioning among its few amenities. A car went by which he thought might have contained a couple of detectives, but it didn’t stop. He figured that once they’d gotten a line of sight on him and verified he was okay, they’d rely on the transmitter to keep track of him until he made a major move again.
No one seemed to be paying any special attention to him. Older, slightly disheveled guys like himself—Schultz knew what kind of impression he made at a quick glance—didn’t merit a second look from most people.
Of course, they don’t know the sexual dynamo on the inside.
He chuckled to himself and started girl-watching. The roster in his fantasy harem could use a little shoring up.
Twenty minutes later, the sun had crept over to his spot, and he pushed himself up to avoid sitting in the direct sunlight. The top of his head was still a little sensitive. Pain shot through his left knee as he rose, reminding him that he’d been negligent about taking his arthritis medicine since he got back from Tucson.
Poking around the grounds of the museum, Schultz found a path that connected to the hiking trail system in the park. Even though he looked out of place on the trail in his sport coat and long pants, he turned onto it anyway. It looked like an ideal place for an assault, and that’s what he was doing out there, wasn’t it?
Shortly the trail wound its way into the woods. Sunlight filtered through the leaves and dappled the ground under his feet, making a spotted pattern. He imagined he was walking along the spine of a huge leopard.
Twice, joggers passed him. A lone man, sweating, lost in the music that played into his ears. Two young women in halter bras and shorts running together, carrying on a smooth, lilting conversation in spite of their exertion.
He felt the presence behind him moments before he felt the gun in his back.
“Walk with me,” a vaguely familiar voice said. “Don’t turn around, and don’t try anything funny. I don’t want to shoot you out here, but I will if I have to.”
He moved forward, walking in step with the person behind him. His right hand edged inside his coat, toward the holster. He hesitated, knowing that if he resisted now, all he could smack on the person was a mugging charge. He was going to have to let things get a little further along, and hope that he could be extricated before he ended up a corpse.
He’d known the moment would come, but now that it was here his stomach was doing flip-flops and his heart was pounding so hard he felt it might break loose from his chest and gallop down Art Hill without him.
The muzzle pressed hard against the small of his back. “Hands at your sides.”
The voice clicked—he recognized it. He stopped suddenly, surprised. Despite what he’d been told, he turned slowly to face his assailant.
“Hello, Libby,” he said.
She whacked him on the side of the head with the gun, and he went sprawling onto the leopard’s back.
Thirty-six
WHEN PJ GOT TO the airport in Dayton, she checked in for her flight and then found a pay phone. She called the cellular phone she’d given Schultz.
The call didn’t go through. The phone was turned off.
Apprehensive, but thinking that most likely Schultz was a techno-idiot and had hit the wrong button, she called Wall. He reported that Schultz had left home and was being followed at a distance using the radio tracker. He had gone to the art museum. A drive-by had verified that all was well—the dirty old man was scoping out the young things in the park. Elijah hadn’t budged from his digs, so there was no cause for alarm.
“I’m not so sure about that,” PJ said nervously. She relayed to him what she had learned about the Ramsey family. She didn’t mention her use of the gun to threaten Darla. She had a feeling that was not an approved interrogation technique. “I have the tape recording and the letter in my purse,” she said.
“Don’t fool with the envelope,” Wall said. “We’ll want to check it for fingerprints, see if it was really written by Jeremiah. You should have turned it over to the Dayton police. They could have bagged it up properly.”
“Too late now,” she said, annoyed with his attitude. “My flight leaves in a few minutes.”
She was also irked that Wall hadn’t said a word about a job well done.
“I think you should have someone make personal contact with Schultz,” she said. “What I’ve uncovered casts doubt on Libby, too. Maybe someone in Jefferson City could check on her whereabouts.”
“That’s reasonable, given what you’ve just told me about the family. We’ll take care of things here. You go directly home when you get back in St. Louis. I’ll send Anita by to pick up the letter.”
“How’s Dave?”
“Ornery.” She heard a smile in his voice.
“See you soon.”
The flight was uneventful. She took a cab home from the airport. It was almost six o’clock, and the evening brought no relief from the heat. The two flights in such a short period of time had tired her out, and she was emotionally drained from the interview with Darla. Helen Boxwood arrived shortly after PJ did. Helen hadn’t heard from PJ, so she had come over to spend the night in the house with Thomas, as arranged earlier in the day. PJ invited her to stay for dinner and ordered a jumbo pizza delivered, thinking that pizza had become a major food group for the Gray family.
With satisfied hunger and the smell of green pepper and onion lingering in the air, Helen and Thomas retired upstairs to watch the videos Helen had brought. Megabite trailed after them, in hopes of something more appetizing coming her way than a leftover slice of veggie pizza. Left alone on the main floor of the house, PJ started sorting through her thoughts.
Foremost in her mind was the conviction that she wasn’t going to surrender that enticing letter from Jeremiah without reading it first.
She got out the letter and, wearing gloves, carefully unsealed the envelope using the time-honored steam method. After thinking back over her conversation with Wall, she was sure she hadn’t mentioned that the letter was still sealed. The letter was several pages long, and she didn’t have time to read and study it, so she loaded it into her fax machine to make a copy. While the pages were slowing feeding through, she erased the last portion of the interview tape, the part where Dark talked about the sealed envelope. It was almost at the end, anyway, so there wasn’t much to erase. While doing that, she realized that there was ample documentation of her use of the gun on the tape. She couldn’t possibly erase all references, or the tape would have suspicious gaps. She sighed. She’d have to take whatever Wall doled out about it.
Once she had the letter copied, she put the original back in the envelope and tucked in the flap. Microscopic examination of the envelope would reveal traces of adhesive, showing that it had been sealed. But she expected the situation to be resolved by that time. She had a strong feeling that things were going to move fast.
Slipping off her gloves, she folded the copy as compactly as she could and put it in her pants pocket where she could have access to it later. Her loose T-shirt covered the slight bulge. Anita had called, verifying that PJ had gotten in from the airport, and said she was on her way over to pick up the letter. PJ didn’t want to be caught with the copied pages spread over her kitchen table when Anita knocked at the door. With the copy safely settled in her pocket, PJ gave herself over to worry about Schultz.
It wasn’t entirely Schultz’s safety that was occupying her mind. There was the big issue of having a relationship with a man who worked for her. From what she had seen of other couples who worked together on a daily basis, few of them could make it last. She certainly couldn’t ask Schultz to leave his job, and her commitment to CHIP was solid, so it was an issue that wouldn’t go away on its own.
Act of Betrayal Page 25