The Laura Cardinal Novels

by J. Carson Black

  “It isn't, though.”

  “No, I don't think so.”

  “You think he really is looking to make a big score?”

  “Sounds like it.”

  But what kind of score? That, they didn't know.

  Laura walked him out and went to her own car.

  She could go home. She was tired enough. But she didn't want to. Fortunately, her mare was fed along with the other horses on the Bosque Escondido, so there were no worries there.

  It was a clear night, and there would be a full moon tonight.

  A good night for a drive.

  Chapter 28

  As Laura approached Steve Lawson's cabin, she saw two people on the porch. Lawson and the woman who must own the SUV parked behind the little purple PT Cruiser.

  Interesting little car, the Cruiser. Kind of funky. Laura thought it went with Steve Lawson pretty well.

  The woman walked out to the SUV and stopped at the driver's side, looking at Laura. She was in Laura's lights. A small, slender woman with a cloud of dark hair, wearing a casual black sweater-tights combo that would look good in New York. Fashionable boots. Warm for Tucson, but nice up here. Hard to see her features, but Laura guessed they were attractive. The woman stared into the headlights, and Laura doused them. Got out.

  The woman waited for Laura to come to her. Laura noticed that Steve Lawson had come around the car, and the two of them watched her approach.

  “Detective Cardinal,” Steve said. “I'd like you to meet my—" He paused. “Julie DeSabato. Jules, this is the detective I was telling you about.”

  They shook hands all around.

  “I was just leaving,” said Julie, but she didn't open her car door. Laura felt she was being scrutinized, and the scrutiny wasn't friendly.

  There was tension here.

  Steve seemed nervous. No, more like shaken. He looked pale—almost haggard—and there was a restless quality in the way he swayed from foot to foot.

  “Detective Cardinal,” Steve Lawson said. “What brings you up here?”

  “I wanted you to look at some photos.”

  “You have a suspect? Already?”

  Julie DeSabato said, “I've really got to go.” She tipped up on her toes, and gave Steve Lawson a peck on the lips. “Think about what I said,” she told him. Then she got into the SUV and gunned the engine.

  Laura and Steve stepped back as she drove away.

  “My ex-wife,” Lawson said. “Why don't we go inside?”

  They clumped up onto the porch. Jake met them, tail wagging. Laura reached down to pet him.

  “We're looking at a man who was here during that time,” Laura said. “Would you take a look at these photos and tell me if you've seen any of these men before?”

  Lawson took the sheet from her. His sleeves were rolled up, and there was a nasty-looking scar on his right arm. He walked under the kitchen light, looked at the sheet for three or four seconds. Passed it back to her. “I'm sorry. Nobody looks familiar.”

  Laura held on to the sheet. “It's all right. I'm asking a lot of people.”

  “So you think he was up here at the time Jenny Carmichael disappeared?”

  “Really, at this point, we don't know.” Laura scanned the room. Saw the dishes in the drainboard, a wine bottle and glasses on the counter. A Ouija board sitting on a footstool, the footstool the same ugly Early American material as the chairs and couches.

  Lawson looked at her. “Spaghetti con vongole,” he said.

  “What?”

  “Our dinner. Spaghetti with clam sauce.”

  “And after dinner, a turn at the Ouija board.”

  “Do you . . . Wee-gee?” Steve Lawson said softly. He seemed to be saying this to himself.

  “Excuse me?”

  “It's just a line from—“

  “I Love Lucy.”

  “How'd you know that?”

  “When I was a kid it used to be on KTTU when I was getting ready for school.”

  “You seem young for that.”

  “Not for syndication. They had reruns of that and The Andy Griffith Show. The Andy Griffith Show was my favorite.”

  “What a coincidence,” Steve said. “That's mine, too. The early ones, before they went to color. That and The Dick Van Dyke Show.”

  “I hated The Honeymooners.”

  His eyes widened. “So do I.”

  “You don't, by any chance, like The Three Stooges?”

  “Hate 'em.”

  “Really? I thought men loved The Three Stooges.”

  “We aren't all part of one huge body. Some of us have the capability of original thought.”

  “Why don't you like the Stooges?”

  “I'm not big on physical humor.” He leaned against the kitchen counter and folded his arms. “There was a study that said men and women see humor differently.”

  “Here it comes.”

  “No, seriously. It could explain the whole Three Stooges phenomenon. Men like their humor broad. They like slapstick. Not all men—Jake and I are the exception. Women like their humor more subtle. They're willing to take it a few more steps to get to a satisfying punch line.” He caught her skeptical look. “You think I'm flattering you, am I right?”

  “You're being downright obsequious.”

  “Now that's a big word.”

  “It means—”

  “I know what it means. You think I'm an egg-sucking dog.” He cocked his head. “You think I'm trying to flatter you out of suspecting me of murder?”

  It surprised her, his coming out with it like that. “You think that? That I see you as a suspect?”

  “I'd think you weren't doing your job if you didn't.”

  “You're right about that.” She paused, kept her voice neutral. “Everybody's a suspect.”

  “If I was a guilty man, I'd be shaking in my boots.”

  Laura glanced pointedly at his legs. “No shaking there.”

  “Nope.”

  “So according to your theory, you must be innocent.”

  “Diogenes can give it up, retire, live off his stocks. Take that trip to New Zealand he's always been harping about.”

  “Diogenes?”

  “The guy with the lamp.”

  “You're the last honest man?”

  “If the shoe fits.”

  “Does it?”

  They stood there, the silence stretching, having gone from easy banter to awkwardness. Laura liked him—okay, be honest, she liked him a lot—but there was still the feeling he wasn't telling her everything he knew. She doubted it had anything to do with Jenny Carmichael's death. Unlike Jaime, she didn't believe Steve Lawson killed Jenny.

  She could be wrong, though.

  “If you wouldn't mind, I'd like to go over your statement again.”

  “Fine with me. Can I get you anything? Water? Coffee? I think I have tea.”

  “Water's fine.” Laura pulled the tape recorder out of her purse and set it down on the coffee table. She sat down on one of the Early American chairs.

  Steve excused himself, went down the hallway, ostensibly to the bathroom.

  While he was gone, Laura got up and walked across the room so her back was to the window. This was another precaution she had schooled herself in, something that had become a habit. Any time someone left the room, she went to a different spot. She'd learned this from her old mentor, Frank Entwistle. If someone—someone like Sean Grady, for instance—planned an attack on her, he'd find her in a different place. He wouldn't have the upper hand.

  She heard a medicine cabinet open and close. She heard the rattle of pills in a plastic bottle, heard the faucet turn on, fill up a glass, and then turn off again. Heard him set the glass down with a crack.

  He'd massaged the place above his eye a couple of times; she wondered if he had a headache.

  He came back into the room. If he noticed that she'd moved, he didn't mention it. He walked over to the sink and poured water into two glasses. She saw that his sleeves were now rolle
d down and buttoned.

  “Do you live up here full-time?” Laura asked him.

  “I've got a place in Tucson. Haven't been back there in a few days.”

  “In this weather, I don't blame you.”

  “It is nice up here.” He brought her the water, handed it to her. A plastic Casper the Friendly Ghost cup.

  Laura said, “I had these when I was a kid. The movie tie-in.”

  “I don't know how they got here. Grandpa must have picked them up somewhere.” He sat down opposite her. “You grow up around here?”

  “I'm a native. How about you?”

  “California. LA, Laguna.”

  “Lucky you.”

  His eyes seemed to flicker at that. Something not so good. Something he wanted to keep to himself. “I also spent a lot of time up here and down in Tucson. At certain points in my life, my grandfather practically brought my sisters and me up.”

  “Your grandfather sounds like a good man.”

  “He was.” He bore down on the words in emphasis. Clearly, he didn't want her to probe about his grandfather. Which meant that was where she would go. But they were relaxing at the moment, and she let that happen. Jake sat at her feet. She rubbed his head and asked Steve about his sisters.

  They stayed on relatively safe topics, Laura trying to divine what was going on with him. And finding herself responding to the kind of person he seemed to be.

  At last they came to a silence. Not an awkward silence this time, just a resting spot. Laura was amazed at how comfortable she felt around him. She needed to keep from falling into that trap. Heywood was her prime suspect, but Steve Lawson was another, just by dint of his proximity to Jenny's grave. She nodded to the tape recorder. “I'm going to record this.”

  “Fine with me. Just don't quote me on The Three Stooges. I have my image to think of.”

  Laura asked the same questions she'd asked before in a slightly different way, and Steve Lawson gave her the same answers. Then she went farther afield. She stuck to the topic of his grandfather for a long time. She learned a lot about him, but nothing that contributed to her knowledge about the case.

  She turned off the tape recorder and said, “That does it.”

  Whatever had been bothering him when she'd first seen him seemed to have gone away. Laura wondered if it had anything to do with his ex-wife. So she said, “I'm amazed that you have such a good relationship with your ex. How do you do that?”

  He shrugged.

  “I couldn't do it.”

  “You're divorced?”

  She nodded. Stayed quiet, hoping he'd fill the vacuum. He did.

  “Julie is a good friend. We still have things to work out.”

  “With a Ouija board?”

  Again, she saw a flicker in his eyes. “I'm not a big believer in that.”

  Laura nodded. “Compromise. I get that.”

  He stood up. “It's been a long night.”

  “It's been a long day.”

  “You can say that again.”

  He and Jake walked her out onto the porch. Laura looked up at the stars. “Unbelievable.”

  “What is?”

  “How close those stars are.”

  He nodded. “Better watch your step. These stairs are old and falling apart.”

  “That's okay—“

  He steadied her with his arm.

  Shit.

  She felt it, a shock up her elbow. It was her left elbow, and it was nothing like the shock she would have felt if he touched her bad arm. Not the same sensation at all.

  Laura wanted to pull her arm back, but she didn't. She hoped he didn't notice her reaction. Hoped he didn't notice that for just an instant, she had responded to him the way a detective working a case shouldn't.

  Driving down from Mt. Lemmon, Laura tried to get a handle on her feelings. She liked the guy. That was plain. She more than liked the guy.

  And she couldn't do that. He was still a suspect. As fine and upstanding a citizen as he appeared to be, as much as she would like to go with her feelings—that this guy was solid—she had to keep a lid on it until she cleared him. Which might never happen.

  But another voice in her head wore a completely different groove. The other voice was asking, Is it mutual? Was he attracted to her, too?

  “It doesn't matter,” she said aloud as she passed the ranger's station and took another curve. “It's just not going to happen.”

  Laura opened the door to her house on the Bosque Escondido and saw the answering machine blinking across the room. The digital display showed fourteen messages.

  Laura stopped just inside the door. The most phone calls she'd ever received in one day were six, and that was when she'd been home with the flu, helping to set up a task force.

  She withdrew her SIG and moved away from the door, deeper into blackness. Heart slamming in her chest, mouth dry. Gun ready, she snapped on the lamp by the TV.

  Nobody here.

  Of course not.

  But there was a rabbit warren of rooms; this was an old ranch house. She didn't dare let her guard down yet.

  She went through the house and cleared every room. Positive—well, almost positive—that no one would be able to break in here. Still, she went by Ronald Reagan's mantra: trust but verify.

  Satisfied that she was locked in and alone, she played the first message.

  “This is Candy from Lolita Escorts. We do have an opening, so if you want to schedule an interview—“

  Laura deleted the message.

  The next message was from Fetishes Escort Service, also returning her call.

  She listened to and deleted all the calls: X Girls Cinema, Oracle Adult Movies, Sensual+ Massage, Nightshade Motel and Video, Sensations Adult Novelties, and a host of others.

  Laura was learning: Tucson had a robust sex trade.

  She sat down, aware that she was shaking from adrenaline.

  Someone had her home number. It could be Grady, or it could be someone else. She was betting on Grady.

  This was the kind of sophomoric thing he would do—a childish prank. Like ordering twenty pizzas for somebody you didn't like.

  The question was: Did this prank stem from impotence and pettiness or was it a sign of worse things to come?

  She remembered the knife flashing past her vision, the knife he had meant to kill her with, and suddenly in her mind's eye, she saw the black mamba mural on Jaime's wall. The snake rearing back like a cobra, the black depth between its unhinged jaws. Its shiny dead eyes.

  The thought occurred to her that there was a mamba.

  And it was coming for her.

  Chapter 29

  Laura awoke fifteen minutes before her alarm went off, thinking about the banality of evil.

  She had dealt with plenty of sociopaths, and all of them were the same. No matter what their crimes—and contrary to popular belief, most sociopaths weren't slavering killers—they all shared the same trait:

  They lacked.

  They lacked compassion, they lacked the capacity for love, they lacked the ability for self-examination, they lacked guilt, they lacked fear. Sociopaths were defined by what they didn't have.

  Laura thought that the internal landscape of a sociopath must be a dreary, barren place, devoid of the joys and sorrows characterizing the lives of average people. There was only want, impulse, and immaturity. Sean Grady could have been the poster boy for sociopathy; he was the essence of banality. Laura thought his kind of evil was all the more chilling because it was rooted in shallow ground: It didn't mean anything.

  Laura knew that if she confronted Grady about the phone calls, he'd lie. She knew that she would get no satisfaction by talking about this with Dave Toch. She'd only appear weak. So she would watch her back as she always did, only a little more carefully.

  She was getting ready for work when her cell rang. It was Peter Waddell.

  “You have a fax machine at home?”

  “Yes.”

  “I've got six pages to send you�
�Heywood's trophies.”

  “Sandy came through? How'd you get her to do that?”

  “Wasn't me. She found out Robert cleaned out their bank account.”

  “That would do it for me, too,” Laura said. You did not want to mess with her on money issues. “Did you get my message last night?”

  “Hey, I just got my first cup of coffee. And I've been spending some quality time with Heywood's trophies. What's up?”

  “He showed up at Clinton Purvis's place.”

  She could almost hear him sit forward. “When was this?”

  “Yesterday morning.”

  “So he's not staying there?”

  “I don't think so, unless he's camping on the property somewhere. There's a guy looking after Purvis's dogs. I think he'd keep him off.”

  “I need to fly out there. Let me check flights, and I'll call you back.”

  Laura set the phone down and walked outside into the hot, still morning. Even the birds' voices were lackluster. She looked at the list of items found in the suitcase and the accompanying photographs.

  She looked at the list first.

  Bracelet - silver

  Bracelet - charm bracelet

  Earring - hoop

  Earring - gold stud

  Earrings - heart-shaped, silver

  Earrings - turtles

  Earrings - butterfly

  Key fob - red leather

  Tongue stud - silver

  Underpants - paisley

  Underpants - plain, pink nylon

  Underpants - teal lace

  Watch - plastic, Minnie Mouse

  Watch - Timex

  The banality of evil.

  Laura looked at the items, three or four to a page.

  The quality of the fax wasn't good, and some of the items looked smudged and dark. Waddell would be bringing the actual photographs with him later today.

  But Laura wanted to get going with this. She was more and more certain that Heywood was the killer of at least two of the girls kidnapped in the mid-nineties: Kristy Groves and Jenny Carmichael.

  Micaela Brashear was the anomaly. Micaela, and the girl she called Lily.

  A horse neighed for its breakfast in the direction of the corrals.