The Survivors Club

by J. Carson Black

  “If you’re looking for the riding stable, it’s back off Highway 83,” the woman said. Tess knew Jaimie Wolfe was thirty-four years old, but she looked older. The sun had already done its damage.

  “Jaimie Wolfe?”

  She woman turned to look at her. “Is this about George’s death?” She pushed her sunglasses up on her head. “I wondered when you’d get around to me. You want some iced tea?”

  Tails wagging, the dogs trotted along beside them en masse as they walked to the house. Jaimie talked as they walked. “I can’t believe what happened. He was such a nice man. Absolutely dedicated to ridding this part of Santa Cruz County of buffelgrass, and even put a lot of his own money into it. He worked like a longshoreman.”

  “You mean digging out the grass?”

  “Yeah, but also getting the news out. He’d give talks, he did the newsletter. Never missed a meeting, and I guess that’s why I wondered if something was wrong…”

  “That would be, when?”

  “Day before yesterday? Yeah, we were going to touch base. It all seems so unreal.” They stepped up onto the porch. Latticework corralled the porch and yellow jasmine gave off a heavenly scent.

  “You go ahead and sit down and I’ll get us some iced tea.” She slipped through the screen door and was gone.

  Tess watched the girls at the stable. One had her giant steed in a wash rack and was spraying him with a hose.

  Jaimie Wolfe came back out with the iced tea, handed one to Tess, and sat down, tipping back and resting her booted feet up on the railing. “So what else do you want to know? I’ll do what I can to help.”

  Tess said, “Did he talk about anything besides buffelgrass eradication?”

  Jaimie cocked her head. “For instance?”

  “For instance, if anything was bothering him?”

  “Bothering him?” She seemed confused. “I don’t think so.”

  “He didn’t have anything on his mind? Anything that might have been weighing on him?”

  “No. But really, I didn’t spend that much time with him. Just the SABEL stuff.”

  “By the way, do you have a list of SABEL members?”

  Jaimie said, “Yes, but it’s on my computer. Give me your e-mail address and I’ll send it to you.”

  “Did he get along well with everybody on the SABEL board?”

  “From what I could tell, yes.”

  Tess looked into Jaimie Wolfe’s eyes. “You know how he was killed?”

  Jaimie looked away. “I saw it in the paper today—I can read between the lines. Awful.” She shuddered. “I can’t imagine who would do something like that. Nobody I’d know.” Abruptly, she stood up and yelled at one of the girls. “Don’t let him do that! If you’re not careful, he’s going to step right on your foot. Put your boots back on until you’re done with him. Flip-flops, for fuck sake!” Turned back to Tess. “You’re asking if he had any enemies? Let me think. He took the spread of buffelgrass very seriously.” She launched into a description of how the invasive, flammable African species came to the country, leaving the Sonoran Desert susceptible to wildfires. “Everything could go up, and fast,” she said, waving at the golden hills around them. “He was a true believer. He was also worried about his daughter and his son-in-law. He thinks—thought—they’re headed for divorce.”

  Tess said, “Have you met them?”

  “A couple times. That was enough for me.”

  “What do you think of Bert Scofield?”

  “What I know about Bert Scofield is that he came on to me. It was at one of our get-togethers we had here at the ranch about three months ago. I was in the kitchen and he kind of had me trapped between the door and the kitchen table.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I stomped on his instep. And I told him if he pulled that crap again, I would tell his wife.”

  “What was his response?”

  She shrugged. “He said he was gonna leave her anyway. He also said she didn’t care.”

  “How would you characterize his relationship with his father-in-law?”

  “I only met them socially, they weren’t the least bit interested in SABEL or anything that didn’t include eating—the two of them really put it away, a pair of greedy-guts—and I noticed she was sneaking leftovers from the spread into her purse. I didn’t say anything, because I loved George. I felt so sorry for him.”

  “Why?”

  “He pulled up stakes to come here to be near her. But she always seemed like a sour old ingrate, to me. Hate to say it, but sometimes I think the wrong daughter died.”

  “You’re talking about her sister? Karen?” Tess asked. In Tess’s research, she’d learned that Pat wasn’t George Hanley’s only daughter. Years ago, his other daughter had been shot and killed during a holdup at a convenience store.

  “Yeah, that was a long time ago, apparently.” Jaimie stood up and bracketed her mouth with her hands. “Alison,” she shouted. “Is your mom coming soon?”

  One of the girls looked up from where she’d been sitting on a chair outside the barn and yelled, “After she gets off work!”

  “I want to talk to her, so don’t sneak off, okay?” Jaimie said to Tess, “That woman owes me for two months board, plus lessons. I know it’s hard times for everybody, but she should pay at least something. I try hard to keep these kids going, but this is an expensive business.”

  “Riding lessons?”

  “Oh, it’s much more than that. Showing. Big money, you wouldn’t believe how much those warmbloods cost. Alison’s mom has a good job, but she doesn’t have anywhere near the money she needs for them to compete on the highest level. The sad thing is, Alison has the talent. She could go all the way.”

  “I got the impression it was George’s daughter who wanted him to come out here.”

  “You got that right. But then he did and she ignored him. She’s a cold one. Don’t get me wrong. She’s needy, and kind of weak, but it’s all about her. She wanted her dad to come down here but once he was here, it was like, she had that box checked. Pat’s such an insecure person. She knows down deep what a disgusting creep her husband is, but she wants to hold on to him. Why, I don’t know. She’s the type that only grabs on if she thinks she’s going to lose you. You could tell George thought he’d made a mistake coming down here, but that only made her tighten her grip. And when he did come over to her place, she just got in arguments with him.”

  “You seem to know them pretty well.”

  “Don’t forget—I saw them in action. George asked me to go with him on more than a few occasions, kind of as backup. I knew he was unhappy. Pulling up stakes like that and coming all the way here. I’m divorced myself, and I know what a drain the wrong kind of person can be. Now I’m free as a lark, and doing what I love to do.”

  “But it’s an expensive hobby.”

  “Oh, yeah. But I come from money, and even though I have a lot less than I used to, I’m doing all right.”

  “Was anything bothering George Hanley, besides his family situation? Anything you saw?”

  “I dunno. He was such a gracious man. Old-fashioned that way. I guess you could say he was a gentleman.”

  “Did he ever mention planning a trip to LA?”

  “I don’t think so.” Jaimie stood up, her eyes on the barn. “There’s Alison’s mom. I’ve got to talk to her. Anything else?”

  “Did he talk much about the tours he led in Credo?”

  “I have to talk to her,” Jaimie said, starting down the steps.

  Tess moved fast to catch up with her. “Did he? Talk about the tours in Credo?”

  “He mentioned how much he enjoyed them. He was worried about illegals, all the drug running, stuff like that, but who isn’t, around here? It was such a remote place.” Her pace quickened. “Janine!” she called to the mother, who was just getting out of her Cadillac. Jaimie Wolfe darted a glance back at Tess. “Look, I’ve got to get this straightened out. I’m paying fricking alimony to my ex, if you can bel
ieve it, the bastard thinks because I’m a DeKoven I’m rolling in it. Which is not the case at all. Plus, it’s the principle of the thing. I’m one of the best there is in this business.”

  “Anything,” Tess said, “that could shine a light on who might have wanted to kill him?”

  “I’d start with Bert,” she said. “He really didn’t like having George around. Selfish bastard.”

  She walked away.

  DeKoven. It didn’t occur to Tess what that meant until she’d driven off the property. She was new to Santa Cruz County. But Tess had been living in Arizona long enough to have heard the name.

  Jaimie Wolfe was a DeKoven?

  CHAPTER 8

  Tess rented a house on Harshaw Road. Harshaw Road was a poorly maintained stretch of asphalt outside Patagonia proper—a mixed population of old houses jammed together on dead-end streets, and small ranchettes.

  Tess’s place was just about where the houses thinned out to a few acres per landowner.

  She turned left onto the one-acre lot, the Tahoe’s tires rumbling across the cattle guard, and parked on the narrow lane that ended next to the house. The place needed paint. It needed a lot of things. But there was a voluptuous pistachio tree in the front yard, one of two remaining from a long-ago orchard, complete with a tire swing.

  That, along with the cheap rent and the great view, was what sold her on the place.

  From the deep porch (and the porch swing left by its previous residents) Tess could watch horses graze in the field across the way. She often watched the day time-lapse away on the hill across the road, the emerald mesquites catching the last rays, the sun torching them Day-Glo green before the shadows advanced and transformed them to the color of ashes.

  It was peaceful and quiet here, except when the coyotes awoke her at dawn. She liked hearing them, as long as the cat was inside.

  Her house: two swings but no dryer.

  The cat wasn’t waiting for her at the door. Sometimes he did, sometimes he didn’t; depended on his mood. It seemed to her he distrusted her ever since she’d bundled him off to the vet to be fixed.

  Tess unlocked the door to the house.

  The sun stole across the display case near the big window. Someone had attempted to give the picture window an arch, but this one looked like something you’d carve out of a cardboard box.

  The display case made up for it. She’d bought the curved-glass and wood display case at a local antique store. It had come from a museum and cost her one whole paycheck.

  Tess grew up as an only child, but her two best friends were the twin daughters who lived next door. Her mother and their neighbor, Celia, were very close too. They took the three girls—Tess, Beth, and Jennifer—to theme parks and movies. Tess learned quickly that Beth and Jennifer were well-acquainted with the term “souvenir,” a word she didn’t know. To the twins, it meant getting their mother to buy them something—usually something kitschy, although she noticed Jennifer held out for more expensive swag. Everywhere they went, Beth and Jennifer clamored for souvenirs. Tess caught on quickly, and did the same.

  Fast-forward to her work as a homicide detective. Tess had tracked a serial killer once in her career, the hardest type of killer to find. She’d gotten lucky and made an arrest. That was all it was—luck. What she saw in his house had been expected, but Tess was not prepared for how it affected her.

  The killer had kept trophies from the twelve women and girls he’d killed. A hairbrush, a pair of earrings, panties. Even one girl’s asthma inhaler.

  That got to her more than anything else. She could imagine the girl’s fear as he choked her—a girl who knew what it was like to require air and fight for it.

  That was when it occurred to her that someone had to mark the scoreboard for the good guys.

  So every time Tess solved a case, every time a bad guy was put away, she picked out a souvenir that had some meaning to the case. To remember them. To remember the victims. Not as victims, but for the people they were.

  Tess’s souvenirs were distributed across three shelves, and placed before each of them was a card, neatly labeled. Right now there were six victims and six symbols of what had meaning for them: a baby’s rattle; a rodeo buckle; a bottle of Juicy Couture perfume; a bottle of CK One cologne; a Genesis CD; and a healing crystal from the Desert Oasis Healing Center.

  Her gaze lingered on the healing crystal. She thought of all the bad things that had been generated by the Desert Oasis Healing Center.

  And the one good thing that came out of it.

  Max Conroy.

  CHAPTER 9

  When Brayden got to Le Bar this evening, he was there, waiting for her.

  Going out with her friends was supposed to be fun.

  He was strange. Good-looking—really good-looking—but he was way too familiar. The way some guys are, you know the type. But this was different.

  He scared her. And Brayden did not scare easily.

  Her instincts were good, and alarm bells were going off.

  He was a handsome guy, really, but his grin was crooked with just a hint of his teeth, little teeth. Just thinking about it sent shivers up her spine.

  And he leaned too close.

  Two days ago, they’d perched on stools by the long bar near the dance floor, a place that funneled the cute guys through. The place was just a zoo, tons of people. Brayden was with her two friends from college and work, Melinda and Daffy (they called Daphne Daffy because she kind of was.) Brayden had been divorced for five months, and it was nice to get back out again in public. Nice to flirt a little.

  Frankly, it would be nice to sleep with someone again, without having to share the rest of her life with them. After Justin she could go without marriage for the rest of her life.

  But this guy, Steve, bothered her. It was almost as if he’d targeted her. She knew that Melinda and Daffy were hotter than she was. And better at flirting, too, because they hadn’t been out of commission for seven years. So why didn’t he go after Daffy, who was slim and stunning and had boobs to die for?

  (They were fake.)

  When he’d first stared at her across the bar, she couldn’t believe it. He was absolutely gorgeous. Only when he came over to talk to her did she feel uneasy.

  Really, like he was targeting her. Like a predator who wanted to eat her.

  That creepy smile of his.

  But it wasn’t just that.

  He gave her the impression he’d studied up on her. He had a familiarity with her family—at least that was how it sounded. He didn’t come right out and talk about her little girl, or her ex, or her family, or what she did. But she got the idea from context that he knew stuff.

  When he went off to the bathroom, she decided to grab her purse, pay her part of the tab, and get out.

  The next day, he’d called her.

  Mel had given him her number.

  Brayden made some excuse, managed to get off the phone.

  When Mel and Daffy wanted to get together tonight, she’d thought about saying no. But they were going someplace else, way on the other side of town, and while Tucson wasn’t a big city, it had plenty of bars.

  When she got there, he was sitting with them.

  She was about to turn around and walk out when Mel saw her and waved.

  His back was to her—he hadn’t seen her. Brayden ignored Mel’s waving and slipped into the crowd—so many people at the bar tonight—and worked her way through and out the door. Out into the cool night, the moon riding high in the sky.

  Walked briskly to her car.

  “Hey, Brayden!”

  She kept walking. Only fifty yards or so and she would be there.

  She heard his footsteps quicken.

  “Hey,” he said, grabbing her arm. “What’s the hurry?”

  “I have to get home.”

  He got up close to her. Infringing on her space, his face looming over hers. “What’s the matter? You seem spooked.”

  He looked puzzled, but Brayden knew his p
uzzlement was a fake. Like everything else about him.

  “I have to go.” She dug into her purse for the alarm remote. What if he accosted her here in the parking lot?

  She heard him jog a couple of steps to keep up with her. His breath on her neck as he touched her arm again.

  She said, “Look. I have a boyfriend—”

  “No you don’t.” He grinned his crooked grin, his face close. “Don’t you want to know where I saw you?”

  “What?”

  “Where I saw you.”

  She shook her head. “I’ve got to go.”

  “Atlanta. Ring any bells?”

  Her heart seized up for a second. “That wasn’t me. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Okay,” he said. “I wasn’t there. Maybe it wasn’t you, but you know what I’m talking about.” He leaned in close to her. “We have a lot to talk about.”

  She managed to pull away. Fumbled at the remote button, unlocked the car.

  As she slid onto the seat he rested his arm on the roof. “We really should talk.”

  She turned the key to the ignition but it didn’t seem to catch so she turned it again—the grinding clash of gears shrieked across her nerves. But the engine was running. She put the car in gear and it lurched forward. Barkman stepped back.

  Brayden floored it, and watched him in the rearview mirror.

  He was laughing.

  CHAPTER 10

  Tess at home: Feed the cat. Decide what to eat for dinner. Watch the sun set from her porch swing, watch the lights wink on in the house across the way.

  Before she figured out which frozen dinner to heat up in the microwave, the phone rang.

  She knew it was him even before she saw the readout.

  Max said, “I miss you.”

  “I miss you.”

  “I miss you more.”

  Tess said, “God, we’re annoying.”

  “We should live in the same place,” Max said. “Then we wouldn’t be annoying.”