Darkness on the Edge of Town (Laura Cardinal Series)

by J. Carson Black

  “He started out as a hacker,” Galaz told her. “Got himself into trouble with the wrong people. After the shooting, he straightened himself out and never looked back. Even if his family didn’t own J J Brown, he would have made it big-time. Unbelievable intellect.”

  J J Brown was a discount department store with high-end products, much like the outlets today, started in the 1920s. The Ramseys had been the beneficiaries of that wealth ever since.

  She rang the bell, thinking how much she didn’t want to be here. I’ll make an idiot of myself. I won’t know how to talk to him, I’ll stare…

  She heard a stirring inside. The door opened and Laura was hit by a blast of refrigerated air. The man in the doorway wore a white knit shirt, chinos, and bedroom slippers. He reminded her of a plump, soft dove.

  “Detective Cardinal?” he asked. He looked vaguely disappointed. What was a life-saver supposed to look like? Superwoman? He pushed open the door and held it as she walked in. “Jay has been waiting—he’s quite excited. He’s in his study.”

  Laura followed him into the hallway that led off the kitchen.

  She prepared herself. With all the dangers, all the bad things that could happen—muscle spasms, cord pain, bedsores, bladder problems—she expected he would already be a ruin of a man.

  Freddy opened the door to the room.

  The sun spilled in shuttered stripes across the Berber carpet. Laura could barely see through the dust motes. A massive cherrywood desk, a large computer monitor, a horse statue from the Tang dynasty. And the shape in the wheelchair.

  Hitting the ball backhand, flaxen hair catching the sun--

  Her eyes adjusted to the light.

  He looked exactly the same.

  In a strange moment of déjà vu, she was a kid again with a crush on the privileged, older son of a wealthy family. Suddenly she was that tongue-tied girl, mouth dry and heart beating fast.

  Jesus. You’re a grown woman. You have a boyfriend and everything. Grow up.

  His hair was the same vibrant pale gold. His face would be angelic if it weren’t for the amusement in his eyes.

  The same look he gave me when I was fourteen.

  He had the same lean, handsome face, elegant nose, and penetrating blue-green eyes. He wore very expensive but casual clothing, and it fit his lithe body well. Pushing forty, but he didn’t look it. It was as if he’d been frozen in amber.

  Aware she was staring.

  “Laura,” he said warmly. “It’s good to see you again.” Not the voice of a sick man.

  She wondered if she could unstick her throat enough to talk; tried it. “Hello.” What a scintillating wit.

  A click and a buzz, as the motorized wheelchair came toward her.

  “Freddy, you finally get to meet my guardian angel. The girl—the woman, who saved my life.” He came closer. “I told you she was pretty, didn’t I? But pretty doesn’t do you justice now.”

  Up close, Laura saw that his youth was an illusion. There was a little dip of flesh beneath the chin. His complexion was uneven, the elasticity lost, and there was something brittle around the eyelids. His eyes were bright, but hard too--the dryest part of him.

  “You know, Laura, I don’t think I ever thanked you.”

  Your mother did.

  He was studying her—amused? Interested? Could he really be interested? Did quadriplegics have a sex drive? She had no idea.

  “You’re staring.”

  She stepped back. “I’m sorry.”

  “That’s okay. I’m used to that. There’s always that awkward few minutes. Don’t be embarrassed.”

  But his eyes pinned her like a butterfly to a board. “Mike said you need help tracking down a predator.”

  Laura was relieved to talk about the case. “We think we have an Internet predator.” She started to fill him in on the Jessica Parris case, but he held up a hand.

  “I watch the news. You’re very telegenic, by the way.” He smiled. Angelic. “Mike told me all about it. I don’t know what I can do to help. You have anything on this guy?”

  From her briefcase, Laura removed the photocopies of the young man, the digital camera and jewelry, the matchbook cover the killer had left at the bandshell. She started to hand them to Jay, hesitated, and was relieved when he took them from her.

  “Freddy?” Jay Ramsey said without looking in the attendant’s direction.

  The soft-looking man bustled over, took the photocopy and looked at it.

  Jay asked, “This is the man?”

  “He could be. It’s possible he killed a girl in California.”

  Freddy said, “Definitely the southeast. Probably the Gulf coast.”

  “Freddy was born in Pensacola,” Ramsey explained. “What else?”

  Freddy handed Laura the photocopy back. “Guy is almost too good-looking. That looks like a publicity photo.”

  Laura said, “I’m thinking that if we could find the general area, we could link him through a talent or model agency.”

  Jay Ramsey looked up at her. “Could happen.”

  She found herself feeling unusually pleased.

  Jay shifted in his chair, winced. “He sent her the camera and the jewelry.”

  “The detective in Indio thinks he wanted her to take pictures of herself for him.”

  He turned his attention to the photocopy of the matchbook. “Crazygirl 12. That’s interesting.” His chair buzzed around to the computer on the cherrywood desk.

  “What’s interesting?” Laura asked.

  “How old was that girl—Jessica?”

  “Fourteen.”

  Jay stared at the computer screen. To Laura’s limited knowledge, it appeared to be state-of-the-art. Ramsey spoke but did not look at her. “The number 12 after her screen name—that usually means her age. And since it’s human nature for teenagers to want to appear older, I sincerely doubt this girl would lower her age by two years.”

  “What are you saying?”

  He looked straight ahead at the computer. “Jessica Parris isn’t Crazygirl 12.”

  “You think he contacted another girl?”

  “That’s the most likely scenario.”

  “He came to Bisbee looking for another girl.” Her mind was moving now, all self-consciousness forgotten. “But what happened to her?”

  Ramsey’s body flinched, and he rolled his head on the backrest of his chair. “A few things, I imagine. He kidnapped her and killed her. He took her and kept her with him. Or he never got to her.”

  “There are no missing children that I’m aware of.”

  “Then he probably never met up with her.”

  Why? she wondered. What stopped him?

  Jay Ramsey said, “I have a question for you.”

  “Okay.”

  “What was it like when you found me?”

  She stared at him. “I’m sorry?”

  “What happened before and after you found me?”

  Laura didn’t like the question. It took her right back to that time, and she didn’t like to think about the past. She shrugged. “It happened so fast.”

  “What did I look like?”

  “You were unconscious.”

  “But what did I look like?”

  She wanted to tell him this was a pointless conversation, but already felt she owed him. He had given her real insights into the Internet connection. She had to find Jessica’s killer, and he might be the one to help her do it. Keep your eye on the ball.

  You were…” She wondered if he really wanted to hear this. “You were lying in the bedclothes, part of your upper body off the bed. I didn’t see blood on you but I saw it on the carpet. I think you were naked.”

  “Naked.”

  “I think so. You were partially under the covers.”

  “You didn’t touch me. What made you not touch me?”

  “I wanted to—“ She stopped. Not touching him had saved his life. The doctors said that moving him might have increased the swelling in the area where the spine had
been nicked. She started again. “I was afraid to,” she said.

  He smiled. “An honest answer. I appreciate that, Laura.”

  “I don’t know why you asked.”

  “It was the seminal moment in my life. I wanted to see what it looked like from the outside. I was out of it. I don’t even remember them coming to shoot me.”

  Laura knew that kind of amnesia was common.

  “You know what happened, don’t you?” Jay said. “I wasn’t a bad kid, but I was heavily into cocaine. Kind of guys I was dealing with, you don’t want to fool around. I thought I knew what I was doing.” He sighed. “When I screwed up, they decided to make an example of me—if it could happen to a rich kid, it could happen to anyone.”

  He paused. Waiting for her to comment?

  “You want to talk about your case, though.” He returned his focus to the computer screen and said briskly, “This is all we have to start with? Crazygirl 12?”

  “Yes. Is it impossible?”

  He smiled. “Nothing is impossible. It will take a little time, though. Tell you what. I’m meeting with some people this afternoon and I want to have a rest. Why don’t you come back this evening? In the meantime, I’ll see what I can do with Crazygirl 12.”

  Laura felt a strange letdown. “All right.” She was aware of Freddy standing at her elbow. He escorted her out--wham bam thank you ma’am.

  At the door he said, “He’s very excited to be working with you on this. But he had a long night. Give me your phone number and I’ll call you and let you know if it will work out tonight.”

  Then she found herself outside, feeling, illogically, that Jay Ramsey had taken something from her. Which was ridiculous. She understood why he’d want to know what happened. It was probably the thing that made him agree to see her at all.

  If it would help catch Jessica Parris’s killer, she’d be happy to tell him anything he wanted to hear.

  Laura stopped the car on the lane near the ruined stables, letting the engine idle.

  She’d campagined Calliope for three years, winning several working hunter classes in Tucson and Phoenix, placing first in a couple of the big shows. All that time, she thought she owned Calliope. Betsy had “given” her the horse, even providing her with the mare’s Jockey Club papers.

  One day Betsy Ramsey told her she wanted Calliope back.

  Laura’s parents explained to her that they could hire a lawyer, but ultimately they would lose. The Ramsey family was wealthy, the Cardinal family—a school prinicipal and a fifth grade teacher—were not. And Betsy Ramsey had donated money to build a new wing on the elementary school where Alice Cardinal taught.

  It was Laura’s first lesson in pragmaticism.

  Laura remembered how it felt, taking the Jockey Club papers back to Mrs. Ramsey. She’d loved that mare. Calliope had been her best friend. She’d spent hours with her, riding her, grooming her, grazing her along irrigation ditches that were now as dry and dusty as her memories.

  Mrs. Ramsey rode Calliope to Reserve Champion in working hunter in the Desert Classic in California that year.

  The day Laura left Alamo Farm, she never went back, not until today. She couldn’t even bring herself to say goodbye to her mare. Somewhere along the line she had gotten the notion that clean breaks were best. Laura didn’t remember getting this idea from her parents or peers. But she knew instinctively that prolonging the association, that holding out hope, would only hurt her more in the end.

  Maybe there had been a ticking clock inside that warned her she’d need that coping mechanism later on. Something primitive, hinting she’d have to face finality early in life? So when her parents died, she’d know how to accept it.

  The moment the gate rolled back, Laura felt a deep sense of relief.

  She put on her left turn signal and waited for the traffic on Fort Lowell to clear.

  “You should have looked at the fine print.”

  The voice came from inside the car. Frank Entwistle’s bulk filled the passenger seat, dressed in a cheap polyester suit jacket and slacks, a brown shirt, and an unfashionably wide tie. He held a breakfast sandwich in one hand. The smell of grease permeated the car.

  “You’re not real.”

  “So you say.” He leaned over and hit the turn signal lever, switching it from left to right.

  “What’d you do that for?” she asked, although she knew.

  “Aren’t you going go by your old house?”

  “No.”

  “Why not? You’re right here in the neighborhood.” He glanced over at her, shrugged. “Suit yourself.”

  “Thanks.” Laura switched on her left turn signal and pulled out, going east on Ft. Lowell Road, watching her old mentor out of the corner of her eye. He’d never learned to chew with his mouth closed, and apparently being dead didn’t change anything. “I didn’t know ghosts could eat.”

  “I’m not a ghost.”

  “What are you? A figment of my imagination?”

  “That’s as good an explanation as any.” He reached over and aimed the air conditioning vent toward his face. “Hot in here. Slow down, will you?”

  Laura had to slow down anyway. They were approaching the tight curve that bordered the Mexican cemetery.

  Frank draped his arm across the seat back. “You ever go in there?”

  “No. Why would I?”

  “You were a kid back then. You know how kids are, always pushing the envelope, trying to figure it out--about death, you know? When your school mate got taken, it would be natural to go there. I know I won’t ever forget the first kid in my class to die.”

  “Who’s to say Julie died in the cemetery?”

  “Not died. Taken. Why don’t you pull over?”

  Although her first impulse was to resist, Laura turned onto the verge at the last minute, tires bumping on the hard dirt, white dust billowing up behind them. “There was nothing in the paper about exactly where she was taken.”

  Frank Entwistle crumpled up the grease-spotted paper from the sandwich and shot it at the dashboard. “Then how come you dream about it?”

  Laura looked past him at the graveyard. The greasewood and mesquite trees, greener and fuller after the summer rains, mingled with plaster angels, crosses, and graves of heaped dirt and piled rocks. A profusion of flowers—both real and fake--rested on the graves, garish in the unrelenting sun. Laura was parked under a mesquite tree, facing the wrong way to traffic. In the spot where, in her dreams, the orange and white car cruised to a stop, the mesquite tree’s sketchy shade scrolling over the blocky white hood. The girl, hands clasped around the straps of her backpack, leaning down to talk to the man inside.

  In her dreams, Laura always heard the car’s rough idling, smelled burning oil and felt the heat from the Chevy’s engine--details her imagination had conjured from the nightly news and one newspaper photo long ago.

  Entwistle said, “No matter how old you get, you always remember.”

  “Remember what?”

  “The first kid in your class to die.”

  Julie Marr was a transfer student from North Carolina. She had a strange accent, stranger hair, and even stranger clothes.

  Laura had known what it was like to be bullied, picked on. But she’d made it to the other side; she had friends. She’d felt for Julie, but face it: She wasn’t about to put her own reputation in jeopardy.

  Julie Marr lived in the same subdivision as Laura. Laura hated to admit this, but if she saw Julie walking up ahead of her, she would cross to the other side of the street so they wouldn’t end up walking together. It was her damn stride. Her natural stride was long; she covered the ground quickly. So she’d walk on the other side, her eyes straight ahead.

  Like Jessica Parris, Julie Marr had disappeared between school and her house. Laura had Press Club two days a week after school. Otherwise, the orange and white car might have stopped for her.

  The stiff old latches sprang back like little mouse-traps. Laura sat cross-legged on the floor of the gu
est bedroom, the late afternoon sun filtering in through Venetian blinds that came with the house, contemplating the old-fashioned suitcase and trying not to sneeze from the dust.

  Inside were stacks of files held together by shoelaces. Most of them were marked in ballpoint ink discolored with age, usually beginning with the word “Laura”. Laura- School; Laura – artwork; Laura – swimming lessons, and so on.

  But some manila folders her mother had saved for herself.

  There it was, toward the bottom. The word, “Crime” in her mother’s spidery writing.

  Laura knew exactly where to look, even though she had not seen this file in eleven years. She remembered seeing articles on Tucson murders that her mother had clipped, some of them as early as the forties, including the grisly saga of Charles Schmid, who killed three young girls in the 1960s and landed Tucson in Life magazine as the town with the “Ugliest street in America”. A killer who wore face makeup and put crumpled-up beer cans into his boots to make him look taller.

  Laura had forgotten how serious her mother had been about writing. There were three spiral notebooks full of notes, scrawled slips of paper, photos, phone numbers of detectives and police officers, lawyers and prosecutors, and six chapters of a book titled Death in the Desert: A Comprehensive Account of Tucson’s Most Infamous Murders, by Alice Cardinal.

  She didn’t remember this. She had been a teenager when her mom started writing classes, involved with her own life. She hadn’t taken her mother’s interests seriously. “Author” didn’t fit with her image of her mom. Her mom was a school librarian who spent most of her time and energy trying to shape Laura’s life, not her own.

  Laura looked at the first page.

  Chapter One

  Tucson Arizona had seen its share of murders, but none was as mysterious as the disappearance of San Pedro Middle School student Julie Marr.

  On a warm day in late September, Julie Marr was walking home from school as usual, when she vanished without a trace. Two days later a man named Jerry Lee, out hiking in the Redington Pass area east of town, noticed an old car that seemed to have rolled down the embankment off the road and had come to a stop in some brush and cactus. A curious sort, he bushwacked down to the car, and was shocked by what he found. The back seat of the old car was soaked with blood.