Suspicion of Vengeance

by Barbara Parker

  It amazed Jackie what he could remember on a good day. She picked a piece of straw off Diddy's plaid shirt. "What have you been into?"

  "I had to go to the ranch. Whit McGrath is getting himself a new horse this week, a filly, all the way from Kentucky. I helped the boys clean out a stall. I told Whit I wouldn't charge him nothing to keep her, except for feed. It gives the place some class." He laughed.

  Jackie smiled at him. "Such a deal."

  "You girls come on in. We'll rustle up some supper."

  The apology was forming on Gail's lips, but Jackie spoke first. "Well, Diddy, we can't right now. We've got some stuff to talk over, but we'll be down in a while. Go ahead and get cleaned up, okay?"

  "Ten-four." He turned back around and winked at Gail. "See you later."

  "Bye."

  They watched him go. When the screen door had banged shut, Gail leaned heavily against the side of Jackie's truck.

  "Margarita time," said Jackie.

  But Gail's blue eyes were unfocused, staring at the trees. "What you said about Lacey Mayfield. It bothers me. Before Anthony risks going onto McGrath's property, I want to be sure we're right. I've got to talk to Gary Dodson about Lacey. Do you want to come with me?"

  Jackie looked toward the house. "I better not." She reached into her uniform pants. "Here. Take my car."

  She stood out of the way while Gail opened the door and got in.

  "Gail? Do me a favor. When I talked to Gary Dodson at the courthouse, he said my mother went to him to find out about the Mendozas, and she was distressed. He used that word. Distressed. He said she died a few days later. I was wondering how she was. Her state of mind, you know?"

  "I understand," Gail said.

  "What did she say? Did she mention anything of a personal nature? Did she mention me or Alex? Would you ask him about that?"

  Gail could have used her cell phone to make sure Gary Dodson was in, but she decided not to. She didn't want to give him any advance warning. Jackie had said to look for a dark green Oldsmobile sedan about ten years old, and Gail saw the back end of it as she came around the corner. Dodson lived over his law office, converted from an old house. She recalled the shabby furniture, the worn carpet, and the curtains pulled across the windows, keeping out the light. Time had stopped for him twelve years ago. Both he and Lacey were imprisoned in the past, the sister trapped inside her anger, Gary in this tomb. Kenny's death, if it came, would not release either of them.

  She parked across the street and looked around for a black pickup truck before taking the keys out of the ignition. What she noticed was Dodson's secretary turning into the driveway, struggling to get her bulk out from under the steering wheel, then walking up the steps. She carried a folder with papers inside; perhaps she had been on some errand.

  Gail quickly got out of the Isuzu and ran up behind her, practically forcing her way through the door the moment the woman pushed it open.

  "Hello again. I need to see Mr. Dodson. Would you please tell him Gail Connor is here?"

  The woman frowned at her. "He's not in."

  "Oh, but I'm sure I saw him." Gail moved toward the hallway. "I'll just announce myself. You wouldn't mind, would you?"

  "Hey, wait a minute!"

  Quick footsteps carried her to the door at the end. She knocked, then pushed it open. "Mr. Dodson?"

  He was working on some papers at his desk, exactly as she had left him more than two weeks ago. This could have been the same somber suit, the same starched white shirt with fraying cuffs. He stood up and waved his secretary quiet.

  "Never mind, Nelda. It's all right." He took off a pair of gold-rimmed glasses. "What do you want, Ms. Connor?"

  "I'd like to ask a question. I won't take more than a minute. Please."

  "All right." With a sigh Dodson laid down his glasses, squaring up the frames with the edge of his file. "Nelda, wait. Did you get the agreements signed? Leave them on your desk, and I'll look at them later. Don't forget to lock up when you leave."

  "Good night, Mr. Dodson." The woman went out, closing the door behind her.

  A sliver of afternoon light came through the curtains, and a brass-shaded banker's lamp illuminated Dodson's desk. As before, the corners were taken up with stacks of old files with peeling labels, and Gail wondered if he kept them there to create the illusion that work was actually done here. She doubted he had any cases other than the pittance McGrath tossed his way.

  "Have a seat, Ms. Connor."

  She took one of the walnut jury-box chairs across from him and set her purse on the other. "Thank you." Amber and the baby smiled back at her from the framed portrait on the credenza, and the same lite-FM music was playing on his radio. "Forgive me for disturbing you, but I need your help. Kenny Ray Clark lost his appeal in the Florida Supreme Court, and the execution is scheduled for Wednesday. That's two days from now."

  "I'm sorry the decision wasn't in your favor." The springs in Dodson's chair squeaked in a steady rhythm as he rocked in it. His head went in and out of the lamplight. "I was at the hearing last week. Had I been the judge, I would have ruled the other way. You've come up with an interesting theory of who killed my wife, but regretfully, I have no influence over Whit McGrath. As I explained to your cousin, Miss Bryce, I can't help you."

  "Yes, she told me about your conversation. What I wanted to ask you was, how well did your wife get along with her sister?"

  "Strange question." He lifted his hands briefly from the chair. "Fine."

  "Any arguments in the weeks leading up to her death? Any rivalry between them?"

  "No. They weren't best friends, but they got along all right." A smile creased his cheek. "My goodness. Do you suspect Lacey too?"

  "I wanted to rule her out." A cool breeze came from the vents, and Gail crossed her arms for warmth. "As long as I'm here, Mr. Dodson, I have a question about my aunt, Louise Bryce. Jackie said you'd met her." Gail hesitated, then dove into the subject. "Louise died in a single-car crash in Palm Beach County in 1988. Jackie was only twelve at the time. She was told that the crash was an accident, and that her mother had been drinking. I think she has always feared it was something else. That her mother sped into that turn not wanting to come out of it alive."

  The soft squeaking of springs continued. The lamplight carved shadows into Dodson's gaunt cheeks.

  "You told Jackie that her mother was distressed when she came to see you, and that she died a few days later. You seemed to be saying that Louise was distressed about having notarized the Mendoza deed for Whit McGrath. What did you mean, exactly? Did she seem to be in a mental depression?"

  "No, I wouldn't say so. By distressed, I meant... agitated. Excited."

  "Excited?"

  "Worried. Concerned. I thought I'd made it sufficiently clear to your cousin."

  "What was Louise worried about?"

  "The deed. She wanted assurances—and I gave them—that the deed had been properly signed. That the people who signed it had not been forced to do so."

  "Why didn't she ask Whit McGrath?"

  "Oh, she did, but they weren't communicating very well at the time. They had split up. I remember she was angry at McGrath, but not depressed, not to the extent of ending her own life. Please tell your cousin, and again convey my condolences."

  Angry. Gail let the word float through her head for a moment. She shivered. Her short-sleeved linen dress did little to ward off the frigid air from the vents. "What did you tell Louise about the Mendozas?"

  "I said they'd gone back to Guatemala. That they had signed the deed, accepted a check for the property, and there was no way to contact them."

  "Had she been trying to?"

  "Louise Bryce was concerned, as I said, because she had broken the law. It was a petty crime, to be sure, but a crime nonetheless. When Mr. McGrath shut her out, she came to me. What was I supposed to do? She started screaming at me. She demanded to have an address for the Mendozas. What a scene. But I was able to calm her down. After all, she wasn't blam
eless, was she?"

  "You told her she could go to jail?"

  "I had to tell her something. She was threatening to go to the police."

  "Because she suspected the Mendozas were dead."

  Dodson stopped his chair. The bones in his face seemed sharper, the skin more pallid. With a quick movement, he pushed back his frayed cuff to check his watch. "You know, Ms. Connor, I have some things to do this afternoon."

  "Wait. I've just got one more question. Jackie told you why we suspect that Rusty Beck was responsible for your wife's death." When Dodson made no reply, Gail said, "We think Beck was afraid Amber would talk about the Mendozas. Beck murdered them, put them in the trunk of their car, and pushed the car into a sinkhole on Whit McGrath's property. The only leverage we have against McGrath is that he knew about it. He knew, didn't he?"

  "Ms. Connor, I'd really rather not discuss—"

  "A man is going to die if I don't get some answers. Just a yes or a no. Please."

  Dodson blinked, then made a quick nod. "He knew."

  "And Amber? Did she know?"

  He pressed on his forehead with stiffened fingers. His cuticles were raw. "I never told her. She knew about the deed, but ... nothing else. Please leave, Ms. Connor. I can't discuss this anymore."

  Gail moved forward to the edge of his desk. She spoke softly, sensing that if only she could put this the right way, he would let go. "How did you find out the Mendozas had been murdered? Did McGrath tell you?"

  "He didn't have to. It was obvious."

  "Why was it obvious?" Gail waited. "Mr. Dodson?"

  Staring down at his desk, he leaned his forehead on an open palm, and after a few seconds, he began to speak. "When the deed wasn't delivered by a certain date, which had been promised, I became concerned. Mr. Hadley, my supervising partner, wanted an answer, and I had none. I couldn't get any information from Mr. McGrath, so ... I drove out to speak to the Mendozas. Mr. Mendoza said he'd never sell. Never. And I'd already written the title opinion! I said to him, 'I'll make sure you get double your price.' He said, 'No, we won't leave. This is our home.' "

  Dodson's lips trembled, then moved again. Gail leaned closer to hear him. He could have been reading from the pages of a book.

  "Two days after I spoke to Mr. Mendoza, the deed was dropped off at my office with a note from Whit McGrath. 'Have this recorded.' It wasn't right. I had to find out what was going on, and I drove to their property. No one was there. I looked through the windows and saw furniture still in the house. Dishes in the sink. The dirt around the house had been raked. There were no footprints. No tire tracks. I couldn't move. I felt sick. Terrified. As if... they were there. Watching me."

  From his pocket Dodson produced a folded handkerchief, and he pressed it to one eye, then the other.

  Gail released a breath. "What did you do then?"

  "Drove to Whit McGrath's office. I told him what I'd seen. I was outraged. Four people. I thought he couldn't know. But he did." Dodson cleared his throat. "He said they'd cashed the check and gone back to Guatemala. It was a lie, of course it was a lie, but he couldn't admit it, could he? I knew, and he knew that I knew."

  "You never told anyone."

  "No." Dodson unfolded his handkerchief and wept into it. "I did nothing. They were dead ... murdered ... and I did nothing. Mr. Hadley asked me ... where they were. I lied. I said ... Guatemala."

  "Why?" The enormity of this he, the staggering weight of it, forced the question to her lips. "Why did you lie for him? Four people dead, and you said nothing?"

  He sobbed. "I had already recorded the deed! I couldn't embarrass the firm. I had a job, a family. Amber wanted so much. Always making demands on me. Buy me this, buy me that. What could I do? I couldn't bring them back. It was too late. Go ahead, say it. You're disgusting ... weak. You pitiful example ... of a man."

  After a fast shower, Jackie changed into shorts and an old police academy T-shirt. She usually ran five miles after work, but today it would have to wait. Gail would be back soon. Jackie unbraided her hair and shook it out.

  "It's cold in here." She saw that she had flipped the AC temp control down all the way. She turned it off and opened the windows. A strong breeze came through, and the photographs she had left on the kitchen counter started sliding to the floor. These were exterior color shots of the Dodson house. She'd been looking for something the crime scene techs might have missed. A patch of flattened grass, a button, a shoe print, anything.

  Gathering them up, she noticed the photo of the west side of the house. The windows in the master bedroom were open. The four-paneled aluminum frames were tilted outward. But the other windows were closed. Three sets of windows, a hedge underneath. Living room, baby's room, master bedroom. Closed, closed, open. She hadn't really noticed that before. Jackie went through the photos to find the back of the house. The master bedroom windows there were open also. The third bedroom and the kitchen were closed. A big AC unit hung through the wall in the master bedroom. Jackie brought the photo closer. There was a vertical white line underneath.

  She went to her desk for her magnifying glass, then to the window, where the light was brightest. She focused. It was nothing. A PVC pipe for condensation. The flash glistened on the concrete drip pad underneath. Water. The AC had been running. That was funny, she thought. The temperature had only reached the low seventies that day.

  Jackie picked up the photographs again and shuffled through them. She found a close-up of the ground under the rear bedroom window, which also showed half of the concrete pad. She looked through her magnifying glass. The concrete was wet. Not just wet, flooded. The dampness extended to the outline of mildew and algae that always built up in the summer, when ACs were let run all day. This one had been running for a long time. Who had turned it off? And when? According to Dodson, the windows had been open when he had arrived home.

  The crime scene reports were in a folder on her desk. Jackie flipped through pages until she found what she was looking for. Exterior photographs. Taken between 9:00 and 9:30 p.m. But still the puddle was there. It hadn't had time to evaporate.

  Raising her head, Jackie looked at the open window of her apartment. She felt the warm air coming in.

  Last Monday at the' courthouse she had sat on one heel talking to Gary Dodson through the open door of his car. She remembered how cold it had been inside. The AC had been turned up high, and condensation had run out from underneath. The bottom of her purse had been soaked.

  "Oh, my God."

  Jackie threw down the photographs and ran to the counter for her keys. They were gone. She grabbed her cell phone and her pistol and pounded down the stairs yelling for her grandfather. "I need to borrow your truck! Diddy!"

  As Dodson had continued to talk about his own failures, the logic of the odd relationship between him and. Whit McGrath had begun to make sense.

  Gail said, "After you were fired from Hadley and Morgan, Mr. McGrath's company continued to give you some legal work. It's because he didn't want you to talk about the Mendozas. That was why, wasn't it?"

  He wiped his eyes. "You're making it sound like blackmail. It wasn't. I'm a good lawyer. It wasn't my fault they fired me. I lay it all on his doorstep. McGrath owed me, don't you agree?"

  "Maybe so, but he wouldn't care about that. He wouldn't be easily intimidated, either, unless ... you had proof. Do you? Do you have proof of what happened to the Mendozas?"

  His thin lips trembled into a smile. "No. What proof? I can't show you a photograph. I didn't see them die."

  "But you could help us, couldn't you? Because you know the truth."

  Again his eyes filled with tears.

  Gail reached across the desk, touching his sleeve. "Please. Kenny has two days to live. You can't let him go to his death for someone else's crime. What can I say to convince you? Mr. Dodson, please."

  Her cell phone rang in her purse. She let it ring. The noise was muffled.

  Dodson didn't appear to have heard. He retreated, leaning his fore
head on his hands. The frayed white cuffs hid his face. "I can't. I told you, I can't help you."

  "But why? You don't have to be afraid of him."

  "I'm sorry. I don't want your client to die, but I can't."

  Gail could hear her phone ringing again, but Dodson was paying no attention, either to her or to the tears that had begun to spill down his cheeks.

  "Why can't you?" Gail wanted to shout at him, scream, pound on his desk, and the effort of remaining calm was making her dizzy. "Why are you so afraid of him?"

  The voice was small and choked. "He— He would tell."

  "Tell what? That you recorded the deed for him? It's going to come out eventually. Please don't wait until another innocent person is dead."

  "No. No, no, no, I can't." Gary Dodson put his head down on the desk. "I don't deserve to live."

  Intending to shut off her phone, Gail took it out of her purse. She noticed the number. Jackie was calling.

  She murmured, "Excuse me." She spoke softly into the mouthpiece. "Jackie. I can't talk now."

  Gail could hear a car door slam and an engine start, then Jackie asking her if she was with Dodson.

  "Yes, in his office."

  Dodson raised his head, and his forehead creased into deep lines. He stared at the cell phone.

  Jackie said to make some excuse, leave as quickly as possible, don't show a reaction, just say you have to go.

  "Why? What's wrong?"

  Telling her not to ask any questions, just go. The tension in her voice came through clearly.

  "All right. I'll leave now. Be home in a couple of minutes."

  Jackie said not to hang up. Let me hear you leave.

  "Okay. Sure."

  Dodson said, "That was your cousin? The police officer?"

  "An emergency. I'm so sorry. I need to go." She reached for her purse and stood up. "Thank you for your time."

  She heard a drawer slide open, and from it came a revolver. The lamp glinted on the long, shiny barrel. She could see the chambers. The bullets in them. The immense black hole of the gun.