by Sylvia Nobel
On the drive towards Hidden Springs I mentally flayed myself. Why was I allowing myself to be manipulated by Grant and become mired in yet another predicament? How much more complicated could my life possibly get? I soon found out. The first couple of miles of dirt road were decent, but the further less-traveled section soon deteriorated into a slippery river of mud. Even in four-wheel drive some spots were damn near impassable. My shoulders tensed and my hands fastened in a death grip on the steering wheel as I struggled for control, and more than once I feared I’d be the one stuck waiting for a tow truck. I was relieved when I finally jostled to the top of the hill. Across the valley, the ethereal beauty of the Praying Nun, cloaked in a swirling veil of fog as she knelt in eternal prayer, took my breath away. It was a dicey drive downhill, several times almost sliding off the road, but moments later I reached the valley floor and entered the dark palm tunnel. How different, how somber and mysterious the old hotel appeared that morning nestled darkly in the gloom of the overhanging trees.
While I stood at the door banging the brass doorknocker, rainwater dripped off the eaves and splashed into a wheelbarrow filled with at least two inches of water. The hinges of the scrolled wooden door emitted a shrill screech as Marissa swung it open.
“Come in.” Unlike yesterday, she looked relieved to see me.
The first thing I noticed when I stepped inside, besides the ultra-creaky floorboards, was the musty, dank smell. I guessed it was just the odor of age that had permeated this more than one-hundred-year-old building. And it felt damp and chilly even though a fire crackled merrily in a stone fireplace situated in the room to my right. “He’s in there,” she whispered, pointing.
“By the way,” I advised in a low tone. “Just to set the record straight and clear up any confusion, Grant Jamerson is my former fiancé. I’m engaged to Bradley Talverson now.”
She gave me a small, knowing smile. “I guess that wishing something is true doesn’t always make it so.”
“I’m afraid not.”
She gestured for me to follow her. I did, but paused at the entrance to what looked like a sitting room filled with dark old-fashioned furniture to admire a bronze statue of a Native American woman holding a small child. I immediately recognized the distinctive style.
“I just met the lady who does these sculptures,” I remarked to Marissa. “Her pieces are outstanding. Have you met Myra Colton?”
“Yes. She delivered this a couple of weeks ago. Seems like a nice lady.”
When I walked through the doorway Marissa nodded towards the couch where Grant lay stretched out, a blanket pulled over him, his blonde hair ruffled. His eyes were closed, but I sensed he was not asleep. I tapped him gently on the shoulder. “Grant?”
He turned his head slowly and opened those amazing cornflower blue eyes while reaching for my hand. “That’s my girl. Kendall to the rescue.”
“We don’t have a lot of time,” I replied, ignoring his overt compliment while trying to douse the growing suspicion that he wasn’t really hurt at all. “Dr. Garcia is waiting for us.” His hand tightened around mine and he started to sit up but then groaned in pain.
“Christ, that hurts.” He grabbed the back of his neck with his free hand and his complexion grew so pale I thought he might pass out.
“Just take it slowly,” I urged sympathetically, now convinced that his injuries were genuine. With Marissa holding his other arm, we eased him off the couch, out the door and into my truck.
“Sorry to be such a baby,” he moaned, finally settled in the passenger seat as I slid behind the wheel. “Guess I shouldn’t have waited so long to see someone.”
“Guess not.” I turned the key and shifted into gear as rain spattered on the windshield. “Hang on. It’s going to be a rough ride.” I don’t think he believed me until we’d cleared the gravel drive and turned onto the rough, muddy road.
“Nice pickup.”
I glanced over at his apprehensive expression. “It’s not mine.”
“No?”
“Tally loaned it to me until I can get a new car.”
“What happened to your Volvo?”
“It got kidnapped and destroyed on my last assignment.”
“Sorry to hear that.” He winced as I swerved to miss a deep pothole. “So…you sure you’re able to handle something this size?”
“If you’re worried, I’ll be happy to let you drive,” I answered tersely, shooting him a challenging look. I think under normal circumstances, he may have taken me up on it, but he backed down, murmuring, “No, that’s okay.”
I drove as carefully as possible, but there was no way to avoid the giant swales in the road that rocked the truck from side to side. By the time we reached the clinic his jaw was locked and his eyes looked glassy with pain.
Good to his word, Dr. Garcia met us at the front door and ushered him into a cubicle. Seated in the waiting room I flipped through several month-old magazines, looking up when I heard raindrops spattering against the windowpane. Talk about dark and depressing. It was an odd phenomenon to see the sky blanketed with dull gray clouds. Tally had been right again. I’d scoffed at his prediction that I would become addicted to the perpetually blue skies and brilliant Arizona sunlight. As I watched the nearby palo verde trees sway in the wind there was little doubt in my mind that the craft show would to be rained out and I wondered how things were going at the Starfire with Tally’s buyers. It was a really sloppy day, but everyone would probably be inside the spacious barn. Thinking of that made me anxious to visit my new mare again.
Forty-five minutes later, a blurry-eyed Grant and Dr. Garcia re-emerged from the back of the clinic. “He’s got a couple of badly bruised ribs, pulled shoulder muscles and a nasty case of whiplash. I gave him an injection for pain, but you’ll probably want to get these filled as soon as the drug store opens,” Dr. Garcia advised me, scribbling on a prescription pad. To Grant he warned, “You need to take it easy for a few days, young man, and I would strongly advise you not to drive while taking these medications.”
I thanked Dr. Garcia for meeting us on such short notice and on a Sunday as well while Grant fumbled with his checkbook. Driving towards McCreary’s Drug Store, I glanced at my watch. If all went well I’d still be able to make my appointment with Ginger at one o’clock.
I was the first customer at the prescription window and we were on our way back to Hidden Springs within twenty minutes. Now that Grant was no longer groaning in pain, I was hoping to find out if he’d learned anything of importance concerning Riley Gibbons from his exploratory visit to Phoenix yesterday, but he was zonked out for the entire trip. A light rain continued to fall, but the drive was far less harrowing than it had been earlier. He stirred and yawned as I drifted to a stop beside Marissa’s SUV.
“Feeling any better?” I inquired, shutting off the engine.
“I think so,” he replied sleepily, his boyish yet beguiling smile just a tad goofy. He moved his head back and forth gingerly. “Dr. Garcia dispenses some great drugs. I don’t feel like there’s an ice pick stuck in my neck anymore.” Our eyes connected and held for several seconds causing my pulse to spike involuntarily. Mayday! Mayday! The fact that I still found this man even remotely attractive disturbed me greatly. “I hope I’m going to be able to drive by Tuesday. If I can’t, that’s gonna really suck.”
“What do you mean?”
“My editor’s going to hang me out to dry. Having me cover the judge’s funeral was the sole reason he flew me out here.”
“With any luck, you’ll be okay by then.”
“Hopefully. Hey, listen, I…um…guess I owe you one for helping me out today.”
“I think that can be arranged.”
“Yeah? How?”
“You could tell me what you found out about Riley Gibbons yesterday.”
Eyeing me through half-opened lids, he arched a skeptical brow. “Thought you weren’t covering this story.”
“I am now. Sort of.”
He no
dded approval. “That’s my girl.”
An uneasy feeling came over me. How welcome his words and attentions would have been a year ago. How fantastic it would be now to work with a man who encouraged me in my career instead of inhibiting me. The fact that I’d even permitted that thought to enter my head filled me with self-reproach. I threw up a protective shield. “I’m not your girl anymore so quit inferring to people that I am.”
“What people?”
“For starters, Marissa.”
“Who?”
“Come on. The young woman at the hotel who called me on your behalf.”
“Oh, her. Well…I was out of my mind with pain. It was an honest mistake.”
“I’m not buying it.”
His playful grin betrayed him and I counseled myself again not to succumb to the magnetic power of his blue eyes. “Can’t blame a guy for trying, can you?”
“I’m serious. Any further communication between us has to remain on a strictly professional basis. Got it?”
He studied my face for long seconds, probably trying to determine if I was serious before venturing, “This might interest you. I spoke to a Judge Creston Towers while I was in Phoenix yesterday.”
“Who’s he?”
“Good friend of the deceased. He told me that Gibbons had confided to him about receiving a couple of disturbing messages a week or two before he was murdered.”
“Disturbing how?”
“Apparently, the envelopes arrived a few days apart and were postmarked from several other states. Each one contained a single sheet of white paper with a quotation printed on it.”
I threw him a sharp glance. “What? What kind of quotation?”
“You know, like the ones we were forced to read in English Lit class. Judge Towers pointed them out to detectives when they were going through Judge Gibbons’s personal papers at his office.”
“Do they believe that they’re in any way connected to his murder?” If they didn’t think so, I sure did.
“I talked to a Detective Lansing in Homicide and he admitted there wasn’t much to go on. According to the lab analysis they could have been printed at any copy shop on any computer and there were no fingerprints.”
“Do you remember what the quotes said?”
He ran a hand over his forehead. “I can’t recall all of them right now. I’ve got them written down in my notebook. I think one of them referred to…dreaming of revenge or something like that.”
An uncomfortable chill invaded my stomach. “I’d like to see the exact quotes.”
“Sure.”
“What cities were the letters mailed from?”
He thought for a moment. “San Luis Obispo, California, and Santa Fe, New Mexico.”
“Did Judge Towers have anything else to say?”
“Just that Riley seemed worried and preoccupied during his last week at work.”
This story was getting more intriguing by the minute. Just the way I liked them. “It’s been my contention all along that we’re dealing with someone out to even the score.”
“Sounds like it. But who? That’s the ten million dollar question. And who’s got time to sit and go through the guy’s entire caseload for the past fifteen or twenty years trying to find out?”
“Actually I’ve got two people researching it now, the authorities are working on it and I met up with an old friend who just happens to be the forensic anthropologist on this case. I’m hoping I’ll get lucky and get some inside information not widely available to the general public.”
A look of pride blazed in his admiring gaze. “I knew you were going to make a dynamite investigative reporter the minute I met you.” He paused before saying softly, “We made a great team didn’t we?” When I didn’t answer he added hastily, “You know you’re wasting your talent in this little hole in the—” He caught my withering look and swallowed the remainder of his sentence. “Know what? I need to get in a prone position right away or you’re going to have to carry me inside.”
His complexion had lost its rosy appearance as he slid from the truck and I was very aware of his arm coiled snugly around my waist while I assisted him to the hotel entrance. Marissa met us at the front door and we followed her up squeaky wooden steps. When we reached the landing, I immediately noticed yellow caution tape stretched across the dark mahogany newel posts at the base of a second staircase leading to the upper floor. A crudely written cardboard sign taped to the bottom step warned: VERY DANGEROUS CONDITIONS BEYOND THIS POINT! KEEP OUT!
Just ahead of where we stood, I could see a long, dim hallway crowded with furniture. A ladder, stacks of drywall, cans of paint and a myriad of power tools scattered on drop cloths were visible in the murky light seeping through tall windows. Marissa opened the door nearest to us, explaining that it was one of only three usable bedrooms on the second floor until renovation was completed.
Within seconds of helping him into an impressive four-poster bed and tucking him underneath a comforter, Grant promptly fell asleep. What I wanted more than anything was to go through his notebook, but I couldn’t very well rummage through his personal belongings with Marissa watching me. Agitated, I set his medications on an antique side table before we quietly left the room.
“What’s the story with that sign?” I remarked, as we passed the roped-off staircase.
“Oh. Our handyman put that up a few weeks ago because he said it’s too dangerous to take a chance on having guests wandering around up there.” Her gaze turned wistful. “Riley loved to hang out and read in one of the rooms he turned into a library. It’s still in pretty good shape but the rest of them are a mess. The man who owned this place before Riley was either lazy or didn’t have the money to make repairs.”
“I understand there was also a fire.”
“Yeah, that was a long time ago, but there’s also been a lot of water damage over the years from the leaky roof. Winston says the floors are all rotted because of that and termites. He said he almost broke his leg when part of the floor collapsed so he’s real adamant that nobody go up there until he gets things fixed. Right now, he’s bustin’ his hump trying to get the other rooms on this floor repaired so we can at least get them ready to rent out.”
“Looks like you’ve got your hands full,” I remarked, as we descended the stairs.
“More than you think.” She was silent for a couple of seconds before inquiring, “Is Mr. Jamerson going to be all right? I hate to sound petty, but I really don’t have time to play nursemaid to the guests.”
I briefly explained his injuries then added, “The doctor thinks he’ll be okay in a couple of days, but feel free to call me again if he seems worse.”
“I will.”
We reached the first floor and I paused. “Is this a good time for us to talk?”
She averted her eyes, my question appearing to put her on guard. “I guess it’s as good as any.” I accompanied her into the sitting room again and she motioned for me to sit on the elegant claw-footed sofa. She knelt and fussed with the fire in the hearth for a few minutes until a warm glow filled the room. Wrapping the bulky sweater around her middle, she curled into a gold brocade wing backed chair. I observed her pallid complexion as I opened my notepad.
“Mind if I take a few notes?”
She fingered the material of her long skirt. “I suppose not.”
Her aloof demeanor puzzled me. “I understand you worked in Judge Gibbons’s office.”
“That’s right.”
“What was your position?”
“Clerk.”
“And what were your duties?”
“Lots of things. Filing, computer work, arranging Riley’s court schedule, running errands for him and other administrative staff members.” A careless shrug. “Stuff.”
“How long did you work for him?”
“About a year.”
“When did you become…romantically involved with him?”
“Before you go any further I want to set the record straight. I�
��m sick of being referred to as the other woman,” she raged, making air quotes with her fingers. “I’m not a slut or a home wrecker. Riley was a good and kind man. He took me under his wing and helped me when I was on desperation’s doorstep.”
“What do you mean?”
She sighed deeply. “It’s kind of a long story.”
“I’ve got time.”
Her attention was diverted to the doorway and I turned to see a stocky Hispanic woman clad in blue jeans and a sweatshirt. She wore thick glasses and her dark hair, pulled tightly into a bun, was streaked with gray. “Mail from yesterday,” she announced, waving a handful of envelopes. “Do you want me to put it in the kitchen for you?”
“No, I’ll take it now,” Marissa said, holding out her hand.
The older woman passed by me inquiring, “You feeling any better today?”
“A little,” replied Marissa, languidly accepting various sized envelopes from her. Frowning, she opened one of them, saying in a distracted tone, “Bernita, this is Kendall O’Dell. She’s a newspaper reporter from Castle Valley.”
Smiling, I said, “Hello, Bernita, nice to meet you.”
She returned the greeting and pushed her glasses to the bridge of her broad nose.
Marissa beamed an affectionate smile at the older woman and it brightened her morose expression, revealing how attractive she could be minus her perpetually sad demeanor. “Truth be told, it’s Bernita who does the lion’s share of work around here.”
Looking humble, the older woman shrugged and murmured, “We all do our part to keep this place going.”
I thought again what a weird situation it was having the judge’s widow and girlfriend forced into this uneasy alliance in order to sustain the faltering business. Bernita’s black eyes reflected an obvious fondness for Marissa before she turned and left the room. Might be interesting to get her take on the judge’s murder.