A Body to Spare

by Sue Ann Jaffarian

  “Yes. There’s a small group of ladies who walk every day around lunchtime, which would be about now. But Mom seldom leaves her phone behind when she goes. She says she needs it in case one of them croaks along the way.”

  “Your mother is such a little ray of sunshine,” Greg said with a smile. “But it’s actually a good idea.”

  “More to the point, my mother is worse than a teenager when it comes to her phone and her iPad.”

  After a delightful brunch, I tried Mom again. Still it went to voice mail. “I’m getting worried, Greg. Let’s go over there.”

  “It could be dangerous,” he said, “or at the very least get Andrea and Dev mad at us.” He started up the van.

  “Is that a no, we’re not going?” I turned in my seat to glare at my husband.

  “Of course not, sweetheart,” he said with a slight laugh. He pulled out of the parking space and pointed the van toward the exit. “I was just stating the possibilities. Buckle up—we’re on our way.”

  When we reached Mom’s retirement community, Greg pushed the code to get us through the gate. The man in the small white guardhouse, a middle-aged rent-a-cop in a gray uniform, smiled at us with recognition and waved as we passed through.

  As soon as we parked in front of Mom’s place, I hopped out without waiting for Greg and trotted to the door. Thankfully, the distance was a lot less than when I had run after Jean the day before. I mashed my hand over the bell several times, just in case she was home. While I waited for an answer, I leaned far over the partial patio wall and tried to look into the living room. The blinds were drawn closed. My mother always opens her blinds as soon as she’s up and dressed. I straightened up and pulled my key ring out of my bag. On it was Mom’s key. By the time Greg caught up with me, I was inside, calling, “Mom!”

  Although it was a two-bedroom place, Mom’s condo wasn’t that large. As you walked in, the wall to the right of the front door was the common wall shared with the next townhouse. On it were hung cheerful prints of well-known still-life arrangements, and set against the wall under them was a low bench. To the left was the living room, dining area, and kitchen. Beyond that was a short hallway that branched off to the right toward the small second bedroom and the one bathroom, and to the left to the average-size master bedroom. Midway along the hallway was a closet with folding doors that concealed an apartment-sized washer and dryer and storage for towels and linens.

  I dashed across the living room and turned left in the hallway. “Mom!” I called. Her bedroom was empty, and the bed was made. I went the other way. Both the bathroom and extra bedroom were empty. Everything was neat as a pin.

  “She’s not here,” I said to Greg when I returned to the living room.

  “No, but her cell phone is.” He held up a smartphone that I recognized as my mother’s. “It was on the kitchen counter, plugged into the charger,” he explained. “That’s probably why she didn’t take it with her. It was probably low on juice.”

  My racing heart slowed back to normal. “Maybe she’s at the rec room playing cards with friends,” I suggested. “You stay here in case she’s not and returns. I’ll just pop over there.”

  When I left Mom’s, I stopped dead in my tracks on the sidewalk, trying to remember where the recreation room was located. The community had a nice setup, with a large pool, game room, and exercise room located somewhat in the center of the sprawling property, which was honeycombed with sidewalks. An elderly couple strolled by in matching track suits. “Where’s the rec room?” I asked them. They pointed across the street to a wide green belt with a sidewalk running down the middle of it. I walked in that direction at a fast clip.

  There were three groups of people playing games at card tables in the rec room. One table consisted of two couples playing bridge. At the other, three women played a different card game. It looked like hearts. At the third table, two men played chess. No one was at the pool tables. I glanced through the glass wall that revealed the gym and spotted one man walking on a treadmill while watching a game on the overhead TV.

  “Hi,” I said, approaching the table of women. “I’m Odelia, Grace Littlejohn’s daughter. Have you seen my mother?”

  A roly-poly woman with cotton-candy hair answered, “Not today. But most Sundays she’s here playing cards with us.”

  “Maybe she went to church,” another woman answered, which caused a ripple of titters. My mother is many things, but a churchgoer is not one of them, and she’s quite vocal about her atheist status. The woman making the remark was pale and thin and wore a lovely dress and a string of pearls. Hanging on the back of her chair was a jacket that matched the dress. I remembered meeting her and thought her name was Rose. I also remembered that Mom didn’t care for the woman. I’ll bet Rose had probably gone to services earlier in the day.

  One of the chess players looked up at me. He was a bald African American man with a gray stubbly beard who I’d met several times before. Mom liked him. His name was Art, a widower who I’m pretty sure had his eye on Mom when she had first moved into the complex. I don’t think anything romantic came of it, but they did become friends. “I saw Grace driving off with a friend of hers when I was on my way over here,” Art told me.

  I turned to him with interest and annoyance. Mom had orders not to go anywhere, but my mother’s general policy was that orders, like rules, were made to be broken. “Are you sure, Art?”

  “Pretty sure. She waved at me as she got into his car.”

  “His car?” I repeated. “So it was a man?”

  He stopped playing and scratched his stubble as he tried to remember. It sounded like fine sandpaper. “More like a kid, really. A red-haired young man, kind of spindly.”

  Swayze.

  Art peered at me with concern over the top of his glasses. “Do you know who that is, Odelia?”

  “Yes, I do.” I wiped the worry off my face and replaced it with a smile. “Thanks, Art.” After I wished them all a good day, I left the rec room and headed down the greenbelt toward my mother’s place at a jog. With all the jogging I was getting, maybe I should listen to Greg about more cardio or at least start wearing a snugger bra.

  When I turned at a bend in the walkway for the home stretch, I saw Greg sitting outside Mom’s place waiting for me. He was holding something in his hand and waving it in my direction. Did Mom leave a note? Stupid me. Why didn’t we look for one earlier? It would have saved time and my legs.

  I kept up my jog until I reached him, then collapsed forward, hands on my knees to steady myself as I gulped air. There was another catch in my side. I half expected Greg to say something about my condition, but he didn’t; instead, he shoved the paper in front of my lowered nose.

  “Odelia, we have a serious problem.”

  “Besides me having a heart attack?”

  He didn’t laugh as I expected. Instead, he shook the paper under my nose again. “Grace has been kidnapped.”

  I straightened up so fast I nearly fell to the ground in a dizzy lump. “What?” I scooted over to the patio wall and leaned against it for support.

  Greg handed me the note. “I found this on the kitchen table, under the phone,” he explained. “It was facedown, so I didn’t realize it was addressed to you until after you took off.”

  It was a single piece of paper folded in thirds. On one of the outside folds my name was printed in a juvenile hand that looked familiar. Inside the note was neatly printed in the same manner: If you want your mother back, stay by her phone. No cops or she’s dead.

  “Grace didn’t leave her phone behind to charge it,” Greg said. “It was left by the kidnappers to communicate with us.”

  I rubbed a hand over my face and squeaked out between breathes, “Swayze has her.”

  “Swayze?”

  I nodded. “Mom’s friend Art saw her get in a car with a young guy that fit John Swayze’s description. He said Mom waved at him.”

  “Was she waving at Art or trying to get his attention?” Greg asked.


  “Good question,” I said, finally speaking normally. “But why would Swayze grab Mom? And why in heaven’s name would she go off with him after we specifically told her to stay home?”

  “Maybe she didn’t have a choice.” Greg ran a hand through his hair several times, creating haphazard furrows. His jaw was clenched from stress, much like my stomach.

  “We need to get her phone.” I started to move inside the condo, but Greg stopped me by holding Mom’s cell phone up. “Got it.” When I took it from him, he added, “I know what the note said, but cops or no cops? It’s your call. Swayze is obviously someone other than who he says.”

  I fell back against the low block wall again in fright. “Oh my gawd, Greg. John Swayze must be the hitman.”

  I could tell Greg was whirling my comment around in his brain by the way his eyes moved. They almost circled, then darted from one side to the other, as if actually searching for information stored in his gray matter. “I don’t know, sweetheart,” he finally said. “If he was, why didn’t he take you out when he had the chance back at our place? He recorded you. He didn’t kill you. And didn’t you pat him down, looking for a weapon?”

  “I only grabbed his wallet.” I shook my head. “I really should have checked for some sort of weapon. It was slip-shod of me.”

  “Not really, sweetheart. You’re not a cop. It’s not like you called in sick the day they covered pat-downs at paralegal school.”

  Greg was trying to make me feel a little better, but it wasn’t working. John Swayze had my mother, and until he called we wouldn’t know why or what he wanted. We were stuck waiting for a call, with no idea of when it would come. I took several breaths of air—not out of exhaustion but to try and center my emotions and thoughts. Like us, Mom lived close to the ocean, and the air was heavy with both salty sea moisture and the dampness of the overhead storm clouds. It hadn’t rained yet today, but the threat was there, just as it was in the note.

  “Who knows why Swayze did what he did,” I finally said. “Maybe he was only scouting for the real killer.” I looked down at the note again, studying it closely. “But I think whoever wrote this might also have written the note found on Zach’s body.”

  Greg put on his reading glasses and held out his hand for the kidnapper’s note. “Are you sure?” I handed it back to him, and he pored over it like it was a map to buried treasure. “The other note only had two words, as I recall,” he said, not looking up.

  “No, I’m not absolutely sure, but I think it’s a possibility.” I took another few breaths. “Both are printed in a similar juvenile hand.” I closed my eyes and concentrated. “I really don’t recall coming across Swayze before now, so if he did kill Zach and put the body in my trunk, why? What’s the connection to me?”

  Silence as thick and gummy as oatmeal fell over us while we put our brains through their paces again. After a few moments, I asked, “What do you think we should do, honey?”

  “I’m not sure, Odelia.” Greg put away his reading glasses. “Other than just wait for whoever has Grace to contact us.” He paused. “I don’t want to put Grace’s life in danger by involving the police, but they need to know that Swayze might be involved.”

  “I agree.” I pushed off from the wall and went inside and grabbed my purse. Greg came in behind me. I pulled out my cell and called Andrea Fehring and put it on speaker so Greg could participate.

  “What’s up, Odelia?” she answered after two rings.

  “I’ve been thinking,” I began, choosing my words carefully. “I think maybe John Swayze might have had something to do with Zach’s death or at least with putting him in my trunk.”

  “Why do you say that?” she asked.

  “Something about the note left with the body has been bothering me since I met Swayze,” I continued. “I think I recognized his handwriting.”

  “And where did you see it?” Fehring asked.

  Next to me, Greg mouthed, “Careful.”

  I hesitated just long enough to swallow. “When I went through his wallet after I bashed his hand. I was looking for ID.”

  “And he just happened to have a handwriting sample on him? Maybe he was practicing forgery.” Fehring offered up a very terse laugh bordering on a woof. “Give me a break, Odelia. What’s really going on?”

  “It was sort of a to-do list,” I quickly answered. Greg gave me a thumbs up on my speedy creativity. “I remember it having a similar look to the writing on the note left with Zach’s body. You know, precise block printing like a kid who never learned cursive.”

  Now Greg was mouthing, “Don’t oversell.”

  “Greg and I were talking about it and thought I should tell you. Did you dust the note for fingerprints?”

  A big sigh came through the phone. “Of course we did, and we found nothing. Not Swayze’s. Not anyone’s.” A pause. “Look, I’m very busy. We brought in Finch, but Glick’s disappeared.”

  “Yeah,” I said, “Dev told us about it. Any breaks?”

  “Not yet.” There was another pause. “By the way, Odelia, I’m not happy that you didn’t tell me about Elaine Powers contacting you yesterday.”

  Greg mouthed, “Say nothing.” It was difficult, but I kept my mouth shut.

  “What else are you not telling me?” Fehring prodded.

  I took a deep breath. Greg was now silently telling me to tell her about Clark. Instead, I handed him the phone. I was tired of dancing around Fehring’s questions and was too worried about Mom to be careful.

  “Andrea,” Greg began, “Greg here. We also wanted to tell you that Clark has been looking into some background on the Finch family.”

  There was a long silence on the other end. “I should be mad, but I’m not,” she finally said. “At least he’s a trained cop and knows how to be careful. So spill it.”

  Greg filled her in on what Clark had told us about the Finch family dynamics and the theory that maybe Zach used the kidnapping as an opportunity to hit the road on his own. “He could have even escaped,” Greg suggested. “Went into hiding, and maybe the kidnappers found him after all these years. Maybe he was Jean’s roommate?”

  “No,” Fehring said, “we’ve located the roommate. We got his name from the occupant information on file with the complex’s security company. He is an actor who just moved to New York, just as Jean said, and he has long blond hair like on the comb. We also showed a photo of Zach to Jean’s neighbors, and none of them recognized him as living there, but one woman who lived in the condo across from Jean did say she saw Zach visiting from time to time.”

  “So Jean did know that her brother was here in SoCal?” I asked, moving back closer to the phone.

  “Sure looks that way,” Fehring said. “And from fingerprints we took from the body, it looks like he was going by the name of David Moreland. The address on file with the DMV is a mailbox place, just like with Swayze’s. We’re trying to get their records now to see what physical address Zach put down. We’re also going through all of Jean’s contact lists from her phone, computer, and address book to see if she had a physical address for him under that name, but we’re coming up with nothing. Whatever Zach was doing to support himself, it was off the grid.”

  “Off the grid,” I echoed. “Maybe that’s what got him killed. Maybe Elaine was wrong about recognizing Nathan Glick’s voice.”

  “As much as I don’t want to show support for your killer pal,” Fehring said, “she stays alive remembering details like that, so I’m not so ready to dismiss Glick just yet, especially since he ran.” Another pause. “So are you following orders and staying put?”

  “We’d love to go home, Andrea,” my hubs said, getting a thumbs up from me on his own quick thinking. He hadn’t lied to her but had offered up a comment that could be taken as an affirmative response.

  “Not just yet,” she told us. “We’ll call you as soon as we feel it’s safe.”

  “What about work tomorrow?” Greg asked. “Can I at least go to my shop? I have a business t
o run.”

  “Sit tight, Greg,” Fehring said. “But it wouldn’t hurt to have someone cover for you tomorrow.”

  “How about my employees—are they safe?” he asked.

  “Your business is in Huntington Beach, correct?” she asked.

  “Yes, it is.”

  “I’ll make a call to their police chief and see if he will post someone to watch it tomorrow—how’s that? I’ll see if I can arrange something at Odelia’s work, too, just in case.”

  “We’d feel a lot better about it,” Greg told her. “Thanks.”

  Another cell phone rang. It was Mom’s. When I made the call to Fehring, I’d placed it on the counter by my purse. Neither Greg or I made a move to touch it. Instead, we stared at each other with the wide eyes of lemmings who’d just received orders to march off a cliff.

  twenty-five

  “What’s that phone?” Fehring asked. “I thought Dev took the phone Powers gave you.”

  “He did,” I said quickly. “That’s Greg’s phone.”

  “Yeah. It’s my parents,” he lied. “I need to take it.”

  “I’ll let you two go, then,” Fehring said, “but stay close to both of your phones.” She hung up.

  Mom’s phone rang again, and Greg and I continued to stare at each other, afraid to answer and at the same time afraid not to. Worry for Mom won out, and I grabbed the phone and hit the answer button.

  “I see you found the note,” said a woman on the other end of the line.

  “Yes,” I stammered. “We found it.” Greg grabbed the phone from me and put it on speaker.

  “Who’s we?” the voice asked. I didn’t recognize it at all but continued to push my memory through its paces.

  “My…my…,” I said, struggling to get the words out.

  “It’s Greg Stevens, Odelia’s husband,” Greg said in the phone. “We found the note and Grace’s phone. Please don’t hurt Grace.”

  “Wow,” said the woman, “a son-in-law worried about his mother-in-law. That’s unusual.” She laughed, but it wasn’t a fun laugh. It was sharp as a knife and edged with cruelty. “Grace will be fine if you follow instructions.”