Sudden Guilt (A Nick Teffinger Thriller / Read in Any Order)

by R. J. Jagger

  “Which he’ll then share with you?”

  Ta’Veya nodded.

  “It’s called pillow talk.”

  Paige swallowed.

  “You need to be careful,” Paige said. “You need to be sure you don’t give us away.”

  Ta’Veya hugged her.

  “I won’t. I have a lot more to lose than you do, remember.”

  FROM THE BUS STATION, Paige headed straight to the University of Denver College of Law and parked her body in a worn leather chair in the Law Review room.

  She got invited to join the Law Review—the law school’s journal that published articles on legal topics—by ranking in the top 10 percent of her class after the first year of school. During her second year—last year—she served as an Associate Editor, primarily responsible for minor text editing and for ensuring that all citations and references were in compliance with the Harvard Citator.

  At the end of the second year she got elected to be the Articles Editor, meaning that this year she was responsible for choosing the articles that would be published.

  Quite the challenge.

  Law school professors around the country were dancing to the publish-or-perish beat and scrambling to get their articles inked in any law review journal that would have them. Meaning she received daily knocks on the door in the form of letters, phone messages and emails.

  Every knock needed to be answered.

  Most knockers needed to be turned away.

  Some of them didn’t take too kindly to it.

  Who was she to say no to them?

  Wasn’t she smart enough to recognize their brilliance? And how their stuff was so much better than all the other crap being published?

  Noise.

  Noise.

  Noise.

  Still, today she welcomed it. It was familiar and normal. It was sand to stick her head in and make the rest of the world disappear.

  The secret to being a good law student is to not waste an hour of time. The secret to being a good law student who also worked on the Law Review is to not waste a minute of time. She’d wasted plenty of both this week which only amped-up the stress.

  She kept her nose to the grindstone to recapture lost ground, getting up only to get and get rid of coffee, as the buzz and hustle inside the room steadily increased.

  Someone brought in a box of Krispy Kremes.

  She kept them in her peripheral vision for ten minutes and then grabbed the last one before someone else did.

  SHE NOTICED A COPY of the Rocky Mountain News sitting on the desk next to the coffee pot. The front page had a small teaser about a woman who had been found dead last night.

  Paige turned to the article.

  Apparently the body of a young woman had been discovered last night near the railroad tracks next to Santa Fe, close to Evans. Police were in the process of identifying the victim. The article had a picture of a body covered by a sheet.

  The victim’s foot stuck out.

  The ankle of that foot had a tattoo.

  A tattoo that Paige recognized.

  She dropped the paper as she pulled up a mental picture of Marilyn Poppenberg, a third-year law student who parked on the same street as Paige.

  AT THAT MOMENT HER CELL PHONE RANG. She almost didn’t answer but did. A man’s electronically scrambled voice came through.

  Him.

  “I underestimated you,” he said. “I didn’t take you for the kind to bring a gun. Be sure that never happens again. I already warned you once not to screw with me.”

  “I’m out,” she said.

  “There is no out. What you need to do is be real sure that you and your new friend Ta’Veya White don’t do anything stupid. Don’t underestimate me.”

  Then the line went dead.

  Chapter Twelve

  Day Three—May 7

  Wednesday Morning

  ______________

  TEFFINGER WOKE TO THE RINGING of his cell phone. Light crept into the room around the edges of the blinds meaning the day had started without him. He looked at the clock and couldn’t believe the time. Then he remembered shivering down at the railroad tracks until two in the morning. He flipped open the cell as he headed for the bathroom.

  The voice of Dr. Leigh Sandt, the FBI profiler, came through. He pulled up an image of a classy woman, about fifty, with shapely StairMaster legs.

  “Let me put you on hold for ten seconds,” he said. “Otherwise you’re going to hear something you’d rather not.” He muted the phone, pissed like a madman and brought her back up.

  “I’m heading to Denver this afternoon,” she said. “So be warned.”

  That was good.

  He left her a message yesterday to see if she’d tap her resources and find out if there had been any other reported cases around the country involving women chained with black collars. He also emailed her photos of the collar.

  Now she was headed to Denver.

  And sounded excited.

  “I’ve been hunting this guy for years,” she said.

  “You have?”

  She had.

  “I’ve been dead in the water for the last six months, waiting for fresh blood,” she added. “I never pictured getting it in Denver.”

  Teffinger pumped her for details.

  Then he shaved in the shower, popped in his contacts and hopped in the Tundra. He wound out of South DeFrame Way to the 6th Avenue freeway and headed east, steering with his knees while he ate cereal.

  Duran Duran’s “Rio” came from the radio, one of his favorite songs.

  He hardly paid attention to it.

  AT HEADQUARTERS HE HEADED STRAIGHT for the coffee.

  Sydney walked over, looked at her watch and then at him.

  “Late night,” he said. “Leigh Sandt is flying into Denver this afternoon. It turns out that our collar friend’s been on her radar screen for some time. Unfortunately, I think she’s excited about finding someone who actually survived. I didn’t have the heart to tell her about the body last night.”

  “What body?”

  He told her about the woman at the railroad tracks with a screwdriver in her ear.

  “Two bodies in one day,” she said. “I’m impressed. You earned your keep yesterday.”

  He grunted.

  “So you think she’s the woman who was in the collar? That’s your theory?”

  He shrugged. “That’s my guess, based on the timing. Plus they both have connections to trains. We need to check her DNA against what we found at the boxcar and see if there’s a match. Can you run with that? Do you have time?”

  She made a sour face.

  “No.”

  He hugged her on the shoulders and said, “Expedite it, please and thank you. If anyone gives you any pushback let me know.”

  She laughed.

  “What?” he asked.

  “Teffinger, no one’s scared of you, in case you don’t know.”

  HE CHECKED THE MISSING PERSON REPORTS and found a possible match to the woman they found last night, based on age, weight and hair color—namely one Marilyn Poppenberg, a D.U. law student. Poppenberg reportedly had a tattoo on her right ankle, some sort of Asian design that meant blessed.

  Teffinger pulled out the yellow pages, called a tattoo shop, explained the situation and asked if they’d fax over whatever designs they had that matched that description.

  Five minutes later the fax gurgled a picture of the exact tattoo on the dead woman’s ankle.

  Bingo.

  A match.

  He’d verify it later with dental records but had no doubts.

  The dead woman was Marilyn Poppenberg.

  Then he realized that he’d been working for over a half hour with only one cup of coffee in the gut.

  He headed over to the pot.

  It was time to correct that little oversight, right this second.

  DENVER HAD GOTTEN SOME RAINY MAYS BEFORE, but nothing like this. Clouds were already moving in from the mountains, even this ear
ly in the morning, meaning another thunderstorm this afternoon.

  Guaranteed.

  Teffinger didn’t mind the rain.

  But he didn’t mind the sun either.

  He drove east on 6th Avenue with “Surfer Girl” coming from the radio. That was the same song that had been playing at the eighth grade school prom when he slow-danced with Mary Winters and rubbed an erection on her stomach.

  Wondering if she noticed.

  She did.

  But she still grabbed his hand and dragged him to the floor every time a slow song came on.

  Two weeks later they made love down by the river on a Saturday night.

  His first.

  Her second.

  He crossed Colorado Boulevard and sipped coffee as stately mansions on oversized lots slipped by, owned by people who definitely didn’t work as detectives.

  Ten minutes later he arrived at the University of Denver.

  He got twisted around with all the one-way streets and maniac drivers, but finally spotted the car he was looking for, a 1985 Camero, parked three blocks north of campus.

  It had two tickets under the wiper blade.

  He found a place for the Tundra a block away and then doubled back on foot with a disposable cup of coffee in hand. A peek through the driver’s window of the Camero showed nothing of interest, so he sat down on the curb to wait.

  Ten minutes later a young woman walked up.

  She wore a long-sleeve green cotton shirt that hung over faded jeans. Long thick red hair cascaded down around pale skin and freckles. He liked her immediately and for some strange reason pictured her in a juice commercial. She muscled out of a backpack, lowered it to the ground and extended her hand.

  “You’re Detective Teffinger, right?”

  He nodded.

  “Which means you’re Samantha Oakenfold.”

  She smiled. “Just Sam.”

  She was the woman who filed the missing person report on Marilyn Poppenberg, who they found down by the tracks last night.

  “Thanks for coming, Just Sam.”

  She laughed and said, “Whatever I can do to help find Marilyn. She still hasn’t shown up for classes.”

  Teffinger frowned.

  She must have read the expression on his face because her forehead tightened. “What?”

  He reached out and held her hand. “I think we already found her.”

  Then he explained.

  And showed her a picture.

  “That’s her,” she confirmed.

  “I need to ask you some questions,” he said. “You want to go somewhere?”

  She nodded.

  And he picked up her backpack.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Day Three—May 7

  Wednesday Afternoon

  ______________

  TARZAN DROVE DOWN BROADWAY past the “Buy Here Pay Here” car dealerships, antique stores and greasy spoons. A half hour later he spotted a ragged Jeep Wrangler with a For Sale sign sitting in an RTD Park-N-Ride. It was an older model with square headlights. The plastic windows in the soft top were brittle and yellow. The springs showed rust.

  He called the number on the sign and talked to a man named Dick Zipp—no joke—who swore up and down that the vehicle was mechanically sound and well maintained. He only wanted two thousand for it, which was a “screaming-banshee steal for whoever gets lucky enough to buy it.”

  “Can you leave the plates on it until I get my own?”

  “Keep ’em,” Zipp said. “I don’t have any use for ’em.”

  “Do you have the title?”

  He did.

  Trane explained that he wanted the car but was pressed for time and couldn’t turn it into a multi-trip project. “Here’s what I can do,” he said. “I’ll put two thousand cash right now under the carpet by the back seat. You pick it up and then leave the title and registration in the same place. Will that work?”

  “Sure, as long as the cash is really there, like you say.”

  “It’ll be there,” Trane said. “Go ahead and sign the title but leave everything else blank. I’ll fill it all in later so you don’t have to bother.”

  “I’ll be down around five,” Zipp said. “Where do you want me to leave the keys?”

  “Same place as the title.”

  “Okay,” Zipp said. “Just be sure no one sees the money. If it disappears between now and five that’s your problem, not mine.”

  “The money will be there.”

  “In that case treat it good. That little fellow and me have been through a lot.”

  TARZAN RETURNED LATER BY CAB AND WATCHED as Zipp exchanged the papers for the money. The man, unbelievably, had a solid build and stood about six-one, just two inches shorter than Trane. He had black rimmed glasses, shaggy brown hair, and clothes befitting the jeep—namely ragged jeans, a flannel shirt and dirty tennis shoes.

  After Zipp kissed the vehicle’s mirror and disappeared down the road on foot, Trane went over to see if the piece of crap ran. It fired right up and actually handled pretty good.

  Perfect.

  For two thousand dollars Trane got himself a pretty good vehicle and, by incredible blind luck an identity.

  Dick Zipp.

  He couldn’t believe the name.

  The guy’s parents must have been nuts.

  “Hey, Mrs. Zipp, what should we call our new baby?”

  “I don’t know, Mr. Zipp. How about Richard?”

  “Yeah. I’ve always liked that name.”

  “It has a classy ring to it.”

  Yeah, right.

  Real classy.

  Dick Zipp

  ON THE WAY HOME Trane picked up a cheap shaggy-brown wig, a pair of black rimmed glasses, two pairs of cheap jeans and two flannel shirts—paying cash. Back at the loft he clipped the wig until it was the right length and popped the lenses out of the glasses.

  Outside he rubbed the jeans and shirts on the asphalt until they got greasy and dirty, then washed them and smiled when the stains stayed.

  A few well placed rips made them look ten years old.

  Yeah, baby.

  Perfect.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Day Three—May 7

  Wednesday Afternoon

  ______________

  PAIGE KNEW IN HER HEART that Marilyn Poppenberg’s death was somehow connected to the man behind the scrambled voice. It was too much of a coincidence that Poppenberg got killed and Paige got chosen at almost exactly the same point in time. She and Poppenberg parked on the same street and often walked together.

  Maybe he picked one of them, then saw the other one and picked her too. Maybe Poppenberg had been the chosen one but refused to cooperate, so the guy killed her.

  Suddenly Paige’s cell phone rang.

  The incoming number had a private number.

  When she answered, Ta’Veya’s voice came through.

  “I’m pulling out of the driveway right now,” Ta’Veya said. “I should be there in six hours, give or take.”

  Paige told her about Marilyn Poppenberg, the fact that Teffinger was involved in the investigation according to the newspaper, and her theory that the woman’s death was somehow connected to the man they were looking for.

  Ta’Veya agreed a hundred percent.

  But she also had a concern.

  “Teffinger will be showing up at the school to talk to people,” she said. “Be real sure he doesn’t see you or hear your name, because if you get on his radar screen a second time he’s going to want to know why.”

  Paige agreed.

  “Get up here and keep an eye on him,” she said.

  “I’m on my way.”

  THE NEWS OF POPPENBERG’S DEATH spread quickly through the law school. It turned out that she’d been bound with blue rope. And the death wasn’t just an ordinary death; it was a murder. And not just an ordinary murder, either; some sicko had pounded a screwdriver through her eardrum into her brain.

  Everyone had questions.

&
nbsp; A boyfriend?

  A stranger?

  Wrong place, wrong time?

  Revenge?

  Jealousy?

  Drugs?

  The first of a series?

  To Paige, Poppenberg had always been too wild to be a friend but had grown to be a fairly strong acquaintance. Paige had seen her around during the first year of school, with her outlandish fashion and wild hair, and wondered about her from a distance. But they never spoke and didn’t have any classes together.

  Then last year they ended up in the same Evidence class.

  They talked occasionally and walked to their cars together if they both happened to be heading that way at the same time. On one of those occasions, Poppenberg had a flat and had no idea what to do so Paige changed it for her.

  Poppenberg gave her a joint for her trouble.

  Paige said, “Thanks,” then flushed it the first chance she got.

  In spite of her wild streak, Poppenberg had a good sense of justice. In Evidence they learned about the exclusionary rule. It was a principle holding that evidence obtained by the police in violation of a person’s Constitutional rights couldn’t be introduced at trial, but instead got excluded, hence the name. The theory was that if the police couldn’t benefit in court from trampling on the Constitutional privileges of people, then they’d be less inclined to trample in the first place.

  Poppenberg hadn’t disagreed with the rule.

  But she did take issue with the fact that after guilty people escaped justice the police didn’t keep an eye on them.

  Especially murderers.

  She even told Paige once, “I have half a mind to do it myself.”

  “What do you mean, monitor them or something?”