Dead Wrong

by Janice Kay Johnson

  "They had this bullshit reason for firing me." Remembered anger roughened his voice. "That's when I got drunk and stole a car from the shop. I wrecked it on purpose. Yeah, I know. I was a goddamn genius."

  Yeah, he'd shoplifted, too, when he first got to Elk Springs. "I was hungry," he said with a shrug. And, sure, he'd beaten the crap out of this guy who'd insulted Ricardo's girlfriend in a bar one night. "I had a temper."

  After plea bargaining, he'd done six months for the auto theft. "Detective Patton actually put in a word for me. She helped me get a job when I got out. Otherwise I probably wouldn't have stayed in Elk Springs." His laugh was harsh. "Big favor, huh? God, I wish she hadn't done me any favor."

  No, his girlfriend hadn't stuck by him. He didn't have a girlfriend after he got out of the joint.

  He'd worked the day Gillian Pappas was murdered. It wasn't as good a job as his last one, it didn't take any skill, all he was doing was changing oil in one of those quickie places where people sat in their cars while guys with oil embedded under their fingernails worked in the pit, but it was okay.

  "I mean, I figured, six months, a year." He shrugged. "I could show what a good employee I was. Then maybe a car dealer would hire me. Detective Patton…" His face closed.

  "Detective Patton?"

  "She knew someone at the Subaru dealership. She said she'd talk to him."

  No wonder the lieutenant had wanted Trina to come alone. She'd had more history with Mendoza than she'd admitted. It sounded as if he'd been some kind of project of hers. Cops sometimes got involved this way, when they thought someone had gotten a raw deal or maybe just believed they saw a spark in someone who'd made bad choices. They thought if they fanned a little, the spark would burst into a warm, crackling fire. Sometimes it even worked. People did get raw deals. Kids with crappy backgrounds could turn around because someone said, "I see promise in you. I know you can do better."

  But Ricky Mendoza hadn't turned his life around, according to a jury of his peers. Instead, he'd brutally raped and murdered Gillian Pappas. Trina didn't like imagining what the lieutenant had felt, knowing that without her intervention Mendoza would probably still have been in prison.

  "After you got off work that day, what did you do?" Trina asked.

  "I went home and had dinner, then decided to go have a couple beers at this bar. Maybe shoot some pool." He was silent for a moment, looking at Trina but seeming no longer to see her. "I stayed a couple hours. I was about to go when I saw this girl come in."

  "Did you approach her?"

  "Not at first. I figured she was meeting someone. But I kept an eye on her. She ordered a drink, then another one real fast. A couple guys hit on her, but she handled them. I went to take a leak, and when I came back this guy was giving her a hard time. I gave him a shove and told him to back off. I guess she was grateful, because she asked my name."

  "Did she tell you hers?"

  "Yeah, Gilly. Gilly Pappas."

  He described how they talked. She had another drink, and he persuaded her to eat some chicken wings because he could see she was getting plastered.

  "All of a sudden she stood up and said, 'You wanna screw?'"

  "Did anyone else hear her?"

  "I don't think so. I guess people did see us leaving together. Nobody seemed to be paying any attention, but turns out I was wrong."

  "What did you say?"

  "I asked if she was getting back at someone. She grabbed my shirt and said, 'Do you care?'"

  "Did you?"

  For the first time, he looked angry. "Shit, yeah, I cared! She was…she was classy. Okay? I knew that, but we really talked, and I thought…" He jerked his shoulders. "Well, I quit thinking. I'd have rather it wasn't revenge sex. You know? But it had been a while, and she was real pretty. So I said, 'No.'"

  "You lied."

  "Yeah, I lied. So sue me." He guffawed. "No, convict me of murder. Worked even better, didn't it?"

  "Please tell me what happened next."

  Lightning-quick, he reverted to anger. "What do you think happened? She came out to my car, told me to drive back to the alley and park. Then she unzipped my pants, lifted her skirt and bit my neck. She didn't want to come back to my place, and she didn't want pretty. Afterward, I thought she'd wanted to get it over with as fast as possible. It was like something she had to do."

  "Did you have a condom?"

  "No, and she didn't ask me to put one on. I figured she was on the pill or something. Or maybe too drunk to care. I don't know. I wish I'd worn a condom."

  Trina bet he did.

  "Did you talk at all after?"

  "No. She got real quiet. Scrambled into her panties and adjusted her clothes like she felt dirty. She started to get out and I told her I'd drive her back to her car. She shook her head and just took off. Walking so fast she was almost running. I drove around the block and saw her come around the side of the bar. She was crying. I felt like shit." He fell silent.

  "Did you see her get into her car?"

  He shook his head. "It was one-thirty, two o'clock. The place was still busy. The parking lot's not that well-lit. She kind of disappeared behind a pickup."

  "What did you do then?"

  "I drove home. Got up, went to work in the morning. We listened to the radio in the shop. Late afternoon, I hear about this woman's body that was found. I didn't think anything about it. That night, I see her face on TV. That's when I started to feel scared."

  "Did you consider going to the police and telling them that you thought you were the last person to see her alive?"

  "Sure," he jeered. "Yeah. I screwed this girl without a condom, she bit my neck and drew blood, her fingerprints are all over my car, and anybody is going to believe I didn't kill her? Well, here's a news flash." He looked around as if in exaggerated surprise at their surroundings. "Nobody did believe me."

  She wanted to argue that it might have been different if he'd come forward on his own. But she wasn't so sure. It had looked bad. His semen, her fingerprints in his car, the wound on his neck and scratches on his shoulder. His skin under her fingernails. The cops had had Gillian Pappas's boyfriend saying, "She would never have had sex with a strange man she picked up in a bar." And then they'd had Ricky Mendoza, a seeming loser with a record that included violence because of his temper. How could they call it any different?

  "Did you have friends, family, to give you character references?"

  She saw a flash of pain on his face.

  "My parents. They came a couple of times. But they don't speak such good English. They kept saying, 'You wouldn't kill no girl, would you? We raised you to respect girls.'"

  "You must have other family."

  "Because we're Catholic? You think I must have ten brothers and sisters? Well, I don't. Just a sister. She's ten years older than I am. Back then, she was already married and had kids. Her husband had cancer. I think he got it from using so many pesticides in the fields. You know? But he was an illegal, so who cares? He died, and she had enough to do, raising three kids."

  "You never heard from her?"

  "She called once and said, 'I'm sorry, what happened to you, Ricky. I know you wouldn't hurt some woman like that.'" He shrugged, as if it didn't matter. "She sends me a Christmas present. And she writes sometimes."

  "How old are her children?" Trina asked softly.

  "Her oldest is eleven, her youngest is six. Ricardo. They named him after me." He sounded both proud and defiant, as if to say, Somebody thinks I'm worth naming a son after.

  "Do you have other family? Cousins?"

  His mood shifted. His eyes narrowed. "Why do you care?"

  "I'll explain, I promise."

  In a hard voice, Ricky Mendoza said, "I have cousins back in Mexico. Not here."

  "Friends?"

  "Nobody who stuck around once I was arrested."

  Mildly shocked, she asked, "So people who knew you thought you might have done it?"

  "I don't know if they thought that, or just didn't
want anything to do with the cops. They were, like, people I had drinks with. My best buddy, he got knifed in prison. He ran this chop shop, see. Three months inside, and he was dead." Another shrug, more feigned indifference.

  "Let me ask you this, Mr. Mendoza." Trina leaned forward. "Can you think of anyone who cares enough about you to try to get you out of here?"

  He was either a heck of an actor, or he was stunned. "Get me out of here? You mean, like someone's planning a break?"

  "No," Trina said. "Not a break. Someone murdered another woman and displayed her body in exactly the same way Gillian Pappas's was displayed. The crime is almost a perfect copycat."

  "You think…" He swallowed. "You think someone did that so it would look like I couldn't have murdered Gilly. So you'd get a pardon for me because I must not have done it."

  "We think it's a possibility that's the motive. Yes."

  "Nobody would do that for me." He actually shuddered. "You think somebody would do something like that just to help out a friend?"

  "We do think it's a possibility," she repeated.

  "Yeah, well, the only people who care about me are my family, and they're not murderers!" He flattened his hands on the table and half rose. "You're not going to be trying to haul them in, are you?"

  She didn't move and kept her voice nonthreatening. "We might look into their whereabouts. That's all."

  "They live in Union Gap. They wouldn't be down here. It's winter. There's nothing to pick."

  "If we can verify that, they'll be out of the picture."

  His angry stare clashed with her steady one. Finally he dipped his head abruptly and sank back into the chair. After a moment, he asked, "This girl. The one that was killed. Did she look like Gilly?"

  "Yes. Quite a lot like her."

  "What was her name?"

  "Amy Owen. She grew up in Elk Springs." She paused a beat. "Did you know her?"

  "Why would I know her? I told you. Girls like Gilly. They didn't pay attention to someone like me." His bitterness could have etched metal. "Not unless they wanted to piss someone off."

  She wondered if that was true. Ricky Mendoza had been a handsome young man. Possibly a little wicked looking. But if his story was true, he was essentially decent. He'd made the effort to follow Gillian Pappas to her car, to ensure she was safe. He must have seemed a godsend to her, a nice enough guy she could imagine having sex with him, but also rough enough around the edges to make him different from Will Patton. Someone whose identity she could fling at Will, use to hurt him.

  What she had never dreamed was that the one who would end up hurt was Ricky Mendoza.

  Because she ended up dead.

  "Did it ever occur to you," Ricky asked now, "that maybe I didn't kill Gilly? That maybe the guy who did is still out there? That this Amy's murder wasn't a copy? It was the real thing?"

  "You were convicted of Gillian Pappas's murder." She hesitated, debated, then said very carefully, "However, that possibility is also one we have to consider." She clicked off the recorder and rose to her feet. "Mr. Mendoza, thank you for your cooperation."

  Looking as though she'd elbowed him in the gut, he sat gaping at her.

  She nodded and walked out, passing the guard on his way in.

  * * *

  A WEEK AGO, his mother had asked him to Sunday-night dinner. Nice to have her seem disconcerted to have him show up.

  "Will!"

  "Do I have the wrong night?"

  "No! No, of course not. Come in. I've just been crazy with this murder…." Her voice trailed off and she let him in. "Sorry."

  "At least you're having dinner at home tonight." He knew from experience that she might eat fast food for a week straight when she was pursuing a fresh case.

  She laughed. "Scott's amazed. He's actually the one cooking tonight."

  "Come to a dead end?"

  His mother hesitated. "Maybe. No one close to Amy looks like a viable possibility."

  Following her toward the kitchen, he said, "That's because Amy is such an unlikely victim. I mean, I know beautiful women who enjoy enraging men. Amy isn't—wasn't—like that."

  "So everyone keeps repeating. Why Amy? they ask." She sounded frustrated. "I have to say, 'I don't know.' If we knew why she was chosen, we'd be halfway to making an arrest."

  "You working with someone in the D.A.'s office?"

  "I talked to Louis Fein. Since I don't even have a suspect, we didn't have much to say."

  Her husband, Scott McNeil, was stirring something on the stove. A big, athletic man with auburn hair graying a little at the temples, he grinned. "Hey, Will."

  "Scott." He glanced around. "Are Emily and Evan here?"

  "Evan's playing Nintendo. Emily is on the phone. She's always on the phone. She's been on the phone or the computer since the day she turned twelve. She only goes to school because her friends are there."

  "Hey, maybe I'll go whip Evan's ass."

  Scott muttered, "I wouldn't count on it."

  Meg laughed. "Do you hear the note of wounded ego? Dad got badly beaten last night."

  "You know, it's not skill." Will shook his head. "You shouldn't feel bad. It's age. You can't help it. Those reflexes start to go…"

  His stepfather punched his shoulder. Laughing, Will stepped back.

  This felt good, as if he really belonged here. He hadn't felt as comfortable in a long while. Even his mother looked relaxed as she handed him a glass of wine.

  "So, you start work tomorrow?"

  "I get assigned a desk, anyway."

  "You'll probably be in court by afternoon. They've really been hustling to get briefs filed on time. Hamilton left six weeks ago, you know."

  He frowned. "I should have started last week. They kept insisting I should find a place to live, get settled, no hurry. So they were bullshitting me, huh?"

  "I suspect so."

  "Damn it!"

  She patted his arm. "Don't worry. They've managed." She cocked her head and he realized the doorbell had rung. His mother set down her wine. "I'll get it."

  Will watched her go. She'd had a peculiar expression on her face. Not surprise. Guilt, maybe. Had she invited someone tonight she thought he wouldn't be happy to see?

  Scott was peering in the oven and seemed oblivious.

  "Someone else coming to dinner?" Will asked casually.

  "Hmm?" Appearing satisfied, his stepfather closed the oven door. "Not that I know of. Maybe Abby or Renee dropped by."

  If so, his mother wasn't bringing her into the kitchen. The sound of voices had moved away, toward the living room or den. Curious, Will took his glass of wine and followed.

  His mother hadn't shut the door to the den. Over her shoulder he saw that the visitor was her partner, Trina Giallombardo. She was dressed as if she'd been working, in slacks, a white shirt and blazer, her badge anchored on her belt.

  "It was snowing part of the way, but I had no problem," she was saying, as he approached unheard.

  Meg murmured something.

  "You were right. He wanted to talk."

  He? Will stopped, tempted to eavesdrop. But he was an adult and a prosecutor, for God's sake, not a teenager who lurked outside doors to hear what his mother was up to. He cleared his throat and took another step into the doorway.

  His mother gave him a swift look, alarm—no, damn it, guilt!—apparent to an experienced eye. He was willing to bet she'd forgotten he would be here this evening, or she wouldn't have asked her partner to stop by.

  "Will! Um…you remember Detective Giallombardo."

  "Trina."

  She nodded, unsmiling. Did she not like him? He remembered what Travis had said about enemies, and for the first time in his life wondered if he'd carelessly created dozens of them back when he was young and sure the world would lay a red carpet for him. Maybe he should ask Trina Giallombardo: had he been a jackass back in high school?

  "I assume this is work. I'll leave you two," he said, starting to step back.

  As if she'd ar
rived at a decision, his mother said, "There's no reason you can't hear what Detective Giallombardo has to say." She fixed a stern gaze on him. "As long as you don't interrupt."

  "If you'd rather…"

  "No. I'd have to tell you what she learned later, anyway."

  "All right." Apprehensive without knowing why, he leaned against the wall.

  "Please, sit," his mother said to Trina. "You look tired."

  She did, he saw, but not as if she was ready to wind down. She was twitchy from caffeine or adrenaline, he wasn't sure which.

  "I'm fine," she said, sounding impatient, focusing on his mother. Nonetheless, she settled on the edge of one of the leather chairs in front of the desk.

  Meg took the other, then looked at Will. "Trina talked to Ricky Mendoza today."

  Will stiffened but kept his mouth shut. He'd known this was inevitable. The surprise was that she hadn't gone to see Mendoza herself, instead deputizing someone else. Did she have the sense to know that she was too soft where he was concerned?

  When she realized he wasn't going to throw a temper tantrum, she turned back to the young detective. "You said he was cooperative?"

  "He kept saying he didn't have anything better to do than talk to me."

  "Which is true enough." His mother gave a brisk nod. "Tell me how you handled it."

  "I promised I'd explain at the end, but I wanted to hear his side of the story first. He agreed."

  "You taped the interview?"

  She nodded and reached into a bag at her feet, producing a recorder. His mother plugged it into an outlet, then hit Play.

  Trina Giallombardo's voice was startlingly clear. "I'm asking for your consent for me to tape this interview."

  "Yeah, you can tape." The man sounded indifferent.

  Rage gripped Will at the sound of that voice. He'd heard it only once, the day Ricardo Mendoza testified in court. Will wouldn't have sworn he would even recognize it. He was shocked at his visceral reaction. Oh, yeah, he knew the voice.

  On the tape, Trina asked, "When did you move to Elk Springs?"

  Mendoza talked about his family, migrant workers. He told of getting fired from the auto body shop in Elk Springs and his drunken decision to steal a car and wreck it on purpose. Then he backtracked, admitting to having beaten someone up for coming on to his woman and to having shoplifted.