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Blessed be the Wicked

Page 12

by D. A. Bartley


  Abbie took a chair across from Flynn and next to her dad.

  “As I was saying, the idea of the preexistence…”

  Abbie concentrated on the result of her brother’s grilling genius, letting her dad’s words blend into white noise. She just didn’t have the energy for a serious academic discussion. Flynn was making all the polite sounds of following along, but it was clear this religious conversation was no more interesting to him than it was to Abbie. The other man, however, was enthralled. He kept asking questions and Professor Taylor kept answering them.

  Finally, John made it over. The moment he sat down, the entire table lightened up.

  “Done! The grill is officially closed. If any of those teenage boys are still hungry, they’ll have to eat cupcakes.” John winked at his sister.

  The wife of the man who was eating up every word that dropped from Professor’s Taylor’s lips came over to inform her husband that one of their daughters had an early morning dance-team practice, so they needed to get everyone home. The man seemed loathe to leave, but said his good-byes as instructed. The moment provided John and Flynn an excuse to disappear, too.

  “So, I’m told this case of yours has turned out to be a homicide.” Abbie’s dad had barely touched his burger. He had nibbled at a few potato chips and drunk most of what looked like lemon-lime soda in his clear plastic cup.

  “You’ve been correctly informed,” Abbie said.

  “No leads though?” Abbie’s dad asked. Abbie couldn’t help but wonder if she heard a hint of relief in his usually stern tone.

  “No. I can’t really discuss this. You know that,” Abbie said.

  “Yes, yes, of course. I just wondered if you’d found any links to the Church, you know. No tenuous connection to Church business interests or anything…”

  Abbie waited for her dad to finish his thought. He didn’t. It was, for Professor Taylor, a rather clumsy attempt to fish for information. Abbie wondered if he’d realized he’d tipped his hand by mentioning a business connection. Was Bowen’s investment that important? Or was keeping Bowen’s connection to Smith’s business from becoming public that important?

  Apparently, from across the yard, Abbie’s conversation with her dad looked friendly enough. John kept glancing her way, trying not to look as if he was keeping an eye on them. She wondered how long he was going to leave them there sitting under the tree. The sky was turning lavender with streaks of pink. Abbie had Smith’s funeral in the morning and it would take well over an hour to make it home.

  “Dad, it’s been good to see you,” Abbie said finally. She had given up on John coming back to check on them and rescue her.

  “You, too,” her dad said.

  Abbie wasn’t sure that she meant the statement any more than he did. They had been civil, though, and that was a start.

  “I’ve got an early morning, so I need to get going.” Abbie bent down to give her father a rather awkward hug. She walked across the yard. The other families had successfully harangued kids into SUVs. Both boxes of the cupcakes were empty. Flynn was standing alone with John. They were laughing about something. Abbie walked over to say good-bye to her sister-in-law, who was busily tossing paper plates and plastic cups into an oversized black garbage bag. “Thanks so much.” Abbie tossed some napkins and a few plastic cups into the bag. Her sister-in-law set the bag down and gave Abbie a hug.

  “You know how much you mean to us. We’re always here for you. I’m always here for you.” Her sister-in-law stressed the word “I,” then continued, “That husband of mine can be a pain. I’m just a phone call away.”

  Abbie knew her sister-in-law meant every word. The two of them had always gotten along. She knew her other sisters weren’t so keen on John’s wife. That might have had something to do with why she and Abbie got along so well.

  “Thanks,” Abbie said. “I know.”

  “You leaving?” John and Flynn had come over, hands full of the remaining detritus from the dinner. They each deposited their collection into the trash bag. John gave his little sister a big bear hug.

  Abbie stood facing Flynn. The sky was dark now and the backyard was completely abandoned. The light from the kitchen spilled onto the patio. Abbie could hear the pleasant banter of a happily married couple inside as they finished with the cleanup. Her dad must have gone inside as well.

  Flynn hugged Abbie. “Let’s see each other again soon.” Abbie hugged him back. She didn’t look on purpose, but she couldn’t help but notice he wasn’t wearing a wedding band. She made her way to her Rover, which was now parked alone in front of the house. As she climbed into her old car, she felt the flutter of butterflies in her stomach. She pulled away from the curb and started the drive home.

  You know, it’s getting to be time. Abbie heard Phillip’s words whisper in her ear. She wasn’t sure how she felt about that.

  EIGHTEEN

  Organ music floated from the chapel into the lobby. Abbie had expected to have some kind of emotional response when she arrived at Smith’s funeral. The last funeral she’d been to had been Phillip’s, and before that it had been her mom’s. Still, despite her best efforts to prepare, she felt a despair that nearly suffocated her when she walked into the church. The viewing had started about an hour ago and was ending now. The mortician had done a masterful job. The gash in Steve Smith’s neck was completely hidden beneath his white button-down shirt and tie. Endowed members of the Church were buried in their temple clothes, so Melinda Smith had had to find a second white suit for her husband. The white clothes Steve had been wearing when his body was discovered were still in the police evidence closet. Abbie doubted they’d be able to get the bloodstains out anyway, even if the suit was mostly made of a polyester blend.

  People began taking their seats in the chapel. Abbie took the program a young man handed her and then sat next to Clarke at the back of the chapel. While friends were shuffling into the chapel, the family was ensconced in a private room with the casket for the last viewing of the body. Bishop Norton would be making some soothing comments to them about salvation. Then a family member would give the family prayer before they joined the rest of the people gathered in the chapel.

  The men were dressed in suits and ties. The women wore either blouses and knee-length skirts or loose-flowing dresses, mostly in floral prints of all sizes and colors. Abbie knew the lack of dark colors could strike non-Mormons as strange, but LDS funerals were not focused on grief because death was just part of the eternal plan of salvation.

  Abbie glanced at the program. Exactly on cue, at the scheduled start time, Bishop Norton stood at the podium.

  “Brothers and Sisters, on behalf of the Smith family, I welcome you all on this solemn occasion. I say solemn and not sad, because even though Brother Smith was called back to our Father in Heaven at a time few of us expected, we can all take comfort in knowing that his passing is part of our Heavenly Father’s plan. Steve and Melinda Smith were married in the temple, and they, like all of us, have the opportunity to live eternally with their family in the presence of our Heavenly Father as long as they follow the principles of His restored gospel.”

  Abbie had always found LDS funerals strange because they focused so much on Church doctrine and so little on the person who died. Bishop Norton said a few more words about God’s plan for salvation and resurrection. After that, Steve’s younger brother spoke, providing a résumé of the Church leadership positions Steve had held during his life. Then he made a point of mentioning how he never swore, always paid his tithing—even when it was difficult—and followed the Word of Wisdom. He proclaimed his brother to be a model of Christlike behavior. Abbie felt discomfort settle in her stomach. She knew the religion of her birth was not unique in its focus on perfection, but Abbie felt there was a shallowness in suggesting that the absence of sin made a person perfect. This kind of perfection—flawlessness—felt cold. Abbie believed spiritual teaching should help people become more compassionate of shared human shortcomings, not less forgiving
of them. Jesus probably swore from time to time; he got angry enough to turn over tables and he certainly drank wine. Abbie wondered if Christ himself—with his distinctly antimaterialistic ways, his motley crew of friends, and his long, straggly hair and a beard—would be considered Christlike in this crowd.

  “Amen.” Abbie was brought back from her daydreaming as everyone murmured their shared agreement at the end of the prayer.

  The family was getting ready to head to the cemetery. Others were milling around the lobby waiting to line up at the buffet tables in the multipurpose room next door, where the Relief Society was preparing the post-funeral luncheon. Abbie glanced around the lobby. She saw Melinda with a girl who looked as if she must be her oldest daughter, probably the girl Melinda had told them liked to drive her BMW convertible. They were standing with the Bishop. The attorney was talking to a beautiful blonde who looked familiar to Abbie, but she wasn’t sure why. She scanned the room for other familiar faces. The woman from the dry cleaner’s was there, but she didn’t see anyone else she knew.

  “Taylor!”

  Abbie turned around to see Clarke whispering as loudly as he could. She knew he was trying to be discrete. He was failing.

  “Is everything okay?” Abbie could see Clarke was agitated or excited or both, maybe.

  “I just got an email from a secretary who works at the airport. I think she’s the assistant to the head of security. She has transferred all the footage we need to a thumb drive. She asked if we wanted her to mail it to us or if we wanted to pick it up,” Clarke said.

  “You told her we’d pick it up,” The words came out of her mouth with more enthusiasm than she intended.

  “Of course!”

  “Let’s go,”

  They both knew that whatever information they got from the airport, it would move the case forward. If the Hummer had never been in short-term parking, Melinda Smith was going to have some explaining to do. If the Hummer had made it to the airport, how had it gotten there?

  Clarke was speeding, but Abbie didn’t mind. Before she knew it, they were walking into the office of airport security.

  “Hello,” Clarke said to a young man sitting behind a desk, “I’m Officer Jim Clarke. Mrs. Sullivan said she would leave an envelope for me.”

  “Oh, yeah.” The young man handed Clarke a padded manila envelope with “Officer Jim Clarke” neatly printed on it. “Here you go.”

  “Thank you!” Clarke exclaimed.

  The drive from the airport didn’t take any longer than the drive to the airport did, but somehow it seemed to last an eternity. Abbie couldn’t wait to see the footage. As soon as they got to the station, they both sprinted to Abbie’s office.

  She motioned for Clarke to sit down at her computer. He inserted the thumb drive. Clarke peeled off a Post-it with “Short-term parking” written in tiny letters on it. The time stamp said 12:01. It was dark, and until 4:30 there were only a few cars that came through. After 4:30, though, there was a pretty steady stream of cars and trucks. Abbie was standing behind Clarke as they both stared at the screen. It was extraordinarily boring … until it wasn’t.

  At 8:36 AM, there it was: the yellow Hummer. The camera was angled to give a pretty clear view of the plates; it was Smith’s license number, all right. The angle of the recording was not so great for identifying the driver, though.

  “Is there anything we can do?” Abbie asked. She knew the tech guys could sometimes perform miracles. Her eyes were blurry and her head hurt from staring at the screen so long.

  Clarke shook his head. “I don’t think so. The problem is the angle of the camera in the parking lot. No matter how much we clean up the picture—and I don’t think there’s much room for improvement—it’s not going to change the perspective. I’ll double-check that with IT though—the angle of the camera is what the angle of the camera is. I doubt we’re going to get anything clear enough to identify who was driving that Hummer.”

  “Okay, let’s just look at it again,” Abbie instructed.

  Clarke sighed. He was getting frustrated, too. “Dang it! I can’t even tell if it’s a man or a woman driving.” The driver was wearing a dark hoodie and was definitely smaller and shorter than Steve Smith.

  “You’re right. We’re not going to be able to tell who the driver is,” Abbie said, “but someone took the trouble to drive that yellow Hummer to the airport, and that someone knew when Smith was leaving for Costa Rica. Even if we can’t identify the driver, we know a lot more than we did yesterday.”

  NINETEEN

  Abbie had suggested they get something to eat after spending the better part of the day at Smith’s funeral and then staring at the computer screen. Getting away from the station would do both of them some good.

  The restaurant was dark, even though there was a wall of windows at the back. It was one of those Mexican barbecues where you pointed at the meat, vegetables, and sauces you wanted and the person behind the counter assembled your taco, burrito, or bowl. You took your food on a large orange tray along with pale-brown recycled paper napkins to an open table of your choice. The chairs matched the trays.

  Clarke got a Sprite, an oversized beef burrito, and two pork tacos. Abbie opted for two chicken tacos with extra-hot tomatillo salsa. She filled her pebbled red plastic cup with lemonade and a lot of ice.

  “Something’s been bothering me about what happened with the airport. I’m not sure it’s anything, but I think you should know.” Clarke had already finished off one of his tacos and was starting on the second. “I’ve never been involved in a murder investigation. You know that, but I have worked with security at the airport before. A few years ago, there was a big Ponzi scheme run by a bishop up in Huntsville. The guy ended up getting caught on the tarmac at the airport down in St. George. He was on his way to some non-extraditable place in Latin America. Anyway, that’s not the point I’m trying to make … the point I want to make is … I worked with security at the airport then. They’re efficient and quick. It took hours, not days, to get the footage we needed.”

  “I’m not sure I’m following,” Abbie said.

  “The secretary who called, well, she said something odd. She apologized that it had taken so long. She told me she hadn’t checked the logbook, but she saw my original request. She said it had been flagged and, even though she wasn’t usually the person who took care of this kind of thing, she was in early and had time to review all requests to make sure they were up to date.”

  “Okay…” Abbie took another bite of her taco.

  “Well, she’s the secretary for the head of security, the guy who was supposed to be traveling, the guy I was told was traveling. I was just making conversation, you know, being nice, and said something about it being hard to keep track of things for your boss when he’s out of the office. She said her boss wasn’t out of the office, that he never misses work and hasn’t traveled for over a year.”

  “Any chance you could’ve misunderstood?”

  “No,” Clarke said. “I’ve been on the phone with the people at the airport more times than I can count since Melinda Smith told us about that yellow Hummer. I started thinking I was being given the runaround, but I tried to give them the benefit of the doubt. I think the only reason we got the thumb drive is because some highly organized secretary took care of what she saw as a request that hadn’t been responded to. I think our request had been flagged because nobody was supposed to respond.”

  “That sounds conspiratorial,” Abbie said.

  “I know.” Clarke scraped the bottom of the paper bowl to get the last remnants of rice and beans. “I don’t like it. I don’t like it at all. And, you know what? If I hadn’t worked with airport security before, I might have been able to believe Henderson’s story about them being overworked and understaffed. They’re not. On top of that, there’s the clear lie about the boss traveling. There are just too many things to think it’s a coincidence.”

  “For a moment, let’s assume you’re right and what happened
was not simply the result of extraordinary incompetence or an office so understaffed that it takes months to do what should take days. Who would have an interest in us not seeing the security footage? Who would have the ability to keep us from it?”

  “I have some ideas,” Clarke said. “I don’t like any of them.”

  Abbie sipped her lemonade. “What are you thinking?”

  “We have to figure out what’s going on in Costa Rica. It looks like Steve was stealing money from investors. Then there are all the people he already owed money to before the Celestial Times Shares project. If we think of this in nonreligious terms, we could make a list of just the people who lost money to Steve. Given the blood atonement angle, though, we probably should include the possibility that someone thought Steve was breaking the Law of Consecration by stealing from the Church. I did a little research and read about some stories—not very credible ones—of pioneers ‘atoning’ for stealing cows back in the day of Brigham Young. I wouldn’t think taking money for private resorts near temples would constitute withholding money intended to further the Lord’s interests on earth, but some people might.”

  Abbie was impressed with Clarke’s research. The two of them picked up their trays and deposited the remnants of their lunches into the square trash cans near the restaurant’s exit.

  “Let’s go figure out Costa Rica, then,” Abbie said.

  TWENTY

  Clarke and Abbie spent the rest of the day trying to get through to the right people in Costa Rica. It was an exercise in frustration. The telephone numbers they had were out-of-date or disconnected, and the few times they did reach an actual human being, the person who could have helped them was out of the office.

  Abbie heard Clarke’s stomach growl for the third time. She looked at the clock. They had gotten carried away and hadn’t realized that the rest of the office, with the exception of the one officer whose turn it was to take the night shift, had left.

 

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