Burn Out

by Marcia Muller

  I said, “You haven’t been getting your exercise, have you, guy?”

  A whinny.

  “We could go for a short ride, if you cooperate. But if you play games, there’ll be no alfalfa tonight.”

  As if he could actually understand me, he bobbed his head.

  It was probably a mistake. No one knew I was taking the horse out, and if he threw me again, I’d have to limp my own way back to the house.

  So why’re you doing it, McCone? To prove some unimportant point?

  No. This one feels important.

  Lear Jet allowed me to saddle and mount him with no problem. He trotted sedately toward the mesa overlooking the lake, and by the time we got there I felt as if we’d tentatively formed a rapport.

  “You know what?” I said, stroking his mane. “You need a new name. Lear Jet—even if that’s what Hy called you—is undignified. How about King Lear? Now that’s strong, speaks of a horse with self-esteem.”

  Also speaks of insanity, but it’s not likely he knows his Shakespeare.

  The horse bobbed his head again.

  “It’s settled, then. I’ll call you King for short.”

  When we got back to the stables, King only stepped on my foot once while I was grooming him. And I was pretty sure that was an accident.

  When Hy came out of the ranch house, King was in his fenced pasture and I was cleaning out his stall. Hy stared in astonishment, shook his head, and said, “Never thought I’d see you tending to Lear Jet—or any other horse.”

  “His name,” I said, “is now King Lear. King for short. We’re almost friends. In fact, I think he likes me better than you. At least I come to the stable bearing carrots.”

  “Fickle animal. Since the two of you are on your way to becoming buddies, I just may have to buy myself another nag.”

  “King is not a nag.”

  “Oh yeah, the two of you have bonded big-time. If I ever get to ride again, I’m definitely going to have to spring for a new nag—I mean, horse.”

  “King could use some company.”

  “Do we have onions?” Hy asked.

  “Yes, in that wire basket.” I sat at the table, thumbing through a report Kristen Lark had faxed me.

  “How fresh are these eggs?”

  “Check the sell-by date.”

  “Fresh enough. What’s Lark got to say?”

  “Not much. Nothing on Boz Sheppard. The sleeping bag Tom Mathers was wrapped in belongs to him; his wife says he kept it in the truck. She’s got an alibi for the time of the killing: she slammed out of the wilderness supply a short while after I left; a customer saw her leave, and spent at least an hour afterwards with Tom, talking about a fishing trip he wanted to line up. T.C. went directly to Zelda’s, drank and danced for hours, then spent the night with a good old boy at the motel.”

  “Canned mushrooms all right?”

  “They’ll have to be; we don’t have fresh. The good old boy is Cullen Bradley. I interviewed him at the hardware store he owns in Bridgeport. Glad-handing small-town guy with a serious hangover. Those Bridgeport men really get around. I wonder if— What?”

  “Oregano?”

  “In an omelet? Are you insane?”

  “Just trying to get your attention, McCone.”

  “I’m paying attention.”

  “No you’re not. And that’s a sign you’re getting better.”

  Monday

  NOVEMBER 5

  I spent a good deal of Monday morning on the phone to the agency, going over the week’s schedule with Patrick Neilan. Two new clients had set initial appointments with him for the afternoon: one was a deadbeat-dad case, which he’d probably assign to Julia Rafael; the other concerned identity theft. In the past Patrick himself would have taken it on, or it would have ended up on the desk of Charlotte Keim, my chief financial investigator.

  But Keim, once my nephew Mick’s live-in love, now worked for Hy; after the acrimonious breakup of their relationship, I’d asked Hy to hire her in order to preserve peace within the agency. Her replacement, Thelia Chen, a former analyst for Bank of America, was working out splendidly. She ought to be able to handle the case.

  The agency was practically running itself in my absence. Patrick was working out well as a partial stand-in for me. Ted and his assistant, Kendra Williams, were a superefficient pair. Mick and Derek made short work of the increasing number of computer forensic jobs that came in, and weren’t averse to doing mundane searches when nothing complex was on the table. Julia Rafael was bilingual and could deal well with Latino clients with limited English; former FBI agent Craig Morland had wide-ranging contacts with government agencies. And for a good all-around operative I could always call on the freelance talents of Rae Kelleher, who was now writing novels with a strong crime element and welcomed keeping her hand in the detective business.

  Once this state of affairs would have made me feel distanced, left out. Now I merely felt relieved. I’d created a great team and, if I accomplished nothing else in my career, it had been worth the effort.

  Still I felt restless, the empty day ahead weighing heavily upon me. No leads, no new information. Unless . . .

  I dialed Glenn Solomon, a high-powered San Francisco attorney for whom I’d done a great deal of work—and who was also a good friend.

  “Glenn, d’you know a Las Vegas firm—Brower, Price and Coleman?”

  “Sure. They handle the legal work for at least three major casinos.”

  “What about Frank Brower?”

  “Lousy golfer, but a nice guy.”

  “So you know him well?”

  “We get together down there two, three times a year.”

  I explained what I needed to know and asked, “Can you get him to tell you who was footing the bill for Hayley Perez’s legal work?”

  “If I go about it the right way.”

  “Will you do it for me—as a favor?”

  “Yes, my friend. But I thought you were taking a long vacation at that ranch you and Hy have.”

  “I was. Severe case of burn-out.”

  “And you’re over it now?”

  “No, I’m just helping out some friends.”

  I booted up my laptop and Googled Bud Smith. Good luck, with a name like that. I narrowed the search down to insurance brokers, Mono County, California. No Bud, but there was a Herbert in Vernon. His record was clean—no complaints to the state department of consumer affairs. I then searched for more information on Herbert Smith of Vernon, California. Nothing. Apparently he wasn’t important enough to the gods of Google. Finally I logged on to one of the search engines that the agency subscribes to—even though I’m averse to availing myself of company resources for personal reasons—and came up with some revealing information.

  Herbert Smith of Vernon, California, was a registered sex offender.

  To confirm the information I visited a site that posted the whereabouts of registered sex offenders. He was on it.

  How, I wondered, had a community of not more than four hundred people failed to pick up on his status? How could Dana Ivins have arranged for him to mentor young men and women?

  I dialed Ivins’s number. She picked up, sounding crisp and professional. I told her what I’d found out and asked, “How could you put your clients at risk like that?”

  Calmly she replied, “Bud’s case was unusual. He never confirmed it to me, but even the prosecutor over in Mineral County thought he was covering for someone else.”

  “So this happened in Nevada.”

  “Yes, twenty-six years ago. A girl of thirteen was raped, sodomized, and abandoned in the countryside near the munitions storage site outside of Hawthorne. She managed to crawl to the road and flag down a passing car. There was evidence pointing to Bud—tire tracks from his truck in the sand, a piece of cloth she’d ripped from a shirt belonging to him. Unfortunately, the girl was extremely traumatized. She couldn’t even speak, much less identify her attacker.”

  And over a quarter of a century ago, th
ere wouldn’t have been any DNA evidence. DNA testing was in its infancy then.

  “So why did the prosecutor think Smith was covering for someone?”

  “Bud had a younger brother, Davey. He was sixteen, something of a child prodigy—math, I think—but considered strange by his teachers and peers. Bud raised him after their parents died and was overly protective of him. Originally the police focused on Davey because he’d been seen in town talking with the girl, but then Bud confessed. And stuck to it.”

  “So Bud did his time and . . . ?”

  “And moved back here to Vernon, where he was born and raised till the family moved to Hawthorne during his teens.”

  I was a little surprised that Smith could have gotten a California insurance broker’s license. Many types of licenses are unavailable to sex offenders—such as real estate, because the agents have access to keys. But then with insurance, if the person is registered and up-front about doing time, the state is more lenient. And Bud had apparently been honest about his record.

  “Is Bud’s status common knowledge around here?” I asked Ivins.

  “Not really. I suppose some people may have stumbled across it on the Internet. But Bud’s very civic-minded and well liked, so if they have they’ve kept it to themselves. I know only because he confided his past to me when he applied to become a mentor. Then I did some research on his case.”

  “What happened to the brother, Davey?”

  “I don’t know that, either. All I’m really sure of is that Bud has been good at mentoring our clients.”

  “Does he tell them he was in prison, and why?”

  “Whatever goes on between friends who help friends is strictly confidential.”

  It seemed to me she didn’t know a hell of a lot of things she should know about what went on between her organization’s clients and their mentors.

  “Is Bud aware you told me he might have been tutoring Amy Perez in math?”

  “. . . I mentioned it to him. He called shortly after you left me that day.”

  “Why did he call?”

  She frowned. “I don’t really know. I told him about your visit, but then someone called on his other line. He said he’d get back to me, but he never did.”

  “Is he still living on Aspen Lane?” It was the address listed for him on the registered sex offenders site.

  “. . . Yes.”

  “Do you have a phone number for him?”

  “I can’t give out—”

  “Never mind. I’ll get hold of him.”

  Irresponsibility, I thought. Sheer irresponsibility. I’m all for giving sex offenders a second chance, but given the high rate of recidivism, that chance shouldn’t be in a sensitive area involving young people. And I wasn’t sure I bought the rumors of Bud Smith’s false confession—even if the Mineral County prosecutor had had his or her doubts.

  I called Smith’s office, got a machine. Thumbed through the slim local directory; his home number wasn’t listed, under either Bud or Herbert. Better to speak with him in person anyway. I’d drive out to Aspen Lane and—

  The phone rang. Glenn Solomon.

  “I talked with Frank Brower. His instructions to represent Hayley Perez came from a Mount Kisco, New York, law firm—Carpenter and Bates.”

  “You know anyone there?”

  “No, but Frank was on the Harvard Law Review with Bates. He’ll get back to me later.”

  “Thanks so much, Glenn. I’m leaving now and my cellular might not work where I’m going. If it doesn’t, please leave a message on the machine here at the ranch.”

  “Certainly.” He paused, the silence full of meaning.

  “What?” I asked.

  “What I always tell you when you embark on one of your quests, my friend: be clever and careful.”

  Aspen Lane was three miles out the road to Stone Valley—a place I hadn’t visited for years and didn’t even like to think about. The horrific events that had happened in the valley back then had ultimately brought Hy and me together, but I didn’t want to relive them, even in my head. The vision of the mountain exploding, our frantic flight—

  So stop reliving them, all right?

  The lane was well named: golden-leafed aspen spread out to either side and clustered around the small, mostly prefab homes. Bud Smith’s was at the very end, where the pavement stopped—a double-wide trailer with attractive plantings and a deck with an awning over it. A fishing boat was up on davits, ready to be prepped and tarped for the winter. Usually I think of child molesters as unsavory types who live in squalor and lurk in dark places seeking their prey, but I couldn’t reconcile either the man I’d met or his tidy home with such an image.

  No one answered the doorbell. I walked around the structure calling out to Smith. No response, but I sensed a presence nearby. Finally I went back to the deck and saw what I hadn’t noticed before: the door was slightly ajar.

  Not breaking and entering, just trespassing. And trespassing for a good reason: now I’m worried about the man.

  The excuses I use to justify my actions . . .

  I eased the door open, listening. Silence. Strong smell there, but it wasn’t sinister—cooked garlic and onions. Still, I drew Hy’s .45 from my bag before I went inside. The living room and galley kitchen were empty. The meal must have been cooked yesterday, since the stove and all the counter surfaces were clean.

  I moved along the hallway. Three bedrooms and a bath opened off it, all of them deserted. In one of the smaller rooms, the bed had been left unmade. Otherwise everything was neat.

  Why didn’t Bud Smith sleep in the larger room with the queen-sized bed? Perhaps he shared the trailer with someone who was tidier than he?

  Well, that information could be had online. But while I was here . . .

  The master bedroom’s closet contained a man’s clothing—mostly vintage and odd, as I’d seen Bud wear. So it was his room after all. The bathroom didn’t tell me much. A Water Pik and two electric toothbrushes, some first-aid supplies, aspirin, and sinus headache pills. No prescription drugs. A razor and shaving cream on a shelf below a mirror in the shower stall. Third bedroom, mostly empty—a guest room that hadn’t been used in quite a while, judging from the layer of dust.

  Back to the room with the unmade bed. The closet held some newish-looking woman’s jeans. A couple of sweaters were draped across a chair, and there were a few tops hanging in the closet. Woman’s underwear in the bureau, and a flannel nightgown tossed on the bed. Makeup items and a pair of earrings on the bureau.

  So Smith had a female roommate. She was probably at work.

  I moved back to the living area, looking in drawers and cupboards, gave the whole trailer another once-over, then left and started back to the ranch.

  I sat at my laptop, thinking about Bud Smith—a convicted child molester who may have been covering for his younger brother. Smith, who had told me he knew Amy Perez and, if Amy had followed Dana Ivins’ advice, may have tutored her in algebra. Who had sold a life-insurance policy to Hayley, with Amy as beneficiary. Had he known Hayley before she bought the policy? Probably not, given their age difference.

  I logged on to Mono County property records and learned the land and the double-wide had belonged to Smith for seven years. When I went to the state insurance brokers’ registry, I found that he’d received his license the same year he’d purchased the land. The California Registry of Sex Offenders showed he’d contacted them within a day of his arrival in the state, and reregistered when required.

  Which proved . . . ? Not much.

  The Mineral County Independent News in Hawthorne didn’t have online issues going back twenty-six years. I could drive over there and check their archives, but it was getting on toward five o’clock. Better to wait till morning.

  Well, what about the paper in Reno? A controversial rape case would have warranted mention. I checked, found their online archives didn’t go back twenty-six years, either. Tomorrow I’d have to visit Mineral County.

 
But now I’d take a ride on King, who was probably waiting for me. Tonight I’d cut a path across open land where our small herd of sheep grazed. Hy had told me the sheep had something to do with a subsidy or lower taxes—I forget which—but I suspected he kept them out of sentiment. His stepfather, to whom he’d been considerably closer than to his birth father, had been a lifelong sheep rancher.

  The ride was without event, and I felt a growing kinship with the horse. I’d been traumatized by the events of the night when he’d charged me, but so had he. Animals are essentially innocent, until we humans treat them badly and give them cause to fear. King needed my reassurance.

  As we retraced our steps, I wondered if this caring for the horse indicated a caring for other things in my life.

  Ramon was at the stable when King and I got back, cleaning out the stall. He said hello and went on with what he was doing, allowing me to tend to King on my own.

  When I finished rubbing King down and led him into the clean stall, I noticed Ramon’s dark eyes were shadowed and puffy. He attempted a smile, but it didn’t quite come off.

  “How’re you doing?” I asked.

  He made a wobbly gesture with his hand. “We buried Hayley up in Bridgeport today.”

  “Oh, I wish you’d told me. I would’ve—”

  “Not necessary; you didn’t know her. It was a nice turnout, though. Even that wild man she ran off with and his girlfriend came. The girlfriend brought beautiful flowers. She works at Petals.”

  So Rich Three Wings and Cammie Charles had paid their respects to Hayley. Rich, because he still loved her, and Cammie, probably because she felt guilty that her imagined rival was dead.

  I asked, “Did Miri attend?”

  Ramon’s eyes narrowed, the lines around them deepening. “No.”

  “Why not? She was only on seventy-two-hour hold at the psychiatric ward.”