Steven Havill - A Discount for Death

The engineer’s eyes narrowed, and she leaned back against the slanted surface of the drafting table. “Oh, my. Don’t tell me that the new place is involved, too. Your husband must be just beside himself.”

“Leona…”

“What else can I do?”

“Sit tight. Do not discuss this with anyone. No one. That’s really important, Leona. You really need to keep this to yourself.”

“When you first came, you mentioned something undercover,” Leona said.

“With what you’ve been able to provide,” and she lifted the bags, “you’ve given us a valuable shortcut,” Estelle said.

Leona’s eyes twinkled craftily. “You were going to ask me to try and purchase bogus drugs from the store, weren’t you?” She glanced at her watch as if coordinating the time for an assault. “I could go down in the morning and ask for something. I think half the time Mr. Trombley is convinced that I’m just a hypochondriac anyway.”

“The thought had crossed my mind. But with this, it’s not necessary.”

“I’ll be happy to help, if that’s what you need to do.”

“And we appreciate that. But the results would be the same, either way.” Estelle rose. “I’ll be in close touch.”

“Do you have time for tea?”

Estelle sighed. “Some other time, thanks.” After sidestepping four or five other conversations, she made it to the front door. The cool air outside felt wonderful.

Settled into the Expedition, she found her cell phone, pressed in the number, and waited.

“Yep,” Robert Torrez said after a moment.

“Bobby, I just came from Leona Spears.”

“You what ?”

“Leona supplied the missing link. I need to wake up Judge Hobart for a search warrant for Trombley’s Pharmacy. And an arrest warrant. I’m pretty sure how the whole scam worked. We nailed Louis Herrera and Owen Frieberg a few minutes ago.”

“So I understand,” Torrez said. “We’re runnin’ a little short-handed around these parts.”

“Frieberg implicated Trombley, and now we have the proof of that.”

Silence followed, and she could hear voices in the background. “Who pulled the trigger on Enriquez?” the sheriff asked.

“Frieberg wouldn’t come out and say it, but he implied that Guy Trombley did.”

“Maybe once he hears a cell door clang shut, it’ll loosen his tongue. Works wonders sometimes.”

“We need to move on this, Bobby. Tonight.”

“Well, we’re tryin’ to move…about eight directions at once. Before you do anything else, stop by here. And by the way, the district attorney would like to talk with you.”

“We don’t have a lot of time to waste, Bobby. I don’t want Trombley slipping away.”

“Talking to me isn’t a waste of time, Estelle,” Dan Schroeder said, and his voice startled her.

“Sir, we have to move on this.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” the district attorney admonished, and she heard a car door close out the background noise. “Look, I need to talk to you.”

“I understand that, sir.”

“It’s not a ‘it can wait until tomorrow’ sort of thing, Estelle.”

“I understand that, too, sir. If we move on this, it isn’t going to take long.”

“I have a couple of questions that I need to run by you, for one thing. We need to know what the little boy told you while it’s still fresh in your mind.”

“He didn’t tell me anything, sir. He’s too frightened.”

“You talked to him?”

“There’ll be time for that later.”

“Maybe so. Something else more immediate, though. There’s a fair-sized crowd of oglers here, including Frank Dayan. I figured you’d want to talk to him yourself.”

“Bobby can do that,” Estelle said.

“Please,” Schroeder said. “Dayan’s not going to settle for monosyllables, and the whole damn situation could use your touch.”

“That’s not a real high priority for me just at the moment, sir.”

“Well,” Schroeder said, “Dayan aside, I’ve got some questions that I’m not going to hash over on the telephone. You’re heading in?”

“Yes, sir. We really need the search warrant.”

“We’ll get it, trust me. But will you humor me in this?” Schroeder’s tone didn’t leave much room for discussion. “You and the sheriff and I are going to meet for a few minutes, and you’re going to lay all this out for us, one step at a time. You’re going to bring us all up to speed. All right?” Before Estelle could answer, the district attorney added, “And then we’re going to secure a warrant, because I have no doubt that you’re exactly right. Then we’re going to have a couple of well-rested, cool heads bring in Guy Trombley. Not you. Not Bobby. Not anyone who’s worked thirty hours straight. All right? That’s the way I want it to work.”

When Estelle didn’t answer promptly, Schroeder added, “Look, I talked to Bobby, and he agreed with me. We both know you’re concerned about your husband and what this whole damn mess is going to do to his name. And that puts you too close, Estelle. I understand that. But I don’t want mistakes. And neither do you.”

“Sir,” Estelle said, “if you and the sheriff want to send someone else to arrest Guy Trombley, that’s fine with me. I just want it done . I don’t care who does it. In fact, that’s probably the best thing to do.”

“I just think it’s best if the whole town doesn’t end up thinking this was some personal vendetta, Estelle.”

“Which it was,” she said, and almost managed enough energy to laugh.

***

Three hours later, Deputy Jackie Taber’s voice on the radio was calm. “PCS, three oh three is ten fifteen, one adult male.” Estelle Reyes-Guzman leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. That may have been a mistake, since it then took considerable effort to open them again. She looked across the conference table, across the sea of paperwork, at District Attorney Daniel Schroeder.

“Take a break,” Schroeder said. “I know you’d like to be there.”

“I don’t know if I want to be or not,” Estelle said, but she was on her feet and headed toward the door almost before the sentence was out of her mouth. She stepped into the short hallway between the conference room and Dispatch. Through the glass partition around the Dispatch Center, she saw Frank Dayan in earnest conversation with a state policeman. The publisher caught sight of Estelle and gesticulated urgently.

The undersheriff tried her best to keep her expression sober.

“Do you know what day this is?” Dayan asked.

“I have no idea,” Estelle replied. “I’ve lost all track.”

The newspaper publisher shook his head sadly. “You arrest practically the whole town the day after my paper hits the streets.”

“What can I say.”

“Well, for one thing, you can tell me what the deal is with Owen Frieberg. I caught sight of him being brought in. I saw the handcuffs.”

“I’ll do better than that,” Estelle said, and then held up a hand. “Can you give me just a couple minutes?”

“I’ve given you the whole darn week,” Dayan said. “What’s another minute or two now?”

“Do you have your camera with you?”

“Sure.”

She pointed at the hallway, beyond Dispatch. “Go wait in the doorway of my office, Frank. Guy Trombley is going to be coming through into booking in about,” she glanced at her watch. “A minute. You might get a shot.” She smiled. “Scoop time.”

“You’ve got to be shitting me. Guy Trombley? What…?”

“Stick around,” Estelle said. She patted Dayan on the arm and left him standing in the hallway, groping the camera out of his coat pocket. She knew he might have five seconds to snap a picture, during that brief moment when Trombley was led from the garage to the booking room. She guessed that if Trombley saw the newspaper man, he’d have a second or so to try and hide the handcuffs from view. In any case, the fuzzy photo would run on the front page of the Posadas Register in a week’s time.