Jonathan Kellerman - The Murderer's Daughter

“Eleven.”

“Almost twelve?”

“My birthday was a month ago.” We had angel food cake and chocolate mint ice cream for the third time and there won’t be a fourth time.

“Just eleven,” said Ray. “Wow. Well, now, this is a terrible thing for a little girl to see. But you did your best and that’s what matters, Grace.”

Grace’s brain filled with lightning-like starbursts and thunder-like noise. A voice inside shrieked: Liar liar liar! That’s not what matters! Everything will change!

She said, “Thank you, sir.”

“Well,” he said, “that probably wraps it up — my guess is Mrs. Stage had a heart attack. Sounds like shock brought it on, seeing that boy in his bed.”

“Bobby,” said Grace. “Robert Canova.”

“Robert Canova... what’s his story?”

“He was born with problems.”

“Looks like it...” R. G. Ballance closed his pad. “Okay, you’re probably wondering what’s going to happen. Obviously, you can’t stay here but we’ll make sure you’re okay, don’t you worry.”

“Thank you.”

“Pleasure, Grace. Is there anything else you feel like telling me?”

Grace thought of three things she could tell him:

1. Bobby’s air tube, taped tightly every night, really tight, loose on the floor, hissing like a yellow snake. That made no sense.

2. The look on Ty’s face when he came down into the kitchen: sad — more like disappointed. But not surprised. Like he’d expected something bad to happen and that had come true.

3. The smile forming on Sam’s lips as he looked out at Ramona’s body.

She said, “No, sir, that’s everything.”

An hour later, the three new fosters had been trundled off in the blue car and Grace was in back of the black car.

At the wheel was one of the woman detectives, brown-haired and freckle-faced. Unlike R. G. Ballance, she didn’t introduce herself and as she gunned the engine she chewed gum really fast.

After she’d been driving for a while, she said, “I’m Nancy and I’m a detective, okay? I’m taking you to a place that might seem a little scary. It’s called juvenile hall and it’s mostly for kids who’ve gotten into trouble. But there’s also a section for kids like you who need to wait until their situation gets clear. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Like I said, it could seem a little — almost like a jail. Okay? But I’ll make sure to put you in a safe part. But still, it’s not the prettiest situation... anyway, before you know it, you’ll be out of there. Okay?”

“Okay.”

“Really,” said Nancy. “Everything’s going to work out okay.”

Sitting in her room at the Hilton Garden Inn, Grace kept looking at the old photo of the blond boy.

Ty.

Andrew.

Atoner.

Viewing the picture made morphing boy to man easy. He’d darkened his hair as Grace just had, and puberty had firmed up his face. But the features remained the same.

Was the reason for the dye job worry that his naturally fair color would trigger Grace’s memory? Knowing who she’d been and seeking her out not because of the article?

Even if the article had led him to her, had that triggered recall of the girl living at Stagecoach Ranch?

Who’d been there when the bad things happened.

Then she realized that Malcolm had spent time testing the three sibs so perhaps it was him Ty/Andrew had sought. And that had led him to Grace.

Either way, it was Grace he’d ended up with. Intending to strip bare old, malevolent secrets.

About the death of Bobby Canova? A vicious brother with a hungry smile?

That seemed scant motive for murder; try proving anything about deaths ruled as natural over two decades ago. So there had to be more.

Grown-up Sam doing grown-up bad things.

As Grace pondered, another terrible possibility intruded: Grace’s name had triggered Andrew’s memory and he’d pulled up her faculty photo.

Known who she was at the Opus lounge.

No, impossible. If he had, no way would he have gone along with...

Stop; turn the page, move on.

Find the enemy before he finds you.

Fixing the date of the wild-haired children’s arrival at the ranch was simple: two months after Grace’s eleventh birthday.

She logged onto the L.A. Times archives for that day and plugged in sam ty lily. Nothing. Using fourteen additional dates — a week before and after — was no more productive.

Vegans, Sam spouting the Bible, and the homemade clothing suggested a cult or a sect, or at least an odd, isolated upbringing. The trio arriving at night with a two-vehicle police escort — uniforms as well as a detective — suggested serious criminality.

But pairing cult and sect with the fifteen dates was also a dead end and Grace decided she could keyword forever and miss the crucial cue. Better to examine actual coverage of that period and that meant scrolling laboriously through entire issues of the newspaper.

Fortunately, microfilm was also computer-archived and the Times offered free access through 1980, with more recent stories pay-per-view. Grace was about to enter her credit card when she realized she could reach the same destination for free, using her psych department faculty account at the med school library.

Either way, she’d be documenting her search but she couldn’t see any way that could be avoided. Or any possibility of linking herself to Beldrim Benn, even assuming his corpse would be found.

She recalled the sound of the body, thumping and rolling into the abyss.

Went the faculty route.

Making her way through months of microfilm was a slow process that produced nothing for hours.

She scrolled back two-thirds of a year before finding it.

By Selwyn Rodrigo

Times Staff Writer

Forensic examination of the remains of the Fortress Cult, so called because its leader constructed a walled enclosure of abandoned motor homes and dug out caves at a remote Mojave Desert location, has produced evidence of past killings at the site.

Four months ago, self-appointed “Grand Chieftain” Arundel Roi, born Roald Leroy Arundel, died in a shootout with county sheriffs after reports of child abuse led social service workers to the squalid site that housed what authorities say was a one-man apocalyptic cult based on biblical prophecy, racist “identity religion” and witchcraft.

That visit proved fatal to social worker Bradley Gainsborough, who was shot without warning shortly after entering the encampment. A second investigator, Candace Miller, was also wounded but managed to escape and phone authorities. The pitched battle that ensued saw Arundel Roi perish, along with all three of his common-law wives.

The women, each of whom had a criminal record, were thought to be recruited by Roi, 67, during his time as a prison guard at the Sybil Brand women’s jail. All four cultists were found clutching high-powered rifles and, in the case of one woman, a live hand grenade.

Inspection of the grounds revealed a bunker stocked with additional explosives and firearms and another piled high with an assortment of machetes, cleavers and other knives, as well as hate literature and pornography. The appearance of what appeared to be blood, tissue and hair on some of the cutting weapons sparked a coroner’s analysis, the results of which have just been released.

Though most of the organic material on the blades remains unidentified, DNA matches to three missing persons have been obtained. The victims were homeless men whose names have not been divulged. All were seen in the company of Arundel Roi or one of his wives at a bar in Saugus. Monetary gain appears to have been the motive, as welfare checks in the names of the deceased were mailed to a post office box rented by Roi.