J. Jance - Day of the Dead

Brian had joined the department as a deputy while Brandon was still in office. When a new administration came into power sometime later, Brian had more than half expected to be let go. Rather than fire him, Sheriff Forsythe elected to encourage Brian to quit by giving him crappy assignments and letting him work the cars far longer than he should have. Brian had fooled everybody-including himself-by sticking it out, keeping his nose clean, and doing a good job. Now a ten-year veteran, he had finally been promoted to Investigations. As new guys came on board and old guys retired, Brian Fellows’s connections to Sheriff Walker mattered less and less.

Unfortunately, neither of Brandon Walker’s biological sons had turned out to be at all like their father. Natural-born bullies, Tommy and Quentin Walker had reveled in tormenting anyone younger and weaker. On every possible occasion, they had made life miserable for their half brother, Brian, and for their father’s new stepson, Davy Ladd. Later on, as teenagers, Tommy and Quentin had run off the rails entirely and turned into full-fledged juvenile delinquents. Tommy had died at sixteen while engaged in something he’d been forbidden to do. Quentin, tortured by the part he’d played in his older brother’s death, had been in and out of trouble and/or jail ever since. Even now he was back in the slammer on a drug charge, which meant he’d be in prison for the better part of the next ten years.

But waging their joint defensive war against Tommy and Quentin had united Davy Ladd and Brian Fellows in a close childhood friendship that endured to this day. In fact, all of them-Davy Ladd, his wife, Candace, and their two-year-old son, Tyler, along with Brian and his wife, Kath-were expected at the Walkers’ place for dinner late Sunday afternoon-just like a real family.

But between then and now, Brian Fellows had work to do. Someone had been murdered and hacked to pieces in the desert. Like Brandon Walker before him, it was Brian’s job to find out who was dead-and why.

J. A. Jance

Day of the Dead

Nine

After a while, I’itoi woke up. Elder Brother laughed when he looked around and saw all the children sleeping, and he thought about what was hidden in his bag.

I’itoi called to the children. When they were all awake and watching, he opened his bag and shook it. Out fluttered the big yellow leaves and the spots of sunshine and the brown leaves and the shadows and the tiny white flowers and the small pieces of bright blue sky. They were all alive. They floated in the air for a few moments, and then they danced away into the sunlight. And the children danced after them.

I’itoi stayed in the shade of the tree and was glad that at last there was something beautiful and gay that would never change and never grow ugly as it grew old.

And this, nawoj, my friend, is the story of the birth of hohokimal-the butterflies.

Speeding east on I-10, Brian dialed home on his cell phone. When Kath didn’t answer, he left a message. “I’m on a call and headed to Vail,” he said. “It could take time. I’ll let you know when I’ll be home.”

Minutes later, he pulled off the freeway at Vail and headed for the Fast Horse Ranch development. A mile or so beyond the subdivision, he saw the clump of parked vehicles. He pulled in behind a patrol car sitting with its back door open. A woman was inside and a dog-a big German shepherd-lay on the ground nearby, panting and keeping a wary eye on the people milling about. Deputy Ruben Gomez met Brian before he was fully out of the car.

“What’s the deal?” Brian asked.

“It’s pretty bad,” the deputy replied. “Little girl, Hispanic, probably fourteen or fifteen years old. Somebody’s hacked her to pieces and stuffed her in a bunch of garbage bags. The lady in my car, Ms. Lammers-Susan Lammers-was out walking with her dog. The dog ran on ahead and came running back carrying an arm. As soon as she saw it, Ms. Lammers called it in. I found the bags with the rest of the body when I got here.”

“Any ID?” Brian asked.

“Not so far. I didn’t want to foul things up, so I stayed away. Dispatch tells me CSI is on the way.”

“Right,” Brian said. “I’ll go talk to the witness. How’s the dog, friendly or not?”

Ruben cast a cautious glance at the animal. “She says he’s fine, but if I were you, I wouldn’t make any sudden moves.”

Keeping one eye on the dog, Brian moved toward the open door. “Ms. Lammers?” he asked.

A blond-haired woman, red-eyed and still sniffling, peered out of the vehicle at him. “Yes,” she said tentatively. “But please, call me Sue. Mrs. Lammers is my mother-in-law.”

“I’m Detective Fellows,” Brian said, offering his ID. “Mind if I ask you a few questions?”

“Sure,” she said.

As the woman climbed out of the vehicle, Brian estimated her to be in her early forties. She wore a sweatshirt, faded jeans, and hiking boots. “I saw him,” she said, brushing her short hair away with a hand that was still visibly shaking. “I’m sure I saw him.”

“Who?” Brian asked. He opened his notebook.

“The guy. The one who dumped her. He was parked on the shoulder as Ranger and I walked up the power-line road. As we got closer, I think he saw us coming and took off.”

“Which way?” Brian asked.

“He headed back toward Vail. I don’t know where he went after that. The intersection is behind the crest of the hill. I couldn’t see which way he turned.”

“What kind of vehicle?”

“A pickup of some kind. I wasn’t close enough to see a license or what model it was. Dark-colored. Dark blue or maybe purple. With a matching camper shell.”

“What were you doing?” Brian asked.

“Ranger, my dog, and I were taking a walk.”

“From where?”

“My husband and I have a place down the road. Two miles or so from here. On Fast Horse Ranch.”

Brian looked around. “Is your husband here?”

“He’s at the house. I haven’t called him,” Sue Lammers added after a pause. “We had a fight. I took Ranger out so I could cool off.”

“What time did this happen?”

“You mean what time did I find the body?”

Brian nodded.

“Over an hour ago now,” she told him. “Ranger ran on ahead of me. He does that sometimes, but he’s scared of trains. There was one coming-a big freight train-so Ranger came back. I saw he was carrying something and thought it was a stick.” Her lip trembled. “But it wasn’t a stick at all,” she continued. “It was an arm-a piece of an arm.” Again she paused, swallowing convulsively before going on. “It was still all bloody.”

She spoke with the air of one trying to forget even as she remembered. Tears welled in her eyes. Brian gave her a moment to compose herself while he mentally calculated the distance a pickup truck, traveling at legal highway speed, might have covered in the space of an hour.

Just then a van containing two members of the CSI team pulled up behind Brian’s vehicle. Deputy Gomez went to meet them. He led them forward, pointing as he went. Brian stayed with Sue Lammers.

“Did you see anything that would help us?”

“No. He was too far away.”

“He?” Brian asked. “You’re sure it was a male?”

“Not really,” Sue admitted. “I mean, it looked like a man. I saw him walk from the truck into the desert and then back again. He went back and forth a couple of times. I thought he was dumping garbage, but I worried about it all the same. I mean, I was out here by myself. The last trip he made, he must have seen me. That’s when he jumped into the truck and took off.”

“When you go walking by yourself like this, are you armed?” Brian asked.

“No,” Sue said quickly. “I have my cell phone along in case anything happens, but that’s all. I don’t believe in carrying weapons. Neither does my husband.”