J. Jance - Day of the Dead

“In other words, we may find lots of material,” Ralph said.

“That’s right,” Brandon returned. “I’m looking for the proverbial needle in the haystack, and first I need you to find the haystack.”

“I’ll get right on it,” Ralph told him. “You do what you can to keep everyone out of harm’s way. In the meantime, I’ll see about getting you some help. Once we’re set, I’ll be back in touch.”

“Thanks,” Brandon said. “I appreciate it.”

Brian was within minutes of heading out to Kino Hospital for the autopsy when Homicide Captain Julio Hernandez stopped by his desk. “What’s up?” Brian asked.

“The Big Guy wants to see you.”

The Big Guy was none other than Sheriff William Forsythe. In all his years with the Pima County Sheriff’s Department, Detective Brian Fellows had never before been summoned for a personal audience with the top gun. He blinked in surprise.

“Sheriff Forsythe wants to see me?” Brian asked stupidly.

Hernandez nodded. “ASAP.”

Feeling like a grade school student being sent to the principal’s office, Brian made his way to the administrative wing of the building where, after giving his name to a receptionist, he was nodded into Bill Forsythe’s spacious office. The sheriff was on the phone. Frowning, he motioned for Brian to have a chair.

“Sure,” the sheriff said into the phone. “Of course. I know just what you mean, and I’ll take care of it. Don’t worry about a thing.”

Forsythe put down the phone and then glowered across his desk at Brian. “Thanks for coming, Detective Fellows,” he said. “I was just looking over the paperwork from yesterday, and I came across your interview with Erik LaGrange.”

“Is there a problem?” Brian asked.

“I’ll say there’s a problem,” Forsythe growled. “Do you know who LaGrange works for?”

“Yes,” Brian answered. “Medicos for Mexico. It says so right there in the report.”

“And Medicos for Mexico is run by…?”

Brian bristled at the condescending, pop-quiz nature of Forsythe’s dressing-down, but he tried not to let it show. “Dr. Lawrence and Gayle Stryker,” he answered carefully.

“Do you have any idea how influential these people are in this community?” Forsythe demanded. “You don’t drag people like them through a homicide investigation just for the hell of it.”

“Gayle Stryker was having an affair with the guy who’s our prime suspect,” Brian interjected. “He claims she’s the only one who can give us an accounting of where he was and what he was doing the night before the murder.”

Forsythe pounced on Brian’s words. “Yes,” he said. “The night before, but not the day of the murder. I’ve looked at the preliminary ME report. Fran Daly estimates time of death as sometime Saturday morning. LaGrange told you himself that the woman left his house the previous evening. That means, Detective Fellows, that Mrs. Stryker’s being with LaGrange on Friday night has nothing whatsoever to do with whether or not the dirtbag has an alibi.”

“But-”

“No buts, mister,” Forsythe interrupted. “I’m giving you the word, and I’m giving you an order. Back off! If you even so much as call Gayle Stryker and ask her a single question, I’ll have your ears and your badge. Is that understood?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good,” Forsythe grumbled irritably. “Now get going.”

J. A. Jance

Day of the Dead

Twenty-Three

The dead baby was so small that they could not place her kneeling as the Desert People place their dead. So they laid the little girl on her bright blankets and very carefully covered her with branches of shegoi-creosote bush and kui-mesquite. Then they picked up the big rocks.

By then the mother could not see. She was looking at the sun. She did not want to be a weak Indian, but she could not watch as they threw the rocks on the little mound of brush. She turned and started down the mountain toward the village. She walked fast and stumbled often.

When the woman reached her house, the first thing she saw was one of the cradles which she had made for her baby. The cradle was swinging from the branches of a mesquite tree. For this nuhkuth she had used a brown blanket. She snatched the cradle down. She folded the blanket and pressed it against that thing inside her which hurt so much. Then she went away from the house because she did not want to be there when the others came back.

The trail led down to the water among the cottonwoods. The woman could not see where she was going, but she did not care.

There were many trees down by the water, but most of the leaves had come off because summer was gone. And it was almost dark because Tash-the sun-had already set.

The woman was still holding the brown cradle blanket close against her breast when she seemed to hear a baby’s weak voice. She looked and just beyond the water she saw a tiny brown cradle swinging from the low branches of a tree.

Brian Fellows arrived at the ME’s office still smarting from his encounter with Sheriff Forsythe. By the time he got there, the victim’s fingerprints had already been taken and forwarded to the lab, but even with that out of the way, the rest of the autopsy seemed to take forever. Dr. Daly’s work was thorough and unhurried. One by one she noted the numerous individual wounds-evidence of long-term physical and sexual abuse that had resulted in visible damage as well as internal bleeding and scarring.

“This isn’t something that went on for a day or two and then stopped,” the ME said. “The extent of the scabbing and scarring would be consistent with weeks or maybe even months of torture. You’re dealing with a monster here, Mr. Fellows, a real sicko. If I were you, I’d get him off the streets pronto.”

To Brian’s way of thinking, “sicko” hardly covered it, especially if any of those other cases turned out to be related. “I already figured that out,” he said. “What about defensive wounds?”

“Didn’t find any,” Dr. Daly returned. “See that?” She pointed to a still-visible indentation on what remained of one pathetically thin wrist.

Brian nodded.

“Chafing like that would be consistent with her being bound or chained for long periods of time,” Dr. Daly explained. “I’d say we’re finding no defensive wounds because she wasn’t able to defend herself.”

“Are you saying she was alive when the final assault began?”

Fran Daly nodded grimly. “Hopefully not for long,” she said.

Two hours later, Brian left and went straight back to his office, where he discovered PeeWee was among the missing. Tackling the pile of sorted files, Brian hit the phone and began contacting the various agencies involved, requesting complete autopsy reports on each of the victims. Brian wasn’t at all surprised to find nothing in his in-box from Jimmy Detloff. Before he could make an end-run call to Deborah Howard, however, PeeWee burst into their shared cubicle. “How’d it go?” he asked.

“Mixed bag,” Brian answered. “Forsythe bitched me out personally and told me we should lay off the Strykers. His contention is that the time of death makes Gayle Stryker’s involvement with LaGrange beside the point. Plus, they’re pillars of the community.”

“And the autopsy?” PeeWee asked.

Brian sighed. “You lucked out big-time. Dodging it was the right thing to do. That poor kid went through hell before she died, and hell lasted for a very long time. The more I think about LaGrange, the less I think he’s capable of doing what was done to her. He strikes me as too much of a wimp.”

“Maybe you’re right, but what about that matching fingerprint?” PeeWee returned. “The one from his house that AFIS connected to the Yuma County case?”