J. Jance - Day of the Dead

He paused and seemed to consider. “No,” he answered at last. “There’s nothing I want.”

“Good,” she said. “I’ll call for a jet to take us to Cabo. By contract we have to give them eight hours’ advance notice, but they may well have a plane available to pick us up sooner than that. I have some errands to run, then I’ll head out to the ranch and take care of things there. You hold down the fort here, but keep a low profile. Don’t talk to the media. Don’t grant any interviews.”

For several long seconds, Larry appeared to be seized with indecision. Gayle was afraid he hadn’t heard a word she’d said.

Finally he nodded. “All right.” Then, making what seemed to be a supreme effort to pull himself together, he added, “You’re sure you won’t need my help out at the ranch?”

She smiled at him then. Things always worked more smoothly when she was the one who came up with the plan and all Larry had to do was follow orders.

“I can handle it,” she said.

“But you will be careful,” he cautioned. “That stuff can be very dangerous.”

“You know me,” she said. “I’m always careful.”

J. A. Jance

Day of the Dead

Twenty-Seven

Feeling all his sixty-plus years, Larry left Gayle’s office and went to his own. He shut the door and locked it. Then he called out to reception and said he was not to be disturbed.

He hadn’t exactly told Gayle the truth. He did want something from the house. If he had known he was leaving today, he would have brought his notebooks to work. They would have fit in his briefcase. Now, because he hadn’t wanted to admit to Gayle that the notebooks even existed, he was faced with the prospect of leaving them behind. If Gayle destroyed them along with the rest of the house, fine, but if anyone happened to stumble across them…

In terms of treasure, Larry’s prize didn’t amount to much-a series of cheap photo albums he’d picked up from Walgreens over the years. What he valued was the collection of photos he kept inside-dated Polaroid shots of each of his girls, pictures that graphically chronicled each of their individual journeys. When he was between girls-as he was now-he often consoled himself by revisiting his past exploits. Browsing through the pictures was a balm to him, but in someone else’s hands…Regardless of what he had told Gayle, he had to go get them. If she caught him there, he’d make up some excuse, but the notebooks had to be in his personal possession when he stepped onto the jet.

Unable to sit still, Larry paced back and forth in his office. The incident with Brandon Walker had unnerved him. Eventually he would feel the rush of relief, but right now he was mired in fear. Periodically he glanced out the window. Since Gayle had told him to stay put, he couldn’t leave before she did. Unfortunately, her Lexus remained in its place.

Hoping for relief, he forced himself to sit down and try to relax. He used the remote to turn on his Bose radio, tuned, as it always was, to KUAT, where they were playing Mozart-his favorite, the Piano Concerto no. 22 in E-flat Major. Lost in the music, he actually managed to doze for a while.

When he awakened, the news was coming on. The opening item caught Larry’s attention: “Media relations officer Ted Garner has just confirmed that a prisoner found hanging in his Pima County Jail cell last night has died as a result of what the medical examiner’s office is calling self-inflicted injuries. Erik LaGrange, longtime development officer for Tucson-based Medicos for Mexico, was booked into the jail in connection with the death of a teenage girl whose dismembered body was found near Vail on Saturday. In a court appearance yesterday afternoon, LaGrange had pleaded innocent to all charges.”

The newscaster went on to other topics, but Larry Stryker was no longer listening. Gayle had finished with Erik LaGrange, and now he was dead. Welcome as that outcome might be, it left Larry with a disturbing question rattling around in his head. It wasn’t the first time he’d asked it.

What happens if she’s ever finished with me?

Lani woke up late. She poured some coffee and then went looking for her mother. Diana was in her office, fingers flying over her laptop’s keyboard. “Where’s Dad?” Lani asked.

“Beats me,” Diana said. “He was out of here early. I’m sure it has something to do with the case he’s working on. How are you feeling?”

“Fine,” Lani said. “Can I have your car keys? I left a mess in your car last night. I want to take it into town and have it detailed.”

“You don’t have to do that,” Diana said. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“Please,” Lani said.

Diana smiled. “Sure,” she said. “You know where to take it?”

“You still use that same place on South Fourth?”

“Smitty’s,” Diana said with a nod. “Come pick me up afterward. We’ll have lunch, just us girls.”

Staring at the bloodstains that now marred the red-and-white imitation-leather seats, Smitty Coltharp plucked fitfully at the end of his foot-long ponytail. “My land, girl,” he said. “Your mama loves this car so much, I’m surprised she didn’t kill you. There’s dust in there an inch thick, and what on earth were you doing in that backseat?”

“A friend of mine,” Lani said, “a friend of the family, actually-was having a baby.”

“Whoa!” Smitty said. “Sorry I asked.”

“Do you think you can clean it?”

He shook his head mournfully. “We’ll see,” he said. “But it’s gonna cost you. You go inside out of the sun and sit tight. I’ll let you know when I’m finished.”

Lani did as she was told. The office came complete with grimy plastic chairs, a scarred wooden desk, and a collection of dog-eared magazines. Next to a coffeepot filled with an inch-thick layer of what could have been year-old coffee sat a newspaper folded to reveal a more-than-half-completed New York Times crossword puzzle. Looking around for the remainder of the paper, she found the rest of the Sun, virtually unread, tossed in a trash can. Glancing at the front page, her eye was drawn to the picture of a man and a woman in the lower right-hand corner.

Gasping with recognition, Lani almost dropped the paper. The woman’s face was one she knew-the same one that had obliterated Fat Crack’s face in the photo and in Lani’s dream; the same face that had, in seconds, morphed into a featureless skull. Now, just seeing that face smiling at her out of the newspaper photo filled Lani with a terrible dread.

Who is this woman? Lani wondered. What’s the matter with her?

Looks at Nothing’s crystals had tried to warn her about this woman. So had Fat Crack in her dream. Trying to quell a rising sense of fear, Lani forced herself to read the article, which told her almost nothing. A murder suspect named Erik LaGrange had attempted suicide in his Pima County Jail cell the previous evening. The man and woman in the photo, Dr. Lawrence and Gayle Stryker, founders of an organization called Medicos for Mexico, had been the suspect’s employers.

Those three words finally rang a bell-Medicos for Mexico. That was the volunteer medical organization her mother had suggested Lani work for rather than going with Doctors Without Borders. Lani struggled to remember what her mother had said about the people who had been friends years earlier back when both women were still on the reservation. But why is this woman so dangerous? Lani asked herself. And what does she have to do with me?

Not able to summon any answers on her own, she picked up Smitty’s phone and called her mother. “Who is Gayle Stryker?” Lani asked when Diana answered.

“She and her husband are old friends of mine,” Diana said. “You’ve met them, haven’t you?”