Ridley Pearson - Killer View

Senator James Peavy’s warning echoed in Walt’s ears, though he was much closer to home: people made their own laws. There were places in this county that a uniform felt more like a bull’s-eye than a designation of authority, and Triumph was one of them.

The road rose more steeply on the final approach to Triumph. Remains of ancient mining equipment jutted out of the hill. The road ascended to a cluster of dwellings, a desolate, desperate landscape juxtaposed against stunning views to the west.

As Walt made the drive, he noticed that each terraced steppe changed color. The lowest was a black-gray clay, the middle gray-green, the top grayish yellow. Even half color-blind, Walt saw the similarity to the dried mud on Kira Tulivich’s shoes.

He drove through the neighborhood carefully. He hadn’t been up here in a while and was surprised to see some decent-looking homes interspersed with the trailers. Wood smoke spewed from stovepipes. A few dogs patrolled.

Parked next to a broken-down RV he spotted an old beater Subaru that he recognized as Taylor Crabtree’s. Walt’s office had impounded the car twice. Even from a distance, he could see discoloring along the side of the car.

Now it added up: Crabtree, a repeat juvie offender; his face, a battered mess; now, mud on his car. Walt parked alongside the Subaru. The mud was the same grayish yellow as Kira Tulivich’s shoes.

Walt saw his own face in the reflection off the glass of the driver door, as he stole a look inside: the dark “snow tan” hid any evidence of fatigue or lines of concern, the sunglasses masked his eyes. Only his cracked lips and stubble beard offered a glimpse into the strain of the past several days.

Walt squinted, pushing closer to the glass: on the Subaru’s dashboard was a sticker: KB’S BURRITOS. Kira Tulivich had offered only one, seemingly irrelevant piece of information from the examination table: “KB’s”

Walt broke off a chunk of the mud and bagged it, then slipped the Beretta out of its holster. Walt ducked down alongside the Subaru and triple-clicked the radio com clipped to his uniform’s epaulet. This signaled to his dispatcher a low-voice communication: he or she was to answer in clicks, not voice. Walt reported his location in a whisper and requested backup, using the radio code to signal no lights or sirens. He released the mic’s button and waited.

Two clicks. Backup was on its way.

After two minutes passed, Walt lost patience waiting for backup to arrive. He reminded himself that Crabtree was just a kid.

He edged around the car, crossed to the RV, and put his ear to the door. If the kid dived out a window or climbed out a skylight, Walt would regret not waiting. But he hammered on the door just the same. “Crabtree! It’s Sheriff Fleming. Open the door, please!”

The RV moved and squeaked on its springs.

“Crabtree!” Walt called loudly. “Don’t be stupid.”

The door swung open.

“Keep your hands where I can see them.”

Crabtree wore blue jeans and the denim shirt from Elbie’s. His hands were stained black from work, his hair a rat’s nest. His beat-up eyes were filled with contempt and soured with distrust.

“Yeah?”

“Step outside,” Walt said, backing up. “Okay, now… hands against the RV and your butt back.” Walt frisked him. “Good. Fine.” He holstered the Beretta and asked Crabtree to turn around.

“I don’t know nothing about any guys trying to get people to join anything.”

“It’s not about that,” Walt said.

Crabtree shrugged.

“Do you know a girl-a young woman-named Kira Tulivich?”

“Sure I do.”

The admission surprised Walt. Crabtree was the kind of kid who’d deny everything. “You know her from where?”

“School. From around. You know.”

It started to rain again. Walt ignored it. Taylor Crabtree checked the sky a couple times, shedding more light onto his cut-up face.

“Know her well?”

“Nah. Just know who she is. Her type and me, we don’t exactly mix.”

“Her type? You mean she’s older, or pretty, or what?”

“Rich,” he said. “That’s the way it is at school: us and them. You know?”

“When was the last time you saw her?”

Crabtree’s hesitation belied his answer. “I don’t know.”

“You know what we’re going to do, Taylor? We’re going to put a forensics team from Boise on your car. You ever seen CSI ? Like that. They vacuum the car. Develop prints. Lift some. Photograph others. They’ll be looking for hair and fibers that connect back to Kira Tulivich. That mud on the car. All that evidence-some of it you can’t even see-is going to bring you down like a ton of bricks. You want to get ahead of this, now is your chance.”

Crabtree wasn’t paying attention. Walt followed his line of sight: spotting a couple of pickup trucks coming up East Fork Road and then, in the far distance, a cruiser. His backup, still a mile away.

Walt thought he could use this. “Running out of time here. When was the last time you saw Kira Tulivich?”

Crabtree refocused on Walt’s stern face.

“When I seen her, I thought it was her, but I ain’t never seen her all dolled up like that.” The boy’s eyes drifted back to the advancing patrol car.

“Forget about that,” Walt said. He radioed the unit to hold off. The cruiser pulled to the side of the road just as the two pickups drove out of sight. “You saw her?”

“I said I did, didn’t I?” Crabtree sounded irritated, and more nervous than a few minutes earlier. “Walking…on the side of the road…”

“Walking? What road?”

“And I stopped to… you know.”

“Let’s assume I don’t know,” Walt said.

“She got in. But she was fucked-up.”

“You knew this how?”

“Because she was fucked-up. Shit, Sheriff. Fucked-up. You don’t know fucked-up?”

“In what way?”

“High. Real high. Barely recognized me. Barely standing up. That kind of fucked-up. Real fucked-up.”

“Intoxicated.”

“No. More than that. High. Boozed-up, yeah, but fried, you know? Spaced. And I say, ‘Get in,’ and she gets in, like it’s cool. You know? With me. I mean, that’s like totally not happening. And I say, ‘Where to?’ And this is, like, I don’t know, the middle of the fucking night.”

“And she was on which road?” Walt asked.

Crabtree looked as if he’d been slapped. “This road,” he said, pointing. “East Fork. Headed down toward the highway.”

“And you were headed where at that time of night? The middle of the night?”

“I don’t know. Don’t remember. Smokes, I suppose? Mountain View,” he said, referring to a gas station quick stop.

“Okay.”

“And once she’s in the car, you know, I see she’s all messed-up. The dress is toast. Her face looks like shit, like she’s been beaten real bad. Her left tit comes out of the dress and she barely notices. Stuffs it back in and looks over at me with these creeped-out, dead eyes. And now I’m thinking she’s loopy because someone hit her too hard or something. Like my moms used to get…And I’m no longer asking her, ‘Where to?’ I’m booking it for the hospital.”

“You took her to the hospital?”

“I dropped her there, yeah. I thought about taking her in, you know, but what was going to happen to me? I’d be talking to you. The way I am right now. And no one would believe me, just like you don’t believe me. That’s how it is with me. That’s how it always is, so fuck that. I just dropped her. Let her figure it out.”

“You came to my house the other night,” Walt said. “The back door.”

“That wasn’t me.” Spoken too quickly, and with his eyes to the ground.