J. Jance: Partner In Crime

“How many inmates are we talking about?” Joanna had asked.

“Fourteen.”

“Any of them high-risk?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Give me the list,” Joanna had conceded at last. “I’m not making any promises, but I’ll run the proposition by the jail commander and see what he has to say.”

In the end, eleven of the proposed inmates had been allowed to attend the service. In his eulogy, Father Morris had spoken of Yolanda Cañedo as a remarkable young woman. Certainly the presence of that solemn collection of inmates bore witness to that. And, as far as Joanna could tell, the prisoners’ behavior had been nothing short of exemplary.

They stood now in a single straight row. With feet splayed apart and hands clasped behind their backs, they might have been a troop of soldiers standing at ease. Seeing them there, dignified and silent in the warm afternoon sun, Joanna was glad she had vetoed the jail commander’s suggestion that they attend the funeral wearing handcuffs and shackles.

Chief Deputy Frank Montoya came up behind her then. “Hey, boss,” he whispered in her ear. “They’re putting the casket into the hearse. Since we’re supposed to be directly behind the family cars, we’d better mount up.”

Nodding, Joanna left the inmates to the care of the two guards and Ted Chapman and walked back toward Frank’s waiting Crown Victoria. Even in heels, the five-foot-four sheriff felt dwarfed as she made her way through the crush of uniformed officers. A light breeze riffled her short red hair.

“Looks like the members of Reverend Chapman’s flock are behaving themselves,” her chief deputy observed, as he started the Civvie’s engine.

“So far so good,” Joanna agreed.

“But they’re not coming to the cemetery?”

Joanna shook her head. “No. Having them at the church is one thing, but going to the cemetery is something else. If there’s any confusion, I was afraid one or more of them might slip away.”

“You’ve got that right,” Frank agreed. “We don’t need to give your friend Ken Junior anything else to piss and moan about.”

“Since when does he need a reason?” Joanna returned.

Ken Junior, otherwise known as Deputy Kenneth Galloway, was Sheriff Brady’s current problem child. He was the nephew and namesake of another Deputy Galloway, one who had been part of a network of corrupt police officers in the administration that had immediately preceded Joanna’s. The elder Galloway had died as a result of wounds received during an armed confrontation with Joanna Brady. Although Joanna had been cleared of any wrongdoing in that incident, the dead man’s relatives continued to hold her responsible for Galloway ’s death.

Although the younger man was the deceased deputy’s nephew rather than his son, around the department, he was referred to as Ken Junior. Fresh out of the Arizona Police Academy at the time of his uncle’s death, the younger Galloway had been far too new and inexperienced to have taken an active part in the police corruption that had marred Sheriff Walter V. McFadden’s administration. For that reason, Ken Junior had been allowed to stay on as a Cochise County deputy sheriff. Never a great supporter of Joanna’s, he had quickly gravitated to union activism and had recently been elected president of Local 83 of the National Federation of Deputy Sheriffs.

In recent months Joanna had clashed with Ken Junior twice regarding Yolanda Cañedo’s illness. The first confrontation had occurred when Joanna suggested that members of the union ought to do at least as much for the Cañedo family as the jail inmates had. The second had happened only a few days earlier, as the Cañedo family had struggled to make arrangements for Yolanda’s funeral.

Deputy Galloway had balked at Joanna’s insistence on giving Yolanda the honor of an official Fallen Officer funeral. Ken Junior had taken the position that, as a mere jail matron, Yolanda Cañedo didn’t qualify as a real Fallen Officer. Joanna had gone to the mat with him on that score. Only over his vociferous objections had two lines of smartly saluting officers greeted Yolanda’s grieving family as they exited St. Dominick’s Church after the funeral.

Led by two Arizona Department of Public Safety motorcycle officers, the hearse pulled away from the curb. One by one the other members of the funeral cortege formed up behind them for the slow, winding trip down Tombstone Canyon to Bisbee’s Evergreen Cemetery two miles away. The ceremony in the cemetery was the part of the service Joanna had steeled herself for. She dreaded the symbolic Last Call and the moment when she would be required to take a carefully folded American flag and deliver it into Leon Cañedo’s hands.

She remembered too clearly another bright fall afternoon, not so different from this one, when Walter V. McFadden had placed a similarly folded flag in Joanna’s trembling hands at the close of Andy’s graveside services.

During the ride down the canyon and around Lavender Pit, Joanna was glad her daughter, Jenny, wouldn’t be at the cemetery. Once again she had reason to be thankful for her former mother-in-law’s kindness and wisdom. Eva Lou Brady had called High Lonesome Ranch early that morning.

“Let Jenny come stay with Jim Bob and me tonight,” Eva Lou had urged. “After what happened to Andy, Yolanda’s funeral is going to be difficult enough for you. It’ll be even harder on Jen. I’ll have Jim Bob pick her up after school so she’s here with us before the service gets started. That way she won’t have to see the hearse and the cars pulling into the cemetery. We’ll take her out for pizza and try to keep her occupied.”

Lowell School, where Jenny attended seventh grade, was situated directly across the street from Evergreen Cemetery. Not only that, Joanna had been dismayed the day before when she drove by the cemetery and noticed that the plot Leon Cañedo had chosen was fully visible from some of Jenny’s classroom windows.

Bearing all that in mind, Joanna had readily agreed to her former mother-in-law’s suggestion. Now, driving into her own front yard and seeing the darkened house, Joanna was even more grateful. This was a night when she needed a buffer between home and work. The killer combination of funeral, wailing bagpipes, graveside service, and church-sponsored reception afterward had stretched Sheriff Joanna Brady’s considerable resources to the breaking point. Had Butch or Jenny asked about Yolanda Cañedo’s funeral, Joanna would likely have dissolved in tears.

The motion-activated light above the garage flashed on, illuminating Joanna’s way from the car to the house. The afternoon had been warm, but as soon as the sun went down, there was a hint of fall in the air. Once inside, Joanna hurried to the bedroom, where she stripped off her clothing and weapons. She locked away her two Glocks and pulled on a thick terry-cloth robe. Headed for the kitchen, she was stopped halfway there by a ringing phone.

“How did it go?” the Reverend Marianne Maculyea asked. “And how are you doing?”

Joanna’s friendship with Marianne dated from when the two of them had been preadolescent students at the same school Jenny now attended. Married and the mother of two, Marianne was also pastor at Tombstone Canyon United Methodist Church, where Joanna and Butch were members. She was the only person to whom Joanna had confided her concerns about attending and participating in Yolanda Cañedo’s funeral service.

“I’m all right,” Joanna replied grimly. “But it was tough.”

“You don’t sound all right,” Marianne observed.

“No, I suppose not,” Joanna said. “The Last Call was bad, but when I had to give Leon the flag, I really choked up. If I could have come home right then, maybe it wouldn’t have been so bad. Instead, I had to go back up to the church and stay through the whole reception. That almost killed me, Mari. Yolanda’s sons, Manny and Frankie, were there in their white shirts and blue slacks and little bow ties. They’re such cute kids, but they’re so lost and hurt right now, I could hardly stand to look at them, to say nothing of speak to them. What do you say to kids like that? What can you say?”