WHEN JOANNA awakened the next morning, that’s exactly where she found Butch—sound asleep on her living room couch. They had waited up for some time, expecting a phone call. When none came, they had finally ventured into the bedroom. Sometime after Joanna fell asleep, Butch must have crept out of bed. Joanna was grateful for his discretion when, moments after she reached the kitchen to make coffee, Jenny appeared at her side.
“What’s Butch doing on the couch?” she asked.
“Sleeping,” Joanna said.
“I know that. But why?”
“Because if I had been called into the office during the night, somebody would have been here to look after you.”
Pouring herself a bowl of cereal, Jenny scowled. “To baby-sit, you mean. I’m not a baby.”
“No, you’re not. But eleven is still too young to be left here alone at night.”
By the time Joanna finished showering and dressing and returned to the kitchen, Butch was seated in the breakfast nook drinking coffee and chatting amiably with Jenny, who was munching her way through a peanut-butter-slathered English muffin.
As soon as Joanna entered the kitchen, the conversation ground to a sudden, awkward halt. By the time she had poured her own cup of coffee, Jenny had taken her dishes to the counter and was busily stowing them in the dishwasher. Joanna took Jenny’s place in the breakfast nook. “I hope I’m not interrupting something,” she said.
“Oh, no,” Butch replied with a conspiratorial grin. “We’re all done, aren’t we, Jenny?”
From the kitchen doorway, Jenny looked back and nodded. “And you won’t tell? Promise?”
“Cross my heart.”
Satisfied by his words of reassurance, Jenny disappeared into the living room. Joanna turned an appraising eye on Butch. “Does that mean you really won’t tell me?” she asked.
“Yup,” he said. “That’s what it means.”
Joanna shook her head. She was grateful that Jenny and Butch clearly liked one another, but it bothered Joanna to discover their sharing secrets that didn’t include her. It felt as though they were ganging up on her, double-teaming. It made her feel out of the loop and more than slightly resentful. If there was something important going on in her daughter’s life—some important issue that required an adult consultation—Joanna felt she was the one Jenny should have turned to for guidance.
“You’re awfully quiet,” Butch said a minute or so later. “You’re not upset about this, are you?”
“Upset?” Joanna repeated. “Of course I’m not upset. Don’t be ridiculous.”
Her misgivings to the contrary, Joanna agreed to let Butch drive Jenny to school. Meanwhile, Joanna continued to mull over the secrecy issue as she drove herself from High Lonesome Ranch to the Cochise County Justice Complex three miles away. Those private concerns left her the moment she stepped inside her office. Within minutes she was pulled into an escalating whirl of activity that allowed little time for introspection.
Monday morning roll call was the one time a week when as many of her far-flung deputies as possible assembled in the conference room. That gathering was one Joanna tried to attend on a regular basis. It was a way of staying in touch with officers in the field. Once roll call was over, Joanna retreated to the privacy of her own office for the daily briefing with her two chief deputies.
As usual, Chief Deputy for Operations Richard Voland was on hand and on time. He brought with him the routine sheaf of incident reports that had come in county-wide over the weekend. Tossing the papers onto Joanna’s desk, Voland eased his bulky frame into one of the captain’s chairs in front of Joanna’s desk.
“I don’t know where the hell Frank Montoya is,” he grumbled. “I was told he’s up in Tucson chasing after the kid who stole Mayor Rogers’ mother’s car. Isn’t it about time he got his butt back here to Bisbee and started tending to business? I’m sick and tired of having to cover for him—of having to do my work and his, too.”
Relations between Joanna’s two chief deputies had never been cordial. Frank Montoya’s temporary posting to Tombstone had made things worse. Not only that, Frank’s continuing absence meant that Joanna and Dick Voland were thrown together alone for much of the time.
In public, Dick carried on with total professionalism. Alone in Joanna’s office, however, the man’s continuing infatuation with her was growing more and more apparent. He often came to the morning briefing with two cups of coffee in hand. When he gave Joanna hers, fingers brush-big in the process, his face would flush—whether with embarrassment or pleasure, Joanna couldn’t tell. She did know that a call to her from Butch Dixon while Dick Voland was in her office would be enough to send her Chief Deputy for Operations into a day-long funk.
It bothered Joanna that, once the briefings were over, Voland would often find one excuse after another not to leave her office. He would linger in the doorway, making small talk about anything and everything. Sometimes those doorway discussions were official in nature, but more often they revolved around personal issues—around Voland’s bitter divorce and his difficulties as a part-time father. Joanna knew the man was searching for sympathy, and not undeservedly so. But she worried that any personal comments or kind gestures on her part might be misinterpreted.
Before her election to the office of sheriff, Joanna’s experience with law enforcement had been entirely secondhand, as the daughter of one lawman and, later, as the wife and widow of another. Because she had come to the office as a novice police officer, she remained largely dependent on the professionals who worked for her to give her much-needed advice and direction. Richard Voland was an eighteen-year Cochise County Sheriff’s Department veteran. As such, she needed his counsel and help, but his increasingly personal attachment to her forced Joanna to walk a fine line between not alienating the man and not leading him on, either.
On this particular morning, she welcomed Dick Voland’s ill-tempered griping about Frank Montoya. Focus on work usually helped keep personal issues at bay. Without replying, Joanna buzzed her secretary, Kristin Marsten, whose desk was just outside the door.
“Did Chief Deputy Montoya call in to say he’d be late?”
“Actually,” Kristin returned, “he’s on the line right now. I was about to buzz you when you beat me to it. Do you want me to take a message or should I put him through?”
“Let me talk to him,” Joanna replied.
When her line buzzed seconds later, she punched the speakerphone. “What’s up, Frank? Where are you?”
“Still in Tucson,” Montoya answered. “Sorry to miss the briefing, but I wanted to stay with this thing. I was afraid if I didn’t stick around and keep prodding, Pima County would drop the ball.”
“What’s going on?” Joanna asked.
“Everyone has this one filed as juvenile joyriding, which makes it a pretty low priority. When the kid came out of surgery, they didn’t even have any Santa Cruz County detectives here to talk to him. I was it. His mother was there and so was a hotshot attorney who happens to be the kid’s uncle.
“All I wanted to know was where they picked up the car so we’d have some idea of where to go looking for Alice. The kid’s name is Joaquin Morales. His attorney wouldn’t let him talk to me without having some kind of deal in place first. I tried to tell him that if there was a chance Alice was still alive, we needed to find her as soon as possible. The uncle didn’t buy it. He insisted that I call in someone from Pima County. Since the missing person is from Cochise and the shoot-out happened in Santa Cruz, the guys from Pima County weren’t exactly chomping at the bit to come out.
“Finally—reluctantly—Pima County sent out a pair of detectives. According to them, they’ve talked to the kid. He told them he and his buddies found the car out on Houghton Road. If his doctor will release him and if the county attorney will agree to drop all charges, he’s willing to show us where the car was.”
“Wait a minute,” Joanna objected. “That doesn’t make sense. How can anybody put together a deal when they still haven’t found Alice Rogers and when they have no idea whether she’s dead or alive?”
“Good question,” Frank said. “I’m a little curious about that myself. Morales’ attorney made a big squawk about how this is Joaquin’s first offense. I don’t think so. This is just the first one he’s ever gotten caught on, but no one’s particularly interested in my opinion. Besides, all I’m trying to do right now is find Alice while there’s still a remote chance that she’s among the living.”
“I’d say there’s not much of a chance right now,” Joanna murmured.
“You’re right,” Frank agreed. “She disappeared on Saturday night, and now it’s Monday morning. That means she’s been missing at least thirty-six hours. An older woman like that, if she’s been out in the weather all that time, she’s probably succumbed by now—hypothermia if nothing else.”
“So what’s the plan?” Joanna asked.
“I’m going to hang around here. If Pima County cuts a deal and they take Joaquin out to look for the crime scene, I intend to ride along.”
“Good,” Joanna said. “Keep me posted.”
Switching off the speakerphone, Joanna turned back to Dick Voland and business as usual. Ten minutes later, the phone rang again. “The Pima County attorney gave Morales his sweetheart deal. If Joaquin leads us to the crime scene, all charges are dropped. That’s where I’m going now—someplace out on Houghton Road. Morales and the Pima County cops are going in one vehicle and I’m going in mine. Once we get out in that general direction, we’re supposed to rendezvous with a Search and Rescue team.”
“Has Clete Rogers been informed about any of these latest developments?” Joanna asked.
“No,” Frank said. “I haven’t called him. Up to now, I didn’t think I had enough information to clue him in. Once we locate where the kids picked up the car, we’ll have a probable place to start looking for his mother. Now is most likely a good time to bring him up to speed. Clete Rogers may be a complete jerk. Even so, he deserves some advance warning about what’s going on. And, taking all the political implications into consideration, Joanna, you’re the one who should tell him,” Frank added.
Not so very long ago, Joanna Brady herself had been on the receiving end of a next-of-kin notification. She knew how much that kind of news hurt—knew that it tore people apart from the inside out. Not only that, her own wounds were still fresh enough that there was no way for her to distance herself from other people’s hurt. Those were her private concerns, but she was careful not to make them part of her voiced objection.
Across the polished surface of Joanna’s desk, Dick Voland shook his head. “Don’t look at me,” he said. “I’ve got too much work to do.”
“Look, Sheriff,” Frank Montoya said in a placating tone that was calculated to win her over, “I know how this guy operates. Clete Rogers is an arrogant jerk, but he’s also a master manipulator. You’ll be doing yourself and your whole department a big favor if you handle this in person. Clete will be a lot less likely to get his nose out of joint and make trouble if news of his mother comes to him sheriff-to-mayor rather than deputy-to-mayor. Most people don’t give a rat’s ass about who gives them the bad news, but Clete Rogers isn’t most people. He’s a guy who walks around with a huge chip on his shoulder just waiting for somebody to cross him or slight him in any way. That’s why I ended up in Tombstone in the first place. Rogers somehow got the idea that the previous marshal wasn’t respectful enough toward him, regardless of whether or not he deserved anybody’s respect.”
“In other words,” Joanna said, “if I don’t do this, Mayor Rogers is going to make your life miserable for as long as you’re stuck in Tombstone.”
“My life and yours, too,” Montoya told her. “He’ll pull out all the stops.”
Sighing, Joanna glanced at her watch. “What about the board of supervisors meeting this morning?” she asked. “If I can’t go and you’re not going, who will handle that?”
“Let me guess,” Voland grumbled from the far side of Joanna’s desk. “I suppose that’s going to wind up in my lap. I’ll take care of it. I’d much rather do that than have to deal with Clete Rogers.”
“Okay, then Frank,” Joanna said. “Since Dick has agreed to handle the board meeting, I’ll be responsible for notifying Rogers. But what about his sister? Who’s going to notify Susan Jenkins? If Clete merits the benefit of the full deluxe treatment, including a personal visit from the sheriff, shouldn’t his sister deserve similar consideration? What if she feels slighted?”
“Let me point out that Susan Jenkins isn’t an elected official with a sizable voting constituency,” Frank said. “I’m sure someone should go talk to the woman in person, but that someone doesn’t have to be you.”
“Good,” Joanna breathed. “Maybe Dick has some stray deputy or other he can spare long enough to send out to Sierra Vista.”
The Chief Deputy for Operations was already examining his duty roster. “There’s Deputy Gregovich,” Voland said. “He and Spike are heading that direction first thing this morning. They’re due at the Oak Vista construction site outside Sierra Vista. If he stops by to see Susan Jenkins, it won’t be that far out of his way.”
Oak Vista Estates was a new mammoth-sized housing development being built at the southern end of the Huachuca Mountains. The previous Friday afternoon, sign-carrying protesters—people who preferred grassy, oak-dotted foothills to freshly bulldozed urban blight—had held hands across the development’s construction entrance in an unsuccessful effort to block the arrival of flatbed trucks delivering bulldozers, backhoes, and front-end loaders to the site. In the end Mark Childers, the developer, had carried the day by simply waiting out the protesters. He had delivered his equipment after the tree-huggers had all gone home for the night.
Now, in a new week and with work on the project underway in earnest, no one knew quite what to expect. Which was why Voland had dispatched Deputy Gregovich and Spike to the scene in hopes of preventing trouble before it could start.
Terry Gregovich was a Bisbee native and a former marine who had been riffed out of the service after two tours of duty. Back home in Cochise County, Gregovich had done such outstanding work with the Search and Rescue team that Joanna had brought him on board, hoping to turn him into a detective. That plan had been shot down by budget considerations, but when Frank Montoya had located grant money to establish a K-9 unit, Terry’s previous K-9 experience working airport security with the military as well as time spent as an MP had put him on a fast track. He and Spike, an eighty-five-pound German shepherd, were the Cochise County Sheriffs Department’s newest rookies. They generally worked nighttime shifts, but Voland had posted them to days to help handle the Oak Vista protesters.
“Terry’s pretty new on the job,” Joanna observed. “Do you think he can handle talking to bereaved relatives on his own?”
“No doubt about it,” Voland said. “Terry may be new to our department, but it’s not like he’s never been a cop before. He’ll be fine.”
“And what about Spike?” Joanna asked.
“What about him?”
“Here’s Clete Rogers getting a personal visit from the sheriff herself while his sister ends up with a rookie officer and a slobbery German shepherd besides. It sounds a little inequitable to me.”
Dick Voland didn’t seem to appreciate the joke, but Frank Montoya laughed aloud. “No doubt Hizzoner will approve. I’m not so sure about Susan Jenkins.”
“It’s Gregovich or nothing,” Dick Voland growled. “He’s the only deputy I can spare this morning.”
“All right,” Joanna said. “That settles it then. I’ll head for Tombstone as soon as I can. Talk to you later, Frank.” With that she once again switched off the speaker and focused her attention on Voland. “Anything urgent before I hit the road?”
“Nothing that won’t keep,” he said. With that Dick Voland stood up and lumbered toward the outer office. This time he marched straight into the reception area. Breathing a sigh of relief, Joanna followed him. At a desk just outside Joanna’s office, Kristin Marsten was busily sorting through a stack of mail.
“I’m on my way to Tombstone to talk to Clete Rogers,” Joanna told Kristin. “Just put the mail on my desk. It’ll have to wait until I get back.”
Letting herself out of her private entrance and into the parking lot behind the building, Joanna was faced with a decision. As sheriff, she had two vehicles at her disposal—a battle-scarred Chevy Blazer and a shiny and relatively new Crown Victoria. Because she wanted to make an impression on Clete Rogers and because she wasn’t anticipating driving through any four-wheel-type terrain, she opted for the Crown Victoria. Other jurisdictions sometimes referred to Crown Victoria cruisers as “Vics.” Joanna and Frank Montoya preferred to call them Civvies.
The twenty-five-mile drive from Bisbee to Tombstone gave Joanna plenty of time to contemplate how Cletus Rogers would react to the news that his mother’s car had been stolen and that, although she was still officially missing, it was becoming more and more likely that she was dead. Like Frank Montoya, Joanna feared the mayor of Tombstone would come unglued and overreact. What if he decides to go traipsing up to Tucson himself? Joanna wondered. Having him show up at a crime scene will drive the Pima County guys crazy.
Thirty minutes later and still dreading the task ahead, Sheriff Joanna Brady pulled into the parking lot of Clete Rogers’ Grubsteak Restaurant and Saloon on Alien Street. The clapboard-covered building, complete with phony white shutters, looked more like a refugee from a film set than a genuine product of the Old West. As Joanna stepped up on the sidewalk, she noticed, on closer examination, that the exterior paint was chipped and peeling. And when she pushed open the front door, she noted that the carpeting in the front entryway had been tacked down with a few strategically placed strips of duct tape.
Stationed in front of an old-fashioned cash register stood a well-endowed peroxide blonde holding a stack of menus. “Smoking or nonsmoking?” she asked.
Joanna hauled out her badge and flashed it. “I’m looking for Mr. Rogers.”
The hostess stuck a pair of red-framed reading glasses on her nose long enough to examine the ID. “Mr. Rogers is busy,” she said in a brusque manner designed to forestall any further discussion. “He’s upstairs in his office and on the phone long distance. Monday’s order day around here. He’s not to be interrupted.”
“I’m sure he’ll want to speak to me,” Joanna said. “It’s about his mother.”
The hostess sniffed disdainfully. “Well,” she said. “It’s about time someone started looking into that. We’ve had that useless deputy hanging around here for weeks on end, but as soon as there’s a real problem, he up and disappears.”
“Frank Montoya didn’t disappear,” Joanna corrected, coming to her chief deputy’s defense. “He spent the whole night working on this situation, first down in Nogales and now up in Tucson.”
“Oh,” said the hostess, sounding somewhat mollified. “If you’ll just take a seat, I’ll try to catch Mr. Rogers’ eye the next time he’s between calls. Care for a cup of coffee while you wait?”
Joanna was finishing her second cup of coffee when Clete Rogers finally appeared. He was a large, rawboned man somewhere in his mid-to-late fifties. His eyes had the look of someone dealing with life on too little sleep. As soon as he had settled into the booth across the table from Joanna, the hostess hurried up behind him and set a large tumbler of orange juice on the table in front of him.
“Are you all right?” she asked solicitously. Her double chins waggled when she spoke. So did the ample cleavage that showed over the top of her peasant-style blouse.
“Goddamn it, Nancy!” Clete Rogers grumbled at her. “I know if I’m fine or not! Leave me the hell alone. Don’t hover, and get back to work!”
Behind red-framed glasses, Nancy’s enormous blue eyes filmed with tears. Her lower Up trembled right along with her chins, but after a moment she seemed to pull herself together. “Well, excuuuse me!” she snapped back at him, and flounced off.
Clete Rogers looked after her. “Sometimes it’s hard to tell who’s the owner around here and who’s the employee.”
Even though Frank Montoya had warned Joanna about Clete Rogers’ arrogance and ill temper, she was nonetheless surprised by his shabby treatment of someone who was, as far as Joanna could see, a fiercely loyal employee.
Finished with what appeared to be an unwarranted attack on Nancy, Clete turned his attention back to Joanna. “So what’s the deal here, Sheriff Brady? Have you found my mother or not?”
“We’ve located her car,” Joanna said carefully.
“Where?”
“A group of juveniles were stopped while attempting to take it across the border into Mexico.”
“What about Mother?” Rogers asked. “Where’s she?”
“We don’t know,” Joanna said. “Not for sure. We haven’t found her yet.”
Clete Rogers took a swig of his juice. “What exactly does that mean?”
“Just what I said. It means we’re looking for her. So are authorities from Pima and Santa Cruz counties. According to Frank Montoya, they’ve just received what they regard as an informed tip up in Tucson. There’s a Search and Rescue group heading out there now. They’ll be concentrating their efforts along Houghton Road between I-10 and Old Spanish Trail.”
Clete Rogers raised his hand. Despite having been ordered not to hover, Nancy appeared from nowhere as if she’d been hanging fire to see what, if anything, her lord and master might require.
“I’m leaving,” he announced. “Have Ken put together a care package for me. The usual. I’m driving up to Tucson. I don’t want to be stuck out in the middle of nowhere with nothing to eat.”
“Excuse me, Mayor Rogers,” Joanna said. “As I said, there is a search, all right. But it’s being conducted by members of the Pima County Sheriff’s Department. Since it sounds as though that’s where your mother’s car was stolen, officers from Pima County are the ones in charge at this point. I doubt very much that they’ll want any unauthorized onlookers clambering around under hand and foot and possibly disturbing crime scene evidence.”
“And let me remind you, Sheriff Brady, that the person those people are searching for is my mother,” Rogers put in. “Like it or not, I’m involved, and I’m going to stay that way.”
Inside her purse, Joanna’s pager buzzed, sending out a warning that sounded for all the world like a rattlesnake. She reached inside and stifled the thing before Clete Rogers seemed to notice what was going on.
“Really, Mr. Rogers,” she said. “I don’t think your showing up there is wise. As I said before, the more people milling around a crime scene, the greater the chance that important information will be overlooked or destroyed. I believe we’d be better off if—”
“I didn’t hear anyone asking for your advice or your permission, Sheriff Brady. Are you coming with me or not?”
It took all of two seconds for Joanna to make up her mind. No way did she want to be trapped into three hours’ worth of car travel with this overbearing jerk, but she also wanted to be on hand to defend her department and her people in case Rogers launched into an all-out attack over how his mother’s case was being handled.
“Not,” she replied. “I’ll head on up to Tucson as well, but I’ll drive my own vehicle. In fact, I think I’ll leave right now. How much for the coffee?”
What Joanna had left unsaid was that while Rogers waited for his “care package,” she would go on ahead and help run interference for whoever was in charge. Hopefully, she’d have enough of a head start to beat him to the crime scene.
“Never mind about the coffee,” Clete Rogers said. “It’s on the house.”
Reaching into her purse, Joanna pulled out two ones and slapped them down on the table beside her empty cup. She wasn’t going to be beholden to Clete Rogers for anything at all, including two cups of unbelievably bad drip coffee.
“I’ll see you there.”
Out in the car, Joanna checked the pager. Not surprisingly, the number listed was Dick Voland’s direct line at the department. She called him on her cell phone. “It’s Joanna, Dick,” she said when he answered. “What’s up?”
“Frank Montoya just called in. They’ve found Alice Rogers.”
“Alive or dead?” Joanna asked.
“Dead, unfortunately. The kid—Morales—showed them where he and his friends found the car. Search and Rescue turned a dog loose, and he went right out and found the body. It’s six miles east of I-10 on Houghton in a big stand of cholla on the south side of the road.”
“They’re sure it’s Alice Rogers?”
“Pretty sure, pending an official identification from a relative. The clothes the dead woman is wearing match the ones Susan Jenkins told Frank her mother was wearing when she came to dinner Saturday night.”
“What did she die of?”
“No way to tell. Not so far. According to Frank, they found her in the middle of a grove of cholla. He says she’s full of spines. She must have fallen down in the stuff. Not a nice way to go. Frank was hoping to give you a heads-up while you were still in Tombstone so you could let Clete Rogers know.”
Glancing in the rearview mirror to check for traffic, Joanna eased her Crown Victoria onto the street. At that point it would have been no trouble at all to return to the restaurant and give Clete Rogers the news. The bottom line was, Joanna didn’t feel like it. The mayor had been quite specific in saying he wanted no part of her advice. No, let him find out for himself.
“Negative on that,” she told Dick Voland. “You’re too late. I’m already on my way to Tucson. So’s Clete Rogers. If you want to give anyone a heads-up, Frank’s the one who’s going to need it. Let him know Rogers is coming so he can pass the information along to whoever’s in charge for Pima County.”
“Clete’s going to the crime scene?” Dick Voland asked. “The boys from Pima County aren’t going to like that at all.”
“No kidding!” Joanna told him. “In terms of inter-agency cooperation, his showing up will probably put us back ten years. They’ll be ecstatic when a whole crowd shows up. Which reminds me, you’d better send Detective Carpenter along as well. If Pima County has homicide detectives on the scene, so should we.”