8 Sweet Payback (10 page)

He didn’t have to suggest it
twice. Sam set her pages down and trudged to the kitchen with their coffee
cups. She’d brushed her teeth and smoothed the sheets from their earlier visit,
and was about to settle herself into sleepy bliss when she heard his footsteps
on the stairs.

“Well, this adds an interesting
wrinkle,” Beau said, coming into the room. “At the time Jessie Starkey
confessed, he tested positive for cocaine.”

Sam gave a puzzled look.

“That little fact never came up at
the trial,” Beau said. “And the lab report was shoved between two other pages,
in a spot completely unrelated to the confession.”

“So you think someone tried to
cover it up?”

“That would be my guess.”

Chapter
10

The revelations in the Angela
Cayne case file might have kept Sam awake but that didn’t turn out to be. Her
head hit the pillow and she didn’t even roll over until gray dawn began to
filter into the bedroom. When she reached out for Beau she discovered that he
was not in bed. No light from the bathroom; he must be downstairs. She found
him at the dining table with pages from the file spread out in stacks.

“Morning, baby,” she said. “Did
you actually settle into bed last night at all?”

“Oh, yeah. A few hours. Kept
waking up though. Finally, it made more sense to let you sleep without all my
tossing and turning.”

She kissed the top of his head.
“Coffee?”

Not waiting for his answer, she
went into the kitchen and found that he’d already brewed some, just hadn’t
remembered to pour it. She doctored two mugs and carried them to the table.

“I’m trying to organize all this
into a timeline,” he said. “It’s almost as if somebody took a dozen little
folders and a hundred loose pages and just gathered them up any old which way
and stuck them together with a cover over it all. There’s no sequence to it
whatsoever.”

“Glad you said that. Last night I
was beginning to feel like it was my fuzzy head that wasn’t making sense of
it.”

“Wasn’t you.” He paused for a sip
of his coffee. “You know, taking over this job, half the time I wonder how much
of this stuff was Padilla’s incompetence and how often he might have been
purposely covering up something. I find this kind of sloppy work all the time.
If the defense lawyers were never given Jessie’s drug test results, that alone
could have changed the outcome.”

“If money were no object you could
hire a staff just to go through files and organize them all.”

He snorted. Money was always an
object and he was lucky his current staff hadn’t been cut further. Two of his
older deputies had retired within the last year and he’d been informed that he
couldn’t replace them. Let the rest of the department pick up their duties. So,
no. Finding someone to go through old case files wasn’t going to happen.

“How can I help?” Sam offered.
“Looks like you have a system going there.”

“Yeah, kind of. Once I get each interview,
report, evidence list, etcetera, put into one of these piles, we can both read
through them.” He looked up and sent her one of his winning smiles. “Maybe
something to eat?”

“You got it.” Food wouldn’t be
such a bad idea, Sam decided, thinking to clear her own cobwebby brain.

She found that they were out of
eggs, bacon and bread—when was the last time she’d stopped for groceries? But
there was pancake mix and enough butter and syrup to make one of Beau’s
favorite breakfasts. She heated the griddle and soon had two nicely browned
stacks ready; it didn’t take a second call for Beau to show up and take his
spot at the kitchen table.

“I just wish I didn’t feel like I
was starting so late in the game with this one,” he said halfway through his
fourth pancake. “It’s like everyone in Sembramos was there from day one—they
know all the history, and I’m the unsuspecting guy who’s just walked into the
trap. They’ll tell me only what they want me to know.”

“At least you can’t say that it’s
one little town united against the lawman. Nobody in that place seems to agree
on anything.” Sam swiped a wedge of pancake through her puddle of syrup. “You
know, I remember reading about this in the papers, back when it happened. I
wonder, if we had copies of those articles maybe we would get another angle on
it?”

“We couldn’t use news reports to
build a legal case,” he said.

“I know. But maybe the press
talked to someone back then, somebody the sheriff didn’t formally interview. I
could go down to the newspaper office and get copies of whatever is in their
archives.”

Beau looked a little skeptical but
gave a knock-yourself-out approval to the plan. “Meanwhile, it’s late and I
better get to the office and find out what new catastrophe is facing me today.”

He carried the dishes to the sink,
leaving Sam with her thoughts and her coffee. She ran through her own checklist
for the day. Get out to the monster house and try to finish cleaning the
windows and floors there—she’d sworn to Beau that she would drive straight
through Sembramos without stopping. Go by the newspaper office; check in at
Sweet’s Sweets and hope no new disasters had shown up.

Upstairs, she put on the same
jeans and work shirt she’d worn yesterday. Rummaging in her drawer for a pair
of clean socks she touched the deputy’s badge Beau had given her once when she
helped him with a case. At the time she’d suspected that the old piece of metal
was hers more as a spoof, something to semi-officially give her access to
evidence that she shouldn’t otherwise see. She didn’t actually work for his
department.

On the other hand . . . maybe it
wouldn’t be such a bad idea to have it with her now, as long as she had to
drive through Sembramos a couple of times a day. She pinned it to the waistband
of her jeans and let the shirttail cover it. Just in case.

The April weather had taken
another of its sudden turns, Sam discovered when she walked outside. Clouds
scudded in from the west, driven by a brisk wind that whipped the tender buds
on the apple tree by the barn. So typical of the Rocky Mountain climate—March
winds, April showers, and May flowers, all at once, all competing. She buttoned
her jacket and checked her truck and trailer for supplies.

Since the big house had no
landscaping or electricity, there really was no need for lawn mower, rakes or
vacuum cleaner. She pulled brooms and her biggest mop and bucket from the
trailer’s storage box, stashing them in the back of the truck. It would be far
easier to maneuver the circular drive up there on the hill without the trailer.
Taking a minute to consider the job, it occurred to her that without
electricity up at that house, there would be no way to pump water from the well
and that would mean taking water with her for mopping. She filled a couple of
five-gallon buckets that had lids, checked the dogs’ water bowl while she had
the hose uncoiled, then took a deep breath, climbed in the truck and headed
out.

Sembramos seemed quiet this
morning. Sam gave a little wave to Deputy Rico when she passed his vehicle,
parked in front of the patched-up taxidermy shop. He raised two fingers in
acknowledgement. Otherwise, she saw what appeared to be a normal scattering of
cars at the grocery store, the bank and in the school’s parking lot. She hoped
Beau was right—things might settle down once the Starkey family had buried
Jessie. She wondered if this little town had its own cemetery or if the service
would take place in Taos.

Beyond the town limits the highway
was clear, not a single car passing Sam as she drove north. She spotted the
white dome of the house from more than a mile away. Easier, now that she knew
what she was looking for. She wondered about it—as she often did with these
properties. Who had gone to the effort and expense to build such a place and
then never move into it?

She steered off the highway and
her truck climbed the hill to the circle that led to the open courtyard and the
massive front door. Her new key worked smoothly and she carried her brooms
inside. The place seemed even larger today, with the prospect of having to
manually sweep and mop all that tile. She’d decided to start with the kitchen
when her phone rang. Delbert Crow.

“What’s the progress on the LG
property?” he asked, not bothering with a hello first.

“The what?” Her push broom fell
over, the wooden handle hitting tile with a loud clatter.

“LG Properties. That’s how the
ownership is listed. I hear it’s quite a place.”

“You could say that.” She gave a
quick description of what she’d found, including her estimate that she had
nearly ten thousand square feet of dusty tile to clean. “What’s the story with
it anyway? It’s new construction. No one’s ever lived here.”

“Weird.” Papers rustled in the
background. “It’s not a loan default. The land and property were paid for. It’s
going to auction for back taxes.”

“I wonder how long it’s been here,
empty like this?”

“No idea,” Delbert said. “My file
just shows taxes in arrears for four years. So, that’s what I’m calling
about—we need to push this thing. The auction is set for a week from tomorrow.”
No appreciation for the extra effort, just a click as he hung up.

Sam stared at the expanse of dirty
floor in front of her, wondering as she started to work why she hadn’t been
assigned the job earlier. A little more lead time would have been helpful. An
image of her wooden jewelry box popped into her head. She hadn’t called upon
its powers since their trip to Ireland, when she’d discovered that another box
existed. Something about that—and the fact that she’d almost obtained the
second one as well—had spooked her a little. Until she knew more about the
powers of those things she wanted to be careful.

She’d hardly finished that thought
when her phone rang again. As if the woman had read her mind, it was Cora
Abernathy. The hairs on her arms rose.

“Ms. Sweet?” The elderly
librarian’s voice sounded excited. “I think I’ve found some information for
you, if you want to stop by later on.”

Not the best time to drop
everything and rush off in search of Bertha Martinez’s acquaintances, but Sam
had set this ball in motion and the woman had gone to some work on her behalf.
She explained about being tied up with the job and being away from Taos at the
moment, but promised to get by the library within a day or so.

Cora seemed a little disappointed
that Sam wasn’t a block away and ready to rush over at that moment. She
probably found herself becoming interested in the subjects she researched for
her patrons and shared in their excitement when she was able to find what they
needed. Sam made a mental note to take the lady a bakery treat when she went by
to pick up the information.

Thinking of the bakery reminded
her that she hadn’t checked in with her crew since yesterday’s crazy-divorcée
incident. A quick call assured her that things were running smoothly so far.
The day was young, though, she reminded herself as she told Jen to call her if
they hit a snag.

She’d finished the kitchen floor
and thought she might tackle the master suite upstairs—putting off the
inevitable task of that massive great room—when her phone rang yet again. What
did people do before cell phones? Came home to dozens of messages, as she
recalled.

Beau asked how things were going,
said he was checking to be sure no one had bothered her in town or up at the
property. He asked if she would want to meet him in town for lunch in thirty
minutes. She begged off, describing the amount of labor ahead of her. She’d
tossed two granola bars into her pack this morning. That would have to suffice
for a few more hours.

She did take a moment to ask how
things were going in Sembramos.

“At the moment, all is quiet. The
Starkey clan seems pretty subdued. I saw a bunch of them milling around the
house this morning, some actually wearing suits. The funeral service is in Taos
at two o’clock. Then burial in the Sembramos cemetery. After that, I imagine
the drinking will start and that’s when I expect we’ll see what the real mood
is.”

“I don’t envy you.”

“Well, if you can, finish up and
get through town before it gets too late—”

“I’ll do my best.”

Among the choices—going through
the old case file on Angela Cayne, stopping at the newspaper office to follow
up on that story, visiting Cora Abernathy to find out what the librarian had to
offer, or sweeping and mopping floors—Sam would have chosen nearly anything
except the one she was stuck with at the moment. Tomorrow, she would call upon
the box for help.

She stepped up her pace and had
finished the master suite by noon. Taking a break for granola bars and water,
she convinced herself that was enough lunch and then tackled the main room. She’d
mopped about half of it when she ran out of clean water. Checking the time, she
decided Beau was right. It was four o’clock and she should get going. She
collected her empty buckets and left the other tools behind. Her lower back and
shoulders were screaming and tomorrow loomed as another very long day.

This time, driving through
Sembramos she followed Beau’s directive and went straight through without a
pause. Once again, she saw Rico’s patrol car at the side of the road, and this
time there were almost no other people in sight. Maybe the whole town was on
alert for trouble from the Starkeys. Maybe the Rodarte sympathizers were
somewhere else, brewing up trouble of their own. Sam only knew she didn’t have
the energy for any of it.

She arrived at home, accepted
kisses from both dogs, and went straight for the shower and the ibuprofen. She
now felt clean and achy. She picked up her jewelry box from the bathroom vanity
and held it for a long moment. When the wooden surface began to glow and Sam
felt the warmth travel up her arms she set it down, aches and pains only a dull
twinge now. She almost had the energy to drive into Taos and check with the
librarian, but it was late and the woman would have gone home. There would be another
day for that.

She wandered downstairs, slightly
at loose ends until Beau came home.
If
he
was able to break away anytime soon. She picked up her phone and speed-dialed
his.

“So far, so good,” he said when
she asked about the situation. “Starkeys just got back to their house from the
cemetery. Joe got a little loud when he saw my cruiser on their street. I’m
waiting on Withers and Rayburn to come out and give me a break. I should be
home by seven.”

She said she would have dinner
ready. A peek into the fridge and pantry narrowed the choices to leftover pizza
or canned soup. She really needed to get to the store. The pizza didn’t look
appealing so she opened the soup and added a little extra seasoning to it;
biscuit mix could be dressed up a little to go with it and she could make it
seem like a real meal. Fortunately, Beau was pretty easy to please in the food
department.