A Body to Spare (The Odelia Grey Mysteries) (21 page)

“Interesting,” Clark said. “Very interesting. But more interesting out there. I caught the press conference about the Finch kid and his sister. Who was that ass yelling out Odelia’s name?”

“That was John Swayze,” Greg told him. I’d gone into the living room and plopped down again on the sofa. Greg wheeled in next to me while he talked. “Too bad Odelia didn’t take out his mouth instead of his hand when she swung that bat at him yesterday.”

“Yeah, he’s a real jackass,” Clark said. “Are you sure he doesn’t have an axe to grind against Odelia instead of just being a nosy nerd?”

“We’ve both given that a lot of thought, Clark,” Greg said, “and we’ve come up with nothing. To our knowledge, we’ve never come across him or anyone by the name of Swayze.”

“I read his Marigold report,” Clark said, “and you’re right, it’s pretty mundane stuff.”

“Have you learned anything?” I asked, mustering up some energy.

“Yeah, quite a bit, in fact,” Clark said. “First of all, the Finch family wasn’t a Norman Rockwell painting of love and healthy living. Seems Mrs. Finch had a bit of a drinking problem long before Zach disappeared. Alec Finch was a very controlling father, overbearing and abusive.”

“How did you find that out so quickly?” Greg asked.

Clark laughed. “Seems there’s a Jean Utley right here in town. I read about her in a little local weekly newspaper and looked her up on a gut feeling. She’s a retired librarian and remembers the Finch kids quite well, especially Jean. At the time I spoke with her, the news hadn’t broken yet about Jean’s death. I’m sure Mrs. Utley will be quite torn up over it when she hears.”

“Jean told me that woman was dead,” I said, surprised.

“Far from it,” Clark said. “She’s quite old but very spry and sharp. When I told her I was a writer looking to write a book about the Finch kidnapping, she opened right up. Librarians love writers.”

“You couldn’t write a grocery list,” I said.

“No, probably not,” Clark laughed, “but she didn’t know that. Mrs. Utley said Jean used to spend a lot of time in the school library hiding in the stacks, reading. She said she never wanted to go home and once even asked Mrs. Utley if she could go live with her.”

“Instead, Jean took her name when she ran away as an adult,” Greg noted.

“Sure looks that way,” Clark agreed. “I asked Mrs. Utley if she knew why Jean didn’t want to go home, and she got very upset. She said it was suspected that Alec Finch abused his wife and kids. When I pressed about how much people suspected it, she confessed it was common knowledge but that no one would do anything because of Finch’s power and money. She said she never saw bruises on the kids, but emotionally they had all the signs of being battered, especially Jean. Mrs. Utley said she’s always felt guilty about not stepping in herself and stopping it.”

“Was any of it sexual?” I asked.

“I asked specifically about that, and she said she didn’t think so but did say both kids spent as little time as possible at home. She said Zach was always running around the streets with his friends. Sometimes Mrs. Utley and her husband would see him walking alone late at night or just sitting on the swings in the school yard. The cops knew the situation at home and left him alone because he wasn’t a troublemaker.”

“How sad,” I said, shaking my head.

“What about the happy photos in the paper?” Greg asked.

“I asked Mrs. Utley about that,” Clark answered, “and she said Alec Finch often trotted out his family for public appearances. They were well liked, except for Alec, and when he was travelling, which he did a great deal, Maryanne and the kids seemed like a happy and close-knit family.”

A new thought, fresh and shiny, occurred to me. “Do you think Zach convinced his kidnappers to let him go, and he went into hiding to get away from his father?”

The two men went silent while they considered my question. Finally, Clark said, “Now there’s a plausible thought, although it would be pretty difficult for a kid of fifteen to go on his own without hitting the mean streets as a runaway. If the cops picked him up for any reason, they’d know immediately who he was. And his photo was plastered all over the media, so people might have recognized him, especially since Daddy Finch offered a nice fat reward.”

“So who would help him?” asked Greg. “The kidnappers would probably take the money and send the kid packing before they took off. They wouldn’t care what happened to him once they got their payoff.”

“True,” Clark agreed. “Maybe they even gave Zach a few bucks as seed money, but that still wouldn’t get him far.”

Something buried in my memory was waving at me, and it wasn’t being subtle. It was jumping up and down and spinning its arms in the air like a driver stranded on the side of a road. Before it sent up a flare, I focused inward, finally recognizing the tidbit of information so determined to come out.

“Honey,” I said to Greg, “didn’t Jean mention something about someone reported to have spotted Zach somewhere near Vegas a few years after he disappeared?”

His eyebrows came together as he gave my question thought. “Yeah,” he said, “I remember her saying something like that. Didn’t she say the police investigated the report and found it not to be true?”

“Yes,” I said, “but what if it
was
true, and Zach took off before they could investigate it?”

“Or the witness could have disappeared or recanted,” Clark suggested.

“Clark,” I said, “I found a comb left behind in the spare bathroom at Jean’s. It had blond hair stuck to it. I gave the comb to Fehring, and she’s going to have the hair analyzed. What if Zach eventually contacted his sister, and they met up in California? Maybe that’s why she left Aztec so soon after she went to work there. Maybe the two of them took the surname of Utley and lived together.”

“Jean wasn’t exactly in hiding, though, was she?” Clark asked.

“Not really,” Greg answered. “She’d cut off ties with her father, but she was an actress. Even though she mostly had bit parts on TV, it doesn’t seem like she would have pursued such a career if she had been in total hiding.”

“It’s going to take the police days, if not weeks, to process that hair,” Clark said, “unless the FBI can put a rush on it.” He paused. “Didn’t you say Jean claimed another actor lived with her but had moved out recently?”

“Yes,” I confirmed, “but they didn’t take any furniture, just their personal effects.”

“But if it was Zach and not another actor who lived there, what spooked him to make him leave suddenly?” Greg asked. “Do you think he knew someone was out to get him?”

I shook my head. “If he thought he was in danger, then he would have assumed Jean was too, and she would not have stayed behind. If she was hiding him, she would have known too much.”

At the same time Greg and I yelled out, “Glick!”

“What?” asked Clark.

“Nathan Glick,” Greg responded. “That was the slick dude next to Finch at the press conference—the one who spoke after him.”

“What about him?” Clark asked, his voice slow with suspicion.

“Shortly before you called,” I said, “Elaine Powers called. She recognized Glick’s voice from the TV as the guy who tried to hire her to take out Zach and Jean.”

“Elaine Powers got in touch with you?” Clark asked. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“That’s one of the reasons why I texted you to call me,” I said, getting defensive. “We’ve been a bit busy with the cops out here, you know.” Truth is, I didn’t want Clark to know yet that Elaine had contacted us through Mom. I wanted to tell him that in person, just in case he had a stroke and we needed to call 911.

After a short pause, Clark asked, “Okay, so what else did she say?”

“The first time, she talked to us,” I began.

“The first time?” I could hear Clark’s blood pressure rising through the phone.

I looked up at Greg and he looked concerned. “Tread lightly,” he mouthed. I nodded in agreement.

“Yes,” I said to Clark. “We’ve talked to her twice now. The first time, she told us she had nothing to do with the Finch murders but that her crew had been contacted to take on the job. She turned it down even before she knew who was doing the asking as being too much of a hot potato.”

“The second time we spoke to her,” Greg chimed in, “was just now. She called to say she’d seen the press conference and recognized Glick’s voice as the guy who tried to hire her and her crew.”

“Does she have any idea who might have taken the job?” Clark asked.

“No,” Greg answered, “but she’s having her people look into it.”

There was another long pause on Clark’s side before he said, “Well, that’s very interesting, because I finally tracked down Chris Cook. He and his family returned late tonight from visiting family. I gave him the same cock-and-bull story I gave Mrs. Utley, and he bought it just like she did.” He chuckled. “Trusting people must be a Midwestern thing because most people I know on both coasts would have asked for credentials and checked them out first.”

His comment made me think about how easily we’d obtained access to Jean.

He paused, and we could hear him take a drink of something. It was probably his twentieth cup of coffee for the day. “I have to tell you,” Clark continued, “it really made my job easier not having Zach’s death plastered all over the news until just now. None of these people might have spoken to me otherwise. To them it was a cold, sad story and I was just doing research. Anyway, after we went over the usual stuff that happened that night and he confirmed that he saw Zach go into the house, I asked him if he kept in touch with his buddy Nathan Glick, since they were the only two left from that posse. He said they did keep in touch, though less often now that Glick had moved to Chicago and he had gotten married.” Clark chuckled. “Seems Mrs. Cook does not like Glick—at least that’s what Chris confided in me. Which is interesting because when I asked Mrs. Utley about Zach’s friends, she said they were all nice boys except for Nathan.”

“How so?” Greg asked. “Was he in trouble a lot?”

“Not really, but she said he was always up to something and could get the other boys to do almost anything. She said he was sneaky and manipulative.”

“He was acting more like a handler with Alec Finch today,” I said.

“Did you find out anything else about Glick?” Greg asked.

“One last tidbit,” Clark said. “And this ties a lot together, especially with what Elaine Powers said. When I asked Chris about contacting Nathan, he said I might have to wait because he left last week for a Hawaiian vacation and would be gone about ten days.”

“And now he pops up in California,” noted Greg.

“He could have flown back to meet up with Finch when he found out about Zach,” I suggested.

“But here’s the thing,” Clark said, and I could almost hear a smile in his voice. “I checked on his flight information.”

I wanted to ask how but knew better. Greg caught my eye and shook his head in his own form of surrender.

“Don’t tell me,” I said into the phone. “He didn’t go to Hawaii. He flew to Los Angeles instead.”

“Yes and no, sis,” Clark said. “Nathan Glick flew to Maui on February eighth with a layover in Los Angeles.”

“A layover in LA isn’t unusual, Clark,” Greg noted. “You can get a nonstop to Maui from LA.”

“But a three-day layover?” Clark asked. “According to my source, Glick flew to Maui on the eleventh and checked into an ocean-view suite at the Grand Wailea Hotel for a ten-day stay. He cut his vacation short and flew back to LA on the twentieth, two days after Zach was found dead.”

“Those few days before Hawaii would have given him enough time to set up the hit,” I said. “I wish Dev hadn’t taken that phone because we could ask Elaine what day she got the hit request.”

“What phone, and what does Dev have to do with it?” Clark asked.

“Elaine gave us a burner phone to use so she could get in touch with us easier in case she found out anything else,” Greg explained. “Dev found out and took it away from us.”

“Smart man,” Clark said. “So where is Dev now?”

“He’s at his daughter’s, babysitting his grandkids,” I told him. “He was with us when Elaine called to tell us about Glick. He said he was going to call Fehring and fill her in.”

There was another long pause, then Clark said, “I don’t like this one bit. If Powers didn’t do this hit, then there is another
contract
killer out there who did the job and knows who you are, Odelia.” I heard my brother blow out a long breath, just short of a whistle. “Any other hitmen on your Christmas card list?”

“Smart ass,” I snapped at the phone.

“Well, someone with a gun for hire knows where you live, and that makes me nervous—very nervous.”

“If it makes you feel any better, we’re not home right now,” I told Clark. “We’re in hiding for a few days—Fehring’s orders. Only she and Dev know where we are. We’re not even supposed to tell you and Mom.”

“I can live with that,” Clark said with relief. “The question is, can you?”

“Trust me,” Greg said. “Wild horses couldn’t blast us out of this place. We’re going to let the feds and the police handle this.”

“For a change?” Clark quipped. “Listen, I was going to fly back to LA tomorrow, but I think I’ll stick around and ask about Glick. You two stay put.”

twenty-four

“Hi, Mom,” I said
into the phone. “I just wanted to check on you before we went to bed. Everything okay? No more contact with Elaine?”

“Not a peep,” she told me. “It’s kind of boring.”

“Boring is nice and safe,” I told her. Greg looked up from his Kindle and shook his head.

We were tucked in for the night at Dev’s place. Muffin was on the bed at our feet. Wainwright was on the floor at the foot of the bed. As we have at home, Dev had a TV across from the bed. And just like at home, it was tuned to the late-night news.

The big news of the day was still speculation about Zach Finch’s murder and his whereabouts for the past eight-plus years. Jean’s death was getting play, too, with the most popular theory being that it was a murder-suicide—that Jean had killed her brother and then herself—although no one seemed to have a theory about how and why the body got into the trunk of a car. Thankfully, my name was not mentioned again, only my car, like it was some sort of stray animal that had wandered into the car wash looking for a good home.

“Who was that guy who yelled out your name earlier?” Mom asked.

“I have no idea, Mom,” I lied. I may not lie to Dev or Fehring, but I sure didn’t feel bad about lying to my mother. She claims I’m not good at it, but every now and then I sneak one past her, usually for her own good. “Probably some reporter who paid someone to leak my name.”

“It was probably those car wash people, Odelia,” Mom said. “Maybe you don’t tip them enough.”

I dropped my head to my chest in defeat. Mom had a remark for everything. “Until this is over, how about you staying put in your complex?” I asked. I wanted to give her a direct order, but that would go over like a fart in church.

“You already told me that, Odelia, when you called earlier. I don’t need to be reminded.”

“Fehring asked Greg and me to keep a low profile too.” Again my words merited a glance from my husband. “Just for a day or two.”

“Sure,” she said with a sigh. “Besides, I’m still really tired from my trip. I guess old age is catching up to me. That and all the excitement today.”

“Are you sure you’re okay, Mom?” It wasn’t like my mother to be so tired. Even Clark had said something about her being tuckered out from her trip. Greg took his eyes off his book and listened to the conversation more closely. “Maybe you should schedule a doctor’s appointment soon for a checkup,” I suggested.

“I am overdue,” she agreed, “though there’s nothing a pill-pusher can do for old age. No late night for me tonight, though. I’m going to go to bed right after this call.”

“That’s a great idea, Mom. By the way, we heard from Clark. He’ll be back in a day or so.”

“Yes, I know. He called me right after he called you. He told me to keep my skinny ass at home until he gets here—his exact words. Now is that any way to talk to your mother?”

I laughed. She was fine. “Sweet dreams, Mom.”

“
’Night, Grace,” Greg called over from his side of the bed.

After I hung up, Greg asked, “Is everything okay with Grace?”

I hemmed and hawed. “She seems okay except that she’s more tired than usual.” I scooted under the covers and cuddled next to Greg. “Hopefully she’ll take my suggestion and go get a checkup.”

When I woke in the morning, I was a bit disoriented. This wasn’t our bedroom or our furniture. I was alone in a strange bed. Then I remembered we were staying at Dev Frye’s house. I settled back into the comfortable bed and listened. Sounds were coming from another part of the house—words being spoken. I concentrated on listening, wondering who might be out there. It was too early for Dev to have returned. A smile spilled across my sleepy face as I realized that there was only one voice—Greg’s. He was talking to Muffin, cooing to her, calling her a good girl, a pretty girl, his baby girl. I smiled, happy that we had kept the family together in exile. The smell of coffee also made me smile. Getting up, I made a quick stop in the bathroom, then padded out to the kitchen on bare feet, where I found my hubs wheeled up to the kitchen table, reading the Sunday paper with Muffin on his lap. She was purring like a locomotive while he stroked her with one hand.

“Morning, sleepyhead,” Greg said when I came up and gave him a big good morning kiss on the lips.

“What time is it?” I asked, running a hand through my rumpled hair.

“Almost ten.”

“Ten?” I was surprised. Unless I was sick or didn’t get to bed until the wee hours of the morning, I was not someone who slept in, not even on weekends.

He looked up from the paper. “I don’t think Grace was the only one exhausted last night. I haven’t been up that long myself. Wainwright woke me so he could go outside. No doggie door here.”

“Where is he now?”

With a toss of his head, Greg indicated the partially opened back door. “Wallowing on all that grass, last I looked. I’ve already fed them both.”

“Where’d you get the newspaper?”

“Dev gets home delivery. Fortunately, it was on the front porch. I had Wainwright retrieve it for me.”

I shuffled to the counter and the coffeemaker. Next to it was a mug waiting for me. I picked it up and stared at it. “How did you get the mugs down from the cupboards?” I asked, seeing how high Dev’s cabinets were compared to ours.

“Where there’s morning coffee involved,” Greg said with a grin, “there’s a will and a way.”

I poured myself a cup of coffee. “No, seriously,” I said with a laugh. “The coffee can was already on the counter—I noticed it there last night—but not the mugs. What sort of magic did you do? Did you get Wainwright up on the counter to fetch them like he did the paper?” I brought my coffee over to the table and took a chair near Greg.

“I used my brain, sweetheart.” He tapped the side of his skull with an index finger. “I found a couple of dirty mugs in the dishwasher and handwashed them. Otherwise, I’d be drinking my coffee directly from the pot.”

“My hero.” I leaned over and kissed him. “Did you find some breakfast too or will we be fighting the animals for kibble this morning?”

“There’s not much in the fridge, I’m afraid. We should have brought a few things with us.”

I took a sip of my coffee. “When we run out for breakfast we can pick up a few things, but do you really think we’ll be here beyond today?”

He shrugged. “Hard to say, but if we do need to hide out longer, I’ll need to decide what I’m going to do about work tomorrow.”

“But with the information Elaine gave us about Glick, I’m sure Fehring and Shipman are all over him by now.”

“I have no doubt they’ll be questioning him,” Greg said, his eyes still on the newspaper, “but who knows if they pulled him in yesterday or not.” Greg stopped reading and looked at me. “And Glick is probably not our real danger. Whoever killed Zach and his sister is the real threat. And Glick might not be so quick to admit to hiring a killer and giving up the information on them.” He shook the paper. “The story about Zach and his sister is all over the news, here and on TV. I’m sure whoever did the killing is watching it carefully to judge their exposure.”

I got up from the table abruptly and walked to the back door to think. From there I could see Wainwright sprawled on the grass, flattened against it as if he was trying to hide among the short blades. He must have smelled me because he lifted his noble head in my direction and wagged his tail with enthusiasm. I blew him a kiss and returned to the table.

“I hate sitting around like this,” I told Greg. “It makes me even more nervous. There must be something we can do that won’t put us in the path of the killer.”

From the bedroom came the sound of a ringing cell phone. “That’s mine,” I said and headed in that direction to retrieve it. I brought it out to the kitchen and put it on speaker. “It’s Dev,” I said to Greg, holding the phone between us.

“Just checking on you kids,” Dev said. “Everything going okay?”

“Yes,” I said. “We’re fine, just antsy. Any news from Fehring?”

“She pulled Finch in last night right after I told her about the call you got from Elaine Powers,” he told us. “He’s probably still in custody.” He paused. “But Glick’s disappeared, and everyone’s looking for him.”

Greg and I looked at each other. “So it’s looking like Elaine was right about Glick,” I said.

“Nothing’s confirmed,” Dev said, “and Finch has clammed up until his high-priced lawyer gets here, but it’s a real good possibility.”

“Dev,” Greg said, “we were just talking about going out for a quick brunch and a little grocery shopping, if that’s okay? No one knows where we are, so a little outing shouldn’t hurt.”

“Sure, but stay close to my place. Odelia, you used to live close by, so you know the area.”

“There used to be a great little breakfast place on Seventeenth Street, right across from Ralphs,” I said. “We could hit both in short order.”

“That café is still there,” Dev confirmed. “Sorry I don’t have more in the house for you guys to eat. I’ve been kind of winging it until I leave.”

“It’s okay, Dev,” Greg said. “I don’t think the killer is going to track us down in an hour or so.”

“Just be careful and stay close to your phones. And keep the van out of sight as much as possible. I’ll be doing family stuff here most of the day, but Andrea promised to keep me in the loop. She’ll probably be calling you too. We’re the only ones who know where you are; not even Shipman knows. Andrea let him know that we have you squirreled away, and he’s okay with that. Less for him to worry about.” Dev paused, then added, “Shipman’s not a bad guy, just very intense and ambitious. He hates having civilians in the middle of his investigations even more than we do.” I could hear the slight smile behind the words.

“Does Shipman know about Elaine Powers?” I asked.

“Yeah, Andrea passed that along to him. I’m sure Shipman will be talking to you about it at some point, but his first order of business is to find Glick. But trust me, he’s not only hell-bent on solving the Finch murders, but now he’ll be intent on nailing Powers too. It would be quite a boost to his career for him to do both.”

“What about Andrea Fehring?” Greg asked. “Shouldn’t she get some of the credit if this gets solved?”

“She’ll get some fallout credit,” Dev said, “but whenever the feds are involved, they hog most of the accolades. It’s always like that. But don’t worry, Andrea’s cool with it. She just wants to get the murders solved.”

We could hear noise in the background on Dev’s end, then he said, “Sorry, gotta go. I promised the kids I’d get the bouncy castle up and running. Like I said, stay close to your phones.”

After the call, we quickly got cleaned up and went out in search of food. Since we didn’t plan on being gone long, we left Wainwright in the gated back yard with his food and water bowl outside. The dog didn’t seem to mind. He was still happy playing explorer in the grass.

“Who are you calling?” Greg asked. We were outside the café waiting for a table. It was crowded but not too bad, especially for a Sunday. The hostess said it would be a ten- to fifteen-minute wait to get a table that would accommodate Greg’s wheelchair.

“Mom,” I told him, holding the phone up to my ear. “She sounded so tired last night that I want to make sure she’s okay this morning.”

“Good idea,” he agreed. Greg’s folks had called him right after the press conference. They’d been upset hearing my name on the TV. Greg had assured them that everything was under control and that I was not a suspect, just the person who had found the body. He left out the part about us meeting with Jean Utley right before her death and Swayze’s intrusion, and he certainly didn’t mention Elaine. I have complete confidence in the love Greg’s parents have for me; they’re the best. But I know they’ll never get used to their daughter-in-law being a corpse magnet. Unlike my mother, who finds it exciting, they are rightfully horrified.

The phone rang and rang and eventually went to voice mail. I tried again, but still nothing but voice mail. “She’s not answering,” I told Greg.

“Maybe she went out for a walk around her complex. Doesn’t she do that quite often?”

“Yes. There’s a small group of ladies who walk every day around lunchtime, which would be about now. But Mom seldom leaves her phone behind when she goes. She says she needs it in case one of them croaks along the way.”

“Your mother is such a little ray of sunshine,” Greg said with a smile. “But it’s actually a good idea.”

“More to the point, my mother is worse than a teenager when it comes to her phone and her iPad.”

After a delightful brunch, I tried Mom again. Still it went to voice mail. “I’m getting worried, Greg. Let’s go over there.”

“It could be dangerous,” he said, “or at the very least get Andrea and Dev mad at us.” He started up the van.

“Is that a no, we’re not going?” I turned in my seat to glare at my husband.

“Of course not, sweetheart,” he said with a slight laugh. He pulled out of the parking space and pointed the van toward the exit. “I was just stating the possibilities. Buckle up—we’re on our way.”

When we reached Mom’s retirement community, Greg pushed the code to get us through the gate. The man in the small white guardhouse, a middle-aged rent-a-cop in a gray uniform, smiled at us with recognition and waved as we passed through.

As soon as we parked in front of Mom’s place, I hopped out without waiting for Greg and trotted to the door. Thankfully, the distance was a lot less than when I had run after Jean the day before. I mashed my hand over the bell several times, just in case she was home. While I waited for an answer, I leaned far over the partial patio wall and tried to look into the living room. The blinds were drawn closed. My mother always opens her blinds as soon as she’s up and dressed. I straightened up and pulled my key ring out of my bag. On it was Mom’s key. By the time Greg caught up with me, I was inside, calling, “Mom!”

Although it was a two-bedroom place, Mom’s condo wasn’t that large. As you walked in, the wall to the right of the front door was the common wall shared with the next townhouse. On it were hung cheerful prints of well-known still-life arrangements, and set against the wall under them was a low bench. To the left was the living room, dining area, and kitchen. Beyond that was a short hallway that branched off to the right toward the small second bedroom and the one bathroom, and to the left to the average-size master bedroom. Midway along the hallway was a closet with folding doors that concealed an apartment-sized washer and dryer and storage for towels and linens.