Cold Betrayal (22 page)

“You’re asking me to look into it?” Ali asked.

“Yes, I am,” Bishop Gillespie answered. “I’m familiar, of course, with what happened there years ago—the Short Creek incident you mentioned earlier. That was a complete travesty. I certainly don’t want to be responsible for bringing that kind of overreaction down on the heads of folks who may be innocent of any wrongdoing. On the other hand, we have two young women, twelve years apart, risking life, limb, and their children’s lives in desperate attempts to escape. That would suggest that something is seriously wrong as far as The Family is concerned. I want to know what’s really going on up there.”

“All right,” Ali agreed. “I’ll see what I can do.”

That was an easy commitment to make since she was way ahead of Bishop Gillespie in terms of searching out information concerning The Family. On her way down from Sedona, she had called Stu. Since she had struck out in locating any online information on The Family, she asked him to see if he could find any information on Gordon Tower.

“I’m busy working the Bemidji angle,” Stu had said. “If it’s okay with you, I’ll turn this over to Cami.”

There was a discreet knock at the door to the library and the bishop’s assistant stepped back inside. “Excuse me, Bishop Gillespie,” he said. “Your next appointment is here.”

Taking the hint, Ali rose to leave, but Bishop Gillespie wagged an admonishing finger in her direction. “Remember,” he said with a smile, “I expect both you and that bully-baiting friend of yours to stay in touch and out of trouble. I’m sure Mr. Simpson has my cell number, but I’ll ask my assistant to give it to you as well.”

Ali left the bishop’s residence with his direct number added to her phone’s list of contacts. On the way back to I-17, she stopped off at a FedEx office to drop off the envelope bound for Banshee Group. She was back in the car and headed north when her phone rang with a call from Cami.

“Making any progress?” Ali asked.

“Some. I started by searching county and state databases for Gordon Tower. Both his driver’s license and his voter’s registration list him as living on Tower Road in unincorporated Mohave County. Then I got a satellite photo of Tower Road. There’s only one house on it, a massive-looking place, and several outbuildings—a barn, some Quonset-hut-looking things, and a few others. I found a driver’s license listing at that address for someone named Edith Tower, but there’s no voter registration listing for her.

“I figured if Gordon Tower lived on Tower Road, I’d check out some of the other roads as well, and I struck paydirt. When I went looking through voter registrations for a Johnson living on Johnson Road, I found one—a guy named Wendell Johnson Jr. at 114 Johnson Road. A search of the driver’s-license database for that address shows two licenses, one for Wendell Jr. and one for Anita, but no voter’s registration for Anita. There’s another set of Johnsons in the area, a Wendell Sr. and Vera, but their home address is actually in Colorado City.”

“Let me guess,” Ali interjected. “Vera drives but doesn’t vote.”

“Right you are. That’s true for the entire enclave—two driver’s licenses per household—one for a man and one for a woman, but there are no voter registration listings for any of the women. At all.”

“What enclave are you talking about?” Ali asked.

“That information came from the property records. A little under fifty years ago, a guy named Angus Lowell showed up and purchased three thousand acres of unincorporated land in that part of unincorporated Mohave County. He bought that acreage from the FLDS church. He must have paid cash for the whole shebang because there’s no record of anyone ever carrying a mortgage. The entire property is still deeded over to the Lowell Family Trust.”

“That’s it,” Ali breathed. “That’s probably why they call it ‘The Family.’ Are you saying that none of the individuals you just named actually own the properties where they live?”

“Not that I can tell,” Cami said. “They may pay rent to the trust, but if they do, I can’t find any paper trail. My guess is the roads were unnamed until a few years ago when the state required mandatory compliance and all rural roads were assigned names. At that point, the residents must have opted for the simplest solution and named each road for the family that lived there.”

Ali didn’t say the rest of what she was thinking. If this was a polygamous situation, the oldest wife was the one female in each family who was allowed to drive, but not a single one of the women—not even the most senior—was allowed to vote. And if women in The Family weren’t allowed to drive or to vote, Ali wondered, what else were The Family’s girls and women forbidden to do?

“Is there a Lowell Road?” Ali asked. “If so, who lives on that?”

“No sign of a Lowell Road, but the largest set of buildings is on what appears to be the main drag, which is actually Angus Road. That one has the same kind of house, barn, and outbuilding arrangement as all the others, only the house itself is far larger. In addition, there are two possible public buildings, maybe a church or a social hall of some kind with plenty of parking nearby. There are several somewhat smaller structures in that compound as well.”

“Who lives there?”

“Someone named Richard Lowell. The single licensed female driver at that address is named Helena.”

“How many roads on the property in all?” Ali asked.

“I counted twenty-eight separate houses on the map. That would make for close to thirty families, including Wendell Johnson Sr., whose family evidently lives in town.”

Ali’s call waiting buzzed with a blocked number showing up in the caller ID window.

“All right,” Ali said. “Thanks, Cami. I’ve got to take another call. Keep putting the pieces together. I’ll get back to you.” She switched over to the other line. “Hello.”

“Is this Alison Reynolds?”

“Yes.”

“My name is Danny Alvarado, Sheriff Alvarado from Mohave County. Your name sounds familiar to me. Weren’t you involved in some kind of dustup over near Bullhead City a while back?”

“You have a good head for names, Sheriff Alvarado,” Ali said with a laugh. “And yes. I was the woman in the car trunk.”

“I just had a call from the Catholic bishop down in Phoenix—Bishop Francis Gillespie. I take it you know him?”

“Yes,” Ali replied. “He’s a family friend.” She realized as she said the words that it was no exaggeration. Bishop Gillespie was a friend.

“He was asking me about two unsolved cases from here in Kingman years ago—a young woman and her newborn infant. It turns out I was one of the investigators on that case and remember it well. Bishop Gillespie mentioned there might be a possible connection between those cases and a new situation over near Flagstaff. He said that both girls appeared to be runaways who were very young, very pregnant, and who wore their hair in a similar fashion.”

“Yes to all,” Ali said. “The hairdos were very distinctive—long braids wrapped around the tops of their heads.”

“As I said, I was one of the investigators in the Jane Doe matter, and I remember those very distinctive braids. What I’m not sure is how you came to know about them.”

“I heard about them from someone connected to both cases.”

“That would be the nun Bishop Gillespie mentioned?”

“Yes,” Ali answered. “Her name is Sister Anselm. She’s a special emissary of Bishop Gillespie’s, and functions as a patient advocate where necessary. Twelve years ago, Sister Anselm served in that capacity for both your victims—Jane Doe and her infant. Yesterday morning, by sheer coincidence, she was called out to care for this newly injured mother and child.”

“Has your victim been IDed?”

“Tentatively,” Ali answered. “We believe her name to be Enid Tower and that she ran away from one of the polygamous communities up near Colorado City. While on the run, she stepped into the path of an oncoming vehicle. That’s what put her in the hospital.”

“Not Colorado City again,” the sheriff said with a sigh. “Dealing with those people is a nightmare. Do you happen to know which group?”

“I believe they call themselves The Family,” Ali answered. “I don’t have much more information on them than that. From what I’ve been able to gather, the whole group consists of twenty-five to thirty families, give or take. At the time of your Jane Doe’s death, Sister Anselm attempted to suggest to the investigators that her death was the result of some kind of domestic violence. That idea got no traction at the time. This new case isn’t specifically domestic violence, either, but still . . .”

“The good sister was entirely correct in her assumption. Considering the degree of violence visited on our Jane Doe, that’s what we suspected at the time—that it was a DV case. However, with no additional information as to her origins, we got nowhere. I can see how, with a new lead like this and with a small population to draw from, a near DNA match from either our two victims or yours could lead back to our Jane Doe’s killer. Based on that, we’d be willing to reopen the case.”

Stunned, Ali realized that she had won the DNA argument without having said a word.

“But there’s a problem with that,” Sheriff Alvarado continued. “After I got off the phone with the bishop, I went downstairs to bring the evidence box up from the basement. To my chagrin, it’s nowhere to be found. It’s probably just misfiled. I’ve got my evidence clerk on a search mission, but so far there’s no sign of it.”

“Was any DNA evidence from your crime scene ever processed? Even if the box itself is missing, the state crime lab might still have the results taken from the evidence itself.”

Sheriff Alvarado sent a bark of humorless laughter into the phone. “My predecessor wasn’t a great believer in technology. That’s one of the reasons I’m sheriff now and he isn’t. He kept his eye on the bottom line. Since DNA profiling was expensive back then, he thought of it as an unnecessary frivolity. I’m sorry to say that the answer to your question is no—our Jane Doe’s evidence was collected but never processed.

“In the last two years, my administration has been trying to rework our collection of cold cases, but only as time, personnel, and money allow. Having said that, it may explain why the Jane Doe box is missing. Perhaps one of my guys started focusing on that case without letting me know. Once the box is located and on its way to the crime lab, I’ll let you know.”

“Great,” Ali said.

“How are your two victims doing, by the way? Did you say the mother’s name is Enid?”

“Yes, Enid Tower. I can’t tell you much about her condition, but as far as I know, both she and her baby are still alive. The baby was premature, but so far so good.”

“Excellent,” Sheriff Alvarado said. “Glad to hear it. If you learn anything more, keep me posted, and I’ll do the same.”

“One more thing,” Ali said. “What kind of a presence does your department maintain in the Colorado City area?”

“Not much. As you no doubt know, it’s part of my jurisdiction but difficult to reach by car. Back in the old days, all of us had to pull a few weeks of duty over there every year, living in a beat-up mobile home that doubled as the local substation and taking care of whatever came up. Then, about ten years or so ago, the department hired a guy named Amos Sellers who actually lives there. Deputy Sellers spends part of his time working out of the substation and part of it working out of his own home. He’s done a good job keeping a lid on things. Since he’s part of the community, people there tend to trust him. I haven’t had any complaints about him—at least none that made it as far as my desk.”

“Was there any kind of missing person report called in to him at the time Enid Tower took off?”

“Not that I know of. Had there been, it would have been forwarded to my attention.”

“All right, then,” Ali said. “Thank you so much for your help. Let’s stay in touch.”

As soon as Ali hung up, she immediately called Cami back. “Tell me something, have you happened to come across the name Sellers anywhere in that bunch of names?”

Cami didn’t have to think twice before she answered. “Just a few minutes ago. Sellers Road. The people listed there are Amos Sellers and a woman named Elizabeth. Same old, same old. She drives but isn’t good enough to vote.”

“Thanks, Cami,” Ali said. “Thanks a lot.”

Amos Sellers—Deputy Amos Sellers. According to Sheriff Alvarado, he was the law of the land in Colorado City, but if he was part of The Family, as Cami’s research clearly indicated, how come Sheriff Alvarado hadn’t provided that telling detail? And if Amos was the representative of law and order in Colorado City, that meant that anyone being mistreated or abused inside The Family would have nowhere to turn for help—nowhere at all.

As for Sheriff Alvarado? Ali was more than a little pissed at him. When she had mentioned The Family, since he hadn’t mentioned that his deputy was part of the group, was it possible that Alvarado himself had some connections to The Family?

Ali called Cami back. “I know you’re busy, but I need one more thing. Find out what you can on Danny Alvarado, the sheriff of Mohave County.”

Ali pressed on the gas, urging the Cayenne forward and northward at a good ten miles over the posted 75 mph limit.

19

D
espite her concerns about Sheriff Alvarado, the last thing Ali had expected was for him to be a willing ally in reopening the Kingman Jane Doe case. She was sure Sister Anselm would be surprised and gratified about that, too, especially considering her misgivings about collecting the current DNA samples. Once the Kingman Jane Doe evidence box was located, any DNA materials inside it could be sent out for processing with an excellent possibility of there being a match.

Instead of taking Highway 179 and going back to Sedona, Ali stayed on the freeway and drove straight to St. Jerome’s in Flagstaff. When she arrived in the maternity floor waiting room, Sister Anselm was in the nursery, sitting in a rocker with a tiny wrapped bundle of baby cradled in the crook of one arm and a bottle of formula held in her other hand. Using baby formula in this instance made complete sense. The mother of a newborn, especially a premature newborn, couldn’t be expected to nurse the child when she herself had undergone major lifesaving surgeries. Whatever kinds of pain medications were being administered to the mother would go straight through her system and into the baby’s.