Reining in Murder (14 page)

“Of course, Marcus might have thought of doing that, too,” Dan said, deflating Annie's thought of herself as budding detective. “But we found one piece of evidence that shouldn't have been there. Marcus's briefcase, full of business papers from the ranch. It was wedged way back into the trunk. Almost missed it when we cleaned it out. That has Marcus's prints all over it. Now why would he leave that behind? Seems like it'd be the first and only thing he'd take—other than his money, of course—if he'd really fled the country.”

Annie's heart sank. “But surely there are video cameras in the airport, aren't there, Dan? If Marcus wasn't in the car, couldn't the cameras tell us who was?”

“You'd think so. There should have been. But the airport security cameras are run by humans, not computers.”

“I don't understand.”

“Every floor of the airport is monitored at a dozen different angles. Problem is, those monitors are manned by airport security, so when you get tired of watching one area, you can flick to a new vantage point. It's your call. In this case, we've got Marcus's car arriving at the airport at 22:43 hours, but with the tinted windows, you can't tell who's driving. We next see the car go all the way up to the twelfth floor— that's the open-air deck—but no one on shift at the time bothers to do any surveillance up there. So there's no visual record of anyone getting out of Marcus's car. “

“How about the exits?”

“No video in the elevators. Apparently our great state of Washington believes it's an invasion of privacy.”

Annie thought about that for a moment. Then she leaned forward and topped off Dan's glass, almost empty.

“I got an anonymous call today.” She said it reluctantly. Earlier, she'd decided she wasn't going to tell Dan, but considering that Marcus was now halfway off the suspect list, she figured she could risk it.

“What kind of call?”

“Oh, just some local yokel who said he was ‘a friend of a friend,' who wanted me to know that he knew I had Hilda's horse.”

“Why would that be news?”

“Well, he also warned me off Marcus. Said he was someone I shouldn't mess with.” Annie had no intention of telling Dan the man had described Marcus as a stallion.

“Well, a day ago, I would have agreed with your anonymous caller. Now, I'm not so sure.”

“So what do you think, Dan? Are you convinced now that something happened to Marcus? “

“I think it's looking mighty suspicious. All of Marcus's accounts are intact, although of course, every single one of them will be frozen as of this Friday if he doesn't appear.”

“Damn it, Dan! I just deposited Marcus's check and it'll take ten days to clear!”

“Sorry about that, Annie. It had to be done. There is one bright spot, though. I talked with Hilda's man, Todos, on the way back to the Peninsula. He assured me that he was more than willing to stay on and take care of the horses, with or without money. Quite the guy, that Todos. They don't make much more dedicated employees than that, these days.”

Annie was so livid that the only thing she could do was pour herself another belt of scotch.

“You call me immediately if this anonymous caller ever contacts you again,” Dan added.

She didn't hear a word he said.

* * *

The next morning dragged on, much as the one before, broken up only by the welcome onslaught of Clare children coming to visit the puppies. They were even more exuberant than usual, and it took five minutes for Annie to figure out that their parents had discussed the situation and decided that they could, indeed, take one puppy home. Not today, unfortunately, nor tomorrow, but when Annie decreed that the time was right.

“But don't you think we should take both of them?” Hannah looked anxiously at Annie. “I mean, they're brother and sister. They might miss each other.”

Annie was on the living room floor, trying to extract one of the pups from underneath the sofa, where for some reason it felt safer. Annie was sympathetic with the dog, but she also didn't want to find pee saturating her furniture before she had a chance to shove some newspaper underneath him.

“Well, Hannah,” she said, turning toward the youngster, “did you miss your brothers when you went off to horse camp last summer?”

Hannah thought about it.

“Not exactly.”

“Besides, you've already got two cats to keep the pup company. And you know you can bring him—”

“Or her. We might take her.”

“—or her over here anytime you want for a play date. In fact, we could train the dogs to go with us on trail rides.”

Hannah brightened at this and, problem resolved, turned back to the puppies, both of whom were now scrambling over each other and licking any scrap of human skin in sight.

* * *

Annie was waiting in line at the local Cenex store when she overheard two locals talking behind her back about the case.

“Good thing elections are coming up this fall,” a fat man in overalls muttered to his companion, a thin, spindly farmer who was missing most of his lower teeth.

“True enough.” The farmer carefully spit into a nearby wastebasket, put there precisely for customers such as him.

“Two murders and one escaped convict, all within two weeks! Jesus God, what the hell is Dan Stetson doing about it? Nothing, absolutely nothing.”

Annie's anger started to rise, but she kept still, wanting to hear more.

“When someone hits a deer out on the highway, he's Johnny on the spot. Someone's bike gets stolen, he's right there taking down a report like it's a matter of life and death. But when something real happens, he's plain over his head.”

“Yeah, and that's one big head to get over.”

The two men chortled at their fine sense of humor.

“Did you hear the widder of the truck driver's in town? She's mad as hell and making a big stink. Here her husband dies, and nobody cares about him. It's all about Miss Fancy Pants in her rarefied horse farm. Like that was a death to be mourned.”

“My boy tells me the widder's talking to the local newspaper. She says if she can't get the attention of those TV cameras, she'll talk to whomsoever will listen.”

Annie was glad, for once, that the men at the counter were taking their sweet time filling orders. Usually, she waited impatiently as a customer discussed the merits of placing donkeys versus mules in the herd as the best deterrent against cougar attacks against their livestock. The conversation could last ten minutes, all for the price of a bag of chicken feed. The cashiers never seemed to mind.

If I spent half my day talking about matters that didn't concern me, I'd never get anything done,
was Annie's usual unspoken thought. But today, she was glad that the line was moving even more slowly than usual. She picked up a book—
Birds of the Pacific Northwest
—in a kiosk next to her and idly thumbed through it while she continued to listen. The pages were well-worn. Apparently, other bored people in line had preceded her.

“So who's thinking of running against him? Deadline for applying is coming up pretty quick, I reckon.”

“Next, please.”

Annie reluctantly put back the book and approached the cashier stand and gave her order. The men in back of her hushed up. Apparently, they didn't want to give any secrets away so close to the counter.

While watching the well-muscled crew load horse feed and a mega bag of puppy chow in her F250, Annie came to a decision. She might not have been happy with the way Dan had handled Marcus's arrest, but it wasn't fair that he get slaughtered by the local populace simply because he was overloaded and stretched thin. So, instead of heading back to the farm, she eased her truck onto the highway and headed into town. If Dan wasn't around, then surely Tony or Kim Williams would be within calling distance. Someone needed to tell them that a little PR was required to ensure Dan would continue to run unopposed, as he had for the past twelve years. Besides, she had to hand over her mitts for fingerprinting.

* * *

“Like you're telling us something we don't already know?” was Tony‘s unusually sarcastic reply. Annie, perched on a hard metallic chair in Tony's cramped and very messy office, had just poured out the conversation she'd overheard in the feed store, and now was staring incredulously back at the deputy.

“We're getting a dozen calls every day from concerned citizens,” he said, in a more reasonable tone. “We've been told the entire force should be fired, the FBI should be brought in, and Dan Stetson should resign immediately. And those are the nice callers.”

Annie unconsciously ran her hands, still inky from being fingerprinted earlier, down the front of her jeans. “So what can be done? You can't let people think that Dan and everyone else on the force are incompetent.”

“Annie, the best—and only—thing we can do is our job, which is to find out who killed Wayne Johnston, who killed Hilda Colbert, and what the hell happened to her husband. That's more than a full-time job, as you well know.”

“Yes, but—”

“Besides, we're getting heat from all sides from folks that really matter. Dan was in a closed session with the county commissioners last night until eight o'clock. The P.C. mayor is sending us e-mails daily, asking for updates, as if he has a right to know what's going on.”

Tony snorted. His reference to “the P.C. mayor” didn't, Annie knew, refer to hizzoner's political correctness. It was simply local verbal shorthand for the mayor of Port Chester, the only hamlet in Suwana County with the funds for this part-time position.

“And, just between you, me, and these four walls, we're dangerously close to the FBI's descending on us, whether we want their help or not. One of our less-than-bright commissioners is trying to convince us that Johnston's murder falls under a Federal code for violent crimes against interstate travelers. Last night, she threatened to call the Seattle FBI office unless we solve the case within the next forty-eight hours. And you know where that could lead. Before long, Dan and I would be relegated to fetching coffee for a bunch of suits who don't have a clue as to where to look.”

Any hope that Annie had of being reassured by Tony that what she'd heard was just an aberration had just been extinguished. Things were even worse than she thought. She made a decision and reached into her old saddlebag, which served as her purse, and brought out two envelopes. She handed the first to Tony.

“This is my statement. Dan asked me to write it last night, but I thought it might be better to do it with a clear head this morning.”

“Glenlivet time, I take it?”

“I wasn't the one who asked to have it poured. I merely served as the bartender.”

Tony grinned, reached over, and retrieved the envelope. He quickly scanned what Annie had written out about her last conversation with Marcus, folded the paper carefully, and put it back into the envelope.

“I'll make sure Dan sees this as soon as he gets back.”

“But doesn't it seem odd to you? I mean, why would Marcus say he was running late, then not show up?”

“Cold feet? A business emergency back home? I can think of a dozen different reasons, all perfectly innocent, and some not so innocent, as to why Marcus would break a date. Besides, Laurie's Café isn't exactly haute cuisine.”

“Be serious, Tony! Something happened to Marcus, and you know it.”

“Something happened to a lot of people around here in the last ten days. Marcus's disappearance is troubling, but the facts are we've got two murders to solve, and they take priority. The best we can do on the second Colbert case is hope that someone finds him, dead or alive, in the next few days. He's out of our jurisdiction.”

“Well, how about this? There's nothing you can do for Wayne Johnston or Hilda Colbert right now, except find their killers. Marcus Colbert may still be alive. Maybe you should spend time on
his
case on the chance that you can still save a life.”

Annie knew she was being unreasonable and didn't care.

“We could,” said Tony, “but Marcus still has three days to check in with his attorney. Yes, I know”—Tony raised a hand as Annie began to squawk her rebuttal—“his car at Sea-Tac does look suspicious. And
if
he doesn't call in this Friday, and
if
he's still alive, which I seriously doubt, he'll be heading straight back to jail. There's no way a judge would let him out on bail, even if we don't have all the pieces from the crime lab in yet. And if he's found alive by the time the digital voice expert's report comes in and what we expect to find in his bank records, he can kiss his freedom good-bye.”

Clearly, Tony was still smarting from the humiliating court hearing a few days ago.

“What's in the second envelope?” he asked.

Annie swallowed hard. This had been a tough call. By rights, Marcus should now be in possession of what was legally his property—the registration papers for the bay, aka Trooping the Colour. She wished, not for the first time, that she'd just left the paper in Hilda's cold, dead hands and tossed the chewed-up one. But she hadn't, and the thought of holding on to them now, even for one second longer, was anathema to her.

She reluctantly handed over the second envelope, saying nothing.

Tony looked inside, then inquisitively at Annie.

“Where did this come from? And why is it in two pieces?”

“I found them the day I found Hilda's body.”

“Then why are you giving them to me now?”