The Trophy Hunter (30 page)

“Now I am. I’m in a café in Evergreen, but
I’ve got a bit of a problem. My cell phone’s missing, for
starters.” She couldn’t believe how calm her own voice sounded in
the relative safety of the restaurant, with phone contact to her
world restored.

“That’s why they couldn’t get you,” replied
Tamara. “There have been some developments in the Flannigan case. I
know it’s not yours anymore, but you’ll be interested.”

“Go on.”

There was a brief pause at Tamara’s end
before she asked, “Have you spoken to Jess yet?”

“No. I left her a message before my phone
went missing. And I just left another. What’s this about
Flannigan?”

“He’s being charged in the Larry Strickland
murder and another one as well.”

“Another one?” Diana paused, looked around to
make sure she was still alone. She suddenly felt trapped in the
narrow hallway of the near-empty restaurant.

“It wasn’t a name I was familiar with. Some
associate of Flannigan’s.” Tamara paused. “Here it is. Shane
Cutler.”

Diana stifled a gasp.

“Dr. Bell is representing Mr. Flannigan,”
continued Tamara. “He’s picking him up from a rehab center.”

“Flannigan’s in rehab?”

“They’re probably on their way to Denver as
we speak. Something in this case has Jess and Dr. Bell very worried
about you. I gave Jess the information from your calendar. I think
she went to that taxidermy shop. She’s called a couple of times,
but I haven’t heard from her in over an hour.”

“I’m going to try Winston now. I’ll get back
to you,” said Diana. “If for some reason I don’t, let Jess or
Winston know were I am. Is it snowing there yet?”

“No, it’s just really dark. You can’t even
see the foothills. Do you want me to stay late?”

“No. Go on home. Wait, no. Stay until five in
case Jess or Winston calls. Then go home. If I get hold of Winston,
I’ll call you so you can relax.”

She could hear Tamara taking a breath, as if
she was reluctant to say something. Then, “Diana, are you still
with Darren Rogart?”

“No, I’m not.”

“Is he…around?” Tamara finally asked.

“I don’t know where he is.” She decided not
to worry Tamara any more than she already had. “I’m okay. I’ll be
back in touch.”

“Be safe,” said Tamara. Then they hung
up.

Diana searched for more coins in her wallet,
inserted them and punched in Winston’s cell number. Her call went
to voice mail.
Damn!
“Winston, it’s me, Diana. I’m in
Evergreen. I don’t have my cell. I think Jess is up here somewhere
looking for me. I can’t leave till I find her. I’m headed for the
local police, but damned if I know what I’m going to say when I get
there. You were right about Rogart.” She hung up, then regretted
the unsettling content of her message.

As she walked back to the dining area, the
dinner crowd was beginning to file in.
Crowd
was an
overstatement. At least there were a few people dining and waiting
to dine. The restaurant was done in a mountain motif. A gas
fireplace shimmered invitingly. She felt relatively safe there. The
smell of food cooking reminded her that she hadn’t eaten since
breakfast, but even the thought of food made her gag.

A matronly hostess with a wide, friendly face
asked if she could seat her. “No, thank you,” replied Diana. “Can
you tell me where to find the local police station?” As she watched
the hostess’s smile fade, she wished she’d taken Jess’s advice and
gotten herself a GPS unit.

“We don’t have town police,” replied the
woman. “Jeffco Sheriff substation’s over by the library.” The woman
gave her directions that Diana committed to memory. Then she had
another thought. Brookvale had been Darren’s stated destination─the
site of Joe’s cabin. It had looked really close to Evergreen on the
map she’d consulted that morning. But during her drive behind
Rogart, she’d seen no sign of another town.

“Wait,” she called to the departing hostess.
The woman turned, the smile returning to her face, but this time it
seemed more polite than friendly. “What can you tell me about the
town of Brookvale?”

The hostess shrugged plump shoulders. “What
d’ you want to know?”

“What’s there?”

The woman rolled her eyes upward, as if
trying to recall. “’bout three acres or so of forest. It’s not
exactly a town,” she began hesitantly.

“But it’s on the map.”

“’cause it was a stagecoach stop in the
eighteen hundreds,” said the hostess. “It’s got a few historical
buildings left, some cabins, but it’s not really a town. Whole
thing got sold last year as a package deal. One of our locals
bought it. I hear it’s being turned into an artist colony or some
such cultural thing.”

Diana nodded and thanked the woman. A package
sale seemed to rule out Flannigan’s owning a cabin there. One more
lie for Rogart. Unless Flannigan had bought the whole town. But he
wasn’t a local. And he didn’t seem the type to fund a cultural
endeavor. If only she’d brought her laptop, she could’ve checked
out the ownership.

The drive to the sheriff’s station took about
three minutes. An anal-retentive sky was still holding back its
burden of snow. Diana pulled up to the building and parked in one
of the two visitor’s parking spots. She would go in and say…what?
Start with Trisha’s disappearance? Then she remembered Marge Lane’s
brush-off from the Feds and Custer County. Would anything likely be
accomplished by reporting the incident with Rogart? Would her
strongest complaint be that he stole her cell phone? She tried to
imagine the next question. And her answer:
It must have been
while we were kissing. Of course, that was before I tried to run
over him.

With a jolt, she considered the possibility
that Rogart might be filing his own complaint against her. But
where? There was no other vehicle in the substation lot. Why else
would he have given up the chase? Was the chase all in her mind?
Where was Jess?

Then she remembered that Jess had been going
to interview that woman who had painted Darren’s portrait. The
humongous paean to his overblown ego that hung in the entry hall of
his home. The same woman whom Jess said was Rogart’s alibi in the
Strickland murder. Arlette of the double sir-name. What was it?
Cruz-Ramos. She could almost see the distinctive signature on the
painting. Jess had filled in what the “A” stood for. One more
reason to have a GPS.

She gave up on the sheriff’s station and
drove next door to the library where she hoped she’d have access to
a computer and the internet.

The library was small by Denver standards and
nearly empty when Diana entered. A white-haired woman directed her
to the public computers. There were two, neither in use. Diana
logged in the necessary information, then typed “Brookvale” in the
search field. What the screen disgorged was meager. She scrolled
down and saw:
Town sold to local artist…
When she pulled up
the entire article, she saw the name again: Arlette Cruz-Ramos.

She copied the article, then went on the
Jefferson County site looking for Arlette Cruz-Ramos in Evergreen.
While this site offered online information, she needed the property
address to access it; so she looked Arlette up on Switchboard. The
artist was listed, along with a map to her residence.

Before leaving the library, Diana emailed
both Jess and Winston.

When she reached the Cruz-Ramos estate, it
was 5:00 p.m. and nearly dark. The angry clouds indistinguishable
in a dark sky now spit snow on her windshield. The wipers scraped,
making an irritating sound. Not enough moisture to glide smoothly,
yet just enough fine snow to require their engagement.

Diana pulled up to the closed gates and
pressed the call button on the keypad. She had a speech prepared.
But when she glanced beyond the gates, into the courtyard, the
sight of Jess’s red Camaro parked inside knocked it right out of
her head.

Chapter 57

A man’s unnaturally high voice answered
Diana over the gate intercom. She asked for Arlette Cruz-Ramos.

“Mrs. Cruz-Ramos doesn’t receive unscheduled
visitors,” replied the voice.

“I’m Diana Martin, an attorney from Denver
here to see Ms. Cruz-Ramos on an urgent matter. Apparently she made
an exception for my associate, Jess Edwards,” replied Diana
crisply.

“She makes no exceptions.” His tone matched
the outside chill.

Diana shivered, but remained firm. “My
associate’s car is in your driveway. I can read her license plate
from here.”
Well, almost.
Diana squinted through the snowy
drizzle. She had no doubt that it was Jess’s car.

The next voice she heard over the intercom
was a woman’s. “I’ll have to ask you to leave, Ms. Martin.”

“Are you Arelette Cruz-Ramos?”

“You must leave now, Ms. Martin.” The
woman’s voice was overtly hostile.

“Not until I speak with Ms. Edwards.” This
was so wrong. Even if Jess wasn’t there, why the hostility? Well,
she was a stranger. And this was pretty far off the beaten track.
The caution might make sense, if not for Jess’s car parked on the
property.

“There’s no Ms. Edwards here,” replied the
woman.

Diana thought of asking for Darren Rogart,
but revisited their last encounter. She would like to hear the
reaction this brought from the woman, but the risk of having him
appear was too frightening. Neither of his vehicles was in sight,
but that didn’t mean anything.

Oh, what the hell.
“Is Darren Rogart
there?”

Silence. Bone-chilling as the increasing
snow. Diana imagined she could hear the sound of breathing, but
decided it was probably the swelling wind that had commenced to
scatter the loose snow.

Then, the woman’s voice again, “If you don’t
leave immediately, I’ll be forced to call security.”

“Go ahead,” snapped Diana. “I’d welcome the
chance to talk to them. Shouldn’t take a deputy long to get here
from the substation.”

“I’m afraid you won’t find our security
people as friendly as the local authorities,” threatened the woman.
Then Diana heard a sharp
click
, as if the woman had
terminated the connection.

Diana backed up, and then angled around to
the side of the wall that surrounded the estate.
Damn!
If
she just had her cell. The prudent thing to do would be to go back
to town and report what had happened. Now she had something
tangible. There was no way Jess would have left her car and gone
somewhere else. And if she were inside the estate, there was no way
she wouldn’t have made her presence known. Unless she’d been
prevented from doing so.

What if she was wrong about the license
plate? Just like there was more than one silver Ram with a vintage
hood ornament, there were bound to be other red Camaros. She pulled
her car close to the wall, shut off the engine and got out. If she
could find an opening somewhere without setting off an alarm, she
could confirm that the car was in fact Jess’s. As Diana crept along
the outside wall, she heard a hissing sound above her.
Psst!

She staggered back. Her heart lurched as she
looked up into the man’s face. He must be standing on something,
but he was definitely tall. Like a scarecrow. Or someone on stilts.
His brown eyes under bushy brows looked as frightened as she felt.
He touched a bony index finger to his lips. She nodded and
swallowed the scream in her throat.

“She went with Darren Rogart,” he whispered,
inclining his head toward the road leading away from the property.
Diana swallowed again, trying to find her voice, blinked once. When
she looked back, he was gone.

Chapter 58

Diana drove back to the sheriff’s substation,
parked and entered the small concrete building. A deputy with a
thick head of mouse-brown hair sat hunched over his evening meal─a
bun with barbequed mystery meat on a paper plate. Beside him on the
table sat a king-sized drink in a red-and-white paper cup.

Diana cleared her throat to get his
attention. He belched in response.

Just go for it.
“Is there someone I
can talk to about a missing person?”

He turned toward her, wiping barbeque sauce
on a red-and-white paper napkin as he did so. “I’m it,” he said. A
bit of barbeque sauce clung to his bushy mustache.

“My name is Diana Martin. I’m an
attorney─”

“Martin? Whoa, lady, hold it right there,” he
interrupted.

“Excuse me?” Diana stepped back.

The deputy glanced down at a notepad on the
table where he’d been eating. Then he got up, walked to the front
window and looked out at her car. “And you just come from Mrs.
Ramos’s place?”

“Yes, but─”

“You’re lookin’ for your friend who drives a
red car.” Now he wasn’t asking.

“Yes, Mrs. Ramos has obviously called
you.”

He gave Diana a knowing look, then returned
to his sandwich. “Obvious you been botherin’ the woman.”

“I suppose she told you that my friend left
with someone. That’s why her car is still there.” Diana felt
futility setting in. “I can assure you, if my friend left, it
wasn’t willingly.”

The chair scraped as the deputy stood up
again. “Lady, they ain’t no red car at Mrs. Ramos’s and they ain’t
no black gal there neither. Never was. You keep away from Mrs.
Ramos or I’ll have to call for backup and run ya down t’ Golden for
a sobriety test.”

“I’m not─”

“You just go on down to the hotel, check in
an’ things’ll look better in the mornin’” He winked, reminding her
of Rogart. “We don’t take kindly to folks botherin’ Mrs.
Ramos.”

Diana bristled. “She’s lying. You said ‘black
gal.’ I never mentioned my friend’s race.”

The deputy rolled his eyes at her, picked up
the phone and punched. “Hey, Matt, I got me a problem. How long it
take you t’ get somebody up from Golden?”