Desert Rage: A Lena Jones Mystery (31 page)

Good on paper, anyway. Ted Bundy had been good on paper, too.

Call me cynical.

“Where’s Papa DuCharme?”

“Dead. But Mrs. DuCharme is the brains behind the company. Has been since it started.”

I narrowed my eyes. “Anything irregular about Mr. DuCharme’s death?”

“Slipped in the bathtub, cracked his skull open, drowned. Nobody home at the time. And before your suspicious mind goes into overdrive, I checked. Mrs. DuCharme and the kiddies were in the Bahamas waiting for Mr. DuCharme to join them as soon as he finished supervising the installation of some new factory equipment. When he didn’t show at the airport or answer his phone, his wife called Scottsdale PD and asked for a welfare check. Cops found the body, and you know what they say.”

“What do they say?”

“At least fifty percent of the time, and I’m quoting the most excellent Lena Jones here, the person who finds a dead body is the person responsible for helping it get dead in the first place.”

“Gee, you sound just like a detective.”

A big smile.

Time to get serious again. “How about Felix, Beulah Phelps’ son?” Not that I believed the grossly overweight man could have had anything to do with the torture-killings of the Cameron family. He was too sick to do it himself, too poor to hire it done.

“As a juvenile, Mr. Phelps stayed off the radar until his mother went down for multiple homicides. While in foster care, he went on a shoplifting binge, did a six-months’ stint in juvie, came out, was transferred to a group home, got some therapy, and stayed clean after that.”

Clean but doomed.

“One other thing. While you were sleeping, I took a call from Valerie. She’d forgotten about this while she was talking to you over at Good Sam, but this morning she remembered that Dr. Cameron was instrumental in getting a nurse fired. You might want to call her, get the story yourself. But why don’t you wait until you’re feeling…”

His voice trailed away as I scrambled for my cell phone.

Valerie’s story went like this: Approximately a year before the murders, Dr. Cameron complained that some prescribed Oxycodone hadn’t made it to his patients. The following investigation revealed that Wanda Dorset, R.N., had hijacked their medications for her own use. After she refused rehab, Cameron pushed to have her terminated, and she was. Since word of drug addiction and pilferage sweeps like wildfire through the medical community, she couldn’t find another nursing job.

“Lance, that’s her husband, he was already out of work,” Valerie said. “You know, one of those ‘furlough’ things with no end in sight. They were already on thin financial ice, so once Wanda’s paycheck vanished, they lost their house. I hear he even came down to the hospital—I wasn’t there that night, so I missed the drama—somehow made it into the ER and had it out with Dr. Cameron. Some shoving was involved. Security broke it up and tossed him out before it got too physical.”

“Wanda’s husband, he a big guy?”

“Better believe it. Because they were down to the one car, Lance always picked her up at the end of her shift, and we all met him at one time or other. That’s how he got his nickname, The Hulk. Man looked like he never met a set of heavy weights he didn’t like.”

I winced. Just what the Cameron case needed: another suspect.

Although I’d planned to catch up on my case notes, the ER doc was right. I ran out of steam by two thirty and shuffled off to bed, leaving Jimmy to man the fort. My nap didn’t last long. At three, blues riffs from my cell phone woke me and when I blearily looked at the display, saw Stephen Zellar’s number. Hoping for good news, I took the call.

And was glad I did.

In a voice more animated than usual, Ali’s attorney told me she had just been released into the custody of her uncle.

Chapter Twenty-eight

Ali

Ali didn’t like the hotel room. It was furnished like something out of a sitcom she’d once watched with Alec on TV Land, but at least it was better than juvie. And Uncle Bradley, who she barely knew, was better than any guard, although most really weren’t all that bad, to tell the truth. But Uncle Bradley didn’t order her to do this, do that, and hurry up for Christ’s sake. If he tried to order her around, he might have to touch her, and she knew he couldn’t, like, stand the idea. It was why he didn’t do anything about the marks on her face that stupid gansta girl put there. Some doctor, right?

But the food? Heaven.

“Want some more ice cream, Alison?” he asked, for what had to be the umpteenth millionth time.

“No, thanks, Uncle Bradley. I’m stuffed. Can we go shopping now? I need some clothes.” She’d walked out of juvie wearing hand-me-downs, and from the way they smelled, they’d been wadded up in some Goodwill bag for a zillion years. With rat turds.

“Ah, about that. You see…”

Oh, great. Here it came. Another turndown.

She looked out the sliding glass door. They were eight stories up with a parking lot below, high enough that she’d probably die right away.

Tonight. She’d do it tonight.

“I don’t know anything about young ladies’ clothing and haven’t been in a mall for over a year. I wouldn’t even know where to take you, so…”

See? Anyway, what did it matter? If she couldn’t get up enough nerve to kill herself she’d just walk around stinking for the rest of her life, and if people didn’t like it, too bad. Once your mom and dad and brother had been murdered and you saw what they looked like lying there in their own blood, there was nothing anybody could do or say to make it…

No. Don’t think about that. Don’t think about them, not ever, or she’d start screaming and screaming and never stop, she’d…

“…so I’ve asked someone else to, ah, help with that,” Uncle Bradley finished.

“Huh?”

“I meant to say, someone else will take you to the mall.”

Handed off to a stranger. Well, what did she expect? The world sucked and just kept on sucking. She didn’t care. She’d never care. Caring hurt too much.

“She’ll be here any minute.”

She? Well, at least that was something. But if whoever it was thought she was up for any cutesy pink girlie crap, she’d better think again. It was all black for Ali, black for remembrance.

A knock at the door, Uncle Bradley rushing to answer it, anything to keep from having to talk to her. He didn’t know she knew that about him, but she did. He couldn’t stand the sight of her and never would.

Not that it mattered. It didn’t. Nothing mattered anymore.

Except for Kyle, but he was still in…

“Alison? I’d like you to meet Juliana Thorsson.”

Chapter Twenty-nine

Lena

How can a person feel exhausted and restless at the same time? After awakening
un
-refreshed from my second nap of the day, I found myself incapable of following the ER doc’s orders to take things easy. Instead, I wobbled over to my laptop and read through the Cameron case file. To my frustration, I found too many gaps, too many inconsistencies.

Around sundown, Jimmy interrupted me to inform me that we could count out the Oxycodone-pilfering Wanda Dorset, R.N., as a suspect.

“Three days after their house was repossessed, the Dorsets moved back to Malden, Missouri, their hometown,” he said. “She was offered a job as a school nurse, and not being totally drug-addled, took it. He’s working at some power plant. I seriously doubt they flew back here to slaughter the Camerons.”

“So all’s well that ends well for them, then?”

“Not really. They’re living with her mother.”

I gave him a bleak smile. “Maybe she’s a sweetie.”

He shrugged. “Anything’s possible. I’m still following up on everyone connected to the case, including Bradley Teague, Dr. Cameron’s brother. According to my sources, he really was in Kenya at the time of the murders.”

“What sources would those be?”

“If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”

“Funny man.”

“I’m known for my one-liners.”

He returned to his cold office, leaving me sitting there trying to figure out what to do next. I didn’t have to think too long because minutes later my cell rang again. Fiona Etheridge, Kyle’s foster mother.

“I wanted you to be the first to know, well, after my husband, of course, so I guess that makes you the second, I just have to thank you for everything you’ve done, because without you, everything…”

“Kyle’s being released, right?” It was the only thing that could have reduced her to babble.

“Isn’t that what I said?”

“Kinda.”

She babbled on, telling me about the call she’d received from Curtis Racine, Kyle’s attorney. After convincing the county attorney’s office that surveillance videos proved the boy couldn’t have killed the Camerons, Kyle had been granted a release, the only condition being that he, like Alison, could not leave the state.

“Mr. Racine assured us all charges will certainly be dropped,” she finished. “It’s just a matter of red tape now.”

I felt almost as happy as Fiona, but for a different reason. “What time are you picking him up from the detention center?”

“At five. He’ll be home in time for dinner, isn’t that wonderful? I thought I’d never get over having to give up the twins but…”

“I want to talk to him.”

“Huh?”

“The case is still open, Fiona, and he may be sitting on valuable information.”

“Oh.” A long silence, then, “I guess we owe you that much, don’t we?”

You sure do
. “How about after dinner?”

A small gasp. “That soon?”

“And do me a favor. Do not discuss the case with him before I get there. How about eight? No, make it seven. You folks will be done eating by then, right?”

“Uh, I guess so, but…”

“Good. See you then.”

Before she could change her mind, I hung up.

***

I arrived at the Etheridge house at seven on the dot. When they opened the front door—letting out a strong aroma of pizza—both Etheridges were smiling, but their smiles faded when I stepped in and they saw my battered face.

“Something fell on me at the gym.” No point in telling them that the object was a woman and she fell on me on purpose.

“You sure you’re okay to drive?” Fiona asked, concern in her voice. “If you need to, Glen can drive you home. We can do this interview some other time. What matters is that Kyle is home where he belongs. And safe.”

“No need to fuss, I’m perfectly fine.” My head was killing me, but I didn’t want to put off this interview. The longer the delay lasted, the more tainted Kyle’s memory would become. Given the more than two weeks that had lapsed since the murder, it was tainted enough already. But regardless of the hitches in his memory, he was still the first person to arrive at the murder scene. Other than the killer.

Or killers, plural.

Fiona remained hesitant. “You just look so…so…tired.”

Glen, towering behind her, spoke up. “Fi, let the poor woman sit down, okay?” Although he wasn’t a handsome man—his nose was too broad and his chin too narrow—his face radiated kindliness. “Tell you ladies what. I’ll go in the kitchen and pour us some coffee. Decaf all right, Miss Jones?”

I nodded, despite not being into decaf. While he was gone I could get the important questions out of the way. Fiona acted protective, but not as protective as I sensed he’d be.

Seeing my assent, he disappeared into the kitchen, leaving his wife to steer me to the family room. “I’d rather you not ask Kyle any questions about the case until Glen gets back,” she said, quashing my plan. “We’ve already seen what can happen when he’s questioned without parental supervision. I’m sure you understand.”

“Of course.” I didn’t let my disappointment show. The fact that both parents preferred to be present during the interview wasn’t good, because children—especially young teens—were notoriously circumspect about what they reveal when their parents are listening.

When we reached the family room, I saw Kyle sitting on a vinyl-covered sofa with a fat brown puppy in his lap. Two kittens played with a Nerf ball at his feet. He appeared entranced by the view out the sliding glass doors that opened into the backyard. It wasn’t particularly attractive or even well-tended, but he didn’t seem to care. Neither would I, if I’d spent two weeks in the confines of the Mesa Detention Center. Studying him, I was surprised at how old he looked for his age, and how handsome. Clean movie-star features, glossy black hair, blue eyes so dark they were almost violet. The boy radiated good health, but there was no mistaking the burn scars up and down both of his arms, parting gifts from his biological mother.

Seeing me, he tucked the puppy under one muscular arm and stood up, careful not to step on the kittens.

‘Thank you for all you’ve done for Ali,” he said in a deep baritone. Almost as an afterthought, he added, “And for me.” He stuck out his hand.

When I shook it, my hand came away covered in brown puppy hair.

“Sorry,” Kyle said, wiping his own hairy paw on his jeans as he sat back down. “He’s shedding.”

“No problem. I’ve had worse on me.” Monster Woman’s blood, for instance.

Fiona fussed around with some pillows on a raggedy chair across from the sofa. “Sit down, sit down. This is nice and soft. Or do you need back support? How about an aspirin?”

“I’m fine.” I plopped into the chair before she could fuss some more. “I’d really like to get this interview started.”

“Not until…” She left off as Glen entered the room, carrying four unmatched coffee mugs on a tray.

“Here we are,” he announced. “Sugar and milk, for those so inclined.”

I grabbed a mug, took the digital recorder out of my tote, clicked it on, and set it on the coffee table.

Glen looked at it, then glanced at his wife, who’d joined Kyle on the sofa. “Is that really necessary?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Speech-activated, right?”

“Now that it’s on, yes.”

“Then understand that we reserve the right to stop this interview at any point.” His voice, though gentle, was firm.

“Of course,” I said.

“Good. Since we’ve got that settled, Miss Jones, have at it.” Glen put his coffee mug down on an end table, then walked over to the sofa and stood there, arms crossed, fists clenched. Now Kyle was flanked by both foster parents. All gratitude forgotten, they’d circled the wagons.

I cleared my throat. “Kyle, after you returned to the abandoned house and found Ali gone, how long did you stay there? Did you leave right away, or wait for a while, thinking she might come back?” I already guessed the answer, but wanted him to tell me himself.

Kyle, after pouring enough milk into his coffee to turn it pale beige, answered. “As soon as I saw she’d left, I headed for her place. We’d been fighting and I figured she’d gone home.”

“Weren’t you worried about showing up at the Camerons’? Word I hear is that Ali’s parents wanted to break you two up.”

He shook his head. “Not really. Her mother didn’t mind me seeing her, as long as it didn’t get too…” He paused, searching for the word.

“Hot and heavy?” I suggested.

A pained smile. “Something like that.”

“Did you see anything unusual on the way to Ali’s house?”

He took a sip of his coffee. Made a face. Put it back down. “Like what?”

“Anything. A person on the street, maybe, who didn’t look as if he belonged in the neighborhood. Or an unusual vehicle. Anything.”

“Not that I can remember. It was awfully hot, and not many people were out.”

“Not many? You saw some
one
, then. Who? Where?”

“Well, there was the mail carrier. Is that the kind of thing you mean?”

“That’s exactly what I mean. Tell me about him.”

“Her. She was driving one of those little trucks they have. You know, just delivering the mail.”

“Where was this?”

“Couple blocks before I got to Alison’s house. Colt Street, I think it was.”

“Did you see the mail carrier get out of the truck and actually put mail into the mailboxes?”

He gave me a look that said,
Are you for real
? “Uh, yeah, I did. That’s how I know she was a she. She left mail at a couple of houses. She was getting back into her truck as I rounded the corner.”

The police report had logged in several unopened bills and junk mail from the Camerons’ mailbox. Maybe the carrier had noticed something. Since the post office kept a log of who was on what route any given day, it should be easy enough for the police to check.

“Good, Kyle. Now we’re getting somewhere. You see anyone else?”

“Well, there was this air-conditioning truck. Some guy getting stuff out of it.”

A man. A truck. “Where was this?”

“Waaay before I saw the mail carrier. He was, like, closer to the party hou…uh, closer to the abandoned house than to the Camerons’.” He looked over at Glen, who shrugged.

Fiona put her hand on Kyle’s shoulder, the better to squeeze a warning if necessary.

I soldiered on. “How do you know he was the air-conditioning guy?”

Another
you must be some kind of stupid
look. “Because it said BINGHAM’S HEATING AND COOLING right there on the side. It’s the same company Mom Fi uses.”

“What color was the truck?”

A sigh. “Red, with white and black lettering, aluminum ladder on the top. Just like the truck that always shows up here.”

“Same guy, by any chance?”

“Nah. Our guy’s skinny. This other one was kinda fat. Or maybe muscular. Heck, I don’t know. I wasn’t exactly checking him out. Guys aren’t my thing.” He blinked, looking startled at what he’d just said. “Not that there’s anything wrong with that.”

Mom Fi patted him on the shoulder.

I thought about the air-conditioning guy. With the Camerons’ neighbors out of state, their cul-de-sac was deserted, so there couldn’t have been any complaints about overheating units on their street. “Is there anyone else you might have seen that you’ve forgotten about? Think hard, Kyle.”

He looked up at the ceiling, where a fan was busy stirring the air around. His eyes tracked it for a few seconds, then he closed them for a moment, thinking. Mom Fi started to say something, but I raised my hand to silence her. Finally Kyle opened his eyes again. “Sorry. I can’t remember seeing anyone else. Like I said, it was pretty hot out. Most people were indoors. Or at work. Or on vacation, you know?” He turned those startling blue eyes on me. “I mean, c’mon, wouldn’t
you
be on vacation someplace cool if you didn’t have to work?”

Relieved chuckles from Glen. A nod from Fiona.

Considering everything, the interview was progressing well. Kyle felt relaxed enough to act snarky.

I smiled, prolonging the feel-good moment. “You got that right, Kyle. They say Switzerland’s nice this time of year, Iceland, too, so maybe I’ll check them out sometime. But for now, yeah, I have to work, which means asking you all these pesky questions. So far, you’ve been very, very helpful, and I really, really appreciate it.”

He beamed. Not only handsome, nice, too.

But in my business you do what you have to do, even to nice kids. “Kyle, tell me exactly what you saw and heard when you approached the Cameron house.”

Kyle flinched, and the puppy in his lap yelped. Stricken, the boy leaned his head down and nuzzled it. “So sorry, baby,” he cooed. “I didn’t mean to do that.”

Fiona glared. “Lena, we’ve spent hours trying to make him forget what he saw that day!”

Exactly what I’d been afraid of. “In your place, I’d feel the same way, Fiona, but please understand, there’s a vicious killer out there somewhere, possibly in this very neighborhood. Have you thought about that?”

The look on her face proved she hadn’t, so I pressed my advantage. “The Cameron case isn’t closed just because the authorities turned your son loose. The detectives will be going over old ground, trying to figure out what they missed last time.”
Such as eighteen thousand dollars stuffed into a pillow sham.
“If they can’t come up with any new leads, new suspects”—I stressed the word ‘suspects’—“they might go back to where they started. With Kyle and Ali. We need to make certain that doesn’t happen, and if it means dredging up a few bad memories, well…”

She didn’t buy it. Neither did Glen.

To my surprise, Kyle did. Speaking directly to Fiona, he said, “She’s right, Mom Fi. Just because they let us go for now doesn’t mean they can’t arrest us again.” Then he blushed. “After all, we did…uh, I did sign that, um, statement.”

“You mean your confession,” I said, to make certain his foster parents understood the nature of the ongoing threat.

“Yeah, my confession. And I get it, it was a dumb thing to do. But we were scared, and I thought…Never mind what I thought. Ali didn’t do anything bad, she didn’t do anything at all. She just said what she did to protect me. She’s telling the truth now, but if they start in on me again I’m afraid…”