Dove in the Window (33 page)

“And they got away with it?”

“Art appraisal is a tricky business, and most of the women and a few men were very prominent citizens who didn’t want to press charges because of the personal humiliation of being snookered. He messed with the wrong man, though, when he tried to rip off an old Texas oilman by appraising two Schreyvogel oils in his mama’s estate at fifteen and twenty thousand dolllars, respectively. Bennett’s dealer jumped in and offered the oilman forty-five thousand for the both of them. But that ole Texas boy, having dealt with many a honey-tongued horse trader in his life, got suspicious and obtained a third opinion from another appraiser. That appraiser, a legitimate one this time, weighed the paintings in at seventy-five and ninety thousand dollars. Quite a difference. And you know Texans—they hate anyone even tryin‘ to pull one over on them. He went to his attorney, but before anything could happen, the old Texan guy croaked, and Roland and his buddy skedaddled out of the Lone Star state to seek their fortune in California. Roland started the rumor that his friend was the brains behind the deal, thereby saving what little reputation he had left. He’s kept his nose clean ever since.”

“That we know of,” T pointed out.

“Precisely.”

“How could that work into Shelby’s and Kip’s murders?”

“I just report the facts, my dear. You’re the brains in this outfit. Next, we have Parker Leona Williams of Bakersfield, California. Story fit for a confession magazine. Father ran off when she was ten. Mother was an on-again, off-again secretary for a number of small manufacturing companies and basically an unrepentant drunk and sleep around. Older sister served some time in state prison for being the driver in a liquor store robbery when she was a mere two days past her eighteenth birthday. Parker was fourteen when her sister went to prison and her mom went on a drunk and ended up in detox in the county jail. She lost custody of Parker, who was then shuffled around to a series of foster homes where she eventually found herself in the home of a Mr. and Mrs. Cal and Blythe Fellows. Mrs. Fellows was an art teacher, so I’m just taking a wild guess here and assuming it was her influence that started Parker down her artistic road.”

“She never mentioned them,” I said. “Or her family. But that’s not unusual at the co-op. A lot of the people there have things in their pasts that they don’t like to talk about.”

Emory’s voice was mild, “Who doesn’t?” He looked back down at his notebook. “The Fellows were killed outside Tracy, California, in a five-car accident a year ago.”

“How sad,” I murmured. “And her sister and mother?”

“As far as my sources could tell, they’re still in Bakersfield, but both are of a rather transient nature, so who knows?”

“No wonder she was bitter about Greer,” I said. Emory’s eyebrows went up, and I told him about her sudden change of personality when she and Greer spoke about their art at the museum. “She’s probably not only jealous of Greer’s talent and financial situation, but also of her close-knit family.”

“Our Miz Greer and her kinfolk have their problems, too.”

I sat up in my chair. “What?”

“Seems the Shannon ranch isn’t doing as well as could be these days.”

“No big news there. Whose is?”

“At least you and Ben are breaking even. Apparently the Shannons are thinking about selling some prime roadside pasture land by Highway One to a group of investors looking to put in a golf course and country club.”

“I know that piece of property. It’s been in their family for over a hundred and fifty years! I can’t believe they’d sell it to developers. Where’d you find that out? I haven’t heard a thing through the rancher’s grapevine, and neither has Daddy or Dove or they would have told me.”

“It’s very hush-hush at this point. Things like that get people all riled up and sending in letters to the editor. You know, that whole public trust-private ownership thing. It’s going to make the Shannons look mighty sour to their longtime friends and neighbors.”

Remembering the furor two months ago about the land surrounding Bishop Peak and the housing development that was still in limbo, I knew he was right. “How did you find out about it?”

He leaned over and tapped a finger on my nose. “It’s what I do, sweetcakes. And I do it very well.”

I swatted at his hand. “Keep talking.”

“Actually,” he continued, “it wasn’t that hard. Most of the transactions so far are on public record—environmental impact reports and such, though it appears that some people might have had their palms softened a bit to keep it quiet. I found out by simply calling real estate agencies, asking about bidding on the Shannon property. The supervising agent at the first four reacted with ‘huh?’ It was on number five that I received a ‘Who’s asking?’ Bingo.”

I shook my head. “I knew things had been tough the last few years for them, but, shoot, it’s been that way for all of us. Cattle prices are ridiculously low, and the government gave price subsidies to the dairy farmers again by buying their old milk cows and flooding the market with cheap, low-quality beef. I knew things were bad, but I didn’t think the Shannons were so hard up they’d have to sell prime land.”

“Better a part than the whole, I guess. Apparently there’s been some medical expenses also. Their grandmother?”

I nodded. “I knew about that. She’s got Alzheimer’s, and they’ve had to put her in a special hospital. If they’re anything like us, they probably didn’t have any insurance for it, and those places aren’t cheap.”

“So they’d need money fast and, like most ranchers, all they have is land.”

I sighed. But for the grace of God, I couldn’t help but think,
But how would that fit in with murdering Shelby and Kip?

“What else?” I asked.

“Bobby Sanchez. No great discovery there. His family’s very socially prominent in the Hispanic community and very religious. But you knew that. If he had a motive, it had to be those pictures. Which we only know about through Ms. Contreras’s statement. Do you think they really exist?”

“I don’t know,” I said, suddenly frustrated with this whole scenario. “Isaac never found any negatives. Maybe whoever sent them to Olivia has them.” It embarrassed me knowing these intimate details about the lives of my friends and colleagues. How would I look them in the face again?

Hearing the shower shut off, I said, “Hurry, anyone else?”

“Olivia Contreras herself. A few parking tickets. A bust for being part of a sit-in during her sophomore year at Berkeley. She never graduated. Has worked a series of odd jobs since coming back to San Celina. Needs money, but then all of them do.”

“So why is she driving a new truck?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Leased maybe? I didn’t check on that.”

I pushed myself out of my chair. “I suppose. Well, we’re not any closer to finding out who did this than I was fifteen minutes ago.”

“Process it all for a while,” he advised, ripping out the sheets of paper and handing them to me. “Something will click.”

I lay in bed that night, the stories of each of the suspects swirling about my head, keeping me from sleep. Which of those circumstances would be grave enough to drive a person to kill? What circumstances would drive someone to that extreme? Would I—could I—ever be that desperate? I loved the ranch I grew up on with all my heart—it was a feeling that was hard to explain to someone whose only experience with the land was the small plot of ground in the back of their suburban tract home or condo. But would I kill for it? I know I wouldn’t. Human life was more important than rocks and trees. What about a position, a career? I knew of people who’d killed to preserve that. To protect someone I loved from physical harm? That I could imagine doing.

Finally I eased out of bed and stood by the window, watching the shadows in our small front yard change and darken. In the dead of night, problems always seem larger, more impossible to solve—darkness seems to diminish us humans and our feeble attempts at bringing order to a chaotic universe. I thought about Shelby and a life lost so young and wondered if I’d just worded my advice differently, if she’d just not confronted her friend, if I’d just ... who knows what—she’d still be alive. I thought about Isaac and how successful his life had been professionally, and yet the two people he’d truly loved in his life were gone. I wondered about Kip and the family he’d left back in Montana—did they even think when they’d waved good-bye less than a year ago that they’d never see him again? And I thought of Jack—how in some ways my life with him almost seemed like a dream now. How Wade seemed only half a person without him. Was there anything I could do to help Wade move on?

“Querida.”
Gabe’s voice came gently out of the darkness. “Come back to bed.”

I crawled back under the down comforter and fit my body around his.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked, putting his arms around me.

“No,” I murmured.

“You know the biggest lesson I learned in Vietnam? And later, being a cop? That we don’t have control. Over anything. All we can do is the best with the circumstances we’re given.”

I laughed softly. “This from the man who double-knots everything?”

Echoing my laugh, he kissed my temple. “I said I learned it. I didn’t say I practiced it.”

“I’m glad we found each other, Friday.”

“Likewise,
niña.”

I WAS DRINKING a glass of orange juice the next morning when a clean-shaven Gabe walked into the kitchen.

“Feels much better,” I said as he rubbed his smooth, spicy-smelling cheek against mine. “In the excitement, I forgot to ask who won the beard-growing contest.”

“One of my sergeants,” he said. “The one we call ‘ape-man.’”

“What did he win?”

“A case of shaving cream.” He poured some orange juice into our blender, added protein powder, a banana, and some kiwi, and turned it on high.

I grinned at him. “And the pig-kissing contest?”

He gave me a level look. “The picture will be in the
Tribune
today. Knock yourself out.”

I giggled. “I’ll send a copy to your mother and sisters. By the way, I’m going to spend most of the day at the museum, so don’t worry. The place will be packed. We’re expecting a lot of early-bird tourists.”

He poured his breakfast drink into a large glass. “Just be careful.”

“That goes without saying.”

He looked at me over the edge of his glass, his eyes dark. “Not in your case, it doesn’t.”

I stuck my tongue out at him. He just shook his head and finished his drink. When he kissed me good-bye, he tasted vaguely like an Orange Julius.

In my office at the museum, I couldn’t settle down to do any real work, so instead I read Emory’s notes about Roland, Olivia, Greer, Bobby, and Parker over and over. I couldn’t help but wonder which one of them was the “friend” that Shelby had approached. In my gut, I knew that had to be the person who’d pushed her and who’d killed Kip because he’d found out. What I couldn’t figure out was if Kip had a suspicion about who killed Shelby, why didn’t he go to the police immediately? That’s what most people would have done. Unless ...

Unless they’d been involved in something they were trying to hide from the police. That certainly was what Kip’s message on my answering machine seemed to imply. But what? What could he have been involved with that would have gotten him killed? What had Shelby been involved with? I couldn’t imagine her doing anything illegal. She just didn’t seem to have any reason—or be the type. Not that there was a type. I’d been fooled before and was slowly becoming as cynical as my own husband. Unfortunately, people just as often took the low road as the high when it came to getting what they desired. And one thing I knew about Shelby—she desired success.

I read over the notes again and thought about each person’s motive. Parker, Olivia, and Greer were all artists striving to become known. Olivia and Greer were closer to breaking out from a mere regional arena into a national arena. If someone interfered with that, would either of them kill? I know their art meant a lot to both of them, but enough to kill another human being? Parker’s chance of becoming a commercially successful artist was small, as it was in most arts. For every artist who makes it, there are thousands who remain Sunday painters for the rest of their lives. Though most, deep in their hearts, dreamed of the success that came to so few, they knew and could accept the arbitrariness of fame and lived their lives with joy and gratitude with only an occasional twinge of regret.

Parker Williams had a lot of bad breaks in her life, and bitterness seemed to float across her emotional ocean like a layer of spilled oil. But was she bitter enough to kill? Then there was Bobby. I’d known people who’d killed to save their reputations. He probably wouldn’t do it for himself, but I understood the sanctity of the family in a Hispanic household and knew that to save his mother embarrassment, he just might do it if he thought he could get away with it. Then there was Roland, whose motive would be out and out greed—certainly not the first time that had happened. Or Shelby could have found out something that he didn’t want known. Perhaps something to do with another foray into forgery? I looked over the slips of paper again. Lust for fame, bitterness, panic, greed, fear of exposure. All believable motives for murder. And they all had opportunity by being at the barbecue. Not to mention it was so crowded at the Frio Saloon that any one of them could have followed Kip and Wade out to the creek and taken advantage of Kip’s drunk and battered situation. Motive, opportunity. What about means? Since both were spur of the moment, they all had that, too.

I leaned back in my chair and rubbed my temples with my fingertips. Where to go from here?

Dig deeper and always look for the story behind the story,
I remember Emory writing me once in a letter in which he was telling me his thoughts on good journalism. That’s where the real meat is—in the facts that aren’t so obvious. Get the who, what, when, and where, but never forget that the thing most readers are interested in is why. And the why is often found in the people surrounding the story. Look for the person who doesn’t want to talk to you and hound them until they do.
That’s
where the good stuff is.