The Survivors Club (25 page)

CHAPTER 45

After chores were done, after calling to cancel lessons yet again, Jaimie heard the phone ring in the house.

She was hopeful. Maybe someone had found Adele.

As she walked to the house, she thought for the hundredth time that something might have scared Adele. Dogs did run away. If so, she hoped Adele would find her way back. She’d taken Adele as a trophy, but already loved her like one of her own. The idea of Adele out there on her own, lost, hungry, maybe even
hurt
—was unbearable. Every time the phone rang, she hoped it was someone looking for a reward—she’d gladly pay a hundred dollars. Two hundred, even, if she could just get Adele back.

She was still in shock over Chad’s death. She felt as if she’d been beaten around the head. And Michael—she sensed that something was going on with him. Michael, the rock of the family. She sensed that he was holding something back. She sensed that he was scared.

Everything going to shit.

She got to the phone just before the recorder came on. “Hello?”

“Listen carefully.”

It had to be a prank. Whoever it was had been sucking on helium. “Michael, is that you? Because it’s not very fun—”

“I have your dog.”

“What? Who are you?”

“A friend. I found your dog on the road. She’s got a collar and tags, and the tag says ‘Bandit.’ That’s your dog, isn’t it?”

The weird Donald Duck voice, high-pitched and thin as a thread. She heard whoever it was pause, suck on something, and then he piped: “I want a reward.”

“I offered a reward. One hundred dollars—it’s all yours.”

“Good.”

“Why don’t you bring her here and I’ll write you a check.”

“No check—cash. I don’t trust the DeKoven family.”

That high Donald Duck voice.

“Okay, bring her here. When are you coming?”

“No, you meet me.”

“Meet you?” That didn’t sound like a good idea. Fear began to thrum in her stomach, in her heart. Was this a crank call? “No, you come here.”

“What a shame.”

“What do you mean, what a shame?”

“Poor doggie. Looks like Bandit is gonna go to heaven.” And the caller hung up.

Jaimie succumbed to panic. She’d blown it! Now this monster would kill Adele. She tried to find the number on the readout, but it was blocked. There was no place to call. How’d they do that? She had to talk to him—had to. The motherfucking bastard was going to kill her dog!

She sat there, trembling. Unable to move, unable to think.

The phone rang again. Jaimie stumbled to her feet and snatched it up. “Who’s this?”

Helium Man said, “I’ll give you one more chance.”

CHAPTER 46

Tess and Danny were once again in the Scofield kitchen. This time the subject was all about Wade Poole.

“So it
was
him,” Pat Scofield said, after heating up a plate of tamales. “You want one? They’re homemade—Bert made them.”

“Thanks,” Danny said. They each took one, doled out on dinner roll plates.

“Let’s go out onto the patio,” Pat said. “It’s so nice out there, even though it’s sweater weather.”

Pat said, “I saw him again. I was sure it was him, but Bert said it was my imagination. Even though he wasn’t there.” She shot him a resentful look.

Tess let Danny take this. She thought that he and Pat had a better relationship, for whatever reason. Bert looked put out, discounting his wife as usual.

“Can you tell me where you saw him?” Danny said, his voice quiet and gentle.

“Well, I was at the Safeway. And he was in line in the checkout—two people ahead of me.”

“Do you think he saw you?”

“He looked back. He tried to hide it, but I’m pretty sure I saw surprise on his face.”

“Did he say anything to you?”

“No.”

“Did you say anything to him?”

“I wouldn’t give him the time of day.”

“So what did he do then?”

“He just turned around and stacked his groceries on the conveyer belt. Like he never even saw me.”

“So you think he recognized you.”

“Oh, he recognized me all right. How do you not recognize your dead wife’s sister?”

“Did he react in any way?”

“You could tell he wasn’t going to. He thinks he got away with how he treated my sister, but he knew my feelings about him.”

“What happened next?”

“He left. I was still in line—I couldn’t exactly follow him out! But I watched him go, you better believe I did.”

“What did you see?”

“I saw him go out the sliding doors, you could see through them, and walk into the parking lot with his groceries.”

“Did you see him get into a car?”

“No. The person in front of me only had four or five items and I was putting things on the belt.”

“So you didn’t see what he was driving.”

“No.”

Danny looked at Tess. “Thank you, ma’am. I appreciate—”

“But I did see the truck when he drove by that couple of times. What you’d call cruising.”

“Can you describe the truck?”

“It was white.”

“Anything else?”

“I don’t know anything about trucks. Sorry.”

Danny looked at his notes. “Can you tell me about your sister’s nephew from her first marriage? His name was David, right?”

“Yes.

“She really liked him. But you have to understand, I wish she’d never met him. If she hadn’t, she would have never—” Pat’s fingers abruptly went to her mouth and her eyes grew wide. She looked at Tess.

She’d made the connection. After all these years.

Tess could see she was flailing. Her eyes were glassy as she looked from Tess to Danny and back again.

Danny hunkered down so he could look in to her eyes. “Are you all right?”

“I…” She glanced around, focused on her husband.

Tess noticed the stubborn look on Bert’s face. Had he thought the same thing at one time, but then discarded it as impossible? Tess had no way of knowing.

Danny said, “Do you think that is possible? That she was killed on purpose?”

“By someone, do you mean Wade?” demanded Bert Scofield. “Because that’s the most ridiculous thing I ever heard of.”

Tess thought that the idea must have crossed his mind before.

Pat said, “You didn’t see the way he had her under his thumb. There’s a mean side to him, as I keep telling you, but you won’t listen and neither would Dad.”

Danny shot a look at Tess. Tess said to Bert, “Would you mind—I like those tamales so much. I’m wondering if you can give me the recipe.”

“Sure.” He led her back into the kitchen. He reached into the cupboard and plunked down a bag of blue corn and husks for the wrapping. “It’s pretty straightforward.”

“Could you write it down for me? I’d really appreciate it.”

“Sure.” His voice was gruff. He grabbed a tablet that had been affixed to the refrigerator and got a pen from the kitchen drawer. “You’re not fooling me. You just wanted me out of there.”

“Yes, that’s right. But I do want the recipe.”

“Fine. But what you have to understand is, Pat’s always been, well, a conspiracy theorist. She’s been convinced from day one that Wade killed Karen. Although thankfully, she never said it in public. I don’t want to get sued.”

“Is Wade the suing type?”

“Who knows? But if you want my opinion, I think she’s imagining things.”

“But you do admit he’d know where she was at twelve o’clock that night.”

“Sure. But that doesn’t mean he’d do anything. Look, I know people. I work in business. He and I used to go on hunting trips together, and you get to know a guy. I don’t believe it, and I’ll tell you another thing, her dad thought he was a good guy. They worked together for fifteen years. George was his mentor. They were like that.” He crossed his fingers.

“You sound convinced.”

“I know people. Wade’s one of the nicest people you’d ever want to meet. Karen was…she was difficult. Her first marriage ended, but she got attached to that kid, Dave. Couldn’t let it go. No relation, but she was always humoring him. You ask me, she had a crush on the kid. You know, like those schoolteachers?”

“What do you mean?”

“You know, older women and kids barely out of high school. Or even in high school. She was a teacher herself. So…it’s not a leap to think that she might have had a crush on the kid. Going out there at midnight to pick him up when his car was in the shop? You asked me and I’m telling you what I really think: she was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

Tess heard footsteps behind her—Danny. “Hey, thank you!” he said to Bert. “We’ve taken up enough of your time, so we’ll be going.”

“Yeah, well.” Bert glared at Danny. “Maybe you should spend more time on solving my father-in-law’s murder instead of going on wild goose chases.”

“Hey, you might be right,” Danny said. He held out a hand. “We’ll do our best to find out who killed him. It’s important to us.”

“Yeah,” Bert grumbled. “‘Your call’s important to us.’”

Tess grinned at Danny.

Outside, Tess said, “What do you think?”

“I think ol’ Wade is one hell of a con man.”

“Pat’s instincts are right,” Tess said. “But I can see how the guy can charm the pants off anyone.” She thought of the open, friendly face. The guy looked and acted like a big friendly dog. Like he’d bear hug you at any moment. “He’s good.”

Helium Man—that’s how Jaimie thought of the son of a bitch—told her to take Harshaw Road out to Mowry, an old ghost town down near the Arizona-Mexico border. It was a remote area, and few tourists made it there. She was to bring a “reward”—ten thousand dollars in cash. He’d wait until she showed up with the money and left it at a prearranged spot, marked by one of those flags on wires they used for cable markers. She was to call him at a certain number when she’d done it. Once he had the money, he’d direct her to where she would find Adele.

Not that she trusted him. But what else could she do?

She knew he was serious, because he called the dog “Adele.” So he knew
something
about George Hanley’s dog, and he knew she’d adopted her.

This scared Jaimie to the core. She entertained the idea of not playing along, letting him keep her, but he’d anticipated that, too.

He’d told her, graphically, what he would do to Adele, and how long it would take to kill her. He told her he’d cook her on a spit.

She knew he was telling the truth.

“Why are you doing this?” she demanded. “Why hurt an innocent dog?”

His answer: “I know what you did.”

Jaimie could access the money. No problem with that. Briefly, she thought about calling Michael. But she knew what he’d say. She knew he’d tell her not to do it. And she had to do it. Adele was hers. Adele was more than just a dog—she was the embodiment of what they’d done. Everyone else had gotten a tribute, a prize, except for her. Even Chad, and he didn’t even know why. Just for buying the cougar, he had been given a surfboard, stolen out of Peter Farley’s house. But what did she get? Nothing. So she took her own tribute, her own prize. George Hanley was going to be hers.
She’d
found him,
she’d
targeted him. So what if she couldn’t do anything for at least a year?

He was hers, and she’d been cheated out of it.

She tried to tune out the fear she felt. But her mind kept going back to one question: Who would know about the Survivors Club?

Whoever it was, was male. She was pretty sure of that. Even if he disguised his voice with the helium.

But was she really that sure? Couldn’t it be the woman cop?

Was this a trick? Was she trying to lure her out there? Maybe she
should
talk to Michael.

She needed to get the ten thousand out, though. That would take time. But if this
was
for real, Jaimie was not going to let whoever it was kill Adele.

She loved Adele.

Jaimie would go and take out the money, first. Then, if she needed to meet this person, if this was really on the up-and-up and somebody had figured this out and it wasn’t the Patagonia cop and if it wasn’t the Tucson cop, then she would go out there.

She ran out to the truck. The hand holding the car alarm button shook so badly she missed the first time. Then she was in the truck and taking off for Wells Fargo.

“Now what?” Danny asked Tess as they drove back to the sheriff’s office.

“I have no idea.”

“It’s confusing, that’s for sure. So what are we thinking here? You really think he killed his wife?”

“It would be hard to prove.”

“Yeah, but what do you think?”

Tess said, “I do. I think he killed Karen, and I think that her nephew was collateral damage.”

“Why, you think?”

Tess stared out at the blacktop winding through the golden hills. The sun baking the windshield, even though it was only April. “He was tired of her? He wanted to be rid of her?”