CHAPTER 3
It was going on eleven p.m. by the time Tess sat down to write her initial report for the George Hanley murder book.
She and Danny Rojas had split up. Danny returned to the scene to supervise the removal of George Hanley’s vehicle, a 2005 Yukon Denali, while Tess worked on the report back at the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office.
Earlier, deputies had been dispatched to secure the possible secondary crime scene—Hanley’s apartment.
One of them—Javits—called to tell her the door to the apartment was locked when they arrived. It had taken them a while to get there because there was a car accident at a nearby intersection and they had stopped to render aid. They’d reached the apartment by 9:47 and saw nothing amiss. He reported that the area around the room—the walkway, the curb, the parking lot—was free of trash. They secured the scene by sealing the door with crime scene tape and extending the tape out to the pillars of the walkway.
“Did you knock on doors?”
“We did, both sides of his apartment and the place above, but nobody answered. It appeared quiet. The lock had not been tampered with.”
Hanley’s keys—and Tess assumed the key to the apartment was included—had been left in the ignition of the burned car.
Her phone chirped—Danny. Tess ended her call with the deputy.
“The Yukon’s on the flatbed on its way to forensics,” Danny said. “Took a long time to winch it up out of that ravine. Burned to a crisp.”
“How far was it from the ghost town?”
“Maybe a half mile, like we thought. The closest place to dump it.”
They would give it a thorough going-over.
“It was torched big-time,” Danny said. “Don’t know what kind of evidence they’ll be able to recover. Still, gotta try.”
“Hopefully there’s something.”
“Yeah, hopefully.” But he sounded gloomy. Or maybe he was just tired.
Tess stared at her monitor and tapped her fingers on her desk. There was one other detective in the room, Derek Little, a guy she didn’t know well. He was at his own desk, which faced away from hers, talking on the phone. Tess got the impression he didn’t like her, probably because she came in with Bonny, the new undersheriff.
She knew a lot of the Ds she worked with considered her to be a teacher’s pet.
Back to George Hanley. So he was a retired cop who came down here from the Phoenix area to be near his daughter. Nothing unusual about that scenario. They hadn’t learned much from Pat and Bert, except that George Hanley led tours of the ghost town, Credo, once or twice a week. His mother had been born in the town, and he had memories of visiting the ghost town as a child.
The only thing she could think of: if he went down there often, he might have seen something. Something a retired cop might notice.
Border crossers, drug smugglers, and gun runners passed through that area all the time. Even though it was rugged country, the border around there was porous. Where there was opportunity, there was also activity.
Her cell vibrated. She was surprised to see the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency, ICE come up on her readout at this hour.
The agent returning her call, Tony Versailles, explained that he’d been on a raid and was too jazzed to sleep. “What do you want to know?”
Tess ran it down for him, asked him if there was anything on George Hanley.
“Offhand, I can’t remember anyone like that,” Versailles said. “It’s kind of unusual.”
“His age, you mean.”
“You’d be surprised at some of the old folks we’ve dealt with. There are old guys involved, sure, but they’re usually the brains of the outfit and stay clear of the day-to-day operation. Some of the prominent community leaders around here are up to their necks in organized crime, but they’re hard to nail down. I call ’em the Godfathers. Let me take a look and I’ll call you back.”
He called her twenty minutes later. “I don’t see anything here. That doesn’t mean there isn’t something. But the guy’s an Anglo. He doesn’t really fit the profile.”
“He’s an ex-cop,” Tess said.
“Yeah. Could be something there. But we haven’t come across him. I’ll keep checking, though.”
“Thanks,” Tess said.
“No problem. Keep me posted—you never know where this could lead.”
She became aware that Derek Little was staring at her from across the room. When she caught his eye, he looked back at his computer monitor. Concentrated on it for a moment.
Then he rolled his chair out from the desk and stood up.
He walked in her direction. Derek was tall and skinny, the way Tess envisioned Ichabod Crane.
He stooped over her.
Cleared his throat.
“I have a question for you.” When he spoke, she got the impression it was like trying to pull a sliver out of his hand with a pair of tweezers.
She looked up at him. Wasn’t about to stand up.
He cleared his throat again. “You remember the Sanchez case?”
“That wasn’t mine.”
“But we were all looking for him, right?”
Yes. Bonny had put his picture up on the projector. He had beaten his wife to death and was on the run.
“I have a photo here, came off a surveillance camera.” He shoved it under her nose. “Is that him?”
She looked at the guy. “Where was this?”
“Outside Appliance City.”
It was blurry. A night photo. Tess said, “Yes, it’s him.”
“Uh. How do you know? It’s blurry and you can see less than half his face.”
“It’s him.”
“You sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“Okay. Then…thanks.” He remained where he was.
“And?”
He slapped the photo back on the desk. “What kind of car is that? Behind him. See?”
Just the fender. No, just half the fender. Fortunately, it was the part with the headlight.
Tess had seen a car just like it the other day. “It’s a Ford Fusion.”
“Thanks.”
He picked up the photo and walked back to his desk.
The Magic Show was over.
Twenty past midnight, Tess gave it up and headed for home. She had a twenty-mile drive on a winding two- lane road to her place in Patagonia and she was already falling asleep.
Hanley’s apartment was sealed.
It could wait.
CHAPTER 4
Orchard Apartments near Rio Rico was a two-story tan stucco, faded with age. The only landscaping was two spindly agaves ringed with cement blocks. The blacktop edged up to the wild yellow grassland that seemed to take over everything in sight. A large banner had been tied across part of the second story with the legend: MOVE- IN SPECIAL $499 A MONTH - FURNISHED. Across the road was a convenience store, and beyond that, a Motel
