That was more than his mother could stand. “Oh, no, you don’t,” Velma Verdugo said fiercely. “The detectives can interview you during lunch.” Then, after a long moment, her troubled face collapsed into a smile. Seconds later, the entire Verdugo clan was laughing and hugging.
Joanna Brady understood that, too. Something awful had happened. Like Jenny finding the body at camp, the Verdugo boys, while just being kids, had stumbled unwittingly into a homicide. Their lives had been touched by an evil that had left them all feeling vulnerable and scared. But now, while that vulnerability was still fresh, there was much to be thankful for in just being alive. In that situation, even a mother’s fierce anger could be cause for celebration.
“Sheriff Brady?” Deputy Howell said, announcing her arrival. “They told us to report to you or Chief Deputy Montoya.”
Joanna turned away from the people clustered around Frank Montoya’s Civvie to greet the two uniformed officers who had just arrived on the scene. Although Joanna was glad to see Deputy Debra Howell, she was less than thrilled when she realized the second deputy was Kenneth Galloway.
“What should we do?” Debra asked.
“We’ve got another homicide,” Joanna told them. “I want you to work with Detective Carbajal and Dave Hollicker on the crime scene investigation here, Deputy Howell. Deputy Galloway, you’ll be assisting Casey Ledford.”
“Doing what?” Ken Junior asked.
It wasn’t outright insubordination, but it was close – more in tone of voice than anything else.
“Whatever Casey needs,” Joanna told him. “From keeping the evidence log to lifting prints. She’s over there talking with Detective Carbajal. Ask her.”
Galloway walked away, muttering something unintelligible under his breath. “What’s wrong with him?” Frank Montoya asked.
“I’m not sure,” Joanna said. “But I suspect Deputy Galloway has a few issues about working with women.”
Within minutes, the medical examiner arrived. While Detective Carbajal led Doc Winfield to the body, Deputies Howell and Hollicker were sent to search other nearby buildings for a second possible victim. Meanwhile, Joanna and Frank Montoya consulted with Casey Ledford while Galloway lounged in the background.
“What do we know about the missing boyfriend?” the fingerprint tech asked. “How long has he been around?”
“According to Jaime, he’s been in town for several months,” Frank responded. “Working for and living with Dee Canfield most of the time. The DMV tells me that no one named Warren Gibson currently holds a valid Arizona driver’s license, and I haven’t been able to find any other official record of him, either.”
“All right,” Joanna said. “We have search warrants for both Dee Canfield’s house and her gallery, but let’s check the gallery first. There may be employment records or something else there that’ll make it possible for us to find out more about Warren Gibson. Something’s out of whack here.”
IT DIDN’T TAKE LONG for me to figure out that Marliss Shackleford hadn’t agreed to talk to me because she’d been charmed by my boyish good looks and overwhelming charm. She was after something. No, make that someone. She was out to get the goods on Sheriff Joanna Brady.
We retreated from the lobby to the bar. I had O’Doul’s. Marliss had a tall gin and tonic.
“I should have thought you’d be more interested in hanging around a homicide crime scene than in talking to me,” I said for openers.
Marliss gave me a flirtatious smile. She was fortyish and not all that bad looking. She had what my old partner, Sue Danielson, once referred to as big hair. Ash blond and crinkly, it stood out from her head like a massive halo.
“That’s the reporter’s job,” she explained. “Like my card says, I’m a columnist. I write a thrice-weekly piece called “Bisbee Buzzings.” The paper is called the
I have a long-term, not-so-cordial relationship with a man named Maxwell Cole who’s a columnist for the
“As I understand it, you’re a detective.”
“Used to be,” I told her. “Now I’m a special investigator with the Washington State Attorney’s Special Homicide Investigation Team. That’s spelled S-H-I-T,” I added helpfully.
Marliss Shackleford’s face changed. She looked shocked. “I beg your pardon?”
“That’s what my unit is called, the Special Homicide Investigation Team.”
“Oh,” she murmured. “But since this is a family newspaper, we’ll probably have to write the whole thing out.” She fumbled to an uneasy stop and then started over. “And you’re here in Bisbee because…”
“Why do you think I’m here?” I asked in return.
She shrugged. “I presume it’s because of the woman who died down in Naco on Wednesday night. I’ve learned that her real name was Latisha Wall. I’ve also been told she was in the Washington State Witness Protection Program.”
Marliss obviously had sources inside the Cochise County Sheriff’s Department. I wondered who those sources might be. Rather than asking, though, I simply raised my bottle of O’Doul’s and clinked it on her glass.
“See there?” I said. “Since you already know so much about it, I don’t understand why you need to talk to me at all.”
“All right,” she admitted, dropping her ploy of fake innocence for the moment. “I know who you are and where you’re from, but I still don’t know why you’re here. Is it because your boss…?”
“Ross Connors,” I supplied. “He’s the Washington State Attorney General.”
“Are you here because Mr. Connors has no faith in Sheriff Brady’s ability to bring this case to a successful conclusion?”
Marliss Shackleford waited for my answer with her pen poised over a small notebook and with her eyes sparkling in anticipation, like a cat ready to spring on some poor unsuspecting sparrow. She clearly wanted me to say that I thought Sheriff Joanna Brady was incompetent. And, much as I might have liked to – much as I thought Joanna Brady to be an arrogant little twit – I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I was incapable of saying so to a reporter, much less to a newspaper columnist.
“From what I can see,” I told her guardedly, “Sheriff Brady is doing a credible job, especially since her department is so short-handed. She seems to have only one detective on the job, and he’s having to deal with two separate homicides. Her plate is pretty full.”
Marliss’s eager expression faded to disappointment. She put down her pen. “Ernie’s on vacation,” she told me unnecessarily.
“Ernie?” I asked.
“Ernie Carpenter. He’s the sheriff’s department’s other detective. He and his wife, Rose, are off on an anniversary trip – their thirtieth.”
“So you think the county investigators are doing a good job?” Marliss continued.
“Yes,” I said. “I do.”
“And your function is?”
“I’m here as an observer,” I told her. “An interested observer; nothing more.”
“I see.” She frowned briefly, then added. “I understand Latisha Wall’s sister is in town. Have you talked to her?”
“I’m not sure there’s any reason for me to talk to her,” I fudged. “As I said, I’m observing, not investigating.”
Marliss tried coming at me from another direction. “I believe the sheriff’s department investigators interviewed a suspect today.”
The columnist certainly did have an inside track. Now it was my turn to play innocent. “Really?” I asked.
She nodded. “The guy’s a local, someone who’s lived around here for years. His name is Bobo Jenkins – LaMar
