Paradise Lost

Brady,” the desk clerk said. “I’ll be glad to. Does she need help with her luggage?”

Joanna didn’t recognize the young woman, but by now she was accustomed to the idea that there were lots of people in Cochise County who knew the sheriff by sight—or maybe by credit card—when she had no idea who they were. “She doesn’t have any luggage,” Joanna returned. “But thanks. I appreciate it.”

As Joanna climbed into the Civvie, her cell phone began to ring. She could see her caller was Chief Deputy Montoya. “Hello, Frank,” she said.

Unfortunately Old Bisbee existed in a cleft in the Mule Moun­tains into which no cell phone signal could penetrate. The only sounds emanating from Joanna’s receiver were unintelligible sput­terings. Hanging up in frustration, she reached for the radio.

“Tica,” she said to Dispatch. “Can you patch me through to Chief Deputy Montoya? He tried to call me on the cell phone a minute ago, but I’m up in Old Bisbee in a dead zone.”

Putting the Civvie in gear, she began negotiating the series of one-way streets that would take her back down to Main Street. After several long minutes, Frank’s voice cane through the radio.

“Where are you?” he demanded. “I could hear your voice, but you kept breaking up.”

“I’m just now leaving Old Bisbee,” she told limn. “I’m on my way out to the ranch.”

“How did the ID go?”

“About how you’d expect. I just dropped the victim’s sister off at the Copper Queen Hotel for a medicinal Scotch to calm her nerves. I also rented her a room. I’ve got to go home to see Jenny. I told Maggie MacFerson that I’ll drive her back to Phoenix in the morning. The idea that there aren’t hourly Greyhounds running through Bisbee overnight was news to her.”

“So the ID is positive, then?” Frank asked.

“Yes,” Joanna said. “Constance Haskell is the victim all right. I trust the DMV information from that Encanto address has been broadcast to all units?”

“Absolutely—a Beemer and a Lincoln Town Car. Neither one of them were at the residence in Phoenix, right?”

“That’s correct.”

“Good. I listed them both as possibly stolen and the perp presumed armed and dangerous. That way, if someone spots either one of ‘em, they’ll be pulled over. Where are you headed?”

“Out to the ranch to see Jenny,” Joanna replied.

“So you’ve heard about what happened to Dora then?” Frank asked.

“Some of it,” Joanna returned grimly. “Doc Winfield told me. I think I’ll stop by their house on my way home and wring my mother’s neck.”

“From what Jim Bob told me, I guess Jenny’s really upset about what happened.”

“Tell me,” Joanna urged.

“When Dora figured out what was going on—that we knew what her mother had been up to and that a caseworker was there to put Dora back into foster care—she lit out the back door and tried to make a run for it. The caseworker must have seen it coining. She took off out the front door and caught Dora as she came racing around the house. I mean she literally tackled Dora. They both went down in a heap. Dora fought tooth and nail all the way to the car. She was yelling and crying and screaming that she didn’t want to go, that she’d rather die. I’m sure it was traumatic for everybody concerned. If I’d been there, I’d be upset, too.”

So am I, Joanna thought grimly. But right at that moment, powerless to change what had happened, she did the only thing that might help her forge through the emotional maelstrom—she changed the subject. “Anything else happening?”

“Well, I have one small piece of good news,” Frank replied. “I managed to get through to the phone factory. It’s possible the missing message on that answering machine really did say Connie Haskell should meet her husband in Paradise. The call to the house in Phoenix originated from a pay phone outside the general store in Portal, which happens to be only eight miles or so from Par­adise—town of, that is. I told Ernie about the Portal connection. He and Detective Carbajal will head over there first thing in the morning and start asking questions.”