“How do you know it wasn’t him?”
“He always came at the end of the week, stayed till Sunday or sometimes Monday morning. This was in the middle of the week, and the car was only here for the one day.”
“Do you remember what day of the week it was?”
“It was a Tuesday.”
“Are you sure, Mrs. Owens?” Brody spoke up for the first time since Annie had engaged the woman in conversation.
“I’m positive. I was on my way into town to the dentist. Dr. Jacobs. He’s only in West Priest on Tuesday’s. Rest of the week, he’s in Priest or over in Tall Trees.”
“This tall, dark-haired man…” Annie began.
“Good-looking. Don’t leave out the good-looking part.”
“How often did you see him? Twice a month? Once? Every two months…?”
“Maybe once a month, sometimes twice, close as I remember.”
“Do you think you’d recognize him if you saw him again?”
“Oh yes. He really was a looker.”
“Thanks, Mrs. Owens. If you remember anything else, you just give me a call, hear?”
“Will do.” Mrs. Owens nodded but made no effort to leave. “What do you suppose happened to her? You got any suspects?”
“Now, now, don’t go talking about suspects. We don’t even know what she died from. Could be natural causes. Let’s not go jumping to conclusions, Mrs. Owens. That’s how rumors get started.”
“Well, you know I’m not one to gossip,” she said to the sheriff and to Annie.
“That’s good, then. We don’t need any speculation going around town until we know for certain what happened here. And we might not know that for a few more days. Gotta give the medical examiner some time to do his thing.”
Mrs. Owens nodded her understanding and turned to leave.
“You don’t suppose someone killed her deliberately, do you, Sheriff?”
“Mrs. Owens, I thought we just agreed we would not be speculating,” Brody said sternly.
“Just wondering.” The older woman resumed her walk to her car. “She was such a lovely thing, so sweet. Always waved when you went past.”
“Mrs. Owens,” Annie called to her. “Would you happen to know where Mariana worked? What she did for a living?”
“Oh, she didn’t work. I think she had some sort of family money or something, some inheritance, maybe it was.” Mrs. Owens opened her car door. “But she sure didn’t work. Up all hours of the night; I used to see lights on down here all the time. I said something to her once, about her staying up late and was she reading or watching TV, and she said most nights she didn’t sleep well, that she slept better during the day. Which I thought was strange, you know. The way she said it, made me think that she was afraid to sleep at night, like she was safer sleeping during the day.”
“Why do you say that?” Annie asked.
“Just a feeling I had. She had that house lit up like a Christmas tree all night, every night, and the one night I stopped by to drop off some mail that got put in my box by mistake, it took her like a full minute to unlock all the locks.”
Annie and the sheriff looked at each other.
“Did you notice a lot of locks?” Annie asked the sheriff.
“No, but let’s go take a look…”
An inspection of the inside of the front door proved there to be a dead bolt, a slider, and a regular bolt.
“The only lock that was on when we first got here was the slider,” Brody told Annie. “I unlocked that to open the door for you. I guess I missed the others because they were unlocked, and because I was so busy at the time covering my nose and mouth and dodging the swarming flies.”
“Let’s check the back door,” Annie suggested.
There were three locks on the back door as well. Locks on the windows. A dead bolt on the basement.
“Sheriff, what’s the crime rate out here?”
“Zilch. I can’t remember the last robbery. Murders? None in the three years I’ve been sheriff. We had a few hunting accidents, and last year an old man died of a heart attack up the road, a little higher up in the hills. But crime rate? I gotta say we don’t have one.”
“Then why would she have all these locks?” Annie bent closer to inspect them. “Fairly new, too, all except the slider. The dead bolts were installed more recently. Certainly within the past year or so.”
“Well, we’ve only got one place in town that sells locks. Larsen’s Hardware. They sell, they install.”
“Maybe someone should drive down there and talk to them.”
“Just as easy to call Hank Larsen on the phone, have him come on up here and identify the locks as his.”
“Maybe he’ll remember chatting with her. Maybe she told him what she was trying to lock out.”
“Maybe. It’s a good place to start,” Sheriff Brody agreed, but made no move toward the house.
“Were you going to call him today?” Annie asked.
“I thought I’d wait until the body was moved out, Dr. McCall. Not everyone can walk past a partially decomposed body and appear not to notice.”
“I notice, Sheriff Brody.” Annie started back into the house.
“Dr. McCall,” Brody called to her as she stepped over the threshold. “May I ask who you called earlier?”
“Excuse me?”
“You went out the back a little while ago with that little phone book of the deceased’s. Looked to me like you called one of the numbers.”
“I called a fellow agent who was an old friend of Ms. Lowery’s.”
“That friend of a friend you mentioned earlier.”
“Yes.”
“That friend have a name?”
“Grady Shields.” She hated having to give up his name, not knowing what Grady’s involvement with Melissa might have been, but she couldn’t lie, either. “Special Agent Grady Shields.”
“And his relationship with Ms. Lowery-or Ms. Gray-was what, do you know?”
“Former coworker. Friend.”
“That number for Agent Shields, it’s in the address book?”
“Yes. Was there something else, Sheriff?”
“Not right now.”
She closed the door and went back inside, hoping for a moment with the medical examiner. While she waited for him to finish preparing the body for transport, she stepped out onto the back porch to make one more phone call.
“Evan, I’m afraid there’s been a change in plans…”
16
Connor leaned on the iron railing that enclosed the balcony overlooking the Atlantic coast of Morocco and watched the gulls circle overhead. An occasional protesting scream pierced the tranquillity of the morning as a coveted morsel of fish was snatched from one beak by another. The sky was as blue as he’d ever seen it, and the breeze as gentle as a caress. Coming on the heels of the past few weeks spent in a Middle Eastern desert, the peaceful morning was balm to his soul.
There was a rap on the door, and he answered it without hesitation.
“Your breakfast.” The dark-eyed woman carried a rectangular tray in both hands and headed straight for the balcony. “You should eat here, in the sun. It will relax you.”
“Magda, you’re more like my mother than my mother was.”
“Someone has to watch out for you,” she said without smiling. “It might as well be me.”
She placed the tray on the small glass table and removed the napkin to reveal a plate of warm croissants, figs, a thinly sliced pear, and a small mound of white cheese.
“Sit and eat. I’ll be right back with your coffee.”
“You’re way too good to me,” he said as he sat at the table.
“I certainly am.” Magda went through the double doors into the room and disappeared into the hall. When she returned, she brought a second tray, upon which stood a tall carafe and two cups. She poured coffee into both cups, placed one before Connor, then sat opposite him at the table.
“Nice of you to join me.” He offered her the croissants, but she waved him off.
“I eat early, at dawn. You know that. I need an early start if I’m to take care of you and the rest of my guests in the manner in which I’ve made you accustomed.”
“There is no finer hotel in Essaouira. It’s the reason I’ve come to love this city. The reason I spend any available free time right here.” He tilted his cup in her direction before taking a sip. “And besides, there’s no better coffee anywhere in Morocco.”
Satisfied, Magda leaned back in the chair and raised her face to the sun, her eyes closed.
