leash, walking around just as nice as you please.”
Which is why you work homicide and she’s animal control, Joanna thought.
She studied the expanse of disrupted sand around the body. “You said you thought one of the vehicles had dual tires. How do you know that?”
“This isn’t the shortest way to and from the gate, but it’s the most passable. If you look carefully, you can see the dips left in the sand by the dual wheels even though you can’t make out the treads on the tire.”
Joanna looked down and saw that he was right. The tracks were there, but the fine grade of the sand left behind no visible tread.
“The victim didn’t bother following the road when he came here, and he didn’t take a direct route from the gate, either,” Ernie said. “It looks to me like he approached the scene by zigzagging in and out between the dunes.”
“Trying to stay out of sight, maybe?” Joanna asked.
Ernie nodded. “Could be,” he said.
“In other words,” Joanna said, “it’s possible the victim realized something was amiss and came out to investigate.”
“Maybe,” Ernie agreed.
“What about the trailer back by the gate?” Joanna asked. “Any sign of breaking and entering?”
“Lots,” Ernie said. “The front door is smashed and the inside is a mess. No way to tell from looking at it if anything was taken. We’ll need to dust it for prints, but with Casey away at that conference, that’s problematic. Jaime said he can collect the prints, but we won’t be able to run them through AFIS until Casey gets back.”
Jaime Carbajal was Joanna’s third homicide detective. It was unusual to have Joanna’s entire homicide unit focused on only one case, but for right now she was glad that was possible.
“By the way, where is Jaime?” Joanna wanted to know.
“I asked him to stop off and pick up a search warrant for the trailer.”
“But the guy who lived there is dead…” Joanna began.
“I know, I know,” Ernie replied. “But what if he isn’t the owner? What if the trailer actually belongs to Action Trail? The owners of that might have an objection.”
“What are you thinking?” Joanna asked.
“Look,” Ernie said, “I know this is all supposition on my part, but what if Action Trail Adventures is being used as a cover for a drug-smuggling operation? Maybe the victim was in on it; maybe he wasn’t. But supposing we end up finding out that the owners of Action Trail Adventures are somehow involved in what went on. We’d better be damned sure we have a valid search warrant in hand before we ever set foot inside that trailer. Otherwise, whatever we find there could end up being ruled as inadmissable.”
“Good point,” Joanna said.
“And I noticed what looked like the remains of a surveillance camera near the gate,” Ernie added. “The killers probably took that down as they were leaving.”
“Makes sense to me,” Joanna said. “But if there’s a camera, there’s probably also a tape. We need to find that, too.”
“Yes, we do,” Ernie asked. “Seen enough?”
“I think so,” Joanna said. “Let’s go talk with your witness.”
I’m just an ordinary guy, and it’s taken me a lifetime to learn that we all exist in a world of unintended consequences. For me that’s more than just a slogan. It’s life itself. My unmarried mother had no intention of getting pregnant with me, but she did. And when her fiance, my father, died in a motorcycle accident prior to my birth, my mother had choices. Even though abortions were illegal back then, she could probably have found a way to make one happen, but she didn’t. And she could have given me up for adoption, but she didn’t do that, either. In spite of her family’s opposition, she had me and raised me and, if you ask me, she did a damned fine job of it, too.
I lost Karen, my first wife, twice. The first time was as a result of the divorce and that was an unintended consequence of my years of drinking. I usually claim it was caused by working and drinking, but you need to consider the source. That’s how alcoholics work. Even when we finally sober up, we try to rationalize things away and minimize the impact our love affair with the bottle had on ourselves and the people around us. When I lost Karen the second time, it was to cancer. Not my fault. I didn’t cause it, and I like to think that, before she died, I managed to make amends for some of the heartache I caused her, and I’m very fortunate to have lived long enough to have a chance to get back in my kids’ lives.
And then there’s Anne Corley, my second wife. When I think of Anne now, I can still see her, striding purposefully through that cemetery on Queen Anne Hill in her bright red dress. And that’s pretty much all I remember, and maybe it’s better that way. Of course, I was still drinking then, so a lot of my forgetfulness may be due to booze, but there’s no arguing with the fact that what happened between us in the course of those next few dizzying days was astonishing-both astonishingly good and astonishingly bad. Thrown together, we were a fire that burned too hot and bright to last-like the brilliant flash from a dying lightbulb just before it goes black.
What I do know about those few interim days was that we didn’t talk about money. We never talked about money. We had far more important things to think about and do, but the money was there all the time. The fact that Anne had plenty of money was plain to see in everything about her: in the car she drove-a Porsche 928; in the hotel where she stayed-the Four Seasons Olympic in those days; in the clothing she wore; in the way she carried herself.
At the time I was far too wrapped up in being with her to wonder what she could possibly see in a hard- drinking homicide cop. And once she was gone, I was too devastated by losing her to have any grasp on what she had given me. It turned out I wasn’t so much a fortune hunter as I was a fortune finder. The money she gave me was there, but for a long time I didn’t pay much attention to it. (Thank God, Anne also left me under the wing of her very capable attorney, Ralph Ames, who was paying attention to it. He’s also the one who finally helped force me into treatment, but that’s another story.)
Over the years I didn’t talk about the money with anyone other than Ralph Ames and with Ron Peters, my best friend on the force. Make that my best friend, period. Ron knew all about it. He was there in my apartment on that awful afternoon after Anne Corley died and he did me the enormous favor of running what remained of our wedding cake down the garbage disposal. I suppose there was some talk around the department when I moved from the Royal Crest to Belltown Terrace, but since I didn’t make a big deal of it, neither did my coworkers at Seattle PD or at the Special Homicide Investigation Team. And since I kept coming into the office just like any other poor working stiff and since I didn’t make a fuss about my financial situation, neither did anyone else. The subject of money seldom came up.
Until recently, and that brings me to yet another unintended consequence, Mel, my third wife, and the light of my life. At the time I met Melissa Soames, I wasn’t at all interested in having either another partner or another wife. Despite both our efforts to the contrary, she became both. Once she showed up to work at S.H.I.T. and once I laid eyes on her, I should have known she was trouble, but I didn’t, and by the time I figured it out, it was too late. The wheels were off the bus. J. P. Beaumont was a goner.
When Mel and I were courting, we didn’t talk about money any more than Anne Corley and I had. Mel’s first husband had been pretty well fixed as far as finances were concerned, but he was also a jerk who made sure she didn’t make off with much. Once Mel and I were married and had to file our first set of income taxes, things changed and suddenly money was an issue.
“What the hell’s the matter with you?” Mel had demanded, hands on her hips. “Why on earth do you think Anne Corley gave you all that money in the first place?”
It’s funny that’s how Mel and I both talk about her-Anne Corley, with both names. It’s almost as though I never lasted long enough to be on a first-name basis with the woman. Mel has copied that peculiarity.
“Because she liked me?” I asked lamely.
I have to admit, I had never given that question all that much thought or even any thought. Why would I?
“Because she wanted you to have fun with it,” Mel told me. “Because she figured out the moment she met you that you worked too hard-that you were too serious and too driven. She wanted to lighten your load. Instead, you’ve kept right on working too hard and amassing a fortune. It’s time that changed. You can either sit around like some modern King Midas, or you can get off your dead butt (she didn’t say butt, actually) and have some fun with
