source, contact me immediately.”
Beaner stuffed the card in his shirt pocket. “I don’t think Brian is a bad person. I truly don’t think he would hurt anybody. He’s just a scared kid with an overactive imagination.”
“Uh-huh,” Armijo said. “Did you try to sleep with him?”
Beaner blushed and said nothing more.
Outside the cottage Armijo’s cell phone rang. He glanced at the incoming phone number on the screen, put the phone to his ear, and said, “Talk to me.”
He listened, grunted, hung up, and gave Clayton a totally disgusted look.
“What?”
“Captain Apodaca just informed me that one of his hotshot homicide detectives at the murder scene allowed a young man matching Brian Riley’s description to drive off on the Harley motorcycle. Apparently, the young man told the detective that he lived at the apartment complex and needed his wheels to get to work. Since the bike hadn’t been secured into evidence by the crime scene techs, the cop bought the story without batting an eye or thinking to check with anyone else. An APB has been issued.”
“When did this happen?”
“Ten minutes ago. Every city, county, and state patrol officer in the greater Albuquerque area is looking for him.”
“Well, at least Riley has surfaced,” Clayton said as he climbed into Armijo’s unit, although the stupidity of the mistake deflated his spirits.
Armijo grunted. “Yeah, but if he’s on the run again it’s because he found out that Minerva Stanley Robocker went and got herself executed. He’s got to believe the killer is closing in on him.”
“Let’s get some protection here for Beaner before we leave,” Clayton urged. “We don’t need another person Brian Riley knows getting themselves unnecessarily killed.”
Lee keyed the radio microphone and made the request. While the two men waited, they listened to radio traffic. Everyone on the streets riding any kind of motorcycle was being stopped. It didn’t matter if they were on custom hogs, choppers with sidecars, dirt bikes, or motor scooters. If it had two or three wheels and an engine, it got stopped.
A squad car pulled up behind Armijo. He waved and drove off. “Now what?”
“It’s back to Santa Fe for me,” Clayton said. If Benjamin Beaner was to be believed, whatever Brian Riley found had been on the Canoncito property Tim and Denise Riley owned. It consisted of a sizable piece of land, and only the double-wide, stable, horse trailer, and immediate surroundings had been searched. Unless Brian Riley was found and had started talking before Clayton arrived in Canoncito, he planned to comb every square inch of it if necessary.
“Get some sleep first,” Lee said, covering a yawn with his hand. “You look like shit.”
“Thanks a lot,” Clayton replied.
During the hours Kerney had spent analyzing Denise Riley’s letters to her sister, he’d filled a writing tablet with notes. When he’d reached the point where he was trying to decide if Denise’s handwriting curlicues had changed over time, he decided to stop. He put the letters aside, stripped off the latex gloves he’d worn to handle the documents, and reviewed his findings.
Denise had indeed used repetitive phrases and stock comments throughout her letters. No matter where she’d roamed, all the men she’d hooked up with were outdoor type guys who loved sports. Almost universally, she would characterize them to Helen as “footloose and fun-loving—not ready to settle down.” When she worked, her jobs were always “boring, but paid the rent.” When she wrote about adapting to new customs, struggling to learn foreign language phrases, describing the people she encountered, recounting an excursion to a landmark destination, experiencing exotic cuisine, very little detail went with it. It was as though Denise had lifted her imagery, facts, and experiences from travel guides.
There were seventy-eight letters in total, some of them lengthy, many of them short, but only five letters had any cross-outs or strikeovers, and the total number of misspelled words could be counted on both hands.
Was Denise Riley one of the most exacting and error-free correspondents ever? It was possible, but Kerney doubted it. The era of letter-writing was long gone, a victim of computers, the Internet, and e-mail. Even if Denise was a throwback inclined to write leisurely letters to her older sister, surely once in a while a note home would have been dashed off in a scribbled hurry. There was none of that in the packet of correspondence.
Kerney suddenly realized that not once in any of her letters did Denise refer to sending home snapshots of the places she’d visited, the people she’d met, or the men she’d supposedly fallen in love with. He picked up the phone and dialed Helen Muiz’s number. Ruben answered.
“How are things going?” he asked.
“I’ll be honest with you, it’s been rough,” Ruben replied. “Just getting her up and dressed in the morning is turning into a major feat. I’ve talked her into letting me make an appointment for her to see a therapist.”
“That’s a wise thing for her to do. How are you holding up?”
“I’m hanging in. Do you need to speak to Helen?”
“Maybe you can answer my question. In Denise’s letters home, did she ever enclose any photographs of the places she’d lived, her boyfriends, the excursions she’d made, or the tourist attractions she’d visited?”
“Never. She said she was too busy, felt that a camera made her look like a tourist and that she just wanted to blend in and experience the world rather than taking pictures of it.”
“There’s no explanation of that in her letters to Helen.”
“Helen had a phone conversation with Denise about a year or two after she’d left Santa Fe. That’s when the subject came up.”
“Didn’t you or Helen or the other family members think it odd that Denise wouldn’t want to share a photograph or two of her world travels and adventures, the men she lived with, the new friends she’d made?”
“Of course, but you have to understand that Denise had a habit of completely shutting down on a subject once she decided she didn’t want to deal with it anymore. It was one of her ways of establishing limits. Broaching a forbidden subject with her got you an icy stare or the cold shoulder. If it was a serious infraction, you could be completely frozen out of her life for months at a time until she decided to forgive you.”
“And the family tolerated this behavior?”
“She could also be charming, loving, and irresistible, Kerney. She was the eccentric, uncontrollable kid sister who got to break all the rules.”
“You’ve been a big help, Ruben,” Kerney said. “Thanks.”
“Is there anything you want me to tell Helen?”
“Just let her know that we’re still looking for Brian Riley and I’m taking Denise’s letters to the state crime lab for analysis.”
“Okay.”
“Ruben.”
“What?”
“Don’t forget to take care of yourself.”
Ruben laughed. “Yeah, sure.”
Kerney disconnected, put Denise’s letters in a large, clear plastic evidence folder, and made the quick drive from police headquarters to the Department of Public Safety, the umbrella organization of the New Mexico State Police.
Once buzzed past reception, he first went to check in with his old friend, Chief Andy Baca, and found him behind his big desk signing paperwork. Andy looked up, grinned, and waved him in the direction of the couch that faced the desk.
“What’s that in your hand?” Andy asked, sweeping the paperwork to one side.
Kerney sat on the couch and put the evidence envelope on the coffee table. “Letters from Denise Riley to her sister Helen that I’d like the Questioned Documents Unit to look at pronto.”
Andy joined him on the couch. “You got it, amigo. Cop killings go to the front of the line at our crime lab, no questions asked. Now that there are two dead officers, everything else goes on the back burner.”
“I know that, but a phone call from you while I’m on my way over there will surely add to their eagerness to be helpful.”
