Dead Wrong (30 page)

“Good work.”

Several times between there and the gate, the Crown
Victoria’s undercarriage scraped across loose boulders and
outcroppings of rock. Twice, when the creek bed switched back and
forth across the road, the Crown Victoria almost mired down in
loose sand. Only by maintaining sufficient speed was Ernie able to
jolt the vehicle to the far side.

“She’s right, you know,” Ernie
grumbled. “Four-wheel drive would be a lot better.”

“This is where I dropped him,” Dolores
announced when they reached the gate. Joanna got out to open it,
but the track that led beyond the gate was even narrower and
rougher than the part they’d just come through. Far below in
the distance she heard the faintest sounds of at least two
approaching sirens signaling that backup officers were on their
way.

Joanna returned to the Crown Victoria. “It
looks like we walk from here,” she said to Ernie. “Are
you up to it? Your doctor probably wouldn’t call hiking
through the desert taking it easy.”

“I can if you can,” he said.

Joanna turned to Dolores Mattias. “You have
to stay here in the vehicle.”

“But…”

“Not buts, Mrs. Mattias. We have Kevlar
vests. You don’t. It’s for your own safety. You can
either give me your word that you’ll stay here, or we lock
you in. Which is it?”

“I’ll stay,” Dolores agreed.

“How far is it from here?”

“I don’t know. Joaquin took a shovel
with him and went up that path.”

“Did he have a weapon with him?” Joanna
asked again.

“Maybe,” Dolores answered. “I
don’t know for sure.”

That wasn’t much consolation.

Ernie had gone around to the trunk and retrieved
the semiautomatic rifle and twelve-gauge shotgun Joanna kept there.
As he handed her the rifle, he stopped short.

“Listen,” he said.

On the far side of the creek, Joanna heard a racket
that had to be a fast-moving horse scrabbling over rocks and
through the surrounding scrub oak. Joanna and Ernie both ducked for
cover behind the Crown Victoria, but the invisible horse kept
moving, sending a scatter of rocks down toward the creek bed as it
raced by without pausing.

“What if he heads for the gate?” Joanna
demanded as the hoofbeats passed out of range. “What if
whoever it is goes after Dolores?”

“I’ll go,” Ernie said and was
gone.

Alone now, Joanna crept forward. Fifty yards or so
beyond the gate the path took a sharp right turn. Another fifty
yards beyond that, Joanna caught sight of the charred remains of a
crumbling rustic cabin nestled in a small clearing. Winded, she
took cover behind a nearby tree. Struggling to steady her breath,
she studied the terrain and saw no sign of movement anywhere.

Then, on the far edge of the clearing, something
glinting in the sun caught her attention. Sticking to the tree
line, Joanna moved closer until she was able to see that sunlight
was reflecting off the business end of a shovel that lay to one
side of a small mound of freshly dug dirt and what looked like an
earth-crusted fruit crate.

Behind Joanna, one of the sirens sputtered to
silence. That meant Deputy Raymond must have reached the gate and
help was near at hand.

Then she heard it—a low moan that seemed to
come from somewhere near the mound of dirt.

“Who is it?” she demanded. “Where
are you?”

“Help me,” a weak voice replied.
“I’ve been shot.”

Joanna scurried forward. She skirted the box, the
mound of dirt, and a small hole. A man lay facedown in the freshly
turned dirt of a larger hole, with blood seeping across the back of
his denim shirt. A few shovels of dirt had been piled on top of his
legs—not enough to bury him alive, but enough to start the
job.

“Mr. Mattias?” Joanna asked.
“It’s Sheriff Brady. I know I’m not strong enough
to get you out of there by myself. I’ve got to go get
help.”

“No,” he pleaded. “Don’t
go. Stay here with me. It’s too late for help.”

“But…”

“No,” he wheezed. “Someone has to
hear this so people know what happened. I was digging them up.
It’s the best I could do. At least now they’ll have a
decent burial. I’m so sorry.”

Joanna looked at the small dirt-covered box. It
looked much too small to be a coffin, but that’s what it was.
“Aileen’s baby?” she asked quietly.

“She made me help her,” he managed.
“She said if I didn’t, she’d tell her husband
about us.”

“Ruth, you mean?”

Joaquin tried to raise himself up out of the dirt,
but the effort was too much. He fell back into the musty earth,
coughing and gasping.

“Ruth,” he managed. “Ruth and
Rory. She wanted to get rid
of Aileen’s
baby. I didn’t know about him until it happened and he was
helping her. By then it was too late. Tell Dolores…Tell
Dolores…”

“Tell Dolores what?” Joanna implored.
“Stay with me, Joaquin. Stay with me.”

She heard the sound of a surging engine as a
vehicle made its way up the rough dirt track. She turned to see a
departmental Yukon materialize on the far side of the clearing.
Seconds later, Deputy Matt Raymond pounded up to Joanna, with Ernie
hurrying after him.

“Sheriff Brady, what do
you…?”

She pointed at the injured man’s prone body.
“See if you can lift him out of there,” she said.
“Ernie, call for an ambulance.”

Agilely Deputy Raymond dropped into the hole,
placing his feet on either side of the injured man, but just then
Joaquin Mattias exhaled a single ragged breath.

“It’s too late for an ambulance,
Sheriff Brady,” Deputy Raymond said. “I’m pretty
sure he’s gone.”

“Leave him then,” Ernie urged.
“We’ll come back later. The guy on the horse made it
through the gate before I ever got there. He was riding
hell-bent-for-leather and didn’t even see Dolores sitting in
the car.”

“Rory Markham?” Joanna asked.

“Probably,” Ernie returned. “I
diverted the other units,” he added. “I sent them to
the house rather than having them come here.”

“All right,” Joanna agreed.
“Let’s go.”

Leaving Joaquin’s body where it was, the
three officers raced back across the clearing. Joanna and Deputy
Raymond climbed into the front of the Yukon while Ernie clambered
into the back.
Halfway to the gate, they met
Dolores Mattias lurching up the path on foot. When Deputy Raymond
stopped the Yukon, Joanna was the first one out.

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Mattias,” she
said, taking the distraught woman by the arm. “You
can’t go there.”

Dolores shook off Joanna’s hand. “My
husband,” she said. “Where’s my
husband?”

By then, Ernie, too, was at the woman’s side.
“Like Sheriff Brady said, Mrs. Mattias, you can’t go
there. It’s a crime scene.”

“A crime scene?” she repeated.
“What kind of crime scene?”

“I hate to tell you this,” Joanna said
softly. “It’s a homicide scene. Your husband is dead,
Mrs. Mattias. You must come with us. We need to catch the man who
did this.”

“Joaquin is dead?” Dolores Mattias said
uncomprehendingly.

“Please come with us,” Joanna begged.
“It may be too late to help your husband, but it’s not
too late to keep his killer from getting away.”

Wordlessly, as her body convulsed into heaving
sobs, Dolores Mattias allowed herself to be helped into the Yukon
and buckled into her seat.

Tica Romero’s voice, distorted by static,
hissed through the radio. “We have two units within sight of
the ranch house now. They report there’s a horse tethered to
a post on the front porch. Please advise how many people, besides
the suspect, are likely to be inside and what you want our guys to
do.”

“In addition to the suspect three people are
most likely inside,” Joanna answered. “Aileen Houlihan,
who’s bedridden; a nurse; and the suspect’s wife,
Leslie Markham. Tell our officers to wait,” she added.
“We’re coming there as fast as we can.”

At the gate, Ernie Carpenter bailed from the Yukon
in order
to drive Joanna’s Crown Victoria
back down to the scene of the action. In the backseat,
Dolores’s sobs had quieted.

“Why?” she asked finally. “Why
would Mr. Markham shoot my husband?”

“It’s a very long story, Mrs.
Mattias,” Joanna said gently. “But I believe it’s
because your husband knew too much.”

O
nce
they arrived within sight of the ranch house, for what seemed an
interminable length of time no one came or went. The house remained
dead still. The only visible movement was the occasional switch of
the tethered horse’s tail. As Joanna’s deputies took up
defensive positions, she called in to Dispatch.

“Tica,” she said. “See if you can
find a listed phone number for Aileen Houlihan.”

“I have an A. Houlihan,” Tica replied.
“On Triple H Ranch Road.”

“That’s the one,” Joanna replied.
“Give me the number.”

When Joanna dialed it, Leslie Markham answered the
phone. She sounded unhurried and completely calm.

“This is Sheriff Brady,” Joanna said.
“Is your husband there with you?”

“Yes, he is.”

“Who else is there?”

“Just the three of us—Rory, my mother,
and me. Fortunately, I sent the daytime nurse home. The nighttime
one hasn’t come on duty yet.”

“Are you all right?” Joanna asked.

“I’m fine,” Leslie returned with
amazing coolness. “Rory has a gun, though, and he’s
threatening to use it. I told him to go ahead. As far as I’m
concerned, dying of a bullet wound is infinitely preferable to
dying of HD.”

But you aren’t going to
die of Huntington’s,
Joanna wanted to shout.

“Put him on the phone,” she said.

“He won’t touch it,” Leslie said
half a minute or so later. “He doesn’t want to talk to
you.”

“But I want to talk to him. Does your phone
have a speaker option? If so, turn it on.”

“It’s on,” Leslie said. “He
can hear you now.”

“Put down your weapon and come out of the
house, Rory,” Joanna said. “It’s over. An
ambulance is on its way to pick up Mr. Mattias and take him to the
hospital, but he told us everything. We know all about you and Ruth
and about Lisa Evans and Aileen’s dead baby. He even told us
about Bradley Evans.”

That was all a calculated lie. Joaquin Mattias was
dead. He hadn’t come close to telling them everything. But D.
H. Lathrop had taught his daughter the fine art of bluffing at the
same time he was teaching her how to play poker. Joanna Brady was
definitely her father’s daughter in that regard.

At first the only thing coming through the phone
was silence. Finally Leslie Markham spoke. “What baby?”
she asked.

Joanna didn’t allow herself to be diverted
into that conversation any more than she could allow herself to
look at Dolores.
The discussion of Aileen
Houlihan’s murdered baby would have to wait until
Leslie’s life was no longer in danger.

“Let your wife go,” Joanna said without
responding to Leslie’s question. “If you harm her in
any way, Arizona state law will never allow you to inherit, Mr.
Markham. You’re already looking at three separate homicide
charges. Don’t make it worse.”

Another period of tense silence followed. Again,
Leslie was the one who spoke.

“I’m going then,” she announced.
“I’m going to walk out.”

“You can’t,” Rory said.
“Don’t do it.”

“Why not? Because you’re going to shoot
me? Don’t make me laugh. You can’t hurt me any worse
than you already have.”

A moment later the screen door opened. As Joanna
and the assembled deputies held their collective breaths, Leslie
Markham walked to the edge of the porch, where she leaped off, past
the startled horse, and then sprinted away from the house. She
didn’t stop until she reached Deputy Raymond’s Yukon
parked at the far end of the driveway. As she neared the vehicle,
Raymond reached around and opened the door behind him, allowing her
to dive inside.

“All right, Mr. Markham,” Joanna
continued into the phone. “Leslie is here now. She’s
safe. Toss down your weapon and come out with your hands
up.”

Rory Markham’s wordless reply consisted of a
single small click as he disconnected the speakerphone, followed by
the chilling sound of a solitary gunshot. They all knew he was dead
long before the deputy who had let himself in through the back door
sounded out the all clear. When Joanna finally gave herself
permission to turn around and look at the women in the backseat,
Leslie Markham, sobbing, was being comforted by
Dolores Mattias. Seeing them together, Joanna wanted to gather both
women into her arms and tell them what she knew—to explain
how this series of calamities had befallen them, but there
wasn’t time. Not then.

Joanna got out of the Yukon and caught up with
Ernie. “We’ll need to curtain off whatever part of the
room Markham used to blow his brains out,” she told him.
“I know it’s a crime scene, but Leslie and the nurses
will have to have access to Aileen.”

Ernie nodded. “All right,” he said.
“I’ll see what we can do.”

As he walked away, Joanna reached back inside and
plucked the radio out of its holder. She needed to call Dispatch
and let them know what had happened—that they’d need
crime scene people and Dr. Winfield and search warrants and all
those other necessary things. But as she pushed the button down to
speak, she felt the sudden gush of water running down her legs.

“Is everyone all right?” Tica was
saying. “Do you need an ambulance?”

“No,” Joanna began. Just then the first
contraction hit and hit her hard, taking her breath away. “On
second thought,” she said when it ended, “maybe an
ambulance is a good idea.”

“I thought the two gunshot victims were both
dead,” Tica responded.

“They are dead,” Joanna said.
“But I believe I’m going to have this baby, and it
could be soon.”

“Ambulance is on its way, Sheriff
Brady,” Tica reported back a moment later. “Do you want
me to call your husband and have him meet you at the
hospital?”

“No,” Joanna replied, “that
won’t be necessary. Calling him will give me something to do
while I wait.”