Chapter Thirty-Four
Thirty-Four
Leanne was down to twelve hours. After interviewing Selma, she’d hit the one remaining auto shop on her list, but no new lead on the Ridge Grappler tires.
None of the lab work had come back yet—not the rape kit the ME had submitted and not the duct tape from Duncan.
Leanne had tried to set up another conversation with Jordan, but Sandra said the CI was ignoring her messages.
Jordan was spooked, which meant Leanne had a long night ahead of her poring over paperwork in search of a fresh lead.
Leanne looked out over the moon-drenched valley as she headed home.
You could drive for miles out here and not see a single porch light.
This place was remote, and it wasn’t just the landscape.
The people could be remote, too. They treated newcomers with skepticism, and for good reason.
So many people moved out here thinking they wanted to get away from the city and the congestion and the frantic pace of modern life.
But they brought their computers and cell phone culture with them.
Other people came out here and genuinely tried to give it a fair shot, only to discover that wide-open spaces made them feel claustrophobic, even suffocated.
So after a while they picked up and left.
Leanne herself had had some problems with reentry when she’d first moved home after her dad’s death. People kept her at arm’s length, as though expecting her to leave again, and she knew they’d taken her departure as a sort of rejection, which it was. So she’d been working to build back trust.
But the truth was, even after almost two years back, she still had mixed feelings about being here.
She still hadn’t fully unpacked yet. Maybe she needed to.
Maybe it would do her good. It was hard to build trust with people when they sensed your ambivalence.
Maybe they also sensed how much she resented being pulled away from the independent life she’d built for herself to deal with her family’s dysfunction.
Was that why she hadn’t made more friends here, or dated, or spent more time at bars? Possibly.
It was also possible that she was who she was, and no matter where she lived, she was destined to be a loner.
Talking to Duncan was the closest she’d ever had to therapy.
She didn’t need a psychologist to tell her she was the way she was because of her hypercritical mother and her silent father who’d withheld approval all her life.
But she didn’t mind being alone. At least, she didn’t usually mind it. And when she did, she got by.
A sign loomed ahead for Lost Mine Road. Leanne looked out the window as she passed the yucca farm that had been targeted by poachers the other night.
Rows and rows of succulents raced by, their spiky tops bathed silver in the moonlight.
All seemed quiet at the moment—no trucks or spotlights or any other indication of thieves digging up plants.
She thought of Mark Rodriguez asking her or Josh to trade assignments.
He’d been so matter-of-fact about how they worked in a place where some people’s open racism put his life at risk.
Anyone who wore a badge accepted a certain amount of danger as part of the job, but for Mark it was more.
She’d never really considered it before.
All her career, she’d felt alienated from the good-old-boy cop culture that surrounded her.
Maybe Mark felt that, too, but for different reasons.
Leanne drove over a rise, and then she was coasting downward toward the smattering of lights that marked the town. A blinking red dot on the hillside indicated the area’s only cell phone tower.
She neared Duncan’s neighborhood, a cluster of low brick homes. His house was on the far end, and she spotted a light on. She shouldn’t stop.
Or maybe she should.
“Screw it,” she muttered, tapping the brake.
She drove down Duncan’s street and was relieved to see his truck in the driveway, which told her he hadn’t gone to bed yet because he always kept it in the garage overnight. She parked in front of the house, and a chorus of barks went up from the neighbor’s yard as she approached his door.
She took a deep breath and knocked. Nerves flitted through her stomach as she waited and waited. Finally, the door swung open.
“Hi,” he said evenly. He wore jeans, no shirt, and had a can of shaving cream in his hand.
“I have a quick update. You headed out somewhere?”
He pulled the door back. “Yeah.”
She stepped inside, and for a moment they stood there in the dim foyer.
“I’m working tonight.” He led her down the hallway to the guest bathroom, which was across from the spare bedroom that he’d converted into a closet for all his gear.
The faucet was running, and a roll of electrical tape was perched beside the sink alongside a tiny microphone.
A half-eaten grilled cheese sandwich sat beside a can of Red Bull.
“What’s all this?” she asked.
“I’m undercover.” He sprayed a dollop of cream on his fingers and spread it over his chest. “So, what’s up?” he asked, leaning toward the mirror.
She watched, holding her breath, as he shaved his sternum.
“Where is this op?” she asked.
“Odessa.” He rinsed the razor and tapped it on the sink. “Why?”
“And you have to wear a wire?”
“Yeah.”
“Aren’t you worried you’ll be recognized?”
“No.”
Well, she was worried. She tensed as she watched him make another swipe at his chest. Then he set down the razor and grabbed a towel.
“What’s up, Leanne?” He eyed her in the mirror as he wiped down his torso. “If you’re wondering about that duct tape, there’s nothing back yet. I called to check in, but there’s some kind of delay at the lab.”
“Not surprising. But that’s not what I wanted to talk about.” She met his gaze in the mirror. “I wanted to thank you for dropping off that report. It was helpful. Your contact is really good at his job.”
“I know.”
She cleared her throat. “Also, I want to apologize.”
He lifted an eyebrow.
“I was kind of a jerk the other night. I was upset.”
He grabbed a black T-shirt from the counter and pulled it over his head, then rested his hands on his hips.
“You weren’t a jerk.”
“I didn’t feel like talking.” She bit her lip. That wasn’t exactly true. “Actually, I was embarrassed.”
“Why?”
She stared up at him as her heart thrummed.
“My mom told me some stuff about my dad, and I think he may have coerced a confession from Sean Moriarty.”
Duncan stared down at her, no reaction at all.
Her breath whooshed out.
“You knew.”
“I heard a rumor,” he said.
She turned away. Her stomach clenched, and her cheeks burned.
“Hey.”
She turned to look at him.
“It’s just a rumor, Leanne. It doesn’t prove anything.”
“It’s on tape. She heard it.”
“Who heard it?”
“My mom.”
He frowned down at her. “What tape?”
“What does it matter? She heard it herself, and she said he was in the room, which means it happened.” Leanne shook her head. “This whole thing is a disaster. He destroyed a man’s life.”
She turned away, and he caught her sleeve.
“Hey. Listen. If it’s true—which you don’t really know, if you haven’t heard the tape yourself—then I doubt he did it alone.”
She gaped at him. “So what?”
He folded his arms over his chest. “Where is this audiotape?”
“Why does it matter?”
“If it exists, then it matters a lot.” He gazed down at her, his eyes intent, and Leanne knew what he was thinking, because she’d thought it, too.
If her mom had listened to the tape and knew her dad was in the room for that confession, then she knew who else was in the room with him.
“Is she safe?” Duncan asked.
“I think so.”
“You think?”
“She told me she got rid of it years ago.”
He just stared at her, thinking God only knew what about her entire family.
She shook her head. “This is going to be…I can’t even think of a word bad enough.”
“It’s not on you.”
She glared at him.
“What? It’s not,” he said. “You and your father are two different people.”
Leanne’s chest squeezed, and she almost laughed at the irony. Throughout her life, people had told her the opposite.
You’re so much like your dad…
Following in your father’s footsteps…
Your dad is so proud of you…
And even worse—Your father’s a legend in this town. You must be so proud…
Yes, her father had his flaws, but she’d never doubted his integrity before now.
This was the man who’d drilled into her the importance of honesty.
Of telling the truth. When she was six years old, he’d caught her with a pack of gum she’d stolen from the drugstore.
He’d turned the car around and made her go back, cheeks flaming, to return the pack and apologize to the clerk.
She’d never forget the disappointed look on his face as he’d watched her do it.
It was something she’d carried around for years.
But the more she learned, the more she believed her dad had caved in to pressure to produce an arrest. He’d caved in to pressure, and now a man’s life had been derailed and a killer had been allowed to roam free.
That coerced confession had spawned loss and heartache for years to come.
“Leanne?”
“Sorry,” she said, shifting her focus to the surveillance gear spread across the counter. “I know you have to go.”
He didn’t argue, and she turned to leave.
“Hey, you never gave me the update,” he said, following her down the hall.
“We IDed our victim. Her name is Valeria Reyes, originally from Albuquerque.”
“Josh told me about that.”
She stopped at the door. “Did he also tell you McBride gave me forty-eight hours to come up with a suspect, or he’s yanking my case? That was Monday morning.” She opened the door and stepped out. “And the only witness I’ve been able to locate who knows anything is now ghosting me.”
He leaned against the doorframe and looked at her. “What are you going to do?”
She shook her head.
“I know you have a plan. What is it?”
“My plan is to go home, load up on coffee. And then comb through those case files until I figure something out.”