Rattlesnake Crossing

CHAPTER ELEVEN

As soon as she turned the key in the ignition, Joanna remembered Butch. She also realized that if she went straight to Rattlesnake Crossing without either breakfast or lunch, her body would run out of fuel long before she finished what she'd have to do that day. Not only that, she didn't know when there'd be another chance to eat. Pulling her cell phone out of her purse, she punched in the number of Daisy's Cafe. Not surprisingly, Daisy herself answered the phone.

"Sheriff Brady," she said, "your gentleman friend is already here. I've got him stowed in a booth and drinking coffee."

"Good," Joanna said. "And that's why I'm calling. Something's come up. I'm going to have to go on a call, but I thought I'd try to eat and run. Put in my order for chorizo and scrambled eggs and then go ahead and pour my coffee. I'll be there in three minutes or less."

"What about O.J.?" Daisy asked.

"I'll have some of that, too."

"Good enough," Daisy said. "It'll be on the table by the time you get here."

When Joanna pulled into the parking lot, the first vehicle she saw was Butch's Goldwing. That struck her as odd, because she dearly remembered him saying that he wouldn't be Goldwing-ing it when he came to take her to dinner. Oh well, she thought, he must have changed his mind.

She climbed out of the Blazer and slammed the door. That was when she saw a little white Nissan Sentra sedan with the Bisbee Bee logo on the door and a windshield sun-screen with the word PRESS printed on the outside. Joanna recognized the vehicle at once. It was one usually driven by Marliss Shackleford, whose tell-all column, "Bisbee Buzzings," kept the Bee's circulation humming with local gossip. Ever since Joanna's election to sheriff, she had often found herself chewed up and spit out as part of Marliss' journalistic fodder. The fact that the sheriff and the columnist were both parishioners of Canyon United Methodist Church had done nothing to blunt the difficulties between them.

In the small-town world of Bisbee and of Cochise County, Joanna Brady was regarded as a public person. What she did or didn't do was thought to be of interest to everyone-at least that was how Marliss seemed to view the situation. Unhappy with the constant scrutiny, Joanna had learned to dodge the woman whenever possible. In small towns and even smaller churches, that wasn't always possible. Just as it wouldn't be now, when Joanna would be seen having breakfast with an out-of-town visitor-a male out-of-town visitor.

Marliss had already been introduced to Butch Dixon once-on the occasion of Joanna's mother's wedding reception after her marriage to Dr. George Winfield. If Marliss saw Joanna and Butch having breakfast together in Bisbee, no telling what conclusions she would jump to or how those would play out in her next column.

For two cents Joanna would have climbed back into the Blazer and driven away. But she couldn't do that. It wouldn't have been fair to Butch or to Daisy, either one. Squaring her shoulders, Joanna marched into the restaurant. Walking inside, she clung to the faint hope that she and Butch would be seated close enough to the door so she could slip in and out without being noticed. Unfortunately, Butch waved to her from the far corner booth, two tables beyond where Marliss sat chatting with her boss, Ken Dawson, the publisher and editor in chief of the Bisbee Bee.

Because Daisy was already carrying a pair of loaded plates toward the booth where Butch was sitting, Joanna gave Marliss a wave and hurried past almost before the woman saw her and without pausing long enough to ex-change any pleasantries.

"Good morning, sunshine," Butch said with a grin, toasting her with his newly filled coffee cup. "I understand this is going to be wham, bam, thank you ma'am. I'm glad you could squeeze me in, although you're probably here more for the chorizo and eggs than you are for me."

"I'm sorry to do this to you twice in a row," Joanna said, "but Search and Rescue just now found another body up by Pomerene."

The grin disappeared from Butch's face. "The woman who was missing?"

"You know about that?" Joanna asked.

Butch held up a copy of that morning's Bee. "I'd say the coverage was pretty thorough. I always wondered what happened to the guy."

"What happened to what guy?"

"To Danny Berridge."

"You mean you know him?"

"I don't know him per se, but I know of him. He’s a former Indy driver. He won several races. Placed second or maybe third at Indy one year. Was named Rookie of the Year. The next year during the Indy 500, he wiped out one of the rack people-one of the safety workers. He walked away from the wreck and the track. That was the last I ever heard of him until I read about him in this morning's paper. At least I'm assuming it's the same guy. How many Daniel Berridges could there be?"

“The article didn't actually identify him as the same guy?”

"No, but 1 just assumed. He's evidently had a hell of a life, and now with his wife turning up dead…"

Joanna covered her lips with a finger. "We probably shouldn't talk about this right now. We don't have a positive ID and nobody's notified the next of kin. That's where I'm going right now-to meet up with the detectives and then go talk to the husband."

"I can see why you're in a hurry," Butch said, picking up his fork. "You'd better go ahead and eat before it gets cold. You need to keep up your strength."

Joanna's heaping platter of scrambled eggs mixed with hot, spicy chorizo came with a helping of cheese-smothered refried beans, a dish of Daisy's eye-watering salsa, and a tortilla warmer stacked full of tiny, homemade flour tortillas fresh from the grill in the kitchen. Butch helped himself to one, slathered it with butter, and took a bite. As soon as he did, a beatific smile spread across his features.

"I didn't know it was possible to find a place that still served homemade tortillas."

Joanna took one herself. "You have to go pretty far out into the boondocks before that happens," she said. For several moments they ate in silence. "If it wasn't in the paper, how did you know all this about Daniel Berridge?" she asked.

"Didn't I tell you?" Butch returned. "I'm a big race-car fan.”

No, Joanna thought, you didn't tell me. There were obviously any number of things she didn't know about Frederick "Butch" Dixon. Even so, she knew that she still owed him an apology.

"Look," she said, "I really am sorry about standing you up last night. As soon as the call came in and I knew it was going to be a problem, I tried calling, but your phone-"

"Good morning, Joanna," Marliss Shackleford said, sauntering up to the table, coffee cup in hand. "I hope you'll excuse the interruption, but I had to know if you've heard anything about Esther's surgery."

Joanna had no intention of pardoning the interruption, but there was no way of ignoring it, either. Butch Dixon looked up quickly and caught her eye. "Jeff and Marianne's little girl?" he asked.

Joanna nodded. "Esther's been on a transplant waiting list almost as long as she's been here. Because of her ethnic background, the doctors hadn't held out much hope of finding a tissue match, but now they have one. The hospital called last night and told them a heart just became available. The surgeons are expecting to do the transplant sometime today. This morning, most likely."

"So who's taking care of poor little Ruth?" Marliss asked.

"Angie Kellogg," Joanna said.

Marliss Shackleford's face twisted into a disapproving frown. "Not that girl who-"

Joanna cut Marliss off in mid-sentence. "Angie is a friend of Marianne's, and she's also a friend of mine. She also happens to be a very capable baby-sitter. Ruth adores her."

Marliss wasn't easily dissuaded. "You'd think that, as a minister and in a situation like this, Marianne would call on someone…" The steely-eyed look Joanna leveled in her direction caused Marliss to pause and rethink what she was about to soy. "Well, on someone from church, for example. I’m sure any number of the ladies from the church would have been willing"

"The call come through in the middle of the night," Joanna told her. "I'm sure most of the ladies from church-you included -were all sound asleep in your neat little beds. Angie, on the other hand, was still at work and wide awake."

Dismissing Marliss, Joanna turned her attention to her plate, stabbing her fork deep into the steaming mound of scrambled eggs and sausage. Rather than taking the hint and leaving, Marliss stood her ground and cast around for a more rewarding topic of discussion. In the process, her eyes settled greedily on Butch Dixon's smoothly clean-shaven head. "You're not someone from around town, are you?" she said to him. "But I seem to remember that we've met before."

"That's right," Butch agreed mildly, putting down his fork and holding out his hand. "You're a newspaper reporter, I believe. Frederick Dixon's the name, and yes, we did meet before. At Joanna's mother's wedding reception."

"Of course." Marliss summoned her sweetest smile. "That's right. You're Joanna's friend. Down from Phoenix, are you?"

"Peoria, actually. But Phoenix is close enough. All those towns seem to run together."

"What brings you down our way?"

Over another forkful of egg, Joanna sought Butch's eyes. 'There was no way to say aloud what was going through her mind. This woman is a malevolent witch. Anything you say to her is going to wind up in print.

Unspoken or not, Butch must somehow have gotten the message. He gave Marliss an engaging grin. "Just passing through," he said. "My business is up in the Valley of the Sun, and we have a little too much of that this time of year-sun, not business. So it's a good time for me to get out of town for some well deserved R and R."

"I see," Marliss said. "What kind of business are you in?"

Joanna groaned inwardly. Oh, great, she thought. Next he's going to tell her he owns a bar up there. Just wait until the ladies from church get wind of all the latest. An ex-prostitute is baby-sitting Ruth Maculyea-Daniels and Sheriff Joanna Brady is hanging out with a guy who rides a motorcycle and owns a bar!

"Hospitality," Butch replied blandly.

Joanna almost choked with relief. Meanwhile, Marliss sidled closer to Butch's side of the table. "Really. So are you down here checking out how Bisbee does in that department?" The question was asked with one eyebrow arched meaningfully in Joanna's direction. "Hospitality, I mean."

"It's great," he said. "I'm staying up at the Copper Queen this time. It seems to be quite satisfactory."

Visibly disappointed, Marliss turned back to Joanna. "Any inside scoops about what's going on up in Pomerene?"

Sure, Marliss. We've just figured out that we've got a serial killer loose in Cochise County, and I'm going to give you an exclusive on it.

"Not at this time," Joanna said. She finished the last morsel of chorizo and eggs. Something was making her nose run, and she wasn't sure if the heat came from the sausage or from the salsa. Taking one remaining tortilla from the warmer, she buttered it and then waved down Daisy.

"Any chance of getting a cup of coffee to go?"

"Coming right up."

“And the bill, please, too."

"Don’t bother with that," Butch said. "I'm buying."

"Well," Marliss said, finally accepting the fact that the conversation was over, "I guess I'll be going." She headed back to hex own table.

And not a moment too soon, Joanna thought, watching her go.

“Can I see you tonight?" Butch asked.

Joanna shook her head. She hadn't told Marliss about the serial-killer part, and she wasn't going to tell Butch, either. "I can't promise, what with everything going on at work and with Esther in the hospital in Tucson. Even if I did say yes, I couldn't give you any guarantees about what time I'd finish up. That's one of the reasons I feel so rotten about last night. You were stuck out there on the porch by yourself for all that time."

"After living up around Phoenix, I thought it was gloriously quiet. Believe me, I enjoyed every minute of it. I especially got a kick out of watching that storm off to the east, the one that put on such a light show and then never let loose with a smidgen of rain. 'Full of sound and fury' and all that jazz."

Daisy dropped off both a traveler coffee cup and the bill.

Butch snagged the bill away before Joanna could touch it.

"So how about it?" he added, not taking no for an answer. "How about if I show up at your house about the same time I did yesterday-say seven or so. And when you get home, we'll see what time it is and decide what to do then."

She wanted to say no, but he had come all that way and would be here for just a couple of days. It was only natural that he wanted to spend time with her. "All right," she agreed. “But if you come out to the house, don't wait on the porch. There's a key hidden in the grass. Use it to let yourself in. That way, if I get hung up, at least I'll able to let you know what's going on."

"A key hidden outside?" Butch asked. "Are you sure that's safe?"

Joanna laughed. "It's in the grass just to the right of the front-porch step, hidden under a plastic dog turd-a very realistic-looking plastic dog turd. Believe me, with Sadie and Tigger around, nobody's going to suspect that dark brown pile lying there in the grass isn't the real McCoy."

"I suppose not," Butch said. "Come to think of it, maybe I'll double-check before I pick it up."

Finishing the last of her orange juice, Joanna stood up. "Sorry to have to eat and run like this."

He waved her away. "It's fine," he said. "But if you don't mind, I'm going to hang around and drink my last cup of coffee here. I'd take one with me but coffee and motorcycles don't necessarily go together."

Grabbing both her purse and the Styrofoam cup, Joanna dashed toward the door. She was in the Blazer and headed uptown when she realized Butch Dixon hadn't told the truth to Marliss Shackleford. He had said that his business was up in Phoenix. But the phone to the Roundhouse Bar and Grill had been disconnected. His business used to be in Phoenix, Joanna thought. But it isn't anymore.

By the time she was up over the Divide, however, she had stopped thinking about Butch and was back to worrying about the case. Picking up the radio, she asked Dispatch to put her through to Detective Carbajal.

"What's happening?" she asked.

"I've been on the horn to Maricopa County," he told her. "According to the sheriff's office up there, we've got a possible."

"A case with the same MO?"

"Unfortunately, yes. It's old-from two years ago-and it's still open. A fourteen-year-old named Rebecca Flowers was found up near Lake Pleasant north of Sun City. Shot first and then… well, you know the rest."

"No leads?"

"None so tar. And my guess is nobody looked very hard. Rebecca was a street kid, a drugged-up runaway from Yuma. And since it hadn't happened again as far as anybody could tell, there wasn't any reason to take it very seriously."

"Until now," Joanna said. She switched on her blinking red emergency lights and pressed the gas pedal all the way to the floor.

"Right," Jaime agreed hollowly. "Until now."

"You've talked to Ernie?"

"Yes, and her Highness, Dr. Daly, too," Jaime replied. "You were right. I managed to catch her between autopsies. They're both on their way right now. Depending on where you are and where they are…"

"I'm just south of Tombstone," Joanna said.

"Then you'll probably be here within minutes of one another."

"Where are you meeting them?"

"They're coming straight here. I gave them directions. It's the same little track we took last night, the one off Pomerene Road right across from Rattlesnake Crossing. You'll come to a Y where we turned right last night. Go left this time. It'll lead you right here."

Still wearing her work clothes, Joanna had come dressed for next-of-kin notification rather than crime-scene investigation. Still, if that was where everyone else was going, she would, too.

"Listen, Jaime," she warned Detective Carbajal, "this is going to be a high-profile case. We're going strictly by the hook on this one. I don't want any procedures skipped or skimped. You got that?"

"Got it, Sheriff Brady," Jaime said. "I hear you loud and clear."

As she finished with Detective Carbajal, Joanna was fast coming up on Tombstone proper. She slowed slightly, but not much. Her next call was to Frank Montoya, still closeted in his office back at the department. "Frank," she told him, "I need your help. Get on the horn to Motor Vehicles and track down some information on Daniel Berridge."

"The guy who's wife is missing?" Frank asked.

"The guy who's wife is dead," Joanna corrected. "S and R just found the body. I want you to check out his date of birth and then compare it with a retired race-car driver by the same name, a guy who once drove in the Indy 500."

"You think they're one and the same? What gives you that idea?"

"A little bird told me," Joanna said. "Check it out. Let me know as soon as you can."

Even though it was summer, as she passed Tombstone's elementary and high schools, she slowed down some more just to be sure. Then, when she reached the Chevron station, she whipped across two lanes of traffic and pulled in, threading her way past two out-of-state minivans loaded to the gills with kids, dogs, and luggage.

Parking as close to the rest-room door as possible and leaving her lights flashing, she whipped her suitcase of freshly laundered just-in-case clothes out of the back of the Blazer. It would be far easier to change clothes in a restroom than it would be at the crime scene. Less than two minutes after ducking into the rest room, she was outside again. Dashing toward the Blazer, she almost collided with a little boy of about seven or eight who stood next to the door.

"Lady," he said, wiping an orange circle of soda onto his shirtsleeve, "how come you got those flashing lights on the front of this car? You a cop or something?"

Joanna unlocked the door with her remote key and stalled her clothes and the suitcase back inside. She was in a terrible hurry. II would have been easy to ignore the kid, but in the interest of good public relations, she stopped long enough to answer him. "Or something," she said.

"What does that mean?" he persisted. "Are you or aren't you.? "

"I'm a police officer," she said. "Actually, I'm the sheriff."

"No, you're not," he said. "My dad just took me to see the O.K. Corral. Wyatt Earp's the sheriff."

"Wyatt Earp was a marshal," Joanna corrected. "But that was a long time ago. Now I'm the sheriff." She reached into the Blazer and pulled one of her business cards out of the packet she kept on the windshield visor. "See there? That's my name. It says Sheriff Joanna Brady."

"Darren," a shorts-clad woman called. "What are you doing? Come get in the car."

Darren studied the card and then glanced briefly in his mother's direction, but he didn't move. "A girl can't be a sheriff!" he said finally. "They grow up to be mothers and stuff, not sheriffs."

"Darren," his mother called again, "come here this minute!" Still Darren didn't move.

"You'd be surprised," Joanna told him. With that she climbed into the Blazer and took off. When she looked in the rearview mirror, she saw him still standing there, gazing thoughtfully after her as though what she had told him was more than his young mind could fathom.

That was exactly when she turned on her siren full blast-when she did it and why as well, telling herself, The devil made me do it.

Darren's obnoxious image stayed with Joanna long after she had turned the curve and erased him from sight. He was only a couple of years younger than Jenny, yet he was being brainwashed into believing sexual stereotypes that sounded as if they had stepped straight out of the fifties-from one of the old sitcoms like Leave It to Beaver or from a Little Lulu comic book.

Let's hope Darren and Jenny never meet, Joanna thought. If he ever tried spouting that stupid stuff to her, she'd probably punch the little twerp's lights out. And it would serve him right.