Convenient Disposal

Chapter Nine

The painstaking process of combing inside and outside the Acosta household continued until Estelle Reyes-Guzman’s eyes teared from concentration…a few grains of Sheetrock dust here, a hair there.

Although there was no road map, it became clear that the struggle had progressed from the kitchen door, through the house, to Carmen’s bedroom-and nowhere else. That in itself puzzled Estelle. Nowhere else on the Acostas’ property was there a single sign of something out of place, of something tampered with. The backyard was littered with the “stuff” of an active family that didn’t put picking up after itself high on the priority list.

Estelle stood beside the bed, trying to imagine how the battle had progressed. It wasn’t a fight between equals, that was clear. Despite her combative experience, youthful strength, and Acosta temper, Carmen had retreated, perhaps even bolted, toward what she had thought was sanctuary. Maybe at one point she had ducked behind the entertainment center and its television. A flailing lug wrench would make quick work of the wide screen. Carmen had tried for the telephone, too-to call her mother, to call the police-who knew.

A spatter of blood flecked the burlap shade from the shattered bedside lamp, and after Linda Real had photographed it from every conceivable angle, Estelle bagged the entire lamp. That went out to Deputy Jackie Taber’s vehicle, along with the comforter from the bed and the small throw rug from the floor, both soaked with the blood that had gushed from Carmen’s battered head.

The blood flow on the bed and rug had been profuse, most likely from the blow to the back of Carmen’s head that had laid open her scalp. The blood spatter on the side of the lamp shade away from the bed had been tiny, just a couple of drops. Maybe Carmen had gotten in a couple good licks of her own.

“What do you think?” Jackie said at one point. She had her broad back turned to Estelle and was examining the wall to one side of the door. Palm toward the wall, she swept her arm slowly along, covering an area nearly twenty-four inches long, as much as three inches wide, approximately five feet off the floor.

The wall was a pink-tinged white, latex paint over gypsum wallboard. Estelle stepped close, looking over Jackie’s shoulder. Soiling the otherwise clean wall was a swash of discoloration.

“It looks as if someone scrubbed something big and dirty against the wall,” Jackie said. She extended a tape measure. “Too big for a dirty hand.” She glanced down at the floor. “Too high off the ground for a kid to put his dirty feet on the wall.”

“You’d be surprised,” Estelle said. “Even the little ones put crud in the most amazing places.” She slipped a small, folding hand lens out of her pocket and handed it to the deputy. After a moment, Jackie handed the magnifier back.

“I can’t tell. Dirt, maybe.”

“Can you get that?” Estelle asked Linda, and the photographer nodded cheerfully. She started to position herself, and Estelle touched her on the arm. “After you finish the close-ups, I need some that show this entire side of the room, including that smear. I need the position relative to everything else. If you can get the corner of the bed, the table, and this, so much the better.”

Even as Linda was maneuvering to position the camera, Officer Mike Sisneros appeared in the bedroom doorway. “You got a visitor, Undersheriff,” he said. “A William Page? He’s waiting outside at the tape. You want me to let him through?”

“No, I don’t,” Estelle said quickly. “I’ll be out in a minute.” She turned to Jackie. “When you take the sample of that”-and she nodded at the wall-“don’t do a scraping. I don’t want whatever it is mixed with the base paint of the Sheetrock. Go all the way under so that you lift the plaster and paint and whatever that gunk is, all intact.”

“I think the paper layer of the Sheetrock will peel right off,” the deputy said.

“Even better.” Estelle made her way out of the house. With another roll of yellow tape, deputies had isolated Zeigler’s county truck next door, and Estelle paused to look at the area once more. Nothing beyond supposition tied the lug wrench that had been found under the little pickup with either the truck itself or the violence in the house next door-but no other assumption made sense.

Somehow, Kevin Zeigler was involved in the incident, but Estelle refused to entertain the idea that Zeigler had attacked Carmen Acosta. There was no way to predict what trouble would come Carmen’s way; she’d proved that over and over again since she’d been old enough to punch out schoolmates. But Zeigler? In trying to inventory what she knew about the man, Estelle could count only a handful of qualities, first among them that Zeigler outworked anybody in his sprawling office.

The only scenario that made sense was that Kevin had come home for lunch and walked into the middle of something. Had he come home alone? He wasn’t a smoker, but someone recently had been in his truck who was.

Across the street a small crowd of spectators had clustered, with Deputy Dennis Collins in the middle of them, pad and tape recorder in hand. True to form, few of them would be neighbors. Most would be the idle curious who had heard the scanner traffic.

A charcoal-colored Lexus was parked at the curb, nosed up close to the yellow tape. Estelle recognized the man standing impatiently on the street side of the car; at various times she had seen him with the county manager.

As she crossed the yard, Estelle glanced at her watch. If William Page had left his office in Socorro immediately after her telephone call, he had made the trip in just over two hours…a distance of 192 miles. As she neared the tape, she could hear an occasional cooling tick from the automobile’s engine.

Page’s head was shaking as he strode toward Estelle. Without breaking stride, he said something to Sisneros as he passed, ducking under the yellow tape with quick grace.

“Mr. Page?” Estelle asked.

“William Page, yes,” he said. He extended his hand, his grip firm and in no hurry to release. He lowered his head, fixing Estelle with a hard stare, his extraordinary cobalt blue eyes unblinking. “I’m guessing that you’re Sheriff Guzman.”

“Undersheriff. Yes, sir.”

His eyes flicked past her toward the Acostas’ house, and then over toward Zeigler’s. “You have to explain all this to me. I need to talk with Kevin.”

“There isn’t a lot I can tell you yet, sir,” Estelle said. She motioned for him to walk with her toward her car, parked inside the tape and farther down the street, well away from the sharp-eared neighbors. Page was wearing a yellow polo shirt, tan windbreaker, black trousers with a razor crease, and expensive running shoes. If he hadn’t taken time to change, a hard day at the office certainly didn’t show. As they walked, Page raised his arms, locking both hands behind his head as if he expected to be handcuffed at any moment.

“Have you talked with Kevin yet?”

“No, sir. We don’t know where he is.”

“Doesn’t his office-”

“No, sir.” They reached her county car and Estelle stopped, turning to stand by the back fender so she could watch both the street and the taped-off area. “How long have you known Kevin, Mr. Page?”

“William. I go by William,” he said quickly. “I guess I’ve known Kevin for three or four years.” He lowered his hands and thrust them in his back pockets. Estelle guessed him to be in his early thirties. Blond, tan, perfectly fit, William Page would have looked at home on the pages of a mail-order clothing catalog. All he needed was a perfectly groomed Irish setter sitting in the passenger seat of his Lexus.

“So you knew him before he was hired as county manager two years ago,” she said. No one had supposed that Zeigler would be able to fill the shoes of the previous manager, a twenty-eight-year veteran and Posadas legend who had dropped dead during an inspection tour of a recently completed wing of the Public Safety Building. “Where did you two meet? In Socorro?”

“Kevin used to work for the city,” Page said quickly. “I was doing a computer consulting job for them.” He shifted impatiently, glancing first at Zeigler’s house and then down the street.

“Ah.” Estelle nodded. “So when he moved down here, you’ve been able to break away and visit from time to time.” She watched Page’s face, but the only emotion she could read there was worry.

“Okay,” he said, ignoring the statement. He held out his hands a foot apart as if measuring something. “Look…you have to fill me in, Officer. I know these folks here,” and he nodded at the Acostas’ house. “They go ’round and around all the time. Always scrapping. If it isn’t one thing, it’s another. So what happened this time?”

“One of their children was assaulted, Mr. Page.” He looked back at her quickly. “Carmen,” she added. “That’s the oldest girl. She’s fourteen.”

“Of course. I know her.”

Estelle nodded. “It appears that neither parent was home at the time. Her father claims that he was gone just for a short time, over the lunch hour. When he came home, he found Carmen.”

“Oh…,” Page said, and ducked his head, closing his eyes at the same time.

“Mr. Acosta says that when he left on an errand, Kevin’s county truck was not in that driveway. He says that it was parked there on his return. If you think about that, I’m sure you can understand our concern.”

“And you’ve had no word from Kevin? Nothing at all?”

“Not a thing. When was the last time you spoke with him, sir?”

“As I told you on the phone, it was early this morning. We usually chat once or twice a week. Sometimes more often.” He glanced quickly at Estelle, then looked away. “I usually come down early on Friday…sometimes even Thursday, if I can break away. I’ve been going back up to Socorro on Sunday night, sometimes Monday mornings.”

“When you talked with him last night, did he say anything about the neighbors? About the Acostas specifically?”

“No. He was talking about this deal with the village. He thought that was pretty exciting. He thought that it was going to be a real challenge to county resources.”

“And that’s it?”

Page shrugged. “He was thinking of getting a new car.” He nodded toward the truck and car parked beside the house. “I’ve been giving him a hard time about that old relic of his. He said he’d seen a Porsche Boxster he’d fallen in love with. He wanted me to go with him to Las Cruces this weekend to look at it.”

“And you were going to do that?”

He nodded. “Sure. Why not? We go there a lot.” He managed a feeble grin. “There’s not a whole lot to do in Posadas for entertainment. We go there, catch dinner, maybe a movie or two. We’ve got some other friends there, at the university.” He shook his head wearily and regarded the pavement at his feet.

“I’d like to ask that you go through the house again with me, sir,” Estelle said.

The weary expression deepened on Page’s face. “You’ve been in there already?”

“Yes, sir.”

He shrugged with resignation. “Sure. Why not.” He followed Estelle across the street. “You know, I tried Kevin’s cell number about every ten minutes on the way down,” he said. Keys jingled as he selected a house key. “I kept thinking, ‘Well, he’s just out somewhere, probably got called out for some county emergency.’ That happens all the time.” He thrust the key in the lock and turned it. “He never answered, Officer.”

“No, sir. I don’t imagine that he did.”

He stepped into the house, walked to the center of the living room, and turned in place, arms outspread. “This is it.”

“I’d like you to walk through each room, sir. Just walk through and look. Please don’t touch anything. I need to know if anything is out of place, if everything is as you remember it.”

Page shook his head, and as he started down the hallway toward the bedrooms, he shouted, “Kevin!” and then, in a small voice meant for his own ears only, William Page added, “God, Kevin, don’t do this to me.” Estelle kept back, letting Page search the house. He returned to the living room, face pale. “He’s not here.”

“I know that,” Estelle said gently.

“He can’t just disappear,” Page said plaintively. He turned in a circle. “He can’t just walk out in the morning and never return.”

“No one said he wasn’t going to return, Mr. Page.”

He turned and shot her a withering look. “Oh, please, Sheriff. There’s an assault next door. Either Kevin was here or he wasn’t. If he was here, he would have tried to stop it. That’s just the way he was. He would be involved from the get-go. If he tangled with somebody and won, he’d be here, sitting on the guy, waiting for the cops. So he’s either in a ditch somewhere, or…”

“Or what?”

“You think he assaulted Carmen?”

“I didn’t say that he did.”

“No, but that’s got to be a possibility in your mind, isn’t it? And then what’s he do, run away someplace? Is that what your little scenario has him doing? Leave everything behind-house, job, family-and run?” Estelle remained silent. “Kevin did not assault Carmen Acosta, Sheriff. I know that as surely as I know that I’m standing here right now.”

“Did he have any other vehicle, besides that little sports car?”

“No. He used the county truck. He hardly ever drove the Datsun. Whenever he did, something on it usually broke.”

“No motorbike? Not a fifth bike?”

Page jolted, as if the reminder that others had searched the house had sucked his breath away. “No. At least, not that I know of.” He sat down heavily on the sofa, then started to rise immediately, remembering Estelle’s request. She held up a hand.

“Relax, sir.”

He settled back. “Look, he could have walked somewhere,” he said.

“Yes, he could,” Estelle replied. “The county building is only five blocks from here. We have officers looking for him. His staff is looking for him.”

“Did you see him today? I mean, you said he left the meeting at noon?”

“Yes, sir, I did.”

“There were no hints then? I mean, he didn’t mention where he was going or anything?”

Estelle shook her head. “You understand our concern,” she said.

He held up his hands again, then let them drop in frustration. “What about the girl. What about Carmen?”

“She’s being airlifted to University Hospital in Albuquerque.”

“And the assault happened right in the house?”

“That’s what we’re in the process of determining, sir.”

“Is she going to be all right, do you think?”

“No, sir. I don’t think she’s going to be all right.”

He slumped deeper into the sofa. “Raped?”

“We don’t know yet, sir.”

He heaved a deep sigh and clasped his hands tightly.

“Do you have a place to stay where I can reach you tonight?” Estelle asked.

“I’ll be here,” he said, surveying the living room as if he expected it to have somehow changed.

“That’s not possible, sir. Not until the area is cleared as part of the crime scene. Even the Acostas have made other arrangements.”

“Christ.”

“It’s inconvenient, I know. It can’t be helped.”

He rose from the sofa, dusting a piece of lint from his trouser leg. “At the Posadas Inn, then, I guess. You’ve got a lobby down at the Sheriff’s Office?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then I think I’ll go find myself a chair and just wait. Is that all right?”

“Whatever suits you, sir. I just need to know where to find you should something come up.”

“I mean, who can sleep with something like this.” He shook his head. “One minute everything is normal as all hell, and the next minute, the world is coming apart.” He reached down and repositioned one of the sofa pillows. “I didn’t take time to stop by the house to pick up any clothes. How long will it be before I can…before this place is open to me?”

“I’ll let you know tomorrow, sir.”

He nodded absently, reluctant to leave the room. “Did you know about Kevin and me?”

“No, sir,” Estelle said, and let it go at that.

Page moved toward the front door, then stopped. “Can I ask you something?”

“Yes, sir.”

He smiled at the clipped, matter-of-fact response. “Kevin’s county truck in the driveway…you said that Mr. Acosta claims it wasn’t there when he left home, but a while later, however long, the truck was parked there when he returned home and then found Carmen.” He paused, waiting for a response. When there was none, he continued, “Is there something else that makes you think Kevin is involved? I mean, the bit about the truck…that doesn’t mean much.”

“Mr. Page, we have to explore every avenue. That’s all I can tell you at the moment.”

It looked as if William Page wanted to smile, but couldn’t.