The Fourth Time is Murder

Chapter Thirty-seven

Jack Young’s expression looked as if he’d barely managed to leap out of the way of a speeding bus intent on turning him into paste. There was no cause to be sweating on this cool February afternoon, but the young man flicked at his forehead and dabbed his eyes. He tried to appear controlled, even casual, but it was an effort. More than anything else, he appeared thoroughly confused by this odd turn of events.

When Estelle arrived at the address on Capulin Drive off NM28, he was sitting on the running board of his old pickup truck, both hands between his knees. Deputy Tony Abeyta didn’t turn his back on the young man but continued to write on his clipboard. Estelle forced herself to take her time, looking at the house and regarding the young man before getting out of her car.

“There’s a frightened puppy,” Madelyn Bolles said quietly.

“Maybe with good cause,” Estelle said. Down the street, two LCPD units were parked facing the house, but she didn’t see Guenther “Grunt” Nilson. One uniformed officer remained in his car, the driver’s door open. A second officer appeared from the rear of the tiny house, walking a careful perimeter around the building.

Estelle got out of the car and nodded at her deputy.

“Detective Nilson went to pick up a warrant,” Tony said by way of greeting. “I haven’t been in the house yet. No wants or warrants on this vehicle. And this is Jack Young. Mr. Young, this is Posadas County undersheriff Estelle Guzman.”

“Mr. Young,” Estelle said. “We appreciate your cooperation.”

“I’d like to know what’s going on, ma’am,” he replied, and Estelle noted the cadence of his speech, clipped and efficient.

“May I see your driver’s license, sir?” Estelle asked, and Tony slipped it from his clipboard and handed it to her, along with a military ID. John Elliot Young was twenty-three, with a Sunland Park address on Woodcrest Avenue.

“You’re at Bliss?”

“No, ma’am,” he said. “I’m not stationed anywhere at the moment.”

“And how’s that?”

“I’m on a medical discharge,” he said. He swung his right leg out a bit and pulled up the leg of his jeans. An enormous scar began above his ankle and disappeared upward. “Goes to here,” he said, touching his thigh. “That’s the good part of it.”

“I see.” She handed the license and ID back to Abeyta. “So tell me.”

“Tell you what, ma’am?”

“What are you doing here, sir?”

“I was visiting a friend who lives here.”

“The friend’s name?”

He frowned at that. “What’s your interest in her? Is that her with you in the car?” He squinted toward the county car, but the sun reflecting on the windows made it impossible to see who was inside.

“And who would that be?” Estelle asked.

“All right, all right. Of course I know her name,” Young replied. “Her name’s CJ Vallejos. I don’t know what the ‘CJ’ stands for.”

“So you don’t know her all that well, then.”

“I guess I know her well enough.”

“When did you meet her?”

“I met her last night at Waylon’s,” he said, naming a popular nightspot. “We hit it off.” He shrugged. “She invited me back here after we closed the place down.” He shaded his eyes, looking past Estelle at the county car again. “So where is she?”

“How did you happen to meet her?”

He shrugged again. “I said, we were at Waylon’s. There she was, there I was. She asked if I was there for the karaoke, and I thought that was pretty funny. I can play the radio pretty good, but that’s the extent of it. One thing led to another.”

“And you ended up back here.”

“Yes, ma’am. Not sure how. We were both lit.”

She looked at him for a long minute, and he returned her gaze without flinch or apology.

“That’s the first time you met her? Last night?”

“That’s it. So what’s the big deal? She wanted for murder or something?” He tried a halfhearted smile.

“What makes you ask that, Mr. Young?”

“Well, you know. This many cops…and a search warrant? You don’t do that for shoplifting, do you?” A dawning of realization crossed his face. “She didn’t steal that fancy car, did she?”

“Not as far as we know.”

“What a machine,” he said in wonder. “I figured that was Daddy’s car.”

“Daddy’s?”

“How could she afford something like that? As a college student?”

“When Ms. Vallejos left the house this morning, what did she tell you?”

Young hesitated at the sudden change of subject. “She wanted to return a video that she said was overdue. Just down the street. And she was going to pick up a newspaper.”

“You didn’t think that was odd?”

He held up both hands. “What’s odd about returning a movie? She seemed preoccupied, maybe. I thought maybe she was having some second thoughts about us…maybe that was all it was. I was going to fix us something to eat, and she said she’d be back in just a couple of minutes. That’s it. That’s the story. I figured that she’d come back and tell me to get lost.” He shifted position with a grimace. “Mind if I stand up?”

“No.” She watched him push himself up, and for a minute he massaged his right knee with both hands. Then he leaned against the door of the truck. “What’s she done? They don’t send the cops out when a video is overdue. I haven’t done anything wrong, so it isn’t because of me.”

“Where do you work, sir?”

“I don’t yet. I’m spending most of my time fighting with the VA. Something will come along.”

“Did Ms. Vallejos talk to you about any prospects?”

“No, ma’am,” Young said. “She seemed kind of down in the dumps when I first met her last night. But we hit it off. And then this morning…I don’t know. Maybe she’s having second thoughts.”

“That happens.”

“Yeah, I guess it does. I was going to make us some brunch or something, and all of a sudden, she’s all agitated about that video.”

“What were you looking for in the trunk of her car, Jack?”

“Jesus. What do you have, spyware or something? Christ, what is all this? Look, she said she thought that she had a loose mounting bracket on her CD changer in the trunk, so I looked for her. She didn’t. What’s she telling you?”

“She’s not,” Estelle said, and Young heard the implications in her tone. He seemed to slump a little, and leaned his back against the door of the truck.

“What’s happened? Is she all right?”

“Ms. Vallejos was involved in a high-speed chase on the interstate a little while ago. She lost control of her car over west of Deming.”

Young’s eyes grew large. “Are you shitting me? What are you saying?”

“I’m saying just that, sir. She took off westbound, and lost control after her car collided with a semi.”

“Just now, you mean?” he asked, incredulous.

“Just now.”

“My God, where is she? Is she all right?”

“No, sir, she’s not all right. By now she’s in Posadas General Hospital. I don’t know any more than that.”

“I don’t believe this. Why would she do that? She was going to return a video, for Christ’s sakes.”

Estelle hesitated, weighing how much to tell the young man. “We had a unit parked at each end of the street this morning,” she said. “That’s when we saw you opening the trunk of her car. I think she might have seen the officers and that tipped her off. The video thing was just an excuse.”

“An excuse?”

“That’s what I think.”

“You mean you guys had this house under surveillance?”

Estelle didn’t respond and he fell silent, sliding back down the truck door to land on his rump, both hands beside his hips on the running board.

“What’s she done? You’re going to tell me at least that much?”

“Let me ask you this,” Estelle said. “What did you two talk about?”

“What do you mean what,” he said with irritation. “Just stuff, you know? We were at a bar, for Christ’s sakes. You just talk.”

“About school?”

“Yeah, she mentioned that. She was studying political science, and hated it. She wasn’t going back.”

“What about her work?”

“I didn’t get the impression that she had a job,” Young said. “A couple of times, she said that she had plans. She never said what they were.”

“Did she ever talk about other friends?”

“No.”

“Or where she was from?”

“She said Chicago. She’s got a brother up in Canada somewhere. Look, I gotta tell you…we talked a lot about me, okay? She saw me limping and she wanted to know all about what I’d done. How this happened,” and he patted his leg.

“And how did it happen?”

He fell silent. “I was going to tell her this long heroic tale,” he said after a moment. “But I couldn’t.” He closed his eyes. “God, she’s an incredible girl, you know that?” When Estelle didn’t respond, he added, “So I just told her the truth.” He straightened up and lifted his shirt. The scar ran down the center of his body, thick and corded, disappearing below his waistline. “Changes your life, you better believe,” he said. “What do they call it? The young man’s cancer?”

“And the leg?”

“I managed that when I got drunk after I was diagnosed and drove into an arroyo on my way back to the base. Maybe I was trying to kill myself. Who knows. I don’t think I was. The shrink thought I was, though. Pretty glamorous, huh?”

“And that’s what the two of you talked about?”

“Mostly.” He looked off into the distance. “Is she hurt pretty bad?”

“I would guess so. We’ll know more here in a little bit.”

He looked back at Estelle. “You still haven’t told me what she’s done.” An LCPD patrol car pulled into the street.

“That’s Detective Nilson,” Abeyta said.

“I told you, you don’t need a warrant,” Young said.

“This is your house?” Estelle asked.

“No. It’s CJ’s.”

“Then we need a warrant. I’m going to ask that you remain here for a little longer.”

“I got all the time in the world,” he replied.

She reached out a hand and took his shoulder, giving it a gentle, sympathetic shake. “That’s what we always think,” she said.

A moment later, Estelle had time to open the front door and step over the threshold, breathing in the light aroma of deodorant and other potions and fragrances that lingered throughout the little house. In time, they’d all fade, leaving this address on Capulin just another empty shell waiting for a family.

As she had that thought, her phone chirped. Hearing Eddie Mitchell’s quiet voice, she instantly felt a wave of apprehension.

“You clear?” he asked.

“We’re about to go through the house, Eddie. What’s the word?”

“I’m not sure yet. Your husband says that it’s going to be several hours before we’re able to talk with her. Preliminaries show that her spine is busted in two places. Dr. Guzman thinks that she’ll be paralyzed from the waist down.”

“Ay. Is she conscious?”

“Not yet. But he’s talking about transporting her to Albuquerque if we can get the medivac down here. But look, her car’s over in impound, and Mears, the sheriff, and I were going to head over that way right now. If you have a wrap down there, or if you can leave Tony to do it, you might want to pay a visit at the hospital. Just in case.”

“That’s a good idea. Leave someone in the room with her when you go over to impound, though. All right?”

“She isn’t going anywhere.”

“No, I mean just so that…just so someone is with her.”

“Yeah, I can do that. Taber came in, so she can swing by there.”

“That’s good. I’ll be there in an hour or so.”

“One thing, though,” Mitchell said. “You might be interested to know that she didn’t have so much as an overnight bag with her. But she had something like twenty-one thousand dollars in her purse.”

“Nothing else?”

“Just a newly issued New Mexico driver’s license, good for eight years. One or two credit card receipts. And four credit cards and two debit cards. That’s it. Oh, and a couple of family photos. One of what I would guess to be parents. Another of a good-looking kid that might be her brother. No names or the like on the back sides.”

“Okay. Thanks, Eddie. I’m on my way.” Estelle turned in place. “I see she has a computer and a pretty nifty printer. I’ll make sure Tony brings those along as well as anything else he might turn up. Maybe there are some answers here.”

“Take your time,” Mitchell said, still at ease with command, his days as chief of police for the village of Posadas recent history.

“We will.” She folded the phone and slid it back into her pocket. Walking through someone else’s home was always an odd experience for Estelle, and she took a few moments now to make a quick tour. Detective Nilson, a little wizened man who looked twenty years older than he was, stood outside the door, sucking on a cigarette, staring down at the cement step. Jack Young didn’t get up from the running board of his truck.

“I want that,” Estelle said to Tony Abeyta, pointing at the computer. “Maybe somewhere around here she’ll have an address book, some kind of record. Something. One connection we’re looking for is the brother. The boyfriend says that CJ mentioned a brother living in Canada.” Estelle lifted a small sheaf of bills from the desk. “Phone records, anything like that.”

Putting the paperwork down, she walked the length of the living room to the bedroom. From all appearances, it was temporary quarters-nothing frilly, nothing extra.

“If you want Mr. Young to stay while you go through the house, that’s fine,” Estelle said as she headed toward the door. “I don’t need to talk to him again. As far as I’m concerned, he’s free to go.”

“You got it.”

She stopped at the door and extended her hand to Nilson. He looked at her with eyes so light blue that the irises appeared transparent. “Thanks, detective.”

“Hey, don’t mention it,” Nilson said. His grip was light and faintly clammy. “How are things over in the land of the free and the brave?”

“Things are interesting.”

“Oh, I bet,” Nilson laughed. “That’s what our life is…interesting.”

Intent on her laptop, Madelyn Bolles didn’t look up as Estelle approached the car. Estelle eased into the driver’s seat, and Madelyn finally glanced over at her.

“Here’s a question for you,” Madelyn said.

“I hope it’s an easy one,” Estelle replied.

“It is. As I recollect, I started this day around sixish? Something like that? By nine, we were down in Regál, talking with Mrs. Roybal. And so it goes. It’s now about four fifteen. I’m curious about what’s next.”

Estelle stretched, pushing both hands hard against the steering wheel. “I need to stop by the hospital in Posadas for a few minutes. The deputy will finish up here.”

“You think there might be time for me to buy you dinner?”

“Dinner,” Estelle repeated, as if it were a foreign concept. “Let’s see how things go.”

“Is that a ‘yes?’”

Estelle laughed. “That’s as close to a ‘yes’ as I can come at the moment.”

Her cell phone rang, and she took her time unfolding it. “Guzman.”

“Hey,” Bob Torrez said. “Eddie just called you?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. Look, Jackie’s comin’ in to cover at the hospital until you can get up here. We got a match.”

A match, Estelle thought, caught off-guard. “A match of what, Bobby?”

“Tom is one hundred percent positive that the print on the beer can belongs to the girl’s left index finger. One hundred percent. Ain’t no wonder why she ran.”

“I’ll be up there in an hour,” Estelle said. She heard what might have been a groan from Madelyn Bolles.