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Authors: Lisa Jackson

BOOK: Afraid to Die
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She spent the next few hours dragging the Christmas decorations out of the attic, sorting through them, checking to see that strands of lights that worked last year still glowed brightly when they were plugged in. Once she'd separated the yuletide wheat from the chaff, she left the good ornaments and lights near the tree, threw away everything broken, and filled half a garbage bag with items to donate. She thought about baking cookies, decided it was too much work, then decided to either skim off some of Joelle's goodies the next day at work or stop at the grocery store on her way home from work, where she could grab Chinese food from the deli and cookies and candy from the bakery, if Joelle's stash failed her.
Both kids would be home and they'd have a bit of “normal” home life, if there was such a thing.
Satisfied that she was making a step in the right direction, she started into the bedroom when her cell phone rang. Finally. Jeremy decided to check in. But she was wrong. The number that appeared on her screen was unfamiliar.
“Pescoli,” she answered automatically.
“Oh, Detective. Hi. It's Sandi. Down at the restaurant.” Sandi Aldridge was the owner and manager of Wild Will's, an establishment that had been a landmark in Grizzly Falls for years. Tall and lanky, Sandi was a shrewd woman who wore enough makeup to make a runway model wince and always kept one of those over-shadowed eyes firmly focused on the restaurant's receipts for the day. “I didn't want to bother you, but I really don't know what else to do.” That didn't sound like Sandi, an opinionated woman who knew her own mind and didn't mind telling you just how to run your life and anyone else's as well.
“It's fine.” Glancing at the clock on the microwave, Pescoli noted it was after ten. “What's up?” She was getting a bad feeling, her cop senses heightened since never before had Sandi called her.
“It's one of my waitresses. You know Brenda Sutherland, right?”
“Tall, blond, quick smile.” In her mind's eye, Pescoli saw the woman, a friendly sort. Pretty. Always handy with a refill of coffee. Pescoli thought Brenda Sutherland had a kid around Bianca's age. “Sure.”
“Well, she didn't come in today. Was scheduled for the lunch shift and to work through dinner. Never showed. Never called. I phoned her cell and her house and got no answer.”
“This is unusual?”
“Completely out of character. Brenda has never called in sick since she started with me. Never missed a day of work, unless one of her kids was down with the flu or something, and then she always called in and made sure her shift was covered. Most responsible waitress I've ever hired and I've had myself a few.”
That she had. Sandi had been managing the restaurant for years, long before she split with her husband. She'd ended up with Wild Will's in the divorce and had turned a mediocre restaurant into one of the most popular establishments in town.
“I don't think anyone's filled out a missing persons report,” Sandi was saying. “Her boys are with their dad tonight; something to do with their custody arrangement and the holidays, I believe. I remember her saying that, so she would be alone. But I drove up to her house—it's a cabin near September Creek on Elkridge Drive—and it was dark. No one there. Worse yet, I drove by her car parked on the side of the road just past the turnoff from the county road. It looks abandoned, a couple of inches of snow on it; I thought about calling nine-one-one but decided it might be smarter to phone you first, being as you know Brenda and all.”
Pescoli's heart sank. The abandoned car didn't sound good. “Was her car disabled? Flat tire?”
“Don't know. Didn't really look. I just went up to her house and knocked on the door, called her and heard the phone ringing inside. No answer. As I said, it's just not like Brenda.” Sandi sounded worried and Pescoli didn't blame her.
“I'll take a run up there,” she said, “and I'll get back to you. In the meantime, if you could find her ex-husband's name and phone number, maybe his address and any friends or relatives who might know where she is, that could help. Could be she broke down and had someone come get her. What direction was the car going when it was left?”
“North. Toward her house.”
That, too, wasn't good. It sounded as if she had been heading home.
“She was at work yesterday?”
“Yes. And she mentioned she had a church meeting last night. First Christian. You know, they're the ones who are building a new church outside of town on some acreage Brady Long left them.”
Pescoli was nodding, though, of course, Sandi couldn't know that.
“I did call Mildred Peeples. She's on every committee that the church has and a busybody to boot. Knows everybody's business and she said Brenda was at the meeting, kind of antsy, like she had to be somewhere. At least that was Mildred's take. She said the meeting broke up half an hour late, around eight thirty. As far as I know, no one's seen her since.”
Not a good sign.
“Did you call the ex?”
“Ray? No way. He's a sick son of a bitch though. He's probably behind this; I wouldn't put it past him.”
“Does he live in Grizzly Falls?”
“In an apartment. I don't know exactly where.”
“Okay, got it. I'll check it all out.”
“Thanks, Detective.”
“No problem.” Pescoli hung up and started for her bedroom to change out of her robe and pajamas.
The bad feeling that had been with her just got a whole lot worse.
Chapter 4
“O
kay, so go over it again. What's going on?” Alvarez asked as she climbed into Pescoli's Jeep. She'd taken the call from her partner fifteen minutes earlier. Pescoli, obviously driving, had said, “We need to check something out up near September Creek. Brenda Sutherland, the waitress at Wild Will's, didn't show up today and the boss, Sandi, can't find her. Her car's abandoned not far from her house, so I'm going up there. You in?”
Of course she was and now they were headed out of town, Pescoli behind the wheel, the scent of cigarette smoke tingeing the air. Though Pescoli had quit years ago, she was known to sneak a smoke whenever she got stressed.
The holidays tended to do that to people.
Pescoli explained about the phone call from Sandi Aldridge as her Jeep climbed the hills outside of town. The snow, thankfully, had stopped falling and the countryside seemed deceptively serene. “But there's no body,” Pescoli said. “No report of violence. No missing persons report.”
She turned her vehicle down Elkridge Drive, and not two hundred yards in, she noticed the abandoned vehicle.
“Why wasn't this called in?” Alvarez asked as Pescoli passed the snow-covered car and parked on the side of the road, fifteen yards ahead of it.
“Deputies stretched thin. Wrecks, electrical outages, fires from space heaters, you name it and this isn't a major road, so it's not patrolled often.”
“What about the neighbors?”
“That's the problem,” Pescoli said. “Not many up here. Not year-round at least.”
That much was true, Alvarez thought. This area in the mountains was spattered with a few summer homes, all closer to the lake. They climbed out of the Jeep, breaths fogging in the subfreezing temperatures, careful as they approached the car. Over four inches of snow covered the roof. “Been here a while,” Pescoli thought aloud and brushed the snow from the icy driver's side window to shine the beam of her flashlight inside. “Nothing.”
Alvarez looked through the frosty pane as well. The car appeared empty except for a plastic sack from which peeked a glassy-eyed stuffed animal. Looked like a reindeer.
“Christmas gifts?” Pescoli muttered.
“Maybe.”
“Why leave them?”
“Why leave at all?”
“Good question.”
Pescoli called the abandoned vehicle in, then, to cover their bases, Pescoli secured a search warrant not only for the car but also Brenda Sutherland's house as well. After waiting for the tow truck and a deputy to stay with the vehicle, Pescoli drove onward, taking a sharp right and following a twisting, snow-covered lane through stands of icy hemlock and pine that opened to a small clearing and the missing woman's home, a two-bedroom cottage tucked far from the road.
Pescoli parked.
Alvarez yanked her gloves a little higher on her wrists. “No lights except for the Christmas strand.” She nodded toward the house.
“It's late.”
“Yeah, but ...” She looked at the house.
The front porch seemed to sag a bit, but a string of Christmas lights had been strung over the eaves. Alvarez checked her sidearm as she climbed out of the Jeep. Clicking on her flashlight, she surveyed the area and noted the path to the front door was covered in snow, one set of footprints softened with the falling snow approaching and encircling the house before leaving again.
“Sandi Aldridge said she knocked on the door and poked around the house, trying to see inside to check on Brenda Sutherland,” Pescoli explained as she ran her flashlight's beam over the tracks.
“The only set.” She made her way up the front steps and shined the beam of her flashlight over the exterior. Though the downspouts showed rust and wear, the little cabin, set between thickets of trees, appeared homey. A bike had been left on the porch near a pair of boots that had been kicked off randomly. Several pots held dying plants and the welcome mat was worn thin.
Aside from a breath of wind, the night was silent. Pescoli knocked on the door and rang the bell. Chimes echoed inside the house, but no footsteps approached.
“Mrs. Sutherland?” Pescoli called through the solid oak panels. “Brenda?”
Nothing. Just the sigh of the wind and creak of frozen branches.
“She could have taken advantage of the no-kid thing and taken off,” Pescoli thought aloud. “But it doesn't seem likely. One of the boys, his name is Dave or Darren or Don or ... no, it's Drew, that's right. He's in Bianca's class, or she has some classes with him; I've heard the name before and I think the mom was pretty devoted. Besides, as a single mom, she probably wouldn't have ditched the job.”
“Or the car.”
“Good point.”
They walked around the house, investigated the empty garage where clutter abounded and a dark stain on the cement floor suggested that Brenda Sutherland's car might be leaking some kind of fluid.
The yard was empty, thick with snow, and they climbed the back steps to another wide porch, this one complete with retractable clothesline and empty hornets' nests tucked in the roof.
Pescoli pounded on the back door until it rattled, then checked. Unlocked.
“Got lucky,” she said and pushed it open.
No snarling guard dog bolted from the interior, so they stepped cautiously inside, walking quickly through a small kitchen, where the faucet dripped over a sink of dirty dishes and the smell of tomato sauce hung heavy in the air.
Moving quickly through a small dining cove with a red laminated table circa 1960 where two milk glasses and cereal bowls had been left, they entered the living area, which was much tidier, the worn furniture with straightened pillows and a rag rug coiled over scratched hardwood floors. A woodstove stood on one wall, cold to the touch, ashes piled within. The two bedrooms were empty, one with a set of bunk beds and clothes scattered everywhere, the other with a neat double bed, Bible on the nightstand, flannel nightgown and matching robe hung on a hook on the back side of the door. Her closet had a meager, if functional, set of clothes and the bathroom was small, cluttered and well used.
No upstairs.
No basement.
No Brenda Sutherland.
“Definitely missing,” Pescoli said, stating the obvious to the empty rooms. “Guess we'd better have a chat with the ex.”
“I can't help thinking this is a lot like Lissa Parsons.”
“Don't even go there,” Pescoli warned, but Alvarez could tell from her tone of voice and the worry in the lines of her forehead that she'd already come to the same conclusion that the two missing women were somehow linked.
 
 
The next day, things definitely started out on the wrong foot. For some reason Alvarez's alarm didn't go off, probably because she'd slapped the clock silly the day before, and she realized, belatedly, after letting Roscoe out the door, that she'd missed her session with her martial arts instructor. He hadn't called but left a text and she responded, apologizing and feeling out of sorts.
What was wrong with her?
She
never
was late.
Never
missed an appointment.
Never
bought anyone else's excuses about being flaky. Sure she'd had a bad night's sleep with Jane Doe up half the night and thoughts of the missing women running in circles through her brain, but still, she shouldn't be so off-kilter. “Pull it together,” she told herself, feeling a headache coming on as she stepped into the shower. Cold needles of water pounded her bare skin for just an instant before she jumped out of the tiled enclosure. Wrapping a towel quickly around her shivering body with one hand, she checked the temperature of the shower spray with the other, wiggled the handle and discovered not a drop of hot water anywhere.
“Great,” she muttered, wondering what else could go wrong. The answer, of course, was plenty. And it did. She threw on her clothes and realized the puppy wasn't tagging after her. Nor did she hear him. With the dread that comes only with the experience of being a mother or pet owner, she hurried downstairs and found Roscoe, pillow in his mouth, stuffing flying through the air like snow in a snow globe. “Stop! Drop it!” she ordered and he, thinking it was a game, ran around the coffee table and bounded through the kitchen. “I don't have time for this,” she warned, nearly catching him only to have him streak by, tail between his legs, ears flopping. “You are in
so
much trouble!”
When she finally cornered him in the powder room, she was breathing hard and her temper had cooled a bit. “Oh, come on.” She didn't have time to clean up the feathers and stuffing littering her living area, but she put him in his pen, grabbed her purse, wallet, sidearm and badge and left him standing behind the wire mesh managing to look as miserable as any dog on earth. “You'll be fine,” she said, feeling ridiculously guilty before locking the door behind her and heading for the garage.
Though it wasn't yet eight in the morning, she called the maintenance man for the building and asked him to check on her water heater. He was a lazy twenty-six-year-old who preferred spending nights as the bass player for his band rather than his days fixing up the property, but he was cheap and, if given enough time, was handy enough. He'd done some side jobs for Alvarez in the past and she was certain he could determine what the hell was wrong with her hot water tank. She only hoped she wouldn't have to replace the damned thing.
At the office, she found a cup of blistering-hot coffee and tried to shake herself out of her bad mood by munching on a reindeer cupcake, eating first the sugar-coated antlers and then its whole damned head. It didn't help.
Twenty minutes later, she was just answering some e-mail when Pescoli dropped by her desk. “Want some bad news?” she asked.
Alvarez glanced up. “You mean some
more
bad news?” she asked. “It hasn't exactly been a stellar morning and so, the answer is no.”
“Yeah, well, I think you'd better hear this. Your buddy J. R. has just been released from prison. A technicality and his lawyer screamed loudly enough that it looks like there might be a whole new trial.”
“Crap.” The headache that had started early this morning and had been exacerbated by the couch pillow evisceration was really beginning to pound inside her skull. J. R. “Junior” Green, the creep of all creeps, was an ex-pro football lineman who had turned coach and pedophile. Alvarez had been instrumental in sending him up the river and he'd sworn that he'd return the favor by ruining her life. “He's guilty!”
“As sin. We just have to prove it all over again.”
Her headache throbbed, and as Pescoli walked off, Alvarez's cell phone rang. She checked the number, saw that it was Terry Longstrom and didn't pick up. She couldn't deal with him right now, at least not personally. If he needed to talk to her about business, he could leave a message; then she might call him back. Maybe.
She reached into the top drawer of her desk, found a bottle of Excedrin she used only if her periods were severe. Those times she washed the painkillers down with some kind of herbal tea. Today she popped two into her palm, tossed them into her mouth and swallowed them dry.
It wasn't yet nine in the morning, and so far, the day was turning into a nightmare.
 
 
A couple of hours later, while Pescoli was checking with several members of the Bible study group at Brenda Sutherland's church, the members of which were some of the people who'd last seen Brenda alive, Alvarez headed over to Missing Persons, where she made some inquiries, asking Taj about other women who may have been reported missing.
“Let me see,” Taj said, typing into her keyboard and studying her monitor.
Alvarez was antsy. She'd been waiting for hours to talk to Taj, as all night she'd tossed and turned, wondering what connection, if any, there was between Lissa Parsons and Brenda Sutherland.
She wasn't one to believe in coincidences, and if the past few winters had taught her anything, it was to be wary. For a small town, Grizzly Falls had its share of nuts. There were the harmless ones, like Ivor Hicks, who, pushing eighty, still swore that he'd been abducted by aliens years before on Mesa Rock. He'd been brought to the mother ship and was experimented upon by a reptilian race headed by a particularly nasty general named Crytor. He'd sworn that his experience with the aliens had
not
been due to his intimate relationship with Jack Daniel's. Alvarez wasn't convinced. Then there was Grace Perchant, a woman who lived alone with not one, but now two wolf-dogs, her older female named Sheena and a newer addition, a big male that she called Bane. So now, in Alvarez's opinion, Grace had a bona fide pack. Great. Convinced she spoke with ghosts, Grace was always making weird predictions that strangely came to be. Again, she was, at least to Alvarez's way of thinking, for the most part, benign.

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