Deserves to Die (28 page)

Pescoli had already gotten a text from Bianca that there was no school today and, of course, her daughter was ecstatic, saying she was going back to bed for a while, then hoping to get a ride to a friend’s later. Driving back to the station, Pescoli hoped her daughter stayed put. As far as she knew, Jeremy was at home, probably still fast asleep and would be for a while.
Good.
At least for the morning, she needed not to worry about either of them.

She wheeled into the station’s parking lot and spied a spot in the thickening snow. “If this keeps up, Blackwater will have us all shoveling,” she said, cutting the engine. “I can see it now, part of his new military regimen to keep his officers in shape. Did I tell you I caught him in full uniform doing push-ups in his office? Told me it kept the blood flowing.”

“It does,” Alvarez said as she unbuckled her seat belt.

“Yeah, well, once up and showered, I’m not interested in getting my blood flowing,” Pescoli grumbled, climbing out of the car and spying Cade Grayson just parking his pickup in the visitor’s lot not far from the pole where the flag was still positioned at half-mast, Old Glory billowing in the falling snow. “Take a look.”

“Let’s see what he has to say.”

He wasn’t alone. As he hopped out of one side of the truck, his brother Zed, several inches taller and at least fifty pounds heavier, stepped his size fourteen boots into six inches of icy powder. Both men were dressed in thick outerwear and cowboy hats, the wide brims collecting a white dusting as they made their way to the officers.

“Got your message,” Cade said to Alvarez. “We were already in town, picking up supplies, so I thought it might be best to talk face-to-face.”

“Let’s go inside.” Alvarez led the way, and within minutes, they were seated at the conference table, hats removed, jackets unzipped, faces stern, coffee supplied by Joelle on the table, untouched. Alvarez had taken time to dash into her office to retrieve her files and Pescoli, as was her custom these days, had made a quick trip to the bathroom.

The brothers were obviously uncomfortable, whether it was because Cade was being questioned, or due to the fact that they were seated in the sheriff’s department, a door away from what had been Dan’s office.

“Is this about Bart?” Zed asked, bushy eyebrows pulling together. “We all know that Hattie won’t let that one go.” He sent his brother a glance that was unreadable, one that Cade tried to ignore.

“I did look through the case files on your brother’s suicide,” Pescoli said, taking in both brothers as they were seated across from her. “But I can’t find any reason to reopen the case. It looks to me that Bart took his own life. I’m sorry.”

“Not unexpected,” Zed said, his lips twisting down.

More,
Pescoli thought,
in disapproval of his ex-sister-in-law, than in disappointment about his brother’s cause of death.

“Hattie’s had a bug up her butt about it from the first but hell . . . we all just have to accept what happened. We may not like it, but it’s time to move on.” Pointedly, he glanced at the door leading to the office once occupied by his brother.

Cade’s gaze zeroed in on Alvarez. “Why did you call? You seemed to think it was pretty damn important.”

“It is,” she said, her tablet firing up in front of her. “I’ve been in contact with Detective Montoya of the New Orleans Police Department.”

“New Orleans?” Zed said. “What the hell’s this all about? We’ve got a ranch to run and a helluva snowstorm to deal with.” He shot a disgusted look at Cade. “I told you we should’ve just called.”

“What about New Orleans?” Cade asked, deathly solemn, but not surprised.

“Montoya says you were involved with a woman from there, a woman by the name of Anne-Marie Calderone, or possibly, at that time she might have told you her name was Anne-Marie Favier, though she was married.”

He didn’t respond, so Alvarez attempted to jog his memory. “You were in Texas at a rodeo, took a side trip to Louisiana, and met her there?” She slid a copy of the woman in question’s driver’s license across the table.

The edges of Cade’s lips turned white as he let his gaze skate over the image on the license before he found Alvarez’s eyes again. “What about her?”

“For the love of Christ,” Zed said. “You and your goddamn women!” He snorted through his nose and shook his head.

“We’re investigating a couple homicides here in Grizzly Falls. You’ve no doubt heard of them. We think there’s a connection to Ms. Calderone, and we think she’s here. Has she contacted you?”

“You think there’s a connection between Anne-Marie and those murders?” Cade sounded poleaxed.

“Shit,
that
woman? The waitress?” Zed said in a huff of disgust. “I knew she was trouble.”

“Slow down,” Pescoli advised. “So, she is here in Grizzly Falls?”

Alvarez asked, “A waitress?”

“I don’t know all the details, but she admitted she was in trouble, that she thought—” Cade closed his eyes for a second, then clenched his jaw and spit out, “Shit-fire,” as if he were on the horns of a dilemma.

“She thought what?” Alvarez pressed.

When Cade remained silent for a few moments, clearly trying to get his head around what he’d just heard, Zed jumped into the fray. “She came to the ranch.” He flung an angry glare at his brother. “Whatever you think you’re doin’ by holdin’ back, like you’re saving her or something, or keeping some damn confidence, it’s over. They’re on to her.”

A muscle worked in Cade’s jaw.

“Mr. Grayson,” Alvarez urged.

Cade scowled, angry with his brother and quite possibly himself. “She dropped by a few days ago. Said she was in trouble, that it had something to do with those women who’d been found. I don’t know how, but she was afraid.”

“About what? Being caught?” Pescoli asked.

“That she was in danger. For her life, or something. She’d wanted to talk to Dan about what was going on, but of course that didn’t happen. I turned her away. I thought . . . hell, I’d hoped she was going to talk to you.”

“She works down at the Midway Diner,” Zed stated flatly.

“Did she say what she was afraid of?” Alvarez was making notes, but Pescoli was ready to shoot out of her chair and drive like a maniac to the diner. It was time to end this.

“Yeah.” Cade leaned back in his chair and exhaled heavily. “She did, but I didn’t believe her. She . . . well, she has a history of lying.”

Zed swore under his breath.

Cade straightened. “The thing is, she told me she was afraid of her own damn husband.”

“You can’t do this!” Anne-Marie spat, trying to worm her way out of the handcuffs he’d slapped on her wrists.

“You had the option. You wouldn’t leave on your own.”

“You really are a bastard.” She was furious, nearly spitting as, to her horror, he walked unerringly to the area along the baseboard where she’d stashed her important documents, her extra cash, her passports. “Don’t! You can’t!”

Ignoring her, he withdrew her switchblade from his pocket, clicked it open, and bent down to pry the board off to expose her niche. “We’ll have to wait until the fire dies a little for the other spot,” he said over his shoulder. He was serious. He was actually going to force her back to New Orleans.

He dug out the baseboard, then pulled her papers from their hiding spot. As he straightened, he snapped the knife closed and looked over the documents. “This must’ve cost you,” he said, opening one passport after another, his eyebrows rising in appreciation. “Or your grandmother.”

“I had to do it,” Anne-Marie said, desperate to change his mind. “If I went back, he would’ve killed me.”

“The police would have protected you.”

She gave a short, dry laugh. “I don’t think so.”

“You should’ve—”

“I should’ve nothing,” she cut him off. She’d had enough. Taken enough.

With a sudden yank, she removed the ring she wore, the fat piece of costume jewelry that hid her joint. Then quickly, with little effort, she grabbed her left hand with her right and removed the lifelike prosthesis to reveal the stump of her left ring finger, all that remained after the butcher she’d been married to had cleaved off the very finger on which he’d slipped her engagement ring years earlier.

“T
he Midway Diner?” Pescoli said after the Grayson brothers had left the sheriff’s department. She and Alvarez were still in the conference room, picking up their things. “It’s almost lunchtime and maybe we’ll get lucky. She’ll be there, or we can get information from her boss or coworkers.” Pescoli’s stomach was rumbling again.
Close enough for a meal,
she decided. Even if it was one on the run. They hadn’t learned much from the Grayson brothers.

Zed Grayson had been certain he’d spied Anne-Marie Calderone in her job as a waitress at the diner, though the one time Cade had seen her had been at his home when she had come to visit him, desperate, it appeared. He’d suggested she turn herself in and tell her story to the police. So far, she hadn’t taken his advice. Pescoli only hoped that Anne-Marie hadn’t run again. That woman had about half a million questions to answer, though Pescoli still wasn’t convinced she was a killer, fingerprint or no.

During the interview, Alvarez had pulled up the most recent photos of Troy Ryder and Bruce Calderone, sent to her by Montoya in New Orleans. She showed Zed and Cade several shots of the men in question. Besides his Texas driver’s license photo, there was another picture of Troy Ryder from his rodeo days. As for Calderone, his driver’s license photo issued by the state of Louisiana was tucked between two posed shots, one in a business suit, the other of the man in a lab coat, a stethoscope visible in his pocket. Both men were good-looking and about the same height and weight if the information on their licenses was to be believed. Troy Ryder was a little more rough and tumble looking, an outdoorsy type with tanned skin, light brown hair, and a cocksure grin. Dr. Bruce Calderone, dark hair combed neatly, chin lifted in authority, smile forced, did appear more polished and sophisticated, at least according to the shots, but that was how the photographer had staged the pictures, how the man wanted to be portrayed.

The Grayson brothers hadn’t recognized either of the two men who had said “I do” to Anne-Marie.

“Let’s go.” Alvarez was sliding her iPad into its case. “Maybe one of Anne-Marie’s coworkers has gotten close to her and knows where we can find her.”

Keys in hand, Pescoli said, “Don’t count on it.” She was already at the door to the hallway when the other door of the conference room, the one leading directly to the sheriff’s office, opened.

Blackwater took one step into the conference room. “Detectives,” he said, motioning them into his office. “We need to talk. I want you to bring me up to speed, but before you brief me on what you’ve learned, I think you should know that Anne-Marie Calderone is in Grizzly Falls.”

Alvarez gave a swift nod. “We just heard.”

“From Cade Grayson?” Blackwater’s eyes narrowed.

“Zed thinks he saw her at the Midway Diner, and she showed up at the ranch to visit Cade,” Pescoli said. “Neither of them has any idea where she lives, but Zed said she’s driving an older model Chevy Tahoe. Silver or gray or light blue, he thought. Colorado plates. Neither brother got the number.”

“They still involved? She and Cade?” Blackwater asked. “Or . . . Zed?”

“They both say not.” Pescoli shook her head.

“Come into the office and brief me. I know about the Midway Diner. Already talked to the owner.” He stepped out of the doorway and they filed in.

Waving them into chairs, he said, “She’s e-mailing me information about Jessica Williams—the alias Anne-Marie Calderone is using—her employment application, tax info, and cell number. I asked Zoller to get in touch with the cell phone company who issued the phone, but of course, it’s one of those pre-paid things that requires little or no info.” His dark eyes sparked and Pescoli recognized the look—a cop hot on the trail of a suspect. “Still, we don’t have a physical address for her. Yet. She did pick up mail at a local postal annex, you know, where the box is the ‘suite’ number?” He made air quotes and added, “I’ve already sent deputies over there checking her application.”

“You’re taking over the case now?” Pescoli asked, trying and failing to mask her irritation. He was the boss, yeah, but this was their case and she was a little bristly about it . . . well, about most things these days.

“No. No way.” He held up a hand, fingers splayed. “It’s all yours. All yours.” He glanced from one detective to the other. “But we’re a team here, all work together, and so I want you to report to me. I wanted to get some answers pronto and I didn’t want to interrupt your meeting with the Graysons. Time is crucial on this one; I thought it best if we get moving. Anne-Marie Calderone has a history of slipping away.”

Bugged, Pescoli, for once, didn’t argue. “Okay. Anything else? How did you find her?”

“Computer enhancement of her driver’s license photo.” He actually smiled a bit. “I had Zoller tweak it because I was certain I recognized her. It’s amazing what Photoshop can do.”

So he thought he’d broken the case wide open on his own. Pescoli got it. No doubt that bit of information would be leaked to the press.

“Okay, so now,” he encouraged, “tell me what you learned from the brothers Grayson.”

Pescoli took a back seat while Alvarez summarized their morning. “We think Troy Ryder is a party of interest in this case, as well, though we don’t know how he’s currently involved with Calderone or the homicides.” With that as a lead-in, she launched into what they’d discovered about Ryder, the unknown person of interest in room twenty-five of the River View, and Cade Grayson’s admission of actually talking to Anne-Marie Calderone, including her fear of her husband.

Blackwater listened thoughtfully.

Beneath some of his bravado, his eagerness to have things his way, Pescoli saw a glimmer of the lawman who had worked his way through the ranks, a good cop who had inherited Grayson’s position through ambition and hard work.

She still didn’t like him; didn’t care for his style, but she grudgingly accepted that he might not be as bad as he initially seemed. He preened too much to the cameras for her taste, and she wasn’t completely convinced his motives were what they should be, but maybe she could work with him.

At least for a while.

Possibly even the length of her pregnancy.

Alvarez was talking about the possibility of Bruce Calderone having landed in Grizzly Falls.

Blackwater was listening, just not convinced. He picked up a pencil from the holder on his too tidy desk. “But he’s not with his wife.”

“Not according to Grayson. He thinks she’s running scared.”

Blackwater asked the same damn question that had been plaguing Pescoli, “So where is he?”

“Don’t know. But there is a possibility that he stayed at the River View Motel, registered as Bryan Smith. He was either in touch with or observing Troy Ryder. According to the maid, he kept tabs on Ryder. We’ve got security tapes from the motel for all the dates that Ryder was a guest. Smith should be there too as he showed up the day after Ryder checked in and left soon after Ryder checked out. We’ve got his vehicle description and plates, this time from Texas. Plates and vehicle don’t match. Already issued BOLOs on both Ryder’s vehicle and Bryan Smith’s.”

“Good.” Blackwater was nodding, agreeing with his own thoughts as he tapped the eraser end of the pencil on his desk. “The trouble with this is that it’s getting more complicated as we get closer. Anne-Marie Calderone sighted,” he thought aloud, “now, possibly both husbands.” Dropping the pencil into its holder, he looked from Alvarez to Pescoli. “Looks like we’re searching for three people instead of just one. Let’s do it.”

Ryder stared at the stump where Anne-Marie’s finger had been. His stomach turned sour, bile rising up his throat as he stood in front of the dying fire. “He did that to you?” A new rage burned through him and he felt his back teeth grind together. Yes, Anne-Marie was a liar. A major liar. The best he’d ever come across and that was saying something, but for the first time, he wondered if she could possibly be telling the truth. He didn’t want to believe her, didn’t trust her as far as he could throw her, but who would make up such a grotesque story?

“Of course he did!” she said, her teeth drawing back in anger. “Look!” She held up her hand, fingers spread wide. “Do you want to know what he did after? Huh?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “He kicked me, Ryder. Like so much trash, he kicked my naked body into the river and hoped to hell that alligators would finish me off, eat me alive, to get rid of the evidence.”

Ryder’s insides curled in repulsion.

She inched her chin up defiantly. “I’d made the ultimate mistake. Of walking away from him.”

As they stood inches apart, she unburdened herself, letting go of her secret. She stood toe-to-toe with him and told him about going to the townhouse to get her things, and being discovered by Calderone. How he’d drugged her and jammed her rings on her finger before taking her somewhere deep into the Louisiana swampland. How, while she was starting to rouse, he’d sliced off her finger, rings and all, with the skill of the surgeon he was. As a final act, he’d kicked her, rolling her into the murky water.

Ryder listened, but didn’t say a word.

“So”—she stared up at him with her wide eyes—“just so you understand. I’ll never go back.” She blinked once, then whispered, “Never. I’d rather die first.”

He found his voice and dug deep for his resolve. “If what you’re saying is true—”

“If?” she repeated as a blast of wind slammed against the cabin, the walls shuddering. “
If?
Oh, my God, what do you think, Ryder, that I cut off my own damn finger?”

“No.” He knew a sane person wouldn’t mutilate themselves so. And he didn’t think Anne-Marie was insane, just . . . self-serving to the max.

“Then take off these frickin’ cuffs!” She glared at him as the fire sizzled, dying in the grate.

He almost reached for the key. He’d told himself that no matter what, he was going to haul her back to New Orleans, that no matter what kind of lies she spun, he was going to stand strong, never believe her. Yet there he was in the dilapidated cabin, his determination crumbling. His faith in her had been destroyed long ago. Her lies; her fault. But he found it impossible to believe that she would go to such incredible, grotesque lengths.

She’d do anything to save her own skin. You know it. You lived it. The woman has no scruples. None. Zero. Zilch. Don’t be tricked, Ryder. Yes, she’s beautiful and seductive and even charming, but she’s a twisting, diabolical snake and you know it. Once bitten, remember? Twice shy? Twice fucking shy!

Her hands bound together, she brushed her hair out of her eyes and frowned, a bit of pain registering in her green eyes. “You don’t believe me.”

“I don’t know what to believe,” he said honestly.

“I hurt you that badly?”

“You’re just so into your own lies that you believe them yourself,” he said. “You don’t seem to know the difference between real truth and your own skewed fantasy.”

Sighing, she glanced down at the floor, bit her lip, and shook her head as if finally understanding she couldn’t convince him of her twisted reality. “Fine,” she whispered under her breath. “As I said, I’d rather die first.”

“Not gonna happen,” he said as she thrust out her chin. Defiant to the end.

“Then let’s go,” she bit out, furious. “But give me a moment, okay? I need to use the bathroom.”

He wanted to argue, didn’t think it was a good idea to let her out of his sight. “Five minutes,” he said, feeling like an idiot, telling himself not to give her an inch.

But where could she go? Where could she run? The storm was still raging and it was even doubtful that the two of them in his truck would be able to make it out of the mountains, let alone through Montana and south.

But he didn’t chase her all the way up there to give up.

“Leave the door open,” he said and turned to the fireplace where he started searching for the niche near the firebox. He’d watched her on the screen he’d set up in his hotel room stash more of her valuables there. He wanted everything with him when he returned to the Crescent City.

“You really are a son of a bitch,” she threw at him as she walked to the bathroom and left the door cracked.

He felt a bit of satisfaction that she’d followed his order, but experienced a pang of regret and wondered how hard and callous he’d become.

Because of her, Ryder. This is all her fault. You don’t trust her. Of course you don’t. And the reason is directly because of her actions.

He heard water running and the shuffle of footsteps.

After tossing the tiny leather pouch of papers he’d found in her hiding spot, he grabbed his cell phone and flipped open the blinds to survey the weather. “Anne-Marie?” he called.

“You said five minutes! It hasn’t been two.”

So she was inside. Good.
He stepped onto the tiny porch, then closed the door and looked back through the window to make certain she didn’t try to escape, walk out of the bathroom and take a hard right for the back door.

Everything inside the darkened interior remained the same, the fire offering up enough light that he could make out the door to the bathroom.

Quickly, he dialed the phone and turned up the collar of his jacket as it rang. Once. Twice. The wind rushed across the porch, scattering the few dry leaves that weren’t already covered in snow.

“
Hello?” A man’s voice. Rough. Irritated.

“Yeah, it’s me. Ryder.”

“I see that. Modern technology, you know. Where the hell are you?”

“Still in Montana.”

“What? I thought you’d be on your way by now! What the hell’s taking so long?”

“I’ve got her.”

“Then why the fuck are you still in Montana?”

“Big storm,” Ryder explained.

“Big storm? Big deal. You should have prepared for bad weather. Christ, you knew where you were going, what you were doing.”

“I know. I did.”