Elizabeth C. Main - Jane Serrano 01 - Murder of the Month (17 page)

The Russell County Sheriff’s Department had outgrown its cramped space in the basement of the county courthouse several years before. Its expanded reincarnation now sprawled in high-tech glory on the northern outskirts of town. It was all sharp angles and rows of shiny patrol vehicles lined up in the parking lot. Gone was the quaint country atmosphere of the department some ten years ago, when Russell County needed only a couple of patrol officers to stay ahead of crime in the rural community. As the county’s population had exploded, the crime rate had risen as well, and the Russell County Sheriff’s Department had evolved to meet the new circumstances.

When we arrived, the deputy on duty in the entry hall concentrated his attention on the metal detector we passed through, rather than our faces. At first we clustered just inside the entrance, but soon Alix led the way to the glassed-in window beyond. She said, “When you party as much as I did in high school, you get familiar with the general layout of law enforcement facilities, especially if you’re not a fast runner.” She added in a low voice, “Gil was a sprinter.”

“
Really?” Minnie said. “He was a … a little wild in high school?”

“
Along with half the cops who work here now. Funny how the football players like Gil and Kurt never seemed to get caught. All those wind sprints paid off. Harley didn’t play ball because his mama wouldn’t let him, but he could always talk his way out of trouble. Vanessa and I got busted a lot.”

I faced the middle-aged woman at the desk behind the glass, but she was intent on her keyboard. After waiting in vain for her to recognize our presence, I tapped on the glass.

“
Excuse me. We’re here to report a missing person, or … well … to check on my daughter, who might be missing.”

Looking up reluctantly from her work, the woman produced a mechanical half-smile. “Is she missing or not?”

Alix stepped around me and read the name from the picture ID clipped to the woman’s collar. “Well, Ms. Peterson, if we knew for sure that she wasn’t missing, we wouldn’t be here now, would we? Could we talk to someone who might actually help us?”

Ms. Peterson apparently had been at her job long enough to recognize troublemakers. She gave Alix a sour look and said, “I’ll see,” before disappearing into a back room. She closed the door behind her with considerable force.

“
No need to be rude, Alix,” Minnie said.

“
Oh, yes, there is,” Alix said dismissively. “Officious twerps need discipline.”

I noted Tyler’s grin and wondered how many officious twerps he had already encountered in his short lifetime. “Please let me handle this, Alix,” I said. “We need these people on our side.”

Alix waved me forward. “Be my guest, but don’t take any crap.”

I stepped in front of her again. The officer who now emerged from the back room looked as though he had come to the department fresh from a stint with the U.S. Marines. I resisted the urge to salute. His stiff demeanor proclaimed that Ms. Peterson hadn’t given him a favorable report about us, so I hoped that Alix would keep quiet.

Unfortunately, he looked over my shoulder at Alix and directed his opening comment to her. “Well, if it isn’t the charming Ms. Boudreau.”

“Deputy Kincaid.” Alix’s tone was no warmer than his. “Taking a break from harassing the local business owners?” I made a mental note to leave Alix at home the next time diplomacy was called for, and especially to exclude her from any future dealings with the Russell County Sheriff’s Department.

“
Look we had a complaint and—”

“—
and you always go by the book. Yes, you certainly did go by the book and I’m sure Sheriff Kraft was very proud of his little helper.”

Kincaid flushed an unhealthy brick color. Fortunately, Minnie chose that moment to step around Alix and speak up. “We’d like to file a missing person’s report, please.”

Deputy Kincaid gave Alix a look that would have boded ill for her had she been a subordinate in his platoon. His flush now extended all the way down his thick neck to his collar line. Ostentatiously, he turned his attention to Minnie and snapped an official-looking form onto a clipboard. “Yes, Ma’am. Who’s missing?”

I had my doubts about the wisdom of letting Minnie speak for us, but at least she wouldn’t insult anyone. As a further precaution, I placed my elbow on the window ledge squarely in front of Alix. By this time I’d ceased to care that we all looked as though we were jockeying for good starting position at the Preakness.

Minnie spoke clearly. “Jane’s daughter, Bianca Serrano, is missing … we think.”

Kincaid paused with his pen in mid-air. “You think?”

“
We’re almost certain,” Minnie said. “We haven’t actually seen her since Wednesday afternoon, though she left several messages yesterday.”

“
How old is your daughter, Ma’am?” he asked me.

“
Nineteen,” I said.

He put down the clipboard. “Nineteen? She can go wherever she wants. Does she have a roommate we can check with?”

“
Yes, but that’s just it,” Minnie said earnestly. “That’s what makes us so certain something is wrong.”

“
Okay.” He picked up the clipboard again. “Her roommate gave you some information?”

“
Wendell? Oh my, no.” Minnie chuckled at the notion. “He wouldn’t … actually he couldn’t …”

The bewildered Deputy Kincaid didn’t see what Minnie found so amusing. “Do you want us to talk to this Wendell guy or not?”

“
That’s absurd. You can’t do that.”

“
Is Wendell missing, too?” He was totally confused now, but I thought that his confusion was preferable to the reaction he’d have as soon as he understood this conversation better.

“
Well, no, but he was out of food and water,” Minnie explained helpfully, “and his side was hurt.”

“
Out of—”

“
Wendell is Bianca’s dog,” I said. “Look, Deputy, I know it sounds odd, but Bianca is very attached to him, and she would never have left him that way.”

“
I see,” he said, stepping back and looking at our group clustered around the glass like goldfish waiting for food. I had the uncomfortable feeling that he had already assigned us the reasoning capacity of goldfish, as well. Alix, whom he already knew and disliked, was accompanied by several people who made no sense whatsoever. This distinguished delegation was wasting his valuable time with talk of some teenager most likely guilty only of neglecting her dog. “I don’t suppose you have any evidence—”

“If you mean a bloody knife on the counter, a ransom note, or something like that, not really,” Minnie said regretfully, “but we have a theory—”

“
An accident.” I interrupted loudly before Minnie could mention Gil and further erode our already negligible credibility. “We thought maybe someone had reported an accident.”

“
I don’t think so, but I’ll check.” With another look at Alix, he said, “I guess I have time to do that before I get back to harassing the local business owners.” He, too, closed the door to the back room more forcefully than necessary.

I turned on Alix. “Is there anyone in this station you haven’t offended yet?”

Alix made a rude sound. “That jerk! Look, it was just a simple mix-up and he—.”

“Oh, it doesn’t matter,” I said wearily. “I’m sorry I cut you off, Minnie, but we agreed to keep quiet about you-know-who for now.”

“
You’re right. You’re absolutely right, Jane. I forgot. My goodness, Alix, he seemed very cross with you. What did you do to him?”

“Mr. Macho doesn’t like having his authority questioned.”

“
Another twerp, Alix?” Tyler asked.

“
Yep. He and Ms. Peterson have a lot in common.”

Minnie said, “Maybe I should bring them some of my cinnamon pull-aparts.”

“
Do you start cooking every time there’s a problem in this town?” Alix sounded genuinely puzzled.

“
Well, not every time, but you’d be surprised at how often food helps to defuse a tense situation.”

Alix nodded. “Throwing a cream pie at Kincaid’s face might make me less tense, all right.”

“
Oh, that wasn’t what I meant at all,” Minnie said, “and of course being hit with one of my pull-aparts might cause real harm. They’re quite large—and sticky.”

Laughter erupted from behind the closed door and a moment later Kincaid reappeared. I was relieved to see that his color had returned to normal.

“No accidents reported since yesterday, Ma’am, but is your daughter about five feet seven inches tall, with long blonde hair?”

“
You’ve found her?”

“
Well, yes and no.”

“
Is she all right?” Minnie asked.

“
Far’s we know.” He jerked a thumb toward the back room. “Deputy Maxwell saw somebody coulda been her yesterday south of town.” He almost succeeded in keeping the smile off his broad face as he continued. “She was sitting cross-legged on a rock.”

“
Yoga,” Tyler said.

“
She was all right?” I asked. “Did he say when this was?”

“
From what he could tell, she was fine. Course he was just driving by. Said it was mid-morning.”

“
Was her dog with her?” I asked. “A big, black dog?”

“
That’s what I asked. Matter of fact, he was. She probably took off and left him.”

“
I’m sure you’re right and she’ll turn up any time now,” I said hastily. This oaf was no help and I didn’t want to stir his interest in us any further.

“
She wouldn’t do that! She’d never abandon Wendell,” Tyler burst out. “Besides, how did he get back to her trailer? It’s way out of town the other direction.”

“We were probably overreacting,” I babbled.

“
Are you going to let us file a missing person’s report or not, Kincaid?” Alix asked.

“
Tell you what. Why don’t you come back when you got something more’n a dog’s empty water dish.”

“We’ll be going now. Thank you for your time,” I said desperately. I gestured urgently for the others to follow me out of the building before someone made another insulting remark. Once outside, I said, “She was on her way to Jenna’s house, or Gil’s. They’re both south of town.”

As Minnie comprehended the meaning of my words, her face drained of blood so fast that I had to catch her arm to keep her from falling. Tyler grabbed her other arm and we escorted her to a nearby bench.

“
Put your head between your knees,” I commanded.

“
I think … I’m fine,” Minnie replied faintly.

“Just stay there,” I said.

“
What now?” Tyler asked over Minnie’s bowed head.

After weathering the results of the last, disastrous few minutes, I figured I’d be better off proceeding on my own. “
We
don’t do anything,” I said. “I appreciate all you’ve done so far, really. You’ve been great, but I can handle it from here. Tyler, you need to get back to the hospital, and you have a business to run, Alix.”

“I can help,” Minnie said, raising her still-pale face.

“And you, Minnie, need to go home and rest. We’re probably getting worked up for nothing.” I tried to pump some sincerity into my lie. “You know Bianca. She’ll probably show up—”

“
And I’m the Tooth Fairy,” Alix said.

“
Me, too,” Tyler and Minnie said in unison.

“
You’re not leaving me out,” Minnie continued as she struggled to her feet. “I’m fine, and I’ll drive my own car so we can fan out and do … whatever it is we decide to do. That way, it will be harder to trace us.”

“
Why would anyone be tracing us?” Tyler asked.

“
Goodness, Tyler, I’m sure I don’t know right now, but I’m trying to think ahead,” Minnie said. “We’re going to search for clues, aren’t we? Well then, if we fan out to do that, and anyone tries to follow us, they’ll have a hard time doing it!”

“
You know, Minnie,” Alix said, “you are something else. I can’t follow your logic, even when I already know what you mean to say! If the instructions you give the Knitwits for cable stitching—whatever that is—aren’t any clearer than this, they must turn out some interesting projects.”

“My land!” Minnie said. “I forgot all about the Knitwits. They’re still waiting at my house. I’d better tell them to go home.” She started for the nearby phone booth, and then turned back. “By the way, Alix, you were right about the cinnamon pull-aparts.”

“What’d I say?” Alix looked confused.

“Well, actually you said something about Deputy Kincaid and Ms. Peterson. I believe that ‘a soft answer turneth away wrath,’ and I try to keep a Christian attitude, but you were right about those people. They were very, very rude to us. We needed help, and they not only turned us away … they mocked us. You were right. They don’t deserve cinnamon pull-aparts … and you know what? They’re not getting any!”

Alix recognized the magnitude of Minnie’s declaration. “That’s positively revolutionary. Cutting off someone’s supply of cinnamon pull-aparts is an act of war!”

“Exactly,” Minnie responded.

Alix said, “Okay, Jane, you can skip the flimflam. We all know Bianca isn’t going to show up on her own, and we’re not going to waltz out of here and leave you to look for her by yourself.”