J.A. Jance's Ali Reynolds Mysteries 3-Book Boxed Set, Volume 1: Web of Evil, Hand of Evil, Cruel Intent (66 page)

“After Arabella’s brother molested Arabella and when nobody believed her, she ended up taking the law into her own hands, and that screwed up her entire life.”

“That’s it in a nutshell,” Ali agreed. “And that’s why we’re going to Vegas.”

“To take the law into our own hands?” Chris asked.

“No, silly,” Athena said. “To make sure Crystal doesn’t take it into hers and wreck her life, and to make sure Dave Holman doesn’t, either.”

“Oh,” Chris said.

Yes,
Ali thought.
This girl is growing on me by the minute.

“So what’s the plan?” Athena asked.

“I’ve been thinking about that. Once we’re there, I’ll talk to Crystal. I’m hoping I’ll be able to make her see that she needs to go to the cops and turn this dirtbag in. I’m worried about calling her in advance because I don’t want to give her a lot of time to think it over. She took off more than once already this week, and it wouldn’t surprise me if she did it again.”

“What about this?” Chris said. “Don’t give Crystal any advance warning at all. Why don’t we bring the cops to her instead of having her go to them?”

“That might work,” Ali said. “But the cops are another problem. What if they give us the runaround? The diploma on the wall is the one piece of solid evidence we have that ties Richard Masters to all this. But what if he tumbles to what’s happening and while we’re trying to convince the cops to get a search warrant and move on him, he takes off or has brains enough to ditch the diploma? I wish there was some way of verifying that the diploma is still there.”

“How about trying for a photo op?” Athena asked brightly.

“What kind of a photo op?” Ali asked.

“We have the address of the church,” Athena said. “What say we program it into the GPS. We can stop by there and see if the good pastor happens to be in. Maybe I can talk my way into his office. If the diploma’s there, I’ll take a photo of it with my cell phone. That way we can document that it was there at some other time besides just when the video was being filmed. With any luck I might even be able to get pictures of his computer equipment.”

“That’s taking a bit of a risk, isn’t it?” Ali asked.

Athena laughed outright at that. “Riding in a Humvee in Iraq is taking a risk,” she said. “Besides, I know the type. I may be a little too old to qualify for a youth ministry, but I’m betting Pastor Masters will turn out to be one of those smarmy goody-two-shoes guys who won’t be able to see anything about me except what he thinks is a hopeless cripple. He’ll fall all over himself trying to help me.”

“As long as his help doesn’t include anything more than talking,” Chris said with a laugh. “You may be short an arm and a leg, but I’m guessing you’d still be able to clean his clock.”

Ali fell asleep shortly after that and didn’t wake up again until Chris slowed to exit the freeway. “Where are we?” she asked.

“Headed up Civic Center Drive toward North Las Vegas.”

“Time to call Crystal,” Ali said. “Let me use your phone.”

Chris passed his to the backseat. “When are you going to get your own phone back?”

“Good question,” Ali said.

She put in Crystal’s number, pressed
SEND
, and was dismayed when a male voice answered.

“Is Crystal there?” Ali asked.

“She’s busy. Who’s asking?”

Ali wasn’t eager to reveal her name. “A friend of hers,” she said.

“Oh, yeah? Call back when you have a name.” With that the man hung up.

Ali pressed
REDIAL
.

“Do you have a name now?” the same voice asked. He sounded surly and argumentative.

“My name is Alison Reynolds,” Ali said. “I’m a friend of Crystal’s and of her dad’s.”

“Oh,” the man said. “Why didn’t you say so? This is Gary Whitman, Crystal’s stepdad. After what we’ve been through this week, no calls go through this phone without being screened first.”

A little late,
Ali thought.
But better than nothing.

“Can I talk to her? I’m in town and would like to see her.”

“We’re at soccer practice right now,” Whitman said. “It’ll be over in about an hour. Is Dave with you?”

“No,” Ali said. “Just my son and his girlfriend.”

“Do you want to stop by the house then?” Gary sounded relieved, as though having Dave in tow might have been a problem. “Roxie’s still at work,” he added. “She won’t be home until after five.”

Good,
Ali thought.
By then, maybe we’ll be ready.

“Do you have our address?” Whitman asked. “We live in Jackpot Dunes. It’s a trailer park just south of Nellis.”

“We’ll find it,” Ali said.

When they found the strip mall location of Back Door Apostles, Ali was a little surprised to see that, on a Saturday afternoon, it was a very busy place. There were several cars in the parking lot and a whole group of teens and preteens hanging around outside a door marked
YOUTH MINISTRY
.

When Athena started to get out of the car, Chris did, too. “We’ll both go in,” he said. “You can talk to the pastor, if he’s in. I’ll see what else is going on.”

After the better part of an hour, Chris was the first to emerge. “You wouldn’t believe it, Mom. This place is a regular kid magnet. They’ve got everything in there—a pool table, video games, computers, comics. My guess is that Masters uses the place to bring in all kinds of kids, then he finds the most vulnerable one and cuts her from the herd.”

That was Ali’s guess, too.

Athena returned to the Cayenne a few minutes later looking downright radiant. “Got him,” she said triumphantly. “Masters was called out of the room for a couple of minutes. The diploma was still there. I got several pictures of that. I also got photos of his Web-casting equipment and his computer, serial numbers included.”

“That’s my girl,” Chris said. “Where to now?”

“North Las Vegas PD,” Ali said. “We’re believers. Let’s see if we can make believers out of them.”

It was late Saturday afternoon. Josie Gutierrez and Frank Edwards, the two on-duty detectives in the Sexual Assault Unit, were both out in the field. It took some talking on Ali’s part to bring them back in to headquarters, and they weren’t particularly happy about it when they got there.

“What’s this all about?” Detective Gutierrez wanted to know.

“It’s about Crystal Holman,” Ali told them.

“The Amber Alert from this week?”

Ali nodded.

“But I heard she came home yesterday,” Detective Edwards said. “I thought everything was fine.”

Ali handed Edwards the CD Chris had made. “Take a look at these files,” she said, “then you tell us if everything’s fine.”

The two officers disappeared into the bowels of the building. A few minutes later, a grim-faced Detective Gutierrez returned. “You’d better come with me,” she said. “We have a few questions. Who the hell is this asshole? Where was the video shot? Who did the enhancement? And who the hell are you? In reverse order.”

Initially, Detective Gutierrez took the same position Larry Marsh had—that civilian involvement was a no-no. As far as she was concerned, Athena should never have entered Masters’s office because it was far too dangerous, and she and Detective Edwards alone should be the ones to interview Crystal and her family.

“Look,” Ali said. “You wouldn’t have a clue about any of this if it weren’t for us. I’ve been through a hell of a lot with Crystal Holman in the last few days, and I think I have some credibility with her. And with Roxie, too,” she added.

“You know the mother?” Gutierrez asked.

“She came to see me in Sedona just yesterday afternoon,” Ali said, choosing to edit out the exact nature of that visit.

The detective turned to her partner. “What do you think, Frank?”

Edwards shook his head. “With kids it can go either way,” he said.

“Chris and Athena don’t have to go,” Ali added, “but if you don’t take me, I’m prepared to show up on my own—with or without your permission.”

The detectives finally relented. They drove in a two-car caravan with the two officers leading the way. When they arrived at the Jackpot Dune’s Mobile Home Park in North Las Vegas, the place was every bit as desolate, grim, and uninviting as Ali expected. It reminded Ali of that old Roger Miller song lyric, “No phone, no pool, no pets.” She was surprised they even allowed children. No wonder Crystal hated it.

While Chris and Athena stayed in the car, Detective Gutierrez led the way up the obviously new wooden steps and knocked on the mobile home’s metal door. When Roxanne Whitman opened it, though, she ignored the police officers and looked straight at Ali.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded. “Has something happened to Dave?”

“It’s about Crystal,” Ali said. “We need to talk to her.”

“She’s in the shower, but tell me. What’s wrong?”

A tall man appeared beyond Roxanne’s shoulder just as Detective Gutierrez held up her badge. “What is it, Roxie? What’s going on? Why are the cops here?”

“Do you mind if we come in?” Detective Gutierrez asked.

Shrugging, Roxie and Gary Whitman stepped aside and let the two cops and Ali enter their small but spotless living room.

“You still haven’t said what this is about,” Gary said, once they were all seated.

“Do you happen to know someone named Richard Masters?”

“Of course, I know Pastor Masters,” Gary Whitman said, answering for both of them. “He’s the youth minister at our church. He’s a great guy, and great with kids.”

“Has Crystal had any interactions with him?” Detective Gutierrez asked.

“Yes,” Gary said. “Definitely. When she started having difficulties at school, we sent her to him for counseling.”

“And did the counseling sessions seem to help?”

“Well, no,” Gary admitted. “Not really. Things have been getting worse instead of better. But she’s a teenager. You know how they can be.”

“Did she indicate whether or not she was happy with the sessions?”

“She did say she didn’t want to go anymore,” Roxanne pointed out. “She said that a couple of weeks ago.”

“And I told her she didn’t have a choice,” Gary said. “She needed to clean up her act, or else.”

Ali’s heart constricted. In her own way, Crystal had tried to tell someone. She probably hadn’t told anyone the whole story, but she had asked for help, and no one had listened. Her parents hadn’t listened, but Ali had. And now something was going to be done about it.

“I hate to have to tell you this, Mr. and Mrs. Whitman,” Detective Gutierrez said. “We have reason to believe that Mr. Masters is a sexual predator who has had inappropriate sexual contact with your daughter. We need to talk to her about it.”

“Why, that son of a bitch!” Gary Whitman exclaimed, his whole body rigid with absolute outrage. “That low-down son of a bitch! Let me at him. I’ll tear him limb from limb!”

Just then Crystal appeared in the doorway to the living room. She was wearing a robe. A damp towel was wrapped around her head. “Mom? Gary?” she asked uncertainly, looking from one face to another. “What’s going on?”

Roxanne leaped off the couch and hurried to her daughter’s side. “Oh, my poor baby,” she murmured, gathering Crystal into her arms. “Come in here. I think we need to talk.”

O
n Wednesday of the following week Rudyard Kipling Hogan was laid to rest in the cemetery of his hometown of Kingman, Arizona. Ali, along with everyone else, was surprised when it turned out to be a far larger funeral than anyone—including the mortuary—had expected. A standing-room-only crowd turned out to bury him as if paying their respects to a departed hero. As the local paper had editorialized, regardless of who had actually killed Kip Hogan, he was as much a victim of that long-ago but not forgotten fire as the men who had perished in the actual inferno. It had simply taken a lot longer for him to die.

Elizabeth Barrett Hogan came home for her son’s funeral, accompanied throughout the services by both Sandy Mitchell and Jane Braeton. Ali heard several people speculating about who was who and most especially wondering about the two very protective women who never left Elizabeth’s side, but since Elizabeth wasn’t telling, neither was Ali.

She was standing nearby when, at the end of the graveside ceremony, Ali’s father went over to Elizabeth’s wheelchair and handed her an envelope. Ali knew what it was. Bob had found it in the LazyDaze when he had cleaned it out. It was a letter Kip had written to his mother only a few months before his death, one that bore the U.S. Postal Service’s inarguable determination—
Return to Sender.

“Kip tried to write to you,” Bob Larson said. “But it was too late. The forwarding address had run out by then, and it came back.”

Elizabeth held the envelope up to the sunlight and peered at it from several different angles. Then she stowed it, unopened, in the purse that rested on her lap. “Thank you for this,” she said, smiling up at him. “If Kip wrote it, it’s not too late. And thank you for being his friend.”

Bob patted her shoulder wordlessly and then hurried away, but not fast enough that his wife and daughter failed to see what was going on. Edie Larson hurried to her grieving husband’s side. “Come on, Bobby,” she said. “Let’s get out of here before you make a complete fool of yourself.”

A week after Arabella Ashcroft’s arraignment, Ali received a surprise call from the woman’s attorney, Morgan Hatfield. Ali knew from news reports that Arabella had pled innocent to one charge of vehicular manslaughter in the death of Billy Ashcroft. She knew, too, from Dave that additional charges were pending in other jurisdictions, including involvement in the deaths of the nurse and patient who had perished in the fire at the Mosberg Institute and the woman who had run an institution called the Bancroft House near Carefree. In the mid-sixties the director had gone for a horseback ride, had been reported missing, and had been found dead months later. At the time, no one had connected her death to Arabella Ashcroft’s being incarcerated there. Now they had.

It occurred to Ali that this was a time when pleading insanity might actually be the right thing to do, but she didn’t mention that to Mr. Hatfield.

“Arabella would really like to see you,” Morgan said. “She’s in the new high-security jail on South Fourth in Phoenix.”

Arabella had lied to Ali on so many occasions about so many things, that Ali wasn’t eager to go another round. “Why?” Ali asked. “What does she want?”

“I’m not sure, but you know Arabella. She was quite adamant.”

Two days later, still filled with misgivings, Ali drove herself to Phoenix. Arabella came into the visitors’ room wearing shackles and a bright orange jail jumpsuit.

“The food here is dreadful,” Arabella said, as soon as she sat down opposite Ali behind a Plexiglas window. “Have you heard of nutrition loaf? It’s where they mix all the food together in a terrible conglomeration, bake it, and serve it as a meal.”

As jail fare went, nutrition loaf was fully balanced and amazingly cheap. “I’ve heard of it,” Ali said.

“Oh, what I wouldn’t give to have one of Mr. Brooks’s dinners about now,” Arabella said wistfully. “He did a particularly wonderful job with lamb chops. Have you heard from him, by the way?”

“No,” Ali said. “I haven’t.”

“I haven’t either, not directly,” Arabella said. “He must be terribly angry with me. I’m afraid I’ve been a naughty, naughty girl.”

That’s the understatement of the century,
Ali thought.

“I’ve also heard rumors that there’s only one person interested in buying my house,” Arabella continued. “He’s a developer, of course. He’s planning on tearing it down. The real estate agent warned me that, if he does make an offer, it’ll probably be for only a fraction of what the place is worth—pennies on the dollar.”

“So?”

“I’d like you to buy it,” Arabella said. “For this.”

Using a pencil, she jotted a sum down on a three-by-five card and shoved it through the opening under the window that separated them.

Ali looked at the amount and put the paper down. “That’s ridiculous,” she said. “That’s pennies on the dollar, too.”

“Yes, it is,” Arabella said. “But you wouldn’t tear it down. And anything that’s left after I pay off Mr. Hatfield will go to a good cause—to the scholarship trust fund—which I’m hoping you’ll administer, by the way. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

Ali shook her head. The amount was something she could well afford, but she didn’t think she’d have the energy to tackle the kind of wholesale remodeling that would be necessary.

“I don’t think so,” she said. “It’s far more house than I need.”

“Please,” Arabella said quietly. “I’d really like for you to have it. And I know Mother would, too.”

Ali stood up. “I’ll think about it,” she said. “But I’m not making any promises.”

“Wait,” Arabella said. “Don’t go yet, please. I need to ask you. How’s your friend—the little girl who ran away?”

“The guy who molested her is in jail,” Ali said. “And she wasn’t his only victim.”

“So, did I help?” Arabella asked.

“What do you mean, did you help?”

“Did you tell her about me? Did you use me as an example so she’d go to the police?”

Ali looked at Arabella—a pathetic, damaged, delusional old woman—and she could not deny her that one bit of satisfaction.

“Yes,” Ali lied. “Yes, I did.”

On the drive back to Sedona, Ali felt little satisfaction for having lied and allowed Arabella that one small triumph. Driving through town, Ali saw her mother’s Alero parked outside the Sugarloaf. The Bronco wasn’t there. Wanting some private time with Edie, Ali stopped and knocked.

“Are you all right?” her mother asked as soon as she saw her face.

“I saw Arabella Ashcroft today,” Ali said.

“Oh,” Edie said. “No wonder you look a little green around the gills.”

“She wants me to buy her house.”

“Arabella has a lot of nerve calling it her house,” Edie said. “She may have lived in it, but it was always her mother’s house. Anna Lee Ashcroft was a nice woman. And if you do decide to buy it, that’s how I’d think of it—as Anna Lee’s, not as Arabella’s.”

Ali was quiet for a moment. Finally she said, “I never really knew that Aunt Evie and Arabella were good friends. From what Arabella told me, I guess they were. She said it was because of that friendship that she and her mother started the scholarship thing—that to begin with, the whole point was to benefit me.”

“Arabella was always a conniver,” Edie said. “I think she was after your Aunt Evie and saw you as a way to get Evie into her clutches. She might have succeeded, too, but Anna Lee warned Evie away. And then she went ahead and set up the scholarship fund so other girls would benefit from it, too, not just you.”

“Wait a minute,” Ali said. “What kind of clutches? What do you mean?”

“Oh, forever more, Ali,” Edie said with a laugh. “Just because your Aunt Evie stayed in the closet all her life, don’t tell me you didn’t know about it.”

Learning that bit of Aunt Evie’s history hit Ali hard. And knowing how Richard Masters and Curtis Uttley had used the Internet to victimize and ensnare Crystal didn’t help. The whole chain of events had cast a pall over Ali’s life and over her interest in cutloose as well. She could no longer look at what happened on the Internet as being harmless and she wasn’t sure if she was helping or making things worse.

She drifted into a strange lassitude. Her interest in blogging seemed to have dissipated, but she had no idea what she was going to do instead. She did some random posting, but without having her heart in it. When she finally heard from Velma T, she read the message with a heavy heart.

Maybe,
Ali thought,
I was wrong to be worried about Velma’s financial situation.
She continued reading:

On a sunny evening in March, Dave Holman came by for dinner. While Athena and Chris laughed and cooked in the kitchen, Ali and Dave sat outside on the front porch on the swing, sipping some of Paul Grayson’s very expensive wine. They were spending more and more time together these days. Ali wasn’t sure where the relationship was going, but for now she was comfortable with it.

“The custody hearing’s next week,” Dave said, draping one arm around her shoulder. “We’ve hammered out an arrangement that seems reasonable, and we’re pretty sure the judge will go along with it. Richey will be a senior next year, and he’ll stay in Vegas to finish high school. After that he’s planning on joining the Marines.”

“Like father like son,” Ali said.

Dave nodded. “And the girls will spend half the summer there, then they’ll come live with me and go to school here. They’re thrilled. Of course, it means I’ll have to find somewhere else to live, but with Roxie paying child support…”

Ali was astonished. “She’s agreed to pay child support?”

“That’s what I said. It’s a reasonable arrangement. And I have to give Gary Whitman credit. He’s the one who came up with the idea and convinced Roxie that it was doable. After what happened to Crystal, I think he wants the girls out of Vegas even more than I do. When Richard Masters agreed to a plea bargain and Crystal no longer faced having to testify, Gary was so relieved that I thought he was going to burst into tears.”

Ali said nothing. After a pause, Dave added, “It really chaps my butt.”

“What does?”

“Gary and I aren’t ever going to be friends,” Dave said. “But he isn’t that bad a guy. Maybe he’s not the best businessman who ever came down the pike, but he’s a better husband to Roxie than I ever was, and she’s happier with him than she was with me. I just have to make sure he’s not a better father.”

Again Ali had nothing to say. She found that happened to her often these days.

“Speaking of fathers,” Dave continued, “I saw yours today. Bob’s worried about you.”

“He is?” Ali asked.

“And so am I,” Dave said. “You’re depressed, Ali. You’re not yourself. You’re not even blogging anymore. You’ve been through a lot. Have you ever heard of post–traumatic stress disorder?”

“Of course, I’ve heard of PTSD,” Ali said dismissively, “but it’s got nothing to do with me.”

“Yes, it does,” Dave argued. “Your father and I have both been around it. We know the signs. You need to see someone. You need help.”