No Place to Die (13 page)

A little after four o’clock, I called the duty officer and told him that I was taking a couple of hours of personal time. Then I locked up my desk and walked down the stairs and out the door into another beautiful late afternoon. The temperature stood somewhere in the midseventies and only a few scattered wisps of clouds were anywhere to be seen in a bright blue sky.

It was exactly the sort of day that convinced thousands of visitors every year to chuck their lives in the Midwest and relocate to the Valley of the Sun, and it struck me that it would have been a perfect evening to sit out in the backyard with Julie, sipping margaritas and cooking dinner on the grill while we talked through the events of the day. Instead, I got into the car and drove to north Scottsdale to be deposed by Philip Loiselle, the lawyer who was determined to prevent her from finally finding peace.

The deposition was a part of his—and Elizabeth’s—ongoing effort to invalidate Julie’s living will and the medical power of attorney that she’d signed. They were attempting to establish that Julie had never really intended that the living will should be invoked under circumstances such as her current condition.

Elizabeth, who’d barely spoken to Julie in five years, and who’d certainly never discussed these sorts of matters with her, had testified in a deposition of her own that her daughter had always been a fighter and that she would never willingly surrender her life, even under the most extreme circumstances. She insisted,
on the basis of her own religious faith, that it would be morally wrong for the doctors to terminate Julie’s life. And contrary to the testimony of Julie’s doctors, she insisted that as long as Julie remained alive there was always the chance, no matter how slight, that she might regain consciousness and perhaps even go on to lead a normal life.

Julie’s father had remained aloof from the debate. On the one hand, he respected Julie’s wishes and her right to make her own decisions. On the other, he couldn’t imagine the prospect of watching his daughter die, even though in every meaningful sense of the word, she already had. He came out to Arizona occasionally, grieving for a day or two at Julie’s bedside, and then retreated to Minneapolis, neither actively supporting nor opposing his wife’s activities.

His pain and confusion mirrored my own, and I understood and identified with his heartache instinctively. He adored Julie. He had loved and supported her at every turn, and he too had been devastated by her loss. In life or death, Julie had always been his daughter, whereas in Elizabeth’s case, and for whatever reason, Julie had become another cause.

Over the course of an hour and a half, guided by my own lawyer, Steve Nelson, I testified as patiently as possible. I swore again that Julie was of sound mind and that she had clearly understood what she was doing when she signed her living will and the medical power of attorney. I described in great detail how active she had been, both physically and intellectually, and I repeated the details of several conversations in which she had clearly insisted that she would rather be allowed to die than be forced to live with an injury or an illness that would leave her physically or mentally incapacitated. I testified that, her mother’s religious faith notwithstanding, Julie had long ago stopped attending
church and had abandoned any belief in God or in a life after this one.

The ordeal left me totally drained and completely depressed. Living every day with the loss of Julie and of the life we’d had together was almost more than I could bear. But having to share so many of our most personal moments for the benefit of her mother and the legal process was inexplicably painful. It seemed a violation of Julie’s privacy, and I found little consolation in the fact that I had no choice in the matter if I was going to fulfill the trust that she had placed in me.

I left the lawyer’s office, made my way to the freeway, and drove slowly back to the department, fighting the rush-hour traffic all the way. As a partial compensation, though, Mother Nature provided a spectacular sunset to help offset the frustration of the drive.

As the sun slipped from the sky, the McDowell range stood out in sharp relief to the east, the mountains a deep purple in the advancing dusk. Above me, the sky faded slowly from a cobalt blue to a pale gray. To the west a bank of clouds gradually dissolved from a light pink to a brighter orange and then to a blazing crimson before finally draining out to a gunmetal gray and then disappearing altogether as the darkness descended over the Valley.

Back at the office, I devoted a couple of hours to catching up on my paperwork, and that accomplished, I drove over to the nursing home. Thankfully, my mother-in-law had left no messages for me on the answering machine.

I kissed Julie hello and dropped into the chair next to her bed. The nurses had washed and brushed her hair, and dressed her in what had been her favorite pale blue pajamas. She looked for all the world as if she were just sleeping peacefully in our own bedroom,
waiting for me to get home at the end of my shift so that she could draw me gently into her arms and exorcise the demons of another horrible day.

I found it impossibly hard to accept the fact that she would never be able to do so again, and as I took her hand, the pain of losing her nearly overwhelmed me yet again. Exhausted, I hunched forward and said quietly, “I’m lost, Jules, and I miss you so much. I’ve got some asshole out here shooting people right and left. I’ve got a woman missing and probably dead, and I can’t figure out what more I could or should be doing to catch the bastard and stop him. And it’s killing me that I can’t at least have the comfort of talking my troubles through with you.”

Sighing, I sat back in the chair and mentally replayed the events of the day, trying to imagine what we might have done differently—what we might have done better. I wanted to believe that Richard Petrovich was our killer and that by arresting him we had brought an end to the string of shootings. But I also knew that if he was the killer, we now had virtually no hope of finding Beverly Thompson alive. If Petrovich wasn’t willing to trade her location for a chance at making things easier on himself, then almost certainly he had already killed her and disposed of the body.

But despite the DNA evidence, my gut told me that Petrovich was not the guy, and absent the DNA, we had absolutely no evidence against him and not even a hint of a motive. Why in the hell would he have decided to target Fletcher, Collins, and the Thompsons? We still had no connection among any of the victims and no connection between any of them and Richard Petrovich. It was possible that one would still surface, but for the life of me I couldn’t imagine what it might be.

If Petrovich was not the guy, the bad news, of course, was that the killings might continue. The good news, if there was any, was that Beverly Thompson might
still be alive somewhere. But if so, where? And what more could we be doing to find her? If Petrovich wasn’t the guy, who was? And what more could we be doing to stop him?

After an hour of wrestling with the various permutations of the problem, I kissed Julie good night and headed home. In the kitchen I stripped off my coat and tie and draped them over the back of a chair. I spent a couple of minutes at the counter, sorting through the day’s mail while I tried to decide what to do about dinner. I really wasn’t at all hungry, but I hadn’t eaten anything since lunch and knew that I needed to get something into my system.

I opened the refrigerator door and scanned the contents. The most appealing thing staring back at me was a take-home box containing some leftover tortellini that I’d started at Tutti Santi the night before Beverly Thompson was kidnapped. I put it in a bowl and gave it a minute and a half in the microwave—just enough to take the chill off—and ate it standing at the counter.

Not quite ready to surrender to bed, I wandered into the living room and poured three fingers of Jameson into a heavy old-fashioned glass. Then I put Lil’ Debbie & Blue Plate Special into the CD player, slipped on my headphones, and stretched out on the couch, balancing the whiskey on my chest. By the time Lil’ Debbie was halfway through “Stormy Monday,” I’d already fallen fast asleep thinking about Julie, about Beverly Thompson, and about the random accidents and inexplicable injustices that constituted life early in the twenty-first century.

True to his word, Carl McClain spent the late afternoon in the kitchen. After forcing himself on Beverly, he lay beside her for fifteen or twenty minutes, puzzling over what had just transpired and listening to her sob. Finally, he touched her lightly on the hip. Then he got up from the bed, gathered up his clothes, and walked out of the room, closing the door behind him.

Beverly lay there, weeping softly for another few minutes, until her despair was trumped by the compulsion to scrub her body clean of McClain’s touch. With the cable trailing behind her, she made her way to the bathroom. She closed the door as far as the cable would permit, then used the toilet and stepped into the shower.

As always, the water temperature was only a little north of lukewarm, but at least the pressure was reasonably decent. Beverly let the water course over her body, then picked the bar of cheap soap out of its plastic container. She scrubbed herself vigorously and stood under the showerhead, rinsing herself until the water turned cold.

She shut off the water, and a second later she heard a light tap on the bathroom door. She peered around the shower curtain to see McClain dressed in a fresh pair of jeans and a new T-shirt. He stepped tentatively through the door, looking as though he might be somehow embarrassed, and held out a clean bath towel. “Here,” he said.

Beverly reached a hand out from behind the curtain
and took the towel. As she did, McClain pointed back at the bed. “I left you one of my shirts. Your blouse and bra are in the washing machine. You can wear the shirt until they’re dry. It’s clean,” he added.

Beverly nodded slightly. “Thank you.”

McClain returned the nod and then backed out of the room, pulling the door closed behind him again, as far as the cable would allow. Beverly stared at the door for a few seconds, then dropped the shower curtain back into place and began drying herself. Suddenly she found herself weeping again, grateful for the simple relief of something as basic as a freshly laundered towel. Catching herself, she pounded a fist into her thigh. “Stop it,” she whispered. “Do not let him do this to you.”

She finished drying herself and spread the towel out over the shower rod to dry. Back in the bedroom, she slipped into the blue long-sleeve shirt that McClain had left on the bed and buttoned it up. It was way too large for her, but she was thankful for that as well.

For a moment, she flashed back to the Sunday mornings when she had often worn one of David’s shirts while they relaxed in bed with the
Arizona Republic
and the
New York Times
. Catching a sob in her throat, she forced the thought from her mind and belted her skirt around her, letting the shirt hang out over it.

McClain had left the bedroom door slightly ajar—only an inch or so—but enough so that she could hear him puttering around in the kitchen. The aroma of something roasting in the oven drifted down the hall, infused with an underlying scent of rosemary. McClain was apparently a “classic rock” guy, and on the radio in the background, Beverly could hear Sammy Hagar lamenting the fact that he couldn’t drive fifty-five.

She debated the wisdom of trying to sneak a look out into the hall. If she stretched the cable as far as it
would go, she could just reach the bedroom door. She had no way of knowing what the floor plan of the house was outside of the bedroom and bathroom. She knew that the bedroom door swung quietly on its hinges. If she opened it a bit farther, would McClain see or hear her from the kitchen?

She took two steps in the direction of the door and then stopped. In the past, McClain had always closed the door when he left the room. Why had he left it slightly open now? Was he testing her, waiting to see if she would attempt to take advantage of the opportunity? And what would he do if he caught her?

She took another small step toward the door and reached tentatively out to the knob. On the radio, Sammy gave way to Creedence Clearwater Revival, and Beverly suddenly realized that McClain was no longer making noises in the kitchen.

She turned, walked quickly back to the bed, and sat down. Just as she did, he walked through the door carrying silverware and napkins. Handing them to her, he said, “Dinner’s almost ready. You can set the table. Your beverage choices this evening are water and beer—or both, if you’d prefer.”

“Both, please,” she replied.

Ten minutes later, he returned carrying two glasses of water and clutching two longneck bottles of Miller Genuine Draft between his arm and his chest. He set the drinks on the table and said, “Have a seat.”

Beverly took her chair while McClain made another trip to the kitchen. He returned with two salads, set one of them in front of Beverly, and took the chair on the other side of the table.

The salad consisted of a variety of fresh mixed greens—romaine, endive, and red-leaf lettuce—along with some diced cucumber and some thinly sliced red onions. It had been lightly tossed with balsamic vinaigrette, and in truth, it was an excellent salad. Beverly
ate a few bites, then looked up to McClain. “Thank you for the salad. It’s very good.”

He flashed her a look of self-deprecation. “Sorry about all the junk food so far. Normally I don’t eat that kind of crap—not any more at least. But I’ve just been too busy too cook.”

She hesitated for a few seconds, calculating how best to play him, and wondering how far she should press her luck. Then she swallowed another bite of the salad and said, “I don’t want to make you angry, but can I ask what you’ve been busy doing?”

McClain set down his fork and looked at her for a moment as if trying to decide how to respond. Finally he gave a small shrug. Looking away from Beverly, he said in a soft voice, “My daughter was in a softball tournament this weekend. Most of the time I was gone, I was watching her play.”

Beverly was genuinely dumfounded. It had never occurred to her that this sadistic rapist—this fucking
murderer
—might have a family, let alone that he might care about them. The bastard had shot and killed David without giving it even a second thought. He had destroyed the only family she had, and then the cocksucker had nerve enough—balls enough—to have a family of his own?

The thought of it—the rank injustice of it—infuriated her beyond anything that McClain had done to her thus far. It took every ounce of self-discipline she possessed to prevent herself from flipping the table into his lap and cursing him to hell. She took a deep breath, nodded slightly, and looked up at the rotten son of a bitch. “How old is your daughter?” she asked.

“Nineteen.”

“She’s in college?”

“Yeah, ASU. She plays first base.”

Beverly nodded again. “She must be pretty good if she’s playing at that level.”

The asshole actually blushed. “Yeah. She was a high school all-star and won a full athletic scholarship.”

“You must be very proud.”

Again, he seemed embarrassed. “Yeah. Whatever. She’s a good kid.”

He set his napkin on the table. “Keep your salad if you want, but the chicken should be ready now.”

He got up from the table and left the room, taking his empty salad plate with him. Watching him go, Beverly curled her fingers into her hands and pressed her nails into her palms. She took a few deep breaths, then slowly exhaled and took a long pull on her beer. Attempting to channel her rage as productively as possible, she finished the salad.

After a few minutes, McClain returned with two plates. He’d roasted a small chicken and divided it in half. He’d also prepared oven-browned potatoes and fresh green beans, seasoned with lemon. He set Beverly’s plate in front of her.

“It looks very good,” she observed.

He shrugged. “One way to find out.”

They ate quietly for the next twenty minutes, and in fact the food was excellent. Beverly wondered where someone like McClain had learned to cook, but she couldn’t bring herself to ask him. He finished a few minutes ahead of her and waited patiently while she finished. Finally, she pushed the plate away, leaving only a little bit of the food uneaten.

McClain made two trips taking the dirty dishes out to the kitchen. Then he came back into the bedroom. “I have to go out for a while,” he said. “Would you like another beer before I go?”

“Yes, please. Thank you.”

He returned with the beer in one hand and her blouse and bra in the other. The blouse was on a hanger and it was obvious he had ironed it. He gave her the beer and then, somewhat self-consciously, handed her
the clothes. “These are ready, but you can hang onto the shirt if you want.”

“Thank you.”

McClain nodded and, saying nothing more, turned and walked out the door. Beverly listened as he locked it. Then she heard again the small metallic click that followed. She waited a couple of minutes to be sure that he was actually gone, then stripped off his shirt and put her own clothes back on again. She put McClain’s shirt on the empty hanger and hung it on the doorknob. Then she walked into the bathroom and poured the beer down the sink.