Revenant (11 page)

“Sorry,” she said, “I babysit my grandchildren while their parents work.”

I introduced myself and watched the wariness creep over her face.

She turned away from me. “I have nothing to say.”

“Mrs. Lopez, the more information the public has, the better their chances of keeping their daughters safe.”

That stopped her in her tracks. “Come in.” She unlocked the gate, let me in, then relocked it. “I can't leave the children alone.”

As I followed her to a swing set, I wondered how often she'd said those words since Maria disappeared.

“What is it you want?” she asked when we were seated in two lawn chairs beside the swings.

“I'd like to know a little about Maria.”

She turned her head away so I wouldn't see the pain, and I knew I'd walked across her scars. My hands had begun to shake, and I would have given a lot for a drink.

“Maria could make anyone laugh,” she said. “Even when she was in trouble. She got away with a lot because she'd get her father laughing, and he'd forget why he was mad with her.” She put a finger in her mouth and nibbled at the nail, forgetting for a moment that I was there. She put her hand down. “Carlos never got over losing her. The light died in his eyes. I should have been stricter with Maria.”

“Where is your husband?”

“He's at work. At Keesler. He's a mechanic.”

“Was Maria a good student?”

I took down the specifics of high school as Bonita Lopez talked. “Maria had just finished the tenth grade, but she looked older. The legal drinking age was eighteen, but Maria never had any trouble getting into bars. She liked to go to that place where the bodies were found.” She swallowed. “She liked to dance. She'd start dancing in a group and everyone else would stop to watch her.” She paused. “She had a big dream. She wanted to go to New York, to be in the Rockettes.” She got up to check the children and returned. “She wasn't tall enough but I never told her that.” Her voice thickened. “No one should steal a child's dreams.”

“Was she seeing anyone?” I asked.

She shook her head. “She'd dated a couple of boys at high school, but that had ended with the school year. Maria was a kind girl, really, even though she loved to play pranks.” Mrs. Lopez's face took on softness. “That girl, she told her friends she was getting married and even went up to Gayfer's and registered herself as a bride. Picked out china and crystal patterns.” She shook her head. “Two of her friends believed her and bought wedding presents. I made Maria return them, but she thought it was hilarious.”

“You're certain she wasn't seeing anyone?”

She nodded. “Positive. Maria was in love with life. She wanted to laugh and dance, and it cost her her future.”

“Why do you say that?”

“The Gold Rush always had a band. There were lots of men there, from the air base. She was just flirting, but I told her not to go there. The crowd was too old for her.” She shook her head. “She didn't listen. That night she disappeared, she snuck out a window.”

“How do you know she went dancing?”

“She took her favorite red dress and her dancing shoes with heels.”

I asked her the same questions I'd asked Verda Coxwell about someone following Maria or wanting to hurt her.

“Maria was well liked. She had dozens of friends. Boys and girls. It wasn't someone she knew. I won't believe that. But I'll tell you what I think happened. She went to that club, she danced, she caught the eye of that murderer, and then when she went to leave, he snatched her up and killed her.”

I thanked her and left. As I drove to lunch, I considered the bottom line of what both mothers had told me. It would be much harder to find a man who picked his victims at random.

T
he Vieux Marché was a business district in Biloxi designed to encourage tourists. The old brick road that ran in front of the shops, once the town's main street, was closed off to cars. There were quiet benches, palm trees among the oaks and bright flowers. I went there with a Subway sandwich and a Diet Coke. I ate what I could and fed the rest to the birds, a wild mixture of pigeons, seagulls, sparrows, blue jays, mockingbirds and one fat robin. Pedestrian traffic was slow, and I had plenty of solitude. I thought about Verda Coxwell and Bonita Lopez, shying away from their pain and clinging to detached reason. If I allowed myself to sympathize, it would ignite my own sorrow.

They both loved their daughters. The girls were bright and well liked in school, but without serious boyfriends. Or so their mothers thought. The wild card was Nat Coxwell. I would have given a lot to interview him. As it stood, the police would make more headway checking into his record. I flipped out my cell to call Avery to see what he'd uncovered on Nat and his religious obsession.

“He belonged to Mt. Sinai Primitive Baptist Church,” Avery said. “We're checking there to see if any complaints were ever lodged against him. I think it's a dead end. I'm like you—any kind of fanaticism indicates mental instability, but the man has been dead two months. He didn't kill Pamela Sparks.”

“Copycat?” I asked.

“I'm not going there, Carson.”

“We're having a discussion, Avery, not an interview.” I was annoyed. On and off the record were tricky things, unless firmly stated. My rule was not to print casual conversations unless I was specifically “on the record.” Avery didn't know this about me, and even if I told him, he would still doubt me. “What do you have on the killer? And this is on the record.”

There was a pause. “I'd rather not talk about this over the phone.”

My pulse quickened. Did he have something, or was it the lack of leads that made him reticent? A cell phone wasn't a good idea either way. “Are you free this afternoon?”

“Tomorrow morning,” Avery said. “Gotta go.” He ended the call.

I calculated what I had for the Thursday edition, and the two interviews were enough. It kept the story alive, but it didn't sensationalize it. The interviews were legitimate journalism, although it would reiterate the fact that five, very likely six, girls were dead.

The unidentified body gnawed at me. Was some mother still waiting for her daughter to come home? Would Avery ever be able to identify the remains?

In the pattern of behavior I was trying to build around the victims, the only common elements I could find were that the girls were young and pretty. Only Pamela Sparks had been engaged. Audrey hadn't dated, and Maria was too young to be serious, or so their mothers thought.

I cleaned up my bag lunch, threw it in the trash and walked out by the sculpture of the fisherman casting his net. I loved the statue. Old Biloxi had relied on the fishermen. It was only fitting that they were honored.

Instead of going back to the office, I called in and got Jack to find Sheila Picket's address. It took him a few minutes to ferret out that she'd married Roscoe Bellington, a prominent divorce lawyer. I took down her address in a ritzy area on Back Bay and drove over, stopping at the wrought-iron fence to stare. The house was a muted coral Mediterranean with a red tile roof that covered at least five thousand square feet. The green back lawn sloped down to a boat slip, and from the driveway I could see the deck of a boat. The yard was manicured, the curve of the drive perfect, just like the date palms and the orange lilies that bloomed profusely.

When I knocked on the door, I was expecting a maid. Instead, a pretty blonde in designer shorts opened it. I introduced myself, gave her my card and watched her think through what I might want with her. Her life was far removed from dead girls on the beach.

“How can I help you?” she asked, shifting so that she blocked the door. Her body language told me not to expect entry to her home.

“Audrey Coxwell. You were friends with her, right?”

“Audrey.” Her posture changed slightly. “I was horrified when I read that they'd found her body. I guess I always hoped that she'd run off with that airman.”

This was more than I expected. “Could you tell me about him?”

“Let me see.” She cocked a hip, frowning. “It's been a long time. I was a different person then.”

“Did you grow up with Audrey?”

Wariness touched her face. “Yes.” The answer was curt.

She didn't want to talk about her past. She'd left all of that behind, and any reminder would be unwelcome, especially one in the newspaper for all of her society friends to gossip about. Crossing the tracks was a hard task to pull off.

“This isn't for publication, Mrs. Bellington. But it might be useful.”

“I'd have to have that in writing to believe it,” she said.

“I only want to know about Audrey. If I quote you, I can merely say an old friend. I don't have to use your name.”

She thought about it. “My husband doesn't need to be reminded that I was ever anyone except Mrs. Bellington. I wasn't a bad girl. Maybe a little wild, if you call drinking in the bars and dancing wild. Still, it's not an image my husband would be happy to see smeared in the paper.”

“I'm not interested in making trouble for you.”

She nodded. “Audrey was a good girl. She didn't have a choice. Her father—” she rolled her eyes “—was like some kind of psycho religious nut. She couldn't wear makeup, she had to wear dresses down to her ankles, she had to keep her hair long. Goodness, if he'd ever seen her in a pair of shorts, he would have whipped her to within an inch of her life.”

“But she did wear shorts, right?” I thought I had a handle on their friendship.

“She did. Mine. She'd come over to my house, get out of that frumpy dress, put on some shorts or one of my skirts, and we'd go out. If her father hadn't been such an asshole, she wouldn't have had to lie and sneak around. She was eighteen, for Christ's sake.”

I didn't make any notes because I didn't want to spook her. “You said Audrey had a boyfriend. Can you tell me something about him?”

A look of distaste crossed her face. “Adrian. He was stationed at Keesler.”

“You didn't like him?”

“It's not that. It was hard not to like Adrian. He was handsome and quick-witted. He liked to laugh and party. I think that's what attracted Audrey. She thought he was the exact opposite of her father, and she knew she didn't want any more of that.”

“But…”

“But he had this edge. He was a tough guy. He liked to fight, and he'd start them. I saw him beat another man one night. If the bouncer at the Gold Rush hadn't pulled him off, he would have killed the man.”

“Do you have a last name on Adrian?”

“Welsh.” Her tone was reluctant. “Audrey met me and some girls up at the Gold Rush the night she disappeared. Adrian joined us up there. They got into a fight, and Audrey walked out.”

“What happened to Adrian Welsh?” If Audrey was the first victim, as I suspected, then Adrian could have killed her and gone on with the series of murders. As far as I knew, he could have been transferred off the Gulf Coast and now returned after retirement.

“After Audrey disappeared, I don't know. I mean I never saw him again in the clubs.” A new look crept into her eyes. Guilt?

“Your friend disappeared and you didn't even talk to her boyfriend about where she might be?”

“I thought she might have married him and just decided not to ever tell her parents. I didn't want to know. I'm not a good liar, and if I knew, I was afraid they'd get it out of me.”

It didn't ring true to me, but I let it go. “Was she serious enough about Adrian to marry him?”

“She had a ring, and they'd set a wedding date. They were going to elope right after she was the bridesmaid in her friend's wedding.” She smiled slightly at a memory. “We were going to throw her a surprise party, so we took her up to Gayfer's and registered her as a bride. Back in the '80s the bridal registry was the be-all and end-all for a Gulf Coast girl. Literally a rite of passage. Every bride spent hours picking out china, crystal and silver patterns. It was Audrey's proof that her life was really about to change. I don't think I'd ever seen her so happy.”

“Her parents didn't know anything about this?”

“No. She would never have told, and her parents would never have thought to check the bridal registry. If her father had even had a hint of it, he would have chained her in her room.” She looked down. “I was sort of afraid that was what happened for the first week or so. I didn't call or ask any questions, because Mr. Coxwell didn't like me. I thought I'd make it worse on Audrey. And then I thought she'd run off with Adrian. I knew if that was true they were both in trouble. Him with the air force and her with her folks.” She took a breath. “I was dating Roscoe by then. He would have dumped me if I'd gotten involved in a scandal.”

I didn't say anything. She'd had no way of knowing her friend was dead. “Can you describe Welsh?”

“Tall, blond, hair cut real short, hard jaw, six-pack, about six foot two.” She thought. “Blue eyes, a scar on his chin from a bicycle wreck, he said. Tattoo on his arm. Something to do with the air force.” She shrugged. “He was handsome back then.”

“Do you know where he was from?”

“Nebraska, originally. I kind of got the idea that his home life wasn't any better than Audrey's. I think that's one thing that drew them together.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Bellington. This has been helpful.”

She straightened and started to close the door, then stopped. “Please. My husband will be furious with me. He's worked hard to develop a certain…status.”

“I won't use your name,” I assured her.

 

An unusual pall had settled over the office when I walked in. It was normally a place of busy noise. Jack jerked his head, indicating that I should meet him in the coffee room. I walked back there wondering what new thing I'd done to offend my coworkers.

“The CEO of the Gannett newspaper chain just left,” Jack said. “He made an offer to Brandon.”

I felt my lungs tighten. “What kind of offer?”

Jack shrugged. “I only saw Brandon once since the guy left, and his face was grinning. He's been on the phone. Probably counting his money.”

The
Morning Sun
was one of the few independent newspapers left. Brandon was publisher and owner. That had a downside, but working for one of the large chains had plenty of downsides. For example, a chain newspaper would never have hired me because of the liability factor. Brandon could take that risk with his paper.

“Do you think he'll take it?” I asked. It had never occurred to me that Brandon would sell the paper to anyone. It gave him power and prestige in the community.

“I don't know,” Jack said. “If Gannett bought us out, we might have better insurance and retirement.”

I nodded. Sometimes I forgot about the financial benefits that were important to the survival of the average person. Money couldn't buy happiness, but it could buy good doctors and a 401k.

“I don't want to work for a chain,” Jack said. “I've never liked being part of an organization. Hell, I won't even eat at a chain.”

He made me smile. “Brandon will do what he's going to do.”

“Right. I just wanted you to know what was going on. The reporters are meeting at Baricev's tonight to talk. They asked me to ask you to come.”

“Okay.” It amused me that they'd send Jack as an emissary. I hoped I wasn't all that fearsome. “I'll be there.”