The Botanist (12 page)

Chapter 20

The instant Cody parked his car behind Tom’s in the driveway of the modest middle-class home, a smile meandered across his face. Tom had asked him to dinner with his family, a warm invitation Cody would’ve said yes to anyway, even if spending the evening alone after the day he’d had wasn’t such a bleak alternative. Soft orange light shone out from every window in the place, and the blinds in the front room windows kept plastering themselves against the glass as tiny, playing bodies from within ran into them.

“Cody!”

Tom’s youngest son was eight years old and had enough energy to wear out the family’s two Labrador puppies on a daily basis.

“Hi, Hank. How’s it goin’?”

“Great! I taught Sugar and Flour to roll over. Wanna see?”

“Yeah, sure.”

Cody followed Hank into the living room where the boy got down on his knees in front of the dogs. He made a circular motion with his hands and commanded, “Roll over.” He had to do it three times, but both dogs finally did it.

Cody applauded. “Good job, bud. How long did it take you to teach them?”

“Three days. Are you staying for dinner, Cody? Mamma’s makin’ meatloaf.”

Cody laughed. “Yeah, I’m stayin’.”

“Of course he is.” Margaret breezed into the room. She wore an apron covered with various streaks of food over blue jeans and a plaid, button-down shirt.

Cody straightened and kissed Margaret’s cheek when she came up to him. “Thanks for having me.”

“Of course. Hank’s been asking about you for days. Hank, take Cody upstairs so you can both wash up.”

Cody followed Hank around for another twenty minutes before they all sat down together. Tom’s three older kids weren’t as enthusiastic as Hank was to see Cody, but they were polite and friendly as always. His oldest son, also called Tom, was seventeen. His two younger daughters were fifteen and twelve respectively while his oldest daughter was up north finishing her degree at the university.

After the meal, the likes of which Cody was sure only married women like Margaret and his mother knew the secret to making, Margaret chased Hank upstairs to get ready for bed, hollering over her shoulder for Tom to start the dishes. With a sigh, Tom got up to clear the table.

While Cody helped with the dishes, Hank tried to argue his way out of bedtime, Tom Jr. found an excuse to go to the market—a.k.a. an excuse to use the car—and Margaret argued with Jamie, the older of the two girls, about going to a friend’s house on a school night.

When things settled down, Cody and Tom went out on to the porch to talk. Tom sat on the front steps while Cody perched on the railing in front of the bay window.

Of course, Hank had to make one last-ditch effort, and his whining, followed by Margaret’s stern voice, could be heard in muffled tones.

Margaret stuck her head out the screen door. “Tom, little help here?”

Tom put on what Cody called his “mean dad” face—brows down, eyes narrowed, and jaw set—and raised his voice. “Hank, do as your mother says!”

“But Da-
ad,”
came Hank’s tiny, disembodied voice. “Why?”

“Because I said so,” Margaret said. The screen door slamming muffled Hank’s reply.

Tom kept the stone-dog face on until Hank’s pre-pubescent squeaks could no longer be heard. Then he grinned at Cody, who chuckled.

“So,” Tom said, when they’d savored the silence for a few minutes, “what do you think, Cody?”

“About what?”

“The case. All of it. Off the record.”

“There’s a lot of ‘it,’ Tom. Which part do you want my opinion on?”

“Well, Ms. Thompson, for example. Do you think she’s staging this?”

Cody sighed. “No, I don’t. I know there’s no evidence either way, but I believe her.”

“Why?”

“I was there when she was running from this guy. I don’t think she could have faked that kind of desperation.”

“We’ve seen people fake it before.”

“Yeah, but this was different. People can fake it, but to do it so convincingly, they’d have to be stark raving lunatics. She’s too, I don’t know . . . together? Too grounded.”

“Too believable.”

“Yeah. I suppose I can’t explain it very well. It’s just a gut feeling.”

Tom seemed to accept that. “We’ll know soon enough, I suppose.”

“What do you mean?”

“When she gets out of the hospital tomorrow, we’ll have to start investigating her. If what she says is true, we need to figure out who this guy is and what she is to him. If there’s anything shady in her past, we’ll know about it before long.”

“Did you get anywhere on her bracelet?”

Tom sighed. “Yes and no. I found a database that lists expensive pieces and their serial numbers. Mostly it’s there to track the pieces in case of art theft. If anything emerges on the black market, you can look up its history. It also establishes history so buyers can be sure they aren’t buying blood diamonds—that sort of thing.”

“And Alex’s piece was in there? I thought she told us it wasn’t expensive.”

“It’s not; that’s one thing that’s strange. Alex’s piece is middle-of-the-road. I’m no appraiser, but from what I can tell, most of the pieces from the collection it came from are probably worth two, three, maybe four hundred dollars.”

Cody considered. “I bet she doesn’t know it’s worth that.”

“Probably not,” Tom agreed, “but even so, the other pieces housed in that database are worth tens, even hundreds of thousands of dollars. It’s odd to find such a low-price piece among them. And what are the chances that Alex’s piece would just happen to be in a database like that? It wasn’t difficult to find at all.”

“What do you think it means?”

“I’m not sure, but I don’t think it’s a coincidence.”

“So what information does the database give?”

“Not much. It says the designer of the collection was named Daniel Nath Jones.”

“Nath? Odd middle name.”

“Yeah.”

“Any information about him?”

“None. Just the name and the fact that the pieces in his collection all sold on the east coast about thirty years ago.”

“Which would have been just a few years before Alex was born,” Cody put in.

“I Googled him,” Tom said. “Couldn’t find a single stitch of information about who he is, where he lives, his work, nothing. Not that I’m done with this lead, that’s just what I found out today. I’ll keep you posted.”

Cody nodded.

“What about our Shakespeare guy?” Tom asked.

“Now
there’s
a lunatic. Did you read the autopsy report?” Cody sipped his soda.

“Yeah. Lots of contradictions.”

“Such as?”

“He’s beyond brutal with his victims, yet he’s gentle enough to get flowers to grow a specific color for him? The bodies show no signs of reticence or remorse, yet he gives them a beautiful burial and even irrigates the soil?”

“Probably for the sake of the flowers,” Cody said.

“Yeah, but still. Our killer is chock-full of contradictions like that.”

“The psychotic ones generally are.”

Margaret came out to the porch and sat on the wooden swing behind the door. Both men fell silent. She looked back and forth between the two of them.

“Sorry. Did I interrupt you two talking about your case?”

“How did you know we were talking about the case?” Tom asked.

“Whenever you guys work on a particularly disturbing case, you have a habit of ending conversations when I come close enough to hear.”

Tom grinned up at his wife. “Sorry, honey. We don’t mean to be condescending.”

Margaret laughed her quiet laugh. “Don’t be sorry. You have the right of it. If either of you”—she included Cody in her gaze—“need to talk, I’m happy to listen. But, that said, I’d just as soon avoid the grim realities if I can.” After a short silence, she addressed Cody. “Are you having trouble with your dad again?”

Cody threw Tom an accusing glare. So, Tom
had
noticed Cody’s reluctance to see his father. Tom suddenly found his shoes fascinating.

“He and my mom are moving up north. He wants me to cover his business while he’s away.”

“That’s out of the question now, isn’t it? With this new case and everything?” Margaret asked.

“It was always out of the question. He just wants to get me out of cop work.”

“Why is that?”

Cody sighed. “Margaret, I’ve been trying to figure out the answer to that for—what—six years? Everything I know about my father’s childhood, everything
he’s
told me, says that he was close to his brother. They were best friends growing up. Yet, when I announced I would follow in my uncle’s footsteps and become a cop, my father was completely against it.”

“Perhaps the two of them had a falling out as adults.”

“If they did, I can’t get him to tell me a single thing about it.”

“Maybe he’s just being a parent, Cody.” Margaret pushed a stray lock of hair out of her eyes. “Just worried about your safety, you know? Being a cop can be dangerous.”

“In
this
town?”

She gave him a flat-eyed stare. “A psycho in a barn nearly killed you two years ago, Cody.”

Cody’s cheeks heated. Why was it so easy to forget about that? Not that it ever left his mind, but he just didn’t see it as a reason not to do his job. He sighed. “Maybe you’re right. I don’t know. He never says that, though. I always get the impression there’s more to it.”

“Well.” Margaret leaned back, and the porch swing swayed gently in the warm evening breeze. “Don’t be too hard on your father, Cody. I’m sure there’s a good reason for the way he feels about this.”

“Then why won’t he tell me what it is?”

“That I don’t know, but perhaps he will in his own time. Besides, it’s natural for men to want their sons to follow in their own footsteps. After all, you’re the only son he’ll ever have.”

Cody didn’t particularly share her sentiment. If he was the only son his father would ever have, shouldn’t his father be proud of him no matter what profession he chose?

After a few minutes of companionable silence, Margaret got up. “Well, I’ll let you two get back to discussing your gruesome case. I’m going to bed.”

She kissed Tom goodnight, and Tom murmured something about coming up in a while.

Cody got to his feet as Margaret disappeared into the house. “Go up now, Tom. I should get home, anyway.”

“Do you need to talk about this thing with your dad more?”

Cody shook his head. “No. He’s mad at me, I’m mad at him. There’s not really much more to say.”

Tom smiled empathetically. “I’m sorry he’s giving you a hard time, Cody, but you’ve got to know what a good detective you are. You’re one of the best we have. Do you know that?”

Cody studied his soda can. “The captain told me that today.”

“He did? Good.”

“You’re the best detective this town has, Tom. I don’t deserve the sentiment yet.”

Tom leaned back against the railing and grinned. “Yeah, I am pretty good, aren’t I? But I’d say we’re neck and neck.”

“If I can crack the Shakespeare case, maybe I’ll be there.”

“If you can crack the Shakespeare case, we’ll all sleep a little better at night.”

“’Night, Tom.” Cody headed down the stairs toward his jeep.

“See you tomorrow, Cody.”

Chapter 21

The dream came again. Alex was in a large cavernous room with walls painted a color somewhere between brown and red. The edges were blurry. She couldn’t make out the dimensions very well. High pitched screams bounced off the space around Alex’s head and echoed in her ears. The sickly-sweet, putrid smell invaded her nostrils, and she tried to plug her nose, but she couldn’t do that
and
clamp her hands over her ears to block out the screams.

“Please. Please! Leave her alone!”
The voice was a man’s, and it sounded familiar somehow, but she couldn’t place it. Something wet dripped onto her bare leg and she looked down. She was sitting cross-legged and wearing a dress that didn’t quite cover her knees. It took her moment to realize the water droplet had come from her own face.

Another loud screech came from behind the walls, and Alex abandoned her nose and wrapped her arms around her head, using the length of her forearms to cover her ears. The smell was bad, but for the moment the screams were worse.

A presence next to her. A hand on her forehead. She looked up. Her eyes traveled up an impossibly tall frame. It seemed the person’s head must be miles above her. He had something—mud, perhaps?—caked all over his face. As he turned toward her, the same scar, those same eyes, glared down at her. It was the cop from the highway. He bent, his face descending rapidly toward her.

A throaty whisper
, “Alexxxxxx . . .”

Alex kicked awake with a yelp. The nurse bending over her jumped back in surprise, cursing softly. It was dark in the room, but a shaft of light from the open door had draped itself down the room’s center, and faint light was beginning to come through the windows.

Only an instant after stepping away, the nurse stepped back up to Alex’s bedside. It had been the nurse’s hand on her forehead, not the cop’s.

“I’m so sorry, honey. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“Not your fault,” Alex breathed. “Nightmare.”

“Oh. You okay?”

“Yeah. What time is it?”

“Early, a little after six. You should try and sleep some more.”

Alex nodded, deciding not to argue. This was a new nurse. The night nurse, Thelma, had awakened Alex every two hours all night. Alex remembered Thelma saying something about getting off at six, so this woman must be her replacement. Each time she’d been awakened, Alex had startled awake in a similar fashion. She’d had the same dream over and over.

At the last awakening—four a.m.—she’d decided that she simply wouldn’t go back to sleep, but would lay awake so the nightmare couldn’t return. But her body was so exhausted from the trauma it had suffered over the last few days that she simply couldn’t keep her eyes open.

Now it was six, though, a time that Alex generally rose in the mornings. And it was starting to get light. Confident that she could stay awake this time, Alex settled back against her pillow to think . . . and promptly found herself in the brownish-red room.

After
scaring the tar out of the nurse again, Alex awoke to find a young officer stationed outside her door. After the doctor spoke to her about taking it easy for the next week or two, the nurse brought in her personal items and helped her change. Once she was in her own clothes, Alex invited the unidentified officer into the room.

His name plate read Officer Shaffer. He had the face of a twelve-year-old, complete with peach fuzz on the upper lip, but he moved with the same easy grace she’d noticed in Cody and the other detectives that spoke of prowess with a weapon and confidence in his own abilities.

“You been here all night, Officer?”

“Yes, ma’am. Since about nine last night.”

“Who set that up?”

“Detective Oliver, ma’am. Said the Mt. Dessicate PD would feel easier about your safety if we kept a detail on you for the time being.”

Alex nodded. Officially she was offended that they didn’t think she could take care of herself. Really, though, she was glad to have a police presence nearby. The fact that Cody Oliver was the one who’d set it up for her was even better.

“So what now? They’re letting me out in about an hour.”

“The captain wants me to take you to the station, ma’am, so you can talk to the detectives some more. I believe they’re preparing a safe house for you to stay in until this is resolved.”

Alex nodded. She noticed the letters on the side of his uniform were GPD, rather than MDPD. “Where you from, Officer Shaffer?”

“Gunnison, ma’am. A ways north of here.”

“Well, thanks for watching over me. I appreciate it.”

When the young cop spoke, his voice was soft. “Of course, ma’am. It’s my job.”

Alex smiled.

An hour later he helped her into the back of his patrol car. Though she hadn’t actually broken anything, her ribs were badly bruised, she had bad road rash on her arms, knees, and belly, and then there was the concussion. A glance in the mirror of the hospital bathroom had revealed a checkered scrape on one cheekbone, a split but healing lip, and two colorful but healing eyes—one black, one purple and yellow.

To say that she had to move carefully was an understatement.

When she was safely in, Officer Shaffer shut the door and went around to the driver’s seat. Suddenly, Alex felt claustrophobic. Memories of the previous night invaded her mind. Now, with the grate intact and the knowledge that she couldn’t get out unless someone let her out, she felt the same panic rising in her chest.

She told herself to breathe. Officer Shaffer had been sent by Cody Oliver, who she trusted. Besides, it was only a five minute car ride to the station. That was all.

She told herself not to be such a ninny. She would not have a phobia of cop cars or back seats for the rest of her life. She couldn’t live like that. She would get through this short car ride and the next one would be easier.

In spite of her resolution, by the time Shaffer pulled into the Mt. Dessicate Police Station, Alex was on the verge of a meltdown. Her hands shook in her lap, and she focused on keeping her breathing even. Shaffer parked and got out of the car, and Alex willed him to move faster to her door. She was behind the passenger-side seat, but she had the urge to scoot across the back seat and bang on the door until he opened it.

She didn’t.

As he went around the back of the car, the door to the station opened, and Cody Oliver came out. He was talking on his cell phone, oblivious to her and her neurosis. It looked like he might have come outside the station for quiet so he could make his call.

Something about him being there instantly calmed Alex. Even if her worst imaginative fears came true—if Shaffer suddenly turned into psycho-cop and tried to abduct her—Cody was
right
there. He would see her; he would help.

Alex took a deep, calming breath and by the time Shaffer opened her door, her hands were hardly shaking at all.

“So,
Ms. Thompson,” Tom said when Alex was seated at his desk in the back room of the station. Office Shaffer was chatting with some of the other uniforms in the lobby, while Tom and the captain questioned her. None of the other detectives were investigating her case, but Cody, Frank, and Court had conveniently found things to keep them at their desks when Tom’s questions began. “I’ve gone over both the statement you gave us when you got here the other day and the one you gave Cody last night about your abduction. I’ve compared them. The one thing that sticks out to me about both accounts is that this man zeroed in on your bracelet. I’m looking into the serial number Cody pulled off the back of it, but I haven’t come up with anything conclusive yet.”

Alex nodded. “I thought of that.”

“Is it valuable?” the captain asked.

Alex looked down at the silver charm bracelet slung around her lower forearm. She’d worn the bracelet almost every day for as long as she could remember, but she’d never thought to have it appraised.

“I don’t know. It’s not heavy.”

“You didn’t buy it?”

“It was . . . given to me.”

Tom frowned. He could probably tell she was being evasive. Alex realized she’d have to tell them about her true reason for being on the highway outside Mt. Dessicate four years ago. It was personal, which was why she’d been reluctant to tell Cody about it the first day she arrived, but she supposed that was irrelevant now. After two days, she knew the detectives a bit better and, if they were going to help her, she’d have to tell them the whole truth. Besides, it wasn’t anything to be weird about, just something she didn’t volunteer in conversation with people she barely knew.

“Detective?”

“Tom.”

“Tom. Are you going to be digging into my past?”

Tom scrutinized her face for a few seconds. “Ms. Thompson, I’m not convinced that this has anything to do with you personally. I still think it may be a wrong-place-wrong-time scenario. Granted, those scenarios don’t generally happen twice, but if this guy’s been pulling people off this highway for years, and you’re his victim-type, it’s not completely implausible. On the other hand, if this does have anything to do with you personally, we need to find out what. His attention to your bracelet is the closest thing to a lead we have. Unless there’s something else you’d like to tell me?”

Alex sighed. “I don’t know why he would come after me specifically, or why my bracelet caught his attention. I don’t mind if you dig around in my personal life. I have nothing to hide. But you may as well start calling me Alex, if that’s the case.” She glanced around the room. “All of you.”

Despite being apparently busy with paperwork, the sides of Court’s mouth went up. Frank wasn’t even pretending to work. He grinned over at her and winked. Cody’s back was to her, so she couldn’t see if he was listening or not.

“So.” Tom hesitated but when she didn’t go on, continued, “What do you have to tell us?”

“Only that I was adopted.”

Tom sat back with raised eyebrows. Even the captain looked up from his notebook, mild surprise written on his face.

“Oh,” Tom said.

She shrugged. “I didn’t know about it growing up. Even when I was eighteen, my parents didn’t tell me. Not until I was trying to get a visa to go down to Mexico for a job and there was a problem with my birth certificate did I have any inkling. That was the real reason I was on your highway four years ago. I confronted my parents, who fessed up. Then I got really upset, totally overreacted, and sort of stole my dad’s car.”

A guffaw from behind Tom said Court was still listening. Cody and Frank had abandoned all pretense of work and were watching and listening intently.

Alex ignored them. “I have an aunt in Arizona. She’s the one I always talk to about things I can’t talk to my parents about. I was going to see her.” She shrugged again. “That’s when the Botanist first pulled me over.”

Tom gave her a wary look and, from the corner of her eye, she saw Cody and Frank exchanged glances.

“What?” she asked.

“We don’t know for certain that they’re the same man, Alex.”

Alex studied her hands a moment before giving him a tight smile. “I understand that
you
don’t know that yet, Tom. But I do. I’m sure of it.”

Tom sat deep in thought for a moment, processing what she was saying. Alex didn’t interrupt his contemplations. Finally he leaned forward. “Okay . . . and the bracelet?”

“I’ve had it for as long as I can remember. My mom always told me it was a christening gift but she never found out who it was from. When I found out about the adoption, she told me the whole story. Apparently I was found wandering on a highway as a toddler. Someone stopped and picked me up, took me to the police station.”

“You were wandering on the highway as a
toddler?”
Tom looked flabbergasted.

“Yeah, I know. I was really lucky I wasn’t killed. I could barely walk, and so was too small to be seen above the hood of a car. If I had crawled into the middle of the road, even if by some miracle the driver saw me, it probably would have been too late to stop. Luckily, that didn’t happen. A trucker saw me playing in the dirt on the shoulder.”

Alex glanced around the room. All five men looked shell-shocked. Frank and Court’s mouths hung open slightly, though she didn’t think they realized it. Cody didn’t say anything—and his mouth stayed shut—but his eyes were the size of saucers.

“I don’t remember this,” she offered, “at all. The earliest memories I have are with my adoptive parents.”

“And you”—Frank was still trying to recover—“didn’t think this was important enough to tell us before?”

That confused Alex. “No. Why would it be?”

“Frank, get back to work,” Tom said over his shoulder, looking annoyed.

“But Tom, think about it. Maybe this has something to do with her birth parents. Maybe
he’s
her birth father. Maybe she’s his long-lost daughter and he gave her the bracelet so he’d be sure to recognize her again and—”

“Frank!” It was the captain that yelled at him, while Tom rested his forehead in his hand.

Alex shifted uncomfortably in her seat. This psychopath had better not be her father. How awful would that be?

Frank looked mildly surprised at the captain’s rebuke, but then he glanced at Alex and seemed to check himself. He cleared his throat. “Uh, sorry, Alex. I get carried away sometimes.”

Alex smiled in spite of herself. Even when Frank was being insensitive it was endearing. She glanced at Cody, who was watching her.

“Oh, Frank.” She looked back at him. “Please don’t ever say that again. If my life is really some kind of Star Wars psychodrama, I must be a lot more messed up than even
I
realize.”

Frank grinned at her, and she smiled back. The mood in the room lightened palpably. The captain looked relieved that she wasn’t offended.

“Now if I can get back to questioning
my
witness.” Tom spread his glare around the room. Cody, Frank, and Court went back to what they were doing, looking chastened, but Alex was sure they were still listening.

“Where were you found, Alex? What highway? What state?”

“I’m . . . not sure. It was here, in Utah, but beyond that I don’t know. I never thought to ask which highway it was. My dad told me it was farther south, but we live up in Cache Valley, which leaves pretty much the entire state below us.”