Pulling on her robe, Angie hurried to the vestibule. For an extra tip from Tony each month, the paper boy dropped their newspaper directly through the otherwise unused mail slot beside the front door. Angie retrieved the newspaper, then hurried toward the kitchen, reading as she went.
The latest crisis in the Mideast had bumped Andrew Brady story off the front page, but it still had plenty of play. She read every word the three-column article, trying to understand exactly what had happened. Angie was startled to realize that Andrew Brady’s newly widowed wife, whose tenth anniversary had been the day before his death, was only a few years older than she was. The newspaper reported that they had a nine-year-old daughter. Knowing that only made Angie feel worse.
Alfer reading the paper, she carefully put it back together and returned it to its place in the vestibule. It was better for her if Tony didn’t realize she actually read newspapers in general and today’s in particular.
Feeling anxious and ill at ease, Angie meandered into the living room. The two road-runners were out cavorting in the back yard, but today she paid no attention. For weeks she had beguiled the time with half-formed day dreams about the kind of house she’d buy for herself some day, if she ever got the chance. Not one like this one, huge and spacious and uncaring where everything-from linens to silverware-was included in the rental. This place was elegant but impersonal in the same way hotel rooms were, and Angie had had a bellyful of hotel rooms.
Angie wanted out of the life, permanently and she wanted something more besides-a place of her own, small but cozy, with dishes and furniture and curtains that all carried her own particular stamp on them. She’d put up bird feeders all over the backyard-a yard with a single tall, shady tree. And she’d plant a garden, one thick with flowers and vegetables both.
Except, today she couldn’t summon the day-dream. Joanna Brady-the wife of the dead deputy-hadn’t bothered Angie when she didn’t know about her existence, but now she could think of nothing else. Andrew Brady was dead at thirty-two, Joanna Brady was a widow at twenty-seven, and it was all Angie’ s fault.
She sat there now, staring blindly out the window, struggling with her conscience and with what she should do. Her problem now was twofold. Not only would she have to escape Tony, but she would have to elude the law as well. And whatever she did, it had to soon. She had checked in the closet, had opened the latest briefcase she found there and seen the money. Getting away from Tony would take money, but those money-filled briefcases didn’t stay in the closet for more than a few days at most, once they appeared. So speed was essential as far as the availability of money was concerned.
It was also the key to survival. Angie understood that if Tony had even the slightest glimmer that she knew the truth about him, that he wouldn’t hesitate to kill her. Every time he looked at her, she was petrified that her face would somehow betray her, giving away to him the thoughts she meant to keep hidden in her head.
If she was going to get away, it would have be soon, before Tony learned her secret, while she could still take his money and use it as a grubstake. But regardless of how much money there was, she doubted there would ever be enough for her to get away from him completely. The only way he’d ever leave her alone was if he was dead or in jail. Dead didn’t seem likely, and thugs like Tony got out of jail all the time. And as soon as he got out, knew he’d be after her. He’d be vicious as bulldog, and just as relentless. She didn’t dare think about what he’d do if he ever caught her.
If she did come up with a plan for getting away, she’d have to come up with a foolproof plan for getting rid of Tony as well. She couldn’t see herself holding a gun on him and pulling the trigger, but she needed something every bit as permanent as a well-placed bullet something that wouldn’t land her in jail well.
“Angie,” he bellowed from the other room. She jumped as though she’d been shot. He was awake early and wanting her. Lost in thought, she hadn’t even heard the click of the cigarette lighter.
“Did you start the coffee?”
“Not yet. I will in a minute.”
“Bring me the paper,” he ordered, “and turn on the TV set in here. I wish to hell 1’d asked for that television repairman to come today instead of Saturday. This worthless little set sucks. It’s so goddamned small a man could go blind just trying to see what’s on it. And hurry up with the coffee.”
Finished organizing her list, Joanna had started to gather her keys and purse when Sa die, her canine early-warning system, began to bark. Joanna checked outside just in time to two Cochise County sheriff’s vehicles stopping in front of her gate. Two men walked toward her back door-Chief Deputy Richard Voland and Ernie Carpenter, Cochise County ’s chief homicide detective.
Joanna knew Dick Voland pretty well. Not Ernie Carpenter. Around the department he had the unenviable reputation of being an unbending, humorless prig who nonetheless usually got his man. In a world of bola ties and sons, he was the only officer on Walter Fadden’s staff who consistently showed up work wearing knotted ties and three-piece suits.
Andy hadn’t particularly liked the man, and neither did Joanna. Aloof and rigid, a stickler for rules, Carpenter seemed to hold himself above it all, from interdepartmental politics to volleyball games at the annual picnic at Turkey Creek. Moments earlier, Joanna might have dreaded seeing Detective Carpenter, but now, full of this latest bit of information from Dr. Sanders, she was eager to tell what she knew. Quieting the noisy dog, she closed Sadie in Jenny’s room and then hurried back to kitchen to open the door.
“Good morning, Joanna,” Voland said, politely tipping his hat. “Hope we’re not catching you at a bad time.”
“No. Come on in.”
From the distressed looks on their faces, it was apparent that neither one of the officers relished the coming encounter. The death of a fellow officer was always hard on all concerned. Thinking it would ease the situation, Joanna blurted out her news from Dr. Sanders. “Andy’s surgeon from Tucson just called. He told me he thinks Andy was murdered.”
To her surprise, neither Carpenter nor Voland seemed much interested in her news. “Really,” Carpenter mused. “What makes him say that?”
“He saw preliminary results from the autopsy. They don’t have a toxicology report yet, but Dr. Sanders seems to think Andy died of a possible drug overdose, that someone slipped Andy something lethal right there in the hospital under everyone’s very noses.”
Carpenter shook his head and smiled indulgently. “That’s all very interesting, Joanna. Sounds like something straight out of a soap opera to me, but we have to take these things one step at a time. We need to ask you a few questions if you have time.”
She nodded. Looking at the two burly men looming over her in the kitchen, Joanna knew they wouldn’t be well suited to the tight-fitting benches of the breakfast nook. “Come on into the dining room,” she said.
As they seated themselves around the table, Dick Voland seemed especially uncomfortable. “I hate to bother you at a time like this. I’m sure you’re real busy today, but since we couldn’t visit with you yesterday…”
“It’s all right,” Joanna assured them, determined to be cooperative and do what she could to help. “I understand you’ve got your jobs to do. And after talking to Dr. Sanders, I’m ready to talk. Would anybody like coffee?”
Both men shook their heads in silent unison. Their joint refusal unnerved her a little. It wouldn’t have hurt them to observe some social niceties, and it puzzled Joanna that they both seemed to give so little credence to Dr. Sanders’ mind-boggling news.