Buried Secrets Can Be Murder: Charlie Parker Mysteries, Book #14 (The Charlie Parker Mysteries) (11 page)

“What do you mean?”

“I’d gone to school in California, UCSD, computer sciences and, since one of my projects had to do with a faster-than-light chip, I got recruited up in Seattle right away. It was the heyday of the dot coms and salaries were through the roof. Tali grew up in New Mexico and we met in college. She said she’d followed my rise among the science students. She seemed head over heels in love with me after our first few dates at UC and, well, I really fell for her too. Life was perfect for us once the kids came along. House in a nice neighborhood, I was making great money, Tali got to stay home with the kids and go for spa treatments and shopping whenever she wanted.”

“But something changed.”

“Apparently so. But I didn’t have a clue about it until I came home that day when the kids went missing. Tali was so . . . I don’t know how to describe it . . . so unconcerned. I asked about the children, and at first she told me they were napping. She poured us glasses of wine and we went to the living room to relax. But Tali didn’t really relax. She seemed jittery and hyper-alert, I guess you would say—her eyes darting around, looking at the yard and the woods beyond.”

He took a ragged breath. “I asked her what was wrong. You know, I half expected her to tell me she was having an affair or something. When she said the kids had been taken, I was in shock, numb. She convinced me that there would be a ransom call from that man in black. We had money. We could just pay the ransom and everything would go back to normal. I remember practically ripping my hair out for a few hours, waiting for that call. When it didn’t come I knew we needed help and I called the police. When they arrested Tali it was my first clue that everything might not be as she’d presented it. But what could I do? I’d bought into the story all the way. She was so helpless in the face of all that drama. She needed me to support her.” His voice broke a little.

“And I suppose her mother and sisters also came to her aid?”

“Immediately. Scout lived only a few blocks from us. She was so similar to Tali—they had nearly the same reactions to all the events that unfolded during that time. Roxanne and Babe flew up from Santa Fe as soon as it became apparent that Tali was being grilled by the police. Roxanne even hired the lawyer who defended her—on my dime, of course. I don’t quite know how to describe the frenzy, the way I got caught up in the whole thing.”

I jotted notes while he talked. “So you made it through the trial, stood by her side. But then you two split right away afterward.”

“As the evidence came out in court I began to see Tali the way the police did, how obvious it was that she was guilty. She would turn around and smile at me once in awhile, and it was all I could do not to scream and call her names and demand to know where the kids were. That was the hardest part, never knowing what really happened to my children. I—” His words broke off and I realized he’d set the phone down for a minute.

When he came back I tried to make my voice as soothing as possible. “It must have been horrible, Boyd. I understand.” The guilt he must feel had to be oppressive.

“It was bizarre. When we walked out of that courtroom, Tali a free woman, I felt like I was made of ice. Like I was dead inside. Like my limbs would barely move. She hung onto my arm and kept looking up at me with the same adoration she’d shown when we dated. She actually thought we would simply drive home and resume our lives. I knew if I ever had her alone I would probably kill her.”

“What did you do?”

“I put her in a cab and gave the driver our address. While she’d been in custody I’d already moved my things out of the house. I’d listed the place with a real estate agent. When her cab drove away I went to the hotel where I’d been staying. I didn’t give a damn what happened to her.”

“And then?”

“She found me and started calling at all hours. Begging me to come back, swearing she was innocent. Part of me wanted to believe her, but I’d seen the look in her eyes. She was glad the kids were gone, plain and simple. I told her we would never go back to being the honeymooners we’d once been. Told her to get on with her life; I was filing for divorce. She started coming to my hotel, pounding on my door, causing scenes in the halls. I hired a couple of security guys to try to keep the place peaceful, and I guess they warned her off.

“In the meantime, I applied for jobs outside the area. With my record for inventing new technology, I had replies practically before my emails went out. I landed the job in California within a week. Took off, never saw Tali again. When the Seattle house sold, the Realtor sent me a check. Pretty soon the divorce lawyer sent me a copy of the decree. I was a little amazed that she signed it without a battle. Whatever my security guys told her must have sunk in. Next thing I heard was when some article appeared in a news story that said she’d skipped out of Washington and no one seemed to know where she was living.”

“Chet Flowers seems to think it might be New Mexico,” I said.

“I wouldn’t be surprised. That’s where her family came from, where her mother always lived.”

“So, why do you want to find her now?”

“Chet might have told you. Closure. I’m a haunted man, Charlie. I can’t sleep, I drink too much, I’m a loser at work. I need to give my kids a proper burial. I need to find them.”

Chapter 11

Wow. I hung up the phone with Boyd Donovan’s voice filling my head. The poor man. If we couldn’t do this for him, I briefly wondered if he might even become suicidal.

Ron came back from his airport run, and he’d brought chicken for lunch. I filled him in with the newest information then checked in with Drake to see how his day was going. He said he was up to his elbows in the turbine engine and suggested that we might meet for dinner at Pedro’s later. I put back that second piece of chicken and wiped my hands.

“I better go through some of Chet’s gigantic file before I start to make contact with any of the Freizel family,” I told Ron.

I carried the monster thing to the window seat at the front of my office, where the southern exposure made a cozy spot to stretch out. For a few minutes, I’ll admit it, I dozed. Refreshed, I gave the case file a skimming, picking out the places where Tali and her family members were interviewed.

“So far, everything in these transcripts gels with what Boyd Donovan told me and what we learned from Chet,” I told Ron when he peeked into my office to see why I was so quiet. “Boyd was right about Tali sticking to her story. No matter how the detectives asked their questions, she answers in nearly the identical way each time.”

“That’s usually suspicious in itself,” he commented, poking through the candy dish I keep on the bookshelf, looking for his favorite butterscotch pieces.

“Wherever they ask something she doesn’t want to answer, she asks for her attorney.”

“What about the sister who lived nearby?” he asked. “How does she explain it?”

“The same way Tali did, in nearly identical terms. She makes it sound reasonable that Tali thought there would soon be a ransom call.”

“Where was the sister the rest of the day?” he asked through a mouthful of hard candy.

“Scout’s movements aren’t really brought up very much, other than those parts you just mentioned.”

“That might be something to find out when you talk to her.”

I agreed. I just hadn’t quite figured out what my approach would be. At least Chet Flowers had done a lot of the homework for us. He’d provided addresses and phone numbers for both Babe Freizel and Scout Stiles. Judging by their interviews with the police and what I’d heard about their court testimony, I couldn’t very well expect a warm welcome from either of the sisters or their mother if I divulged that I was asking on behalf of Boyd Donovan.

I puzzled over this long enough to watch the shadows lengthen across the scant remains of yesterday’s snow on the browned lawn. Which meant there was not time to make the drive to Santa Fe this afternoon. I needed to go in there rested and prepared. Plus, there are only a few things for which I’m willing to miss out on a Pedro’s dinner with my husband. This wasn’t one of them.

The answer came to me later that night, as I admittedly was struggling a bit with going to bed on a full stomach. To get answers about the events of five years ago from Tali Donovan’s family, I needed to make it about them. Not about her.

I woke with a loosely woven plan, happy to see that our normal brilliant blue skies had returned. Any residual snow would soon be gone from the roads and even the icy spots wouldn’t probably make it past noon. I set a gentle kiss on Drake’s shoulder as I got out of bed.

A slice of leftover pecan pie counted as breakfast, consumed while standing over the kitchen sink with a cup of coffee nearby and one eye on Freckles as she roamed the back yard. The moment she seemed ready to head through the hedge to Elsa’s I opened the back door and called her in. It was almost comical to see her abrupt turnaround when she heard the word breakfast.

While the dog wolfed down her kibble, I located a steno pad and small tape recorder. I held up my navy blazer for inspection, deciding it looked sharp enough and clean enough to work for my purposes. Using Drake’s computer I designed a fake business card and printed a few copies. I was now Charlotte Langston, freelance writer. A map of Santa Fe was also a must, so I printed one from a website and I was in the process of poring over it when Drake emerged from the bedroom.

“You’re up and at ’em early this morning,” he said, sending me that smile that had melted my heart from day one.

“A mission.” I’d briefly explained the new case over dinner last night. “I’m going to try the ‘fascinated reporter’ ruse on the older of Tali Donovan’s sisters. Wish me luck.”

Freckles looked ready to roar out the door with me and was severely disappointed when I didn’t let her come. Drake dropped the word ‘cookie’ and she immediately switched her loyalty.

I’d counted on finding the interstate less crowded than usual for an early morning weekday. Under normal circumstances there’s a lot of commuter traffic heading toward Santa Fe on a work day. But this being Christmas week I’d hoped many offices would be closed or people taking extra days off, and I figured many post-holiday shoppers would wait until a little later in the day. That was my hope. I was only moderately disappointed.

There was another reason for my timing. According to Chet’s notes, Roxanne Freizel worked at one of the big box retail stores, which pretty well guaranteed she would have to work today. Babe, the eldest daughter who lived with mom, was (still, I hoped) between jobs and would likely be at home if I arrived early enough. The trick was catching that magic timeframe—after mom left and before Babe went anywhere. I roared up La Bajada Hill on I-25 and took the 599 exit, which I’d plotted on my map as the most direct route.

I was creeping along Calle Encino in my Jeep, looking at house numbers, when I spotted a woman in her sixties walking out the front door of a single-story flat-roofed house that was stuccoed in one of the obligatory brown tones allowed in Santa Fe. She gave me a brief stare and I cruised on past while she got into a Honda sedan. She put the little car in gear nearly the moment it started, and she backed out with hardly a glance. My dashboard clock said it was 8:53 so obviously she was running a little late.

I pulled to the curb two doors up from the place she’d just left. Sure enough, that house was number 1620 and the woman must have been Roxanne Freizel. I wished that I’d had a better opportunity to get some details about her. Oh well. For today, my quarry was Babe. I pressed the doorbell and the door immediately swung open.

“Oh!” The woman standing there was clearly startled. “I thought Mother— Never mind.”

Babe was an older version of Tali’s mug shot. Disheveled, wearing a baggy pair of sweats with a dribble of something over one boob, no makeup and dark brown hair that had clearly been slept on.

“Hi!” I said as brightly as I could. “Babe Freizel?”

She nodded and her eyes narrowed suspiciously. “What are you selling? We got this sign.” She pointed downward to a little orange thing that said No Soliciting.

“Trust me, I’m not soliciting.” I squared my shoulders. “I’m doing a freelance article for
Cosmo
.”

Cosmo?
Really, Charlie, that’s the best you could do?
I chided myself.

“And, um, we’re going to run a story next month on the fifth anniversary of your sister’s trial.”

She started to close the door and I edged in closer.

“Wait! It’s not the standard piece about the case or any of that. My editor wants the focus to be on family members who stick by their loved ones through the very worst of times. We’re looking for those unsung heroes . . .” I kept making it up as fast as I could. “. . . those brothers and sisters—well, it has to be sisters, since this is
Cosmo
—who gave up
so
much to help a family member.”

The door relaxed inward a tad.

“I read through a bunch of the articles about the trial. Background, you know. And it just seemed to me that you and your sisters and your mom . . . well, you just fit our ideal family for the slant of the piece I want to do. Do you suppose I could come in and talk with you for a few minutes? I mean, it would be a real interview, and I even brought my little tape recorder to be sure I get the quotes right.”

There were so many holes in my story, starting with the idea that a major magazine would hire
me
, or that they could possibly assign an article on a month’s notice. But apparently Babe didn’t know any better. She opened the door, surreptitiously running her fingers through her hair as I passed her.

“Look, if there’s gonna be pictures—” she started to say.

I held up a hand. “Not to worry. The editor will send a photographer separately and you’ll have plenty of notice.”

I felt a moment’s twinge of guilt for the lie as we took seats on a beaten down brown sofa. The rest of the room was furnished in similar bargain-store stuff that holds its shape until the six months of interest-free payments have been made. The color theme leaned toward dirt tones with a two-foot Christmas tree atop a TV tray and an oversized photograph of a mountain and lake above the couch, to add sparkle and fun.

Babe’s excitement at being featured in a national magazine grew as I led with a few questions that I thought a journalist might ask—how had the trial impacted her personally, how had her life changed in the past five years. Not an easy acting job for someone whose only real training came in accounting and taxes.

I scribbled away at my notepad, feigning fascination each time Babe mentioned her own role. My only true goal here was to gain her trust so she might give me the information we needed, but I felt obligated to wade through a lot of other useless stuff before I could get there.

“You must be a very close family,” I said after she’d mentioned her mother for the first time. A little catch came into my voice, just to let her know how special I thought that was.

Babe shifted in her seat. Was I starting to see cracks in the solidarity?

“Mother and I have done our best. Scout and Tali were always a little bit in their own little world, being so much younger and all. When I graduated high school they were still in elementary. My first marriage ended by the time they met their husbands.”

“And you stayed here in New Mexico when they both moved to the Seattle area?”

“That’s right.”

“How did you feel when your youngest sister was arrested?” That stupid appeal to the emotions which reporters invariably ask right after a tragedy. How do they
think
people feel? But if I were to keep up this charade, it seemed the thing to say.

She came back with the usual—shocked, stunned, couldn’t believe it. What had I expected? It was pretty much the same thing they’d all said publicly for years.

“I imagine it’s a hard thing for everyone to get over, even after all these years.”

“Mother has pushed it under the carpet. The strain was too much for her. She doesn’t speak to Tali at all. In fact, we don’t even know where she is now.”

Interesting, if it was true.

“And Scout? Is she still close to Tali?”

“Scout lives in Albuquerque and I imagine they communicate. I talk to her a couple times a month but we stay away from that subject. You know, it’s nothing major. We’ve just gone different directions in life.”

“I see.” I pursed my mouth for a few seconds then leaned toward her. “I’d like to talk to her—Scout. Even though I can see that the focus of my article is going to be about you . . . I’m thinking a little additional background, a brief other viewpoint. You understand.”

The poor ugly-duckling sister chewed at her lip a moment, not really wanting to share the limelight with her younger sister. I almost felt bad about deceiving her this way.

“She lives on the west side. It’s a little cul-de-sac street, I can’t think of the name . . . I’ll have to get my address book to give you the exact street number.” She got up and went through an archway that led to a hall.

I already had this information, but since she’d offered . . . She might relent and give up Tali too, for all I knew. I fidgeted, ready to get going.

Babe came back with a small paper book, the kind of thing they used to hand out for free in stationery stores. It had little tabs with the letters of the alphabet and she thumbed down and opened the book.

“Here’s Scout,” she said.

I jotted down the address she read off. I eyed the book when she set it on the coffee table and resumed her seat.

“Um, can you think of anything else you might add to the story?” I asked. “Take a moment, if you’d like.”

Babe’s eyes stared toward the ceiling, thinking. I started a fit of coughing.

“Sorry,” I choked. “Could I trouble you for a glass of water?”

“Oh, sure.” She got up and headed for the kitchen. The second she was out of my sight, I grabbed the address book. The sound of glassware in a cupboard, followed by the gush of running water. I quickly open the book to the D’s. No entry for Donovan. Nothing under T for Tali either. And no Tali listed under F, in case she’d taken back her maiden name. The tap stopped running and footsteps were coming closer. I didn’t have the luxury of paging through the whole thing, so I coughed a couple more times for good measure and set the book back exactly as I’d found it, seconds before Babe walked back into the room.

“Thank you so much,” I said after a few gulps of the water. “Gosh, don’t you just hate when that happens.”

She smiled at me and accepted the glass when I handed it back.