Dead Wrong (20 page)

“Weatherman said it’s moving east,” the older man said. “We’re getting an early start. We got twenty-five lots to clear.”

“Do you have any jobs near Horsetooth Reservoir?”

“Nope. That’s clear over on the west side of town. It won’t get plowed until the snow stops and it’s daylight. The roads up to the dams are steep and the visibility is next to zero. Too easy for a plow to slide off the road,” said the younger man.

“I need to get up there. How would I do that?”

“I’m not sure it’s possible.” He looked Albert up and down. “You’re all banged up. Do you even have winter gear with you? Parka, hood, gloves?”

“No. Wiped out my car in a pileup on I-25. I’ve been stuck here ever since.”

“Aw, man, that sucks. You must be miserable.” He turned toward the older man and waved him toward the door. “Why don’t you give him that coat we got in the truck for stranded drivers?”

“Yeah, we can do that. Sorry we can’t help you get up the hill, though. The only thing I can think of is renting a snowmobile. There’s a dealer about a mile from here.” He glanced at his watch. “Doubt he stayed open during the night, but with the storm winding down and the possibility of picking up a few new customers, he’ll probably open up early this morning. The business is called Clyde’s Ski-Ride. He’s in the phone book.”

Albert sighed. “Thanks. Any chance you could drop me over there? I’d be happy to pay.”

“Nah, not necessary,” the younger one said. “Just call it good old Colorado hospitality. But you have to wait—”

“I’ve got a better idea,” said the older driver. “We gotta do Clyde’s anyway and it’s the only one we have on the north side. When we get ready to head up there, we’ll take you with us.”

Albert could not believe his good fortune. Due to the kindness of strangers, he would have a coat to protect him from the fierce cold, and he had access to transportation that would get him up the hill to Foster and whatever she had that Ortega wanted so bad. Albert now had to figure out a way to handle the situation so he didn’t have to kill her or any of her companions. Especially the kid. He had never killed a kid.

While he waited for the men and their snow plows to return, he managed to score six Vicodin. He’d need them to get a snowmobile up that hill.

Near Fort Collins, Colorado
Saturday, January 25

“Let’s get back to the bigger problem,” Thomas said after Grace went down the hall to Blue’s bedroom. “We need to know what’s in the emails you haven’t read. The phone messages, too.”

“I can listen to the voice mails,” Blue said. “I’ll take notes.” This time Thomas didn’t protest.

Lynnette handed her cell to Blue, who took one look at the display and asked, “Do you have the charger? It’s almost dead.”

“Yeah. In my purse.” Lynnette tossed her purse on the counter.

Blue plugged in the phone and accessed Sammy Grick’s voice mail as Lynnette opened her emails, beginning with the oldest ones first and dealing with one correspondent at a time. Dave Buchanan, her former boss at
The Indy Reporter,
had tried to contact her as soon as he found out about Carl’s death and her disappearance. His most recent attempt had been sent Friday night:
You’re scaring me. No matter what you’ve done, I’ll help you. Call me.

Thomas was reading Dave’s emails over her shoulder. Lynnette checked her watch. It was four o’clock Saturday morning in Indiana. Dave probably wouldn’t see the message for three or four hours. She hit Reply and typed:
I haven’t done anything wrong. I’ll call later today.

After scanning the rest of the emails, including those from her stepmother, Lynnette had the two emails from MGutierrez left. She opened the first one, from Maggie Gutierrez of the Glades Police Department. It read:
It’s in your best interest to contact me and no one else, Mrs. Foster. Email me and I’ll send you my phone number. We need to talk.

Lynnette hadn’t expected an email from the cops, especially a female cop. Would she be sympathetic? Or would she be one of those women who had to out-tough the men to prove her worth? Lynnette hit the Reply key and hesitated.

“What are you going to do?” Thomas asked.

“Get the number. I’m not telling her where I am, if that’s what you mean.” She glanced at the wireless connection icon. It was now covered by a red X. “Nuts, I’ve lost the connection.”

“Lynnette,” Blue said. “All of the calls are really scary. These guys want their stuff real bad. The guy with the accent, the one who says he’s on his way—”

“Ortega,” Lynnette said.

“Yeah. He’s called before. But think about it. First it was the fat guy, and you saw him in person. Then there was the guy at the library. We saw him in person. This other guy, Ortega, seems to be the one in charge. Like maybe the other two are working for him. He says he knows where you are, he’s coming to pick up his stuff, and he’ll help you get away. Dad’s got to be right. They’re tracking you through this phone. They found out you’re here before Dad removed the battery. You should have dumped it a long time ago.”

“I know. I was afraid to. I kept thinking I’d make the trade when I got somewhere safe. I needed the phone so they could contact me.”

“They won’t need to contact you by phone if you stay here,” Thomas said. “Whoever these men are, one or more of them will show up as soon as the roads are cleared. This Ortega might do exactly as he promised. On the other hand, he might kill you. He might kill all of us. We don’t know what these checks mean, and we don’t know what Ortega plans to do with them. We need to involve the authorities, for your safety and for ours.”

He was right. She couldn’t put Grace and Blue in more danger. Still, she had every intention of talking to Dave before she did anything else. “Okay. As soon as I can get online, I’ll email the Glades cop and get her number.”

Glades, Florida
Saturday, January 25

Maggie saw Detective Prince walk in the door and felt an immediate urge to duck under her desk. Her worst fears were realized when he stood in the doorway and shouted across the room. “Gutierrez! Have you been sending emails to Lynnette Foster?”

He’s such a jerk.
Maggie walked across the room to Prince. “Sorry, Detective. I didn’t hear you. What did you say?”

Prince looked at his watch. “You’ve been working on the Foster case since Thursday against my explicit orders. You are in deep trouble . . . unless you can tell me where she is.”

Ouch. That does not sound like he gave me unspoken permission to work this case.
“I haven’t been able to catch any movement since she disappeared from the mall in Denver. Hasn’t used her credit cards, no ATM withdrawal, no contact with her friends or her relatives. She has a stepmother in Southern California who’s been trying to email her and call her on her cell phone, but Foster isn’t answering. I think something happened to her.”

“Something like what?”

“Car accident? In the hospital? They’re having a blizzard out there. Maybe she’s holed up in a motel.”
How the hell do I know?

“Bullshit. Somebody’s helping her. You talked to the stepmother?”

“Yes. She says she hasn’t talked to her stepdaughter since she married that ‘damned son-of-a-bitch cop.’ ”

Prince raised his eyebrows. “Does this stepmother have an alibi for Wednesday?”

“She says she’d love to claim responsibility but she played in a bridge tournament in Laguna Beach and has a hundred witnesses.”

“What about the Denver P.D. You talked to them?”

“Yes. And I asked all the right questions. They don’t know any more than they already told us. You want me to check the hospitals?”

“No, I’ll have someone else do it. Anything else I ought to know before I ask your supervisor to put you on report for emailing a suspect?”

Maggie glanced across the room toward the computer monitor on her desk before looking at Prince.
Do all of my emails get screened?
“Can’t think of anything offhand, sir. I’m sorry, I misunderstood your orders. I’ll back off.”

“You do that.”

“Did you get any word from Miami P.D. about that Ortega killing, sir? Did they locate the husband?”

“He was in L.A. on business. He’s on his way back.”

Maggie returned to her desk. Prince wouldn’t report her. He’d used her to save himself a little time but now he wanted to make sure he controlled his case. She refreshed her screen. Still nothing from Lynnette Foster. Maggie couldn’t send any more emails to Foster, but she would sure as hell open anything she received from her.

Near Fort Collins, Colorado
Saturday, January 25

It was seven fifteen in the morning when Lynnette woke to the smell of coffee and bacon. A bright sun reflected off the snow and streamed in the living room windows on the east side of the house. She rose from the couch, drew the afghan around her shoulders, and walked to the windows facing the hills and mountains to the west, where the glare was less intense. She sucked in her breath as she saw the view. A steep hill plunged from the wide deck toward a body of water that stretched to the north and south. Beyond the hill, a notched rock jutted skyward. Snow covered most of the terrain surrounding the water. The edges of the lake were frozen, the water in the center placid. The wind had died. A rabbit hopped along the edge of the ridge by the deck.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Thomas stood at the entryway between the dining room and kitchen.

“Where are we?”

“West of Fort Collins on the eastern ridge that borders Horsetooth Reservoir. That’s Horsetooth Mountain.” He pointed toward the rocky growth to the west.

“Yes, it’s beautiful.” She gestured toward the table where she’d left her laptop open and plugged in. “Is it working?”

“Afraid not,” he said. “Not sure why we’ve lost the connection.”

“And the television?”

“Too much snow on the dish. Unfortunately, the south side of the house is where the drifts are the worst. I can’t do anything about it now. We shouldn’t waste any more time. Let’s have breakfast and hit the road. The plows won’t make it up here until this afternoon, but I have a blade on my truck, so we’ll take that. No one’s going to get up here in a rental car, but I don’t feel comfortable keeping you and Grace here any longer. I’m willing to see you back to Florida and help you sort out your problems there.”

“Thank you. I appreciate that. I should call my stepmother,” Lynnette said. “And my friend in Indianapolis.”

“Our landline is out, same as our Internet connection. My cell couldn’t even pick up a signal this morning.”

Lynnette’s own phone showed no signal, though the battery was fully charged. “What would cause that?”

“Ice on the tower? Wind damage? I’m not sure.”

Lynnette met Thomas’s gaze and wondered what he thought about as he studied her face. Without saying anything, he returned to the kitchen. She heard plates and glasses clinking against each other, followed by the sound of bacon sizzling in a frypan.

Grace wandered into the living room from the hall. She stopped when she saw Lynnette, then turned away and went into the kitchen.

“Good morning,” Lynnette heard Thomas say. “Bacon? Toast? I’m out of eggs.”

She could not decipher Grace’s mumbled reply. Thomas handed Lynnette a new toothbrush, still in its store packaging. “Blue’s using my shower so you can use the bathroom in the hall. Blue pulled together some clean clothes for you, including a couple of my black T-shirts. She also put a few things in there she thought Grace could use.”

When Lynnette returned, her breakfast was on the table. She sat opposite Grace, who had nearly finished.

“Grace and I had a talk,” Thomas said. “I’m going to escort her back to Florida and stay there until we’ve found someone to represent her and help sever her connection with her foster family.”

“That’s very generous,” Lynnette said.

“You would have done the same. The simple fact that you tried to help Grace along the way, even while you were struggling with your own problems, proves the point.”

He put four strips of bacon and two pieces of toast on the table seconds before Blue walked in and sat down. “Grace now has a better understanding of the situation,” he said. “Don’t you, kiddo?”

“Uh-huh. I’m sorry I yelled at you before, Lynnette. And I’m really sorry I told all those lies. It’s just, you were nice and all, but I couldn’t be sure—”

“I get it, Grace. It’s okay.” Lynnette leaned back in her chair and watched as Thomas stacked dirty dishes in the sink. He seemed so much like her own father. She felt the empty feeling in her stomach that always accompanied thoughts of her dad and his death. Blue was a lucky young woman to have a father like Thomas. And Grace was a lucky kid to have him willing to advocate on her behalf. She was too old to look to Thomas as a father figure, but that’s what she wanted to do. “What now?” she asked. “We need to get ready. How can I help?”

“If you and Grace grab bottled water and something to snack on in case we get stuck in a snowdrift, Teresa and I will pack the truck.”

“Where are we going?” Grace asked as she and Lynnette bagged the supplies. “I mean, I know you’re going to fly to Fort Lauderdale, but are we going to Denver to the airport? Is Thomas going to take me on the same plane with you?”