Land of Entrapment (22 page)

“I’m glad, Kase. I just don’t want you to get hurt again. I know, I know. I sound like your mom or something. But you’re pretty special and you deserve someone who sees that.”

“Geez, you’re making me wanna grab a tissue here,” I said, only half-teasing.

“Yeah, whatever. Listen, I’m working this weekend to get caught up but I have time tomorrow evening. Can I swing by?”

“That’d be awesome. Oh, before I forget—Cody was poking around here yesterday around two. Sage saw him. No, she didn’t run out there and open a can on his ass, but she said he was really pissed that he couldn’t get in.”

“Keep me posted on that. Do you want me to spend the night tonight? I have a training seminar I have to deal with that ends at ten so I can be there around eleven.”

“Jesus. No, don’t worry. Go home and have your space, you big ol’ detective, you. You need your rest to keep us civilians safe.”

She laughed again. “I’m so glad you’re in town.

All right, I’ll check in with you later.”

“Thanks. Bye.”

We hung up and I sat for a bit, staring blankly at the computer. So Roy was Raymond. And he had a criminal past. I wondered if that meant anything with regard to John Talbot. My legal pad was lying next to the computer. I flipped to my organizational columns and wrote “Raymond Watkins” in the Roy column. I added “criminal record” and then wrote “Talbot” and a question mark. I tapped the pen against the paper, trying to see if there was any definitive connection. I added “called” under the Megan column and yesterday’s date and time along with the place and the number from which she had called. I added

“probably abused.” I wrote “asshole abuser” in Cody’s column. That reminded me. I needed to look at Melissa’s log of Megan’s calls, which I’d left in the car.I stood and retrieved a half-full bottle of Tazo from the fridge and walked to my car to get the notebook. Once back at the computer, I set my tea on a nearby coaster and stared at the notebook, but I Googled Sage instead and her Web site popped up. I ended up perusing it for a good half-hour. Nicely designed, it included some stunning flash images of landscapes that I figured she had taken. A small recent shot of her graced the upper right-hand corner of her homepage. From what I could tell, it might have been taken on top of a mesa somewhere. She was grinning broadly, gazing past the camera, a mischievous faraway expression in her eyes. Her arms were folded casually over her chest. I stared at the photo for a long time. God help me. She’s absolutely gorgeous.

I clicked through her site, savoring it like a rare liqueur. Her portfolio was unbelievable. She had already traveled all over the world, including Europe, India, Latin America, and Turkey. I clicked on her biography and my jaw dropped. She would be thirty-one in early February. Had I thought to do this sooner, I would have known she wasn’t as young as I had assumed. This threw a whole other song into the mix.The biography portion of her site included a couple of photos of her as a little cowgirl. Even as a child, she’d had that damn grin. The Wyoming landscape stretched for miles behind her in each image. Another photo showed her sitting in a downpour in what looked like a Central American jungle. She huddled amidst indigenous peoples beneath a leaky roof, laughing with them. My heart lurched and my breathing sped up. This is either really good or really bad. Shit.

The text provided just enough information without going into too much detail. She had been born in Wyoming and got interested in images and art as a child. From there, it was just a matter of getting her hands on a camera. Her mom gave her a used Kodak when she was five. After that, Sage said in the biography, there was no going back.

I clicked on another page of her Web site labeled

“exhibitions.” She had already had several over the years. University of Wyoming, University of New Mexico, a couple of galleries in Los Angeles, one in Austin, and two in Boston. Those featured European images. “Wow,” I said out loud. Upcoming exhibitions included an installation on the UNM

campus—Sage had already mentioned that one. But she also had an opening coming up in Santa Fe on Canyon Road, which was the place to get your art shown there. I was blown away. I clicked on

“galleries” and found out that her work was currently on display at two here in Albuquerque. One was in Old Town.

Another page on her site featured several photographs that had been published in magazines. A few I actually recalled seeing somewhere. The last page I viewed was called “upcoming projects.”

According to this, in February she was scheduled to do a photo essay down in the Everglades after which she was going to document local fishing along the Gulf Coast. She thanked the Aaron Siskind Foundation underneath the description of the Everglades shoot. The Fifty Crows Foundation out of San Francisco was helping fund the Gulf Coast project.

I sat back. Her work was amazing. She captured not just the image, but the essence of whatever or whomever she photographed. Sage was not only talented, she was gifted. She was born with an ability to see into people and to draw out of them their innermost thoughts and dreams. She did the same with landscapes. I was spellbound. So many layers.

Here she was, one of the up-and-coming talents in documentary photography and she was so understated. Humble. Real. I wanted to know more.

In every conceivable way. And that thought both excited and scared the hell out of me. She’s not as young as I thought. This could be dangerous.

I stood and stretched. Time to get my mind off Sage for a bit and do the job I was asked to do. There was nothing in Melissa’s notebook that she hadn’t already told me. But she had logged the three numbers from which Megan had called. The most recent number matched the last three times she had called. So she was staying put somewhere. Megan called Melissa at least once every eight days, it seemed, as I flipped through the pages and checked the dates. The longest stretch was the most recent.

I put the notebook down and went back through Megan’s bookshelves, paying particular attention to the books Cody had given her. For all I knew, something he had underlined was some kind of secret code, in which case, I’d probably not ever know what he was looking for. But I might have missed something. I went through Megan’s books again as well. School texts and some fiction that included Tony Hillerman and Nevada Barr. I could totally visualize Megan as a forest ranger. I hoped Nevada Barr was that kind of influence on her.

I moved to her bedroom, where Megan kept her addiction recovery books. Nothing in them beyond notebook paper on which she had written what looked like affirmations and a few thoughts. I was glad to see that the books looked like they got a lot of use. I finished in the bedroom and went back to the computer. Had I missed something in her files?

An hour later, I was stumped. I had gone through all of her files again. Maybe Cody and Roy wanted the photos. That seemed logical. But there wasn’t anything that would get them arrested in those photos, which were all fairly benign. I looked through the two drawers of Megan’s computer desk. I had already checked all the CDs but I decided I’d check them again.

Ten CDs later, I sat back, glaring at the screen.

What was I missing? The CDs were just back-ups of files on her hard drive. I opened the drawer to put the disks back. A folded manila envelope rested on the bottom. The CDs had been sitting on top of it and it hadn’t registered with me earlier. I took it out and knew immediately there was a CD in it from the way it felt in my hand. The envelope was sealed and addressed to Cody. No return address but the postmark date was July 8, after Megan had left. Did Cody hide it here?

I opened it carefully with my pocketknife and pulled the case out so I could remove the disk. I inserted it into the CD drive and clicked the mouse through the steps to open it. The only thing on this was one file—a photo. I clicked on it and waited for the appropriate software to open it. As it took shape, I felt my stomach clench. It was a picture of John Talbot’s body lying in the parking lot. The angle was different than the photo that Mark had shown me at the station. Raymond Watkins stood over Talbot, looking down at him with a smirk. Cody stood to Raymond’s right, glaring at whoever was taking the picture.

“Oh, my God,” I said softly. I shouldn’t e-mail this to anyone. I had to take it to Mark right away, so it could be admitted to evidence. Plus, I really didn’t want anything like this traceable to my e-mail address. Should I copy it? Fuck. Then it’d be on Megan’s computer and that might look incriminating.

Better to just get the damn thing to Mark. I ejected the disk and put it back in its case before sliding it into the envelope, figuring that my fingerprints were all over it anyway. I quickly shut everything down and checked to make sure I had Mark’s card. A gallon-sized plastic Ziploc bag I found in one of Megan’s kitchen drawers worked for an envelope once I folded it over. No sense getting any more fingerprints on it.

Halfway down the walk to my car, I remembered that Sage’s house was open and I turned around so that I could retrieve the key from inside and lock up. The key sat on the counter, like she said, next to a plate covered with plastic wrap. A note rested next to the plate. “Banana bread. Come on, bachelor. Have a slice.”

I smiled and lifted the plastic wrap for a piece and took a bite. “Oh, my God.” It was the best I had ever tasted. I carefully re-wrapped it and glanced at my watch. One-thirty. I found a pen on the kitchen counter next to a phone and wrote on the piece of paper, “Thanks! Freakin’ DEE-LISH-US!” I placed a copy of the key to Megan’s on the piece of paper and wrote right next to it, “Just in case.”

I locked up then headed to the next block to retrieve my car, which was only a couple blocks from Carlisle, a main drag that cuts north-south through the heart of Nob Hill. On the way to the police station, I called Mark and left a message telling him that I was on my way with a photo on a CD I’d found at Megan’s that pertained to the Talbot case.

When I got to the station, the receptionist said that Mark wasn’t in and was there something she could do? I left the envelope with her after writing a long note explaining the circumstances in which I’d found it and admitting that my fingerprints were thus all over it. I told him to call me for further information. I was hesitant to leave it with the receptionist, but it was a police station, after all. From the car, I called Chris and left a message telling her I’d found a photo at Megan’s and she needed to check in with Mark.

Then I called Melissa. Geez, nobody was answering their phones. I left a message with her as well, telling her to call me.

Two-thirty. I got back into my car and re-traced my route to Carlisle. An American Furniture store dominated the parking lot on the corner of Menaul, a major east-west route, and Carlisle. I turned left before the store into the shopping center and parked.

The afternoon heat scraped against my skin as I walked toward Cost Plus Imports. Sculptures made out of rebar and car parts decorated a small grassy area in front, one a dinosaur or maybe a dragon and another a crane. I entered the store, trying really hard not to think about the fact that I found that picture in Megan’s house. I hoped to God she didn’t know what had been in that envelope.

I headed directly to the wine section and selected a dry sweet rosé from New Mexico’s Blue Teal Vineyard, located in the Mesilla Valley near the Mexican border, and a darker red called Coyote, from Black Mesa, a northern vineyard near Taos. The Blue Teal needed to be chilled, but the Black Mesa was better at room temperature. I knew I was on autopilot, trying to do little stupid shit to keep myself on track, keep myself focused on here and now. There was nothing I could do about John Talbot or the picture.

I’d done what I was supposed to. So why did I feel so damn helpless?

On my way back to Megan’s I stopped at a gas station and called Cody’s number from the pay phone. Four rings and voice-mail again. I hung up.

Fuck this. Time for a disposable cell phone so I could actually leave him a message and get something going here with him. Maybe since Megan knew I was in town, she’d take the opportunity to bail on him if I could get him away long enough. I clenched my teeth and hoped Mark would call soon. Gripped by a sudden weird urge, I steered west again toward Old Town and the gallery where Sage’s work was on display. I wanted to not think about Megan for a while longer.

I parked just off the Plaza, on Romero and walked a half-block to the main square. I walked another block to Amapola Gallery. An electronic sensor beeped as I entered. Loads of art graced every conceivable space. Gallery personnel had added display cases for smaller objects, including jewelry.

Everything was arranged nicely so traffic could flow easily around objects. A man behind the counter near the back wall looked up. I guessed he was Navajo.

“Hi,” he said. “Looking for anything in particular?”

He spoke in a pleasant baritone.

“Actually, yes.” I approached the counter. “Sage Crandall’s work. She’s—”

“Right over here,” he replied, grinning. He came around the counter and crossed the room to a series of framed photographs on the wall. His cowboy boots thudded heavily on the wooden floor. He wore jeans and a red button-down shirt. The design on his bolo tie struck me as Puebloan. He gestured at the wall.

Ten photographs, all landscape shots. Four looked as if she’d taken them in Central America. Two of those were marked “sold.” Chaco Canyon’s Pueblo Bonito at sunrise and sunset graced two more, both sold.

Two others depicted the Great Stupa in Sanchi, India.

One was marked “sold.” But the last two were the ones that really caught my eye.

Slot canyons, probably in Utah. She’d been in these canyons and I wondered how she’d managed to bring her gear with her. Both photos captured the undulating but immutable nature of the narrow walls, splotched white and sandstone red. Soft sunlight filtered down through an opening high above the canyon floors. Sage had managed to capture a pictograph in each image. In one, the design looked like an animal of some sort. She had framed it in the lower left. In the other, the pictograph looked more like a human. It was about midway up, on the right.