Peter had hoped to stop by the house long enough to upload the photos and clear his camera’s memory stick, but he had to stay focused. He was well aware that groggy doctors make mistakes, so he swilled coffee and tried to keep his mind on the job. Tomorrow, after he’d gotten some sleep, he would have plenty of time to treat himself to a victory lap on another job well done. Morgan Forester was dead, and her asshole of a husband would go to prison for it. What could be better than that?
The blue Ford 500 pulled into Bobby Salazar’s lane at the car return facility ten minutes before his shift was due to end. Bobby knew he needed to leave right on time-at four. Otherwise, depending on traffic, he might late for his five P.M. biology class at Phoenix Community College. There was a big exam scheduled for that night. Chasing after an A in the class, he couldn’t afford to be late.
With that in mind and hoping this rental return wouldn’t be a problem, he approached the vehicle, handheld card scanner in hand.
“How’s it going?” Bobby asked.
The driver was a middle-aged Anglo wearing mirrored sunglasses, a Diamondback baseball cap, running shoes, an ASU tracksuit, and a pair of leather driving gloves. Over time Bobby had come to have a very low opinion of people who wore driving gloves. They were usually arrogant and unpleasant, and this one fit that bill to a T. He didn’t bother acknowledging Bobby’s greeting. Wordlessly, he handed over his rental agreement and then got out and opened the back door, where he extracted a briefcase.
Used to being treated as a nonentity, Bobby leaned into the driver’s seat to verify both the odometer reading and amount of gas left in the tank. By the time Bobby popped the trunk, the driver was already moving away, walking briskly toward the shuttle buses that would return him to the terminal.
“Don’t you want a receipt?” Bobby called after him.
Shaking his head, the man didn’t reply. He just kept on walking. The scanner printed out the unwanted receipt automatically, and Bobby stuffed it into his pocket.
“Have a nice day, Mr. Morrison,” Bobby called. No matter how rude the customers might be, company training dictated that they should always be addressed by name. If Morrison heard him, there was no response.
“Screw you, too,” Bobby muttered under his breath. He turned back to the car and checked the trunk, certain that Mr. Morrison had forgotten to collect his luggage. Except for an array of day-old newspapers, the trunk was completely empty. That struck Bobby as odd. Briefcase-only guys usually wore the other kind of suits. Most of the time guys in sweats or running suits came complete with mountains of luggage and mounds of golf clubs, to say nothing of short-tempered wives and screaming kids.
Shrugging, Bobby returned to open first the driver’s door and then the passenger door, continuing the routine check to be sure nothing had been inadvertently left behind. He found sand and gravel on the driver’s-side floorboard. On the passenger-side floorboard carpet, he found a small rust-colored stain, smudged in a fashion that made it look as though some attempt had been made to clean it up.
Of all the attendants on the lot that afternoon, Bobby Salazar was uniquely qualified to recognize the ill-concealed stain for what it was-blood. He had seen bloody carpet before, and he had tried to clean it up with a similar lack of success.
One of his ex-roommates, Kiki Rodriguez, had been home alone when he had gotten bombed out of his gourd on Ever-clear. Nobody ever knew, because Kiki couldn’t remember and couldn’t tell them exactly how he had broken the glass that cut his hand so badly. What was clear was that he had wandered aimlessly around the apartment, bleeding like a stuck pig and leaving a trail of blood everywhere, before he finally passed out on the couch. Bobby had been the one who came home and found him there. He had called 911. The EMTs had taken Kiki off to the ER, leaving Bobby to deal with both the cops and the bloody carpet. He wasn’t sure which had taken longer, answering the cops’ questions or trying to get the damned blood out of the carpet. He had tried everything, including calling in a professional carpet cleaner, but when he had moved out of the apartment two months later, the stains had still been visible enough that Bobby had lost his security deposit.
Concerned, Bobby got out of the car and gave the rest of the front seat a thorough examination. There was no visible blood anywhere else-not on the seat or the steering wheel or the door handle. The stains were on the floorboard and nowhere else. The guy had obviously walked in it. What if he hit something? Bobby wondered. A deer, maybe. Or a dog. Please, God, not a person!
Bobby walked to the front of the vehicle and studied the bumper, looking for damage. He was relieved when he found nothing-no dents, no dings, no sign of a collision with anything, living or dead.
Two more renters had pulled into Bobby’s lane. Their luggage was already unloaded, and they were waiting impatiently for him to come check them in as well. He knew if he mentioned the presence of blood in the vehicle to one of his supervisors, there would be hell to pay. Questions would be asked. Forms would need to be filled out and filed. More than likely, Bobby would be late for class. Not only that, if he took that long with one vehicle, the guys who tracked productivity would no doubt give Bobby a black mark for slowing down the return process. You were supposed to check in so many customers per hour-or else.
Waving to one of the drivers, Bobby sent the Ford off to be washed, then turned and approached the next waiting customer. “How’s it going?” he said. “Hope you had a good trip.”
Late in the afternoon, Ali drove back to the Andante Drive mobile home, which had been left to her by her mother’s twin sister, Evie. Permanently set on a concrete footing that had been carved into the steep hillside, the place boasted a very un-mobile-homelike basement that included Christopher’s studio and Ali’s late second husband’s extensive wine collection.
Ali had lived there for the better part of a year and a half, most of that time with her son as her roommate. She hoped that by the time she finished the remodel and moved on to Arabella’s house, Chris would have married his steady girlfriend, Athena, and Ali would be able to pass the mobile home along to them. Both Chris and Athena were public high school teachers whose low salaries wouldn’t stretch very far in Sedona’s stratospheric real estate market. Not having to buy a home of their own would give them a big leg up in starting married life together. Ali liked the idea that Aunt Evie’s legacy to her would stay in the family.
Ali had never been a particularly capable cook, and she knew that what she brought home from Basha’s deli section wouldn’t be nearly as delectable as whatever Leland Brooks might have “thrown together.” She had suggested hosting the Thanksgiving festivities primarily because she knew she would have him there to backstop her. For this Monday-evening dinner, she had raided Basha’s deli counter for some enchilada casserole and a selection of salads and veggies.
When Ali walked in the door, Sam, her impossibly ugly sixteen-pound, one-eared, one-eyed tabby cat, trotted to the door to greet her, complaining at the top of her lungs that she was starving. Since Chris’s Prius was already parked outside, Ali knew the cat was lying. For a time, her adopted kitty’s weight had mysteriously edged up. It was only when the vet complained about the weight gain that Ali discovered that Sam had routinely cadged two evening meals by pretending she hadn’t been fed. Once Ali and Chris had realized they were being suckered, they hatched the plan that whoever came home first fed Sam, no matter what the cat said to the contrary.