“Oh, really?” Joanna snorted. “What’s it”
“You.”
“Me?” Joanna echoed. “Are you kidding?”
“Nobody’s kidding, Joanna. And he’s not the only one who’s mentioned it, either.”
Joanna Brady shook her head. “Oh, no,” she said. “Absolutely not. Not me.”
“It’s going to take a complete outsider to straighten up this mess, Joanna,” Marianne said. “Someone who has nothing to gain by taking on the job.”
“I’ve already got a job,” Joanna reminded her.
“That’s funny,” Marianne replied. “It turns that Milo Davis was one of the ones I heard talking about it over coffee this morning.”
“Do we have to discuss this now?” Joanna asked.
Marianne shook her head. “no, I stopped by to pick up Andy’s clothes if they’re ready.”
Joanna nodded. “They’re in the bedroom, laid out on the bed.”
Jenny picked that precise moment to come dashing into the kitchen, trailed by the two dogs. Within minutes a carload of women from the church arrived with the beginnings of what would be several days’ worth of casserole meals. Just when it seemed as though Joanna’s home had turned into a complete circus, a silver-grey Taurus with government plates drove into the yard.
Not wanting to talk to Adam York in front of her other guests, Joanna hurried out to meet him. “What are you doing here?” she asked.
“I came to invite you to the unveiling.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Your friends, Bobo Jenkins and Angie Kellogg, just went up to the hotel to pick up that book. I wanted you to be there when they brought it back so you’d be able to see with your own eyes that I’m not in it.”
Joanna looked at him steadily. He met her gaze without faltering. “I really am a good guy, Joanna, and from what I’ve learned around town, I’ve pretty much figured out that you are too.”
“I’ll go tell Jenny that I’m leaving,” Joanna said.
The Taurus sped down High Lonesome Road. “Is that where it happened?” Adam York asked, nodding at the wash beneath the bridge.
Joanna nodded stonily.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s a terrible, terrible thing.”
“Thank you,” Joanna murmured.
They drove for a while in silence. “I’ve been thinking about Angie Kellogg,” Adam York said at last. “She wants to sell me that book of hers.”
“I know,” Joanna responded.
“But if I do that, I’ll have to go through channels and across desks. The book will end in an official inventory somewhere, Angie becomes an official witness, a paid informant, and the money she has in that damn beach bag of hers becomes part of an official investigation as well. Since it’s most likely drug cartel money, it would automatically be forfeit.”
“So?”
‘She came up with the idea on her own, and it seems like a good one. She gives me the book. and I don’t ask any questions about the money in her beach bag. The taxpayers aren’t out any money, and I have access to Tony Vargas’s clientele without anyone knowing I have it.”
“I’ll know,” Joanna said.
“Is that a threat?” York asked.
“You could call it that.”
“Listen, Joanna. There may very well be other crooked cops in that book, trusted officers in other jurisdictions, maybe even some in my own. This book, if it’s kept under wraps, may be our one chance to clean house.”
“And if you don’t use it to do just that, you’ll be hearing from me.”
York laughed. “According to the rumors around town, I may be hearing from you any-way.”
“What rumors are those?”
“I heard you’re running for sheriff.” “You heard wrong.”
“Oh,” he said.
A moment later Joanna asked, “Why are you telling me all this, about this under the table deal with Angie? Wouldn’t you be better off with it just between the two of you?”
“Because she won’t finalize the deal until you give the okay.”
“And I’m not okaying anything until I see for sure that your name’s not in that book.”
York laughed again. “You really are one stubborn woman, aren’t you, but believe me. My name’s not in there.”
They found Angie Kellogg with her foot still securely wrapped in bandages sitting on the tiny front porch of Bobo Jenkins’ home in Galena Townsites, one of Bisbee’s subdivisions. Galena was an area where look-alike homes had been built as company housing during Bisbee’s mining heyday. After the mine closures in the mid-seventies, the houses, previously rented to employees, had been sold off at rock-bottom prices.
Angie was wearing what was evidently a pair of Bobo Jenkins’ oversized sweats. The arms had been rolled up several times and the legs bagged out around her ankles like pantaloons. She was holding two books in her lap. One, black leather with gold-embossed letters on the front, looked like a date book of some kind. The other was the same shabby bird book Joanna had seen before. The well-thumbed field guide was open and Angie’s face was alight.
“Bobo actually has a hummingbird feeder, right here by the porch,” she said pointing. “Two of those cute little things were here just a couple of minutes ago. I’ve never been that close to hummingbirds. Have you?”
“Not that I remember,” Joanna said.
“Did Mr. York tell you about my offer?” Angie asked.
Joanna nodded.
“What do you think?”
“I told him you shouldn’t make up your mind until we checked to see if his name is in Tony’s book”
“It isn’t,” Angie Kellogg said. “I already looked.”
TWENTY-TWO
That evening, the visitation at the mortuary went on for hours. Joanna shook hands with what seemed like hundreds of people, all of whom came to express their condolences. It was a wary, reserved gathering. Everyone in town was still in shock over the revelations about Walter McFadden and Ken Galloway, and they were all leery about how many others of their law enforcement officers might be caught up in the dragnet.
Toward the end, when visitors were finally beginning to dwindle, a young woman breezed into the room, pushing a wizened, much older man in a wheelchair. The two of them came directly to Joanna.
“Hello,” said the woman, holding out her hand. “You must be Joanna. I’m Cora, Cora Hancock. This is my Uncle Henry, Henry Adkins. I can’t tell you how sorry we are. Andy was such a nice young man. I just don’t know when I’ve ever met anyone nicer.”
Cora, Joanna wondered as her heart skipped a beat. She had planned to call that phone number in Nevada eventually-someday much farther down the line when she would be better prepared for what she might hear. But she had deliberately put it off for a while, until she felt stronger, until the raw wounds from the last few days had begun to heal. She had not expected to confront Cora, who seemed to have a last name after all. Yet, here she was, on Joanna’s home turf-and with Andrew Brady not yet in his grave.
But Cora, with her bleached blonde hair and amazing makeup, looked every bit the fallen woman Sandra Henning had described, except for her laugh which was warm and irrepressible.
“When I heard the funeral was scheduled for Saturday, I told Uncle Henry that I didn’t know if I’d be able to get off, since weekends are always the busiest time at Harrahs. Have you ever been to Laughlin, Nevada, by the way?” she asked, pausing minutely for breath. “It’s just across the Colorado from Bullhead City.”
Joanna shook her head. “Anyway, the director got somebody to fill in for me, so I told Uncle Henry we could come, and here we are. It’s been a long drive, although not as long as it seemed the last time I made it.”
Again she paused for breath, but Joanna was too dumbstruck to say a word. “That reminds me, did Andy get you that ring he was going to?”
Joanna held out her hand and finally found a way to speak. “This? He told you about my ring?”