“Absolutely.”
Joanna sighed. Obviously Bobo Jenkins’s visit hadn’t altered Dee Canfield’s intentions, but at least Joanna had been there to prevent any physical violence.
“All right, then,” she said. “Mind if I take a look around before I go?”
“Go ahead,” Dee said. “Help yourself.”
Joanna spent the next few minutes wandering through the gallery. The lovingly rendered subjects – a young girl shooting baskets, an old man sharpening his knife, a minister leaning down to speak to a young parishioner – were most likely the same living and breathing people who, by now, would be reeling from the terrible news that Rochelle Baxter was dead. Joanna noticed that the paintings in the first two rooms were priced from $850 to $1,000. In the room where Warren was hard at work, they were triple that. Bobo’s accusation of her being “money-grubbing” wasn’t wrong.
Shaking her head, Joanna returned to the front desk, where Dee Canfield was on the phone. Without saying a word, Joanna let herself out the door. She and her Civvie caught up with Bobo Jenkins halfway through town.
“Hey, Bobo,” she called. “That looks heavy. Care for a lift?”
He glared at her briefly, then shrugged his broad shoulders and headed for the car. Between them, they carefully loaded the painting into the Civvie’s backseat, then he climbed in the front next to her.
“Thanks,” he muttered gruffly. “Appreciate it.”
He sat in brooding silence until they started up O.K. Street. “Dee’s still going through with it, isn’t she – the opening and raising the prices?”
“Yes,” Joanna replied.
Bobo slumped deeper into the seat. “Damn!” he said. “What about Shelley’s family? Have you found them yet?”
“Not so far. We’re working on it.”
“Once Dee sells the paintings, Shelley’s family will never be able to afford to buy them back.”
“Probably not,” Joanna agreed. “But you tried, Bobo. You did your best.”
He shook his head. “Not good enough.”
Joanna stopped the car halfway down Youngblood Hill, right in front of the gate and the steep stairway that led to Bobo’s house. For the better part of a minute he made no move to exit the car. The depth of his misery was palpable, and Joanna’s heart ached for him.
“I’m sorry about all this, Bobo,” she said at last. “I can see Shelley meant a lot to you.”
He chewed his lip, nodding but saying nothing.
“And I’m sorry to burden you further,” she added. “But we’re going to need your cooperation.”
“What kind?”
“We’ll want you to stop by the department and give us a set of prints. Detective Carbajal is tied up right now. As soon as he’s free, he’ll need to ask you a few questions.”
“You need my fingerprints? Why? I thought you said Shelley was sick.”
“She was sick,” Joanna agreed. “But the medical examiner has labeled her death as suspicious.”
“You’re saying someone killed her?” Bobo asked incredulously. “Who would have done such a thing? And why?”
“I can’t answer those questions, either,” Joanna said. “Not yet. We’re working on it, but it’s very early in the process. Investigations take time.”
“But you want my prints. Am I a suspect?”
“Not at all. Yours will be elimination prints. We print everyone who was known to have been at the crime scene prior to the event. That way we can sort prints that belong from those that don’t. From what you’ve told me, you may have been the last person to see Shelley alive.”
Bobo Jenkins nodded morosely. “I see,” he said. “Do I need to do that right away – the fingerprinting?”
“As soon as possible,” Joanna told him. “Time is always important, but you’ll need to call the department before you come by and make sure Casey Ledford is there. She’s our latent fingerprint tech. The last I heard, she was still at the crime scene. And Detective Carbajal is busy at the moment, too. I’m sure he’ll contact you once he’s free.”
“Crime scene.” Bobo repeated the words and then took a deep breath. “Detectives. I can’t believe all this is happening. I can’t believe Shelley was murdered.”
“Bobo, we don’t know that for sure, either,” Joanna reminded him patiently. “At this time, her death is regarded as suspicious. For all I know, it could have been a suicide.”
“No,” Bobo Jenkins declared. “Absolutely not! Whatever killed Shelley, it sure as hell wasn’t suicide!”
With that, he opened the car door, got out, and slammed it shut again. Joanna unlocked the back door. Then she exited the car, too, and helped him retrieve his painting.
“It’s a very good likeness,” she said, once he was holding it upright so she could see it clearly. “Your Shelley must have been a very talented woman, and very special, too.”
As Bobo Jenkins looked down at the painting, his eyes filled with tears. He wiped them away with one end of the grubby towel that still dangled, unheeded, around his neck.
“Thank you for telling me about this, Joanna,” he said quietly. “For coming in person, I mean,” he added. “You’re the boss. It would have been easy to send someone else instead of doing it yourself.”
Joanna nodded. “You’re welcome,” she said.
“And thanks for following me down to the gallery, too,” he continued. “I was so pissed off when I went down there that I might have done something stupid. I could have hurt somebody.”
Joanna looked up at him and smiled reassuringly. “No, Bobo,” she said. “I don’t think you would have. But for whatever it’s worth, I think you’re right about the paintings. There’s no question – they shouldn’t be sold. They should all go to Shelley’s family. Deidre Canfield is dead wrong on this one.”
“Thanks for that, too,” he said.
Carefully holding the painting in front of him, he angled his way through the gate and started up the stairs. Behind Joanna a horn honked impatiently. She jumped back into the Civvie and hurriedly moved it out of the way of the vehicle she’d been blocking.
It was a tough way to start the day, considering she still hadn’t had her morning briefing or a second cup of coffee.
STANDING IN THE WARM LATE-MORNING SUN with the heavy pay phone receiver held to one ear, the man waited impatiently for his call to be put through. The receptionist had accepted the charges, so it wasn’t a matter of money. Still, he didn’t have all day.
Finally someone picked up at the other end. “Good,” he said when he heard the voice. “It’s you. You’ll be happy to know it’s done. She’s dead. All you have to do now is send money.”
Four
BY THE TIME JOANNA ARRIVED at the Justice Center and let herself in through her private back-door entrance, it was almost eleven o’clock. As usual, her office was a mess. The wooden surface of her desk was barely visible under stacks of neglected files and paper.
Organizing the Fallen Officer portion of Yolanda Cañedo’s funeral had taken far more of Joanna’s personal time and effort than she had expected. She and Frank Montoya had shared the responsibilities. All essential law enforcement work had been handled, but some of the more routine matters had been allowed to slide. Now, though, as Joanna dug into the paperwork on her desk, she discovered items that had been routine on Monday. By Thursday they had moved to the “urgent” column.
Wanting to have some quiet time to attack the daunting backlog of paper, Joanna set to work without bothering to announce her presence to anyone, not even to Kristin Gregovich, her secretary in the outside office. Twenty minutes later, as Joanna whaled away at the mess, Kristin came into her office to deliver yet another batch of paperwork. Startled to find Joanna seated at her desk, Kristin almost dropped what she was carrying.
“You scared me to death!” she exclaimed. “Why didn’t you tell me you were here?”