Exit Wounds - J. A. Jance [78]
The woman, two or three inches taller than Joanna, was pushing forty and good-looking. Her hair was pulled back in a long smooth ponytail. She wore dangling silver-and-turquoise earrings. Silver rings, heavy with chunks of turquoise, decorated several of her fingers. She was dressed far more casually than the man in what looked like freshly pressed Levi’s topped by a cowboy shirt and a Western-cut jacket. She might have been modeling Western attire if it hadn’t been for her boots. Unlike the man’s highly polished snakeskin footwear, the woman’s worn Judson’s bore the dusty sheen and telltale marks of someone accustomed to working in barns and corrals and dealing with the business end of horses and cattle.
Randy Trotter stood to greet the new arrivals. “You must be Mr. Ortega,” he said, holding out his hand. “It’s very good of you to come all this way on such short notice. And this is Sheriff Joanna Brady,” he added, gesturing in Joanna’s direction. “She’s from Cochise County, Arizona, our neighboring county to the west.”
Mr. Ortega shook hands first with Sheriff Trotter and then with Joanna. “Glad to meet you,” Diego Ortega said gravely.
Randy Trotter continued with the introductions. “And this is Detective Cruikshank, Sheriff Brady.”
Until that moment, it hadn’t occurred to Joanna that Detective Johnny Cruikshank was a woman rather than a man. The two women sized each other up briefly. Then, after nodding in Joanna’s direction, Detective Cruikshank retreated into the other room and returned pushing two additional desk chairs in front of her.
“We won’t be able to get into the morgue for another half hour,” she explained. “Dr. Lawrence didn’t want to pay any more overtime than absolutely necessary. He told me not to call Bobby Lopez to let us in until after Mr. Ortega was here.”
“Is Bobby on his way?” Sheriff Trotter asked.
Johnny nodded. “Yes, but he’s out at the ranch. He says it’ll take him that long to get here.”
“Thanks for bringing the chairs, then,” Randy said to his detective. “I guess we should all take a load off.”
“It was very kind of you to send Miss Cruikshank to pick me up,” Diego Ortega said, settling himself onto one of the two rolling chairs and carefully easing the knees of his trousers so as to avoid bagging them and spoiling the crease.
“Under the circumstances, it’s the least we can do,” Trotter returned.
“My coming was an absolute necessity,” Diego Ortega replied with a grim smile. “Otherwise, my mother would have killed me. Carmen’s her baby—the youngest. And yesterday was Mom’s birthday. Carmen travels a lot. At times Mama may not hear from her for weeks on end, but when it came to birthdays, no matter where she was, Carmen was always the first to call, usually first thing in the morning.
“By noon yesterday, when Carmen still hadn’t called, Mama was worried. By six o’clock last night she was frantic and on the phone to my brother, Carlos, who happens to be a lieutenant with the LAPD. He’s the one who entered the missing-persons report. Even though it was a holiday, someone from LAPD got through to Fandango Productions. They told us Carmen and Pamela were in Arizona. They also said Carmen and Pamela were expecting to interview Carol Mossman—”
“Who’s also been murdered,” Joanna put in.
Diego Ortega nodded. “So I’ve been told,” he replied. “Once we knew Carol Mossman was dead, it was the weapon connection Sheriff Trotter told me about that brought me here. I told Mama I’d fly out today and make sure, one way or the other. I think not knowing is harder on her than knowing will be. And since I fly my own plane, I didn’t have to mess around with airline schedules. Flying into someplace this small…”
Joanna knew that Lordsburg, New Mexico, like Bisbee, Arizona, was a long way off the map for any regularly scheduled flights. The two cities’ tiny municipal airports were good for little else than serving as bases of operations for local general aviation enthusiasts.
“Tell me about Fandango Productions,” Joanna said.
Diego Ortega studied Joanna appraisingly.