The Killing Tide, page 6
“Can you think of anyone in particular?”
“I don’t know,” Carmen said and let out a little sigh, the first sign of emotion in this burnt-out woman. “He sat on the bench for so long. Many of the people he put in jail must be out by now.”
“Has anyone threatened him?”
“A few times over the years. No one recently.”
Sheriff Tyson cut in. “I sat down with Antonio’s assistant and wrote up a list of names of criminals who threatened him. Oh, and there was also the egg throwing incident.”
“What was that?” Stuart asked.
“A couple of years ago, Antonio had to let a local killer off for lack of evidence. This hitchhiker had been spotted close to the scene of a local girl who had been strangled. I arrested him. Searched him and found nothing of the girl’s in his possession. He did have a big wad of cash, though. The girl had just cashed a check and was known to be carrying a large amount of cash that had been stolen off the body. That was enough for him to go to trial. A few witnesses came forward, but the public defender poked holes in all their stories. It was a typical case of people believing what they wanted to believe.”
“So Judge Rodriguez let him go?” Alexa asked.
Sheriff Tyson nodded. “I think it was the right decision. I think that guy stole the money from somewhere, he was a drifter, but there was no evidence he got it from her. He claimed to have won the money gambling. I grilled him pretty hard and he held up to all of it. My gut said he wasn’t our man and the CSI boys couldn’t find anything linking him to the crime scene. I’d bet a thousand dollars he was innocent.”
“But the public didn’t see it that way,” Stuart said.
Carmen Rodriguez turned from making the coffee. “Jed Fisher led a mob here to protest. Threw eggs at the house. There must have been a dozen people outside. Hank came and cleared them out, gave them all a fine.”
The sheriff nodded. “Also gave him a warning for dragging the judge’s name through the mud on social media. That quieted him some.”
“Has he ever had a run-in with Judge Warburton in Phoenix?”
“No. But I heard his cousin just got locked up in Phoenix for drunk and disorderly. Might have been that judge. I can’t recall.”
I know what my bet is on.
“Have you spoken to Mr. Fisher?” Alexa asked.
“No. I was waiting for the two of you. I figure three of us from three different agencies will put the scare in him. We’ll go down to the San Pedro Café in a minute and talk to him.”
“You know he’s there?” Alexa asked.
The sheriff snorted. “He’s always there, drinking coffee in the mornings and beer in the afternoons. Then he goes to the roadhouse and drinks whiskey. That man hasn’t worked a day in his life, unless causing trouble counts as work.”
Carmen served the coffee.
“Thank you for the coffee, ma’am,” Stuart said, “but I think we should be going to get this Jed character.”
“Don’t worry about him,” the sheriff replied. “He’s too lazy to leave town, and my deputy reported he was at his usual stool not half an hour ago.”
Alexa was itching to go too, but they were on the sheriff’s territory.
Always listen to the local law, especially if they’ve been working the job a while and are from the community, Powers told her once. They’ll know the area better than anyone.
“We should probably go check,” Stuart said. Then turned to the widow. “Sorry you had to make coffee for nothing, ma’am, but this case is very urgent.”
“I understand.” Carmen went to a side table and pulled out three plastic cups. She poured their coffees into them.
“I don’t want you to go emptyhanded,” she said. “Are you sure you don’t want any cake?”
Stuart looked abashed. “No, thank you ma’am. We’ll need to go now.”
They gave their condolences to the widow at the door. When she closed it, Alexa had the impression of a tomb being sealed.
As they walked to the cars, Stuart said in a low voice, “She shouldn’t be staying there. She’s messing up a crime scene. Bad for her mental health too.”
The sheriff cocked an eyebrow. “Why don’t you go back and tell her that?”
Stuart gave a little shrug and looked away.
They pulled out of the parking lot and followed the sheriff’s car back downtown.
“I’ll take us to the next street over so we can park without Jed seeing us,” Sheriff Tyson told them over the police radio.
They parked on a dusty street lined with a dollar store, a laundromat, and several boarded up shops. Then they circled around the block on foot and came to the San Pedro Café. To the east, both streets ended after about a hundred yards at the banks of the river, marked by a screen of trees and vegetation. The bridge spanning it was a couple of blocks away.
It was a long cafeteria in the old style, with windows going along the front giving a view inside of a long counter, a row of stools upholstered with faded red leather, and several booths. Behind the counter was a soda machine, a large refrigerator for beer, and a grill where a stocky woman was making hamburgers. Two men, one small and the other husky, sat together at the counter with their backs to the window. An old man in a John Deere hat sipped his coffee cup alone in a booth. Two teenagers lounged in another booth, laughing loudly enough to be heard through the glass.
“Jed Fisher is the smaller man at the counter,” the sheriff said. “Let me talk to him.”
As they got to the glass door, one of the teenagers elbowed his friend. They turned to stare at the sheriff and his two companions.
When the teen belted out a laugh and spoke, they heard it clearly.
“Aw, Jed, you’re in for it now!”
Jed turned around, showing a grizzled face and wide eyes under the brim of a Phoenix Suns cap. He leapt off the stool and ran for a back hallway next to the counter.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Stuart rushed through the door after Jed Fisher. Over the cackling of the teenagers, he heard the sheriff shout, “I’ll circle around and cut him off!” He didn’t know if Alexa followed him or the sheriff; he was too busy chasing this hayseed.
He blew past the hefty man Jed had been sitting with, who didn’t move an inch, only watched, and ducked into the back hallway into which Jed had disappeared. As he suspected, past a men’s and women’s bathrooms was another door at the back wall of the café. Jed wrenched it open and darted out before Stuart could stop him.
They ended up in a narrow alley, the heat from the noonday sun feeling even worse after briefly being in an airconditioned interior. Jed bolted down a dusty alley past the blank backs of a couple of buildings with faded yellow paint, then hooked a right. Stuart followed, only a few paces behind him.
The FBI agent rounded the corner, taking a longer route in case Jed spun around and tried to jump him.
But the guy was still running.
Damn fast for someone who sits on a barstool all day.
“FBI! Stop and put your hands up!” Stuart shouted.
Jed ignored him, taking a left onto the street where Stuart and the sheriff had just parked. Stuart picked up speed, sweat breaking out on his skin.
Damn. It’s as hot as Iraq out here! I should have asked for a posting in Maine or someplace. At least I’m not wearing a helmet and Kevlar.
Hope I don’t need them for this guy.
Stuart thought of pulling his gun but didn’t want to slow his rhythm. He was beginning to gain on the suspect.
A brief glance over his shoulder showed Alexa coming out of the alley, and the sheriff just rounding the far corner of the building.
Good job cutting him off, sheriff. You should have brought your horse.
Stuart faced forward and concentrated on reducing the distance between him and Jed Fisher. It looked like the guy was headed for that line of trees and bushes. Maybe he thought he could lose him there. Maybe he could.
Catch him now so you don’t have to find out.
They passed the laundromat, where an elderly Hispanic woman stared openmouthed at them through the grubby window, and right by a lone man in a cowboy hat who stood, hands in pockets, watching them with no apparent interest. Stuart half expected him to spit tobacco juice on Stuart’s dress shoes.
He was almost on Jed now. The trees were just a few yards ahead. Jed took a quick glance over his shoulder and put a hand in his pocket.
Stuart immediately stopped and got to one knee, pulling out his gun in a single fluid motion.
“Hands up!”
But Jed wasn’t going for a gun, and he wasn’t stopping. He threw something into the underbrush as he entered the vegetation. Stuart had a glimpse of a small plastic bag.
Stuart leapt up and rushed after, holstering his pistol. This guy wasn’t armed, and it was best not to be carrying a gun in your hand when you tackled someone. The gun could go off or, even worse, they might decide to fight you for it.
Instead he’d pummel this guy into submission.
He had to catch him first. Panting, sweat pouring down his face now and stinging his eyes, Stuart entered the cool shade of the low trees, desert grass swishing against his legs.
Just a few yards ahead, Jed hurried down the embankment of the San Pedro River.
As Stuart reached the edge of the rocky, sandy slope, he saw Jed a few feet below, cartwheeling his arms to stay upright as he ran down the steep incline toward the dry riverbank of sand and windblown trash.
Stuart launched himself in the air, reaching his arms wide and hitting the suspect with a football tackle from behind. His arms went around Jed’s middle, and together they rolled down the slope, Stuart timing it perfectly so that when they reached the bottom, Jed was beneath him, face down in an old empty supersized bag of potato chips.
Spitting out some sand and blinking the sweat from his eyes, Stuart pinned him with a knee to the small of his back, pulled out a pair of cuffs, and got Jed’s hands behind his back.
The perp managed to raise his face out of the old wrapper.
“You’ll never take me alive, you son of a bitch!”
“I just did,” Stuart gasped. He wanted to add something witty and cutting, but he was too tired to think of anything.
Stuart stood, wiped his brow with the back of his sleeve, which only stained his suit and put more sand on his face, then pulled Jed up onto his feet.
“You run pretty good for a cop,” Jed grumbled.
“College football. You?”
“Track and field in high school. I’d have beat you if I wasn’t hung over.”
“Whatever. Let’s go.”
“You scuffed them pretty shoes, city boy,” Jed said.
“Never mind that. We got some questions for you.”
They worked their way up the slope. Alexa and the sheriff appeared at the top.
“Nice of you to join us,” Stuart said. “He threw a little plastic bag into the underbrush.”
“I’ll bet you ten dollars I know what’s in it,” Sheriff Tyson said.
“I’m not taking that bet,” Stuart huffed. “God, it’s hot.”
The sheriff went off to search the underbrush as Alexa came up to him.
“You all right?”
“Still one of the greatest linesmen ever to graduate from Penn State.”
Alexa turned to Jed. “You know why we wanted you?”
“I don’t know nothing, and I didn’t do nothing.”
“Anything,” Stuart corrected. “You didn’t do anything.”
“That’s what I said. I didn’t do nothing.”
Stuart sighed. “Never mind.”
Stuart handed Jed over to Alexa and started dusting off his suit.
I wonder if I can put the dry cleaning on expenses?
“Bingo!” Sheriff Tyson called, standing up amid a clump of tall grass and holding a baggie up high.
“Aw, crap,” Jed muttered.
The sheriff strolled over. Stuart could see it was filled with small white crystals.
“Well, well, well, a nice little haul of crystal meth,” the sheriff said. “Don’t you know this junk is bad for your teeth?”
“That ain’t mine,” Jed said.
“Yes it is,” all three officers said at the same time.
The sheriff read him his rights and they headed back to the café.
“Why did those kids warn you?” Stuart asked.
Jed said nothing.
“You know them?” Stuart asked the sheriff.
“I do. We’ll have a word.”
“They’ll be long gone.”
“I don’t think so.”
The sheriff turned out to be right. As they came to the café, they saw the old man in the John Deere hat standing out front, holding both teens by the wrist. The kids looked downcast and nervous, even though they stood a foot taller and must have weighed at least 30 pounds more than the thin old man.
“Hey, Clyde. Looks like you gone fishing and caught two big ones,” the sheriff called, then turned to Stuart and Alexa. “Clyde’s the math teacher at the high school.”
“We didn’t do nothing!” one of the kids protested.
“Anything,” Clyde corrected.
In a voice that carried authority but wasn’t unkind, the sheriff said, “How about you two kids go back to your booth? I want to talk to Jed a minute. And don’t move a muscle or I’ll call your parents.”
“Yes, sir,” they muttered, and went back inside.
“Need me for anything more?” Clyde asked.
“Naw, that’s OK. Just think up some excuse to give them Saturday morning detention for the next four weeks.”
“Will do.” Clyde strolled off.
“If those kids have drugs on them, they’ll ditch them,” Stuart whispered.
“They don’t have drugs on them,” the sheriff said.
“But—”
The sheriff looked him in the eye. “They don’t have drugs on them.”
Stuart glanced through the window. The boys were back in the booth, sitting slumped and half out of sight, but not out of sight enough to hide the fact that one of them was reaching into his pants.
No point in chasing it if the local law wants to look the other way, Stuart thought. We got a murder to solve.
And maybe that math teacher can fix it better than the law.
Still, it nettled him. He tried to focus on the sheriff as he began to question Jed.
“So I know you heard about Judge Rodriguez.”
Jed paled. “Is that what this is about?”
Stuart studied him. Was this an act? Of course everyone always acted surprised when faced with charges, like kids caught by their teacher cheating on a test.
“Uh-huh. Now, you and him have a little history,” the sheriff said.
“I ain’t never been in his court in my life.”
“No, but you’ve been in courts in Tucson, Bisbee, and Alamogordo. And I wasn’t talking about that. I was talking about that little egg throwing incident a while back.”
Jed’s face turned red. “He let Diane’s murderer go free!”
“There was no evidence and you know it. You’ve been talking bad about the judge ever since.”
Jed shook his head. “I wouldn’t kill him. You know I didn’t like him but I’m no killer.”
The sheriff snorted. “Just a drug dealer and petty thief.”
And you sure got angry when the sheriff brought up that acquittal.
“A man’s got to live,” Jed protested.
Stuart rolled his eyes. He hated it when criminals used the poverty excuse. In his platoon he had men and women from the Appalachians and the Hood. They were born into poverty too, and took the Army as a way out of it. They made something of themselves.
At least the ones who came back.
“So where were you at around ten to midnight on the night of July 3?”
Jed thought for a moment. A mark in his favor in Stuart’s eyes. Suspects who were quick with their answers were the ones who already had something prepared. Ask a regular person that same question, and they always have to think.
The smart cons know that, though, and always playact.
“I was … wait, that was Saturday? Oh, I was playing cards with Ben Greenstone, Peter Andreson, and Ike Tallen.”
“A fine crowd of model citizens. If I ask them will they tell me you were there?”
“Of course they will,” he said, glancing through the window to look inside the café. “Oh, and I went to the AM / PM Minimart to pick up a twelve pack around midnight. We ran out.”
“So you had already been drinking and went to AM / PM to keep the party going?”
Jed’s eyes got shifty. “They were drinking.”
“Riiight. I know Georgine keeps the tapes for a whole week, so I’ll go have a looksee.”
“You do that.”
“Stay here with the feds while I go inside.”
Despite not being invited, Stuart joined him. After that chase, he needed some air conditioning.
The cold interior hit him like a plate glass wall. He shivered a little, grabbed some napkins from the counter, and started wiping his face and hands.
“Please don’t get sand on my floor,” the woman behind the counter said. “I just mopped.”
“Sorry,” Stuart said.
The teens scooted down lower in their booth. Sheriff Tyson ignored them and addressed the hefty man who had been sitting next to Jed.
“Hey, Ike. What were you doing on Saturday night?”
“Playing cards and drinking with Jed and a couple of others.”
“Did Jed leave at any time in the evening.”
“Yeah. We run out of beer and he went out to get more.”
“Do you know where?”
“No. I figure the AM / PM. It’s the closest to my place.”
“When did he leave?”
Ike shrugged.
“How long was he gone?”
“About twenty minutes. Yeah, so he must have gone to the AM / PM. The Circle K on the highway is too far for him to get back so quick.”
“Thanks, Ike.”
The woman behind the counter handed Stuart a glass of water, which he drained with a heartfelt thank you.
The sheriff and Stuart stepped a little apart.
