Ali thought about her meeting with Jasmine Wright. “Maybe,” Ali said. “That’s why we need to find out where they both were last Thursday night and exactly what they were doing.”

 

“I’m trying,” Andrea said determinedly. “Believe me, I’m trying.”

 

“So am I,” Ali said. “Chris figured out Reenie’s password. I’m about to log on and see what, if anything, I can find in her e-mail account. It bothers me, though. It seems disloyal to be prying into her private affairs.”

 

“I know,” Andrea agreed. “I felt the same way when I was going through her files last night. But if we don’t look, who will?”

 

“Who indeed?” Ali returned.

 

Minutes later, armed with Samantha as the password, a conflicted Ali Reynolds was scrolling through the e-mails Reenie Bernard had sent and received in the last seven days of her life. The account had been set up to keep sent and previously read e-mails for a maximum of fourteen days. Reenie had been dead for a week. That meant that a full week’s worth of correspondence had already been deleted from the files. It also meant that whatever information might have been gleaned from those messages had already been lost.

 

What remained intact was at once both mundane and surprising. Almost all the messages Reenie had sent dealt with the day-to-day realities of keeping the Flagstaff YW up and running. They concerned what was going on right then as well as in the future, when Reenie would no longer be in the picture. She had been in touch with several head-hunting agencies as well as with several other YWCA branches in search of someone who might be interested in taking over the helm in Flag. She had also sent out notes to any number of people—major donors most likely— telling them that her medical situation was changing rapidly and asking for their help in devising a suitable transition plan.

 

Reenie’s notes, brimming with bad news, were written, however, in a matter-of-fact tone and without any discernable trace of self-pity. There was nothing in them that bemoaned her own personal situation or her declining health. Instead, in the days leading up to her death, Reenie Bernard had been totally focused on keeping her beloved YWCA afloat.

 

Reading through the correspondence, Ali remembered what Ed Holzer had said about his elder daughter, that she was “a do-gooder to the end.” It was true.

 

Lots of incoming e-mails had arrived on that Thursday itself and in the days following Reenie’s disappearance before people knew she was gone and before she had been declared dead. Those, along with e-mails that had arrived since Monday, had all been opened and then saved as new—presumably by Detective Farris.

 

Who gave him the password? Reenie wondered. But then she remembered that Lee Farris was a detective after all. Surely he was every bit as smart as Chris and had figured out the Samantha bit all on his own.

 

Most were notes sent in reply to Reenie’s earlier communications. In them people expressed their shock and dismay about what was happening and asked what they could do to help.

 

Then, as she sat there, Ali was surprised to hear the distinctive click that announced the arrival of new mail. With Reenie dead for more than a week, Ali opened the e-mail more than half expecting it to be meaningless spam:

 

Dear Reenie,

 

As you suggested, I’ve been in touch with the US Postal authorities. They’re launching a fraud investigation of the way Rodriguez Medical Center does business. The people I spoke to aren’t very hopeful that we’ll ever be able to get back any of my mother’s money, but thanks so much for all your help. I’ll keep you posted. We’ve got to keep this from happening to anyone else.

 

Randy Tompkins

 

As the message sank in, Ali realized at once that she’d been wrong. She had supposed all along that Reenie had been going to opt for the high-priced treatment being offered in Mexico. Instead, she had ended up helping to expose it as exactly what Howie had thought it was—a rip-off. It meant that the unexplained trip to the bank Ali and Andrea had put so much store in counted for nothing. Dave Holman was probably right. Reenie had been busy establishing a banking presence somewhere else, somewhere apart from her joint accounts with Howie.

 

After switching over to her own e-mail for a moment, Ali retrieved Don Trilby’s address. She forwarded Randy’s note to him along with the following addition:

 

Dear Don,

 

I discovered the following e-mail among my friend Reenie’s files. You may want to be in touch with Mr. Tompkins yourself before you make any permanent decisions on the course of your treatment. I haven’t contacted Mr. Tompkins directly about this, but I suspect he’d be more than willing to discuss this with you.

 

My very best to you and your family, Alison Reynolds

 

Finished with that, Ali returned to Reenie’s mailbox where she glanced through Reenie’s Favorites list and found a number of the ALS support sites Ali herself had visited in the previous days.

 

A sharp knock on the door compelled Ali out of Reenie’s correspondence and back to the present. Samantha immediately abandoned her place on the couch in favor of a hiding place behind it.

 

“Danny’s here,” Chris announced, shouldering his backpack and picking up his single suitcase.

 

“Do you need help getting the Bronco down the hill?”

 

“No. Danny and I will caravan it down. I don’t know why Gramps is in such a hurry to get it back. After all, I don’t think he’s going to be driving for a while.”

 

Ali laughed. “He’s had that Bronco since I was a kid,” she said. “Driving or not, I’m sure he’s lost without it. What about your skis?” she asked.

 

“They’re down in the basement,” he said. “And if you don’t mind, I’d like to leave them there for the time being. That way, if I do end up getting that teaching job, it’ll be one less thing to move.”

 

“Your stepfather is going to be very annoyed when he finds out you’re ‘squandering’ your education on being a teacher. He always thought you’d end up doing something in the entertainment world—building sets or something.”

 

“Let’s don’t tell him, then,” Chris said with a wink. “What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”

 

Ali walked Chris as far as the door and kissed him good-bye. “Be careful,” she said.

 

“Don’t worry. We will.”

 

Chris and Danny left a few minutes after twelve. As soon as they were gone, Ali abandoned her computer and hurried into the shower. After drying her hair, she sat down at Aunt Evie’s dressing table. For the first time since she’d been in Sedona, she spent the better part of an hour carefully applying makeup. And it did help. The tricks of the TV trade ended up leaving her looking far better than she should have, considering the amount of sleep she’d had the night before.

 

For Reenie’s funeral she dressed in the one good outfit she had brought along from California—a midnight blue St. John suit trimmed with a narrow band of gold thread with a matching pair of Bruno Magli pumps. Examining her reflection in the full-length mirror in the bathroom, Ali decided she looked fine. Adequate anyway. For someone her age.

 

Chapter 16

 

By the time Ali arrived at the church in Cottonwood at 1:35, the parking lot was already jammed with cars. So were the surrounding streets. She ended up having to park her Cayenne a block and a half away and walk the rest of the way.

 

Bree Cowan, waiting at the church entrance, hurried out to the sidewalk to meet her. “Thank God you’re here,” she said.

 

“Why? What’s wrong?”

 

“Harriet Ellsworth is president of Reenie’s board of directors. She had agreed to speak at the service, but her husband ended up in the hospital this morning. She called just now to say she can’t come. Dad is having a fit. I told him I’d ask if you could possibly fill in. I know it’s the last minute, but nobody knew Reenie as well as you do.”

 

“Of course I’ll do it,” Ali said. “Let me go sit somewhere quiet so I can pull my thoughts together.”

 

“There’s a library off Pastor Bronson’s study,” Bree suggested. “Maybe you could you use that.”

 

Pastor Bronson was a round, balding, and disconcertingly jolly little man who directed Ali to a small book-lined room to the right of the pulpit. While Bree went to tell Ed and Diane that the difficulty had been handled, Ali scrounged through her purse in search of pen and paper.

 

Only one paper item came readily to hand—the envelope containing the friendship card Reenie had sent. Somehow, that seemed to be a fitting place to compose Misty Irene Holzer Turpin Bernard’s eulogy. So Ali removed the card and wrote her notes on the back of the card itself.

 

Years earlier, Miss Abel, a speech instructor at NAU, had suggested Ali avail herself of Toastmasters to gain more experience in public speaking. Now, twenty years after spending a year attending weekly Toastmaster meetings, Ali found it unnecessary to write out everything she intended to say. Instead, she jotted down a few key words of reminder: 1. greeting cards; 2. high school; 3. makeup; 4. missing years; and 5. greeting cards again. Ali knew that, in order to be structurally sound, a good speech ends where it begins—that’s how to make sure the speech has a point.

 

When it was time for the service to start, Ali entered the sanctuary from the front. She was happy to see that the church was crammed wall to wall. That was a tribute to Reenie, of course, but it also spoke well of Ed and Diane Holzer’s standing in the community. Most funerals come with a pervading sense of sadness. In this congregation, however, Ali sensed an almost electric tension.

 

Howie, the two children, and an elderly couple Ali assumed to be Howie’s parents sat in the front pew on one side of the church. Ed Holzer, arms folded on his chest, sat stone-faced directly across the aisle from him. Diane, already weeping, sat next to her husband with Bree and Jack Cowan seated next to her. It reminded Ali of a bad wedding where the bride and groom’s feuding families line up on either side of the church. In that tradition, Ali chose a seat in the second row, directly behind Jack Cowan.

 

Throughout the proceedings, nothing at all was said about the manner of Reenie’s death. It was as though, by mutual consent and diplomacy, everyone simply skipped over that part. In the program, however, there was a discreet announcement to the effect that remembrances in Reenie’s name should be made to the church building fund or else to the ALS Research Foundation.

 

Ali’s turn to speak came at the end of the service. It was only when she walked to the pulpit and prepared to make her remarks that she spotted Jasmine Wright seated on the aisle in the next to last pew.

 

Seeing her there was almost enough to derail Ali’s concentration, but she pulled herself together. This is for the kids, she told herself fiercely. With her hands shaking from outrage rather than nerves, Ali smiled as believably as possible at Matt and Julie and held up the card.

 

“If you knew Reenie Bernard,” she said, “you know who sent this. Reenie loved cards. She loved sending them and receiving them. She sent them at Christmas and Valentine’s Day and Easter and the Fourth of July and Thanksgiving. Sometimes she sent them for no reason at all. This one happens to be a friendship card. You see, Reenie and I were friends.

 

“We met and became friends on our first day of high school, when we showed up in Mrs. Toone’s algebra class and figured out that we were both scared to death.”

 

Back in the fourth row, behind the Holzers, Dave Holman smiled and nodded knowingly as did several other people in the room. Some of them Ali recognized as classmates or schoolmates. Some she didn’t, but clearly lots of the people in the room were familiar with the teacher in question. Mrs. Toone had been a daunting creature who took the position her students would learn algebra properly or else.

 

“We were both scared to be going to school with kids from all those other places. I was from sophisticated Sedona and imagined that kids from Cotton-wood would be a bunch of country bumpkins. As for the kids from Verde Valley? Forget it.”

 

A few chuckles rippled through the room.

 

“But then we got there and it turned out it was fine because we were all just kids. It seems unlikely now that a girl who grew up living in an apartment out behind a diner would become friends with a banker’s daughter, but that’s exactly what happened.”

 

She talked about the things she and Reenie had done together—about school plays and pranks and organizations. And she talked about the missing years, when their friendship went dormant for a time but didn’t disappear.

 

“We went our separate ways and lost each other for a long time after high school, but then I came home for our tenth high school reunion and there she was, the same old Reenie. We picked up our friendship again as easily as if we’d never been apart. We called each other often and wrote letters back and forth. That’s when she started sending me cards again, an amazing collection of cards. My only regret is that I didn’t keep all of them.

 

“If you’ve seen the YW’s vibrant new facility up in Flagstaff, you’ve seen the works of Reenie Bernard’s heart, hands, and mind. When other people said it was impossible to have a new building, Reenie ignored all the naysayers. She wasn’t afraid to reach for the stars, and she built it anyway.

 

“I went to Reenie’s office in Flagstaff yesterday,” Ali continued. “One whole wall is covered, floor to ceiling, with greeting cards—the ones people had sent to her.” Ali had to pause for a moment and compose herself before continuing. “It says in the Bible, ‘As ye sow, so shall ye reap.’ Reenie Bernard sowed greeting cards wherever she went, and she definitely reaped the same.

 

“Last night I heard from a woman named Louise Malkin who lives in Lubbock, Texas. Her sister, Lisa Kingsley, recently died of ALS. Lisa and Reenie met in an ALS chat room before doctors confirmed that Reenie, too, had been stricken with the disease. They became friends. I know that because last night, while sorting through her sister’s belongings, Louise found a lovely greeting card. I don’t think I have to tell you who sent it.

 

“Thanks for all the cards, Reenie. Thanks for giving all of us something to remember you by.”

 

Ali resumed her seat then. As the organ began the introduction to “Morning Has Broken,” she heard sounds of sniffling as people reached for handkerchiefs and tissues.

 

Miss Abel would be proud, she thought.

 

Outside, after the service, two black limos were lined up behind the hearse. Howie, his parents, and Matt and Julie rode in one. The Holzers along with Jack and Bree rode in the other while everyone else walked the three short blocks to Cottonwood Cemetery. If Jasmine came along to the cemetery, Ali didn’t spot her. There was no exchange of greetings or pleasantries between the two opposing sets of family members, not at the church or during the brief graveside service, either.

 

When it was time to return to the limos, Julie slipped away from Howie’s mother and ran over to Ed and Diane. She was crying and clinging to Diane’s waist when Howie stepped forward and drew her away to the limo for the ride back to Flagstaff.

 

So that’s how it’s going to be, Ali thought. They’ve lost their mother and now they’re losing their grandparents as well.

 

Back in the church’s basement parish hall, the tenor of the gathering seemed to have changed for the better. Yes, it was still sad. People were still grieving, but with Howie and his parents no longer present, most of the uneasy tension seemed to have drained away.

 

Ali was standing near the punch bowl when Dave Holman made his way over to her, coffee cup in one hand and a plate of sandwiches in another. “Good job,” he said. “Especially for a last-minute pinch hitter.”

 

“Thanks,” she said.

 

“Do you have plans for later?” he asked.

 

Her first thought was that Dave Holman had a hell of a lot of nerve. How dare he try to pick her up at Reenie’s funeral? But then he continued.

 

“I’m working at the moment,” he added. “But I’ve been going over the phone records you were interested in. I’ve been tracking down some of those names and numbers. It occurred to me that you might be able to tell me about some of them.”

 

“About the bank . . .” Ali began.

 

“Oh, it’s there all right,” Dave said. “I have a call in to the branch manager. He won’t be back until tomorrow. Since you seem to know a good deal about all this, I thought maybe I should sit down with you and take an official statement . . .”

 

So he wasn’t asking for a date—not exactly. “Sure,” Ali said. “What time?”

 

“I could pick you up between six and six-thirty,” he offered. “We could go down to the substation and maybe stop off somewhere for a burger afterward.”

 

“That would be great.”

 

Because there was no elevator at First Lutheran, Bob Larson had to wait upstairs in his wheelchair while his wife made a brief appearance at the reception.

 

“Great job,” Edie said, as Dave Holman melted back into the crowd. “Reenie would have loved it. Especially the part about the cards. She always sent those lion and lamb ones at Christmas. I think I still have a couple of them. They were too cute to throw away.”

 

“I wish I’d saved more of mine,” Ali said. “So how’d it go with the consultant?”

 

“All right, I guess,” Edie said, but she didn’t sound enthusiastic.

 

“What happened?”

 

“Dad got along with the guy like gangbusters,” Edie said. “I didn’t like him much.”

 

“Why not?”

 

“He wants your grandmother’s recipes,” Edie answered. “All of them. I thought we were just talking about selling the building, but the recipes? Your grandmother’s sweet rolls?”

 

To Ali’s amazement, her mother, who prided herself on not being the least bit sentimental and who ordinarily never cried at funerals, seemed dangerously close to tears.

 

“Mom, what’s wrong?”

 

Edie shook her head. “I don’t know what’s the matter with me. It was my idea to sell the place, but now that it looks like it might happen, I don’t know. The Sugarloaf’s been my whole life. I don’t know what I’ll do without it.”

 

Ali gave her mother a hug. “Don’t worry,” she said. “You’ll figure it out.”

 

Ali had planned on making a polite appearance at the reception and then taking off. That proved impossible. People she hadn’t seen since high school— classmates, retired teachers, local business people—all wanted to stop and chat: It was such a shame about Reenie. Was Ali still doing the news in LA? Where was she living now? How long was she going to be in town? Did Ali’s folks still own the Sugarloaf? How was it possible for her to stand up in front of all those people and speak off the cuff like that? It was all mundane chitchat, but some of the questions were more easily answered than others, and all of the conversations proved to be as difficult to escape as Br’er Rabbit’s brier patch.

 

When Ali finally exited the church and headed back to the Cayenne, Andrea Rogers trailed after her. “I’m sure Harriet Ellsworth is devastated that she missed this,” Andrea babbled. “But you’re a much better speaker. By the way, I saw you talking to that Dave Holman guy. He’s a detective with the Yavapai sheriff’s department, isn’t he? What did he want?”

 

“To go over some phone numbers with me,” Ali said. “As far as I’m concerned, that’s progress.”

 

It was dusk by the time she finally drove up Andante and into the driveway on Skyview. The sun was sinking below the far horizon as she parked in the driveway. Tired after a long day and drained by the afternoon’s storm of emotions, she barely paid attention as she unlocked the door and let herself into the house.

 

She was reaching for the light switch when something powerful slammed into her out of the dark. There was an explosion of pain inside her head, and she crumpled to the floor. She was out for a few seconds. When she came to, the spinning room was sprinkled with blinking stars. The overhead light was on by then, although she didn’t remember actually hitting the switch.

 

Groaning, she pulled herself up onto her hands and knees. That’s when she saw the boots—steel-toed work boots covered with an indelible layer of gray dust. She watched as one of the boots hauled back and took aim for a kick. The blow caught her in the midsection and sent her flying across the room. She landed against the end of the kitchen cupboard. She lay there like a rag doll, clutching her stomach, moaning, and gasping for breath.

 

“Where is she?” a menacing voice demanded close to her ear.

 

Ali could feel beery breath on her cheek and smell the man’s sweat, but she didn’t look at his face. Instead, she watched his feet, hoping against hope that he wouldn’t kick her again; knowing he would. Without asking, she knew who he was—Ben Witherspoon—come looking for Ali and for his wife.

 

“I don’t know where she is,” Ali croaked. “I have no idea.”

 

He kicked her again, harder this time. She heard the blow and felt it both. Her whole being roared in pain. She thought she screamed, but she wasn’t sure. Part of her, oddly separated from her body, was suddenly asking a string of disjointed questions that were only remotely connected to what was happening. They seemed to come from somewhere nearby but not necessarily from inside her head. It was as though some outside observer was standing by, commenting on the play-by-play action: Is anything broken? How much more can she take? How long before he kills her? Is the phone still working? How did he get inside the house? Who let him in?

 

The pain found her again, dissolving the outside commentator as it roared back through her body. She rolled away from him, choking and coughing.

 

A rib, she thought. He broke my rib.

 

Ben Witherspoon was talking to her now, his voice low and threatening. Desperately she fought to gather her wits. She needed to know what he was saying. And planning.

 

“You’re the bitch who sent her away, so she must have told you where she was going. Tell me!” he ordered. “I’m her husband, goddamnit. I have a right to know.”

 

He kicked at her again. This time Ali managed to scramble far enough out of range that the bruising blow landed on her butt. It hurt, but it missed hitting anything vital.

 

Where’s Samantha? she wondered now. What the hell has he done to the cat?

 

“I don’t know where Corine is,” she gasped. “She didn’t tell me.”

 

Witherspoon reached down and grabbed her by the arm, twisting it painfully behind her as he picked her up and flung her toward the couch. “That’s your computer, isn’t it? Open it and turn it on,” he commanded. “I want to see how you do this crap!”

 

Ali’s head was still spinning, but being upright helped. While she waited for the computer to boot up, she stole a look at the intruder. He was in his mid-thirties, wiry but strong. His hair was dirty blond and in serious need of washing. He had the bronzed leathery skin of someone who has spent too many hours working in the sun. With a sense of shock, she realized she had seen Ben Witherspoon before. He had come into the Sugarloaf for breakfast that morning just when Susan had been taking over for Ali. He had sat at one end of the counter. Ali and Dave had sat at the other.

 

What was it Dave had said just then? Hadn’t he called Ali by her name? No wonder Ben Wither-spoon knew who she was. Or maybe he had seen the Christmas photo Chris had posted on the blog.

 

“How did you find me?” she asked.

 

“It’s none of your business,” he said. “I’m the one asking the questions.”

 

But Ali thought she knew the answer. He must have followed her up the hill when she left work.

 

Why wasn’t I paying more attention?

 

She looked around the room. Her purse still lay by the door where it had fallen when he had knocked her to the floor. And since her Glock was in her purse . . . What was it Nancy Drake, Ali’s self-defense instructor, had said to her about the useless-ness of women carrying weapons in their purses.

 

Armed but not dangerous, she thought.

 

That was exactly where she was. Her Glock was there, all right, but totally inaccessible.

 

“The logon’s finished,” she said when the interminable hour-glass finally disappeared from the screen. “What now?”

 

“You and I are going to do a post,” he said. “Cutlooseblog’s last post. We’re going to do it together. I’ll dictate the words. You write them down.”

 

Ali’s hands shook uncontrollably as she tried to work the keyboard. Her trembling fingers missed keystroke after keystroke as she attempted to type what he dictated. The implication behind his words was clear. This wasn’t a suicide note because Ali Reynolds wouldn’t die by her own hand. But she was going to die. Of that she was certain.

 

“Do you want me to post it?”

 

“Why not?” he said. “It’s not going to make any difference.”

 

Logging onto cutloose she could see that there were over a dozen messages waiting for her, but she made no attempt to open them.

 

This will be my last posting. I’m sorry for all the trouble I’ve caused. Good-bye.

 

Posted 5:52 P.M. by Babe

 

She looked at the time—5:52. What time had Dave said he was coming to pick her up? Sometime between six and six-thirty. She felt the smallest flicker of hope. If she could hang on long enough for Dave to arrive, she might make it. But could she last until then? Could she stall Ben Witherspoon that long?

 

“Is that all?” Ali asked.

 

“What do you mean all?”

 

“I already told you I have no idea where Corine is right now, but she sent me an e-mail. I could write to her for you. Is there something you’d like me to tell her?”

 

“What a good idea,” he sneered at her. “Let’s do that.”

 

She had Corine’s real e-mail address, but she didn’t dare use it. What if Witherspoon stole her computer. If he logged on he’d have access to all of Ali’s correspondence, including the e-mail from his wife. The guy was obviously computer savvy and knew how to find his way around the Internet. After all he’d been tracking Corine’s computer movements for some time without her knowledge. If he ever gained access to her new e-mail address, Ali had no doubt that he’d somehow figure out a way to find her physical location as well.

 

Other than Corine, Chris alone knew everything about Watching’s threat. Unfortunately he was probably in California by now. But then she remembered how her own cell phone had worked as they came across on I-10. If she managed to send him a message, would he understand what she was really trying to say? Holding her breath and praying he didn’t have his phone turned off, Ali typed in Chris’s e-mail address.

 

Ben came across the room and stood peering over Ali’s shoulder as she typed. “CDR?” he asked, reading off the address line. “That’s Corine’s address?”

 

Ali nodded. “Her first initial followed by the initials of the shelter she’s staying in. Daughters of the Revolution.” It was the best Ali could think of at the moment. It sounded terribly lame to her, but Ben Witherspoon fell for it.

 

“Figures!” he snorted. “Of course, she’d take up with a bunch of commies. For all I know, they’re probably lesbians, too—pinko, commie, lesbians.”

 

“What do you want to say?” Ali asked.

 

“Dear Corine,” he said. “You’re a whore and a bitch . . .”

 

“I can’t write that,” Ali said.

 

“What do you mean you can’t write it. You said you’d write what I wanted to say. What’s the matter? Are your fingers broke?”

 

“I can write it,” Ali told him, “but it won’t go through. The spam filters will kick it out.” Ali didn’t know if that was true or not, but it sounded good. Again, Ben Witherspoon seemed to take her at her word. He studied her for a long minute with a somewhat puzzled expression on his face.

 

“Dear Corine,” he began again. “I remember when we got married how you promised to love and obey. Obey, remember? I want you back. I want Tony back. You have no right to leave me like this and take my son. Babe is writing this. Remember her? I found her, and I’ll find you, too. And you know what I’ll do to you then. You’ll be sorry. Ben.”

 

He peered over Ali’s shoulder the whole time, while she was typing and until after she punched Send. “Good,” he said when she finished. He pulled the power cord out of the wall and handed it to her, then he returned to the couch. “Pack that thing up and bring it along. It’s a lot newer than mine.”

 

Ali’s heart sank. It hadn’t taken nearly as long as she had expected to send the message. Dave still wasn’t here.

 

“Why?” she objected. “Where are we going? Besides, don’t you want to see if she sends something back?”

 

“We’re going for a little ride,” he said. “Just me and you. In your cute little SUV instead of my Datsun. I’m trading that in, too.”

 

“But . . .”

 

The land line began to ring. Instinctively, Ali reached for it.

 

“Don’t,” Witherspoon snarled. He reached for something on the couch beside him. When he picked it up, Ali saw it was a knife, most likely from the cutting block in the kitchen. He waved it casually in her direction. “Don’t even think about answering it,” he added.

 

They waited together until the phone stopped ringing. Moments later, the cell phone, still in her purse across the room, began to ring as well. “It’s probably my son,” she said. “I should probably answer. If I don’t, he’ll worry. He even might send someone over to check on me.”

 

“Answer it then,” Witherspoon snapped. “But not a word out of line. Not a single word, and no tricks, either. Got it?”

 

Nodding, Ali got off the couch and went to retrieve the purse. As she bent down to pick it up, she caught a glimpse of Sam’s one yellow eye gleaming back at her from under the couch.

 

Thank God she’s scared of strangers, Ali thought. Thank God!

 

Rummaging through her purse she spotted her Glock’s blued-steel handle just under her pulsing cell phone, but she didn’t try to pick it up. She didn’t dare. Right that second, Ben Witherspoon was all the way across the room, far less than ten feet. That was something else Ali suddenly and belatedly remembered from Nancy’s self-defense class—that within eight feet, someone with a knife can take out someone with a gun. The process of removing the gun from the purse and aiming it would take too much time. She’d be lucky to get off even one shot before Witherspoon and the knife were all over her.

 

Instead, Ali picked up the phone. Then casually, seemingly without thinking, she swung the purse’s strap over her shoulder.

 

“Hi, Chris,” she said. “How’s it going?”

 

“Are you all right?” Chris demanded. “Is he there at the house with you right now or are you somewhere else?”

 

“You’re already in Palm Springs?” she asked brightly. “Really? That’s great. You guys are making good time then.”

 

“Mom, do you want me to call the cops?”

 

“Yes,” she said, “the funeral was very nice. Lots of people were there. Lots of them. One of the biggest funerals Cottonwood’s ever had.”

 

Please, God, she prayed. Help Chris understand what’s going on.

 

His next words gave her hope. “Should I call Dave Holman?” he asked.

 

“Yes,” she said at once. “Dave was there all right, along with everyone else.”

 

“I’ll call him,” Chris said. “As soon as I hang up. Be careful.”

 

“Good,” Ali said quickly. “That’s fine. Tell Danny to drive carefully.” With that she ended the call.

 

“Come on then, Babe,” Witherspoon said cheerfully. “Let’s you and me go. Ladies first. But don’t try anything stupid.” He brandished the boning knife in Ali’s direction. “I’d hate to have to use this here in your pretty little house. Wouldn’t want to make that kind of mess. We’ll share the load. You carry the computer. I’ll pack the knife. And whatever you do, don’t make a sound.”

 

306

 

Chapter 17

 

Ali picked up the computer and started toward the door with her assailant right behind. She realized as she walked, that this might be her only chance. If he came close enough to her, maybe she could fire her .9 mm Glock at point-blank range in a way that would drop him like a rock and take the boning knife out of play. And maybe kill him.

 

That was the other thing Nancy had said: When you make the decision to buy and carry a deadly weapon, you’ve already made a moral decision as well. You’ve established that there’s a point beyond which you will use that weapon to defend yourself, and you’ve drawn that line rationally and not in the blood-pounding heat of the moment.

 

Ben Witherspoon had crossed Ali’s deadly-force line long ago. He had bet she wouldn’t fight back, but he was wrong. Even so, she still hoped that when she opened the door, she’d find Dave in his patrol car parked outside, ready to come to her aid. But Dave wasn’t there. If anyone was going to save Ali Reynolds, it was going to have to be Ali herself.

 

The night was cold, clear, and utterly silent. Ali’s breath puffed white in the frigid air, and every icy intake made her want to double over in pain. At least one rib was broken, maybe more. Overhead, the still, velvet-black sky was bright with winking stars. Ali had lost her shoes in the earlier scuffle. The cold gravel of the driveway bit sharply into the soles of her bare feet, making her limp, but the pain also helped her focus.

 

She glanced around hopefully, looking to see if any of her neighbors had spotted something amiss. Unfortunately, the laurel hedge around the backyard—the same hedge that gave the house its much prized privacy—now lent cover to the man who intended to kill her.

 

“You drive,” Witherspoon growled at her. “But if you try to pull anything—anything at all—I’ll slit your throat. Understand?”

 

Ali nodded. She understood all right. Absolutely. What’s more, she knew he meant it. She also knew that, once she got in the car with him, she was as good as dead. Whatever she was going to do to save herself had to happen soon!

 

When she arrived at the front of the Cayenne, she stopped and made as if to put the computer on the hood. She felt the blade of the knife bite into her back.

 

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he demanded.

 

She knew at once he’d cut her, not deep, but enough to hurt. Enough to make her bleed. Enough to let her know he meant business. “I need the keys,” she hissed back at him. “They’re in my purse.”

 

“Get ’em then,” he returned. “And be quick about it.”

 

She had dropped her cell phone into her purse. It rang again just then, startling them both.

 

“Don’t answer it,” he snapped. “Let it ring.”

 

She did as she was told, but the flashing light on the screen of the ringing phone provided an amazing amount of light inside her otherwise pitch-black purse—enough to see her car keys. Enough to see the gun.

 

Then something else happened. From far away down the mountain, Ali heard the faint wail of a siren. Witherspoon was standing right next to her, close enough that she felt him tense at the sound. Knowing this momentary distraction was her only chance, Ali wrapped her shaking hand around the handle of her Glock. Whirling, she spun around and faced him. She didn’t even try removing the weapon from her purse. Instead, holding the gun inside, and with the leather of her Coach bag touching his belly, she pulled the trigger.

 

Nancy Drake’s voice droned in her head. “Once you’ve made the decision to stop someone, you’d by God better carry through. Use hollow points. They’re the ones that do the damage. And forget about target shooting. Go for the gut. Take out a guy’s pelvis and he’s going down.”

 

With the first shot, Ben Witherspoon’s eyes bulged as much in outrage as surprise, but despite Nancy’s predictions, he didn’t fall. “Why you . . .” he screamed.

 

In the aftermath of the shot, Ali’s ears rang. She couldn’t hear what he was saying, but she read his lips. And his mind. He was enraged, and with the knife still in hand, his intentions were absolutely clear. So she let go of the purse and pulled the trigger again. This time the bullet found its mark and he did go down. Hard.

 

When Ali could hear again, she realized that her phone was still ringing. Or maybe it was ringing again. It lay where it had landed, a yard or so from her feet. Next to it, barely visible in the pulsing light, she caught the gleam of the car keys.

 

Just then, to her dismay, a steel-hard grip, like the jaws of a trap, locked around the base of her ankle. Witherspoon was down, all right, but he wasn’t out. Ali reached for the door handle, trying to hold on to something to keep from falling. In the process, she slammed the Glock against the car door. The gun bounced out of her grip, fell to the ground, and then spun out of reach.

 

Ali hit the ground, too. When she landed, the jolting pain from her broken ribs was so excruciating it took her breath away. She felt a sharp stab of pain in her leg, too, and knew he had cut her at least once and that he’d do it again if she didn’t get away. She kicked him then, hard, with her other foot. She felt the gratifying blow as her heel connected sharply with the bottom of his chin. The kick took him by surprise. His head jerked back and she heard his teeth knock together in his mouth. His grip loosened only slightly but it was enough. She squirmed away from him, scrabbling along the ground like an ungainly lizard, desperate to escape his reach.

 

The wailing sirens were much closer now, coming up the mountain, but they weren’t nearly close enough or fast enough to satisfy her. If he came after her again, there was no guarantee anyone would reach her in time.

 

Nearby she heard the murmuring voices of worried neighbors who had emerged from their various houses in search of an explanation for the real-life gunfire that had suddenly drowned out the cops-and-robbers sound effects of their nightly police drama fare.

 

But Ali needed armed police officers right then far more than she needed well-meaning or curious neighbors. When her fingers chanced to encounter the familiar shape of her car keys, she did the only thing that made sense.

 

She grabbed them and pressed hard on the panic button and kept right on crawling.

 

The next thing she knew, Dave Holman was there beside her, kneeling on the ground.

 

“He tried to kill me,” Ali heard herself blubbering. “He was waiting inside the house and . . .”

 

“Hush,” Dave said, covering his lips with one finger. “Don’t say another word. You’re hurt. Let’s get you to the ER.”

 

cutlooseblog.com Monday, March 21, 2005

 

First, please let me apologize for the long silence, especially after that post that said it was my “last” post. I know many of you have been terribly concerned. Some of you are already aware of what’s happened. The rest of you are about to find out.

 

Twenty-two years ago, when I was pregnant with my son, I decided that when it came time to choose an OB-GYN to deliver my baby, I’d go looking for a woman. My reasoning was simple. Since men don’t have babies, maybe a female doctor would be more in tune with what I wanted and needed. And I have to say, even all these years later, that Dr. Winona Manchester was perfect in every way. She had two children of her own. She was sympathetic and realistic. When she told me what I should or shouldn’t do, I believed her. She’d been there and done that.

 

Since most of you know Tank is now twenty-two, you must be wondering why I’m telling you all this old news. I’m getting to that. And since this is a blog, and I don’t have to say my piece in the forty-five seconds before the next commercial, I’m going to say it my way.

 

For years, in my role as a “public person” I’ve helped out with various social events. I’ve spent a lot of time raising money for cancer research for the simple reason that’s what my first husband died of. I’ve also done a good deal of work for various women’s groups, including organizations that deal with helping victims of domestic violence. But I did that more as a good citizen than because I really knew or cared that much about the issue. I was interested. I was involved. But like those male OB-GYNs that I dismissed so long ago, I hadn’t been there or done that—until now.

 

My last regular message was posted on Friday morning, the day of my friend’s funeral. The night before I had received a second threatening e-mail from the estranged husband of one of my readers. You may remember the woman I advised to take her baby and run. I posted her husband’s comment that if she left him, he’d come looking for me. She did run, and he made good on his promise. He found me. He broke into my home while I was attending Reenie’s funeral and was waiting for me when I got back. (The cut screen and the broken window have both been replaced, and my new security system is being installed right this minute.)

 

Before Friday night, I never knew what it felt like to be kicked hard enough to break bones. (Two ribs, currently taped.) Or to be sliced by a kitchen knife. (Eleven stitches. Tetanus shot.) I also never knew that a life-and-death battle is just exactly that. In newscasts I’ve often been critical of “trigger-happy cops.” But while I was spouting those views, it turns out I’d never been there or done that, either. I didn’t know what it means to have your life turned upside-down in a him-or-me scenario.

 

I spent two nights at the hospital in Flagstaff, the same hospital where my father had his surgery last week. (My mother was there again, bless her.) I still hurt all over from the kicks that found their intended targets, and I’m grateful for the one that missed. One of the blows left a clear shoe-print-style bruise on my backside. Having that photographed for forensic purposes was not a high point of my existence, but I’ll live.

 

I’m home now, and I’m alive. My assailant isn’t. That’s due primarily to the California concealed weapon permit I carry in my wallet and the Glock I had in the bottom of my purse when he attacked me. (If you are someone who thinks all handguns should be outlawed, you’re more than welcome to write to me here, but I think you’re going to have a hard time changing my mind.)

 

There’s a lot more I’d like to say right now, but my lawyers (yes, that would be plural) won’t let me. I’ve hired a local defense attorney in the event (unlikely, I’ve been told) that the county attorney decides to press charges against me. Arizona seems to be one of those states where people still have the right to defend themselves in their own homes and on their own property. The second attorney is due to the fact that the dead man’s estranged wife, the abused woman who read my column and fled for her life, is now considering filing a civil wrongful death suit against me. (No good deed goes unpunished!)

 

After living for more than forty years with no attorneys, I now have four which, by my count, is approximately four too many.

 

Someone called a few minutes ago to let me know that a news team from my old station wants to come to Sedona to interview me. It seems that the LA area is “intense with interest” about my situation. I told them not to come. But if they show up anyway, I’ll put them in touch with my attorney(s) and repeat my two new favorite words. “No comment.”

 

Posted: 12:47 P.M. by Babe

 

Several hundred e-mails had come in over the weekend while she had been dark, almost all of them asking why Ali was abandoning cutlooseblog. Almost as soon as her post was up, she started hearing a barrage of clicks, as if people had been lurking in dark corners of the Internet, waiting for her to reappear. Not surprisingly, some of them were very familiar. Velma’s message in particular made her smile.

 

Dear Babe,

 

Velma again. Okay, I finally did it. I called you Babe. Hope you’re happy.

 

Thank you for putting up your picture. That was fun, but then all of a sudden you just stopped and nothing more came through. I checked every single day.

 

Last night they finally had something on TV about what happened to you. I’m so sorry, but I knew it all along. As soon as I saw that “last” post of yours, I knew something was terribly wrong. I even called information and got the long distance number for the police department there in Sedona. But the person I spoke to wanted to know what I was reporting, and of course, I had no idea of what or where or any of the other things she said she had to have in order to make a report.

 

I’m so glad you’re going to be okay.

 

Velma T in Laguna

 

Sylvia’s, too, was familiar.

 

Dear Ali,

 

This morning someone bought your autographed photo from me for $11.38. That means I more than doubled my money. As far as I’m concerned, you’re a very good investment.

 

Your fan, Sylvia

 

Some, however, were entirely new.

 

Dear Babe,

 

My name is Al Rutherford. I saw what happened to you on TV last night and it is amazing. I am a student at UCLA. Film studies. I need to write a screenplay, and I think your story would be awesome. Do I have to have your persmission to write it? If so, would you please send it. Also, when I finish I hope you will help me find a agent. Everyone says you have to have agents now although that didn’t use to be the case

 

Best,

 

Al (Short for Alvin)

 

When he was young, my father worked on the Chipmunk records

 

Dear Babe,

 

What happened to the cat? To Samantha? Is she all right? You didn’t mention her and I’m worried that awful man may have hurt her, too.

 

Janelle

 

Ali immediately posted that one along with a response.

 

cutlooseblog.com Monday, March 21, 2005

 

Sorry I forgot to mention it, but Samantha is fine. It turns out she’s smarter than I am. As soon as the guy broke into my house, she evidently went looking for cover and didn’t come out until after he was gone. While I was in the hospital, my mother came over to look after her. Thanks for your concern.

 

Posted 2:10 P.M. by Babe

 

Shortly after that the security system installer knocked on the front door to tell her he was finished. He came inside and spent the next half hour taking Ali through all the intricacies of her new wireless setup, including instructing her on setting the codes and tuning her television set to the proper channel so she could see who was outside knocking without having to open the door.

 

When he left, Ali wasn’t at all surprised that she fell asleep on the couch. The doctor had told her the pain meds would make her sleepy, and it was absolutely true. During the day. At night, it seemed she couldn’t sleep at all or, when she finally did, she was plagued by nightmares. In each of those, Ben Witherspoon was always back in her house, stalking her and menacing her, with a knife in one hand and a gun in the other.

 

A sharp knock on the front door startled Ali out of her afternoon nap. The security system installer had left her TV set tuned to channel 95. As Samantha scrambled to disappear, Ali checked out the television screen. On it, she saw Bob Larson’s battered Bronco parked in the background. In the foreground stood Kip Hogan, Bob Larson’s new right-hand man. An Arizona Diamondbacks baseball cap was pulled low over his eyes.

 

Seeing a man there, a relative stranger, caused an unreasoning fear to rise in Ali’s throat. What she wanted more than anything right then was to have her Glock back and in her hand, but the weapon had been confiscated as possible evidence and was still under lock and key where it would remain until all legal wrangling had run its course.

 

Kip knocked again.

 

Straighten up, Ali told herself. She stood up, staggered over to the door, and opened it.

 

Kip took off the cap, bent down, picked up an ice chest, and then followed Ali into the house. “Afternoon, ma’am,” he said politely. “Your mother sent over some food. Want me to put it in the fridge?”

 

Back on the couch, Ali laughed aloud at that and then stopped abruptly. The words ‘it only hurts when you laugh’ were no longer funny.

 

“If you can find a spot,” she said. “There’s already so much food in there, I don’t know what I’m going to do with it all. People must think I’m starving. And if I eat it all, I’ll turn into a blimp.”

 

She had come home from the hospital to find her kitchen counter overflowing with platters of cookies, cupcakes, pies, and brownies along with plastic-wrapped loaves of banana bread. In all its carbohydrate glory, the place had looked more like a gigantic bake sale than a private kitchen. She found that the refrigerator and freezer both, too, had been stuffed to the gills with goodies. There were frozen casseroles stacked in the freezer while the fridge bulged with plates of fried chicken and covered bowls full of every kind of fruit salad imaginable along with two separate potato salads, one macaroni salad and a dish of very leathery red Jell-O.

 

While Ali watched, Kip worked with single-minded determination to cram this new load of foodstuffs into the refrigerator. “What about your friends up the mountain?” Ali asked, thinking in sudden embarrassment that only a week ago, Kip had been bunking in a snowy homeless encampment up on the Mogollon Rim.

 

“I’m sure they’d be most appreciative, ma’am,” Kip said. “If there was any of it you didn’t want,” he added, “any you thought you could spare.”

 

“Ask my dad,” she said. “Tell him I have way more food here than I’ll ever be able to eat. Maybe the two of you could come collect it tomorrow or the next day and take it up the mountain.”

 

“I’ll talk to him about it,” Kip said nodding. “See what he has to say. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”

 

He exited then, scurrying away as if uncomfortable talking to her alone. Once he was gone, Ali limped out to the kitchen. The doctor had warned her that she’d feel worse in a day or two than she had in the hospital, and it was true. The many bruises on her body had gone from black to greenish purple. As they changed color they seemed to hurt more rather than less.

 

Ali picked through the goodies. Her mother had sent over a covered dish filled with potato soup. She dished up some of that and put it in the microwave to heat. She reached for a piece of chicken, to go along with the soup. But the chicken reminded her of Howie Bernard and the kids. She pulled the tin foil back over the chicken and settled for soup only.

 

Chris called while she was eating. “How are you?” he asked.

 

“Better,” Ali said, making the effort to sound more chipper than she felt. “I’m doing fine. Really.”

 

She’d had to talk like crazy to keep him from abandoning his finals and coming straight back to Sedona. Her mother had helped with that one, or it might not have worked.

 

“You have enough to eat?”

 

She surveyed the mounds of food covering her counter. “Plenty,” she said. “You wouldn’t believe how much food there is.”

 

Chris didn’t sound like himself, though. “What about you?” Ali asked. “Are your finals going all right?”

 

“They’re fine,” he said without conviction.

 

“What’s wrong, Chris?” she said at last. “I can tell by your voice that something’s up.”

 

“It’s all my fault,” he said. “I’m the one who talked you into doing the blog thing. If I had just left you alone, none of this would have happened.”

 

“Yes,” she said, “and then I wouldn’t be sitting here gorging myself on your grandmother’s delicious potato soup. Things happen for a reason, Chris. I was looking for a new direction, and you gave me one. Of course, neither one of us expected me to get the crap beaten out of me along the way. But what is it they say at the gym, ‘No pain; no gain.’ ”

 

“Mom,” Chris groaned. “Don’t even joke about it.”

 

“I’m not joking. Besides, what if Witherspoon had attacked someone who hadn’t had a gun. What then?”

 

“But . . .”

 

“But what?”

 

“You killed someone, Mom,” Chris objected. “My mother actually took another person’s life. It’s not a video game; not a movie. A real live person’s life.”

 

“Is that what’s bothering you?”

 

“I guess,” he said miserably. “I mean, the whole time I was growing up, I never thought you were that kind of person.”

 

“You know what, Chris? Neither did I. All those years I lived with Paul Grayson, I was a mealy-mouthed namby-pamby. I put up with his bullshit and got along no matter what. I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about that the last couple of days and wondering why I did it, and I think I’ve finally figured it out.

 

“I did it because I was afraid something might change. Afraid something might happen. Afraid that if Paul dumped me I wouldn’t be able to make it on my own. But I’m not afraid anymore, Chris, I’m not afraid of anything. And that includes Paul Grayson and cutlooseblog.com. Yes, you’re right. The blog brought me Ben Witherspoon. So what? Facing him down brought me something I needed, something that had been missing from my life for a very long time—self respect. When push came to shove, when it was a choice of him or me, I had guts enough to choose me. Finally. And that counts for something.”

 

Even as she said this, she realized it wasn’t completely true. Because she had installed a security system. And she had felt that sudden sense of dread when Kip showed up on the doorstep. But it was mostly true, when it came to the big things, anyway.

 

“You’re going to be all right, then?” Chris asked after a pause.

 

“Absolutely,” she said. “I’m going to be more than all right. You can count on it.”

 

She sat at the table for a long time after she got off the phone with Chris, wondering if she had said too much or too little and whether or not her outburst had made any sense—to him or to her. He had asked her what time it was, and she had ended up telling him how the clock was made. Too much information, she thought.

 

Bored with watching a screen full of her empty front and back doors, Ali had switched over to a Phoenix channel where the evening news featured the story of a young fresh-faced man, Hunter Jackson, a 2003 graduate of Chandler High School who had died two days earlier in a mortar attack on his convoy in Baghdad.

 

Hunter hadn’t seen the mortar that was destined to kill him, but suddenly Ali Reynolds had a whole new understanding of all those other young-faced kids who had gone off to do their duty and who had made the hard choices to kill or be killed; to kill or let their buddies or their allies or civilians be killed. She knew just as certainly that those young people came away from those decisions—those momentary life and death decisions—changed in the same way she was now changed as well.

 

“God bless them,” Ali whispered aloud. “And bring them safely home.”

 

Chapter 18

 

After dinner she fell asleep for a while again. By nine o’clock, she was wide awake and back reading mail at cutlooseblog.com.

 

Ms. Reynolds,

 

An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind. Shame on you.

 

David

 

Not very original, Ali thought. He took that one straight off a bumper sticker. And she didn’t post it, either.

 

Dear Ali,

 

I don’t know your regular e-mail address, so I’m writing to you through this. I’m sorry I haven’t been in touch with you through all your troubles with your job and everything. And when I heard about you and Paul splitting up, I just couldn’t believe it. You always seemed so happy.

 

Seemed, Ali thought. That’s the operant word.

 

And then there was that picture of you that showed up in the Times last week. Please tell me that you haven’t really been forced into waiting tables and that you’re having to live in a trailer. If Paul won’t give you enough money to live on, I could probably send you some.

 

So clearly whoever was writing this hadn’t bothered to read any of the rest of the blog. Ali looked to the bottom. Roseanne Maxwell. Roseanne’s husband, Jake, was one of Paul’s so-called buddies and co-workers. So that’s what this was—a thinly veiled political effort on Jake’s part to get the goods on Paul and gain some corporate advantage.

 

And now I’m hearing that there was some kind of break-in last week at the place where you’re staying and that you were hurt and somebody actually died. How awful! You must be falling apart. If you need a place to stay, our door is always open, and our lovely little casita has just been redone and it’s totally available. Not only that, I’m sure Jake can do something to help you with the job situation. It can’t be as hopeless as it seems. Chin up.

 

Love and Kisses, Roseanne Maxwell

 

It didn’t take Ali long to decide how to respond:

 

Dear Roseanne,

 

Thanks to both you and Jake for your kind offer. You’re right. I’m living in the trailer . . .

 

She didn’t say manufactured home with what was essentially two master suites. She didn’t say that there was a Jacuzzi soaking tub in her spacious bath or an office alcove off her bedroom. Nor did she mention that the home had been placed on footings that allowed for a basement with wine cellar underneath.

 

. . . my Aunt Evie left me when she died. It has running water now, and air-conditioning won’t be an issue until summer.

 

Don’t worry about me. I’m in Sedona. If I just stay focused on my crystals, I’m sure everything will be fine.

 

Ali

 

It was a goofy enough response that Ali giggled aloud, but she didn’t post either one. It wasn’t necessary. Saying something like that to Roseanne Maxwell was as good as an Internet posting any day.

 

Then she went back to reading the mail. It was interesting to see that comments from gun-control advocates and gun-control opponents were fairly evenly divided and almost uniformly shrill. She posted some of them but not all, because many of them said the same things.

 

Dear Babe,

 

You sound like you’re proud of yourself for taking another person’s life. You shouldn’t be. Because you had that gun, you didn’t even look for other ways to end the conflict between you and the man who broke into your house. You just hit the trigger and went blam, blam, blam!!! The other guy’s dead. End of story.

 

If there were fewer guns in the world, maybe we’d find other ways to solve the world’s problems. Stories like yours make things worse instead of better.

 

Tommy F.

 

Ben Witherspoon wasn’t interested in talking, Ali thought, and maybe we should outlaw kitchen knives, too, while we’re at it. But she posted Tommy’s remarks without any further comment from her.

 

Dear Babe,

 

The Bible says “The meek shall inherit the earth.” Guess you won’t be on the receiving end.

 

Georgie

 

Guess not, Ali thought and posted that one, too. The next one gave her pause.

 

Dear Babe,

 

Twenty years ago, when my husband beat me up, I filed charges against him. He was tried, convicted, and sent to jail. As they were taking him out of the courtroom, he screamed that he’d get me when he got out. My friends told me to get a restraining order. I got a .45 instead.

 

When he got out, he broke into our apartment while I was asleep. He woke me up and said he was going to take our baby, my son, and throw him out the window. I got the gun out of my nightstand, followed him into the hallway, and shot him. He died and I went to prison. The cops said that yes, he broke into the house, but he didn’t hurt me, and he wasn’t armed at the time. They said it was my fault, that I should have called the cops instead of following him into the hallway and shooting him in the back. They weren’t there, but they all said that showed premeditation.

 

And my public defender told me I’d better cop a plea to second degree or I’d go to prison for first, so I spent the next seventeen years in prison. DSHS took my son and the courts terminated my parental rights. I don’t know where he is. He’d be twenty-two by now.

 

I hope this doesn’t happen to you, and I don’t think it will. You’re white. I’m not.

 

Lucille

 

Ali didn’t post Lucille’s comment. Instead she wrote back.

 

Dear Lucille,

 

Thank you for your good wishes. Your letter is all too true. There’s more than one level of justice in this country, one for those who can pay for quality representation and one for those who can’t. I’m appalled by what happened to you. With your permission, I’d like to post your comment on cutlooseblog.com to see what kind of discussion it engenders.

 

Also, have you made any effort to locate your son? If I can be of any help in that regard, let me know.

 

Ali Reynolds, aka Babe

 

The phone rang. “Ali,” Paul said. I’m glad you’re there. I need to talk to you.”

 

It would have been nice if he’d asked how she was feeling or if she was okay, but he didn’t.

 

“If this is about the station sending over that film crew tomorrow,” Ali began, “I’ve already decided I’m not—”

 

“No, no,” Paul interrupted impatiently. “It’s nothing like that. It’s April. I just found out she’s pregnant.”

 

So? Ali wondered. What does this joyous news have to do with me?

 

“The baby’s yours I assume,” she said.

 

“Of course it’s mine,” Paul snapped back at her. “Whose do you think it is?”

 

No point in going into that, Ali thought. “Why are you calling me, then?”

 

“She wants us to be married,” Paul said. “Right away. Before the baby gets here. That’s what I want, too. This child is my future, Ali. This is the baby who will carry my genetic material forward. So what can I do to get this process started?”

 

Ali’s first instinct was to simply burst out laughing. Wasn’t this the same man, who, in the course of their last conversation, had declared that he wouldn’t be manipulated? The ever-dependable pregnancy gambit had to be the oldest ploy in the book.

 

She also understood exactly why he was calling her directly. By going around Helga, he was sure he could negotiate himself a better deal. And he had reason to think so. After all, Ali Reynolds had gone along with his wishes for years. But with the death of Ben Witherspoon, the playing field had changed. Paul Grayson still hadn’t figured that out.

 

“Well . . . ?” he pressed, pushing her to give him an answer in the same bullying voice he always used to get his way.

 

“When it comes to divorces,” she said finally, “you have three choices—quick, cheap, and good. Pick any two. When you figure out which two you want, give Helga a call and we’ll talk.”

 

She hung up. The phone rang again almost immediately, but when caller ID showed it was Paul calling back, Ali didn’t pick up. She’d already said her piece and had nothing more to add. Instead, she jotted off an e-mail to Helga.

 

Dear Helga,

 

Paul’s girlfriend is pregnant and wants to get married—fast. I think he’s ready to wheel and deal. Call him up tomorrow morning and see what you can do. I trust your judgment on this. The more we can stick it to him, the better.

 

Ali

 

She returned to cutloose.

 

Dear Babe,

 

As you suggested, I’ve been in touch with Mr. Tompkins. Based on what happened with his mother, I’ve made a determination not to pursue treatment with the Rodriguez Medical Center folks in Mazatlan.

 

According to Tompkins, the treatments consist mostly of stuffing the people full of overpriced but essentially over-the-counter supplements and then filling them full of a pain med cocktail that keeps them in enough of a pink haze that they don’t know what’s hit them. They keep them feeling better-right up until their money is gone. Then the patient is shipped back home to die, unless they conk out while they’re still in Mexico. Bad idea.

 

The money we’re not spending on them is almost enough to pay off our mortgage. I think I’ll do that—stay home, take my lumps, and spend whatever time I have with my family.

 

Thank you again for your help.

 

Don Trilby

 

PS You’re welcome to go ahead and post this. RMC has already filed suit against Mr. Tompkins for breaching his mother’s confidentiality agreement, but I didn’t sign any such thing, and I think other ALS patients and their families need to know how these creeps work. I’m glad I figured it out in time.

 

Ali was in the process of posting it when her phone rang. She was surprised when the caller ID readout said Howard Bernard. Why’s Howie calling me? she wondered.

 

“Ali?” Matt asked. He spoke in almost a whisper.

 

“Matt!” Ali exclaimed. “Is something wrong?”

 

“Mom’s stuff is gone,” he said with a sob. “Her clothes and her jewelry and her coats and shoes and everything. It’s all gone. They took it away. To Goodwill. While we were in Cottonwood.”

 

Ali remembered what Andrea had said about the moving boxes stacked on the front porch. “They did what?” she exclaimed.

 

“Dad,” Matt blubbered. “And I’m sure Jasmine helped. They packed up everything. It’s like she was never even here. How could they do that? Didn’t they know Julie and me would want some of her stuff? That we’d like to keep it?”

 

Sparks of anger lit up Ali’s line of vision, but she didn’t explode with the series of four-letter words that were on the tip of her tongue. She didn’t want to add fuel to Matt’s flame or any more hurt, either.

 

“Maybe they thought it would be less painful for you if you didn’t have to deal with those things,” she suggested.

 

“No,” Matt said. “Dad wants to forget Mom, and he wants us to forget her, too. So he can marry Jasmine. Can I come live with you, Ali? Please? I wouldn’t be any trouble, I promise. And Julie, too. We’d be good, the same way we are with Grandpa and Grandma down in Cottonwood. They always say we’re not any trouble at all.”

 

“I know you’re not,” Ali said quickly. “But it’s not that simple. Parents can’t just hand their kids off for someone else to look after.”

 

“You mean like we did Samantha,” Matt said.

 

“Well, yes,” Ali agreed. “Kids are a little more complicated than cats. And parents get to have the final say.”

 

“Shouldn’t kids get to have some say, too? I mean, Jasmine pretends like she likes us. She’s always saying nice things, but I know she doesn’t mean them. She’s just saying them to get in good with Dad. And with us. I don’t like her, Ali. I don’t want him to marry her.”

 

Three days after his mother’s funeral, Matt shouldn’t have had to be worrying about his father remarrying. But then, Howie Bernard was a clod. A highly educated clod. He had always been one in the past and would continue to be one in the future.

 

Ali thought then about the note from Lucille telling her appalling story. The courts had terminated the poor woman’s parental rights over a shooting that, with decent legal representation and any kind of justice, would most likely have been declared self-defense.

 

What if the remaining parent were charged and convicted of actual homicide? Ali wondered. What if Jasmine Wright and Howie Bernard had plotted together and succeeded in murdering Reenie? What then?

 

“They’re not going to get married,” Ali declared. “It’s much too soon.”

 

“Oh yeah?” Matt countered, and Ali had nothing to say in return.

 

“How’s Sam?” he asked, abruptly changing the subject. “I keep asking Dad when we can come down and get her, but he says he doesn’t know. That he’s too busy.”

 

“She’s fine here,” Ali said. “But I could bring her home if you’d like me to—tomorrow or maybe the day after that.” She was stalling on going out of the house as much as possible. Her face and neck were still black and blue from the blow Witherspoon had nailed her with when she first walked in the door. And there were other cuts and bruises that she didn’t remember individually but which made her look like she’d been in a serious fight—which she had.

 

“That would be awesome,” Matt said, sounding suddenly much more cheerful. “I know Sam’s ugly, but I really, really miss her.”

 

“She’s not ugly,” Ali said. “She’s interesting.”

 

“Gotta go,” Matt said suddenly. “Dad’s home now.” And he hung up.

 

As Ali hung up, she heard the New Mail click. At the top of the list was one from Helga@Weldondavis-reed.com.

 

Dear Ali,

 

I’m on it. If it comes down to serious negotiations, we’ll do a conference call. Hang on to your cell phone. If his sweet young thing has him by the balls, you can rest assured he won’t be using his brains. We should be able to work a deal.

 

Talk to you tomorrow.

 

Helga

 

After reading that, Ali sat in front of the keyboard and tried to get a handle on everything she was feeling. She had every confidence that Helga would look out for her interests, but who was looking out for Matt and Julie Bernard’s? Not their father. Not Howie, the unfeeling creep who was willing to send his wife’s personal possessions off to Goodwill before his wife was even in her grave.

 

Ali remembered how she’d felt when Dean died. It had taken her months before she’d been willing to part with the last of his clothing. She’d kept some of it, just so she’d be able to press her face into it and still smell his scent and sense his presence. And Ali could imagine Matt and Julie finding the same kind of sensory comfort in some of their mother’s things. But those were evidently lost to them now.

 

As for Howie? Was he so arrogant, so convinced of his own infallibility, that he didn’t think anyone would notice the lack of respect he was showing for Reenie? Maybe he thought that, since she was ill, no one would bother looking beyond the official determination of suicide, that it would simply be accepted at face value.

 

But it won’t! Ali vowed. If he’s responsible for what happened, I’ll hound him until hell freezes over.

 

With her fingers flying over the keyboard, she fired an e-mail off to Andrea.

 

Dear Andrea,

 

I just heard from Matt. It seems all those moving boxes you saw on Reenie’s front porch were packed up to take her stuff to Goodwill. It’s probably too late, but can you see if any of it can be tracked down?

 

Thanks, Ali

 

Once that was on its way, she exited cutloose and logged on to Reenie’s mailbox. By then, it was almost midnight—another day had passed. When the witching hour occurred, another day’s worth of Reenie’s correspondence would be lost forever. To keep that from happening, Ali went to the mail file and began making printed copies of everything that was there, starting from the oldest and working her way up to the most recent. When she finished with that, she opened and printed all the new messages as well, before resaving them as new. And then, just for completion’s sake, she went through the spam folder— all 78 of them—one at a time, opening and checking them first before deleting.

 

When she saw one called Account Numbers, she expected it to be one of the usual spam gambits offering low mortgage interest rates or maybe a solicitation to help some poor unfortunate African heiress reclaim her fortune. Except this one wasn’t spam. It was dated Thursday, March 17, 2005:

 

Dear Ms. Bernard,

 

Your inquiry from last week has been forwarded to me by Andrew Cargill, manager of our First United Financial branch in Phoenix. As you are no doubt aware, in the past few years there’s been a good deal of consolidation in the banking industry. Each time a bank changes ownership, it results in changes in account numbers. Usually the account names remain the same although in some instances, secondary or tertiary names on the account may be dropped from the record.

 

I understand your concern that, in the case of your children’s trust accounts, a substantial sum of money may be missing. However, I’m sure that by checking with the trustee and/or with the grantor should s/he be available, this matter can be sorted out with very little difficulty. Once we have been informed of the correct account name, it will be easy to come up with the account numbers.

 

Please let me know if I can be of any further service in this regard.

 

Lana Franklin

 

Vice President

 

Customer Relations

 

First United Financial

 

Fargo, ND.

 

A bank in Phoenix, Ali thought in triumph. Yes!

 

It wasn’t what she had thought originally because now she was convinced Reenie hadn’t gone there in search of money for treatment in Mexico. Instead it had something to do with her children’s lost trust accounts. It could be as insubstantial as those old-fashioned Christmas Club things that you put money into each month so you’d have enough saved up to spend when next year’s Christmas came around. The e-mail made it sound like the missing accounts amounted to more than that, but that could be a simple corporate hyperbole.

 

Regardless of why Reenie had gone to the bank, however, Ali had picked up her trail after everyone else had lost it. No one seemed to have any idea about her movements or actions between the time she left Dr. Mason’s office and the time she went off the cliff.

 

Reenie Googled the bank information and copied it into her Reenie file. The bank office was on Northern, near I-17.

 

I’ll give Andrew Cargill a call in the morning. She thought about that for a minute. No, she decided, I think I’ll go see him in person.

 

She went to bed then and, for a change, slept soundly. Now that she no longer had to be up bright and early for her shift at the Sugarloaf, she was, of course, wide awake well before sunrise and aching all over. The stitches in her back and leg precluded soaking in the tub, so she settled for a quick shower and went back to the computer.

 

cutlooseblog.com Tuesday, March 22, 2005

 

My life is in limbo at the moment. Legal proceedings are moving forward in two separate states. Until those cases are concluded, it’s difficult to see into the future and decide where I’m going.

 

The job I thought I’d do for my whole life is no longer my job. I’ve left the home I’ve lived in for the past several years. I thought my parents needed my help with their restaurant, but it turns out they seem to be able to get along fine without me. For twenty-two years I’ve been a mother, but my son is grown now and ready to be on his own, so I’ve worked myself out of that job as well.

 

It would be easy to sit around and worry about all those things, but I’m not going to. The best way to banish worry is to do something, specifically the job that comes most readily to hand.

 

My friend Reenie was buried last Friday. As far as I know, her death has been termed a suicide. Maybe it is—and maybe it isn’t. But that’s the job I’m assigning myself to do right now—to find out for sure—to ascertain, to my own satisfaction, whether Reenie Bernard did or did not kill herself and, if she did, why. We’re not talking about legalities here. I’m not an attorney or a police officer. I don’t have any vested interest in probable causes or chains of evidence. I want answers that carry weight in my heart rather than in a court of law.

 

In the past, I’m sure I would have accepted the “official” answer as the “real” answer, but circumstances change, and so have I.

 

And since all of you have been walking along the Reenie road with me, I’ll keep you posted as well.

 

Posted 5:23 A.M. by Babe

 

Lucille had responded:

 

Dear Babe,

 

You can post my letter. I haven’t looked for my son. I don’t have the money, and I’m afraid of what I’d find. Maybe he’s dead. Or like his father.

 

Lucille

 

Ali posted Lucille’s first note, then she started to read the new stuff. The first one was from Andrea Rogers.

 

Dear Ali

 

Glad to know you’re feeling better. Thank God! That maniac could have killed you.

 

I’ll go to Goodwill first thing this morning, before I even go to the office. I know some of the people down there. When I tell them what’s happened, I’m sure they’ll do whatever they can to help. Some of Reenie’s stuff is probably gone—some but not all. I’ll do what I can.

 

Andrea

 

The next e-mail was a stunner.

 

Dear Mrs. Reynolds,

 

A friend of mine told me I could write to you here.

 

My husband was abusive. He use to beat me in front of the kids, but I stayed with him. Because of the kids. He finally got sick and died, praise the Lord!

 

But now my son is dead, too, and I keep wondering how much of it is my fault. I forgive you if you forgive me.

 

Sincerely,

 

Myra Witherspoon

 

Closing her computer, Ali went to get dressed.

 

Chapter 19

 

Myra Witherspoon’s note stayed with Ali as she dressed and tried to make herself presentable. For both Lucille and for Myra, domestic violence had been a communicable disease, spreading its poison through their families from one generation to the next. And maybe even to the generation after that. Both of them had lost their sons. But obviously, both women had somehow plumbed the depths of their own heartbreak and found a measure of forgiveness for others. Otherwise they wouldn’t have written.

 

It was humbling to realize that Myra was willing to forgive the person who had pulled the trigger and ended her son’s violent existence.

 

If our situations were reversed, Ali wondered, could I do the same?

 

She rummaged through her closet until she found a long-sleeved turtle neck she had left in Sedona over Christmas. That covered the bruises on her arms if not the ones on the backs of her hands, and a pair of jeans did the same for the stitches from the cut on her leg and the scrapes on her knees from where she had scrambled away from her attacker in the gravel driveway. Her face was another matter entirely.

 

Working in front of the bathroom mirror, Ali soon discovered what many other women had learned before her—makeup can’t do everything. No amount of Estee Lauder concealer camouflaged the ugly greenish yellow tinge of the bruise that spread from her cheekbone to the base of her neck. Eyeshadow only emphasized the cut near the corner of her puffy eye. Lipstick did the same for her cut and badly swollen upper lip.

 

Chris called as she was examining the final results in the mirror. “How are you feeling?” he asked.

 

“Medium,” she told him.

 

“Maybe I should come back over this weekend,” he offered. “My last final is over at noon on Friday.

 

“That’s not necessary, Chris. Really. I’m fine. I’ve got more food here than I’ll ever manage to eat. All I’m doing is hanging around with Sam and taking it easy.”

 

“I just read this morning’s post,” Chris countered. “That didn’t sound like you’d be taking it easy.”

 

“Don’t go all grown-up on me,” Ali said with a laugh. “I just want some answers. That’s all.”

 

“And how do you plan on getting them?”

 

“By asking questions, I suppose,” she returned.

 

“What kinds of questions?”

 

“My plan for today is to drive down to Phoenix and talk to the banker Reenie talked with the day she died. I just want to get a line on what she did after she left the doctor’s office.”

 

“That’s all?”

 

“What do you mean, that’s all?”

 

“I mean you won’t be doing things you shouldn’t.”

 

“You mean as in not minding my own business? You really are starting to sound like your grandmother.”

 

“And for good reason,” Chris responded. “You just got out of the hospital, remember?”

 

“So you’re worried about me!”

 

“You could say that,” he agreed. “And from the sound of your post this morning, I should be, which is why, at the very least, I should come over and help.”

 

“No,” she said. “You definitely shouldn’t do that. Finish your exams. Finish school.”

 

“But you’ll be careful?”

 

“Chris, I’m going to go talk to a banker,” she said, not trying to conceal her exasperation. “How dangerous can that be?”

 

“In your case, who knows?” he returned.

 

Chris hung up abruptly after that. Ali and her son quarreled so seldom that their telephone tiff left her feeling uneasy. Had Chris started it or had she? And what did he expect her to do, just turn her back on Reenie and forget about it?

 

Sipping coffee, she reread the printed e-mail from First United Financial. This time her eyes stopped short on the words “the trustee and/or with the grantor.” Who in Reenie’s family would be best qualified to fill either one of those jobs?

 

Ed Holzer! Ali realized. Of course. That made perfect sense.

 

After all, the man had been a banker for years before selling out and establishing a property management firm in its stead. In fact, there was a good chance that Ed himself had established the trust accounts. Maybe these were things he and Diane had set up to benefit their grandchildren.

 

Ali had started making a to-do list to take with her. The phone rang just as she added Ed’s name.

 

“Good morning,” Bob Larson said. “How’s my girl this morning?”

 

“Fine,” she told her dad. “Still bruised and battered but fine.”

 

“Your mother wants to know if you’re coming down for breakfast. So do I, for that matter.”

 

“I won’t have time,” she said. “I’m leaving for Phoenix in just a few minutes, and I thought I’d stop by and see Ed and Diane Holzer on the way.”

 

“Our loss,” he said. “Dave’s, too.”

 

“Dave?”

 

“Holman. He was hoping to talk to you, too.”

 

Detective Dave Holman was the last person Ali wanted to see. She remembered Dave running to her side at the end of the Ben Witherspoon confrontation. And she had a hazy recollection of his worried face hovering in the background as the EMTs rolled her from the ambulance into the ER. She hadn’t seen him again after that, and it was just as well. For one thing, Rick Santos, her criminal defense attorney, had told her to have nothing at all to do with law enforcement officers for the time being, at least not until the Witherspoon matter had been resolved, one way or the other. Before that, her attorney needed to be present at all times: As in anything you say can be held against you.

 

But Ali had a second reason for avoiding Dave Holman which, in her opinion, carried as much weight as her attorney’s objections. If Chris somewhat disapproved of Ali looking into the Reenie situation, Dave was likely to be absolutely opposed.

 

“Tell him I’ll be in touch,” Ali said. She was about to hang up, but Bob caught her in time.

 

“Kip said something about your having extra food you want to donate?”

 

“Tons of it,” she said.

 

“How about if I have him bring me up to your place later on this morning,” Bob suggested. “I have a key. We can pick up your extra food and take it up the mountain. Kip’s old neighbors will be glad to have it, and I imagine your mother will be thrilled to have me out from under hand and foot.”

 

“Be advised,” Ali said. “I have an alarm system now.” She gave him the code. “And don’t let the cat out.”

 

“What cat?” Bob demanded. “Since when do you have a cat? You always hated cats.”

 

In the crowded days between her father’s snow-boarding accident and Ali’s own trip to the hospital, there hadn’t been much occasion for visiting.

 

“Sam belongs to Matt and Julie Bernard,” Ali explained. “It’s only temporary. Samantha’s the first cat I’ve ever really made friends with, and she’s not half bad. Ugly, but not bad.”

 

Bob laughed. “That sounds a lot like what your mother says about me on occasion.”

 

When it came time to leave the house, Ali spent the better part of ten minutes fruitlessly searching for her purse. Baffled, she finally thought to look in the shopping bag her mother had used to bring her wrecked clothing home from the hospital.

 

Sure enough, there, zipped into a Ziploc bag, she found the remaining contents of her purse—wallet, MP3 player, three tubes of lipstick, a compact, nail file, a few paperclips, out of date credit card receipts, a plastic tampon container, and other assorted junk. The collection included an official-looking Yavapai Sheriff’s Department document that notified her that her Coach bag had been kept as evidence and could be claimed at a later date.

 

Right, Ali thought. A Coach bag with a bullet hole in the bottom.

 

Ali paused long enough to write “buy purse” on her to-do list. She stuck that along with the printout from Reenie’s e-mail into her makeshift, see-through plastic purse and then set off for Phoenix by way of Cottonwood.

 

It was only a little past ten when Ali drove into the yard at Ed and Diane Holzer’s place. She saw at once that their car was missing from the carport and no one answered her knock. Thinking Ed might have gone to his office, Ali drove on into town.

 

Holzer Property Management was located at the corner of Aspen and South Main in a block Ed had purchased and redeveloped. It was tucked into a small commercial complex that contained two dentists, an accountant, a chiropractor, a Mailboxes, Etc., and a Subway sandwich shop. Ali was disappointed when she saw no trace of Ed’s Buick in the parking lot there, either, but she went inside to check all the same.

 

The receptionist just inside the door was clearly troubled by Ali’s appearance. “Ed isn’t in today,” she said, trying hard not to stare at Ali’s cuts and bruises. “I believe he had a doctor’s appointment this morning, but Bree is in. Would you like to talk to her?”

 

“Sure,” Ali said. “Why not?”

 

Ali was shown into a conference room where she found Bree seated in front of an unfurled stack of architectural drawings. “My God!” Bree exclaimed, leaping to her feet and coming around to give Ali an effusive hug. “You look awful! I heard about what happened, but I didn’t expect . . .”

 

“. . . me to look like the wrath of God?” Ali finished with a pained grin. “Believe me, I’m a lot better now than I was two days ago.”

 

“Grab a chair,” Bree said, resuming her own. “What can we do for you?”

 

“I was looking for your dad.”

 

Bree shook her head. “Sorry,” she said. “You just missed him. Mom and Dad left about twenty minutes ago. They’re on their way to Phoenix so Dad can see his cardiologist.”

 

“Phoenix,” Ali said. “That’s where I’m going, too. Do they have a cell phone? Maybe I can catch up with them there.”

 

Bree shook her head. “Sorry. Dad hates cell phones. Loathes them, in fact. Wouldn’t have one on a bet. But this sounds urgent. Is there something I can do?”

 

Ali considered for a moment before deciding there was no reason not to ask Bree about the accounts. She was, after all, a managing partner. Presumably, whatever Ed knew Bree knew and vice versa.

 

“I’m doing some tracking on Reenie’s movements the afternoon she died,” Ali began.

 

There was a subtle shift in Bree’s demeanor. “How come?” she asked, frowning. “As far as I know, it’s all settled. At least that’s what they told me—that according to Detective Farris the case was closed.”

 

“It may be closed as far as he’s concerned,” Ali said. “Closing cases is what he gets paid for, but can you just accept that, Bree? Can you see your sister just giving up without a fight? I can’t. She wouldn’t turn her back on her kids that way. I still believe she’d stay and duke it out.”

 

Bree took a deep breath. “The point is,” she said, “this has all been terribly hard on my parents. They’re starting to come to terms with what happened. It’s only going to make things worse if you keep going over the same ground. Don’t bother them with this, Ali, please. Let it go. Give them a chance to get past it.”

 

Here was someone else telling Ali to drop it, to mind her own business. And in the old days the old Ali—the old please-everyone-but-yourself Ali— might have backed down.

 

“Hurting your parents is the last thing I want to do,” she said. “But Reenie was my friend, Bree, and as a friend, I want answers about why she’s dead— answers I can accept. Detective Farris may be right—suicide may well turn out to be the answer— but I still want to know why she did it, why she just gave up.”

 

“So what are you doing about it?” Bree asked.

 

“Trying to find out what Reenie did after she left Dr. Mason’s office in Scottsdale that Thursday afternoon. I have reason to believe she visited a bank, United First Financial in Phoenix. I believe she was trying to track down some trust accounts that had been established in her children’s names, but the bank manager wasn’t able to locate them.”

 

“Oh, those,” Bree said at once. “I’d forgotten all about them, but now that you mention them, I do remember. Dad and Mom set one up for Matt right after he was born, and they started one for Julie as soon as she showed up as well. I’m sure misplacing them is just a bookkeeping error of some kind. I can’t imagine why on earth Reenie went to the bank directly instead of calling here.”

 

“You have the records?”

 

“Of course we have the records. All it would have taken is a single call from Reenie to me to straighten this whole thing out, but then again, with everything that was going on in Reenie’s life right then, she probably wasn’t thinking straight.”

 

“Probably not,” Ali agreed.

 

“Anything else I can do, then?” Bree asked.

 

“No,” Ali said. “Thanks for your help. I should probably be going. Give your folks my best, and when I talk to Andrew Cargill I’ll let him know he should call you for information on those missing accounts.”

 

“You’re still going to talk to him?” Bree asked sharply. “I thought . . .”

 

“Andrew Cargill is the last person who saw your sister alive, Bree. Reenie may have mentioned something to him about where she was going and what she planned to do next.”

 

“But—”

 

“It’s what I have to do, Bree. For Reenie and for my own peace of mind.”

 

Ali left then, without looking back, sensing rather than seeing Bree watching her exit from behind. Once back in the Cayenne, she programmed the address for First United Financial into her GPS and headed for Phoenix.

 

The sky overhead was a bright, cloudless blue. The winter rains had done their magic. Even with springtime weather only a few days old, there was already a hint of green everywhere as hardy high desert grasses poked their way up out of the ground. On I-17 traffic was heavy but moving and not at all slow. Spilling downhill from the Mogollon Rim and Arizona’s high country, the freeway’s long sweeping curves made the steep descent deceptively smooth. It was a stretch of highway where unwary truckers and motorists, oblivious to the force of gravity, could find themselves sailing along at speeds well above the 75-m.p.h.-posted limits.

 

It was also a part of the highway whose long vistas of distant mountains never failed to raise Ali’s spirits. She passed the broad, grassy expanse of Sunset Viewpoint. As she started down the first steep grade that led to Black Canyon City and to the Valley of the Sun far below, her cell phone rang. Ali pressed the button, glad she had set her phone on hands-free mode.

 

“Ali?” the distinctively deep voice asked. “It’s Helga.”

 

“How are things?”

 

Helga Myerhoff laughed. “Couldn’t be better,” she said. “Never better.”

 

“You’ve talked to Paul’s attorney, then?”

 

“No,” Helga said with a laugh. “I talked to Paul himself. I have no idea why he seems to think he’s qualified to do this on his own.”

 

Ali was astonished. “He’s trying to do this without an attorney?”

 

“Men who are used to running the show end up thinking they’re smart enough to run all shows,” Helga said. “And more the fool him,” she added. “I believe your soon-to-be-former husband is what people in the real estate business refer to as a ‘motivated seller.’ He wants out of this marriage in the very worst way.”

 

“And he’s willing to pay for the privilege?” Ali asked.

 

“Apparently,” Helga said. “I believe it’ll be to our benefit if we can make the deal before some hotshot pal of his talks him into changing his mind.”

 

“What’s he offering?”

 

“Fortunately, he wants to keep the house. He’s willing to buy out your half of the equity on both that and on the condo in Aspen, which was also purchased after the two of you married. The selling prices are to be based on the average of three separate and independent appraisals.”

 

“Sounds fair,” Ali said.

 

“That’s what I thought,” Helga agreed.

 

“What else?”

 

“He also wants to make a lump-sum payment for you to sign off on his pension. I’ll need to look into that because I think there’s a good chance he’s screwing us on the pension’s current valuation. Don’t worry, though. I’ve got my favorite accountant bloodhound working that line of inquiry.

 

“Mr. Grayson is also willing to pay lifetime alimony, but only in the event you don’t remarry,” Helga continued. “That’s standard, of course, but I told him the amount he was offering was a joke. I let him know that if he really wants us to sign off on this so he can make it to the altar before his kid gets here, he’d better get real in a hurry.”

 

“I’m surprised he didn’t hang up on you.”

 

Helga laughed. “Frankly,” she said, “so am I.”

 

As she drove, Ali had been keeping a close eye on traffic, which had mostly slowed to the posted 60 m.p.h. limit. Glancing in her rearview mirror, Al pulled out to pass two slow-moving trucks, one driving on the paved shoulder and the other in the right-hand lane. She was easing around them when a vehicle—a bright iridescent red SUV of some kind— suddenly emerged from around the obscuring curve behind her and charged forward.

 

“Ali,” Helga said. “Are you still there?”

 

Ali knew the red car was coming way too fast. “Just a minute,” she said. “Let me get out of the way of this nutcase.”

 

Ali pressed down on the accelerator, and the turbo-charged Cayenne shot forward. Even so, by the time she had overtaken the trucks and was ready to move back into the right-hand lane, the red car was right on her bumper. Once Ali returned to the right lane, however, the red car didn’t pass after all. Instead, it slowed and stuck—right in Ali’s blind spot.

 

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Ali muttered under her breath. “Why the hell don’t you just pass?”

 

“Ali?” Helga asked. “Are you talking to me?”

 

“This jerk behind me won’t . . .”

 

Just then something slammed into her back left-hand fender. For what seemed like an eternity, as metal screeched against metal, the front end of the Cayenne swung sickeningly toward the left. As the median rushed toward her, Ali gripped the wheel and desperately twisted it to the right. Too late she realized that by then the other driver had veered away. Without the pressure against the rear of the Cayenne, the front of the vehicle suddenly snapped straight again. Ali knew instantly that she had overcorrected.

 

With terrible clarity, Ali saw the Cayenne swerve back to the right, aiming dead-on at the steel guardrail that lined the right-hand edge of the pavement. Invisible beyond the pavement was a sheer two-hundred-foot drop-off.

 

Wrestling the wheel, Ali tried to compensate for the overcorrection, but there wasn’t room enough. Or time. Instead there was a sudden grinding explosion of steel on steel. Lost in a blinding curtain of air bags, Ali felt the disorienting sensation of spinning. Then, with the Cayenne still astonishingly upright, it came to a sudden stop.

 

The driver’s side air bag had blown Ali’s hands free of the steering wheel. Side-curtain bags had protected her head. But now, as the passenger space filled with smoke and dust, Ali sat stunned and gasping for air, trying to piece together what had happened.

 

Off in the distance, hidden somewhere in the wreckage, she heard Helga’s voice. “Ali! Ali! What in God’s name happened? Are you all right?” Then, there was a sudden sharp pounding on the car window next to her ear.

 

Fighting her way through the empty air bags, Ali saw the face of a bearded man peering in the window. Behind him, parked on the freeway, sat a gigantic idling semi.

 

“Lady, lady,” he shouted through glass. “Are you all right? What the hell was the matter with that woman? She tried to kill you.”

 

“I think I’m all right,” Ali managed, but since she could only summon a whisper, he probably didn’t hear her.

 

“Can you unlock the door?”

 

Eventually Ali complied, and the man wrenched it open. “Come on,” he said. “My buddy’s stopping traffic. He’s calling the cops, too. If you think you can walk, let’s get you out of there in case something catches on fire.”

 

Once Ali was upright, the good Samaritan took one look at her battered face and backed away in horror. “My God, woman, you really are hurt! I’d better call an ambulance.”

 

Ali laughed at him then. She couldn’t help it. She laughed because, no matter how awful she looked, she wasn’t dead and she should have been. She laughed so hard she finally had to sit down on the pavement to keep from falling over.

 

An Arizona Highway Patrol car showed up while Ali was still laughing.

 

“I think she needs an ambulance,” the truck driver told the officer. “She’s gone hysterical on us. Maybe she’s in shock. Did you catch the woman in the other car?”

 

“We’re working on it,” the officer replied. He turned to her then. “Are you all right?”

 

“I’m fine,” she said. “No problem.”

 

“License and registration?”

 

But she wasn’t fine enough to retrieve the paperwork herself. For an answer, Ali pointed back to the wrecked Cayenne. “In there,” she said. “Registration’s in the glove box. My cell phone’s in there somewhere, too. If you could find it . . .”

 

The cop reached into the vehicle. He emerged a few seconds later, holding a piece of paper and the cell phone along with the loaded Ziploc bag she was using for a purse. To her amazement the bag was still fastened.

 

“This?” he asked dubiously.

 

Ali nodded, and then she began to laugh again. “Those Ziploc bags are something, aren’t they?” she asked before dissolving in a spasm of giggles. “Maybe they could use this in a commercial.”

 

When the EMTs from the Black Canyon City Volunteer Fire Department arrived, none of them was prepared to take Ali’s word for it that she was fine. Instead, they loaded her onto a gurney, strapped her down, stuffed her into an ambulance, and took off. The ambulance hurtled forward for what, in Ali’s disoriented state, seemed like a very long time. Suddenly it slowed almost to a stop, but still it kept moving forward, siren blaring.

 

“Are we there yet?” she asked the young attendant at her side.

 

He shook his head. “Not yet,” he said. “There’s a problem on the freeway. We’ll get through it, though. Don’t worry.”

 

Don’t worry, Ali thought. That’s what I told Chris. I’ve got to call him. But she couldn’t. Someone had taken her phone.

 

Eventually they arrived at the John C. Lincoln Hospital in Deer Valley. For the second time that week, a no-nonsense ER nurse, armed with a scissors, came in and began snipping off Ali’s shirt and bra.

 

“Do you have to do that?” Ali asked. “I’m going to run out of bras pretty soon.”

 

Shaking her head, the nurse went right on snipping. It took three hours of poking, prodding and X-raying, before the ER physician finally shrugged and shook his head.

 

“Okay,” he said. “I think you really are fine, but I’m keeping you until this evening for observation. Now what about the cops? There are at least three of them out in the lobby waiting to take a statement. Think you can handle talking to them now?”

 

Ali nodded. “Send them in.”

 

To her amazement, a grim-faced Dave Holman led the way, followed by two uniformed officers and another in plain clothes.

 

“What are you doing here?” she demanded. Her first thought was that the county attorney had decided to prosecute her after all.

 

“The incident occurred inside the Yavapai county line,” he said. “It’s our jurisdiction.”

 

“She tried to run me off the road,” Ali said. “It’s a miracle I didn’t go right over the edge. What was the matter with that woman . . .”

 

“You saw her?”

 

“No,” Ali said. “All I saw was the car, but that’s what the truck driver told me, that the driver was a woman. You did catch her, didn’t you?”

 

Dave shook his head. “No,” he said. “I’m afraid we didn’t.”

 

“Why not?” Ali demanded. “She was right there on the freeway. What happened? Did she just disappear into thin air?”

 

“She’s dead,” Dave said.

 

“Dead?”

 

Dave nodded. “DPS had reports about the incident with you and that the perpetrator was headed southbound. They put up a rolling roadblock just north of Black Canyon City. She tried to go around and went off the highway and off a cliff. She didn’t make it.”

 

“So was she drunk?” Ali asked. “On drugs? What?”

 

“No,” Dave said. “It doesn’t look like drugs or alcohol, at least, not at this time.”

 

“But she tried to kill me,” Ali objected. “Why?”

 

“That’s what we hoped you’d tell us.”

 

Ali was mystified and becoming slightly annoyed. “A total stranger—a maniac—tries to run me off the road, and you want me to tell you why? How on earth would I know?”

 

“Because she wasn’t a stranger,” Dave answered quietly. “I believe you knew her quite well. We’ve tentatively identified the victim in the second vehicle as Breezy Marie Cowan, Reenie Bernard’s sister.”

 

“Oh,” Ali said. And for the moment, that was all she could say.

 

Chapter 20

 

The interview took the better part of the next two hours. Ali told them everything she could remember about her meeting with Bree Cowan as well as what she’d gleaned from reading through Reenie’s accumulated e-mails, including Reenie’s fruitless meeting with the manager at First United Financial’s Phoenix branch.

 

About noon, Dave Holman’s cell phone rang. “We’ve located Mr. and Mrs. Holzer,” he said grimly, once the call ended. “I need to go talk to them.”

 

He left, taking one of the uniformed officers with him. Ali was still answering questions from the other two when Edie Larson bustled into the ER followed by Kip pushing Bob in his wheelchair. The two officers stepped aside to let them through.

 

“What have you done this time?” Edie grumbled, leaning down to kiss her. “It’s becoming very tiresome you know. All I seem to be doing these days is driving from one ER to another.”

 

Ali was surprised to see either one of her parents right then, to say nothing of both of them. “I didn’t call on purpose,” she said. “I knew you were working and . . .”

 

“Dave Holman called us,” she said. “And don’t worry. Everything at work is under control. We borrowed a cook from Tlaquepaque to finish up the day. The manager there owed us from when we helped him out last Christmas.” Having said that, Edie Larson heaved herself into the chair next to Ali’s bed and promptly burst into tears. “You’ve got to quit scaring me this way, Ali. I just can’t take it.”

 

Bob patted his wife’s hand. “Come on now, Edie,” he soothed. “Dave told you she was fine, and you can see for yourself that it’s true.” He looked at Ali. “Do the Holzers know what’s happened?”

 

Ali nodded. “By now they do. Dave left a little while ago to go tell them.”

 

“But why?” Edie asked, drying her tears. “Why would Bree come after you that way? It makes no sense.”

 

“Dave thinks it may have something to do with some trust accounts that were set up for Matt and Julie. Bree has evidently been looting them. He thinks Reenie was starting to figure it out. Fear of being exposed must have pushed Bree over the edge.”

 

“And Reenie, too,” Bob interjected. “What kind of car did you say Bree was driving?”

 

“A Lexus,” Ali said. “A bright red Lexus. Why.”

 

After parking Bob’s chair next to the bed, Kip Hogan had retreated to a spot near the door and as far away as possible from the two officers still standing inside the curtained alcove. With some difficulty, Bob turned and gave Kip a meaningful look.

 

“Tell them, Kip,” he said. “Tell them what you told Edie and me on the way down.”

 

Kip looked at the cops warily and then cleared his throat. “There was a Lexus on the mountain that night,” he said. “The night Ali’s friend died. Two cars came through onto Schnebly Hill Road, a white SUV and a red Lexus. The white one, a Yukon, drove down the mountain. Pretty soon the man came walking back up the road, got in the Lexus, and they drove away. Me and a couple of my friends saw the whole thing, but when the cops came around asking questions, we didn’t want to get involved, so we more or less melted into the woods. But now . . .” He shrugged. “I guess I am involved.”

 

“Who was in the red car?” Ali asked.

 

“A man and a woman.”

 

“What did they look like?”

 

“The woman had dark short hair,” Kip answered. “The man was dark-haired, too. Little bit of a goatee.”

 

All this time, in the back of Ali’s mind, she had imagined that somehow Jasmine Wright and Howie were responsible for what had happened to Reenie. But the people Kip Hogan had just described could be none other than Bree and Jack Cowan. They had motive and opportunity and had been seen at the scene of the crime.

 

“Does anyone have Dave Holman’s cell phone number?” Ali asked. “We should probably give him a call.”

 

cutlooseblog.com Wednesday, March 23, 2005

 

I’m not sure why emergency room personnel insist on cutting off perfectly good clothing instead of letting patients take their clothes off over their heads. But they do, and I’m running low on bras. Yes, that means I’ve paid a visit to yet another emergency room—a different one this time. That’s twice in one week. I’m beginning to think being a freelance blogger is a risky occupation.

 

Because that’s how I ended up in the ER—by being a blogger. The questions I was asking about Reenie brought me up close and personal (way too close it turns out) with the people who most likely killed her. The same questions also brought me far too close to a guardrail overlooking a sheer two-hundred-foot drop.

 

Yes, I know for sure that my friend was murdered. So do the police officers who have now, reluctantly, reopened her case. She was most likely unconscious when she was placed in a vehicle that was then driven off a cliff.

 

Most people are murdered by someone they know and love, and that is true in Reenie’s case, as well. All along I suspected her husband might have had something to do with what happened, but it turned out I was wrong. It is now believed Reenie was murdered by her younger sister. And what was the motive? What else? The root of all evil—money.

 

Police believe that Reenie somehow discovered that her sister, Bree, was possibly looting trust accounts of monies that had been set aside to benefit Reenie’s children. Rather than having the embezzlement exposed, Bree, with the help of her husband, allegedly turned to murder.

 

It’s possible that money missing from the trust accounts is only the tip of the iceberg. Bree has worked in her father’s company for years. Recently, due to her father’s ill health, she’s been in charge. It appears she also had been siphoning money out of the business without her father’s knowledge or consent. How much damage she’s done to him remains to be seen.

 

Bree has already answered for her crimes. She went off a cliff while trying to elude a police roadblock. She’s dead. Her husband is in jail, being held without bond on suspicion of homicide.

 

That means Reenie’s parents will be having yet another funeral this week—a second funeral for their second daughter. The first one, for Reenie, was an outpouring of public grief. The second one will be a private affair—family members only—as two fine, upstanding people try to come to terms with their own nightmare version of Cain and Abel.

 

It makes me wonder? How do parents cope with a tragedy like this where one of their children stands accused of murdering another? How do they find the courage to go on?

 

I don’t know, but I’m sure they will. They have to. Because their grandchildren, Matt and Julie, are coming to live with them while the children’s father goes off on a yearlong sabbatical.

 

Taking his girlfriend with him, Ali thought, but she didn’t put that in the post.

 

Which means Sam will be staying on with me. And that’s all right. Neither one of us liked being together much to begin with, but I think we’re going to be friends.

 

Speaking of parents, mine have decided not to sell the Sugarloaf—or rather the buyer decided against making the deal. I guess his restaurant consultant advised him against it. My father is bummed about it; my mother is delighted, so I guess they’ll work it out.

 

As for me, will I stay in Sedona? I don’t know. But I think I will keep blogging. Dangerous or not, I’m beginning to like that, too.

 

Posted 12:28 A.M. by Babe

 

About the Author

 

J.A. JANCE is the New York Times bestselling author of the Joanna Brady series, the J.P. Beaumont series, and the interrelated novels Day of the Dead, Hour of the Hunter, and Kiss of the Bees. She was born in South Dakota, brought up in Bisbee, Arizona, and now lives with her husband in Seattle, Washington, and Tucson, Arizona.

 

Readers can visit her online at www.jajance.com.