Cactus Heart - [16]
I pulled on some shorts and walked to the kitchen, where I poured orange juice and drank it in one long swallow.
“I don’t have anything new to leak, my dear.” I pulled aside the blinds and looked into the yard. The oleanders and bougainvillea needed trimming, the joys of a nine-month growing season.
“I’m calling to make a deposit, my love,” Lorie said. “It’s only fair.”
I could hear computer keys clattering in the background of her voice.
“Remember your skeletons in the wall? And the man who was executed in the kidnapping? Jack Talbott? Remember he had a girl with him?”
“Right. Frances Richie.”
“She’s still alive,” Lorie said.
I sat at the wicker kitchen table, my heart pounding a little harder. “Really?”
“I shit you not,” she said. “She is still at the women’s unit at Florence, where she has been since 1942.”
“How did you find this out?”
“I’d like to say it was terrific shoe-leather reporting, but actually, somebody called and left the tip this morning. One of the clerks passed it along to me.”
I thanked her and hung up. Frances Richie had been twenty-four when she was arrested with Jack Talbott in Nogales. That would make her about eighty-two now. A true life sentence.
My head a little clearer, I went to see if everything of the night before had merely been a strange dream. The living room was sunny and serene behind the picture window, the ceiling-high bookshelves familiarly pleasing. I walked into the study and there was no Peralta. But the comforter was left folded on the chair with military precision and the newspaper was set precisely in the middle of the desk.
May you live in interesting times.
Over at the Starbucks at Seventh Street and McDowell, I stopped to buy my usual vente, non-fat, no-whip mocha. I sat outside at a round table surrounded by trim, young white professionals, all attractive, all well off, all unsure whether they really want to live in this wonderful little historic district of stucco homes surrounded by the inner city. They clutched their lattes and the alarm buttons to their Range Rovers and hurried in and out.
And why not be afraid? Look at this morning’s Republic. In addition to another story about the discovery of the skeletons, it was chock-a-block full of post-modern mayhem right here in paradise. The centerpiece was about the pressure to catch the Harquahala Strangler. There was more in the B-section: some teenagers in Gilbert thought they were vampires and murdered a twelve-year-old girl to prove it; a visiting nurse was raped and killed in Mesa; some gangbangers tried to ambush two Phoenix cops out in Maryvale. And a string of shootings on the west side had been tied together and now police were seeking one suspect. He now had a name, too: the Grand Avenue Sniper. Otherwise, the Cardinals were losing, the big Indian casino south of town was booming, everything with a “dot-com” attached to the name was making millions and the desert was disappearing into the city at the rate of an acre an hour.
I finished the sports section when the cellular phone rang. I hoped it would be Lindsey. It was Peralta.
“Progress,” he demanded.
“What? It’s not even nine in the morning.” I was cranky. “I could have briefed you at the house last night. Or this morning, I mean, at two o’clock.”
“You’re a tragic fucking figure,” he said.
“Fuck you. I’m sure we’ve found Andrew and Woodrow Yarnell, but PPD is going by the book. DNA tests and all.”
Peralta grunted through the cellular system.
“The case was initially investigated by Joe Fisher. He was a legendary detective on the Phoenix force. That’s cool.”
“If you say so, Mapstone.”
“Why do you care?” I asked.
“Because you’re my project.”
Before I could respond, he said, “I see your old girlfriend had a big story about the Yarnell case. Funny how that happens.”
“Well, Mike, we work for America’s Toughest Sheriff. Theater and all that.”
“Why do they keep using that bad photo of me?”
“I want to go out to Arizona State Prison,” I said. “Can you grease the skids?”
“What? You teaching history to the cons?”
“I’ll laugh when I wake up. Frances Richie is still alive out there. She was the woman arrested with Jack Talbott in the Yarnell case.”
“Jesus. We have judges letting murderers out in seven years. What the hell is she still doing in prison?”
“One of many questions I want to ask.”
“What questions?” I could see him sitting back at his big desk, shaking his head. “We know who did it. What else is there to know?”
“Hey, you want me to work the case. Let me work the case. I want to know how the bodies got into that old warehouse. I want to know where that pocket watch came from. I want to know why the chief deputy doesn’t seem to have enough to do so he has to micromanage me.”
“All right, let me call the warden,” he said. Then, “I put your Lindsey on the Harquahala case.”
“So I heard,” I said. “I don’t know if she’s ‘my’ Lindsey, though.”
“Really?” His voice changed. “Why is that?”
“Because these are the nineties. At least for a little while longer.”
Now it was his turn to search for a comeback. I said, “Three years is a long time to come up dry on a case like the Harquahala Strangler.”
A handsome young New York professor comes to Phoenix to research his new book. But when he's brutally murdered, police connect him to one of the world's most deadly drug cartels. This shouldn't be a case for historian-turned-deputy David Mapstone – except the victim has been dating David's sister-in-law Robin and now she's a target, too. David's wife Lindsey is in Washington with an elite anti-cyber terror unit and she makes one demand of him: protect Robin.This won't be an easy job with the city police suspicious of Robin and trying to pressure her.
A cache of diamonds is stolen in Phoenix. The prime suspect is former Maricopa County Sheriff Mike Peralta, now a private investigator. Disappearing into Arizona's mountainous High Country, Peralta leaves his business partner and longtime friend David Mapstone with a stark choice. He can cooperate with the FBI, or strike out on his own to find Peralta and what really happened. Mapstone knows he can count on his wife Lindsey, one of the top "good hackers" in law enforcement. But what if they've both been betrayed? Mapstone is tested further when the new sheriff wants him back as a deputy, putting to use his historian's expertise to solve a very special cold case.
Cincinnati homicide Detective Will Borders now walks with a cane and lives alone with constant discomfort. He's lucky to be alive. He's lucky to have a job, as public information officer for the department. But when a star cop is brutally murdered, he's assigned to find her killer. The crime bears a chilling similarity to killings on the peaceful college campus nearby, where his friend Cheryl Beth Wilson is teaching nursing. The two young victims were her students. Most homicides are routine, the suspects readily apparent.
Cheryl Beth Wilson is an elite nurse at Cincinnati Memorial Hospital who finds a doctor brutally murdered in a secluded office. Wilson had been having an affair with the doctoras husband, a surgeon, and this makes her a aperson of interesta to the police, if not at outright suspect. But someone other than the cops is watching Cheryl Beth.The killing comes as former homicide detective Will Borders is just hours out of surgery. But as his stretcher is wheeled past the crime scene, he knows this is no random act of violence.
The private-detective business starts out badly for former Phoenix Deputy David Mapstone, who has teamed up with his old friend and boss, Sheriff Mike Peralta. Their first client is gunned down just after hiring them. The case: A suspicious death investigation involving a young Arizona woman who fell from a condo tower in San Diego. The police call Grace Hunter's death a suicide, but the client doesn't buy it. He's her brother. Or is he? After his murder, police find multiple driver's licenses and his real identity is a mystery.
Опорск вырос на берегу полноводной реки, по синему руслу которой во время оно ходили купеческие ладьи с восточным товаром к западным и северным торжищам и возвращались опять на Восток. Историки утверждали, что название городу дала древняя порубежная застава, небольшая крепость, именованная Опорой. В злую годину она первой встречала вражьи рати со стороны степи. Во дни же затишья принимала застава за дубовые стены торговых гостей с их товарами, дабы могли спокойно передохнуть они на своих долгих и опасных путях.
Как часто вы ловили себя на мысли, что делаете что-то неправильное? Что каждый поступок, что вы совершили за последний час или день, вызывал все больше вопросов и внутреннего сопротивления. Как часто вы могли уловить скольжение пресловутой «дорожки»? Еще недавний студент Вадим застает себя в долгах и с безрадостными перспективами. Поиски заработка приводят к знакомству с Михаилом и Николаем, которые готовы помочь на простых, но весьма странных условиях. Их мотивация не ясна, но так ли это важно, если ситуация под контролем и всегда можно остановиться?
Из экспозиции крымского художественного музея выкрадены шесть полотен немецкого художника Кингсховера-Гютлайна. Но самый продвинутый сыщик не догадается, кто заказчик и с какой целью совершено похищение. Грабители прошли мимо золотого фонда музея — бесценной иконы «Рождество Христово» работы учеников Рублёва и других, не менее ценных картин и взяли полотна малоизвестного автора, попавшие в музей после войны. Читателя ждёт захватывающий сюжет с тщательно выписанными нюансами людских отношений и судеб героев трёх поколений.
Александра никому не могла рассказать правду и выдать своего мужа. Однажды под Рождество Роман приехал домой с гостем, и они сразу направились в сауну. Александра поспешила вслед со свежими полотенцами и халатами. Из открытого окна клубился пар и были слышны голоса. Она застыла, как соляной столп и не могла сделать ни шага. Голос, поразивший её, Александра узнала бы среди тысячи других. И то, что обладатель этого голоса находился в их доме, говорил с Романом на равных, вышибло её из равновесия, заставило биться сердце учащённо.
Валентин Владимиров живет тихой семейной жизнью в небольшом городке. Но однажды семья Владимировых попадает в аварию. Жена и сын погибают, Валентин остается жив. Вскоре виновника аварии – сына известного бизнесмена – находят задушенным, а Владимиров исчезает из города. Через 12 лет из жизни таинственным образом начинают уходить те, кто был связан с ДТП. Поговаривают, что в городе завелась нечистая сила – привидение со светящимся глазами безжалостно расправляется со своими жертвами. За расследование берется честный инспектор Петров, но удастся ли ему распутать это дело?..
Если вы снимаете дачу в Турции, то, конечно, не ждете ничего, кроме моря, солнца и отдыха. И даже вообразить не можете, что столкнетесь с убийством. А турецкий сыщик, занятый рутинными делами в Измире, не предполагает, что очередное преступление коснется его собственной семьи и вынудит его общаться с иностранными туристами.Москвичка Лана, приехав с сестрой и ее сыном к Эгейскому морю, думает только о любви и ждет приезда своего возлюбленного, однако гибель знакомой нарушает безмятежное течение их отпуска.