Before the rain, p.20
Before the Rain, page 20
Jordan groaned. “No way.”
“The whole thing’s crazy,” Ray said. “We need permission from Eric and the FBI, and a bunch of back-up guns. Not a reporter.”
“Angie’s not dangerous, I promise,” Jordan said.
Sunny looked to Ray. “You decide.”
He sucked air. Watching his face, she knew he would rather meet with Angie, not take Jordan to a Phoenix jail. And if what Jordan said was true, especially about his newspaper’s previous contact with her, Angie might not talk without him. Even to the FBI.
“Go ahead and call her,” Ray said. “Find out if she’s willing to see us, then I’ll ask Eric’s permission.”
“Who’s Eric?”
“Our boss,” Ray said. “We’ll make the decisions on who goes where, with what, when we get there. We have to see what the FBI thinks. They might not let us go in there without them, even if we have the sister’s okay.”
Jordan grunted. “Who goes where with what when we get there?”
“Too complicated for an English major?” Ray said.
“I was a History—”
“Oh, call her,” Ray said. “Now.”
25
On the way over, Ray waiting to hear from Eric, the reporter told them Angie Costello Chiarella lived with her construction-executive husband and two teenage daughters in the northern part of Scottsdale. More of a miniature horse farm, the eight-bedroom home featured a barn, a tack room, a riding trail connected to the public horse path, a swimming pool, a tennis court, and shade parking for a dozen vehicles.
Sunny grunted. “I know a couple of Beverly Hills hotels that get by with less.”
Ray’s thoughts bubbled inside a Congressman King stew, the politician, maybe a former chief, and apparently a part of the gang who killed Alissa. This on his mind while he drove past the Chiarella house slowly, noticed the security gate. Press a button and speak.
The neighborhood was quiet at night. Big eucalyptus trees lined the road. He parked one block over to wait while Eric spoke privately with the Federal Bureau of Investigation. See if Jordan’s crazy plan had legs.
He answered Eric’s call. It took a while, but the engine hadn’t cooled. He put the boss on Speaker. “We’re all listening, Eric. Are we going in?”
“First, a quick speech for the reporter. Jordan, you listening?”
“I’m all ears, general.”
“I’m Eric Johannsen, the Department of Homeland Security’s Principal Deputy Under Secretary for Intelligence and Analysis. I mention the full hairy title because I need you to understand how important this witness Chiarella could be to America’s national security.”
“We’re approved?” Ray asked. He couldn’t wait to get in there, find out if Jessie’s sister knew anything about Alissa.
“Shut up, Ray. Jordan, you need to understand how much trust your country is placing in you.”
Jordan leaned forward in the SUV’s restraining chair. Earlier, a sturdy, balding FBI agent named Morelli had worked from a briefcase of electronic listening gear, tape, and other equipment to body-wire Scott with a miniature recording device.
“I’m after a story, General, that’s all,” Jordan said.
“Understood, son. But you’ve agreed to help by not publishing what you hear tonight, at least for a while. Is that right?”
“Yes. The deadline Jessie Maris gave in her note would be Sunday,” Jordan said. “I’ll wait until Jessie shoots someone, the Sunday deadline passes, or you say go ahead.”
“And,” Eric said, “if the FBI thinks something Chiarella says for your story would ruin a DOJ legal case, you’ll at least talk to them about changes?”
“I agree to be sensitive to their concerns, not about my story. Two things are important to me, General. One, nobody knows I wore a wire for the FBI, and nobody sees a copy of my story before publication. Nobody but my editor.”
“How’s that going to work?” Eric said.
“The FBI will have everything Angie says on tape, right?” Jordan said.
“Yeah.”
“So anything she says that worries them, tell me about it. I’ll listen. I don’t want to blow a legal case against a criminal. Especially an abuser who wants to be governor.”
“Fair enough,” Eric said. “Especially considering the FBI has been told Chiarella won’t talk to the FBI except through an attorney. What I just heard, the attorney needs two days to wrap another big case. Then he wants to talk with his client. This Chiarella woman—or her husband—came up with some New York hotshot, thinks he’s Alan Dershowitz and David Boies wrapped in one.”
“Still,” Ray said. “A reporter going on an interview?”
“Hey, a reporter that’s willing to wear a wire and make promises about holding off on the story? Big shots realized we all have more to gain than lose.”
“Plus,” Sunny said. “If Jessie’s notes are accurate, the FBI knows we have only hours to find our cannon.”
“Exactly,” Eric said. “So, get going.”
“We’re ready,” Ray said. “The wire’s on Jordan. We’re almost there.”
“Oh—one more thing,” Eric said.
The atmosphere thickened inside the SUV.
“Jessie’s sister asked about you,” Eric said. “She wanted to know if you were related to the insurance investigator who went missing in Arizona two years ago.”
Ray’s stomach flipped. “That’s weird.”
“No kidding. Her explanation was newspapers and television. She said the case was widely covered here.”
In the telephone silence, Ray heard a fuse burning, a buzz from his abdomen, something in Eric’s voice.
“Maybe you should take me off speaker, Ray. Let’s you and I speak privately.”
“No. Go ahead. My partner needs to know this, and Jordan knows personal things are out of bounds. They’re already curious.”
“Angie Chiarella not only remembered Alissa’s name,” Eric said, “She knew Alissa’s old case involved railroad theft. Even if some of those facts were on TV, they are long-remembered details. Seems odd, don’t you think?”
Ray pulled into the Chiarella’s driveway. “Very.”
“Call me when you’re finished,” Eric said.
He kept the vehicle in Park, flipped on the interior light, and faced them both. He wanted Sunny and Jordan to see his face. Clearing his throat, he said, “You agreed personal stuff is off the record, right, Jordan?”
“I did, yes. Unfortunately.”
“My wife, Alissa, worked as an investigator for a New York insurance company. About two years ago, she was kidnapped and murdered while investigating a similar crime to what we’re working on.”
“Theft from a moving train?” Sunny asked.
“Yes. A big generator.”
“She figured out the centrifugal force angle?” Jordan asked.
He shrugged. “Maybe, but there’s no evidence she did. She was searching the tracks between Tucson and Gila Bend, but I don’t believe she knew what exactly what she was looking for.”
He gazed straight ahead, his fingers gripping the gear shift. The light in his vision wiggled and blurred. He blinked away moisture. His guts were ripping in two different directions. He wanted to choke Congressman Randall King. And he wanted to cry like a newborn baby for missing his wife.
“I’m surprised they let you on this investigation,” Jordan said. “I mean…your wife?”
“There’s no proven connection yet,” Ray said.
Jordan made a face. “But Alissa Hauser’s remains showed up at the Maris property.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Ray said.
Angie Costello Chiarella answered the door chimes herself, escorting Ray and her other guests into a Better Homes & Gardens living room-den-breakfast nook the size of a professional hockey rink. Three fireplaces, including a brick pit in the room’s center. An exposed, wood-beam ceiling rose twenty-five feet above oak plank flooring. Five couches and a department-store inventory of chairs, lamps, tables, flower baskets, living trees, and brightly colored cushions filled the oblong space with desert shades—gold, tan, and bleached-bone white.
The room reminded him of the home furnishings department in an old-fashioned department store, an entire floor of living room chairs and couches, all the accessories. Like a dozen or more individual homes. He’d been to Macy’s a few times with Etta’s high school friend and her friend’s mother.
“I’m so worried about Jessie,” Angie said. She was still guiding the group across a landscape of furniture. “Maybe I helped her too much after our mother died, paying her rent and schooling, giving her spending money. My husband and I arranged several good jobs, too. She’d do well on the interview, work hard for a few months. But she’d always get bored and move on. Always involved with terrible men.”
“Nolan wasn’t the worst?” Ray said.
“Hardly. Just the most persistent.”
Angie sat down in a wingback chair and waved her guests to a long sofa facing her. Angie, the beautiful and powerful, like faded pictures of Elizabeth Taylor he’d seen in old magazines his mother kept. A woman who had made her own way and arranged for all the comforts she’d wanted, he assumed.
Her living spaces were the largest he’d ever been inside. As much luxury, extravagance, and opulence as a minor Middle Eastern oil sheik. He wondered if Sunny and Jordan were, like himself, slightly uncomfortable.
Jordan introduced him and Sunny, but Angie kept her stare on the reporter. “Are you sure they want to help my sister, Jordan? I honestly don’t know if she shot that husband of hers, but I’d cheer Jessie if she did. That bastard deserved to be boiled alive.”
“I bet these detectives agree with you,” Jordan said.
Ray leaned forward. “I’ve seen your sister’s medical records, Ms. Chiarella. I felt dirty and angry reading them. A gruesome human, that man Nolan Maris. Wounds like a broken eye socket and a dislocated shoulder come from the cruelest kind of domestic violence. We understand your anger.”
Repeating the information about Jessie he’d picked up days ago, Ray wondered again why any living creature would stay in such a self-destructive situation. A dog or cat would run, take their chances with the street. But he’d heard abuse worked like brainwashing, so he probably didn’t understand. It was hard for him to think about, frankly. A grown man punching and seriously injuring a woman.
“Are you one hundred percent sure you weren’t followed,” Angie asked. “I know how you and the FBI found me, Jordan. But no one else did in eighteen years.”
“Who are you frightened of?” Ray asked.
“Nolan had a goon squad of crazy biker friends, every single one a convicted criminal or a perp the cops hadn’t caught yet. They could be looking for me, hoping I’ll lead them to Jessie and that terrible cannon.”
“There was no one behind us,” Ray said. “I assure you.”
He glanced at Sunny, nodded for her to take the lead. They’d discussed the move earlier.
“Why don’t we start with you telling us a bit about yourself,” Sunny said. “Not a three-page biography—a thumbnail sketch.”
Angie shrugged. “I grew up in a house of yelling and screaming, Mom and Dad always fighting, so I wanted out as quickly as I could. Got married before I graduated high school. We kept it a secret, but there was a baby coming by the time I got my diploma.”
“No college?” Sunny asked.
“Nope, just three kids, one left in high school now herself. My husband did well in the construction business. Started contracting and moved to development.”
“What was Jessie like growing up?” Sunny said.
“Played victim a lot, never doing what Mom asked, always in trouble. Dad leaving us made everything worse, but Jessie and I both understood why he had to go. Our mother was obsessed with herself, her good looks and her figure. The crazier Mom got—”
“When did your father leave?” Sunny asked.
“Jessie and I were both in grammar school. Like six and nine.”
“Is that when your mother started her abuse?”
“Oh, no, but she got worse after Dad left, especially with Jessie. Even staying all those years, I felt bad moving out. But I had to save myself.”
“Was that before or after Jessie’s juvie court case?” Sunny said.
“Maybe that year or a year after. Why?”
“We believe Nolan and his friends stole the Air Force’s weapon,” Sunny said. “And then your sister stole it from them. What we need is background on your sister so we can find that autocannon. You’ve read the notes she published in the paper?”
“Sure. They were scary to read. My sister sounds desperate. A little crazy.”
“She needs help,” Sunny said. “We know that. We want that cannon, not to hurt your sister. We’ll protect her and the public.”
“Even if I totally believed you, I have no idea where she is,” Angie said.
“Okay. But can you tell us about that court hearing years ago? Your sister was petitioning to separate from your mother?”
“Now there’s another monster,” Angie said. “Much worse than Nolan.”
“Your mother?” Sunny said.
Angie smiled. “She was a monster like Nolan, yes, maybe worse, but I’m talking about the judge—a current congressman now running for governor. That’s the guy Jessie wants to kill.”
Ray’s jaw tightened. “You were in court that day?”
“Only the day Jessie’s attorney called me as a witness. Nothing happened in court that day, except maybe the way the judge stared at Jessie.”
Sunny and Ray traded glances.
“Could you start at the beginning, please?” Sunny said.
Angie lifted a decanter from the table beside her and poured a dark drink. Whisky or tea. “Would any of you care to join me? This is very old bourbon.”
Sunny said, “No, thank you.” Jordan and Ray shook their heads.
“Everything I am about to say is public knowledge,” Angie said. “All the neighbors knew my mother abused me and Jessie, although Jessie got the worst. Punches. Kicks. Hot irons. Locked in the closet. The afternoon she came home from the court hearing, our mother tied Jessie to our maple tree.”
Ray’s throat tightened. What kind of a parent?
“Jessie’s attorney called six eyewitnesses that day,” Angie said, “including two police officers. There were hospital reports and pictures. Recordings of 9-1-1 calls. And a sworn affidavit from Jessie’s school nurse on the frequency of bruises, cuts, and scrapes, the lack of sleep. But Judge King didn’t care about any of that. Evidence didn’t matter. He sent Jessie back for more.”
“Why would he do that?” Sunny asked.
“Bribery. And sexual favors.”
Sunny made a face. “What?”
“Let me finish,” Angie said. “Our aunt paid for Jessie’s attorney and showed up in court to offer her a place to come live in California. She testified her sister—our mother—was insane and had been so diagnosed as a teenager.”
“She had evidence?” Ray asked.
“Letters from doctors. But Judge King still said no, said children always belonged with their mother. He spoke the words as if he were quoting the Bible.”
“No wonder you called him a monster,” Jordan said.
“That’s not the reason,” Angie said. “Sending Jessie home was a good deed compared to what happened at our house that night…his payment for sending Jessie home.”
Sunny gasped.
“Congressman Randall King was, and probably still is—” Angie’s voice broke. Her eyes teared. “—a violent pedophile.”
ONE DAY BEFORE THE RAIN
26
Tommy Moon hopped down from the eighteen-wheel, tractor-trailer rig he’d driven into the remote box canyon, his boots raising a puff of dust which merged with the brown cloud following him, Tommy like that character in the comic strip Peanuts, Pigpen, a ball of dirt always floating behind him.
He wasn’t a bad guy. Handy with tools. And his tongue. But Jessie wouldn’t be sorry to see him disappear.
He’d driven into the tiny canyon at dawn, ten minutes early, finding Jessie on top of the flatbed, the tarp, and the collection of cardboard-squares camouflage removed from the autocannon. She’d been inspecting the weapon, imagining what the exploding ammunition would do to Congressman King. Getting the autocannon’s feel.
But Tommy had probably seen her touching something she shouldn’t, the big fuzzy shark watching her from inside his private dust cloud. Seen her dare to place her hands on his metallic work of art. She didn’t like the look on his face as he approached.
“What are you doing? I asked you not to touch anything before I got here. Gum and duct tape are holding everything together.”
“I wasn’t touching anything. I was looking.”
“I saw your hands on the cables and the trigger. You were getting ready to hook-up the ammunition drum, weren’t you? See if you could fire it, probably. Why else would the truck’s engine be running, the hydraulic motors ready?”
She grinned. A passion had risen inside her, a violent seed planted long ago that had been getting stronger, forging toward release and flower. Must have been there most of her life, but she’d never known it existed until she’d killed Nolan. In this newer stare down with Tommy, she felt like a tiger.
“Isn’t that why we’re here?” she said. “See if we can fire it?”
Tommy put his hand on the trailer, a dirty boot on the first rung of the step-up. “Yeah, but you needed to wait for me. Let me hook it up, make sure it’s right when we fire it.”
Killing her abusive husband had triggered the upcoming climax of the seed which grew inside, not finished it. Was the swelling just hatred? “Oh, Tommy, relax,” she said. “There’s no one around for ten miles, and we need to test our machine and livestream the action for our buyers.”
