Blood Flag: A Paul Madriani Novel (6 page)

End of a perfect night, thought Sofia. She could have been out for drinks with friends. Instead here she was down in a dark hole trying to rescue a dog who was scratching her legs all to hell. She reached down in the darkness, got her hands around him, lifted him up, and tucked him against her chest, holding him tight with her left arm. Reaching out with her right hand she grabbed the ladder. Phantom vision from the fine nerves in her face sensed something up close as it penetrated the zone in front of her sightless eyes. It tickled the tip of her nose and the tiny hairs on her right ear. Sofia stopped for a second to scratch her face and rub her ear in case it might be a spiderweb. But it wasn’t . . .

SEVEN

D
id you give Sofia the day off?” It’s Monday morning and Harry is standing at the front counter in the office as I come through the door.

“No.” Coffee in my hand, briefcase under my arm, I’m running late. It’s already after ten.

“Well, she’s not here. She’s supposed to do the filings at the courthouse. Be nice to have them done before noon,” says Harry.

“Where is she?”

He shrugs a shoulder.

“I’ve been calling her since just before nine. There’s no answer.” This from Sally, our receptionist.

“Try it again,” I tell her.

“I have. Several times. It rolls right over to voicemail. She’s either on the line talking or she’s turned off her phone.”

“Well, check it again. Maybe she hung up,” I say.

Sally punches the number for Sofia’s cell on the reception console at her desk, waits a second for the auto dial, then slowly shakes her head as she listens through the headset. “There’s no answer. Just ‘leave a message.’ I left one earlier.” She hits the button and hangs up.

“Does she have a home number?” I ask.

“If she does she never gave it to me,” says Sally.

“Shoot her a text message,” I tell her. “Ask her to call in.”

I glance at Harry. “Don’t look at me. You’re the one who hired her.” Harry is still searching for his own assistant. I suspect this could take a while. When it comes to the office Harry’s like a cloistered monk. He doesn’t like strangers invading the sanctuary of his secluded contrarian monastery down the hall, even if they’re trying to help him. Strike that—
especially
if they’re trying to help him.

“It’s not like her to be late,” I say.

“How would you know? You keep banker’s hours,” he says. “You’ll have to give her a little more time before she’s gonna have you properly trained.” Harry gives me an I-told-you-so smirk and goes right back to the question of the day: “In the meantime, who’s gonna do the filings?”

“How about Selena?” Selena Johnson is Harry’s secretary.

“She’s busy!” he says. Harry is giving me a message: Sofia is my hire. I created the problem, so now I own it.

During all of this, Brenda Gomes, my secretary, has been standing, peeking over the wall of her cubicle like a spotter checking to see whose target’s been hit. As I lift my eyes she drops down behind her carpeted barricade faster than a doughboy nailed by a sniper.

Before I can even ask her, Harry says, “Fine, let’s have Brenda do it!” Ever helpful, he’s quick to give me a hand, making points with my secretary. I will owe her a lunch, and Sofia, when I can get her to call in, will owe her an apology.

I finish dictating some letters into the computer behind my desk and check my watch. It’s just before noon. I’m thinking of grabbing Harry and getting some lunch when the phone on my desk rings. I turn and look. It’s the com line. I pick it up. “Yes?”

Sally’s voice: “There’re two detectives here from the sheriff’s department to see you.”

For a moment I think maybe I’ve blown a scheduled appointment. It wouldn’t be the first time. I check my watch to see if it’s stopped and glance at the calendar. But both my watch and the clock on my desk say no and my calendar is clear.

“What’s it about? Did they give you a client name?”

“No. Just a business card.”

“Ask ’em for the client’s name and pull the file, please,” I tell her.

She checks. I hear the muffled voices as she covers the mouthpiece with her hand. When she comes back on the line she says, “It’s not about a client. It’s something private. They want to talk to you.”

The way she says it triggers an alarm in my head and acid in my stomach.

“Show them in.” I hang up, turn, and dim the screen behind me. Before I can swing back around there’s a rap on wood from the outside.

“It’s open.”

As it does I look up. A hulking shadow in a dark suit stands there filling my doorway. He’s big enough to play linebacker for the NFL but looks old enough to be retired. I’m guessing in his early fifties, close-cropped hair, something between an old flattop and a butch. What’s left of it is losing the battle to the rebels in the war between the brown and the gray.

“Mr. Madriani?”

“Come in. Have a seat.”

As he clears the door I can see the other one, younger, more dapper, blond, tall, and lean in tan slacks and a dark polo shirt. He strolls in and navigates around the mountain that is his partner. His unbuttoned blue blazer flashes open so that he gives me a peek at the bulge of brown leather and black gunmetal threaded onto his belt. It’s accented by the glint of brass from the shield on his other side.

The older man in the wrinkled serge suit says, “I take it you are Paul Madriani?” They don’t sit, they just stand there looking down at me. The dour expression on his face, his tone, the way he looks at me like an insect under glass, cause me to wonder if they’re about to arrest me.

“I am. Is there something I can help you with?”

“I’m Detective Brad Owen. This is my partner, Jerry Noland. We’re with the sheriff’s Homicide Unit. I’m afraid we have some bad news for you. You have an employee by the name of Sadie Maria Leon?”

The flood of adrenaline to my heart gives birth to a surge of panic. I read it in his eyes, hear it in the undertaker’s tone of his voice, a message he has delivered a thousand times. The oracle of pitiless loss. I know what is coming, but I don’t want to hear it.

“No. No. The girl who works here, her name is Sofia.” I shake my head. “You’ve got the wrong person.” I want them to go away.

He looks at a notebook in his hand. “Name on the driver’s license reads Sadie Maria—”

“Our girl uses the name Sofia.”

“She did,” says the younger cop. “But not anymore. She’s dead.” He drops Sofia’s business card on my desk directly in front of me. Disbelief slams at light speed into the wall of reality. “We found that one and several more just like it in the purse near her body.”

The brief moment of premonition is not enough to dampen the shock. I sit there as my paralyzed brain tries to cope. Denial and desire freeze time as my mind scrambles madly to swim back up the river to those golden seconds of safety before they knocked on my door.

EIGHT

A
re you all right?”

My eyes wander from the business card on my desk to the sea of blue serge standing in front of me. When I look up, the older cop, the one named Owen, is staring at me.

“Are you OK?”

“Yeah. I’m fine.” I lie to him. I am breathing hard. Beads of cold sweat are erupting like popcorn from the flesh on my forehead.

“Can we get you anything?” he asks.

“No.”

“Do you take any medications?”

I shake my head, though at the moment I could kill for a sleeping pill, anything to knock me out so that when I wake this nightmare will be over.

“A glass of water?” he asks.

“No.” It’s strange but the only thing I can think of right now is how I am going to tell Joselyn. I look at the cop, try to collect myself, and finally come up with a cogent question: “How did it happen?”

“We’re not sure.” It’s the younger cop, the one named Noland, who speaks. “A jogger found her body early this morning out off Highway 94 in the El Cajon–La Mesa area. Do you have any idea what she might have been doing out there?”

I shake my head.

The older detective says, “When’s the last time you saw her?”

I try to think for a moment, clear my head. “It was Friday, late in the day. I’m not certain of the time. Probably around five thirty. I’m not sure.”

The older one starts to take notes. “Where was this?” he asks.

“Here in the office,” I tell him. “She was headed out on an errand.”

“Where was she going?”

“To pick up a dog. Was there a small dog with her?”

“Not in her car or anywhere near the body,” says Noland. “Where was she supposed to pick up this dog?”

“Client’s house. I’d have to get the address,” I tell him.

“We’ll wait,” he says.

“I’m sorry. I need to think. I’m a bit rattled.”

“We understand.” The older man seems sympathetic. The younger one, not so much.

“You’re sure it’s her?” I ask.

“No one has formally identified her yet,” says Noland. “And the face was a little distorted. But there’s no question it matched the picture on the driver’s license.”

My heart sinks.

“This house she was going to. Where was it located?” asks Owen.

“I’m not sure how much I can tell you. The client was gone and there was no one else living in the house, so someone had to pick up the dog.”

“We need to have that address,” he says. “If that’s where she was headed, we’re gonna need to check it out. Was it in the El Cajon or La Mesa area?”

“I don’t think so. I’m not sure. Tell you the truth, I’ve never been to the house.” Brauer’s file is still on my desk, but I don’t want to reach for it and open it in front of them. The fact is, I have no idea where she lives. But the second they leave I intend to find out.

“Can you give us the name of the client that owns the house?” asks Noland.

“If I was going to do that, I’d just tell you where she lived.”

“Why don’t you help us?” says Owen. “We’re trying to find out who killed the girl. You do want to help us, don’t you?”

“I’d love to, but I can tell you that my client’s not involved, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“How can you be sure?” says Noland.

“Because she has a ironclad alibi.”

“How can you know that unless you know the time of death?” he says.

“Trust me, I know. Where exactly did they find the body?” I ask.

“Make you a deal,” says Noland. “You tell us where the house is, we’ll tell you where they found the body. Then we can compare notes.”

I consider this for a moment. Emma Brauer couldn’t possibly be involved. She was in jail before Sofia left the office, and she remains there this morning. Harry is still working on bail. If somehow her house was involved in Sofia’s murder we need to know about it before anyone goes back in and fouls the evidence. The place has already been searched by the city PD in Brauer’s case, and it’s not likely that the two sheriff’s detectives are going to find anything relating to Robert Brauer’s death since they aren’t even looking for it and are not involved. I look at them. “Better yet, tell you what: I’ll take you to the house on one condition.”

“What’s that?” Noland looks at me.

“You take us to the crime scene where you found the body, myself, my partner, and our office PI and let us look around . . .”

“Can’t do that,” says Noland. “Can’t have you tramping through the evidence.”

“We won’t. We’ll keep our distance. We can probably help you.”

“How?” says Owen.

“What was she wearing when you found the body?”

He scratches his head. “Yellow dress of some kind and a jacket.”

“It sounds like what she had on Friday afternoon when she left here. But I can’t be sure unless I see the body, as it lies.” I want to know who killed Sofia and why. The place where she was murdered might give us some answers.

The two detectives look at each other. “He could identify the body,” says Owen. “Save her parents some grief.”

“I can do that,” I tell them.

“Why not?” says Owen.

Noland’s not sure. “We need to check with the lieutenant. We’ll call you a little later. They’ll still be working the scene. First we have a few questions.”

“Go ahead,” I tell him.

“This client of yours is a woman. You said ‘she’ has an alibi.”

“Slip of the tongue,” I tell him. “She was in jail all weekend since Friday afternoon. She’s still there.”

“And you say there’s no one else living in the house with her?” asks Noland.

“As far as I know. That was the reason Sofia was headed to pick up the dog.”

“But you don’t know if she ever got there?” says Owen.

“One way to find out.”

“What’s that?” he says.

“See if the dog’s still there.”

This catches their attention. They look at each other as if it hadn’t dawned on them.

“Could be dead by now,” says Noland. “Three days without food or water.”

“We don’t know that. But I’ll be sure to find out, and when I do, I’ll let you know.”

“If that’s a crime scene, you’ll need to stay away from it,” says Noland.

“We’re not gonna know that until we go look.”

“Let me ask you,” says Owen. “Did you hear anything from the girl after she left the office on Friday?”

I shake my head. “No. As far as I know, no one else in the office did, either. We were worried about her when she didn’t show up for work this morning. We called her cell phone several times, but there was no answer. Did you find her phone?”

“We’re still looking,” says Owen.

“About your client,” says Noland. “You say she was in jail. Is she married? Any boyfriends, any males who might have had a key to her house, maybe lived there with her at one time?”

“She’s not married and has no boyfriends that I know of.”

“You’re sure of that?” says Owen.

“As sure as I can be.”

Noland asks: “What is she in for?”

“That I won’t tell you. But I’m sure you’ll find out, sooner or later.”

“How long did Sofia work for you?” asks Owen.

“Eight months, maybe nine. I’d have to check our records.”

“Who sent her after the dog? To the woman’s house?” asks Owen.

This is a sore point. Ever since they walked in and told me what happened I’ve been asking myself the same question. Did I send her out there? “I’d have to think about that,” I tell him.