The Desert Behind Me Read online

  The argument ping-ponged in my head about the remote chance of seeing any of the girls. Frank’s derision was like Chinese water torture, drip, drip, dripping with annoying consistency through the two hours I sat in my car. During that time, no security patrolled the parking lot. Twice, a mother pulled in a visitor spot, hurried into the palace, then returned to her luxury sedan and drove away.

  The last high school I interacted with in Buffalo had a uniformed officer patrolling during school hours. Few windows graced the old stone building on its prison-like façade, the small front yard of crabgrass shaded by old-growth oaks and maples.

  She’s suddenly there in my memory.

  I get a panicked call. Her forgotten geometry homework is on the kitchen table and could I please, please please get it for her? I’m on patrol and it wouldn’t be a problem to swing by home, collect the work and save her. But she needs to learn responsibility. It hurts to say no but I am proud of myself for staying firm. My concern is for her character, so she learns self-reliance and the consequences of her actions.

  But I can’t stand the thought of those hours she’d spent bent over her geometry going to waste. Mom would say my weakness wouldn’t be any favor to her, but I can’t help myself.

  Her gratitude carries forward to her home-cooked spaghetti dinner and spotless room for at least a week.

  If I’d known how few times I could save her, I’d have gladly ruined her character every opportunity I got.

  I pulled myself back to Tucson and the school.

  The solitude of the parking lot was interrupted with a trickle of cars and SUVs, this generation’s version of the family station wagon. They lined up orderly along the front walk, waiting for their princes and princesses. I perked up like a sheep dog guarding her flock.

  A flood burst through the school doors. Rivers of kids spilled toward the parking lot, splitting and flowing in all directions. Doors slammed, engines fired, the line of waiting parents moved away, only to be replaced with more. Cars pulled out all around me. I should have found solace in so many of our children safe, full of life.

  Finally, I spotted them. The short girl, Megan, and the acne-faced one. Jen? No tall blonde. No Cali. Jen and Megan stormed across the parking lot, heads together, clearly annoyed. No more aware of their surroundings than a toddler drifting off for a nap.

  I jumped out of my Juke and intercepted them as Megan extended her key to a white CRV. “Megan?”

  With a slow swivel of her head, she focused on me. A vague welcome bloomed on her face, habit from a lifetime of friends and family.

  Jen looked puzzled, but wore a welcoming expression, the default of those who never considered their world could fall apart in an instant.

  Using my firm mother voice I said, “I need to talk to you.”

  Megan’s smile slipped and she narrowed her eyes, mouth diving into a frown. If she lived to middle age, Megan would probably develop that permanent sour expression.

  When she finally recognized me, Megan colored. “You’re the cop who stopped us. We didn’t do anything wrong and you got us suspended from cheerleading.”

  Jen stepped back and looked around as if hoping for rescue.

  “I could make it permanent if I tell Ms. Turner about your escapade last night at my house.”

  Megan thrust her hip out. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Malicious mischief is nothing to laugh about.” I sounded tough and expected them to cower. “But that’s not really why I—.”

  Megan threw back her shoulders. “Your word against mine. Try it.” A beat. “Bitch.”

  Jen bit her lips and stared at the pavement.

  I hadn’t expected that level of belligerence and I went full-on cop mode out of habit. “That’s the way you want to play it?”

  She twitched her finger on the key fob and her car blipped unlocked. “I’m outta here. Get in, Jen.”

  Without waiting, Jen shot around the CRV and jerked the door open.

  Damn. I’d blown it. “Wait.” Wrong. Stupidly, I reached out to stop her.

  She yipped and jerked away, wrenching open her car door and diving inside. Jen hunkered in the passenger seat of the CRV.

  I was already on my way back to my car as Megan slammed her door and locked it, then fired up and peeled away.

  With the parking lot congestion, Megan didn’t get much of a jump on me and I was able to follow. Her lack of self-preservation skills made trailing her easy. In a matter of five miles, I followed them into a quiet neighborhood with mature desert plantings, next to a golf course shaded by eucalyptus and several species of palm trees.

  They pulled into the driveway and stopped in front of the closed garage door at a typical stucco two-story with a tiled roof. A chintz covered outdoor wicker love seat and a feathery palm greeted visitors on the front porch.

  Their heads moved with angry animation, probably cursing me for my audacity to talk to them. They gave me ample time to park and walk up the driveway behind Megan’s door. Without glancing around, she opened it and stepped out.

  She startled when she finally spotted me. “Leave me alone!” She ran around the front of her CRV toward the front door.

  Jen huddled next to her. They wasted their fear on me, but welcomed the real threat of people like the guy from the ball park.

  “I’m not going to hurt you.” I’d practiced keeping my voice slow and quiet. “I want to talk to you.”

  Megan pulled Jen toward the front walk, looking over her shoulder at me. “We weren’t at your house and I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  My worry made me sound sterner than I intended. “How about your friend, Cali? Did you see her today?”

  Megan’s eyes flicked to Jen. “Yeah. She was at school.”

  With more effort than it ought to take, I quieted. “I need to know she’s okay.”

  “Are you some kind of perv?”

  The front door opened and a woman lumbered out. Her khaki capris and pink collared T-shirt stretched tight over a figure that probably sampled the three square meals along with desserts and snacks she prepared for her family. “Who are you?”

  I focused on Megan. “Officer Jamie Butler from the Arizona Rangers.”

  She offered me a curious but pleasant expression. Remnants of Megan’s youth lingered in her face, but a double chin made its debut and faint wrinkles hovering around her mouth more than hinted at frown lines. “I’m Megan’s mother. Mrs. Thompson. What can we do for you?”

  Mother to mother, at least we spoke the same language. “Your daughter and her friends TPed my house last night, but I’m more concerned—”

  Mrs. Thompson threw her arm around Megan’s shoulder. “It wasn’t Megan. Whatever you believe. She was home last night. All night.”

  Megan smirked at me and cuddled under her mother’s wing.

  Jen shifted from foot to foot, not under Mrs. Thompson’s protection.

  “Okay. But that’s not—”

  Mrs. Thompson gave me her back and ushered Megan up the front walk. Jen trailed behind.

  I followed them. “Cali. I’m worried about her.”

  Mrs. Thompson tossed the words over her shoulder as she entered her house. “Cali is not my problem.” She kept Megan tucked close and left the door ajar for Jen.

  Jen hesitated, glanced inside the house, then whispered. “Cali wasn’t at school today.”

  My heart hit my ribs. “Where was she?”

  Jen’s eyes shifted toward the house again and she said quickly. “Maybe at home?” She turned to leave.

  I grabbed her arm, knowing I shouldn’t but needing her answer. “Where does she live?”

  Megan appeared in the doorway. “Jen! Come on!”

  She turned her back to Megan and mumbled, hardly moving her lips. “Those apartments at Ina and First. The one with the dead lime tree in front.”

  “Now!” Megan’s shrill voice commanded and Jen lurched toward her.

  It took a long time
to exit the neighborhood because I made a wrong turn and ended up in a maze of stucco and palms. Megan and Jen were safe behind walls with a mother who watched them closely. I had a bad feeling about Cali.

  13

  Each red light throbbed in my belly and my fingers tapped the wheel. The well-heeled neighborhoods faded into strip malls and multi-unit complexes until I located a two-story block of apartments where Jen had directed me. Six slump-block buildings of a half-dozen units upstairs and down clustered around a central area with a rusted swing set and metal picnic table. The roar of traffic on the busy intersection washed over the area of scabby bushes, concrete, and dead grass. A completely different world than Megan’s sanctuary of landscaped homes.

  The cracked sidewalk led me around the buildings as I looked for a dead tree to mark Cali’s unit. So much felt abandoned here. Cali’s bright smile from Kino Elementary flashed through my mind. She belonged someplace green and flowery, the sound of birds and a soft breeze.

  The tree was little more than a brown twig thrusting from dry dirt in a chipped Talavera pot. The screen was ripped out, leaving a dented aluminum frame in front of a hollow plywood door. I rang the bell and waited.

  Nothing.

  The screen door protested with a squeal when I wrenched it open to bang on the door. Still nothing.

  A potbellied man stepped out of the unit next door. He squinted, as if he’d been sleeping. A couple inches shorter than me, he rubbed black hair and spoke in a thick Latino accent. “You can quit the noise. Nobody’s home.”

  An empty house. No one home. A memory sent an arrow through my skull.

  Ringing in my head as I remembered checking her bed, moving quickly to my room, the dining room. Running, screaming, searching.

  Breathe. Then and now. “When did you see them last?”

  He shrugged and blinked. “I work nights. Try to sleep in the day. I usually see them when I get home. But that girl plays her music most of the time. I asked her to keep it quiet until five, when I get up. She’s good about it. House was dark last night. Ain’t heard them today.”

  “Do you have a pen and paper? I’d like to give you my number so you can call me if they show up.”

  He shook his head and reached to open his door. “I don’t know them. Don’t have time for this. Just wanted you to quit banging so I can sleep.”

  He disappeared inside, the click of his lock ending the conversation.

  I stood on the concrete, staring at the door. Cali and her mother might have gone away for a couple of days. Nothing sinister about that.

  Voices harangued me, telling me Cali was in danger and I was the only one who could help her. I repeated that Cali was probably off with her mother someplace. “Most of the time, the simplest explanation is the best.” I looked around to see if anyone heard me talking to people they couldn’t see.

  A spot of faded red drew my attention to the ground next to the pot. My fingers tingled and blood rushed through my ears. I stood for several seconds before I made myself bend down to retrieve it.

  A tattered bit of an old red bandana, stiff, as if from dried sweat. My hand shook as I examined it. Just a bandana. Like a million of them. Like the one I’d used yesterday.

  “Still think the simplest explanation is the best?” Frank cackled.

  14

  The moving van still hunkered in the street across from my house. More disturbing, the gray sedan was parked down the block. On impulse, I drove past my house and continued toward the car. I couldn’t see through the tinted windows to tell if someone sat inside or not. The street curved, forming a giant loop through the neighborhood and I followed it around. When I made the circuit and returned to my house, the gray sedan was gone.

  I pulled straight into the garage and closed the door before crawling out of the car. The scent of lilacs lingered in the garage. Another reminder of the awful anniversary, only a day away, and how tightly my nerves must be pulled. I felt more in control of myself than these strange happenings suggested.

  When I entered the house, I took tentative steps to the front door, where I’d shed my shoes and socks after yesterday’s run. The shoes lined up next to the wall in their orderly formation. The socks rested on top, as usual. No bandana.

  Maybe I hadn’t used it yesterday. I closed my eyes and concentrated. Standing in the driveway, Sherilyn walking over. Mopping my face. I knew I had it. But it wasn’t here now.

  I’d lost touch with the real world before. I knew what it felt like. This didn’t feel the same. The Hot Tamales hadn’t been a hallucination, my bandana was missing, and even though the gray sedan probably didn’t pose danger, it was definitely real.

  At Tara’s suggestion, I’d started a mosaic project in the serenity of my backyard. A tabletop of one-inch Mexican tiles. The task distracted and the vivid blues, from cobalt to sky, soothed me. This afternoon its benefit was minimal. I paced, muttered, and argued. I finally heaped my clothes on the deck and dove into the pool.

  Cool silence. Blessed relief for the forty seconds I held my breath and swam along the bottom. It was never long enough.

  It wasn’t my job to raise those girls. They had mothers. But Frank’s warning circled around my head. If only I’d seen Cali myself.

  Tara called and I managed to sound as chipper as ever. I told her I’d had a flat tire. If she didn’t buy the lie, at least she didn’t challenge it. “I don’t usually work on Saturdays but I think you should come in before Sunday. How about eleven tomorrow?”

  “Okay.” I wanted to refuse, but that wouldn’t look good to anyone.

  Without warning, I remembered.

  The second day. By then, I know she’s not at a friend’s house or out for a walk. She’s gone and time is a demon that makes no sense. It’s speeding too fast, she’s been gone too long. It’s slowed to a dull throb in meaningless space. People are talking. Different friends and cops I work with cycle into my awareness so there must be coming and going. I clutch her red hoodie. Occasionally someone forces a cup into my hand and I drink. I take a bite of flavorless food when it seems easier than fighting against whoever insists.

  Unable to stand another minute of waiting, I push out of my front door to stand in the drizzle on the front porch. That’s when I see the red of the ribbon under the lilac bush by the dining room window. Weak legs take me down the steps and I fall to my knees in the cold mud.

  The ribbon is marred with ground-in mud. The barrette she’d glued it to is missing. But my eyes focus on something else and I want to die. A drop of brown staining the red ribbon. Blood. Her blood.

  Maybe I screamed. Maybe I’d simply been gone too long and she’d come to find me. All I know is that Kari has her arm around me.

  She’s leading me up to the front door and somehow managed to pry the ribbon from my hand. “Evidence,” she says softly.

  Exhausted by the battle waging in my brain, I finally gave in and took a pill. I’d been trying to wean myself from the meds and Tara had lowered the dose so there would be no worries about sleep walking.

  Locked behind my own doors, I’d lost hours at a clip, coming back to awareness with no recollection of passing time. It happened less frequently now. I thought reducing meds was helping.

  The evening slipped away as so many had in the last few years. It wasn’t quite living, and even though I hated the way the clouds absorbed all emotion, it sure as hell wasn’t dying. Some days, that counted for victory.

  I woke Saturday morning to my door bell, the sound so foreign it took a moment to figure out what it was. In my two years here, I’d only heard it a smattering of times, Girl Scouts selling cookies or landscapers soliciting labor. Those times, I’d peeked out the slats in the shade of the window that opened onto the porch. I’d never answered.

  This morning, when I spied through the blinds, the khaki of a cop’s uniform greeted me.

  My athletic shorts and t-shirt kept me decent. I unlocked the door and swung it open. I still hugged the red sweatshirt close to my chest
, so I set it on a bench inside the door.

  The officer, handsome Rafe Grijalva, watched the moving progress across the street. He popped his attention to me and his eyes lit up. “Good morning.”

  He held a small spiral notebook and pen. It looked official.

  I cleared the morning croak from my throat. “Hi. What are you doing here?”

  Even though I’d pulled myself from the drugged sleep on the chair in the living room and had to look like a zombie, he didn’t seem to mind. It had been a long time since I’d cared about male attention.

  He raised an eyebrow and his mouth ticked up at my appearance. “Following up on a report.”

  It felt odd that I cared how he saw me. I squirmed under his scrutiny. “Report?”

  “It came to the department and I recognized your name. Thought we could get it cleared up. Maybe I could come in and talk about it?”

  I indicated Mom’s decorative but uncomfortable bench on the porch. “Please, have a seat.” I didn’t have anything to hide and my house was more than tidy. My policy was never to leave a mess, nothing anyone else would have to clean up. But I felt too exposed to have anyone inside my home.

  He didn’t protest. I slipped into flip flops and joined him, perching myself on the end of the bench, two feet between us.

  He read from his notebook. “A Mrs. Thompson says you were harassing her daughter at the high school baseball tournament on Thursday.”

  It took me a moment to work it out. “Oh. Arizona Rangers. The mother must have called Mitch Harris and got my name. She should be a detective.”

  The brown of Grijalva’s eyes was so deep it looked almost black. He probably pulled more confessions with that gaze than others did with a stick. “Smarter than some with a badge. I saw you and Pete working the tournament.”

  Of course he had to get the official business taken care of. “Crowd control. I’ll be there again this afternoon.”

  He scribbled in his notebook. “The Rangers have you busy. The elementary program and then the tournament, all back to back. Doesn’t sound like retirement.”