Dead Wrong

When Joa

Joa

“No biggie,” Joa

Chapter 7

When Joa

Joa

“You’re right,” Ernie agreed. “We should all have copies, but it isn’t going to take some high-tech computer program to see what we need to see.” Ernie tapped one of the photos with a thick forefinger. “Look at the background on this one. If those aren’t the Huachuca Mountains, I’ll eat my hat.”

Joa

“I think you’re right, Ernie,” she agreed. “If I’m not mistaken, we’re going to find this was taken in the parking lot of that Fry’s grocery store out on Highway 92.”

“Do you want me to check on that?” Debbie asked. “I could take copies of a couple of the photos out there. If the woman is a regular customer, one of the clerks or carryout people will recognize her.”

If it’s not already too late, Joa

“Good thinking,” Joa

Joa

Ernie shook his head. “Not yet,” he said as Jaime Carbajal nodded in agreement.

“All right then,” Joa

“Evans may have been a loner, but his landlady thought he walked on water,” Jaime conceded. “That’s why she was so adamant about not letting us into his place without a search warrant. The guy didn’t smoke or drink; paid his rent on time; never gave her any trouble; didn’t have women spending the night; and helped out occasionally with little jobs around the house. When it comes to renters, it doesn’t get any better than that. So either Evans really was a good guy or else he was really good at creating a screen so people thought he was a good guy.”

“Which is it?” Joa

Jaime Carbajal shrugged. “The jury’s still out on that,” he said. “We need to see if we can track down Bradley’s credit-card use and telephone records. Frank will be focusing on that. Credit-card receipts will help us track his movements in the days before he died. So will his phone calls. In the meantime, Ernie and I will spend most of today interviewing people at the prison down in Douglas. We know Ted Chapman’s opinions about Bradley Evans. Personally, I’d like to see if there are any dissenting ones. If he had something going with the girl in the pictures, maybe he confided in one or more of the people he was working with at the prison.”

Joa

“Not the exact hour and minute,” Jaime responded. “But we do know that it was sometime between Friday night and Saturday morning. We talked to the two guys who are selling the vehicles that were parked on either side of Evans’s Ford. According to them, the truck definitely wasn’t there on Friday. One of them, Rick Gomez, remembers seeing it for the first time around ten on Saturday morning, when he came by to meet up with someone who was interested in buying his Toyota.”

“There’s a lot more presence technology out there nowadays than there used to be,” Joa

“We can try,” Jaime said, “but I wouldn’t count on it. People use that particular lot for a reason. It’s not in the center of town, it’s been vacant for years, and it belongs to an absentee landowner. The lot itself has no security cameras at all.”

“What about neighbors?” Joa

Jaime shrugged. “There are a couple of gas stations, but not much else. We can ask to see their tapes, and who knows? Maybe we’ll get lucky.”

Joa

“Not much,” Casey replied. “All the prints I found inside the truck appear to belong to the victim and nobody else. The big difference is that the prints on the gearshift, steering wheel, and door handle have all been smudged or even obliterated.”

“So the last person to drive the vehicle was wearing gloves?” Joa

Casey nodded. “That would be my guess.”

“What about the prints you lifted from the exterior?”

“I didn’t find any prints at all inside the camper shell or the bed of the pickup,” Casey said. “There were signs that the bed of the pickup had been scrubbed out pretty thoroughly. The total absence of prints there would mean whoever cleaned it was wearing gloves-and probably not because he or she was worried about chapped hands. As for the unidentified prints on the exterior? The ones I found were mostly on the doors and side windows as well as on the liftgate on the camper shell and on the back of the pickup. All of those would be consistent with someone trying to catch a glimpse of the vehicle’s interior to see what kind of condition it was in.”

“In other words, i

Casey nodded.

“What about the primer?” Joa

“No,” Jaime said. “I asked about that, and his landlady said no way. She claims the pickup was still a dingy red when she saw it sometime last week. She couldn’t swear exactly when that was, but she says she saw it almost every day. And that makes sense. Evans’s apartment is a converted garage out behind the landlady’s house. The carport next to it is carved out of her backyard and is fully visible from her kitchen window.”

“So it’s possible the primer was added in an effort to keep us from finding it,” Joa

“Make that delay our finding it,” Ernie said. “Whoever did it must have known we’d find it eventually.”

“How much primer would it take to cover a pickup like that?” Joa