Camelback Falls (David Mapstone Mystery 2)

It was true. I asked her what she was doing on the East Coast. It had only taken several days to find out where she was.

“I’m at Harvard, a Neiman Fellowship.” She paused. “It’s a journalism thing.”

“Sounds like an honor,” I said.

“It gets me out of the newsroom for a few months,” she said.

“And that keeps me from pissing off the bosses with my daily rebellions.”

I told her about my daily rebellions, and she let out a squeal of delight. I could just see her tossing her hair back out of her eyes, smiling that wide white smile and lighting up a Marlboro. “You’re the sheriff! I don’t believe it! I’ve been skiing the past week in New Hampshire and I haven’t even read the paper online. God, I wish I were there to write that story!” Then she knocked her voice down. “I’m sorry about Peralta. I know he’s your friend.”

“Thanks,” I said. “But as usual, I need your help.”

“Anything for my old boyfriend the sheriff.”

“Remember that big shootout in Guadalupe in 1979? The two deputies?”

“I covered it, David,” she admonished. “Remember, we met when I was covering the police beat?”

“I remember everything,” I said “So, what about that case never made the papers?”

“Oh, David, now the bargaining side of my personality is coming out. It’s not my best side. Why do you want to know, my love, and what’s in it for me?”

“A well-made martini when you get back to Phoenix,” I said. “Anyway, you’re on a junket.”

I knew from the expectant silence that it wouldn’t fly. So I told her my story as economically as possible.

“Holy shit,” she said. “Are you safe?”

“Yeah,” I lied.

“Well, the thing that never got in the paper was the degree of influence exerted by the girl’s father, Bill Watson. He was loaded with oil money. And I’m convinced some heavy campaign contributions came to the judge and the county attorney in exchange for the light sentence for Marybeth.”

“But she was just a kid, and the record indicates she wasn’t directly involved.”

“Mmmmm,” Lorie said. “So how do you explain the prison sentence for her boyfriend?”

“Daddy’s money?”

“Exactly.”

“So what do you know about Camelback Falls?” I asked.

She let out a little whistle. “I haven’t heard that name in years. It was Jonathan Ledger’s house. You know, the sex guy?”

“Did you ever go up there?”

She laughed. “Oh, I had an adventurous youth, but not that adventurous. I did get an invitation to a party there once, but I was busy or had to work or something. It was apparently quite the swinger’s place back then.”

“I never got those kind of invitations,” I said.

“You were too ponderous, my love. All those books and big thoughts.”

“So what kind of people went up there?”

“My invitation came from a doctor, a sports medicine guy I was dating. I think I was dating about five men at once then. No, you weren’t one of them. Anyway, I got the sense it was a crowd with a lot of money and not much sense. You know, it was the seventies. Anything goes. Ledger kept a salon of beautiful people, and they had legendary parties. That was the rep.”

“So no lowlifes, or prison escapees? Or runaways from Tulsa?”