Replacing Gentry (17 page)

Chapter Nineteen

T
hree strikes and you’re out. Commit three crimes and it’s life in prison. Interior designers prefer to arrange in threes—three candles on a mantle, three pictures in a grouping. Three to lead an organization: president, vice-president, secretary.

It takes the succinct actions of three with the proper authority to launch an atomic bomb, or so I’d seen in a movie or two. What is it about the number three? Is it the pleasing roundness of the number, or is it that two is too few, while four too many? After striking out at the Vital Record’s Office and then the Health Department looking for the death certificate, I was determined more than ever to find the identity of Unidentified Woman 
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. And since the boys had been sequestered to the house for the last couple of weeks, I’d had plenty of time to do two things.

First, have a few uncomfortably one-sided conversations with them about sex and drugs that I was pretty sure they ignored.

Second, peruse the Internet for clues. After hours of searching, I’d turned up a newspaper article with a short mention of a Jane Doe found dead in a West Nashville alleyway with no identifying possessions about four and a half years ago. According to the article, the police hoped that someone would come forward to claim the body.

And since Paul’s spin machine had been cycloning through the media touting the merits of the deal and painting Daniel as a champion of the middle class, the strain on our marriage was slowly mending along with Daniel’s public image, which made this as good a time as any for me to resume my investigation.

My third and final option was to try local law enforcement. The central precinct of the Metro Police Department was located downtown on Broadway just blocks from the famed Music Row. A phone call had directed me to a Detective Ripley in the Special Investigations Narcotics Unit, which coincided with what the caretaker had said about drugs being the cause of death.

After leaving three messages, I waited, appropriately, three days after the last message went unreturned. So today I donned a pair of dark glasses, a baseball hat, and an unassuming outfit—like that would keep Paul’s thug off my trail—and ventured downtown to the police station.

At the precinct I was directed to the appropriate unit, where a young officer in uniform informed me that the detective I sought could most likely be found enjoying an early lunch at the BBQ place down the street.

Making my way down the hill, I stopped at the light in front of the Bridgestone Arena and checked my watch. I hoped this wouldn’t take too long since the boys would soon be getting home from a church youth trip. Apparently, anything church related constituted an exception to the conditions of their confinement.

My light changed. I crossed the street and into another world. In only a matter of yards the landscape changed from steel, glass, and concrete to thin sidewalks, wooden doors, and storefronts flashing in neon. The smell of fried food and BBQ moved the humid air, alive with the sound of country music. Passing one bar after another, I listened as one tune morphed from boisterous and rowdy to soulful and then to every melody in between. Keeping my eyes on the marquees above, I headed for the one with three flying pigs cascading over a sign that read “Jack’s BBQ.”

“Will you take our picture?” a group of women in their fifties sporting matching pink cowboy hats chorused in my direction. One of them held out a small digital camera.

“Sure,” I agreed though I wanted to keep moving.

They assembled into a clump of empty-nesters-gone-wild, enjoying a brief stationary moment, and I snapped the picture. I handed back the camera as they thanked me profusely. I turned to see the line snaking out of the place I hoped to find the elusive Detective Ripley. Easing myself past a tight-knit lunch line, I ignored the disapproving glances of those who assumed I was cutting. They couldn’t have been more wrong. The savory smell of tangy BBQ tempted my taste buds, but I hadn’t come here to eat.

Edging past the glass-encased counter, I removed my sunglasses, allowing my eyes to adjust to the dimly lit surroundings. Knotty wood-paneled walls reached high to the open ceiling, the close space stretching further to the back than it did from side to side. Moving past single tables lining one wall, I took the steps up to the second floor. The young officer had said I’d find the detective upstairs, next to the window.

To my right, a man and woman in business attire sat with their heads together in intense conversation. Directly ahead, a single man held his fork aloft, his silhouetted face toward the window. All of sudden, disturbing a law enforcement officer during his lunch, with questions regarding a case he appeared to have no interest in discussing didn’t seem like the brightest idea. Nevertheless, I’d come this far, and what was the worst that could happen? It wasn’t like he could arrest me for disturbing his lunch, right?

Sliding the hat from my head, I released my hair from its ponytail, and shook it free. The hat made me feel like I was hiding something. Only guilty people hide.

“Detective Ripley?” I said, and he turned to me with a guarded look.

He was younger than I’d expected, thirty-five maybe, with close-cropped light-brown hair, hooded eyes, pronounced cheekbones, and a weak chin.

“Hi, I’m Marlie Evans.” I gave him my maiden name with a repentant smile. “I’ve left you a few messages regarding a Jane Doe case from a few years back.”

His gaze ran over me, his eyes dimming as they landed briefly on the large rock sparkling from my left ring finger. “Right, Ms. Evans,” he said.

I pulled a copy of the article from my purse and laid it on the table. “I’m sorry to bother you during your lunch, but I was hoping you could tell me a little about this woman.”

He took a healthy bite of shredded pork, dripping in sauce, and glanced over the page as his cheeks worked like a rolling pin pressing out a tough piece of dough. “Sure, I remember that case.” He swallowed hard. “A woman like that. It was strange how no one ever came to claim the body.” He motioned with his fork to the chair facing him. “Have a seat.”

I sat and scooted close to the table. “What do you mean?”

“Nice looking, designer clothes, but no wallet or jewelry.” He blew out an airy whistle. “You’d think someone would have missed her, is all.”

“So, no one ever claimed her?” I clarified, controlling my excitement that I might be on the right track. “And there was no way to identify the body? Dental records? Fingerprints?”

He shook his head. “We searched dental record and finger print databases, but it’s a needle in a haystack when we don’t have a name to compare them to.”

“What else can you tell me about her?”

He looked down, regarded his food a moment as he moved it around on his plate. “She had track marks on her arms, indicating drug use.” He speared a clump of greasy green beans and slid the bite into his mouth.

“Was there an autopsy?” I asked, and hoped that if so, it included pictures.

“No ma’am.” He gave his head a curt shake. “There weren’t no autopsy since no one claimed her body. Forensic tests combined with external examination concluded that she died of a drug overdose.”

Like a campfire doused with a bucket of water, my excitement was reduced to an acerbic smoke. “I see,” I said, then proceeded to my last slim chance of finding any hint to her identity. “I don’t suppose there’s any way I can get a look at the case file?”

His eyes narrowed to a scrutinizing stare. “You a private investigator or somethin’?” He dropped his fork to his plate. “A reporter?”

“No, nothing like that,” I denied with a wave of my hand to wipe the idea away. “I’m . . . just doing some research.”

He picked his fork back up and stabbed some more meat. “Writing a book about serial killers?” he scoffed, opening his mouth wide to take the bite.

“Serial killers?” I repeated, thrown by this unexpected twist. “Why is that funny?”

“Because you’re too late,” he said, pointing the prongs of his fork at me. “About ten months after her death the Feds came ’round askin’ the same questions, lookin’ for that file.”

“So, the Feds have it,” I concluded, defeated.

He snorted out a laugh. “They wish.”

“I’m confused. Who has the file?”

He put off answering my last question to take a long drag of his iced tea. “Nobody. Somewhere along the way, that file went missin’. Every photo, every report, every last piece of evidence.” He set the plastic glass back to the table with enough force to slop a few drops over the side.

“And the body?”

“Cremated,” he said pointedly. “Buried in an indigent cemetery. Standard procedure with the unclaimed.”

And with that, I was back to where I’d started. This unclaimed body could be Unidentified Woman 
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just as easily as it couldn’t. I wanted to drop my head to the table and rap it a few times against the sticky wood. The dots weren’t connecting.

“If her death was ruled an overdose, why were the Feds investigating it as a link to a serial killer?” I asked, doubting if the answer would shed light on my quest.

“Somehow the Feds got wind of the details and thought it followed the pattern of a killer who hooks up with wealthy women, and men, introduces them to drugs, kills ’em by making it look like an accidental overdose, and then dumps the body out with the garbage. They’d been chasin’ him around the southeast and DC area for the five years prior. We didn’t think much about it at the time.” He pressed a grease-spotted paper napkin to his mouth. “Body parts get stolen from time to time . . . some crazed teenagers or crooked junky comes by and desecrates a dead body for some sick pleasure or,” he shrugged, “superstition.”

A sickening feeling tiptoed down my neck. “What do you mean, ‘body parts’?”

He leaned forward and spoke from the side of his mouth. “Her eyes were missing.”

My head whirled as I thanked the detective, slid the article from the table, and pushed back to leave. What were the odds the medical examiner would still have the forensic report? Not good, I’d bet. Either way, I couldn’t ignore the fact that both a police file and death certificate were gone. And with Gentry’s autopsy report missing from the hospital as well, what did all these lost records have in common—Gentry? Maybe. Maybe not. One thing for sure, it would take someone with connections in the right places to make all these official records disappear.

It seemed like the deeper I dug, the more questions came rising to the surface. There was only one person left to ask. The one man whose actions had piqued my interest in the first place. The only person left I could assume, from all the evidence, had the answers. Daniel.

My toe caught on a loose floorboard. I tripped and dropped the article to the floor. As I stooped down to retrieve the paper, from the corner of my eye, I caught a familiar sight from under one of the previously unoccupied tables.

A pair of black Ostrich cowboy boots.

Slowly, I pinched the paper between my fingers as I assessed the possibilities of seeing the very same boots, on the very same man, three times in just a matter of weeks. As casually as possible, I straightened, tucked the article into my purse, resisted the urge to look over at him, and stayed my course toward the stairs. I must have been more befuddled than I thought because at the end of the dining area I turned right when I should have gone left and found myself taking a narrow stairway up to another seating area, instead of down to the main floor.

After a quick glance around, and a forced smile to a couple of older gentleman in WW II hats, I knew the only way out was the way I’d come. As quickly as my unsteady feet would take me, I headed back down the stairs, planning to move past the black-booted man without showing any alarm or notice.

Only my wretched eyes betrayed me with a swift peek. He was now on his feet. Then I turned the wrong way again, this time heading toward a set of stairs leading down to a glass door and out to a back patio. Pushing through the door, I took the rickety steps until my feet hit uneven asphalt. Past white plastic tables with green umbrellas, I pushed through a gate and into an alleyway.

Suddenly disoriented, I looked one way and then another, trying to get my bearings. About fifty yards to the right, cars whizzed past the gap in buildings along a busy street. The other direction was blocked about halfway to the street by construction. The building on the other side of the alley was the famed Ryman Auditorium, formerly known as the Grand ’Ole Opry. Ahead of me was an iron gate that led to a short stairway with a door at the top
.

Most likely locked
, I decided when I heard the measured clomping of boots on unsteady wood.

He was following me. I had to move, but would I make it to the street before he made it to the alley? Deciding not to risk an uncertain outcome, I thought it best to hide.

Washed in black paint, the shallow alcove I ducked into was home to three stinky dumpsters on one side. Concealing myself into the shadow against the opposite wall, I looked around the blackened space, making out the shape of a door. “The Stage on Broadway” was stenciled in the center. I wanted to try the knob but didn’t dare. The sound of his boots had me pressing my body flat to the grimy wall.

I tracked his steps with my gaping eyes. A trickle of sweat rolled down from my temple to hover at the base of my jaw. Not only was I incapable of breath but now I found myself unable to blink as I watched him move with unnatural silence through the echoing alleyway. He disappeared from sight, the soft crunch of his footfalls growing to a whisper. As he moved farther away, the steps faded into nonexistence.

I listened until I was sure he was gone. Sidestepping to the corner, I reached over and tried the knob. Locked.

I swore under my breath and moved back to my original spot. Pressing my body back against the wall, I held perfectly still, trying to decide how long I should reasonably stay put before edging out and back through the restaurant to the street. But there was nothing reasonable about any of this! I was chasing the ghost of a woman that may or may not have a connection to my husband. And hiding from a man who had no conceivable reason for following me.

I flicked away the bead of perspiration dangling from my cheek. Drying my hand on my jeans, I sucked in a long breath of stale moist air. With closed eyes, I knocked my head against the cinderblock wall, hoping to jar my commonsense back into place.