Expecting to Die

  The woman’s mouth rounded into a silent O just as Carlton himself squeezed through some men who had gathered around the other side of the table. The noise from within was a cacophony of serious voices punctuated by occasional bursts of sharp, short laughter.

  “Is there a problem, Edie?” Carlton asked. He was medium height, maybe a couple of inches under six foot, wiry, with near-black hair that matched his eyes. In his early forties, he was a man who looked like he took himself seriously. His nose was hawkish, his skin stretched tight over his sharp features, and when he smiled, it seemed forced, a hasty stretching of the lips to show peg-like teeth.

  “This woman doesn’t want to pay. Says she was ‘invited, ’ whatever the hell that means.” Her voice dripped skepticism.

  But Jeffe recognized Bianca. “She’s right.” His gaze moved from her daughter to Pescoli. “They are special guests.”

  Behind the slanted glasses, Edie’s eyes were flint. “Well, someone shoulda told me, don’t ya think?”

  Carlton reached across the table, grabbed the stamp, and pressed it onto first Pescoli’s, then Bianca’s wrist. “Okay, you’re in. Sorry, Edie, it’s been crazy, you know. What with Barclay coming.”

  Wending through a couple of guys who looked like members of ZZ Top, Carlton rounded the table. “Bianca’s our guest, and she’s here with her mother.”

  “Fred told me to charge everyone, and that’s what I was trying to do,” Edie muttered, irked that her authority had been usurped. “That’s the problem, Carlton. I hear one thing from Fred and Ivor and those guys with their rifles and scopes out to hunt down and kill a Sasquatch”—she flipped her hand to a group of a dozen or so bearded men in trucker’s caps, jeans, and T-shirts who were huddled into a group—“and then I hear something else from you tree huggers who just want to capture one on film.” She twisted the same hand toward the other side of the room, where there was a smaller contingency. Groups A and B didn’t look much different aside from the fact that there were more women in the cluster identified as tree huggers. “So, you tell me, Carlton,” Edie went on. “You tell me, who am I supposed to listen to?”

  “Well, I am the president of the club, elected, mind you, this past January, and I did set up this meeting with Mr. Sphinx, so you tell me.”

  Red color climbed up her neck and suffused her face, and she turned aside. Jeffe either ignored her or didn’t notice as he ushered Bianca and Pescoli inside. “I’m sorry,” he said. “Everyone’s on edge. Not only is Barclay arriving, but when we moved the meeting to this room, we discovered some of our decorations, the things we usually have at meetings, were missing.” He was obviously disturbed. “It’s irritating as hell to spend hours looking for a folding table we need and can’t find it and, God, the costume. Where the hell is it?”

  “What costume?” Pescoli asked.

  “We have a Big Foot costume, you know. For plays and reenactments. Parties. Whatever. Very expensive. Very lifelike. Supposed to be locked up, but it’s missing. What’re ya gonna do?”

  “You’re missing a costume and there have been Big Foot sightings? Don’t you think someone took it and used it? That it’s what someone was wearing when they chased Bianca?”

  “Why would they do that?”

  “Maybe a prank.” Or, worse, she thought. “Which of the members have access to that closet?”

  “Anyone who’s a member, I guess.”

  “You said it was locked. Where are the keys?”

  “Well . . . they’re in a box in the regular meeting room, and before you ask, the key wasn’t missing. I used it earlier when we were setting up.”

  “I need you to get me a list of members and note on it anyone who was in the closet recently, or since you last saw or used the costume.”

  “Oh, come on.” She stared at him and Jeffe shrugged. “I’ll try,” he said, then led her through the crowd that was, for the most part, about seventy percent male. There were women, of course, but most of them seemed attached to one of the men.

  Pescoli had expected all the members to be mountain men, and there were definitely those who looked like they could be a part of the cast of Duck Dynasty or Swamp People. With long, unkempt hair, bushy beards, trucker’s caps, old T-shirts, and faded jeans, they seemed intense and what she would consider part of the outdoors-man landscape. But the rest of the crowd could have been found in any town in America. Men in khakis and work shirts, some wearing glasses, others in slacks, with wives, some even looking as if they were heading to church or, alternatively, a rock concert.

  There were those who had tattoos visible, metal studs in their faces, and those clean shaven with trimmed hair, checking their smartphones. The ages ranged from preteen to an old guy in a wheelchair hauling an oxygen tank who didn’t look to be long for this world. But he was here, at the meeting that seemed, to Pescoli, more like some kind of rally.

  Despite the vastness of the room, it felt stuffy and close, almost claustrophobic, and there was a definite buzz to the conversation. She heard Sphinx’s name said with what was almost reverence, and she recognized more than a few familiar faces. Lex Farnsby, the crime scene tech, was chatting up Jenner Stevenson, an accountant of about fifty who was standing next to his wife, Barbara, a schoolteacher. Along with the Stevensons was Ivor Hicks, who now sported a short white beard and yellow-tinted shades. Ivor was one of the local nuts and had suffered his own set of tragedies. Pescoli made a note to avoid him, along with the others gathered nearby. She also spied Sage Zoller, a junior detective with whom she worked at the sheriff’s department. She’d known Zoller was a bit of a conspiracy theorist but hadn’t realized she, too, was a Big Foot Believer.

  Fred Nesmith was in a heated conversation with Otis Kruger. Nesmith lived off the grid, was an anti-government type who’d fathered six kids and probably would have had a dozen more if his wife hadn’t died in labor with the sixth. He hunted for meat and pelts and didn’t give a damn about the local laws. Like Nesmith, Kruger was also a known poacher and proud of it, another guy who considered the wilderness his own personal realm. Once again, no laws mattered to Kruger, a beanpole of a man whose face was weathered, his hair long enough to show where it had started to turn from brown to gray, his temper mean.

  She recognized some of the kids, too, those she’d recently interviewed. Kywin Bell, a big, blocky guy stood out. He and Donny Justison were hanging out with the O’Hara brothers. Not far away, Maddie Averill sipped from a water bottle, her gaze drifting to TJ. Lindsay Cronin and Seneca Martinez were in attendance as well, huddled together and talking with Bryant Tophman and Rod Devlin near a table where T-shirts and Big Foot paraphernalia were for sale. Lindsay kept looking around, as if nervous, or more likely searching for someone she deemed more popular than Seneca. Tophman was a football player and looked the part. In the past year or so, he’d bulked up, developed a lot of muscle. Devlin, in contrast, was a little taller, but whip-thin, his skin acne-prone.

  Pescoli caught glimpses of the others, as well, and decided that nearly everyone from the party at Reservoir Point had suddenly taken an interest in the Big Foot Believers, or, more likely, the rumors of a television show being filmed in the town and the fact that Barclay Sphinx was here.

  Shifting from one foot to the other, she glanced back at the group of boys. Austin Reece, all smug smiles and obvious sense of privilege, had joined his friends and wasn’t far away from TJ and Alex O’Hara, the ubiquitous Madison standing by.

  Rod Devlin and Austin Reece stood near the table with Simone Delaney, who caught Pescoli’s eye and quickly looked away. A second later, she disappeared into the crowd, and Pescoli wondered if her mother, perfect Mary-Beth, knew her daughter was attending the event.

  Probably not.

  “I’d like to talk to you before we get started,” Carlton said to Bianca just as Regan spied Luke moving toward them. In one hand, her ex held a water bottle, his other fingers laced with those of his wife, Michelle, who, in five-inch-heeled boots, was having some trouble
keeping up with him.

  Bianca nodded. “Okay.”

  “There’s a connecting room behind the stage.” He offered a smile. “It’s kind of like our green room. Barclay’s already there.”

  “What?” Luke asked, joining the group. Then, “Hi, Carlton. You’ve met Michelle.”

  Carlton brightened. “Several times. I was just telling Bianca that we should go meet Barclay before the meeting gets going.”

  “I’m in!” Luke was grinning from ear to ear and Michelle was nodding. Aside from the high heels, she hadn’t over-glammed herself and was wearing a yellow shell and tight white jeans that funneled into her short, suede boots.

  Pescoli just wanted her ex to butt out, but decided not to make a scene. Santana and Jeremy, who had both insisted upon joining, were meeting her here. Santana had to finish overseeing a project at the Long ranch and Jeremy had a class that wouldn’t be over until 8 PM.

  So, she’d have to go it alone.

  Single-parent it one more time.

  Well, fine.

  CHAPTER 15

  Bianca and Regan followed Carlton Jeffe toward the stage at the far end of the room, where the crowd was mostly gathered. The room they walked through was cavernous, with high ceilings and velvet curtains that appeared as old as the building itself. Those curtains were currently drawn, and the room was dark aside from the illumination cast by hanging chandeliers that looked as if they belonged in a ballroom rather than over a meeting of the Big Foot Believers.

  They passed a refreshment table pushed against a side wall with a coffee urn, bottles of water, and an array of cookies. A second table held CDs and T-shirts from some of Barclay Sphinx’s reality shows. Throughout the seating area, where the crowd was still milling, life-sized photographs of Big Foot had been placed, as if the tall mythical creature were actually attending the event.

  The stage was elevated only about a foot off the main floor. It was set up with several chairs facing the audience, a podium with a microphone, and a few posters from Barclay Sphinx’s television shows. The podium itself was decorated with a large head shot of the guest of honor.

  Despite the ceiling-mounted fans slowly whirling above, the room was hot, and Pescoli was glad when Jeffe said, “This way,” and led Bianca and her away from the crowds, circumventing dozens of folding chairs that had been set in a semicircle around a small stage with a microphone and an amp, circa 1970. A projector on one side of the stage was showing films of Big Foot on a drop-down screen. The images were grainy and unclear, pictures of the beast from a far distance, forever looking over its shoulder and always alone in the woods, footage even Pescoli had seen a number of times.

  The “green room” was simple and small. Empty except for a few folding chairs and a low table where more refreshments had been placed—cookies fanned upon a plastic tray, two carafes of coffee marked decaf and regular, and about twenty water bottles that were chilling in a large tub of crushed ice.

  Barclay, a tall, thin man in his mid-thirties, was standing, and despite the heat he wore a gray jacket over a black T-shirt, jeans, and leather flip-flops. His head was shaved and gleamed under the lights overhead, almost as if it had been polished. Clean-shaven except for a reddish soul patch, he wore John Lennon glasses.

  “You must be Bianca!” he said as they approached. “I heard about the accident.” One long finger motioned to her booted foot. “You all right?”

  “Yeah.” Bianca nodded. “Will be.”

  “Barclay Sphinx.” He shook Bianca’s hand and then snapped his head up to survey the room. “Maybe you should sit down. Hey,” he said sharply to Luke, as if he were a gopher on a movie set. “Can we get a chair here?”

  “Sure, sure.” Juggling his water bottle in one hand, Luke snagged one of the folding chairs and placed it near Bianca.

  “Let me help,” Michelle said and adjusted the chair.

  “And you are—?” Sphinx glanced at her, then grinned. “The sister?”

  “Stepmom,” Michelle simpered, extending her hand. She couldn’t help but gush. “I can’t tell you what a pleasure this is, Mr. Sphinx, I am such a fan!”

  “Thanks.” They exchanged glances.

  “I adore Tarnished Stars. It’s brilliant!” Michelle breathed, and Lucky actually shot her a slightly irritated glance.

  Sphinx’s lips twitched, bemused, and Pescoli fought the urge to roll her eyes.

  “Oh, let me introduce you all!” Carlton, ever energetic, stepped between Michelle and Barclay as Luke’s wife reluctantly, it seemed, let go of the tall man’s fingers. He made hasty introductions among the producer, Bianca, and what must have appeared to be her entourage, adding at the end, “And this is Fiona Carpenter, Mr. Sphinx’s assistant.”

  “Executive assistant,” she corrected. Fiona was compact and petite and radiated competence. Her brown hair was cut short and highlighted with thin streaks of red, and her outfit was composed of a gray long-sleeved T-shirt, tunic length, and black leggings that tucked into her boots. She didn’t smile, wore no visible lipstick, just a sheer gloss, and appeared to be all business.

  Sphinx was sharp, remembered everyone’s name and said to Pescoli, “You’re the cop, right? A homicide detective?”

  “Yes. With the Pinewood County Sheriff’s Department.”

  “Perfect,” he said, nodding to himself.

  She didn’t really see how her career path could be considered “perfect” by anyone’s standards, much less a Hollywood or Seattle producer of different reality shows for cable TV, but what the hell.

  Carlton interjected, “As I said before, Bianca’s . . . uncomfortable telling her story to the group, a little shy, so I thought you could speak, Barclay, and then later people could ask Bianca some questions.”

  “How about this?” Sphinx asked, as if the idea just occurred to him. “What about if I ask Bianca questions on stage, kind of a personal interview in front of the group, and then I could say a little bit about her responses.” His eyes, behind the round glasses, found Bianca’s. “You would only have to answer with a word or two. I read your story in the papers and online from all of the posts from your friends, so I have a pretty good idea what happened. That way it’s a little more intimate, not so nerve-wracking.”

  Bianca’s eyebrows drew together. “I’m not shy.”

  “All the better,” Sphinx said. “We’ll set up as an interview and you can expound to your heart’s content.” Then he looked directly at Carlton. “Set it up on the stage. Just that way. Now.” He didn’t smile, didn’t frown, just gave the order, as if he was used to barking out a command and expecting people to scramble to do his bidding.

  “Good. Sure. Sounds great.” Carlton was starting toward the stage in the other room.

  “Oh, and Jaffe—?”

  “Jeffe,” Carlton corrected quickly.

  “Yeah, maybe another chair. I’d like Mom to join us.” He swung his gaze to Pescoli, flashing his most sincere grin. “I understand you’re involved in a murder case as well. That your daughter found the body of a classmate while running from Sasquatch.”

  “I am investigating a murder and yes, Bianca did find the victim, but there was no Big Foot, and I’m not getting on the stage to discuss an ongoing investigation.” To Carlton Jeffe, she called, “You won’t be needing that extra chair.”

  “Oh—okay. I’ll set up now. We’ll be on in five.” With that, he bounded out of the room.

  Sphinx pulled a face. “You sure you don’t want to be a part of this? Someone in the crowd might know something that could help you solve this murder. I heard that you’re kind of a rogue cop, that you don’t always play by the rules, that you’d bend them to close a case and bring a killer to justice.”

  “I think I’ll just hang with the crowd, stand in the back and watch.”

  “Not a believer then?”

  “Of Big Foot? No. Definitely not.” From the corner of her eye, she spied Lucky, his face a mask of horror that she was actually standing up to the producer
, and Michelle, too, looked appalled.

  Sphinx was unfazed. “You probably know I’m considering a second series, Big Foot Territory: Montana! I think your daughter’s story would be a great pilot. It has all the dramatic elements the audience loves. A pretty girl at a party in the mountains, chased down a mountain by a monster to end up finding a corpse in a stream, a dead girl, a classmate. Her mother is a cop, doesn’t believe her, but together they search for a killer and a rogue Sasquatch who just may or may not be the killer.” He was actually caught up in his own story, talking faster, as if convincing himself as he spoke. “We’d do a reenactment with Bianca. Up at the site where the Big Foot was seen, I think it’s called Reservoir Point? The pilot would start out with a Handycam, shaky, raw, a little like The Blair Witch Project maybe. Because of the murder, it would be two programs, one that ends with the discovery of the body and the next with the aftermath, Big Foot in the shadows.”

  Michelle actually clapped and bounced on her heels, like a twelve-year-old spying a teen idol. “I’d watch that! In a heartbeat.”

  One of Sphinx’s eyebrows raised over the tops of his glasses. “There you go. The fans, at least one, have spoken.”

  “You want me in the TV show?” Bianca asked a little breathlessly, and she, like Michelle, had stars in her eyes.

  “No.” Pescoli had to stop the madness. “Bianca’s still in school and . . . no. Just no.”

  “Mom!” Bianca protested.

  Sphinx offered Pescoli a conspiratorial smile. “Look, Detective, this could help your investigation. If the homicide isn’t solved by the time of the airing, I’d be willing to put a tag at the end of the second episode, explaining the circumstances about the murder and, should anyone know anything, a number they could call along with a website dedicated to solving the case.”

  Michelle actually gasped. “Oh! Perfect.”

  No way. They weren’t going to sensationalize a fresh case with grieving parents. “Thanks, but I think the department can handle it,” Pescoli said dryly.

  From the main room, after a screech of feedback, Carlton’s voice rang over the speakers. “Can I have your attention? Hey! Could everyone take a seat now? We’re ready to start with the program. Mr. Barclay Sphinx will talk with us, and he’s going to ask Bianca Pescoli about her close encounter. She’s agreed to let him ask her questions, so if you could all just take your seats. I know it’s standing room only, so those of you on your feet, please take a spot near the walls and please don’t block anyone’s view. Okay? . . . yes? Okay, we’re ready. So, without further ado, Big Foot Believers, let me introduce you to Bianca Pescoli and Barclay Sphinx!”