The Judas judge kk-5 Page 25

  "I'm sure he was on your list."

  A giggle fluttered on her lips. "How you do go on. I have no list."

  "Perhaps he was a low priority because he never really victimized you, except to take your money in payment for his silence."

  "Silence about what?"

  "Things he saw, and what he knew."

  Linda's eyebrows arched. "That's quite a stretch."

  "I'm impressed with how you carried it out. You used a different MO and a different signature for every murder. You really did your homework. And making those anonymous phone calls to yourself was a brilliant strategy."

  Linda tried to repress a smile but didn't quite succeed. "What are you talking about?"

  "Killing off your family, one by one."

  "You have an overactive imagination."

  "You killed your father because he raped you, your mother because she stood by silently and let it happen, and Arthur because…" Kerney shrugged.

  "Because?"

  "Now it's only a theory, mind you."

  Linda smiled like a child about to play a favorite game. "Let's speculate," she said, clapping her hands together.

  "Daddy passed you on to Arthur."

  Linda blinked and the playfulness disappeared. She forced it back on her face. "Oh, that's very good."

  "And then there's Eric, who saw and knew things."

  "Like what?"

  "Your ex-husband helped me figure it out when he told me how you'd lock the bathroom door to brush your teeth, and wouldn't allow him to see you naked."

  "Poor Bill. Such a conventional, narrow-minded man. I totally misjudged him."

  "Voyeurism probably started for Eric at home when he saw you being raped and molested by Vernon or Arthur, or both."

  "Or maybe he just kept bursting in on me while I was taking a bath, like kid brothers sometimes do. That would be enough to make a girl modest. Or maybe he was just sexually screwed up."

  "Did you start seeing Dr. Joyce to keep her silent about Eric? That was very clever."

  Linda smiled openly at the compliment. "She's teaching me ways to cope with my pain. It's been a very trying time."

  "And is the pain gone?"

  "Oh no," she answered mechanically. "Dr. Joyce says I have a lot of work to do in that regard."

  "Talk to me about it, Linda."

  "I can tell you one thing." She lowered her voice when Mary Margaret stepped into the room. "Daddy always used to say that giving a young girl an early start in life was a father's obligation. Don't you think he did a good job of getting me started?" She flipped her long hair and it covered her face.

  "The lawyer is here," Mary Margaret said.

  "Just a minute," Kerney said, keeping his attention fixed on Linda Langsford.

  Mary Margaret slipped out the door and closed it.

  Kerney had caught something in Linda's voice that made him think she wanted to keep talking. "What kind of start did he give you, Linda?" he asked lightly. "Was it a good one? One that you liked?"

  Linda rose from the chair and pushed the hair back over her shoulders. "That's a very mean question. I really should talk to my attorney."

  "I know you weren't bad, Linda. You were trying to be good and do what you were told. You haven't been arrested or read your rights so whatever you tell me can't be used against you. You know that; you're a lawyer."

  "Are you truly that interested?"

  "Very. I'd like to understand what happened."

  Linda paused. "I'll tell you one story that will explain everything. When Daddy stopped playing with me and started playing with Kay, I had to play with Arthur. That's what Daddy called it, playing. I had my first abortion when I was twelve. Mother told people I had the stomach flu." Kerney said nothing, hoping for more.

  "I had the stomach flu again the next year, and the year after that. Daddy got really mad at Arthur about making me pregnant so many times."

  "What about Eric? What did he do?"

  "Do you think I'll be allowed to bury my brother?"

  "I'm sure it can be arranged."

  "Eric was so sad. He used to hide in my closet at home and play with himself while he watched me undress. He was too scared to do more, but he wanted to. I could tell. Funny, isn't it? All he had to do was ask. Daddy and Arthur had trained me well."

  "But wouldn't you have hated Eric more if he had molested you?" Her expression turned quizzical, as though the question was point less. "Of course. As much as Daddy and Arthur. I've planned a very nice service for him. Nothing nearly as grand as Daddy's. I don't expect very many people will come. But Penelope and Kay might like to."

  "Now if only Penelope and Kay were dead, that would tidy things up nicely," Kerney said, thinking all the tidbits had finally come together.

  "What a lovely thought," Linda said, her sweet smile turning slightly crazy.

  Among the items seized during the search, one of the most incriminating turned out to be a photo album with a series of neatly labeled and dated snapshots of Linda, Arthur, and Vernon Langsford taken during a camping trip made when the children were young. Their excursion had started at the Valley of Fires Park outside of Carrizozo and ended at Dog Canyon, now known as the Oliver Lee State Park.

  Overnight stops had included the Three Rivers Petroglyphs site and the nearby Three Rivers campground at the base of Sierra Blanca. From the dates printed in a child's handwriting below each snapshot, Linda had been eleven years old at the time, and her brother fifteen.

  There were pictures showing Linda cuddled in Vernon's arms, sitting in her brother's lap, her coltish legs spread wide, and striking a cheesecake pose with hands on her hips.

  Kerney studied her face. Linda had been a naturally pretty girl with wide, innocent-looking, hopeful eyes. But a forced smile hid clenched teeth and a furrow creased her forehead like a tightly strung wire.

  In one picture, Arthur stood behind her, his hands grasping Linda's hips as she bent forward toward the camera. In another staged shot, Linda sat facing her father, with her legs wrapped around his waist, her mouth open in a provocative pout.

  In all the snapshots, Vernon and Arthur's eyes had been scratched out.

  Kerney closed the album, convinced that the camping trip had been used to pass on the family tradition of incest from father to son. He now understood why Linda chose to kill her father at Oliver Lee State Park, and why spilling innocent blood along the way made a kind of cleansing, crazy sense to her.

  He looked at the hardback books Lee had entered into evidence. Linda had amassed a small but sophisticated library on crime classification, homicide investigation, scientific evidence in criminal cases, and case studies of violent criminals. Lee had flagged a section in one of the books that outlined the typology and style of the spree killer, which had been heavily underlined.

  From a dresser in Linda's bedroom, Lee had removed six individually framed photographs of Linda's parents, siblings, Kay Murray, and Penelope Gibben. On the back of each, with the exception of the Gibben and Murray photographs, were birth and death dates. For Penelope and Kay, birth dates were entered, but the spaces for the dates of death were blank, ready to be filled in.

  It was all good incriminating evidence.

  Kerney looked at the evidence boxes and stacks of papers taken from Linda's residence. They filled the district headquarters conference room table and spilled over to the floor. He would leave it to Lee and his team to do the tedious analysis and cataloging needed to strengthen the case.

  Outside the closed door he could hear banging sounds as folding tables were being set up in the reception area to handle the large volume of evidence collected at the other search sites. He went to find Lee, who was directing the placement of evidence being carted in from the units.

  "This is gonna keep us real busy for a while," Lee said.

  "You can handle it."

  "Are you bailing out on us?"

  "As soon as I finish meeting with the district attorney, I'm heading back to Santa Fe."
>
  "You did it, Chief."

  Kerney smiled grimly. "We all did it, Lee."

  Lee studied Kerney's solemn expression. "Are you okay, Chief?"

  "I'm fine. Give the team my thanks for their good work."

  He moved out the door and through the parking lot, past an agent who was unloading more evidence. Night had brought a light, cooling rain and the tangy scent of creosote filled the air. He shivered. Not against the chill, but in an attempt to shake off all he'd learned about the Langsford family and would rather never have known.

  Slightly disoriented from a dreamless, heavy sleep, Kerney rolled out of bed. It took a minute for him to realize he was back in Santa Fe at his own place and the morning was half gone. He cleaned up, got dressed, drove to work, and tried to make an inconspicuous entrance through a side door. Before he could reach the second-floor landing, half a dozen officers and civilian employees had stopped him to offer congratulations on the Langsford case. A few others in the hallway, probably those unwilling to forget about the Shockley incident, greeted him with tight, curt nods.

  He smiled at Andy Baca, who waited for him in the reception area outside his office. Kerney had worn his uniform to work and he watched Andy take in the unusual sight with a look of mock disbelief. In his office, they both sat on the couch that faced Andy's oak desk.

  "Lee Sedillo says you've made a strong case," Andy said.

  "The DA bought it after he heard the tape recording," Kerney replied.

  "He'll take Linda Langsford to trial. But he wasn't happy about prosecuting her without any hard physical evidence or not being able to use Linda's taped confession. He figures the defense will argue insanity."

  "Is she?"

  Kerney shrugged. "Insane or not, she's a cold-blooded killer. She murdered five people to conceal an act of revenge against her father, killed her mother and brother, and was planning to ice three more, if you include Eric, Kay Murray, and Penelope Gibben."

  "Will you be able to arrest her for the murder of her mother and brother?" Andy asked.

  "That's hard to say. I've asked the Cold Crimes Unit to reopen the investigations."

  "What about Gibben and Murray?" Andy asked.

  "I don't know how that will fall out. I'm hoping we can get enough information from the search warrants to at least track down some of Vernon Langsford's other victims. Then it depends on what they tell us."

  "If Gibben and Murray didn't procure for Langsford, at the very least they colluded with him."

  Kerney nodded in agreement. "There could be conspiracy charges filed."

  "Will the DA follow up?"

  "That's iffy right now. The perpetrator is dead, it's possible that the statute of limitations has expired, and only Margie Hobeck and Kay Murray have made statements. He's researching case law."

  "Have any other victims come forward?"

  "Not yet. The news about the case is just breaking, and the department shrink says it may take a while before any of them feel safe enough to want to talk."

  "Langsford was a lifetime pedophile with multiple victims. That might win a jury's sympathy," Andy said.

  "Sympathy won't wipe the slate clean for the five innocent people she left dead in her wake," Kerney replied. "It's gonna be some trial, that's for sure."

  "The really bad guy wasn't brought to justice."

  "Getting shot to death by your daughter comes pretty close," Andy said.

  "I rather he'd been caught and held accountable."

  "We don't execute child molesters in New Mexico," Andy said.

  "I wasn't thinking of legal action," Kerney said. "I had something more personal in mind."

  Andy recognized the feeling. It had been a case to turn anyone's stomach, no matter how hardened. Kerney had been right in the middle of a dung heap of a family, and squashing Vernon Langsford would have made any cop feel better. "This one got to you, didn't it?"

  "Big time."

  "What's with the uniform?" Andy asked. "You haven't worn it more than five times in the last year."

  "I decided to put it on while I still had the chance," Kerney said, as he pulled at his shirt collar displaying the three stars. "So, you really are leaving."

  "Without fanfare."

  "No party?"

  "No party, no surprises."

  Andy went to his desk, returned with a business card, and gave it to Kerney. "The Santa Fe city manager wants you to call him."

  "About what?"

  "I don't know. He was here for a joint criminal justice planning meeting and left his card with my secretary. You will let Connie and me take you and Sara to dinner before you leave, won't you?"

  "As long as you don't get sloppy drunk and maudlin," Kerney said.

  "Have I ever?"

  "There's always a first time," Kerney said, smiling at Andy, "for both of us."

  The thirty days Kerney had promised Andy stretched into two months. On the Friday before his last week at work, Kerney took the day off and drove to Las Cruces, where he met Milton Lynch, the executor of Erma Fergurson's estate, who was ready to close on the sale of Kerney's inherited land to the Nature Conservancy and file final papers with the probate court.

  Lynch took Kerney through the paperwork, his back to the picture window in his office that gave a stunning view of the Organ Mountains, and finished up with an accounting of the net proceeds that Kerney would receive after the taxes were paid.

  Even with the enormous tax bite and the sale of the land to the Nature Conservancy at below market value, Kerney was about to become a multimillionaire.

  "How do you want the funds disbursed?" Lynch asked.

  Kerney had consulted a tax attorney and CPA in Santa Fe earlier in the week. He gave Lynch a disbursement schedule for the joint accounts that he'd opened in his and Sara's names.

  Lynch studied the schedule. "This is a good mix of conservative and growth investments," he said. "But you really need to buy some real estate fairly soon, and let your tax-free fund pay the monthly principal and interest."

  "I plan to do that," Kerney said.

  Lynch ran a stubby finger across the line that projected Kerney's annual after-tax income. He noted the amount and asked, "Will this amount adequately provide for you and your wife?"

  Kerney laughed. Even after reinvesting most of the expected dividends and interest, his net disposable income was about to become more than double-almost triple-what he'd ever taken home in paychecks during the course of a year.

  Lynch's bushy eyebrows flattened into a straight line as he looked up from the papers. "I take that to mean yes."

  "Yes," Kerney replied.

  "Now there's the matter of Erma's other bequest to you." Lynch rose, crossed to the office closet, and returned holding a wrapped package, which he placed in Kerney's hands.

  Kerney tore away the protective paper to find an oil painting by Erma of his family's ranch on the Tularosa, as it had been before the army took the land to expand White Sands Missile Range.

  He took the image in as memories of his childhood flooded back: setting new corral fence posts behind the house with his father, painting the eaves and the porch trim with his mother, climbing the nearby windmill in the early morning to watch the sun rise over the Sierra Blanca peaks as it cascaded down to Three Rivers.

  "It's wonderful," he said, trying to keep his voice steady.

  "Prices for Erma's work have escalated since her death," Lynch said.

  "Erma held this piece out of the retrospective of her work shown at the university the year before her death. I've been authorized to ask if you'd like to place it on permanent loan or give it to the university. They'd love to add it to their collection."

  "Not a chance," Kerney replied.

  "I didn't think so," Lynch said, holding out an envelope. "Here are the two accounts you asked me to set up. Each has the maximum tax-free gift amount you are allowed under the IRS code. You can add the same amount to the accounts annually, if you wish."

  "I understand."


  "Good luck, Chief Kerney," Lynch said. "I hope you enjoy being a rich man."

  Kerney shook Lynch's outstretched hand. "I'll try to get used to it."

  "I don't think you'll have any problems."

  From a distance, it was a modest house at the end of a dirt lane, made even more unprepossessing by enormous pine trees that dwarfed the structure and allowed only the diffused, fading evening sunlight to filter in. Up close, the house was more substantial in appearance, rectangular and low to the ground with a bright red tin roof over a post-and-beam porch. New metal-clad wood windows had been recently installed, and the porch deck, made of long planks, had been carefully laid and thoroughly weatherproofed.

  In a small clearing away from the house, a fenced vegetable garden held the drooping remains of tomato and squash plants killed by frost. A swing and slide set stood under a pine tree next to a sandbox.

  Kerney knocked on the front door and Clayton answered, his expression changing quickly from surprise to impassivity.

  "What brings you back to Mescalero?" he asked.

  "I wanted to give you this," Kerney said, holding out the envelope.

  Clayton read the certificates of deposit and with a stunned expression on his face shook his head. "I don't need your money."

  "It's not for you; it's for your children's education. The enclosed letter explains everything. Consider it a scholarship fund."

  "I don't know any cop who has twenty thousand dollars lying around to give away."

  "I can afford it," Kerney said.

  He waved the envelope at Kerney. "You really want to do this?"

  "I do."

  "Why?"

  "Because it pleases me. If you decide not to keep it, send it back to the return address on the letterhead. I hope you won't do that."

  Kerney turned to leave.

  "Wait."

  "What?" Kerney said, swinging back around. Clayton's expression was uncertain.

  "You want to give my children money, just like that?"

  "Just like that."

  "I don't know what to say."