The Replacement Child - By Christine Barber Page 0,9
I have?”
“That’s up to you,” Kline said. “Just try not to piss anybody off, and low-profile it. I already told the state police officer in charge of the investigation—that Lieutenant Pollack guy—that you’re going to be looking around.”
“How do they know it’s her?” Gil asked.
“They found Melissa’s purse on the bridge with her driver’s license in it, and state police says the body down below matches the photo on the license. But someone, I guess Ron, will have to do a formal ID later.”
“How’d they find the body?”
“Some early-morning tourist looking at the gorge spotted it and called it in.”
“They don’t think it’s a suicide?” The bridge was popular with jumpers. Last year, a man had come all the way from Wisconsin just to commit suicide there.
“No car at the scene. Her car was found in Oñate Park in Santa Fe this morning about an hour ago. State police crime techs are checking it.”
“Has anybody seen the body close-up yet?” Recovering the body would be hard. The gorge was 650 feet below the bridge and there was no path down.
“Some rescue worker has seen her but they won’t tell us anything. But they’re calling it a homicide.”
Kline’s phone rang and Gil took that as his cue to leave. He was just closing the door of the chief’s office behind him when he heard Kline say to him, with his hand over the phone receiver, “By the way, Gil, nice work on that interrogation last night. I’ll be sending a formal memo of congratulations out later. Oh, and Manny Cordova is going around the office doing a fairly good impression of you.”
Gil just nodded and closed the door.
Lucy flipped her alarm clock right-side up; she had put it facedown on her nightstand when she went to bed. If she couldn’t see the clock, that meant she didn’t have to wake up, right? It read 8:45 A.M. in big green numbers. She stuck out her tongue at the clock. When she went out drinking, she could never sleep past 9 A.M. It didn’t matter if she’d gone to bed at 8 A.M.; she was instantly awake an hour later. She stood up, swaying. The blue drink had been her undoing. What had it been called? Something bird. Something sexual. Moaning bird? Screaming orgasm bird? Kicking bird? No, wait—that was the chick from Dances with Wolves, and not a very sexy-sounding alcoholic beverage.
She went into the bathroom to get some aspirin, but all she could find was an old bottle of Pamprin. Did that work on hangovers? She popped two into her mouth and turned on the faucet, which groaned in protest and then spit out a trickle of water. She cupped her hands and took a drink to wash down the Pamprin, dribbling enough cold water down her pajama top to make her jump and curse. She quickly brushed her teeth, trying to scrape off the remnants of last’s night drinking.
Going back to her bedroom, she got down on all fours in front of her closet and began tossing shoes out, trying to find a pair that matched. After two minutes of searching, and one minute of lying on the floor when the room began to sway, she ended up with black pumps with two-inch heels. She slipped those on and almost tottered over when she tried to walk. She steadied herself on her dresser. She just needed to get outside to the mailbox. She walked out into the kitchen and got a pot of coffee brewing, then pulled her long coat over her pajamas and opened the front door. A blast of cold air hit her and she pulled her coat tighter around her.
It was sunny out, of course, as always. She smelled the sweet piñon smoke coming from the Martinezes’ chimney across the street. She looked over at the Sangre de Cristo Mountains just peeking over the top of her neighbors’ house. The mountains were slipping in and out of the morning shadows. Santa Fe Baldy was white capped but the lower elevations still had no snow even in January.
Through her hangover, Lucy navigated her way to her mailbox across the street, her high heels clicking happily over the pavement. It was the only sound in the morning air except the rustling of the cottonwood branches and the far-off closing of a car door.
Lucy lived on Alto Street in a neighborhood that couldn’t decide if it was up-and-coming rich or down-and-out poor. It was in the old part of Santa