Free Voice Mail Murder by Patricia Rockwell Page B

for all the world like a pedophile. He was motioning to her. She glanced at Rocky and then moved over to the column.
    “Detective,” she greeted him. Rocky followed. “I didn’t expect to see you at a college football game.”
    “Nor I, you, Dr. Barnes,” he snickered. “My sources tell me this is an unlikely place to find you. And yet, here you are!” He gestured widely, his coat flapping in the stiff breeze. Rocky chuckled. “Mr. Barnes,” said Shoop, nodding to Rocky.
    “Detective,” acknowledged Rocky, “I hope you’re not embroiling my wife in another one of your investigations?”
    “Mr. Barnes,“ said Shoop, “we do not embroil anyone. We only ask for assistance. If your wife decides to exceed our request . . .”
    “So,” continued Rocky, “that means you tracked her down . . .”
    “Actually,” Pamela cut in, before the two men came to blows. “I’d already spoken to the detective, dear. He asked me to evaluate some recorded voices. That’s all. Isn’t that right, Detective?”
    “Yes,” answered Shoop, puffing up his relatively scrawny chest defensively against the much more muscular Rocky. “I merely tracked your wife down here to bring her this.” He reached into the pocket of his overcoat that was flying in the wind. A plastic CD case was in his hand.
    “Not another set of voice mail messages?” queried Pamela.
    “No, my dear Dr. Barnes,” assured Shoop. “This . . . .” He tapped the side of the CD container. “This is the information you requested. You asked for samples of suspects’ voices that you could use to compare to the voice mail messages. Well, here are your samples. Our forensics people have extracted short segments from all of the interviews we conducted with the women we have interviewed for this case—and a few of the more effeminate men—and we placed them on this CD—in no particular order—all listed by number. You have merely to go through these dozen or so suspects and compare them to the speakers on the voice mail CD and simply let us know if you find a match.”
    “Simply,” she said, laughing.
    “What does he mean, voice mail recording?” Rocky asked his wife, a look of fury on his face.
    “Don’t worry,” she said soothingly, patting his arm. “And, Detective, thank you. I’ll compare the voices. But—there’s no ‘mere’ about it. With the three voice mail suspects and —you said—a dozen or so suspects on this sample tape, this is not going to be quick work.”
    “Don’t worry, Dr. Barnes,” said the detective, pulling his coat tighter against the wind, and turning to head out of the stadium. “You can have the entire weekend!” He stormed off.
    The entire weekend, thought Pamela. It was Saturday night.
     
     

Chapter Ten
     
    Rocky hadn’t spoken as they drove home from the game. Pamela stared straight ahead, glancing surreptitiously from time to time at his knuckles gripping the steering wheel, every gnarly muscle in his hands visible. They seldom fought, but her involvement in several murder investigations over the last few years had been major bones of contention. Rocky believed any involvement was personally dangerous for her; she believed she was perfectly safe and was merely providing helpful information from a distance. Unfortunately, Rocky’s perspective had been proven correct in several instances and Pamela’s life had been put in jeopardy because of her assistance on the cases.
    Now, the couple was in their bedroom in their modest ranch-style home on the outskirts of Reardon. Pamela sat on their bed, Candide shuddering in her lap, as Rocky paced back and forth around the room. The little dog seemed to sense his master’s fury and he had rushed to Pamela for comfort.
    “Were you going to tell me about this?” he asked, not looking at his wife, but continuing to pace back and forth.
    “Rocky,” she implored, clutching the little white dog in her arms. “Shoop came to me. He just asked me to listen to some