It was a pitch-black night in the high desert, Antelope Valley, up the Grapline Highway

north of L.A. It was late February. The year was 2000. Sheriff's Deputy Billy Cox stepped

out of his patrol car and braced himself against a cold wind howling down from the San Gabriel Mountains.

Wind show was in the low 30s, rain coming in.

Hard to believe in just a few weeks a sea of blood-red poppies would begin to bloom in the surrounding Mojave Desert.

Cox was responding to a call of shots fired at the

park and ride off exit five on Highway 14 in Palmdale. It was 9.49 p.m. The lot had about emptied out

by the time he arrived, daily commuters home safe in their beds. And then, there he was, the caller.

Security guard, by the look of it, waving at him about a hundred yards away.

Cox drove over there and rolled down his window.

The guard seemed agitated.

Told him somebody had been shot.

Looked bad.

Over there, he pointed. Over in the west end of the lot.

So then Cox cruised slowly through the darkened lot, and there it was.

Something very wrong around that bright blue Mustang, all askew between the long rows of parking spaces.

Cox slowly eased out of his squad car and approached.

The driver's side door was open. The window rolled down about four inches.

A woman's left leg and bare foot were hanging out of the door. Weird angle. Dead still.

The engine was running.

Keys in the ignition.

Headlights on.

...