Bad Blood (27 page)

He went to the door and paused with his hand on the latch. “Was Rick Estes in on it with Boris and Tyler? Is that why he was killed, too?”

“No!” Dale Mack said, exploding. “Rick was a good man! He didn’t have anything to do with that shit!”

Pat put his hand on Dale’s arm. Jim watched him do it. Carol had put her hand on Roger’s arm in that same restraining way. And Jim watched Dale master his anger in a way that, had he but known it, mirrored the same emotions and actions as the chief’s husband across the river.

“You go on now, Jim,” Pat said, looking suddenly weary, as Roger and Carol had looked weary. “You just go.”

He went.

Dale Mack’s wife was standing in the door of her cabin, watching, expressionless. He didn’t see the beautiful daughter or anyone else in the village on his way down to the landing.

He untied the bowline and pushed the skiff back into the river.

“Sergeant Jim! Sergeant!”

He looked around, the rancor at Pat Mack’s cabin still with him enough that he dropped his hand to his weapon. When he saw who it was, he relaxed. “Auntie Nan,” he said, perking up. Was here a Kushtakan who would talk to him?

But no. “You give me a ride?” she said. She was carrying plastic grocery bags in both hands, both of which looked full of clothing.

“To Kuskulana?” he said, surprised.

“To Niniltna,” she said.

The Cessna was a state-owned aircraft, with its fuel paid for by the Department of Public Safety, and as such not to be used to give joyrides at the state-paid pilot’s whim.

On the other hand, Auntie Nan had been a witness to all the goings-on in Kuskulana for longer than he’d been the Park rats’ personal trooper. Simple though she might be, she was bound to know things he didn’t.

“I’d be happy to, Auntie Nan,” he said, and handed her into the skiff.

Twenty-four

SUNDAY, JULY 15, CANYON HOT SPRINGS

Monday, July 16, Kate’s homestead

Kate came down from the pass fully intending to pack up and head back to the homestead that afternoon. Instead, she spent the rest of the day and that night at Old Sam’s cabin. If there were questions you didn’t want to answer, you couldn’t do better than stay out of cell phone range, and Canyon Hot Springs was as far out of cell phone range as she could get.

She unpacked and set up camp in the cabin and then stripped down to bare skin and jumped into the largest pool feetfirst. Mutt climbed to a small ledge halfway up the side of the canyon. Kate watched her curl up in a fugitive ray of sunshine. Canyon Hot Springs was where she and Kate had had their come-to-Jesus meeting last October, when Mutt had stated in no uncertain terms that she was either a full partner in the firm, entitled to all the same benefits and especially risks that Kate was, or she wasn’t. And if Kate had decided that Mutt wasn’t, Kate was pretty sure Mutt would have vanished out of her life for good.

“Of all the homesteads in all the Parks in all the world,” Kate said, “you had to walk into mine.”

Mutt’s ear twitched, but she didn’t bother opening her eyes. So far as she was concerned, their argument had ended when she demanded and got an unconditional surrender.

When Kate had soaked all the weariness out of her bones, she left the pool and dressed. She spent the rest of the day making a leisurely survey of the cabin and its surroundings. Astonishingly, the outhouse was still upright. The cabin needed a few nails here and there, a few holes made by inquisitive mammalian and avian creatures needed plugging, and she gave it a thorough cleaning while she was at it.

She’d sent all the food and cookware over the mountain, and that night dined sumptuously on an overlooked package of Top Ramen noodles cooked in an empty tin can she had found and boiled clean.

She slept outside. For the slice of open sky over her head, for the sound of the wind in the spruce trees, for the smell of their sap in her nostrils, it was a risk she was willing to take. With Mutt beside her as her own personal hostile wildlife DEW Line, it wasn’t all that risky.

Nothing disturbed them. Not bear, not wolf, not moose, not ghosts, not dreams.

The next morning she rose early and breakfasted on dried mango slices and tamari almonds, topped off with one of the new Starbucks instant coffees, which weren’t bad after you added three packets of Coffee-mate and a couple of cane sugars.

Fortified for whatever the day might throw at her, she packed up and scoured the area for any trash. She spent some quality time in the outhouse and left behind a liberal layer of lime.

She left Johnny’s ATV behind at the cabin, tarped and roped like a mummy in the vain hope it would keep the porcupines from getting into the engine and eating the belts. When Johnny got back from Suulutaq, she’d bring him up here and they could drive out together. Be a nice sendoff before he went to college, a trip for just the two of them.

Three of them. No way would Mutt allow herself to be left behind.

The trailer she left hitched to hers. She had a full tank and a full jerry can, which should more than see her home.

The doglegs were a little more exhilarating on the way down, especially since she geared down instead of using the brakes. Mutt galloped alongside, her tongue flopping out of one side of her mouth. The need for stealth gone, she turned onto the Step Road just down the bluff from Park HQ. The only people she saw were Keith and Oscar, stooped over in their extensive commercial herb gardens. They stood to wave as she and Mutt went by.

She was in Niniltna by eight o’clock that evening and passed through without stopping, taking the Park road home and not sparing the horses. At a little after nine she rolled into the clearing and dismounted, weary but calm.

That calmness evaporated when she looked up and saw the expression on Jim’s face.

“Hey,” she said warily.

“Where have you been?” It was very much the trooper speaking.

In every good lie, it was always best to include as much of the truth as possible. “Up to the springs.”

He nodded, and came down the stairs. “You go up there alone?”

She stared at him. “You know I didn’t. How?”

“Mandy.”

“Of course.” More and more crowded every day.

“She thought you had Johnny and Van with you.”

“Oh,” she said.

“But I called Johnny, and he and Van were still at the mine.”

“Oh,” she said again.

“So who was with you?”

His tone was inflexible. He wasn’t going to let this go.

She looked past him, at the house the Park had built, the house he had moved into with her, one clean shirt at a time. It had taken two years of both of them ignoring the fact that his toothbrush had taken up permanent residence next to hers in the bathroom, that he had an equal share of drawers and closet space, that he’d forged a relationship with her adopted son that looked a lot like foster father.

So, if she wanted this to continue, lying was probably not her best option. “Jennifer Mack and Ryan Christianson.”

His brows snapped together. “You took Jennifer Mack and Ryan Christianson up to the springs?”

She nodded.

He was groping to make some sense of her revelation. “You’re going to leave them up there for the summer?”

Mutt hopped down from the back of the ATV and stood looking from Kate to Jim, scenting the tension in the air.

Kate unstrapped her backpack from the rack behind the four-wheeler’s seat. “No,” she said. “They’re not there anymore.”

“Where are they?”

She fiddled with the backpack, killing time, and then looked up to meet his eyes. “I took them up to the pass.”

“What pass?”

She looked away. “Something I didn’t tell you about Canyon Hot Springs.”

“Yes?” he said, his voice dangerous.

She almost squirmed, and caught herself in time. “The canyon takes a right turn, way back up, past all the mines Old Sam’s dad dug into the cliffs. You remember?”

He nodded, grim-faced.

“I didn’t take you all the way up when we went to get the Cross of Gold.”

“What did I miss?” he said in a tone that would brook no evasion. If she but knew it, she was paying for all the hours he’d spent being lied to in Kushtaka and Kuskulana this week.

“When you get to the top, there’s a pass through the Quilaks. About one person wide. Goes down the other side.”

“Into the YT,” he said.

She nodded.

“So you took them up there and turned them loose.”

She nodded again.

“Interesting,” he said, “when I’m pretty sure you know Ryan Christianson murdered Rick Estes.”

“I don’t know that,” she said, her voice steady.

“I flew down to Alaganik this afternoon,” he said. “Ryan’s friends were there, but Ryan wasn’t with them. And his parents are worried. I thought it was because Ryan might have killed Tyler, or Rick, or both of them. I already know Tyler and Boris killed Mitch. And now you’re telling me Ryan ran off with Jennifer? Kuskulana’s heir apparent absconded with Kushtaka’s darling?” He laughed. He didn’t sound even remotely amused. “Oh, that’s great, that’s just, that’s … Jesus. I’ll definitely be wearing Kevlar the next time I fly down to Kuskulana.”

“No,” she said, “listen. Anne Flanagan married them secretly four days ago. Jennifer snuck out of her house that night and met Ryan on the river. Rick Estes saw her and followed her there. They told me he just appeared out of the brush, seconds after she met Ryan. He tried to stop her going with Ryan—no, Jim, he actually laid hands on her. Ryan tried to stop him, and they started fighting. Rick had time and pounds on Ryan and he might have won, if…”

“If?”

“If Jennifer hadn’t hit him from behind.”

“What with?”

“She said one of the oars out of Ryan’s skiff.”

“Which is now where?”

“In Potlatch.” She thought she wouldn’t mention the fact that the skiff and all its contents would have been sunk in the river by now. “They knew they couldn’t get much farther without being seen by some relative or other, so they stopped at Potlatch and got Scott Ukatish to call Anne Flanagan in Cordova. He’s got a small strip. She picked them up and brought them to me in Niniltna.” She paused. “For what it’s worth, I believed them when they said it was an accident. Jennifer says that Rick had a crush on her and that her father wanted her to marry him. It sounds like he thought he had the right to stop her.”

“You’d better hope the autopsy bears them out,” he said.

She did, most fervently.

He hadn’t changed out of his uniform, and with his hands on his belt he looked like a recruiting poster for the Alaska Department of Public Safety. Badass trooper about to clean house.

“You’re not as surprised at any of this as I thought you’d be,” she said.

“I went back out to Kuskulana and Kushtaka,” he said. “I talked to the Christiansons, and then I went over the river and talked to the Macks.”

“They tell you anything?”

“No, but before I went, I found Boris Balluta. He told me his side of it. Pretty much like we’d thought, Tyler figured he’d start his own bootlegging business on the Halvorsen’s stock. Boris was his partner. Mitch caught them at it, and from what Boris says, killed himself staggering around in the dark trying to beat on Tyler and Boris. They nailed the hatch down—you saw the toolbox—and ran for it. Boris, naturally, says it’s all Tyler’s fault.”

“Fortuitous, since Tyler’s too dead to contradict him.”

“Two months later, Kenny Halvorsen notices Mitch isn’t fishing. He comes home to find the hatch nailed shut. He pulls it up and finds Mitch, but he can’t call the cops until he gets all the contraband out of the crawl space.”

“And Boris— “Kate said.

“And poor Boris is petrified that both villages are going to come after him.”

“He’s not wrong,” Kate said.

“No,” Jim said. “I can’t believe he was still in the Park when I found him.”

“Ryan…” Kate said.

Jim’s head came up. “Ryan what?”

“Ryan says Roger found Mitch first.”

“Oh hell no,” Jim said.

She spread her hands. “Don’t shoot the messenger. Ryan says Roger nailed the hatch back down while the council figured out what to do with the contraband before calling you. Before they could, Kenny came home and found Mitch.”

They frowned at each other. “Which one’s telling the truth?” Jim said.

“Who has more to lose?” she said. “So far as anyone knows except you and me and Anne Flanagan, Ryan Christianson is dead, and he knew that when he told me his story. Roger Christianson, on the other hand, is very much alive and well and still living in the Park. Plus Kenny is only a low-rent Kuskulaner at that. If anyone gets thrown to the wolves, it’ll be him.”

Jim nodded. “I’ve been looking for Kenny. I haven’t found him yet. I banged on every door in Kuskulana on my way home, but no one admits to seeing hide nor hair of him, although one or two of them were willing to swear that he’d moved Outside.”

“When?”

“Oh, they weren’t sure, but last week some time, they thought.”

“Was this before or after they swore on their mothers that he’d been in their sight every minute of the day Tyler Mack was murdered?”

“The very same, or close enough as to make no never mind. Not like any of them would have a different story.” The stern lines of his face eased a trifle, and he looked less angry than tired. “Oh, and Auntie Nan hitched a ride with me to Niniltna.”

“What did she tell you?”

“Not a goddamn thing. Although I don’t think she’s as dumb as she pretends to be.”

“Anne Flanagan says it was Auntie Nan who made the wedding possible. She pulled Anne out of Tyler’s services and took her to the two kids.”

“Definitely not as dumb as she pretends to be,.”

“Never underestimate an auntie,” Kate said.

“You know, Kate,” Jim said, shoving his cap back on his head, “I used to be a pretty good law enforcement officer. I could serve and protect with the best of them.” A surge of rage flooded up over his face. “If fucking people would just fucking let me!”

“Where is Auntie Nan now?”

The rage ebbed. “With Auntie Edna, who if I understood correctly is by way of being a shirttail relative to everybody named Mack in Kushtaka.” He thought it over and added, “Better them than me.”