Dance of the Bones (18 page)

When Lani returned to Leo's pickup and climbed inside, she saw from the expression on his face that something was wrong. “What is it?” she asked.

“Jimmy Lewis, one of the Law and Order guys, is a buddy of mine. They know who the victims are.”

“They're not illegals?” Lani asked.

“No,” Leo said, turning the key in the ignition. “They found their driver's licenses. It's two of the José brothers, Carlos and Paul.”

“I was afraid of that,” Lani said.

Leo nodded. “So was I.”

Lani thought of the single gunshot she had heard later in the morning, after the initial volleys of shots. “What about Tim?” she asked.

“There was no sign of him here, but chances are he's dead, too,” Leo said. “We have to get back to Sells. I want to tell Gabe before anyone else does.”

BRANDON WAS FINE FOR A
while as he headed north on the Catalina Highway. Driving through the bustling business centers of Oro Valley, he couldn't help but remember when Ina had been on the far edge of the city. That was no longer true. As for Catalina? He remembered that as a sleepy hamlet on a two-­lane road with little more than a bar, a gas station, and a tow-­truck operation. Now it, too, was busy enough to have multiple lanes and multiple traffic lights. Off to the left, between there and I-­10, were numerous housing developments and golf resorts. And off to the right, the ridgelines in the distance teemed with newly constructed cheek-­by-­jowl houses.

He stopped briefly at the red light that marked the entrance to Saddlebrooke, with a thriving “active adult” community that included thousands of retirement homes and more golf courses. No doubt somewhere up there was the property near Golder Dam that John Lassiter had sold to some “crazy” developer who planned to build houses there. It turned out, Brandon realized, that the developer was having the last laugh.

It wasn't until Brandon turned off Catalina Highway and onto Highway 77 that the familiar pall of grief settled over him. His meeting with Amanda Wasser, in which he had learned about her unyielding loyalty to a father she didn't know, had put Brandon's troubled relationship with his own sons in an even worse light.

Tommy had died in his late teens. He and his younger brother, Quentin, had been engaged in the felonious activity of stealing pots from an ancient site in a cavern on the reservation when Tommy had fallen to his death. Wanting to cover up what had really happened, Quentin spent years maintaining that Tommy had simply run away. During that time, before Mitch Johnson's arrival on the scene had revealed the truth about Tommy's death, Quentin had drifted ever deeper into the world of boozing and drugging. His coming down with hep C was pretty much a foregone conclusion, and his frequent run-­ins with the law meant that he had finally been given a three-­strikes life sentence.

On the surface it was easy to theorize that Quentin's burden of guilt about his brother had been the cause of Quentin's eventually fatal downward spiral, but every time Brandon had driven Highway 77 from Tucson to Florence—­every time he had gone to the prison to visit Quentin prior to his death—­Brandon had blamed only himself. Today was no exception.

Brandon hadn't been able to prevent his divorce from his sons' mother, Jane, but once that happened, he should have been more actively involved in raising the boys. He should have done more to set them on the right path. He should have done better. He should have fixed it. Brandon's sons were both dead while he was still alive. That wasn't the way life was supposed to work. He grieved for his boys who had died so young and wasted so much of their all-too-short lives.

Drowning in regret, Brandon wasn't the least bit surprised to pull into the visitors' parking lot at the prison and find that the knuckles on his fingers were white from his death grip on the steering wheel. On a sunny Saturday in March, the Arizona State Prison Complex in Florence was the very last place in the universe where Brandon Walker wanted to be.

 

CHAPTER 17

EACH SUMMER THE WOMEN FROM
the villages would go to the foothills around Baboquivari to gather the fruit from the ­saguaro
—­
s bahithaj
—­
from which they make the saguaro wine
—
­nawait. For many years, when ­people from a certain village went to gather the fruit, they were met by the Evil Giantess
—­
Ho
'
ok O
'
oks
—­
who lived nearby.
You will remember, nawoj, my friend, that Ho
'
ok O
'
oks had grown out of the dust balls that once belonged to Nephew-­of-­the-­Sun.

Ho
'
ok O
'
oks
was a powerful spirit of evil who could make ­people do just what she wanted. Sometimes she made them give her their best cows. Sometimes she would catch a young child and take it away with her. And although the mothers mourned for their children and pleaded with the Giantess, the children were never returned.

The Evil Giantess had such a lot of hair that when she shook her head, it was like a cloud. The children were all afraid of her. And so it became a custom for one of the women from the village to stay with the children to keep them safe. But this was not easy to do. There were horses and cattle to be watered and there was wood to be chopped to keep the fires warm to heat the ollas used to cook the cactus fruit before the syrup
—­sit'ol—­
could be turned into wine. All those things meant the women of the village were always busy.

WARDEN HUFFMAN WAS GOOD TO
his word. Brandon Walker checked his weapons in one of the lockers provided, then carried Amanda Wasser's box of documents through security. Once clear of that, a waiting guard led him to a nearby interview room, let him inside, and locked the door behind him. Brandon didn't mind. The silence of the locked room was infinitely preferable to the noisy bedlam of the regular visitors' room. His memories of that room—­of sitting there trying to converse with Quentin through a yellowed plexiglass barrier—­were painful ones Brandon didn't wish to revisit.

The door banged open, jarring him out of his reverie and back into an equally unwelcome present. A uniformed guard ushered a grizzled old black man into the room. “You here to see John Lassiter?” he asked.

Brandon nodded. The man was in uniform. His clothing was more like hospital scrubs than guard attire. The name tag dangling on his lanyard identified him as Aubrey Bayless.

“Mind showing me some ID?”

“How come?”

Bayless shrugged. “Lassiter asked me to check, so I'm checking.”

Shaking his head with annoyance, Brandon reached into his back pocket, retrieved his wallet, and held it still long enough for the man to study it.

Finally the old man nodded. “Okay,” he said. “Right back.”

In the long silence that followed, Brandon remembered taking John Lassiter into custody. The homicide investigation was Pima County's, but the arrest itself had been a joint operation conducted by Brandon and a Tucson PD detective named Michael Farraday. Information from a confidential informant had led them to a seedy bar called the Tally Ho on North Sixth Avenue, one that was lowbrow and scuzzy enough to be El Barrio's clone. Once inside, they spotted Lassiter seated at the dimly lit bar, hunched over a pitcher of beer with a shot of tequila on the counter in front of him.

Naturally the place had gone quiet the moment the two detectives walked into the room. Action at the pool tables stopped cold. Lassiter was drunk enough that it took a moment for the sudden silence to penetrate his fog. He was just starting to turn on his barstool when Farraday reached out to tap him on the shoulder.

Big Bad John Lassiter immediately roared to his full height—­all six-­foot-­six of him, without even knowing who they were or what they wanted—­and he had come out swinging. He was belligerent enough that for years afterward, whenever they had been together, Brandon had reminisced with Farraday about being lucky and quick enough to dodge Lassiter's powerful right-­hand blow. It had taken both detectives to subdue the guy and get the cuffs on him, and all the while, a girl—­a young woman really—­had been screaming in the background, telling them to stop and begging that they not hurt him. That girl, Brandon realized now, must have been Amanda's birth mother, and she had most likely been only a few weeks pregnant at the time.

The last time Brandon remembered seeing Big Bad John had been at the Pima County Courthouse at the close of Lassiter's second trial. The verdict was read—­guilty—­and the judge had remanded him to custody. When it was time to leave, Lassiter had stood up—­again to his full height—­and had patiently placed his hands behind his back so the guards could cuff him and lead him back to his cell. Even in handcuffs, John Lassiter had been an imposing figure, dwarfing the guards who had swarmed around him like so many midgets. That was who Brandon was expecting to walk through the door, a giant of a man, big enough to match the song. But that wasn't what happened.

When the interview room's door swung open, Aubrey Bayless pushed a wheelchair into the room. John Lassiter's clean-­shaven face was familiar, but the rest of him was not. The passing years had turned him into a massive piece of humanity that seemed root-­bound in a chair that appeared far too small to hold him. Brandon's first impression was that someone had heated him up and simply melted his body into the chair.

MS, Brandon remembered after a moment. It was the same ailment that had placed Lassiter's daughter on her red scooter. Obviously scooters weren't part of the prison's caregiving protocol.

Aubrey Bayless positioned Lassiter's wheelchair on the far side of the table and disappeared into the background, taking a chair next to the door. For a few moments, Brandon and Lassiter studied each other across the table between them as well as across the years. Lassiter was the first to speak.

“Thank you for coming to see me, Sheriff Walker,” he said. “I appreciate it. And please accept my belated condolences about your son. Cirrhosis is a tough way to go. I don't blame him for taking an early out.”

Brandon was taken aback. “You knew Quentin?”

Lassiter shrugged. “He and I talked sometimes when we were both in the infirmary. That's how I knew about the work you do for that cold case group, TLC. Quentin told me. That's why I asked for you.”

It took a moment for Brandon to swallow the lump that suddenly filled his throat. Words of condolence from Big Bad John weren't at all what Brandon Walker had expected.

“Thank you for that,” he murmured. “Thank you very much.”

WHEN GABE'S EYES BLINKED OPEN,
at first he thought he'd gone blind. He was in utter darkness. There was no light. He could move his legs, but nothing else. His arms were secured to his sides with something that was probably duct tape. A gag was in his mouth, making it impossible to speak. Gentle swaying from side to side and the sound of tires on pavement told him he was in a moving vehicle, but he had no idea how much time had passed since the stun gun attack, followed by an injection of some kind that had knocked him loopy.

He sniffed the air. It smelled rank—­as though someone had peed his pants and probably something worse. Gabe's face went hot with embarrassment. How could he be such a coward? He couldn't even be brave when someone had knocked him out. Then over the sound of the tires he became aware of something else—­of someone else. There was another person with him in this dark place, someone who was now sobbing brokenly.

Gabe tried to shift his position, wanting to turn his face in the direction of the sound, but he couldn't. There was an unyielding barrier just above him. In the dark and through his clothing he couldn't tell if the low ceiling was made of wood or metal. Whatever it was, it didn't move, and it was low enough that it didn't allow him to turn over on his side. He could lie flat, staring up into the darkness, and that was it.

Then it occurred to him that perhaps the other person was crying because he or she had no idea anyone else was there in the darkness. It took real effort, but eventually Gabe was able to scoot his body over the few inches of floorboard between them. When he touched the form next to him, the sobbing ceased abruptly. Soon the other person moved as well, coming closer until their two bodies lay side by side.

As they lay there huddled together for comfort, it took some time for Gabe to grasp that they were almost the same size and bound in the same way. With effort, they were just able to touch fingers. When that happened, Gabe's heart filled with inexplicable joy. Some sense he couldn't explain told him who his companion was—­Timmy José.

His friend wasn't dead. He was there in the darkness right along with Gabe. They were both trapped, but at least they were together. Tim José wasn't dead and neither was Gabe—­at least not yet.

Then, whether it was the darkness, the movement of the vehicle, an aftereffect from whatever had been in the syringe, or a combination of all three, Gabe's eyes closed and he drifted off again.

WHEN LANI AND LEO WALKED
into the Ortiz house, there was no sign of Gabe, and Delia was putting away groceries. She was also in a snit. “Your son is in big trouble,” she said, turning angrily on her husband.

“Why?” Leo asked. “What did he do now?”

“I grounded him for running off from Lani the way he did,” Delia said, “but what do you think happened? I had to work for an hour or so and get some groceries. When I came home, he was gone. I told him he was grounded, and he took off anyway!”

Leo reached for his phone. “Don't bother,” Delia said. “I already tried calling him. He didn't take his phone along with him. It's in the bedroom.”

Leo stared at her for a moment, then he turned abruptly on his heel and marched down the hall to Gabe's bedroom. When he returned, his face was somber, and he was carrying a paper bag. He put the bag on the table, then he walked over to Delia and took her in his arms.

“I'm afraid it's worse trouble than his just being grounded,” Leo said quietly.

“What?” Delia asked anxiously, pushing herself away. “What's going on? What's happened?”

“You know those two dead men out by Rattlesnake Skull charco?”

Delia nodded. “You told me. What about them?”

“They've been identified,” Leo answered. “The dead men are Carlos and Paul José.”

Delia put her hand to her mouth and sat down heavily on a nearby kitchen chair. “When you told me about it, I thought they were illegals.”

“So did everybody else, but Lani and I both thought we recognized the vehicle as belonging to the Josés,” Leo told her. “The problem is, from the way they were gunned down, they must have been into something bad. Gabe may be involved as well.”

“Are you serious?” Delia demanded. “How's that even possible?”

“See for yourself,” Leo said, pushing a paper bag across the table to his wife. “I found this in one of Gabe's dresser drawers. Look at the note inside.”

Delia plucked out the note and read it. When she finished, the slip of paper fluttered away from her fingers and fell to the floor. Leo picked it up and handed it to Lani so she could read it as well.

“The Josés are all involved in some kind of smuggling thing, and now they've pulled Gabe into it, too?”

“That's how it sounds,” Leo agreed.

Lani looked at the bag but didn't touch it. “That bag is possibly critical evidence,” she said. “Whatever used to be in it probably explains why Carlos and Paul were killed. That means we're going to have to turn the bag over to the FBI.”

“But what about Tim José?” Delia asked brokenly. “If his brothers are dead, and he's missing, is he dead, too?”

Lani chose not to speak up about the final gunshot she'd heard, at least not then. She understood the implications better than anyone else, and she wasn't ready to bring those out in the open.

“Tim may not be dead, but he's certainly in danger,” Lani said.

“We need to find both Gabe and Tim,” Leo declared. “I'd better start looking.”

“But don't tell anyone why,” Lani cautioned. “At this point there's been no official announcement about the identity of the victims. We know about that now, but we're not supposed to, and we shouldn't let on that we do. As far as anyone else is concerned, Gabe was grounded and took off anyway. That's why you're looking for him—­to bring him home.”

“But what about the bag?” Leo asked. “Should I put it back where I found it?”

“You can if you want to,” Lani said, “but it's really too late. Your fingerprints are on the bag and all our prints are on the note. At some point we'll need to come forward voluntarily and turn it over to the FBI agents working the case.”

“But doesn't the bag implicate Gabe in whatever it is the José brothers were up to?” Delia objected.

“It may,” Lani said, “but let's cross that bridge when we come to it. First let's find Gabe and see what he has to say.”

“On my way,” Leo said. “I know most of his hangouts. I'll check those first.”

Taking his keys, he hurried out of the house, leaving Lani and Delia together in the kitchen. The two women were close now, so close that it was difficult to remember a time when they had not been friends.

“What happened?” Delia asked. “Why didn't Gabe stay on the mountain with you?”

“Because I brought up his friendship with the Josés,” Lani said. “I told him he was going to have to make a choice between doing right and doing wrong.”

Delia's eyes flooded with tears. “I guess it's already too late for that, isn't it?”

“Maybe so,” Lani agreed, “but I still want to hear what Gabe has to say.”