Dangerous Refuge (20 page)

Thirty-three

I
t took Tanner about two seconds to realize that McCurdy’s 8 was everything the Ground & Pound wanted to be. Stubby’s place had been held together with duct tape, sweat, and desperation. McCurdy’s 8 was all about professional fighters who had already proved themselves in the octagon under hot lights with screaming and jeering fans surrounding them.

McCurdy’s 8 was where men oiled themselves in their own sweat, ready to fight or die for the crowd. It was ancient Rome minus the lions and lead plumbing. Posters of meaty champions hung on the walls in oversize images of blood and triumph, adrenaline smiles holding off the pain that would come as surely as dawn.

The biggest poster was of Nick McCurdy, grinning through bruises and blood, holding up a championship belt buckle almost as big as his chest.

Beyond the reception area, men hit padded steel bars and heavy bags, grunting with effort, sounds that filled the place with a peculiar, primitive rhythm. Part of Tanner understood the sheer physical joy of going one-on-one with a worthy opponent. The rest of him wondered if the fighters had ever tried sex instead.

He didn’t bother trying to talk to McCurdy himself. He just badged the mountain of meat on the other side of the reception desk. The name tag read
Bulldog
.

It should have been
Gorilla
.

“Got a few questions about a fighter called Antonio Rua, goes by either Tonio or Tony,” Tanner said, putting his badge back in his pocket.

“Don’t know him.”

“He’s a new member.”

“Gotta check with the super,” Bulldog said.

Tanner nodded, relieved that Bulldog was a man with nothing to prove. Even if Tanner fought dirty—and really, why fight any other way?—Bulldog wouldn’t be much fun.

While he waited he looked around, noting the cameras that recorded everything that happened in the gym—including the reception area. The thumps and grunts from the various octagons in the big room were the only sounds. No trash talk, no cursing, just the kind of determination and ability to eat pain that were a vital part of the training.

This is a waste of time,
he thought.
Shaye said Lorne’s body wasn’t torn up by anything but scavengers. You beat a man to death and it leaves real marks.

But the gym wasn’t the first wild-goose chase Tanner had ever been on while investigating a case. It wouldn’t be the last. Investigations where murderers didn’t leave witnesses, or brag about themselves in bars or on the street, were time-consuming bitches to solve. If they were solved at all. He didn’t like that, but he knew it just the same.

All he hoped was that Shaye wouldn’t have to live with that kind of knowledge.

Bulldog returned. “Super says we always cooperate with cops. What do you need?”

“Information about Rua.”

“Why?”

“He’s dead.”

“Ah, man. Super really hates when the fighters take it out of the ring.”

“Bullets, not fists.”

Bulldog shook his head. “Coward.”

Tanner shrugged.

The other communed with his computer, pulled up Rua’s file, and spun the machine toward Tanner.

There was nothing on the screen that helped.

“Rua have any friends here?” Tanner asked. “Anyone who touted the place to him?”

“McCurdy’s 8 doesn’t need touting,” Bulldog said, unwrapping a piece of sugarless gum and stuffing it into his massive jaws. “Anyone who don’t know about us don’t know shit about fighting.”

“He hang with anyone in particular?”

“I never saw him come in or leave with any of our fighters.”

Tanner tried another direction. “Does this place take anyone who walks in the door?”

“Nope. Waste of time. Super watches a wannabe fight, then decides.”

“So Rua made the cut?”

“Barely. What got him in is he had this really fast, tricky heart punch that rocked fighters twice his size. The Super thought it might win him a few matches.”

“What’s a heart punch?”

Bulldog chomped his gum a few times. “You hit a guy hard enough on his heart and it can take him down. I saw a heart punch kill a guy once.”

Tanner kept his face neutral. “Must have left a hell of a bruise.”

“Dead dudes don’t bruise. Plenty of other bruises from the fight, but not from the one that killed him.”

“Huh. I thought that sort of thing was bullshit.”

“Saw it. Never forgot it. It’s not just strength, its speed and timing. Super can give you a medical explanation, but it’s like a concussion on your heart instead of your brain.”

Tanner spent some more time asking questions about Rua’s training schedule, sparring partners, anything and everything that might bury the heart-blow discussion in Bulldog’s mind. Then he thanked him and headed out.

As soon as he got in the truck, he called August.

“I know this won’t raise the sheriff’s eyebrows,” Tanner said, “but Rua had a fighting trick known as the heart shot.”

“Keep talking.”

“It’s a fast, single blow to the heart that can take down a trained fighter—even kill him. The result looks like a heart attack and doesn’t leave a mark.”

“Bullshit.”

“Think about it. Bruises form because blood is pumping, under pressure, and leaks out of injured veins or arteries. No heartbeat to cause pressure, no bruises.
Bam.
Lights out forever.”

Silence, then a long-drawn-out curse followed by, “Well, ain’t that a kick in the butt. You sure about this?”

“I’m sure that it wouldn’t require much to take out a man Lorne’s age. It was the lack of body marks that was bothering everyone. This is an explanation.”

“With Rua dead, it’s blowing smoke. Sheriff won’t inhale. He’s at some national peace officers’ meeting over in California, learning how to be even better at his job. But if the reports of the fire that are coming in get any worse, he may come back.”

“He could try pulling his head out of his ass,” Tanner said. “Once his ears stopped ringing, he might be able to connect Lorne to Rua and figure out why Rua was whacked and who did it. Anything new on that, by the way?”

“Haven’t heard a word. Could be everyone’s at the same conference, learning all kinds of new things about how to make jail more like a nice resort.”

“Makes me want to rush out and get arrested,” Tanner said. “Oh, wait. Nobody’s around to do that job. They’re all at the conference.”

“You might have a future here after all.”

“Thanks, but I have one just like it waiting in L.A.”

August laughed. “Damn, but I could like you. Look, I’ll do what I can, but it’s not a hell of a lot. If you come up with any link between Lorne, Rua, and a third person, then I can ignore the sheriff and get some investigating done. Until then, my hands are tied. I’m under direct orders to ‘quit chasing my ass and get busy on community relations.’ Solving a murder in El Dorado County and starting rumors about a senior citizen’s perfectly natural death in Refuge County isn’t any part of my job description.”

Tanner hung up and called Shaye.

She answered on the first ring.

“Did I wake you up?” he asked.

“No. I’ve just been sitting here, watching the shadows lengthen across the first floor’s heating and air-conditioning units. What did you find out at the gym?”

“Ever heard of a heart shot?”

“As in bullets?” she asked.

“Fists.”

“Missed that memo.”

“I thought it was a myth, but the dude at McCurdy’s 8 said it’s real. A single blow delivered just right sends a shock wave to the heart. Most of the time it just knocks the fight right out of an opponent. Once in a while it’s lethal. Looks like a heart attack. Doesn’t leave a mark.”

“Did Rua know how to do it?” she asked immediately.

“It was a specialty of his. The only thing that got him in the door of McCurdy’s 8, where the guys make the Ground and Pound look like preschool for pussies.”

“I’ll call Deputy August.”

“I already did. No joy. Sheriff flat-out told August that his job is to let sleeping dogs lie and concentrate on community relations.”

“You’re kidding.”

“I wish.”

There was silence while Shaye watched shadows lengthen. “Now what, Detective?”

“I’ll be back in an hour, maybe hour and a half, depending on traffic. Reno isn’t L.A., but lots of cars are hitting the freeway, heading for happy hour or home.”

“We’re not getting any closer to who told Rua to murder Lorne, are we?”

“
Investigation
is another word for
patience,
” Tanner said.

“Is it true about the first forty-eight hours after a murder?”

He didn’t have to ask what she meant. It was a brutal fact of life that every investigator faced—solve a murder in the first forty-eight hours after death or the chances were high that it would never be solved.

“Do you want to let it go?” he asked.

“No,” she said instantly. “Do you?”

“No.”

What he didn’t say was that she was the one holding him in the valley. She was right about the trail getting colder at an exponential rate. But part of him was coming alive even faster.

“Shaye?”

“Yes?”

“You don’t have any deeply buried yen to live in L.A., do you?”

“I . . . oh, Tanner, I wish I did,” she said in a husky voice. “But when I first saw Refuge it was like coming home. My ex taught me that burying what I want in order to give him what he wanted was a losing combination. And I was the one on the losing end. What about you? Do you have a deeply buried yen to live here?”

“All I know is I don’t want to lose you. Don’t leave until I get there. It will be a while. Have to gas up. Be there, honey.”

“I will.”

“I’ll hurry.”

She heard the sound of an open line. She stared at the phone, her heart beating too fast.

I don’t want to lose you.

And she didn’t want to lose him.

For all the good it would do either of them. Sometimes being an adult sucked.

Thirty-four

S
haye tossed the phone onto the bed, got dressed, and went to the tiny balcony that had a slice of a view of the parking lot. The angle of the sunlight transformed the asphalt into a charcoal landscape, ripples of cracks and rivers of tar like veins throughout. The lot had been patched together a hundred times over the years, but never would be whole.

I used to think I was like that, never able to be whole again.

But I don’t anymore. When did that happen?

Maybe loving Tanner would be a kind of freedom I’ve never known, never even dreamed of. Free of the past that ripped me apart. Free to take a chance on the future.

Believing, finally, in a future, instead of simply gutting my way through every problem alone, every day, every week and month and year until I’m as old and dead as Lorne.

She knew she could keep living alone and doing a good job of it. She had done it for years.

Her phone rang.

Shaye hurried back to the bed to pick up her phone and answer.

“Tanner?” she asked quickly.

“It’s Kimberli. Where’s tall, dark, and sexy?”

Shaye frowned. Despite the teasing words, Kimberli’s voice was flat, thin, stretched by an anxiety she’d never heard from her boss. And she wasn’t using her own phone, or the ring would have been different.

“What’s wrong?” Shaye asked.

“What isn’t?” Kimberli said shakily. “Somehow the Conservancy is the bad guy because Lorne had a senior moment and pulled out before he signed the letter of intent.”

“That doesn’t make sense.”

“When do emotions make sense?” Kimberli retorted. Her voice was rough, like she had been screaming or crying. “I was told that growing old meant outliving your enemies and dancing on their graves. Now I feel like someone is dancing on mine. Lorne changing his mind screwed us. Ranchers are saying that the Conservancy tried to pull a fast one and get him to sign a contract that gave us everything and him nothing.”

Shaye knew she should tell her boss,
It’s not your fault, everyone makes mistakes,
but she wasn’t feeling charitable right now. If she had made the kind of mistake Kimberli had, she’d have been fired, and rightly so.

“Who are the ranchers?” Shaye asked. “Are they mine? I can talk to them and—”

“The head of the National Ranch Conservancy called and reamed me over Lorne,” Kimberli said as if Shaye hadn’t spoken. “He said the Conservancy can’t take that kind of scandal. Something would have to be done. I’m afraid that ‘something’ is firing me.”

Shaye waited while Kimberli fought to control her voice. After long, long moments she succeeded.

“You know what the real hell of it is?” Kimberli asked, then rushed on without waiting for an answer. “My guess is that Lorne never was going to sign the ranch over, but thought he could have a little fun and keep a pretty woman at his beck and call for months and months.”

For a moment Shaye was too shocked to speak. “I know you and Lorne didn’t like each other, but we all managed to be civil and keep our ultimate goal in mind—saving Lorne’s ranch for future generations.”

“Yes, yes, that’s just good business,” Kimberli said in her raw voice. “But now the Lester family up north is one lawyer’s appointment away from withdrawing their offer and the Gunthers on the east side of the valley are talking to realtors about putting their land on the market. We’ve been blindsided. The Conservancy is reeling and looking around for people to blame and they’re dumping the load on me. But I’ve poured
everything
into the Conservancy. No one will hire me and my great-uncle’s inheritance can barely keep me, much less Peter. I’m too old to start over. I’m ruined!” she wailed. “I have nowhere . . .”

Shaye gave up trying to interrupt Kimberli’s monologue. There was no point. Though the presentation was over-the-top, what she said was the simple truth. If the Conservancy fired her, Kimberli was finished. All the attention, all the galas, all the businesses and politicians courting her for the Conservancy’s approval . . . it was all gone.

When Shaye realized that her job right now was to listen, she went to the bed and settled in for as long as it would take Kimberli to run down. With her boss, it could be quite a while.

Shaye looked out the window. Somewhere in the Sierras above and north of Carson City the fire was still burning, smoke rising thick and black from the far side of the closest mountain ridge. The color of the smoke announced the arrival of a fire trying to get big enough to generate its own furious winds. She hoped it was burning in an unpopulated area, but those were getting harder and harder to find.

Someone tried to beep through twice, but she didn’t feel right about putting her distraught boss on hold. Then the line went dead. She checked her own cell battery. Plenty of juice. Apparently Kimberli had talked her borrowed cell phone’s battery into the ground.

She listened to Tanner’s call-me message and was just getting ready to hit the callback button when someone slid an electronic key into the lock on the only door into the motel room.

Crap. Tanner must have forgotten to put out the Do Not Disturb sign.

“Maid service,” said a muffled voice.

“I don’t want—”

She had an instant to realize that she hadn’t put the chain or dead bolt back on after Tanner left. Then the door opened and Ace stepped into the room, with Kimberli right behind him.

Part of Shaye’s mind noted that Ace wore hiking boots, jeans, a warm shirt, a waterproof jacket, and a floppy fishing hat that all but concealed his face. He was friendly, smiling as warmly as he ever did, but there was something about him that was off.

He’s wearing surgical gloves.