Nightwalker (27 page)

Finally he found exactly what he was seeking. Emil Landon could trace his bloodline back to a Paiute on his paternal side—and to Frank Varny on his maternal side. Did he believe that there really was gold in Indigo? That he could finesse it away from the tribe because of his ancestry?

Dillon closed his eyes and was rubbing them in exhaustion when his phone started vibrating in his pocket. He answered it quietly.

“Wolf here.”

It was Jerry Cheever, and Dillon realized he should have expected the call. Cheever didn’t know he’d already seen the latest corpse to wind up in the morgue.

“One of those guys you chased off last night is dead. At least, I think it’s one of the men who attacked Jessy Sparhawk last night. Corpse came into the morgue last night, a jumper—or that’s what it looked like, anyway. But you’ll never guess what Tarleton found in his system when he ran the tox screen today.”

“What?” Dillon asked.

“LSD. The fellow took a nice trip before he went for
his flight straight to hell. Oh, he had a record, by the way.”

“Why am I not surprised?”

“Well, here’s something else to factor into the equation. We’re bringing Emil Landon in for questioning. Go figure,” Jerry said sarcastically. “We found a button in his limo. A button off Tanner Green’s shirt. Imagine that.”

Dillon smiled at Cheever’s sarcasm. “Can you charge him?”

“I can keep him around a while. Charge him? I can try—but he’ll walk. Tanner Green worked for him, and whether it’s true or not, Landon will say that Green sometimes drove the car. There’s no way a button from Landon’s employee’s shirt in Landon’s own casino’s limo will be enough evidence to satisfy anyone that the man’s a murderer. A good defense attorney—hell, even a crap one—could tear apart a flimsy piece of evidence like that. But I’ll hold him as long as I can. See if he’ll inadvertently spill some info. I could be wrong, but he doesn’t seem like he’s that bright, certainly not bright enough to be behind this whole thing, so maybe we’ll get lucky.”

Mean, yes. Bright? Maybe not. Maybe Cheever was right.

“Just because he’s not brilliant doesn’t mean he’s not in on it,” Dillon said.

“I agree. But we need evidence.”

“Right, and thanks. Jerry, mind if I come in and study the tapes again?”

“No problem. Give me an hour or so. I’ll get you set up with a decent monitor and a tech.”

Jessy was glad to answer her phone and hear Dillon’s voice. When he suggested that they all have lunch together, she agreed, and he said he would be by shortly.

“I think we ought to take Timothy with us, don’t you?”

“I think that would be great,” he told her.

When they got to the restaurant, she and Nikki wound up at one end of the table—with Ringo—while Brent, Timothy and Dillon confabbed at the other. Before long, she and Nikki—and Ringo—found themselves eavesdropping, and from there it was just a short step to joining the conversation.

“Timothy, you say there’s gold out there?” Dillon asked. He was frowning, but he wasn’t acting as if he thought Timothy was delusional in any way.

“It’s there,” Timothy said. “I saw what happened when I was there. Well, George Turner was there, and I saw it through his eyes. Wolf knew where the gold was, I’m sure of it. And then Varny came in, and…well, you know what happened after that.”

“If that’s the case, and all these deaths really have something to do with Indigo,” Jessy said, “it means that someone out there believes in the gold, too. But he doesn’t know how to find it. He thinks Dillon will figure it out for him.”

“You think that’s why he was looking for a paranormal investigator? Because he knows things are building toward a reenactment? You think it was all a scam, his life being in danger?” Brent asked.

“It’s beginning to look that way,” Dillon admitted.

They had barely finished eating at that point, and already he was looking anxious.

“We’ve got to go,” he said, standing and reaching into his pocket for a piece of paper, which he handed to Brent. “Check out these names for me, will you? Start with the top name in the left-hand column. On the right I’ve listed the names of everyone in the saloon the day of the gunfight. I want to see if they all connect somehow, if each name from the past lines up with a descendant in the present. I’m going over to the police station. I want to see the security tapes again. I swear I’m missing something.”

They left, and Dillon dropped them all at Jessy’s house so they could pick up her car, since Adam had the rental. Dillon started to drive off, then stopped and called out to Jessy.

She walked over to the car and saw that he was smiling at her.

“What?”

“I…” He reached out and pulled her close, then planted a gently passionate kiss on her lips. “Be careful. Stay at the home until you hear from me. Stick with Timothy or Nikki once you’re there. I’ll be back soon,” he promised.

She smiled. “I won’t spend a moment alone. By the way, who’s on the list?” she asked curiously.

“Everyone I’ve come across in the course of this investigation,” he told her. “Cops—Jerry Cheever, Len Durso. Emil Landon and Hugo Blythe. Darrell Frye. I even threw in an M.E., my friend, Doc Tarleton, along with Sarah Clay, who works in forensics. And your stage manager.”

“Ron?” she said with a gasp.

“And Sandra,” he admitted.

“Sandra?” She felt her temper rising.

“Trust me, she’s not a suspect,” he assured her. “Humor me, huh?” Then he kissed her lips again and drove away.

“Jessy?” Nikki called, and Jessy turned around to see that Brent was already settled behind the wheel, with Timothy next to him. It was her car, but she decided it wasn’t really the time for a feminist statement.

Jessy got into the backseat with Nikki, and in a few minutes, they were back at the home. Brent walked them in, and Timothy greeted Jimmy and a nurse named Liz, who he really liked. He admitted he was ready for a nap, but first he took them to the TV room and introduced them to Mrs. Teasdale, who took one look at Nikki and Brent and informed Nikki that she was going to have beautiful children.

Timothy and Mrs. Teasdale agreed on a Scrabble date for later, and then Jessy, Nikki and Timothy retired to his room. Brent left them at last, heading for the library where Dillon had spent the morning. To be on the safe side, Brent ordered Ringo, who’d tagged along, to stay with the women. “And call if anything—” he began. He shook his head. “Hell, Ringo, you’re such a damn good ghost, I forgot you can’t use a cell phone.”

“Who knows, maybe I can,” Ringo said. “It’ll be a new challenge, anyway.”

They left Timothy to his nap and retired to a table in the empty breakfast room, where Jessy started doodling, and Ringo was standing off to the side, trying to dial Nikki’s cell phone.

“It’s bizarre, isn’t it?” Jessy said to Nikki.

“What’s that?”

“‘They’re all assembling,’” Jessy quoted. She looked over at Ringo, who had managed to flip open the phone. “Ringo, tell me about the shoot-out that day.”

He set the phone down and walked over to her. “The circumstances of my own death are beginning to bore me.”

“Please, Ringo.”

“Okay, okay. There was a bartender—and some townsfolk, but they had cleared out. At the poker table, there were John Wolf, myself, Sheriff Percy and Mark Davison. When Varny came in, he had four men with him. Now this I’ve only read, mind you, because I was dead at the time, but Varny had another of his goons, a particularly distasteful fellow named Tobias, with him, and he dragged in John Wolf’s wife. They’d been married in some kind of an Indian ceremony, and I guess the law recognized it.”

“Ten people,” Nikki said. “Four poker players, Varny, five goons. Wait, and Mrs. Wolf. That makes eleven.”

“Actually, there were really thirteen,” Ringo pointed out. “Don’t forget the piano player, and the singer.”

“Okay, so you’re you,” Jessy said to Ringo. “Dillon would be John.”

Ringo laughed. “Or Mariah. She was the one who carried on the line. She was pregnant at the shoot-out, or the Wolf line would have ended right there.”

“I wonder if I play any part in this?” Jessy murmured.

“The piano player,” Timothy said from the doorway, surprising them all.

In fact, Jessy was so startled by the sound of his voice that she jumped. “Pardon?”

“The piano player. George Turner. He was a distant relative.”

Adam Harrison spent his time at one table.

It wasn’t the craps table where Tanner Green had died, because that had been removed, but he played at the table that had taken its place.

The pit boss had a name tag that read Darrell Frye, and he kept looking at his watch as he walked around keeping his eye on the various tables. Interesting, Adam thought.

Adam waited until things were relatively quiet and then got Frye talking.

“Hear you had some excitement in here the other night,” he said to the croupier closest to him. “A man died or something?”

The croupier looked around and saw that Darrell Frye was hanging around by another table, then grinned conspiratorially and said, “Yeah, a fellow bought it right here, right where we’re standing. Hell of a thing.”

“Were you working?” Adam asked.

The other man nodded gravely. “I didn’t see anything till the guy collapsed on some poor woman, though. Too bad about the cameras.”

“Yeah? What happened to the cameras?”

“It’s a big deal up in the executive offices, but they were glitching and not catching everything or something like that. It was supposed to be a big secret, but everyone working here knew it.”

Adam filed that away to tell Dillon later and played for a few more minutes, then tipped the croupier and wandered away. He noted that Darrell Frye had finally gotten the break he’d obviously been waiting for. Adam spotted him in the coffee shop and went in himself, ordered a cup of coffee and took a seat, and then he waited.

His vigilance was rewarded when a pretty brunette in a clingy knit dress came up to Darrell Frye. She had a nice figure, long red-tinted hair that was poufed up like something from the sixties and huge sunglasses. Adam found her more than a little suspicious and wondered if the hair was real, or if she was wearing a wig.

She sat down across from Darrell Frye, and at first they spoke too softly for him to overhear their conversation. But in a minute their voices grew heated and their words were clear. “Today. Today, do you hear me?” the woman said, and then she rose and stormed away, stiletto heels clicking sharply on the terrazzo floor.

Dillon was surprised to see Doug Tarleton when he arrived at the station. Doug was wearing civilian clothing and sipping coffee in a chair in the conference room where Jerry Cheever had set up the screen and player so they could study the tapes.

“Doc, what are you doing here?” Dillon asked.

Tarleton grinned. “Taking a break. I’ve been up to my arms in blood and guts for too many hours in a row.”

“You
are
an M.E.,” Dillon reminded him.

Tarleton laughed. “Yeah, I know. But Detective
Cheever here decided to humor me, so here I am. Okay with you?”

“Hell yeah,” Dillon told him.

The technician today was another rookie officer, this one named Drake Barton.

“Where’s Sarah Clay?” Dillon asked.

“Over at the morgue, working trace evidence,” Tarleton said. “That girl has ambition, and she’s one hard worker.”

“She is,” Dillon agreed. He studied the young tech, hoping that this guy was just as good. “Can you show the craps area for the time before the murder took place?” he asked.

“What are you looking for?” Cheever asked him.

“I’m thinking that maybe Tanner had been playing at the Sun earlier,” he said.

“Sure. I’ll roll it back,” the tech told him. “How far? There are hours and hours of footage here.”

“Go back about three hours, but fast-forward until I tell you to slow down,” Dillon told him.

“Gotcha,” Barton said.

The tape began to roll. Dillon watched the croupiers and clientele running around like something out of a cartoon but saw no sign of Tanner Green.

Then, suddenly, there he was, playing at the same table where he had died.

“I’ll be damned,” Cheever said.

“Hey, they say the man is good for a reason,” Tarleton commented.

Dillon shrugged. “All we’ve done so far is see that Tanner Green was there before he was killed,” he pointed out. “Back it up, please,” he asked the tech.

This time Dillon kept his eyes on Darrell Frye. He went through the motions of his job competently, but he seemed nervous. Hell, he looked like a ferret, Dillon thought.

And he was constantly watching the time.

But Dillon knew that he just didn’t like the guy, and that could be behind his impression of what was going on.

“Wait,” he said again. “Back up again, then play it again, but slowly this time.”

“He ordered a drink. Not exactly unusual at a casino,” Cheever said.

“Play it again,” Dillon insisted.

“There
is
something odd there. I see it, too,” Tarleton said.

“What?” Cheever asked, apparently annoyed that he wasn’t seeing what the other two did.

Barton, the tech, said slowly, “It’s like one of those pictures where you see something different depending on how you look at it, or one of those ‘what’s different in picture B from picture A?’ things.”

“Play it one more time, please,” Dillon said.

The tape began to roll.

“Stop!” Dillon said. “That’s it.”

“What?” Even Tarleton looked confused this time.

“The cocktail waitress,” he said.

“What about her? She’s cute—they try to hire cute girls,” Cheever said.

“No, no. There’s another woman in the background. They’re both wearing little sarong things, but look at the difference.”

The two outfits looked the same at first. On second glance, though, the waitress serving Tanner Green was wearing a slightly different version. On one, the parrots in the pattern were dark green and in perfect alignment with one another. On the other, they were more of a lime color and arranged at odd angles.