In Gallup, Greed
Page 20
“And it was greed that confused them.”
“They weren’t all greedy for money,” Alice suggested. “Lolo wanted the money, that’s true. But the others were greedy for recognition or a way out of misery, like Mirage. I think they all wanted their lives to be redeemed, and they thought the money and recognition would do that.”
A Zuni silversmith stopped at our table, offering inlaid turtle fetishes. “For longevity,” she murmured.
We exchanged looks, but waved her on.
“Clark will be without a father again,” Burro said.
“The truth about his father is better than the myth he was fighting,” I noted.
“Maybe.” Alice was less sure. “Will the truth about Momma be good for you, Cinnamon?”
"Maybe. I missed Momma all my childhood. I still miss her. That’s why I actually believed she was on the other end of the phone when Molly made that call. If I know the truth, I know what to accept about Momma. That might work for Clark, too. Once he knows who his father really is, the work is to accept him.”
“I hope Clark can do that. As for me, I’m going to help you look for Momma,” Alice announced.
“Thank you.” I liked this woman who might be my sister.
" And, better yet, I’ve got new information on Momma.”
“Really?” I held my breath.
“A small clue,” Alice tendered. “Mirage found an old address for Momma when she cleaned her apartment. Here,” she handed a note to me.
“It’s in Albuquerque,” I was surprised. “In the War Zone.”
"Why would she move there?" Burro asked.
"Poverty, Mirage thinks. It's a place where you can work cheap and live cheap.”
"We have a school to visit there next month, on Louisiana Boulevard,” Burro reminded me.
"If Momma’s there," I said, "the three of us will find her.”
Ω
A Scent of Spirit
Lolo held the ladder, and Nez and Mirage lifted the oil painting up a few inches above the wall hanger. The old man in the frame looked startled as the artists moved him from his assigned post overlooking Redemption Gallery.
“Take it easy, old man,” Nez soothed the character in his painting. “Almost done.” Slowly, the two lowered the oil to the floor and began to box it for travel to Nez’s studio.
Once the elder was safely packed, the three took a break on the leather furniture still arranged in Holly’s conference room.
“I was blinded by the money,” Lolo said. “No facts supported what Jerry claimed about buyers and recognition or redeeming our work. I wanted to believe him because I wanted financial security.”
“Don’t overdue it, Lolo,” Nez countered. “Wanting financial security isn’t a sin. We all wanted something, and we all believed Jerry was giving us that. Lonnie believed in the beginning, too.”
“I thought Jerry stabbed Lonnie at first,” Mirage confessed to the group
“I convinced myself Clark stabbed him,” Lolo said.
“Did you sense any rage in Blue Dog, Lolo? Some kind of uncontrolled anger?” Nez asked.
“To be honest, he seemed like he was in it for the sex, no problems, no connections, a simple toss in the sack kind of guy.”
“Spooky. I never saw it coming,” Mirage agreed.
“No,” Lolo said. “But none of us were really looking for the truth, were we?”
“What do we do to make it right?” Nez let the question echo in the empty building.
All three heard the echo, and sat until the faint sound disappeared as if they fully expected an answer from the cosmos, or Lonnie’s ghost or, perhaps, from within their own hearts.
“Life is sacred,” Lolo offered. “I forgot that.”
“We seek serenity,” Nez added.
“We will change,” Mirage said, “and that will honor Lonnie.”
They broke away to pack more and talk about the size of cartons or the number of car trips back and forth. Slowly Redemption was emptied of material things. Lonnie’s wise man, wrapped in bubbles and cardboard, was the last package to leave Redemption.
At the door, the three looked back. The L cubicles were empty, the walls blank, the air still and stale. The spirit of Redemption had vanished, and, yet, an essence of turquoise, polished silver, and feathers followed the three artists home and lingered with them in the long dusty afternoons of Gallup.
Ω
When We Find Her
Rain drummed on the barracks roof, drowning the blue Sangre de Cristo Mountains in a gray haze. A sharp whistle from the kettle startled me. Burro was making chamomile tea for us.
“A misunderstanding, perhaps?” he asked. “Maybe Jake is buying a building on the Southside – they have those new aluminum siding structures for start-ups...a good place for a bike shop.”
I smiled at my friend, grateful that he cared. “I don’t mind that he’s not buying a bike shop, Burro, but I mind the big lie.”
“I’m sure he can explain it.”
““He’ll talk to me,” I murmured. “He won’t explain it.” We waited in silence, standing by the window. I saw the red helmet like a stop sign, clear enough in the driving rain.
Jake parked his bike against a tree and shook off the rain like a free man. I answered his knock, not sure of the protocol for breaking up with handsome liars that smell like chai and make me feel whole for a night.
“Hey, you’re not mad at me?” He smiled.
“I am.”
“It’s no big deal...the bike shop was an idea I had that afternoon when I met you. We were in a bike shop, and, in that moment, I actually considered it – changing towns, putting the Big Easy behind me, all the troubles I’ve had there. I meant it that day in that moment.”
“And that bike shop you supposedly sold in New Orleans?”
He dropped the red helmet onto kitchen chair. “I thought about it. Never got around to doing it.” Charming smile.
“Do you actually live in New Orleans?” I mused.
“I’m a waiter at Broussard’s.”
“And they gave you a two months leave of absence?”
“Okay, I worked at Broussard’s a few year’s back. There are plenty of expensive restaurants in New Orleans, and I’ve worked at a few of them. Great tips. It’s easy to save enough money for a bike tour, quit being a waiter for a while, see the country.”
“Cinnamon,” Burro interrupted. “Your tea’s getting cold.”
“Gotta go,” Jake grabbed the opportunity. Retrieving the red helmet, he rushed out in the driving rain, jumped his bike, and peddled fast – an escape.
I sipped. “He reminded me of Momma a little: the way he laughed; the good stories.”
“The abandonment.”
“That.”
“There’s other fish in the sea.”
“Momma might say that.”
“She’d be right.”
“We’ll ask her when we find her,” I rubbed the healing scar on my ribs and returned my eyes to the window, the tall pines, and the dark shadows they cast in the red New Mexico dirt.
A NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR
Thank you for reading In Gallup, Greed, sixth in the Cinnamon/Burro New Mexico Mysteries Series and the first novel. Please let others know your thoughts on the book by leaving a review on amazon.com or contact me at towerlowe.com.
The inspiration for these stories came while I was traveling for work throughout New Mexico. While in Dulce, I emailed a friend, “Something in Dulce disturbs my spirit.” She wrote back, “That’s a good first sentence for a mystery story.” And the series was born.
Check out the short story titles on amazon.com
In Dulce, Disturbed
In Zuni, Zymotic
In Santa Fe, Salacious
In Roswell, Re-Abducted
In Carlsbad, Cavernous OR, the anthology:
Or In Dulce, Disturbed...and Four More
Next in the Cinnamon/Burro New Mexico Mysteries:
In Albuquerque
, Abandoned.
Below is an excerpt.
1
Tuesday, Noon
Maxwell Museum, Albuquerque
Ice-cold air blew in Booth’s face and a funeral urn stared at him with protruding eyes. Formed to watch over the dead, this urn huddled with the other static objects isolated from their cultures in the basement of the Maxwell Museum of Archeology in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Booth walked among them every day and pretended to be intensely engaged in problems with an overhead plumbing leak.
In spite of the cold air, he sweated, his heavy frame seated on the concrete floor across from that jerk Calder and Dr. Bandel’s unstable son, Eric JJ. The two of them looked cool and at ease.
“If Angela flakes out, turns over, gives in...we’re done for, Booth.” Calder knew Booth needed money, so he played on that.
Eric JJ’s shirt glowed green in the florescent light. “We’re here for your own good, Booth.”
“I’ve done everything you said, Calder. Didn’t skip any steps.”
“That brother of yours –”
“León is harmless. Because of that illness, he doesn’t know what day it is most of the time. Don’t start putting this on him.”
“How about those two detectives you talked to?”
“Those two are do-gooders want to help my brother get a better doctor. They got nothing to do with this job.”
“As long as you didn’t mention this to them in passing or in a panic,” Calder said. Booze felt dizzy and knew his diabetes was acting up. He had skipped lunch to deal with these two a-holes, and now he needed a nutrition bar or an apple. He turned to look behind him for his toolbox. He usually kept snacks in there.
“You planning to fix this problem, Booth?” Calder asked. “‘Cause you need to.”
Booth found an apple, pulled it around and took a bite. “I’m not feeling too good. Let’s talk later.”
“Sure, sure, okay,” Calder said. “Look, we’ll all leave this place, and get lunch to go, settle our problems outside the museum.”
Booth felt better after the apple, and he followed the two men up to the office. Dr. Bandel was perfectly dressed in a gray jacket and black skirt. Her deranged kid hovered behind her.
“I don’t like the way this is going,” she said.
Her glossy black heels made her look menacing, like the bad girl in a porn movie. He felt dizzy again looking at her bright red lips, turning down because he had screwed up. Arrhythmia bumped by his heart. The plumber’s life didn’t do anything for a man’s health. Booth spent most of his time stationary under a sink or driving around in his utility truck. He stressed about León and Angela every minute. This museum job promised to set him free, but he sure didn’t feel liberated this afternoon. He felt trapped between these two men, who had given him the job, and his wife and brother, neither of whom seemed to give a damn about Booth but sure wanted the safety and security this money would bring.
They all drove to Del Taco in Calder’s car, including Bandel and her son. Dr. Bandel didn’t order any food, but watched over the others with squinted eyes. She turned them on Booth while they waited for the food.
“Mr. Baca, I like you, and I admire your plumbing work. I remind you, we have a deal, and I trust completely that you and your wife and your brother, León, will stick to our deal.”
“Right.” Booth was fed up with the lot of them, but he needed to eat before he lost touch with reality.
Calder leaned into the backseat of his black Audi to hand a bag to Booth. “Here’s a taco and a Mr. Pibb.”
He grabbed the bag more because he needed to eat than because he wanted the food. Indigestion followed him back to the museum. He even drank the Mr. Pibb, though he was addicted to Diet Coke. The drink burned his throat and threw his blood sugar into convulsions.
When he got home, Angela was in a foul mood.
“Don’t start on me about these creepy burial items or your crazy brother León,” she said. “And if you’re sick, it’s your own fault.”
“I’m going to lie down for a few minutes,” Booth told her. “Then we need to talk this through, figure out what‘s going on.”
“What’s going on is you ruined my life.”
Booth shook his head and recognized a loosing hand.
“Get me a Diet Coke and ice,” he said.
“You need to stop drinking that crap,” Angela responded.
But he heard her dispense the ice and pop the top of the can. Maybe that was a good sign.
He awoke during the night with cramps and diarrhea. As he headed back from the bathroom, he fell to the floor, his arms and legs twitching. He tried to stop it all, but his mind was disconnected from his body. The room swirled, and he slipped into unconsciousness, his head on the dingy brown carpet.
Angela and the maid found him there the next morning, his pajamas soaked in vomit. He was dead.