by R. J. Jagger
The howl of a coyote sounded in the distance.
She rolled onto her back.
Her arm fell down, no longer supported by the ground.
She felt around.
To one side was a cliff that went up.
To the other was a precipice that dropped off.
She was on a ledge, no more than two or three feet wide.
“Jundee.” No answer. “Jundee are you there?”
Silence.
She looked down. The mysterious light turned out to be a headlight shining almost straight up, not two headlights, just one. It was yellow and dim as if coming from a weak battery.
“Jundee!”
No answer.
“Don’t be dead! Don’t leave me here!”
55
W ilde slipped into the shadows down the alley from Senn-Rae’s loft as twilight choked the Denver skyline. With any luck, the mysterious “9” from Senn-Rae’s notes meant a nine o’clock meeting tonight with her client, Mr. Smith, who may or may not be the pinup killer.
The lights were on inside Senn-Rae’s place.
The shades were down.
An occasional shadow floated past one of those shades.
She was home.
Good.
If the meeting was someplace else, she hadn’t left yet.
Wilde checked his watch—8:37 p.m.
He’d cut it closer than he should have.
Right now, Shade-the-bait was parked in her hotel room after rattling Denver cages good and hard earlier today. Alabama was in the adjacent room with the lights out, waiting for a killer to come down the fire escape. Both women had guns, the ones purchased by Alabama this afternoon. That didn’t mean they were safe. In a perfect world, Wilde would be there. If anything went wrong he had only himself to blame.
“I need two of myself,” he told Alabama earlier.
She rolled her eyes.
“As if the world would allow that.”
He hadn’t had much luck discovering anything new after leaving the house this afternoon with Shade. A For Rent sign was in the weeds at the base of the road, which is why Shade checked the house in the first place. After they left this afternoon, they called the number on that sign a hundred times, hoping to find out who was renting the place.
The phone always rang.
That’s all it did, though.
No one answered.
As to the Navajo writing scribed on the floor under the mattress, Shade said there was someone in town who could translate it.
“Who?”
“It’s better that you don’t know.”
“I’ll be the one to decide that.”
“I don’t mean better for you, I mean better for him.”
She disappeared to find him.
She couldn’t.
Suddenly the lights began to click off one by one until the loft was dark.
Senn-Rae was leaving.
The meeting was off-site.
That complicated things.
Wilde dipped his hat a little farther over his left eye and waited. When the woman appeared, she was wearing a sexy black dress, nylons with a line up the back and tall high-heels. Her hair was down.
That wasn’t attorney attire.
What the hell?
She headed around the back corner of the building towards 16th Street. There, she stood for a few moments, checking her watch.
A black car pulled to the curb.
The back door swung open.
Senn-Rae hopped in.
The vehicle took off.
Wilde ran to the street and looked for a cab.
There was none.
Suddenly one came down the street from the opposite direction. Wilde ran across and jumped in front of it, waving his arms. The vehicle screeched to a stop. Wilde jumped in the back and said, “Do a one-eighty.”
The driver looked at him, confused.
“Now!”
56
J undee didn’t respond to Fallon’s calls, not once. He was dead or unconscious. Daybreak might come in an hour or it might not come for seven; Fallon had no idea what time it was. What she did know is that it was critical to not fall asleep. Sleep might make her roll off the ledge.
Tomorrow would be tough.
How would she get down?
She might have no choice except to jump.
There was nothing but rocks below, rocks and the hard, crooked metal of Jundee’s car.
Something would break her leg or ankle or back or skull.
That was almost certain.
Then what?
She wouldn’t be able to climb out.
There was nothing left up on the road to indicate someone was down here.
She’d rot to death.
She needed water.
Her throat was sandpaper.
Her eyes were dry.
Her brain was dry.
Her thoughts were dry.
If things were this bad already, how would they be tomorrow?
Wait, there were two cans of Coke in the car.
Right.
Good.
There was a bag of chips in there too.
No, wait.
There was only one can of Coke.
Jundee drank the other one.
Up above were a million stars. Under different circumstances they would have been beautiful. She looked for a constellation or a picture but found none.
Dots.
That’s all they were, just a jumble of dry dots.
The briefcase was cursed.
Everyone who touched it died.
She wished she’d never seen the stupid thing.
DAY FIVE
June 13
Friday
57
W ilde woke Friday morning in a strange bed in a strange hotel room with a woman’s arm draped over his waist and her head buried in his neck. He rolled onto his back and checked the woman’s face.
It was Alabama.
The bottom half of her body was under a sheet.
The top half stuck out.
The half that stuck out had no clothes.
Her breathing was deep and heavy.
Dawn crept around the edges of the shade and softened the room with a golden patina. Wilde wasn’t under the sheet. He was fully dressed in his shirt, pants, socks and shoes. He swung his legs over the edge of the bed as gently as he could and stood up. The motion must have set off Alabama’s sensors because she rolled onto her back and opened her eyes.
“Morning, cowboy.”
Then she yawned and stretched her arms above her head.
Her breasts were perfect.
Her arms were perfect.
Her neck was perfect.
If Senn-Rae hadn’t come into his life, Wilde might well have bent over and tweaked Alabama’s nipples. He might have run an index finger around her bellybutton. He might have given her what she wanted, every single bit of it.
Wilde picked the wrong cab last night. He picked someone who was more interested in obeying traffic laws than catching a black car. After Senn-Rae got away, Wilde went back to the alley behind her loft and waited. If the woman had gone on a business meeting, it shouldn’t last more than an hour or so. She was gone for forty-five minutes then got dropped off alone. If Wilde had been smart, he would have hung out on 16th Street instead of the alley. If he’d done that, he’d have a license place number right now.
Oh well.
From there he went over to the hotel to help Alabama guard Shade.
One watched the fire escape while the other slept.
Nothing happened.
No one came.
Wilde had the last shift.
He must have laid down in bed for a minute to rest.
That was last night.
Now it was morning.
Alabama finished her stretch and cupped her hands behind her head.
“You were good last night,” she said.
“We didn’t do anything.”
She frowned.
“You don’t remember?”
“Yeah, I remember,” he said. “I remember doing nothing.”
She smiled.
“Almost had you,” she said.
“No you didn’t.”
“Yes I did.”
It was true.
She did.
“Do me a favor,” he said. “Go check on Shade and be sure she’s okay.”
Alabama swung the covers off.
The bottom part of her body was as naked as the top.
“Yes, sir.”
58
F allon woke on the ledge and gasped at the brutal reality that she had fallen asleep. She could have rolled off a thousand times. She was still alive but only by luck. The sky was softer now. The thousands of stars were gone, reduced to all but a handful. The pitch-blackness of the sky had muted to a not-so-pitch blackness.
She could make out shapes.
She could see the ground under her body.
She could see the cliff.
She could see the car down below. It was farther than she thought. Yesterday when she’d looked up at the ledge, it had seemed far but not insanely high. Now, looking down, the distance took on a much deadlier edge.
“Jundee!”
He didn’t answer.
She sat up and stretched her body as much as she dared. She rubbed the circulation back into her legs and arms and shoulders.
Her mouth was worse than sandpaper.
She couldn’t even spit.
The sky lightened even more.
Daylight was coming.
The sun wouldn’t break the horizon for some time but was throwing more than enough light to see close things. She needed to get down and she needed to do it now. If she thought too much about it she’d chicken out. She’d dwell on the fall. She’d dream up too many ways it could kill her.
She got down on her belly and swung her legs over the edge. She edged out even farther, letting her feet sink. Then she felt around for a foothold. She couldn’t find one with her right foot but did get one with her left.
It wasn’t much.
It was a couple of inches of rock at best.
She couldn’t tell if the rock was loose or would hold her.
She put more weight on it.
It seemed stable.
“Okay, do it!”
She put her full weight on it and bent her leg to lower her torso down. Her hands came to the edge of the ledge. The next move would take her completely off the ledge and onto the cliff.
She made the move.
The wall was so vertical that she couldn’t see beneath her feet. All she could do was get one loose, lower it and feel around for another hold.
She did it.
She actually got down another foot.
Then she did it again.
And again.
And again.
She might actually be able to do this.
Then something happened that made her heart pound. She couldn’t get a lower foothold. She felt everywhere her foot could possibly reach and couldn’t detect even an inch of jag to balance on.
She looked down as good as she could.
The car was below her.
It was a two to three story drop.
If she dropped straight down, she’d land on the bumper and grill. If she kicked off a little bit, she’d land on the windshield. If she kicked off with all her might, maybe she’d clear the car entirely. Maybe she wouldn’t. Maybe her head would snap into it.
What to do?
She held on.
Her breathing got more and more frantic.
The time was coming.
Think!
Okay, just drop straight down. That would be the shortest distance. Try not to let your ankle or shin wedge into anything. If that happens, you’ll snap your bone right out of your leg.
Okay.
On three.
One.
Two.
Three!
59
T he most important thing in the universe was to find Mojag and get him to translate the message Visible Moon scribbled on the flooring under the bed. To that end, Shade went to the fleabag Metro last night only to learn that no Indians were checked in or had been checked in at anytime during the last year, for that matter.
His pickup wasn’t parked anywhere within a five block radius.
Nor had any of the neighboring hotels heard of him.
He hadn’t marked the mailbox.
What the hell?
Where’d he go?
Did something happen back at the reservation?
Or, even more likely, did he actually spot the guy and take him? Did he do it that way to keep Shade out of it? Was he busy killing him off in some remote corner even as she thought about it?
No, he wouldn’t do that.
He’d get information about Visible Moon first.
Shade searched until late, then gave up and headed for the hotel.
That was last night.
Now the first rays of daybreak were sneaking in the window.
She showered and headed for the financial district, which was the most likely place for Mojag to be if in fact he was still in town searching.
Something happened she didn’t expect.
She actually spotted him in a coffee shop.
He was at a window table watching the crowd pass.
She headed in and sat down across the table.
“Surprise,” she said.
The look on his face was just that, surprise.
“Where have you been?” she asked.
He explained.
The first night in town, he accidentally hit a young woman with his pickup truck down on Market Street. It wasn’t his fault—she darted out right in front of him—but he fled the scene.
“Was she hurt?”
He shrugged.
“I don’t know.”
He got a hotel out of the area, north on Broadway.
The pickup was parked behind the hotel.
He hadn’t been using it.
He’d been taking the bus.
“No sign of our man yet,” he said. “I’m going to find him though. Today’s the day. I can feel it.”
Shade pulled a piece of paper out of her back pocket, unfolded it and pushed it across the table.
“What’s this say?”
He wrinkled his brow.
“Where’d you get this?”
She explained.
Someone spotted an Indian woman in a car south of the city. Shade drove around looking for a potential hideaway in that area. She found a house that was empty except for a mattress and some food. Under the mattress, scratched in the wood, she found this message.
“It’s Navajo,” she said. “It’s from Visible Moon.”
“It’s Navajo alright.”
“So what’s it say?”
Mojag shook his head.
“What did you do, try to make a copy of what was in the wood on this paper?”
“There was actually a step before that,” she said. “We didn’t have any paper with us so we scratched a duplicate of the floor onto a wooden cabinet door. Then I made this paper from that.”
“That explains it,” Mojag said. “What’s here doesn’t make sense. Little changes throw it off. I need to see the original. I need to see the floor itself.”
“Okay, let’s go.”
60
W ilde didn’t know what pose the woman on the shed had been left in but did know what she was wearing. His first job this morning was to go through the old editions of Dames in Danger to find the inspiration. It didn’t take him long. There it was on page 23 of the March 1950 edition. The painting was unsigned but based on the brushstrokes and style it was done by the same nameless person who painted the boxcar pinup.
Same artist.
Same magazine.
Two pinup paintings.
Two pinup murders.
Both bodies had been staged on top of a structure in a
remote area.
Who was doing it?
The artist?
Someone trying to frame the artist?
The publisher?
Some crazed reader?
Yesterday he dialed the number of the For Rent sign a hundred times and got nothing but ringing. He dialed again expecting more of the same and stood up when a woman’s voice came through, “Hello?”
“Hello?”
“Yes, hello.”
“Hey, I’m really sorry to bother you,” Wilde said. “I was driving out in the country and noticed a For Rent sign. It had your number on it. I was wondering if it’s for rent or what’s going on.”
“No, sorry.”
“It’s not?”
“No.” A beat, “I thought we took that sign down.”
“You did,” Wilde said. “It was in the weeds. I thought it might have blown down. Is it already rented?”
“No, it’s not for rent. We were going to rent it but no one called and then we changed our mind.”
“Okay.”
“Sorry.”
“I understand.”
Wilde almost hung up but searched for any lingering questions.
He found none.
Okay.
Good enough.
Dead end.
“Goodbye.”
His focus turned back to the stack of Dames in Danger on the desk. What he needed to do was go through all of them and find all the paintings by the same artist.
Why?
He wasn’t sure.
Maybe he’d see something he wasn’t already seeing.
He sat down in his chair and spun around.
Then he took out a book of matches and set it on fire. The sweet smell of sulfur filled the air. The flames got higher and more intense. Wilde held them in his left hand, took the receiver off the phone with his right and dialed.
The same woman answered again.
“It’s me again,” Wilde said. “This is a weird question but I was wondering if anyone else called recently wanting to rent that place.”