“Yip, yip, yip,” Lenny said.
Senora Mari maneuvered the troublemaker from my aunt’s arms so that she could hold him like a prized grandbaby. “He has been very brave. He has unmasked Jeff Clark’s killer.”
“Was that smart?” Aunt Linda asked me.
“Lenny’s his own man. Why should he be the one guy who ever listened to me?”
Senora Mari usually went to great trouble to convince us of her great dislike of Lenny. In fact, she usually chased him out of the kitchen with her broom when he managed to make it downstairs from my apartment and into her domain. Now she dropped the act and began to rock him in her arms. In return, Lenny stared lovingly into her eyes, batted his eyelashes, and gave her his heartwarming doggie smile.
“Last night I had a dream.”
I shook my head and Aunt Linda struggled to contain a grin.
Senora Mari didn’t see either one of us, or she chose to ignore us, because she kept her focus on Lenny. “This musician guy with the cowboy hat . . .”
“Jeff,” I said.
“Yes, Jeff Clark. Like the Clark Bar.”
That caught me off guard. I might’ve seen one of the antiquated candy bars in my entire life. Was it popular in Mexico—a treat from her childhood? For me, it was something found on the convenience store shelf when they were out of my ten favorites.
“So, what wisdom did he impart this time?” There was only one way to go when it came to Senora Mari’s dreams: let her get on with it.
“He didn’t say much.”
“Yip,” Lenny said.
“No, it’s true.” She spoke directly to Lenny. “He sang.”
I choked back a laugh. “In your dream?”
She broke eye contact with Lenny and slung him to her side so that their faces were nearly side by side. “He sang a beautiful country song.”
“Yip,” Lenny said.
Aunt Linda was doing an admirable job of keeping a straight face. “Was it ‘Your Cheatin’ Heart’?”
“No, but it filled me with sweet sadness and heartbreak.”
This time I could hear Aunt Linda’s impatience. “What did Jeff Clark tell you with this song?”
“He said the person who killed him was not sweet, but rotten with bitterness and envy. He asked me to draw.”
“Draw? With pencils or crayons?”
“Ssh.” I wanted to hear what she said. There was often a seed of truth in her dreams, somewhere, if you listened hard enough.
“No, that’s not it.” Senora Mari raised her chin as if she might challenge her daughter-in-law to a duel. “Poker. Draw a card, like poker.”
“What do you think that means?”
“Yip,” Lenny said.
“Yes, yes, he’s right.” Senora Mari handed him to me and immediately wiped her hands on her apron. She was wearing one we had given her for her last birthday that read Stir it and die.
“Come on, what did it mean?”
“Five-card draw.” It was all we could drag out of her.
As I was changing out of my uniform, I received a text message from Patti’s lawyer, Gretchen Cruz, asking me to meet her at the jail. Patti wanted to meet with both of us now that she could have visitors. Before I ran out the door, I called the jail to double-check on the actual times. A bored operator, doing an excellent impersonation of a recording, said ten to five o’clock. If I hurried, I could combine two errands yet again. Efficiency to the max.
I clipped on Lenny’s leash. “Drink, Lenster.” I knelt down, put a finger in his water bowl, and pretended to sip from it. “Drink and then we’ll go on a walk?”
“Yip.” In spite of my poor acting skills, he drank.
On the street, the railroad depot and surrounding businesses basked in the setting sun’s hot pink glow. The cool evening breeze flirted with my hair even as the heat soaked through my shirt. We walked and greeted those we knew around us. Across the street at the Cogburn Hotel, Clay and Britney exited the building and turned left. Even though I pretended to watch Lenny sniff a loose ball of tumbleweed that had ventured down Main Street, I noted in my peripheral vision that they headed toward Pecos Pete’s.
As we started off again, Wilhelmina and Heather walked out of Elaine’s Pies. “Fancy meeting you here,” I said.
The mother and daughter shared a furtive look between them. “Guess so,” Wilhelmina said with a ghost of a smile.
“This is Lenny.”
“Yip,” my Chi said in greeting. Heather knelt and cautiously patted his nose, as if touching a hot stove. Not too proud to grovel, Lenny rolled over and gave her his belly. “Sweet doggie,” she whispered.
“She loves dogs.” Wilhelmina looked on with bemusement. “Always begged Jeff to let her bring one on tour, but he refused.”
Heather scratched Lenny’s belly. “Said it wasn’t fair to make everyone else put up with my dog.”
Hmm. Jeff Clark was no fool.
Once Lenny and I started on one of our walks, I hated to stop. He loved greeting his neighbors and tending to the smells he discovered along Main Street with first one sniff and then another. He needed our walks together to keep his creative juices flowing. How could I turn around and head for home so soon? I couldn’t disappoint him. Heather was petting him and cooing over him as if he were her long-lost child. “Would you like to walk him?”
“Oh yes,” she said picking him up to kiss his nose.
He responded by licking her face.
“Look-a there, he’s a two-timer,” Heather crowed.
“Can he help it if he loves people?” I asked.
“How will you get him back?” Wilhelmina studied the two of them as Lenny bathed her daughter’s face in wet kisses.
“I’ll come get him.” I handed Heather the leash. “Where will you be a couple of hours from now?”
“Oh,” Heather sighed. “Can’t I keep him longer?”
“I don’t think the Cogburn Hotel takes pets. You’ll have to sneak him in as it is.”
“I don’t care.” She hugged him to her breast.
“Yip,” Lenny said in agreement.
“Don’t squeeze him too tightly. He may look tough, but under all that hair he’s as delicate as a baby bird.”
Wilhelmina slowly shook her head as if stunned at her predicament. “Thanks, I guess.”
“No, it’s me that’s truly appreciative. I have to go see a friend. Kind of like an emergency. It would bring Lenny so down in the dumps if I took him home, only to stay by himself when he could be outside enjoying the fresh air.” I glanced at the hotel. “He’s going to love your room at the Cogburn Hotel—don’t you worry.” Oh, boy. The hole I was digging was getting deeper by the second.
“Okay. Fine,” Wilhelmina said.
We exchanged information and I jogged back to Milagro and my Prius. Within minutes, I was on the highway and headed for the county jail.
Chapter 16
I found Gretchen Cruz in the waiting area. She was talking to her cousin, who was once again typing her way through a leaning tower of paperwork.
“How’s it going?” the cousin asked.
“That’s what I’m here to find out.”
Cruz picked up her briefcase and led us to a window seat at the end of a long hallway I had missed on my previous visits. “They charged her.”
“I guess we knew this day was coming.”
“She needs to see you. She’s not doing well.”
“Tell me another one.”
Cruz didn’t crack a smile.
Trying to shake off my emotions, I stood. “You won’t meet anyone like Patti Perez. Come on. Who do you think runs the Feed and Supply now her parents are dead? Who do you think remodeled it and kept it from going under when the economy went belly-up? This may knock her down for a spell, but you wait. You’ll see. She’s goi
ng to rise again, stronger than ever.”
“You make quite a case. Didn’t I mention that I think she’s innocent?”
I collapsed onto the window seat. “That’s a relief.”
“How could she possibly be guilty? The evidence is too pat, too perfect.” She pulled out a cigarette and held it between her fingers without lighting it. “Don’t worry. I’m just flirting with it.”
“That’s what I figured.”
I thought about that Land Rover. “Did the sheriff and his deputies interview her neighbors? Didn’t any of them see someone else that night?”
“The sheriff’s office says they canvassed the neighborhood. They admit that a few of them weren’t home. The ones that were claimed they didn’t see or hear anything.”
“Well, that’s predicable. Hear no evil and see no evil.”
“The evidence is circumstantial, which isn’t good enough. Between you and me, they’re desperate for a motive. Are you sure there’s not some hidden reason Patti would have for killing Jeff?”
“I thought you said she wasn’t guilty.”
“I said I didn’t think she was guilty. Regardless, if they unearth even the slightest motive, even if she admits to having considered killing him in her sleep in the middle of a bad dream, they’re going to find her guilty.”
I ignored the coward inside of me and plunged ahead. “I interviewed the neighbors.”
“Uh-oh.” Cruz lowered her briefcase to her lap.
I frowned. “I did it under the guise of writing an article for the Bugle.”
“Okay,” she said, her expression remained skeptical.
“I was the consummate professional each and every time.”
With a sigh, she opened her case and removed a legal pad and pen. “Give me all the details. Don’t leave anything out.”
“One of the neighbors remembers seeing a vehicle driving away that night. One he’d never seen on the street before.”
She placed the cigarette behind her ear. “Wouldn’t it have been too dark to see?”
“No. Apparently not.”
Keeping her comments to herself, she made a note. “What did he see?” She removed the cigarette from her hair and began to work it through her fingers like a majorette twirling a baton.
“A midnight blue Land Rover.”
She broke the cigarette in half. “Darn it,” she muttered, staring at the two pieces as if surprised at what she’d done. “That sounds like he made it up. Who drives a Land Rover in this part of the country except for tourists?”
“That’s why it could be true.”
“Did you tell the sheriff?”
“I was going to tell Deputy Lightfoot while I was here today.”
She looked at me in disbelief.
“So I forgot. I remembered when it counted.”
“Right.”
“Let’s go see Patti.”
“What about the other neighbors?” She poised her pen. “What did they see?”
“Not much. Someone heard a trash can being knocked over. That’s about it.”
She threw out the broken cigarette and wiped off the loose bits of tobacco on her skirt with a tissue she pulled from her briefcase. We wandered through the bowels of the building until we made it to the visitor’s entrance. A certain familiar freckle-faced deputy dared to scowl at me. As usual, he was sporting a sunburn. He was so fair that he never tanned—the curse of the redheads.
“What’s she doing here?” Deputy Barnes asked Cruz.
“She’s a visitor.” She pointed a long-nailed finger toward the gigantic sign on the wall behind his head.
He grabbed his belt with both hands and opened his mouth to complain.
In a loud, confident voice, Cruz took the floor. “Since she’s the visitor and I’m the lawyer, we can both go inside at the same time.”
His mouth slammed shut. His eyes narrowed. After a pregnant pause, he drew a deep breath. “Come on.” A guard opened the metal door to the cells, and we stepped into a small, narrow passage. As the door clanked shut behind us, Barnes removed a large, heavy set of keys from his belt.
We walked down a wide aisle with rows of cells on either side. In my peripheral vision, I could see that about half were empty, while the others contained only one female prisoner each. I didn’t know what to do. Should I look at their faces? Or pretend I didn’t notice them in their black-and-white-pinstriped pajamas? I was frankly more than a little scared that they’d try to grab me or spit in my face. What did I know? I’d never been inside a jail before. I’d only seen women prisoners on cable.
I made the mistake of turning my head to the right. The giant of a woman’s dark eyes scorched my skin like simmering asphalt against my feet on a hot summer day. In spite of my elevated pulse, I managed to lift the corners of my mouth and give her a nod.
I’d spent that first summer after the death of my parents in Broken Boot, roaming the streets with Patti Perez. I learned that a girl with facial piercings and black combat boots could be your friend, in spite of her appearance.
“Cruz, help me,” whispered a short, dark-haired woman with tattoos up and down both arms. “Come on, chica, this lawyer they gave me sucks.”
Gretchen Cruz looked neither left nor right. Was the miserable inmate one of her old clients? Or simply attempting to get a rise out of the strong yet feminine attorney?
With a slight movement, I adjusted my path to the far side of the aisle. I didn’t want the prisoner to bite a tattoo into my arm just to prove she could overpower a gringa without working up a sweat.
Without any physical violence on the part of the prisoners or fainting spells on the part of Patti’s best friend—namely me—we reached the visitor’s room. Inside we found a quiet, withdrawn Goth Princess. She sat on one side of an old, warped wooden table, its one leg not close to touching the ground.
“Patti.” Without thinking, I started toward this pale, bent version of my friend, intent on giving her comfort with a hug or a touch.
“That’s far enough.” Deputy Pleasant, Big Bend County’s only female deputy, stepped between us.
“Over here.” Cruz gestured to the opposite side of the table.
“How you holding up, girl?” I asked.
At first, Patti stared right through me as though her inner fierceness had burnt out, leaving only a lifeless, weak creature. “About time you got your sorry butt in here to see me,” she said with a hint of her old fire. She attempted to smile, but the corners of her mouth barely lifted.
“I had to stop by to make sure you’ve been rehearsing your songs for the singer-songwriter contest.”
“Ha. How am I supposed to do that? Accompany myself with an imaginary guitar?”
“Hm. It might help you make a case for temporary insanity,” I said in a stage whisper. I smiled at Deputy Pleasant to show my comment was all in good fun.
The female officer raised an eyebrow.
“Watch that,” Cruz said as she took her seat next to my friend.
I trotted around to the other side of the table and joined them.
“You okay?” Patti couldn’t stay in this dank place with no windows nor sunlight. Like any girl from the desert, she would dry up and then disintegrate into a million pieces.
Her eyes filled with tears, but then she swallowed hard, eviscerating any signs of weakness. “Sick.”
“Oh no.” Was that code for someone had hurt her? Stuck her with a—What was it called? A shiv? “Did you demand to see a doctor?”
“Nope.” She sat up in her chair and pulled her hair behind her ears. “There’s no cure for being sick of the food, the bedding, and this god-awful, atrocious striped jumpsuit.”
I opened my mouth to argue that her outfit suited her black hair, but then I caught her raised eyebrow. “You’re right. It hurts my eyes, it’s so ugly. At l
east you’re ready for Halloween.”
“For which I am eternally grateful,” Patti quipped.
“You know, I think that jumpsuit is even uglier than that bright green bridesmaid’s dress you wore for your sister Claudia’s wedding.”
“Way to make me feel better, Jo Jo.” To defuse her comment, she reached across the table and we bumped knuckles.
Pleasant stepped forward. “If you touch the prisoner again, you will be escorted from this cell and deposited in the parking lot, at which time you will be issued a citation for failing to follow the posted procedures of the Big Bend County Jail.”
“Uh, okay.” I placed my hand over my heart. “I promise . . . sincerely.”
“Let’s review for Josie’s sake.” Cruz opened her briefcase and removed a legal-sized folder. Though she referred to the report inside, it was obvious she’d rehearsed her speech. “They have Patti’s fingerprints on the guitar.”
Goth Princess curled her lip. “Of course they do. I play it every day!” She threw her hands into the air. “Can you believe some idiot destroyed my Fender Blacktop Stratocaster?” On a road trip to the Buddy Holly Museum in Lubbock, Patti and I’d found her guitar next to a ukulele in a pawnshop.
I ignored the windowless, concrete walls around us—walls that closed in more and more as we talked. “Why didn’t they use a frying pan or a shovel?” I was trying desperately to hide the fact that I was scared for her.
“Perhaps the guitar was symbolic,” Cruz said, making a very good point.
The hair on my arms rose. “That or someone didn’t like the way Jeff Clark played guitar.”
One of Cruz’s eyebrows rose ever so slowly. “They also have you driving Clark to your place in your jeep.”
“Which I never denied.”
“Why would she kill him? They hadn’t seen each other in years.” I demanded.
Cruz closed the file. “You admitted to arguing with Jeff Clark. Did you hit him?”
Patti’s eyes narrowed. “I should’ve kicked him where the sun don’t shine. That would’ve kept him from reproducing any other misogynists like himself.” She placed her fists on the table, her hands red from gripping so tightly. “He was too drunk to believe that I wouldn’t want to pick up our relationship right where we left off.”
The Good, the Bad and the Guacamole Page 20