by Kylie Brant
“So what have you got?” Joe asked bluntly. This was the first time Mitchell had surfaced since Quintero’s shooting, and if Joe had to guess, he’d say the agent had slept in the same rumpled suit since.
“Murder weapon was a 9 mm. Hasn’t been found. Same weapon was used on all three. The road was a secondary scene, which we’d already figured.” Joe nodded. There had been almost no blood at the site where the bodies were dumped, indicating they’d been shot elsewhere and then transported.
Mitchell opened his briefcase. He showed Joe some close-ups of the victims’ knees. “Examination of their clothing and bodies indicates that they were forced to kneel for some time prior to their deaths, with their hands tied behind them. Maybe to plead for their lives.”
Joe frowned, studying the pictures of abraded skin. “Sounds even more like gang-style killings.”
“Or some gangsta wannabes. We’ve discovered the three didn’t necessarily hang together, except to get high. Hosteen would score the drugs and the others paid him.”
“So Hosteen could have been a little bigger than you think. Maybe he encroached on someone else’s territory.”
Mitchell looked doubtful. “C’mon, he was only sixteen. How big could he have gotten?”
“Maybe he owed money? Didn’t pay his dealer so they were shot and dumped at a public place as a lesson to others?” Joe’s voice was doubtful. That bespoke of the kind of savagery that was foreign to this area. Not unheard of. But still uncommon.
When drugs were involved, however, violence escalated alarmingly. One statistic estimated that as many as twelve percent of the Navajo teens were using meth. And with the purer form of ice showing up in the area, the brutality was bound to rise significantly.
“Anything else in the tox reports?”
“No, just that they’d all smoked ice a few hours before death.”
Joe nodded. “Did any of them carry cell phones?” When Mitchell shook his head, he pressed, “What about landlines? Do you have phone records for Hosteen?”
“Right here.” The agent produced a sheaf of paper. Joe rose and went back to his desk to get the stapled pages Tallhorse had prepared. Rejoining Mitchell, he looked up the Hosteen number and found it listed three times on the phone’s incoming records. Six outgoing calls had been made from Quintero to Hosteen.
Mitchell linked his fingers and cracked his knuckles loudly. “Those six calls from Quintero to Hosteen might mean you’re on the right track about him not paying. Is this Quintero’s pattern?”
Joe slowly shook his head. “Never has been. I’ve heard of him beating a man half to death over a territorial dispute, but from all accounts he was high when he did it. But then, Oree appears to have gotten much bigger than he used to be. Maybe his tactics changed.”
“Or someone else is pulling his strings. Find a gun when you tossed his place?”
“Two rifles.”
“Well-” Mitchell gathered up the pictures and documents and placed them back in the case “-keep me posted. The trail on those homicides is going cold fast.”
He stood and walked to the door. With his hand on the knob, he turned back. “Oh, I meant to tell you…saw your ex and your son when I was called back to the Phoenix field office yesterday. Cute kid. Thought you told me they were in Window Rock.”
Joe stilled. “Phoenix,” he repeated carefully.
“Recognized them from the picture you used to have on your desk. I was at Kmart because I forgot toothpaste again. Do that every time.” He waved a hand. “Anyway. Heard your ex giving the clerk her new address for a check she was cashing. Wilshire Heights Boulevard…” He shrugged, continued out the door. “Doesn’t matter. Could have sworn you said they were in Window Rock, though.”
Joe followed him out the door, his limbs feeling wooden. “They were. They…moved again.”
“I figured. Well, keep in touch. I’ll do the same.” Lifting a hand in farewell, Mitchell walked away, leaving Joe staring after him, thoughts fragmented. He didn’t for a moment consider that Mitchell was mistaken. He’d seen that picture on Joe’s desk at least a dozen times over the years, before it had been replaced with one of Jonny alone. And how many blondes did one see with a young Navajo boy in tow?
Rage seethed, a scalding tide threatening to overflow. Heather had lied to him. The knowledge pounded in his blood, hammered in his brain. If she was living off the reservation, without telling him, he could only conclude one thing. She was poised to take off with his son if the custody agreement didn’t go her way.
His fists curled so tightly that his nails bit into his palms. She had to realize that tribal law was going to award custody of a Navajo child to a tribe member living on the land. She stood a chance of sharing custody if she remained on the reservation.
She stood no chance of custody off it.
Had Bruce known this yesterday when he’d come to visit? Had his odd request been an oblique warning that Heather was planning to whisk Jonny away from both of them?
With effort, Joe tamped down the mingled temper and fear that threatened to divert logic. After a moment of weighing options, he headed to the phone on his desk, to the list of contacts in the side drawer. Then calmly, coldly, he dialed the number of a private investigation firm in Phoenix.
Chapter 9
The flea market was a riot of the senses. Delicious smells wafted from some of the vendors’ booths, while the brightly colored blankets, artwork and crafts caught the eye in others. There was a steady hum of voices, mingled, indistinguishable from this distance, except for an occasional burst of laughter.
Already Delaney’s fingers itched for her camera, ready to capture the vivid color, the slivers of culture and the individuals whose very faces had stories to tell.
“I’d recommend an earlier start next time,” Eddie advised. He’d insisted on carrying one of her tripods, and wore the strap of her second camera around his neck. “That’s the only way to beat the heat in the summer months, at least for a while.”
“I suppose.” Although the statement was true, it didn’t fill her with any enthusiasm. Sleep didn’t come easily enough for her to voluntarily rouse from it only a handful of hours later. But waiting until sheer exhaustion overcame her, usually around 2:00 or 3:00 a.m., she could avoid the nightmares that often plagued her.
Last night had been an exception, however. She quickened her step to keep pace with Eddie’s longer stride. The reason for her wakefulness had been the man lying beside her.
She’d been too aware of him. Long after passion had been spent and his breathing had gone deep, her senses remained alert. It still felt foreign to have his big body spread out next to hers, the weight of his arm curled around her waist, holding her close. Not unpleasant. Just…different.
It wasn’t as if she’d never shared a bed with a man before. But she divided her life into two distinct parts, before Baghdad, and after. There’d been no one since Reid, no one since her life had snapped, then been put back together, forever altered. Sometimes she felt as though she’d been rendered blind two years ago, and she now had her hands out in front of her, feeling her way through days and experiences that used to come so effortlessly.
So when her instinct had been to roll away and curl up in a tight ball meant to ward off the specters that frequently accompanied sleep, she’d made herself lie there. And get used to the still steady warmth of a man she couldn’t say she really even knew, on a personal level. But one who called to something deep inside her.
“Give me a minute.” Delaney took the camera out of the case and shot the scene from where she stood, hoping to capture the bustle of human life. She clicked several pictures in quick succession, moved to take up a different position and started again. She wasn’t sure how long it was before she grew aware of Eddie standing nearby, watching the throngs of people.
“Sorry.” She straightened, sheepish. “I’m afraid there’s going to be a lot of standing around when you’re with me.”
“I’m flexible.�
� He gave her a broad grin. “That’s why the council hired me. Plus I’ve worked as a guide at just about all the major tourist spots around these…” He broke off to tip his hat up to better view a woman, early twenties or so, walking by with a tray of breads. When he looked back at Delaney, saw her raised eyebrows he laughed without a shred of embarrassment. “I’m also a trained observer.”
They fell in step again. “Then you observed that she was way too young for you.”
“You think?” He gave her a flirtatious wink. “But you’re not, are you?”
“I’m too old.” They were probably close to the same age in years, but she couldn’t match Eddie’s laid-back manner. She’d never again be that open, that casual, that relaxed. But those same traits made him an easy companion. He stopped when she wanted to, making introductions to anyone he knew, which seemed to be more than half of the people they encountered. Most were cordial, inquisitive about her, although there were a few whose expressions went blank and closed at the introduction.
Delaney quickly found herself losing track of time, as she stopped by vendors and got wrapped up in conversation. One woman explained at length how she wove the brightly colored rugs she displayed and what the figures on them symbolized. She was more than happy to pose for some photographs when Delaney asked, and even agreed to talk to Delaney at a later date, when they’d have more time to discuss the craft she’d learned from her grandmother before her.
There were booths displaying old items rather than new, and Eddie explained that some of the vendors engaged in what would most accurately be called a swap meet. Others sold used goods, and business seemed to be brisk.
As promised, Eddie eventually led her to the booth with “the best” corn cakes and while he wrangled good-naturedly with the pretty girl selling them, Delaney stepped a little ways away and took more pictures. The crowd was thinning a bit, the sun merciless overhead. She caught sight of a little girl, no more than three or four, and she smiled, enchanted when the child grinned in return.
Delaney indicated her camera. “Would you like to take a picture?” The girl swiftly turned to check with her mother, who was on the other side of the booth straightening the turquoise necklaces and rings. At the woman’s nod the child scampered over. Delaney helped her cradle the camera, showed her how to look through the optical viewfinder and take a picture of her mother before she straightened and looked around for Eddie. It wasn’t the sight of her guide flirting with the clerk, that caught her attention, however. It was the man standing a couple hundred feet past him.
The ground seemed to rock beneath her feet. She closed her eyes, reopened them, expecting to discover that the man was a stranger, like the rest of the people in the crowd. But he wasn’t. He was the man in the composite the police artist had done. The completed sketch of the person who had shot at her, days before.
Without conscious thought she moved closer to Eddie’s side, blocking the man’s view of her. He was four or five booths down, on the same side of the street. She peered around Eddie’s form, waiting to get a better look at him.
After several seconds he faced the vendor, holding up two hatbands and talking rapidly. While the clerk brought out another tray of wares to show him, the man glanced around, giving Delaney a full view of his face.
Her last shred of doubt was dashed. This was the man who’d wielded the rifle. She shifted again, before he could catch sight of her. “Here you go.” Eddie turned and handed her a piece of corn cake. “Best taste and the best price. You’ll thank me later.”
“I’ll thank you now if you’ll do something for me.” She gave him a nudge to get him to move a few inches away. “Look to your right at the man picking out hatbands.” She sighed as he looked past her. “No, your other right. There. See him? Black hat? Red-and-black shirt?”
“The guy buying the concha shell band? He’s getting ripped off. Sheballa does the best workmanship, but I don’t see him here today. He’s usually set up at the end of this row.”
“Eddie,” she whispered urgently, “Concentrate! I want you to take my camera. Saunter closer, casually,” she stressed, “and act like you’re taking pictures of the vendors and the wares. Make sure you’ve got him in every picture you take, but don’t act like you’re taking his picture. Got it?”
“Not really.”
She took the corn cake and tripod from him and shoved the camera in his hand, showed him how to focus and snap the shot. “Quickly. Before he leaves.” Giving him a little push, she faded behind a trio that stepped up for an order of fry bread and Eddie looked around, seeming a little lost.
In a moment, however he raised the camera and ambled away. Delaney let out a breath of relief. Her plans for the rest of the day abruptly morphed. She wanted to get these pictures to Joe, to see if he agreed that the man was the one they were looking for. She moved to keep Eddie and the man in sight, while still keeping people between them.
The stranger was leaving. Eddie continued to snap pictures, as she walked up behind him. “Let’s see what you got.”
The guide looked at her oddly, but handed over the camera and took a piece of the corn cake she held. “Okay, do you want to tell me why a guy buying a hatband is so important for your book? Because if you’ve got a thing for hats, I’ve got a half dozen of them at home, all with better-looking bands than the one that guy bought.”
“Sorry.” She set down the tripod and viewed the pictures he’d taken, surprised at the number he’d managed with clear shots. “Nice job. Maybe I could make a photographer of you.” Then she happened across one plainly focused on the bosom of the girl they’d passed earlier on the way to the market. “Or maybe not.”
“I said I was flexible,” he reminded her, his mouth full of corn cake. “Never said I was blind. Or stupid. What the heck is going on?”
She started strolling in the same direction as the man they’d photographed, heading away from the flea market. “I think I know that man from somewhere.”
“So instead of going up to talk to him, you take secret pictures of him.” He took another bite, swallowed.
“Well, he sort of tried to kill me a few days ago so I’m not feeling especially friendly. C’mon.” She hastened her stride, keeping her head down. “I want to follow him.”
But Eddie had stopped in his tracks. “He tried to kill you? Why?”
With an impatient gesture she hurried him along. “I don’t know. Maybe he doesn’t like photographers. Maybe he prefers blondes. Whatever his motive, I’d like to find out, wouldn’t you?” There was no use telling him what she knew about the man’s motives, which was depressingly little. “The police are looking for him and I want them to find him, so let’s go.”
They trailed him for a block or so, lagging well behind, but keeping him in sight. When he got into a pickup Delaney attached the zoom lens to her camera. She stepped into the street, brought the camera up again and took several pictures as he was driving away.
Eddie watched her, clearly at a loss for words. “Well, now what? You still want to go to Monument Valley?”
“Maybe later.” She lowered the camera, staring after the truck pensively. “First I need to go to the police.”
“You’re getting to be a popular guy, Joe.” Vicki Smith didn’t bother to try and hide the curiosity in her gaze when she showed Delaney and a strange man to the computer he was logging off of.
He rose, looking from Delaney to the man he assumed was the guide the council had hired for her. “I thought you were going to Monument Valley today.”
“We were. But first we went to the flea market. You’re not going to believe this. Look.” She held the LCD screen of her camera up to him and began flipping through the pictures Eddie had taken.
He looked obediently, his brows rising when he saw one in particular. “I’m not sure that young lady would appreciate your interest in her cleavage.”
Her sigh was exasperated. “Men. Look at the guy in the hat. Does he seem familiar to you? At all?”
> Joe looked closer, and recognition flickered. “Maybe. Let’s get these on the computer screen for a comparison.”
He shot a look at the man standing silently behind them. “And you are?”
“That’s Eddie Bahe. My guide. Eddie, special investigator Joe Youngblood.”
Bahe, who had looked more than a little uncomfortable since he’d come in, looked distinctly more so as Joe continued to stare at him. He smiled weakly. “I’m going to be helping the lady out while she’s on the Rez.”
“Don’t tell me. That was your handiwork we saw on the camera.”
He gave a halfhearted shrug. “Never claimed to be a photographer.”
Joe figured that he could guess exactly what Bahe did claim to be, but Delaney’s voice interrupted his thoughts. “Did a match show up for the composite?”
“No. Which just means the guy had no prior convictions. Or that the composite sketch wasn’t accurate enough.”
Soon Delaney was seated in the chair before the computer, Joe and Eddie hanging over her shoulder, peering at the pictures and comparing them to the likeness on the sketch. Joe reached forward to tap the screen. “Let’s see that one again.” When Delaney zoomed in on the full frontal view of the man, he and Eddie leaned forward simultaneously for a better look, their shoulders butting.
Joe shot the other man a narrowed look and Eddie backed up, smiling sheepishly. “Sorry.”
For several long moments, Joe looked from the picture to the composite. “No way to be sure,” he muttered, “given the way we put that sketch together. But it seems close. Real close.”
“That’s what I thought.” Delaney selected another photo. “So now you can go talk to him.”
“I’ll be glad to do that, once I…” He stopped as a picture appeared on the screen of an older model blue pickup driving away. She zoomed in on the license plate. “Quite the little detective, aren’t you?” He went to his desk, got a piece of paper and a pen and came back to scribble down the number. “I’ll run this through the MVD. Bring up the other shots of the truck, will you?”