The Ties That Bind

by Andi Marquette

  I studied the two large Rottweilers that stood appraising my car. One offered a few half-hearted barks but the other was the ringleader, from the way he sat imperiously watching us, his upper lip curled back, revealing a fang the size of an icicle. Alpha Maximus, I dubbed him. His head was about the size of a basketball.

  "I'm not feeling the love from those dogs," I announced. River half-laughed but Sage, sitting next to me in the passenger seat, kept her eyes on the dogs. I glanced in my rearview mirror at Kara, trying not to morph into a disapproving older sister. But from the expression on her face, I failed.

  "Chill," she said as she opened her car door. As soon as Alpha Maximus heard the click of the latch on Kara's door, he was on his feet, his upper lip curling again to reveal more teeth. He probably had a whole other set in there that came rocketing out of his throat, like the monsters from the movie Aliens.

  "Kara--" I started. I looked around my car for something to use as a weapon though Alpha's skull was obviously forged from steel.

  She ignored me and waited for Alpha to get a whiff of her. I thought of tiger maulings at the zoo. Shit. Where's a crowbar when you need one?

  "Well, look at that," River muttered. I looked out the windshield. Alpha was rubbing up against Kara's leg like a giant cat, a goofy grin on his massive face.

  Sage smiled and put her hand on my arm. "Chill," she repeated.

  The security door on the front of the house opened and Shoshana emerged. She approached Kara and Alpha's smaller twin wiggled his back end like a puppy. "Hi," she said, greeting Kara with a smile and a quick hug before she turned and waved at me. "Glad you found it. Sometimes I don't give the best directions."

  River and Sage exited the car the same time I did and the smaller of the Rottweilers threw himself at Sage's feet and rolled onto his back.

  "Wow. He never does that with strangers," Shoshana said as she approached. "You must have some good energy."

  Sage smiled. "Or maybe I'm just another nice girl to seduce." She bent and stroked the dog's head.

  "That's Brutus." Shoshana motioned toward Alpha Maximus. "And this big useless bag of fur is Sam." She pointed at the dog worshipping Sage then smiled at me. "Hi."

  "Hey. Good to see you," I said in my most polite tone. "Thanks for setting this up."

  "Of course." She glanced at River. "You must be Sage's brother. River, right? I'm Shoshana." She offered her right hand and River took it, bobbing his head in acknowledgment.

  "Yep. That's me. Thanks for taking the time."

  "Anything I can do to help." She motioned us toward the house. "Come on in."

  We followed her into the cool interior, through a foyer and on into a den toward the back of the house that retained its 70s California ranch house style, where a thin, dark-haired man sat in an armchair, a book open on his lap. He wore his hair long and it was pulled back in a ponytail. A trimmed goatee adorned his chin and upper lip. He looked like the kind of guy who should be doing art in a Santa Fe studio, with his faded jeans and paint-stained T-shirt. His hands were clasped over his abdomen and he studied us each as we entered, wary. He set the book on an end table to his right.

  "Mr. Purcell," Kara said, moving toward him around an

  overstuffed burgundy couch and extending her hand. "I'm Kara Fontero. Thanks so much for taking the time to talk with us."

  He took her hand tentatively but the trace of a smile pulled at his mouth as Kara worked a little charm on him.

  Kara gestured at each of us in turn. "My sister, K.C. And this is Sage Crandall and her brother, River."

  "Bill's kids," Purcell said, nodding. His voice sounded raspy. Maybe he was a smoker, though I didn't see or smell anything that indicated such. "Sorry I'm not getting up. Got a little problem with the back."

  "Old injury," Shoshana explained. "Make yourselves at home." She threw a little smile at Kara then left the room.

  Sage shook Purcell's hand, as well. "Thank you," she said before seating herself on the couch across from him. River sat in a chair that looked like it was part of a dining room set that someone had placed next to the couch. Kara and I joined Sage, me between them. He didn't say anything until we had settled into our places and then he launched right into it.

  "So you think maybe something's up," Purcell said, looking pointedly at Sage.

  "Maybe," she said, without any kind of surprise that he had dispensed with formalities. "Maybe not. I'll be honest, Mr. Purcell. River and I didn't have the best relationship with our father. We didn't even know he was in Farmington until all of this happened."

  Purcell didn't say anything in response. He just waited, studying her like a painter might a subject.

  "But there are some suspicious circumstances with regard to his death, and they may or may not relate to some safety violations at Ridge Star." Sage stopped then. River was staring at the carpet, his forearms braced on his thighs.

  "It wouldn't surprise me," Purcell said, gaze still on Sage.

  "Did you work with him?" I asked, hoping to draw him out a bit.

  "A few times." He adjusted his position in his chair, wincing. "He worked on the rig, usually with the string--the pipe that we threaded the drill bit down into the ground. He was good at it. Had a real knack for reading the tension right and knowing just how to adjust things."

  "So he'd know if something wasn't safe," I pressed, treading carefully. This guy struck me as somebody who knew a lot more about a lot of things, but he'd never let on. Slippery.

  He regarded me for a long moment and was about to respond when Shoshana reappeared carrying a tray of glasses filled with what looked like iced tea. She handed one to Purcell then offered the tray to each of us in turn. She set the tray on the tall narrow table that stood behind the couch and propped herself on the arm closest to Kara. Her presence seemed to loosen Purcell up a bit because his shoulders relaxed and he smiled at her.

  "Yes," he said, looking at me. "Bill would definitely have known if something wasn't safe on the rig."

  "What kind of options does a man have, if he knows things like that?" I rested my glass on my thigh.

  "Two. He tells or he doesn't." Purcell's tone was flat.

  "Who would he tell?" Shoshana this time, and though I hated to admit it, I was glad she stepped in because she seemed to have a calming effect on her uncle.

  "Nobody at Ridge Star. At least nobody in management. We all knew who we could and couldn't talk to. If he told anybody, it would have to be somebody he trusted."

  I wanted to follow up with that but Sage interrupted. "If I may-- why did you leave Ridge Star?"

  Purcell's expression hardened and he took a sip of tea. "I hurt my back maybe five years ago on another rig with another company. I couldn't do much of anything for a year. Then I started working again, but only office stuff for a few companies in the area. The money's better on the rigs, though, as dangerous as they are." He paused for another drink. "I was okay for a year at Ridge Star. But the work is hard and my back started acting up again so I requested lighter duty. The injury was in my records, after all. They started putting me on harder and harder details and after a month of that, I quit." He shrugged and stared at his glass, which he held braced in his lap. "It's shit work, but there's that adrenaline rush..." his voice trailed off. "And the money is good, especially in places like this."

  "Did Ridge Star want you to quit?" Sage asked in a tone that could make the most reticent person talk about secret things from childhood. I saw in his expression that the mystical Sage ju-ju was working on him.

  "I can't prove it, but yeah. After I requested lighter duty so my back could have some rest, all my shifts the next week and the week after that were total crap. No way could I keep that up very long." He shrugged. "So I didn't."

  "Did Bill know what happened?"

  "I didn't tell him. Or anybody, for that matter. But word on a rig gets out and he asked me a couple of days before I left if Ridge Star was messing with me."

  "What did you tell him?" Sage
's demeanor was soothing, though I detected a little edge in her voice.

  "The same thing I told you. I told him I couldn't prove it, but it sure looked like it. He asked if I'd be willing to go on record about it at some point."

  We all sat in silence, waiting for him to continue. When he did, I exhaled. I'd been holding my breath.

  "I told him I'd have to think about it."

  Sage surreptitiously pressed her thigh against mine. My cue to continue the line of questioning. "Did he contact you after you left?" I asked.

  "He tried to call me about a month after I left but I didn't get back to him." He dropped his gaze to his glass of tea. He wasn't saying something.

  "Do you know what he might have wanted?" I tested the edges of his boundaries with a different tack and a neutral tone, a technique I'd learned watching Chris work.

  "Probably to ask if I'd go on record." He kept staring at his glass.

  "Do you think that Bill might have been doing some kind of investigation on his own time?" I put the onus of the question on Bill rather than Purcell, trying another angle.

  He looked up at me. "I know he was. A lot of us did. He got real mad after Nestor got hurt."

  "What about the other two guys who died?" River broke in. "The ones that Ridge Star kept quiet?"

  Purcell shrugged. "I don't know what Ridge Star did or didn't do with regard to that. Not my problem."

  River returned his stare for a long moment.

  "Mr. Purcell," I said, breaking the tableau, "walk me through a timeline here." I pulled a small notebook out of my cargo pocket along with a pen. His eyes narrowed. "Just a timeline," I repeated. "When did you start working for Ridge Star?"

  "March of last year. I did okay until around November when my back started up again. I tried some physical therapy and massage and all that, and it'd be okay for a few days but then it'd start up again. So this past April I asked for light duty. Didn't get it." His knuckles whitened around his glass. "I was gone by the end of the month."

  "When did Nestor get hurt?"

  "January."

  Bill had said as much in his letter to River. He just hadn't named Nestor. "What happened to him?"

  Purcell shook his head. "When you work the string, what you're doing is you're running pipe down into the hole that the bit's made. The deeper you go with the drill, the more pipe you run down that hole, and the more pipe, the heavier the load on the pulley system of the rig." He paused and glanced around at us, as if making sure we understood. "Bill was really good working the pipe, like I said. I know he'd been after the company men to check the cable on the pulley system. Bill said they hadn't been inspected in a while and he was worried about fraying."

  "When was the last time they were inspected?"

  "Not for at least a month. And when you're doing that kind of work, you need to keep up with that. The guys who work the string--the ones who have been doing it a while and have a feel for it--they know if something's not right. And Bill told one of the company men the day before that the cable wasn't right." Purcell relaxed his grip on his glass. "And all the company man did was say he'd look into it. Typical bullshit."

  "Company man?" I asked.

  "The guy in charge of organization at the site," Purcell offered. "The operations manager. He's also supposed to be checking safety and efficiency. Problem is, they're company reps."

  I got his meaning. "Do you remember this guy's name?" I glanced up at him.

  "Clint Monroe. He started working at Ridge Star about the time I came on board. He was still there when I left. Lives in the area, last I heard." He spoke dismissively.

  I wrote that down. "So what happened when Nestor was injured?"

  Purcell exhaled through his teeth, a sound like air hissing out of a tire. "Bill told him not to stand where he was on the rig, and Nestor adjusted his position. Bill said that the way the string was pulling, the cable could snap and Nestor was in the line of fire for falling pipe. Nestor and Bill--they were pretty tight. Then I guess the cable broke and Bill yelled at Nestor to move but it happened too fast and sure enough, the pipe fell at an angle, catching him just right. I wasn't on shift that day, but I heard about it. Same story from a few different guys..." he trailed off, pulling on his goatee. "A couple more guys got injured in March. And another one died in June. I was gone by then, though."

  "Did you talk to Nestor after he was hurt? "No. I sent him a card and contributed to the collection the guys took up. Nestor's a good man. But I didn't know him very well."

  I shot River a glance. His attention seemed directed at Purcell, unlike at the lawyer's office, where he spent most of the time staring at the table or the copy of the will. I looked back at Purcell. "How often did Bill complain to the company man about safety issues?"

  He thought for a bit. "Hell, a lot. The guys kind of made him their unofficial spokesman and he was willing to do it."

  Interesting. Bill became an activist. "Was it risky for him to do that?"

  Purcell stared at me for a few seconds, with an expression that told me he was weighing how much to say. "Damn right it was," he said, making his choice. "But Bill had been around rigs a long time and he had a rep among roughnecks. He had his problems--" Purcell looked at Sage then River, "but at work, he stood up for the guys and he looked out for the weevils--rookies. And he never, ever brought his personal issues to the jobsite. I didn't interact with him too much, but the times I did, he came across as a man who meant what he said and who tried to do the right thing. And he knew his way around a rig. He was the kind of guy you wanted to work with because he'd tell you what was up with the equipment and he'd go to the company men to point it out. Not many guys had cojones like that in this industry."

  River muttered something I didn't catch.

  Purcell focused on him and said, "Rig-rats are expendable. Doesn't matter how many years on the job you have for a company. Somebody else can replace you." He looked back at me and Sage. "Bill was different, though. When he brought something up with the higher-ups, he never made a fuss about it and he always took the company man aside to talk with him about it. He never made accusations in front of the guys. I think he had respect from a couple of them." He shifted his position in his chair again. "Until Monroe."

  I made a little note about that. "This Monroe didn't like him?"

  Purcell shrugged. "Didn't like anyone. I heard the higher-ups brought him in from Texas to increase the 'bottom line.'" He sneered. "Which always means 'fuck the workers. We need more money.' Excuse my language," he said, glancing then at Shoshana and Kara.

  "Was Ridge Star having money problems?" I followed the financial angle, tapping the tip of the pen on my notebook.

  "Couldn't tell you. I do know that they don't have the best safety record." He smiled sardonically. "Not that the industry is the safest in the world to work in. Comes with the territory."

  "Did something make them stand out, though, in terms of that?"

  "Bill seemed to think so. It's one thing to have a run of bad luck. It's another to not do the standard safety ops or inspections or to replace fu--messed-up equipment. And it's another issue, to maybe try to cover it up," he finished, cryptic

  Bill had talked with Purcell after he'd left but Purcell wasn't willing to go there. "Did Bill ever mention any kind of threats he'd been receiving?"

  "No. Not in so many words. But a couple times after Nestor got hurt, he showed up at the jobsite with black eyes. Another time he came in and he was limping. He didn't say much about what had happened, but the rumors were that he'd been given a talking to about trying to dig into Ridge Star's safety records." He lowered his gaze back to his glass and his fingers tapped its surface.

  "Mr. Purcell," I continued.

  "Look," he said. "I'm real sorry what happened to Bill. I hope they find the bastards that did it--"

  The front door opened and Brutus and Sam burst into the room, bee lining for Shoshana and Sage. "Hi," said the newcomer who appeared in the doorway. From her features, I
gauged her as Indian, though her long dark hair alone might have indicated such to some people. Purcell's wife, then. Shoshana stood and gave her a quick hug. "Hi, Nan. These are the people I said would be stopping by." She introduced us all in turn and Nan gave us each a smile before she approached Purcell and bent to kiss him on the forehead.

  "Thanks for your time, Mr. Purcell," I said, standing. "We really appreciate it." Brutus bumped his massive head against my thigh. I patted it and his tongue lolled out of his mouth.

  "Good dogma," Kara said. Shoshana laughed.

  "Don't leave on my account." Nan's voice was an alto that belied her stature.

  "We've already taken enough of your husband's time," Sage said. "Thank you. And thank you, Shoshana, for setting this up."

  "If you have any more questions, just call." Purcell pushed himself out of the chair with help from Nan. He grimaced. "Shoshana'll give you the number. Good luck."

  We headed for the front door, Brutus pushing against my thigh the whole way.

  "I think he likes you," Sage observed, fighting a smile.

  "Well, we don't have room in the car. There might not even be room in Albuquerque." I scratched his ear and he smiled. Which was a scary sight on a Rottweiler. River held the door for us and we exited, Brutus following. Kara lingered on the patio, talking to Shoshana. I frowned but jerked my gaze to River, trying not to behave like a parent with her.

  "What do you think?" I directed my question to him and Sage. He leaned against the front of the car, thumbs hooked in his jeans pockets.

  "He's not telling us the whole story," River said.

  "That's the feeling I got, too." I glanced at Sage. She was staring past River, thinking.