“Starving.”
“Okay, hang tight. I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
Ella clipped the phone back onto her belt. “I’m going to have to rush off. My cousin’s stuck—her car broke down.”
“And I heard you say that she’s hungry?” Rose asked. “It’s so early, I bet she hasn’t had breakfast. I’ll fix a breakfast burrito for her and you. The eggs are already scrambled.”
Ella started to ask for something simpler, but then changed her mind. The truth was that Rose loved mothering people. To deny her that wouldn’t help anyone—least of all Justine or her right now, since they were both famished.
By the time Rose had loaded up a grocery sack with a thermos and more food than two people could eat in a week, Ella was ready to go.
“Wow,” Ella said, taking the sack. “That smells wonderful!”
“You’ve each got a breakfast burrito with eggs, potatoes, and a bit of salsa. There’s also a thermos of coffee and several pieces of fry bread in a smaller sack inside.”
“Thanks, Mom,” she said, giving Rose a hug.
Ella went into the living room and found her daughter dancing in front of the TV set. Her favorite cartoon character was singing and dancing, and Dawn was imitating his movements.
“Hey, Pumpkin, I’m off to work. How about a hug?”
Dawn launched herself into Ella’s arms enthusiastically, squeezing her as hard as she could. “Bye! Can I ride the pony after day school?”
“Ask Boots,” she said, using Jennifer Clani’s nickname. Lena had given it to her granddaughter who, as a child, had loved her grandfather’s boots and would always wear them around the house.
“Okay.” Dawn looked back to the TV set and started dancing again.
Ella watched her a moment longer. Dawn was independent, a trait Ella was sure would cause no end of trouble someday.
About twenty minutes later, she pulled up beside her partner’s unit, and Justine jumped out, locked the door, then hurried into Ella’s SUV. “It’s freezing out here this morning,” she said.
“Did the heater in your unit work?” Ella looked over and saw the windshield on Justine’s unit had started frosting over.
“Not without heat from the engine. The car ran fine almost up to the turnoff, then it made a strange, coughing sound and stopped cold.” Justine took a deep breath, and zeroed in on the sack. “That smells wonderful.”
“Help yourself. Mom packed enough for an army, as usual.”
Justine unwrapped one of the breakfast burritos, handed it to Ella, then took the other for herself. “Thanks for bringing all this stuff, Ella. I left home this morning before anyone woke up. I’d have to answer too many questions if I’d stayed for breakfast.”
“Then I assume you and Wilson did break up?”
She nodded. “I really like him, Ella, but things weren’t right between us.”
“You want to talk about it?”
Justine shook her head. “I’m all talked out right now.”
“I understand.”
Both of them remained silent, and Justine finished her breakfast quickly. “Do you want me to drive while you finish yours?”
“You really must have been hungry,” Ella said. “Yeah, let me pull over.”
Moments later, sitting in the passenger’s seat, Ella finished breakfast as they headed into Shiprock. The coffee her mother had made was strong and hot, and the aroma filled the car. She gave Justine the extra mug her mother had packed after pouring coffee into it from the thermos. “Don’t stop by the station, let’s go directly to the car rental place in Farmington. Those agencies open early.”
“Seven o’clock, in their case. I called them this morning to verify their hours.”
“Did you also call maintenance and ask them to dispatch a tow truck to go get your unit?”
“Yeah, right before I called you about an hour ago. The really depressing thing is that they told me they had two other calls to get to first.”
Ella exhaled softly. “It was cold last night, and things are getting worse. The tribe has to allocate more funds to the department.”
“I’ve been really thinking of supporting NEED—actively. Maybe join their organizational meetings, rallies, and so on. A lot of cops are doing that.”
Ella nodded. “I can’t say I blame them. The tribe has to come up with some long-term income sources to keep things running. Uncle Sam can’t be depended upon to help, not with all the cutbacks in federal spending. The tribes, more and more, are on their own.”
Ella turned on the small portable radio she carried in her car. The Farmington radio station’s morning broadcast with George Branch was on. Ella turned it up and listened, curious to see if Kevin was really out of the woods with the man. Her stomach clenched as she heard Kevin’s name mentioned.
“Councilman Tolino has come up with a lot of ideas, but he fails time and time again to implement them. Councilman, if you’re listening, put your money where your mouth is. You say you’re pro-NEED. Okay, we believe you. Now do something to make things happen. The last time the council took a vote, you were absent. Were you hiding?”
Ella switched it off. Poor Kevin. He’d celebrated too soon. She thought of Ernest Ration, and smiled. Somehow, she had a feeling things would get interesting in the next day or so.
“I wonder what Kevin will have to say about that?” Justine asked.
“I guess we’ll find out. For what it’s worth, partner, I’m leaning toward a pro-Need stance myself. A nuclear power plant on the Rez entails risk, but this time the tribe has to take the chance. At this point, I’m for anything that will give our people a way to become self-sustaining,” Ella said.
When they arrived at the car rental place, Ella hurried inside the small building. Beside it was a large parking lot, half-filled with new, mostly white vehicles of different models. A young Anglo woman in her midtwenties greeted them from behind the desk. Seeing the badge pinned to Ella’s belt, she gave them a worried look.
“Is something wrong, Officers?”
“We need to speak to a manager, please,” Ella said. She knew she was out of jurisdiction here, but it was a legitimate phase of an ongoing investigation.
She had barely finished her sentence when a man in his late thirties wearing a blue blazer and tie came out of an adjoining office. He glanced at Ella’s badge, then back at her. “I’m the owner, Jim Apodaca, Officer. How can I help you?”
“May we speak privately?” Ella asked.
Apodaca waved her inside his office. “Are you from the tribal police?”
Ella nodded, then signaled to Justine to stay in the outer office. She knew Justine would strike up a conversation with the receptionist. One way or another, they’d get the information they needed.
“The tribal police have no jurisdiction here, isn’t that right?”
“Yes, but we’d like your cooperation on an investigation that leads off the Navajo Nation. We need some information.” Ella described the SUV and the woman, then gave him the three digits they’d gotten from the plates. “We need to know the name and the address of the person who rented this vehicle.”
He leaned forward, a worried frown on his face. “Was one of our vehicles used to commit a crime?”
“We just need to locate the driver and talk to her,” Ella replied without answering directly. “We’re investigating a missing person’s case, and we think she may have information that could help us.”
The owner leaned back in his seat and regarded her warily. “I don’t know about this…”
“Your cooperation might end up saving a man’s life. We could go through local police agencies for this information, but we wanted to save some time. That’s why we came directly to you.”
He took a deep breath then let it out again. “All right. But please don’t make our involvement public. It might hurt my company, and we’re just trying to get off the ground here.”
“No problem.”
He pulled his chair for
ward and faced his computer. “Okay, give me what you’ve got again.”
Ella read the numbers on the license plate and gave him a description of the SUV again. Seconds ticked by, then he stopped typing and turned the monitor around so she could see the information.
“That vehicle is rented to a woman by the name of Margaret Bruno. She’d first rented a four-door sedan, but she returned it to us and asked for a four-wheel-drive. She has a Texas operator’s license, but gave a local address. Do you need that information?”
“No, it’s not necessary. I appreciate your cooperation. Now I need to ask you for another favor. Once the SUV is returned, I want you to call me before you clean or detail it. I’d like to go over the vehicle for evidence.”
“What kind of evidence?”
“I can’t tell you that, but believe me it’s very important.”
“Can you guarantee that you’ll keep my name and my company’s name out of it?”
“I can’t guarantee it, no, but if we tie anyone who rented one of your vehicles to a crime, we’ll give your company the highest references, saying that you cooperated and helped us solve a very important case.”
“All right, but you can also thank me by recommending my company to all your friends.”
“You’ve got it.”
She knew how hard it was for anyone to start a business in this area. Times were tough for people, especially in a poor area of a poor state. Money was scarce, and businesses were taking a substantial hit.
Thanking Apodaca, Ella left his office and met Justine in the lobby. They walked outside and, as soon as they were both in the car, Ella spoke. “How did it go? Did you get anything out of her?”
Justine smiled. “I knew that was what you wanted me to do, so we talked. She remembered the woman who’d rented the SUV because she’s first rented a sedan. Apparently she was a pain in the butt all the way around. She didn’t know her name, but she said that the woman told her she was an ex-cop, and she wasn’t going to be jerked around by anyone.”
“I got the name. It was Margaret Bruno.”
“Sure sounds like her personality. But that’s not who was driving the SUV. The description doesn’t fit.”
“The hair color doesn’t, that’s true, but the rest does—more than you realize. Think about it, Justine. Margaret is tall, and not very busty. With a baseball cap and the right wig, she could pass as a guy, particularly to a scared convenience store clerk who’s afraid to take a good look at her face. We know she got into the power plant disguised as a male teacher the day of that training fiasco. And think about the woman we saw in the tape—it could have easily been Margaret in a dark-haired wig. Remember that all along I’ve said that whoever tailed me had special training operating a vehicle.”
“But why would Margaret go after Councilman Redhouse?”
“I’m not sure yet, but she’s our best suspect, and we think Shives might be the Anglo connected with Whitesheep and Billy. Admittedly, it’s easier to tie her into the murder of Officer Franklin and the confrontation Wilson had with the thief. Her connection to Shives and his to Kee Franklin is already established.”
Justine thought it over. “They might have also been responsible for the drive-by at Jonas Buck’s home and Redhouse’s murder as a way to discredit NEED…. But why would Shives assume that the tribe wouldn’t hire him if that project went through?”
Ella considered it, then spoke. “Maybe he thought that his downgraded security clearance would show up in a background check and raise the kind of questions that would keep him from getting the job. But that’s still a slim reason for murder. And what about Whitesheep? How does he fit in, or is that another situation entirely?”
Justine shook her head and shrugged. “Maybe he got killed because he knew about Shives meeting Redhouse.”
“Or maybe he knew that Shives had paid the councilman that cash as a bribe, or for information. Whitesheep ended up with some of that money, too.” Ella nodded. “Sounds like the pieces are finally coming together.”
“So what now?”
“We still need to find and confirm a motive for Delbert Shives and Margaret Bruno. Maybe we can start by asking Permian for more background.”
“For that, I’m sure we’re going to have to find a back door. I doubt we’ll get any official cooperation. They don’t want to be connected to any hint of a scandal now that they’re trying to convince the tribe that they should be the ones to run the proposed power plant.”
“Do you know anyone who works for them?” Ella asked.
Justine shook her head. “Do you?”
“Not that I can think of offhand. Let’s head back to the station for now.”
It was shortly after eleven by the time they arrived. As they walked inside, Big Ed was out in the hall, and signaled to Ella to come into his office.
Ella followed him there then, as she was seated, their chief closed the door behind them.
“Give me everything you’ve got.”
Ella did, and watched his expression.
“All this time, and we’ve essentially got nothing we can take to a prosecutor,” he said thoughtfully.
“Nothing we can prove, but we do have leads.”
He nodded. “I’ve requested a meeting with the committee that’s responsible for funding our department. We’re in a crisis situation, and I’ve got to do something to loosen up their wallets. I had hoped to show them some impressive results on our high-profile cases.”
“Maybe what they need is a harsh dose of reality. One patrolman’s life might have been saved had he had a working radio. If we’re not given what we need to do our jobs, they can’t expect us to either serve or protect this tribe effectively.”
He looked at her for several long moments. “Maybe I should take you with me tonight.”
Ella sighed. “You’re much better at that kind of thing than I am. I’m not much on diplomacy.”
“Yeah, that’s true. Any chance of you learning before 7 P.M.?”
“None,” Ella answered with a smile.
“Then get to work.”
“Yes, sir,” Ella said, and quickly left the office. She didn’t want to take a chance that Big Ed would change his mind and maybe order her to come with him.
The second Ella returned to her office and sat down, her phone began to ring. She picked it up at the same time Justine came into her office. Ella waved for her to take a seat, then concentrated on the caller.
“This is Jim Apodaca at the Circle E,” he said. “Ms. Bruno just returned the SUV she’d rented from us. She wanted to trade it for a larger model with better off-road capability. She and her friend are getting ready to go on a hunting trip. They had their rifles and camping gear already with them.”
“Can you describe her friend for me?” Ella asked.
She listened carefully and realized that Jim had just described Delbert Shives. “Don’t touch the car. We’re on the way.”
Justine glanced at her. “What’s going on?”
Ella filled her in. “Jim said that they had two rifles with them.” She glanced at her partner. “I’m getting a real bad feeling that we’re not the only ones looking for Kee Franklin. He’s in a world of trouble.”
Twenty-Four
At the car rental office, while Justine went over the car, Ella called Dispatch and put out a Code Five on the large model SUV rental from the Circle E.
“Did Ms. Bruno give you any idea where she and her companion were headed?” Ella asked Apodaca.
“All she told me was that they were going to go off for a few days to do a little business and maybe get some hunting done. She mentioned they were joining someone else tomorrow morning, then after that, they were planning to rough it for a few days.” Jim shrugged. “Wish my wife liked hunting or camping, but she’s even afraid of bugs. Ms. Bruno looks like she could handle anything.”
Ella nodded. She had sensed from the very beginning that Margaret Bruno could be dangerous. And the more she learned about Bru
no, the more worried she became.
Leaving him, Ella went to help Justine go over the vehicle. By the time they were finished, they had several thick, black hairs that Justine was nearly certain had come from a wig. “I’ve also got two sets of prints. I want to run both through FBI data banks. Let’s see if they belong to Shives and Bruno, or another person entirely.”
“Good idea.”
As they got ready to leave, Sheriff Taylor pulled up in his department vehicle. “Your dispatcher said I’d catch you here.”
Ella told Taylor what they’d learned, then asked, “Have you made any further progress on Whitesheep’s murder?”
“In addition to the five hundred dollars in cash with Councilman Redhouse’s fingerprints on most of them, we found a few medium-length black hairs in the car seat near the body. They came from a wig, according to our lab. But no prints. I wanted to ask you to send the wig hairs you’ve recovered at your crime scenes over to our lab. Now that we know that the bullet that killed Whitesheep came from the same gun that killed Councilman Redhouse and Officer Franklin, we’d like to compare the other evidence as well.”
“You’ll have what you need by the end of today,” she said, glancing over at Justine, who nodded.
Later, as they drove back to the Rez, Ella lapsed into a long, thoughtful silence.
“Process everything we found in Bruno’s car as soon as possible,” she said, as they neared the station. “Work every shred of evidence from that vehicle. I want anything and everything you can give me.”
As soon as they arrived at the station, Ella went directly to her office. As she walked through the door, she found Kevin and Ernest Ration waiting for her.
“Hey, guys,” she said, glancing over at Kevin. “What brings you two here?”
“I got the strangest call from George Branch, promising me that if I called ‘my people’ off, he’d cease and desist taking shots at me on air for good. Somehow I ended up with the feeling that he was setting me up, so I thought I’d better tell the police department.”
“What’s happened to him now?” Ella asked.
“I wanted to know that myself, so I asked him. Turns out that after his last broadcast when he bashed me again, someone subscribed him to an Internet porno network. By midafternoon Branch had so many photos of naked men posted to him at his station’s computer that his electronic mailbox closed down because it was completely full. The whole thing was an embarrassment to him, and he left work really ticked off. Then he found out that someone had entered his home somehow and rearranged his furniture. There was no forced entry, and nothing was taken, as far as he could see.”
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