by Aimée Thurlo
Charlie and DuPree arrived first, driving down the street past the store while they looked for any parked vehicles where the caller, and perhaps Lola, might be watching.
“We’re five minutes early,” DuPree said, glancing east across two lanes of highway toward the high school. From this spot they could see tennis courts and a grass practice field.
“Look ahead, beyond the high school grounds to the east. There’s a three-story apartment building with balconies facing this direction,” Charlie observed, raising a pair of binoculars DuPree kept in the vehicle. “Someone is standing just inside a patio door on the second level,” Charlie added. “It’s a woman, blond.”
“Need me to slow down?”
“Negative,” Charlie advised. “I’m guessing that this is our caller. It’s the only open door in a building that has at least thirty apartments facing west.”
“There’s nobody sitting in their car on the same side of the street as the Circle K, so let’s go with your gut. I’m going to circle east and approach that building from the other side,” DuPree replied.
Charlie’s cell phone sounded. It was Gordon. “Putting you on speaker,” Charlie advised.
“We’re pulling into the convenience store lot now. Any idea on a location?” Gordon asked.
“Yeah, that pale pink apartment building across the street. A woman was standing on the balcony of a second-story apartment, south end, looking toward the Circle K. We’re going down the street fronting the apartments and approach from the east side.”
“Gotcha. Hang on, Charlie,” Gordon said as Nancy said something to him.
About ten seconds went by, then Gordon spoke again, quickly. “Hurry it up, Charlie. Get to that apartment, the one you said. The woman, Didi, just called Nancy. Says they just spotted someone watching the building’s parking lot. Lola thinks it might be Jerry Benally, her old boyfriend.”
DuPree hit the gas, racing up to the apartment building. “Can’t see anyone outside. We’re going in through the front. Hurry and back us up,” the detective said.
DuPree slowed, easing into the lot as quietly as possible, pulling right up in front of the no-parking slot by the main entrance.
Charlie was out before the car stopped rolling, looked left and right, then sprinted toward the double-door entrance. Inside he discovered a hall leading toward stairs at one end of the building, an elevator at the other. “Take the elevator,” he called to DuPree, who was a few steps behind him.
Charlie ran down the hall, then opened the door to the stairwell. He took the stairs two at a time, reaching the top of the first flight just as he heard two rapid gunshots, then a third and fourth spaced a few seconds apart.
His weapon out now, Charlie took the next flight in three steps. He stopped, looking through the small window in the door before opening it up. Nobody.
He stepped out and immediately saw a middle-aged man in a Hawaiian print shirt standing in his apartment doorway, holding a cell phone. “Police!” Charlie lied with a harsh whisper. “Get back inside!”
Charlie raced to the open door of the end apartment, stopped by the jamb, and looked inside. One Indian man was leaning against the sofa, bleeding from his side, aiming a pistol toward a short hallway in the apartment. The door beyond was closed.
Hearing a noise inside to his right, Charlie dropped to one knee, swung his Beretta around, and saw a bandaged Jerry Benally aiming a pistol at him.
Benally fired, striking the metal doorjamb and the wall at the end of the hall.
Charlie shot him in the center of his chest, then ducked back as the guy by the sofa snapped a round in his direction. Hearing running footsteps coming down the hall and hoping they belonged to DuPree, Charlie decided to try to save the wounded man for questioning.
“Police! Put down your weapon!” he yelled. Charlie paused, heard a curse, then decided to jump across the door opening to the far side.
Two bullets struck the wall where he’d just been standing. Looking in, pistol first, Charlie caught the surprise in the man’s expression as the guy realized he’d missed.
Charlie had him flat-footed. “Put it down!” Charlie yelled again. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that DuPree had arrived and was now at his left shoulder.
The idiot swung his pistol around, firing, the second of two bullets kicking up the carpet as DuPree fired a double tap into the shooter’s torso.
Charlie stepped into the room, avoiding the two men now on the floor as he swept the room with his gaze. He heard a gasp behind the breakfast bar fifteen feet away and sidestepped along the far wall, weapon aimed toward the blind spot. Then he saw the blond woman, the same one who’d been looking out the balcony.
She lay flat on her back, and was trembling slightly, the tremors of death, an image Charlie knew well. There was blood everywhere, and her throat had been shredded by a bullet.
“Who’s out there?” came a surprisingly familiar voice from a back room.
DuPree, crouched low, was covering Charlie, but looked over at him, puzzled.
“That you, Mike?” Charlie asked.
“Mike Schultz. You that Navajo guy, Charlie Henry?”
There was a footstep in the hall outside and a voice. “It’s us, Charlie,” Nancy whispered.
“What the hell?” Gordon asked, slipping in and looking down at the two dying men.
“Yeah, it’s me, Charlie. Mike, where’s Lola?” Charlie said, walking toward the hall, still reluctant to lower his weapon.
“Who the hell is Mike?” DuPree whispered to Gordon.
“She’s gone,” Mike replied. “I’m putting down my weapon and opening the door, okay? Don’t let anyone shoot me.”
Charlie looked back at his three companions. Nancy had come in and was kneeling down beside Lola’s friend—the blonde. DuPree nodded, still covering the bedroom. Gordon had come around and was behind and to his right, weapon aimed.
“Okay, Mike. Slowly. We’ve got three weapons on you.”
The door opened, and Mike the Pimp stepped out, hands up, dragging his right leg, which had a stream of blood flowing from the thigh down. “The bastards shot me. How about calling the EMTs before I bleed to death?” he asked, a weak grin on his face.
“First, where’s Lola?”
“Gone. She managed to climb out the bedroom window and drop to the grass while I was keeping these men back.” He looked over at the woman by the counter. “Didi? She took the first bullet. Is she…”
“Dead,” Nancy said, phone at her ear.
Charlie stepped toward Mike, steadied him with one arm, and looked through the doorway into the bedroom. The window was wide open. “Where’d she go?”
“The hell away from Albuquerque, I hope. Lola said that the necklace she pawned belonged to Cordell Buck. She’d ripped it off from Jerry’s boss.”
“Who was Jerry’s boss?” DuPree asked.
“Clarence Fasthorse’s mom, Sheila something,” Mike said, his voice trailing off and his face going paler by the second. His strength gave way and he slid on his back down the wall and landed on his butt. “Get that Sheila bitch, and her son too,” he added, his eyes closing.
“Sergeant Medina, keep this apartment clear until more officers arrive,” DuPree ordered.
“Gordon, can you keep Schultz from bleeding out? I’m going to look for Lola,” Charlie said, turning toward the door.
“Wait, Charlie! No, better yet, go and take Nancy with you. I’ll protect the scene,” DuPree said, motioning toward the door.
“Find me a towel or something,” Gordon yelled as Charlie stepped out into the hall. Nancy was already ahead of him, running down the stairs.
* * *
Five minutes later, Charlie was two blocks away in a residential area, knocking on doors and asking anyone who answered if they’d seen a young Indian woman running or hurrying through the area within the past several minutes. Nancy had taken her Jeep and was circling the neighborhood, using her phone to set up a search grid with officers
who were now entering the area.
Charlie’s cell phone rang just as he was trotting across Montgomery Avenue toward a Smith’s supermarket. He brought out the phone as he stepped onto the curb and looked at the display. It was Gordon.
“Bad news, Charlie,” Gordon reported. “Mike doesn’t have any car keys, which means he probably gave them to Lola. She could be miles away by now. DuPree is trying to find out from Mike’s people at the Firehouse what kind of car that might be. It’s not Schultz’s Mercedes, that’s all we know. It’s still at the bar.”
“Mike won’t tell you?”
“Can’t. He’s out like a light. The EMTs are here working on him now. They think he’ll make it, but it’ll be awhile before he can talk. Nancy’s leading the search for the vehicle, once we know what to look for,” Gordon said.
“I might as well come back,” Charlie said. “See you in five.” He ended the call, then turned around for one more look. He waited for the light to change, then crossed back to the south toward the apartment building. When he arrived there were at least seven cop cars in the parking lot, emergency lights flashing, and maybe twenty tenants outside in a loose cluster.
It would probably take minutes to get in without an escort. He brought up his phone, touched Gordon’s image, and waited. “Gordo, can you ask an officer to meet me down in the parking lot? Otherwise, once they see I’m packing they’re going to hang on to me for sure.”
As he continued across the parking lot, Charlie wondered what was going to happen once Sheila Ben heard about the death of two more of her crew—and Lola’s escape. Suddenly it made sense that Clarence’s mother was the brains behind the Night Crew—her son was just the front man and she was the one who handled the money. What Charlie didn’t know, and needed to find out, was how Sheila ended up with Cordell Buck’s favorite piece of jewelry. Once he found that out, instincts told him it would lead directly to whoever killed Buck, and why.
Chapter Seventeen
Two hours had passed and Charlie and Gordon walked into FOB Pawn, having been dropped off at the front entrance by an APD patrolman. Nancy was leading the countywide search for Lola, DuPree was still at the crime scene, and Mike the Pimp was undergoing medical treatment at Saint Mark’s hospital under the protection of APD officers.
“You guys look like you’ve been through the wringer,” Jake said, looking over from behind the front counter. “I’m glad you called. Ruth heard about a shooting in the Northeast Heights. The police were involved, and several people were killed. We were worried … is that blood on your shirt, Gordon?”
“Yeah,” he said, looking down. “I’ve got a spare in the back. I’d better go clean up.”
Ruth, hearing their voices, looked over through the office window, saw Gordon walking in her direction, and ran out of the office. “You’re hurt?”
“Not to worry—it’s not my blood,” Gordon said, smiling.
She nodded, looking past him now at Charlie. “How about…”
“Charlie’s okay too. I’ll let him tell you all about it,” Gordon added. She reached out, touched him on the shoulder briefly, then walked up to join Charlie and Jake.
“Hi, Ruth. We’re all okay, including Nancy and Detective DuPree, but a friend of the woman we’ve been looking for was killed today along with her two attackers. We were just a few minutes too late to prevent that. Another friend of Lola’s helped save her life, but ended up in the hospital. He should be okay.”
“What about Lola? She’s the person who started all this when she pawned the squash blossom,” Jake asked.
“She’s on the run again, unharmed, apparently, but probably scared as hell. Nancy and half the county are trying to find her, but who knows?” Charlie replied.
“So, you’re back to square one trying to find out who really killed the Navajo silversmith?” Ruth asked.
“Yeah, and Lola claimed she knew. Unfortunately, she never told anyone else, apparently, before she split. At least we’ve ruled out more of the carjacker gang—process of elimination, I guess you could say,” Charlie hedged, not wanting to talk about people he’d killed. “Unless it was one of those already deceased, it’s either one of his remaining gang or Clarence Fasthorse himself.”
“I can see how killing the person you robbed serves to get rid of the obvious eyewitness, but I’m still fuzzy why they dug up the grave to steal more jewelry off the body,” Jake wondered. “You think it was the same people both times, don’t you?”
Charlie nodded. “That’s been a foregone conclusion, not just with me, but for the tribal police and the other agencies.”
“Somebody must have really hated the silversmith to do this kind of thing to him. I read that his body was torched in his casket,” Ruth added. “You and Gordon are taking on some really nasty people. But, after what they tried to do here to get the squash blossom necklace back, I guess it goes without saying.”
“To me, it sounds like someone had an unpleasant history with the dead jewelry maker. He was stolen from, killed, stolen from again, then his body desecrated,” Jake said.
Gordon, coming up wearing a fresh shirt, caught the last of their conversation. “Yeah, I was thinking about that, too.”
“The original attack on him outside the casino was planned, right?” Jake asked.
“Yeah, and there lies the answer. Whoever chose him as the target is responsible for his death, even if they paid someone else to do the deed,” Charlie concluded. “That suggests Clarence.”
“Or his mom?” Gordon suggested. “She ended up with the squash blossom, right?”
“That’s what Mike the Pimp said Lola told him,” Charlie replied.
“Mike the Pimp? What a horrible nickname,” Ruth retorted.
“That isn’t a nickname, that’s kinda his profession,” Gordon said, smiling wickedly. “Well, one of them.”
“Yeah, well, in spite of that, Mike was the one who saved Lola today,” Charlie added.
“And maybe us,” Gordon added.
The front doorbell sounded and they all just stood there, silent, as a woman in her early twenties wearing tight jeans and a crop top entered. With her was a spike-haired guy who looked about her age, dressed in an unbuttoned leather vest and tan cargo pants. They were carrying an electric guitar and something in a cardboard box.
The woman saw them staring at her. “What?”
“Um, sorry, come on in. We were…” Charlie began, knowing he couldn’t mention their conversation topic.
“Expecting the UPS guy,” Jake responded smoothly. “But hey, is that an SG Special you’ve got in your hands, sir?”
The young man, in his early twenties, narrowed his eyes, a little confused. “The guitar? It’s a Gibson, supposed to be a classic. My grandpa bought it back in the sixties and played it for a while. It still works like new, according to my dad.”
“Can I take a look?” Jake said, reaching his hands out toward the man, who seemed eager. The woman placed the box she was carrying onto the counter. “Got some old music records here too, and a Homer harmonica, or something like that. What price can we get for this junk if we sell it?”
Ruth came over and looked into the box. “It’s a Hohner Chromonica, Jake! This is a nice collection. Let’s set everything out on the counter so I can have a look. I’m Ruth,” she added, smiling broadly.
Charlie and Gordon took advantage of the interruption to head back to the office.
“Hope those customers didn’t steal that stuff. They didn’t have a clue what it was,” Gordon commented, grabbing his mug and reaching for the coffeepot.
“At least the kid had a credible history for the guitar. Jake will be able to sort that out, and Ruth is good with almost all the musical instruments and jewelry. If those youngsters shy away when it comes to showing a photo ID and having it copied, that’ll be a good sign. We couldn’t have better help than those two,” Charlie confirmed.
“It’s more like we’re the help, not Jake and Ruth. They’ve been running this p
lace without us the past few days. I wish we could have brought in Lola and given her the opportunity to rat out Clarence and his mommy,” Gordon said. Sipping his coffee, he leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes.
Charlie brought out his cell phone to make a call and spotted a text message. “Something from Al,” he announced.
Gordon sat up straight. “What’s the news?”
“Jayne and Rand, her boyfriend, are driving Al up to Shiprock. He’ll call me when he gets home. Once he’s alone he wants the latest news. Says he’s out of the loop now, but expects to start desk duty in a few days.”
“Staying with his sister must have worn thin. It’s been less than a day, Charlie,” Gordon said, grinning.
“You met him. Al’s a pain in the ass after about ten minutes, and Jayne has never gotten along with anyone in the family since eighth grade except for Dad. Besides that, Rand is a dick and probably up to something illegal. I told you about his Internet ‘business.’ He won’t want a cop roaming around the house,” Charlie admitted.
“So how’d you three kids get along growing up?”
“Mom and Dad laid down the rules, kept us busy, and held us responsible for our actions. We had to show respect for each other, but sometimes I think there was too much competition. My brother and I got into some serious fights, and not just arguments. Al got married right out of high school, skipped college, and went to the police academy. Less than six months later, along came a son. Instant family.”
“You skipped college too. Your dad wanted you to become a lawyer, like him. Right?”
“Mom did too, but they couldn’t exactly forbid me not to enlist, with the wars going on and all. They respected that and supported me all the way. Mom told me once that I looked better in a uniform than a suit, and that one lawyer in the family was enough,” Charlie replied, pouring himself the last of the coffee.
“Jayne seems like a free spirit.”
“Yeah, with a mind, maybe two, of her own. She’s such a lousy judge of character though, trying to save one guy after another. They’re always weak and loaded down with problems. She has an elementary certificate, like Mom, but never applied for a teaching job. She says she’s not ready to work with kids yet. She’d rather work retail, so she does.”