by Mark Reps
His words felt slightly hollow as he spoke them. Doreen looked so deeply into Zeb’s eyes he could feel the track of her stare right down to his heart. He shivered. That anyone could see so deeply into his very being shook him.
“I feel like I can believe you,” she said. “Yes, I really do believe you.” Her words also carried a twinge of doubt. “Seven months after our marriage our son, James Wellington Jewell, was born.”
Zeb’s heart sank to the floor. His mind raced in a thousand directions. He was at a loss for words. He didn’t want to hear another word. How could she have possibly kept this from him? He was about to find out.
“When young James was two and a half years old, he and I went to meet Loren for lunch at the Green Dragon Tavern. Loren had just stepped out of a cab and was waiting for us. Little James saw his father and began to run toward him.” Doreen’s complexion turned ashen. Tears welled in her eyes but none came. “Just as Loren bent down to pick him up a car veered out of control and hit them. Both of them died almost instantly. I held them both as they breathed their last breaths.”
With those words, Doreen collapsed into Zeb’s arms and fell onto his lap where she wept tears of pain. Zeb caressed her hair. Untold thoughts raced through his mind. Who was this woman he now held? Was she so broken that she could not be put back together? Did the horrible event she just described prevent her from ever being whole again? Or was she healing from a horrible trauma right in front of his very eyes. What did this mean for their relationship? Was it over? Was this the real beginning? His mind went everywhere. His mind went nowhere. Zeb had seen the look in Doreen’s eyes as she went back to the time and place of the deaths of her husband and son. It took him back to the Mexican border and the death of Darren Wendt and to the school basement and the explosion that had killed Delbert. If he had periodic flashbacks to Agent Wendt’s and Delbert’s deaths, he could not even imagine what went through her mind. What went on inside Doreen’s head had to be truly horrifying. Felipe Madrigal flashed through his mind. He tried to push it away, but Felipe was another person who was not what he seemed to be. The whole world seemed jumbled and crazy. Eventually Doreen sat up, dried her tears, silently made some tea, opened another beer for Zeb and announced she wanted to tell him the whole story.
“The doctor said I was sufferin’ from an acute stress disorder. You and I would call it a nervous breakdown. I couldn’t face myself. I couldn’t even look in the mirror. I couldn’t face anyone. And, I really couldn’t face the world.”
“What did you do? Were you hospitalized?”
“The doctor tried to dope me up with them crazy people pills to hide my feelin’s and emotions. I couldn’t do that. The medications made me feel suicidal. I went to a shrink. That only made me feel worse. I even went to a Cherokee medicine man. I think that mighta helped some, but not a lot. I had to face my monsters in my own way. So, I did what I knew how to do. Loren was a motorcycle enthusiast. He taught me how to ride.”
“So that’s where you learned,” said Zeb feeling irrationally jealous that Loren had been the first to share the thrill of a motorcycle ride with her.
“I had a Harley Davidson, a 978 FLH Electra-Glide. I sold everythin’ I owned. I had some money from a settlement of the deaths of Loren and James. I called up a lawyer and he put the money into a trust. Far as I know most of it is still in that trust. I never check on it.”
Zeb could only shake his head in disbelief. This was all too much, too fast.
“I took off on my Harley and rode across the country and up to Alaska. I rented a house on Kodiak Island for a year. I got drunk or stoned out of my mind every day for the better part of that year. I watched television and movies twenty hours a day. When I was really messed up, I wandered off into the woods hoping the bears would eat me, but they never did. Oh they saw me and watched me,” said Doreen with a laugh. “But they must have figured I was crazy and that a crazy woman’s meat wouldn’t be no good for eatin’.”
Zeb looked at her with alarm.
“Don’t look at me like that.”
“Like what?” asked Zeb.
“Like I am crazy. I was crazy. ‘Was’ being the operative word. I ain’t crazy now. In fact, this is as sane as I’ve ever been.
“Okay, you’re not crazy.”
“Thank you for noticin’. Then one day I got a job waitressin’ at a local greasy spoon. I had done it back in high school. It was about all I knew how to do. I made some quick cash, hopped back on my Harley Davidson and headed south. I was goin’ to ride to the tip of South America and jump in the ocean.”
Zeb’s head jerked back in astonishment.
“Cool it cowboy, only kiddin’ about jumpin’ into the deep blue sea. I coulda’ done that any time in Alaska.”
Zeb was only half convinced she was joking.
“But as fate would have it, my motorcycle broke down right here in Safford. While my Harley was at the shop gettin’ fixed, I walked up and down Main Street. I found myself starin’ at my own reflection in the window of the Town Talk. I truly saw myself for the first time since my husband and son had been killed. I had to change. In the window of the Town Talk were two signs, Help Wanted and For Sale. I walked right in and bought the place. Best move I have ever made.”
“And the Town Talk? Why did you choose a restaurant to buy?”
“My husband’s family was in the restaurant business. They spent every minute of the day yammerin’ on about their cafe. I just sort of listened and learned. Like I told ya, I worked in diners in high school and up in Alaska. I figured how hard could it be to run a place like the Town Talk? I always took a shine to the idea of a small town diner so I bought the Town Talk. And the rest, as they say, is history. Or, in my case, the present.”
Doreen felt like an elephant had been lifted off her chest.
“I can’t say that I have ever felt as free as I feel right at this very moment,” she said.
Zeb scratched his head.
“I love you,” he said trying to convince himself it was true. “I need a little time to digest all of this, and to think it over.”
“You can take the rest of yer life to think it over. Nothin’ about it is gonna change. Facts are facts and history is history. What you see is what you get.”
Doreen opened her arms widely. Zeb accepted her embrace, but something didn’t feel quite right.
“For now, let’s keep this between us,” said Doreen. “Sometime we’ll let the world in on our little secret. But let’s not complicate things for a while, at least until after we been married a while.”
After their heart to heart talk Zeb tossed and turn throughout the night. Doreen’s life story was giving him second thoughts about their impending wedding.
“Doreen, I know this is bad timing, but I think I need some time to work through everything you told me last night.”
“I sort of was suspectin’ you might need some extra time,” replied Doreen.
Zeb sighed. He really hadn’t thought Doreen would take it so easily.
“We’ll talk about it soon. Give me a few days.”
“I love you,” said Doreen.
He kissed Doreen and headed to the sheriff’s department. It was time to find out for certain if Felipe Madrigal had killed Delbert.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
“Do you think Felipe Madrigal was capable of blowing up the grade school?” asked the sheriff.
“Do you think someone else is involved in this? Mr. Madrigal is a meek, mild-mannered old man. His voice is full of sorrow when he talks about what he has done,” replied Deputy Steele.
“Every con man sounds like that.”
“He really doesn’t seem like the sort of man who might make a bomb and plant it in a grade school, if that’s what you mean.”
“What have you found out about the bomb?”
“I talked with your friend, Josh Diamond,” said Deputy Steele. “I take it he hasn’t talked with you yet?”
“I’ve talked with him ab
out the break-in at his store. I am up to date on the injuries he sustained. He’s tough. He’ll be fine. What did he tell you about the bomb?” asked Zeb.
“He called it a well-placed, amateurish, low-power, pipe bomb. It was armed with a fuse, a blasting cap and a three-inch pipe packed with low grade explosives. Josh thought it likely had a timer. Whoever planted the bomb knew when it was going to go off and had plenty of time to be somewhere else when it did.”
“So we must assume whoever set the bomb knew it didn’t have a lot of power behind it,” said Zeb.
“It looks that way to Josh. He said it was the type of bomb that anyone who knows how to read a library book could make.”
“That doesn’t narrow our list of additional suspects down much, does it?”
“No it doesn’t.” replied Kate. “I’ve been over to the grade school boiler room and looked at it closely. The mortar between the bricks is old and loose. Only eight full bricks were knocked out of the wall by the explosion. One of those was the one that hit Delbert.”
“Well then we have a situation, don’t we?”
“Sheriff?”
Deputy Steele’s response was a stall for time. She knew precisely what the sheriff was thinking. A phone call from a scared old man sending the sheriff’s department to a crudely made bomb placed in an area where it should never have hurt anyone did not add up. It had to be a ruse, a simple diversion to get the sheriff’s department looking the other way.
“The day the bomb went off…the day of the threats. What else is on the crime sheet for that day?”
Kate simultaneously had the same thought.
“Not much…three speeding tickets, one act of vandalism, a broken window that coincides closely with the phone calls and a stolen car. The car was an old junker. The type kids steal and joy ride until it runs out of gas.”
“How about the day before and the day after the bombing?” asked Zeb.
“Only routine traffic violations, a few writs were served, some divorce papers, nothing overtly suspicious. Josh Diamond’s gun shop was broken into while he was in the hospital. That could have been the same day or a day or two later. We don’t know for sure.”
“Let’s have a look at that list of stolen items,” said Sheriff Hanks.
“Five handguns, four .38’s and a .22 and plenty of ammunition for all of those guns. A flak jacket, a double holster, military style, and a gun cleaning kit,” said Deputy Steele. “But no money was taken. According to your report the cash in the register wasn’t even touched, nor was anything taken from in or on his desk.”
“No doubt about it, the thief knew exactly what he wanted. Entrance was made through the alley door. The door was opened using a thin, but obviously strong piece of metal to lift up a two by four that was used to barricade the door.”
“I also saw in your report that Josh Diamond noted only one set of tracks in the alley behind his store,” said Deputy Steele. “I agree with your findings that it was a thief, not thieves. You don’t suppose Felipe Madrigal is a robber, too, do you?”
“It would surprise the heck out of me,” replied Sheriff Hanks. “However, he doesn’t seem like the type who would call in a bomb threat either, but he did. He admits to that. Have you completed the background check on Mr. Madrigal? Work history, marriage, kids, criminal history, tax liens, anything.”
“I am working on all that. My report will be on your desk the minute it’s complete.”
“If he didn’t act alone, we need to find a link. I’ll take a ride out to his house and search it from top to bottom,” replied Zeb.
“Are you thinking you might find the stolen guns?”
“I doubt it, but I will look for them anyway. I don’t exactly know what I am going to be looking for. I just hope I know it when I see it.”
“You heading out there now?” asked Kate.
“Yes, right now.”
“What do you want me working on today?”
“We need to triple check to see if anyone in the area saw Lorenzo’s pickup after it was stolen.”
“What are you thinking?”
“A powder blue LUV pickup like that, somebody had to see it,” said Sheriff Hanks.
“Do you think Lorenzo’s truck is tied to the bombing?” asked Deputy Steele.
“I’ve known the García family forever. They are what you call a superstitious bunch. Mrs. García reads tea leaves and palms. She even makes predictions about the future. God knows what thoughts she is going to put into Lorenzo’s head over this whole deal. I will bet you anything he will be spooked into believing the dead woman’s spirit is going to affect him. If we can explain what happened, it will make a great difference to his peace of mind. Did you get any updates on the body they found in his pickup?”
“I got one follow up from Detective Muñoz,” said Deputy Steele. “He sent a note saying the body was a Hispanic female, between twenty to twenty five years of age, approximately five feet tall, weighing one hundred pounds. Most importantly the fire isn’t what killed her.”
“What did?”
“She had a broken neck and a crushed windpipe.”
“Murder?” inquired Sheriff Hanks.
“It looks like it. The message from Detective Muñoz indicated the investigation is open and ongoing. The Tucson police department is trying to locate any missing persons who fit the woman’s description. They haven’t had much luck.”
“To them this is a routine case of an undocumented illegal alien in a stolen truck.” said Zeb.
“That doesn’t make the young woman any less dead.”
“I didn’t mean anything by it,” he replied, realizing how cold his statement sounded. “It’s just that the odds of finding out the who and the why are less likely when you are possibly dealing with an illegal alien as the victim.”
Kate knew the sheriff was right.
“We have to remember in this case we are here to serve the victim, a dead young woman,” he added.
Kate’s head told her not to follow her imagination. Yet her mind could not shake a horrifying vision of the young woman’s death scene--a brutal pair of hands gripped tightly around her neck, squeezing her life away, breaking her neck, crushing her windpipe. It was not a pretty picture.
“Maybe your friend, Detective Muñoz, can beat the odds on this one,” she said.
“I wouldn’t bet against him. As soon as you finish that report, why don’t you head out to the Garcías and check around. See if anyone remembers ever seeing the powder blue LUV pickup truck with someone other than old man García behind the wheel, or if anyone saw the vehicle driving faster than he would have driven it. Somebody had to have seen something the day it was stolen. Someone out that way must know something. Jar some memories. Give me a call on the two-way if you learn anything.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
“Snap to attention, amigo, siesta time is over. We’re burnin’ daylight.”
The half-asleep Ángel felt a rough hand on his shoulder shaking him back and forth.
“Come on ass-wipe, we got work to do.”
Opening his eyes, Ángel Gómez yawned widely and slowly stretched his arms over his head. The harsh command from Jimmie Joe Walker had roused him from a pleasant, sweet dream of his beloved Juanita. In his dreamlike condition Ángel could practically smell the lovely rose water she splashed behind her ears and sometimes even between her breasts for him. It was her firm breasts that had been the focus of his dream. His flesh tingled as he thought of her holding the hemline of her skirt away from her body in one hand and snapping fingers on the other as she danced a sensuous salsa she called El Gato Caliente.
Ángel drifted back into semi-consciousness as he imagined his lovely woman dancing closer, closer, enticing him to be a man, a hot-blooded man, making him ready to pounce on her like the animal he was.
“Wipe that silly, shit eatin’ grin off your God-damn mug. I said wake up, boy.”
This time Ángel awoke fully. Standing above him the man who had become
his compadre and master was slowly loading bullets into a handgun one at a time.
“One--two--three--four--five--six. Bang, número uno, bang, número dos shot, bang, número tres, bang, fourth shot, bang, fifth bullet out of the gun. Just one shot left.” He pointed the gun directly at Ángel’s forehead. “Kapow--you’re dead. Gone to hell forever, my little muchacha. Gone directly to hell.”
Diablo Blanco was playing with his guns again. The evil game of pointing the gun at Ángel and pretending to fire the bullets frightened him. The look on Jimmie Joe’s face was the look of an hombre loco who might just pull the trigger. Ángel felt a rush of dread run through his veins. In prison he had seen Jimmie Joe do so many crazy things. He knew the White devil did not feel things in the same way other people did. He was crazy like a rabid lobo and mean like a cornered rattlesnake. Maybe one day the devil inside the big White man would make him pull the trigger and Ángel would be blown to bits. If the devil shot him, he hoped it would be a quick one through the head, not a slow one in the stomach.
“You don’t like to play my little game, chiquita? Then you’d better be a real good driver because I don’t want to shoot you--and you know why I don’t want to shoot you, don’t you?”
Ángel smiled at the apparent reprieve but did not know how to answer. Shake your head one way and Jimmie Joe would go crazy, shake it the other and who knows what might happen. Jimmie Joe erupted into a fit of insanely disturbing laughter. Ángel broke into a cold sweat.
“I don’t want to waste no stinkin’ bullet.”
Jimmie Joe’s smile faded to hard steel. Bending down toward Ángel he caressed the young man’s cheekbone with the barrel before resting the cold metal against his ear. He rubbed so lightly it tickled. But Ángel did not laugh.
“Let’s go for a little ride. We need some practice in driving the big truck fast around corners. You drive.”
“I’ve got to take a leak first,” said Ángel. Then I’ll be ready to go.”
Ángel stepped outside the ramshackle trailer and behind the mesquite tree. He unzipped his pants and gave a small morado cactus a good dowsing of yellow water. As he tucked his private parts into his underwear, he looked over his shoulder. He wanted to be certain Jimmie Joe was not watching him. Reaching into his boot, he took out his switchblade knife, checked its action before tucking it tightly into a secret compartment he had sewn into the waistline of his pants, and untucked his shirt for additional cover of the hiding place. Reaching back, he double-checked the positioning of his blade. A second knife in his boot was also ready. Jimmie Joe, sitting inside the cab of the big four-wheel drive truck, appeared oblivious to Ángel’s actions.