PRAISE FOR
DEATH ALONG THE SPIRIT ROAD
“A mystery novel that grabs you by the lapels and refuses to let go…This is storytelling at its best and C. M. Wendelboe is a new author to watch.”
—Margaret Coel,
New York Times bestselling author of The Perfect Suspect
“The pacing of the novel…is distinctly native, something I haven’t read since the departure of the old master, Tony Hillerman.”
—Craig Johnson,
New York Times bestselling author of Hell Is Empty
“Wendelboe paints a vivid portrait of life on the reservation and deftly mixes history with a satisfying mystery.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“The absorbing first in a new…series.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Death Along the Spirit Road is a fantastic read…C. M. Wendelboe is a fabulous writer with an eye for detail and the ability to express it perfectly. This is a definite must-read.”
—The Romance Readers Connection
“This Native American police procedural is a strong whodunit because of the powerful backdrop in which Tanno investigates.”
—Midwest Book Review
DEATH WHERE THE
BAD ROCKS LIVE
C. M. WENDELBOE
BERKLEY PRIME CRIME, NEW YORK
THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP
Published by the Penguin Group
Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA
Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.) • Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England • Penguin Group Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.) • Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.) • Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi—110 017, India • Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, Auckland 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.) • Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa
Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
This book is an original publication of The Berkley Publishing Group.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
Copyright © 2012 by Curt Wendelboe.
Cover illustration by Richard Tuschman.
Cover design by Rita Frangie.
Interior text design by Laura K. Corless.
All rights reserved.
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PUBLISHING HISTORY
Berkley Prime Crime trade paperback edition / September 2012
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Wendelboe, C. M.
Death where the bad rocks live / C. M. Wendelboe.—1st ed.
p. cm.
ISBN: 978-1-101-58145-2
1. United States. Federal Bureau of Investigation—Officials and employees—Fiction. 2. Indian reservation—South Dakota—Fiction. 3. Dakota Indians—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3623.E53D46 2012
813’.6—dc23 2012014771
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
ALWAYS LEARNING
PEARSON
To those who have become ill and lost loved ones
in the place where the bad rocks live.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Again I would like to thank my editor, Tom Colgan, and my literary agent, Bill Contardi, for their patience and professionalism leading me through this maze that is the publishing world. I am thankful to my first publicist, Kaitlyn Kennedy, and Penguin’s sales and marketing staff, especially Eric Boss and Kacey Pfaff. I am grateful for my mentors, Judy and Craig Johnson—especially Craig for keeping me and “Big Elvis” up on two wheels. I value the input of my Lakota friends, especially Oglala Lakota Ernie LaPointe for sharing his knowledge of the Old Time as it relates to present attitudes on Pine Ridge Reservation. I am most thankful for the support, untiring help, and love of my wife, Heather—who absolutely never tells me what to do.
Since the creation of the Turtle Island (The North American Continent), the first Nations always knew all things have a Spirit. The four-legged, those that fly, the green growing things, the water, the rocks (stones), and the Earth. The first Nations lived with all these entities as relatives, because we are all born from the Earth, our true Mother. There is not anything bad or evil from these living entities, but are labeled as such from people that do not have any knowledge, by the two-legged that create controversy.
ERNIE LAPOINTE
Great-grandson of Tatanka Iyotake: Bull Who Sits Down
(Sitting Bull; Hunkpapa Lakota)
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Epilogue
CHAPTER 1
DECEMBER 1944
The faint whisper of wind grew louder in Moses Ten Bears’s ears as the throp-throp-throp of a large aircraft cooking off speed neared. Snow, mixed with cottonwood seeds that made their own breed of snowstorm, swirled around the car as the bomber passed overhead at treetop level. If there had been any trees in the Badlands.
“You’re sure they’re not bombing here today?” Ellis Lawler’s eyes darted between Moses and the aircraft, which was shrinking in the distance. The frail, little man with skin the color of dirty snow shivered inside the frigid Buick, and his teeth clicked together as he rubbed his hands for warmth.
Moses chuckled. Here on the reservation, people would say the Buick they huddled inside was a Big Ugly Indian Cow Killer.
“You think that’s funny?” Ellis blew into his gloves. “They came pretty close that last pass.”
“They have not bombed here since last year. Those Army Air Corps flyboys have used this part of the Stronghold for practice so long they could make the run in their sleep. Besides”—Moses snatched a glove from Ellis and held
it just out of his reach—“they stopped using cars for targets last year.”
Ellis reached for the glove, but Moses kept it away, finally allowing Ellis to grab it. He craned his neck out the window in the direction the bomber had flown. “Just the same, I’ll feel better when Clayton gets here. This place gives me the creeps.”
But it didn’t give Moses the creeps. It rejuvenated him every time he came here. The Wanagi Oyate, the spirits of those that have passed on, called to him from this place. This was the Stronghold, for so long a Lakota sanctuary, for so long a place where warriors fled to seek safety from invading enemies, for so long a place where spirits of those gone before him still roamed. This was Oonagazhee, the Sheltering Place. And he decided this would be the final time he’d guide any wasicu, White man, here.
Ellis uncapped a mason jar of corn whiskey, the odor permeating the car. Moses retched, as much from the revolting smell as from what revolting things whiskey had done to the Lakota, draining their will, draining their history, like the cold draining the heat from him this frigid afternoon. Ellis took a long pull and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. He passed the whiskey jar to Moses, but Moses shook his head. Ellis shrugged and took another drink before capping it and setting it on the floorboard. “Where the hell’s Clayton?”
Clayton promised to meet them here an hour ago. Ellis’s car had no heat and even Moses shivered as he fought to stay warm from the Waziya, the killing North Wind, which seeped through the cracks in the side window. “He must have had car trouble. He is always on time. He is close, though.”
“How the hell you know that? More of your medicine man mumbo jumbo?”
Moses ignored Ellis the Ignorant, as he called him, and shoved his hands in his jacket pockets. When Clayton had asked him to ride here with Ellis, Moses had refused at first, but Clayton persisted. Moses relented, not because Clayton was a sitting U. S. senator, but because Moses never refused his friend. He had agreed to guide the geologist here, an act Moses was growing to regret. He had always suspected the greedy little bastard could not even carry on an intelligent conversation. Now he had his proof.
The biting wind whistled through a crack in one side window, bringing snow and fine dust inside, accompanied by that same roaring engine sound that grew louder. Moses turned in the seat to look out the fogged-over back window. The B-17 flew even lower this pass, heading straight toward them, following the jagged terrain of the Badlands. “They’re flying too low.”
“What?” Ellis turned in his seat to look out the back window. His eyes widened and his mouth dropped as he spotted the bomber bearing down on them.
“I think they are going to drop their bombload,” Moses said, matter-of-factly.
Ellis screamed and yanked on the door handle, while Moses watched the bomber coming closer. The aircraft was near enough now that Moses saw the turret gunner fog the inside glass with his hot breath, heard the engines drown out Ellis’s screams, smelled the avgas exhaust from the quad motors as strong as the odor of Ellis’s moonshine.
Ellis hit the starter button on the floorboard with his foot and the Buick coughed to life. He ground gears and double-clutched just as the first bombs exploded fifty yards behind them. Pressure ruptured their eardrums. Moses cupped his hands to his bloody head and prayed silently to Wakan Tanka, the Great Mysterious, praying that his journey to the Spirit Road would be successful.
Another bomb exploded closer to the car. Overpressure blew out the windows. Ellis screamed, but Moses could not hear him or the other bombs detonate. All was silent. All was peaceful. All he heard was the prayers in his head, silent and chilling as the killing North Wind.
The aircrew did not score a direct hit, but that mattered none. Ellis lay slumped against the steering wheel, blood flowing freely from his nose and mouth and lifeless eyes. Moses looked down at the large piece of windshield glass protruding from his own chest. His hand feebly grabbed for his medicine bundle on the thong dangling around his neck. Soon, Wakan Tanka. Soon I’ll meet you along the Spirit Road.
CHAPTER 2
Willie jerked the wheel, skidding the Durango on the loose dirt, the back end of the SUV dropping off the edge. Manny yelled. Willie screamed. The wheel spun in his hands. He stood on the brakes, dust engulfing the Dodge, obscuring the two-hundred-foot drop-off. It rocked to a stop, and Manny opened his eyes. He chanced rolling his window down, chanced a look at the drop-off that could kill them both. Scrub trees on the floor of the Badlands looked like tiny weeds. The alkaline floor below looked like an unwelcome grave, sagebrush sitting like tiny headstones.
“Now what do we do?”
Willie smiled, but the sweat rolling down his face betrayed his fear. “We can pray.”
“You better pray we don’t get out of this in one piece.” But Manny’s idle threat revealed his own fear. He chanced another look out his side window. The Durango teetered over thin air that Manny had no intention of stepping into.
“Got any ideas? You’re the one that got us into this fix.”
“Not my fault this road’s so narrow.”
“Would you rather have brought my bureau car?”
“Not with you driving.”
“Like I could do worse?”
Willie put the Durango into four-wheel drive and tapped the foot feed. Tires spun without catching, the back end swaying in empty air.
“Stop! You’re making it worse.”
Willie put the Dodge in PARK and sat back in the seat, closing his eyes and breathing hard. “The winch,” he said, opening his eyes and looking around. “There.”
“There what?”
He pointed to a large boulder off the path away from the drop-off. “If I can run the winch cable off the front bumper around that rock, we might be able to ease it back on the road.”
Willie opened the door and started to step out. The SUV tilted more to the open air and Manny grabbed his arm. “You step out and this thing’s gonna drop over the edge. With me in it.”
“Well, we got to do something.”
“How much you weigh?”
Willie shrugged. “Two forty. Give or take.”
“Well, I’m one eighty…”
“Diet’s not working, huh?”
Manny ignored him. “If I slide behind the wheel when you step out, it might not change the balance much.”
“Worth a try.”
Manny crawled over the radio console and slid behind the wheel as Willie opened the door and stepped onto the road. The Dodge rocked, threatened to tip off the cliff before it settled back into an uneasy silence. Manny held his breath as Willie unbolted the winch cable from the front bumper and slowly ran it out. He reached the boulder. Manny breathed. Willie circled the rock and secured the hook end to the cable itself. He walked back to the Durango. “Hand me the winch remote from above the visor.”
Manny grabbed what looked like a garage door opener and handed it through the window.
“When the cable tightens, I’ll signal you and you stick this baby in LOW.”
“And it’ll get dragged back onto the road?”
Willie laughed. “Either that or the cable will break, and you and the outfit will do a double gainer off the side.”
“You don’t seem too worried about it.”
Willie grinned. “I’m not the one inside. Here goes.”
A steady whirring reached the inside of the Durango, and Manny took several deep breaths, his hand on the gearshift, foot on the brake, ready to stick it in LOW.
“Now.”
Willie stepped away from the Durango, remote in hand, cable tightening. Manny stepped on the accelerator. Play in the cable gone, the front tires bit into the dirt, rear tires still dangling over the Badlands. The back tires jerked, the SUV jolted ahead, back tires back on hard ground. Manny skidded to a stop inches from the boulder. He put it in PARK and sat back in the seat. Sweat had flowed freely, staining his shirtfront, and he grabbed his bandanna and wiped his forehead.
Manny stepped out and
walked to the edge of the drop-off. A chill ran over him as he fought down a vision of him and Willie and the Dodge caroming off the cliff and coming apart in a hundred pieces before reaching the floor of the Badlands. He backed away and joined Willie, who had reversed the winch and stood watching the cable run back on the spool. “Another few inches and we’d be in the Happy Hunting Grounds.”
“Spirit Road,” Willie called over his shoulder.
Manny sat on a rock and closed his eyes, aware once again that he had a heartbeat, and that it slowed to normal. If he were a better driver, he’d demand Willie let him take the wheel. But Manny drove crappy, which only recently had been upgraded from driving shitty.
“Whenever you get around to it, feel free to drive a little slower.” Manny wiped his face and the inside of his Stetson with his bandanna. “The victim’s been dead for years. It’s not like we got to race to get there. Hell, you’ve been racing around all morning. Look at yourself—didn’t even shave. And what you got on your shirt, last night’s pizza?”
Willie rubbed his hand over his stubble that hadn’t been shaved yesterday either, and he picked at some kind of food dried to the front of his uniform shirt. “Been having things on my mind lately.”
Manny suspected Willie bordered on full-blown depression, his life teetering over the ledge like the Durango had just been, threatening to drag Willie down. Even his recent appointment to Oglala Sioux Tribal Police investigator hadn’t rescued him.
Willie shut the remote off and slipped the hook over the cable, securing it. “I got to see a man about a horse.” Willie stepped away from the Dodge to relieve himself. Manny suddenly felt the urge as well, surprised he hadn’t peed his pants as he sat teetering over the edge a few moments ago. As he turned and unzipped, he realized the whole place was his urinal.
As Manny did dust control on his own side of the car, he marveled at tawny sandstone spires towering a hundred feet above the Badlands floor that had lured people to their deaths in this remote part of the reservation that George Custer dubbed “hell on earth.” Most people would agree with that assessment. At first glance, nothing could exist in this desolate landscape, no one could survive here for long, in this land that hosted barren hilltops overlooking a million years of change. The siltstone and sandstone and mudstone makeup of the Badlands caused it to change daily, adding to the danger of getting swallowed up and never being found by anyone. As if the Badlands wished it that way.
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