The City of Rocks

by Don Travis

  “And you claimed to be BP agents?”

  “It seemed the prudent thing to do when I saw armed men who obviously didn’t belong on the ranch coming straight toward us.”

  “You coulda hid. Likely they wouldn’t have found you.”

  “They’d have seen our horses and rooted us out. Besides, the City looked like an overnight place to me. I found trash where people had eaten and wallows where they sacked out. Didn’t want to be trapped there. What are you trying to say?”

  “Nothing. Just trying to understand the situation.”

  Paul addressed Williams. “How come you didn’t catch any of them except for the undocumented workers and the wounded man they abandoned?”

  “They were doing what we wanted them to do—running for the border. It didn’t appear we would interdict much in the way of drugs, so the best thing for everyone was for them to go back where they belonged.”

  “Ever since Ramos and Compean, the BP’s been mighty skittish about shooting at Mexicans,” O’Brien said.

  He referred to the February 2005 incident when Border Patrol Agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean shot a Mexican driver while trying to run down a van in Fabens, Texas. After the smuggler escaped back over the border on foot, the agents discovered about 750 pounds of marijuana worth around a million dollars in his vehicle. Despite a widespread public outcry, the US attorney in El Paso prosecuted and convicted the two agents for several crimes committed during the altercation. Both were presently serving time in federal institutions.

  O’Brien’s comparison didn’t track for me. “As I understand it, those two agents were accused of shooting an unarmed man, although plenty of us don’t believe that was the case. These people today were obviously armed and had shown a willingness to use their firepower aggressively.”

  Ramirez returned to claim his seat, sparing Williams the pain of responding.

  “My team found nothing at the City. We brought in a K-9 unit, but the dogs didn’t find anything either. No drugs. No fugitives. No weapons caches. Nothing at all. SPA Williams and I have to get back to headquarters. Are you hanging around in case we need to talk to you again, BJ?”

  “No, we need to get on the road too. Paul has to go to work tomorrow.” I handed him a card with all my contact numbers.

  “Confidential Investigator,” he read. “A PI. Are you on a case?”

  “Nope, this was supposed to be some relaxation time.”

  We all walked the agents and O’Brien to their vehicles. One of the BP teams had come by land, and Williams returned with them. Ramirez headed for the waiting helicopter. After we watched them out of sight, I turned to Millicent.

  “We’d better get moving too. It’s going to be late by the time we get home, and I need to get started on your problem first thing tomorrow. I know an investigator in Florida, but I want to locate one who has an in with the racing crowd down there. We need some leverage on this Hammond guy.”

  Luis brought our overnight bags down, and we said our good-byes quickly. Just before we took off, Maria brought us a big picnic hamper.

  Once we were on the road, I expected Paul to be full of talk, but he rooted around in the basket and came up with a couple of pieces of homemade fudge. After he polished those off, he grew quiet again. I glanced over and found him drowsing. I understood the phenomenon. Lethargic episodes often followed periods of high excitement and danger due to the release of tension and reaction to adrenaline. I let him nap. He roused after we picked up I-40 out of Las Cruces and offered to drive. Instead I found a rest stop where we pulled off to explore the contents of Maria’s hamper.

  As we munched on thick slabs of roast beef between a rough rye bread and devoured coleslaw with a tangy sauce beneath a peaceful canopy of early stars, the armed assault of this morning seemed far in the past. Not so for my companion.

  “That thing this morning, you do that much? Get in shootouts?”

  “Naw. That’s rare.”

  “What about getting shot in the leg? You know, when you got that intriguing scar.” He smiled, his teeth bright in the gathering darkness.

  “I was in the APD back then, and my business there was catching crooks and killers. My work now is to gather information. There’s a world of difference.”

  “Still, it happens now and then,” he insisted.

  “Well, it did this morning.”

  “Sort of exciting, wasn’t it?”

  “I wouldn’t call thinking you’d killed a man exciting. More like frightening.”

  “Well, okay. There’s that,” Paul admitted.

  Chapter 19

  AS I left the house the next morning, I eyed Paul’s old Plymouth at the curb. And by old, I mean old. I couldn’t even tell you the year, but it had to be a late seventies or early eighties model. He’d named the rattletrap the Barrio Bomb, but it wasn’t much of an explosive threat any longer. It merely wheezed along. He’d refused my offers to buy him a new—or at least a newer—car, saying he’d get one when he could pay for it himself. Paul made decent money for the limited hours he worked, and his living expenses were minimal, although he insisted on donating something for the groceries each month. But he was bound and determined to finish his education debt-free. Admirable, and an accurate measure of the man I treasured, but I had to admit the faded purple wreck brought down the neighborhood a bit.

  Upon my arrival at the office, I started looking for a competent and trustworthy PI in the Miami area. My search eventually led to a man by the name of Bob Cohen, whom I pictured as a heavy, florid chain smoker, a judgment prompted solely by his raspy voice and quick, breathy speech. Nonetheless, he had a reputation as a careful investigator with high moral standards and contacts in racing circles. I wasn’t certain if that included duck races.

  “Yeah, I know Kenny Hammond,” he said after I briefly explained the situation.

  “Know him or know of him?” If he knew the developer personally, he might not be the man for the job. Personal loyalties might get in the way.

  “Everybody in the state knows him by reputation. I know him casually from occasional Kiwanis meetings. Nothing that would prevent me from doing the job. But I’m not sure I’m up for helping someone blackmail the guy.”

  “If that were the game, I wouldn’t touch it myself. No, if my client’s right, Hammond tried to set her up for a quarter-of-a-million-dollar fall. She tumbled to it in time to protect herself, but now that protection might come back and bite her in the fanny.”

  “That default clause you mentioned?”

  “Right. If—and I say if—he had anything to do with the theft of her racer, he was trying to defraud her. I’m convinced the duck is across the border in Mexico, so that’s a dead end from here. Since Miami has a large Hispanic population, I thought Hammond might have contacts in that community who could help him with something like this. All my client is looking for is something to level the playing field again.”

  “All she’s looking for is something to hang over his head and make him back off.” He stopped to reconsider. “Well, that’s close enough to being on the right side of the ethical line, I guess. Hammond’s pretty thick with the Cubano community, so you could be right. Let me check out a couple of things, and I’ll get back to you this afternoon to let you know if I can do it.”

  He probably wanted to check me out. He was careful, and I liked that. I liked that very much.

  After I got off the phone, I invited Hazel and Charlie into the office to bring them up-to-date on the situation and endure Mother Hazel’s lecture about being careful. She always delivered one after a close shave, and I guess a hail of gunfire qualified. Once her rebuke was out of the way, we settled down to discuss some of the other cases. I began to get the feeling things were getting away from me. We had two new cases I knew nothing about. They were ordinary assignments, tracking down a long-lost heir to a small estate and conducting a background check on a potential hospital administrator, but I’d always been the one to accept or reject cases. Now it
seemed that responsibility had fallen to Hazel by default.

  That shouldn’t have bothered me, but it did. I had a world of confidence in my office manager. She knew the way the place operated better than I did. She knew me and my capabilities and interests and standards, so there was little danger she would accept something inappropriate. I’d be more likely to cave in to some poor soul’s pleading and take on a disastrous case than she was.

  But things seemed to be growing more than I ever expected—or wanted. Charlie put in full days now, and it was past time to make his job permanent. Hazel spent more time sleuthing from the office than she did acting as administrator. She regularly called in a discreet temp to do the transcribing and run down things at the courthouse. She also called in Tim Fuller from time to time to give Charlie a hand. All this would have pleased most businessmen, but I didn’t consider myself an entrepreneur. I was a cop. A cop without a shield, but a cop nonetheless. I investigated.

  Charlie hung around after the meeting and asked if I had a minute. I invited him to join me at the small conference table in the corner of my office. He claimed the chair to my right. Odd. He usually took a seat directly opposite me so he could watch my expression, an old cop’s trait. He spent a few seconds twisting the worn gold Albuquerque High ring on his right hand. I waited him out.

  “BJ, we might have a situation here.”

  “What kind of situation?”

  “Well, personal, I guess you’d call it.” He studied the tabletop a moment longer while I held my tongue. “How do you feel about office relationships?”

  “Relationships?” I struggled to hide a smile. “You mean office romances?”

  His rangy shoulders rose and fell. “I suppose. Romance seems kinda strong, though.”

  I let the smile loose and beamed at him. “Hell, Charlie, it came to that last year while I worked that case up in Bisti.”

  He ducked his head and looked like a craggy sixty-year-old schoolboy owning up to being smitten for the first time. “You might be right. How do you feel about that?” He lifted his head and fixed me with his blue-eyed gaze. A lock of gray hair fell over his forehead.

  “I think it’s great. You two are made for one another.”

  His lips twitched. “I’m talking about Hazel, you know.”

  “I know. I’ve known for quite a while. Probably before you did.”

  “Well, back in my cop days, two people on the job getting involved was frowned on.”

  “You’re labeling us, Charlie. I don’t think anybody looks at office romances like that any longer. Of course, it’s Hazel, and I meant what I said. I think it’s great.”

  The man actually blushed. “Well, thanks for being so understanding. I’d rather you didn’t say anything to Hazel. You know, wouldn’t want to embarrass her.”

  “Are we talking about the same Hazel? But, okay. I won’t say anything if you don’t want me to.”

  “It’s not formal. I mean, I haven’t asked the question or anything like that.”

  “Enough said. You have my blessing, if that’s what you want. But let me know when I can put a dozen red roses on her desk.”

  “I’m going to do that this afternoon. Then I’ll tell her we had this little talk.”

  BOB COHEN phoned shortly after lunch to accept the assignment. He made a point of stating he worked for me and no one else, which made clear how close to the ethical edge he felt the case skirted. Personally I had no such qualms. Hammond had intended to use underhanded means to take Millicent’s money, and I saw nothing wrong with finding a way to prevent him from doing so.

  Cohen gave us some “go-to” Internet addresses for public information on the Miami developer and faxed some other data. After reading the material, I was struck by the developer’s absolute pettiness. Hammond, a man with a personal net worth in the high eight figures, dealt in hundreds of millions of dollars on a regular basis. That he would resort to cheating to win such a paltry amount—by comparison, admittedly—proved what an egomaniac he was. Win at all costs. Consequences be damned.

  Reviewing that information carried me into the afternoon, when Charlie’s promised roses showed up—pink, not red. The color perfectly matched Hazel’s powdered cheeks. I walked into the outer office to find her holding a small black box in her hand and muttering, “Charlie, you old fool.”

  He took a ring from the box and held it up. She blushed brighter but held out her hand. He slipped the circlet on her finger.

  “Congratulations,” I said. “It’s about time.”

  “BJ, are you sure it’s all right?” Hazel turned toward me but continued to gaze at the modest diamond and sapphire ring on her finger.

  “Of course it’s all right. If he’d waited much longer, I’d have bought the ring myself and claimed it was from him. When’s the wedding?”

  “We haven’t talked about a date. I didn’t even know he’d bought a ring.”

  “Had it for a month,” Charlie said. “Just waiting for the right time.”

  I clapped each of them on a shoulder. “Well, I’m going to settle the date right now. You two are getting married in my living room on New Year’s Eve, just before the ball drops in Times Square. Agreed?”

  “I guess so.” Charlie gave Hazel a look.

  Her pudgy cheeks dimpled in a smile. “Sounds good to me. But I want a small affair. Nothing elaborate.”

  I went home that evening happy for two of my favorite people, but as I walked into the kitchen and found Paul throwing together a quick meal, my world turned bittersweet. Hazel and Charlie could sanctify their love in a public ceremony—and more power to them—but that privilege was denied us. Why? For the millionth time, that question came to mind, and I did not like the ugly answer that rose in response.

  THE NEXT afternoon, as I harvested some additional information on Hammond from the websites Cohen had provided, Hazel announced a phone call from my old comrade-in-arms, James Guerrero.

  “I don’t know if you’re still interested in that fellow you called me about the other day,” he said, “but I ran across something interesting this morning on Hector Acosta.”

  Despite the fact the GSR investigation had closed and my present assignment was Hammond, I assured him I was.

  “Do you remember I told you Acosta supposedly made a lot of money in Brazilian emeralds? Well, there’s a little bit of a stink about that. Not in Mexico but down in Brazil. The former mine owner, who’s also the landowner, claims he’s been defrauded.”

  “What kind of fraud?”

  As Guerrero related the tale, the owners—a family named Guzman—knew the mine was pretty near played out when they leased it to Acosta and his associates. They had sold the mineral rights for a pittance but insisted on a royalty provision. The modest monthly payments they were receiving satisfied the family until a write-up in the Mexican press extolled the exploits of Don Hector Acosta. The article made a big point of the millions he had made on Brazilian emeralds. Supposedly enough to bankroll everything else—the ranch, some commercial developments in Mexico City and Veracruz and Durango and elsewhere. Old man Guzman read it and immediately contacted his lawyer to file a suit claiming a million in unpaid royalties and nine million in damages.

  “I take it from your tone of voice that doesn’t sound right to you,” I said.

  “Nope, it sounds like money laundering to me. That’s conjecture… not a conclusion. It would be a hell of a way to wash dirty money.”

  “If that’s the case, you’d think they’d take the mine owner into their confidence.”

  “I damned sure would have. If that’s what was up, the last thing they need is a squeaky wheel. And a loud squeaky wheel, at that.”

  “You said Acosta has some commercial developments in several places. That might tie into something else that’s related. See if you can find any connection between Acosta and a man named Kenneth Hammond or Hammond Development, Inc. out of Miami, will you?”

  I gave him the particulars on the Florida developer be
fore we did some Corps reminiscing and hung up. Acosta and Hammond were both into commercial development. Maybe they knew one another, had joint business interests.

  The Brazilian lawsuit required a bit of thought as well. It might provide a chink in the Mexican rancher’s armor that could be exploited. If Acosta felt some pressure, he might be inclined to help Millicent with her wager problem as a public relations ploy. Providing he had ties to the Miami Cuban business community and Hammond, of course.

  I gave Acosta’s name to Cohen so he could check for a Miami connection while James nosed around his contacts across the border. Then I phoned Millicent to see if she knew of any association between the two. I expressed surprise when she answered her own phone.

  “I do that quite often, actually. But Maria isn’t here today, so I’m it.”

  “Where’s Maria?”

  “She and Luis had to go home. Or at least, they had to go to the Lightning Ranch. Paco was breaking a bronc and it fell on him. Broke his shoulder, they say.”

  “Will he be all right?”

  “Oh yes. But Maria needed to see for herself, so I told them to take a week off. They should be back by the weekend. Have you made any progress?”

  I told her about Bob Cohen and filled in some of his background, including the fact he knew Hammond slightly.

  “I have him looking for Hispanic contacts,” I said, “because I believe your duck disappeared across the border after Liver Lips took her.”

  “I see.” She sounded distant, distracted.

  “Is everything all right?”

  “Yes. Except for maybe losing the ranch that’s been in my family for a hundred years, everything’s peachy. Hector’s made another offer. Sweetened it by about half a spoonful of sugar.”

  “But it’s still not an acceptable offer?”

  “No.”

  “If you do end up having to sell it, why don’t you put it on the market?”

  “That’s what I’ll probably do.”

  “If we aren’t successful in getting you out from under this, do you think Hammond will take a mortgage on the place and let you pay it off?”