The event center had been cleverly designed with two second-story decks that ran all the way around the entire room. The floor seating could be moved to accommodate proscenium-arch productions for concerts and plays or to feature an arena-style configuration for sporting events.
I checked the seven exits and walked down a supply corridor that led to a concrete loading dock and staging area in the back of the annex. Band equipment and scenery could be loaded into the event room through this corridor.
After I had a pretty good idea of the layout, I still wasn't ready for bed. I found a place in the quiet lobby where I could think.
I still had Rick O'Shea's arrest warrant in my pocket. I had been intending to go to the tribal police and get them to help me serve it. However, now that I knew this whole resort was owned by E. C. Mesa, I wasn't sure that was such a hot idea anymore. Unless, that is, I could get an updated players' report.
I dug into my pocket with my left hand, got my cell phone, then dialed Sally Quinn.
"This better be fucking great, Shane," she said, obviously reading my name on her LCD screen.
"I need someone to give me the name of a cop I can trust with my life at the Tohono O'odham Indian Reservation. It's just outside of Tucson."
"You need what?" her voice getting sharper as she came awake.
"I have a judge's warrant for a prime murder suspect, but my doer is friends with the guy who owns this resort. I don't want to ask the reservation cops for help serving the warrant only to have them give me up to the perp."
"How do you spell it? That Indian name."
I gave her the spelling.
"Call you right back."
I hung up and looked around at the lush decor of the casino and hotel lobby. This whole opulent resort was like a bad version of Escape from New York, walled off from the poverty and outlaws that surrounded it.
Then I remembered Alexa telling me that the Mesa Indians had spent millions of dollars on border issues last year. Since there are no coincidences in law enforcement, I wondered, how does a man named E. C. Mesa, who has a fascination for Indian motorcycles, own a lush resort on a Mesa Indian reservation right on the Southwest's main drug corridor?
My phone rang, interrupting this thought.
"Yeah?"
"Okay, the guy you want to talk to is Captain Thomas Ironwood," Sally said. "Calloway called a friend of his on the Phoenix PD who says Ironwood used to work there and he's a kick-ass cop. He checked with the reservation PD and found out Captain Ironwood works nights on that department because that's when all the action takes place. I got an old Phoenix PD Web site article here that says he's a full-blooded Tohono Indian who got recruited to the reservation PD from the Phoenix drug-enforcement squad. He's ex-military, a Green Beret. Captain Calloway's friend on the Phoenix PD says you can trust Ironwood all the way."
"Thanks. Go back to sleep. Sorry I woke you."
I got up and went back to the concierge desk and asked where the Tohono Nation Police Station was. I was told it was about a quarter mile down the road in New Town. The concierge offered to have the casino host drive me.
Graham met me outside, his permanent smile in place.
We climbed into his golf cart and headed down the road. The electric cart buzzed as the headlights sawed through the early-morning darkness.
New Town was a grouping of recently constructed homes, stores, and warehouses. It was located inside the nine-foot wall that protected the casino from the Mexican criminals and endless gunfights outside.
From the architecture, I estimated it had been constructed about the same time as the resort. There were several blocks of efficient but uninteresting boxy-looking one-story dwellings, which I guessed served as housing for the hotel and casino employees and their families.
The police station was a concrete-block building with microwave transmitters on the roof and four blue and white Tohono police cruisers parked out front. It was good equipment, well maintained.
I went inside, showed my creds to a desk sergeant, and asked to speak with Captain Thomas Ironwood, who, as Sally had said, was on duty, working nights. An overweight deputy led me to a small, neat office and told me to wait. After he left, I studied the room filled with pictures of a tall, lean sergeant in a marine uniform posed with a squad of soldiers in Iraq. There were at least half a dozen law-enforcement awards and plaques presented to Thomas Mitchell Ironwood from the Phoenix Rotary, PD, and city council.
A few minutes later a tall, well-built man about thirty-five years old with black, close-cropped hair and a neatly pressed uniform walked in.
Tm Tom Ironwood," he said. "How can I help you?" He had a military bearing and command presence.
I showed him my police credentials.
"LAPD?" He looked up and cocked an eyebrow. He was dark skinned with black eyes. Not quite handsome, but close.
I told him I had an arrest warrant for Rick O'Shea and about Diamond Peterson and how I thought she might be in some danger.
"You have the O'Shea warrant on you?" he asked.
I handed it to him. "I think he's scheduled to be one of the MMA fighters at that 'Rage in the Cage' thing at the event center tomorrow night. He's not on the poster, but I think that's because he knows he's hot. I'm betting because of the size of the purse he'll show up anyway. If he does, I'd like your help serving this."
"I can already tell you that nobody named Rick O'Shea is on the reservation," Tom Ironwood said. "You're the second guy's come in here tonight asking about him. The other one didn't have a warrant, so there wasn't much we could do but take a look on the computer. Check the gate sign-ins."
"Another guy?"
"Mexican named Vargas." He looked at me carefully. "A lawyer. According to his gate log-in he's staying over at the old Blue Mountain Lodge on the northeast edge of the res. It's about four miles down the road outside the wall, off Highway Seven, across from the new waste dump in Old Town."
"Can you check and see if you have a record of Diamond Peterson arriving yesterday?" I asked.
He scanned his computer. "No," he said. "That means she's not here. With that wall and all our perimeter security there's no way in or out except through the main gate. If she was on the property, it would be listed here."
I didn't want to get into it with him, but according to jack he was wrong about both Diamond and O'Shea. They were both in the casino earlier this evening.
I thanked him for his help. I wanted to ask him about E. C. Mesa. But some survival instinct told me not to. I went to the reception area and called Desert Taxi, then went outside to wait.
The sun was just breaking the horizon in the east. I watched as it rose slowly, its red and gold beams casting long fingers of light across the desert sand, just as it always had at dawn on Seal Beach thirty years ago.
The cab arrived, and I told the driver where I wanted to go.
Then I was traveling toward that red-gold ball of light with the ghost of Walter Dix right behind me. I could almost feel him on that big old cigar box, paddling hard, breathing through his mouth, hurrying to catch the curl.
Paddle fasta. Dis is our poundah, bra.
Chapter 53
The Blue Mountain Lodge was a concrete-block, one-story motel situated near a garbage-disposal pit.
The motel sat outside the resort security wall and, as a result, had paid a high price in broken windows, litter, and spray-can graffiti. It was about a half a mile down the road from Old Town, which, as I drove past, gave off the tired look of despair. The structures in Old Town were ramshackle with broken equipment advertising broken lives.
When we pulled into the parking lot, it was only a little past five, but as I got out of the cab, I was immediately hit by the toxic smell of garbage coming from the clump across the street.
I went to the front desk and showed my credentials to a tired-looking, overweight Indian woman with a lined face and rat-nest hair who was perched on a high-backed stool behind the desk. I gave her a twenty and asked her
if Sabas Vargas was registered here. She never got up, but told me that Vargas was in room six. I reached over her shoulder and plucked the room key off a peg.
"Do not call and announce me," I told her, then flashed my creds again to make the order stick.
I walked down the cracked cement walkway, past scarred wood doors, until I found room six. I unlocked without knocking and stepped inside. The room was threadbare and smelled of cooking grease and cigarette smoke.
Vargas was sprawled on the bed in his underwear. When he heard the door open he reared up on his elbows and squinted at me with unfocused eyes.
"What the fuck?" he growled.
I crossed the room, pulled his pants off the chair, and handed them to him. "Get dressed," I said.
"I'm through taking orders from you, Scully."
"Let's go. I'm buying breakfast."
He blinked a few times, then stood and put on his pants. He grabbed a denim shirt off another chair, then went into the bathroom and closed the door. I heard water running. When he returned to the bedroom he was wide awake but still trying to figure out what was going on.
"You have a rental car?" I asked.
"Yeah, the red Mustang out front."
"You're driving. Come on."
We exited the room and walked to his car. I waited while he fished around for his keys and unlocked the door. We got in and pulled out onto the highway.
"I saw a coffee shop a mile back," I said. "We gotta get away from this smell."
"Yeah ... I didn't see the dump cause it was dark when I checked in and the wind was blowing the other way."
We drove to a small wood-sided restaurant on the highway that advertised a farm breakfast special: Eggs, potatoes, choice of chicken or fried steak.
We climbed the steps, went inside the half-full diner, and sat at an empty booth at the front window. An Indian waitress came over, poured our coffee, and left two menus. When she was gone, I leaned forward.
"Okay, Sabas. I'm only gonna say this once."
"I don't wanta hear it."
"Yes you do. Its an apology."
He sat back, not sure how to react.
"You were right," I said. "I was trying to shut you guys out. I wanted this to be just between Walt and me. All those years since I graduated Huntington House, I've been running away from him, Sabas. It was such a bad time in my life I didn't want to go back. I didn't want to deal with those old memories. If I'd gone over there, I would have seen this coming. I wouldVe gotten a nose full of Rick O'Shea. I woulda sensed something and stopped him. Like you, I've been kicking myself."
We were silent, eyeing each other across a scarred linoleum table-top. At first, his eyes were shiny black marbles, radiating distrust, but slowly, they softened.
"Sucks, doesn't it?" he said. "Knowing you could've saved Pop but were too wrapped up in your own bullshit to even try."
"Yeah." I sighed. "I've been dragging it around for a week. I just figured since I screwed up so bad, that it was my job to fix it. I didn't want help from the rest of you. I kept telling myself you were amateurs and you'd just screw it up. Maybe from a law-enforcement standpoint that was correct, but from an emotional one, it was selfish. I'm sorry. That's the whole apology. It's the best I can do."
Sabas reached across the table and put one of his big, scarred paws on my left hand and squeezed it once before letting go. "Apology accepted."
"Jacks still running with these guys" I told him. "He called last night and told me Diamond showed up here yesterday. She got into an argument with O'Shea in the casino. O'Shea pulled her out of there. Jack said it caused a big ruckus.
"According to the tribal police, there's no record of either of them being on the reservation, but since Jack saw them both yesterday they gotta be here. I'm worried about Diamond. Her name's not registered at the security gate, so I have no idea how she got in. But if Jack's right, then O'Shea got his hands on her, and I don't have a clue yet where she is."
"Maybe I do," Sabas said. He set his coffee down. "I saw Chris Calabro in the casino last night right after I first got here around seven. He was alone playing the slots. I hung back and watched. After he wiped out I followed him.
"He goes back to this little house that's about a half a mile down the road from the casino right on the golf course. I asked around and found out the casino has two or three bungalows that aren't listed on the room charts. They give them to the main acts who play the show rooms. The guys from Team Ultima are all staying in one of those. That's probably where they took her."
"Good stuff," I said.
He smiled. "So how do we do this?"
"I found out last night that E. C. Mesa owns the Talking Stick Hotel and Casino."
"Yeah, I learned that too. It's why I went down and registered at the Blue Mountain Lodge. But I can't put up with that smell another night."
"We're all at the resort under Seriana's name. We should be okay there 'til tonight. We've got plenty of room in our suite. Let's move you in with us. Then we can start working on a strategy."
He nodded, gazing out at the hot dry Tohono O'odham reservation. Then he said, "It's turned into a fully developed sea, bra."
It was what Pop always called any dangerous sea where without warning, a riptide could sweep you far out into the bay with little chance of getting back to shore. Pop never let us surf when it was like that.
"I guess sometimes you just gotta take a chance and go out anyway," Sabas said softly.
Chapter 54
"Where the hell did you go?" Alexa demanded as I walked through the door. "I've been worried sick."
"Look who I found," I said.
Sabas walked into the Pinto Suite behind me. All of the women, including Alexa, hugged him.
We gathered in the suite over room-service coffee and studied a site map of the resort that I'd found in the leather-bound folder on the writing desk. Sabas pointed to the spot where he had followed Calabro. A small cluster of three bungalows were indicated halfway dow n the tenth fairway.
"Why don't we all sign up for golf," Alexa suggested. "Rent carts, go to the tenth fairway. Try and see inside."
It was a good plan, so we callcd and got an early tee time at 8:30 A. M. Next we arranged for club and shoe rentals. At the appointed hour, we signed in at the pro shop, got our equipment, and took off in two carts. I drove one, Sabas the other.
Once we were out of sight of the first tee and the clubhouse, using a course map we'd picked up at the pro shop, we drove across the third and sixth fairways and shot off the cart path, through the rough, passing several other foursomes ahead of us.
The hot desert sun was making a slow climb in the clear blue sky. It was low enough so I could feel it shooting under the cart awning, heating the back of my neck and shoulders.
When we reached the tenth tee, we parked and waited. Nobody was coming up behind us, so we headed our carts on down the tenth fairway and pulled to a stop next to each other across from the bungalow Sabas had pointed out.
"You two guys have already been burned," Alexa said. She pulled a club out of her bag, dropped a ball, and sliced it over by the bungalow where Sabas had told us the fight team from NHB was staying. Then Alexa, Vicki, and Seriana walked toward the house and into the rough where they began searching for Alexa's ball. Sabas and I were backup, watching from twenty yards away.
Alexa moved toward the back fence of the target bungalow and began walking along the east side of the house. Then she turned and came back again.
"Not here," she called out to Vicki. "Try around to your right."
They continued to search, looking into the windows of the house from time to time as they traversed the back fence. Five minutes later they all turned and came quickly back to the carts. I could tell something was wrong.
Alexa got into my cart as Sabas pulled alongside with Vicki and Seriana. Each woman wore a tight, strained expression.
"She's there," Vicki said angrily.
"You saw Diamond?" Sabas said.
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"Yeah," Vicki said. "She's swimming in the pool. What kinda hostage gets to take a morning dip in the fucking pool? I was worried when jack said she showed up here asking for O'Shea. I think this makes it pretty obvious the bitch is in on it!"
I looked at Alexa, who nodded.
"I don't get it," I said. "If she's one of them, then why didn't she tell O'Shea I was a cop?"
"Let's not deal with it now," Alexa said. "Let's just get out of here."
Sabas and I floored the little electric carts and, without another word, whizzed off down the fairway.
Chapter 55
We were in the Pinto Suite trying to deal with the idea that Diamond had betrayed us. But I was having trouble seeing it. Besides not telling O'Shea that I was a cop, she also hadn't burned Jack.
If she had scammed Pop into signing all those documents, then she was an accessory in his murder. She had a lot at stake. If she was an accomplice, she'd tell them. But Jack was still hanging with them, and that meant she hadn't.
Wouldn't she also tell O'Shea that we'd learned about the challenge match on this reservation and that we were planning on being here? Knowing that, why would O'Shea take the chance and show up here at all? Yet according to Jack, he had. So, what the hell was going on?
After I repeated these concerns to the others, we all sat around trying to come up with a reason that would fit the known facts. Nobody could do it.
Alexa finally looked at me and said, "The Black-Hole Rule."
"The what?" Sabas scowled.
Alexa said, "In astronomy, when the known astronomical facts don t fit the action of the planets, then there's usually a black hole you can't see creating the magnetic pull. Same is true in law enforcement. Since Diamond's actions don't fit our known facts, we have to assume there's an information hole we don't know about that's causing it."
Sabas said, "We gotta take some action. We can't just sit here and do nothing."
"Regardless of what we just saw, I think we still need to treat Diamond as a hostage," Alexa said. "We can't put her life at risk without having the answers to Shane's questions. T hat means we've got to come up with a way to rescue her before we attempt to arrest O'Shea."
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