A Cold-Blooded Business (16 page)

Her feet still churning, she crashed into some kind of stretchy barrier that held for a second and then gave.

She tumbled forward and would have hit hard if the tangle of tree limbs and enveloping material hadn't cushioned her fall. When she got her breath back, she fought her way to her feet and the first thing she saw was Mutt, staring down at her from the lip of the little hollow with an expression of incredulous delight. "Oh, ha ha, very funny," Kate said sourly, and looked around.

She had somersaulted into a tiny clearing, sheltered from wind and, judging from the thickness of the overgrowth, pretty efficiently from rain as well, although not as well as it had been before Kate's arrival.

In the clearing there was an old tin pot, battered and rusted. There were the ashes of a fire, lukewarm to the touch. There were two bottles of Thunderbird, both empty. There was a woman, curled in a fetal position on another square of plastic with a third bottle cradled in her arms. She was dressed in ragged jeans and a thin nylon jacket, long dark hair matted around her face and neck. She was a sound sleeper, considering Kate had just crashed through her roof. She kept sleeping as Kate re stretched the square of plastic tarp and refastened it to the trees, and she was still sleeping when Kate left.

Mutt, discovering what was wanted, nosed out another three shelters in that stand of alders, all of them as luxuriously furnished and none with the residents at home. They checked out another section of hillside close to the Alaska Native Service Hospital with the same result. At five o'clock Kate gave it up, climbed laboriously back up the hillside, found the Blazer and drove home to take a very long, very hot shower.

Jack didn't say

"I told you so," but he was so sympathetic and understanding the entire evening that Kate wanted to kill him anyway.

The next morning Kate invaded Costco, emerging $398.76 later, secure in the knowledge that the outhouse on her homestead was not going to run out of toilet paper until the next century, and grateful that Jack had a large garage.

That evening Axenia surprised Kate by arriving exactly on time and playing the part of the perfect guest. She complimented Jack on the dinner (which Kate had cooked), played Tetris with Johnny on his new Game Boy and generally stayed as far away from Kate as she could and still be in the same house. Kate let her. Axenia didn't mention Ekaterina's whereabouts or why she had been in Anchorage in the first place, and Kate didn't ask.

Sunday morning was spent fighting over the Sunday paper with Jack and Johnny, after which father and son went skiing at Alyeska. They invited Kate along but she could tell their hearts weren't in the invitation, and she shooed them off on their own, glad to see the backs of both of them. She was beginning to feel crowded. Johnny had the television on from the time he woke up till the time he went to bed. It was wearing.

She consoled herself with the thought that it was also temporary, and curled up again with Backlash, trying to ignore the sound of jet engines on short finals to Elmendorf Air Force Base, the yells of children playing in the park across the street and the cars driving by with rap music booming loud enough to be heard in the fillings in her teeth.

At five P.M. Monday the Bobbsey Twins presented themselves on Jack's front doorstep, wearing identical scowls. "You got the files?" Childress said, a belligerent thrust to his jaw.

"No," Kate said, "I sold them to Sheila Toomey. She says there's enough in them to keep the Anchorage Daily News going for the next year." She stood back, holding the door open. John King stamped inside. Childress, his face brick-red, followed with a damning glare.

They seated themselves in the living room. Kate perched on the arm of a chair and didn't give them a chance to start in. "Last Tuesday's charter was delayed."

John King folded his arms across his chest and eyed her over the toes of his boots. "So? It happens."

"So it came in a day late, twenty-four hours overdue."

"And?"

"And that night I personally witnessed three separate cases of drug-related behavior in widely dispersed areas across the field."

Childress muttered beneath his breath. John King said, "Keep talking."

Kate gave a slight shrug. "Could mean nothing. Could be a coincidence."

She met King's bespectacled glare without flinching.

"Could mean the dealer changes out on a Tuesday, and his or her customers went a little overboard when they finally got their supply."

"You got any evidence?" Childress demanded.

"Yes."

"What?"

"The same thing has happened twice before."

"What a load of crap!" he exploded. "John, let me--"

"Shit," John King said, his scowl deepening. "You sure about this, Shugak?"

"No. All I'm telling you is there is a pattern. Three times during the last twelve calendar months there have been a rash of drug-related incidents to which your North Slope medical staff have responded. Prior to each time the incidents occurred, the charter was delayed either one or two days."

Childress started to speak and Kate held up a hand. "There's something else. Toni Hartzler, Public Relations. Gideon Trocchiano, Catering."

She took a breath, held it. "Jerry Mcisaac, physician's assistant."

The room was still for a moment. King had flushed red up to the roots of his hair, and he growled, "What about them?"

"They all change out on Tuesday."

"So does half of Production and most of GPS," Childress snapped. "John, don't listen to this shit! There's no motive here! All three of these people are making over seventy grand a year, what possible motive could they have for selling dope?" John King said sharply, "Hartzler's making seventy?" Kate interrupted both of them without apology. "I'm not looking for a motive, I'm looking for opportunity." They were silenced.

"I'll find out how, you can work on why after the fact. There's more.

All three of these people have their own transportation, not something that comes easy on the Slope unless it's assigned to the job. And all three of them have jobs that keep them out in the field, all over the field or, as in Trocchiano's case, a job that brings the field to them.

Each time the incidents occurred, Toni Hartzler, Gideon Trocchiano and Jerry Mcisaac were scheduled to fly up and were late getting in due to the charter delay. And each time, the incidents occurred after they were on the ground."

"Goddamnit," King muttered.

"One other thing. The odds are big against all three of them being on the same plane on the same day at the same time. Trocchiano is a contract employee in catering, whose staff works two-and-one. Mcisaac is in and out on medevacs. Hartzler is up and down on tours; from what I can tell from the manifests, half the time she flies commercial, accompanying her tour group from gate to gate."

"But all three of them were all on these flights."

"Yes, except for Mcisaac, who flew up on the second charter last Wednesday."

"Then why include him?"

"Because he was on the other two flights, and he did make it up on Wednesday, just not on the same plane. He has to be included." "John,"

Childress said, unable to contain himself a moment longer, "this is crap. Let me sniff around UCo, put out some feelers, I can find out where it's coming from and then--"

"It's coming directly into the Base Camp," Kate said.

That silenced him, but not for long. "How do you know?"

"Because I was offered toots from wholesale amounts of it in half a dozen rooms in the Base Camp on Saturday night."

John King surged to his feet. "What! Why the hell didn't you tell me when I called you Wednesday?"

"You hired me to find the dealer. I haven't yet. Besides, King, it's not UCo and you know it."

"And just how the hell do you know that?" Childress demanded.

Still looking at John King, Kate replied, "UCo contracts out to both sides of the field. It's a given that if a UCo employee was doing the dealing the problems would be occurring on both sides of the field at once. They aren't, are they?"

Silence. A long one.

John King stirred. He removed his cowboy hat, smoothed back his hair and reseated the hat with the air of a trail driver ready to ship the herd out to Abilene in the teeth of rustlers, tornadoes and hostile Indians.

He looked across at Kate, yet another hostile Indian. "You find the fucker for me, Shugak. That's all I care about. I don't give a damn if my mama's the one doing the dealing, just find her."

She nodded. He left.

Childress snapped his eels king briefcase shut and paused, looking at her, his upper lip lifting as if he smelled something bad. "I don't need your help, I didn't ask for it and I don't want it." He stepped forward so she'd have to tilt her head to meet his eyes. "I'll be watching, Shugak. You fuck up one time, I'll be there and I'll have your ass off the Slope so fast you won't have time to kick your heels together three times."

Kate remembered Toni's invocation of that same spell and gave an involuntary laugh. It infuriated Childress and he stamped out the door.

"So much for the drugs being brought up the haul road by contractors,"

Jack observed from the doorway.

"You hear all that?"

"Uh-huh." He tossed a thick manila envelope in her lap. "Present for you." She opened it up and found a report on Lou Childress inside. "He cloth protest too much," Jack said when Kate looked up. "Makes me nervous."

She shook her head. "Dicks R Us, We Suspect Everybody."

"You know my methods, Watson," he replied with a modest inclination of his head.

"You read it?"

He shook his head. "Just got it today. Investigator told me Childress is maxed out on all his credit cards, though, and he just refinanced his house."

"Lot of people did that when the interest rates went down," Kate observed. "It's hard to think the head of RPetco Security, who has to be pulling down a hundred grand a year minimum, could be dumb enough to deal drugs."

"Stranger things have happened."

"What drugs?" Johnny wanted to know. He came all the way into the room and stood next to his father. Both of them were sunburned.

"Cocaine," Jack told him. "It's a case Kate is working on. What do you want for dinner, squirt?"

"Peach pancakes," Johnny replied promptly. Jack rumpled his hair.

"Hey, Dad," Johnny said, ducking away, "don't mess with the mane."

"Sorry," Jack said, hiding a grin. "No peach pancakes today, no peaches in the cupboard." "How about Mcdonald's?" Johnny said hopefully.

"One Big Mac coming up," Jack said. He looked at Kate. "Sound okay to you?"

She shook her head. "I've taken a moral stand against eating at Mcdonald's." She saw their looks and added, "Don't ask."

The next morning Jack drove her to the airport. On the ramp he got out to get her bag out of the back. She took it and jerked her head at Johnny, riding shotgun in the front seat. "Call your attorney." He nodded. "I mean it, Jack. He doesn't want to live with her and he's old enough to choose. No judge with any brains or balls is going to force him to."

The lines in his face relaxed and he kissed her, hard. "See you next week."

She entered the swinging doors in time to see Billy Bob Nielsen, production operator at One, accosted by a Hare Krishna, equipped with carnations, copies of the Bhagavad Gita and an ingratiating smile. The smile slipped a little when the big man picked him up and set him head down in the March of Dimes wishing well, to the accompaniment of a round of applause from every passenger and worker in the terminal.

Kate paused next to Dale, who was watching with an expression of deep appreciation. The big man came up to them, dusting his hands. "Nice job, Billy Bob," Dale told him.

Billy Bob's grin split his beard from ear to ear. "The fulfillment of a life-long dream."

It didn't get him a seat next to Dale on the charter, however. Chris Heller was on the flight, and he grabbed it, settling in between Kate and Dale. "Hello," Kate said.

It took him a minute to place her. "Oh, hi. Kate Shugak, right?"

"How are things at the dig?"

He beamed. "Great, we think we're about to find a body."

"Terrific," Kate said.

"Any more asshole senators you gotta take around this time up?"

"Only if I get real lucky." She reached into a pocket and her hand closed around a small, hard object. "I'm coming out to visit Tode Point this week."

He ran a hand through his hair and grinned, displaying a deep dimple in one cheek. "I have been warned. The kids'll be ecstatic, a real-live Native American in their real-live Native American dig."

Kate noticed Dale trying to pretend she wasn't listening and introduced her. "Dale Triplett, Chris Heller. Dale's a production operator.

Chris is an archaeologist."

"No kidding? An archaeologist?" Dale inspected this new life form with cautious interest. "How about that. So? Was there really a Curse of the Pharaohs?" "Absolutely," Chris said at once. "There was an inscription on the wall outside the door where Carter and Carnarvon went in." He dropped his voice to a spectral whisper."

"They who enter this sacred tomb shall swift be visited by wings of death."

"

Dale's eyes widened. Breathlessly, she prompted, "What happened?"

"Carnarvon died of blood poisoning five months after the burial chamber was breached. Carter was fired and discredited. One witness to the opening of the tomb was murdered by his wife, another was killed by a taxi in the streets of Cairo. The Egyptian government fell five times in the five years following the discovery. And Lady Carnarvon was killed by grave robbers." He thought for a moment. "And eaten," he added.

Dale looked suitably appalled and hid behind the morning paper to ward off further gory details.

Kate gave Chris a speculative look. He dimpled. "I thought so," she said, and opened her own paper to the crossword puzzle. The first clue to meet her eyes was "boy king" in three letters. She wouldn't tell Chris and Dale what made her laugh.

Eighty-seven minutes out of Anchorage the 727 touched down at Prudhoe.