Chili Con Carnage (17 page)

Gert steepled her fingers and tapped her chin. “Sounds good, doesn’t it? He’d seen the light, and turned away from a life of crime. But remember what I said about Robert. Lazy as the day is long and as dishonest as any man who ever walked the Earth. Turns out the reason he walked away from his profitable little drug venture was because he tried to shake down whoever was above him in the drug hierarchy. Robert wanted a bigger piece of the profit pie, and when he didn’t get it, he opened his big mouth and said he’d go to the cops and bring down the whole enterprise. Needless to say, there were some people who were pretty angry, and they swore they’d come after him.”

“Which is why he was hiding out here at the Showdown and why he changed his name.”

Gert didn’t confirm or deny. She didn’t have to. “He’d taken a lot of money with him, but of course, he was blowing through that pretty fast. Robert always loved the good life! So that’s why he was laying low, and that’s why he was working as a roadie. He figured if he was traveling, he’d always be one step ahead of the guys who were looking for him.”

I wasn’t sure I wanted to know the answer, because I hated to have my theory about Puff as murderer shot all to hell, but I had to ask. “Do you think they might have killed him?”

“He claimed he was safe. He claimed they didn’t know where he was. But if someone else involved in the enterprise did . . .”

She didn’t have to say it, she was thinking about Puff, just like I was.

“Which gets us right back to where we started,” I pointed out. “If Puff killed your nephew . . .”

“Then I might have killed Puff. For revenge. Only I didn’t.” She slid me a look. “I couldn’t have. I wasn’t here last night.”

On the cop shows on TV, they would call this an alibi and head off to investigate whether it was true or not. It wasn’t like I didn’t want to, I just wasn’t sure where to begin. Except at the source.

“Where were you?” I asked Gert.

“That . . .” She gave my knee a sharp, friendly slap and stood. “That’s something I can’t tell you.”

It’s not like I had any authority, I mean, not like the cops would if they asked the same question. That didn’t keep me from giving it my best shot. I followed her over to the dish towel rack. “If the cops can’t confirm your alibi, it’s going to make you look guilty.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. I’ve talked to the police. They know my connection to Robert and they don’t think a thing of it.”

“But if they should come around and ask about last night—”

“Then I’ll tell them.”

“But when I asked—”

“I told you, Maxie, that’s something I can’t tell you.”

It took me a couple minutes to chew over this tangled train of thought, and when I was done, I was no closer to working it out. “You can tell the cops, but you can’t tell me.”

Gert folded a dishtowel. “That’s right.”

“Because . . . ?”

She set the towel in the tub. “Because I promised I wouldn’t.”

“You promised—” In a whoosh that sounded like a balloon getting punctured, the air rushed out of my lungs. “Jack!”

Gert set another towel in the tub. “I can’t say.”

“But Gert . . .” I stood on the other side of the tub from her, and because she was acting like it was no big deal and I knew different, I gave the tub a little kick to get her attention. “If you know where he is, if you know what’s going on—”

“I’m sorry, Maxie.” She stripped another towel off the rack. “I’m sworn to secrecy.”

“But you can tell me if he’s all right, can’t you? You can tell me that he’s not hurt, or sick. Gert, you’ve got to help me out here. If you’re in touch with Jack—”

“I didn’t say that.”

“But you said—”

“I said I couldn’t tell you where I was last night.” She laid the last of the towels in the tub, snapped on the top, and brushed her hands together. “I hear you’re sticking around so you can go to court with Sylvia tomorrow. You’ll meet us in Vegas?”

“Vegas?” I couldn’t believe she was talking about Showdown business. Not at a time like this. I thought about dropping to my knees and begging her for the truth, but I’m not the begging type and something told me it wouldn’t work, anyway. That didn’t mean a little whining wasn’t in order. “Gert, you can’t do this to me. It’s cruel and unusual punishment.”

“I’m sorry, Maxie.” Gert walked over to the doorway of the tent, and her message was clear. It was time for me to hit the road. “I wish I could help you, but I can’t.”

“Can’t? Or won’t?”

Her smile was soft around the edges. “See you in Vegas.”

I wasn’t sure if I should laugh, cry, or throw the mother of all tantrums.

I didn’t do any of those things.

Instead, I went back to the RV, my head swirling with possibilities.

What was Gert trying to tell me without telling me anything?

That she’d been in touch with Jack? That he was okay, and nothing was wrong, and he’d be back any day now?

Or was she being foxier than that?

Halfway back to the RV, I stopped and turned to look over my shoulder toward Gert’s tent. If she was still in there, still packing away her merchandise, I couldn’t see her. That didn’t keep me from picturing the way she’d looked when she was talking about secrets and promises—as sweet as honey and as innocent as the driven snow. With just a little sorry thrown in there to soften the blow.

Like everyone else at the Showdown, she knew I was concerned to the point of obsession with what had happened to Jack. Just like she knew that as soon as she introduced even one little tantalizing hint that she might know what’s going on with him, I’d get thrown right off the Roberto/Puff track.

Well, it had worked, hadn’t it?

The only question now was if Gert was sincere.

Or playing me for a sucker.

It wasn’t easy finding a spot for the RV in the El Rancho parking lot.

I maneuvered, squeezed, tweaked, and adjusted. Once I was satisfied—the guy to my right who I was way too close to would not be—I went inside.

Just as I expected, Joey P was behind the bar. He recognized me and came right over to where I was perched on one of the tall stools. One leg of the stool was shorter than the others and it rocked back and forth and took me along for the ride.

“Lite beer?” he asked.

To say it had been a long weekend was putting it mildly. Grateful that he was the kind of bartender who remembered what his customers drank, I took him up on his offer and got down to business.

“Karmen,” I said by way of introducing the subject.

Joey P didn’t even need to look around. There was a couple in the booth near the windows, another playing one of the rackety pinball machines over on the other side of the bar. El Rancho was the kind of place people didn’t show up at until well after the sun was down and the music was cranked nice and loud. “Haven’t seen her today,” he said.

I didn’t doubt him, but while I tipped back the gloriously icy beer bottle and took a drink, I looked around anyway. “I was actually thinking about yesterday,” I told Joey P. “Last night, say between . . .” I went over it again in my head. When I’d left for Roberto’s apartment, it was already after ten, and by the time I watched the video, got over to the Taos Inn, and got back to the fairgrounds with Nick, it must have been well past midnight. “Late,” I said, and decided to hedge my bets. “I’m thinking between nine and two in the morning.”

Joey P poured a bourbon shot for a guy at the end of the bar, delivered it, and settled in front of me, his beefy arms propped on the bar. “You’re thinking about that fire over at the fairgrounds.”

I pulled out money to pay for the beer along with a more-than-healthy tip and slid it across the bar to him. It wasn’t like I was trying to bribe the guy or anything. But I figured it didn’t hurt to let him know I was serious. “I mention Karmen and you automatically talk about the fire. Why?”

Joey P scratched his chin. “Saw it in the paper this morning. About the fire, I mean. And I know that chili cook-off, that’s where Roberto worked. And you’re here all of a sudden, asking about Karmen, the day after a murder. So, sure, I thought of the fire. And the guy who was killed. You think Karmen—”

“I’m just trying to get my facts straight,” I told Joey P, because it was true and because it made this whole conversation sound more casual and less like an interrogation. “Puff was a friend. I’m just wondering about what happened to him, that’s all.”

“Sure. I get it.” Joey P tugged on one stretched earlobe. “About how friends care about friends. Karmen, she hasn’t stopped talking about Roberto since he went and got himself killed and they were a whole lot more than friends, if you know what I mean.” If I didn’t, the wink he gave me would have given it away. “I guess you know how she’s feeling about the whole thing, huh, seeing as how you’ve run into her a couple times. Karmen, she’s as heartbroken as any chick I’ve ever seen. She doesn’t even get it, you know? That Roberto, he was dating you and he didn’t care about Karmen no more.”

“We weren’t exactly dating,” I pointed out, because really, one of these days, maybe someone would actually get it straight. “We went out once. Here. That night of the fight.”

Joey P shook his head. “Well, call it what you want, one date or the big brush-off for Karmen. It don’t make no difference. Roberto was done with her.”

“And Karmen was mad.”

“You bet. She was mad at you. She was plenty mad at Roberto. Until he was dead. Then all of a sudden, it’s like he’s some kind of saint, and she’s like the grieving widow, you know?”

I was glad he’d brought up the subject. Then it wouldn’t look so obvious when I did. “Angry and grieving. Not a pretty combination. Especially when it comes to someone with Karmen’s temper. Do you think, if she knew who killed Roberto . . . do you think she might have decided on a little revenge?”

Joey P had been lounging, wide shoulders relaxed, head tipped to the side in a lazy sort of way that said bartenders didn’t get a lot of down time and he was going to take advantage of every minute. Now, he stood up like a shot. “You think . . . ?” He pressed his lips together, thinking. “Karmen, she’s got the personality, that’s for sure. That bitch is hell on wheels.”

Maybe the nice, warm feeling in the pit of my stomach was thanks to the beer, but I didn’t think so. I think it was because—finally—I felt like I was getting somewhere with this little investigation of mine. Mirroring Joey P’s reaction, I sat up, something very much like hope hopping around along with the beer bubbles inside me. “So you think it’s possible Karmen could have killed the guy at the fairgrounds and set his trailer on fire? If she thought that guy killed Roberto? Because I’ll tell you what, that’s what I’ve been thinking, too.”

Laughing, Joey P waved one hand in my direction. “It would make a great story, don’t you think? Hate to tell you, sweetheart, but it ain’t possible. Karmen? She was here last night, whining and moaning and crying about Roberto. Again.”

“But if she was thinking about Roberto—”

“Thinking about him, missing him, blubbering over him. Yeah, that’s for sure. But she got here . . .” Joey P squeezed his eyes shut, thinking it over. “The football game just started,” he finally said, pointing to the big-screen TV in one corner of the bar. “That means it must have been nine o’clock. I know that’s when Karmen showed up because me and the guys at the bar here, we were trying to watch the game, and she walked in and started in on the whole I-miss-my-Roberto thing, and she was standing right in front of the TV when she did it. We missed the first couple plays thanks to her.”

“So she arrived around nine.” I thought this over. It still fit the time frame. If . . .

“What time did she leave?” I asked Joey P.

“This . . .” He rapped one finger on the bar. “I can tell you down to the minute. Because Karmen spent the evening drowning her sorrows in Jack Daniel’s. By midnight, she’d had enough to dull her pain. I know this for a fact because she finally shut up, and we finally got a break from her bawling.”

“So she could have been feeling calmer. Or maybe the liquor just made her madder about Roberto’s murder. Or it gave her the courage she thought she needed. Then, she could have left here and—”

“Not a chance,” Joey P told me. “The reason Karmen finally shut up is because she passed out. At three, after I locked up and cleaned up and turned off all the lights, I carried her out of here, poured her into my car, and drove Karmen home.”

“So she didn’t kill Puff.”

“You got that right.”

I suppose I should have been happy to hear it. After all, it eliminated Karmen as one of my suspects.

But it didn’t exactly put me in a great state of mind.

I finished my beer, and tried to buy a bag of barbecue chips for the road, but Joey P insisted I take them as a gift. Then I carefully (was I really parked
that
close to that guy on my right?) guided the RV out of the parking lot and back to the fairgrounds.

Once I was there safe and sound and with no damage to the RV or the cars around me, I rewarded myself for a job well done by digging into the bag of chips. When I got out of the RV, brushing barbecue-flavored powder off my hands, I came around the corner toward the Palace and stopped dead in my tracks.

“When I didn’t see your RV, I thought maybe you’d left town.” Elbows back and legs stuck out in front of him, Carter Donnelly leaned against the front of the Palace, his smile as bright as it was when he was in front of the cameras. He held up two white deli-style bags. “I brought sandwiches. A lamb burger for me. Chicken, guajillo chili, and Cotija cheese for you. Unless you’ve got something against Cotija cheese.”

“I love Cotija!” I darted forward. “Jack sometimes uses it on top of chili. It tastes like Parmesan and—” I don’t usually get embarrassed, but when I realized I was lecturing a chef about the Mexican cheese I loved, I clamped my lips shut.

Carter laughed. “And guajillo?” he asked.

Thinking about the pepper with its slightly green-tea taste, my mouth watered. “Heavenly!”

He handed me the bag, and I led the way around the side of the Palace and opened the door so we could go inside and pull up stools to the worktable. I plunked my bag on the table, opened it, and breathed in deeply. In addition to that green-tea taste I mentioned, some people think guajillo has berry overtones. I’m not that much of an uppity connoisseur. I just know it smells good and tastes fabulous. I grinned.

“So . . .” I looked across the table at Carter. “What are you doing here?”

He’d already taken a chomp out of his lamb burger and he swallowed it down. “I’m not heading back to LA until after the fund-raiser on Tuesday,” he said.

“I know that. I mean here. At the fairgrounds. Pretty much everybody’s gone. The Showdown’s over.”

“Oh, that.” Carter took another bite, nodded his approval and chewed thoughtfully. When he was done, he said, “For one thing, my people are coming for my motorhome tonight,” he explained, not the least bit self-conscious about having people and freely admitting it. “And yes, I know I don’t have to be here for that, but with everything that happened this week . . .” He was dressed in black pants and a mossy-green golf shirt that looked perfect with his rusty-colored hair and ruddy complexion, but even that wasn’t enough to disguise the shiver that snaked over his shoulders.

“I figured I’d make sure they get that thing out of here in one piece and on the road again,” Carter said. “Call me superstitious, but I for one am going to be very happy to see it go. You know, just to prove to myself that we can put all the unpleasantness here behind us. Besides that . . .” He took another bite and left me wondering what he had to add while he chewed it over.

Carter swallowed and smiled. “I thought it would be nice if we had dinner together.”

He’d written that best-selling book, right? The one about how to woo women with food? Apparently, he knew what he was talking about, because that smile and the wonderful aromas of roasted chicken and peppers wafting out of my deli bag just about did me in. I grinned back at him.

At least until he said, “I heard you were here, waiting for your sister’s court appearance tomorrow. I thought I should bring you dinner so you’d know how much I admire your devotion to Sylvia.”

I’d actually been ready to pull my sandwich out of the bag so I could dig in, but all this talk of devotion in the same breath as Sylvia caused my stomach to flip and my appetite to disappear. I pushed the bag a little farther away and sat back. “I’m not a saint,” I said.

“I bet your sister thinks you are.”

“Half sister,” I corrected him.

“Which explains why you two don’t look a thing alike.” With a tip of his head toward the fridge in the corner, Carter asked permission to get something to drink, and I nodded my okay. He came back with a diet cola for me and a root beer for himself. If only he knew, Sylvia was the diet soda drinker. As casually as I could, I put the diet cola back where it belonged and brought a high-test one over to the table for me.

“That makes it even more exceptional,” he said in a way that was so darned sweet, I wanted to groan. “You care about your half sister enough to stick around to try and help her out. You believe in her. I hope she appreciates it.”

“Don’t count on it.” I popped the lid on my soda. “Sylvia and I, we’re not exactly best friends.”

“That makes what you’re doing all the more special.”

I rolled my eyes.

Carter didn’t hold it against me. In fact, he pulled two pieces of paper about the size of dollar bills out of his pocket and handed them across the table to me. “Tickets for the fund-raiser on Tuesday night,” he said while I stared at the printing on the tickets that said they cost five hundred dollars each. “It’s the least I can do.”

“For . . .” I glanced from the tickets to Carter and back again to the tickets. “What?”

“That dead guy did fall out of my trailer and on top of you,” he said. “And . . . well, for nothing I guess. Except that you work hard and you look great in that silly Chili Chick costume, and I think you had a tough weekend and you deserve a little something special.” He pointed to the tickets. “There are two. Bring Sylvia.”

“If they let her out.” I didn’t mean to sound ungrateful and I was afraid that’s exactly what happened because of the bitter edge to my voice. I canceled it out with a smile and tucked the tickets onto the shelf behind me where jars of dried chili peppers and mixed spices were lined up not nearly as perfectly as Sylvia would have arranged them. “Thanks.”

Carter had taken another bite of his burger, so he held up a hand as a way of telling me it was no problem.

He was a nice guy. He was famous, rich, a powerhouse in a field that was full of prima donnas and chefs who went after each other—and each other’s reputations—like samurai warriors.

He brought me dinner.

At the same time the thoughts bounced through my head, an unfamiliar feeling settled in the pit of my stomach.