Desert Heat (20 page)

 
“I’ll check him out.” Sheriff
Bodine
snapped his notebook shut. “I don’t think I have to
remind you not to leave town.”

He
slipped through the door.

Mallory
staggered to her feet, Mike with her. They walked in silence to the car and got
in. Mike reached for the key and stopped midway. He pounded his hands on the
steering wheel. “Damn it.”

 
“I’m sorry,” Mallory said.

He
looked sideways at her. “Why did I tell him Brent is a diabetic? Now the
sheriff will be all over him. Brent wouldn’t hurt a fly. He’s one of my oldest
friends. I trust him with my life.”

She
turned sideways. “You don’t know what he might do in extreme circumstances.
Maybe he just lost it. That treasure has made a lot of people go nuts.
Like Skeeter, for instance.
And Sandra Weeks doesn’t strike
me as stable.”

 
“Someone else could have done it,” he
insisted.

 
“Brent keeps his condition pretty well
hidden,” she reminded him. “He doesn’t go around broadcasting that he needs
insulin to survive.”

 
“He’s not strong enough to wrestle down a big
man. “All the more reason he couldn’t have maneuvered Skeeter. Bodies are dead
weight.” Mike stared out the front window.

 
He had her there. Brent was small, about five-seven
and slim. “The coroner thinks Skeeter was maybe unconscious.” She hated
pointing out the evidence to him, but it added up. “There was no moving him.”

 
“Brent didn’t do it.”

 
“Then who do you think did?” she asked.

 
“Let’s get the metal detector.” He sounded as
if they were headed to the dentist for a root canal.

“Okay.”
Something had changed between them and she didn’t know how to put it back.

~*~

Mike
drove in to the ranch and eased up to the lodge. Two unfamiliar cars were parked
in front of it. One of them was a Blazer with the Forest Service logo on the
door. The other was a plain blue sedan.

 
“I think I have more trouble,” Mike said.

Mallory
touched his stiff shoulder. “I’m with you.”

He
didn’t reply and climbed out of the SUV. She slid out of her side and
accompanied him into the lodge. Standing in the lobby were a man and a woman.
The man wore a khaki uniform with the Forest Service patch on his sleeve. The
woman wore a suit and a sour face.

 
“Mr. Malone?” The Forest Service man stepped
forward.

 
“Yes.” Mike met him halfway, but didn’t extend
his hand.

 
“Stu Jones.”

Mike
nodded. “What can I do for you?”

Stu
motioned to the woman and she came close. “Mary Moore, an attorney for the
SRPL.”

Mike
again nodded. His gut clenched and he fought to remain calm. These people
hadn’t come to bring good news.

Stu
spoke. “You are under an injunction which prevents you from taking a guest on
public land until the matter is resolved. We have a report that you and a guest
were riding on the property adjoining your ranch last night. And this isn’t the
first time.”

 
“I didn’t take a guest on public lands,” Mike
denied hotly. “Just Mallory . . .”

Mary
opened her briefcase and withdrew a piece of paper. “Were you at the
petroglyphs
last night around dusk?”

 
“Yes,” he said. “But that’s my land.”

 
“Were you alone?” Her tone suggested she knew
he wasn’t.

 
“No, I told you, I was with Mallory.” Mike’s
neck began to ache. “But—”

 
“You were actually with a guest of this ranch,
correct?” She tapped a nail on the papers.
“Which you are
specifically forbidden to do?”

 
“I’m not a paying guest,” Mallory said. “I’m a
friend.”

 
“You’re not an employee here?” Stu hooked his
thumbs in his belt.

 
“No.” She pushed up her glasses. “But I’m not
a regular paying guest either.”

 
“How long have you been here?” Stu sounded
like he was on Mike’s side. But his questions were tough. “Have you been off
the ranch?
If so, where exactly?”

 
“Just a few days,” she said. “Mike took me to
Mesa, to Tortilla Flat, and Goldfield.” She sent Mike an apologetic look.
“Weaver’s Needle.
And to the
petroglyphs
.”

Mike
opened his mouth to speak and the woman wagged a finger at him. He snapped his
mouth shut and ground his teeth. Mallory answered truthfully, and he wouldn’t have
her lie, but each answer dug him in a little further.

 
“All that is fine, but what
about last night?
Did you use the trail from the
petroglyphs
to the ranch, the one on public land? The one you are not supposed to use until
the injunction is lifted?” Stu hiked up his pants.

Mike’s
neck muscles bunched. He resisted the urge to rub them.

 
“Yes. It was dark and we came down that way.
Were we not supposed to?” She sent Mike a confused look.

He
wanted to groan.

 
“Mr. Malone, in light of this infraction, we I
am going to recommend closing you down permanently.” The woman smiled and he
thought of a vulture.

 
“But he didn’t do anything wrong,” Mallory
cried.

 
“I’m afraid he did,” the woman said. “He
willfully disobeyed the rules of the injunction.”

Stu
nodded somberly.
“’
Fraid
so.”

 
“But it was just me,” Mallory cried.

 
“Rules are rules.” Mary snapped her briefcase
shut. “I’m going to make a report of this. It will be reviewed at your hearing
in June. Good day.”

Stu’s
expression resembled a hound
dog’s
. “I’m sorry about
this, but there’s nothing I can do.”

Too
numb to reply, Mike watched them leave. Who had turned him in? Mallory said she
saw something by the gate as they came through it. He should have listened.

Chapter
Twenty

 
“Mike?” Mallory wanted to touch him, to hug
him, but she didn’t know if he would welcome her.

He
turned toward her and he looked like he had been pole axed. “I need to call my
attorney.”

 
“Do you want me to come with you?” she asked.
Maybe her presence would be enough support.

 
“There’s no need. I’m going to be busy on the
phone for a while.” His voice was flat.

Her
insides felt all crumbly, like they couldn’t be put back together. “This is
all my
fault.”

 
“It’s the SRPL. Not you. They’ve been looking
for an excuse. We gave them one. If it’s anyone’s fault, it’s mine.” He moved
by her. “But they’re not going to win without one hell of a fight.”

 
“What can I do?” Somehow she had to help him
fix this. He might not blame her, but she was the reason he’d been on the
trail. This mess was her fault. If he didn’t resent her now, he would sooner or
later.

 
“Nothing, thanks.” His determined look came
back. “I have to get the attorneys on this right away. I’ll figure out a way to
beat them somehow.”

 
“I have some savings—”

 
“No way.
This is my battle.
I’ll take care of it.” His jaw jutted out at a stubborn angle.

Mallory
watched him walk away, sick at heart. There had to be something she could do.
If only the treasure existed, maybe that would help. Mike was tied up for a
while, but all she had
was
time on her hands. There
wasn’t any reason she couldn’t go back to the courtyard and do another search.
During broad daylight, and with Brent in custody, she should be fine.

After
she drove to the dig site and parked, Mallory hauled the metal detector out of
the back of the SUV. She walked over to the spot where they’d spent the morning
digging and turned it on. Almost immediately it began to make a clicking noise.
Her heart jumped before she realized it was just the regular sound.

Moving
the machine in a slow arc, she waved it over the holes they’d left behind.

When
the metal detector’s clicking changed to a shrill beeping, she jumped and
dropped it. Grabbing the nearby shovel, she began to dig like crazy. In a few
minutes, she found the source of the metal.
A rusty nail.

Laying
it on the adobe wall, she continued to search.

The
shrill whine rent the air again.

This
might be it.

Pulse
pumping, Mallory picked up the shovel and dug in the sand. The tip of the
shovel hit something solid.
 
Her nerves
exploding in little bursts, she fell to her knees and began to dig with her
hands. Consumed with reaching the item, she didn’t look up when someone drove
up and parked. Mike had probably finished his phone calls and come to help.

 
“Did you find it yet?”

Mallory
looked over her shoulder just in time to see a shovel coming at her head.

~*~

Mike
hung up the phone as Brent walked in early during the evening. “You’re back.
Did
Bodine
come to his senses and see that you didn’t
murder Skeeter?
Or Wendell Wallace?”

Brent
sat on the edge of his desk.
“Yeah.
I have an airtight
alibi. You didn’t think I did it then?”

 
“Are you joking?
Of course
not.
I never doubted your innocence.” Mike indicated the phone. “As a
matter of fact, I just got off the phone with my attorney. I told him you might
need him to defend you, if it went that far. I knew it wouldn’t.”

 
“Thanks, man.” Brent’s chin wobbled.

 
“You’re not a killer,” Mike told him. “I’ve
known you since college, and I think I’d know if you were going around whacking
people. But somebody’s raising hell around here, and I need to get to the
bottom of it. When you were being questioned, the Forest Service and an
attorney for the SRPL showed up and told me they’re going to recommend
permanent closure.”

 
“Why? What did you do?” Brent’s mouth gaped
open and he snapped it shut.

 
“I took Mallory down the trail from the
petroglyphs
,” Mike admitted. “I didn’t consider her a guest
since she’d not
paying
, but they didn’t see it that
way.”

 
“Who saw you?” Brent asked.

 
“I don’t know. Mallory said she saw something
by the gate when we came in, but I didn’t so I wasn’t worried about it. But
someone was lurking there and turned me in to the Forest Service.”

 
“Doesn’t that bunch usually run in packs?”
Brent asked. “I’ve never seen them work alone.”

 
“Yeah,” Mike admitted. “They usually don’t
hide out in the bushes either. A direct confrontation is more their style.”

 
“There’s sure been a lot of weird stuff going
on around here.” Brent held up his fingers. “One, Zorro’s
saddle
being messed with, two, the rafts being shredded. And three, whoever killed
Skeeter took some of my insulin.”

Mike
jerked out of his chair. “What? Why didn’t you say something?”

 
“Because I don’t talk about it, that’s why.
But if I’m going to be accused of murder, it’s time to bring it out in the
open. Mike, somebody took four tubes of my meds.” He looked around,
then
lowered his voice. “And I think it was somebody here.
All of it.”

 
“What are you saying?” Mike’s chest felt too
tight.

 
“I’ll spell it out. I haven’t seen any of
those river
wackos
around, have you?” He paused. “But
I have seen somebody else around some of those times. Dianna.”

 
“No way.”
Mike shook
his head.

 
“Think about it, man. She’s in love with you.
If she thought she could save the ranch by finding the treasure, she’d do it.
The chick’s been obsessed with you for a long time.
Even
before Elisha left.”
Brent shifted his weight. “I don’t like saying it,
but look at the facts. I saw her in the raft office just before they were
shredded. And she could’ve found time to cut Zorro’s cinch before she came to
pick me up at the repair shop.”

“Skeeter
was killed with an overdose of insulin,” Mike said. “She couldn’t know to
inject him under the toenails like that. She’s small, too. It would’ve been
really hard for her to wrestle him around if he were awake,” Mike said. Brent
was making sense.
Too much sense.
Mike couldn’t force
himself to face the fact that one of his closest friends had killed two people
for the love of him. He wanted to hurl something through the window.

 
“She’s a physical woman,” Brent said. “Believe
me, man, after the interrogation I just went through, I’m not going to throw
around accusations without thinking about them. I’ve done nothing but work this
over in my head all day. She’s the only one who makes sense.

 
“Like I said, Di wouldn’t know how to use
insulin.” Mike clung to that belief. He had to. Anything else was impossible to
believe.

 
“All she had to do was ask me,” Brent said.
“Or Shelby.
She’s a nurse. She’d know.”

 
“Did she?” Mike dreaded the answer. “Ever ask
you?”

 
“No.”

 
“Then let’s go talk to her, and then Shelby.”
Mike headed for the door, determined to put this crazy talk behind him.

At
Dianna’s house, he pounded on the door, but no one came to the door. Something
was wrong. His skin tingled and his gut clenched. “Di, open the door.”

No
one answered.

 
“Maybe she’s with Shelby,” Mike suggested. He
walked across the yard and knocked on the door. “Nobody’s here either.”

 
“Not unless they drove out in the desert together,”
Brent said. He pointed toward the old courtyard. “I saw one of the
Suburbans
go that way when I drove in.”

Mike
stomach plunged. “Have you seen Mallory?”

 
“No.”

He
was already moving, kicking himself with every step. He hadn’t kept Mallory
safe. He said over his shoulder, “Call
Bodine
. Tell
him to get out here right now. Mallory’s in danger.”

Mike
sped up the sandy road toward the courtyard so fast that the SUV fishtailed. If
anything happened to Mallory, he wouldn’t be able to stand it. In just a few
short days she’d filled a hole in his heart that no other woman ever had. He’d
fallen in love with her. And he couldn’t live without her.

~*~

Mallory
came to, a little groggy. Her head pounded worse than the time she’d gone to a friend’s
bachelorette party and spent the night throwing away quarters and drinking
dollar margaritas in one of
Vegas’s
many casinos.

 
Picking herself up out of the sand was getting
to be a regular habit, one she could do without. She fumbled for her glasses.

Her
arms wouldn’t move. She was tied up, bound like a piece of carpet. She wiggled,
but the rope was too tight. Who had done this?

 
“So, you’re awake.”

Relief
filled her. “Thank God you found me. Someone tied me up like a hog. Would you
undo me?”

Shelby
looked at Alan as if Mallory had said something incredibly crazy.

 
“I don’t think so,” he said almost gently.

She
struggled. “But somebody tied me up—” She stilled. “You did this?
But why?”

 
“Quit the act,” Shelby said. “We know you
know.”

 
“I don’t know anything. I’m not clear what
you’re talking about.” Mallory still saw stars. She wasn’t sure how hard she’d
been hit, maybe harder than she realized.

 
“Cut the games,” Shelby yelled.

 
Alan knelt near her. “Where’s the treasure?”

 
“I don’t know. Can I have my glasses, please?”

He
stood as if to get them, then pulled his foot back and aimed for her face.
Mallory
 
braced
for
the blow.

 
“Not yet, Alan.”
Shelby grabbed his arm. “We need her to tell us what happened to the gold. Then
we can drop her off in Canyon Lake.”

Her
head spun. Drop her off in the lake? They were going to drown her? Not if she
could help it. She wiggled around like a fish on a bank. Nobody was going to
save her. No one even knew where she was. Brent was at the police station. He
didn’t know about the site anyway. Mike was distracted by his problems with the
SRPL. She had to figure a way out of this mess herself. Her prospects didn’t
look good, but she had to try. She’d just found Mike, she couldn’t lose him
now.

 
“I can’t see. Hand me my glasses so I can look
around.”

Shelby
shoved them on Mallory’s nose. “There. Shut up about your glasses. Now, tell me
where the gold is.”

Mallory
almost wished she hadn’t asked for her glasses. Shelby looked like a stranger.
Her eyes were wild and her skin was red and blotchy. But it was her mouth that
was most frightening. Pulled in a tight line, it bore no resemblance to her
usual wide smile. Alan looked the same as he always did, grumpy.

 
“I don’t know where the gold is, but the metal
detector went off there where the shovel is lying.”
Where
you hit me on the head.

 
“Alan, dig.” Shelby bent down. “It better be
there.”

Mallory
stared defiantly back at her.

They
both turned and watched Alan shovel sand out of the hole she’d started. The sound
of metal hitting metal rang out over the desert. Dropping to his knees, Alan
dug like a dog, throwing handfuls of sand out behind him. “I got it.”

Shelby
ran to his side as he pulled a rust-covered box from the ground. “Open it.”

He
sat back on his heels and lifted the lid.

Mallory
strained to see. This is what her father had given up everything in his life
for. What would he have found if he had not been murdered?

Alan
lifted out a handful of sand, then another.

 
“There’s nothing here,” Shelby said.
“Nothing at all.”

 
“You killed two people for a box full of
sand?” Keeping her mouth shut probably would’ve been the smart thing to do, but
Mallory couldn’t help herself.

 
“Shut up,” Shelby screamed.

 
“There’s something here.” Alan’s voice rose
with excitement. He pulled out a tiny piece of yellowed paper. “What is it?”

Shelby
jerked it from his hand and looked at it.
“Just some numbers.
Eleven-twenty-six-sixty-five-sixty-four.
What is that?
A phone number?
No.
Maybe an
address?
What the hell is this?”

Mallory
kept her face neutral although she wanted to smile. She and her mother had
shared the same birthday. November twenty-sixth. And Mallory’s parents’
birthdays had been in ’64 and ’65 Skeeter hadn’t forgotten them. He’d found the
treasure and he’d left a clue here for whatever reason. Maybe he knew she’d
somehow find it.

 
“We’ve got to get rid of her,” Alan said.
“Then we’ll figure it out.” He stood and picked up the shovel.

Mallory
struggled, but she wasn’t any closer to
loose
than
she’d been ten minutes ago.

Alan
handed the shovel to Shelby and picked Mallory up, slinging her over his
shoulder like a bag of grain. She twisted, but he held her fast. Shelby ran
ahead of him and opened the back door of the Suburban. Alan tossed Mallory in
and she landed on something soft.