Desert Lost (9781615952229) (18 page)

For the next few hours, while awaiting news from the cops, Jimmy and I kept ourselves sane by straightening up my apartment. I mopped up blood and vomit, he hammered the leg back onto the coffee table. After flattening all my empty moving cartons—who needed them now, anyway?—I put them in a large pile, then reorganized Madeline's slides. Jimmy dumped a pile of ripped-up magazines on top of the moving cartons. We both drank coffee until our hands shook.

“I can't stand this,” Jimmy said, replacing a sofa pillow as pale sunlight began to filter through the blinds.

“Neither can I.”

“We've got to do something. Just thinking about Maddy…”

“We are doing something. We're waiting.”

“Hell.”

“You got that right.”

We began straightening again, repositioning tables, chairs, pillows, and magazines. By the time we gave up, we'd rearranged the furniture four times and vacuumed the carpet twice. Despite my attempts with Resolve, the bloodstains remained.

“Have to get a new carpet,” I mused aloud.

“Berber or pile?”

“Berber's pretty.”

Jimmy stared at the ruined rug. “I like the way pile feels on my bare feet.”

“Pile it is, then.”

“Not that I'll be running through it barefoot or anything.”

“That would be a sight.”

“Then again, there's wood planking. They're using wood from demolished barns now. Bet that looks great.”

I shook my head. “Wood flooring isn't appropriate for a second-story apartment. Too noisy.”

“The only thing below you is Desert Investigations, and I won't complain.”

“You never complain about anything. Except, maybe, me.”

“That's not fair. I…”

The phone rang.

Jimmy and I almost knocked each other down getting to it. Elbowing him away from the receiver, I picked up the phone.

It was Madeline.

Chapter Twenty-one

The cops and the EMT's had long since beat us to the biker bar where Madeline had turned up. Gringo's Knife &Gun Club, located off SR-86, halfway between the town of Sells and the Mexican border, had—like most biker bars—a reputation for unseemly doings. It was possible that the God Squad, when dumping Madeline in the desert nearby, believed that if she somehow made it to the bar, the bikers would finish what Hiram's men had started. If so, they'd miscalculated.

Bikers have mothers, too.

When I ran into Gringo's, it took a moment for my eyes to adjust from the bright desert morning to the dim interior light. Stale beer, cigarettes, coffee, and another sharp but unidentified smell assaulted my nostrils. On the jukebox, Bob Seger growled something about running against the wind. As my eyes adjusted, shapes coalesced from the darkness: women with too-knowing expressions, men with the faces of medieval torturers. They looked like they'd been partying all night.

“There she is!” Jimmy shouted, pointing.

At the end of the long bar I saw a conglomeration of cops, EMTs and rough-looking men standing around the table where Madeline sat, puffy-faced, wrapped in a baby blue blanket. As the EMTs took her vitals and a cop talked into his radio, an enormous bald man clad in leather and tattoos leaned over her solicitously. “Ready for more hot coffee, hon?”

Madeline nodded a head that was now as bald as the biker's. “Thanks, Snake.”

When I rushed forward, the biker looked around. “You the daughter?”

I nodded, put my arms around her, and leaned onto her breastless chest. She smelled faintly of bleach.

“Don't cry, Lena. I'm fine. These nice folks've been taking good care of me.”

“I'm not crying. I'm just cold.”

“Liar.”

While giving Madeline a cup of coffee that had been handed along the bar in a biker-style water brigade, Snake explained, “She stumbled in here naked a couple of hours ago, told us she'd been kidnapped, drugged, and dumped in the desert. When she came to, she said, she wandered around until she heard our jukebox. Greasy Ed over there had just bought a blanket at the swap meet down the road, so we wrapped her up and poured hot coffee down her. Looks like she'd been out there half the night in the rain. Shitty way to treat a lady.”

Madeline must have seen the question in my eyes, because she said, “I wasn't raped, just force-fed some pills, and God only knows what they were. But tell me this. Why did those men have to strip me down, shave my head, and douse me in bleach? Wasn't hitting me over the head and drugging me enough? Damn pervs.”

Once I was certain I could talk without making a further fool of myself, I answered, “They did it to get rid of everyone's DNA but yours.” Quick study, that Prophet, not that bleach was guaranteed to wash away DNA—just blood. I wanted to rage against him, but the detective in me asserted itself. “Before you passed out, did you get a good look at any of them?”

She shook her head. Not only was it bald, but it had been shaved by someone who obviously wasn't used to doing it, because her scalp was covered in nicks and scrapes; the whole mess was crowned by a large purple knot. Lower, I saw a bruise forming near her eye, and scabbed-over cut on her jaw. If it hadn't been raining, she might have sported bleach burns, too. Band-Aid Man had better hope he never ran into me again.

Oblivious to my revenge fantasy, Madeline answered, “Sorry to disappoint you, but when those guys, there were three of them, broke into your apartment, they were all wearing masks. The Halloween type, you know? Like I told the deputies, there was Wile E. Coyote, Tweety Bird, and Batman. It was all pretty confusing, what with them yelling stuff about you needing to keep your nose where it belonged, and tossing around all your pretty furniture. I remember thinking that the masks were a good sign, that it meant they probably didn't plan on killing me. I'll tell you this, though. I got my own back by biting the guy wearing the Tweety Bird mask on the ear. Boy, you should've heard the sissy scream. But then they crammed those pills down me, jammed the pillow case over my head, and the next thing I knew I was in Dreamland. When I woke up I was freezing my ass off in the desert.”

At that point, after letting me have Madeline to myself for a few moments, Jimmy thrust himself forward and she rewarded him with a hug, cooing, “What a nice boy you are, worrying about me like this.”

“Geez, Maddy, we thought…” His voice on the verge of breaking, Jimmy shut up. But he didn't let go of her hand.

The Pima County deputies, silent until now, began asking me questions. I answered truthfully, right down to the details of my arrest for misdemeanor assault. The deputy in charge, his badge said ASHTON, seemed amused. “Interesting way of collecting DNA evidence. I might try it some time. From that bleach smell on her, though, it looks like they figured out why you did what you did. But there might not be any uncontaminated DNA left, what with the bikers fussing over her. And, considering all the hugging that's been going on, yours and Mr. Sisiwan's DNA will have added to the soup.”

I reminded him that because Madeline bit Tweety Bird on the ear, there was a chance one attacker's DNA remained lodged between her teeth.

“Washed down by a gallon of biker coffee. But we'll see.”

At the end of a brief interview, the EMT's loaded Madeline onto a stretcher and wheeled her out to the ambulance. I climbed in with her, and after finding out which hospital we were headed for, told Jimmy to meet us there. At one point during the drive, which to Madeline's child-like excitement was conducted with the siren screaming, I gave some thought to the location.

Prophet Shupe ran a big compound in Mexico, where given the Federales bribe-friendly practices, his followers were seldom bothered. But that didn't necessarily mean anything. The Prophet was cagey enough to misdirect the authorities by having his men drive Madeline south, dump her, then turn around and head north to Second Zion or even one of his compounds in Canada. Regardless of which way he'd worked it, we might never see Band-Aid Man again.

“You're about to break my hand, sweetie,” Madeline said, interrupting my thoughts.

I relaxed my fingers. “How are you feeling?”

“Like those women in Picasso's
Demoiselles d'Avignon,
all twisted around. I've survived worse, so comparatively speaking, last night was no big deal. But…” A crease of worry crept between her bloodshot eyes. “But you look more upset than ever. What's wrong?”

“Nothing.”

I'd just realized that loving me could be harmful to others.

***

After a variety of tests, Madeline was pronounced sound enough to leave the hospital. As we headed for the parking lot, we were waylaid by a camera crew from a Tucson TV station. Clad in borrowed scrubs, she submitted to a brief interview, which made me proud of her courage, but I was frustrated by her seeming calm. Didn't she realize how close she had come to getting killed? Didn't she want to go back to my apartment, shower, crawl into bed, and cry for an hour? Or ten?

I sure did.

After she waved the press a cheery goodbye, Jimmy hustled her into his truck. Madeline seemed drowsy during the ride, perhaps because of the lingering effects of whatever drugs her abductors had given her, but when we reached my apartment and she saw her slides on the coffee table, she came alert.

“Oh, crap. I missed this morning's appointment at Shadow Mountain Gallery. Guess I'd better give Perez a call and tell him what happened. I'll be damned if, on top of everything else those pervs did to me, I let them screw my chances for a show.”

Despite my protests, she called the gallery, gave the director a highly expurgated version of the night's events, adding that if he didn't believe her, to watch the five o'clock news. Then she listened for a while, and when she hung up, a smile warmed her battered face.

“Perez says he'll have a contract ready for me to sign tomorrow, and he might even be able to arrange an opening as early as next month. I guess what they say is true—there
is
no such thing as bad publicity.”

Chapter Twenty-two

“Hey, Country Boy. You know sumthin' 'bout this?”

Jonah had always tried to tune out his talkative cellmate, but now Crazy Al rattled the newspaper right in front of his eyes. If he did that one more time, Jonah was going to…going to…going to what? Fucker was
huge
. “Don't know nothing about nothing,” he grumbled. “Take that thing away.”

“Can't read, can you, Country Boy? So I'm gonna read it
for
you, let you know what kinda shit your friends been up to.”

Jonah tried to close his ears but found it impossible. Crazy Al's voice was too loud, and if truth be told, too scary-big to hit.

In a voice almost as large as his physique, Crazy Al intoned, “Headline says ‘
Artist claims kidnap by polygamists.
' Now we move onta the story, Country Boy, and you better be payin' attention, 'cause it's all about you folks. My woman Tracy delivers newspapers and brings me a leftover every time when she visits, like this morning. She's one smart woman, got her GED and startin' college next fall, gonna get a big degree, gonna make something of herself. ‘But don't you forget your Al,' I told her. ‘Don't you be thinkin' you're gettin' too good for him, 'cause…'”

Kidnap? Polygamists?
Despite his fear of the big man, Jonah interrupted him. “If you're gonna read the damned newspaper, get to it. I'm not interested in your woman.”

Crazy Al snorted. “Not interested in
any
woman, is what I hear.”

If anybody else had said that, Jonah would have knocked him through the wall, but the man had at least a hundred pounds on him. And wasn't he in for attempted murder? Almost tore some guy's head off with his bare hands or something? “Just read, okay?”

Smiling an evil smile, Crazy Al read.

“Tucson—AP.
Artist claims kidnap by polygamists.
Oh, yeah. Tracy told me that AP stands for Associated Press, that another paper wrote the story but they let this one had it. Weird, huh?”

Jonah closed his eyes. “If you say so.”

“Where was I? Ah.
Madeline Grissom, 62, an artist visiting Scottsdale from New York, claimed she was abducted by three polygamists on Thursday and dropped off in the desert near Sells sometime late Friday morning before turning up at a biker bar. In an interview with a Tucson television station, Grissom said that a northern Arizona polygamy leader known as Prophet Hiram Shupe might have orchestrated the kidnapping, and had it carried out by a group of local polygamists presently residing in Scottsdale. She added that her abductors wore Halloween masks of Tweety Bird, Wile E. Coyote, and Batman.

“When asked to comment on Grissom's claims, Lieutenant Dagny Ulrich, of the Scottsdale Police Department, said that an investigation was ongoing, in concert with the Pima County Sheriff's Office.

“‘We did find evidence that a crime may have been committed, but at this point, we're still waiting on test results,' Lieutenant Ulrich said.

“An unnamed police source said that the apartment from which Grissom was allegedly abducted is owned by Scottsdale private investigator Lena Jones. When contacted, Jones refused comment.

“Grissom, a former resident of Phoenix, was at one time known for her colorful abstract paintings, and used to be represented by Brent Goodson Halworth Galleries. She has not shown her work there for several years.”

“‘Tastes in art change over time,” said Brent Goodson Hallworth. ‘Ms. Grissom came in here a few days ago looking for representation again, but I had to tell her no, her work was dated. When an artist falls out of favor, they sometimes resort to publicity stunts to put them back in the spotlight. I'm not saying definitely that's what Ms. Grissom has done here, which would be slander, but stranger things have happened. This business about the Halloween masks and the polygamists, for instance. That's exactly the kind of tall tale an out-of-stater looking for free publicity might dream up. Anyone who lives in Scottsdale these days knows quite well we don't have polygamists.'”

As soon as Crazy Al stopped reading, he shoved the story toward Jonah again. “So what you got to say 'bout this, Country Boy? Is that what you polygamy folks're into now, grabbing women right off the streets? What, you guys ain't got enough women of your own?”

When Jonah remained silent, Crazy Al slapped him across the face with the newspaper. “Answer me, Country Boy!”

Jonah took the abuse for a while, then, his mind made up, twisted out of Crazy Al's reach and ran to the cell door.

“Guard!” he yelled. “I got to talk to somebody!”