Shallow Grave-J Collins 3 (42 page)

My blood frothed. I dialed her number.

It was the hardest thing I’d ever done, acting normal. I must’ve pulled it off because Leticia agreed to meet me to hang Ben’s prayer bundle.

I drove to the place this had all started, and where it would fi nally end: Bear Butte.

489

MATO PAHA
looks the same in the fall as it does in the summer. Th

e only time the face changes is when it

snows. White covers the toff ee-colored rocks, erasing the hillsides and the 1400-foot laccolith disappears into the gloomy winter skies like a mirage.

I parked away from the blown-out casino shell. Th e

visitors’ center was boarded up. No one here but me and my ghosts.

I secreted my gun in my right pocket, a bottle of water in my left, and my cell phone in the back pocket of my jeans.

A wind blew off the depression where the creek fl owed and whistled through the bare branches. I forced myself to walk over to the ledge. Th

e riverbed was bone

dry, save for a stream running down the center about 490

a foot wide. Th

e water hadn’t frozen yet. Everything

looked dead. Forgotten. Forlorn. Strangely enough, I fi nally felt like I fi t this place.

I ducked under scrub oak branches and emerged in the creekbed. It smelled dank, even though the rocks nearly crunched beneath my boots. I wandered up-stream, the gurgle of the water solace in the immense shadow of Bear Butte. I didn’t know exactly where Ben had died. It’d been spring and the snowmelt made the creek run higher and he’d washed downstream.

A chill snaked through me. My mother would’ve said a goose had crossed my grave. Could the opposite be true? Could I just have crossed my own grave? Was I destined to die here today? I glanced down at the ugly gray rocks coated with black scum and mint green-colored moss. Dead vegetation. Cigarette butts. Stray food wrappers. All in all, a piss-poor resting place.

I craned my neck and looked up at Bear Butte.

Didn’t Indian people come here for guidance? I mentally shouted: Give me an answer!

Not a single sound rumbled from the sleeping giant.

I sighed and turned around.

And Leticia Standing Elk stood behind me ten feet away.

I jumped before I caught myself.
Play it cool, play it
loose.
“Hey. I didn’t hear you.”

491

“My people were scouts for a good reason. We excel in matters of stealth.” Her hands were in the pockets of her long wool coat. My stance mirrored hers. Did she have a gun in her pocket too?

“Th

anks for coming.”

“Th

anks for asking me.”

Weren’t we polite? “You ready to go up?”

“I suppose. My legs are already aching anticipating the climb.” Leticia eyed my Timberland boots. “I wouldn’t have thought you were much of a hiker.”

“I’m not.”

“You been up there before?”

“Yeah. Last summer.” I paused, let my fi nger run along the top of the gun barrel. “You?”

Leticia smiled. “We can follow the riverbed until we reach the bridge and use the shortcut to get to the main trail.”

She hadn’t answered my question.

“You have the prayer bundle?”

I could hedge too. “Th

ink it might snow?”

“Maybe up at the top.”

“Looks like the clouds might wreck the view anyway.”

She huff ed a little. With her extra poundage and my smoker’s lungs we were pretty evenly matched.

We didn’t talk, just lumbered on.

We’d reached the bridge. We were both panting.

492

Th

e path diverged, one each side of the wooden bridge, a steep climb through the raggedy bushes. She arced left; I headed right.

Once we exited the underbrush, we cut across the blacktop road to the information center, a shelter made of painted logs that held up sheets of plywood. Plexiglas covered the diff erent maps of the area and pictures of the kinds of vegetation, along with warnings about rattle-snakes in the summer. Reptiles wouldn’t be a problem now, with the exception of the snake at my back.

I pulled my water bottle out of my left pocket. I wondered again if she was armed. I wondered if she’d shoot me in the back. Or if she’d sneak up behind me and slit my throat. Th

at sick, helpless, rage-fueled feel-

ing returned. I stared at the tips of my boots until I regained control. I had to let her think I trusted her.

Leticia said, “Are you sure you want to do this?”

I nodded. “How about if I pace us for part of the way, and then we’ll switch?”

“Lead on, MacDuff .”

Hikers are supposed to sign in with a brief description of their destination and then out when they come back down. In case they get lost or hurt, then the GF&P

would know where to look. We bypassed the login station and beat feet for the rocky path.

My increased heart rate owed nothing to the 493

strenuous climb.

Th

e fi rst tree we passed was weighted down with prayer bundles and ties in every color of the rainbow.

I kept going. More scrub oak and chokecherry bushes curled over the trail as it straightened. Th en the path

jogged to the right, the incline increased drastically, and the trees were scarce.

Leticia breathed down my back.

Odd, that Leticia didn’t ask why I didn’t pick one of the trees closer to the information station. I’d let her think I trusted her. She’d make her move on the backside of Bear Butte. Th

e steepest section without barricades to

keep hikers from tumbling down the mountainous drop like Jack and Jill on meth. Or from being pushed over the edge.

Friendly conversation was conspicuously absent.

We rounded the fi rst rock outcropping that overlooked the camping area. From this distance the white stone rings around the fi repits stared up at us like blind eyes. Creepy. No tipis either. We really were all alone.

“How about if we switch now?” I panted.

She nodded. Leticia’s pace was slower. We’d started the fi rst set of switchbacks. Before I could curse RJ

Reynolds, we were making our fi rst descent.

No trees back here to tie the prayer bundle to. She didn’t stop; she kept trekking along, even through the pre-494

cipitous parts, where off to the right, deadfall clogged the ravine. It was unbelievably cold. I shivered again. Th is

would not be a fun place to be after the sun set. I spied the fi rst offi

cial stopping point, a large wooden deck.

Leticia turned and smiled through the heavy puff s of air leaving her mouth. “I’m ready to stop for a minute.”

“Me too.”

“You want to go all the way to the top?”

I didn’t answer, pretending to catch my breath.

We heaved ourselves onto the platform. Bench seats were lined around the perimeter.

I walked to the railing and looked over.

We had a perfect view of the destroyed casino. It was a serious blight on the landscape. I’d feel the same way even if it hadn’t blown to pieces.

“How much longer are we going to continue this pretense?” Leticia asked.

“As long as it takes for you to tell me why you killed my brother.”

She sniffl

ed. “It was an accident.”

Fury fi lled me. How fucking stupid did she think I was? I said, “Bullshit,” and whirled around to see her pointing a gun at my head.

“I didn’t think you’d buy it, but it was worth a shot.”

Leticia’s reptilian eyes didn’t leave mine. “Th at gun is

useless in your pocket, isn’t it? Having second thoughts 495

about using it on me?”

“Not anymore.”

“Too bad. I believe I’ll be taking it.” She approached me, putting the barrel of her gun against my temple.

“Move and I’ll kill you where you stand.”

Sweat slithered down my back, creating ice on my spine.

Her hand crept in my jacket pocket and out came my Browning. Th

en she aimed both guns at me.

“Didn’t you ever consider I’d eventually fi gure it out?”

“You
didn’t
fi gure it out.” She smirked. “I have to tell you, it’s been amusing watching you chase your tail like a retarded bloodhound these last few years.”

“Maybe it did take me a while, but I pretty much nailed why you killed him when you were in my offi ce

last week.”

“Right. You don’t know squat.”

“Wrong. See, I was working too hard creating conspiracy theories. Looking for political motivations within the tribe surrounding the casino and gaming issues. But the bottom line is this: You slit his throat because you were jealous of him. Classic Cain and Abel, right? Mommy loved him best no matter how much
you
accomplished.”

“Shut up.”

“Ooh, I’ll bet it burns your ass that you’re still not Mommy’s favorite. Th

at my half-
white
brother ranks

above you even though he’s
dead
? What fi nally set you 496

off , Leticia? Why’d you do it?”

I feared she wouldn’t answer me, but the noxious words poured from her mouth.

“Ben returned from Arizona, fl ush with his new Native spirituality, his sudden adherence and reverence to the ‘old ways.’ He’d brainwashed my mother into believing his bullshit that he’d changed into something beyond another lazy fucking injun. He told me I was hurting
our
people by bringing in gaming. He said he couldn’t stand to be around me and the ‘negative energy’

I used, and he’d be moving to Arizona permanently.

“My mother blamed me. She said it was my fault he’d gone down there in the fi rst place and my fault he was staying away. She told me she wished
I
was the one leaving, not Ben.

“Th

at mealy-mouthed motherfucker was so self-absorbed he didn’t care about the problems he’d caused. I asked him for forgiveness. I asked him to meet me here at this Lakota holy place, to meditate, so I could get on the right path.” Leticia snorted. “Pompous asshole couldn’t wait to prove how much better he was than me. As he lit the sage and closed his eyes to commune with the Great Spirit, pretending he was something more than a miserable fucking
half-breed
, I snuck up behind him and gave
Mato Paha
the ultimate sacrifi ce: blood of the profane.”

I didn’t realize I was crying until an icy wind froze my 497

tears to my cheeks. “You’re a sick, self-serving bitch.”

She thumbed the safety on my gun; her gun was ready to fi re. “And yet, I still got the jump on you. You been slacking on your training, Miss PI.” She’d kept her hos-tile gaze locked on mine the entire time. “Where’s your cell phone?”

“In my truck.”

“You lie. Try again.”

When she asked me to take it out I’d rush her. “It’s in the back right pocket of my jeans.”

“Turn around.”

I did. Slowly the right side of my coat was swept back with the barrel of the gun, while once again the other barrel made an intimate acquaintance with the side of my face.

Leticia said, “Take it out with your right hand and keep your left arm straight out.”

Shit. I dug the phone out of my jeans.

“Hold it out and drop it.”

I did.

Leticia kicked it hard and it slid across the deck like a silver hockey puck, then dropped into oblivion.

“Turn around and walk backward to the bench.”

I shuffl

ed until the crease of my knees met solid wood.

Leticia put her gun in her pocket and aimed the Browning at me. “Be ironic, wouldn’t it, if I shot you 498

with your own gun? I could probably even make it look like suicide.”

“You’re going to shoot me? A little hint from Detecting 101: Bullets are a dead giveaway that foul play was involved.”

She laughed again. “Oh, I’m not going to shoot you.

You’re going to jump.”

499

I stared at her. Looked over the ledge. Then I laughed. Mine sounded slightly more hysterical than hers had.

“Fuck you, Leticia. I’m not gonna jump.”

“You’re going to do whatever I tell you to do. Stand up on the bench.”

“No.”

I could sense she was getting agitated. Good. Agitated people made mistakes and the second I glimpsed the tiniest opening I’d take it.

“Last chance.”

“No. You’ll have to shoot me.”

“Fine. Have it your way.” She fi red.

Th

e fi rst bullet grazed the outside of my coat, blowing a hole in the sleeve. She corrected her aim and I felt 500

a hot sting as the second shot lodged between my shoulder and collarbone.

I screamed. Surprise and the bullet’s momentum knocked me back, and then the immediate throbbing pain leveled me to the ground.

Oh shit oh shit oh shit it hurt.

A hand grabbed my hair and she cranked my head back. I looked at Leticia’s placid face set against the backdrop of the swirling storm clouds in the darken-ing sky.

“Get up.”

I whimpered. My shoulder was on fi re; the pain re-ceptors in my brain were going haywire.

“I said,
get up
.” She jerked me to my feet by my ponytail with enough force that sections of my hair were ripped from my scalp. I swayed; my fi ngers automatically tried to touch the spot where I’d been shot. Leticia batted my hand away. “Stand still or I will shoot you again.”

My heart was beating so hard I expected it to explode. I gritted my teeth against the searing agony and the stickiness I could feel spreading under my shirt.

“Change in plans. Which means I have to rough you up a bit.”

Th

e grip of the gun connected with my jaw. She followed through with a crack to the other side of my face between my ear and temple.

501

I shrieked. At least I think I did. I couldn’t hear anything out of my left ear. Th

e pain was so unbeliev-

ably intense I sank to the deck, momentarily forgetting about the bullet wound until my arm and shoulder met unforgiving wood.

Another scream burst from my throat even as I curled up in a protective ball and blinked the blood out of my eye.