The Zen Man (26 page)

“Cattle don’t know about holidays,” murmured Walt.

As he cut, she toyed with the idea of running. Flat-out, full-throttle running for her life to that ranch. She looked across the barren land to the box on the horizon. Had to be several miles, probably more. Too far. Her insides shriveled as she realized there was no way out.

“Go to the fence, sweet cheeks,” the older man ordered, taking the knife back from Walt, “and sit down with yah back against a post.”

She did as told, wincing as her butt made contact with the cold, hard earth. As the men tied her arms to the rails, the older man gripped about how the cold worsened his arthritis.

After a few minutes, the men stood. She looked up into their flushed faces.

“This is a message. No struggle, no blood on our hands,” said Walt. “Nasty stuff, DNA. So we’re going to leave you here, unharmed.”

“Unharmed fah
now
,” corrected the older man.

Walt hunched his shoulders into his coat and looked off at the gathering snow clouds. “Weather reports say it’s going to dump four, maybe five feet, by morning. With temperatures dropping, doubt you’ll make it past two or three hours out here.”

The old man smiled, his teeth tiny and dingy.

Walt chuckled. “But if you get lucky and some cowboy chances past, saves your sorry city girl white ass, don’t think you’re a safe little damsel. We’ll be watching you. Know your every move. Go to the cops, you’re dead. Understand?”

Shivering, she nodded.

The men walked back to the Land Rover, the older guy bitching how he would’ve worn boots if he’d known they were driving out to the middle of Kansas. As the Land Rover drove off, she stared at its license plate, then choked back a laugh. Like it’d do any good to remember it.

Pulling up her knees, she tried to huddle into herself, couldn’t. She looked over at the ties around her arms, lashing her to the post, imagined chewing through those plastic stems. If only she could get this pillow case out of her mouth. For long minutes she rubbed her chin against the shoulder of her jacket, grunting and straining to loosen the cloth, finally stopping, exhausted by the effort. Tipping her head back against the fence, she panted into the cloth, her breath warm against the inside of the fabric, and stared at the incoming gray clouds.

How long would it take to die? She’d seen snowstorms in the mountains dump several feet of snow within a few hours, so would she die by hypothermia or suffocation? Would death be quick or slow? Would it be painful?

Shivering, she thought about warm places. Long-ago summer nights in Newport Beach, her tan body glistening with sweat in a bikini, her head spinning, her feet dancing. Wild rides up the coast on the back of a bike, sun baking her skin, winds stinging her face. Brazen, partyin’ California girl.

How’d that girl end up here, alone, facing death on the frigid high plains?

God, if I were to make it out of here alive…

She squeezed shut her eyes as a fresh gust of chilly air rushed past.

…
I’d open my heart to the possibility…

Freezing dots hit her face. She opened her eyes, watched the fluttering of the first snowflakes from the sky.

In the distance, the hammering stopped.

“If you haven’t wept deeply, you haven’t begun to meditate.”
—Ajhan Chah

I
stared out the passenger window at the swirling snow. “Your Audi’s fucked up, man. My Pontiac would be flying on these roads.”

“Rick, we’re driving in near white-out conditions. I’m going as fast as I can.” Sam looked down at the GPS image on his dashboard. “Looks as though we’re near the address your buddy gave us.”

My buddy, my secret telecom contact, hadn’t been too happy running an illegal ping on such short notice, but he’d stopped squawking after I explained Laura had disappeared. He reported her last cell signal had been at 11:53
A.M.
at an address on County Line Road that I knew to be way the fuck out in Elbert County.

Sam, who’d been going over the police statements with me, insisted we take his car. As we jogged down to the parking lot, I called Garrett on my cell, told him to get his and Ziggy’s asses into his van, that Laura was in trouble.

I glanced at the time. One-twenty. Looked at the map on the GPS. We were close, maybe within a mile. I called Garrett on my cell.

“Sam and I will take the first road we come to, you and Zig take the next road to the east. Work to the south on each road. Keep a grid. Look carefully for her…”

My throat caught. Couldn’t say more.

This kind of unpopulated, desolate area was the kind of place where bodies were found. I hadn’t said those words, and neither had Sam, but I knew we were both thinking it.

“Turn here,” I ordered, pointing to a long stretch of dirt road.

Sam shifted into a lower gear, turned.

I glanced at Garrett’s 4Runner, fading into the falling snow as he continued driving down the main road.

The Audi lurched and shuddered over potholes and bumps. I squinted, scanning the white terrain. Snow had to be six, eight inches deep. Easy to see a body…no, not a
body
.
Laura
. She’s still alive…still alive…repeated it to myself over and over, willing it so.

To the right, against a split-rail fence, a snow-dusted lump.

“There!” I yelled, pointing.

The car swerved, lurched over a bump toward the fence. Closer, I saw a form huddled at the base of the fence, head bowed. We were thirty or so feet away. The car still rolling, I shoved open the door and jumped, scrambled to catch my balance, ran like hell.

“Laura!”

The head lifted.

Running, crying her name, I finally reached her. Fell to my knees, frantically brushed snow off her hair, face, body. Sam suddenly next to me. Our hands fumbling, we untied the pillow case. She coughed, her lips moved, but no sound.

“She’s tied to the fence,” Sam yelled.

I fumbled, felt the thin strips, grappled with them. Plastic ties, the kinds cops use for cuffs. Fuckers.

“Call 911,” Sam barked.

I tugged out my cell as Sam, yelling something about a pocket knife in the glove compartment, ran back to the car. Elbert County dispatcher came on the line, calmly took my information, informed me an ambulance was on its way. I huddled next to Laura, wrapped an arm around her, tried to hold her closer. Impossible. Half-covering her with my body, I pressed against her, willing my warmth to her.

“I was a fool to let you go by yourself,” I whispered hoarsely.

I felt her intake of breath, a strangled release of air.

I pulled back my head, looked into her eyes, their color like ash.

“What, baby?”

Damn if she didn’t smile, her pale lips trembling.

“My cowboy,” she whispered.

Reporter
: Well, can’t you tell us anything about the case?
Nick Charles
: Yes, it’s putting me way behind in my drinking.
—-The Thin Man

D
usk was settling in as I shook a martini canister in time to the Grateful Dead tune “Victim or the Crime.” The esoteric tune rarely shows up anymore on the Dead’s set lists. Guess it’s too out there, even for the Dead.

Couldn’t shake the image of Laura out there on the plains. She was fine now, physically anyway. Finally got her home an hour ago, after the doctors at Elbert Memorial Hospital had released her, and the Elbert County sheriffs had completed their interviews. She’d been honest with the doctors about her aches, lied to the sheriffs about the circumstances. Smart girl. We didn’t need law enforcement going
French Connection
about our investigations. Or catching on to Laura’s misguided theft.

I popped off the lid. The scent of the alcohol—grainy, sweet—filled my senses, called to me like a faraway siren song. I needed it. Wanted it. Fuck, I deserved it.

I raised the canister to my lips…

“Should’ve known you’d be playing the Dead.” Laura stood at the bottom of the stairs wrapped in my shapeless flannel robe, fussing with the sash.

I grabbed the chilled martini glass, sloshed liquid into it. My hands shook.

She looked up, her hair a riot of dark around her shiny, pink face. “Which song is that?”

“It’s a Weir song about…” I grabbed a rag and sopped up some spilled drink. “Drug use, addiction and the law.” I coughed self-consciously. Fuck. I’d almost lost five years of sobriety. “They, uh, sang it for the Christmas concert at the Warfield Theatre, eighty-seven.”

She tilted her head, gave me a pensive look. “You okay?”

I nodded like one of those bobbing head dolls. “Sure. Cool. Well, maybe not real cool, but manageably cool. Dealing with random mayhem infinitum and the occasional brush with death.” I tossed aside the rag.

“I’m all right, you know.”

“So the doctors said. So you say.”

She waited a moment for me to say more—’cause I’m the kinda guy who can not only fill silence, but pack it to the brim—but I stayed mum, my insides contorted with the fears of the day, the indignity of my near-backslide. She’d been through enough crap without witnessing my executing a spectacular belly flop into the cesspool of life. Because I can’t just savor a sip. One becomes three, then twelve, then I’m waking up in my vomit, wondering where my clothes are, and who moved a rave bar inside my skull.

She eyed the XM radio. “Didn’t those guys ever sing something more Christmas-y, like ‘Deck the Halls’?’”

“Too cheery. They’re more into dire lyrics with an occasional glint of happy.” I held up her drink. “Speaking of which, a glint of vermouth, just the way you like it”

She waggled her fingers. “Come to mama, baby.”

I carried it to her, my hands still shaking. It was time to pick up the pieces of our life, set a few new rules.

As she took a sip, I said, “I love you. And because I do, you’re no longer allowed to play PI.”

She swallowed, her eyes wide. “You’re no longer letting the little lady
play
PI? You’re a lot of things, Rick, but chauvinistic isn’t one of them. Plus, after what I’ve been through, I’ve
earned
the right to be a dick.” She killed off the rest of the martini, headed to the bar. “I’ll skip the civility and go for the straight shot next.”

While Bobby wailed on about patience running out on the junkie, I watched her pour a measure into a shot glass and toss it back. When she looked back at me, her face was flushed, her eyes twinkling. The robe had fallen open, exposing the soft, pear-like curves of her breasts. She picked up the bottle again.

“Maybe you don’t need another,” I murmured.

She poured herself another shot, tossed it back, and blew out a gust of air. “I’m starting to feel better.”

I pulled out a stool, only because you-know-who was curled up in my chair, and sat at the butcher block table. “I chopped some vegetables for a salad, cut a few potato wedges, made some hamburger patties.”

She leaned forward and flashed me a hungry smile that I was fairly certain had nothing to do with food. “The perfect Christmas meal,” she whispered, her eyes all big and dark and glassy.

I wasn’t sure if I should fuck her, comfort her, or cook for her.

Suddenly she shivered and raised her shoulders, a pained look on her face. “Can the Elbert sheriff’s office trace Walt and his uncle from recorded cell signals during the time I was tied up?”

“Maybe. But Walt’s smart enough to guess that, so he’s undoubtedly tossed both yours and his cell phones by now. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s in another country as we speak.”

“It all seems so odd…” She ambled slowly back to her chair, her shoulders slumped. “I’m the one who went after the job, and yet…it’s as though I stepped into a trap.” She sat down, curled her knees underneath her, stared at Mavis, then looked up at me. “Think Dixon killed Wicked?”

“He’s certainly a suspect.”

“Helps your case, right?”

“Court won’t consider admitting evidence about Walt unless the defense has proof tying him to her death.”

“So you’re still number one.”

“‘Fraid so.”

“How we can find evidence tying him to her death?”

“Dig for it. Find a trace of anything in Wicked’s house, or computer, that’s linked to Walt.”

“We can’t break in again.”

We. She wasn’t buying into no more playing PI. “Sam can request that the police allow us access to her files, house, office.” I watched her rubbing her arm. “Still hurts?”

“Those plastic ties look wimpy, but they dig deep.” She started to speak, changed her mind, stared at the bottle across the room.

“What is it, Laura?”

After a moment, she said softly, “Being out there alone…thinking I might not make it…” She blinked, stared down at her hands, then shifted her gaze to me. “I love you, Rick. And I know you love me. What we share is rare in this world…makes me think we should…”

She stared at me with a look I couldn’t fathom. After a moment of silence, filled with metallic clinking from the wind chimes outside the kitchen window, she straightened.

“I got the license plate.”

“But…you told the sheriff you hadn’t seen it.”

“That’s right. I said that.”

“But they could’ve run it in the NCIC database, baby, found out who that Land Rover is registered to.” My laptop, which had taken up permanent residence on the butcher table along with Laura’s, was within reach. I dragged it over, hit the power button.

“I told you…Walt and that man threatened to come back and finish the job if I snitched—”

“But if you’d given the plate to the sheriffs, Walt and that older guy would never have known.”

“Never?”

I thought about the leaks from the Jeffco sheriff’s office after Wicked’s death. “Okay,
probably
never. But by the time they did, it’ve been from behind bars. Jesus, Laura, if we’d known this earlier, maybe…” I typed in the login and password for a database. “What’s the license number?”