Wild Wild Death (12 page)

“Seems a might odd, don’t you think? To steal them, and then to come talk to you about it?”

Goodshot shook his head. “Don’t make no sense.”

“I didn’t say it was true. I just said it was a possibility. Until I know what he’s up to, I don’t want to say too much. He said…” I weighed the wisdom of mentioning this next bit, but let’s face it, it’s not like I had a lot of choice. I was quickly finding out that the Great Southwest was a whole other world. One I didn’t understand. If I was going to make sense of where I was and what was happening, I needed an interpreter.

“He knew I was looking for something,” I told Goodshot. “And he mentioned a shaman. How—”

“No mystery there.” Goodshot struck a ghostly match against the side of the building, and when it flamed, he lit a cigarette. “Shaman must have thrown the bones.”

“That’s what the cop said. But real y—”

“You’re standin’ here talkin’ to a dead man and you’re gonna tel me you don’t believe it?” The skin around Goodshot’s eyes folded into a mil ion little crinkles. “Shamans, they’re powerful men. They walk in the spirit world. If you ask this policeman to take you to the shaman—”

“Not until I know if he’s on the up-and-up. Then maybe…” Even I realized my statement left open the possibility that, somewhere along the line, I would not only get to see Mr. Tal , Dark, and Gorgeous again, but get to know him a little better, too.

This time the shiver that tingled through me had nothing to do with the sensation of being spied on.

“No luck on the bones, huh?” When I glanced to my right, I saw Goodshot puffing away. “So you were lying yesterday when you said—”

“I wasn’t exactly lying. I was…” My shoulders drooped. “Okay, I was lying. I didn’t have a plan. I didn’t want to disappoint you. Or Kitty. She’s an old friend, huh? Whatever happened to Anarosa, anyway? You’d better be careful, I’ve seen ghosts who are pissed. If those two ladies—”

“Not to worry.” He dropped his cigarette and it vanished before it ever hit the ground. “Kitty’s a professional, if you get my drift. She ain’t goin’ to get jealous over a little woman like Anarosa. And besides…” His face split with a grin. “I ain’t headed out this afternoon to see neither one of them.”

Goodshot brushed his hands together and presto!

he was holding a bouquet of summer flowers. “Used to be a schoolmarm in this town. Little lady by the name of Suzanna. Died in a fire at the schoolhouse, so I hear, and she’s buried up at there cemetery, but I ain’t seen her around. Thought I’d go over to where that ol’ school used to stand and see if she’s haunting it. You know how most ghosts is, can’t seem to get what happened to them there at the end out of their heads.”

“Some of them can’t seem to get their conquests out of their heads, either.” I grinned right back at him.

“You were a playboy before there was even such thing as a playboy.”

“Oh, I dunno about that!” Goodshot headed down the sidewalk. “As long as there have been pretty girls, there have been men chasing after them.

Remember that, Pepper. Next time that policeman of yours comes around.”

He didn’t give me a chance to tel him that I didn’t know what he was talking about. Or that he’d read me al wrong.

Then again, I guess he was tired of me lying to him.

“What are you gonna do, Pepper?” He cal ed one last question out to me, and I looked up to see him floating down the street on a stiff wind.

And since I didn’t have the heart to lie to him another time, I opted for the truth. “Grocery store.” I pointed, and I didn’t try to explain about how frustrated I was feeling about getting nowhere on my investigation so I just said, “Chocolate.”

I watched Goodshot until he sailed around a corner, and when he was gone, I went inside the grocery store and grabbed a cart. While I was at it, I wanted to pick up some drinks to keep in my motel room and maybe some bread and peanut butter, too. There were only so many enchiladas a girl could eat, even if the diner attached to the local gas station did have the reputation for having the best ones in the state.

I wheeled up and down the aisles and I guess I was more upset about the case than I was wil ing to was more upset about the case than I was wil ing to admit, because within a couple minutes, I had the whole comfort food thing just about covered: three Snickers bars, a bag of barbeque potato chips, and some of those pretzel nuggets coated with honey and mustard. Enough junk food to last me a couple days. With any luck, by that time, I’d have some idea what I could do to get Dan away from the kidnappers. After al , I liked Dan. No way he deserved to be bound and gagged and in the clutches of guys who were dopey enough to come to a handoff in alien masks.

I guess that’s what I was thinking about as I stood in the snack-food aisle juggling a bag of tortil a chips while I decided if I wanted mild or spicy salsa. I’d just grabbed a jar of spicy (okay, Dan wasn’t the only thing I was thinking about; I might have been obsessing about the hot cop, too) when I heard a commotion in the aisle that backed up to the one I was in. Grunting. Like somebody was trying to reach something on one of the upper shelves and couldn’t.

I was just about to go over there and see if maybe I was tal enough to help, when I saw a man’s hand groping for a bag of Chips Ahoy.

“Damn,” I heard him grumble. He made another stab and caught one corner of the package and the bag of cookies tumbled from the shelf. I heard his satisfied “Yes!” when he tossed it in his cart.

But I never moved a muscle.

I was rooted to the spot. Surprised. Angry.

Completely blown away.

See, when he reached for that bag of cookies, the man’s sleeve rode up his arm.

And that’s when I saw it—a red and blue tattoo in block letters on the underside of his wrist. the tribe wil rise again, it said, right above 1948.

The same tattoo ghostbuster Brian and his friends showed me the night Quinn and I went to the basebal game.

“Brian? And his Indians fans friends?” The words whooshed out of me at the end of the breath of surprise. At least I had the good sense not to talk to myself too loudly. I heard the guy in the next aisle push his cart on ahead and snapped to. I couldn’t let him know I was there—or that I’d seen the tel tale tattoo.

With one last regretful look at those Snickers bars, I left my cart right where it was and zipped out of the store. Lucky for me, I’d left my car in the Hometown parking lot when I started my pointless trek around town earlier that day, and now, I hopped in and slumped down in the driver’s seat so I could watch the door of the grocery store and not be seen.

Then I waited.

Sounds easy enough. It might have been, too, if I wasn’t so angry, I thought my head was going to pop off.

I remembered that bal game and how Brian and his buddies had said something needed to be done about the curse Goodshot had put on the city and, hence, on its sports teams. They were rabid fans, sure, but I never imagined…

Automatical y, my hands curled around the steering wheel, so tight, my knuckles were white.

Okay, I got it. I understood why people supported their favorite sports teams and why they wanted them to win. But would anybody actual y go through the trouble of kidnapping someone (aka Dan) to make that happen? Would those same people then ask another someone (me, specifical y) to mastermind a body snatching to win the kidnappee’s freedom? Had Brian and his friends risked Dan’s life and my spotless criminal record in the name of ridding the city of a curse they thought was keeping the Cleveland Indians from winning a championship?

It wasn’t possible. I knew it in my heart, and not because I was al that wel acquainted with Brian or his friends. I just couldn’t imagine that anyone would be that bold. Or that desperate. Or that brainless.

Then again, the kidnappers had worn alien masks to our meeting.

Denial is a wonderful thing. I went right along believing no one was stupid enough to risk a person’s life for the sake of a sports team for another five minutes or so. That is, until I saw Brian walk out of the grocery store.

Coincidence? I thought not. There was no way Brian and I would be visiting this godforsaken part of the world at the same time. Not unless he’d engineered my visit in return for Dan’s life.

When Brian loaded his bags into a dark green Jeep parked on the street in front of the store and slid behind the wheel, I started my car and waited for him to make his move. And when he took off, heading north on Main Street, I stayed a couple car lengths behind him.

lengths behind him.

With any luck…

I sucked in a breath of dry desert air and told my brain not to get ahead of itself, but it was already too late for that; my mood brightened and my heartbeat sped up.

With any luck, Brian was about to lead me right to Dan.

Up ahead, the Jeep turned left, and since there was no traffic around, I waited a few seconds to fol ow. When Brian disappeared over a rise, I made the turn and trailed along after him, and within another minute or two, I had him in my sights again.

He drove on, and I held back.

We played that game for a half hour, heading down one road after another, twisting and turning through the parched landscape. In a little while, I saw another welcome to new mexico, land of enchantment sign. Hey, I’d never been a whiz at geography, but even I knew that meant we were headed south. If I needed proof, I saw it up ahead in just a few more minutes when the smooth dome of Wind Mountain appeared, silhouetted like a brown egg against the cloudless blue sky.

Al the while, I was careful, and I was sure there was no way Brian knew I was fol owing him. I lagged behind, and when a van with Texas plates came rushing up to my bumper, I even let it pass and stayed back, the van between me and that green Jeep up ahead.

About an hour after we left Antonito, Brian turned onto a dirt road, stopped, and hopped out of the Jeep. It wasn’t exactly like I could pul up next to him and ask what he was up to, so I hunkered down in the front seat and drove right on by. About a thousand yards down the road, I slowed and checked my rearview mirror. Brian had driven on, and for the first time, I had the luxury of taking a look at my surroundings and realized where I was—back at the gas station where I’d found the note instructing me to go to Taberna a couple nights earlier. I pul ed into the pitted parking lot and swung around, and by the time I stopped at the turnoff where I’d seen Brian get out, the Jeep was already kicking up a cloud of dust on a winding road that led farther from the paved road and closer to Wind Mountain.

Since there wasn’t a tree in sight, and no place for me to safely stay hidden, I waited until the Jeep disappeared behind an outcropping of boulders before I turned where Brian had turned. Not to worry, there was so much dirt trailing behind him, I knew I’d have no problem picking up Brian’s trail. But before I’d gone even twenty feet, I saw why he’d stopped in the first place—there was a metal swing gate completely blocking the dirt road and a fence on either side of it that snaked along the main road as far as the eye could see.

Grumbling, I shoved my gearshift into park, climbed out of the Mustang, and stepped right on top of a rock. Peep-toe platform sandals, remember.

Stylish for sure, but not exactly made for walking on the surface of the moon. My ankle twisted, and limping and cursing, I made my way to the gate. If I needed some sort of pass code or a key to open it, I was cooked.

Lucky for me, al I needed to do to open the gate was slide a huge metal bolt to one side and give the gate a healthy push. It swung open, and when it did, I limped back to my car and drove right through. I didn’t bother to get out on the other side of the gate and close it behind me as Brian had. For one thing, I didn’t want to risk another injury. For another… wel , a girl never knows when she’s going to need to make a quick escape.

From there, things got a little trickier. Fol owing the Jeep on paved roads was a piece of cake, but on rough terrain, my Mustang was a whole lot like my shoes: made for the city, not the boondocks. I bumped over rocks and into ruts and through what looked like dried-up streambeds and I had no choice, I had to slow to a crawl. It was that, or risk bottoming out the car.

Al the while, I told myself not to worry. I could stil see that giant poof of dust trailing behind the Jeep.

Al I had to do was keep it in sight and—

Bang! Hiss! Flap, flap, flap.

The not-so-encouraging sounds fil ed my ears and the steering wheel jerked in my hands. My poor car wobbled and tilted.

Flat tire.

“Damn!” I pounded the steering wheel, slowed down, and stopped, and al I could do was watch the cloud of dust in front of me get farther and farther away. Just like my chances of fol owing Brian and finding Dan.

“Damn! It isn’t possible. I’ve never had a flat and

“Damn! It isn’t possible. I’ve never had a flat and

—”

Bang!

Another tire went, and my car sagged onto the dirt road.

Too mad to move, I sat there for a couple minutes, my breaths coming in sharp, quick gasps, my brain cycling through my options. There weren’t many. In fact, as far as I could tel , there was only one.

I pul ed out my AAA card and my cel phone.