Wild Wild Death (2 page)

Do yourself a favor, find a recipe online, and give it a try.

It was on a trip to New Mexico back in 2009 that I first visited Bandelier National Monument and the remarkable pueblo ruins there. It is truly an incredible place and I enjoyed scrambling up into the ancient pueblos and getting a glimpse of how the inhabitants lived many hundreds of years ago. As interesting as the entire place was, the memory that remains clearest to me is that of the kiva. As we entered the area, it was late in the afternoon and there were few tourists visiting. That may have been because of the weather. Dark clouds gathered overhead and thunder growled, echoing off the steep cliffs. As we approached the sacred kiva, I knew we were not alone. The spirits of the pueblo’s ancient inhabitants were surely al around us. In researching the Pepper Martin mysteries, I have visited many haunted places and participated in paranormal investigations, but nowhere have I felt the presence of spirits as distinctly. New Mexico is known as the Land of Enchantment. Bandelier is proof.

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On one hand, there’s the whole thing about being inconspicuous and blending in with the shadows. On the other…

Truth be told, in my heart of hearts, I feared the night might end with questions, accusations, and yes, mug shots. If that was the case, I didn’t want to go down in history in the Cleveland Police Department arrest records archives looking like some frumpy reject.

I compromised, and even though it was a sticky night, I chose jeans for practicality along with a black jersey T. Good camouflage and flattering lines, and both looked just right with the oversized Jimmy Choo multicolored print tote I slipped on my shoulder. What private investigator for the dead could ask for more?

Since it started to rain just as I left my apartment, I grabbed Quinn’s blue windbreaker, too, and shrugged into it. If worst came to worst and I ended up against a wal with hash marks on it, I could always take off the jacket for the pictures.

Without going into the ugly details, let’s just say that getting over the stone wal that surrounded Garden View Cemetery wasn’t the most graceful thing I’ve ever done. It was also more exercise than this girl is used to, and by the time I final y had both feet on the ground of the place I used to work, I was breathing hard. As much as I hate to admit it, I may have been sweating, too. Wel , just a teensy bit. No matter. Within a couple minutes, I was outside the marble mausoleum where Chester Goodshot Gomez rested in peace—but hopeful y not for long.

Al I had to do was figure out which of the keys I stole from El a fit the mausoleum door.

Long story. For now, let’s just say I’m not cut out for a life of crime. Especial y when it comes to stealing from fluffy, lovable El a. I swear, the guilt was what made my hands shake and my heart beat a jackhammer rhythm. Then again, thinking that Dan Cal ahan’s life depended on me and what I was about to do didn’t do much for my composure, either.

The very thought made me feel as if I’d chugged a Slurpee. Or maybe that frozen-stomach sensation came when I heard the crunch of car tires against the road that wound through this section of the cemetery with its century-old mausoleums and headstones that stood as tal as my five feet eleven inches. Security, and yes, I was on a first-name basis with the entire crew. Something told me that did not mean they’d take it kindly if they found me lurking there in the middle of the night.

I darted to the far side of Goodshot Gomez’s mausoleum, flattened myself against the marble wal , and waited for the white patrol car to cruise by. They were on a forty-five-minute schedule so I knew exactly when they’d be back. By the time they were, I planned to be long gone.

Keeping the thought firmly in mind, I clenched my pocket-sized flashlight between my teeth and tried key after key in the rusted lock on the mausoleum door. When one final y fit and the ancient lock clicked open, I took a second to congratulate myself. Right before I stuck my head into the mausoleum.

“Hel o?” Okay, it might have been crazy for anybody else to peek into a musty tomb and cal out a greeting, but in my world, it’s just common courtesy. “Hel o? It’s me, Pepper.”

No answer. And no sign of Goodshot.

So far, so good.

Not that I have anything against Indians or anything. It’s just that this was not the moment to run into the former Wild West show star who’d died in a tragic accident in Cleveland and—

How do I know? About Goodshot?

Wel , like I said, I used to work at Garden View, and not just answering phones or sel ing plots or anything like that. I was the one and only ful -time tour guide at the historic cemetery, and I’d brought plenty of people past this mausoleum.

I knew Goodshot’s story, al right. It went something like this.

July 17, 1899

“I

don’t know, fel as…” With a slow look around at the buildings that ringed them like the rocky cliffs of an arroyo, Chester Goodshot Gomez took a long draw on his Cuban cigar and released the smoke in a series of O’s that weren’t as lazy as they were just plumb weary. “Al this talk of streetcar riots and unions and management scrapping with workers…”

He shook his head, his eyes on the spot not twenty feet away where a man in a dark cap stood square in the center of a set of streetcar tracks that glinted in the afternoon sun like twin butcher knives. The man was handing out flyers and urging the folks who passed to support his cause and avoid riding something he cal ed the Big Consolidated Line.

“We’ve only been in this town for a day, and I’m tired of the bickerin’ already.” Goodshot took a last puff on his cigar, tossed the butt onto the sidewalk, and ground it under the heel of his leather boot.

“Heard someone talkin’ this morning. Those union types, they used explosives last night to demolish some streetcar tracks not too far from here.” Chester sighed. “I can’t help but think… life, it was never so complicated back on the pueblo.”

“It might not have been complicated, but you’re forgettin’, my friend, you always said as how it was plenty boring.” Thad Jenson, tal and lanky, slapped Goodshot on the back. “Ain’t like you to talk like you’s hankerin’ for what’s past.”

“Yeah, what’s got into you?” With his thumb and forefinger, Rawley Moran snapped his Stetson back on his head and tipped his craggy face to the sunshine that poked its way between the shadows of the two buildings across the wide, public green space from where they stood. He laughed, coughed, and pounded his chest. “You gettin’ homesick in yer old age?”

“Nah!” It was true, or at least Goodshot liked to think it was, so he sloughed off the comment like it was nothing more than a fly bite. “Just ponderin’, is al . Thinkin’ about how cities is—”

“Big? Excitin’? Fil ed with pretty women?” Thad caught the eye of one such lady as she passed and she giggled, the sound as delicate as the clink of champagne glasses. But then, like so many city ladies, she probably wasn’t used to the sight of two cowboys and an Indian out on the street together.

Thad grinned, and Goodshot couldn’t blame him.

He’d caught a whiff of the woman’s lavender scent, too. “A visit to the nearest saloon wil change your mind and get you back to thinkin’ about what’s real y important in life.” The young cowboy looped an arm through Goodshot’s.

“Like tonight’s show,” Rawley added, fal ing into step beside them.

To Goodshot’s way of thinking, they were probably right. The show was what mattered. But then, Colonel Brady’s Wild West Stampede of Rough Riders and Ropers was the place he’d cal ed home ever since he left the New Mexico Territory.

He’d been young then, restless and bored growing corn and tending sheep the way his ancestors had done for a thousand years. He craved adventure, excitement, and in al the days he’d spent traveling and the nights he’d performed, he’d had no complaints. Hel , to his way of thinking, his life was just about perfect.

He’d been around the world twice, eating at the grandest restaurants, staying in the nicest hotels, being appreciated—a smile touched Goodshot’s lips—by some mighty fine women, too. He loved the exhilaration of a show, racing Tandy, his mustang, around the ring to the sound of the crowd’s applause. It was satisfying, sure enough, almost as agreeable as the fact that big-boned, booming Colonel Brady paid him a whole two dol ars a week more than the Anglos who performed alongside him.

Then again, as the longest-performing ridin’, ropin’, shootin’ Indian in the show, Goodshot was its main attraction and he loved the attention.

Oh, how Goodshot loved the attention!

Automatical y, he fingered the heavy buckle on his snakeskin belt. It wasn’t every day a scrappy kid from the pueblo ended up on the other side of an ocean he couldn’t have imagined as a boy, having ocean he couldn’t have imagined as a boy, having tea with the queen of England, and not every man did she present with such a token of her admiration.

Sure enough, his life was fal ing into place, just the way he always dreamed it would.

Stil …

With a shake of his shoulders, Goodshot twitched away his misgivings. He could not so easily be distracted from his errand.

“Hold on there, boys.” He locked his legs and refused to budge another inch. “We come out to the post office, remember. I promised Brady we’d mail these for him.” He took a fat pile of letters from his pocket. “I don’t want you two gettin’ me blind drunk so I’m forgettin’ what I was supposed to do.”

Like he knew they would, Thad and Rawley laughed and Goodshot pul ed away and marched past the man with the flyers.

“Don’t ride the streetcar today,” the man said, stepping into Goodshot’s path. “Sir, show your solidarity with the workers of this town. Please, don’t ride the streetcar today.”

Goodshot paid him no mind, heading instead into the imposing building with the U.S. flag studded with its forty-five stars hanging outside.

When he came out again, he had a letter in his hand, and a funny feeling in the pit of his stomach that reminded him of the time he rode his first bul .

Thad had just tipped his hat to a woman in a yel ow gown, and he settled it back on his head and narrowed his eyes, studying Goodshot. “You look like you swal owed a rattler back end first. What’s that you got?” He leaned forward to catch a glimpse of the letter, but since Thad could barely sign his own name, much less read other people’s writing, Goodshot didn’t pay him any mind.

Rawley was another matter. He could not only write his name, but he had actual y been known to read whole, entire books. He cocked his head, curious. “Who’d be writin’ to an old In’jun like you anyway? Unless it’s some pretty señorita, eh?

Maybe remindin’ you that you was supposed to be comin’ back to her?”

“Or tel in’ him he’s got a passel of kids he should be supportin’.” It wasn’t Thad’s laugh that snapped Goodshot out of his thoughts, but the way Thad poked him in the ribs with one elbow.

“This here letter, it came from the Taopi pueblo.”

Goodshot held up the envelope and explained for Thad’s benefit. “It’s been fol owin’ us from town to town. See here, next to my name, it says ‘Saint Louis,’ then ‘Chicago,’ then ‘Cincinnati.’ Al the places we done shows. It’s been tryin’ to catch up with me. I wonder who even remembers me back in New Mexico.”

“Then you’d better go on and open it and find out,” Rawley suggested.

Goodshot knew he was right. Just like he knew it was foolish to suddenly feel so jittery about something as fiddling as a letter.

Except he’d never gotten a letter from home before.

Not in the twenty years he’d been away.

His fingers trembling, he tore at the envelope, unfolded the single sheet of paper inside, and scanned it. With each word he read, his heartbeat raced as fast as Tandy around the ring.

He finished, and somehow found his voice. “I need to get home,” Goodshot told his friends. “Now.”

“Hold on there, amigo.” When Goodshot made a move to cross the street, Rawley put a hand on his shoulder. “You can’t just up and say you’re leavin’ for New Mexico. What about Colonel Brady?”