Endangered

by C. J. Box

  BIRTHPLACE OF PRCA WORLD CHAMPION COWBOY DALLAS CATES

  Bull had emerged from inside the house and stood waiting for Joe with his hands on his hips outside the front door.

  —

  AS JOE SHUT OFF the engine and reached for the door handle, a pack of six big dogs thundered out, howling, from underneath the wooden porch Bull was standing on, and surrounded the pickup. They were mixed-breed short-haired mottled-color brutes with dark muzzles and flashing teeth. Joe guessed they were a mix of Rottweiler and Rhodesian ridgeback, a scary combination. One of them lunged at the passenger window and bounced off with a thump, leaving a smear of goo on the glass. Daisy cowered and backed up into Joe.

  Bull whistled and called to them. The pack slunk back to the house. He opened the front door and one by one they went inside.

  Joe told Daisy to get on the floor of the cab and stay. He shut off the engine and made a point of folding the seat down as he got out. Behind the seat, as always, was his 12-gauge shotgun.

  Because if Bull opened the door and let the dogs out . . .

  Bull rocked on the balls of his feet like a fighter in the ring and sneered at Joe.

  “Hell of a brave dog you got there,” Bull shouted.

  He had to shout because of the din of a loud motor—likely a generator or air compressor—racketing from the garage where the pump trucks were parked. The sound was distracting.

  “Daisy loves everybody,” Joe shouted back. “She’s not used to being attacked for no good reason.”

  “They got a reason,” Bull said. “They’re protecting their property from the man who dicked me around.”

  Joe said, “Then I guess you know why I’m here.”

  Bull’s eyelids fluttered. A tell. But of what? Joe wondered. He paused by the grille of his pickup and waited to see if Bull would spill something. There was no doubt in Joe’s mind he had something to hide.

  Before Bull could respond, the screen door opened and hit him in the back.

  “Move, son,” Brenda Cates said, annoyed. “Let me come out.” Behind her, the dogs barked to be let out.

  Bull dropped his hands and stood to the side so his mother could come out on the porch. She squeezed out through the front door so the dogs were still inside.

  Brenda emerged, wearing an apron embroidered with flowers, and she was in the process of cleaning her hands with a towel.

  “You caught me in the middle of making some pies,” she said to Joe. “So what brings you out here?”

  Joe couldn’t hear her well over the noise from the garage, but he could read her lips well enough to get the gist of what she was asking. He knew he’d lost his opportunity to get Bull to blurt something out or to come up with a lie. Brenda had saved her son whether she intended to or not.

  “Can we get that racket back there shut off so we can talk?” Joe asked.

  “Just say what you came to say,” Bull shouted.

  “I was wondering who might have been home a week ago last Thursday, in the evening,” Joe said. “That would have been on March thirteenth.”

  Brenda eyed Joe coolly. Her face was hard to read. But she’d stopped wiping off her hands.

  Bull turned his head to her as if waiting to follow her lead.

  Joe took a few steps forward until he stood directly beneath them on the porch so he could hear them better.

  “A week ago Thursday,” she said. “Well, I was here. Dallas was here, of course. Bull and Cora Lee were out on a service call, right, Bull?”

  “Yep,” Bull said. “We didn’t get back until late.”

  “They take the second pump truck out if Eldon is already on a job,” Brenda said. “Sometimes when people call us, they can’t wait for Eldon to get there. You know, like if it’s a sewage emergency.”

  Joe nodded like he understood.

  She said, “Now, why are you asking about Thursday the thirteenth?”

  Joe pointed to the north. “Someone was up there on BLM land causing mischief. I was wondering if you or anyone might have seen a vehicle or heard anything.”

  Although Brenda had no reaction to the question, Joe saw Bull’s shoulders relax. He knew that whatever dilemma he might have been facing had passed. Yet Bull clearly felt guilty about something.

  “What was I supposed to see?” Brenda asked. “I’m usually in the kitchen at night. The window looks out the front of the house, not the side. So I really can’t say I saw anything. Now, can I ask you a question?”

  Joe nodded.

  “What’s the real reason you’re here?”

  “I just told you,” Joe said. But he was afraid his face might betray him.

  “You’re here to see Dallas with your own eyes, aren’t you?” she said. “You still think my Dallas had something to do with what happened to April, even though he was here at home and they caught the man who did it and hauled him to jail.” She sounded both angry and disappointed with Joe. He felt a twinge of remorse.

  A woman’s voice from inside the house called out, “Who’s out there, Bull?”

  “Damned game warden,” Bull said without turning his head.

  “The one who put you out of business? That motherfucker?”

  Cora Lee, Joe thought.

  “Yep, it’s him,” Bull said.

  “Tell him to get the fuck off our property,” she said from inside. “Maybe I ought to let the dogs out to chase him away. He got no right comin’ on private property if we don’t invite him.”

  Brenda’s eyes narrowed as she glared at Joe. “Is that true?” she asked.

  “It is,” he said. “But I’m not here looking for any trouble. I’m here trying to get some information on an ongoing investigation.”

  “An investigation of what?” Brenda asked, suspicious.

  “I seen a truck up there,” Eldon said from behind Joe. It surprised him, and he jumped. Eldon had been in the garage working on one of the pumpers, judging by the grease and muck on his bib overalls. The whine of the motor in the garage had covered his approach. There was a long, heavy wrench in his right hand.

  Joe said, “How long have you been behind me?”

  “Long enough to hear what you asked,” Eldon said.

  Joe nodded toward the garage. “Do you suppose you could shut that thing down so we can hear each other?”

  “Naw,” Eldon said. “I’m usin’ it. I gotta power-wash them tanks out or they really start to smell rank. Especially now that it’s gettin’ warmer.”

  Frustrated, Joe said, “You saw a truck up there last Thursday night?”

  “I did,” Eldon said. “I got home in time for supper. I parked my pumper in the garage. As I was walkin’ to the house, I looked up there in the hills and saw it. Then I heard a bunch of shots. I didn’t think much of it at the time. People are always goin’ up there and shootin’ the shit out of things. There ain’t a BLM sign or marker that ain’t shot to shit.”

  It was true. Joe asked, “What did the truck look like?”

  “White, new. I thought it was one of them fed trucks. I see them all over.” He looked past Joe to Brenda. “Remember when those two federal knuckleheads came here last month asking about sage grouse? A man and a woman?”

  “I do remember,” Brenda said. “They wanted to know if we had any sage grouse on our land. It seemed like a dumb question.”

  Eldon said, “I told ’em if I did, I would have shot all them prairie chickens by now and roasted them. They didn’t like that one bit.”

  Bull laughed at his dad’s humor.

  Eldon said, “You can’t even eat the big ones, the bombers. They’re no good for nothin’ but jerky. But the young ones are pretty tender. Right, Brenda?”

  “Right, they are,” she said.

  Joe had been watching the two of them, back and forth, as if viewing a tennis match. He found it interesting how
both of these big men deferred to Brenda at all times.

  Joe said to Eldon, “Are you talking about Annie Hatch of the BLM and Revis Wentworth of the Fish and Wildlife Service?”

  “That sounds like their names,” Eldon said. “They gave me their cards, but I used them to start a fire in the fireplace.”

  Bull snorted again. He thought that was a good one.

  In the distance, Joe thought he heard a high-pitched scream from the air compressor.

  “Better shut that thing off,” Joe said.

  “Why?” Eldon asked.

  “Sounds like the bearings are going.”

  Eldon shrugged. “It’s always something.”

  Joe gave up.

  “Are you sure it was their truck you saw?” he asked.

  “No,” Eldon said. “I ain’t sure. But that’s what I thought at the time—‘Those sage grouse feds are back.’ But that’s a hell of a long way up there, and I just saw the white truck for a few seconds. Then I heard a bunch of shooting.”

  Bull folded his arms over his chest and said to Joe, “There can’t be that many new white pickups in the county, can there?”

  Joe was thinking the same thing. He asked Eldon what time he’d seen the white truck.

  Eldon shrugged and said, “Six-thirty, maybe?” He looked to Brenda for confirmation.

  “That sounds right,” she said. “We usually eat at six forty-five. We try to get done by the time Wheel of Fortune comes on.”

  The timing worked, Joe thought. But it didn’t make sense—until he thought back on what Lucy had observed in regard to Hatch and Wentworth. Then it did.

  “So,” Brenda said to Joe, “you want to see Dallas?”

  The offer took Joe aback. “Yup,” he said.

  “Come on in,” she said. “You’ll see that he’s as banged up as I told you he is. Then maybe you’ll finally believe us and leave us alone.”

  Bull said, “He can come back, Mom. Just so it’s dark out and there’s no witnesses for when I whup his ass.”

  “Damned straight, Bull,” Cora Lee laughed from inside the house.

  As Joe mounted the peeling steps of the porch, he glanced over his shoulder to see if Eldon was coming in. The man was lumbering back to the garage, swinging the wrench back and forth at his side.

  Joe heard the air compressor whine again. He hoped the bearings would burn out and disable the engine so he could think clearly without the background noise.

  Brenda cracked the front door and leaned inside. “Cora Lee, put them dogs out back in their run. We’re comin’ in.”

  15

  The sound of the compressor muted as Joe stepped inside the house and the door was closed behind him. He removed his hat and held the brim with two hands.

  “He’s in the back,” Brenda said.

  Cora Lee was sprawled on a couch with one leg cocked over the arm. She was watching television, and she refused to look at Joe. That was okay with him. The show that blared from the flat-screen was something about spring break in Florida. Lots of bikinis and abs.

  The house was small, cluttered, and close. It smelled of baked goods from the kitchen. The furnishings were familiar to Joe from so many visits to area homes: a unique combination of hunting memorabilia crossed with Wild West kitsch. An elk mount dominated the wall over a fireplace, and the fabric of the couch and chair was a motif of bucking horses and lariats. The low-hanging chandelier was a reproduction of a wagon wheel, with dusty little bulbs on each spoke. The adjacent wall, which melded into the hallway, was covered with cheaply framed photographs of rodeo action shots. Dallas riding a bull, Dallas on a saddle bronc, Dallas flying his hat like a Frisbee in an outdoor arena after a particularly good ride.

  “That one is my favorite,” Brenda said as Joe leaned in to the picture. “It was taken three years ago at Cheyenne Frontier Days when Dallas won it. The ‘Daddy of ’Em All,’” she said.

  A china hutch in the corner contained nothing but silver and gold buckles Dallas had won across the nation. There were four sparkling shelves of them.

  As Joe passed by the wall, he searched for photos of the rest of the family and found one: an old shot of Bull, Timber, and Dallas with their arms around one another. It looked like it had been taken on a camping trip more than a decade ago. Bull’s mouth was agape and he looked simple. Timber was wiry and lean, and his eyes were closed as he smiled. Both brothers towered over Dallas, who stared straight at the camera with a kind of alarming confidence for a boy that small. By the looks of the photo, Dallas would have been nine or ten at the time, Joe thought. That was it as far as photos of his brothers went. The rest of the front room was a shrine to Dallas Cates. A stranger entering the house could have reasonably assumed Dallas was an only child.

  Joe inadvertently glanced at Bull, who stood glowering by the door. As if Bull could read Joe’s mind, he winced and looked away. Joe almost—but not quite—felt sorry for him.

  —

  DALLAS RECLINED in an overstuffed chair in what appeared to be his old bedroom, judging by the yellowed rodeo posters on the walls and the photos of him playing football, wrestling, and running track as a Saddlestring High School Wrangler. He was watching a small television between his sock-clad feet. When Joe entered the room, Dallas turned his head stiffly and his eyes registered surprise when he recognized Joe. He lifted the remote and clicked off the set.

  “Mr. Pickett,” Dallas said.

  “Dallas.”

  It wasn’t a ruse, Joe quickly determined. Dallas had been seriously injured. His face was still puffy and his left eye was swollen shut. The bruises on his face and neck were entering the gruesome blue, green, and yellow phase. His left arm was in a sling.

  “I thought I heard Mom talkin’ to someone out there.” Dallas’s voice was muted and airier than Joe remembered. He attributed it to a throat injury.

  Joe said, “Yup.”

  Dallas winced as he shifted his weight in the recliner to face Joe. Even in his condition, Dallas radiated a kind of raw physical power, Joe thought. Muscles danced and his tendons popped beneath his skin as he moved. Sinew corded in his neck.

  “Nothin’ hurts like busted ribs,” Dallas said, and he lifted the front of his baggy sweatshirt. His midsection was wrapped, but Joe could see the bruised discoloration on Dallas’s skin above and below the bandage.

  “I broke my ribs once,” Joe said. “I know how it hurts.”

  “It’s not so bad,” Dallas said with one of the big boxy grins he was famous for. “It only hurts when I breathe. Or talk. Or eat. Or try to move.”

  Joe nodded sympathetically.

  “Dr. Jalbani at the clinic in town says the only thing I can do is rest and let the ribs heal on their own. There’s nothing they can do to speed up the recovery. Did you know that?”

  “I did.”

  “When did Saddlestring get a Pakistani doctor?” Dallas asked. “It seems kind of funky.”

  “He’s been here for two years.”

  “Well,” Dallas said, “that just shows you how much I’ve been around, I guess.”

  Dallas suddenly got serious, and said, “How’s April doing, Mr. Pickett?”

  Joe realized Brenda was standing in the door right behind him. Dallas had glanced over to her before he asked the question. Joe wondered if Brenda had silently prompted it.

  “She’s in bad shape,” Joe said. “She’s in a coma in a hospital in Billings.”

  “Man,” Dallas said, “that’s bad news.” Then: “Is she going to make it?”

  “We’re optimistic,” Joe lied.

  Dallas nodded. And kept nodding. Then another quick glance to Brenda behind Joe’s shoulder.

  “Has she been able to communicate?” Dallas asked.

  “No.”

  “Man, that’s rough. Will she ever be able to talk?”

  “
We hope so.”

  Yet another glance. Joe considered whipping his head around so he could catch Brenda coaching her son, but he didn’t.

  “Well, if she recovers, I hope you’ll tell her how sorry I am this happened to her,” Dallas said. “I mean, we had our problems and all, especially at the end. But she means a lot to me. I can’t stand to think of her stuck in some hospital room like that. So tell her I’m thinkin’ about her, will you?”

  Joe nodded.

  “Maybe I’ll be up and around soon,” Dallas said. “Billings ain’t that far.”

  He paused, then said, “If that’s okay with you and Marybeth, I mean.”

  Joe didn’t want to say, There’s nothing to see. And he didn’t like Dallas using his wife’s name so casually. He said, “I’ll let you know when she’s better. Maybe we can work something out.”

  “That’d be great, Mr. Pickett.”

  He seemed almost sincere, almost eager. Joe thought perhaps he had always judged Dallas too harshly. He’d been put off by his mannerisms, his history, his too-eager-to-please persona.

  But maybe, Joe conceded, it had as much to do with the fact that April had left with him while Joe and Marybeth were away. That it had been Dallas’s fault as much as April’s why she had left.

  Joe asked, “How long have you been back, Dallas?”

  “Since March tenth,” he answered quickly.

  “Oh, for Christ’s sake,” Brenda said from behind Joe.

  “Not the thirteenth?” Joe pressed.

  “Hell no,” Dallas said, letting some heat show through, although the grin was still frozen on his face. “I see what you’re doin’ here.”

  “Just had to check,” Joe said. “I’m sorry.”

  “You ought to be,” Brenda said.

  Joe looked back at her. She wasn’t as angry as he’d expected. Oddly, she looked relieved.

  “Well,” Joe said to Dallas, “I hope you’re up and around soon.”

  Dallas’s grin turned into a bigger box. “The only good thing about it is, I couldn’t have gotten busted up at a better time. I lost my entry fees on the Rodeo All-Star gig in Dallas, of course, but the big fun doesn’t really start until June. By then, it’ll be a rodeo a day, and sometimes two, through the rest of the summer. That’ll be one paycheck after another. I plan to turn this setback right around and light up the PRCA all the way to the national finals. I ain’t the first cowboy to get hurt, you know.”