Endangered

by C. J. Box

  That was his issue, Timber knew. It wasn’t that his son was a convicted felon who was sent to the penitentiary in Rawlins. It was that he’d been dumb enough to get caught.

  “I’m ready to come home,” Timber said to Brenda. He ignored Eldon. Ignoring Eldon was getting easier to do.

  “We’re ready to have you back,” she said, but with a beat of hesitation.

  “What?” he asked, ready for another lecture about staying away from drugs and not hooking up with his old crew. She didn’t realize that most of his old crew was either dead or in prison with him.

  “Before you come straight home, we need to know you’re with us,” she said. She reached out with both hands and cupped his left. His right was still under the table, trying to control his leg. She stroked the back of his hand with her pudgy thumbs and studied him closely. She always seemed to know what he was thinking even when he tried to hide it from her. It was like she could see into his soul. Sometimes she knew what he was thinking before he was even sure.

  She said, “We need to know you’re willing to be part of the family again—that you’ll contribute. We need some proof of your loyalty before we can welcome you back with open arms.”

  Timber stared at her. He knew she couldn’t be overheard by the guard because of the noise in the room and the blaring television above his head. The CCTV would show them talking to each other, but there weren’t recording devices to pick up what they said.

  “Are you still working in the infirmary?” she asked.

  The question came out of the blue. “Yes. But it’s not like I have any responsibility. I just mop shit up.”

  “That’s not important,” she said. “What’s important is that you know your way around a medical facility. Even if it’s with a mop in your hand.”

  He sat back and tried to read her face for clues. As usual, she gave nothing away.

  “We need you to do something for us where nobody knows you,” she said. “It’s got to be done in a way so it won’t connect back to us in any way. But you can’t do that unless they let you out of here free and clear and within the next couple of days. You’ve got to hold your temper and think long-term, like I said. Store up that angry feeling. Don’t retaliate if someone does something to you.”

  “I’ve been good,” he said defensively. “I done what you said. I’ve been a model prisoner for the last year. See that guy over there with the full sleeves?” He nodded toward a dark man with a black mustache, a shaved head, and a swirl of tattoos that covered each arm to his wrist. The inmate wore red and was whispering into his wife’s ear while his two little boys wriggled around his legs.

  Brenda looked over, then looked back.

  “He stole my MP3 player from under my mattress. I know it was him. Two years ago, I would have ripped his throat out for what he done to me. But I let it go for now because I couldn’t prove it and I want to get out of here. Did you hear me? I let it go.”

  “I’m glad,” she said.

  “Now, what is it I have to do before you’ll take me back?” he asked.

  “Don’t put it like that,” she said. “You know I love all my boys. But you also know that the most important thing in the world is to keep the family intact. We’ve all got to be working together or they’ll tear us down. The town, the county—they all hate us for what we are.”

  Then she went on and on about how the community leaders refused to put up welcome signs on the outskirts of town that would read: Home of World Champion Rodeo Cowboy Dallas Cates.

  He nodded. He’d heard it so many times from her over the years.

  “So what is it I have to do?” he asked.

  “Before we get to that, I’ve got a question for you,” she said. “Who loves their mama the most?”

  19

  This kind of thing has happened before,” Governor Rulon said to Joe in the governor’s capitol building office. “Remember the Canada lynx debacle in Washington state?”

  “No.”

  “Ah, a prelude to a story,” Rulon said. He was wearing a snap-button cowboy shirt, jeans, and scuffed boots. No one else was in the building on Sunday except for a security guard dozing at the lobby counter.

  Joe had left his home well before the sun came up. He toasted the memory of Chris LeDoux as he passed Kaycee, and he thought of Nate. The four-and-a-half-hour drive had included all four seasons: summer in Kaycee, winter near Midwest, fall in Casper, spring outside of Chugwater.

  He’d also been thinking about the call they’d received the night before from Nurse Reckling in Billings. She said that she’d overheard two of the doctors discussing the procedure for bringing April out of the coma. Reckling cautioned Marybeth about jumping to any conclusions, but promised she’d keep her posted. It was the first thread of good news they’d had on April’s condition since she was placed in the drug-induced coma.

  Sheridan had decided not to go on spring break to Arizona with her friends but to come home instead. She wanted to see April. Marybeth told Joe that it just might be that the doctors would try to bring April back when the whole family could be at the hospital.

  “That way,” she said, “we’ll all know at the same time if she’ll make it or not.”

  He could tell by the look on her face that she was more than slightly terrified by the prospect.

  —

  RULON LEANED BACK in his chair, steepled his fingers, and said, “When I was U.S. Attorney, there was a big three-year study going on to determine if the rare and elusive Canada lynx existed in the forests of Washington. If the lynx could be proved to exist there, the Endangered Species Act would kick in and the feds would have to close all the roads, shut down the loggers, and seal off the forests to snowmobiles, skiers, four-wheelers, and on and on.

  “Toward the end of the study period, with everyone holding their breath, there was an exciting discovery: Canada lynx hair had been found on three different rubbing posts. That proved that the lynx was there after all!

  “Then somebody blew the whistle. It turns out that high-ranking U.S. Forest Service biologists had planted the hair samples on the posts. They’d gotten the hair from some zoo or a dead lynx and had planted it so it could be found. These biologists were true believers and they did it for their cause—to save the planet. How falsifying scientific evidence saves the planet is anyone’s guess.

  “Hell,” Rulon said, slapping the desktop with the heel of his hand, “you got into a similar situation a couple of years ago with Butch Roberson and the EPA. This kind of petty crap by government bureaucrats shouldn’t be new to you.”

  “It isn’t,” Joe said. “I just keep hoping that was a one-off.”

  “Oh, Joe,” Rulon said almost sadly. “It’s inevitable that when there are hundreds of thousands of bureaucrats with endless budgets, who have no accountability and can’t be fired, that these things are bound to happen. They’re just people, although too many of them like to think that they’re special people with some kind of special insight. But when they have private agendas, watch out! That’s what I keep hollering at anyone who will listen.

  “What about the fact that they allow wind and solar companies to kill thousands of eagles and other birds without punishment or fines, but they throw the book at an oil company or power plant if a bird dies in their vicinity? Where’s the fairness in that?”

  Joe knew it was one of Rulon’s constant themes, and one of the reasons he’d won more than seventy percent of the vote for his reelection, despite the fact that he was a Democrat in a thoroughly Republican state.

  “So what you’re telling me, Joe,” Rulon said, “is that this Wentworth guy slaughtered an entire lek of sage grouse so he could spend more time with Annie Hatch, the fetching yoga instructor. Is that your theory?”

  Joe nodded.

  “Can you prove it?”

  “Not yet,” Joe said. “I need to check out the feder
al lab in Denver to see if the evidence box arrived there and what was in it. If it arrived intact, we should be able to match the tire tracks I photographed at the scene with the photos from Wentworth’s truck and the shotgun and the shells. If the box was tampered with, we know the chain of evidence and who tampered with it. And if it didn’t arrive at all, we know who supposedly sent it to them. I want to be at that lab when it opens tomorrow morning. I don’t want to call ahead and tip them off.

  “But,” Joe continued, “judging by how Wentworth reacted yesterday, he might crumble and confess on his own. Especially if Annie Hatch puts pressure on him.”

  “I’m really liking this,” Rulon said, grinning. “Keep digging, but keep what you find between us.”

  Joe was puzzled.

  “You know he did it,” Rulon said. “Now I know he did it. And this Wentworth guy sure as hell knows we know he did it. I want him to twist in the wind while you quietly build the case against him. Even when you have a solid case, I don’t want you to talk to him or confront him.”

  “Why not?”

  “Joe,” Rulon said, “you’re a good man. I’ll miss working with you when my term is over. One of the reasons I like you is that you don’t think like a politician. Your boss does, goodness knows, but you don’t.”

  Joe wasn’t sure if that was a compliment or an insult.

  Rulon said, “With this in my pocket and at the ready, I have leverage against the feds if they decide to list the sage grouse as an endangered species. I can let them know through back channels that they better not rush to judgment. I’ll let them know that if they try to rush studies or suddenly come to conclusions that the plight of the sage grouse will shut down our energy sector, I’ll release the information that their own guy in the field killed an entire population of birds we tried to protect. I’ll reveal it in a press conference on the steps of the U.S. Capitol. I’ll wave your report around like I was McCarthy with his list of communists in the State Department!”

  Joe groaned. But he admired Rulon’s cunning, while at the same time hoping it would never be aimed at him.

  “Go forth and build a box around this love-struck reprobate,” Rulon said, tossing the back of his hand at Joe as if making a royal proclamation.

  “So tell me more about your daughter and Romanowski,” Rulon said.

  Joe did.

  As Joe put on his hat to leave, the governor said, “Are you going to the rodeo while you’re in Denver?”

  Joe paused. “What rodeo?”

  “The Cinch Rodeo All-Star Shootout, of course,” Rulon said. “You might just make it if you leave now. And if you see a bull rider named Cody McCoy, put some voodoo on him. I’m in a fantasy rodeo league, and if McCoy eats dirt this weekend I could win it all.”

  Joe shook his head. “You’re in a fantasy rodeo league?”

  “Of course,” Rulon said, as if he were offended by the question. “Remember that name: Cody McCoy. Do some silent curses at him or something. Make a Cody McCoy voodoo doll and drop it into the dirt just before he rides. We can’t have him win the Shootout.”

  There had been rumors prior to the last election that Spencer Rulon was going insane because of his erratic behavior. Joe hadn’t paid any attention to the rumors. Now he wondered if he should have.

  “Well, go,” Rulon said, exasperated.

  20

  Like many westerners, Joe liked to seek out pockets of the rural west in any urban environment. Finding members of his tribe provided comfort. Although Denver was geographically in the west and there were plenty of remaining frontier vestiges—the Black American West Museum, the Buckhorn Exchange restaurant, the National Western Stock Show—it was also a large metro area of more than two million people, with funky hotels, restaurants, professional sports teams, gangs, and hipsters smoking legal weed and drinking craft beer. It was the anti-Saddlestring, and the politicians who ran Denver didn’t like to play up its western roots.

  The rodeo that Rulon had suggested offered a refuge, and Joe had nothing else to do before the federal lab opened in the morning. As soon as he bought his ticket and went inside the indoor National Western complex, he smelled familiar smells and encountered familiar-looking people. The men milling around the exhibition booths wore jeans, boots, and hats. Most left-side back Wrangler pockets showed Copenhagen chewing tobacco rings.

  Unlike when walking around the 16th Street Mall downtown, he expected to meet someone he knew, and he did. The two brothers Stan and Dave Flitner ran the Lazy T Ranch outside of Saddlestring. They had a booth of their own and they were taking orders for bull semen in the hallway to the indoor rodeo arena.

  “Look out!” Stan said in mock alarm when he recognized Joe. “It’s the game warden! Dave, hide those fish!”

  “Ha-ha,” Joe said, shaking their hands. They both wore black hats because it was still technically winter. Within two months or so, they’d replace their felt hats with straw hats and summer would be official.

  “What brings you down here?” Dave asked from behind the table.

  “Just killing time,” Joe said. “I’ve got a meeting in the morning.”

  “Want to buy some bull semen?” Stan asked. “We’ll give you a ten percent discount on account of you’re local.”

  “I’ll have to pass,” Joe said with a straight face. “I’ve still got a couple of gallons in my refrigerator.”

  “That’s too bad,” Stan laughed. “Business has been kind of slow.”

  —

  THE CROWD INSIDE the arena was sparse, which was no doubt disappointing to the organizers of the event, Joe thought. Too much to do in Denver on a weekend, he guessed, as he settled into his seat. Still, those who were in the grandstands seemed to be hard-core rodeo fans by the way they cheered and applauded certain cowboys. They were probably in fantasy rodeo leagues, Joe thought.

  While he watched the saddle bronc and bareback events, he followed the cowboys on the program.

  The All-Star Shootout, he learned, was designed to attract only the top cowboys in each event. Unlike the PRCA circuit in the summer, where any cowboy with a PRCA card could pay an entry fee and ride, this was invitation-only. These were the names rodeo fans knew and followed, and Joe recognized a few of the top contestants.

  As he read over the list of cowboys in the bull-riding section, he saw the name Cody McCoy. He didn’t issue a voodoo curse, but he again recalled what Lucy had observed. Since she’d been right about Wentworth’s desire for Annie Hatch, maybe she’d also been right about something else.

  Lucy had said there was no way that April and Dallas Cates had gone their separate ways, even though Dallas—and Brenda—insisted on it. If April never regained consciousness, it might remain a mystery forever, one of those loose ends that would always nag at him.

  Joe studied the names of the bull riders. They were from all over: Decatur, Texas; Terrebonne, Oregon; Donalda, Alberta, Canada; Waycross, Georgia; Oral, South Dakota; Winnemucca, Nevada; Los Lunas, New Mexico; Roosevelt, Utah; O’Brien, Florida; Stephenville, Texas.

  Stephenville was where Dallas had moved to once he went professional.

  Joe thought about it. These champion rodeo cowboys lived thousands of miles apart, yet they gathered together every weekend during the winter and practically every day in the summer at some rodeo or another. They traveled together, lived together, competed together. He thought there may very well be a couple of them, and maybe more, behind the chutes at that very minute who knew Dallas, and probably April as well. Maybe one of them could clear up the discrepancy.

  He slapped the rodeo program against his leg and stood up. He was glad he was wearing his uniform.

  —

  IT WAS CALLED the “ready area” and it was located under the stands behind the chutes, out of view from the general public. Joe worked his way down there until he encountered a security guard who wouldn’t let him through.


  The guard wore a blue uniform shirt and eyed him warily.

  “I’m not supposed to let anyone back there if they don’t have a credential,” the guard said.

  “This is my credential,” Joe said, pointing to the pronghorn antelope patch on his arm that said WYOMING GAME AND FISH DEPARTMENT and then his badge over his breast pocket. “I just need to talk to a couple of guys.”

  “What did they do?”

  “They may know something about a situation I’m investigating,” Joe said, keeping it truthful but vague.

  “Man, I don’t know,” the guard said, looking around.

  “Here’s my card,” Joe said, handing it over. “You can see I’m legit. And if you need to call your supervisor over, go ahead.”

  The man smiled. “I don’t even know who my supervisor is. I’m just a weekend rent-a-cop. The Nuggets aren’t playing today or I’d be at Pepsi Center, running one of the parking lots.”

  Joe waited.

  “Oh, okay,” the man said, stepping aside. “Don’t get me in any trouble.”

  “I never promise that.” Joe smiled.

  —

  THERE WERE A DOZEN private dramas unfolding within the ready area as Joe approached. The atmosphere inside the chain-link barrier was electric and intense.

  Cowboys sat on saddles on the concrete floor with one hand on imaginary reins and the other in the air, acting out a ride to come. Others slapped themselves across the face while they strode from one wall to the other like football players awaiting kickoff. Several stood with their eyes clamped shut, praying wordlessly.

  As Joe entered, he stepped around a rodeo cowboy expertly taping his Wrangler jean legs around the shafts of his boots, and another tightening his riding glove by cinching a string of leather between his teeth.

  He didn’t know where to start.

  In the arena, the saddle bronc competition ended and the cowboys who had ridden in it streamed into the ready area. They acted differently from the ones waiting to ride because they were done. Some joked and patted others on the back, some scowled at getting bucked off, one cowboy bitched about his score and said he’d been jobbed by “that fat judge with the stupid mustache.” As the saddle bronc riders gathered up their gear, the bull riders filed out one by one. To a man, they seemed more wired and tightly wrapped than the bronc riders. Each cowboy had a friend or two with him who would help him out mounting the bull, getting set, and offering encouragement.