He started dressing as she did the same. Once they had finished he added, “And the desert isn’t barren, Dana. Come out here a minute. Let me show you.”
He took her outside, where the air was heating, then moved to the ladder at the back of the RV. “Climb it,” he said. “I’ll be right behind you.”
Dana looked distrustfully at the ladder. “Oh, come on, Jay, it’s got to be ninety already, and I’m sore and—”
“It’ll be worth it, I promise. And I’ve tested and retested this ladder. It’s secure as it can be. Come on, Dana, just for a minute.”
She shrugged and muttered, “In the spirit of humoring you…” before making her slow way up the ladder toward the top, with Max barking in frustrated longing from below.
“Hands to yourself,” she groused when he tried to boost her bottom.
“I just thought, with all that groaning you were doing—”
“That it would be a great excuse to cop a feel?”
“Hadn’t thought of that angle,” he lied, grinning, before he joined her on the top deck. “Careful of that rusty spot.”
“So what,” she started, “was so important to show me up…here…”
Her words trailed off as she looked out at the vastness of the desert all around them: a vista unbroken, save for the earth-colored adobe ranch house and outbuildings, by any other sign of human habitation.
“It’s…it’s so green.” Her words were hushed with reverence. “And I see flowers—right there.”
He followed the line of her slim arm to where she pointed out a mass of bright purple blooms decorating a stand of cholla cactus. “And over there? What’s that?”
He spotted the pale yellow-green patches clothing rocks that had been dull gray days before. “That’s lichen. And over there, those little white blossoms—tangled fishhooks. And enough grass to keep the cattle chewing quite a while.”
In the distance he saw several cow-and-calf pairs doing just that, and he felt the first stirring of eagerness to be out there among them working, a job that Dennis Riggins had been tending in his stead since Uncle R.C. had died. Dennis was keeping his uncle’s horses, too, a pair of sturdy geldings sometimes used for desert searches.
“But how can this be?” asked Dana. “Just two days ago this was all…empty.”
“Dormant,” he said, “that’s all. Just waiting for the rain. Never barren, Dana, any more than you.”
As if to hide her face, she turned. “Thank you so much for showing me, Jay. There really is a beauty here if you know where and when to look.”
He inhaled the dry air’s clarity, gazed out across the salt flat to the foothills that looked for all the world like shapes cut out of purple construction paper…
Where he formed a silhouetted target within a distant rifle’s scope.
Chapter Twenty-one
A belief developed in the Middle Ages that the ingestion of the preserved flesh of the Egyptian mummy could cure all manner of infirmity and illness. This practice, which persisted well into the nineteenth century, accounted for the looting of innumerable desert tombs in order to support the grisly trade.
When mummies were no longer readily available, the dried, ground flesh of executed felons or diseased poor ensured that profits could continue to flow uninterrupted.
—From Medical Oddities Through the Ages,
Professor Elizabeth Farnum, Ph.D
An explosion of scarlet, flecked with shards of skull and splatters of gray matter. A burst of will communicated in the trajectory of a single, deadly missile.
A pulse of lethal power, his power, that would fall like a killing bolt from the clear blue.
The Hunter hardened with the thought of it, with the justness and the rightness. With an answer to the frustration and raw hatred that cut like broken glass inside him. With the avalanche of pain and destruction he would hurl down at the bitch’s sister…if he but squeezed a little harder on the trigger of his gun.
Sweat poured off him, more in response to the weight of his decision than to the day’s heat. As he stared through the rifle’s scope, the salt sting forced him to pull away, to blink.
And to consider the sacrifices he had made to get that money. And the sheer stupidity of killing the one woman he could have forced to lead him to it.
If he had only run the sisters to ground that storm-slashed night as he had planned, had only held his gun to Dana Vanover’s head and started flaying strips of her flesh with his skinning knife. Then Angelina surely would have told him the location, would have wept and begged him to let her take him to it.
But instead he had allowed his hunting instincts and his rage to call the shots—that and his terror that Angelina would escape beyond his reach. If he had been smart enough to think beyond that, he would have aimed high to pin the pair down until he could get to them.
But his intentions hardly mattered, since he had been unable to track them in the darkness. Worse yet, he’d later learned that he had killed her—accidentally shot dead the one person in the world who could have led him to the cash.
Fury and frustration crashed around the Hunter, deep red waves as thick and salty as congealing blood. After all the sacrifice, all the deprivation, to lose his prize through such stupidity…
Sometimes he heard the woman he had murdered laughing from the grave. For she’d unearthed his due, leaving it for Sheriff Jay Eversole to find.
And that bastard had turned it over to the goddamned FBI…
The Hunter’s index finger spasmed, and he barely controlled the urge to squeeze off a killing shot. Or better yet a pair of them, to take out both of those who had helped to ruin everything for him.
But this time he pushed back the predator, which allowed his human remnant to think through the likely consequences—the law officers that would swarm like angry hornets, stopping at nothing to seek him out.
Through his scope he saw that Eversole was moving, climbing down from the RV after Dana Vanover. Even from this distance he saw their casual touches, the body language that hinted they were either lovers or soon would be.
At the realization the Hunter’s finger moved to stroke the rifle’s barrel and then caress the well-worn handle of his favorite skinning knife. His breathing intensified as his thoughts turned to the smooth strips of pale flesh he had peeled from the pale body, to the sweet-salty iron taste that he had held for hours between his teeth and gum.
As a youth he had been taught to honor the valor and the cunning of his prey by taking such a tribute, and he still recalled the first steaming sliver of buck’s heart pressed bloody to his lips. When he had gagged at that initiation, his father’s friends had mockingly asked if he was certain that he wished to be a real man, had had themselves a good laugh at his expense.
Never guessing that much later the lesson would sink in.
Never guessing the bitterness of his regret that he had lost the chance to taste of Angelina, who had been by far the worthiest prey that he had ever taken. Brilliant and resourceful, strong enough to elude him on his own turf for months, in spite of her condition.
Was it possible Angelina’s sister was all she had been and more? For twice she had escaped his bullets. Her sister, who was charming the county sheriff, just as Angelina had before her.
A smile pulled at dry lips until the lower split and oozed out bloody droplets. Because the thought of Dana Vanover gave the Hunter an idea…
One that had him smiling as he stroked both the knife’s shaft and his own.
Dana’s gaze lingered on the pickup’s rearview mirror as the tiny clutch of buildings disappeared over the horizon. One hand fiddled with the truck’s air-conditioning vent in an attempt to direct some cool air toward her face. What breeze she felt was hot and gritty, dry as the afternoon outside.
“Sorry, Dana, but this old girl’s AC takes a few miles to get crankin’.” Bill Navarro patted the dashboard, then pulled a bandanna from his pocket and brushed at sun-faded plastic as if he’d noticed the thin
film of dust there.
Dana sneezed twice, which had him stammering more apologies as he tucked the blue cloth in the front pocket of a freshly pressed shirt.
“Please don’t do that,” she said. “Say you’re sorry, I mean. I really do appreciate your taking half your day to drive me.”
A smile warmed a deeply tanned, broad face that smelled of drugstore aftershave. A decent-looking face, since he’d taken time to clean up. “The pleasure’s all mine.”
She nodded before turning in her seat to look out the rear window, desperate for a last glimpse of the place—of all the godforsaken places in the country—her older sister had chosen to call home. Here it was less green than Jay’s ranch, but nevertheless, patches of bright color caught her eye.
Jay’s voice flowed from her memory, cool and unexpected as a wellspring in the rocky soil. “Never barren, Dana, any more than you.”
She wished he was here now, that he could have put aside his duties to drive her to the airport. Even though she knew it would only make it more difficult to leave him.
“If you’re worryin’ about that nutcase coming after us,” Bill told her, “you don’t have to.”
He hunkered low and reached beneath the seat between his feet, then drew out the largest pistol she had ever seen.
Her eyes widened at the sight of it, as well as at the memory of Angie bleeding, dying, a bullet in her shoulder.
“I feel much safer,” Dana said too quickly. “Now could you please put that away?”
When he blinked at her blankly, she added, “My…my sister. That’s how she…”
His tanned face reddening, Bill shoved the gun back out of sight, his movement so abrupt that she lifted her feet for fear he might squeeze off a shot. He looked disappointed at her reaction, maybe even angry, but he didn’t push her.
As the trip wore on she felt guilty for playing the grief card, using it as an excuse to draw into herself for the remainder of their journey. Clearly Bill had harbored hopes of a little conversation. But even for the sake of manners she couldn’t manage such a thing.
Not with her heart aching for both the hope and the man she was leaving behind in Rimrock County.
Later that same afternoon in his office, Jay talked to Special Agent Steve Petit. With the officious Tomlin busy elsewhere, Petit loosened up a little more as he talked about his years in the town of Monahans, where his father still raised cattle, a living he supplemented by hot-shotting oil-field equipment from site to site in his old pickup.
Jay listened, waiting for the other shoe to drop, but Petit never said a word about the news reports regarding the theater incident. Probably the agent already knew far more than the reporters. The bureau could have his medical records opened in a heartbeat, or those of any present or past member of the military.
More than likely both Petit’s reticence and his trip down memory lane were tactics meant to ease the local yokel into talking about his uncle’s possible corruption. Still, Jay found himself confessing his suspicions that R.C.’s death might be related to both the Piper-Gold and Vanover killings. As he pulled a couple of sodas from his office fridge, he suggested, “Maybe we could brainstorm together. God knows I want to get to the bottom of this as much as you do.”
Petit immediately agreed.
“No idea’s too wild,” the special agent said, setting the ground rules for the exercise. “So no calling bullshit on me, saying this old buddy or that neighbor would never do such a thing.”
Jay felt a muscle tic in his jaw, but he nodded all the same. However difficult this might be, it would keep him from being shunted aside, then bulldozed by the widening FBI investigation. And it beat the hell out of staring at the clock and wondering if Dana had yet reached the Carlsbad airport, whether she had boarded the plane that would take her out of his life once and for all. He wondered, too, about Bill Navarro, in a truck alone with her for an hour and a half. Would the rough-hewn and short-tempered rancher have it in him to play the gentleman so long? Jay worried that he should have insisted upon taking her himself, in spite of his appointment with Petit and Dana’s insistence that she could handle Bill.
“We’ve gotta consider the possibility”—Petit’s voice pulled Jay’s thoughts back on track—“that R.C. Eversole was murdered by Piper-Gold and her husband. Maybe the money wasn’t so much a bribe as blackmail. He could’ve figured out their angle, but eventually he squeezed a little too hard.”
Since that didn’t sit well with him, Jay threw in, “Or maybe they killed him after he wouldn’t take their cash.”
Petit looked doubtful, which was natural, considering the money buried outside of R.C.’s bedroom window. But he obeyed his own rule, which prompted Jay to mention his earlier suspicion that Angie Vanover had killed his uncle before her own eventual murder.
Petit nodded. “Could’ve been her way of shutting down the project, if she believed Eversole was bought off. She could’ve murdered the woman you found in the cavern, too, maybe at the same time. But if Vanover killed one or both, who’d be left to look for her?”
“Roman Goldsmith,” Jay guessed. “Maybe after he killed his wife, he figured out she really hadn’t known the location of the money.”
“That’s a possibility, especially considering that we’ve linked Goldsmith to an unsolved murder in Miami, where he was running a real estate scam back in the nineties.”
“Seems off, though, somehow, doesn’t it, to have a city type traipsing out to a salt cavern in the Rimrock County desert?”
“Not necessarily, since Haz-Vestment did a survey of the area around the domes to make their scam look legitimate. Goldsmith could have known about that cavern…Or maybe your uncle had a local partner who wanted to avenge his death. And find the missing money, if Angie was the one who hid it.”
“Considering the skull and petals I found in the bedroom, that part seems to fit.”
Both men lapsed into silence as they thought for several minutes.
Petit spoke next. “Or what if somebody else found out about the money? Someone local with a pressing need for it.”
Jay recalled Dennis Riggins’s reaction to the news of Haz-Vestment’s investigation. Remembered, too, Abe Hooks saying, “You don’t really know that bastard. Nobody knows him the way I do.”
“Have you taken a good look around here? Just about everybody living in these parts scratches out a pretty thin living,” Jay said instead, thinking it was bad enough speculating about his uncle, but at least R.C. Eversole was not around to hear it. Dennis, on the other hand, would die a thousand deaths if agents came to question him. Better that Jay should talk to him, though Dennis might try to kick his ass for daring.
Petit grinned, revealing the chipped front tooth. “If people in Devil’s Claw’re anything like folks where I’m from, the whole damned bunch of ’em would just as soon starve as admit it.”
A beep interrupted, alerting Jay a moment before the fax machine hummed and spit out the first of several pages.
“Let me check this, see if it’s anything important.” Jay put down his Dr Pepper and stood from where he had been sitting on the corner of his desk. After walking to the low ledge of the counter, he said, “It’s from the El Paso ME’s office. A summary of their preliminary findings.”
“Already?” Petit rose from the straight-backed chair where he’d been taking notes. Reaching for the papers, he said, “That was mighty speedy, even with an FBI rush on it.”
Jay turned from his proprietary grab. “Not so fast. This isn’t Angie Vanover’s autopsy. It’s Miriam Piper-Gold’s—and that’s my name on the cover sheet.”
Petit looked disgusted. “Listen, Sheriff, you know as well as I do her death falls in our territory.”
“The name’s Eversole, not Sheriff. And since I found this body and rode herd on this examination, let’s just say we look at the report together.”
Petit regarded him coolly for a minute, and in his gaze Jay saw the battle raging between West Texas good old boy a
nd the bureau’s more-professional-than-thou way of thinking. Shrugging, the agent opted for the path of least resistance.
“All right,” he said. “I don’t see any reason why we can’t have it your way.”
Jay pulled his desk chair around the corner and laid the papers out where they could both see. He frowned as he read.
“So they’re ruling it a homicide.”
“Just the way you figured,” Petit responded, giving him his due.
“But I didn’t figure this.” Jay reread a few lines to make sure he hadn’t misunderstood them. “They’re calling the facial injuries postmortem, especially in light of the damage to the fingers.”
“What damage?” Petit asked. “I don’t remember your saying anything about that.”
Jay shook his head. “Because I missed it, even though I was the one who bagged her hands.”
He tried to recall the fingertips, but he’d been mostly concentrating on the nails, which might hold evidence beneath them. These and the general condition of the mummified body had prevented him from focusing on one macabre detail: the fleshy pads, it seemed, had been pared away.
“Somebody didn’t want her ID’d, destroying the face, damaging the dentals, carving off those fingerprints,” said Petit.
Jay tapped another paragraph on the report. “I do remember seeing these cuts. Thought maybe an animal had been going at the internal organs. But the edges did seem pretty regular, now that I think on it.”
According to the medical examiner, strips of flesh appeared to have been flayed from the victim’s inner thighs and belly region. The cause of death, while remaining inconclusive, likely involved “circulatory collapse due to exsanguination.”
“So she bled out,” Petit concluded. “After being cut, possibly tortured, with something very sharp. A hunting knife? A scalpel?”
Jay nodded. “Someone wanted her to tell ’em the location of that money, I’m thinking.”
The Salt Maiden (Leisure Romantic Suspense) Page 20
