The Lovely Pines

by Don Travis

  He lifted his shoulders and dropped them. “Lapsed. Long time ago. But I gotta admit, when I learned who she was, I got a shiver down my back.”

  “Was that when you decided not to go along with selling her?”

  He grimaced. “I don’t really know. Maybe. All I know is it didn’t seem right selling her to somebody who’d hide her away for another thousand years.”

  I began to like Diego C de Baca a little better. “Who did your buddies intend to sell her to?”

  “I don’t know, but Spider said once we got her to the States, he knew somebody who’d pay a hundred grand for her.”

  “From the research I’ve done on the internet, more like a quarter mil. He was going to stiff you two guys. And that’s after he put you in the spotlight by having you mail it home. Miracle you weren’t caught then.” I looked at him again as a thought struck me. “Why didn’t you mail it to your father and have him put it in the room?”

  “Are you kidding? If he’d have found out I was stealing a religious piece like that—you know, historical—he’d haul it straight down to the sheriff’s office.”

  “Come on. He got you out of all kinds of scrapes.”

  “None of those had anything to do with his church. This one did.”

  “Okay, let’s figure this thing out. I was headed to the attorney’s office when I got word of the attack on your brother. I still have to get in touch with him. I’ll do that next. You just have to hang tight until I can talk to him.”

  “What about Nancy? You sure she’ll be all right?”

  “You call her and make sure. Tell her I’m going to have someone keep an eye on the house until you turn yourself in. He’ll be an ex-cop who’ll ring the doorbell and introduce himself. Right now, it’s time you met your host.”

  His eyebrows climbed. “He’ll kick me outa here.”

  “Don’t think so. I’ll pave the way, but we’ll have to let him in on how to access this secret room.”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “Okay, then you figure a way out of this. I’ll give you time to clear out, and then tell the Gondas I’ve solved the mystery of their mysterious break-in.”

  “Wait a minute. Where am I going to go?”

  “Don’t have a clue. If you hadn’t met me, what were you going to do?”

  His head drooped. “Hadn’t decided. Look, I’ll go along with it, okay? But he can’t tell anybody. Not till that lawyer can come up with something.”

  I left through the door that gave out onto the wine cellar, leaving it ajar. John Hakamora and Parson Jones were working with some equipment at the far end of the winery, but I managed to slip into Gonda’s lab without being seen. Ariel was concentrating on something on his desk and almost jumped out of his skin when I spoke.

  “Verdammt, BJ! You startled me. I didn’t hear you come in.”

  “I didn’t. In the way you mean it, at least.”

  “You have come to tell me you found who killed my son?”

  “No, but I’ve solved your intruder problem. For the moment, however, I must ask you to keep what I reveal to you to yourself. You can’t tell anyone.” I hesitated, thinking about Zuniga’s murder. I still didn’t know how the two incidents tied in, so I added something that brought a frown to his face. “Not even Margot.”

  “I see. Very well. Tell me.”

  “I’ll show you. Follow me, but try not to attract the attention of your winery workers.”

  He silently followed me into the depths of the wine cellar. The look on his face was something to see when I swung open the heavy stone facing that covered the hidden door. Diego’s expression was similar… astonishment.

  I ushered Ariel inside and made certain the door was securely latched before introducing the two and launching into a partial explanation.

  “Ariel, Diego has a problem, which is the reason he invaded your premises in the first place. Because of something that happened when he was stationed in Iraq, two men are on his trail. He knew of only one place that was secure, but it required that he initially break into your winery. Thereafter, he could come and go as he saw fit without disturbing you or your property.”

  Gonda listened patiently, his features composed. I finished by posing a question to Diego.

  “Will you trust me with the artifact until after we receive our instructions from Del Dahlman—from the lawyer?”

  “She’s all that’s keeping Spider from killing me outright.”

  “Even more reason to trust me. If he catches you with the statuette, he’s free to do just that.”

  “I don’t carry her around. She stays here where she’s safe.”

  “Do I need to point out that he’s closing in on you? If he catches up with you, he’ll sooner or later force you to give her up.” I held up a hand as he started to protest. “Believe me he’d get it out of you. But if I have her, all you have to do is tell him you delivered her to me for safekeeping with instructions that if anything happens to you, I’m to turn her over to the authorities together with a signed statement naming Natander as the killer of that priest in Iraq. That should make him more interested in me and less interested in you.”

  “You’d take that risk?”

  I nodded.

  “How do I know I can trust you?”

  “Think about it, Diego. If you can’t trust me, you’re in big trouble. I have access to your hideout and know who’s been helping you. The question is, what do you do if you can’t trust me?”

  From his body language, Diego clearly hadn’t thought that one through. In the end he agreed and handed over the Lady, as he called her.

  That done, Ariel stepped up and faced Diego. “Tell me, son. Did you kill Bas Zuniga?”

  “Who?”

  “My son. Bascomb Zuniga.”

  “I don’t even know who that is. But I can tell you one thing. I haven’t killed anyone.” He looked flustered before adding, “On this side of the pond, anyway. And over there, it was just holding up my end… you know, doing my duty.”

  “Do you know who did kill him?” Ariel persisted.

  “Sir, I don’t even know what you’re talking about.”

  “I am talking about someone shooting my son in the back on the road out in front of this winery in the middle of the night when he was coming off… duty.” Ariel almost choked on the last word.

  Diego turned to me. “You told me he was killed with a small caliber pistol?”

  I watched him closely. “In the back.”

  “No, sir,” he said to Gonda. “I do not know who killed him.”

  I could see from his eyes he’d leapt to the same conclusion I had. The shooter wasn’t Spider Natander. Could it have been Hugo Pastis?

  Chapter 17

  ANGST CLOUDED Diego’s features when I exited the hidden chamber via the wine cellar with the Lady in my possession. Couldn’t be helped. I wanted the artifact locked securely in my office floor safe.

  No, wait. In Del’s safe. That way we could argue Diego turned it over to his attorney in preparation for surrendering both himself and his swag to the authorities. Because I’d parked a considerable distance away in order to avoid surveillance, I accepted Ariel’s offer of a ride to my Impala. We were no sooner in his big boat of a car, a blue 2008 Cadillac Escalade, than Ariel asked the question I knew was coming.

  “Do you believe him, BJ?”

  “Absolutely. Think about it a minute. Bas’s murder called unwanted attention to the Pines. It wasn’t in his interest to kill your son. Nor did Bas resemble either of the two men on Diego’s tail.”

  “Those are the two photographs you showed me earlier, is that not right?”

  “Yes. James Natander and Hugo Pastis. They were all in the service together, and if Diego is telling the story right, Natander stole the artifact and conned him into mailing it stateside. A big risk he didn’t want to take himself. When Diego suffered second thoughts about the theft, the three Army buddies had a falling-out.”

  “I
s that young man’s life in danger?”

  “Yes, although what he said is true. They want what he has more than they want him dead. Although I believe they’d end up killing him anyway. To keep him from talking.”

  “Then he is welcome to remain in hiding at the Pines for as long as he needs to.”

  “That’s only until I can arrange to have him turn himself in.”

  No one seemed to be watching the Impala, but there were plenty of hiding places nearby. So I tucked the artifact, still wrapped in the cloth Diego used to protect it, as unobtrusively under my arm as possible and got directly into my car upon our arrival. As I sped back to Albuquerque, I couldn’t spot a tail, but traffic was heavy on I-25, so I couldn’t be sure. I used the time to call Del’s office on my cell and smooth the way to him. Fortunately he could squeeze me in.

  DEL STARED at the figurine standing in the middle of his desk for one long minute before lifting his eyes to mine. “That mud ball is worth how much?”

  “Several hundred thou.”

  He snorted. “I don’t believe it.”

  “Remember Mildred Muldren’s duck?” I referred to a case last year that was labeled the City of Rocks in my files. “I didn’t believe she was worth two hundred fifty thousand either. But people got killed over her just the same.”

  He chuckled. “Quacky the Second.”

  “Quacky Quack the Second, if I remember correctly.”

  “Okay, so what do we do with this thing?” Del asked.

  “Turn it over to the authorities, presumably so it can be returned to Iraq. At the same time, I want Diego C de Baca to surrender himself in order to get him out from under a death threat.”

  Del arched his left eyebrow. “For ratting out his confederates?” I’d already filled him in on the details. “I doubt that’ll do the job.”

  “It will if they’re in custody.”

  He sighed. “Hope they don’t end up in the same prison block.”

  “You’re going to keep that from happening.”

  “How do I do that?”

  “You’re going to get Diego off.”

  “Vince, I am not a criminal lawyer.”

  “Maybe not, but some people would disagree.”

  He raised both eyebrows at my play on words. “And what do you mean by that?”

  “Forget it. I want to turn Diego over to Gene Enriquez. He wants to talk to Diego because of the attack on German C de Baca.”

  “Yeah, but Gene will just let him go. He didn’t attack his brother, so there’s no reason for APD to keep him. This is federal. Why not go straight to them?”

  “Two reasons. Gene will have my ass if I don’t give him first crack. He’s had a felony committed in his jurisdiction, and he wants it cleaned up. So do I. If Gene gets Natander and Pastis, he’ll hold on to them until the feds can act.”

  “That’s one reason. What’s the other?”

  I scratched the bridge of my nose. “Because Gene will tell them Diego turned himself in voluntarily with the stolen artifact. And if another officer of the law attests to that fact, it’s less likely to get lost in the paperwork. As a matter of fact, Roma’s going to want to talk to him about breaking into the winery, so that gives us two jurisdictions attesting for him. Even better.”

  “You don’t trust the feds?”

  “I don’t know the feds. I know Gene. Besides, do you trust them?”

  Del didn’t deign to answer. “All right. Bring him in, and we’ll walk him over to APD.”

  “That won’t work. There’s a trained sniper out there looking for Diego. If he goes to the police, Natander might figure the artifact is lost to him anyway, but killing Diego will keep him from naming them as the perpetrators.”

  “How will they even know? If I understand you, they can’t find him.”

  “They know he’s somewhere in the vicinity of the Lovely Pines Winery. They’ll be watching everyone who comes and goes.”

  “So how do you want to handle it?”

  “There’s a wine tasting at the Lovely Pines—”

  “But you said that’s where his two trackers are looking for him. Why pick him up there?”

  “Because that’s where he is. I’d rather take him out in a crowd than try to slip him past Natander and Pastis again.”

  “So when’s the tasting?”

  “In about an hour and a half. And I want us there. We’ll buy a case of wine that someone from the winery will put in our trunk. A couple of someones. And Gonda will walk with us to the car too.”

  “I see. In all the confusion—”

  “Diego, who’ll be one of the someones, will slip into the back seat of the car and lie on the floorboard.”

  “And then we’ll drive the artifact and the fugitive to APD.”

  “No, the artifact will be locked in your safe here at Sloan, Hedges, Blah, Blah, Blah.”

  Del snorted through his nose. “You’ve got to stop that. It’s disrespectful.”

  “You didn’t object before you became one of the partners.”

  “Well, I am, so I do. Don’t turn my part of the name into Blah. Why do you want to leave the artifact here?”

  “Gene doesn’t need or want it. I’d rather have it in your safe than in the APD evidence room. Not because it might be stolen, but because it might get broken. You can turn it over to the feds when they’re in the picture.”

  He sighed. “All right. If we’re going to the wine tasting, we’d better get a move on. Your car or mine?”

  “Yours. I don’t want mine shot up if things go wrong.”

  “Typical,” Del said dryly.

  WE ARRIVED a few minutes early, so Del obviated the need for next Tuesday’s appointment with Gonda by reviewing New Mexico’s liberal grandparental visitation statutes with him. If either or both parents were dead, any grandparent of the child could petition for privileges, which should be enough to provide us the location of Zuniga’s vanished son. Del agreed to start the legal proceedings to enforce the Gondas’ rights as quickly as possible. They would consider whether or not to apply for visitation, custody, or adoption once we knew the circumstances.

  Two couples, as well as some singles, joined Del and me at the six o’clock wine tasting at the Lovely Pines. Two of the singles were my old APD partner, Gene Enriquez, and his last riding partner before he made lieutenant, a tall blond detective named Don Carson. They drove up to be on hand in case of trouble. Del argued that made our presence superfluous, but I knew the deadly accuracy of a military sniper better than he did and shut him down.

  Gene, however, voiced his own ideas when time came to depart the winery and insisted we make a change in plans. Carson would ride with us in Del’s Volvo while Diego, wearing Carson’s hat, sat beside Gene in his departmental Ford as we pulled out the front gates of the winery. I made the detective lie on the floorboard of the back seat so Natander and Pastis wouldn’t see more people leaving than arrived. I was pretty sure they knew who I was and would be keeping a close eye on me. The fact that two of the other couples who’d been at the wine tasting left the property at the same time we did made me feel a bit easier.

  Ninety seconds after turning out onto the main road, Carson popped up and slid onto the seat. “I’m too damned tall to crouch down on the floorboard. This is better.”

  “Get back down,” I warned. “We’re too close to the—”

  Just as Del touched the brakes to avoid hitting a squirrel running across the road, both rear passenger windows shattered. Del almost lost control of the Volvo, slowing even more.

  “Don’t stop!” I yelled. “Get us the hell out of here!”

  Del stomped on the accelerator, and the powerful automobile shot forward. Then the rear window exploded.

  Chapter 18

  GENE, WHO was in front of us, apparently saw us running up his tailpipe and goosed his Ford. Catching our urgency, he lowered the window and plopped a magnetic light onto the roof of his car and switched on the siren. I turned in my seat and found Don Ca
rson flat on his back on the rear floorboard. He was covered by broken glass and bleeding a little because of it but otherwise appeared unharmed.

  Traffic—light until we hit Bernalillo—opened up before Gene’s siren as he led us straight to the Sandoval County Sheriff’s Office. He’d apparently put out a call, because as soon as we pulled around behind the building, four deputies in vests and helmets surrounded our cars and escorted us to safety. Del and I stood with Diego in the corner while the law officers sorted out the incident. Sgt. Roma Muñoz, in all her diminutive authority, seemed to have taken charge. I heard her tell Gene that investigating officers and a forensics team had been dispatched to the ambush site.

  Eight of us sat in a conference room at SCSO, although the sheriff soon excused himself and left Del, Diego, Gene, Carson, and me with Roma and Detective William Soto to sort through what happened. I started at the beginning and instructed Diego to lead us through how he got into the wine-tasting room in the chateau that afternoon.

  GONDA HAD fetched Diego by opening the hidden door in the wine cellar and leading him into the winery, where John Hakamora and Parson Jones, the two surviving winery workers, waited. As a group they walked to the chateau, with Diego wearing a hat Gonda gave him. In a side room, I introduced Diego to both Del and Gene, whereupon Del started acting like a lawyer and formally surrendered his client to the APD.

  After the wine tasting, in which we all participated, we adjourned to our vehicles, as did the others in attendance. According to plan, Gonda walked his guests to their cars with Diego—still masquerading as a winery employee—in tow, bearing a case of wine to be placed in the trunk of Del’s car. Then, as Gonda went about engaging the other departing guests in conversation, Diego climbed into the front seat of Gene’s Ford while Don Carson sneaked into Del’s Volvo and lay on the back floorboard so any watcher would not see more people departing than arrived.

  “SOUNDS COPASETIC to me,” Gene said. “Then we took out of the winery in kind of a procession.”