Which is why he didn’t see the shoulder until his face collided with it. Smooth calfskin leather jacket, black with a racing-red Ducati appliqué logo.
A hand pressed him away. ‘Watch where you’re going.’
From a distance the man would have looked much younger, but Mike was right up on top of him, so he could see the smoothness of the face lift and the too-black dyed hair – he had to be in his mid-sixties. He had perfect white teeth and the relaxed posture of a man secure of his place in the world. He’d given Mike no more than a cursory glance; he was focused on the high-stakes blackjack table across the way.
As were William and Dodge, standing just behind him.
Mike’s legs tensed, locking up, the muscle cramping. He tilted his head, hiding his face beneath the cap’s brim, and managed to turn away. The three men were clustered by the door leading back to the offices – the same door the cocktail waitress had emerged from earlier.
As Mike walked away, he heard the man in the leather jacket say, ‘Results, boys. Soon.’
And William’s raspy voice, like a fingernail down Mike’s spine, ‘We’ll have ’em, Boss Man.’
Still riled, Mike hurried through the employee parking lot, Shep following him at a pace.
‘As in customer-service Indian or many-moons Indian?’ Shep asked.
Mike spit, the sunflower-seed chaw hitting the asphalt with a wap. ‘Many moons.’
‘Like peace-pipe, Manhattan-for-a-handful-of-beads Indian?’
‘Yes, Shep. Like that.’
‘You?’
There, in the cherry front spot, was a Ducati to match the man’s riding jacket. Sleek and muscular, the motorcycle looked part fighter jet, part armored action figure. Mike crouched and read the lettering stenciled onto the bumper block. BRIAN MCAVOY, CEO.
Brian McAvoy.
Boss Man.
‘Where to next, Big Chief Squatting Cow?’ Shep said.
‘Rick Graham.’ Mike thought of the newspaper article inside describing the local hero from Granite Bay. ‘Let’s see if our boy’s listed.’
Chapter 48
The white bedding, in the silver moonglow thrown through the skylight, looked like a pan of frosting. The giant cabin-style house was done to a turn – gable windows, antler chandeliers, steep-pitch roof for more headroom here, on the second floor. The place was way too pricey for a cop’s salary, even if that cop was a state-level counterterrorist czar. The gated neighborhood, half an hour north of Sacramento, seemed more the domain of law-firm partners and vineyard owners.
A cold breeze blew through the open door letting out onto the unlit balcony. It riffled Rick Graham’s salt-and-pepper hair against the pillow, and then he gave off a sleepy grumble, his hand thumping around the nightstand for the lamp switch. It clicked, and he released a yelp.
Mike sat bedside in a rustic armchair, the .357 resting casually in his lap, the barrel pointing at Graham’s upper torso. Black leather gloves turned his hands invisible in the darkness.
‘Do you have any idea whose house—’ Recognition struck. Graham shoved himself up against the headboard. He was wearing flannel pajamas, perhaps in a nod to the decor, the top unbuttoned to reveal a swath of gray chest hair. ‘Lemme guess – you came back to fuck up my tires again.’
Mike tightened his grip ever so slightly on the revolver.
‘How’d you get past the gate?’ Graham’s hand continued a slow drift toward the pillow next to him. ‘This house has heavy security. This is all being recorded.’
Mike pointed at the camera mounted above the open door, angled at them both. ‘Digital save to the hard drive on the Dell in your study.’
Graham’s Adam’s apple jerked.
Mike said, ‘Your affiliation with Deer Creek seems to go back a ways.’
Graham made a quick move with his hand and came up with a .38 Special. It was aimed at Mike’s head before Mike’s gun could leave his thigh.
Graham’s lips stretched to one side, a half smile, and his thumb drew back the hammer.
Mike tipped his head toward Graham’s pajama top. ‘Your pocket.’
Holding the revolver steady, Graham moved his other hand across and tugged at the loose breast pocket. A metallic rattle. One of the brass-cased rounds tipped out onto the sheets, and Graham stared down at it helplessly.
Mike put a heel up on the edge of his chair, hefted the gun across his raised knee.
Graham swallowed again and lowered his hand, the unloaded weapon disappearing into the sheets. ‘If I tell you everything,’ he said, ‘you won’t kill me?’
Mike allowed a little nod.
‘Give me your word.’
‘You have my word.’
This seemed to relax Graham a degree or two. ‘If you know someone’s profile, you know as much about him as possible. I can read people from the data droppings they leave behind. And yours say you’re not a liar.’
Mike lifted the gun a little, Graham’s eyes widening to track its movement. ‘Not generally,’ Mike said.
‘What do you want to know?’
‘Your affiliation with Deer Creek.’
Graham moistened his lips. ‘Me and Brian McAvoy go back to the beginning. He was a fresh-faced kid out of UNLV’s hotel-administration program. Family money, smarts to spare, and looking to use both. I was a young gun at Sac PD looking for advancement. We found each other useful. McAvoy funded an exploratory committee looking at expanding gaming outside of Vegas.’
‘He stumbled upon Sue Windbird.’
‘He stumbled upon a living, breathing lottery ticket. Tribes spend fortunes on legal petitions, lobbyists, lawyers, treaty experts, historians, genealogists – just to get what Sue Windbird already had.’
‘Which was what?’
‘You have no idea how big this is, do you?’ Graham chuckled, taking his time. He was stalling, sure, but it was clear how much he relished the tale as well. ‘The Bureau of Indian Affairs thought her tribe was already extinct. So in the seventies, Deer Creek slid right past all the tightened regulations for tribal acknowledgment. But just because a tribe has a surviving member, that doesn’t mean it retains all its tribal rights. Unless’ – his eyes gleamed with something like exhilaration – ‘the tribal territory was never abandoned. And guess what? During all those years when Deer Creek land was carved up and parceled out, ol’ Sue stayed hunkered down in her shitty cabin on a hundred acres of original designated reservation. A federally recognized tribe on sovereign land with one dying member left. Do you know what that means?’
‘Tell me.’
‘That land’ – Graham’s hands went wide – ‘that hundred acres constitutes a tiny sovereign nation in the middle of California. It is not beholden to the laws of the United States of America.’ He paused for effect. ‘We’re not just talking about having a monopoly on gambling when it’s illegal everywhere else in the state. We’re talking about no zoning laws, no federal regulations. Hell, short of the right to pursue felons, the U.S. has shaky criminal jurisdiction on tribal lands. And the best part? Every single dime of profit is a hundred-percent tax exempt.’
Mike thought of those picketers outside the casino: WHY ARE WE PAYING TAX SO CASINOS CAN RELAX?
‘And the location!’ Graham continued. ‘There’s a planned retirement community nine miles up the road – disposable-income heaven. You’re looking at seven thousand homes, one-point-eight people per lot. Those gomers might as well sign their Social Security checks directly over to Deer Creek.’
Mike thought about all the retirees he’d seen out on the casino floor, tugging on slot handles and throwing down chips.
‘Indian gaming exceeds twenty-five billion annually – more than the combined gaming revenues of Las Vegas and Atlantic City put together.’ Graham’s face showed equal parts satisfaction and pride.
Mike’s jaw ached with tightness. ‘That buys a lot of influence.’
‘You don’t know the half of it. Indian casinos were the largest soft-money contributor in the
last state election cycle. They practically greased the governor into office. Christ, Deer Creek alone bought thirty-five thousand dollars of tickets to Obama’s inauguration.’ Graham paused, wet his lips. ‘McAvoy started with a high-stakes bingo palace. From there he moved into lotto, punch cards, and unregulated slots. It wasn’t money like now – they were still fighting in the courts over slots and tables. Then the Supreme Court’s Cabazon decision blew it wide open in ’87. It was a whole new world. Remember when the California budget was overdue a few years back? The hundred-million-dollar shortfall?’
Mike nodded.
‘Deer Creek made it up. As in paid for it outright. It’s a pittance compared to what they’d pay in real taxes over the years, but they’ve been smart. They’ve made deals, spread less money around to the right people.’
‘How . . . ?’ There were more questions than Mike could keep track of. ‘How did they pull it off on the back of a ninety-year-old woman at death’s door?’
‘How does anyone pull anything off?’ Graham said. ‘With clever lawyering. McAvoy dug up some ancient clause that said that all reservation land sales were invalid unless preapproved by the federal government. Well, guess what? When the original Deer Creek reservation was parted out and sold off, no one knew to get federal approval. So McAvoy threatened to throw thousands of property sales – and titles – into question. We’re talking two thousand acres of Northern California. We’re talking lawyers calling up influential landowners and commercial real-estate holders, telling them they might not own their property anymore. Land development shut down. Banks stopped approving new mortgages. Didn’t take long for McAvoy to get Sue Windbird what she deserved.’
‘And he secured his own interest by promising to hold everything in trust for the tribe,’ Mike said. ‘So once Sue Windbird died, he’d set up his own tax-free ATM.’
‘And why shouldn’t it be his? You think Great-Granny was gonna up and build a billion-dollar business on her own? When we found her, she was still picking berries and shitting in an outhouse. That woman lived her last years like a queen. They paraded her around in ridiculous tribal costumes to ground breakings and ribbon cuttings. She drank single-barrel scotch and ate chateaubriand.’
‘When did McAvoy find out she had a kid?’ Mike asked.
‘Everyone knew she had a kid. A drunk – typical full-blood Indian type. Died in a car crash in ’59. What everyone didn’t know was that he knocked up some white girl.’
‘You uncovered that when you were doing the genealogy charts? To prove Windbird’s stake on the land?’
Graham looked impressed. ‘Yeah. We thought we were outta the woods, then bam! Turns out there was a little girl, born in ’51. Took some searching, but we found her.’
‘We,’ Mike said. ‘You keep saying we.’
‘Like I said, I’ve been with Deer Creek from the gates. And even if I didn’t dip my snout in the feed bucket, who do you think bankrolls half our agency? McAvoy’s donated half the law-enforcement equipment in the state. So let’s not get prudish over the distinction between public and private.’
‘That’s how you own all the cops.’
‘I’m a director at the largest antiterrorist agency in the state. I don’t need dirty cops. I finger “people of interest.” That’s what I do. If cops help me, it’s not corruption. It’s them doing their job, following directives. I point and they track.’
‘The girl,’ Mike said, steering him back on course.
‘Danielle Trainor.’
‘My mother.’
‘That’s right.’
If Mike’s mother was half Indian, then Mike was a quarter.
And Kat one-eighth.
Graham ran a hand down his face, drawing his features into a droop, and for an instant Mike caught a glimmer of remorse in his eyes. But then Graham spoke hard, his words defensive, shoring up an argument it seemed he’d been making to himself for years. ‘With the money McAvoy had invested, he couldn’t leave a loose end like your mother out there. Just like he can’t have some foster-home rube show up now and get the keys to the kingdom. Or your daughter – what’s she, eight? – waltz in and stake a claim to the whole goddamned operation. I mean, can you really blame him?’
Mike just looked at him.
‘Okay, from your position, sure. Of course. But you have to understand, there’s a lot at stake.’
‘An Indian casino with no Indians.’
‘That’s right.’ Slyness bit into Graham’s voice. ‘We’re just holding it in trust, see.’
‘For an extinct tribe,’ Mike said.
‘Not so extinct, are you?’
Mike leaned forward, and again Graham’s eyes tracked the barrel of the .357. A bead of sweat worked its way down from Graham’s left sideburn. He held up his hands. ‘Listen, I can be your friend here. Proving your claim will be really tough—’
‘My claim?’
‘You won’t get shit without that genealogy report. That’s why McAvoy keeps it buried in his private safe with all his valuable dirt, behind a painting of an Indian healer in his office. No one knows about the safe except him and me.’ He mistook Mike’s stunned expression for disbelief. ‘I don’t have the combination, but I could smuggle you in there and you could force him to open the safe. With that genealogy report, you could claim the casino and all its assets. I could help you navigate—’
Mike’s voice was as cool and hard as the bullets he’d removed from Graham’s gun. ‘I don’t give a shit about the casino.’
Through the open balcony door carried the buzzing of cicadas.
Graham wet his lips. ‘Then why are you here?’
‘You’re the profiler. Look into my eyes and tell me why I’m here.’
Graham’s fingers fussed in the sheets nervously. ‘Your parents.’
‘They’re dead.’ Mike couldn’t bring himself to phrase it as a question.
Graham looked away sharply.
‘Go on,’ Mike said. ‘Give me all those facts you add up to make a person. Because that’s all I’m gonna get.’
Graham cleared his throat, still kneading that sheet. ‘They were high-school sweethearts. Your mother was in the music society. She won Best Smile senior year – I think it was the contrast with her skin. Your father was voted Most Optimistic. He came from more money than her. Not that he was rich or anything – his dad was an accountant – but Danielle was raised by a single mother in a one-room apartment, helped her clean houses on weekends, wore thrift-store clothes. She identified heavily with her father, though she knew him only fleetingly for her first eight years. She emphasized her Native American heritage, which fits with the idealization—’
‘Which instrument?’ Mike asked. Graham looked at him blankly, so Mike said, ‘She was in the music society. Which instrument did she play?’
‘Flute, I think it was.’
Mike’s throat was dry, so he gestured with the gun for Graham to keep talking.
‘They were married out of high school. John ran a fabric distribution center. He was fairly paid but didn’t love his work. He loved baseball, western movies, and Mexican food. Danielle worked as a manager at a clothing store until he made enough, and then she stayed home. Family folks. Picnics on weekends, had a Dasher and a Ford station wagon – one of the Country Squires with the fake wood paneling?’
Mike could see the car, could smell the dust of the backseat.
Graham was still talking. ‘She was a gardener, Danielle, liked her hands in the earth. She loved candles and Cat Stevens and incense.’
‘Sage,’ Mike said faintly. ‘Sage incense.’
Graham looked suddenly agitated. ‘How much do you need to know?’
‘You killed them,’ Mike said.
Graham looked at him steadily, though his fingers still fussed at the bedding. The bullet glinted into view, surfing the folds of the sheet. ‘You gave me your word.’
Mike raised the .357 and sighted on Graham’s forehead.
‘Of course I did
n’t goddamned kill them. I’m a cop.’
‘So you had people. Like Roger Drake and William Burrell?’
Graham’s eyebrows rose with surprise. He said, ‘Like Lenny Burrell.’
Mike set the revolver on the chair arm, keeping it aimed toward the bed. ‘William’s father?’
‘Uncle.’ That bullet rolled ever closer to Graham’s fingers. ‘He took care of your mother first—’
‘How?’
‘Shot her in the bath, I think. It was quick, painless. You were asleep in the other room, but your father chased down Lenny on his way down the hall to you. There was a tussle, and your father beat Len away. He had rage going for him, John. Somehow he’d caught wind of what was going on. That you were marked, too. He took off with you that night before Len could circle back with reinforcements. Len caught up to him a week later outside Dallas. We needed to know where your father had parked you – it wasn’t like now, with databases and alerts and interagency communication around missing persons.’ Graham rubbed his eyes wearily, his voice rueful. ‘Len took his time with him, too. Leonard Burrell was a capable man. Your father had impressive stamina. Despite what he endured, he never gave up where you were.’
Mike looked up at the beams reinforcing the dark ceiling, his thoughts a haze. He said slowly, ‘I’ve hated my father for thirty-one years.’
‘Is it a relief?’ Graham’s dark-shaded face seemed almost paternal. ‘That you don’t have to anymore?’
Mike thought, You have no idea.
Graham cleared his throat. ‘I’m sorry for what I did. There are nights where . . . Well, that’s no concern of yours.’
Mike was aware, vaguely, of Graham’s arm tensing, his fist working the sheet, the dark spot of the bullet against the pale cloth. Mike said, ‘Why didn’t anyone ever find them? My parents?’
‘Len was expert at a lot of things. One of them was making bodies disappear. Easier that way. No murder investigation without a body. A lot less heat. No missing-persons reports in police files. People get into all sorts of trouble, pick up and go. Everyone just figured the Trainors moved on. No funeral service, no obit, much smaller splash. No one to miss them.’
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