Red Gold

by Robert D Kidera

  “Maybe I have.”

  I revved my engine and checked the side mirror before turning north onto Fourth. C.J. stared after me, hands on hips, his mouth open.

  Five minutes later, I waved to the cop parked on the street outside my house and pulled into the carport. Archuleta called before my feet touched the gravel. No wisecracks this time.

  “We found Jason Damien’s Ford Bronco this afternoon. Abandoned just outside of Grants.”

  “So you don’t know where he and Carmen are and don’t know what he’s driving? Wonderful.” I shook my head.

  “It gets worse. We found a pair of women’s jeans in the car.”

  I felt my heart race.

  “Don’t obsess about it,” Sam said. “We’ll get him. It’s just a matter of time.”

  “Carmen may have run out of time.” My jaw tightened. “Listen, Sam. Tomorrow I’m going to flush a big bird out of the weeds.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “I’ll tell you when it’s over. I’ve had a long day and now I need some sleep.”

  “Just don’t do anything stupid, Professor.” He hung up before I could say goodbye.

  The plan in my head was a long shot. I didn’t care. I’d had enough of being robbed, bombed and shot at. I was fed up with all the lies and deceptions. I was tired of being fucked around.

  I stomped into the house, took a long hot shower, and poured some food into Otis’s bowl. Passing on my usual Black Bush nightcap, I lay in bed with my loaded .38 under my pillow.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  April 17

  My right eye opened. Otis, my furry black alarm clock, had his claws buried into my pillow half-an-inch from my face. I rolled on my back and stared at the ceiling.

  I had to go through with this. Too many scores to settle. The cops were doing their best, but so far it wasn’t good enough. This was no time for me to sit idly by.

  My shower was hot and my breakfast light. I reviewed my plan one more time over a cup of black coffee.

  Yes, it had to be done. I filled my silver flask with whiskey and took a generous swallow from the bottle for good measure. Then I slid my .38 into the pocket of my jacket and locked up the house.

  Heavy morning traffic slowed my way downtown. I lucked into a parking spot right across from the Baca Building—a ten-story glass and chrome monolith of little warmth and even less charm. The first time I’d visited Richard O’Connor’s office, I walked out with Aunt Nellie’s millions. Today, I wanted to walk out alive.

  I hadn’t been cleared to carry concealed. That meant my .38 violated the law. It wouldn’t matter after today. I took a healthy swig from my flask, set it on the front seat, and floated across the street.

  I entered the elevator with a sullen Mexican boy and an elderly, bent-over woman. She tossed hushed Spanish rebukes at the lad all the way to the fifth floor, where she then dragged him out by his arm. Three floors later, I stepped into the sterile marble foyer of Chavez, Lujan, Vigil, and the guy I wanted to see. Rebecca smiled at me from her desk, but before she could finish saying, “Can I help you?” I sped past her and headed straight into O’Connor’s office.

  Since I’d called ahead, he was expecting me. “Good morning, Professor. What is it about your aunt’s estate that you wish to discuss?”

  I had the urge to leap across his desk and smack him, but instead took the chair opposite him and unzipped my jacket. I slid out my .38 and aimed it right between his eyes. His smile never wavered.

  “I want Carmen. You know where she is.”

  He moved to get up.

  “Stop.” I motioned him down with my gun.

  “Easy, McKenna.” He settled back into his seat. “I don’t know what kind of game this is—”

  “Let’s call it ‘Treasure Hunt.’ You want gold. I want a certain lady.”

  “Cut the detective crap, Professor.” O’Connor’s smile disappeared. “I don’t have time for this.”

  “Wrong.” I moved the barrel of my Colt down to aim at his mouth. “You have exactly ten seconds. If I have to blow you to hell, I’ll be the happiest man in the world.”

  He blinked and raised a hand. “Okay. Okay. I’ll make you a deal.”

  “I didn’t come here to deal.”

  “Of course you did.” He looked at my jacket. “You’re not wired, are you?”

  “What?” I hadn’t even thought of it. “No, no wire. Just me and the gun.”

  O’Connor took a deep breath and leaned forward. He studied my face. “Suppose I do know where your friend Carmen is? Kill me and you’ll sign her death warrant. Yours too, I’m afraid. But…Professor, if you tell me where all that gold is, I can have Officer Flores delivered to your front door. Unharmed. Noon tomorrow.” He leaned his six–and-a-half feet back against his chair, and examined his cuticles.

  My arm was starting to ache. I shifted the gun to my left hand. “You must think I’m a fool.”

  “There’s no doubt in my mind. You barge into my office in broad daylight, pull a gun on me, fill the air with wild accusations, and threaten my life. Have you been drinking?”

  I gripped my gun with both hands and said nothing.

  O’Connor shook his head. The smile returned. “Professor, when will you ever learn? I could have had you killed any time I wanted. But you possess something of mine. I want it back. That’s all.”

  I faked some bravado. “Did Chato and Ricardo have something you wanted?” I leaned toward his desk. “There’s something you need to learn, O’Connor.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Your life is in my hands now.” I squeezed the handle of my .38 to keep it square on his smile.

  But his smile never wavered. I expected another salvo of bullshit. Instead, he surprised me. “You win. I’ll have Flores returned unharmed by noon tomorrow. Then you tell me where the gold is. No cops, no tricks. Deal?”

  I knew his offer was too good to be true. I also knew if I pulled the trigger, I’d never get to Carmen. “Okay. But O’Connor—”

  “What?”

  “Cross me and you’ll die.” I stood.

  He raised both arms, as if to say “Who? Me?”

  I backed my way to the door and checked him one last time.

  He remained in his seat, the smile frozen on his face. I slipped my gun into my jacket pocket and stepped into the lobby. Rebecca gave me the slightest nod as I hurried past her to the elevator.

  I had a clear view of both the front door and the driveway of the Baca Building from my SUV. I started up the engine and waited. My phone rang less than a minute later. Caller ID said it was the law office I’d just left.

  “Yes?”

  “He just got into the elevator,” Rebecca said. She’d held up her end of our deal.

  A swallow of whiskey went down before O’Connor’s Lexus barreled out of the driveway, turned onto Gold, and sped west toward the expressway. I gave him a one-block head start and pulled out to follow. He took I-25 a short distance north to I-40 and then continued west toward Grants. He was playing it the way I hoped he would.

  Sixty miles to Grants. Traffic was light, more trucks than cars. I hung back about a quarter mile. He never exceeded the speed limit.

  Thirty miles along, my cellphone rang again.

  “Everything okay?” C.J. checking in, just like I’d asked.

  “Going as planned. Talk to you in one hour. Bye.” I took the silver flask off the passenger seat and treated myself to another good snort.

  The Lexus pulled off I-40 just west of Grants and headed north on Highway 605. Ten miles up the road, a large faded sign announced “Ambrosia Lake.” I recalled Chato’s words back at the cabin: “The second man, the one who hardly spoke, asked if he should go back to Albuquerque or to Ambrosia.” I touched the .38 in my pocket.

  An army of uranium prospectors invaded this part of New Mexico back in the 1950’s. They extracted the precious ore, called “yellow cake” in its refined state, as quickly as possible. Th
ey left nothing of value behind, not even Ambrosia Lake. It dried up fifty years ago.

  Yellow road signs warned of residual radioactive danger from the mounded mill tailings that lined both sides of the road. It was the kind of place a cockroach might go to die.

  O’Connor turned off the road. I coasted to the shoulder less than a quarter mile behind and took out my binoculars. He stepped from his car and opened the gate into a bleak compound surrounded by an eight-foot chain link fence. Then he returned to his Lexus, pulled inside the gate, and drove behind a gray sheet metal Quonset hut. The only other building within the compound was a weather-beaten, doublewide trailer.

  I inched my SUV along the shoulder of the road to within a hundred yards of the gate. O’Connor stepped from behind the metal building into the sunlight and crossed to the trailer. He stepped inside without a glance in my direction.

  The rusted swamp cooler on the trailer’s roof sprang to life with a rattle so loud I could hear it. A single power line ran from the corner of that roof to the road.

  I slugged down the rest of my flask, left my SUV behind, and approached the gate with gun in hand.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Gravel crunched under my feet as I approached the compound. The sun slow-roasted the back of my neck. A turkey vulture rode a wide circle in the sky above the trailer. No other living thing in sight; no other sound except the wind.

  Two strands of barbed wire intertwined along the topmost rung of the fence that surrounded the property. Things could get bloody even before I made it inside.

  The gate was closed, but O’Connor had neglected to relock it. Could he have been that careless, or was this a trap? I didn’t care. I was here to make him pay for all he’d done. I slipped inside the fence and inched forward along the side of the hut that faced away from the doublewide. The sign on its sloping wall bid me, “Welcome to Uranium Country.”

  The door was locked. I snuck around the back of the building to the side opposite the trailer. O’Connor’s Lexus sat five feet in front of me, with twenty feet of open space between the car and the doublewide. I crouched behind his car, removed the valve cap from the left rear tire, and let out all the air.

  I crawled up to the front bumper and studied the trailer. Door and windows closed. Blinds down. O’Connor inside. Was he alone?

  Beads of sweat gathered on my forehead. The .38 felt heavy in my right hand. I darted across to the small step-up porch in front of the trailer door and leaned my weight against the side of the building.

  The turkey vulture called out overhead.

  I edged to the nearest window, but its glass was opaque with dust. I crept back to the door and pressed my left hand against the doorknob. It turned. O’Connor had left this unlocked, too. I inched the knob all the way around without a sound.

  After a deep breath, I slammed my shoulder against the door, flung myself inside, and froze with my gun up and ready in a two-handed grip.

  Across the room, Richard O’Connor sat behind a metal desk and smiled his smile. Jason Damien stood to his left and scowled.

  The lawyer clapped his hands in slow, mock applause. “Nicely done, Professor. Rather dashing. Are you familiar with my associate, Mr. Damien?”

  “We’ve met.”

  Damien sneered. “I warned you. You shoulda gone back to New York when you had the chance.”

  I trained my gun on them and looked around. The room was large and open, with two folding chairs to my left and a bar with two stools set against the wall to my right. A door just beyond the bar was closed.

  A strong gust of wind hit the trailer. The fluorescent ceiling light flickered.

  “Where’s Carmen?” Too much impatience in my voice. Damn.

  “You’re in quite a hurry, aren’t you?” O’Connor studied his fingernails again. “Our little deal is off. Neither of us had any intention of living up to it anyway.”

  “I’ll make the decisions. I’m the one with the gun.”

  “Indeed you are, McKenna,” O’Connor nodded. “So what are you going to do, shoot me? Can you imagine the headlines in tomorrow’s Journal? Deranged Professor Shoots Prominent Attorney. Is that what you want?

  “I want Carmen. Now.”

  “She’s here. Contrary to your low and unjust opinion, I am a man of my word.” He looked at Damien and pointed toward the door beyond the wet bar. “Go get Officer Flores.”

  Damien crossed behind the desk, walked to the door, and opened it.

  “Come on out. Your boyfriend is here,” he snarled.

  Carmen crept into the room. There were no signs she’d been abused. She wore the same light blue shirt from two days before. Its long tails hid the top of loose-fitting khaki pants. Damien gripped her arm from behind.

  “Gabe, I’m sorry things turned out this way.” Her voice was steady but subdued.

  “Did they harm you?”

  “No. I’m all right.” She looked over at O’Connor and back at me. “Just do what he says and get me the hell out of here.”

  O’Connor raised his hand to cut her off. “Don’t move, Flores. McKenna and I have some business to settle first.” He looked at me like he was scolding a naughty child. “McKenna, you didn’t fool me for one second. You think you trailed me to this place? I led you here. I left the gate open for you. Jason and I like to have home field advantage whenever we can.”

  “Congratulations. So you win that point.”

  He shot me a look of triumph. “I win, period. The gold is mine.”

  I couldn’t stand to look at his damn smile any longer. I glanced over at Damien. His sneer riled me even more. “Is that the nastiest look you got?”

  O’Connor interrupted, “Don’t insult my associate. I haven’t got all day. Where’s the gold?”

  “The gold is on ice.”

  “Not good enough. You want my friend here to mark up your lovely lady?” Damien pulled a knife from somewhere unseen.

  “No. Wait.” I took a deep breath. “The map you need is in a locked box; in my new library wall safe back at the house. The key is in my wallet. I’ll have to reach in to get it.” I motioned to my jeans.

  “Put the gun away first,” O’Connor warned.

  Damien grabbed Carmen closer to him and pressed his knife blade against her throat.

  I slipped my .38 into my jacket pocket and reached around to the back of my jeans. I slid my wallet out and squeezed it until it bulged open. With my left thumb and forefinger, I pinched the key to the safe deposit box I’d rented for James McKenna’s papers.

  O’Connor’s eyes lit up after I returned the wallet to my pocket and held up the key in my left hand. He sat down behind his desk once again.

  “The key opens a metal box in my library safe,” I said. “It’s a hidden wall safe I had installed last Thursday. Look behind the stack of books, left side of the shelf behind my chair. Look for The Art of Deception, a large hardcover. Right behind that.”

  “That’s better,” O’Connor said. “Now the combination to the safe.”

  “It’s 18-6-24. The map and the directions to the gold are inside the box.” I raised my right hand to my waist. “You’ve got what you want. Let Carmen go.”

  “You haven’t given me the key yet.”

  I aimed for the corner of his desk and tossed the key hard enough that it bounced off the desk and onto the floor. O’Connor bent down to pick it up.

  Damien wasn’t fooled. He pushed Carmen aside and reached into his jacket. I drew my Colt and fired a shot at him before he had his gun out. The bullet struck him in the chest. He fumbled his gun onto the floor and landed on his side. I sprang forward, switched the Colt to my left hand, and grabbed Damien’s Glock with my right.

  Carmen edged toward me as I stood over Damien. “Nice work, Gabe! Hand me his gun and I’ll sit on him. You take care of O’Connor.” She held out her hand.

  “No.”

  “What?”

  It hurt to look at her. “Go stand next to O’Connor. Keep your hands where I
can see them.”

  “Gabe, what’s the matter with you?”

  I gave her a slow, acid smile and let her savor it a moment. “You have no idea.”

  Damien groaned. I kicked him in his head and motioned Carmen with both guns. Backing away, she sidled up to O’Connor’s desk, her hands raised.

  Blood from Damien’s wound leaked onto the cheap carpet. He moaned softly and clutched the right side of his chest with a desperate red hand.

  O’Connor stood there, his smile just a memory. “I underestimated you, Professor. Carmen’s a pro. She’s been playing you since the day you arrived from New York.” He frowned at her. “First time you’ve let me down, my dear.”

  I held a gun on each of them. “I knew you were a bastard from day one, O’Connor. Carmen just took a little longer to figure out is all.”

  “Wait, Gabe,” Carmen pleaded. “You’ve got this all wrong. I’ve been working undercover for Archuleta. We’ve been trying to infiltrate O’Connor’s operation for months.”

  “Nice try.”

  “But you don’t understand—”

  I stepped forward. Carmen backed against the wall. “What don’t I understand? That you and O’Connor are partners? That your husband left you two years ago? That you signed Millie Singleton into custody at the Women’s Correctional Facility after her meth conviction? You made like you didn’t know who she was.” I felt the urge to hit a woman for the first time in my life but fought it off.

  “I can explain all that.”

  “Do your explaining at your trial. I searched your house yesterday. Played back your answering machine. It was Damien’s voice on that message.”

  Carmen’s only answer was the hatred in her eyes.

  “As for your working undercover, that’s bullshit, too. Archuleta told me you weren’t fit for anything harder than traffic patrol.”

  She looked away. O’Connor sat frozen and silent. Damien lay still on the floor.

  I felt a surge of power. “I ran a title search on your house yesterday. Richard O’Connor owns it. Imagine that.” I turned to him. “I’ll give you one thing, big guy. You have fine taste in women’s lingerie. Nice collection you bought for your lady here.”