Elizabeth Lowell - Blue Smoke and Murder

“Balfour in Nevada,” Zach said. “We’re still in contact. Still an open tail, county sheriff’s car, quarter mile behind the Caddy.”

“Roger.”

“Get ready to coordinate communications if I have to set down.”

“Standing by.”

Zach popped the microphone in answer and switched over to the BlackBerry’s bug frequency just in time to hear Jill talking to Mary.

“The patrol car will lead me to the meeting,” Jill said.

He couldn’t hear what Mary said.

“Hopefully the next call I make will be the one you’re waiting for.”

A pause.

“Stay close to the phone,” Jill said.

Zach’s sat/cell vibrated. He switched over to it. “What?”

“The destination may be Beaver Tail Ranch,” Faroe said. “If the sheriff is smart, the deputy will drop her there and head for milepost 418. He’ll stop traffic southbound. We’ll stop it northbound. Once the deputy turns on his light bar, land ASAP and get to the car that will be waiting by the road. I don’t want to lose this client.”

“I’m not real happy with the idea myself,” Zach said. “And I’m less happy about seeing the cops on the opposition’s side.”

Faroe grunted. “Money talks. Crawford has it. After I had a little come-to-Jesus talk with the sheriff, he agreed to stay out of our way.”

“You sure of this?” Zach asked.

“No.”

“Hold.” He turned to the pilot. “Is there a Beaver Tail Ranch close by?”

The pilot looked at the land and pointed into the distance. “Up ahead where the dead trees are.”

Zach went back to the phone. “I trust somebody at St. Kilda took apart the state of Nevada to see where Crawford put the fix in?”

“The governor owes Crawford,” Faroe said. “So does a state senator and a few odd congressmen. So does the sheriff.”

“Since when are corrupt politicians odd?” Zach asked.

“The sheriff thought he was doing a favor for a wealthy man who supports the local law. Nothing unusual about that, in Nevada or anywhere else.”

Zach swept the ground with the binoculars. The shabby ranch surrounded by dead or dying trees came into focus at extreme distance. “Have you heard anything about Garland Frost?”

“He’s improving much faster than they thought he would,” Faroe said. “He’s even trying to give orders.”

Zach smiled. “Good for him. He can be a real son of a bitch, but he didn’t deserve what happened.”

“Child,” Faroe said, “since when has ‘deserving’ entered into life’s equation?”

“Since-hold it.” Zach saw the light bar on the patrol car flash to life. “Cop car just lit up. It’s going down at the Beaver Tail.”

“Keep her alive.”

Easier said than done.

NEVADA

SEPTEMBER 17

6:24 P.M.

Hi, Mary,” Jill said into her sat phone. “I wanted to make sure you were still awake.”

“Working on it. How’s it on your end?”

“Just got a wake-up call from the cop behind me. I’m slowing down and pulling over. I’ll leave the connection open.”

“Watch yourself,” Mary said. “Friends are hard to find.”

“Same goes.”

Jill laid the phone aside. Now that it was happening, she wished she had more time. Something had been bugging her since the service station at Indian Springs, but she couldn’t pin it down.

Later, she promised herself.

The wheel bucked in her hands when the two tires on the right side of the Escalade hit rough gravel at the edge of the pavement.

The cop pulled even, matched speeds, and used the loudspeaker in the car’s grill. “Follow me!”

The voice sounded like Halloween in hell, but she signaled agreement and eased back onto the highway.

“Okay, I’m not pulling over,” Jill said into the sat phone. “I’m back on the highway. He wants me to play Follow the Leader.”

“Keep me in the loop,” Mary said.

“Don’t worry. I’m feeling real talkative right now.”

Jill picked up her speed again to match the officer’s. Two miles later, his brake lights flashed once in warning. She slowed as he did.

The cop’s left turn signal came on.

“We’re turning left,” Jill said. “Old gravel road, mostly dirt and weeds now. Buildings about a half mile away. Dead trees around. Could have been a ranch once. Or a resort. Or-”

Her voice died as she focused on a battered, sun-faded sign next to the dirt road.

“Okay, this is weird,” Jill said into the sat phone. “It’s a cathouse. Or was. The sign reads ‘Beaver Tail Ranch, Lots of Both Right Here. Y’all Come.’ The place looks like it’s been a long time between lube jobs.”

Mary choked off laughter. “Anybody there?”

“So far, all I see is me and the cop. Why don’t I feel good about that?”

“Because you’re smart.”

“Yeah?” Jill asked. “Then why am I here?”

Mary didn’t answer.

Jill didn’t expect her to.

BEAVER TAIL RANCH

SEPTEMBER 17

6:25 P.M.

Score watched the deputy park at the end of a row of rickety cottages whose doors opened onto the dried, rocky area surrounding an equally dry swimming pool. The pale, curving body of the pool was pocked by dark holes where tiles had fallen out. The dying light gave the cement a creamy glow.

“Alert the ops in the barn,” Score called over his shoulder.

A voice from another room called, “Yo.”

Score watched the deputy go to the Escalade and circle his finger, silently telling the Breck woman to lower her window. Her words carried clearly from the bug to the headset he wore.

“I don’t like this, Mary,” Jill said. “It looks deserted. And the deputy wants me to roll down the window.”

“Your call.”

“I wish.”

Score grinned. He knew it was his call all the way.

The deputy was a middle-aged man with buzz-cut hair beneath his uniform hat. He hitched his utility belt up over his belly, leaned in, and spoke through the partially open window.

“The man you wanted to meet is in the fourth cottage down the row,” the deputy said, pointing.

“Who’s with him?” she asked.

He shrugged. “I was told to bring you here. I’ve done it. That’s all I know.”

“That’s right, you dumb putz,” Score said in a low voice. “Now go back and sit in your car until we call and tell you to arrest Ms. Breck on extortion charges.”

The deputy got in his car, made a U-turn, and sped back down the gravel road to the highway.

“What the hell?” Score said. “Dumb as a brick. Can’t remember even simple orders.” He hissed through his teeth. When the time came, he could get the deputy back here quick.

Through the partly open window, a surge of wind shifted dust into the Escalade.

“C’mon, babe,” Score said in a low voice, pulling a black ski mask over his face. “Come and get it.”

BEAVER TAIL RANCH

SEPTEMBER 17

6:26 P.M.

I’m going in,” Jill said to Mary. “I’ll call you once I check the money.”

“Be safe. If that doesn’t work, be matte-black bad.”

Jill almost smiled. Someday she’d like to meet Mary. “Same goes.”

She hung up and tossed the phone in back with the aluminum suitcases. It banged and clattered.

Hope your ears are ringing, whoever and wherever you are.

She picked up the BlackBerry and put it in one of the cargo pockets of her hiking pants. The belly bag hung around her waist. She opened the top zipper, shifted the pistol so that she could reach it with one grab, and checked the safety.

Matte-black bad.

And the mother of all rapids is just ahead.

The idea of rowing with a black pistol was unnerving.

It can’t be any worse than my first trip alone down a class-five rapids.

Can it?

Jill got out of the car and looked at the cribs arrayed around the dusty pool. The “cottages” looked shabby, abandoned.

Looks like the sex business isn’t real good out here.

Beyond the ranks of cottages, more than half a mile down the rutted road, several sagging barns and outbuildings silently stated that once this had been a working ranch, rather than a working girls’ ranch. The distant buildings were even more beaten down by time and sun than the cribs, where sex had come with time limits and a price list.

The door in the fourth cottage away from her banged open with more than the force of the wind. There was a flickering blue light showing inside. Somebody was watching TV.

Got bored waiting, did you? she thought with grim satisfaction. Too bad. I’m tired of being your puppet.

Besides, she didn’t know how much time it would take St. Kilda’s people to close in on the ranch. She wanted to give them every second she could.

Slowly, like a woman with all the time in the world, Jill stretched, loosening muscles that had been confined too long in a car. The stretch felt so good that she repeated it, held it, and did it all over again a third time, breathing in the fading heat and exhaling clammy manacles of fear.

She could fairly taste the impatience radiating out of the fourth cabin.

You can just wait for it, dude, she thought. I certainly have.

Ignoring the primitive unease that slid down her spine from her nape to the bottom of her hips, she pressed down on part of the key fob. The Escalade’s cargo area opened. She pulled out one suitcase and locked the vehicle again, leaving two cases inside. No way was she going to be shuffling three suitcases when she needed a hand free for the pistol.

The open door on the fourth cottage banged in the wind again. Despite the nerves jumping in her stomach, Jill didn’t flinch at the sound. Wind rattling around old buildings was as familiar to her as her childhood.

Neither fast nor foot-dragging, she walked toward the open cottage.

And wished she was somewhere else.

Anywhere.

Zach, I sure hope you aren’t far away. This isn’t the kind of river I know how to run alone.

ABOVE NEVADA

SEPTEMBER 17

6:28 P.M.

Take one quiet orbit close enough for me to read the serial numbers on the helo in back of the barn,” Zach said to the pilot. “Do it fast.”

The plane began shedding altitude. It hit the layer of air where the heat of day met the coming chill of night. The plane jumped around, a drop of water in a searing skillet.

Even with motion-compensated binoculars, getting numbers wasn’t easy. He stared through the lenses and memorized the numbers on the helo.

“Got it,” Zach said. “Take us up again.”

The plane began to climb back into twilight while Zach punched number one on his speed dial.

“Faroe,” said a deep voice.

“We’ve got trouble,” Zach said. “There’s a Jet Ranger parked behind the whorehouse barn, which is about three thousand feet from the cribs. Two black Suburbans are parked with the helo. Looks to me like somebody brought in another security outfit.”

“Who?”

“Trace these helo serial numbers,” Zach said, speaking distinctly as he repeated what he’d seen through the binoculars.

“I’ll get back to you,” Faroe said.

Zach switched to the pilot’s frequency. “We’re going to land.”

“Where?”

“On the highway.”

“What about traffic?” the pilot asked.

“It’s taken care of.”

The pilot took the plane higher.

“I told you to land,” Zach said.

“Do you want to walk away from it?”

“Yes.”

“Then shut up and let me do my job.”

Zach switched back to his sat/cell. “Come on, come on,” he muttered. “How long can it take to run the numbers on a-”

His sat/cell rang. “Who are they?” Zach demanded.