Above The Law Page 8

  Desperate fingers plumbed the fat for the washboard within. In his mind, he did a simple calculation of the doughnuts and beer he could cut out to bring it back. He swung the bedroom door to a close, stood sideways, and sucked it in. After a determined nod, he replaced the cutoff flannel with the last garment hanging in his tiny closet, a loose-fitting white dress shirt that in his respectable years had always been teamed up with a blazer and tie. For shoes, he simply laced up the Timberland boots he'd worn open-tongued in the barrio.

  Sitting on the bed, he dialed information for the Wilmer Police Department. While he didn't speak to Gage, the chief's secretary told him if he could get there before five-thirty, the chief would be able to see him. On the way out, Jose emptied the garbage to remove the bad smell. While Kenna never minded the clutter, he didn't want her to spend her visits in squalor.

  Because of traffic, the drive to Wilmer took nearly forty-five minutes. Gage was in the office, and after twenty minutes he appeared in the lobby with a frown as big as his head. He extended a hand and Jose shook it, matching his grip and then weakening the way a dog will roll to its back in order not to fight, until Gage's lips evened out.

  "Wayson says you're okay," Gage said, studying Jose carefully as if he still wasn't sure, "otherwise you'd be shit out of luck."

  "I understand you met my lovely client," Jose said, shaking his head in the knowing way of good old boys.

  Gage continued to study him. Jose held the chief's gaze, aware that the success of his trip hung in the balance. Finally, the enormous cop snorted and turned without speaking. Jose followed the chief back into his office as though he'd been politely invited.

  "I got a redheaded bitch for a sister-in-law," Gage said, sitting back in his chair, taking up his bayonet paperweight and throwing his big boots onto the desk. "One's enough."

  "I hear you," Jose said, eager to prove they were of the same mind. "She's not fun, but she's plugged into a lot of those society people, pretty much my pipeline for work. So, when she asked me to come down here and look into this guy's death, what could I say? I spoke to Wayson. He said all good things about you, and I figured we could work together on this one. You know what I mean?"

  Gage smiled, pointed his bayonet, and said, "I always called you guys PTs instead of PIs. Peeping Toms. Must make a hell of a pot of money to stop being a cop for that."

  "Right," Jose said, forcing a smile. "Anyway, I don't want to bother you any, but she's got this Mex girl raising her skirts."

  "You look half Mex yourself," Gage said, using the point on his teeth.

  "Dad's family came over in 1821," Jose said without missing a beat. "So he said he figured he'd get a little leeway."

  "And you do," Gage said with a magnanimous wave of the blade. "Not too many Texans who don't have a Mex up their family tree somewhere. What do you wanna do? She'll get the goddamn report anyway. Not quick, but she'll get it."

  "Nothing really," Jose said. "Maybe take me out to where it happened so I can say I was there, saw it, and the whole thing couldn't have been nothing but an accident."

  "And that'll make her happy?" Gage said, his face giving nothing away.

  "She's a lawyer," Jose said. "I'm a cop-or I was. She'll be happy."

  "You can even take her the report," Gage said, swinging his feet off the desk and rising up. "Let her know it's all Momma's cooking. Save me a stamp."

  Gage took a folder from the top of his pile and handed it over to Jose, who took it, half-rolled it, and swatted it against his leg as he got up, too.

  "Let's go," Gage said, taking his hat off the antler of a dead deer mounted on the wall and fixing it on his head. "We'll have you home for dinner."

  CHAPTER 22

  ISODORA WORE A WHITE COTTON SHIFT, HER OWN CLOTHES. She held Paquita tight, rocking her back and forth as she stood on the tarmac waiting in the long line of Mexicans boarding the unmarked gray plane. When she saw Casey, her face lit up and she angled her little girl's face so Casey could see her.

  "She's beautiful," Casey said.

  "Thank you so much, Miss Casey," Isodora said.

  "I feel like I didn't do anything," Casey said.

  "I have her. That's all I need."

  "What will you do in Monterrey? Do you have family there?"

  "No, but Maria gave me some money," Isodora said. "I'll find something. I heard a man talking about a new soap factory outside the city. Maybe I can get work."

  "Who'll watch Paquita?"

  A worried look crossed Isodora's face and she shook her head, signaling that she hadn't thought that far.

  "I want you to sign this for me, Isodora," Casey said, handing her the fax and a pen. "I'm not giving up. When you get to a place, I want you to call me. Call collect."

  Casey took the signed release back and handed Isodora a card that she examined, then tucked into the small bag hanging from her shoulder.

  "You won't forget?" Casey said.

  "Will you?" Isodora asked.

  One of the ICE agents yelled something and they turned to see the tail of the line disappearing up the metal steps.

  "No," Casey said, and watched her go.

  Despite her law clinic's steady downward spiral in property value and the embarrassing condition of her car, Casey had been able to hang on to the one luxury that mattered. When she first came to Dallas, she'd purchased a condo out in Las Colinas, across from the Omni Hotel. Beyond the grass and the tree-lined sidewalks, two long buildings with brick storefronts snuggled up to the canal that ran between them. Brick pavers and wrought-iron balconies jutting from the expensive condos above gave Casey the feeling of Venice the moment she saw the place.

  The refuge of the six-story buildings blocked out the sound of the passing freeway and allowed the songs of mockingbirds, blue jays, and house finches and the occasional complaint of a mallard down on the water to float in through the curtains, waking Casey just before sunrise. She had purchased the spacious two-bedroom unit with cash, opting out of a mortgage so she'd always have a place to call her own.

  Because of the fine hotel just across the wide boulevard, the small, almost secret neighborhood had more good and different restaurants than it deserved, including a Japanese steak house, a fine Italian restaurant with black-tie waiters, a small sports bar, a French bistro on the canal, and a Lone Star Texas chili joint, as well as the unusually good food at the Omni.

  By the time she returned from the airport through the rush-hour traffic, Casey was ready for the chili joint and a couple of cold bottles of Budweiser. She showered, put on a V-neck T-shirt and jeans, and headed out the back door. Hers was one of the few units to have a small private stairway leading out onto the canal. As she left, she gave the door to her condo a half-hearted shove closed. She followed the brick sidewalk under a walking bridge, then rounded a corner, entering a wide alleyway that led to the restaurant.

  Noise from the chili joint washed over her. The place was jammed, but the hostess recognized her and led her to a corner table not too far from the open doors where luckier diners sat out on the patio under red and white umbrellas. On the opposite side of the room, a long-haired blond cowboy with a drooping mustache strummed away on an acoustic guitar. When he looked up and noticed Casey, he crooned "Tequila Sunrise" without taking his deep blue eyes off of her. She couldn't help smiling, but it was to herself, not him. She dialed Jose, hoping to catch him and invite him for a drink, but got no answer.

  When the chair across from her scraped along the plank floor, she looked up to see the cowboy singer before turning back to her steak.

  "I like your music," she said, "but you don't want my husband to walk in here right now. He's the jealous type."

  "Just trying to be friendly," the cowboy said, nodding at her empty beer bottle. "Can I buy you another?"

  "I'm serious. He's a cop."

  "No harm meant," the cowboy singer said, raising his hands in surrender and getting up.

  "None taken," she said.

  After a thick mu
g of coffee and a brownie with ice cream that she shouldn't have had, Casey tried Jose one last time before paying the bill and heading for the door. The sounds from the restaurant had died down, and when she rounded the corner Casey could hear the steady plunk of water dripping from some unknown source into the still water of the canal. Clouds of bugs flickered under the street lamps and the dark pockets between lights along with the dripping water made Casey shiver and pick up her pace.

  When she got to her door, she realized that not only hadn't she closed it tight, but she hadn't left a single light on inside. She halted on the stoop and eased the door open, peering into the blackness, straining to see the stairway she knew to be there.

  That's when someone reached out from the dark entryway and grabbed her arm.

  CHAPTER 23

  YOU WANT ME TO RIDE WITH YOU?" JOSe ASKED, FOLLOWING HIM out the door.

  "Better off taking yourself," Gage said. "We got to pass the highway, and when we're done you'll want to just keep going."

  The chief told his secretary that he'd see her tomorrow, and then told Jose he'd pull around front to meet him. Jose climbed into his truck and stuck the handheld GPS into the front left pocket of his jeans, covering it with the tail of his shirt. He waited along the street until he saw Gage whiz past in a brown-and-beige cruiser. He took off after him, spinning his wheel and stamping on the gas, and wondered the whole way if the chief was trying to have some fun with him.

  When they got to the open gates of the workers' entrance to the ranch, Gage left his car off to the side of the drive and climbed in with Jose. Jose could see from Gage's face, even behind the mirrored glasses, that he was all business.

  "No sense wasting my shocks when I don't have to," Gage said, pointing for Jose to proceed.

  They passed a handful of faded barns. Behind them, and through a gap in the trees, Jose caught just a glimpse of at least a dozen long rows of tenant houses. In the gap, two emaciated little girls in soiled white dresses jumped a dirty piece of rope.

  Jose slowed his truck, and while he could no longer see the tenant shacks or the girls, the smell of raw sewage seeped into the cab through the crack in his window.

  "That's a lot of shacks over there," he said, angling his head back toward the barns and sniffing.

  Gage glanced toward the shantytown, then focused ahead before he said, "Big ranch. Lots of hands. None of my business. None of yours."

  "Couple thousand head of cattle or something?" Jose said. "Cotton, too?"

  Gage grinned at him. "You are a detective."

  "Observant," Jose said. "Sometimes places like that, with that many workers, are breeding grounds for trouble."

  "What, like Cesar Chavez kind of strike stuff?" Gage asked.

  "I was thinking gangs and drugs."

  "Mosquitoes on a puddle," Gage said with a shrug. "All you do is spray it every once in a while, keep things cleaned up."

  Jose let up on the brake and kept going.

  For several miles they traveled over rough and rutted roads until they came to a rare cluster of low hills scarred with farm fields and topped by hardwood. Jose recognized the widely spaced rows of bright green sprouts distending from the brown furrows as corn when they climbed out and hiked up the hillside toward the crown.

  About fifty yards from the upper edge of the field, Gage stopped and eyed first one tree line, then the other, as if to triangulate his position, then started for the wood that ran up the hillside. Jose carried the file with him and leafed through the report as he followed Gage into the wood. Late-day copper light filtered through the young leaves. Pollen floated past, glittering like stardust, and insects buzzed and darted about, cutting tiny arcs through the beams.

  "Says Elijandro sat in front of the senator," Jose said, tapping the report, "about twenty feet and off to his left."

  "Bird was out there," Gage said, pointing back at the place where they'd stood in the nascent corn. "Senator Chase sat here, and the guide sat there. Decoys were lower down, but the bird came to a strut up there, through that gap, right in line with the guide."

  Gage pointed past a large oak, then swung his hand to the left, pointing a line over the top of a low stump closer to the field.

  "And Elijandro-the guide-jumped up when the senator shot?" Jose said, his eyes darting about the area, soaking it in.

  "Bird was right out there," Gage said, directing a thick finger toward the field and following his own finger to the spot in front of the stump. "Blew his brains all over. Rain got to it, I guess, and the bugs."

  The chief toed some dead leaves, leaving a scuff mark.

  "I didn't see any photos of the body in the file," Jose said.

  "This ain't CSI," Gage said.

  "What about the shell casing?" Jose asked.

  Gage's eyebrows shot up. "What about it?"

  "Senator right-handed? Shoots a right-handed gun?"

  "I believe so. Why?"

  Jose looked back to where the senator had sat and scanned the forest floor off to the side where the shell would have ejected. He shrugged and said, "Just details."

  Pointing to the gap between the two trees that would have been the senator's aim point, Jose said, "That's a real narrow lane to shoot through."

  "He's not much of a hunter," Gage said, "the senator. Probably got excited."

  After a silence, Gage said, "Wayson said you used to be a homicide detective. This ain't that. No question about the weapon, senator's twelve-gauge. Not much reason to look for the shell casing, but help yourself if you like."

  Jose looked up and grinned. "Nah. Just thinking out loud. I'm good. I saw the place. Pretty clear how it all happened."

  "Cut and dry."

  "That's what I'll tell her," Jose said. "Sorry to drag you out here."

  "It's on my way."

  Jose let the chief lead the way out, but before he followed, he reached into his pocket and set the GPS.

  The two of them trudged back to Jose's truck. He dropped the chief off at his cruiser, noticing for the first time the camera mounted above the gates. As he left, he watched the cruiser disappear in his rearview mirror, guessing that the chief wasn't going home but to report in to the senator.

  Jose took the highway a couple of exits north, then got off and found a diner where he had a plate of hash and eggs and several cups of coffee in a booth next to the dusty window. He took his time eating and spread the police file out across the tabletop of his booth, digging into it, and burning through the last light of day.

  CHAPTER 24

  CASEY LURCHED AWAY, STUMBLING AND LOSING HER FOOTING because of the unrelenting grip on her arm.

  She curled her fingers into a claw and slashed up and across in the direction she thought her attacker's face must be. The nails caught something, slicing through like butter, and the man cried out without letting go.

  Casey screamed.

  "Casey Jordan!" he shouted. "Are you Casey Jordan?"

  She could see him in the light now, not the abusive husband of Soledad Mondo but a bulky, fiftyish man with a bulbous nose, wearing a tweed sport coat, and with a bad, frizzy gray comb-over hanging half off his balding head.

  "Let me go, you son of a bitch!" she shrieked, swinging again.

  This time he caught her hand and grabbed hold of it tight, backing her down into the doorway, surprising her with his strength.

  "Are you Casey Jordan?" he hollered.

  "Yes," she said. "Let go of me!"

  The man released her wrists and stepped back into the shadows, fumbling with something inside his coat pocket, maybe a knife, maybe a gun. She gasped and thought to run, or kick him in the balls, but felt stuck in cement with limbs paralyzed by their own weight.

  Whatever he took out flashed in the gloomy entryway. She blinked.

  "I'm serving you with court papers," he said, extending the packet and jiggling it at her while he patted his bleeding cheek.

  "You hide in my entryway?" she said, not taking it. "You think you can just do tha
t?"

  "It was all open," he said.

  "You're a process server?" she asked.

  "Sometimes people run," he said. "You cut me. Anyway, here."

  She took it and he stepped around her.

  "What's this about?" she asked, wheeling on him.

  He shrugged and stopped in the glow of the light, examining the blood on his fingertips and stopping up the slash marks with a handkerchief from his pocket.

  "I just serve them," he said. "But I always tell people, if they think about it… they'll know."

  Casey watched him shuffle away down the canal. She pulled the door shut tight and threw the bolt, flipping the light switch and tearing open the sleeve that held the court documents. With practiced precision, her eyes quickly found the meat of it.

  Her lip curled up off her teeth and she snarled.

  "You asshole," she said, thinking of her ex-husband as she went up the narrow stairs. "You sick, pathetic, washed-up asshole."

  She slapped the papers down on the dark green granite of the kitchen island, went to the fridge to pour a glass of sauvignon blanc, then picked the papers back up again, shaking her head. She crossed into the living room and flopped onto the couch, snatching up the phone.

  "Paige? It's me. I got a new low for you."

  "The DA?" she said.

  "My ex," Casey said. "He's suing me."

  "You're divorced already."

  "For slander."

  Casey heard the rustle of her putting her hand over the phone to whisper. She said, "You told someone about his pecker?"

  "The movie," Casey said, snapping open the papers. "For the goddamn movie. Listen to this: 'false portrayal of his excellent character and impeccable integrity.' Can you vomit?"

  "How much?" Paige asked in a normal voice.

  "What?"

  "Is he suing for?"

  Casey barked out a laugh. "Five million."