Death Along the Spirit Road (44 page)
Read Death Along the Spirit Road Online
Authors: C. M. Wendelboe
“And your aunt Elizabeth?”
Willie dropped his eyes. “She’s being cuffed now. How about him?” He pointed to Reuben. “Do we take him in?”
Manny shook his head and gestured to Reuben. “He helped talk her down. This is one sacred man who is clear of everything.”
CHAPTER 23
Workmen off-loaded metal chairs, snapping them open and arranging them in a semicircular pattern in front of the makeshift stage. The front two rows were to be reserved for dignitaries and the press covering the ground breaking of the Red Cloud Resort. Manny stood between Willie and Clara in the rear. They’d arrived early and stood waiting for the chairs, and the festivities, to begin in an hour.
“I still think you should have stood up there with Erica,” Manny said. “It’s as much your show as hers.”
Clara smiled and chin-pointed to the stage. “This is her baby. Let her have her day. I’ll have enough time for the spotlight once the resort is underway.”
Erica wore a gray herringbone suit and stood beside the lectern, tapping the microphone. Feedback sent waves of highpitched squealing from the speakers arranged around the field marked for the resort, and she adjusted the volume control. On the other side of the lectern was a raised relief mock-up of the resort. She fidgeted with it, scooting it closer to the podium, nervously eying the lieutenant governor shaking hands with tribal council members on the stage with him.
Willie nudged Manny and pointed to the parking lot filling up slowly with attendees. Reuben got out of Crazy George’s Buick and walked toward them. He wore a sharply pressed white shirt closed with bolo tie, and his long ponytail was tied neatly with a new deer-hide thong that draped down his back. He cradled his injured arm in a sling as he stopped in front of Manny and held out his hand. Manny shook it, and Reuben offered his hand to Willie. Willie hesitated a moment before he accepted it.
“Thought you couldn’t drive?”
Reuben smiled at Willie. “Didn’t say I couldn’t. Just don’t like to. But this is special. Not every day your only kid invites you to rub shoulders with the neat and elite.” Erica had insisted that her father have one of the reserved front seats. “Lumpy will have a cow when he sees me. Better grab a chair.”
Reuben sauntered up to the front row of chairs and stood a moment to catch Lumpy’s glare before he winked at Lumpy and sat. Lumpy stood apart from the others in his pressed and starched black Oglala Sioux Tribal uniform. “Security,” he had bragged to Manny before the ceremony. “They wanted tribal police for security. Not you feds.” Manny had smiled at that. If the organizers were actually concerned with the dignitaries’ safety, they would have selected someone other than Lumpy Looks Twice to thwart danger. And if they realized how ruthless he could be, they wouldn’t want him near them. In the end, Lumpy would gain the attention he wanted, attention that would be remembered when the tribal council appointed a new police chief.
Desirée Chasing Hawk’s laugh turned Manny’s attention to the back parking area. She leaned into the lieutenant governor’s aide and threaded her arm through his as they walked from his limo. Her bruises and cuts from Jack Little Boy had either completely healed or she had covered them so expertly that she was back to her luscious self. At least on the outside. Manny wondered how long it would take before she went through the young aide on her way to some other man she could use and discard.
“You never said how Alex Jumping Bull fit into things,” Clara said.
“He was witness to Jason killing Billy Two Moons,” Willie said, then turned to Manny. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to steal your thunder.”
Manny smiled. “Not to worry. The more thunder you steal, the less pressure I’ll have. But Willie’s right. Jumping Bull told Elizabeth that Billy Two Moons brought him along as a witness the night he met Jason by Hill City. Jumping Bull was hiding on the back floorboard of that new Chrysler and saw the entire murder. He fled that night out of abject fear. Then greed got the better of him. He saw a chance to put the bite on Jason for some of that Red Cloud estate money.”
“He bit into Jason for a long time,” Clara said. “But Jason would have done himself in eventually, anyway. As I said before, he was a lousy businessman.”
“That he would have,” Manny answered.
Erica stepped up to the lectern and gently tapped the mike. “I’ll be right back.” Clara walked up to the lectern and began speaking with her.
“Is it me, or is Clara a little cold today?”
“I’m afraid it’s me,” Manny answered. “Just when I thought she and I were an item, she said she wants to back off. Said she was just so frightened the last couple weeks that she’s not sure she wants to be involved with a lawman.”
“So you two are up in the air?”
“I’m not so sure there’s ever going to be ‘us two.’ ”
“By the way, my contact at the
Rapid City Journal
called me,” Willie said. “Ecstatic. Seems like that piece Nathan Yellow Horse put in the
Lakota Country Times
about Sonja Myers printing confidential information had some interesting effects.”
Rapid City Journal
called me,” Willie said. “Ecstatic. Seems like that piece Nathan Yellow Horse put in the
Lakota Country Times
about Sonja Myers printing confidential information had some interesting effects.”
“There was no leak,” Manny said. “That was just to get them tied up scooping one another.”
Willie nodded. “She was exonerated. But it still cast enough aspersions on her journalistic integrity that the networks won’t touch her now. She swears she’ll hurt you professionally for giving Yellow Horse that bogus story.”
“At least she wasn’t fired like Yellow Horse,” Clara said. She’d returned from the stage to stand beside Manny.
“By the way,” Willie said, “did you manage to call your supervisor Niles?”
Manny nodded. “Niles the Pile finally made a decision. One of the few decisions he’s actually made since I’ve known him. Back in the field. He took me off the academy assignment after I told him the case had hit an impenetrable wall. When I reported that the case may never be solved, he told me he’d already filled the instructor’s slot.”
“So officially, Jason’s murder is still an active case?”
“It’s still an active case,” Manny lied, and hoped Willie hadn’t picked up too much from him to detect it.
“So where are you off to now?” Clara asked. “What’s your assignment?”
“‘A fate worse than Greenland,’ is how the Pile put it.”
“You’re back on Pine Ridge?” Willie asked excitedly.
Manny nodded. “At least some of the time. The Pile transferred me to the Rapid City Resident Agency.”
“Back taking all the reservation cases,” Clara said. “That’s terrible.” She took his hand and squeezed it gently while they waited for the ground breaking to begin.
“Sure,” Manny said, smiling and squeezing her hand in return. He had never slept better than in these last weeks following his reassignment. The
wanagi
had not visited him once during the night. He’d started rebuilding his relationship with Reuben, who was helping him sort through his Lakota issues. He’d met a woman he could grow to love if she’d have him, and a friend he had grown to trust. He’d somehow manage to survive the transfer the Pile had given him. “This is just terrible, isn’t it?”
wanagi
had not visited him once during the night. He’d started rebuilding his relationship with Reuben, who was helping him sort through his Lakota issues. He’d met a woman he could grow to love if she’d have him, and a friend he had grown to trust. He’d somehow manage to survive the transfer the Pile had given him. “This is just terrible, isn’t it?”
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