Desert Heat (6 page)

“Murder, evidently,” Marianne Maculyea replied. “Someone shot him in the back. He had just gotten out of drug rehab a month or so ago. According to his mother, he was living in Mexico and supposedly getting his life back in order. Lefty’s like me. He was raised a Catholic but left the church years ago. I’ve become friends with Mrs. O’Toole up at the Mule Mountain Rest Home. She asked me to handle the memorial service. Deena, Lefty’s ex-wife, is helping with the arrangements. Between the two of them, I’ve had my hands full, but enough of that. Tell me about Andy. What in the world happened? Jeff said he’d been shot, too.”

Joanna nodded. “That’s right. It must be an epidemic. I found Andy down under one of the bridges along High Lonesome Road. They brought him here by helicopter. He’s been in surgery for over an hour so far.”

“Tell me again what happened to Lefty O’Toole?” Walter McFadden interrupted.

Marianne Maculyea’s total focus had been on Joanna. Now, for the first time, she seemed aware of the sheriff’s presence.

“Oh, hi there, Walter. I didn’t see you when I came in. The story we’re getting is still pretty muddled. It happened down near Guaymas. When they found him, he was thirty miles from nowhere, out in the middle of the desert. It’s a miracle anyone found him at all. His car turned up abandoned by an old airstrip, so chances are it was robbery. At least that’s what the Mexican authorities are saying so far.”

“And he was living down there?” Mc-Fadden asked.

“That’s right. In a dilapidated old school bus someone had converted into a poor-man’s RV. From what we’ve been able to piece together, he disappeared from the mobile home park over a week ago. The body was found this last Wednesday and the
federales
notified Mrs. O’Toole late Thursday afternoon. Since then, Deena’s been trying to make arrangements to bring him home. It’s costing Lefty’s mother a small fortune to get the body back across the border.”

“Why haven’t I heard about this before now?” McFadden demanded.

Marianne shrugged.
“Mordida
doesn’t work all that well if too many people hear about it.”

Joanna wasn’t fluent in Spanish, but living in a border town, you didn’t have to be.
Mordida,
literally translated as “the bite,” refers to bribing public officials. Across the line, it was the time-honored if illegal custom by which Mexican border guards supplemented their meager incomes. If an American citizen happened to die in Old Mexico, getting him home could be a very expensive process, especially it the case received very much publicity. Then the delays could become insurmountable.

Marianne Maculyea turned back to Joanna. Taking both Joanna’s cold hands in hers, she squeezed them tight. “I’m sure Andy has an army of doctors and nurses looking after him. How are you holding up?” she asked. “Can get you anything?”

“I’m all right,” Joanna answered. “So far.” She extricated her hands and walked back over to the painting. In the meantime, Walter McFadden put down his newspaper, picked up his hat, and walked over to Marianne. “Reverend Maculyea, if you’re going to be here with Joanna, maybe I’d better be getting on about my business.”

Marianne nodded. “I plan to stay all night, if that’s all right.” She looked to Joanna for confirmation, but she seemed to have faded out of one conversation and into another.

“I’m sorry Lefty O’Toole’s dead,” she said quietly. “And Andy will be, too. No matter what happened later, Andy always liked the man. He always said Lefty would have been fine if the war hadn’t messed him up. He thought Lefty deserved another chance.”

Marianne shook her head. “Andy’s always been a man ahead of his time,” she observed. “Small towns don’t necessarily make heroes out of people who turn the other cheek.”

“Don’t be putting down Andy,” Walter McFadden grumbled. “And don’t be hard on old Bisbee, either. Lefty O’Toole’s been messed up on drugs for as long as I can remember. Sounds to me like he got in way over his head, and somebody took care of him.”

Tipping his hat to Joanna, he stalked from the waiting room. The two women exchanged glances. “I don’t think Walter liked hearing about Lefty from somebody like me,” she said, “but Deena insisted on keeping it quiet.”

“Don’t worry,” Joanna said. “He’s probably just worn out. I know I am.”

After McFadden left, Marianne located a vending machine and bought two cups of acrid coffee. For the next two hours Joanna Brady and Reverend Marianne Maculyea sat in the waiting room and talked. Or rather, Joanna talked and Reverend Maculyea listened. Finally, at one o’clock in the morning, the door to the waiting room swung open and a doctor dressed in surgical green stuck his head inside.

“Mrs. Brady?” he asked.

Joanna scrambled to her feet, her heart thud-ding heavily in her chest. “Yes.”

“I’m Doctor Sanders. Your husband’s come through surgery as well as can be expected under the circumstances. He’s in the recovery room right now, and from there he’ll be going to the Intensive Care Unit.”

Feeling her knees sag, Joanna sank back down into the chair. “Is he going to be all right?”

Dr. Sanders shook his head. “That I don’t know. He’s been gravely injured. For the next forty-eight hours at least, it’s going to be touch and go.”

“How bad is it?”

“We’ve already been through one episode of cardiac arrest, and there may be some brain damage from that. As far as the wound itself is concerned, we’re dealing with possible peritonitis as well as damage to his liver, kidney, and large intestine. Not only that, the bullet lodged against the spine, so it’s possible there could be some spinal damage as well.”

The hard-hitting words sent Joanna reeling: brain damage, peritonitis, paralysis. She felt as though she were flying apart, but Dr. Sanders seemed unaware of the effect his words were having. “Actually,” he continued, “we should all count ourselves lucky that he’s made it this far.”

“Can I see him?” Joanna asked.

“No. Not at the moment, Mrs. Brady. There’s not much point. He’s still under anesthesia, and we’re going to keep him heavily sedated for a while. With that kind of abdominal damage, we’ll be leaving the incision open so we can continue monitoring exactly what’s going on. Infection and all that. If I were you, I’d go somewhere and try to get some sleep. It’s going to be a long haul. You’ll need your rest.”

“What are his chances, doctor?”

Dr. Sanders was young, not much older than Joanna. He gave her a searching look. “Do you want it straight?”

She nodded. “Please.”

“He’s got about one chance in ten of making it.”

“Those aren’t very good odds, are they, doctor?”

“No, but you said you wanted it straight.”

“Then I’ll stay here and stretch out on one of the couches. Ask someone to come get me w hen they move him from the Recovery Room to the ICU.”

“All right,” he said. “I can understand your not wanting to leave. I’ll have someone bring in a blanket.”

Reverend Marianne Maculyea kicked off her shoes. “Have them bring two,” she said. “If she’s staying, so am I.”

“Okay,” Dr. Sanders said. “Suit yourselves.” He walked as far as the door and then paused as if reconsidering. “Since you’ll be here,” he said, “I’ll set it up for you to be able to see him for five minutes once they get him to ICU.”

“Thanks,” Joanna murmured.

An orderly appeared a few minutes later and dropped off two blankets and two pillows. The women made makeshift beds on the couches. Reverend Maculyea padded around the room until she located the light panel. She shut off all the lights except the red
EXIT
sign directly over the door.

“Hope you don’t mind the red glow,” she said, making her way back to the couch, “but it looks as though that one doesn’t have a switch.”

Joanna settled herself on the couch and pulled the blanket up around her chin. For a moment the room was quiet, then the stillness was broken by the wail of an approaching ambulance which finally quieted once it arrived at the Emergency Room entrance.

“Mari?” Joanna asked.

“Yes.”

“I’m trying to pray, but I can’t remember how to do it. I’ve forgotten all the words.”

“You don’t have to remember the words,” Marianne Maculyea returned. “Trying to remember the words counts. God’s got a pretty good idea of what you mean, but would you like me to pray for you?”

“Please.”

“Now I lay me down to sleep,” Reverend Maculyea began. “I pray the Lord my soul to keep.”

Joanna found the old, familiar words of the childhood prayer oddly comforting. Somehow they made her want to laugh and cry at the same time.

“If I should die before I wake,” Marianne continued, “I pray the Lord my soul to take.”

The prayer had barely ended when Joanna Brady fell into an exhausted and troubled sleep.

Seven miles away, in his luxurious rented home in the Catalina foothills, Antonio Vargas answered his doorbell. He checked through the peephole to make certain no one was there. Sure enough, there was nothing visible on his front porch but a single briefcase.

Quickly Vargas unbolted the door and hauled the case inside. It was a good one, a Hartmann with a combination lock. He spun the locks to the correct combination and snapped open the lid. There they were, lined out in neatly wrapped bundles of twenties and hundreds-$50,000-blood money, his pay-check for taking out both Lefty O’Toole and Lefty’s pal, Andrew Brady. Killing people was his job, and he was very good at it.

There had been some grumbling over the cost of this particular operation, but those L damned bean-counters didn’t know anything about working out in the field. It had been necessary to convince them what exactly was at stake if preventive measures weren’t taken. They’d come around then, when Tony had shown them in black and white that one of the most lucrative drug routes in the country—the one through Cochise County—was at risk. After that, they’d seen things his way, and money was no object.

Closing the briefcase, Vargas stuck it up on the top shelf in the coat closet next to the door. Fortunately, Angie was either smart enough to stay out of his business or dumb enough not to know what was going on. Either way, she kept out of his way and didn’t ask questions. She could cook, and she was a hell of a lay, one who seldom told him no. What else did a man want? Or need?

Tony felt his growing erection and marveled that his hard-on materialized at the very touch and smell of all that money. He wondered which for him was actually the bigger turn-on—blood or money. As he sauntered back into the bedroom, he switched on the bedside lamp. Angie Kellogg groaned, rolled over on her side, and covered her eyes with a pillow, trying to shut out the light, but Tony was not to be dissuaded. He pulled back the bedding and climbed onto the bed, turning her over onto her back and peeling back her gown.

“Wake up, Angie baby, and see what daddy has for you. He wants you to take him for a little ride.”

“Please, Tony. Not now. It’s the middle of the night. I’m tired. I want to sleep.”

“Sleep hell! Open up!”

And she did, too, because Angie Kellogg was first and foremost a survivor, and she was far too frightened of Tony Vargas to do any-thing else.

FOUR

Joanna’s first visit to the ICU came at three o’clock in the morning. The daunting collection of machines, tubes, and wires took her breath away and left her feeling weak and angry. The person lying there on the bed looked like little more than a pale representation of the man she loved. She touched Andy’s thick strawberry-blonde hair, but his eyes remained closed. There was no response when she sat down beside him and took his warm limp hand in hers. She huddled next to him for the strictly enforced five-minute period while silent tears rolled down her cheeks.

By her fourth visit, just after seven, she was better able to handle the situation. When she emerged that time, Dr. Sanders was waiting for her in the hallway. “Care for a cup of coffee?” he asked.

She glanced at Marianne who waved her away. “Go ahead,” she said. “I’ll come find you if you’re needed.”

“Thanks,” Joanna said. She followed Dr. Sanders down the hall, thinking they were on their way to the cafeteria. Instead, he led her into a tiny conference room, showed her to a chair, and then went out and brought coffee back from somewhere nearby.

“Have you seen him already this morning?” she asked. Seating himself across from her, Dr. Sanders nodded.

“What do you think? Is he going to make it?”

“He’s hanging in there for the time being,” Dr. Sanders replied noncommittally. “That’s about as good as it gets at the moment.”

He leaned closer to her across the small conference table and seemed to study her face. His searching look made Joanna feel self-conscious, and she tried to hide behind her coffee cup.

“How long have you and your husband been married, Mrs. Brady?”

“Call me Joanna. Ten years. Ten years exactly. Yesterday was our tenth anniversary.”

“You love him very much, don’t you.”

Joanna bit her lip. “Yes.”

Dr. Sanders’ face was somber. His was not the look of someone about to deliver good news, and Joanna tried to prepare for it, to steel herself against whatever was coming.

“What is it?” she asked. “What are you trying to tell me?”

“How has he seemed to you lately?”

”Seemed? What do you mean?”

Sanders shrugged. “Oh, you know. Has he been despondent about anything, angry, or upset, any of those?”

“We’ve been busy,” Joanna conceded. “We both work. We have a nine-year-old child. Andy’s been running for sheriff ...” She paused and examined the doctor’s features warily. “I don’t understand why you’re asking about that.”

“Have you ever read the story about the Little Engine that could? It’s a children’s book.”

“Of course I’ve read it. Hasn’t everybody? It’s one of Jenny’s favorites, but what does that have to do with anything?”

“You remember in the story how the Little Engine says ‘I think I can?’ “

“Yes.”

“That Little Engine thought he could pull the train over the mountain. He wanted to do it, believed he could do it.”

“Yes, but . . .”