Nothing Is Negotiable (15 page)

Luke looked Paul in the eyes and shook his head, then turned and walked away. He knew now it was up to him to find Bonnie.

Luke walked around to the back of the bunkhouse trying to keep his temper in check. He was so mad he could eat nails. When he heard the Crown Victoria drive away he started to pace across the back porch. To think Bonnie had hopped on a bus to Calgary and flown back to Texas was beyond ridiculous.

For ten minutes he couldn’t hold a thought, all he wanted to do was beat the crap out of that old man. Now Luke was considered a wife-beater, and probably every law enforcement agency in Canada would know about it before he could get out of the country.

He went to the refrigerator and grabbed another beer. When he got back to the porch he noticed Elvis and Buddy sitting beside the table where his T-bone sat cooling. It was scrumptious ten minutes ago, but now, his appetite was gone. He stepped over to the table, cut the meat in half and set the plate down in front of the dogs. Elvis grabbed the piece with the bone and ran off in one direction, and Buddy grabbed the rest and went the other way.

Luke took several long draws on the beer while he paced. It took at least ten minutes before his blood pressure settled down enough to actually think of something other than pistol-whipping the old man with his own gun.

But, he knew staying mad wasn’t going to help anything. He had to do something. And now he had to follow his strongest lead.

He changed into blue jeans and boots and headed for town.

It was nearly dark when Luke found The Stampede on the north side of town. It looked like a Texas honky-tonk that passed its prime thirty years ago. The old wooden building was about half the size of a high school gymnasium and he could see where the tin roof had been patched at least a dozen times. The dirt parking lot was packed but he found a space between two pickups that looked like they’d been hauling hay all day. As he walked toward the front door he heard the whine of live country music reverberating off the wooden walls of the dancehall.

He stepped inside the front door and stopped to let a waitress with a tray of dirty plates and empty beer bottles cross in front of him.

Luke surveyed the crowded room through a haze of cigarette smoke. The front part of the building was a café where about twenty tables were covered with red-checkered tablecloths. Over on one side were half a dozen booths and on the other side of the room were four busy pool tables. Along the back wall was a long crowded bar. Just left of the bar was a swinging door with a faded sign that said
Cover Charge $5.00
.

He pushed through the crowd and wedged himself between two cowboys at the bar. He ordered a beer and took in the rowdy atmosphere. It was obvious that most of the drinkers at the bar had been here for some time. Loud laughter and an occasional whoop could be heard above the rumble of the crowd. It seemed like a typical small-town bar where everyone seemed to know each other.

The bartender set a beer down in front of Luke and as he reached back for his wallet, he caught the familiar scent of gardenias. He glanced over his shoulder and saw Mitzi walking toward the ladies room.

He dropped a five on the bar and kept an eye on the bathroom door. A few minutes later she emerged and strutted back through the crowd. As she walked past him he grabbed her by the arm. Turning, she recognized him immediately and said, “Hey baby, you made it,” then swung her arms around his neck, once again smearing him with her latest splash of Jungle Gardenia. When she stepped away, she grabbed his hand and started dragging him with her. “I’m sitting down at the other end of the bar.”

At the end of the bar Mitzi reclaimed her seat and Luke pulled up a stool beside hers. She summoned the bartender and said, “Johnny, give me a Crown and Seven?”

“I’m glad you came out,” she said then leaned a little closer and tried to focus on the scrapes on his forehead. Luke could tell she’d already had too much to drink. “What happened to your head?”

“Oh, I ran into a wall,” he said, not wanting to get into it.

She didn’t seem to be concerned about it and swirled her new drink with her finger then licked it off. “So, how did it go with Marinel?”

He took a swig of his beer. “She remembered seeing Bonnie and me at the clinic.”

“I thought she would,” she said as she sipped on her drink.

“She told me Dr. Duncan has an apartment that’s connected to the clinic. Did you know that?”

“Hell, yes.” She said, slurring her words. “I could have told you that. I know everything about that place.”

“I understand he keeps it locked and he’s the only one with a key.”

“That’s bull shit,” Mitzi gave him a crooked grin and shook her head. “One night Rita and I were working late and needed to get some old files that were stored in there. We looked around in his office until we found it.”

“He keeps it hidden somewhere?”

“It’s in his filing cabinet under K. It’s got a big tag on it that says, ‘Apartment’,” she scoffed. “Like it took a brain surgeon to figure that one out.”

“I’d really like to see that apartment.”

“Why? Do you think Dr. Duncan’s hiding your wife in there?”

“No, but Marinel told me she saw some guys carrying a rug out the back door. Dr. Duncan said she was wrong. I’d really like to check it out.”

“I don’t think anyone’s been in there lately,” Mitzi said.

“That’s what Dr. Duncan said, but Bonnie was last seen at the clinic and I found some stuff in the alley that was in her purse. And there was some grass closed in the door that goes to the apartment like the door had been opened recently. Seeing the inside of that apartment would help me put the pieces together. It won’t take ten minutes.”

“I can’t do that. If Dr. Duncan knew I let you in there, he’d fire me.”

He knew he could break through her resolve. “How would he ever know? Like you said, you’re the office manager—you can come and go when you want to, right?”

“Yeah, but...” She looked at him and blinked, trying to focus. She slowly shook her head. “I don’t know about going into his apartment.”

Luke grabbed his billfold and took out a hundred-dollar bill. He held it below the bar where she could see it. “Luke, I can’t.”

She watched as he pulled out another crisp hundred and held it with the first one. She raised her stare from the bills to Luke. The corners of her intoxicated lips turned up. “I said no.”

He took the last bill from his wallet and held it with the others. “It’s all I have.” His eyes moved from her bloodshot eyes to the bills, and counted them, one by one, then looked back at her. Her eyes went to the bills and stayed there. “I really want to see that apartment.”

Mitzi closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Slowly her eyelids opened and she looked passed Luke and panned the crowd, which was oblivious to them.

She quickly pulled the bills from his hand and hid them in her purse. “You
cannot
tell anyone I let you in there,” she said adamantly.

“Don’t worry, I won’t.”

She tipped up her glass and guzzled the rest of her drink. “Let’s go get this over with before I change my mind.”

“I’m ready,” he said, pushing back his beer bottle.

He walked behind her as they made their way to the door. She was inebriated, but he decided she could make the two-mile drive without a problem. He figured she was an experienced drunk and had probably made the drive a hundred times before, much drunker than she was now.

The streets of downtown were deserted and Luke followed her to the alley behind the clinic where they parked next to the building. It was dark except for a small sodium vapor light that illuminated the back door of the clinic. She unlocked the door and they slipped inside where Mitzi punched a series of numbers on a keypad on the wall and the flashing red light turned to a steady green.

“Okay, the alarms off,” she said, “C’mon.” She hit the light switch and the hallway lit up. They went down to the first door on the left. “This is Dr. Duncan’s office.” She twisted the handle, but it didn’t open. She rattled it back and forth but it still didn’t budge. “Well, crap. He locked his office.”

She looked back at Luke and shrugged her shoulders.

Luke’s heart sank.
Three hundred bucks down the drain.

Then Mitzi burst out laughing and pulled a key chain out of her purse. She rattled it in front of him and said, “Don’t worry, honey, I’ve got the key.”

Luke sighed and shook his head while she opened the door, still giggling.

She turned on the light and walked over to a filing cabinet in the corner. A second later she pulled out a single gold key and walked over to the door on the adjacent wall and unlocked it. They stepped inside and she flipped a switch that turned on two lamps that sat on end tables on either side of a saddle-brown leather sofa.

They were in the living room. Adjacent to the sofa was a recliner; both were arranged around a coffee table in the middle of the room. There was an old television in a cabinet against the wall and a closed door just to the left of it. Visualizing the layout, Luke imagined the door opened onto the alley.

Behind him, against the wall, a dozen cardboard boxes were stacked neatly on the dark brown tiled floor. Next to them were a couple of old filing cabinets, an old desk, some office chairs, and some pieces of medical equipment he couldn’t identify. He could see Dr. Duncan wasn’t kidding when he said the apartment’s primary function was that of a storeroom.

Just beyond the living room he saw a small kitchen on one side and adjacent to it was an open door where he could see the foot of a bed.

“Here it is,” Mitzi said.

Luke walked ahead of her into the room. Mitzi followed him as he made his way to the bedroom. The room was small with only a queen-sized bed, a night table and a tall dresser. It was nice; no junk had been dumped in here. Beyond the bedroom was a small bathroom.

They went back to the living room where Mitzi went over and dropped into the recliner.

“What do you think?” she asked.

“I don’t know. Give me a few minutes to look around,” he said.

“Go ahead, but not too long,” she said as she pushed back on the chair and a footrest popped up in front of her. “I don’t want anyone to come by and see my car, okay?”

“Okay,” he said.

Mitzi had already closed her eyes. Luke hoped she’d go to sleep; that would give him more time.

The first thing he noticed was a layer of dust on the framed photos and glass shelves by the TV which meant the apartment probably wasn’t cleaned on a regular basis. But it was the rugs that he came to see and the best he could tell, there were only two. One was a runner, at least twelve feet long and a couple of feet wide. It was behind the sofa and stretched from the office door toward the bedroom. It was beige with a colorful pattern stitched into it.

The other one was under the coffee table and they matched. It was about eight feet square. Both looked new, the colors still bright. He squatted down and lifted one corner. The floor was shinier underneath it. He ran his finger along the floor and came up with a layer of dust. Gently, he lifted one side of the table a few inches and noticed the carpet was crushed flat where the table leg rested. There was no doubt this rug had been here for some time.

He stood and wiped the dust off of his hands as he looked around for an area where a rug might be missing. But here in the living room there wasn’t room for another one. He strolled through the other rooms but came to the same conclusion. There didn’t seem to be an area where a rug was missing, especially one that would take two people to carry. He went back to the living room with the conclusion that Marinel did not see a rug carried out of this apartment.

But what she could have seen puzzled him. He glanced around one more time, but saw no reason to stay here any longer. As he leaned over to wake up Mitzi, something started pounding on the door in the clinic that opened onto the alley.

Bam, Bam, Bam!

Mitzi’s eyes popped open like a Jack in the Box and she saw Luke’s face in front of her. She was on the verge of panic so Luke quickly put his hand over her mouth. She started to fight, but quit when she recognized Luke, he pulled his hand away.

Bam, Bam, Bam!

“Shit,” she whispered as she looked from side to side and struggled to get out of the recliner. She got up quietly and rushed to the office door, then turned to him. “Get back in the bedroom and stay there.” She went to Dr. Duncan’s office, closing the door behind her.

Bam, Bam, Bam!

Luke sneaked over to the closed door and listened.

He could hear Mitzi ask who was outside. A second later he heard her tell whoever it was to wait a minute and she’d open the door. He hurried back to the bedroom and waited.

A few seconds later he heard Mitzi laughing and a man’s voice. It sounded like they knew each other. There were sounds of conversation and a minute later he heard the door close.

Luke sat on the side of the bed, relieved. The clatter of her high heels came his way and he remained still until she opened the bedroom door.

“We got lucky,” she said as she crossed her arms and leaned on the door jam.

“What do you mean?”

“It was Kenneth, an old friend. I told him I was showing my new boyfriend where I worked. He was cool with that. Said he wouldn’t mention it to anyone. Are you ready?”

“Yeah, I guess so.”

As Luke stood, Mitzi leaned down and smoothed the bedspread where he had been sitting. “That’s odd,” she said.

“What’s odd?” Luke followed her gaze back to the bed.

“Doctor Duncan has a handmade Indian blanket that is always on this bed. It was a gift from Mrs. Aponi, an old Indian lady here in town. It’s beautiful. I tried to buy it from him but he wouldn’t sell it because every time she comes to see him, she always wants to see it. And, it’s always on the foot of the bed.”

Luke looked back at the bed and all he saw was a cranberry bedspread with an intricate pattern. He considered this missing blanket.
Could Marinel have seen two men carrying a blanket?

He ran his hand over the red bedspread and a thought hit him. He pulled back the top of the spread near the pillows.

“What are you doing?” Mitzi asked.