The Territory: A Novel (16 page)

Through dinner, Dillon explained what he had learned about Red’s finances. Red made about forty-four thousand dollars per year as a heavy equipment operator. His expenses, purchases, as well as living expenses, debt, travel, and savings, were more in line with a man earning around eighty-five thousand per year.

“There’s no question that Red was selling guns, and that’s where his extra income was coming from. I counted fourteen invoices for what looked to be a wide variety of guns. Most of the transactions, though, were just referenced by a customer number. You need the file that cross-references the numbers with the customers.”

“None of the receipts had customer names?” she asked.

Dillon frowned. “I recognized two local names, but most of the invoices didn’t contain a name. I found one that had the city San Miguel de Allende written at the bottom of the paper. And there were three with Juárez noted on the back. There were only two invoices that raised a big red flag, though. Together, they total $3,846. Both transactions were during the month of August. And both had what appeared to be the guns’ serial number as well as another number that most likely identified the customer.”

“Where’s the red flag?”

Dillon stood and retrieved the box from the house. He put it on the picnic table and pulled out both receipts for Josie to examine.

Her eyes widened and she looked up from the paper. “This is written out to the Arroyo County Sheriff’s Department! Since when do they spend four thousand dollars on two guns? We can barely afford to pay utilities right now.”

Dillon sat back down at the table. “Isn’t your pal, Deputy Bloster, a member of Red’s gun club?”

Josie rubbed at her temples. “How could the sheriff let this happen? He signs off on all department expenses, just like I do, before they get approved by the council. He had to approve these invoices.”

“Don’t rush judgment. Go talk to the sheriff tomorrow. Just watch your back.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked.

He folded his hands and stared at her, apparently considering his words. “You have a solid reputation, and you’re well respected for the job you do.”

“But?”

“But you’re still a female in a male-dominated profession.”

“And?”

“And I know you’re friends with Martínez, but there’s still plenty of good old boy vibes running through this town. If things turn ugly, you aren’t in the club.”

She resisted the urge to defend Martínez. He was a fellow cop, a person she had admired and trusted, sought counsel from in her role as chief, and she didn’t want to believe he would sacrifice her over a piece of scum like Bloster. But she nodded agreement and let the statement go until she could think through the information later in silence.

Josie stood and began cleaning up. “Based on everything you saw, and knowing Red’s history, give me your theory on what happened to him,” Josie said.

“I need to get into his files a little deeper before—”

She cut him off. “Gut instinct. What do you think happened?”

He steepled his fingers and rested them against his lips as he put together his thoughts. Watching him, Josie realized how important his reactions were to her.

“I think Red was brokering guns, most likely to Mexicans. But I doubt he realized just how evil the people he was dealing with are. I imagine it was that ignorance as much as greed that killed him.”

*   *   *

After Josie logged off for the evening, Otto conducted interviews at the police department with three additional members of the Gunners. The goal was to get a better sense of the organization and its possible ties to either Medrano or La Bestia. His first interview, with Jimmy Johnson, took place in the upstairs office at the conference table where Otto had talked with Bloster and Fallow. Johnson worked at a body shop in town and still wore his blue mechanic’s uniform. Otto noted the black stains around his fingernails and on the front of his work shirt.

Otto left his stack of file folders and notes with Fallow’s and Bloster’s names on them in open view so that Johnson would see them. Otto also laid a file folder on the table with Johnson’s name written across the tab. He placed the folder so that it faced Johnson’s chair. Otto had shoved it full of paper he pulled from the recycling box so that it would look as if he already had significant information collected.

As Otto hoped, Johnson spent the first part of the interview glancing at the file folder with his name on it. He was an average-sized man with a significant potbelly and large square glasses that magnified watery blue eyes. He appeared confused and repeatedly squeezed his hands together into fists.

Johnson gave the same generic information that Otto had already heard about the Gunners. Finally, Otto pulled the Johnson folder in front of him, opened it, and rifled through the papers. Johnson asked, “So, what are you so interested in me for?”

Otto closed the folder again and took his time responding. He gave Johnson a stern look. “A good friend of yours, an associate you trade and sell guns with, has been murdered. It’s come to our attention that Red may have been trading and selling guns to Mexican drug cartels. We suspect you may be doing the same.”

Johnson’s eyes opened even wider and his jaw dropped. “Where the hell did you get that idea? I don’t even know any Mexicans to sell guns to!”

Otto smirked. “You don’t know any Mexicans?”

Johnson looked even more flustered. “Well, of course I know some. I mean, I don’t know anyone who I would sell guns to. I mean, I could sell guns to people. I just don’t know any cartel members to trade with. That’s what I meant.”

Johnson’s responses didn’t get any better. After another fifteen minutes, Otto cut him loose. He felt sorry for the man. He looked so worried standing at the door to leave that Otto tried to reassure him.

“Mr. Johnson, just go home tonight and think about our conversation. If you think of anything that might help us find Red’s killer, you give me a call. Even if it seems insignificant, call me anyway.”

Fred Grant arrived shortly after Johnson left. Grant owned a small cattle ranch north of town and drove a four-wheel-drive pickup with monster-sized wheels and no muffler. He strolled into the department wearing an untucked flannel shirt with the sleeves cut off, blue jeans, and dusty boots.

When Otto turned the questioning to Red’s involvement with the cartels, Grant raised his voice in anger. “I don’t know who’s feeding you that nonsense, but they’re flat-out lying. The Mexicans killed his dad! He formed the Gunners to protect our town. He would never turn on us like that.”

“Mr. Grant, I have invoices that show Red was selling guns south of the border.”

“So what? There’s a big difference between south of the border and selling to the cartels. I’d lay my life on the fact that Red Goff never did business with the cartels.”

“What do you know about Hack Bloster and Red selling guns together?”

He gave an exaggerated shrug. “And? Big deal! They sold guns.”

“We suspect they were selling guns to the Medrano cartel,” Otto said.

Grant looked away as if disgusted. “They sold guns to make money for the Gunners.” He looked back at Otto, his eyes squinted, shaking his head in disbelief. “Have you forgotten that Red was murdered? Don’t go trying to turn him into the bad guy because you can’t figure out who killed him.”

“Were you selling guns with them?”

“This is ridiculous. I’m through talking to you. You got anything else to ask, do it through my lawyer.”

Otto got nothing out of Grant. He suspected Grant had more to tell, but he also didn’t think involving an attorney at this point would garner any new information.

The last member of the Gunners he talked with was a truck driver named Jerry Irons. Otto had known Jerry for years, and he and Delores occasionally had dinner with Jerry and his wife, Sandy. Jerry was a level-headed man with right-wing political leanings that he kept to himself unless asked. He and his wife were transplants from Vermont who moved to the desert for the warmer climate.

After several minutes of small talk about the wives and weather, Otto asked Jerry to discuss his thoughts about Red’s murder.

“It’s scary, Otto. What’s happening to our town? I know Red had enemies. He was arrogant, and a lot of people didn’t like him, but murdered? Shot in the head?”

Otto nodded. He had his own fears about the safety of his family. “Jerry, can you give me anything? Any gossip, any worries you have about various members? Bad relationships Red had with someone that might have led to his death?”

Jerry scooted his chair back, crossed one leg over the other, and rubbed at a smudge on his boot as he considered the question. “That’s tough. It just doesn’t look like something local. I guess that sounds naïve, but it just doesn’t play out like a hate killing. Why kill him and then drag his body back inside that girl’s trailer? You asked about the Gunners. I don’t see anyone in the group killing him in that manner. Just doesn’t work for me.”

Otto finally signed off duty with the night dispatcher, feeling exhausted and frustrated. So far, it appeared the only Gunners with a connection to cartel members were Fallow, Bloster, and Red. Now one of them was dead, and the other two weren’t talking. He called Delores on his cell phone to tell her what time he would be home. Fifteen minutes later, he pulled down his lane. The Podowski ranch lay about ten miles north of the river, and consisted of sixty-five acres of pasture that held a small herd of milk goats. A split-rail fence surrounded a small three-bedroom bungalow covered in white aluminum siding with a deep brick porch on the front of the house. Mangy thirty-year-old bushes lined the front of the house with little else in the way of plantings. Otto drew great satisfaction feeding and watering the goats, clearing the fence rows of brush, battling the invading prickly pear, yucca and cholla, and tinkering on a tractor that spent more hours torn down than up and running. Otherwise, landscaping didn’t interest him, and Delores claimed a black thumb, but the woman could cook like no other.

Each night as he drove home from work, Otto anticipated the smells from his kitchen: sausage, apples, onions, garlic, kraut, meatballs—an endless tribute to Polish tradition. As she did most nights, Delores met him at the door, an apron over her calico-print housedress, her silver hair pulled up into a neat bun behind her head. She smiled, her blue eyes surrounded by wrinkles, and pushed the screen door open for him. After a quick peck on her lips, Otto walked through the living room and into the kitchen, dragging his briefcase. Delores followed on his heels.

“What’s for supper?” he asked.

“I could feel it in my bones. I knew it was a bad one. Apple dumplings with fresh whipping cream. Sit down at the table.” Delores took his briefcase from him and scooted a chair out at the kitchen table. He felt like a boy, a feeling she had nurtured in him since their first date forty years ago. He was perfectly happy letting Delores take over.

“Sit down, sit down,” she said, ushering him to the chair before pouring him a glass of milk.

The smell of cinnamon and cream and butter made him dizzy. He sat at the table and watched her hovering over the stove, his perfectly capable wife, her body soft and inviting. All his life, he had seen other men chasing skinny women in high heels with hard stomachs and hard breasts, and the idea made him shudder. How could anything compare to the vision of Delores on her way to the table with a platter of steaming apple dumplings?

“So, tell me,” she said.

“Not so much to tell as there should be. The man shot at the Trauma Center was killed by rival gang members from Mexico. How do we tackle that? And Josie thinks Red was killed trading guns to the Mexicans. How do we tackle that one, too?”

Delores set the platter of dumplings on the table and stood for a moment, hands on her hips. “You said, ‘Josie thinks.’ Does that mean you don’t?”

“What’s the gossip on the street about Red Goff and the Gunners?” he asked.

“The girls think the Gunners club is a drug cartel, no different from the Mexican versions,” she said.

Otto smiled at her reference to the girls. It was a group of eleven old women who gathered once a week and called themselves the Homemakers. Delores was one of the younger ones at fifty-seven. They rotated homes for meetings, brought food to sample, created a craft project each week, and quilted baby blankets for foster babies. They were a nice group of ladies, but girls they were not.

“For a bunch of old women, you’re on target more than you aren’t.”

She smiled, pleased. “Helen claims her husband buys guns off Red all the time. Claims his prices are better than Walmart.”

“You said drug cartel. What do drugs have to do with it?” he asked.

Delores wove an intricate tale of he said/she said and so-and-so is related to so-and-so, who was arrested for some odd thing. When she talked gossip like this, his attention faded. He nodded and forked another dumpling into his mouth, his teeth sinking into the sweet dough, his tongue distinguishing the subtle differences among the cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves in the rich sauce. He washed his bite down and said, “In the middle of all this mess, Josie’s mother showed up today from Indiana.”

Delores sat across from Otto with her own plate and glass of milk. “What did she look like?”

Otto’s eyebrows knitted together. “I don’t know. Like a floozy. Josie had a date with Dillon Reese tonight, and her mother showed up out of the blue, demanding attention.”

“Maybe you should invite Josie and her mother over for dinner this week. Help her out a little.”

Otto ignored the idea. As much as he liked Josie, he’d heard enough about Beverly Gray from her to know that he did not want to spend an evening entertaining the woman. He wiped his mouth with a napkin and asked, “No meat tonight?”

“Just dumplings. If we don’t start watching our weight, you’ll end up with both knees on the operating table.”

*   *   *

At midnight, Josie walked Dillon to his car. The air was soft on her skin, and a billion stars and a fat white moon lit up the night. Dillon leaned against his car door instead of getting inside and put his arms out to her. He pulled her toward him, rested his hands on her hips, and offered a half grin that she couldn’t read.