Short Cut to Santa Fe (25 page)

She wondered, idly and unworried, where he was; he had promised to be back as soon as he could, but had pointed out that if he started tearing off to Albuquerque every few hours, people would wonder why his attachment to his family had become so powerful. She smiled lazily and slid farther and farther into the tub, until the water rose and fell in tiny waves just under her chin.

And then, as though her dreams had the power to create their own reality, the bathroom door opened, just like the last time, and a puff of cool air blew in. She slowly turned her head. “I wasn't expecting you so soon,” she murmured huskily to the dark shape outlined in the door.

“I don't suppose you were, Lola. I don't suppose you were.”

The voice snapped her out of her daydream. She sat bolt upright, reached for a towel and clutched it to her chest. “My God. What in hell are you doing here? I thought you were Fernando.”

“That's strange. Very strange. We don't look at all alike. And why expect my little brother to walk in while you're taking a bath?” he added maliciously.

“You do when you're standing against the light and I can't make out your face,” said Kate, ignoring the last part of his remark.

“Perhaps. Anyway, I came to see you, Lola. Or should I call you Kate? After all, we both know who you are.”

“You can call me Joe or Sam, if you want, as long as you get out of here.” Her heart pounded with fury. “Right now. If you don't mind. I'd like to get dressed.” The telephone began to ring again, its nagging call sounding over and over and over again.

He stopped to listen to the phone before answering, watching her carefully to catch her reaction. “Oh, but I do mind,” he said, after the caller had given up. He sounded pleasantly amused. “At least, I mind leaving without you. Lola-Kate, my love, you and I are bound together absolutely and completely. I cannot do without you.”

“What in hell are you talking about? You and I are not bound together by anything.” She felt ridiculous, trying to carryon an argument from a bathtub, and that only made her angrier. “Now get the hell out of here.”

“Oh, but we are, Lola-Kate. We are tied by the most powerful bond of all. The power of life and death, Lola-Kate, or to put it less poetically—my family has always had a tendency to be too poetical—in the relationship of fingerer and fingeree. You can get up in the box against me, Lola-Kate, and if you do, I will be screwed. I don't like thinking about that.”

“You're wrong,” said Kate. “In fact, you're crazy. I know nothing about you. I've certainly never seen you do anything but eat dinner and get drunk.”

“You're lying, Lola-Kate,” he said in a sad voice. “It's not surprising, but I had thought you were tougher than that. You disappoint me. You really do.” He had moved into the room and was lounging against the counter, a study in relaxation. A dog barked in the backyard, and another one answered it from closer by. The house creaked and moaned, in the manner of old houses. “Where are the goddamned dogs?” he asked edgily.

“They're all outside,” said Kate, and then realized it had been a stupid thing to say. The thought of a pack of dogs outside the door might chase him out the window. Too late. “In the back.”

“Good.” He turned his attention back to her. “Lola-Kate, I saw you. When you walked in here yesterday and took one look at me and freaked. Because we'd met, hadn't we? At Deever's. When I came to collect my money.”

“Rocco?” Disbelief was written across her face. “Are you Rocco? No. You can't be.”

“Don't call me that, Lola-Kate. It's not my name. I hate it. Deever does that to people. He takes away their names and then sneers at them for not having any. I have my father's name, goddammit. It's an honorable name and it's mine.” As he straightened up, his right hand darted to one side and back again. He held it out to show her. A knife lay across his palm; a stray beam of light hit it and was reflected for a moment into Kate's eyes. “It's sharp, Lola-Kate,” he said, in a soothing, gentle voice. “I keep it very sharp. It won't hurt.”

She froze, trapped by the menace of the honey-sweet voice.

“Now,” he went on briskly, “get rid of that towel. Go on. I don't give a damn what you look like. The towel's in my way.” Before she had time to react, he grabbed it by a corner, ripped it out of her hands, and tossed it aside. With his left hand he slid his fingers onto her scalp and grabbed a fistful of her newly cropped hair. Then he jerked her head fiercely back.

And in one spasm of terror and infinite regret, she knew this was the end. The world went black.

And then it went white, with black spots. “Put that knife down and let go of her,” said a very familiar voice. “Before I blow the back of your head off. I'm right behind you. At this range I can't miss.”

The pressure on the knife eased slightly. “You wouldn't shoot me, little brother. I know you. You haven't got the guts. Remember last time? You wouldn't do it then—you won't do it now.”

“You fool,” said Fernando steadily. “I was fourteen the last time. Or was it fifteen? I'm smarter now. And if you must know the truth, old pal, I care a hell of a lot more what happens to her than what happens to you. After a while you can even wear out family loyalty.”

Kate kept her eyes tight shut. It seemed crucial that neither of them should notice her; she clasped her arms over her chest and tried very hard not to move or speak or think or feel.

“Give me the knife,” said Fernando, “and let her go. You can have five minutes' start to get the hell out of here before I call in.”

“That's a laugh.”

“Maybe, but it's better than nothing.”

“I have a better idea. Come on, sweetheart. We're leaving.”

Kate was suddenly jerked to her feet by her hair. It was another revelation in new and painful experiences. Then, pressing the knife against her throat again, he grabbed her around the waist and heaved her with no difficulty out of the tub. The Rodriguez brothers were strong. “We're walking out of here, little brother, and if you shoot, the chances are maybe fifty-fifty that I will slit her throat going down. You want to risk that? Now get out of my way. Stand back.”

Fernando didn't move.

His brother drew the edge of the knife delicately across Kate's chin, and she could feel the warmth of blood that trickled down her neck. “I have no trouble cutting someone's throat, little brother. Do you want to watch?” He shoved her, holding her tight against him with an arm around her waist and a knife at her throat, like a shield, and this time Fernando stood aside, his weapon still raised. They moved in a dreadful parody of some mad dance routine through the bedroom, around the huge bed, and out the door into the hall. At the top of the stairway, they stopped abruptly. Directly ahead of them, Kate heard the click of claws on the wood of the stairs and a deep-throated sharp warning growl. The knife loosened and then tightened its pressure on her throat.

“Careful, Lola-Kate, because if anyone tries anything, your little throat goes first,” he murmured in her ear. The growling started again, low and long and menacing. “Shut up, you fucking miserable hound,” he said. “Get the hell out of my way.” A huge, broad-headed dog with a gleaming brindled coat stood in the middle of the stairway, legs set apart, head slightly down, defying anyone to pass.

There are only seven dogs, thought Kate, unable to think of anything else, and they are all outside. I counted them. Six in the yard, and a mother in the kennel. Seven.

Then she heard a key in the lock and felt the change in atmosphere as the door opened.

A horrified and powerful voice screamed so loud the entire house echoed with the name. “Guillermo!”

Fernando yelled, “Hold him, Prince!”

And Prince sprang up the stairs. At the same moment, Guillermo Rodriguez flung Kate's still wet and naked body at Fernando, immobilizing him for a brief slice of time. As the dog's teeth sank into Guillermo's knife arm, he put both hands on the banister and vaulted it, sliding down for a foot or two before falling to the ground floor, leaving cloth, skin, and blood behind him. He landed in an awkward crouch, but one millisecond of rebound carried him to his feet and, knocking his mother out of the way, he threw himself out the door she had left open. He was in her car with the door shut before Prince hit the metal with an echoing thump and fell back. Guillermo reversed and turned in a shower of gravel, knocking the dog out of the way. As the car disappeared around a corner, Prince scrambled to his feet, shook himself, and walked soberly into the house.

Antonia ran up the stairs, tearing off her jacket as she moved. Fernando was standing rigid in the hallway, white-faced and shaking with rage, clutching Kate by the arms in a fierce grasp, and staring after his brother. Antonia took her, wrapped the jacket around her shoulders, and held her tightly, patting her on the shoulder. Fernando began to pace back and forth along the hall. “Thank God I came home when I did. Otherwise I'm not sure what he would have done,” she said at last.

“And that the dog was in the house,” added Fernando grimly.

“I don't know where he managed to hide. The first thing Juana always does is put all the dogs out.”

“Why did you come home?”

“I wanted to check that Kate was all right, and I remembered that I'd told her not to answer the phone. I felt very uneasy for some reason and so I came back after my class to check, that's all.” With her arms still tightly around Kate, she watched her youngest son closely.

“If you hadn't walked in, he would have killed her,” said Fernando. “A hell of a lot of good I was doing, just standing there, watching, waving a gun around.”

“If you hadn't come in when you did, I would have been dead long before Antonia made it home,” said Kate. “He was about to kill me then.”

Fernando walked with deliberation down to the end of the hall, sat down at the little desk, and punched numbers rapidly into the telephone. “You're calling them?” his mother asked.

“I have to, Antonia. And then Kate must get dressed and go to Santa Fe to make a statement. I should have taken her yesterday, but I was afraid that would put her in greater danger. I was worried that we had Deever people in the department. That's a laugh,” he added bitterly. “But you begin to believe that he has them everywhere.”

“He does,” said Antonia sadly.

After a long, murmured conversation, Fernando put down the telephone receiver and stood up abruptly. “Come on, Kate. We're off to see McDowell in Santa Fe. Apparently your friends are still there.”

“My friends?” asked Kate, puzzled. “Do you mean Harriet? You've actually found her?”

“Yes. She was spending her time looking after a pair of twins and a wounded FBI agent. Except no one is supposed to know she's an agent.”

“Do you know what this means?” said McDowell, from the comfort of a chair in the bar at the hotel in Santa Fe.

“Sure. It means,” said Fernando, “that we can get Deever on something so tight he won't be able to slip out from under it.” He was beginning to regain his normal colour after a drive to Santa Fe that Kate was not likely to forget soon.

“What's that?” asked Kate, who was drinking super sweet Turkish coffee on the theory that it was good for shock.

“Kidnapping. Forcible confinement. In short, you, Kate. You're the perfect witness. Respectable, honest, virtuous, intelligent.”

“Ooh,” she said. “I like the sound of that.”

“And with you up our sleeves, we can keep him locked up until we pin down the connection between him and the hijacking. The other passengers said that the hijackers were told there was something on board worth a million bucks and they wanted it. They were looking for gold bars or something like that, but we know what was worth a million to Deever.”

“Getting off,” said another voice.

They all looked up. “Harriet,” said Kate, trying to rise from the low, comfortable chair and falling back again. “Am I glad to see you. But I absolutely can't get up. Come here.” She reached up and gave Harriet an enormous hug.

“And this is John,” said Harriet, startled. Something had happened to Kate since she'd seen her last. Besides the fact that she had cut off most of her hair. “Remember? The cop. Ever since I was on that bus I've been wondering what could be worth a million. Because it takes a hell of a lot of jewelry to be worth that amount to a thief, doesn't it?”

“After it's fenced, yeah,” said McDowell.

“So you have this guy that the whole world is after for something he's actually done, and I would bet that evidence—proof that he's innocent—would be worth a fortune to him.”

“How about lack of proof that he's guilty?” asked Kate. “Isn't that just as important?”

“So what was he looking for?” asked McDowell lazily, willing enough to play games with a couple of interesting women over a beer.

“His wife,” said Kate. “That's what he said. And she was on the bus.”

McDowell looked unimpressed.

“What does his wife look like?” asked John.

“Victoria Deever?” said Fernando. “Can't miss her. Classy. Expensive. One of those tall, leggy, long-haired blondes. They've been married for maybe five years. She's certainly seen enough by now to testify against him. I'd be surprised if she did, though. I would guess if she opened her mouth to say anything, that would be the end of her.”

“But it's irrelevant,” said McDowell, pulling out his trump card. “She wasn't on the bus. The only tall, leggy blonde on the bus was named Teresa, not Victoria. And she's a Latino from New York, not a Southerner from the Carolinas or wherever and she didn't seem to have any connection at all with Deever, although we're still checking on that.”

“Then it has to have been Suellen Kelleher,” said Harriet.