Two Medicine (41 page)

Brooke nodded. “I told you
that you seem different, and now I think maybe it was because of
her. She’s done something to you, I think?”

I glanced at Brooke for a
second but then looked away back over the lake. “I think
so.”

“You’re mourning her,”
Brooke said, with a darker look on her face. “You’re in mourning,
and it’s made you rooted in this place, Will. I think it’s given
you a purpose – a reason to stay here. You were never rooted
before.”

I looked back at Brooke
with a scowl; I felt like she was now intruding into a world in
which she didn’t belong – she hadn’t paid the toll to be able to
talk about Alia’s effects on this world.”

But Brooke was undaunted,
she was always a brave one. She just smiled knowingly at me. “Don’t
act like you don’t understand what I mean, Will, I know you do.
Just think about it. We don’t have to talk about it anymore. I just
wanted to figure out what was different about you.”

“Of course I’m mourning
her, but that hasn’t improved me in any way.” I said grumpily. “It
just about ruined me.”

“No, it gave you roots.”
Brooke picked up a small purple blossom of flowers and twirled it
thoughtfully under her nose. “You know about my brother Nick, the
one who died?”

I did, Scott had told me
about it. Nick was a troubled guy, a little older than Brooke. He
had always battled a drug addiction and he was bi-polar; and I had
always figured that was what had drew her to Scott initially – he
and her brother were a lot alike. But her brother Nick had simply
disappeared from their home one day in Marietta, Georgia, two years
ago, and not a word was heard about him for all that time. Not
until one day when police all the way in Athens, Georgia called to
say that they had identified a body as being Nick, and that someone
had to come down to identify and claim him. Scott had gone with
Brooke to view the body.

“Well maybe you know,” she
said, her voice sounding a little strained, “that he drowned in a
shallow ditch full of water, next to the highway near Athens – not
too far from town. Nothing else around, just his body in this
ditch. Nobody knew anything about the circumstances of why he was
there, why he had gone that far, and what he was even doing out
there to begin with.

“The point is,” she said,
looking back at me, “is that
not
knowing is worse than knowing when it’s someone
you loved. A mystery to others becomes a… a haunting fixation to
you. I know, and
that’s
what I can see on you too, despite the fact that
you seem more… rooted. Something is eating at you too, and I know
that feeling, that look.”

She suddenly reached over
and gave me a hug, leaning into me. I was surprised, but I put my
hand on the back of her head and my arm around her back. She was
warm and smelled sweet, and it actually felt good to have her hold
me. I looked up the slope and saw Scott was heading back
down.

“If you can, you should
find her, Will,” Brooke said with urgency as she hugged me. “Find
out what happened to her. You’re lucky because you’re here, close
to it, and you know this world. I’ll never know what happened to
Nick, but you can find out about Alia.”

I heard Scott
crunching through the brush above us. He was
sweating and flushed, but was beaming with pride. After Brooke and
I got up and stretched ourselves, Scott showed us his pictures of
the bear, grinning as proudly as if he had shot it and had it
mounted in his den as a trophy. Even with his zoom fully extended,
the bear was still the size of a pea, but it was wild, and a
Grizzly, and that was special.

The rest of the hike was
strenuous and it got very hot, but it felt good to sweat in that
clean air and pure sunshine – it was a clean sweat. The flies and
bees left us alone at that elevation, right above the tree line,
but I could see bees below us down the hill in the sunshine,
buzzing lazily in the patches of flowers.

I thought a lot about
Brooke’s words as we hiked along; and I hoped in a way that she
wasn’t right about me having to find out about what happened to
Alia – because even though I wanted to more than anything at that
moment, I knew that if I somehow didn’t find out, that I’d be
suffering from a “haunted fixation” for the rest of my
life.

But maybe she had it
right. I wished Brooke was staying longer so I could talk to her
more about things, to get her thoughts on my life. She was a rare
treasure and I was a little envious of what Scott had, but I was
glad for him all the same.

Later than afternoon we
returned, exhausted but with that special kind of peaceful
relaxation from being out in the sun all day. I saw them to their
campsite but didn’t stay long; and despite my thoughts going over
and over what Brooke had said, I slept more soundly that night than
I had in a very long time.

Thirty-
Four

I came by the camp after
they had packed up their stuff. All of their junk was shoved into
the car they had, and they were all set to go.

As I said my goodbyes,
Brooke hugged me and kissed me on the cheek, slipping me a knowing
expression as she got into the car. Scott, sporting the beginning
of a scruffy beard and looking as healthy and whole as I’ve ever
seen him, gave me a big bear hug.

“
This mountain air is
doing you good,” I said to him.

He smiled at me broadly.
“Take care of yourself, Will. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t
do.”

“
I don’t
know
what
you would do, anymore. You’re a new man.”

He laughed and looked past
me at the mountains in the distance. “Just a new chapter,
buddy.”

“
So you’re off to
California now?” I asked.

“
Yea,” he said. “By way of
Utah, Nevada. Gonna take our time.”

“
Take care of yourself,
Scott,” I said, and with that, he got into his car and drove away
from the campsite.

After getting back
to the store that night, I had a note from Phyllis
that Greg had stopped by and left a message for me to call him.
 I stared at the note, feeling Brooke’s words resonating in me
about finishing this mission to the end, finding out who killed
Alia. I decided then and there to recruit, all over again, and once
and for all, the one person who I knew would help me – the Khaki
Kop himself.   Instead of calling him, I would just go and
confront him at his house – rejuvenated that energy that was so
fleeting within him, but that buoyed me along with him
nonetheless. 

I got to Greg's house late
that night, around 10 pm.  It didn't look like any lights were
on in his house, and I felt like a trespasser walking up to his
door.  I remembered he had a back deck and I walked past the
front of the house and around the yard to the back.  A single
porch light shone down and I saw him sitting at a little black
rod-iron table.  As I walked up I saw he was writing on a
legal pad, and when he looked up at me he flipped the pad over on
its front.  

“
Speak of the devil,” he
said, regarding me with a studied frown.  

“
The devil? That doesn’t
sound encouraging.” I sat down at the little table, across from
him, and looked down at his pad.  “What you working on?”
  

“
It can wait.  I need
to talk to you.” He sat back in his chair and crossed his arms.
 “I think I know who killed Alia.”

His words hit me like a
punch in the face, and my breathing stopped. “Who?”

“
Before I get to that, let
me ask you something.  Are you planning on going to the
Blackfoot powwow?”

“
The powwow?” It took me a
moment to get on track with what he was asking. “Yea, I
guess…”

“
Who invited
you?”

“
Thunderbird, actually. He
said the council approved it or something like that.”
 

Greg nodded.
 “So
Clayton
didn't ask you?”

“
Clayton? Of course
not.”

“
You
didn't see him recently – at his house?”  Greg looked
concerned, and unfolded his arms, leaning forward.  “That
house is
watched
, Will,” he said in a quieter voice, “and it's known that you
have been there.” 

“
Watched by whom?”
 

He didn't answer. I sat
back, looking at him doubtfully, “What has any of this have to do
with who killed Alia?”

“
There's a lot of people
talking about you out there.”  Greg nodded his head in the
general direction of Browning.  “And you got some attention of
law enforcement too.”

I snorted dismissively.
“Who? Officer Olsterman?”  

“
There are more entities
than the BIA’s office watching things in Browning, Will,” he said
gravely.  “Because of our position, the rangers are advised
about certain criminal developments, and, my friend, your name has
come up.”  

“
Come up how?” I felt a
cold sinking fear in my chest. “Stop speaking so cryptically; just
tell me what the fuck is going on, Greg.”

“
There's suspicion that a
major drug-running deal is going through Browning and that someone
at Two Med is involved. You are suspected as being a part of
running the drugs.”

“
Out here? At the store?”
I laughed. “Who is saying all this? Who is here besides the
BIA?”

“
DEA. And not for the
first time. There’s been drug issues in Browning in the past; and
there’s been a pipeline of drugs coming through here from Canada
for decades. The BIA is just the boots on the ground for larger
entities.

“
I don’t get the
connection with Two Medicine, though,” Greg continued. “Who would
be helping to transfer drugs around from Two Med?
Ronnie?”

“
Could be,” I said, but
internally I felt like it was a definite fact.

“
Jesus,” I said after
thinking it over, “I don't hear from you for two weeks and suddenly
you pop up with all this out of nowhere? I didn’t even think you
were involved anymore.”

Greg just stared back at
me. I sat thinking for a moment, processing everything he had said.
 Watching the house, drugs, murder, cops.   I could not
believe it was real.

“
Why’d you go see
Clayton?”  Greg asked.

“
No,” I said, after
thinking for a moment. I looked up at him and shook my head. “No
more questions, Greg.  Stop acting like a fucking cop; and act
like my friend.”  I said.

“
Tell me who killed her or
just leave me out of it and stop freaking me out.”  I said.
 “ I don’t care about the rest of that shit.”

“
Clayton… or Jake,” Greg
said.

“
Clayton
or
Jake?”

“
Look Will, a lot gets
filtered out by the time things reach the Rangers. And we were only
notified about things because somebody is fingering an employee of
Two Med as being involved in drug delivery – that’s the only reason
we even know anything about it.”

Greg shook his head at me.
 “You cannot repeat any of this to anyone, but Clayton and
Jake are supposedly planning, or involved in, a major drug-running
trip over Canada’s border. These kind of over-the-border deliveries
attract a lot of attention from federal law enforcement, and I
think Clayton and Jake know it, and that somehow Alia got in the
way and they got desperate.”

“
So you think they killed
her because she was going to mess up their big deal?”

“
One or both,” Greg
nodded. “Yea.”

“
Which is why you’re
worried about me, now,” I said.

“
That and the Two Med
connection with Canada… that’s what’s stirring things up so much in
Browning lately. The cops and who knows who else were watching
Clayton because of the drugs, and then this grisly murder
happens.”

I tried to picture Clayton
and Jake beating Alia to death in the woods. Questions arose
immediately, however. Why was she killed like that if Clayton and
Jake were trying to keep a low profile? And why the lack of
footprints and the weird location? And why like end it like that,
leaving a body lying there beaten? It still didn’t make any sense
to me.

“
It has always looked to
me more like a sudden act of rage – a ‘crime of passion.’” I said,
sitting back in my chair and running my hands over my face. 
“But with the strange placing of the body, the footprints, it looks
planned-out.”

I thought back to my visit
to Clayton’s house, how he had told me of his campaigns and
intentions to clear his family name.  I had believed him; he
seemed honest, if not somewhat unfriendly.   Was I suckered?
 And if so, was Sky duping me the same? How is she involved in
this?

“
I don’t even know what to
say,” I said shaking my head.  I looked up at Greg. “So what
do we do now?”

“
We
don’t do anything.” Greg
flipped over the legal pad.  He had written a lot on the first
page, filling up the entire front side.