Final Payment

Chapter Twenty-eight

“The lieutenant said whatever you need,” the young state officer called from his black and white. He didn’t step off the roadway, and turned to flag the approaching ambulance to a stop. “Where do we want things?”

Short of a sky-hook, there was no way to remove the wounded Pasquale without causing him great distress, or without further disturbing evidence, but that was the trade-off. Chester Hansen’s body would remain in place awhile longer, until the scene had been thoroughly documented.

In a few moments, the two EMTs had the deputy bandaged and then secured, white-faced and panting with pain, on the gurney. In another minute, Matty Finnegan had the IV running, and before long the big diesel ambulance pulled away, heading back north.

“The CSI team will be out here in a few minutes, Rick,” Estelle said to the state policeman, Richard Black.

“A few long minutes,” he replied. “I heard them saying that the van was over in Hocico. They had a multiple drowning somehow in one of the irrigation ditches.” Estelle shot a glance at the officer. “I don’t know,” Black added. “That’s what they were saying.”

“They’ll be here when they’re here,” Estelle said.

“What happened, do we know?”

“Tom came upon the killer just as Tapia knocked Chester Hansen off his bike. When Tom tried to apprehend him, they scuffled, and Tapia managed to shoot Tomás in the hip. He cleaned things up by dumping everybody and everything in the arroyo, out of sight of the road, and made sure Hansen was dead by shooting him in the head. We think that Tapia is on a motorcycle, and he may be hurt. We don’t know more than that. He headed out north, and that’s where I’m going right now.”

She put a hand on Black’s shoulder and turned him while she pointed. “The scuffle happened right over there, where you can see that trampled greasewood? That whole area. Tomás was thrown into the arroyo, and that’s where he was shot. Tapia was standing on the arroyo edge when he shot them both. We need those two empty casings from his gun, so be careful where you step. We think it was a 9mm, so the brass is easy to miss in this grass. While you’re waiting, you can scour the area carefully and find those. Just mark them with evidence flags. Don’t pick them up. Okay?”

“Got it.”

“Linda Real will be out here after a bit for pictures, so give her any hand she needs. I’m going to snap a quick couple before I go.”

The trooper nodded. “Her and Pasquale are livin’ together, aren’t they?”

“They are. She’s apt to be distraught, so be helpful. She’s going to want to get back into town as quickly as she can.”

“Sure.”

“The ME will be out as soon as he can, but we’re really short-handed today.”

“You ain’t just a-kiddin’,” Black said.

“What can I do?” Leona asked.

“I wish I knew,” Estelle replied. “Feed me good ideas.” She made her way to her vehicle, and with camera in hand returned to the edge. As she was taking the third photo, she saw the wink of sun on brass. The casing nestled in a clump of bunchgrass. “We need a flag on this one,” she called, and waited until the trooper had placed the thin wire securely in the dirt. “The other one won’t be too far.”

When she was finished, she returned to the Expedition to find Leona mulling over the county map.

“Look at this,” the county manager said. “If I wanted a discrete route back into Posadas from here, this is how I’d go.” She traced the route with a pencil, not touching the point to the paper. “Back up this road about a mile, and there are all these spiderwebs.” She indicated dotted lines that represented nothing even as grand as an established two-track. “One of them wanders over toward the Salinas arroyo, another to the windmill on the back side of Cooper’s ranch, and then…” She paused and leaned forward, pushing her dark glasses up into her hair.

“Remember that grand plan a number of years ago for that housing development south of the airport? If my memory serves me correctly, Hardy Aimes almost talked the county commission into that one. Close enough that he graded a whole bunch of access roads and lanes and such. This whole block here.”

As Estelle leaned forward to examine the map, Leona added, “The point is, with a copy of the county map from the Chamber of Commerce, or off the Web, or a dozen other places, we can go where we want.” She dragged a finger across the paper. “He can wend his way back to State Seventy-eight, where one of the development ‘roads’ comes out across from the airport, or he can meander south and east and eventually, he’ll come out on North Flat Street, right behind the high school. Voilà.”

“And with the race going on, no one is going to see him,” Estelle said. “He’ll be mistaken for one of the support team.” She nodded. “Maybe so.” She walked around the front of her truck. “Rick, keep your eyes open,” she said. “If you see a stocky Mexican guy with a broken ankle riding a bright red Yamaha dirt bike with no plates, your excitement is about to begin.”

“I got the picture of him off the computer,” the trooper said. “But it don’t make sense that he’d come back here.”

“We hope not,” Estelle replied. “Keep the bikers on the road and moving. Don’t let anybody congregate here. We’ve lost enough evidence already.” She started the truck and backed carefully away, turning around on the road. As they wound back up the hill, she kept the pace steady, mindful of the sporadic appearance of bike competitors and occasional official race vehicles.

Just beyond one of the dilapidated windmills that dotted this portion of the county, Leona leaned forward, pointing.

“That’s it,” she said. The turnoff could have been mistaken for an attempt by a sun-struck road grader operator to cut a bar ditch. Estelle stopped the truck and got out, scanning the ground. It would be impossible to hide a motorcycle’s tracks in the red earth, even through the gravelly sections. One recent set of vehicle tracks cut a crescent across the trail where someone had pulled over, perhaps to let cyclists pass. And off to the side, cut deeply in the soft soil, was a clear track showing the imprint of both front and back tires, and then doubled as if either there were two motorcycles or someone had driven in here and then retraced the route back out to the county road.

Estelle walked two dozen paces away from the truck, until the scrub growth closed in on either side of the path. The tracks showed that the motorcycle had veered in here and then, forced to a halt by the narrowing window of vegetation, had turned around. For a moment, the undersheriff stood and gazed at the tire prints. They could have been cut ten minutes before or a month ago. In this protected spot, with no rain or snow since January, the tracks might as well be petrified.

A series of shoe prints were indistinct beside the tire tracks, and Estelle could imagine Tapia, grimacing with the pain, putting down his good leg to support the bike as he horsed it around on the narrow trail. She knelt and took a quick set of digital pictures, forcing herself to take her time, then returned to the truck feeling an odd combination of relief and regret. Now that she knew something of his route, Estelle wanted nothing more than to charge after an escaping Manolo Tapia, running him to ground. But the big county vehicle was no match for a nimble motorcycle, whether the rider had an injured ankle or not.

“Next plan,” she said. “Someone on a bike went in a ways, then turned around.”

Leona was undeterred. “Now, Bobby is the inveterate hunter,” the county manager said. “I’m surprised he isn’t dashing about through the brush in hot pursuit.”

That image brought a smile from Estelle, since Bobby never “dashed” anywhere. “He’s thinking Posadas,” she said. “For all he cares, Tapia can bake out in the sun all day. He wants to be sure that Hector Ocate stays put and safe.”

“Not to mention that his Gayle is back in town and would be in some jeopardy,” Leona added.

“There is that.”

“Now, your man made the same mistake I did,” Leona replied. “I don’t think this is the right turnoff.” Waving ahead, she added, “Just a bit farther.”

A bit farther was an obvious two-track, and as soon as she turned off the main road, Estelle recognized the route. She didn’t spend a lot of time touring the back byways of Posadas County, but she knew this particular path, knew that it ran almost due east. Clearly, the tire prints showed that the motorcyclist knew that, too. The tracks swung off the county road in a smooth arc, no hesitation, no slowing. The undersheriff turned into the narrow lane and stopped.

“He came back out,” Leona said, seeing the double tracks.

“Or there was more than one,” Estelle said. “Or Tapia was out here yesterday or the day before, practicing his setup.”

“I hadn’t thought of that possibility-a man practicing. That makes sense. Risky, though. Surely he would want to be careful not to be seen.”

“Who’s going to take a second look at a man on a motorcycle?” Estelle asked. “Especially this weekend. Illegals don’t jump the border on dirt bikes. Ranchers use them and four-wheels all the time. So do hunters. And kids.”

“But a stolen, unlicensed vehicle…” Leona persisted.

“Number one, we didn’t know it was stolen until just hours ago. Number two, Tapia might not know that we do know…now. And as long as he doesn’t cruise the streets and state highways, the odds of us seeing him are slim to none. Under normal circumstances, if an officer were to see him out here in the boonies, odds are good he would never be stopped.”

Estelle eased the county truck along the rough trail, trying to avoid driving on the motorcycle tracks whenever she could. They had traveled less than a hundred yards when her phone buzzed in her pocket.

“Guzman.”

“Estelle,” Gayle Torrez said, “Channel Eight is offering their chopper. They’re over in the motel parking lot right now.”

“Accepted,” Estelle said instantly, fully aware of the risks of involving civilians in an emergency operation. “We’re just east of County Road Fourteen. Tell them to pick me up at Cooper’s windmill. There’s a good wide meadow there. They’ll see my vehicle. I’ll park at the base of the windmill, out of their way.”

“You got it. Jessica Duarte and her cameraman are here in the office right now. I’ll give them a map for the pilot. She says they can be in the air in about five minutes. That’s maybe ten out to you at the most.”

“We’ll be there,” Estelle said. Cooper’s windmill, two miles east of their current position, hadn’t pumped water in ten years, since the day that Jim Cooper had climbed up the wooden tower to service the transmission. He had ignored the modest dark clouds so far away that the thunder was just a faint rumble. The lightning bolt flicked out and swatted the rancher. He fell, probably already dead, his skull hitting the water tank so hard that the dent was still visible in the steel rim. When Estelle had responded to the incident, the sky was a blank blue, innocent of any wrongdoing, the homicidal clouds having retreated beyond the San Cristóbals.

For much of the distance to the windmill, the road was no more than a scuff on the rough table of prairie. Here and there, Estelle could see the motorcycle tracks. On a few low humps, the sort of things that would have vaulted a bike into the air had the rider been a rambunctious youngster enjoying his freedom, the tracks showed this biker had stayed firmly, and patiently, on the ground.

As they approached the windmill, Estelle saw that the lopsided fan had frozen in place. Enough remained of the tail, with the faded Aeromotor logo still visible, that the mill head drifted this way and that, ruined fan facing into the breeze.

The stock tank below the windmill was empty, one side caved in by the back bumper of a careless woodcutter’s pickup. Bullet holes dappled the metal. Estelle slowed the truck to a crawl, scanning the area around the mill. After passing the stock tank, the lane turned and circled left, up a gradual rise to the north. She picked up her binoculars as she braked to a halt. Focusing carefully, she examined the road ahead.

“Nothing,” she said. The road up the grade was facing them, in bright sunshine. She should have been able to see the tracks left by a passing motorcycle as Tapia accelerated up the hill, away from the meadow and the windmill.

“Is that…” Leona started to say, pointing toward the tank. Where it wasn’t crushed inward, the steel tank rim was four feet high. It now cast a hard, sharp-edged shadow on the prairie on the east side-a shadow that humped outward at one point into an amorphous shape. Estelle trained the binoculars and immediately saw what appeared to be the back wheel of a motorcycle.