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Contemplating all the stories Athena had told to cover up for why she was leaving early, made Dela forget where she was headed, until a voice called out, “Dela, why do you look so puzzled?”
She glanced up and smiled. Her friend Rosie was calling to her from the deli.
“Hi, Rosie. Just the person I wanted to see. Do you have a few minutes?” Dela smiled at the woman who was as round as she was tall and as warm and caring as she was smart.
Today she was wearing a purple skirt that flowed around her ankles and a flowered pink and purple blouse. It accentuated her rosy cheeks and lips. Her friend was always in a good mood and had a way of getting people to tell her things they wouldn’t tell anyone else. Add to that Rosie’s photographic memory and she was better than a computer database for delving into people’s histories.
“I’m just getting off work. Do you want to sit here or somewhere else?” Rosie’s gaze drifted toward the coffee shop.
“Let’s go to the coffee shop, and I’ll buy you a piece of huckleberry pie,” Dela said, knowing it was the woman’s favorite.
“Have I told you lately you are my favorite person?” Rosie’s eyes sparkled.
“Besides your family you mean?” Dela said, leading the way to a booth in the corner of the café.
“There are days that I like you better than Willow and Daisy.” Rosie slid into the bench seat across the booth from Dela.
“That’s because you live with Willow, and Daisy is the complete opposite of you.” Dela knew that Rosie only lived with her older sister to help her out with the kids since both her sister and her brother-in-law worked.
“I’m moving out. I’m tired of being bossed around like another one of her kids when I’m the one taking care of them.”
Nellie walked over, her order book in one hand and pen in the other. “Can I get you anything?”
“I’ll have iced tea and peach pie. Rosie will have huckleberry pie and...”
Rosie grinned and said, “A large cola.”
Nellie wrote it down and walked away.
“Why are you buying me pie?” Rosie cocked her head sideways like Mugshot did when he listened intently.
“What can you tell me about Athena Kindale?” Dela asked, playing with the silverware in front of her.
“This must be for work since you don’t usually ask me about another employee unless they’ve done something.”
Dela glanced up at her friend’s face. “She’s been skipping out on work and having someone else clock her out at her regular time. And she gave three different excuses for why she’s been leaving early.”
Rosie shook her head. “I knew she’d be nothing but trouble for Alex when he married her.”
Alex Kindale was a tribal member. His wife was not.
“Why?” Dela asked and leaned back as Nellie delivered their drinks and pie.
Nellie walked away. Rosie picked up her fork, cutting the tip off the slice of pie. “Because she lied to him when they met and she lied to him after they were married.”
Dela studied her friend as she slipped the forkful of pie between her lips.
“What kind of lies?” Dela sipped her tea waiting for Rosie to chew and swallow the bite.
“When they met, she said she was studying at the community college to become a nurse. He was there to become a computer technician, what he does for Cayuse. Later he learned she wasn’t even going to college, she’d just said that. Even knowing she lied, Athena had him hooked and they were engaged. Then after the wedding, she brings home a little girl, about three years old, and says she was an unwed mother in high school and this is her daughter.” Rosie shook her head. “When she applied for a job here as a barmaid, I wondered who was watching the girl and why she needed to work when Alex was making good money at his job.” Rosie cut another bite of pie. “I’ve heard it’s so she could flirt with the men.” She shoved the bite in her mouth and chewed, staring at Dela.
“It sounds like she’s a chronic liar.” Dela went on to tell Rosie the different stories Athena gave her, Dexter, and Natalie.
Rosie picked up her drink. “I bet none of them are the truth and she’s up to no good. Whatever she’s doing.”
♠ ♣ ♥ ♦
Dela and Mugshot, her large, three-legged dog, returned from their jog around the neighborhood as Heath Seaver, her former high school sweetheart and now roommate with benefits, parked his pickup in her driveway. He stepped out wearing his tribal officer uniform.
She had to admit, he was a manly sight in his uniform, buffed up by the body armor under his shirt and standing there with his hands resting on his duty belt as his gaze scanned her up and down.
“Looks like you two had a good workout,” he said, grinning at her.
Dela nodded. “It’s always a good workout when Mugshot and I can put in several miles. It helps me clear my mind.”
“What happened at work that has you needing to clear your mind?” he asked, walking ahead of them to open the gate and enter the backyard.
Jethro, her donkey and Mugshot’s friend, stood with his head hanging over the gate looking into the yard.
“Yeah, we’re back,” Dela said, walking over and opening the gate so the two animals could join them when Heath grilled some burgers and Dela enjoyed her view of the Blue Mountains.
Heath tapped her on the shoulder as she settled into the patio chair. “What’s going on at work?”
“Nothing that concerns the tribal police. At least not that I know of. Just an employee slipping out and telling a different story to everyone who confronts her.” Dela waved to the back door. “Would you be so kind as to bring me a glass of iced tea before you change?”
Heath smiled. “You know, I’m beginning to think you only let me move in so you could boss me around.”
She grinned back. “You know where the door is if you don’t like it.”
He laughed and entered through the sliding door, leaving it ajar before returning with her tea. “Who is this person?” Heath asked.
“Athena Kindale.”
Heath dropped into the chair beside her. “Is her husband Alex?”
This grabbed Dela’s attention. “Yeah. Why?” She shifted in the chair to face Heath.
“I read a report that he came in on Sunday dragging his wife and wanting her to press charges against someone who’d assaulted her.”
Dela retraced her conversation with Athena. “She didn’t look like she had any marks on her. Another of her lies?”
Heath shrugged. “I guess she was working at Harry’s in Pendleton and a couple guys got into a fight and she was caught in the middle and took some hits to her body.”
“Or that’s what she told her husband, and she was beaten up for some other reason.” Dela told Heath what Rosie had said about the woman.
He stood. “It sounds like this woman is trouble. I feel for Alex, he’s always stayed true to the people and came back to work here when he could have made more money elsewhere.”
Dela nodded, but her mind was sweeping through what could have happened at Harry’s and trying to find a way to convince Heath she only wanted to go there to have a drink after dinner, not to snoop.
♠ ♣ ♥ ♦
Sitting in a corner booth at the back of Harry’s, Dela sat close to Heath so they could hear each other talk.
“I told you this was a bad night to come here,” Heath said.
“When you said there was a biker rally in the tri-cities, I didn’t know you meant there would be overflow into Pendleton.” Dela didn’t like how many people were in the bar. She couldn’t watch Athena as easily as she would have on a regular Wednesday evening.
After losing sight of the woman again, Dela scanned the bodies crammed into one of the oldest bars in Pendleton. And the one with the most corrupt history. Less than a year ago, she and Marty had met a drug dealer in this bar to save a woman and her child from retaliation by the dealer.
Tonight, she just wanted to see how the woman who’d told so many lies earlier in the day acted while working here.
“You would have thought he’d stay away on a night like this,” Heath said, his breath relieving the heat by blowing across the sweat forming on her neck. She followed his gaze and spotted the drug dealer, Gus Sanders. He had a different bodyguard with him and a young woman. A married man like Gus shouldn’t be so handsy with every female he encountered. His wide hands were cupping the young woman’s butt as they crossed to what must be Gus’s booth as it was the same one he’d sat in the night Dela had handed over his stolen money.
Before Gus and the young woman were seated, Athena arrived at the booth. Bile rose in Dela’s throat as the man cupped her butt and squeezed. This was the type of male Dela felt should be castrated. He treated women like they were only put on this earth to allow him to grope and have fantasies.
She did gag as Athena leaned forward brushing her breast against the dealer and whispered into his ear. Whatever she said caught his attention. He stared forward before glaring at her. She smiled, kissed his cheek, and hurried back to the bar with the empty tray she’d held up in the air out of harm’s way while talking with Gus.
The drug dealer did a slow scan of the people near him. His gaze landed on her and Heath and his brow furrowed.
“I’d love to know what Athena said to Gus,” Dela said in Heath’s ear and snuggled closer to make the drug dealer think they were on a date and not there to watch him.
“I like this kind of surveillance,” Heath said, kissing her.
Dela enjoyed the kiss but didn’t let her mind go anywhere but on what had just happened in front of her eyes. She slowly pulled out of the kiss, peered into Heath’s eyes, and asked, “Think there’s any chance Gus will tell us what Athena said?”
Heath snorted and picked up his drink. “Nope.”
Dela leaned back in the booth and scanned the mass of bodies for Athena. She couldn’t see her anywhere. “We might as well leave. I can’t see a thing and I think what we did see is a bit telling.”
Heath finished his beer. “I’m ready to get out of this noisy place.”
She slid out, waited for Heath, and they walked across the saloon floor to the door. They jostled through men and women dressed in leather, head scarves, and boots.
Heath said excuse me three times to a woman who was blocking the easiest route to the door. She seemed to not hear or not care that she was in the way. He tapped her on the shoulder, and she screamed.
Four men closest to them, turned, making a wall of men around Heath. Dela squeezed his hand to stay by his side when he tried to slip his fingers free. She stepped between two of the men and glared back at them.
“What did you do to my lady?” A tall, beefy, bald-headed man asked.
“I asked her to move politely three times and when she didn’t respond I tapped her on the shoulder.” Heath had his hands and arms relaxed, but Dela could tell he was evaluating the situation.
This was her fault for dragging him here even after he’d told her what they would encounter.
A smaller man with a scraggly beard and wiry, tattooed arms took a step into the small circle. “Shouldn’t you be on the reservation, Kemosabe?”
“Shouldn’t you be in prison?” Heath shot back.
The man snarled and lunged.
Dela took a step forward and pushed him sideways into his friend. “We didn’t come here for trouble. We’re just having a night out. Let us be.”
The smaller man straightened and glared at them both. “I heard the womenfolk do everything and the men just sit around. But really? They also fight for you?”
Heath shook his head. “I’m not going to fight you.” He put his hand in his pocket and pulled out his tribal badge. “But I will arrest you for attempted assault of an officer if you don’t let us go.” He stared at the man with calm and authority.
Dela was grinning on the inside, but she kept a stern glare on the small man and a peripheral eye on the other three.
“Common Skeeter, pull your proboscis in and let’s get another drink,” the largest man of the four said, turning the small man toward the bar.
Heath grabbed her hand and they quickly left the bar. Out in the parking lot, Heath pulled her into a hug, but his tone was anything but loving. “Don’t ever jump between me and another man again. You could have been hurt.”
She remained in his arms only long enough to be thankful they’d both walked out of the bar unscathed. But his tone made her hackles raise. “You aren’t my commanding officer or my boss. I’ll do what my training taught me, save whoever is in danger.”
“I care for you and don’t want you getting hurt trying to save me. Save yourself first.” Heath pulled her back into his arms and kissed the top of her head. He knew her well enough to know she was too stubborn to give in already.
He released her and walked to his pickup. “Get in. We both have work tomorrow.”
Dela climbed into the passenger side, and he slid behind the wheel. She hadn’t really learned anything from this outing, but she was going to ask Athena what she said to Gus when the woman came to work tomorrow.