SOMETHING ABOUT THE sound of the front door opening, the scuff of footsteps on the wood floor, made Vicky glance away from the computer monitor. Beyond the beveled glass of the French doors was the tall figure of Adam Lone Eagle. The black hair smoothed back, blurring into the collar of his dark coat. She felt a jab of annoyance. Here he was, when she’d decided he’d probably never call again. Just walk away after a half-dozen dinners, the way you’d walk away from an acquaintance you ran into every time you went to the grocery story. The muffled sound of Adam’s voice floated through the doors. Then Annie’s, giggling and nervous.
Adam had a way of making women nervous, Vicky thought, just like he had a way of appearing at inopportune moments. She was about to leave for the reservation. She’d gotten to the office early and spent the morning finishing up some work—a lease for a client renting out an office in Lander, a threatening letter to an insurance company that refused to pay another client’s claim—after spending most of the night pacing her apartment, her thoughts running in a continuous loop over the meeting in Gianelli’s office. Always circling back to the beginning: T.J. was innocent. Somewhere in the night, with the green iridescent numbers on the clock blinking 3:10, she’d decided to check out T.J.’s alibi herself. One witness who had seen T.J. at the office Monday night, and Gianelli would have to look elsewhere for the killer.
Vicky got up and yanked open the French doors just as Adam was reaching for the knobs. “Got a minute?” he asked, his eyes traveling over her before coming back to rest on hers. He was smiling, as if he were pleased with the image he’d taken in.
“That’s all I have,” Vicky said, moving back toward the desk, annoyed at the way he made her stomach flutter with the way he looked at her, the most ordinary question he asked. The man always took her by surprise, as if there were things about him she’d forgotten since the last time she’d seen him. The determination in the way he carried himself: head high, shoulders square inside the black leather jacket. There was determination, too, in the set of his jaw, the sharp cheekbones and finely shaped nose with the hump at the top, the eyes like black stones that absorbed everything and revealed nothing. He might have been a warrior who’d stepped out of one of the old photographs.
He was still smiling at her. “It’s been too long since I’ve seen you.”
She gripped the edge of the desk. Dinner ten days ago, then nothing. “We’re both busy,” she said.
“Come on.” He leaned close. The smell of aftershave on his skin mixed with the faint odor of leather. “You didn’t miss me a little?”
“Adam, I’m very busy.”
He held up one hand, palm outward in the sign of peace. “How about tonight? We can have dinner over at Hudson. There’s something I want to talk over with you. Seven o’clock.”
“You don’t give a woman a chance to say anything, Adam.”
“Say yes. I’ll pick you up at your place.”
Vicky drew in a long breath. “I’ll meet you at the restaurant,” she said finally.
Adam reached out and ran a finger along the curve of her chin, a light touch that sent a jolt of electricity through her. “See you tonight.” Then he was gone, striding through the outer office, letting himself through the front door.
Vicky gathered up the papers scattered over her desk and slipped them inside a folder. She was about to file the folder in one of the desk drawers when she realized that Annie was standing between the French doors, holding onto the knobs. She was young. Twenty-three years old, half of Vicky’s age, the age of her own kids, Lucas and Susan, with an “I’ve seen it all” look on her face.
“That Lakota sure knows how to get what he wants,” Annie said.
Vicky set the folder in place and slammed the drawer. She had no intention of discussing Adam with her secretary. She told her that a client would be stopping by to pick up the rental lease this afternoon, and the letter to the insurance company had to make today’s mail.
“People been talking about . . .”
Vicky cut in. “I don’t want to hear the gossip, Annie.”
The woman’s head snapped back as if she’d been struck. “I thought you’d want to know.”
Vicky took her coat from the coat tree and shrugged into the soft gray wool. Oh, she could guess the gossip on the moccasin telegraph. Adam Lone Eagle, lawyer from Casper. Lakota. Handsome. They’d been seen together in restaurants, holding hands, and walking down Main Street. But there were days and weeks with no phone calls, when she wondered if she’d ever hear from him again, and she’d told herself it didn’t matter. She wasn’t sure whether she was attracted to him, or whether she’d talked herself into the idea because. . . because, at times, the man seemed so attracted to her and because he was available.
“I’ll check in later,” Vicky said, fixing the strap of her black bag over one shoulder and brushing past the secretary. She hurried across the office and let herself outdoors, pulling the door shut against the secretary’s gaze.
She drove north on Highway 287, stomping on the accelerator to pass the old pickups lumbering down the middle of the asphalt. Clumps of brush floated past the window like bales of sunshine. She passed Plunkett Road and turned onto Blue Sky Highway. After several miles, another right into the graveled parking lot that wrapped around the squat, redbrick tribal headquarters building. She left the Jeep in a vacant space at the end of a row of vehicles and walked back to the entrance through the warmth of the sunshine washing over the sidewalk.
Across the tiled floor of the lobby, a wave toward the receptionist behind the desk, then down the hallway on the right past a procession of closed doors with panels of pebbly glass. Savi Crowthorpe’s door was open. The councilman was curled over the papers spread across his desk. He was a slim man with muscular shoulders, a hawklike nose, and straight, black hair that hugged the curve of his neck. The capable, long fingers of the basketball player he’d been at Wyoming Indian High flipped through the papers. Glancing up, he waved Vicky inside with his eyes.
“Gotta make this short,” he said, skipping the polite preliminaries. “I have a meeting in ten minutes. Take a seat.”
Vicky sat down on the metal-framed chair halfway between the door and the desk. The office was stuffy, hot air angling like a blowtorch out of the overhead vent. She unbuttoned her coat. “I’m here about T.J.,” she said.
“You and the fed.” The councilman squared the edges of the stacked papers. “Gianelli was waiting in the lobby when I got to work yesterday. Wanted to know what time T.J. left the office on Monday. I’m gonna tell you the same thing I told him. After the council meeting, T.J. and I worked late on Senator Evans’s visit next week. How we’re gonna handle the crowds at Fort Washakie; how much food we gotta serve, ’cause people aren’t coming out if they don’t get fed; and how we’re gonna end the program so the senator can get over to St. Francis Mission. Finished up about six-thirty, and I went home. It was the wife’s birthday, so she wasn’t real keen on me working late. Kept calling wanting to know when I was coming home.”
“What about T.J.?”
“Still in the office when I left. Said he was gonna work on the comments he was gonna make at Fort Washakie about the importance of getting another environmental study before we start polluting the reservation. His exact words, as I remember. Like I told the fed, if T.J. says he worked late, that’s what he did. Works all the time, that man. He’s the one who discovered how the BIA was trying to push a weak environmental analysis on us that was done by a consulting firm hired by the oil companies, so the companies could start their drilling.”
“Anybody else here?”
“At six-thirty?” The councilman gave her a crooked smile. “The place was a tomb.”
Vicky shifted her gaze to the window. She could feel her heart pounding. T.J. had no alibi.
The phone had started to ring, and the councilman stretched out his long fingers and lifted the receiver. “Don’t start without me,” he said, jumping to his feet. He dropped the receiver back into place. “Sorry, Vicky. Gotta go.”
“Thanks for your time, Savi.” Vicky stood up and turned toward the door.
“He didn’t kill his wife, you know,” the councilman said. “Woman gets shot, the husband’s the first one they’re gonna suspect. Maybe T.J. isn’t perfect, but he doesn’t have killing in him. You gotta help him, Vicky.”
“Look, Savi,” she began. “If you think of anybody who might have seen T.J. here on Monday night . . .”
“Patrol car,” he cut in.
“What?”
“Police patrol comes around during the night, checks to make sure the building’s locked up, everything’s okay.”
“Thanks.” Vicky gave the man a wave and started down the hall, pulling her cell phone out of her bag. She stopped at the front door and tapped out a number, then stepped outdoors and retraced her steps to the Jeep, moving between the crisp cold of the shadows and the warmth of the sunshine, the phone pressed against her ear.
“Wind River Police.” A woman’s voice came on the other end.
“Let me talk to Chief Banner.” Vicky got in behind the wheel and pulled the door shut. “It’s Vicky Holden.”
“Hold on. I’ll see if the chief’s available.”
“It’s important.”
“I’m sure.”
A couple of minutes passed. The Jeep came alive—engine running, cool air pouring from the vents. Finally the chief’s voice: “Vicky? What’s going on?”
“I’d like to talk to the patrolman on duty Monday night, the one checking the tribal headquarters.”
“This about T.J.?” There was a clicking noise at the other end, as if the man was tapping a pencil against the phone.
“T.J. was working late. He needs a witness.”
The tapping stopped. “Looks like my boy was on duty in Ethete that night. Patrick’s real conscientious about checking on the tribal buildings.”
“Can you connect me to him?”
“Doesn’t come on duty until . . .” Tap. Tap. Tap. “He clocks in at five. Where you gonna be?”
She told him that she was on her way to Vera Wilson’s place. Then back to Lander.
“Patrick’ll find you. Take it easy, Vicky.”
“Wait, Banner,” she said. “There’s something else.”
“Shoot.”
Vicky took in a gulp of cold air. “Were there any disturbance calls to T.J.’s house? Any records of domestic abuse?” Gianelli would ask, and she had to know what Gianelli knew.
A loud guffaw burst down the line. “A tribal councilman? If that’d happened, it would’ve been all over the rez. Next time he ran for election, people would’ve thrown his ass off the council. Look, I’ll check the records for you, but I’m telling you, there’s not gonna be anything there.”
Vicky felt her muscles begin to relax. She thanked the chief, hit the end button, and slipped the phone back into her bag. Then she backed into the lot and lurched forward out onto the highway. She had to talk to T.J.