Tavish’s home was several miles away. She started walking.
Her route would take her within a block of the Hogarth and Montgomery Art Gallery. It would be nice to see the empty hook where her drawing had hung. The drawing Sawyer had purchased. But Lambert would take one look at her and show her the door.
She smiled at the thought.
A woman swerved and stepped off the curb to avoid getting near her.
What if I yell “boo” at her? Her grin turned into a chuckle.
Several blocks later a police cruiser roared past her. Then another. She ducked her head and shuffled on. Both turned down the street toward the gallery. Breaking into a limping trot, she crossed the street and turned the corner. She smelled the smoke before she saw it.
A red-and-white hazmat truck was parked in front of the gallery. Firemen had trained their hoses on the smoke.
Her stomach tightened. She stopped dead. Her artwork, the drawings she’d labored over for months, would be ruined by water. A deep weariness settled over her shoulders. Had a year of her life been washed away in a few moments? Weariness pushed into her exhaustion. She couldn’t stand. Leaning against the building next to her, she slid down the wall until she was on the pavement. Her vision sharpened and focused on the acrid smoke.
Marley barked.
Tavish whipped her head back and forth, looking for the small dog. It took her a moment to realize the shrill sound had only been in her mind.
Marley’s right. I’ve got to move.
She shoved off the ground. This was not a time to be weak, to give in. To be the same neurotic woman I’ve been.
“Right,” she said out loud. Reason this out. What were the chances that a fire accidentally broke out at the gallery while she was having a show?
The gallery door opened and Lambert emerged, hands cuffed behind his back. He tried to duck and keep his face turned from the gathering crowd.
A man hurrying to the scene paused long enough next to her to hand her a dollar bill. He moved on without making eye contact.
The currency fluttered in her hand. A dollar. Last week she would have tossed it in a jar she kept by the washing machine for petty cash. When the jar was full, she would have given it to one of her mother’s overpaid staff.
Until now she’d never paid attention to real need. She tucked the money in her pocket.
A small crowd gathered at a distance from the gallery, with a policeman standing guard. Tavish angled into the throng. “What’s going on?” she asked loud enough for the cop to hear.
As she expected, he didn’t look at her. “Drug bust. Lotta dope upstairs.” He turned around.
Tavish melted into the crowd.
“Okay, folks, move on, nothing to see.” The officer put out his arms and waved to the crowd. She started limping toward home, thinking. The break-in at her house. The empty safe at Patricia Caron’s house. Had someone been looking for the money and note from John Coyote that she’d found in the abandoned building? Her smack on the head and attempted murder in the arroyo would be the villain cleaning up loose ends. Just like the “gas leak” that destroyed all those homes in Patricia’s neighborhood.
Was Lambert’s drug dealing another loose end getting cleaned up? Or the coincidental result of an independent investigation? Or something else? “I’m getting as paranoid as a regular street person.”
* * *
Sawyer picked up the ringing phone. “Agent Price.”
“Yeah, this is Deputy Sanderson, Catron County Sheriff’s Department.”
“Yeah, what ya got?”
“A body.”
* * *
Street people were rare in this part of Albuquerque. Most of the homes were on several acres and all were gated. This was the neighborhood of not just Mercedes and BMWs, but Lamborghinis and Rolls-Royces—with lots of private security guards.
Through the fence surrounding a portion of her mother’s estate near the guesthouse, Tavish scouted the landscape. Two gardeners plucked dead leaves and flowers out of the potted plants near the front entrance. A pool cleaner skimmed debris from the fountain. Another worker had a leaf blower and was systematically clearing the cobblestone pavers.
She didn’t recognize any of them. She’d paid no attention to her mother’s staff. For all she knew, they’d worked there for years.
Maria, her housekeeper, stepped from the house and approached the pool cleaner.
One of the gardeners waved to her. “Señora Montez?”
The woman turned and walked toward him.
Maria is Mrs. Montez?
A security patrol car turned the corner and headed in Tavish’s direction. She bent down and pretended to tie her shoe.
It stopped beside her.
Rats! She stood, but kept her head down as she’d noted some of the street people did.
“Kinda in the wrong part of town, aren’t you?” a male voice asked.
She knew that voice.
“Well?” he asked.
Risking a quick glance, she grew faint.
The fake cop. The one who’d moved John Coyote’s body. The one who’d shot at her.
“Got lost,” she muttered.
“Yeah, that’s a good idea. Get lost. You’d better be gone when I return.”
“Yes, sir.” She kept her head down and stared at the sidewalk until the sound of his car grew faint. Then she broke into a limping run.