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“Where the hell did you hear that?” Gus Sander roared as he once again pushed up to his feet. He gave the impression of a bear with his lips rolled back away from his teeth and his shoulders hunched as he leaned with his fists on the top of the desk.
“It seems to be known by nearly everyone on the reservation except for the other tribal police members and those of us who would have turned Detective Jones in if we’d have known.” She smiled. Having this knowledge against the tribal officer who had thrown roadblocks in her way every time she’d tried to work with the tribal police, was a heady feeling. She had been justified in her instinct that the man was rotten.
Sander eased back down in his chair as Dela spoke. Now he leaned back, studying her. “If you know this, what are you doing about it?”
“First, I’m going to clear my name, then I’ll be doing all I can to clean up the reservation.” She peered straight into his eyes. “If I were you, I’d start clearing up any business you have there.”
“You didn’t come here to warn me about cleaning up the reservation.”
“No, I asked you about the threat to me, and I’d like to know if you received any threats. Paul had received one before he died. I’m thinking that someone close to a person who died due to an overdose is out for revenge. They killed Paul and may be coming after you next.” She hid the triumphant smile that wanted to spread across her lips at the sight of fear that flashed in the man’s eyes.
The bodyguard moved closer to Sander. The man behind the desk waved him away and opened a drawer. He pulled out a piece of paper. “I received this in the mail a month ago.” He slid the paper across the desk top toward Dela.
She and Marty leaned forward reading without touching.
You caused the death of someone I loved. An eye for an eye.
Dela glanced up at the drug dealer. “Where did you find this?”
“It was taped to the windshield of my car when I came out of Harry’s Bar one night. I figured it was someone just trying to scare me.” He puffed up. “If someone is chicken shit enough to leave a note on my car window, they haven’t got the balls to really do anything.”
“Are you sure?” Dela asked. “Whoever it is did kill Paul. Stabbing is a personal way to kill someone.” She studied the man whose face had paled.
“I have my bodyguards. They’ll keep me alive.”
“For your wife’s sake, I hope they can.” Dela rose and walked to the door. Marty followed.
“What are you going to do?” Sander asked.
Dela stopped at the door. “About what?”
“The note and Jones.”
She shrugged. “I can’t tell the police any of it if you don’t want me to bring up your dealing.”
The man scowled, and she walked out of the office.
“What do you think he’s going to do?” Marty asked as they walked down the hall and out of the building.
“He’s going to call in Jones and ask him questions and probably tell him to get lost.” She had a feeling Quinn needed to move quickly to get the goods on the tribal police detective.
“What about the note?” Marty beeped his vehicle to unlock and they slid in.
Dela stared at the building. “Sander is probably safe with that bodyguard. I think the opportunity of the fight I had with Paul had weakened him enough that the real killer felt confident they could take his life.” She glanced at her friend. “Unless I get convicted and the killer feels he or she can’t be touched, I don’t see them trying to kill Sander.”
“How can you be sure?” Marty backed out of the parking slot.
“I’m not. But the phrase an eye for an eye means this is a revenge killing, and the only people who would want revenge are family members of people who have overdosed. We need to find out about all the overdose deaths on the reservation in the last two years.”
“Where to?” Marty asked.
“Home. I want to ask Heath to look up all the overdoses, and we need to write down what we learned today.”
♠ ♣ ♥ ♦
Back at her house, Dela sent Marty off. There wasn’t any need for him to hang around when she was just going to call Heath and go through the details she’d discovered so far.
Mugshot lay beside the recliner where Dela sat with a notebook on her lap, a pen in one hand, and phone in the other. She’d already talked to Heath about gathering names of the families of overdose victims. Now she was on the phone trying to contact Quinn. She wanted to know where he was on finding enough evidence to detain Detective Dick before Sander told him to, or made him, disappear.
“You’ve reached the number of FBI Special Agent Quinn Pierce, leave a message and I’ll return your call.” The beep irritated Dela.
“Quinn, it’s Dela. We need to talk ASAP about Detective Dick. Sander is going to make him disappear. You need to work faster.” She ended the message and set her phone down.
A knock at the door caused her to jump. A glance at the time and she figured it must be Heath. She hadn’t taken off her prosthesis yet, making answering the door quicker.
Pulling the door open, she was surprised to see Quinn standing on the porch holding a pizza box that gave off a wonderful aroma. She’d only downed a peanut butter sandwich at Molly’s because she wanted to get on to Sander’s office. “What a surprise. Did you get my message?”
“Just as I pulled up.” He stepped into the house and crossed the living room to place the pizza box on the dining room table. “How do you know Sander is going to make Jones disappear?”
Dela set plates, forks, and napkins on the table for three, causing Quinn to frown, and then asked him what he wanted to drink.
“Iced tea or water.” He motioned to the third plate. “You expecting someone?”
“Heath should be showing up any time.” She poured a glass of iced tea and set it in front of the chair where Quinn stood.
“He seems to be spending a lot of time here lately.” Quinn waited for her to sit and then he sat across from her.
“Get used to it. When I’m cleared of this murder, he’s moving in as a roommate.” She felt her cheeks heat.
“Roommate as in renting a room or sharing your bed?” Quinn’s gray eyes bore into hers.
What was he trying to see? “Renting a room. We’ll see where it goes from there.” She dropped her gaze to the pizza box and opened it. She hid the astonishment that he had brought her favorite. Chicken, olives, artichoke, and white garlic sauce.
“How did you know this was my favorite?” She ran through as many of their meals together as she could remember and none of them had been pizza.
He grinned. “I have my ways.”
The door opened and Heath strode across the room. “Why wasn’t that door locked?”
She stared up into his stormy brown eyes and frowned. “Because Quinn is here and I knew you would be coming any moment.” If he was going to be this paranoid, he wouldn’t be spending the night as he’d offered. She wasn’t scared of whoever wrote the note. Not now that she was pretty sure the killer wasn’t some lunatic. Just a grieving relative.
“You have to take any threats you receive seriously.” Heath took a seat to the side of Dela and glanced at Quinn. “Hey.” And nodded his head.
Quinn did a head bob and they both pulled a piece of pizza out of the box.
Dela stared at them. She no longer had an appetite. The two men seemed to speak volumes without saying much of anything. They were both going to make sure the little woman didn’t come to any harm.
She put two pieces of pizza on a plate and stood. The two looked up at her. “I feel like eating outside away from all of this testosterone.” She walked to the French doors, opened them, and joined Mugshot and Jethro in the yard. She sat on the step and ate her pizza, enjoying the snuffling, drooling, and bird songs.
The door opened when she’d finished eating and continued sitting outside.
“Dela, I don’t know what we did, but could you come in while we discuss what we all learned today?” Heath asked, offering her a hand.
She grasped his hand and he pulled her to her feet.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
Peering into his eyes she asked, “Do you know what for?”
“Not entirely, but you can explain it to me when Quinn leaves.” He smiled as his gaze lingered on her face.
She released his hand and put her plate in the sink before returning to her seat at the table.
“How many families lost a loved one to an overdose?” she asked Heath.
“Besides the Brown and Murdoch families, there were three others in the last two years. The other three were closer to two years ago. I think for someone to be avenging now, they would have lost a loved one in the last year.” Heath’s gaze held hers. “I don’t think revenge would smolder over two years.”
“I agree.” Dela glanced at Quinn. “What did you find out about Detective Dick?”
He pulled out his small notepad and flipped through the pages. “He lives alone, his neighbors don’t care for him. They say he leaves his garbage can out all week, and fills it while it sits alongside the street.”
Dela laughed. “That sounds about right.”
“I talked with Derick Brown. He is now willing to say that Jones told him to keep quiet about where the drugs came from that killed his son after Jones ran him off the road. That was enough evidence to get Jones pulled in and a search warrant for his house. We conducted the search this afternoon and found what looked like a file he was keeping for blackmail.” Quinn glanced at the two of them. “You were both on his list of ‘disposable people.’ I’m not sure what that meant but all the names on it were people who were in his way.”
Dela studied Heath. She understood why Jones was threatened by Heath. He had been hired to take Jones’s place. But why her?
“Does this mean you have him in custody?” Heath asked.
“Yes. Pending further investigation to pile up as many charges against him as we can.” Quinn put a hand on Dela’s arm. “You won’t have to worry about him anymore.”
She nodded. “Do you think he was the one who called and threatened me?”
“We’re still working our way through the phone records to see.”
Heath cleared his throat, and Quinn lifted his hand off her arm.
“It’s good to know that Jones is in custody but we need to discover who killed Paul.” She asked Heath, “Does Chief Steele still have me at the top of the suspect list?”
“He’s wavering but with Mrs. Swan’s eyewitness account, he can’t take you off the list.” He grasped her hand, entwining their fingers.
“Shaffer was going to travel to Lapwai and talk to Mrs. Swan.” She released her hand and shifted her attention to Quinn. “Have you heard anything from him?”
“No. But if he traveled to Lapwai today, I won’t hear anything until tomorrow when he returns with his report.” Quinn pushed his empty glass to the center of the table. “If there isn’t anything else we need to discuss, I’m heading home. I have a kitchen that needs readied for new cabinets to be installed.”
Dela thought about the day he’d taken her to the old Victorian house he was remodeling. “How is your remodel coming along? I’d love to see what you’ve done to it.”
Quinn smiled. “You could come by on Sunday afternoon.”
“We’ll do that,” Heath said.
Dela stared at Heath and then smiled at Quinn. “See you Sunday.”
She walked Quinn to the door. “Thanks for the pizza, I didn’t feel like making anything tonight.”
“You’re welcome. And how I knew about your favorite pizza...that day we ate at the Italian restaurant in Boise, you mentioned what kind of pizza you liked.” He winked and walked out to his vehicle.
Dela shut the door and stood staring at it. She couldn’t believe he remembered such a mundane thing.
The clanking of dishes in the kitchen yanked her from her ruminating and she entered the kitchen to find Heath cleaning up.
“About earlier,” Dela started.
Heath spun from the sink and leaned his butt against it with his hands holding a plate he was drying. “Yes?”
“You two were like a couple of bull elk battering your horns together to impress me. I don’t like it. Never have. If I wanted a man who thought he had to prove to me he was a man, I would have dated Randy Samuels in high school.”
“The quarterback? He asked you out?” Heath put the glass and towel down.
“Yes, he did ask me out. But I knew he’d try to mold me into the kind of girlfriend he wanted. I am not malleable.”
Heath laughed. “That you are not.”
She walked over to Heath. “Don’t try to prove to me you are better than Quinn. I know who you are and I like who you are. You don’t need to puff up your chest and pound on it to get me to notice you.”
“Are you calling me a gorilla?” He pulled her into his arms.
“I call it as I see it.” She smiled up at him.
