My latest novel length story and #6 in the New Mexico mystery thriller series has to have a subplot, so here's the beginning...
Mesh curtains, beige-pink, fell
against the adobe walls, sliding effortlessly across the edge of the bed where
Jake lay on his side, a white cotton sheet over his narrow hips, his chest
glowing in the deep afternoon light.
I felt luckier than I’d felt only yesterday, when the rainy season
coated Santa Fe in mud. Jake
surprised me, and the dim light reminded me of hope, a hazy feeling from the past.
An
electronic version of “The Magic Flute” alerted me that Burro wanted me on the
phone, likely about work. That
seemed unfair on a subdued Sunday afternoon, but Burro called for important
things, so I stirred, grabbed my brown fleece robe and took the phone around
the corner in my small adobe townhouse.
“What’s
up?”
“It’s
Alice. She says we need to take
off for Gallup immediately.
There’s been a murder.”
“At
the middle school?”
“No. We have an appointment there on
Wednesday to see about the Individual Education Plan for Joseph – his parents
want the school to let him into regular ed classes. But this is about Alice’s Native friend, Mirage -- the one
who took in Momma. Mirage thinks
she killed her brother last night.
Alice wants our help.”
“She
‘thinks she killed him?”
“She
blacked out. Doesn’t remember.”
“Are
we attracting bizarre crimes?”
“Seems
like it. Alice wants to leave for
Gallup tonight.”
I
peeked around the corner at Jake’s reclined figure behind the thin curtains.
“Do we have to go now?”
“A
couple of hours.”
“I’ll
meet you at your place.” I held
the sigh until after I hit the end button. Jake would be in Santa Fe when I returned. He was starting a business after all.
Burro
lives off St. Michael’s Drive, on property once owned by the Christian Brothers,
in barracks built during World War II.
After the war, the barracks were used as classrooms at The College of
Santa Fe, run by the Brothers. The
school closed a few years back, and the property was sold off to Johnny Chrysler,
who rents out the barracks. The
buildings are covered in asbestos siding, so tearing them down is impractical,
and Johnny rents to tenants who aren’t particular about details.
Burro
makes a decent living working for the state as my assistant Civil Rights
Investigator, but he’s got hospital bills from before he had medical insurance,
so he rents the cheapest place in town. Burro has treatable schizophrenia,
which causes hallucinations. When
he’s treated with medication, Burro believes the hallucinations reveal the unseen,
detalis that his mind turns to visions. The visions are clues to crimes we get involved in when we
travel around New Mexico investigating civil rights claims. I want to be skeptical but the visions
are often wild and true.
“Money
and scrambled brains,” he murmured as the door to the barracks creaked
open.
“Tell
me that’s not your vision,” I whined.
“It’s
a kitchen, and the trash and all the bowls and pans and every surface is filled
or covered with twenty dollar bills – except the frying pan. There’s this woman standing there,
frying brains.
“Please.
That’s sound more like a bad dream.”
Burro
gave me a look, picked up put out his hand for the Corolla keys. “Let’s get Alice.”
On
the drive, Alice gave us a few more details.
“Mirage
found Bliss – her brother – with stab wounds in his stomach. They didn’t look fatal, but I guess he
passed out and bled to death.”
“He
a heroin addict?”
“Nah…maybe
an alcoholic. Whole family parties
a lot.”
“Why
does Mirage think she killed him?”
“Guilt
or something. She was sobbing on
the phone, hysterical. My view –
he got in some drunken knife fight with one of the artists from his gallery,
passed out, and bled to death.
Mirage wasn’t even there.”
“Where
was she?”
“Says
she woke up in the alley, went to the house, found him. She wasn’t covered in blood or anything
like that. Guilt trip, I guess.”
Four
hours later, the beautiful dark-eyed beauty who took in Momma sat across from
us at Earl’s in Gallup. Earl’s is
where you can eat diner food and buy fine to funky jewelry right from the
artist. Burro loves the place
because they’ve got great fresh food, and he loves the buttermilk fried chicken.
“I’m
ordering,” he announced.
“As
long as it’s not scrambled brains.”
Burro
frowned in my direction and ordered the fried chicken. “The money in the vision is what
bothers me most. Is there a lot of
money somewhere in the Mirage and Lonnie artist scene?
“The new gallery cost a ton of
money. Mirage told me Bliss hooked
up with a wealthy L.A. investor.”
