Coyote's Wife (38 page)

Following a hunch, Ella decided to pay Teeny a visit next. A short time later, she arrived at the fenced-in compound, then stopped by the steel gate. A small camera was above her, to the right. She recognized Teeny’s voice a moment later.

“Hey, Ella! Good to see you. I’m buzzing you in.”

She soon drove up to the small metal warehouse Teeny had converted
into his office and home. Of course the word
home
was open to interpretation. There wasn’t much that could be considered “homey” inside. The place was wall-to-wall with computers and electronic gizmos of all shapes, sizes, and applications. The temperature was always frigid, too—something about computers running best at lower temperatures. Too bad the same couldn’t be said for the person with
freezing fingers at the mouse or keyboard.

Needing to warm up, Ella accepted Teeny’s offer of a bowl of green chile stew. It was late afternoon and she hadn’t eaten since breakfast. Teeny was an amateur chef and his skills were well known to his friends, who benefitted from his expertise in the kitchen.

Though his spicy stew, filled with chopped pork, Hatch
green chile, and chunks of potato
was hot enough to make her perspire, it was delicious. Teeny always added slices of mozzarella cheese, which were soft and chewy—a special touch.

“Okay, here’s the deal,” she said between mouthfuls. “I need everything you can get me on Abigail Yellowhair.”

He shook his head slowly. “I think I know where you’re going with this. I’ve kept up with what’s happening, but anything I could get you
would be sanitized to the nth degree. If she’s involved in questionable activities you won’t find a paper trail. She’s learned from her late husband’s mistakes.”

“Have you heard anything at all that might link her to skinwalkers on any level?” As Ella watched him consider her question, what surprised her most was that Teeny hadn’t seem shocked or surprised by her request.

“Nothing concrete,”
he said at last. “But I’ve heard some gossip about her daughter, Barbara.”

“Close enough. Tell me.”

“When Barbara was in college, she was fascinated by the supernatural, the occult, and practitioners of the paranormal. Using an assumed name, she paid Virgil Pete a visit hoping to find out more about skinwalkers. Virgil recognized her, having been around at one of her father’s political rallies
when she was there.”

“I heard about that from Virgil,” Ella admitted. “But thanks anyway.”

“Did he tell you about her more recent visit?”

“What? She went back?”

“Yes.”

“Virgil didn’t mention that.”

“I’m not surprised. He, like a lot of other people on the Rez, would rather not get on that family’s bad side.”

“Fill me in,” Ella said.

“A few months ago Barbara visited him wanting to buy
some human bones. He told her he couldn’t help her, so she asked him for the names of other skinwalkers she could contact. Virgil mentioned a man he’d heard people talking about because he’d been behaving strangely, a mechanic at a gas station north of Gallup, the one that closed down a while back. When Virgil realized that she wanted to hire skinwalkers, not just buy bones, he decided to try and
get some cash for himself. She’d never know he wasn’t legit.”

“So she hired him?”

“No, he backed out of the deal when she insisted on buying the bones first. But she gave him fifty dollars not to tell anyone she’d been there. Virgil saw her to the door and noticed another person, maybe a woman, waiting behind the wheel of the car. Virgil didn’t see who it was.”

“Did he notice anything about
the car, like its color?”

“Interestingly enough, it was one of those yellow, sporty jobs, the kind Abigail drives.”

Teeny finished his bowl of stew, then, after Ella declined seconds, led the way back to the computer area.

Ella considered what she’d learned. An auto mechanic would have had the expertise to disable the brakes on Ervin’s pickup, and know how to remove battery fluid with a hydrometer.
“It’s a good bet that Barbara and the driver of the yellow car went to the mechanic next. So now we have to find this guy. Any idea who he is or where he works these days?”

“None,” Teeny answered.

“Have you heard anything relating to StarTalk lately, particularly something that might not be public knowledge yet?”

“That company interests me, so I’ve been keeping tabs on it. Someone from StarTalk
has been contacting potential investors with future plans to go statewide. About a week
ago, Jake Case called Abigail and offered to invest a substantial sum. Case runs a PR firm and owns stock in nearly all the companies he represents. He’s been very successful and has plenty of money to spare.”

Ella didn’t bother asking him where he got his information. She knew it was as good as gold, or he
wouldn’t have passed it on to her. “That gives Mrs. Yellowhair one heckuva motive. If she wants to expand, her only option is to get Ervin out of her way, either by getting him killed, committed, or driven out of the company. Reasoning with him obviously didn’t work.”

“The likelihood that Abigail was the one who drove Barbara to Virgil’s suggests that Barbara’s also involved in this plan.”

“Not necessarily. Maybe she wasn’t aware of what her mother’s game really was. I doubt Abigail would ever completely confide in Barbara, or anyone else. But to get what she wants, Abigail wouldn’t hesitate to use her daughter. She’d come up with a million plausible reasons, too,” Ella replied. “Yet without evidence that connects one or both of these women to the people who are harassing Ervin, I’ve
still got nothing. I don’t even have enough for a warrant to tap their phones.”

“That wouldn’t do you any good, at least as far as Abigail goes. She wouldn’t get careless,” Teeny said. “So what now?”

“I’ve got a couple of options. First, I’m going to try and track down that mechanic. Secondly, I’m going to have Abigail followed. My money’s still on her. She must be contacting her goons somehow.”
Ella paused, then shook her head. “No, wait a minute. Abigail’s got a bodyguard and she wouldn’t risk doing something like that in front of a potential witness. It makes more sense to assume she already had everything in place
before
she hired protection.”

“Are you talking about Roxanne Dixon?” Teeny asked. Seeing her nod, he continued. “She’s not working for Abigail anymore—not as of late yesterday
anyway. I ran into her at the Corner Pocket, that pool hall in Farmington. I was there with a client and she approached me looking for a job.”

“Did you hire her?”

“No, I don’t have anything extra at the moment.”

“I wonder if Roxanne’s job ended because, now that the skinwalkers did their thing at Abigail’s place, Abigail has no further need for a witness.”

“Maybe.” Teeny glanced over automatically
at one of the cameras monitoring the outside perimeter, then sat up. “Speak of the devil. Looks like Roxanne was tailing you.”

“She’s out there?”

“She just pulled up within sight of my camera. Since she didn’t come to the gate, my guess is that she’s been following you. Do you want to go have a little talk with her, or shall I?”

“How well do you know her?” Ella asked.

“She and I worked together
a few times back when I was in the department. We get along okay. A few days ago she showed up here asking me to teach her a few gray area skills with computers—like how to hack into utility and other databases, phishing to get e-mail addresses, stuff like that. I didn’t want to do that since I wasn’t sure what she was after, so I begged off. I ended up recommending a few Web sites that specialize
in data collection—for a price.”

“That’s bad news for me,” Ella said, and told him about the e-mails, especially the one threatening to link her with skinwalkers.

He muttered an oath. “I had no idea that’s what she had in mind. But don’t worry. I know some ways of blocking e-mails from known sites—and I just happen to have the information we need about her particular computer. If she sticks
with that machine for her e-mails, I can show you how
to screen her out. She’ll never know you’re not picking it up, either.”

“Sounds good to me.”

Ella wrote down Teeny’s instructions. “Got it,” she said at last.

He glanced at the camera again. “So, do you want to go talk to Roxanne alone, or shall I ask her in, and we can both lean on her?”

Ella considered it for a moment. “I need information
from her and you’ll have a better shot if you go alone. I have to find a link between Abigail and what’s happening to her son-in-law,” Ella explained. “Roxanne would know everyone Abigail’s met with recently. Mind you, Abigail wouldn’t have hired anyone in front of Roxanne, but if there’s a possible suspect among the people she’s seen, Roxanne will know.”

“Agreed.”

“The problem is that if I
go question her, I won’t get very far. Roxanne wants Kevin and thinks I’m standing in her way.”

Teeny burst out laughing. “She doesn’t know you very well. If you’d have wanted Kevin, he wouldn’t have left the reservation in the first place. You would have figured out a way to change his mind.”

“You’re overestimating my charms. Even if I’d been interested in Kevin, I don’t think anything could
have kept him from going to D.C.”

“Then you would have been traveling back and forth. The real reason you’re still single is because you’ve chosen to remain that way, Ella. The truth is, you’ve already given your heart—to your work, and to your daughter. There’s really not much room left over.”

“Hey, did you forget? I’ve been seeing Reverend Tome,” Ella countered with a grin.

“That’s only because
he’s safe. Ford’s already given his
heart to something else, too. But the things you need and expect from a relationship may come between you eventually.”

Ella knew he was talking about sex…or, more to the point, the lack of it. Rather than continue to discuss this, she turned their attention back to the problem at hand and gazed at the camera. “Would you talk to her? She may open up to you.”

“If Roxanne knows anything, I’ll get the information for you.”

It was his tone that alerted her, and she gave him a worried look. “You’re not going to do something that’ll require legal action, are you?”

Teeny laughed. “No. She and I will have a talk, that’s all. We see each other just as we are—no illusions, no pretensions. We know exactly what the other one’s capable of.”

The thought was frightening.
Teeny was a huge man whose sheer size was a threat all on its own. That, and the arctic coldness he could project when he chose, was the reason he seldom had to carry anything through. Roxanne had met her match.

“I’ll be at Blalock’s,” she said, then left.

As she drove out of the fenced perimeter, she spotted Roxanne’s car across the road. Ella saw her duck down to avoid being seen. Then Teeny
came out of the shadows behind her, having left the perimeter by some other exit. He reached into the open window and placed his hand on Roxanne’s shoulder. She jumped, startled, and Ella couldn’t resist a low chuckle.

Leaving them to work things out, Ella picked up her cell phone, and dialed Justine next. “Are those sketches of the man killed near my brother’s place ready?” Hearing Justine reply
in the affirmative, she continued. “We have to circulate those as soon as possible. We need to find out who he was
and what he did for a living. If it turns out that the guy worked in a garage, we’ll have a link to the incidents involving Ervin’s vehicles,” she said and explained.

Next she called Blalock at his new office. “I need to make an official request, Dwayne. I’m on my way over now.”

“I’ll be here, but I have nothing from the Bureau by way of news yet. I tried a few local contacts I’ve worked with in the past, but none are willing to talk to me now. I think they’ve either been paid off, or they’re scared spitless, worried about turning Abigail Yellowhair into an enemy.”

“Maybe both,” Ella said.

She arrived at Blalock’s a short time later. The new building was less than a
quarter mile from Blalock’s old office, which had been destroyed in a fire last year. Most of the offices here were still empty and the building was so quiet she could hear her own footsteps echoing on the tile floor.

Ella went directly to Blalock’s office at the end of the long, dark hall. His front door was open but she still knocked on her way in. As she took a seat, she glanced over at the
second desk on the opposite side of the room. It was covered with unfiled paperwork.

“When
are
you going to get yourself an office assistant?” Ella asked, as she walked in.

Blalock looked up from his computer. “I’ve been interviewing people off and on, but I haven’t found anyone yet,” he said. “Everyone around here knows that my last office was blown up, so they’re not so eager to come work
for me at the rates I can pay.”

“They might have a point,” she said with a thin smile.

“So what official business brings you here?” He pointed to the coffeepot in the corner. “Want a cup?”

Ella looked at the glass pot. She could have sworn there was a ring of something greenish black growing inside it about halfway down. “Is that sanitary?”

“Oh, the rim of scum?” Blalock shrugged. “I left
the pot half empty before I went on vacation last May. When I came back, I found a really weird-looking green fungus growing on the top. I scrubbed the pot out with steel wool and got everything that would come off. What you’re seeing now is just what I couldn’t scrape off.” He poured himself a cup. “So, you want one?”

“I’ll pass,” she said.

“Okay,” he said, and took a seat behind his desk.
“Now what’s up?”

She told him what she’d learned from Bruce Little—Teeny—about StarTalk and Abigail’s and Barbara’s visit to Virgil Pete. “I’d like to have Abigail tailed, and Barbara, too, but the problem is that Mrs. Yellowhair knows most of the officers in my team as well as those I could pull off their patrol routes. The same goes for her daughter.”

“They’ve both met me as well, so I guess
this means you want me to import some out-of-town talent?”

“I was thinking of Lucas Payestewa. He’s Hopi, but he can blend in real easily around here.”