Desert Heat (27 page)

“Somebody’s after us, Bobo. We need your help.”

Without a word, he picked Angie Kellogg up and carried her away from the door. He took her to the far wall where, holding her on raised knee, he opened a door that led to a small stock closet. He set her down on a bar stool.

“You wait here, honey,” he said. “Nobody’s going to find you here.” With that, he hurried back to Joanna who was mopping up the blood with the wet towel she had somehow managed to hang onto.

“I’ll handle that, Joanna. You go be with your friend. The door locks from inside.”

Nodding, Joanna scurried away while Bobo took over the cleanup difficulties. “There are clean towels inside there,” he called over his shoulder. “You’re going to need them. And as for you,” he said to the two men at the bar, “you two jokers may be too drunk to go chase the fire trucks, but you’d by god better be sober enough to keep your mouths shut, you hear7”

‘You’re the boss, Bobo,” one of them returned. “Archie and me’ll do whatever you say.”

Bobo was on his hands and knees mopping up the last of the blood that had pooled on the floor in front of the door. “Fill those two ice buckets with hot soapy water and bring them over here, Willy. Hurry. Archie, you bring me the broom.”

A tipsy eighty-year-old, Willy Haskins was surprisingly spry for his age and condition. He hurried around the end of the bar, filled two plastic buckets with detergent and water, and lugged them over to Bobo. The bartender took them outside. Within seconds the entire length of sidewalk in front of the Blue Moon Saloon was awash in wet, soapy suds. He left the broom out front as though he was in the middle of a routine, late night sidewalk cleanup.

Nodding in approval, Bobo hustled Willy and Archie back inside. “Looks like the next round’s on the house,” he told the two old men. Willy Haskins and Archie McBride nodded in happy unison.

Bobo laughed and shook his head. “In six years, that’s the first time you two boys ever agreed with one another about anything. Keep your mouths shut when the time comes, and I’ll buy you another.”

Moments later, the door swung open and a man stuck his head inside and looked around, then he walked up to the bar and ordered a shot of tequila. “Did a woman just come by here?” he asked.

Bobo Jenkins pushed the man’s drink across the bar, smiling sadly. “No such luck, Bud. You missing one? They’ve just had some excitement up at the hotel. Maybe’s she’s up there.”

The stranger paid for his drink then egged it. “She’s not there,” he said. “I already looked.”

A toothless, gaunt old man was sitting next him on the bar. “You say you lost your woman?” he asked loudly. “Me, too. I lost my wife a couple years back, and when I come in here and told Willy, you wanna know what this old geezer tole me? He says, ‘Hey Archie, did you remember to look under the refrigerator?”

At that both old men, the speaker and his equally aged counterpart at the end of the bar, burst into loud uproarious laughter. “You get it?” he asked, holding his sides and wiping the tears from his eyes. “Maybe you’d better look in the same place.”

“Yeah,” the other drunk added. “Have another drink. Maybe she’ll show up.”

Slamming his shot glass down on the bar, the man got up and stalked out. Willy and Archie were still laughing. Bobo Jenkins wasn’t. He’d been a bartender long enough to recognize danger when he saw it. He felt a trickle of cold sweat run down the back of his neck, but he made no effort to wipe it away.

Bobo walked over to the window and flipped over the closed sign, then he walked back to the bar. “I’m closing up, boys,” he said. “It’s motel time.”

“Wait a minute,” Archie said. “You promised us a drink.”

“I promised you a drink if you kept your mouths shut,” Bobo corrected.

Willy howled in outrage. “Why, Bobo Jenkins, you’re a no-good lousy welsher.”

Bobo shook his head. “I promised you a drink for keeping quiet. What I got was a damn stand-up comedy routine. So here’s what I’m gonna do. Tonight, I’m shuttin’ her down. You two are eighty-sixed. Come tomorrow, though, you boys show up at the regular time, and the entire evening’s on me.”

“No shit?” Archie asked hopefully. “You mean it?
^”

Bobo Jenkins nodded. “You bet your ass I do. Now you two get the hell out of here. And if you meet that bastard out on the street, you keep quiet or the deal’s off. You dig?”

“Mum’s the word,” Willy said, climbing down from his stool and staggering toward the door. “Mum is definitely the word.”

And Bobo Jenkins knew he had found the secret formula that would keep those two old codgers quiet no matter what.

TWENTY

Bobo and Joanna’s joint assessment was that it the cut on Angie’s foot required a doctor’s immediate attention. Carrying her as effortlessly as if she were a doll, Bobo packed her out the door and across the street to the tiny lot where he kept his mint-condition El Camino. After placing Angie in the truck he hurried back to Joanna who was having difficulty working the troublesome lock on the Blue Moon’s front door.

“Who the hell is that bad-ass bastard?” Bobo asked under his breath, as he took the key from Joanna’s fingers and quickly finished locking the door himself.

“She thinks the man chasing her is the one who killed Andy,” Joanna replied. “And he won’t stop at anything to keep her from going to the cops.”

“But why’s he after you?”

Joanna shrugged. “I’m with her.”

They headed for the car where a still-frightened Angie sat huddled in the middle of the seat with her bleeding foot wrapped tightly in a thick swathe of towels. Bobo Jenkins was large enough that, with three people crammed together on the bench seat, it was all they could do to close the doors.

“I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t bleed on the carpet,” Bobo said with a nod to Angie as he turned the key in the ignition. Angie looked up at him warily and tried to move closer to Joanna.

“Hey,” Bobo said. “That was just a joke, trying to lighten things up. You go right ahead and bleed all you want.”

Joanna recognized the old-time Bobo humor. He had always been the class clown, and evidently nothing had changed. When Joanna laughed, so did Angie. It didn’t change a thing about their situation, but it did relieve the suffocating tension.

“What are we going to do?” Angie asked.

“Once you’re under a doctor’s care, I’m going to go see Walter McFadden,” Joanna told her.

“The sheriff?”

“That’s right.”

“Are you going to tell him about me?”

“I’ve got to, Angie. It’s too dangerous otherwise. There’s no telling what they might do.”

“They?” Bobo asked attentively.

“At least two,” Joanna returned. “The one you met, Tony.”

“‘Tony Vargas,” Angie supplied.

“And a DEA agent named Adam York.”

“Thanks for telling me,” Bobo muttered. “It’s nice to know who the hell’s on what side.”

Most of the police officers in the City of Bisbee were still congregated around the Copper Queen Hotel, trying to locate two missing female guests who had disappeared in the aftermath of a minor fire. As a consequence, Bobo Jenkins sped through town at sixty or so miles per hour with no one pulling him over or raising an eyebrow. They made the three-mile drive from Old Bisbee to the Warren district in record-breaking time while Joanna quickly brought Bobo Jenkins up to speed on what had been going on.

‘When they ask who you are,” Joanna cautioned Angie as they pulled up to the emergency entrance, “give them some kind of phony name, and one that isn’t Tammy Sue Ferris, either. Tell them you’re Andy’s cousin from Tulsa or Enid, Oklahoma, and that you’re in town for the funeral. Got that?”

Angie Kellogg nodded. “Okay,” she said.

Stopping the car directly in front of the entrance, Bobo again picked Angie up and bodily carried her inside. Joanna followed. Once the emergency room nurses had taken charge of Angie and rolled her away on a gurney, Bobo and Joanna were left waiting in the empty lobby.

“Lend me your car, Bobo,” Joanna said quietly.

“So you can go see McFadden?”

Joanna nodded. “I’ll come with you,” Bobo offered.

“No, you stay here and keep an eye on her. If Tony somehow figures out she’s here, I’m still afraid he might try something.”

“In the middle of a hospital?” Bobo asked. “What is he, crazy or something?”

“Andy’s being in a hospital didn’t stop him before,” she replied.

“Jeez!” Bobo exclaimed, then he frowned. “He wouldn’t try to get to you through Jenny, would he?”

Joanna felt as though she’d taken a pounding blow to the midsection. “I never thought of that.”

“Where is she?”

“At home, out at the ranch, with my mother.”

“I’d get her out of there quick if I were you,” Bobo warned. “Have them go someplace else until this all gets straightened out.”

Joanna nodded even as she was turning in a frantic search for a telephone. She found a pay phone near the lobby. Bobo Jenkins supplied the necessary quarter. Joanna breathed a sigh of relief when Eleanor answered the hone.

“Where in the world are you?” Eleanor demanded. “It’s late. I need to get home pretty soon.”

“Is Jenny asleep?”

“Of course she is. Hours ago. And Ken Galloway is here waiting to see you. He came to pick up Andy’s uniform and take it up to the funeral home. I thought you were going to do that this afternoon. It should have been done before this.”

“Mother,” Joanna said, “listen to me. I don’t have time to deal with that right now. I want you to get Jenny up and bring her into town. Take her up to Jeff and Marianne’s. I’ll call on ahead and tell them you’re coming. Bring Sadie, too. It’ll make Jenny feel better if she has the dog with her.”

“You want me to wake Jenny up in the middle of the night and drag her into town? Hasn’t she been through enough?” Eleanor demanded. “That’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard of. And I don’t want that filthy dog in my car.”

“Mother,” Joanna said slowly, “this time, we’re doing it my way. I want both Jenny and Sadie out of that house, and I want them out now. If there’s a problem with your car, I’ll clean it up later, but I’m warning you. If you want to have a granddaughter when all this is over, one you can talk to and visit, then you’ll do as I say.”

Eleanor greeted her daughter’s threat with a moment of shocked silence. “I don’t understand any of this at all,” she said at last. “What’s going on, anyway? Where are you going to be?”

“I’ve got to go talk to Walter McFadden right away. After you drop Jenny off, you go on to your own place. When I can, I’ll stop by and let you know what’s going on.”

“I should think so,” Eleanor returned sourly.

Joanna hung up and borrowed another of Bobo Jenkins’ quarters. She dialed Marianne Maculyea’s number and was relieved when Marianne answered after only one ring.

“I’m calling to ask a favor,” Joanna said. “1 know it’s late, but my mother and Jenny are on their way to your house right now. Mother’s bringing both Jenny and Sadie. I need you to keep them overnight. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

“Joanna, something’s wrong. You sound funny. Are you all right?” Marianne asked.

“I will be eventually,” Joanna returned. “I’ve gotta go.”

“Are you sure you don’t want me to go along?” Bobo asked when she put down the phone.

Joanna was filled with momentary misgiving. The world outside the brightly lit hospital corridor seemed dark and dangerous. Adam York and/or Tony might be lurking out there in the forbidding parking lot, waiting for her to set foot outside. And if something happened to her and to Angie both .. .

Decisively, Joanna reached down and fumbled in the side pocket of her purse. Leaving purse sitting open on the floor, she located the two items she was searching for—Lefty’s puzzling letter to Andy and the note pad containing the mysterious Cora’s telephone number.

“Keep this for me, Bobo,” she said, handing over Lefty O’Toole’s letter. “If anything happens to me, I want you to turn it over to the authorities. You need to know that Vargas is really after Angie because of a book she stole from him, one Vargas used to keep track of his business dealings. It’s in the safe up at the Copper Queen. If anything happens to her, the cops need to know about that, too.”

“You really do think they’re going to try coming after her, don’t you?”

Joanna nodded grimly. “I sure as hell do.”

She opened the note pad and stared down at the page containing Cora’s telephone number. Finally, she tore it out and handed that to him as well. “You’ve heard about the money I suppose?”

“I’ve heard rumors,” Bobo conceded, “but I’m not sure I believe any of ‘em.”

“This telephone number belongs to someone named Cora. She’s most likely the woman who showed up at the bank with Andy the day he deposited the extra money in our account. Again, if anything happens to me, I want you to call this number and find out where that money came from. I don’t care if she and Andy were having an affair or not. At this point, it doesn’t much matter. But I want Jenny to know the truth about where that money came from and why. If it was from some kind of crooked dealings, so be it. Jenny needs to know that about her father. If not, she deserves to know that, too.”

Bobo handed Joanna the keys to the El Camino while his dark eyes clouded with sympathy. “They’ve put you through hell, Joanna. I’m sorry.”

She shook her head. “It’s not so bad, Bobo,” she replied. “At least I’ve got friends to help me.”

Her purse had sat open on the floor. When she leaned down to pick it up, the .44 was clearly visible.

Bobo saw the gun without registering the least bit of surprise. “From what I’ve heard about these guys,” he said, “I think I’d keep that thing handy. But if you need it, you’ll be better off with it in a pocket rather than in a purse. In a pinch, it’ll be a hell of a lot easier to get to.”

With a nod, Joanna reached down, picked up the gun, and shoved it deep into the pocket of her fleece-lined jacket.

“And if the doc doesn’t want to keep Angie overnight, I’ll take her home with me,” Bobo continued. “That way you’ll know she’s safe, but you’ll also know where to come looking for her.”