Mistletoe Man - China Bayles 09 (27 page)

"Okay, you," he said to
Ruby. "Pee fast." To me, he said, "Face the wall."

Ruby held up her cuffs. "Can you take these
off, please?" she asked humbly.

Jose
shook his head. "You can pee with 'em on."

"But I can't get my pants down!" Ruby
wailed. "They're too tight."

"Pee
through your pants," Jose growled.

"I'll help you
get your pants down, Ruby," I offered over my shoulder.

"I said, face the wall," Jose snapped.
To Ruby, he said, "Go pee, for crissake. And don't take all day."

Ruby went in and shut the door. I took the
opportunity to say, in a conversational tone, "This isn't what you think,
you know. Those joints are only—"

"Face
the wall," Jose said.

"—oregano."

"Yeah." He barked a laugh. "That's
what they all say. I suppose that white stuff is powdered sugar."

"Right. Taste it if you don't believe me. And
the stuff in the garbage bag is mistletoe."

"Mistletoe! You
two are something else, you know that?" He smirked. "I suppose the
gun is a cap pistol, right?"

"No,"
I said. "Any fool can see it's a Beretta."

"Shut up," Jose said. He
frowned at the door. "She's taking a helluva long time."

"Women have bigger bladders than men. And
she's got those clumsy cuffs on, so it takes longer. You ever try to get your
pants down when you're cuffed?" I turned half-around and added, cordially,
"You guys are a little out of your territory, aren't you? What brings you
up here from South Texas?" I paused, thinking that Blackie had been conspiciously
absent from this bust. "Does the sheriff know you're here?"

Jose's eyes became flintlike. He started to say
something, then shut his mouth.

I leaned my shoulder against the wall
and cocked my head to one side. "So how long has Marvin been on the case?
Was that how you got the lead on Swenson?"

"Marvin?"
He fixed his eyes on me and his jaw began to work. "What d'you know about
Marvin?"

My lips twitched. I
gave him a look that said I knew a lot, but he wasn't going to hear any of it.

"Face the wall," he growled. "I
don't want any more shit outta you."

There was the sound of a toilet flushing, then
water running. The bathroom door opened and Ruby stepped out.

"Next," she
said politely. "But I'm afraid I used the last of the toilet paper."

"That's
okay." I took a step toward the bathroom. "I can drip dry."

Jose grabbed my shoulder and jerked me
back. "Forget it, smartass. You ain't got cancer, you can hold it. Back to
the kitchen, both of you."

We'd been sitting for about twenty
minutes when another man in coveralls came in, the one with the clipped,
authoritative voice, whom Jose had addressed as "Cap'n." He was short
and sallow and without expression. He wore his blue cap with the bill forward.
His eyes were icy blue.

Ruby and I sat in silence as Jose pointed out,
with an unmistakable relish, the various items he and Zacho had confiscated,
evidence of our criminal connections to the drug world. My gun was there, too.
When I saw him looking at it, I said, "I'm licensed for concealed
carry."

The captain turned
for a disdainful look at me, then went back to the loot. He and Jose held a
muttered consultation, during which I heard the whispered word
"Marvin." The captain took my billfold out of my purse, studied my
driver's license, and put it back. He jerked his head at me.

"You,"
he said. "Into the dining room."

We left Ruby under
Jose's supervision, and took seats at the dining room table, where the captain
recited my rights, fast. Then he leaned back in his chair and folded his arms,
regarding me. He gave me about fifteen seconds of flinty-eyed silence.

"All right, Ms. Bayles," he said at
last. "I want to know who the hell you are and what you're doing here, and
I want it straight."

"Excuse
me," I said, "but who the hell are you?"

He leaned toward me,
narrowing the space between us just enough to be threatening. His eyes got
icier. "I am Captain Ron Talbot, South Texas Narcotics Unit."

"I
need to see your identification," I said.

He
made a low growl.

I
smiled. "Identification, please."

Angrily, he stood, unzipped his jacket, unsnapped
his coveralls, and went deep inside for his badge. Pulling it out, he flashed
it at me, very fast.

"Excuse
me," I said. "I'd like to see the number."

With another growl, he shoved it
forward, about three inches from my nose. I pulled my head back and read off
the digits, mouthing them as if I were memorizing them. "Thank you,"
I said.

He reversed the
unsnappings and unzippings and sat back down. "I don't want any more crap
out of you," he said. "Now,
talk."

I'd already determined that there wasn't any point
in trying to avoid the embarrassing truth, so Talbot got the full story, or
most of it. I left out Blackie's request to drop in on the Fletcher sisters and
the bit about Corinne Turtle and her nephew, and the discovery of Aunt Velda's
truck in Swenson's tractor shed. I also explained, briefly, that the white
substance in the Baggie was sugar, the joints were oregano, and the stuff in
the large plastic bag was mistletoe. I didn't try to tell him why or how we had
happened to come equipped with these things.

"You can get the
sugar and the oregano tested," I concluded. "You can tell what the
mistletoe is by looking at it. You can call my husband, who will be glad to ID me.
You can also check me out with Sheriff Blackwell." I paused, and with a
knowing emphasis, added, "And just where
is
Sheriff
Blackwell? This is his county. Why isn't he in on this bust?"

Talbot regarded me with angry contempt. "What
makes you think I'd answer those questions?" he demanded. "And just
who the hell do you think is running this show, anyway? It sure as shit ain't
some half-assed county sheriff who can't find his—"

But that was the end of the captain's
tirade. The front door burst open with a bang to reveal Sheriff Blackwell
himself, jaw set, mouth tight, eyes blazing.

"Hello,
China," he said tautly.

Oh, rats,
I thought to myself,
now I'm in for it,
and mentally ducked.

But I wasn't Blackie's target. He
strode to the table, put both hands flat on it, lowered his head and snarled,
"What the devil are you doin' here, Talbot?"

Talbot, suddenly
deflated, made an ineffectual effort to speak.

Blackie pushed his face closer and
overrode the man. "I thought I made it clear the last time this happened.
You come into my county to do a bust, you notify me. No notification, no
cooperation, no bust. Is that clear?" Talbot said nothing.

Blackie snatched at
the bill of Talbot's cap and yanked it down over his nose. "Is that
clear?" he roared. "Or do you want me to file another goddamn
complaint? How's that gonna look on your record after that mess down in
Kerrville last month?"

Slowly, with an attempt at dignity, Talbot raised
the bill of his cap. "It's clear," he said, through clenched teeth.
"But I thought we had the lid nailed on."

Blackie
snorted sarcastically.

"Where was the leak?" Talbot
persisted. "Was it Marvin? He's not one of mine." "You don't
want to know."

"Like
hell!" Talbot's nostrils flared. "That goddamn Marvin, that's who it
was."

"It wasn't
Marvin." Blackie gave him a malicious grin. "One of your prisoners
called me on the phone."

There was a moment's
silence. "On the
phone!’
Talbot asked incredulously.

Blackie's grin got
wider. "She called the dispatcher and left a message. I was out this way
on another matter, so I thought I'd join the party." He stopped grinning.
"Especially since I should've gotten an invitation in the first
place."

Talbot's eyes darted
to me. "Was it you?" he snarled.

"Me?" I lifted my shoulders, let them
fall, completely innocent. "Not me. I left my cell phone at home. Must've
been Ruby."

"But
...
but where?" Talbot sputtered.
"How?"

"From the
bathroom, maybe," I offered helpfully. It was the only time Ruby had been
out of my sight. "Jose's got a soft spot in his heart for ladies in
distress. He let her pee." I grinned. "She must've leaked."

"Aw, jeez."
Talbot slapped his forehead with the heel of his hand and turned away in
disgust

Blackie put his hand
on my shoulder. "This turkey been giving you a hard time, China?"

"Moderately," I said. "He might've
figured he was entitled, though. We crashed his bust." I looked at
Talbot. "Sorry about that Captain. It wasn't intentional, believe me. I
hope none of the bad guys got away."

Blackie
gave an unkind laugh.

Talbot's eyes slitted. "Don't
tell me she's one of yours," he said to Blackie. "If she is, you've
got one hell of a problem in your shop. She is the most untrained, unprofessional,
amateurish—"

"Not one of
mine," Blackie said. "What are you going to do with her?"

Talbot pulled himself up and stood looking down
his nose. After a moment he said: "Just to show you my generous
intentions, I hereby remand this prisoner into your custody. The redhead, too.
Good riddance."

Blackie held up his hands, looking
alarmed. "Oh, no, Talbot. You're not foisting them off on me. They're dangerous.
If I were you, I'd turn 'em loose, fast Both of 'em. The redhead is weird as
hell, and this one is very bad news. Her husband is a former Houston homicide
dick and a retired police chief. She's a defense attorney. She'll sue your
ass, and he'll kick it from here to Dallas."

"Aw, hell,"
Talbot said disgustedly.

I held out my hands.
"Now that we've cleared that up, how about getting these cuffs off?"

Without a word, Talbot got up and went
to the kitchen. In a moment, Jose came in, patting his pockets for the key.

I was rubbing my wrists when Talbot
returned to the room, Beretta in one hand and ammunition in the other. With a
disdainful flourish, he dropped both on the dining room table.

"Thanks,"
I said.

"Yeah." He
looked at me, nostrils flaring. "Next time you decide to do a drug bust,
you oughta ask the sheriff to show you how to load."

"All right, you two," Blackie said
sternly, when we got outside. "I want to hear the whole story, start to
finish. Straight and fast, just the way it happened. And don't try to make it
pretty."

Ruby shivered.
"Let's do it in the car," she said plaintively. "It's cold out
here."

We got into the sheriff's car, Blackie and I up
front, Ruby in the back, behind the wire screen that separates the front of the
car from the rear. I told my part first. Since it was my second telling in less
than an hour, I got through it quickly. This time, I left out Ruby's cancer.
Blackie was Ruby's friend, and I wanted her to tell him in her own way. I did,
however, report our finding of the truck.

"It's here?" Blackie
exclaimed incredulously. "The red Ford we've been looking for?"

"In that shed," Ruby said,
pointing out the window. "Beside the tractor."

Blackie craned his
neck for a look. "The right front headlight is smashed," I said,
"and there's blood on the grille. The key is in the ignition. Looks like
the vehicle that killed Swenson."

Blackie was silent
for a moment. "So what do you think?" he asked finally. 'The old lady
drove it here and parked it and walked back home?" He frowned. "It'd
be quite a hike, wouldn't it?"

"I'd have to
look at a county map," I said. "You got one?'