“Sounds good.” I turned to the next section of the report while she made the drinks. “Looks like he was arrested for assault too. He ever tell you about that?”
She finished shaking the cocktails and refilled each of our glasses. “Yeah, he mentioned it. I think he said someone owed him money. Does it say what he did?”
I took another sip of the gin. It was starting to go to my head. “No, just that it was dismissed. That tells me the DA gave him a diversion, let him wipe out the charge. But that’s from a while back. Check this out — I found some new info.”
She came around the bar and sat down next to me. “Yeah? Lay it on me.”
“See here? He registered a new business name last year. End Zone Construction. You ever hear of that business?”
“Nope. Sounds like a name he’d pick. Big Broncos fan.”
“The interesting thing is that the business address is listed in Highlands Ranch. You never lived out there, right?”
“No, we were out in Thornton. Other side of town.”
“I searched the address on Google. It’s not an office, it’s a house. A big one too. I’m guessing that’s where he’s living now.”
She gulped her drink and set it down. “Highlands Ranch? He can’t afford that. Doesn’t make sense.”
“Here’s the kicker,” I said. “End Zone Construction has two registered partners, and the second one owns the house.” I paused. “Looks like he might be living with a woman out there and using the address for his business. That’s why you couldn’t find him on the Internet. It’s her house. Her name is, uhh...” I leafed through the pages of the report, trying to find it.
“Sherry Chamberlain,” she said.
I looked up and saw that Louise’s face had crumpled. “Yeah, how’d you know?”
“The address — it’s on Mountain View Drive, right?” she said.
“That’s right, but—”
“That motherfucking bitch. No wonder she won’t answer my texts. She’s my best friend — well, used to be. Goddamn her.” She took her martini glass and threw it across the bar. It hit the brick wall and disintegrated into jagged shards, the sound ringing across the room. “She’s always been after him. Well, she can have the bastard.”
She moved back behind the bar, opened a drawer with a key, and started digging around inside.
“Louise, I’m sorry, I didn’t know any of this. I had no idea he—” I stopped when I saw what she’d taken from the drawer. A handgun. “Hey,” I said, “what are you doing? You’re not going to—”
“I’m getting what’s mine.” She grabbed her bag and stuck the gun in there, then started walking toward the door. “That son of a bitch owes me five thousand dollars. If he can’t pay it, his rich bitch can.”
I stood up. “Let me handle this. I’ll file the papers on him tomorrow, all right?”
She walked out and headed to the parking lot. I watched her fumble for the keys to her car. I could see her hands were shaking.
“Louise, stop! There’s nothing you can—”
And she was gone. I watched her pull out onto Colfax and head for the highway. She’d left the bar wide open. I pulled out my phone and called her. No answer.
I wondered what to do. I could call the cops and warn them, but that would only make matters worse. I realized I had two choices: drive all the way out to Highlands Ranch and try to settle things down, or go back inside the Zephyr and help myself to some free booze. I stared inside at the liquor bottles. Whiskey, vodka, tequila. I could get good and drunk and forget about everything. I felt bad for Louise, but nothing good would result from a confrontation with her ex-husband. Learning that Roger had taken up with her former best friend must have been the last straw after years of struggling to support her daughter. Her breaking point.
I remembered my own father’s breaking point, decades ago. Jobs were scarce on the Rosebud Reservation, and he’d been forced to travel to Nebraska to work for a local mechanic, sacrificing his health as he repaired hundreds of cars, trucks, and farm vehicles. His lower back pained him so badly that he couldn’t walk at times, couldn’t even make it to the bathroom. And then he got fired. His boss had said that there wasn’t enough business, but my dad knew the real reason. Some of the racists in Nebraska didn’t want an Indian working on their vehicle. I remembered that night, when he sat at our little kitchen table and wept. He didn’t know if he’d be able to provide for his family again, and the indignities of reservation life fell upon him all at once. He found another job after a time, but he was never the same. The father I’d known was gone, never to return.
I stared up at the sky for a moment, then walked back inside the bar and grabbed the folder with Roger’s address. I shut the bar door and started running back to my car. People stared at me as I made my way down the sidewalks, past the restaurants and liquor stores and pawn shops and motels. I ran as fast as I could.
Even going at top speed, it took over twenty minutes to make it back to my vehicle. I bent over and caught my breath, then tossed the folder on the passenger seat. I glanced at the clock. Six p.m. — the height of rush hour. The highway would be jammed. I tried calling Louise one more time, but she still didn’t answer. I wiped the sweat off my forehead and started the car.
As I’d feared, the traffic was terrible, and it took a full hour to get to the outskirts of Highlands Ranch, one of the outermost Denver suburbs. The GPS on my phone directed me to Santa Fe Boulevard and informed me that I was five minutes from my destination. My plan was to try to settle Louise down and broker a compromise. Perhaps I could get Roger to agree to an installment plan or a lump-sum payment. I’d appeal to his sense of fatherhood, if any of that was left.
The houses became larger and spaced farther apart. The lawns and bushes were immaculate. I took a right turn and pulled into a cul-de-sac. Then I saw them. Five police cars, the reds and blues flashing.
I was too late.
I parked halfway down the block and walked to the front door of the large house. Two police officers were chatting on the porch.
“What happened?” I asked.
“Sorry, crime scene. Need you to move back.”
I tried to look inside but couldn’t see anything. “I’m an attorney, here for Louise Hoffman.”
“You’re her lawyer?” the officer asked.
“Yes. Can you tell me what’s going on?”
The two cops looked at each other. “She took a shot at the owner of the house. Didn’t hit anyone.”
“No one got hurt?”
“Looks that way.”
Thank God. Maybe it wasn’t as bad as I’d thought. “Where is she?”
“On her way to County. You just missed her.”
I knew it would take hours for the police to finish taking statements and even longer for Louise to be processed at the jail in Castle Rock, so there was no point in sticking around. I stared at the mountains off in the distance. They seemed so close here, majestic and severe. After a moment, I turned back and headed home.
The next day, I was able to reach the assistant district attorney, who briefed me on what had happened in Highlands Ranch. Apparently, Louise had burst into the home owned by Sherry Chamberlain. As I’d suspected, Roger Haskell was living there, but he hadn’t been home when Louise had stormed in. Louise had yelled at Sherry and tried to shoot her, but had — thankfully — missed by a large margin. Sherry had run out of the house screaming, and neighbors had called the police. Louise had confessed to everything, which destroyed any chance she had of defending the charges against her.
The prosecutor told me that they’d be filing charges of attempted first-degree murder, felony menacing, and several firearms counts. My heart sank when I heard this. I knew how plea bargains worked, and I realized that the best Louise could get would be a reduction to second-degree attempted murder and the other charges dismissed. Second-degree attempted murder was a class 3 felony with a minimum sentence of ten years. That meant that, with good behavior, she’d serve no less than seven years in prison and probably more. She’d never see her daughter Lily grow up, and most likely, Lily would go live with her father, who didn’t appear to have much interest in parenting. If he wouldn’t take her, she’d enter the child welfare system.