“You makin’ it?”
“I’ll be okay. I mean, maybe I’ll be okay.”
“Did you see this happen?”
“Yes, sir.”
“It was Tapia?”
“Yes, sir. He matches that picture you circulated to all of us.”
Torrez looked back up the dirt road. “He was waitin’ for him here, or what?”
“Yes, sir. I was far enough behind that I didn’t see where he actually was standing before he swung. When I first saw him, he was already out by the road. But I saw him swing, just like a big baseball bat. He stepped out into the road real quick, and just like that. Wham. Right in the face. He threw the stick over there,” and he pointed upstream. “I can see it from here.”
“Huh. How long ago did this happen?”
Pasquale moved his hand with great care, and looked at his watch. “It’s goin’ on about fifteen minutes now.”
Torrez looked quickly at Estelle. “He didn’t pass you on your way in?”
“No one’s passed us,” Estelle said. “Not on the road.”
“He must have seen you comin’,” Torrez said. “That’s if he stayed on the road. Enough trails around. And he sure as hell didn’t pass me. You sure he went back north?”
“Yes, sir,” Pasquale said.
“Huh. Mexico’s the other way,” Torrez said. “So where’s he goin’?”
“He may know that Hector is in custody,” Estelle said. “It would be important to spring him out. Or shut him up.”
The sheriff looked sharply at her. “Who’s central?”
“Eddie’s at the Public Safety Building. I told Gayle to round up some others.”
“Okay. I’m going to head that way, then. Who else you got comin’ out here?”
“I’ve asked for Adam’s team, and a chopper.”
“Fair enough.” He rose and started back toward his vehicle without further comment. He stopped with a hand on the door handle, turning back toward them. “I’m goin’ straight back in. The kid is the only link we have to all this shit, and there’s no way we want anything to happen to him. You’re all right with that?”
Estelle nodded. The ambulance siren wailed louder. “As soon as Tomás is headed in, and we have some coverage here,” she said.
Torrez nodded and swung up into his truck. “I’ll make sure the border is buttoned up,” he said. “Keep in touch.”
The approaching siren was not the ambulance, but a State Police cruiser, and Torrez swerved his truck off the road without slowing, passing the cruiser and then the ambulance that lumbered behind.
“Well, thank heavens,” Leona breathed.
“Do you want to head back into town with them?” Estelle asked. “You picked a great day for a ride-along.”
Leona shook her head emphatically. “My goodness no,” she said and managed a brave smile. “I’m having all kinds of constructive budgetary thoughts. I find myself wishing that some of the county commissioners were with us now. What’s our next step?”
“The village is covered. We’ve got coverage here, and Tom will be in good hands. Now we can go hunting.”
Chapter Twenty-eight
“The lieutenant said whatever you need,” the young state officer called from his black and white. He didn’t step off the roadway, and turned to flag the approaching ambulance to a stop. “Where do we want things?”
Short of a sky-hook, there was no way to remove the wounded Pasquale without causing him great distress, or without further disturbing evidence, but that was the trade-off. Chester Hansen’s body would remain in place awhile longer, until the scene had been thoroughly documented.
In a few moments, the two EMTs had the deputy bandaged and then secured, white-faced and panting with pain, on the gurney. In another minute, Matty Finnegan had the IV running, and before long the big diesel ambulance pulled away, heading back north.
“The CSI team will be out here in a few minutes, Rick,” Estelle said to the state policeman, Richard Black.
“A few long minutes,” he replied. “I heard them saying that the van was over in Hocico. They had a multiple drowning somehow in one of the irrigation ditches.” Estelle shot a glance at the officer. “I don’t know,” Black added. “That’s what they were saying.”
“They’ll be here when they’re here,” Estelle said.
“What happened, do we know?”
“Tom came upon the killer just as Tapia knocked Chester Hansen off his bike. When Tom tried to apprehend him, they scuffled, and Tapia managed to shoot Tomás in the hip. He cleaned things up by dumping everybody and everything in the arroyo, out of sight of the road, and made sure Hansen was dead by shooting him in the head. We think that Tapia is on a motorcycle, and he may be hurt. We don’t know more than that. He headed out north, and that’s where I’m going right now.”
She put a hand on Black’s shoulder and turned him while she pointed. “The scuffle happened right over there, where you can see that trampled greasewood? That whole area. Tomás was thrown into the arroyo, and that’s where he was shot. Tapia was standing on the arroyo edge when he shot them both. We need those two empty casings from his gun, so be careful where you step. We think it was a 9mm, so the brass is easy to miss in this grass. While you’re waiting, you can scour the area carefully and find those. Just mark them with evidence flags. Don’t pick them up. Okay?”
“Got it.”
“Linda Real will be out here after a bit for pictures, so give her any hand she needs. I’m going to snap a quick couple before I go.”
The trooper nodded. “Her and Pasquale are livin’ together, aren’t they?”
“They are. She’s apt to be distraught, so be helpful. She’s going to want to get back into town as quickly as she can.”
“Sure.”
“The ME will be out as soon as he can, but we’re really short-handed today.”
“You ain’t just a-kiddin’,” Black said.
“What can I do?” Leona asked.
“I wish I knew,” Estelle replied. “Feed me good ideas.” She made her way to her vehicle, and with camera in hand returned to the edge. As she was taking the third photo, she saw the wink of sun on brass. The casing nestled in a clump of bunchgrass. “We need a flag on this one,” she called, and waited until the trooper had placed the thin wire securely in the dirt. “The other one won’t be too far.”
When she was finished, she returned to the Expedition to find Leona mulling over the county map.
“Look at this,” the county manager said. “If I wanted a discrete route back into Posadas from here, this is how I’d go.” She traced the route with a pencil, not touching the point to the paper. “Back up this road about a mile, and there are all these spiderwebs.” She indicated dotted lines that represented nothing even as grand as an established two-track. “One of them wanders over toward the Salinas arroyo, another to the windmill on the back side of Cooper’s ranch, and then…” She paused and leaned forward, pushing her dark glasses up into her hair.
“Remember that grand plan a number of years ago for that housing development south of the airport? If my memory serves me correctly, Hardy Aimes almost talked the county commission into that one. Close enough that he graded a whole bunch of access roads and lanes and such. This whole block here.”
As Estelle leaned forward to examine the map, Leona added, “The point is, with a copy of the county map from the Chamber of Commerce, or off the Web, or a dozen other places, we can go where we want.” She dragged a finger across the paper. “He can wend his way back to State Seventy-eight, where one of the development ‘roads’ comes out across from the airport, or he can meander south and east and eventually, he’ll come out on North Flat Street, right behind the high school. Voilà.”
“And with the race going on, no one is going to see him,” Estelle said. “He’ll be mistaken for one of the support team.” She nodded. “Maybe so.” She walked around the front of her truck. “Rick, keep your eyes open,” she said. “If you see a stocky Mexican guy with a broken ankle riding a bright red Yamaha dirt bike with no plates, your excitement is about to begin.”