“Waste of time.”
“Why’s that?”
Wyetta smiled. “C’mon, cowgirl, you read track about twice as good as me.”
“Oh yeah,” Rorie said. “I almost forgot about that.”
Rorie didn’t say anything else.
Neither did Wyetta.
Because both of them had recognized the boot print by Elvis Presley’s grave.
A hiking boot-standard army issue.
FIVE
Dark clouds smothered the full moon.
Shadows blanketed the desert.
Kate Benteen moved in.
A man dressed in black leather lay on the ground. Kate figured it had to be Ellis Aaron Perkins, because the man’s resemblance to Elvis Presley was uncanny.
A Winchester shotgun lay at his side. She kicked it out of the way, then nudged Ellis’s head with the toe of her boot. When it came to determining life or death, the old nudge-nudge wasn’t the most scientific method in her repertoire. But tonight it did just fine, because tonight Kate didn’t feel like a doctor at all.
And besides, any fool could see that Ellis was deader than Grizzly Gulch on Saturday night.
Ten, maybe fifteen steps separated Kate from the trailer. The dull yellow glow of the porch light puddled on the front stairs. The screen door was a broken mess hanging from one hinge. The front door stood open. Soft fluorescent illumination bathed the living room carpet. Not much light, and not good light, but enough to give Kate a fighting chance if Ellis’s killer was wailing to ambush her.
There wasn’t a lot of wiggle room in a trailer. Kate knew that if she was in for a fight, it would be belly to belly. She’d have to make her first shot count, because she probably wouldn’t get a chance at a second.
Iron clouds melted overhead. The night grew blacker. Kate stood next to Ellis’s corpse, listening for the slightest sound from the trailer.
What she heard was a whole lot of nothing. Staying low, she moved toward Ellis’s Cadillac and placed her palm on the hood. The engine was colder than he was.
She kept moving. Dressed in black, right down to a pair of steel-toed go-go boots. She hadn’t worn the outfit since she’d done that action flick for Roger Corman two years ago. But she was glad she’d saved it, because it was just the thing for covert ops.
Her palms were completely dry. That was good, because you didn’t want to get careless when you were holding a Benelli Super 90.
She skirted the puddle of yellow light on the porch. Put her back to the wall next to the door. The trailer was warm, the metal siding still holding the heat of the noonday sun.
Kate drew a measured breath and held it until her lungs burned. The shotgun was ready. So was the Heckler, secure in its shoulder holster.
So was Kate Benteen.
She whirled fast, a whisper of black leather, and came through the doorway low, her green eyes scanning the room with the deadly intent of a cold-blooded predator.
The man who turned to face her looked too white in the fluorescent light. He said
Kate almost pulled the trigger.
And then she was shaking. . because she’d almost pulled the trigger.
The cat brushed past her leg and raced outside, hissing.
“Hey,” the guy said. ‘Take it easy, all right? We’ve got two corpses here already.”
Kate swore. Then she lowered the shotgun.
She said, “What the hell happened to your hair, champ?”
Jack explained about the haircut. Benteen laughed, but it didn’t seem all that funny to Jack. His haircut had almost got him killed.
She ruffled the uneven buzz with one hand. “You look like you lost a fight with a lawn mower.”
“Thanks a lot.”
“Kind of makes you look like Bruce Willis-”
“You can stop now.”
“Only you’ve got a nicer smirk.”
“Hey. .”
“Ohhh. . Touchy, are we?”
She was wearing some kind of black leather jumpsuit with lots of zippers. Black boots, too. Even her shotgun was black. Overall, she looked like a refugee from
“You do your shopping at the Emma Peel Outlet or something?” Jack asked.
She glanced down, as if she’d suddenly forgotten what she was wearing. “Some styles are eternal,” she explained. “That’s what they say in
That seemed to wrap up the chitchat. Jack got down to it. “So, what brings you here?”
“Process of elimination. I got tired of sitting around the motel waiting for answers. I figured I’d go out and find some for myself. I’ve already kicked in Wyetta Earp’s front door. Deputy Rorie’s, too. They weren’t home. I figured Ellis was next on the list of possible suspects.”
“What do you think?”
“I think Ellis isn’t up to giving me the answers I’ve come looking for.”
“He’s not the only one.”
Jack pointed at a chain that was held in place by an eyebolt screwed into the living room floor. Together, they followed the chain’s path to the bedroom.
The last link of the chain was attached to a shackle that encircled a woman’s leg. At least it had once been a woman’s leg. Now it was a mass of tom flesh, sharp sliver of shinbone showing through.
Priscilla’s corpse lay on the bed. The room was painted with her blood. Only her face was recognizably human.
“Shotgun,” Kate said. “And there’s a Winchester Model 97 out by Ellis’s corpse.”
“So Ellis killed Priscilla … but who killed him?”
“You’re telling me that you didn’t do it?”
Jack snorted laughter. “Lady, believe it or not, I don’t even have a gun.”
She looked at him and didn’t so much as blink. He could see that her grip was firm on the shotgun. “I think it’s time you explain your part in this,” she said.
“Meaning?”
“Meaning: what the hell are you doing in Pipeline Beach, champ?”
Explaining the deal with Freddy G took a while. Kate Benteen was skeptical at first, and Jack couldn’t understand why. It wasn’t like he was telling her that he was a soldier, an Olympic diving champion, a doctor, a rodeo rider, and a movie star all rolled into one.
But in the end she seemed to believe him. So he told her about his last phone conversation with Priscilla.
Ellis’s wife had wanted out of Pipeline Beach. Bad. Jack said he’d help her if she’d tell him what she knew about Komoko and the money. She agreed and gave him part of the story as a gesture of good faith. Jack was to
