“I won’t. Thanks.”
Chapter 4
Margot followed Marv in her Prius. She decided she’d keep her promise to her sister and think about visiting her dad. It took her about thirty seconds to decide she still didn’t want to see him until his funeral and maybe not then either.
She cringed as they headed east all the way out of town and headed into the desert. The last time she had been in the desert, she had nearly got murdered. Then, as a reward for surviving, she’d got thrown in jail.
She wasn’t a big fan of the sheriff and he didn’t hold her in very high regard either. It didn’t help the man trying to kill her was a sheriff’s deputy. There was no doubt that Deputy Brantley was in the pocket of the cartel, but apparently despite being on the take, he was one of the best deputy’s the sheriff had, at least when he wasn’t murdering people. If he wasn’t still at large, the drive would be a lot less stressful. Shaw’s belief he was coyote food was still the most credible scenario to explain his disappearance.
Marv took a turn on an unmarked dirt road and soon enough they were pulling up to what looked like a warehouse whose builder had long abandoned it. There were no signs to indicate it was anything but a leftover from a long-dead business.
“Doesn’t look like much, does it?” Marv said with a smile.
“No, it doesn’t.”
Marv took out a key from his vest pocket. The building looked old, but the deadbolt on the front door was brand new. Marv opened the door and then motioned for Margot to go inside. She stepped into the windowless warehouse and could see nothing but darkness. She had a hand on the gun in her purse when Marv stepped in and flipped on the lights.
“I bet you didn’t see that coming?”
Margot couldn’t argue with him. She had expected it to be better inside than out, but what she didn’t expect was for it to look this good. They’d partitioned off a big section to be the barroom. Margot had expected some tables and a few coolers, maybe some kind of makeshift bar. It had all that, but the high tables and barstools looked practically new and the bar was anything but makeshift. It was some kind of dark-stained oak and it ran the length of the room. Behind were mirrors and an impressive liquor collection. There were coolers full of bottles and cans of beer, but there were also taps, eight of them. If the taps were representative of what was in the kegs, the Racers had some beer snobs in the mix.
Besides the impressive bar, there was a good-sized stage in the far corner and a dance floor. Margot could see they had a P.A. and a soundboard only a little smaller than the ones she’d seen at theatre concerts.
“Some of our members are contractors,” Marv told her.
“Impressive. I suppose you pay a lot in member dues?”
“We had a few good years of fundraising.”
“Fundraising? Is that the new name for meth distribution?”
“We’re just motorcycle enthusiasts, Margot,” Marv said in a way that made it clear he didn’t believe it either.
Marv pointed to a door on the opposite wall from the stage. “We’ve got rooms through there. I can show you where Mal was.”
“He leave anything behind?”
“Nope.”
“Let’s look anyway.”
They walked through the door and again Margot was impressed. She expected some partitions and some cots but instead, there were walls and the room Mal had stayed in looked more like a unit from a nice hotel. It even had its own bathroom. Unlike a nice hotel, it didn’t have maid service. The bed was still unmade.
“Sometimes guys drink too much and we don’t want to send them on the road,” Marv said, replying to a question Margot hadn’t asked.
Margot lifted up the blankets strewn across the lower half of the bed and set them on the floor. There was nothing underneath but sheets. She looked under the bed and saw nothing but collected dust. A check of the bathroom revealed just as much.
“Mal was the only person staying here?”
“Yeah, I checked. Mal was more than a little paranoid. One of the prospects came by to be sure the last guest cleared out and I double-checked the room he was staying in to be sure.”
“Who was the last guest?”
“Does it matter?”
“It might.”
“I honestly don’t know. A guest of Manny’s I would bet since anyone else might clear it through me first. He was staying in that room down the hall.”
“Can I look?”
“I don’t see why not.”
Marv opened that room and she looked inside. Unlike Mal’s room, the bed was made. Probably by the occupant, since there were still a few empty beer cans strewn about. Margot walked through. She noticed the trash can in the bathroom was filled with gauze. The previously white gauze was covered in dried blood.
“Whoever was here must have been hurting.”
Marv shrugged. “Shit happens. If you’re staying here and we didn’t just have a party, most likely you got yourself in some kind of trouble. Either way, I know this dude was gone when Mal got here.”
“Are you sure these aren’t Mal’s?”
“He wasn’t wearing any bandages when he arrived and this room was locked.”
“How long was Mal here?”
“A couple of days.”
“What did he eat? I’m guessing UberEATS doesn’t get out this far.”
“We have a full kitchen behind the bar area. Freezers full of steaks. If he’d wanted to, he could have eaten like a king.”
“You let him eat your steaks?”
“He was my guest. I’m an O.G. around here, so he had the run of the place.”
“Did you check the kitchen
