Indian Country Noir Read online

  "Shit yeah."

  "Oye me. I wanted you along, negrito, because I knew he would do something like this. Like I said, he's very serious."

  "You were looking for a bodyguard, then, not a patsy? I don't know about that."

  "You have to believe me." She kicked off her shoes, lay back on the couch, her body open. Her wet hair covered part of her face. She looked delicious. "I wanted protection. Your cousin used to talk about you all the time. A big man. She told me you do karate."

  "Aikido. I used to." Suddenly I felt like I needed a drink. But there was still a knot in the bottom of my stomach.

  "She had your picture in her room. You had a kind face, a vulnerable face. I liked it."

  I was standing above her. Water dropped from my hair onto her thighs.

  "What was that stuff your husband made me inhale?"

  "Cohoba. A hallucinogenic."

  "I've had worse. I saw a dog that couldn't bark."

  "The Tainos had mute dogs," she said.

  "Nice." I didn't want to tell her that the dog saved my life.

  I could smell her scent, musky and earthy. Her dark, wet clothes clung to her body like a glistening second skin.

  "What happened to your lady friend?"

  "Her flight was delayed. Where's your husband?"

  "He went to meet the buyer."

  I was on my knees, the gun still in my right hand. Then I put my palms on her calves and began to move them up her legs, pulling her dress back and dragging the gun across the copper of her thighs. Goose bumps rose all up and down her skin.

  "What are you doing, negrito?"

  "Nothing," I said, standing up. I leaned way down, looking right into her eyes. I kissed her. She let me. But her lips didn't respond. I tried again. She stared at me.

  "Are you done?" she said.

  "Looks like I am."

  "Your cousin also told me you were a mujeriego-a womanizer."

  "I know what it means. Wait till I see Carmen again."

  I was half hanging off the couch. I should've seen it coming.

  Itaba kneed me hard in the balls and yanked the gun easily out of my hand. I curled up and she kicked me off to the side. I smacked the coffee table with my head and hit the floor.

  I wasn't hurt. Coco duro. I just looked at the ceiling and sighed. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.

  She sat up on the couch and didn't even bother pointing the gun at me. "Oyeme, negrito. Kaonabo is coming, and he's dangerous."

  "Looks like you can take care of yourself fine."

  "He doesn't just want to sell the cemi to buy land. He wants to become a drug king."

  I got up on my elbows. "What?"

  "He thinks we can get more land and more power if we buy and sell drugs."

  "He's right. You'd have money coming in all the time. I-"

  "It disgusts me," she said, getting up. "I knew he was coming to Ponce to try to get the cemi from me. I knew he would do something stupid. But I didn't know he would kill Dr. Arroyo."

  "Why did he?"

  "To start his drug business without witnesses."

  Outside the wind and rain had picked up and smacked against the windows. The taped glass was throbbing like it wanted to bust.

  "I need your help. I want your help." She waved the gun like it was no more than a hairbrush. "It's Pedro."

  "So you want to stop him?"

  "He is a very violent man. I may have to use this."

  "I believe you could," I said.

  We listened to the growing storm for what seemed like an hour. It had begun a slow conga rhythm against the windows, against the walls. I was itchy for a drink. I was so used to having a drink in my hand it was strange not to have one. Itaba just sat there and stared at me. She kept the gun near her the whole time.

  When the man with the flat forehead opened the door, he was drenched from the storm. He did not look happy to see me. In fact, it looked like he wanted to rip my heart out of my chest and eat it.

  "Hold, Pedro," I said. "How's it going?"

  He stood there, saying nothing. He had his dark shades on. Behind him was a short white man, late fifties, I'd guess. Bald head, yellow-white beard soaked with rain. He looked even more shocked. Probably didn't expect a party. He had a satchel in one hand.

  The conga rhythm of the storm seemed to suddenly pick up in intensity.

  "This must be the buyer?" I said.

  The flat-headed man said something to Itaba in that strange language. His voice was deep and came out like a growl. She spoke back to him and he seemed to calm down.

  Itaba walked up to the white guy and they shook hands. "Mr. Hubbard," she said. "Welcome to Puerto Rico."

  "Thank you," Hubbard replied. "I look forward to seeing the amazing cemi you've told me about."

  He kept his eyes on me. I glanced at the couch. The gun wasn't there.

  "This is an associate of mine," Itaba explained. "Don't worry about him." From where I stood I could see she had the weapon tucked into the back of her belt. She turned and said to me, "Please hand me the cemi, Papo."

  I could feel that rhythm, that storm, beating in my own head. I picked up the gift bag from where it sat on the couch. I was tired of being at the sticky end of all this. I handed her the bag and in the same motion I grabbed the gun.

  "Get back," I said.

  The buyer yelped. Like a puppy. Pedro muttered something in Spanish, fast. I didn't get all of it, but I think he called me a stupid, fat American. Itaba stared at me. Wondering what I was going to do next. I had no idea.

  "Give me that satchel," I told the buyer. "You guys can divide up your rock. All I want is the cash."

  The buyer stood still, hesitating.

  Pedro spoke again before the buyer could move. This time in English, with a heavy accent. It sounded like it hurt him to say each word: "You fool. Destroyer of the Earth. You have no regard."

  "At least I try to recycle. I'm reusing this gun, for example."

  The storm continued to bang against the windows and in my head with that conga rhythm, hard and fast. And loud.

  "The Tainos are a good, noble people!" Kaonabo yelled above the noise. "You are not noble."

  "And you call stealing and killing and selling drugs good and noble?" I shouted back. "You're living in the past, my man. I know from experience that gets you nowhere."

  "What's this about?" the buyer said.

  Kaonabo turned to Itaba. "Puta! Mentirosa!"

  "Hey!" I snapped. I scratched my head. "Listen up. If things were different, I could help you. I know about this sort of thing. You could probably use my help."

  Kaonabo cursed me more in Spanish.

  Itaba came to my side. "Negrito, he won't listen. You have to stop him."

  "Wait a second."

  She took another step toward me, and I turned to point the gun at her. There was something in the look of her eyes that was hitting me wrong. I never said I was smart, but she seemed a little too excited to get rid of her husband.

  The flat-headed man took a step forward. The buyer took a step back.

  Then there was a knock on the door.

  It was a man from the hotel. Through the door he said, in Spanish, something like, "We would like you to move to the main part of the hotel. For safety. The hurricane is here."

  "Itaba, get that," I said. I turned to face her and, in that instant, Kaonabo picked a glass from the table and threw it at me. It smashed against my skull and I dropped the gun. I was reeling.

  He grabbed Itaba, pulled the door open, and ran out. The buyer ran too, in the other direction. I got the gun, wobbled on my feet, and moved to the doorway. The confused hotel man looked at me. It was wild outside. The rain came down in black sheets and the wind howled like a baby giant dying for attention. I could barely see more than a few feet in from of me. I ran after Itaba.

  I saw a flash of color ahead-Itaba's skirt-headed down the path toward the beach.

  I followed through the throbbing storm, onto the sand.


  "Stop, you son of a bitch!" I yelled into the wind, then remembered I had the gun. I shot into the air. The pop barely registered in the storm.

  But Kaonabo let go of Itaba and turned. "Nuyoriqueno!" he shouted.

  Just then the giant got nasty, smacking us down with a huge slap of wind.

  Kaonabo was on me, elbowing my head and kneeing the gun out of my hand. I tried to get up, but the wind kept me off balance.

  I really should've gone after the guy with the satchel. Stupid.

  Kaonabo head-butted me in the stomach and, as I bent over, in the chin.

  I fell back on the sand. The wild surf curled in large, foamy waves onto the shore, only a few feet away. The sky over the sea was dark, but there was something black and gigantic on the horizon, moving closer.

  I reached for Kaonabo, but he ducked and kicked me twice in the ribs. His sandals were not soft. I went down, spitting up, almost vomiting. We wrestled, moving closer to the waves, getting wet. Kaonabo was about to hit me again, when I moved, then used his momentum to throw him to the ground. He came at me, I turned on my left foot, and dropped him down again. He got right back up, came in low. I smacked my flat palm into his nose, hard, and Kaonabo fell back. I went to stomp him, but he kicked my feet out from under me. I fell on the cold, wet sand-it was like hitting concrete. I felt the ocean spraying on my back.

  Kaonabo got my head and neck in a choke hold. "Hijo de la gran puta," he said.

  Then there was a shot. In a haze, I turned, looked up, and saw a small hole in Kaonabo's flat forehead. He fell back onto the dark sand.

  Itaba stood there with the gun. The gift bag lay on the wet sand between its, closer to me. She ran toward it, and I leaped like a frog across the beach. Our fingers closed on the bag at the same time. I yanked and she fell on the sand.

  She sat up quickly and pointed the gun at me.

  "Itaba. Wait," I pleaded, standing, the bag in my hand.

  "Lo siento, negrito. But I need this," she said and fired. The bullet whizzed past my face. I fell back; a wave clawed at me and pulled me under.

  I don't believe in magic. I pray at night but don't expect any answers. I do it just in case-like making a side bet.

  I went deep. I swallowed water. There was darkness and cold and then maybe even small glowing lights. I could've imagined that. But somehow I survived. Clutching the plastic bag with the stone cemi inside. I can't explain it. If I had to give an answer, I'd say it was just dumb luck.

  This time there was barking. When I lifted my face from the sand, there was a small, hairy dog yelping at me, stepping forward, moving back, stepping forward. Sand in its fur. I glanced up and saw dull sunshine. All around me-seaweed, dark wood, things tossed out by the ocean, just like me.

  I turned my head to one side and saw Kaonabo's body on the drying sand. Moving toward its were police and paramedics. A gurney. Some tourists.

  It began to make sense. I think Kaonabo wasn't the one who wanted to start a drug empire. It was Itaba. She'd wanted Kaonabo out of the way, maybe because he didn't approve, maybe to keep the money for herself. He could've killed the doctor for her. But my money was on her-she'd had plenty of time to do it then come back and pick me up to be her patsy. Now all she had was her gift bag with the little coqul on it. Bienvenidos a La Isla del Encanto.

  I thought about what was going to happen to me. I didn't know.

  I thought about what was going to happen to the dog. It kept licking me. It was still there. It existed. It looked like a stray. "It's my dog," I told the first policeman who bent down to see if I was alive. "Mi perrrro."

  He must've thought I was crazy. I was glad to be alive. But my hair must've been a mess.

  Tucson, Arizona

  'm watching Ronald Jumps the Train speed-shop through Safeway. He crams his cart with frozen pizzas and HungryMan dinners, corn chips, Cheetos, potato chips, a case of Negra Modelo, two sixes of Classic Coke, and another two sixes of Mountain Dew-all the quick-to-cook, quickly eaten, and sweetish crap that crystal meth tweakers often devour.

  "Ma'am? Can I help you, ma'am?"

  "No." An eager Safeway employee. Do I look that much like a geezer?

  I've been tracking Ronald for five days, ever since dark rumors swirled up from Sonora about a drug cartel takedown war against La Bruja de los Cielos, the rarely seen head of the methamphetamine cartel in northern Sonora. The war brought assassinations by the dozens. La Bruja, herself a vicious stone killer, was believed to have planned last week's assassination of Sonora's state chief of police at a Nogales hotel, AK-47s and grenades pouring down from an upstairs window just as the chief entered the place. Federal pressure got intense. La Bruja's world collapsed, her smuggling routes hijacked, her truckloads of drugs no longer safe because bribed U.S. Customs guards were arrested, and nothing made easier by increased U.S. Border Patrol arrests running parallel to the fence along the P-28 Tucson section. The border was sealed, the border was chaos, the border was dangerous. All of these things shredded the previous maps and players in organizational drug trafficking from the border north through Tucson and Phoenix. Nobody knew anyone they could trust. Including me.

  I do intel surveillance of meth dealers on Indian reservations; I'm a private investigator working for the Navajo Tribal Police. Despite the chaos in Mexico, nothing much had happened for me until I tagged Ronald in the Safeway around 10 in the morning.

  I knew the drug cartel world was in turmoil, but I'm just a small player. I track Navajo meth dealers off the rez, but nobody else. An hour ago, I'm thinking it's mainly another beautiful, quiet Tucson morning. Kids in school, parents working, geezers shopping. Now, watching Ronald cram his cart full, I'm realizing that he's stocking up to lay low, to take a forced vacation from dealing crystal meth up on the Gila River rez and east toward Casa Grande.

  But why?

  Ronald's a shrimpy guy, half Apache, half Mexican, an old-time tweaker born on the Ute reservation in Colorado. He runs across the front of the store, kinda dancing behind the cart, he so wants to get outta there quick. So, why? He can't possibly know I'm tracking him.

  I watch from the back aisle of the large Safeway, my hands on a shopping cart loaded with I-don't-care-off-the-shelfwhatever, as I pretend to browse while following him. I whip past the meat cases to see him in the produce section, piling on boxes of all kinds of berries and even a huge sack of raw carrots-lots of sugar in carrots, tweakers love sugar-when a man moves quickly behind Ronald, bellies up to Ronald's back like a lover, one hand in his Arizona Wildcats lightweight nylon rain jacket. Ronald's shoulders slump, he sags against the cart but nods resignedly. The two men walk slowly, almost a sex dance, the man urging Ronald out the entrance. I'm dashing with my cart up the produce aisle to follow them, except two other guys surround me.

  "Don't be a chili pepper."

  Behind me to the left, a rough whisper, like a rasp across soft white pine. One hand squeezes the back of my neck, the other extends to pry my fingers off the Safeway cart. Hands in leather golf or driving gloves, wearing a tee, his arms rife with intricate tattoos, not prison ballpoint-pen black but professional, multicolored inks swirling around the name Dial. I can see that the tat artist who did the full sleeves on both arms used thicker ink; the word Dial covers an ancient tat reading Diablo.

  I half duck, trying to turn away, but a smaller man on my right wedges his body against me, so I pull the cart toward its, taking tension momentarily off Dial's fingers, and then shove the cart toward the organic apples, peaches, and pears, an elderly couple recoiling as it punches into a free-standing display, the man's face puckering with indignation then quickly dropping a plastic bag of tomatoes, shrinking away from Dial's tats and his cold stare. The tomatoes roll across the floor but nobody pays them any attention.

  "She might have a gun," the smaller man says, his voice strangely familiar, "tucked down in her back."

  "Forget the gun," Dial responds. "Is this her?"

  "Yes."

  I'm trying to see their
faces, but Dial puts a martial arts grip on my upper left shoulder, pinches a nerve. I recoil, gasp, my left arm flops around, I'm staggering from the pain but they hold me upright and, like a two-person team carrying a bashed-up athlete off the playing field, they frog-march me out the wide Safeway entrance. Dial's hand shifts from my neck to under my arm and across my left breast, almost lifting and carrying me along. Sweat pops everywhere from underneath my headband, running down my face. My body flowers with sweat that fountains between my breasts and underneath the sports bra. I'm sweating from panic but also the rapid transition from Safeway's aircon into the muggy April ninety-degree Tucson midmorning air.

  The parking lot is jammed, but nobody really notices us. I decide to shout for help but Dial squeezes my throat. I can barely breath. I can't see an out, so I relax my muscles, trying to flex my fingers, get strength back. The other man's hand slides under my tee and against my bare back, moving down inside my waistband.

  "You still tuck that pistola back there," the second man says.

  I recognize the voice.

  "Rey?" I say. "Rey?" Disbelief.

  "When you went running, you carried it back there."

  He palms my Beretta from the small of my back where I carry it in an unbelted nylon rig. Dial fumbles in my handbag, grabs my keys.

  "Rey Villaneuva?"

  "Yeah," he says quietly.

  "Is that really you?"

  Rey Villaneuva. Once my PI partner. Once my lover. I haven't seen him in, in, I have to think, it's been ... what ... five years? Seven? I cut a glance at his worried still-handsome face half hidden by that familiar shock of unruly black hair, which glistens with water as though he'd stuck his head under a faucet and run his fingers through it instead of a comb. He's wearing brown khakis, the kind he once creased daily with his own iron, but now looking like he's worn them for weeks without washing. The direct sunlight catches flecks of gray in his hair and his week-old whiskers.

  "What do you want from me?"

  "To create a legend," he says.

  They hustle me to a silver Escalade with tinted windows, parked next to my Subaru Baja. Ronald Jumps the Train sits behind my steering wheel, the other man in the passenger seat. Dial swings me hard against the Escalade; Rey's shoulders slump, he won't meet my eyes.