Thirty-four
"Good Lord, what was that?" Alex sprang to her feet.
"A gunshot, I believe." Nora Gail remained admirably
calm, but she had already reached the door by the time the
man who had greeted Alex flung it open. "Is anyone hurt,
Peter?"
"Yes, ma'am. A customer's been shot."
"Phone Reede."
"Yes, ma'am."
Peter lurched toward the telephone on the desk. Nora Gail
left the office. Alex followed her. The madam flung open the
drapes with a theatrical flourish and took in the scene at a
glance. With apprehension and curiosity, Alex peered over
Nora Gail's shoulder.
Two men whom Alex assumed were bouncers had subdued
a man and were restraining him against the ornate bar. Several
scantily clad young women were cowering against the purple
velvet furniture. Another man was lying on the floor. Blood
was pooling beneath him, making a mess on the pastel Oriental
rug.
' 'What happened?'' When Nora Gail got no answer, she
repeated her question with noticeably more emphasis.
"They got in a scuffle," one of the prostitutes answered
finally. '' Next thing we knew, the gun went off." She pointed
down. A revolver was lying on the floor near the prone man's
feet.
"What were they fighting over?" After a lengthy silence,
one of the girls fearfully raised her hand.
"Go to my office and stay there." Nora Gail's tone was
as brittle as cracking ice. It suggested that the girl should
have known how to prevent an incident like this. "The rest
of you get upstairs, and stay there until further notice."
No one argued. Nora Gail ran a tight ship. The young
women flitted past Alex like a flock of butterflies. They were
met on their way upstairs by several men stampeding down,
pulling on their clothes as they ran. Without exception, they
looked neither right nor left as they exited through the front
door.
It was a farcical scene, but giggling over it was out of the
question. Alex was mortified. She had been on the fringes
of violence before, but reading about criminal action in a
police report was different from experiencing it firsthand.
There was something very startling and real about the sight
and scent of fresh, human blood.
Nora Gail gestured Peter, who had rejoined them, toward
the bleeding man. He knelt beside him and pressed his fingers
against the man's carotid artery. "He's alive."
Alex saw some of the starch go out of Nora Gail's posture.
She'd handled the situation with aplomb, but she wasn't made
of stone. She had been more worried about the situation than
she had let on.
Hearing the wail of a siren, Nora Gail turned toward the
door and was on the threshold to greet Reede when he came
barging in. "What happened, Nora Gail?"
"There was a dispute over one of the girls," she informed
him. "A man's been shot, but he's alive."
' 'Where is he? The paramedics are--" Reede stopped short
when he spotted Alex. At first he just gaped at her with patent
disbelief; then, his face turned dark with rage. "What the
hell are you doing here?"
"Conducting my investigation."
"Investigation, my ass," he growled. "Get the hell out
of here."
The wounded man moaned, drawing Reede's attention. "I
suggest you tend to your own business, Sheriff Lambert,"
Alex said tartly.
He cursed as he knelt down beside the man. When he
noticed the amount of blood, however, his concentration
switched immediately from Alex to the victim. "How're you
doing, cowboy?" The man moaned. "What's your name?"
His eyes fluttered open. He comprehended the question,
but didn't seem able to answer. Reede gently moved aside
his clothing until he found the source of the blood. The bullet
had pierced his side at about waist level. "You'll live," he
told him. "Just hang in there a few more minutes. An ambulance
is on its way."
He came to his feet and walked toward the man still in the
bouncers' custody. He was standing with his head bowed.
"What about you? Got a name?" Reede asked, jerking the
man's chin up. "Well, howdy, Lewis," he drawled.
"Thought we'd seen the last of your miserable hide. Didn't take my warning seriously, did you? Can't tell you what a
pleasure it's gonna be to have you residing in my jail again."
"Go fuck yourself, Lambert," the man sneered insolently.
Reede hauled back his fist, then reached for the man's
spine through about a foot and a half of abdominal tissue.
Lewis doubled at the waist, but only until Reede's fist connected
with his chin, bringing it up with a powerful blow.
He was then lifted by the lapels of his jacket and shoved
against the wall.
"You've got a big mouth, Lewis," Reede said calmly,
barely winded by the exertion. "We'll see how smart you
talk after a month or two in a place where the bad boys will
make you eat their dicks for breakfast every morning."
The man whimpered helplessly. When Reede released him,
he slid down the wall to form a pathetic heap on the floor.
Two deputies stepped into the room, gawking at their plush
surroundings.
' 'He resisted arrest,'' Reede calmly said, pointing at Lewis, then curtly ordered him handcuffed, Mirandized, and booked
for attempted murder. He consulted with the paramedics who
had come in behind the deputies and were dealing with the
injured man.
"He's lost a lot of blood," one of them reported to Reede
as he slid a needle into the victim's arm. "It's serious, but
not critical."
Satisfied that everything was being handled properly,
Reede's attention reverted to Alex. Taking her upper arm in
a firm grip, he hauled her toward the door.
"Let me go."
"Unless Nora Gail hired you on, you've got no business
here. Nora Gail, shut down for the night."
"This is Friday, Reede."
"Tough. Don't let anybody leave, either. Somebody'll be
along soon to start the questioning."
He roughly shepherded Alex down the steps and into his
Blazer, nearly cramming her into the seat before he slammed
the door shut. He climbed in behind the wheel.
"My car is over there," she told him stubbornly. "I can
drive myself back to town."
"I'll have one of the deputies pick it up later." He ground
the key in the ignition. "What in God's name possessed you
to come here?"
"I didn't know what it was until I arrived."
"Well, when you figured it out, why didn't you leave?"
"I wanted to talk to Nora Gail. She's a very old and dear
friend of yours, I understand," she said with phony sweetness.
At the intersection with the highway, they met one of his
patrol cars turning in. He signaled the deputy to stop and
rolled down his window. "Give me your keys," he told Alex.
She passed them to him because he wasn't going to give her
a choice, and because, in spite of her brave front, she was
trembling.
Reede tossed her keys to the deputy and instructed him to
have his partner drive Ms. Gaither's car to the Westerner
Motel when they were finished with the preliminary investigation
of the shooting. With that taken care of, he zoomed
onto the highway.
"Don't you feel the least bit guilty?" Alex asked him.
"For what?"
"For turning a blind eye to a whorehouse operating in your
county?"
"No."
She looked at him, completely flabbergasted. "Why not?
Because the madam is an old flame of yours?"
"Not entirely. Nora Gail's place keeps potential troublemakers
concentrated in one spot. Her bouncers keep them in
line."
"Today they didn't."
"Today was an exception. That scumbag is bad news no
matter where he is."
"I should report you for police brutality."
"He had that coming, and then some. He got off on a
technicality the last time he passed through our judicial system.
This time he'll spend a nice, long time in prison.
"And, by the way, they caught Lyle Turner in New Mexico.
He confessed to slitting Pasty's throat for screwing
around with Ruby Faye. It had nothing whatsoever to do with
you, so you can stop looking over your shoulder for bogeymen."
"Thanks for telling me." The news relieved her, but this
latest development was still on her mind. "Don't try to get
me off the subject. I'm not going to sweep this under the
carpet. Pat Chastain would love to know that there's a bordello
operating right under his nose."
Reede laughed. He took off his hat, ran his hand through
his hair, and shook his head in dismay over her naivete.
"Have you ever met Mrs. Chastain?"
"What does that--"
"Have you?"
"No. I've talked to her on the telephone."
"She's a country club hag, tanned skin stretched over solid
bone. She wears more gold jewelry than a pimp, even when
she plays tennis. She thinks her shit don't stink. Got the
picture? She likes being the D.A.'s wife, but doesn't like the
D.A., particularly in bed."
"I'm not interested in--"
"Her idea of foreplay is, 'Hurry up, but don't mess up my
hairdo,' and she would probably rather die than let him come
in her mouth."
"You're disgusting."
"Pat's got a favorite out at Nora Gail's who'll swallow it
and pretend to like it, so he's not going to lift a finger to shut
the place down. If you were smart, which I'm beginning to
seriously doubt, you won't embarrass him by letting on you
even know that Nora Gail's place is out there. And don't
even think about tattling to Judge Wallace. He never partakes,
but all his friends do. He sure as hell isn't going to stop their
party."
"My God, is everybody in this county corrupt?"
"Oh, for crissake, Alex, grow up. Everybody in the whole
goddamn world is corrupt. You might be the only person
who ever went through law school and came out believing
that the law is still based on morality. Everybody's guilty of
something. Everybody's got a secret. If you're lucky, the
next guy's secret is juicier than yours. You use his secret to
keep him quiet about yours."
"I'm glad you brought that up. It was Nora Gail you were
with the night Celina was killed."
"Congratulations. You finally got one guess right."
"It wasn't a guess. Wanda Plummet told me."
He grinned. "When did you figure her out?"
"I didn't," she admitted with some reluctance. "I recognized
her picture in the yearbook. You could have told me,
Reede."
"I could have, but you'd have started pestering sooner."
"I didn't pester her. She was most cooperative."
"She was scared. You can't tell by looking at her now
what a hell-raiser she used to be."
"I'd rather talk about her sister, Nora Gail. The night my
mother was killed, were you with her all night?"
"Wouldn't you love to know?"
"What were you doing?"
"Three guesses, and the first two don't count."
"Making love?"
"Screwing."
"Where?"
"Her house."
"Nora Gail said you were in her car."
He whipped his Blazer around a farmer in a pickup truck.
"Maybe we were. Car, house, what's the difference? I don't
remember."
"You had been to the ranch earlier."
"Yeah, so?"
"You ate dinner there."
"We've been over this already."
"This was a special night--Celina was there for dinner."