Dance of the Bones

The mother of Shining Falls looked everywhere for her child but could not find her. She could not understand why the doves had brought her there.

HENRY ROJAS’S SHIFT THAT DAY was pure agony, primarily because he’d had so little sleep the night before. A -couple of times during those endless hours, he had tucked himself into out--of--the--way spots in hopes of grabbing a power nap, but sleep wouldn’t come. As soon as he tried closing his eyes, images of those two bullet--ridden bodies danced in his head. The only thing that made them disappear was reopening his eyes.

Finally off work, Henry was tired to the bone, far too weary to drive straight into town. He thought about stopping by the garage to check on things but nixed that idea immediately. Instead, he went home to shower—-and to think. With Lucy over at the hospital working the night shift, he stood under the shower for a good long time.

He had connected with Jane Dobson years earlier through somebody who knew somebody who knew somebody else. He met with her periodically or stopped by the house to drop off goods and pick up cash. The woman lived in a nondescript house in a marginal neighborhood. Nevertheless, she seemed to have more money than God. She struck him as a sweet little old lady with silver hair who wore colorful dresses, got around with the aid of a walker, and depended on a portable oxygen tank. How was it possible for someone who looked so harmless to be so ruthless? Yes, the José brothers knew too much and they had to go, but still, the idea that Jane had ordered their deaths without so much as blinking an eye came as a shock.

Henry had always let Jane think she was the only game in town. That wasn’t entirely true. He had developed a second thriving side business specializing in smuggled prescription drugs. Occasionally, when the meds arrived in his hands before they could be passed along to the buyer, he kept them stored in a safe in his garage out at the airport, along with a growing stash of greenbacks and a number of weapons. He knew that if anyone ever took a close look at the guns, they would lead straight back to what the newspapers were always referring to as “Fast and Furious weapons.”

One of the benefits of being on the Border Patrol’s front lines, especially as a patrol supervisor, meant that Henry knew what was going on and could make the best of it. He was the one who posted patrol schedules, so it was easy for him to work around them. He also didn’t believe for a minute that he was the only member of the Border Patrol who earned way more money on the side than he did on the up and up.

It had been a piece of extreme good fortune that, on the night Jane ordered him to take the José boys out, he’d had his latest shipment of succinylcholine stashed in his safe awaiting delivery the next time he drove up to Phoenix. A year or so earlier, when he’d delivered his first load of that to a well--heeled customer up north, he’d asked Lucy, his wife, who was also an L.P.N., about it. She’d answered his question without having any idea why he was asking, but that was how he knew the medication’s primary use was in paralyzing patients prior to surgery. Henry had a feeling that the guy who bought it from him in boxes containing a dozen vials of the stuff was using it for something a lot more interesting than prepping surgery patients.

The point was, Henry had been in possession of a supply of the medication when he’d needed it most. And because Lucy was a diabetic and on insulin, he’d had easy access to a supply of syringes as well. Once he had collected those, he was good to go.