I put my cup down. “How?”
“Vega and a Coronado County deputy went out to her place this morning to bring her in. They knocked. Got no answer. Looked in the windows and saw her lying on the living room floor. Shot three times in the chest. Sheriff Carlson has a team out there right now working the scene.”
“What about Sanchez?”
“Can’t find him.”
“Did you get anything out of Diggs?”
“Nothing useful. Have you had any contact with your wife or Peter Bisonette or Gilbert Mondragón since we parted ways last night?”
I knew why he was asking. He was thinking like a cop, thinking that if I’d told Rainy or the others about my suspicions regarding Marian Brown and Sanchez, I’d given them motive for murder. I was thinking that, too, but only with regard to Mondragón. Although Rainy had killed a man once, the circumstances were understandable and it was long ago. She was a different person now. Cold-blooded murder was something neither she nor Peter would ever condone.
I could have lied, but I’d already started down a different road with Sprangers. I told him, “Yes.” Then I said, “What about your mole? Could Rodriguez have known?”
“Like I said, Diggs hasn’t broken. On my end, what you and I discussed last night has stayed with me. I haven’t said anything to anyone.”
Which made Rainy’s first husband look pretty good to me for the killing.
Clearly, Sprangers was thinking the same thing. “I’d like to talk to Gilbert Mondragón.”
“Not sure that’ll happen.”
“You could help.”
“Let me think about that.”
“Don’t think too long. We’re looking for Sanchez, but I’m guessing that if he’s not already dead, he doesn’t have much time left.”
When the call ended, I contacted Mondragón immediately.
“We need to talk,” I told him. “Now.”
“I’m listening.”
“All of us. You, me, Rainy, and Peter.”
“In broad daylight? What about the drone that Border Patrol agent put on you?”
“He took it off.”
“You’d better be sure.”
“I’m sure.”
“All right. Where?”
“Where are you?”
“An hour from Cadiz.”
Which meant they weren’t in the safe house in Nogales anymore. So where were they now?
“There’s a small roadside park along the San Gabriel River south of town,” I said. “Rainy knows the place. I’ll be waiting.”
*
When I was fourteen, in the dark period after my father died, I spent a lot of time with Henry Meloux, healing. He urged me to hold to the memories of my father. Memories sing to us, he told me. They’re birds whose songs never fade. What I held to as I drove out of town toward the park was the memory of Tamarack County with its tall pines and evergreen-scented air and lakes where sunlight shattered on the water’s surface into a million diamonds. I held to the idea that when all this was over, we would go back to what was familiar—Gooseberry Lane, Sam’s Place, Iron Lake, and Crow Point, where Henry Meloux would be waiting, his ancient face cracked by more lines than dried mud and his dark, almond eyes shining warm in welcome for Rainy and Peter and me. That would be happiness. That would be home.
I parked in the small, empty lot and walked to the picnic table where, days earlier, Rainy and I had met with Nikki Edwards and then things had got really complicated. The park was hidden from the narrow highway by a wall of tamarisk bushes. The lone picnic table sat in the shade of willows and cottonwoods that grew on the riverbank. Fed by the monsoon rains, the water of the San Gabriel tumbled over river rocks with a soft, constant murmur. I thought about Nikki and about the traitor in Los Angeles del Desierto. She knew about the coordinates for Peter’s rendezvous with the women and children of Guatemala and could have been the one to leak them. But there were so many others as well. Jocko? Frank Harris? Maybe even Sylvester?
The black SUV parked next to my pickup. Rainy, Peter, and Mondragón got out and came to the table. Mondragón was watchful, his attention on the road that ran behind the tamarisks.
“Better be important,” he said.
I spoke to Rainy, not Mondragón. “I just need a question answered. Did you all stay together last night after we talked?”
Rainy seemed puzzled but said, “Yes.”
“Berto didn’t leave you at all?”
“No. Why?”
“Yeah,” Mondragón said. “Why do you want to know?”
“Someone murdered Marian Brown last night.”
“And of course you thought of me,” Mondragón said.
“I was thinking about motive. You certainly had one. I needed to know about opportunity.”
“Why didn’t you just ask me over the phone?” But as soon as he spoke he understood. “Still don’t trust me.”
“I trust Rainy,” I said.
Rainy said, “It wasn’t Berto, Cork.”
“Rodriguez?” Peter offered.
“Maybe. Or maybe whoever it is that’s been feeding information about the Desert Angels to Brown and Rodriguez.”
“Any closer to knowing who that is?” Mondragón asked.
I shook my head and looked to Peter.
He shrugged. “I keep racking my brain and coming up with nothing. Honestly, I trust everyone I recruited. I’d still trust any one of them with my life.”
“And ours,” Mondragón said sternly. He looked back at me. “I’ve been working with my people to find out about Rodriguez’s investments on this side of the border. These are people who don’t worry a lot about breaking laws. Or fingers. Seems Rodriguez has got quite a diverse portfolio. Interests in Canadian and U.S. mining in particular, a major shareholder in several exploratory enterprises.”
“There’s a drilling company called Southwestern Geotech that’s been filing on old claims in the mountains around here. Maybe he owns a share of that, too.”
“I’ll have it checked out,” Mondragón said.
“Something you should know, Peter,” I said. “Jocko’s taken a turn for the worse.”
“How bad?”
“When I left his hospital room last night, he was looking pretty weak. It helped a little, I think, when he heard that you were safe.”
“I want to see him,” Peter said.
Mondragón and I both spoke at the same time: “No.”
“If he dies and I haven’t thanked him for all that he’s done, it would be a great injustice,” Peter said.
Rainy spoke quietly. “Do you do what you do for the thanks you’ll get, Peter? Jocko’s heart is full, believe me. But his body is fragile. If you risked seeing him now, his concern for your safety might do him more harm.”
It was a hard truth to swallow, but Peter said, “I understand.”
“Good.” Mondragón turned his attention to me. “It’s dangerous, meeting like this in the daylight. Don’t ask again.”
“Believe me, Berto, I’ll be a happy man when I never have to ask anything of you again.”
Mondragón and Peter headed to the SUV. Rainy and I lagged back. I held her hand.
“What do you and Berto do all day while I’m out beating the desert for clues?”