Trust Me Page 4

  Neither looked at the other. The city was close enough to see cars on the streets, but from this distance they took on the quiet air of insects skittering across a floor.

  She thought about putting her hand on Cody’s neck, coaxing him back from the edge. “Sometimes I think you don’t even like this house,” she said.

  He slopped half a bottle of wine into a beer mug. “It’s the most beautiful place in the world. Beats the view back in Hobbs, that’s for sure.”

  “You always say that.”

  “It’s always true.”

  “Hobbs was only eight years ago.”

  “No, no, no. Those lean days were lifetimes ago.” He took a deep gulp of wine. “I’m thinking I should get the kids to drive us up to Taos this weekend, get out of the city.”

  “Don’t call them ‘kids.’ They’re grown men who carry guns. They work for a living.”

  “I pay them. I’ll call them what I want.”

  A few years ago, he would have meant that to be funny.

  “I want to talk about my car,” Olivia said.

  “What about it?” He held up a hand. “Oh, that friend of yours made it into town the other day. Charlie? Charles? The dweeb from DC.”

  Olivia took a breath and thanked God that Cody was looking at the woods and not her. He knew she had been married before, but not to Charles.

  “Not a friend,” she said. “Just someone I remembered from way back. It’s good you’re taking a chance on him.”

  Cody laughed. “His old boss is in prison. Maybe your boy was dirty, too, but he kept out of the clink. I like that. Nerves.”

  Cody pressed the palms of his hands into his forehead and took a deep breath. “We’ve got to start building again.”

  The motion was honest and terrified. Olivia was mad about the GPS but this timing was all wrong. She had lied about her connection to Charles, and her husband had been too busy to dig up the truth. She needed to leave, and Charles would help her.

  Cody’s cell rang. It was his private phone, the one only a handful of people were allowed to call. The noise seemed to surprise him. Olivia took a step back as he dug in his pocket.

  He jammed the phone hard against his ear. “What?”

  Olivia stepped towards the house. Cody hung up the phone, took a slug of his wine and then coughed. The coughing turned into laughing—a deep, maniacal laugh. He had never sounded like that before. Olivia slipped into the house as Mallon walked onto the deck, braced for bad news. Even inside the house, she still heard Cody cackling like it was the end of the world.

  The men had all stormed out of the compound like a herd of elephants. It all happened too fast for Olivia to ask any questions. She caught scattered mentions of the construction site, the skeleton. Then they were gone and everything went quiet.

  Olivia was never home alone. Someone always lurked in the shadows. Now she crept from room to room, making sure they had all left. Her laugh echoed off the windows. This felt like a game of hide-and-seek. She heard a ticking clock and a bird outside. Horror-movie quiet. Olivia went into her studio and turned on some music. She also switched on a TV for good measure and cranked both volumes. She ran into the master bedroom and jumped on the bed. She bounced a few times and then dropped onto her back with a whoosh that pulled the air from her lungs. The memory foam hurt when she landed.

  Olivia pulled the duvet over her head. The weighty softness was almost too heavy, smothering. If she left, Cody would hold on to every stitch. She threw off the duvet. Bartending at night and painting during the day had worked before. Selling a painting here and there would give her some extra cash. She could do all that again. It would work if she wanted it to.

  Olivia rolled off the bed, went back into the studio and turned off the noise. All her freedom and energy drained and she started pacing and fidgeting. Cody and his goons were still there. Signs of their presence—coffee cups, spare car keys, a smell of hair gel and gun oil—could never be cleaned away.

  Her eyes flicked towards one of the security cameras as she went into her room. Cody claimed that camera was angled more towards the hallway than her bedroom, but she’d never believed him. For months, Olivia’s world had steadily narrowed. The kitchen and dining room were gone. She moved out of the master bedroom step by step. First, she only dressed in the spare room, then read there before bed, then slept alone one night a week, then two, then four, now seven.

  She caught her own reflection on a window. Andrea’s mother had been Olivia’s art teacher. She had a favorite piece of advice: Move with intent, move with intent. Olivia pulled out her dresser drawer and set it aside. Weeks earlier, she had bought a burner phone and taped it to the inside of the dresser. Olivia had a plan. All she needed was knowledge, sensitive knowledge that her rich and soon-to-be ex-husband would pay her to hold onto. A parting gift of a few million dollars seemed reasonable. That would be enough for her to leave town, set up somewhere new—Aspen, Austin, Olympia—paint, start a gallery, donate to schools. More importantly, it would pay for Andrea’s treatment and give her kids a shot at a life outside Española. Olivia’s stomach churned. She hated leaving them in that city.

  The burner phone held only a few numbers: Andrea, an uncle who lived near Los Alamos and Janice Chávez, Cody’s first wife.

  “Hey,” Janice said. “It’s been a few days.”

  “I didn’t want to call unless I had something to say.”

  “You all right?”

  “Bored.” Olivia lay down on the floor and put her feet up on the bed. “I am always bored.”

  “Don’t be one of those rich ladies complaining about being rich. Boredom means you’re not spending your money right.”

  “Like you?” Olivia asked.

  “Excuse me, I do not complain. I enjoy every dime of Cody’s money.”

  “I’m sure you do.”

  Cody divorced Janice right after making his first few millions. He was not a reflective man and he never dwelled in the past, but the importance of pre-nuptial agreements was one lesson Cody Branch definitely learned.

  “Look, something’s going on,” Olivia said. “I don’t know what, but he stormed off. I think all the drones went to the construction site.”

  “Oh? All of them?” Janice bubbled with excitement. “Could be all sorts of drama. No word on what?”

  “Something big. He didn’t even seem mad, more . . . surprised.”

  “That’s even worse. I’ll ask around.”

  “I’m getting nervous. He’s going to figure me out.”

  “You’re more on the inside than I am,” Janice said. “Poke around. Find something.”

  “Hey, you’re not the one tracked and filmed every second.”

  “There’s got to be a room somewhere they forgot to secure. If you’re finally alone, rattle some drawers.”

  “I’ll talk to you soon.”

  Olivia always felt like a child when Janice scolded her. No one else knew what being married to Cody Branch was like, but Janice always found a way to make Olivia feel foolish. Janice banked information like a currency, so far she had lent Olivia plenty, but Charles was Olivia’s big secret.

  Bringing him to Santa Fe had started as a crazy notion, but Cody had been desperate and seemed to like how crooked Charles had become. Before she knew it, Charles was heading to town and Olivia was supposed to make sure one of the rental houses was cleaned out and ready for him. It had taken days to scrub away all traces of Andrea and the kids. Charles could sleep there tonight, and so could Olivia.

  But first, she would visit the one room where all the cameras pointed outward.

  Since he built it five years ago, the guard shack had never been empty. There was always at least one guy watching the monitors. Computer stations filled most of the space, as if her husband’s men had emails to send and reports to read. She rattled the door of the gun rack in the corner. Locked.

  The computers were all password protected. She tried a few phrases—Cody’s birthday, “password,”
obvious stuff—but nothing worked. A bank of TVs along the wall showed the grounds, the hallways, the roof deck. She found the monitor that showed the entrance to her bedroom and shut it off. There were also a few screens that showed the offices near the Capitol and the construction site.

  Olivia sat down to watch the show but could not tell what was happening. Media vans dotted the construction site, and the office was buzzing. She was at the center of her husband’s world, yet she was totally blind.

  She scanned the monitors for Charles. He was out there somewhere, and she would keep watching until he showed up.

  FIVE

  GABE STOOD IN HIS LIVING ROOM with one hand against the wall, testing his bad ankle. Since Jefe had told him about the cancer, weak points had emerged in Gabe’s body. He pictured a little man swimming through his blood, sawing on support wires. That morning, when Gabe got out of bed, the pain in his ankle had knocked him back onto the mattress. By now it was a dull ache.

  Gabe dropped onto his couch, reached into a gallon-sized plastic bag full of marijuana and started rolling a joint. It took him a few seconds longer than normal. No, no that’s not a skill I can lose, he thought. Gabe lit up, puffed a few times and exhaled as he rolled onto his side.

  His father used to treat the leather twice a year with mineral oil, but Gabe let the couch fade and crack, like so many other neglected things around the house. His father was an ugly man who had built a beautiful home. Inheriting the property fifteen years ago had been a surprise to Gabe. He never knew why it went to him and not Lou. Helen was pregnant when they moved in, and they imitated a happy couple for a few years.

  Gabe looked out the sliding glass door. The house sat at the back of a triangular plot. The front door opened to half an acre of scrub, an old barn, remnants of dead gardens and assorted nonsense his dad had tossed out.

  New housing developments penned Gabe in to the rear. He lived in the country, but the yuppies next door lived in the suburbs. They must hate Gabe, and he hated them right back. They would drive him out one day, he knew that.

  He released a cloud of smoke. That was tomorrow’s problem. Today, Gabe needed to drive into Albuquerque to pick up his money before everything shut down. Gabe was owed his disability check and also a final payout from the construction company. Helen had been riding his ass about child support, and Gabe needed to pay up if he wanted to see Micah the next week. Spring Break was coming up and maybe the kid would want to give the bike another chance, or ride horses up to Bosque Peak. Something, anything. It was time.

  Gabe pushed himself up, found some paper in a kitchen drawer and made a list. Things to do with Micah: 1. Ride Horses. 2. Ride the bike up the mountain. 3. Things that kids like.

  He balled up the paper and tossed it in the trash can.

  Gabe heard steps in the grass, muffled but heavy, right outside the back door. He tried to breathe through his paranoia. Dog, it must be a dog, he told himself. Or nothing at all.

  A man, fat and tall, appeared, banged on the doorframe and yelled, “Órale, it’s the police, we’re here to fuck your shit up!”

  Gabe coughed out the breath he’d been holding. Fucking Rey. The lawyer with a degree from Georgetown was standing in the dirt, dressed like a Hell’s Angel and giggling. Rey’s mustache was long with waxed tips, which shook even more than his belly when he laughed.

  “One day, güey, I’m going to shoot your ass,” Gabe shouted from the kitchen.

  “Nah, you couldn’t even hit a target big as me.”

  Gabe unlocked the back door and sat down. “I’m going to electrify my windows,” he said. “Keep psychos like you from screwing around.”

  Rey filled the room with his presence. At six-foot-four and well past two-hundred-and-fifty pounds, Rey was always the biggest and loudest guy around.

  “Like the time you were going to put land mines out front?” Rey asked. “That’s still a good idea.”

  “Until you blow off a meter reader’s foot.”

  “It would have been fireworks. Just enough to, you know, make people leave me alone. You know those yuppies next door are walking their dogs in my field? They ripped a hole in the fence. Should have you sue them.”

  “At least they’re fertilizing the land, right? Whoa.” Rey whistled and pointed at the fat bags of weed on Gabe’s coffee table. “What the hell is all that?”

  “Get me an orange soda and I’ll share this joint with you.”

  Rey stomped into the kitchen and came back with a Fanta and a beer. “Now, what’s up?” Rey picked up one of the gallon bags and hefted its weight. “This isn’t real, right? These are movie props.”

  Rey’s presence made Gabe feel less like an old man burning up the day alone. This was now a social engagement.

  “Frederick gave it to me.”

  They had all gone to high school together thirty years ago, and even as kids no one ever called Frederick Freddie or Fred—there was always something formal about him, even when he was slinging dime bags to farm hands. Only one kid broke the rule. Junior year, new guy from the city called him Fred the Head. No one knew what it meant, not even that dumb kid, but Frederick made sure that was the last time anyone called him anything but his full, God-given name. Rey gripped the bag like it was welded to his hands. “He just up and gave you a pound?”

  “Two pounds.”

  “Like a going-out-of-business sale, or what?”

  Gabe handed Rey the joint. “Don’t even say that. No, I earned this. Jefe out at Isleta grows . . .”

  “No, no, I don’t want to know what you two are up to.” Rey took a drag and set the bag down like it was made of glass. “But, Scarface, don’t leave this out on your coffee table. You got to hide the illegal shit. The cops bust in, make it at least a little tough for them to nail your ass. You got like three or four ratty sheds out there. Put it in a paint can.”

  Gabe groaned. “I’m not going to keep my weed in a shed. It’ll look pretty weird for me to walk out to a shed three times a day. Besides, coyotes or something will get to it. I don’t need stoned coyotes trying to eat my ass.”

  Rey looked at Gabe for a second and then burst out laughing, causing Gabe to do the same.

  “Oh, dude,” Rey said, “I know someone looking for a bed frame. Willing to pay. You still got that big one upstairs?”

  “No, that thing’s been gone for a couple weeks. I got five hundred for that. Rosie told me to take a photo and helped me put it on Craigslist. Some white couple drove down from Santa Fe.”

  Rey whistled. “Five hundred.”

  “Handcrafted, man. Only the best.”

  “I mean, at this rate you’ll be sitting on milk crates in a few months, but whatever.”

  “You sound like my ex. I wasn’t using the old man’s furniture anyways.”

  “You find a job yet?” The joint looked small smashed between Rey’s fingers. He inhaled a third of it in one drag.

  “Nah, they’ll start building again soon.”

  Rey shook his head. “I don’t know. White developers plus Native land and bones . . . I’d look for a new gig, man. Did they really dump the skull in your truck?”

  “No bullshit. I saw it. Fucking skull.”

  Gabe dropped his mouth open and rolled his eyes back into his head. His skull impression had scored Gabe a few rounds of beers over the past couple of weeks.

  “Did y’all stop digging, or were the bosses pushing you to keep going? Who were the foremen out there, by the way?”

  Gabe reached for the roach, what Rey had left of it, at least. “You sound like Courtroom Rey.”

  Rey let out a burst of laughter. “All right, look, don’t tell anyone, but I got this case.”

  “Cool.”

  “No, you don’t get it.” Rey leaned towards Gabe. “I got this case. Real money. I’m telling you to find a new job. My clients are riding this all the way. Did you get severance pay or anything?”

  “The tribe’s going to move the bones, and we’ll go back to work. I didn’t
get a severance because I haven’t been severed. It’s . . . paused.”

  “They should have given you something.”

  “I’ve got to go grab my last check in a minute. And my disability.”

  “You’re still getting disability for that busted ankle?” Rey laughed. “I never should have helped you with that.”

  “I’m going to cash those checks until I die or the government runs out of money.”

  “When they ran you off the site, how’d they do it?”

  Gabe smoked what he could from the roach, then popped it into his mouth. He swallowed, feeling pleasant heat in his chest.

  “I’m not testifying, I’m not . . . whatever you’re trying to do.”

  “This is important, man. These land developers don’t care about the tribes or the workers. You don’t owe them. They owe you.”

  Gabe shook his head. “You know I’m not into that stuff.”

  “You don’t even know what’s going on out there.”

  Rey took a swig from his beer. He had been talking revolution since high school, even carried a gun in his car and a knife in his boot. Gabe never bought it, even when he was a kid. There were not going to be any revolutions in New Mexico anytime soon.

  “I need work,” Gabe said. “I got to see Micah soon. Everyone needs this airport money. Your San Miguel clients need it most of all.”

  “I didn’t say my clients were San Miguel. I’m heading to the construction site. Want a lift?” Rey stood up.

  Gabe shook his head, and stretched out, resting his head back on the armrest. If he left for Albuquerque by two, he should have plenty of time.

  “You don’t get it,” Rey said. “Trust me, my clients are very serious people, and this airport is not happening.”

  Gabe cracked one eye open. “No one cares about an old Indian skeleton. Don’t fuck up my job with your asinine schemes.”

  Rey laughed. “Asinine? Where’d that shit come from?”

  “Fuck you, man. I didn’t go to law school but I know things.”

  “Don’t get mad, Gabriel. Just joking around.”

  Gabe closed his eyes again. Pop used big words like that. Gabe must have inherited more than death from the old man.