The big gamble kk-6 Read online

  Fidel let out a sigh, got his driver's license from his wallet, searched the glove box for his registration and insurance card, and waited.

  Officer Raney keyed her microphone. "The car is registered to Fidel Narvaiz," she said to Clayton, who was parked up the road by an abandoned building that had once housed a bar with a bad reputation.

  "Use extreme caution," Clayton replied, "and let me know the ID of the driver as soon as you can."

  Raney dismounted her unit while Dillingham took up his backup position at the right rear fender. He had a clear view into the Camaro. He placed his hand on his belt next to the butt of his sidearm.

  Raney approached the Camaro, stopped at the center post, and looked down at the driver, a young Hispanic male. His hands were empty, as were the center console, dashboard, and the passenger and rear seats.

  Raney asked for his driver's license, registration, and proof of insurance. Fidel handed them out the window. Raney walked backward to her unit, stood behind the open driver's door, and called Clayton. "The driver is Narvaiz."

  "Can you get me something with his fingerprints on it?" Clayton asked.

  "Ten-four. Do you want me to write him?"

  "Be nice, give him a written warning."

  Raney wrote out the ticket, returned to Narvaiz, and explained that he wouldn't be cited, only issued a written warning. She handed the ticket book to him and asked him to sign.

  "Thanks," Fidel said, smiling. He signed the form and handed the book back to the cop.

  Raney tore out a copy, gave it to Narvaiz, and sent him on his way.

  "I've got his prints," Raney said into her handheld microphone. "They're all over my ticket book." She held it between a thumb and forefinger.

  "Bag it, tag it, give it to Dillingham, and ask him to deliver it to Artie Gundersen," Clayton said. "Dillingham knows what case I'm working, and can tell you what's up."

  "Ten-four."

  At the sheriff's office, while Clayton huddled with Paul Hewitt, Kerney wrote out the arrest affidavit on Norvell. Because his evidence was wholly circumstantial, he took his time, making sure all the relevant facts were convincingly included. Then he faxed it to the private office of the DA in Santa Fe, along with a note to have a copy of the warrant sent to Deputy Istee.

  He walked in on Clayton and Hewitt to learn that the task-force packet had arrived, and Narvaiz's fingerprints matched the partials found on Ulibarri's body.

  "You've got your killer," Kerney said. "Congratulations. When are you going to arrest him?"

  "All in due course," Clayton said, smiling slyly.

  Kerney laughed. "Keep me informed. You've got my phone number."

  "You're leaving?" Hewitt asked, rising to offer his hand.

  Kerney shook it. "It's your show, Paul. You don't need me filling up space. That's something you don't have a lot of around here."

  "Tell me about it," Hewitt said with a chuckle.

  "I'll walk you out," Clayton said.

  Outside, Kerney and Clayton looked for the blue Camaro and didn't see it. The clear day accented the dull slate-colored mountains behind a sea of tall-stemmed soapweed yuccas that spread out across the high desert plains, rippling in low waves against a slight breeze.

  "Grace was hoping you'd stay over, and come to dinner tonight," Clayton said.

  "Another time," Kerney replied, smiling.

  "The kids will be disappointed."

  "You've got a great family."

  "Good luck with your surgery," Clayton said.

  "Thanks."

  Hesitantly, Clayton extended his hand. "Give my best to your wife."

  "Sara," Kerney said, gripping Clayton's hand. "I'll send her your good wishes."

  "Yeah."

  "Take care, and be careful," Kerney said.

  "Yeah. You, too."

  Clayton started to say more, but the moment passed, and he turned away. Kerney watched him disappear into the building. Maybe it wasn't a big breakthrough, but he felt a definite warming trend in the air.

  As he passed the restored train caboose in the postage-stamp roadside park on the main drag that served as the chamber of commerce visitors' center, Kerney thought about Sara. As soon as he got home, he'd write her a love letter, even if he had to struggle halfway through the night to find the right words to tell her what she meant to him.

  Chapter 14

  A little more than four weeks after his surgery, Kerney had a new knee and a new limp, although it was much less pronounced and less painful, and was disappearing fast due to the punishing rehab program he'd set for himself. There were certain situations where bullheadedness wasn't a bad thing, and given the progress he'd made, this was one of them. Even Sara, who'd been getting daily progress reports from Kerney by phone, had conceded the point.

  Tomorrow Sara graduated from the Command and General Staff College, and today Kerney was flying in to attend the ceremony at Fort Leavenworth. It was also the day when the task force would carry out a coordinated strike against the partners and their associates.

  Amazingly, there had been no glitches or miscues during the massive, four-state investigation. Over sixty cops and prosecutors from ten local, state, and federal agencies had worked thousands of hours unraveling the inner workings of the prostitution ring, and gathering evidence with no leaks, no botched surveillance, and no blown undercover assignments.

  At five o'clock in the morning, as Kerney packed for his trip, Paul Hewitt, Clayton, sheriff's deputies, and state police agents were arresting Norvell and his "guests" at his ranch, which had reopened for business several weeks ago. Six prominent men, including a foreign diplomat and the head of a national charity, were about to become front-page news.

  Last night, Hewitt had called Kerney to say he was planning to give Clayton a sergeant's shield and commendation for the work he'd done as soon as the cases were wrapped.

  In Albuquerque Detective Pino, Sergeant Vialpando, and APD vice officers were rounding up Bedlow, Tully, Deacon, and all the known working girls, while IRS agents served search warrants on State Senator Leo Silva and Representative Gene Barrett to seize their financial and corporate records.

  At seven o'clock, Kerney drove to his early therapy session on a perfect May morning just about the time federal agents were shutting down all the out-of-state prostitution operations, except El Paso, which would be the last to fall.

  In an hour, after getting confirmation, Sal Molina was scheduled to make a personal visit to Walter and Lorraine Montoya to tell them that their daughter's murderer had been arrested.

  Back home at ten after a long session with his physical therapist, Kerney showered, changed, and left for the Albuquerque airport. On the way he called Larry Otero and found that the schedule was holding: bank examiners and state investigators were just then seizing the records of Norvell's various Ruidoso enterprises.

  Kerney checked the time as he boarded his flight. By now DEA agents should be picking up the Denver drug dealer who'd been supplying dope to hookers and their clients throughout the four-state region.

  Later in the day around evening time, Clayton and agents from the Texas Special Crimes Unit would take down Rojas and Narvaiz on murder charges, when surveillance reported Rojas back in town and at home. Recorded conversations between the two men clearly showed that Rojas had ordered the murder of Felix Ulibarri.

  From his first-class window seat, Kerney could see the snow-covered crests of the Rocky Mountains, an awesome, remote barrier that spawned rivers, cut canyons, studded high valleys with lakes, and threw domes and sharp-edged peaks into the pale blue sky.

  The plane turned east toward the prairie, and the spine of the mountains that had filled his eyes gave way to a panorama of open range, bending rivers, ribbons of paved roads dotted by farm villages surrounded with checkerboards of irrigated green fields and pale yellow pastures.

  The change in the landscape below strengthened Kerney's resolve to be more open and more attentive to Sara. It was time to remove the self
-imposed barriers that, over so many years of living alone, had eroded his ability to express his feelings.

  He closed his eyes and touched his jacket pocket. In a jeweler's gift box was a pair of diamond earrings. Tonight, when they were alone, he would give them to Sara and tell her again all the reasons why he loved her.

  With a no-knock warrant in hand, Clayton made assignments: three agents to the rear of the house, three to the front door with a battering ram, and two officers with him up the outside stairs over the garage to Narvaiz's apartment.

  The house looked unoccupied, but Clayton knew better. Surveillance reports put Rojas and Narvaiz inside the compound, but where exactly the men were was another matter.

  The team went in low and fast, using palm trees along the driveway as cover. Clayton hit the staircase at a full run, two steps at a time. He heard the sound of the battering ram against the heavy front door as he reached the landing. Narvaiz appeared suddenly in a doorway, semiautomatic in hand, blazing away. The first loud round hit Clayton's vest, spun him sideways. The second round knocked him on his back. His chest felt like a freight train had hit it. He lifted his head, spread his legs, raised his weapon, and watched Narvaiz walking toward him, grinning and firing at the agents crouched on the stairwell behind him. The officers returned fire, bullets screaming above Clayton's head.

  He emptied his magazine at Narvaiz. Rounds from three weapons tore into Fidel's flesh and gouged holes in the open door on the landing. Blood splatter from a neck wound arched over the wrought-iron railing and cascaded down to the driveway below.

  Clayton fed in another clip, aimed his weapon, and watched Narvaiz fall. He heard rounds shattering glass and pulverizing plaster walls inside the house and sent the two agents to lend support.

  The firing stopped before they got down the stairs. They went in calling out names on their handheld radios, asking for status and location.

  Clayton got to his feet on unsteady legs and walked to Narvaiz's body. He counted twelve bullet holes, all leaking either dark fluid or viscous gray matter. Was it adrenaline or just plain fear that had him shaking?

  He waited for a feeling of revulsion to overwhelm him, but nothing came except an emptiness that made him feel dark and bleak.

  His handheld hissed his call sign. Feebly he keyed the microphone and answered. Rojas was down, probably dying, and one officer had a superficial leg wound.

  He stepped back from the body and ordered ambulances and crime scene techs to roll. Would he ever be able to tell Grace about this? Really tell her?

  He doubted it. But maybe one day he could tell Kerney. Please read on for a special preview of Michael McGarrity's next thrilling Kevin Kerney novel Everyone Dies Jack Potter, perhaps the most successful and best-known attorney in Santa Fe, had recently attended a gay rights costume ball dressed as Lady Justice. The following morning a photograph of a smiling Potter wearing a shimmering frock and a curly wig, and holding the scales of justice and a sword, appeared on the front page of the local paper.

  Today Jack Potter wore a tank top, shorts, and a pair of expensive running shoes that looked brand-new to Detective Ramona Pino. He was faceup on the sidewalk with a bullet hole in his chest. He'd bled out in front of his office across from the county courthouse early on a warm July morning. From the blood trail on the sidewalk, Pino saw that Potter had crawled a good fifty feet before turning over on his back to die.

  Ramona was more than slightly pissed at the man who'd discovered Potter. Alfonso Allesandro had spotted the body as he passed by in his newspaper truck, and called the city editor on a cell phone before dialing the cops to report the crime. As a result, a photographer had hurried over from the newspaper offices a few blocks away and walked through the blood trail to take pictures before the scene was secured.

  Both men were now waiting in the panel truck with a uniformed officer while Pino cordoned off the entire block and worked the crime scene with the techs, searching for a shell casing and anything else that looked like evidence.

  Dozens of little orange markers were placed at every cigarette butt lying in the gutter along the street, the broken toothpick found a step away from Potter's body, and the small puddle of fairly fresh crankcase oil in a vacant parking space. One tech dusted all the parking meters for fingerprints while another worked on the door and front porch to Potter's office.

  Ramona inspected the small lawn in front of the building for any signs that shrubbery and grass had been disturbed or that fibers, threads, or hair had been transferred by contact. Finding nothing, she sent the tech who'd finished taking snapshots of the bloody footprints over to the panel truck to secure the photographer's shoes so a comparison could be made. The man opened the truck door, pulled off his shoes, and shot Ramona a dirty look as he handed them to the tech.

  Ramona smiled, but not at the photographer. The newspaper's truck bore an advertising slogan, "Everyone Reads It," and in black spray paint someone had added: "And Wonders Why"

  By the time an assistant district attorney, the medical examiner, and Lieutenant Sal Molina showed up, the courthouse was about to open for business. A small crowd of lawyers, clerks, judges, and officers scheduled for court appearances had gathered across the street and were scrutinizing her every move, which made her somewhat uneasy.

  The ME, a roly-poly man with skinny arms showing below his short-sleeved shirt, went off to declare Potter officially dead. Ramona turned her back on the crowd and briefed Molina and the ADA in a low voice.

  "Potter was shot in the chest at what appears to be close range," she said. "We have no witnesses to the crime and so far, no substantial evidence."

  "Was it a drive-by?" Molina asked.

  "I don't think so," Ramona replied. "Potter took just one bullet, straight on. If the killer had been firing from a moving vehicle, the round would have most likely hit him at an angle. Plus, a drive-by shooter would have probably emptied his weapon at his target."

  "The shooter could have been parked at the curb."

  "Possibly," Ramona said. "But if the killer was in a vehicle, I doubt it was a passenger car."

  "Why do you say that?" Molina asked.

  "The entry and exit wounds in Potter's chest and back are almost perfectly aligned," Ramona answered.

  Molina nodded in agreement. "From a car, the killer would have been firing up at Potter. Have you found the bullet?"

  "No," Pino said as she gazed down the street. At least a dozen buildings would have to be checked for the spent round, including an elementary school, an office building, and a resort hotel two blocks away across a major thoroughfare that circled downtown Santa Fe. It would take hours to do the search, probably with no results.

  "Maybe we'll get lucky," Molina said, reading Pino's pessimistic expression. Pino was a pretty young woman with even features and soft brown eyes that often fooled people into thinking she could be easily conned or manipulated.

  "What if Potter knew his killer?" Barry Foyt, the ADA, asked.

  "That would be great," Molina said. "Otherwise we've got either a random shooting or robbery as the possible motive."

  "Was there anything in his pockets?" Foyt asked.

  "Just his keys," Ramona answered, showing the key ring in a plastic bag. "And he's still wearing his watch, although it's not an expensive one."

  "So maybe we should rule out robbery as a motive as soon as possible," Foyt said, inclining his head toward the single-story adobe building that housed Potter's offices.

  "Are you giving permission to search?" Ramona asked.

  "Plain view only, for now," Foyt said, "including his car."

  "You got it," Ramona said.

  "Does he have any employees?" Molina asked, looking at the civilians who had congregated at both ends of the street behind the patrol cars that blocked the intersections. Uniformed officers stood by their vehicles holding the crowd back.

  "He has one secretary," Foyt replied. "I don't see her here yet."

  "ID her for us when she shows," M
olina said, turning his attention to Pino. "Six detectives are rolling. Let's get the uniforms started identifying onlookers and taking statements. Assign a detective to search Potter's office and put one on Potter's car. Find his wallet. That could help us rule out robbery as a motive. Have the others canvass the neighborhood, and start the techs looking for the bullet."

  "Will do, Lieutenant," Ramona said. Even with the additional help, it was going to be a busy day. Once a residential neighborhood, the McKenzie District west of the courthouse was now a mixed-use area of professional offices, private dwellings, apartments in converted houses, several bed-and-breakfast inns, retail specialty shops, and some eateries that were popular with locals. A good number of people would need to be canvassed on the assumption that someone might have noticed a suspicious person, seen a suspicious vehicle, or heard the gunshot.

  "I wonder if Potter ran every morning before he started work," Molina said.

  Foyt shrugged. "I know he liked to run, but I don't know if he kept to a set schedule."

  "We'll find out," Ramona said.

  "Have you called Chief Kerney?" Molina asked Pino.

  "Negative," Ramona answered. "I wanted to secure the crime scene and get an evidence search under way first."

  "I'll call him," Molina said, turning to Foyt. "Anything else you want to add, Counselor?"

  Barry Foyt glanced ruefully at Potter's body. Foyt had been handling murder cases for the DA's office for the last five years and had been called out to most of the major homicide crime scenes. But this was the first time the victim had been someone he knew and liked.

  "Jack was good people," Foyt said brusquely. "Let's get a suspect in custody fast, Lieutenant."

  "If only it were that easy," Molina said, thinking maybe he'd been stupid to let Kerney talk him out of putting in his retirement papers. Potter's murder could turn into a real bitch of a controversy real fast if progress on the case stalled.