Slow Kill Read online

  From the moment she got in the car, Brenda had talked endlessly, about her parents, her siblings, her job, her ex-husband, her hiking vacation to the Canadian Rockies, and anything else that just popped into her pretty head. In Santa Fe, Brenda’s prattle turned to making hints about expensive items that caught her eye in the jewelry stores and boutiques on the Plaza and complaints about how she didn’t like being left alone while Johnny took care of his business dealings.

  Earlier in the day, realizing there was no way he could face driving Brenda back to Denver, Johnny had sent her off window-shopping on the pretext that he had to make some confidential phone calls to clients. When she got back to the hotel room, he greeted her with a worried look and a tale that his father had just suffered a stroke at his ranch on the Bootheel. In fact, except for being eighty-three years old, there was nothing wrong with his father, other than a recent hip replacement.

  “I’m so sorry,” Brenda stepped close and hugged Johnny. “Will he be all right?”

  Johnny shook his head gravely. “We don’t know, but I have to get down there right away.”

  “Of course, family comes first.” Brenda drew her head back, looked up at Johnny, and bit her lip. “But you’re not going to leave me stranded here, are you?”

  Johnny smiled. “I wouldn’t do that to you. You’re booked on a flight to Denver this afternoon. I’ll take you to the airport.”

  Brenda’s expression lightened. “Thank you.”

  “Sorry to interrupt our plans,” Johnny said.

  Brenda shook her curly locks. “It’s not your fault. What is the Bootheel, anyway?”

  “It’s a strip of land in the southwest corner of the state that intrudes into Mexico. It’s shaped like the heel of a boot.”

  “And your father owns it?” Brenda asked with great interest.

  Johnny laughed. “Not all of it by a long shot, but a pretty fair chunk.”

  “What time is my flight?”

  “Five-thirty.”

  Brenda pressed hard against him and her hand found his crotch. “That’s hours from now. Is there anything I can do to ease your worries?”

  Johnny responded by slipping his hand down the front of her blouse, and Brenda spent the next half hour consoling him with her mouth and body.

  At the airport, Brenda’s flight had been delayed because of the snowstorm, so Johnny forced himself to sit with her outside the boarding area, even though she protested that she would be fine on her own. He’d learned a long time ago to leave women feeling happy and cared about, especially if you had no intention of ever seeing them again. It caused much less trouble that way.

  Because the Santa Fe airport served only turboprop commercial carriers and private airplanes, the terminal was small. In the public area, a space with high beamed ceilings, tile floors, and hand-carved southwestern chairs, about twenty passengers along with a few spouses and friends waited for the last flight out to Denver.

  From where Johnny sat with Brenda, he could see the tarmac. The inbound flight from Denver had just taxied to the ramp area. Soon he’d be shed of her, and the thought made him want to smile, but he stifled the impulse. When the gate agent announced that boarding would begin in a few minutes, Johnny stood, bent over, and gave Brenda a kiss.

  “Thanks for being so understanding,” he said.

  “You’ve been so quiet,” Brenda said, kissing him back.

  Johnny gave her a solemn look. “You know, just thinking about my father.” In truth, he’d used the fabricated family catastrophe to tune Brenda out. Actually, his only worry was whether or not over dinner he’d be able to talk Kevin Kerney into participating in a deal he’d just sewn up. Kerney had been an obstinate, straitlaced kid back in the old days on the Jornada, who’d occasionally dressed him down for his fun-loving adolescent ways. But what Johnny had in mind shouldn’t get Kerney’s ire up. It was a straight business deal with some good money built into it.

  Brenda stood, kissed him again, patted his arm, and nodded understandingly.

  “I’ll call when I can,” he said.

  She buzzed his cheek with her lips and pranced toward the boarding area, looking pert and yummy in her tight jeans. She threw him a smile over her shoulder, and Johnny smiled back, thinking it was a real pity that she liked to talk as much as she liked to party.

  Popular with the well-heeled set, the restaurant Johnny had picked wasn’t one of Kerney’s favorite places. Although the food was good, the dining rooms were small and dark, the tables crowded together, and most nights the din of nearby diners made private conversation difficult. In the summer, when customers could dine on the tree-covered patio, it was much more tolerable.

  He waited for Johnny at the small bar in an alcove near the entrance. As the lone customer at the bar, Kerney spent his time sipping an herbal iced tea and watching the bartender mix drink orders placed by the servers. He looked at his wristwatch, noting that Johnny was ten minutes overdue. But Johnny had always been one to stage flashy, late entrances. Thirty-some years ago, Johnny’s show-off antics had been amusing, but Kerney wasn’t about to cool his heels much longer. He’d give it five more minutes before blowing the whole thing off and heading home.

  The thought had no more than crossed his mind than Kerney felt a hand come to rest on his shoulder. He turned to find Johnny smiling at him. His face was a bit fuller, but his wiry, small-boned frame was lean, and his restless brown eyes still danced with mischief. No more than five foot seven, he wore his light brown hair cut short. Lizard-skin cowboy boots added an inch to his height, and the belt cinched around his waist was secured by a championship rodeo buckle.

  “Looks like you’re hitting the hard stuff,” Johnny said as he glanced at Kerney’s iced tea and took a seat. “It’s been a long time, Kerney.”

  “That it has,” Kerney replied, not expecting an apology from Johnny for his lateness. “You look well.”

  “So do you.” Johnny glanced up and down the length of the almost empty bar. “Where are all the good-looking Santa Fe women? Do you have your cops lock them up at night?”

  “No, but we do try to keep them safe. Are you still chasing skirts, Johnny?”

  “Not me. I’m a happily married man. But I sure do like to look.” He gestured to the bartender and ordered a whiskey. “Not drinking tonight or on the wagon?”

  “Not in the mood,” Kerney replied.

  Johnny raised an eyebrow. “That’s no fun. I hear you got hitched some time back.”

  “I did,” Kerney replied. “Who told you?”

  “Dale Jennings,” Johnny replied. “Says you’ve got yourself a beautiful wife and a fine young son.”

  Dale was Kerney’s best friend from his boyhood days on the Jornada. Together with Johnny they rodeoed in high school. In their senior year, Johnny had taken the state all-round title, while Kerney and Dale won the team calf-roping buckle. Dale still lived on the family ranch with his wife, Barbara, and their two daughters.

  “I do,” Kerney replied. “Sara and Patrick. How about you? Any children?”

  Johnny shook his head as the bartender handed him his whiskey. “Not a one.”

  “When did you talk to Dale?”

  “I’ll fill you in later.” He knocked back the drink and waved the empty glass at the bartender.

  “You’re not driving, are you?” Kerney asked, as the bartender approached with the whiskey bottle.

  “Hell, yes, I am,” Johnny said as he slid his fresh drink closer. “Stop sounding like a cop. I never figured you for one back in the old days.”

  “It’s an honorable profession,” Kerney said. “Tell me what you’ve been doing since you stopped rodeoing.”

  Johnny swirled the ice in the glass, deliberately took a small sip, and smiled. “There, is that better? Don’t want to get in trouble with the police chief.”

  He put the glass on the bar. “Hell, I didn’t want to stop saddle bronc riding. I was in my prime on the circuit. But after I got kicked in the head for the sixth
time, the doctors said if I had one more head trauma it could kill or paralyze me. I had to quit.”

  “I’m sorry to hear it,” Kerney said.

  Johnny shrugged and downed his whiskey. “Back then, twenty-five, thirty years ago, nobody wore protective gear. Nowadays, all the boys wear vests and some are wearing helmets. If that had happened in my day, we would have laughed them out of the arena. Those boys with the helmets look like they should be riding motorcycles, not bulls and bucking horses. But times change, and it’s a damn hard sport on a man’s body—that’s for sure.”

  The hostess came to escort them to their table, and they were seated next to a group of eight women loudly discussing a planned fund-raising event for a local charity. Over their noisy chatter, Kerney again asked Johnny what he’d been doing over the past years.

  “Sports management, for one,” Johnny said, taking a menu from the server, “and media relations. Most of my clients are pro rodeo cowboys, but I’ve got a few up-and-coming country singers in my stable and some minor league baseball players who have the talent to make it to the big show. But I’m branching out. That’s why I wanted to see you.”

  A server appeared with menus and recited the specials. Johnny ordered a salad, steak, and another whiskey. Kerney went with the asparagus soup and lamb. “Are you in town on business?” he asked. “Or just to see me?”

  Johnny leaned back and grinned devilishly. “Both, but it’s all business. I met with the director of the state film office yesterday and the governor today. You’re the last person on my list.”

  “So are you going to tell me what business you have with me, or is it a secret?” Kerney asked.

  “You’re gonna love it, Kerney. I’ve just brokered a deal to film a movie in New Mexico. It will be produced by a cable channel network and a Hollywood film company, costar two of my clients, and be shot entirely in the state. The governor and the state film office are putting a chunk of money into it.”

  “Sounds like quite an undertaking.”

  Johnny spread his hands wide to match the grin on his face. “It’s big, and it’s gonna be a hell of a lot of fun. I want to bring you in on it.”

  “Doing what?” Kerney asked, as the server brought Johnny his whiskey.

  “First let me tell you the fun part,” Johnny said. “The movie is a modern-day western about a rancher who’s facing bankruptcy due to drought and the loss of grazing leases on federal land. He decides to fight back by mounting a fifty-mile cattle drive to dramatize his plight. But when he tries to drive his cattle across closed federal land, the government bars his access. The story takes off from there.”

  “I’ve always liked a good western,” Kerney said. “Let me know when it hits the theaters.”

  Johnny laughed as the server placed his salad on the table. “Hear me out. The fun part is that we’re filming some of it on my father’s ranch in the Bootheel, and we plan to hire as many New Mexico cowboys, wranglers, stuntmen, stockmen, extras, and qualified film technicians as possible. That’s part of our deal with the state. I want Dale Jennings to be a wrangler and you to be a technical advisor on the film.”

  “So that’s why you talked to Dale,” Kerney said. “What did he say?”

  “He’s gonna do it.”

  Kerney tried the asparagus soup. It was good. “You can hire whomever you want?” he asked.

  Johnny, who hated tomatoes, picked them out of the salad and put them on the edge of the plate. “For the key, nontechnical New Mexico personnel, I can. I’m an executive producer for the project. The story line was my idea. I’m even getting a screenwriting credit for it.”

  “I’m impressed. When does all this take place?”

  “In September, after the rainy season, when it’s not so damn hot.”

  “I’ve got a full-time job, Johnny.”

  ‘We’re talking about three weeks on location, maximum. That’s all you have to commit to. Use your vacation time. You’ll get top dollar, housing, meals, transportation, and expenses. Plus, you can bring the wife and your son along gratis. In fact, we’ll hire them as extras. That’s what I promised to do with Dale’s wife and daughters.”

  Johnny finished his greens and slugged back his whiskey. “We have a ninety-day shooting schedule. Three weeks in the Bootheel to do the major cowboy and rodeoing stuff, then some other location filming around the state in Silver City and Las Cruces. We’ll do the set work here in Santa Fe at the sound studios on the college campus. We’re hiring film students as apprentices.”

  Kerney put his spoon down and wiped his mouth with a napkin. “Sounds like a major undertaking.”

  “It’s big,” Johnny replied. “My sister, Julia, is in on it. You know, you broke her heart when you came back from Vietnam and didn’t marry her.”

  Kerney laughed. “Get serious, Johnny. Julia didn’t want anything to do with me.” A year younger than Johnny, Julia had been one of the prettiest, most popular girls in high school. A great horsewoman in her own right, she’d won the state high school barrel racing competition the year after Kerney, Johnny, and Dale graduated.

  Johnny grinned and raised his hand to the sky. “I’m telling you the truth. She totally had the hots for you.”

  “What has Julia been up to?”

  “Pretty much taking care of Joe and Bessie, now that they’re older. What do you think about my proposition?”

  “I’d need to know a lot more about it before I decide,” Kerney replied. “What kind of technical assistance would you have me do?”

  The main course arrived, and Johnny asked for a glass of expensive red wine before cutting into his steak. “Cop stuff.” he said. “You’d make sure anything to do with law enforcement is accurate. The story pits a rancher against agents of the Bureau of Land Management. When he decides to move his cattle illegally across public land, federal agents and the local sheriff attempt to stop him. The chase that ensues turns into a stampede when the cops try to turn back the rancher and his neighbors who are driving the herd across BLM land.”

  Kerney’s lamb came served on a bed of polenta. It looked perfect. “It doesn’t sound like there would be much for me to do,” he said.

  Johnny chuckled. “Now you’re thinking straight. It would be a working vacation, Hollywood style. Besides that, when was the last time you went on a real cattle drive? I’m not talking about moving stock from pasture to pasture, or gathering cows for shipment. But a real cattle drive, pushing three hundred and fifty head across a mountain range.”

  “Can’t say I’ve ever done that,” Kerney said.

  “Doesn’t that sound like fun?” Johnny asked.

  “Yeah, it does.”

  “You think about it,” Johnny said, fork poised at his mouth. “Talk to Dale. Talk to your wife. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for us to do something we used to dream about back when we were kids.”

  “You were always good at organizing grand escapades,” Kerney said.

  Johnny nodded, his face flushed from the whiskey and wine. “And this one is a real moneymaker for everyone involved. Not that you need it. To hear tell, you’ve got a sweet little horse ranch operation outside of town.”

  “Raising and training cutting horses,” Kerney said, wondering who had been so forthcoming about his personal life with Johnny. He doubted it had been Dale Jennings.

  “Are you in?” Johnny asked, his words slightly slurred.

  “I’m not sure if I can spare the time.”

  “You’re the police chief,” Johnny rebutted. “Top cop, and all that. Can’t the department do without you?”

  “I’ll think about the offer.”

  After dinner, Johnny fumbled with his wallet for a credit card to use to pay the check. When he signed the charge slip his hand was shaky.

  Kerney thanked him for dinner and held out his palm. “Give me your car keys, Johnny. I’m driving you to the hotel. The concierge can arrange to retrieve your vehicle.”

  Johnny flashed an annoyed look. “Get real, Ke
rney. The hotel is only four blocks from here and I’m not drunk.”

  “I think you are. Your keys, Johnny.”

  “You’re joking, right?” Johnny said, laughing.

  Kerney shook his head and made a gimme motion with his outstretched hand.

  Johnny shrugged, fished a hand into his pocket, and dropped the keys into Kerney’s open palm along with his business card. “I’m going to need a answer on the technical advisor job in a week,” he said.

  “You’ll have it by then,” Kerney said.

  At the hotel, Kerney accompanied Johnny into the lobby. The concierge was off duty, so Kerney gave Johnny’s car keys and a twenty-dollar bill to a valet parking attendant and asked him to bring the vehicle at the restaurant back to the hotel.

  Johnny described his car and the attendant hurried off. “Let me buy you a nightcap in the bar,” he said.

  Kerney steered Johnny to the elevators and shook his head. “Not tonight, but thanks again for the meal. It was good to catch up with you.”

  Johnny hid his disappointment. He hated being alone in hotel rooms. Maybe he should have tolerated Brenda’s chitchat and kept her around instead of sending her back to Denver. He pushed the elevator call button and said, “You’re no fun at all, Kerney.”

  “Don’t take it personally,” Kerney replied. “I’ve got a busy day tomorrow. Next time, if you come to town on a weekend, I’ll lift a glass or two with you.”

  “It’s a deal,” Johnny said. “When I get back to Denver, I’ll send you a copy of the shooting script for the movie by overnight express, so you can see exactly what I’ve been talking about. You’re gonna love it.”

  The elevator doors slid open, and the two men shook hands and said good night. Kerney left the hotel thinking it might be best to check out Johnny and his offer before making up his mind about the proposal. On appearances, Johnny seemed to be successful and living large. He drove an expensive car, stayed in the best hotel in town, and had treated Kerney to dinner at a pricey restaurant.