Any Other Name: A Longmire Mystery (14 page)

We tracked them two blocks, but then the Bear pulled up and stood at Lee Street, the snow already covering his raven-black hair like the mantle of silver on a grizzly. “They split up.”

“Why in the heck would they do that?”

The streetlight flared off the surfaces of his face. “Two cars. There are two major parking areas in town, one over by Deadwood Creek and the public parking garage on Wall Street. The croupier went toward the creek, and the couple went toward the garage.”

“She’s the one we want; we’ll find out about the dealer later.”

The Bear turned and was off again, trying to catch a glimpse of Roberta Payne in the freezing fog. “They are fast.” He shook his head as we hurried across the empty street, the snow now approaching lower midcalf. “Try and keep pace.”

Henry broke into a run, and I struggled to keep up as he took to the sidewalk—I just ran down the middle of the street. It was strange to see the usually busy little town like this, almost as if we were ghosts, haunting the place with our muffled, silent run. I saw Henry pause and then take a left on Wall toward the parking garage.

Sliding a good six feet on the smooth soles of my boots, I made the turn too, and lumbered after the Cheyenne Nation, almost running into him at the empty glass booth at the entrance. He stood, looking up, staring at the concrete ceiling and the floors above. “What?”

“Someone was trying to start a car.”

I looked at the two passageways on either end of the massive building that stretched most of the length of the town. “You take
in
and I’ll take
out
; working our way to the roof?”

He nodded and was off to the right as I moved left, looking at all the cars as I went, hoping to spot exhaust, movement, or the condensation that would tell me somebody was inside. There were more than a lot of vehicles—evidently guests from the surrounding hotels and employees who had given up the ghost had decided to just leave their vehicles in the safety of the garage for the night.

There was a Toyota pickup at the far end, sitting by itself with the motor running. Just to be on the safe side, I pulled my badge wallet from my rear pocket and held it open, placing my other hand on the .45 at my side as I approached the driver of the small truck and noticed that it was, ever so slightly, rocking.

I drew my coat back over my sidearm and walked a little forward where I could see a woman sitting on a man’s lap. I had just started to move back when the guy saw me and screamed, honestly, screamed. Then the woman started screaming, and I held up my hands.

She slid to the side, and the middle-aged man rolled down the window and started yelling at me. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

I put a finger to my lips. “Shhhhhhh . . .” I then held up my badge and whispered loudly, “Get a room.” The window went back up, and I was able to get past before he threw it in reverse.

I turned up the ramp leading to the second floor. At the top, I looked down the length of the building and sighed through chattering teeth.

I was cold, it was late, and I was really tired.

I started working both sides of the street, so to speak, and was halfway done when I saw Henry, skimming along like a black panther, stooped and crisscrossing the lane just as I was. I shook my head and thought about the best buddy I had in the
world, a man ready to drop everything in his life and rush out into a blizzard to help me try and catch a missing woman.

We met halfway, well, maybe a little more on my side. “Anything?”

“No, you?”

“A couple lap dancing in a Toyota.”

“I heard somebody pull out and assumed you had it.” He blew into his bare hands in an attempt to warm them. “Did you do your civil duty and tell them to get a room?”

“I did.”

He glanced around in the darkness of the garage. “We could just wait at the exits, but she might freeze to death.”

“I’m ready to just go back to the casino and see if they’ve got an address for Willie or either of them.”

He looked at the ceiling. “In my experience, employees are usually relegated to the most inconvenient parking areas, so if they are friends of his . . .”

“Up?” I joined him in looking at the ceiling, and he nodded. “I’ll double back.”

On the third floor, there were fewer cars, and I was able to make better time but didn’t see Henry as I got toward the middle. I kept going, finally approaching the ramp that he should’ve come up when I heard somebody running on the floor below. “Henry?”

His voice echoed up to me. “They’re in the elevator!”

I ran for the steps at the southeast end of the building. Fortunately, there was no snow in the stairwell, but I could already hear Henry and the couple on the street below. Throwing myself against the walls, I bounced my way down, turned the corner at the ticket booth, and tripped off the curb just enough to send myself slinging onto the snow-covered street outside.

Picking myself up on one elbow, I could see the Bear climbing up the fire escape at the back of a three-story redbrick building to my left, and above him, barely visible in the cascading flakes, two people going onto the roof.

“Damn it.” I grabbed my hat and pushed off, running the length of Wall back down to Main, keeping my eyes on the rooftops, and sliding another ten feet into the main thoroughfare.

Holding my hat in front of my eyes to give me a clearer view, I could see that there was a large turret on the corner building, and I could barely make out the shadow of somebody looking down from the front cornice. I shouted up at her, “Roberta Payne, sheriff’s department—you need to stop!” She looked both ways and then behind her as the man yanked her away. “Whatever your name is, you need to let her go!”

He ignored me, and they both disappeared.

I moved sideways down the street, keeping an eye on the roof and trying to see, even though the falling snow was blinding.

After a moment, Henry appeared at the cornice. “Where did they go?”

“Not this way, they—” It was then that I saw something move on the roof of the next building, a full flight lower than the corner one that Henry was on. I pointed and yelled at the Bear, “They’re down there; they must’ve jumped!”

The Cheyenne Nation flung himself from the taller building, but I couldn’t see if he’d landed well or not.

Running sideways and hoping to spot a taller building that might impede their rooftop progress, I tried to keep up but watched as the couple made an easy traverse onto the next three buildings, with me, sliding along in my boots, desperately trying to keep pace on the ground.

Suddenly, I noticed that a half-ton pickup with its bright lights blasting up Main Street had stopped about fifty yards away. Bringing my hand up to shield my eyes, I peered through the fog freezing in the snow-filled air and finally figured it must be Willie.

I stood there for a few seconds, unsure of his intentions, when he revved the engine, lurched forward, and headed straight for me.

For all Willie knew, he was protecting the couple from a wild cowboy-and-Indian duo who might mean them harm. I would’ve liked to have shown my badge, but there wasn’t time. Carefully, I pulled the Colt from my holster and leveled it at the rapidly approaching vehicle.

The truck stopped when I guess Willie figured out what he was up against.

I took a step forward and raised my sidearm, just to show him I wasn’t intent on putting a bullet into him, and yelled, “Absaroka County Sheriff’s Department.” Unsure if he’d heard me, I yelled it again.

That’s when he hit the gas and started straight toward me.

Unwilling to be run over, if by mistaken identity or not, but not wanting to hurt the driver, I fired low, figuring I would hit the front of the truck and something that would disable it.

The brakes locked up, and the truck slid at an angle to my right.

Tugging at my hat, I leaned my head to one side and tried to see in the cab to make sure the bullet had not deflected, but the snow and the reflection on the glass made it impossible.

Suddenly, the wheels started spinning and I raised my sidearm again, only then noticing that the truck was retreating, once more at a high rate of speed. He backed the vehicle into a parking lot at the end of the row, and as I ran after him, I saw Roberta
and the unknown man leap onto a one-story building, swing around a billboard advertising the newest, biggest, and best of something, and lightly jump to the ground next to the vehicle in waiting.

I was getting closer but watched helplessly as they vaulted into the attacking pickup, which fishtailed out of the parking lot and headed off in the other direction, the billowing tunnel of snow in their wake closing off the air behind them.

Their taillights disappeared as the Bear dropped to the ground, both of us leaning over with our hands on our knees in an attempt to catch our collective breath.

He caught his before I caught mine, of course. “Who. Knew. We. Were. Chasing. Spider-Man . . . And. Spider-Woman.”

I nodded and stooped to see a little antifreeze in the snow—I must’ve dinged the radiator—as another set of lights suddenly appeared from the other direction, along with a spotlight that blinded us. A voice rang through a loudspeaker mounted in the grille of a black-and-white Dodge Charger. Static. “Deadwood Police—don’t move!”

Standing and holding my .45 high and wide so we wouldn’t get shot, I shouted, “Sheriff Walt Longmire, Absaroka County, Wyoming!” I gestured toward Henry with a smile. “C’mon, we’ve got a ride.”

—

“Follow
what
car?”

I’d gotten to say
follow that car
only one other time in my life, and the young patrolman was ruining the expectations I had with my second request. “It was a half-ton pickup, blue in color, headed east on Main . . .”

Tavis Bradley, who had turned out to be a part-time
patrolman with the Deadwood Police, had cost us more than part time trying to figure out who we were and what we were doing, but had finally fallen in line and started the warm, if not hot, pursuit in his completely useless-in-the-snow Charger. “I called them in, even though you didn’t have a plate number . . .” The car slid sideways as we joined routes 14/85 south, and I wished, once again, that I had been driving. “There can’t be that many vehicles out here tonight.”

“Turn your headlights on low, please?” The Bear, seated in the front seat with Tavis, peered over the hood at the surface of the road. “It is fast disappearing, but there is one, clearly defined set of tracks.”

The young man did as he was told. “He’s headed onto Sherman toward Cliff, but my jurisdiction ends where 385 branches off and goes south to Custer and the state park.”

I leaned over the seat. “We’re going to broaden your horizons tonight.”

“Shouldn’t we call the Highway Patrol? They’ve got a detachment in Custer and in Rapid City and can cut him off.”

“Get ’em on the wire.”

As the kid snatched the mic from his dash and talked to the HPs, Henry and I watched the road and tried to figure out what had happened in Deadwood. “I don’t get it, why split up?”

The Bear pointed, urging the patrolman to go left.

I thought about it. “I can understand if you decided to change your life and hide out . . . Well, in all honesty I can’t, but was she acting as if we were going to kill her or he was?”

He turned, giving me his usual horse eye. “I’m voting that she fears him much more than she does us.”

The patrolman hung up the mic and glanced back at me through the rearview. “They’re setting up cars on 44, 16, and
385, so he can’t go south and he can’t get over to Rapid, so can I slow down?”

“No. There are other roads he can take, right?”

“Small ones.”

“Well, we’re going to keep after him while we can still see his trail or else we might lose him to those small ones.”

Tavis looked glum. “If I wreck this new cruiser, the chief is going to lose me.”

“Who’s your chief?”

“Emil Fredriksen.”

I laughed. “Fightin’ Freddie?”

“You know him?”

“Yep, I worked with him a couple of times back in the day, when I used to moonlight the Sturgis Bike Rally.”

The Bear spoke out of the side of his mouth. “Dare I ask how he got the name?”

I shook my head, thinking back to a time when I was a struggling deputy with a wife, a child, a mortgage, and a car that needed a transmission. “Oh, every time some tough guy would say that Emil was just a tub of guts and that if he took off his badge and gun they’d kick his ass, he’d take off his badge and gun and kick their ass. I think his badge and gun got more wear from being thrown onto his dash.”

In any other circumstance, it would have been a wonderful drive through one of the most beautiful and, according to the Indians, spiritual places in the world, but with the snow and fog, it was like driving underwater.

I had the kid shut off the lights on the light bar except for the warning ones at his rear, just so that if the SDHPs were out here moving around they wouldn’t back-end us.

“Why no lights?”

“Henry can’t see.” I watched the road for a few seconds then tried to make out the signs, but they were enameled with snow. “Any idea where we are?”

I was talking to Henry, but Tavis answered. “Just south of Hill City, I think.” He turned in the seat and looked at the Bear. “You Sioux?”

“Lakota. Some, but mostly Cheyenne.”

“I never met a Cheyenne before.”

The silence of the vehicle got to the kid, and before long he spoke again. “How ’bout telling us a story, I mean the sheriff and me have been talking the whole way . . .”

Henry nodded. “I know.”

“Well, tell us a story, an Indian story to help pass the time.”

The Cheyenne Nation glanced at him, then back at me, and then at the road. “You may not like my stories.”

The kid wouldn’t give it up. “What, do all the white people die in the end?”

“No, only white-people stories end with everybody dying . . .” He sighed and then smiled to himself. “There was an Indian and a
Ve’ho’e
traveling together—”

“What’s a
Ve’ho’e
?”

I joined the conversation. “White person.”