A Deadly Shade of Rose Read online

  “If that’s an apology, I accept it.” The sleeping bag and fishing gear got tossed in behind the food.

  She watched me. “Ruined your fishing trip?”

  “Yes ma’am, you did a fine job of that.”

  She looked back at the clearing, and then me, finally putting it together. “You’re leaving?”

  “We’re leaving. As you’ve noted, the trip has been ruined.”

  All at once her head snapped around and the gun came up from her side. “What’s that?”

  That, Miss Rose, is a dog—well, a couple dogs. Bloodhound by the sound of it.”

  I didn’t think a pair of eyes could open that wide. I said, “They’ve been moving around out there about twenty minutes now. Getting closer. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”

  “Ted Bant had a couple dogs.” There was a sudden tightness in her throat. “They’re on me. We have to get out of her,” she said.

  “Might only be a couple pooches running down rabbits.”

  Her view shot back at me. “You know that’s not it.”

  “I don’t know that, but I’m not going to take any chances. Get in the truck. I’m almost done here.”

  Marcie hesitated, then got into the passenger side. I broke up the coals and did a quick scan of the site. If someone really was after her, I didn’t want anything lying around that might lead them to me. I was climbing up behind the wheel when those dogs howled, this time so close I looked over my shoulder to make sure a pooch hadn’t jumped into the camper. “They’re closer than I thought,” I said shoving the shifter into second gear—first gear is granny low and practically worthless for anything but pulling tree stumps. The mud and snow tires kicked up and tail of dirt behind and I cranked the steering wheel hard sending the old truck into a two-wheel drift that got her pointing the right direction down the rutted track I’d come up yesterday.

  Two dogs appeared in the mirror. They bounded from the trees into the clearing, put their noses to the ground, ran a couple circles, then let out mournful bays and lunged after the truck and for a few seconds nipped at its tires. We pulled away from them, but not before three men appeared at the edge of the clearing. One of them threw a rifle to his shoulder.

  Crack. Thud.

  And then the trail curved and I lost them in the mirror.

  Marcie cast an angry glance at me. “They saw us—saw your truck. Dammit, Granger. Dammit all to hell!”

  They saw an old pickup truck that looks like a thousand others in this part of the country. I was pretty sure they hadn’t got the license number. Hadn’t been enough time. I didn’t tell her that. I had more important matters at the moment to occupy my thoughts. It was like riding in a Mixmaster. We bounced as swayed down that mountain track, crashed into washouts, flew over high spots. Those dogs were still there but losing ground. Marcie had an arm over the back of the seat, bracing her other hand on the dash, teeth chattering and stringy hair whipping.

  The track straightened some and widened a little to where it might be called a road...if you were being generous with your terminology. We’d left the dogs behind. I let up on the gas a little and the ride calmed a bit. At least we weren’t fighting to keep from catapulting through the windshield. I said, “All they saw was a rust-red 1950-something Ford pickup truck. No way anyone will be able to trace it.”

  Marcie looked skeptical. “It wears a camper. They might have seen your plate.”

  “If they can read that bent-up thing, Superman’s got nothing over them. Someday that plate will earn me a ticket. As far as the camper goes, eight bolts takes it off.” I grinned to show I wasn’t concerned. I’m not sure that was to reassure her or me.

  Marcie didn’t look convinced by my logic. I said, “Hey, they’re behind us and on foot. Unless they have a radio and call ahead for reinforcements to meet us at the highway, we’re practically home free.”

  Her narrow view slid my way, still not convinced.

  I said, “We’ll get out of these mountains and find us a nice restaurant someplace. You’ll feel better after a real meal, not my camp cooking.” I thought I’d made a good argument, but it hadn’t fooled her—hadn’t fooled me either.

  Millin’s Timber Inn was located just outside the mountain village of Woodland Park, set off the highway in tall pines. It was a quaint little restaurant housed in a log building that over the years had seen too many coats of white paint. I’d often wondered when I’d driven past the place, which had been pretty frequently here lately, why anyone would paint a charming log building. Recently, lodge-type homes have become fashionable—or at least come back into fashion—and if painted at all, the color was usually in a nice forest brown. Mostly, they’re left a natural hue, and that’s the way I preferred them.

  The gravel parking lot was nearly empty. I pulled up near the door, set the parking brake so that the truck wouldn’t roll back onto highway 24, and switched off the headlights.

  Inside the doorway, Marcie veered off toward the ladies room calling a bar order to me while I stood by an abandoned cash register in obedience to a sign requesting me to do so until officially greeted and escorted through the roomful of mostly empty tables to the one table that was meant for me.

  I waited, hands thrust into my pockets, looking out a tall window at the darkening parking lot. Not counting my truck, there were three other vehicles there. I glance over at tables. Only two of them appeared occupied. Turning back, the window darkly mirrored a scruffy face. I rubbed the bristles at my chin. These last few months I’d not been very religious about shaving. My own little rebellion of sorts, I mused and grinned at the reflection grinning back at me.

  An attractive greeter-type person arrived to collect me just then. She wore a Bavarian holiday costume like you see at an Octoberfest. “One?” she asked.

  “Two,” I said holding up the appropriate number of digits.

  She snatched a pair of menus from behind the counter and guided me into the larger room with dimmed ceiling lights. I ordered the drinks. The bartender was fast and they arrived before Marcie returned from what I suspected was some serious scrubbing and rearranging.

  The costumed waitress went off to tend to the other guests. In one corner a lady and her gentleman friend leaned close over tall drinks, their table cluttered with dirty dishes. They didn’t seem to notice. Miss Bavaria was presently catering a table of four across the room. Loud chattering came from that direction. The rest of the place was empty. Behind me stretched a long, white wall hung with some very old-looking photographs of steam engines and long passenger trains crossing spindly, timber trestles.

  Marcie came into the room, glanced around, and spied me at the table. I’d already worked halfway through my Glenlivet when she slid into the chair across from me and took a long, passionate drink from the White Russian waiting for her.

  “Whew,” she said finally, licking the creamy white residue from her upper lip. “I feel half human again. I think I rinsed half of the Rocky Mountains down the drain.”

  “Welcome back to the human race.” I grinned, admiring the face across the table. Some women have God’s cosmetic kit built into their genes, the right skin tone, just the right pink tint to their lips, a little more black in their brows.

  She returned the comb I’d lent her on the drive down from the pass. “Thanks.” And then she said again, “My comb and everything else was in my purse, and who knows where that is now.”

  “I bet you have a good idea, though.”

  Her lips tightened. “None I care to discuss—at least not on an empty stomach,” she said matter-of-factly and lowered her view to the glass of scotch on the little white napkin. “You’ve a head start on me, Granger.”

  “I didn’t know we were racing.”

  She took another sip and glanced about the restaurant. “Not many people. Good. Not sure I’m ready for crowds just yet.” She surveyed her clothes with a disdainful eye. “You don’t happen to have any cigarettes?”

  “Sorry, don’
t smoke.”

  “I shouldn’t either, but then I do a lot of things I shouldn’t.” She unfolded the menu and studied it a moment, then closed it and laid it back on the table. “They took everything, even my credit card, but I can pay you back when we get down to the Springs.”

  I nodded at the lump in the coat pocket she’d worn in and set on the chair next to her. “That goes for the revolver too?”

  She leaned suddenly forward and said, “Not too loud. It’s illegal in this state to carry a concealed gun.” The ardor in her whispered words made me uncertain that she wasn’t just joking.

  She scowled at me. “What’s that look for?”

  I said, “Judging from your behavior this morning I wouldn’t have thought such things would concern you.”

  She leaned back in the chair. “Don’t jump to any conclusions about me, Granger. I happen to have a healthy respect for the law, especially in my position—” she stopped, her frown deepening.

  “And what position would that be?”

  “Think you’re pretty clever, huh?” She looked annoyed. “If you must know, I am a secretary.”

  She left that dangling like a carrot. I said, “Okay, I’ll bite. What does being a secretary have to do with your sterling respect for the law?” I took a sip of Glenlivet, watching her over the rim of the glass as she considered her answer.

  She raked her lower lip with her teeth and said, “My job requires a security clearance and even something as little as a misdemeanor might jeopardize that. So, let’s drop it for now.”

  I said, “Let’s not.” I was feeling clever, which usually is a silly if not dangerous notion. “I happen to know something about security clearances and being a secretary with one has little to do with you being familiar with the local firearm laws.”

  Marcie gave me a pitiful eye look and shook her head. “Really, Granger, you’re becoming tiresome.”

  “Answer the question, Miss. Rose.”

  The sigh she gave was heavy with theatrical exasperation. “You think you’ve got me?”

  “I think so.”

  “I can read. You know, newspapers, magazines, newsletters.”

  Have you ever run across a person who always had a quick answer for everything? I had the feeling that Marcie Rose was one of those kinds. I shrugged. “Reading is a useful skill for a secretary to possess.”

  She smiled. “Don’t worry about your gun,” her voice lowered to a whisper on that last word. “—It’ll be returned soon as we get down to the Springs.”

  She paused when our Bavarian waitress appeared, order pad and pencil in hand. We ordered and when Miss Bavaria departed Marcie said, “Now that you know all there is to know about me, how about you?” I detected a hint of playful mockery in her voice. “Are you on vacation?”

  I’d hardly learned anything from Marcie. She was telling me to back off and stop being nosy. Well, it was her business, and although her business had now become my business, I let the remark pass. “I guess you can call it a vacation, a very long vacation.”

  A glimmer of concern came to her otherwise guarded eyes. “You’re out of work?”

  I laughed. “Only temporarily. It’s called a sabbatical.”

  Concern turned to interest. “You’re a teacher?”

  “Does that surprise you?”

  “I wouldn’t have guessed. What do you teach?”

  “Freshmen, sophomores, juniors, and seniors...a few graduate students, although not necessarily in that order.”

  She smiled. “Does this mean I have to call you Doctor Granger now?”

  “Not unless you become one of my students.” I signaled Miss Bavaria with my raised glass. She held up two fingers. I nodded and she trotted off in the direction of the bar. “Actually, I teach biology, when I’m not off doing my own research.”

  “Is that what you’re doing now? Research?”

  “It was my good intentions. It’s what the university assumes I’m doing. Fishing, however, has intruded a bit on good intentions.” I grinned. “My brother owns a cabin west of here near Florissant. He gave me the keys and I came up about a month ago.”

  “From where?”

  “Portales.”

  “Where’s that?”

  “It’s a little eastern New Mexico town. Mostly agricultural. Noted primarily for growing peanuts. There’s a sign on the highway as you drive into Portales from Clovis proclaiming the place to be the Peanut Basin of the Nation. A dubious distinction, don’t you think? Peanuts and Eastern New Mexico University are the primary industries there. I believe the students make up at least half the local population.”

  She laughed, her eyes crinkling in a cute, pixie smile. A pleasant change from the severe, wary side she’d shown up until now. “It sounds like a wonderfully safe life.”

  I frowned and peered at the empty glass in my hand. “A safe life is what I was looking for.”

  “Are those the sober words of a man whose past is too terrible to remember?” There was a hint of melodrama in her voice.

  “I wouldn’t call it terrible,” I said seriously, “but it certainly wasn’t any fun either. Well, in the beginning maybe, when I wasn’t being scared. The planning was fun, and then coming back alive was usually a cause for celebration. Towards the end...” I shook my head, “...it wasn’t fun at all. We just wanted to finish the job and come home, as far away from a jungle as we could get.”

  “Vietnam?”

  “Me and a several thousand other men.”

  She narrowed her view as if trying to gather to a deeper meaning from my words. “Why is it I get the feeling you weren’t soldiering like most of those thousands?”

  I studied her a moment and then made a smirk to lighten the suddenly heavy mood. “Well, I have no idea why you have that feeling, Miss. Rose. Too fertile imagination maybe? An overactive pituitary gland?”

  Marcie leaned her head to one side. “Is that your diagnosis, doctor?”

  “Best I can offer right now.”

  “I get the picture. It’s something you’d rather not talk about.”

  “Now we both have a secret, don’t we?”

  Her expression tightened slightly. “Subject officially dropped. So, how do you manage when you’re away from work? Do you get paid for being on sabbatical, ahem, researching?”

  “Money? Paid? Ha. You see what I’m driving.”

  “You were willing to give the truck away not long ago,” she reminded me.

  “You recall the rate of exchange?”

  “Your life? Did you really think I intended to put a bullet through that broad forehead of yours and get blood all over that nice-looking hair?”

  “In a word. Yes.”

  Marcie Rose stopped smiling and took a sip of her drink. She’d lost the light mood of a moment ago. “Let’s talk about something else.”

  “We can talk about attractive secretaries who run around cold Colorado mountains in March wearing nothing but light, office-type clothes and open toed sandals, being pursued by dangerous gents with rifles.”

  “That’s not a good subject either,” she said flatly, drawing back into her moody cocoon.

  Chapter Four

  Our second round of drinks and the food arrived simultaneously and the conversation changed directions as we arranged napkins, rattled silverware, and got down to the pressing business of filling the empty hole in our midsections. We worked diligently at the job, politely refraining from demonstrating to the few patrons seated about the room how wolfishly hungry we really were.

  By time I’d sopped up the last of the gravy with my remaining scrap of French bread, Marcie was signaling for her third White Russian. I’ve encountered the concoction once or twice. Personally, they are too sweet for my liking. It’s a sneaky drink. The cream acts as a buffering agent, hiding the alcohol in the vodka and Kahlua while they crept up behind you with a cudgel. When you’re tired, and relaxed, as Marcie appeared to be now, it’s easy to sneak past the brain’s forward guard and scramble a few br
ain cells.

  Miss Bavaria brought over Marcie’s drink and turned an inquiring eye toward me. I shook my head and put a palm over the rim of the glass. “I’m driving. But I will have some coffee.”

  Marcie said, “I like a man who knows when to stop, who doesn’t feel it’s macho to keep up with the lady.” I wasn’t sure if I’d been insulted or complimented. “You won’t mind if I indulge myself tonight. I’ve had a bad week.”

  “Go ahead. Indulge.”

  She smiled. “And thank you Mister, err, I mean Doctor Granger.” She was already pretty loose. “Carl always knew when he’d had enough too...” That had been unintentional. When she realized what she’d said she shut her mouth, letting her smile slip. She stared gloomily into her glass, tilting it sideways watching the remains of her drink sag thickly around the inside rim.

  I finished my whiskey. Marcie appeared to be off somewhere, brooding. After a while her blue eyes lifted and peered at me. I had a feeling I wasn’t coming in quite in focus.

  I said, “Who’s Carl?”

  Her head gave a single shake, her eyes heavy. “Just someone I used to know.” The finality in that was hard to mistake.

  “How did he die?”

  “I never said he died.”

  “You didn’t have to say the words.”

  She scowled and the irritation in her voice rose nicely, but not very convincingly. “You teach psychology too? If you must know, he was killed.”

  “An accident?” Talking about it seemed hard for her, but I had the feeling this was something she wanted to tell me—had probably been thinking all evening how to broach it. Maybe it was the reason for her ambitious drinking now? Her dilemma was, it was something she knew she ought to be keeping to herself.

  She gave a short, bitter laugh. “No accident, Granger.”

  “How long ago?”

  Marcie bit her lip and pondered the empty glass she rolled between her palms. “Two weeks.”