I found myself thinking that if I had a few extra million like Dead Ed, I might have been tempted to buy this little ranchette, too.
It was too dark to determine what animals, if any, Dead Ed had kept on his ranch, but he had strung enough barbed wire to contain quite a few head of something. We followed the dirt road up the steep slopes of the hillside, past a big red barn, through a thick stand of woods to a clearing.
Sam said, “That’s Lucy’s car,” pointing to a red turbo Volvo parked next to a Nissan something.
I parked between Lucy’s car and a four-by-four from the Summit County Sheriff’s Office, pulled myself from the driver’s seat, and stretched. Sam got out even more slowly than I. I watched him raise his arms above his head and suggested he might want to tuck in his shirt.
He suggested I might want to fuck myself.
Dead Ed’s ranch house may have been made of logs, but it was definitely not a log cabin. The two-story V-shaped house sat on a prominent rise with exposures to the south and west. I guessed it contained in the neighborhood of four thousand square feet-larger than a cabin, smaller than a mansion.
The black sky above was speckled by a billion stars. I said, “Incredible view up here, don’t you think?”
Sam said, “Yeah. Where is everybody?”
“Maybe Lucy’s inside rustling you up a sandwich. You disappointed? You expected maybe she’d be waiting for you on the porch with a cocktail?”
He ignored me and lumbered up some wide front steps. He pounded on the door with a door knocker that had been constructed from an ice ax.
Lucy answered the door and smiled.
Lucy Tanner was classy, which distinguished her from her partner. Although Boulder had many law enforcement officers who did their job professionally, the city had few cops who could walk the corridors of power and be mistaken for a member. Lucy oozed confidence and grace. Although I’d never asked her, I assumed she chose to be a cop only after ruling out other options available to her, like law firm partner, investment banker, or CEO of some prominent company.
I said, “Hi, Lucy. Nice outfit.” Lucy liked clothes the way Dead Ed liked diesel-powered toys. I knew Sam wouldn’t notice how she was dressed and I knew Lucy felt good when people noticed.
The outfit I was admiring was a one-piece bodysuit of some soft flannel-looking fabric. The places where it might be too tight for a police officer on duty were hidden under a long mustard-colored four-button blazer.
“You really think it works? Sunny and I just went into Dillon to grab some dinner and we stopped at the Donna Karan outlet to look around. I wasn’t sure about this when I first saw it, but she convinced me the colors are good for me. So I picked it up. Can’t beat the price.”
“It works, Lucy. You look lovely. Don’t you think she looks great, Sam?”
Sam grunted.
She turned to face her partner but spoke to me. “He’s hopeless, Alan. Don’t bother. You guys made good time, Sam. Sunny and I just got back here a few minutes ago.”
“Alan mistook I-70 for the Bonneville Salt Flats. Listen, I appreciate the call about this, Luce,” Sam said. He hesitated, stuffed his hands in his pockets. “You know I can’t have been here.”
“I know that, Sam. Don’t worry. Everybody’s cool about you being here.”
“Who is everybody?”
“A Summit County deputy named Larsen. He’s the one who called us; he’s on the ball. And the Robilios’ oldest daughter, Helen. Says everybody calls her Sunny.”
“And she doesn’t know I’m Merritt’s uncle?”
“She thinks you’re a specialist in this kind of thing. You know, like a consultant.”
“And exactly what is ‘this kind of thing,’ Luce?”
Lucy was already walking toward the back of the house. Without turning, she said, “Wing it, Sam. I’m not sure what we have yet.”
“What about me?” I asked.
“You’re Sam’s driver. Hang around the back of the room and act bored. It should be easy for you.”
Twenty-two
“Hello, I’m Sunny Hasan. This is Deputy Larsen, Craig Larsen. You must be the consultant from Boulder. Come in and have a seat. Would you like a drink? Some coffee? The snacks are nothing special, but,” she pointed at bowls of nuts and chips on the plank coffee table, “it’s all that was in the kitchen. Please, everybody help themselves.”
A fire was smoldering in a red granite-faced fireplace that was flanked by two leather sofas of an almost identical hue. A fresh piece of green oak had just been thrown on the grate, and the sap in the wood was escaping in gaseous little bursts that were snapping like a string of tiny firecrackers.
I said hello with a weak wave, and moved to a corner of the huge room, where I settled at a game table. I grabbed a magazine from a stand that was fashioned from the racks of a pair of good-sized bucks, the whole time trying to appear both superfluous and inconspicuous. The magazine I chose was the latest edition of MotorHome.
I was absolutely certain that it was the first time I’d had an opportunity to read MotorHome magazine.
Sam introduced himself to the deputy and to Sunny without revealing his affiliation to law enforcement. Maybe I knew him too well, but I thought he wore his status like a neon-lit COP sign attached to his forehead. Sunny Hasan might be fooled by Sam’s act, but I guessed that Deputy Larsen had been cajoled by Lucy to play along.
Sunny had a wedding ring on the appropriate finger of her left hand, the stone a size considerably smaller than a man of her father’s station might have offered to adorn the finger of his new bride. She wore an outfit that looked every bit as fashionable and new as Lucy’s. I guessed it was another Donna Karan outlet special. Wisely, I thought I would keep my compliments to myself this time.
Sunny was a surprising woman. Dead Ed, her father, had been a defiantly rotund guy with a thick neck and wiry hair in few of the desirable places and many of the undesirable ones. Sunny was a total contrast: small, blond, and cute. Her hair was tied back in a ponytail, and the curve of her hairline had an intriguing asymmetry. Her brand-new Donna Karan special was a short khaki skirt, a white v-neck T-shirt, and a black blazer. I was guessing that Sunny was in her late twenties.
Sam had removed a notepad from one of his pockets and was poised for work. In a soft, seductive voice I’d never heard him use before, he asked, “Now what exactly happened that caused you so much concern?”
Sunny smiled at Deputy Larsen and said, “Shall I begin or do you want to?”
I couldn’t figure out Larsen’s agenda. Was he hitting on Sunny or was he just bored enough with the alternatives in his life that this seemed like a reasonable way to spend an evening? He nodded politely to Sunny and said, “You go right ahead. Go on.”
She perched herself on the arm of one of the sofas before she started. “I’ve been in Denver with Mom since…everything happened. You know, the things with my father. George-he’s my husband-and I live in Grand Junction. After Dad’s funeral, George had to go right back home for work. I didn’t need to be back so quickly, and I decided to take a few days here at the ranch to, I don’t know, consider things, reflect. Grieve, whatever. So I said good-bye to Mom this morning, took George to the airport in Denver, and drove up here.