Desert Shadows (9781615952250) Read Online Free PDF Page A

fished a pad and pen out of my carry-all and jotted down the other names Owen had given me. That accomplished, I punched the Rev’s number into my cell phone.
    After three rings, the answering machine picked up and I heard the Rev’s warm baritone. “Sorry you missed me, but I’m attending the Southwest Book Publishers Association Expo at Desert Shadows Resort. Starting Friday, I’ll be manning SOBOP’s sales booth at the Festival of the West, at WestWorld. If it’s an emergency, you can call my cell phone at (602) 555-5550. And always remember, Jesus loves you.”
    After the beep, I didn’t leave a message. I just started the Jeep and headed north.
    ***
    WestWorld occupies what used to be empty desert and a few Arabian horse farms. Now the horse farms were gone, and so, almost, was the surrounding desert.
    The massive equestrian complex hosted roping contests, rodeos, polo matches, Western trade shows, and once a year, the Festival of the West. The festival was attended by tens of thousands of folks, both locals and tourists, all eager to gawk at a few bored bison and perhaps even meet a real live tobacco-spitting cowboy or two. For added excitement, the Overland Stage, pulled by teams of wooly-footed Clydesdales, offered rides to the kiddies, and local actors reenacted the Gunfight at the OK Corral for the millionth time. Because of the money to be made with Western nostalgia, anyone who ran a remotely Western-themed business rented a booth at the festival, so it wasn’t surprising that the Southwest Book Publishers Association had signed up, too.
    Upon entering WestWorld’s grounds, I aimed the Jeep toward an empty slot next to a similarly battered pickup truck, but I couldn’t help noticing the rows and rows of yuppymobiles pretending to be work vehicles. As I rolled past a silver Hummer which had obviously never even seen a dirt road, much less a battlefield, I could almost feel the Jeep sneer.
    Once parked, I followed a gaggle of tourists toward the festival entrance, situated midway between two large exhibit halls. A sign over the gate informed me that those who arrived in Western wear got in free, which explained the profusion of Yves St. Laurent cowboys surrounding me. I was clad in my usual black jeans and T-shirt, so the ticket-taker, an overly made-up woman dressed like a nineteenth-century hooker, made me fork over the entrance fee. After I’d given her five dollars, I asked for a receipt, at which point she whipped a Cross pen out of her SuperBra and scrawled one. She added a smiley face wearing a cowboy hat at the bottom.
    â€œHave fun, cowgirl,” she said.
    I tipped an imaginary cowboy hat and entered the nearest hall. Facing me was a maze of stalls offering hand-tooled cowboy boots, Indian baskets, turquoise jewelry, and gaudy paintings of saguaro-sprinkled sunsets. I wandered among them until I found myself in front of a long, book-strewn table flanked by several tall bookcases. A banner draped over the booth declared, SOUTHWEST BOOK PUBLISHING ASSOCIATION—WE WRITE THE WEST .
    â€œLena!” Before I could step back, a big man detached himself from the other people manning the table and enveloped me in his arms. “What’s it been, girl, three months, four?”
    I tried not to pull back too quickly. It wasn’t Reverend Giblin’s fault that I hated to be touched. In my two years with him, he and his wife had been nothing but kind. But when Mrs. Giblin suffered a fatal stroke, Child Protective Services removed me and the other foster kids from his home. The next family CPS placed me with wasn’t half as kind, although they took care never to let their “discipline” show on one of those rare occasions when a social worker dropped by. By the time CPS realized their mistake and moved me to the next home, I had developed malnutrition along with several hairline fractures.
    Bearing up as well as I could at the unwelcome