The Exiled Read Online Free PDF Page A

loans at first, but the amount kept growing.”
    “What’s his name?”
    “Bob. Bob Sims.”
    “Do you know where he lives?”
    “No, but I know where you can find him. Up on the hill. At the casino.”
    “Describe him.”
    “Average height. Midsixties. No one would call him slender. Wears a jet-black toupee that’s too small for his head. And he dresses the way Europeans think Americans dress—button-down Hawaiian shirts, the louder the better. And cowboy boots with a snakeskin design.”
    “You’d make a good cop,” Raney said.
    “I doubt it.”
    “You’re sure there’s been nobody else?”
    “She was talking with a guy online. A schoolteacher up in Albuquerque. I don’t think they ever met face-to-face.”
    “Thank you. You’ve been a big help.”
    “I’m glad,” she said. “Now tell me.”
    He told her. The bunker. The bodies. The missing coke. He left out the padlock, the fact that they’d been caged down there, maybe for weeks.
    Clara stood, slammed her glass on the counter.
    “Jesus fucking Christ,” she said. “The danger he must have put her in.”
    Did Raney catch a hint of acting? He pushed the thought away, then wondered why he was pushing it away.
    “One more question: Did Mavis ever say anything about Jack’s side business?”
    “No,” she said. “I had no idea. And I’m sure Mavis didn’t, either.”
    Raney left his card on the coffee bar.
    “If you think of anything else,” he said.
    He turned to let himself out, found an older woman poised to ring the bell. A skinny, redheaded boy—five, maybe six—gripped her free hand. Raney looked back at Clara.
    “My son,” she said. “And Mrs. Hardin, his tutor.”
    Raney unlocked the door, held it open.
    “Obliged,” Mrs. Hardin said.
    As they moved past, the boy reached out, ran an index finger across Raney’s badge.
    “A lawman,” Mrs. Hardin said. “What do you think about that, Daniel?”
    Daniel answered with a series of swift and fluid gestures, second nature to him, mesmeric to Raney—as though the boy were performing a flash ballet with his hands.
    “He wants to know why you wear the badge on your belt and not your chest.”
    Raney pulled it off, thumbed the clip.
    “So dum-dums like me don’t stab ourselves,” he said.
    Daniel signed again.
    “He’s asking if it’s real.”
    “Of course it’s real,” Clara said. “How about a hug for your mother?”
    She crouched, arms spread. Daniel ran, leaped, knocked her off balance.
    “Show some restraint, child,” Mrs. Hardin said.
    Raney excused himself, slipped outside.

6
    T he dinner crowd was gone, the diner nearly empty. He took a booth in the back, between the decorative jukebox and the hallway leading to the bathrooms. The waitress on duty looked like she’d spent the first fifty years of her life smoking cigarettes while standing under a hot sun. She came walking slowly toward him, backlit by the open door.
    “Where you from, darling?” she asked.
    He’d been out West almost two decades and still the locals knew at a glance. It was freeing, in a way: Raney could make up any past he liked.
    “I have a place near the Arizona border,” he said. “Just outside the Gila Forest.”
    “That ain’t what I asked.”
    He smiled.
    “New York, originally. What about you?”
    “Drifted west all the way from Granby, Texas. There ain’t too many places this town improves upon, but Granby makes the cut. Anyway, what can I get you?”
    “Roast chicken and a full pot of coffee,” Raney said. “I’ll be working late tonight.”
    “You bet. I’ll brew some fresh.”
      
    He pulled out a small pad and pencil, drew a rough map of the crime scene, placing stick-figure gender symbols where the victims/perpetrators lay. He imagined their last hours, their last moments, starting with Jack. Did the husband suspect the wife? He must have, but he must also have believed she did it to frighten him, teach him a lesson. Soon he’d hear the door lift open, look up