Chapter 13

Valerie Boren-Odell, 1990

I have studied personalities. It was part of an officer's training and work and I know human nature for by watching a man or knowing him for two or three days I can tell if he can be trusted or if he will bear watching.

—George Lewis Mann, 1937, aide to US marshal, Indian Territory. Indian-Pioneer Papers Collection, interview by Grace Kelley.

The vintage sandstone home looks like it belongs on a postcard rather than across the street from an out-of-business auto repair shop. A pack of adorable black-and-white border collie puppies frolic under a sycamore tree in the fenced yard, which lends to my conviction that I'm at the right place. Curtis Enhoe's house appears as orderly as an accountant's desk, everything clean and tidy.

As weird as it is to show up here uninvited, every time I've called I've gotten a recording about puppies for adoption. Leaving a message seemed awkward, so here I am. I don't want to let this thing with Braden Lacey drag on any longer. Four more days have gone by with no progress. Joanie from the café left me a message yesterday, saying that Braden had missed another weekly visit with his sister, and she wondered whether I'd gotten in touch with Curtis. For reasons I don't want to contemplate, she wanted me to know she didn't mean it when she told me to watch out for him, in regards to Officer Enhoe. Curtis is really a good guy, and about my age, and has been divorced a long time, and the girl he was married to was so citified and spoiled she would've gone running home to her daddy no matter who she was with.

Next time I see Joanie, I will definitely let her know that my interest is job related only, but for now I'm reaching out wherever I can to pin down the facts regarding Braden's whereabouts and welfare. I've burned through every search mechanism available: department of motor vehicles and National Crime Information Center, state resources, county sheriffs' departments, and municipal jurisdictions regionally. Not a hit anywhere. Braden isn't in jail. He hasn't gotten a speeding ticket. He's not in a hospital. No one has filed a missing person's report on him, or for that matter, his grandmother. The powers that be at our county sheriff's department are confident that if Alton Parker vouched for the situation, I can take that as gospel.

I ran across one of Parker's crews out working on a culvert along the road and asked a few questions of the three men. The general response was Braden is flighty and unreliable.

"The boy's got some issues, y'know?" one guy said, winking at me while pretending to toke a joint. "He'll turn up when he feels like it and Parker'll hire him back. Family's friends, y'know? We been tryin' to line the boy out." Covertly, he cast a grin at his cohorts, and then they went back to leaning on their shovel handles.

"We find him, we'll let him know a good-lookin' rangerette's after him," another worker chimed in. "That oughta flush him outta the woods."

The innuendo was as galling as the dreaded rangerette. Rangerettes do dance routines and baton tricks in parades.

Locking my fingers around my duty belt, I resisted the urge to step closer and say, Hey, speaking of weed, I think I just caught a whiff of something. That rangerette sense of smell, you know? You got anything in your pockets that shouldn't be there?

I let it go instead. I was upwind of them, and couldn't really get a bead on the smoky-sweet scent. The guys being Alton Parker's people, I didn't want to make accusations and be wrong.

With all my other efforts coming up empty, my little blue puppy paper slip and Curtis Enhoe seemed like the best possibility left. He came across as a straight shooter in our brief conversations. Maybe even a nice guy. He knew the Blackwell family and had offered some concern about their situation. I didn't think he'd mind my catching him with a few questions.

Now I'm feeling awkward about stopping by, and find myself reconsidering whether this is an unwarranted intrusion on his personal time. Officer Enhoe ends my mental debate by appearing on the porch in his gray-and-black uniform, a soda in one hand, chips in the other, and his patrol hat sandwiched loosely under an elbow.

Dropping my flat hat onto my head to backhandedly indicate that this is an official call, I proceed to the antique garden wire fence, where he and I meet up. He rests his elbows on the gate but doesn't open it. "Joanie called me yesterday." His preemption catches me by surprise. "Said you were still trying to track down information about Budgie Blackwell and her grandkids."

"I am." I don't want to contemplate Joanie acting as a go-between. The last thing I need is an amateur matchmaker tromping around my investigation. "You heard anything?"

"Possibly."

Squinting as the midday sun presses under my hat brim, I wonder at his answer. Is he intentionally being coy? Has Joanie dropped some unwelcome hints about me? Or is there a territorial thing going on here? Federal law enforcement, tribal, and local don't always mesh. "And?"

"I did some checking, but I didn't come up with much." He runs a hand over his scrub brush hair and every last strand falls into exactly the same configuration. "I called a friend whose land neighbors Budgie Blackwell's place down in Antlers, asked him if he'd heard anything about her. He said no. He wondered if I knew where or how she was. The way he told it, old Mrs. Blackwell and those two grandkids were there, and then they weren't. At first, the neighbors assumed they went to visit family, or to a funeral. Budgie knew a lot of people in Oklahoma City from her politics days, and she had a couple sisters around Tulsa someplace—they might've passed on by now, though. Budgie kept pretty private about family stuff, especially after her daughter took up drugs and lowlife boyfriends and left Budgie with the two grandkids to raise. Jade's issues caused a lot of embarrassment and lost Budgie an election. It's hard when you're a well-known name in town and your life goes wrong. People make hay of it, you know?"

A shadow flickers over him—empathy, sympathy, the sting of an old wound? Was that how it was for Curtis when the citified,spoiled wife went back to her daddy? People made hay of it?

"Last time I saw Jade," he goes on, "she was getting hauled out of the Choctaw Labor Day Fest in Tuskahoma, so stoned she couldn't see up from down. Sydney was a little thing, and Braden was a half-grown kid. There was a boyfriend involved, biker dude…and not the harmless type, either. First time I'd ever seen somebody hopped up on crystal meth. It took four guys to get cuffs on him. All the while, there was Braden, maybe ten or eleven, holding his little sister and bawling his eyes out. It was a sad deal."

"The worst kind." I picture the scene, even though I'd rather not. "When the kids are parenting each other, it tells you everything you need to know about the adults." Parks aren't immune to domestic drama. No place is. "Given that history, though, do you think Braden would leave his sister so he could go on a recreational junket in the woods? And while she's at a place like—" I bite back my critique of Myrna Wambles. "In an emergency foster situation? I mean, Sydney seems convinced that Braden was working to earn money and get her out of there."

One dark eye squints shut. Tiny crinkles line the rim. I form the impression that Officer Enhoe is someone who laughs a lot in his off-duty life. "You've got to be careful about investing too much in what Sydney says." He adds a rueful chuckle. "I ran into her when I visited vacation Bible school to see a couple of my nieces singing, and she told me you were going to make her a ranger helper for the summer and she'd ride around with you in your truck."

"She said that?"

"She was convincing, too." He adds a smirk. "That kid'll make a good living in sales someday. Or politics, like her grandma."

"Sounds like it." I don't know whether to be offended or amused.

"She also told me her brother has a treasure map, and as soon as they get the chance, they're going to go dig up the treasure and have all kinds of money."

"She told me something similar. But aren't they already well off…if they own all that land?"

Curtis shrugs. "Maybe. Maybe not. Lots of these old families have had their places since the tribal land was allotted into parcels eighty-five, ninety years back, or since homestead times, but there's not much ready cash coming in, especially if there's no oil and gas money. The surface brings in some grazing or leasing for cattle or hay. It's hard to make a living that way these days."

"I see." I'm reminded again of what an outsider I am. The tumbledown houses and sagging trailers around here tell a story. I just haven't wanted to hear it.

"Everything looks easier from a distance." He hangs his hat on the gatepost and fishes up a puppy that's tugging on his trouser leg. "You stand up on one of those overlooks, stare out over miles, it's like staring at a painting. Rich grass and timber…except for the clear-cut patches, that is. You spend a little time, focus in, you'll find the wide view is a lot easier than the narrow reality."

The words are profound enough that I find myself studying him while he bunches the fluffy black-and-white bundle under his chin, and croons, "You little rat. You eat one more uniform, you're outta here."

Glancing up, he catches me…staring. I quickly shift my attention to the puppy, afraid Officer Enhoe will see the deeper question running through my head. Where does that perspective come from? Who are you?

I take up the puppy's case instead. "How can you talk that way to something so cute?"

"You get good at it after a while. It's time for these guys to go." He tries to offer the puppy over the fence while it wriggles in his oversized hand. "Here, you want him?"

"Oh no. No no no no no, nooooo." Lifting both palms, I retreat a step. "Joanie pointed out the puppies flier when I was in the café with my son. He hasn't shut up about it since."

"A boy needs a dog."

"Not this boy. Not right now anyway."

"These'll be good dogs…well, at least half, anyway. Their mama's a peach. Found her wandering around a convenience store a couple months ago. Not sure what the father is, but she's a full-blood border collie, or mostly. Dumped, I guess. Nobody ever came to claim her." He nods toward a weary-looking black-and-white dog trying to catch a nap under the front porch while puppies pester her from all angles.

"Poor girl." She lifts her head when I say girl, as if that's what she's used to being called. "I don't understand how people do that, just walk away from something instead of taking care of it."

"Me either." Curtis's face sobers, then he dangles the puppy so that its fat little rear swings back and forth over the gate. "They're really soft."

I cross my arms, shut my eyes, and shake my head. "If I pet it, I'll want it."

"That's the idea." When I crack an eyelid, his face and the puppy's are side by side. They're both grinning at me.

I can't help myself. I chortle, "S-stop."

"But it's working, isn't it?" All of a sudden, he has the impish look of the class clown in high school. I never would've guessed this to be part of his personality.

"Definitely-y-y…" I draw out the word, and I know I shouldn't because it sounds too familiar, or friendly, or maybe even flirty. Women in the military and law enforcement must resist blurring those lines. Always. He may be trying to blur the lines. He may be just a friendly sort of person. I have no way of knowing. "Not. Sorry, because I'd love one, but we're still in temporary housing at the Lost Pines Tourist Court. No place for a puppy."

"Mama dog's adoptable, too. She's low maintenance. And she loves kids—boys especially…about…yea high."

He means Charlie.

The handheld radio on my belt breaks in before I'm forced to produce an answer. "Five-four-nine…seven hundred. Five-four-nine…seven hundred. Ten-eighteen. You out there?"

Dispatch is routing an urgent call my way? Everyone else must be out of range or have their radios turned off, because nothing that important ever comes to me.

On the other end, Mama Lu is uncharacteristically breathless.

Grabbing the radio, I respond, "Seven hundred…five-four-nine, go ahead."

I listen, vaguely aware of Curtis leaning closer as Mama Lu reports, "Somethin' of a critical nature that needs to be seen now. Right now." A few things aren't to be spoken of over airwaves that can be picked up by anyone with a scanner. Dead bodies are top of the list. Reporters and curiosity seekers are complications you don't need while processing a death scene. Mama Lu goes on to do an impressive job of covertly letting me know that the problem was reported by off-trail hikers along a backwater not far from the waterfowl refuge. I'm snatching the notepad from my shirt pocket and trying to get my pen to work while she spills out a slew of details as if she were describing a live suspect. "You'll be looking for a male, no shirt, camo shorts, missing his shoes, at least from what they could tell at a distance. They got out of there pretty quick. It was a bad deal. Poor thangs."

Mama Lu's drawl stretches the news like chewing gum. Then she apologizes for sending this to me, but she hasn't been able to raise any of the guys, except "…our summer boy, Roy, but he's not certified, and the new fella, Edwin, but he's at home. He wouldn't know where to go anyhow. He just started last week."

My jaw stiffens at the fact that Mama Lu feels compelled to apologize for asking me to do my job. It's even harder to abide coming over the radio, and in front of a fellow law enforcement officer. "But I called both of them," Mama Lu assures me. "And I'll get them up there soon's I can, with supplies. The hikers will meet you at the trailhead. They're pretty shook up, but they'll tell you where to go, hon."

I clutch my pen hand over my forehead. "Ten-four. I'm ten-seventy-six from Talihina."

"All ri-i-ight, hon…" Lu's uncertainty echoes off every word.

"Five-four-nine, out." I shut down the conversation before she can call me hon one more time.

"Mind if I tag along on this one?" Curtis asks. He has soundlessly deposited the puppy and slipped out the gate. His posture is all business.

When I don't offer an immediate affirmative, he hesitates. "Not trying to get all over your turf, but I've got a bad feeling I know who that might be."

My mind speeds immediately to Braden Lacy. Blood drains from my face, hands, feet.

Curtis's head tilts as if he's wondering at my reaction, but he doesn't inquire. Instead he says, "I'm missing a motorist from a couple weeks back. Some local boys got it into their heads they could drive through a flooded low-water crossing. Two were enrolled Choctaw Nation. Two weren't. We pulled a passenger out of the front seat, still belted in the truck, drowned. Plucked one from a tree downstream. One made it to the bank on his own. Still haven't found the driver. Truth, I was hoping he ran off somewhere and he's been staying gone on purpose. I know the family. They'll be pretty broken up if it's him."

"Man, that's hard. I'm sorry." Drowning calls are tragic in any number of ways, the worst being that the victims frequently come in multiples and try as we might, we can't always locate the bodies. "Crossed my mind it could be Braden Lacey. We've had some serious rains lately, and that's down water from where he left his car."

"I hope you're wrong." Curtis meets my gaze, and a taste of grief passes between us, a brief sensation like a scent on the wind—one potent enough that it harbors for an instant in your mouth. As quickly as it's there, both of us close ourselves to it. There's no other choice.

"We'll find out." I turn toward my patrol vehicle.

"Behind you," he says, and in truth I'm glad. Whatever we find in that backwater, it won't be pretty.

My mind shifts to clinical mode because that's how it's done. Get to the scene, secure the scene, process the scene. Photos, measurements, grid, notes, sheriff's personnel, body bag, transport to morgue, death notification, incident report.

Step-by-step, like marking off a checklist. You can't let yourself slide down the well of imagining your own eyes staring blankly skyward as that sturdy zipper closes out the light, the air, the world. You can't let yourself picture your family receiving the news. You must not contemplate the fragile veil between life and death, clear like glass, so that you can be face-to-face with it, and never even know.

Under the porch, the patchwork dog lifts her head and looks my way. Rising, she moves about the yard protectively gathering her wandering young, as if even she senses the lifting of the veil.