pathogens were floating in the air. After a quick good-bye to Cowan she was walking down the hallway when her cell phone rang in the pocket of her uniform shirt.
She flipped it open and smiled at the number.
“Hey! You on break?” she asked.
“Yep. You busy?”
“I was holding some guy’s hand.”
“Should I be jealous?”
“He was dead. He’s not much of a threat,” she said.
“I don’t think normal people have conversations like these.”
Josie could hear the smile in his voice and laughed. “I never promised you normal. What’s your schedule today?”
“I’m coming home early. I miss you.”
“You’re coming home because you miss me, or because the conference sucks?”
“You should learn to accept a compliment at face value. I’m also coming home because today’s lectures don’t apply to me. It’s corporate accounting. Not exactly my thing.”
She smiled, happy just to hear his voice. “No, Artemis doesn’t really qualify as a corporate kind of town.” Josie waved good-bye to Maria, who buzzed her out into the lobby area of the jail. “Want to meet at the Tamale for supper?” She walked outside, stood under the awning, and saw she wouldn’t need her umbrella.
He groaned. “I was hoping for a home-cooked meal.”
“Ramen soup?”
“Sounds delicious.”
“I’ll see you about six at my place,” she said.
“Perfect.”
“Hey,” she said before they hung up. “I miss you too.”
The downpour that she had walked through upon arriving at the jail had turned into a sprinkle. The sun was still buried in thick gray clouds, but a reprieve from the rain would be nice. She decided it was time to have a talk with Enrico Gomez.
SEVEN
Josie drove south of the courthouse to the San Salba Pawn Shop, located between the Family Value Store and the Pay-Day Quick Loans. San Salba was owned by Carlos Gomez, but his grandson, Enrico Gomez, ran the business. Josie could forget most of what she saw as a police officer, but crimes committed against old people and kids stayed with her. A year ago, after a two-day party in the living quarters behind the pawn shop got out of control and turned violent, Enrico’s grandfather arrived to restore order. Enrico shoved his grandfather, an eighty-year-old man, down a short flight of steps, causing him to be sent to the hospital. Mr. Gomez had refused to press charges. Josie had worked the case and watched Enrico walk out of the police department with the same arrogance as when he entered.
The rain had ended by the time Josie pulled her jeep in front of the pawn shop. The street was slick with streams of thin mud running across the road. Puddles of water covered the ground around the storefronts, but she knew that with the next deluge the puddles would turn into wide swaths of running water flowing over the already saturated ground. The depth of the running water in the arroyos was deceptive and could carry a car away in a matter of seconds. She made a mental note to check in with the sheriff on the current conditions of the county roads after she was finished with Enrico.
Josie saw the old man standing beside a burro in front of the pawn shop. Several men still rode burros through town rather than walking or driving. Josie liked the nod to the past, although some of the townspeople found the animals annoying and the occasional mess they deposited usually led to a rant in a letter to the editor in the local weekly newspaper.
Mr. Gomez was feeding slices of apple to the burro, his hands holding the animal’s reins loosely, his head turned to the store. Despair settled around the old Mexican like a wool blanket. Josie had talked with him at length about his safety, about the need to lock the boy up before he spun completely out of control, but Mr. Gomez refused to listen. It wasn’t fear that kept him from pressing charges; the fear had been worn out of him long ago. It appeared to be misguided loyalty to his grandson that kept the man silent. And Marta’s daughter thought she was in love with this kid. Josie wondered again at the wisdom of having kids of her own.
Still sitting in her jeep, she looked up the unpaved street, at the burro and the wrinkled old man beside him, at the overcast sky and ratty storefronts, and the picture appeared like a gray smudge from sky to earth with no visible horizon line. She wondered how the same characteristics that gave the desert its beauty