Poisonfeather (Gibson Vaughn #2)(58)

“Instead of threatening us, who live here, you need to go on over to the hotel and—” Old Charlie began.

“And what?” the sheriff shot back. “Arrest them for pissing you off? For renting more rooms than they need? Conspicuous consumption isn’t a crime, last I checked.”

“What about the women?”

Gibson hadn’t been the only one to note the steady stream of young working girls being escorted, two at a time, up to the fifth floor.

The sheriff shrugged at this too. “No law against that either.”

“They’re prostitutes. Everyone knows it.”

“Everyone knows? Well, hell, if everyone knows, then I should probably go arrest them,” the sheriff said with a patented shake of his head.

The tension in town continued to rise.

On the second day, Swonger lost contact with Truck Noble. A dozen text messages went unanswered without a word. It didn’t surprise Gibson. Noble had grown either tired or suspicious of Swonger’s insistence. Probably read it as desperate, which they were. Why would Noble risk exposure for a one-off deal that wasn’t going to see him retire to an island? Gibson said as much and left Swonger and Lea to argue among themselves.

It was past two a.m., but Gibson didn’t feel much like sleeping, so he walked down Tarte Street, hoping the night air would give him fresh eyes. He didn’t see anyone on the street and liked having the town to himself. His evening stroll didn’t last long, however, before Sheriff Blake’s cruiser pulled alongside.

“Evening, Sheriff. Can I help you?”

“Come on and get in. I’d be appreciative if you spared me making this difficult.”

The cruiser came to a halt, and Gibson heard the doors unlock.

“So don’t ask you what this is all about or if I’m in some kind of trouble? Just get in the back?”

“Like I said, I’d appreciate it.” Blake’s hand rested lightly on the grip of his service weapon.

Gibson looked up and down Tarte Street, suddenly wishing for a little more foot traffic. Whatever Blake wanted, it wasn’t official. Gibson felt curious to know if his suspicions were correct. He tried the passenger door.

“In back is good,” the sheriff said.

Gibson did as he was asked, and the doors locked behind him. The cruiser made a U-turn and drove back up Tarte Street. They stopped in front of the hotel. He’d been in the cruiser for less than a minute. Long enough to rattle him, which he guessed was the point.

“Inside,” Blake said as the doors unlocked.

In the lobby, a pair of men from the fifth floor patted him down and directed him to the oval parlor off the lobby. Gibson recognized the man at the chess table as the one who’d been reading a newspaper in the lobby the day he’d checked in. Gibson sat opposite, the board empty—not that they weren’t playing a game.

“I wonder . . . Will we get off on a good foot?” the man purred in a soft Mexican accent. “My name is Emerson Soto Flores.”

“Robert Quine,” Gibson said.

“It is good to meet you, Mr. Quine. Due to the nature of our visit in Niobe, I’ve taken the time to familiarize myself with all the hotel’s unusual guests. So many of them . . . One is tempted to hypothesize that Niobe must be very special to attract so many tourists at the same time. An exhibit or a festival perhaps. Or perhaps a celebrity. A man worth traveling a long way to meet.”

“Perhaps.”

“But such a famous man won’t have time to meet with everyone. So it will come down to who most deserves an audience with this man. A difficult question to answer, hence my interest in the guests here at the hotel. And, if I am honest, most of them are undeserving, their interests too prosaic. This is why you are here, Mr. Quine. Because there is no Mr. Quine, and that concerns me.”

With a disappointed flourish, the man placed a silver disk about the size of a hockey puck on the table. “Do you know what a rare-earth magnet does?”

Gibson’s heart sunk. “Yeah. I do.”

He’d stashed his real driver’s license in his hotel safe. Rare-earth magnets were incredibly powerful devices that could break into the average hotel safe in about ten seconds. To illustrate the point, Emerson Soto Flores slid Gibson’s driver’s license across the chessboard.

“You have a very interesting history, Mr. Vaughn. I enjoyed reading about your exploits on the Internet. Especially Atlanta. However, I could not see any connection between you and Charles Merrick.”

“Are you the fifth floor?” Gibson asked.

“No, but I speak for her.”

“And what does she say?”

“She says that no one has come farther to see Charles Merrick. Anyone who attempts to interfere with her appointment will regret it.”

“Does that pass for a threat where you’re from?”

“Where I’m from we don’t make threats, but this is the nature of women, don’t you agree?”

“We must know different women,” Gibson said.

“No. Women believe in nothing but talk. She hopes you will take her threat seriously.”

“And what do you believe?”

“I believe I will have to kill you all,” Emerson said with such casual conviction that Gibson’s mouth went dry.

“So why bother delivering her message?”