“Meaning then you know where not to look.”
“It also tells you something about the person who put the string in your hand, too.”
“But maybe you have the pilot’s name?”
“I heard that a guy named Gilliland would fly any cargo out of Mexico, but that he crashed and was killed seven or eight years ago. The only thing anyone knew about him was that he had a brother named Norman Gilliland who lived in the Sawtooth Wilderness close to Lowman.”
She stared at him, suddenly uneasy; after a moment, she realized why. “So no one knew anything about the pilot, but all of a sudden someone remembers his brother’s first name and exactly where he lived? That’s very specific knowledge for someone who didn’t know anything else about the pilot.”
He gave her an approving glance. “You might make a pretty good tracker yourself. You have good instincts.”
She knotted her fists. “This is another wild-goose chase, isn’t it? Why are we even bothering?”
He paused. “ ‘Another’?”
“That’s what I’ve been doing for ten years, running in circles and getting nowhere.” She stared out the window, her jaw set.
“Like someone’s been feeding you false information?”
Slowly she turned her head to look at him. “You think that’s it? I’ve been deliberately led away from the right track?”
“You’re too smart and too good at what you do for it to be otherwise. When it’s someone else’s kid, you have damn good luck finding them, don’t you?”
Mutely she nodded. She had an almost eerie knack for success, as if she could put herself in the mind of a lost child or runaway and figure out where they’d gone. That had made it doubly frustrating for her, that she could find other children but not her own child.
“That’s another string I can follow,” he said. “Maybe I’ve been asking the wrong questions. Maybe I should ask who’s been telling people to give you the wrong answers.”
She really had been chasing in circles all these years, and someone had made certain she stayed in the same rut by dangling a carrot in front of her nose. The only real lead she’d ever had was the one that had taken her to Guadalupe that night when Diaz was there, and she had no idea who her informant had been. Nor had Diaz ever found out, or he would have told her. On second thought—“Did you ever find out who tipped me that you’d be in Guadalupe?”
“No.”
Another mystery, but evidently this one was in their favor. She was having a hard time dealing with this new slant on all the frustrations and dead ends, the constant rise of hope only to have it dashed on the rocks. She could understand if no one had told her anything, just stonewalled her, but to deliberately have her chasing wild story after wild story smacked of a deep malevolence.
She was so mired in thought she didn’t realize they’d stopped in front of a small hotel until he opened the door and vaulted out. By the time she got her purse hooked on her shoulder and her own door open, he was there, reaching up to grasp her waist and lift her out of the seat. He set her on the ground in front of him, hemmed in by the truck, the open door, and his body. There were a good six inches between them, but abruptly she felt blasted by his body heat, carrying with it the warm, clean smell of his skin. He hadn’t shaved; at least two or three days’ growth of beard stubbled his jaw. She wanted to reach up and stroke his face, feel the bristles against her palm.
“Don’t let it get you down,” he said. She struggled to pull her mind back to reality. “Misdirection takes money and influence. Knowing that gives me another string. Hell, I’ve almost got a whole ball of yarn now.”
She managed a smile, and he turned to lift her bag out of the truck bed. He led the way inside, past a small reception area, where the man on duty gave them a cursory glance, then went back to what he was doing. Everything was clean and well maintained, including the smallish elevator, which arrived with a smooth whooshing sound.
Diaz pushed the button for the third floor, and after the doors closed and the elevator began gliding upward, he said, “Your room number is 323; I’m in 325.” He fished in his pocket and pulled out an electronic door card, which he handed to her. “Here’s your card. Take a left out of the elevator.”
He took both her Pullman case and carry-on bag, while she walked ahead of him and unlocked the door to room 323. The heavy curtains over the windows were closed so the room was dark, and she flipped the light switch. It was a standard hotel room, clean and unimaginative, with a king-sized bed, a twenty-five-inch television in an armoire, an easy chair with an ottoman, and another chair at a desk. The connecting door to the next room stood open, revealing a mirror image of her room.
Maybe he walked in his sleep.
“Where do you want this?” he asked, indicating her heavy suitcase.
“On the bed. I’ll dig out my clothes and be with you in a minute.”
“I’ll wait outside.” He left by her door, and Milla hurried to unzip her suitcase and search through it for her jeans, socks, and sneakers. Three minutes later she grabbed her purse, put her room card in it, and was out the door.
They retraced their steps to the parking lot. He boosted her into the truck, and as she buckled herself in, she said, with a touch of irritation, “Why did you get a truck so high I need a stepladder to get into it?”
“Where we’re going, we’ll need the extra clearance.”
She gaped at him. “What are we doing, stump-jumping?”