Chapter 3
Maxim observed the clubhouse door swing open as he stepped out of his car. The wooden structure was in a clearing of white grass in the wild forest. Technically outside Sanctuary's jurisdictional limits, the area was sprawling and unincorporated. Known as Sycamore to the locals, it didn't have any actual borders. It was more like a neighborhood, but one that spanned two counties and stretched into the desert, away from its namesake.
However, because of Santuary's proximity, Coconino County deputies ceded the handling of the motorcycle club to the marshal's office. It was a practical agreement for both departments, even when it proved impractical.
Gaston sauntered onto the deck. He wasn't ecstatic to see the detective. Maxim placed his white panama hat on his head and just shrugged as he approached. He brushed his suit jacket to make sure his gun was comfortably in place as he reached the step.
"This isn't the best time, Detective."
"That's what I said when I got a phone call at six in the morning." Maxim turned and examined the line of Harleys parked in the dirt. He noticed Diego's Triumph Scrambler in line as well, mostly because it was cleaner than the Harleys. "It looks like you have a full house." Maxim hopped up the two steps and peeked in the open door. There was a bustle of movement, as if the club was gearing up for something.
Gaston gritted his teeth. "That's exactly why this isn't a fucking good time."
Maxim feigned shock at the rude welcome. "I guess I'll show myself in then." The detective pushed past the big man, into the small foyer. A hallway stretched to the back alongside a staircase. To the right was the dining room, and to the left was the living room and den. Maxim had been inside this clubhouse once before, when he'd needed Gaston's help locating the previous president. Deborah had become a fugitive, complete with hostages and the threat to kill Diego's sister. Gaston had helped both men, and his cooperation had afforded him and the club a long leash. Now Maxim was hoping that his trust had not been misplaced.
"Clint Dailey James," he announced as he saw the man in a red leather jacket walk by.
The brown beard spun around as he noticed the detective for the first time. "And what's the police doin' here?"
"I was looking for you, actually."
Clint puffed out his chest, as much as he could over his belly, and sidled up to Maxim. His breath reeked of alcohol and vomit, and his eyes were bloodshot. "And how can I help you, Ociffer?" He mispronounced the last word on purpose, with a condescending slant.
"First I'm gonna ask you to put the beer bottle down."
Clint raised it quickly, forcing Maxim to take a step back and put a hand on the gun at his belt, then the man overturned the bottle to his lips. Clint had done it just to make him flinch.
"Settle down," said Gaston, speaking to both of them.
"Sure thing," said Clint. "And as for this here bottle, I don't make a habit of holding on to them once they're empty." Clint flipped the glass over his shoulder and it smashed on the floor behind him. The other club members took note of the drama playing out and surrounded them, except for West, who stayed in the other room.
"Hey Maxim," said Diego, as if this were a friendly visit.
The detective nodded and relaxed his arms again. He was in a room with dangerous people, but they knew better than to attack him. Besides the agreement he had with the Seventh Sons, the last president's mistake had been attacking the police. Gaston wouldn't let that happen again.
"Clint Dailey James," Maxim repeated, reminding everybody he was on official business. "Where were you last night?"
The man chuckled and looked to his brothers. "Well hell if I remember!"
Gaston cut in. "He rode in last night and kicked it at Sycamore Lodge. What's this about?"
"And overnight?"
"He slept here. We all did. Why?"
Gaston was getting more demanding, but the detective didn't want to jump ahead just yet. Even though he knew he wasn't in danger, he suddenly wished he had brought Hitchens with him as backup. The two veterans were wolves affiliated to the blue team.
"I have some business I need to ask about," replied Maxim calmly. "We can be civil around each other. Remember we went hunting for mule deer together last November?"
"Sure do," answered Clint. "Bagged a big one." He stuck his chin out proudly, more at ease. Maxim could tell that Gaston and Diego were still wary.
"Hey," said the detective offhandedly. "You remember that skinning knife you used on the carcass? The one your daddy gave you?"
The beard rose and fell. "Sure do. It never leaves my side."
Maxim smiled. "That's why I'm here. It's come up in an investigation. You mind showing it to me?"
Clint's eyebrows creased and he peered at Gaston. The president nodded and the rotund man started outside to his bike. "Fine then. Them's were good times, but don't think we're friends again. Not after that business with the laundromat."
Maxim smiled and followed the man outdoors. The incident he was referring to was entirely Clint's fault. He'd gotten drunk and methed up and crashed his bike through the glass storefront of Lucky's Laundry. Not so lucky for the store owner, but perhaps so because no one inside had gotten hurt. Hitchens had still arrested him, and Clint added a DUI charge to his jacket. The old biker had treated Maxim as an outsider ever since.
"You didn't get drawn this year, did you?" asked Clint, forgetting about their differences as he thought about hunting again. Gaston and Diego kicked up gravel and dust as they followed. It must have been over eighty degrees already. With the town's high elevation, that was the summer showing its heat.
"No," said Maxim, shaking his head. "Just wondering what your daddy's knife has been up to."
Clint paused when he reached his bike. The man checked the other side, then realization replaced confusion. "Actually, Officer, now that I think about it, I don't own that knife anymore."
"It's Detective. What happened to it?" Maxim checked Clint's Harley himself to see if there were any compartments or bags with a knife. All the other motorcycles in the line were prepped and ready to go, loaded with saddlebags. Clint's Harley didn't have the extra gear. It was clean.
"Uh, sorry," he said. "I just remembered. I was proper sloshed last night—not that I rode my bike in that state. No, Officer, believe me—Detective. I was good and sober when I came back to the clubhouse."
"What happened to the knife, Clint?"
"Pawned it."
Maxim blinked patiently. "You pawned your daddy's custom skinning knife?"
"Had to. Back in New Mexico. For covering legal fees and whatnot." Clint nodded confidently when he added the last part.
"So there'll be a record at the shop you sold it to?"
Clint stuttered. "I don't know. I don't really remember which shop it was, specifically, you see. But I swear I don't have it. You can search me."
"I will." Maxim spun Clint around and patted at his pockets. He checked the legs and arms under the leathers. Keys and a wallet were all he found. But Maxim already knew he didn't have the knife anymore. "Where were you last night, Clint?"
"Sycamore Lodge."
Maxim appealed to the others. "Can anyone else account for the time you spent there?"
Diego and Gaston shook their heads. Clint threw up his hands. "No one knew I was in town yet. I came in from New Mexico last night. Stopped at the Lodge first."
"What time did you leave?"
"I don't quite recall. But you can ask Deborah's girl. She stopped in for a bit and said hi."
Melody Holton. She owned Sycamore Lodge now. She was a club member, once, but it was just an honorary status now. Her mother had been the ousted president. Once Deborah went, Melody decided to focus on the roadhouse. She wouldn't be a useful witness. She was still a Seventh Son in spirit and would back any club member's alibi.
"Clint," said Maxim, "if you don't have the knife, I'm gonna need you to come with me."
"Why?" protested Clint. "That knife's none of my business anymore."
"Hold on," said Gaston. "None of my guys are going anywhere."
"I'm investigating a murder," said the detective plainly. "I'm not trying to get in the middle of your business." Maxim turned back to the suspect and studied his bruises. "How'd you get those?"
Clint turned to Gaston and stuttered. "A fight back home."
"What happened?" asked Diego. "Who got killed?"
"I don't know yet."
"I don't think he did it, Maxim."
The detective put a stern note in his voice. "I didn't say he did one way or the other, but he can help my investigation."
Gaston put his arm around Maxim's shoulder and nodded him aside. Maxim almost brushed it off but decided to go along with it. They walked to the side of the clubhouse, onto a patch of grass. "Listen," said Gaston discreetly, "I really need Clint today. Can he go into the station tomorrow?"
Maxim was firm. "Sorry. His knife was found with the body. It looks bad."
"Fuck, man," blurted out Gaston. "Work with me, here."
"Why?" demanded Maxim. "What are your guys gearing up for?" The detective pointed inside. The club preparation was obvious. "Because if it's anything like what happened last night, I might as well just arrest you now."
"Just normal club stuff," said the big man, shaking off the accusation. "Clint is important to me. He didn't do what you think."
Maxim shook his head. "I can't help you. Our deal protects your club only as long as shit like this doesn't happen. Whether Clint's guilty or not, I would need to answer for not bringing him in. He's coming with me, and you're going to tell him to come peacefully. If you refuse, I'll send out Patrol to keep an eye on the club's activities today. See how well you can manage 'regular club stuff' then."
Gaston sneered. He would cooperate, Maxim knew, but the uneasy peace between the two men was becoming more uneasy.
Chapter 4
Besides City Hall across the street, the Sanctuary Marshal's Office was the oldest building in the town square. It was a brick fossil with cramped quarters that served various municipal functions. The main floor housed the police offices, the top floor was a hospital wing, and enough space was underground to double up as a morgue and a jail. The facilities were all fairly small and saw limited but regular use.
Maxim guided Clint past the desks in the main office. Nine desks were arranged, three-by-three, in the large room. One for every officer in the force. Of course, that was counting the marshal, but he had his own desk in his own private office. Since Sanctuary was a town of only 3,500, the eight men who served under him were enough, and the department was content to let the desk sit idle.
Maxim was surprised that Hitchens was the only officer in the station. He saw the disapproving look on the face of the sergeant as he walked by. He remembered the shitstorm he had created by dragging Seventh Sons into the station before, but the detective had instituted a new deal since then. The motorcycle club was no longer untouchable. They had to be accountable for their actions. And whatever connections they had with the marshal, or his father the mayor, didn't matter.
The detective led Clint into the hallway beside the marshal's office and into an interrogation room. He wasn't a prisoner, or handcuffed, because Gaston had told him to cooperate.
"I'm gonna need a few minutes," said the detective. "You want a soda or something?"
The man plopped down in the plastic chair and slapped his hands on his belly. "I could use some hot wings and a Bud Light."
Maxim rolled his eyes and shut the door behind him, then returned to the main office. He glanced around for the rookie, then noticed the vanilla Frappuccino sitting on Cole's desk. "Gutierrez made it back?"
The sergeant nodded as he approached. "He's in number two with the groundskeeper. Cole's still tied up at the scene."
"Did the ME show, yet?"
"Sure did. You mind me asking what Clint's doing in number one?"
"His hunting knife was found close to the vic. He says he sold it."
Hitchens raised his eyebrows in shock. "That redneck in there? He's a killer for sure, but he preys on the four-legged variety."
"It feels a little off to me too, but meth does some crazy things."
Hitchens sighed. "That boy using again?"
"I don't know yet. I'll see if he'll go for a drug test. Right now it's just a courtesy visit. I think I'll start with the groundskeeper. He's had a hell of a day." Maxim pulled his jacket off and placed it around the back of his chair. Then he tossed his hat on his desk. As he stepped away, Hitchens spoke up.
"Son, why do I feel like we got a whole new can of worms opening up on us?"
Maxim shook his head. "Because bodies like that don't just happen randomly."
The detective entered the second of the station's two interrogation rooms. Gutierrez was in there, wearing his blues, sitting across from the groundskeeper. With Maxim's entrance, the rookie surrendered his seat and leaned against the wall.
"Javier Gonzalez, sir," said the officer, pointing to the groundskeeper. "He's lived in Sanctuary his whole life. Worked the school for the last twenty-two years."
Maxim nodded thanks. "Did you really fucking shit your pants?"
Gutierrez only showed minimal embarrassment. "Yo, I had some
heavy
carnitas last night. Greasy as a mofo. The sergeant wanted me on the scene as fast as humanly possible and I slapped on my uni and left the house without taking my morning dump. Halfway there, I knew I was in trouble. I was running full lights and sirens to that Starbucks, but I didn't make it. I'm talking about serious leakage."
Maxim put his hand up, sorry he had asked. "I'm gonna cut you off right there." Maxim tried to put the strange events out of his mind. It was hard for him, as a detective, to not ask questions. The mind of the rookie was a strange one that Maxim was curious to understand, but he was taking Mr. Gonzalez away from his work. The man would likely take the rest of the day off, but that field would still need tending tomorrow or some other day in the future. He didn't look like the type of guy that got a lot of breaks.
The detective sat on the plastic chair and studied the man across from him. He was disheveled, hair a little too long, bushy mustache. His skin was cracked and darkened from long hours in the sun, and his eyes showed more wear than his probable age. He had strong, calloused hands that were evidence of honest work. Maxim guessed the man was usually stolid but would forever be haunted by what he had seen today.
Maxim shook the man's hand and identified himself. "Ask him how he found the body."
Gutierrez spoke in Spanish and Javier answered, then the rookie translated to English. "He says he was mowing the lawn. Just riding past and it was there."
"Did he see anyone else?"
Javier stared at the table as Gutierrez asked. The groundskeeper took a moment before answering, and when he did, he simply shook his head.
Maxim believed the man was being defensive, but he couldn't pinpoint why. "What did he do then?"
"He didn't even turn off his mower. He just darted to the parking lot and out into the street. His family only has one cell phone, and he leaves it with his wife. He was lucky to flag down Mr. Clean." The rookie sometimes referred to Cole like that. Maxim started putting the pieces together.
"Ask him where his car is."
Gutierrez answered without checking with Javier. "His wife drops him off in the morning." The rookie must have already gotten the information earlier. It showed his knack for investigation.
"When he was dropped off, did he see any cars or people at all this morning?" In response to the rookie, Javier shook his head.
"Did he see a van or a truck parked by the football field?"
Again, a no. That fit Maxim's interpretation of the events, as the crime would have been complete before the groundskeeper ever arrived. Javier didn't know anything. Yet his eyes betrayed something ominous. Fear, maybe.
Maxim leaned back in his chair and yawned. The day had barely started but he'd been without his coffee. Like Gutierrez, the emergency had thrown him off his morning ritual.
The hanging corpse had been partially hidden in its position, obscured by a bushy branch. It was hit or miss whether someone focused on work within the fence would have noticed it, but it wasn't implausible. The detective decided to emphasize the unlikelihood to get Javier to open up.
"The man's cutting the grass," Maxim started, changing the tenor of his voice to imply dissatisfaction whether the words were understood or not, "driving along the fence, looking ahead and making sure not to veer off course, not hit the fence, keep a straight line, and he notices a body behind the trees?" Gutierrez spoke to the groundskeeper as the detective continued. "I find it hard to believe that he discovered the body so quickly without any foreknowledge of it being there."
The rookie paused, unsure if he should indict the groundskeeper with an exact translation of Maxim's words. The detective urged him to finish. When Javier heard the words, he panicked slightly and spouted off exclamations in Spanish.
"He says he had nothing to do with it," translated the rookie. "He's legal. He's worked hard for his family for twenty years." Every statement was hurried as Gutierrez attempted to keep up with the pleas of the man. "Uh, he's always kept his head down. He's never gotten in trouble. He swears. He didn't do anything wrong."
Maxim looked Javier in the eye. "Tell him if he's not telling me one hundred percent of what he knows then he is committing a crime."
The rookie did, and Javier lowered his gaze. Gutierrez spurred him on. Finally, just above a murmur, Javier said, "
Los hombres lobos.
"
The rookie let the words hang in the air as he slowly turned to Maxim. "He said, 'the werewolves.'"
Maxim's face darkened. "Did he see wolves or men?"
Some more Spanish before Gutierrez answered. "Wolves, sir. At first, it was only movement outside the fence. He saw it from across the field and didn't think much of it. When it came time for him to pass by, he looked."
"And he saw wolves by the body?"
"Well, not anymore. He says the animals were spooked by the mower. But then he saw the body. They were eating him." Javier spoke to the rookie in a pleading tone, unsolicited. Gutierrez translated. "He says he didn't say anything because he thought we wouldn't believe him."
The detective nodded. "Tell him it's okay. As long as he explains everything he saw, he'll be fine. Ask him if he specifically saw the wolves chewing on the corpse."
"No," answered the rookie, "he didn't. But he saw the bite marks."
"Did he get a good look at any of the wolves?"
"He thinks there were two or three of them, but they scattered before he got there. Afterward, he only got a close look at one. The baby, he says."
Maxim smiled. "The baby werewolf."
Javier threw his hands up and complained to Gutierrez. "He says he knew you wouldn't believe him."
Maxim patted the man's arm. It wasn't that he didn't believe the groundskeeper. It was simply a matter of interpretation. Sanctuary was a small town, naturally prone to superstition. Especially so with the Seventh Sons in their backyard. When Maxim had first learned that werewolves did in fact exist, he wondered if he'd given enough credit to other supernatural claims in the past. But he called himself an open-minded skeptic. People exaggerated in the face of the unknown, no matter the truth. Just because one thing existed, it didn't mean everything did.
There couldn't have been any werewolves around—it wasn't even a full or new moon. Javier's sighting of a "baby wolf" suggested to Maxim a coyote more than anything else. The common animals were smaller and weaker than wolves. It might take several of them to pull a body down, or rip it in half. The bite marks on the vic ran up the arm to the shoulder, but no higher. That meant the animal wasn't as tall as a wolf.
What made the most sense was that the groundskeeper had witnessed wild animals feeding on a dead body. That somewhat eased Maxim's concerns about the Seventh Sons being involved, but he still had the knife to deal with. And, even worse, that meant he had no other leads. The real murderer was out there without suspicion.
As the detective asked more questions, it became clear that Javier Gonzalez couldn't help the case. Maxim told him to stay away from the school the rest of the day while the crime scene was processed and asked Gutierrez to take him home. Then he decided to get to the real crux of the problem, and stepped into interrogation room one.
Whereas Javier Gonzalez was withdrawn and afraid, Clint James was the opposite. He sat forward aggressively. He was loud and demanding, still drunk from the night before, and had a chip on his shoulder. Which meant that whether or not he had something to hide, he would make the interview miserable. Immediately, he did not disappoint.
"Well here I am," he said, "as a service to you and the marshal's office, and you leave me locked in here like a criminal."
"Still have a penchant for the dramatic, I see," rebuked the detective. "The door wasn't locked and you're not detained. You're just doing your civic duty."
"And fucking glad of it. I'm a pillar of society, I am." Clint attempted to tame his bushy beard back to make himself more respectable. It didn't suit him.
Maxim studied Clint James. He appeared both wild and tired, an aging man who'd found that partying wasn't as fun as it used to be. He had a black welt under his eye. Some scratches on his forearms. He was even missing a patch of hair. "Mind telling me where you got those injuries?"
The biker pressed his lips together and shook his head dismissively. "It was just a little incident in New Mexico."
"And the PD over there could confirm that?"
"I don't see how. I never called them."
"What about the other guy you tussled with? What would he have to say?"
Clint smiled. "That he got his ass whooped."
Maxim nodded and cleared his throat. "Well, I should check with him anyway."
"Good luck. I don't know the guy's name. Never seen him before."
"You expect me to believe that someone with your strength just got in a random fistfight?"
"Hey," said Clint, throwing his hands up. "I held back. I know the rules. Can't let the secret out or the CDC's on my ass. I kept it low profile. In fact, that's why I didn't go to the police." The man smiled at his clever rationalization.
"Just tell me where you were last night," said Maxim, still not bothering to sit down.
"Sycamore Lodge, Ociffer. I had just come from my aunt's house on the outskirts of Bernalillo. That's outside of Albuquerque, to you."
"Stay there a lot?"
"I live there, most times."
"And what prompted your momentous visit to Sanctuary?"
"You getting smart with me, Detective?"
Maxim grinned. "Of course not. I just mean that it looked like the club was gathering for a specific reason."
Clint's eyes wandered around the room, searching for an explanation. "I don't know what you mean. I figured it had been a few weeks since I'd seen my good brothers. I just happened to swing by for a visit, on account of saying hello. But what kind of asshole would I be if I didn't stop at the Lodge first for a pitcher? The MC gets a special discount, you know."
"So you have no specific knowledge of what the Seventh Sons are up to?"
"Didn't I just say that?"
Maxim twirled his hand to indicate that he wanted to move on. "Just get back to the part about the bar. Were you with any of your brothers there?"