Voodoo Ridge

He strode toward me angrily, half a cookie stuffed in his mouth, his big belly jiggling under his polo shirt.

“That airplane was ancient history. It didn’t matter to anybody. If you hadn’t spotted it, my nephew would be alive today, and I wouldn’t be getting telephone calls from my hysterical sister every twenty minutes. Do you have any idea how much trouble you’ve caused, how much damage?”

“Actually, I do.”

He turned and stormed back to his office, slamming the door behind him.

Whoever it was who’d called me to say he was holding Sava

Marlene sat down at her desk and opened the top drawer, revealing an impressive array of candies, cookies, and bags of potato chips. She unwrapped an Almond Joy.

“You mentioned to me yesterday that Chad and Gordon were close,” I said, knowing that Priest couldn’t hear me with his door closed. “Doesn’t seem to me like there was a whole lot of love lost between the two of them.”

The receptionist glanced nervously in the direction of Priest’s door and crammed half the candy bar into her mouth. “Gordon puts on a big front,” she said.

She offered me the other half of the Almond Joy. I declined.

“I’m sorry,” she said, stuffing the half I’d turned down into her mouth. “I get really hungry when I’m sad or nervous.”

“You don’t owe me any explanations, Marlene.”

“Gordon’s really a big softy. He knows he loved Chad. He gave him a chance when nobody else would.”

“I heard he raises Australian shepherds.”

“Not raise. Breeds. For money.” Marlene licked some chocolate from her fingers.

I asked her why Priest was interested in that particular breed of dog.

“Why not golden retrievers or labradoodles?”

Marlene cocked her head, thinking. “You know, I’ve never thought to ask him. Are you interested in getting one?”

“Someday maybe. I don’t know.”

She brightened. “Speaking of beautiful, where’s your beautiful girlfriend?”

I probably should have told her the truth — one more set of eyes looking for Sava

“She’s around,” I said, “somewhere.”

Marlene laughed like I’d just made a joke. “Well, I’m looking forward to seeing her again — only this time, with a big fat wedding ring on her finger.”

The ring was to have been a surprise. The day before we flew to Lake Tahoe, while Sava

“Do I mind?” she whispered to me excitedly, careful to not let Sava

“I have no clue. How much do rings go for these days?”

“Considering the price of gold? More than you’ve probably got. What happened to the ring you bought her the first time, you don’t mind me asking?”

“She heaved it off the Golden Gate Bridge in the middle of an argument.”

“Making a statement. Nice. I always pawned my bling. Why throw good money after bad, am I right?” She reached up and patted my face. “Don’t you worry. I’ll pick you out a nice ring, bubby — she can always return it if it doesn’t strike her fancy. Pay me back when you can.”

The ring was still sitting in my duffel bag, in a purple velvet box. My plan had been to pretend on our drive to the wedding chapel that the idea of a ring had simply slipped my mind — just to get a rise out of Sava

“Think I’ll go out and check on my plane,” I told Marlene.

“Certainly.”

She buzzed me through a glass security door. I pulled the collar up on my leather jacket and walked out to the flight line. Gordon Priest, I decided, could wait. My grilling him about his possible involvement in his nephew’s murder would’ve only antagonized him and probably gotten me in trouble with the sheriff’s department, accused of interfering with Streeter’s investigation.

The Ruptured Duck was tied down directly in front of Summit Aviation, between a Cessna Cardinal and a notoriously unstable V-tail Bonanza — a “Doctor Killer” as they’re commonly known in general aviation because more than a few physicians have been known to buy them and die in them. I grabbed a green, six-foot fiberglass folding ladder leaning near the front door, propped it in front of the Duck’s right wing, climbed up, and began brushing off eight inches of wet snow with my forearm.

“Thought you might want this,” Marlene said, emerging from inside, sans coat, carrying a snowbrush in hand.

“ ’Preciate it.”

“You know,” she said, “it occurred to me, if you’re interested in an Australian shepherd puppy, you really should talk to my friend, Liam. He and Gordon, they’re sort of business partners. Liam knows everything there is to know about Aussie shepherds. He’s from there, you know, the land down under.”

Liam was Liam McMahon, proprietor of Sundowner Sports, a ski and kayak rental shop situated about a half mile from the gondola station at the base of the Heavenly Mountain Resort. Marlene had described him as a middle-aged charmer, an expert snow and water skier popular with the ladies. Sitting in my Yukon outside his small but bustling shop and observing the activities within, it was easy to comprehend why:

A wiry man with Goldilocks tresses that he wore in a ponytail, craggy, sun-burnished features, and a quick, dazzling smile, McMahon moved easily among his customers, teasing and laughing as he fitted them for boots, skis and snowboards. I waited until the crowd thi

What I assumed would be a short wait turned into nearly an hour. A steady procession of customers came and went, most of them young and laughing, eager to hit the slopes the next day. As the sun went down, I found myself growing increasingly antsy, unable to sit still—shpilkes in my toches, Mrs. Schmulowitz called it — needles in my butt. Customers or not, I’d decided I couldn’t wait any longer when my phone rang. Caller ID showed a number in Lake Tahoe’s 530 area code.

“This is Logan.”

“Yeah, you, like, came by and showed me a picture this morning. Some lady you’re looking for?”

The voice was young, male. It took me a second: the high school kid who’d paused from shoveling snow out of his parents’ driveway as I approached him.