Free Any Other Name: A Longmire Mystery by Craig Johnson Page A

me, plucked the fresh one from her mouth, and made a show of dropping it from shoulder height onto the gravel; then she stamped it out with a full twist, the cigar being what I was pretty sure she wanted to be my head. Tommi with an
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then climbed in my truck and closed the door behind her. “Well, you’re a big fucking deal, aren’t you?”
    I paused writing her ticket. “It’s on all my business cards.”
    “I find it hard to believe that you have business cards.”
    “I made that part up.”
    She glanced back at Dog, having edged away from the diminutive woman to go behind me; say what you will about canine intelligence, he knew when he was out of his weight class, teeth or no teeth. “This your girlfriend?”
    I ignored her and got to the pointed end of the stick as I continued writing. “Jone Urrecha.”
    “Gone.”
    “Where?”
    Absently, she pulled another cigarillo from the pocket of what looked to be a very expensive leather jacket, and tapped the end on my dash. “God, I wish I knew; that sister of hers is driving me up a wall.” She pulled a Zippo from the same pocket and started to light up.
    I stopped writing and looked at her.
    With a long sigh, she repocketed the combustibles, turned in the seat to look at me, and nodded her head toward the winking sign down the road. “You know how many girls I go through on a yearly basis?”
    I aimed the point of the flashlight pen above the ticket docket. “How many girls do you go through on a yearly basis?”
    She stared at me with hazel death rays. “A shit ton.”
    “Define ‘shit ton.’”
    “Shit as in lousy, ton as in a bunch.”
    For absolutely no reason, I was beginning to like her.
    She slumped in her seat and studied the 870 Wingmaster locked to the transmission hump of my truck and then turned her attention to the barren hills a couple of hundred yards up the road. “I mean, it ain’t exactly the Folies Bergère around here—you know what I mean?”
    I didn’t say anything.
    “We’re on the circuit between Rapid City and Billings; I mean how are you gonna keep a naked girl down on the farm once she’s seen those two cities of light?” She scratched her head. “The usual tenure is about six weeks or so, but she lasted longer than most—all of the summer and through the fall.” She thought about it. “Smart kid, smart enough to not be doing this stuff, but I get ’em now and then—the ones that are having money problems, substance problems, personal problems . . .”
    I watched as she extended a hand toward Dog as a peace offering. “Which one was she?”
    Dog sniffed her hand and then turned and looked out the window. “Not very friendly, is she?”
    “He.”
    She examined Dog a little closer. “Jone never said, and when they don’t say and you can’t see any evidence of the other two, it’s usually personal problems.”
    “Who did she spend her time with?”
    “Nobody. She was a loner.”
    I started writing again.
    She watched me and then spoke up. “What the hell are you doing?”
    “Every time you lie to me, I get the urge to finish writing this ticket.”
    “Who says I’m lying?”
    “Just about everybody I’ve already talked to today.”
    She fumed for a while and then threaded her fingers into her hair, and I noticed her whole scalp moved, confirming my thought that it was a wig. “She used to pal around with Thor.”
    “The bouncer?”
    “I think they used to run up and down the road and shit.”
    I stopped writing. “Any business on the side?”
    She huffed again and then answered. “If there was, it wasn’t through me—that shit leads to trouble, so I discourage it.” She shrugged. “Which doesn’t mean that it doesn’t happen, but if it does it’s not on my time or my books. Look, I’m no saint, but I try to keep the girls safe; it’s in my interest, you know?” She tugged at the front of the hair, straightening it not unlike the way I straightened my hat. “Sometimes they’ve just had