CHAPTER FOUR
Kari heard Paul's SUV before she saw it—the crunch of tires on the fire road, the sweep of headlights cutting through the darkness below the ridge. She stood and waved her arms until the lights found her, then turned back to Ben.
He hadn't moved since she'd covered him with the blanket.
His breathing was shallow but steady. In the dim light, she could see the full extent of what they'd done to him—the bruises layered over bruises, the dried blood at his hairline, the raw wounds circling his wrists like bracelets made of pain.
Three days. They'd had him for three days.
The SUV pulled into the clearing and Paul emerged, moving quickly for a man his age. He took one look at Ben and his face hardened.
"How long has he been like this?"
"He was conscious when I found him. Talked to me a little. Then he just... faded." Kari's voice caught. "Paul, we need to get him to a hospital. Now."
Paul crouched beside Ben, checking his pulse, lifting his eyelids to examine his pupils. Ben stirred at the touch.
"No hospital," he slurred, the words barely audible.
"Ben." Kari squeezed his hand. "You need medical attention. You could have internal bleeding, brain swelling—"
"No hospital." His eyes opened briefly, finding hers with an intensity that cut through the fog of exhaustion. "Please."
Then his eyes closed again, and he was gone—not dead, just unconscious. Just his body finally giving out after three days of hell.
"He's right to want to stay away from hospitals," Paul said quietly. "A regular ER is too exposed. Too many people coming and going, too many records that anyone with the right access could pull."
"He needs help," Kari said. "I'm not going to just watch him die."
Paul stood, brushing dirt from his knees. "The tribal medical center."
"What about it?"
"Your people control who comes and goes. Tribal police can post someone at his door."
"And what if whoever took him has people inside tribal police?" Kari doubted this very much, but it was certainly possible. She didn't want to underestimate these people.
"Then we're screwed no matter what we do." Paul's voice was blunt. "But we have to assume that's not the case, or we might as well give up now. The tribal medical center is our best option. It keeps initial jurisdiction with the tribe, and it buys us time to figure out our next move."
Kari looked down at Ben, troubled. "There's something else, isn't there? Something you're not saying."
Paul was quiet for a moment. "I have to report this. A kidnapped law enforcement officer, held for three days, beaten and interrogated—that's not something I can pretend I didn't see. The Bureau is going to want answers. They're going to send someone to question him."
Kari bristled. "The same Bureau that closed the Naalnish case in three days? The same Bureau that's been warning you to stop investigating Devco? You bring them in, and whoever's been protecting these people will know exactly what Ben saw, what he knows, what we're planning."
"I know." Paul met her eyes. "But the alternative is that I become part of the cover-up. I could lose my badge, my pension, everything I've spent thirty years building."
"What a shame that would be."
"And more importantly," Paul said, ignoring her jab, "I lose any ability to help you from the inside." He shook his head. "I'll delay as long as I can. Buy you a few hours, maybe a day. But the report has to be filed. There's no way around it."
Kari wanted to argue, wanted to find some alternative that didn't involve trusting the same institution that had already failed them. But she could see in Paul's face that this wasn't a negotiation. He was telling her how it was going to be.
"Fine," she said. "But I'm staying with him. Every minute, from the moment he goes into that medical center until he walks out under his own power. Anyone wants to get to him, they go through me."
"I wouldn't expect anything less." Paul moved toward Ben's other side. "Help me get him into the SUV. We'll take my vehicle—it's faster, and the tribal medical center is on my way back to the field office."
Together, they lifted Ben as gently as they could manage. He groaned but didn't wake, his body limp and heavy in their arms. They maneuvered him into the back seat of Paul's SUV, and Kari climbed in beside him, cradling his head in her lap to cushion it against the rough road ahead.
Paul drove quickly but carefully, navigating the fire road with the skill of someone who had spent decades traveling the back country of the Southwest. Kari kept her eyes on Ben's face, watching for any change in his breathing, any sign that something was going wrong.
"He's going to be okay," Paul said from the front seat. It sounded like he was trying to convince himself as much as her.
"You don't know that."
"No. I don't." He was quiet for a moment. "But from what I know of Ben Tsosie, he's one tough cookie. Whatever they did to him, he survived it. He got himself out. He made it to that ridge under his own power, which must've been quite a feat in and of itself. That's not someone who gives up easy."
Kari said nothing. She just held Ben's hand and watched the desert roll past in the darkness, counting the miles until they reached help.
* * *
The tribal medical center was a low, sprawling building on the eastern edge of Chinle, its parking lot mostly empty at this hour. Paul pulled up to the emergency entrance and Kari hurried out of the vehicle without waiting for Paul, waving a hand to flag down the nurses who emerged with a gurney.
The next few hours blurred together. Doctors and nurses surrounded Ben, whisking him away to an examination room while Kari answered questions she barely heard.
What happened to him? How long was he missing?
Does he have any allergies, any pre-existing conditions?
She kept her answers vague, saying simply that he had gone missing for several days.
She didn't speculate on what had happened to him.
The nurses could draw their own conclusion.
When the questioning was finished, she watched through the window as they cut away Ben's ruined clothes and began assessing the damage.
Dehydration, they told her eventually. Minor head trauma—a concussion, probably, but the scans showed no bleeding or swelling.
Rope burns on his wrists and ankles, consistent with prolonged restraint.
Bruised ribs, though none broken. Multiple contusions across his torso and face.
Nothing life-threatening, but he would need time to recover.
Kari let out a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding.
True to his word, Paul delayed his report as long as possible.
But by mid-morning, two FBI agents had arrived at the medical center, flashing credentials and demanding to speak with the victim.
Kari recognized one of them—Agent Rivera, the same man who had frozen them out of the Naalnish investigation months ago.
"Detective Blackhorse." Rivera's expression was professionally neutral. "I understand you found Detective Tsosie last night."
"That's right."
"And you didn't think to contact the Bureau immediately?"
"I contacted Agent Daniels. He's Bureau."
Rivera's jaw tightened almost imperceptibly. "Agent Daniels is not the assigned liaison for matters involving tribal law enforcement in this region. You should have called the field office directly."
Kari held his gaze. "My partner was injured and unconscious. My priority was getting him medical attention, not navigating your chain of command."
For a moment, she thought Rivera might push back. Then he seemed to decide it wasn't worth the effort. "We need to speak with Detective Tsosie. Alone."
"He's still recovering. The doctors said—"
"The doctors have cleared him for a brief interview. I've already confirmed it with the attending physician." Rivera gestured toward Ben's room. "You can wait out here. This won't take long."
Kari wanted to plant herself in that doorway and dare them to move her. But she knew how this worked—knew that any obstruction would be noted, documented, used as evidence that the tribal police weren't cooperating fully. And that would only make things worse for Ben.
Seething inwardly, she stepped aside.
The interview lasted forty-five minutes. Kari spent every one of them pacing the hallway, catching glimpses through the window of Ben propped up in his hospital bed, answering questions with the slow deliberation of a man choosing his words very carefully.
When Rivera and his partner finally emerged, their expressions gave nothing away.
"Thank you for your cooperation," Rivera said to Kari. "We'll be in touch if we have follow-up questions."
They left. Kari waited until they were out of sight, then pushed into Ben's room.
He looked exhausted—more exhausted than when she'd found him on the ridge, if that was possible. The interview had drained whatever reserves he'd managed to build up overnight. But his eyes found hers as she entered, and something in them sharpened.
"Close the door."
She did. Then she crossed to his bedside and sat in the chair that Rivera had probably just vacated.
"What did you tell them?" she asked.
Ben was quiet for a moment, his gaze fixed on the ceiling.
"The truth. Part of it, anyway. I told them I was following up on the Naalnish case, that I was poking around near the old property line when someone knocked me out from behind.
I woke up in the desert, disoriented, no idea where I was or how I got there.
Took me three days to find my way back to civilization. "
Kari stared at him. "That doesn't match your injuries. The rope burns, the bruising—"
"I told them I don't remember. I was knocked out, I woke up in the desert. Everything between is a blank." He finally met her eyes. "They didn't believe me. I could tell. But they can't prove I'm lying, and without proof, there's nothing they can do."
"Ben." Kari leaned forward, keeping her voice low. "What happened to you out there?"
He held her gaze for a long moment. She could see him weighing something—trust against caution, truth against necessity.
"Not here," he said finally in a low voice. "Not now. Too many ears, too many eyes. When I get out of here, I'll tell you everything. But for now..." He reached out and took her hand, his grip weak but insistent. "For now, you have to trust me. Please. Can you do that?"
Kari thought about the past eighteen months. The cases they'd worked together, the dangers they'd faced. She thought about the man who had dragged himself across miles of desert rather than give up, who had called her from a payphone because she was the only person he trusted.
"Okay," she said. "I trust you."
Ben's eyes closed, relief softening the lines of pain on his face. "Thank you."
She stayed beside him while he slept, watching the monitors track his heartbeat and his breathing, and wondered what secrets he was keeping—and why.