Bloodline (20 page)

Levy gave him a funny look. "Cinder block…?"

"Forget it." Jack had a flash of a gray mass crashing through a windshield, smashing into… "Just an example that came to mind."

"All that aside, the government wants to be ready to offer a remedy. That's why the urgency to find a way to suppress the trigger. But there's a more practical use. We'll be able to formulate this into injections that will last three months. A condition of parole for oDNA positives will be the therapy. Imagine the reduction in recidivism."

Jack stared at Levy. Something in his voice didn't ring true…

"Is that the real reason?"

"Of course. What other reason could there be?"

Yeah. Definitely lying. But Jack figured it would be a waste of time to ask. Besides, he had a much more pressing question.

"Why are you telling me all this?"

Levy blinked. "Why… because we agreed to trade information: I'd tell you about oDNA and you'd tell me where you heard of it."

Jack didn't buy that. Levy had told him way too much. Could be he'd got carried away with his story, but that didn't wash. He hadn't prodded Jack once for his source on oDNA.

And then he knew.

"You want Bolton back in Creighton, don't you. And you want me to put him there."

Levy looked flustered. "I want nothing of the sort. I told you, this clinical trial is of momentous importance. Nothing must jeopardize it."

"Yeah, but you think it should be tried first on someone less volatile. You've got a wife and a daughter. Bolton knows you, knows where you live, and you know he's a Tate-LaBianca waiting to happen. Admit it: Bolton on the outside scares the crap out of you."

"I admit to nothing of the sort. As I told you—"

Jack waved him off. "Save it. You're looking for a patsy. You're hoping I'll do something to tip off the cops that Bolton's out—like maybe getting myself offed by him—and that'll solve your problem and leave your hands clean. Or at least looking clean."

Levy stared out through the windshield and said nothing.

"Okay," Jack said. "Let's do it."

Levy turned to him, looking puzzled. "Do what?"

"Out Jerry Bethlehem as Jeremy Bolton. But we do it so that neither of us is downwind when the shit hits the fan."

"How?"

Jack thought about that. Dawn was too gaga to be useful, and he couldn't use Christy to drop the dime because the agency overseeing all this would assume the source of the info was the guy she'd hired. Jack didn't want to be on their hit list.

He needed someone with no connection to him or Levy. The only other person Bolton would know on the outside was Hank Thompson.

Now there's a thought.

High-profile guy… low-profile guy… put them together…

And hadn't Thompson said the Dormentalists and Scientologists were after him because so many of their members were becoming Kickers? What if they had him under surveillance? And what if Thompson and Bolton were meeting on the outside? Maybe the rivals would want to know who he was meeting with. And when they investigated Bethlehem they'd find… Jeremy Bolton.

"Get me all you know about Hank Thompson."

Levy shook his head. "That's privileged—"

"You want this fixed or not?"

Levy hesitated, then shrugged. "I'll dig out whatever I've got."

"Do it tonight. I'll be doing a little digging myself."

"Where?"

"I'll let you know if I find anything."

Levy hesitated, then said, "There's something you should know about Jeremy Bolton."

"I'm sure there's plenty I should know about Jeremy Bolton. What've you got?"

"Don't underestimate him. He comes on as a laid-back, shit-kicking good ol' boy, but he tests high on all the intelligence scales, and he's done a lot of reading in the past twenty years. His major shortcoming is his impulsiveness. If you can keep him off balance, he'll act before he thinks. But give him time to think…"

"So I'm dealing with a smart but explosive sociopath." Levy nodded. "With a lot of native cunning. Watch out." Jack had every intention of doing just that. He'd handle Bolton from a distance.

"Thanks for the heads up. Now, how about driving me back to my car?" Conditions permitting, Jack would be paying a visit to the Jerry Bethlehem crib tonight.

As he hit route 9, Jack fingered the bribe money in his pocket. He'd use it to discount the fee he was charging Christy. Checking his messages he found a frantic call from her telling him that her Dawnie had moved out and that Jack had to find something on Bethlehem now-now-now! Call her please-please-please!

So he called and ground his teeth as she told her tearful tale of doing everything he'd advised her not to, then compounding it by trying to buy off Bolton—and failing.

That took Jack by surprise. A guy like Bolton who'd been locked up all of his adult life had never seen anything like that kind of money.

Or had he? He did live awfully well…

The upshot of all this was that Dawn hadn't come home last night. But worse, when Christy had gone food shopping today she'd returned to find a lot of Dawn's things missing. She'd sneaked in and moved out.

Each sob was a blade of guilt. He could end Christy's pain with a single phone call, but that could mean the start of endless trouble for himself. He didn't see Bolton as a threat to Dawn—at least not yet.

He calmed Christy by telling her his plan to get close to Bethlehem and get to know him. Maybe he'd let something slip.

"I really screwed up, didn't I," she said.

Jack wanted to chew her out for not taking his advice but couldn't see how that would help matters. He wasn't about to disagree with her, however.

"Yeah, you did. You made accusations you couldn't back up."

Her voice rose in pitch. "My daughter's shacked up with a murderer!"

"You cant say that. He has an alibi." A shaky one, but an alibi nonetheless.

"I can't stand this! I don't know how much—!"

"Easy, easy," he said, using a soothing tone.

Too much of that kind of talk might trigger some oDNA-type behavior in Bolton.

A mutant trigger gene… oDNA… Jack shook his head. He couldn't believe he was thinking like this.

He said, "As I said, we don't
know
that he did it. Private eyes make enemies. I'm working on a number of angles, but they're going to take a little time."

"I don't have time."

"You may have more time than you think. He didn't take the money, and that wasn't chump change. To me that says Dawn means more to him than just a young girl he can…" He hunted for the right word.

Christy saved him the trouble. "Go ahead, you can say it:
screw"

Yeah. That and maybe…
the Key to the future
…

"The point is, if he means to harm her, he'd have grabbed the money, done his harm, and taken off. But he chose not to."

She sniffed. "I have to tell you, Jack, that baffles me. I know it sounds awful for a mother to say, but what does this guy see in Dawnie? Don't get me wrong, she has a sweet nature—although it's not too evident at the moment—and she's a smart, smart kid, but that's just it: She's a kid, and a naive one at that. What does he see in her?"

Good question. Especially in light of the fact that Bolton had insisted on being relocated in Rego Park. Had he chosen the town out of the air, or did he have a specific reason? Like being next to Forest Hills?

Could Dawn have been that reason?

…
the Key to the future
…

But Bolton had been behind bars before Dawn was born. As far as Jack knew, she'd never been a media figure like the Long Island Lolita of yore, so how would he have even heard of her?

So if not Dawn, then what was it? What was so special about Rego Park?

He said, "I don't know what's going on in his head, so I can't answer that. But I think his refusing the money is a good sign that we're not in a dangerous situation here."

"Not yet."

"My point is, you've got to back off now. Sit tight, do your day trades, and let me do what I do."

"You've got something planned?"

"I do."

"What?"

"If I works out, you'll know. If not, it won't matter. Do you know Bethlehem's address?"

"I should. I've driven by it often enough."

She gave him directions to his townhouse and to the diner where Dawn worked.

Jack hung up just in time to turn into the Ardsley service area. He found a parking spot and watched the entry ramp. He hadn't seen anyone following him, and the only car that pulled in after him was a Dodge minivan. It parked near the food court and a horde of tweeny girls in soccer uniforms piled out.

Satisfied, Jack backed up to where Bolton had parked two nights ago. He grabbed an electric screwdriver and one of his real-fake license plates from under the front seat. He slipped around to the back and opened the trunk. While pretending to be searching for something, he substituted it for the fake-fake tag he'd put on this afternoon—one of half a dozen he'd bought from Sal Vituolo's junkyard on Staten Island. Then he reparked the car nose in, opened the hood, and switched the front plate.

No use in giving anything away to any curious types in Rathburg.

He got back behind the wheel and headed for Queens.

Jack had driven by Bolton's townhouse. Lots of lights on but was anyone home? He needed to be sure before he broke in. He'd checked the Tower Diner—brick walls, canopied windows, pillars at the entrance, and a clock tower, for Christ sake. What kind of a diner looked like that? More like a bank.

He'd looked through one of the windows and seen Dawn, but no sign of Bolton.

The next and last stop was Work. If he didn't find Bolton there, he'd have to assume he was home and put off the break-in for another night.

The place was crowded, with someone singing off-key over distorted guitars blasting from the sound system, but what did he expect on a Saturday night?

Jack wove through the crowd and made his way to the bar. He wasn't look-ing for a drink, just a vantage point. He reached the corner and started looking around. He'd brought his camera just in case he found Bolton in a corner with a lip lock on one of the waitresses. A photo of that might pry Dawn out of his bed.

He did a slow scan of the front end—no sign of him here—and was starting toward the pool tables at the rear, when someone grabbed his arm.

Jack looked and found himself in the grip of a short but beefy biker type whose breath reeked of Jack Daniels. He had a balding head and a huge red handlebar mustache. Jack half expected him to shout,
Great horny toads
! or call him a
varmint
.

"My girl says you was starin at her, you sonuvabitch!"

Jack could barely hear him over the music, but he knew the drill with these guys. They got to feeling mean after a few shots and looked for any excuse to throw a few punches. If you admit looking at his girl, he punches you. If you deny looking at his girl, he accuses you of calling him a liar and punches you. A no-win situation.

The last thing Jack wanted was to draw attention to himself. He gave him a close look.

"Sam?" he shouted over the music. "Is that you?"

The guy looked confused. "What?"

"You're not Yosemite Sam?"

"Ain't no kinda Sam, and you was starin at my girl."

"You might be right, but truth is, Sam, I don't know who your girl is."

"I ain't Sam, and that's her, right there."

He pointed to a busty babe in a skimpy black leather halter top watching them with glittery eyes and a nasty smile.

"Oh,
her
. Her name wouldn't happen to be Cindy, would it?"

"Cindy? Hell, no. It's Roxanne."

"Weird, man. She's a dead ringer for a girl I knew in high school. I thought it might be Cindy Patterson but I guess not."

As Sam digested these departures from the usual script, Jack looked around for a way out. That was when he spotted Bolton leaning with his back against the bar, staring off into space.

Thinking about the Key to the future, maybe?

And then a whole scenario leaped to full-blown life.

"But listen, Sam," he said, leaning close.

"I ain't Sam, goddammit."

"Oh, right. There's a guy down there been giving Roxanne the eye all night. And I can't be sure, but I think she's been eyeing him back. You know, like they know each other."

He cocked a fist. "You tryin to tell me—?"

"Hey-hey, I could be wrong. But if you and I get into a fight and get thrown out, that'll leave a certain someone a clear field with Roxanne."

He looked around. "Where is this guy?"

Jack nodded toward Bolton. "Down there—tall guy in the denims and cowboy boots. Watch out. He looks tough."

"He looks like a
pussy!"
he growled. "You wanna see what tough looks like, you watch!"

He started nosing through the crowd like a rottweiler called to dinner.

Go, Sam. Get that there varmint.

Jack watched him step up to Bolton and say something, saw Bolton shake his head and respond with a condescending smile. Sam's fist flashed out but Bolton dodged it and swung a fist of his own.

After that, things got confusing as women screamed and men shouted, some fleeing the fight, some moving toward it, a pair of bouncers homing in, and an infuriated, red-faced, out-of-control Bolton swinging a pool cue at a bloody and astonished-looking Sam. He checked the bartenders but none of them was calling the cops. Probably hoping their guys could control it.

Jack pulled out his officialdom phone and headed for the door.

Somebody had to be a good citizen and phone in this terrible, frightful melee before someone was seriously hurt.