Harmless (15 page)

Strout said, “As I’m
driving up, I see this strange car parked on the street.  Keep in mind, I’d
been casing the area for a couple of months and I knew the comings and goings
of everybody down to the minute.  I’d catalogued all the visitors, what
vehicles they drove, what time that old hag across from you would walk her dog,
everything, so this car, it was out of place.  I backed off and parked a couple
houses down just so I could keep an eye on it.  Kerry got home from wherever
she’d been about ten minutes later, Clarence showed up, and whoever was in the
car drove away.  I followed him, saw him walk into the station.  Same thing
happened every other day for the next two weeks.”

Thomas reached over and
fiddled with the TV antenna.  “What makes you think he had anything to do with
her death?  Maybe he was protecting her, maybe you freaked her out and he was
there on surveillance.  You said you’d told DeShazo where she was living—what
if he’d told the cops about her stealing his money and they were just waiting
to make a move?”

“No wonder you’re still
riding around in a gumball machine, Planck.  You haven’t been listening to a
word I’ve said, have you?  From everything I learned about Kerry and DeShazo
both—no.  No, no, and no.  This was different.  She wasn’t in any kind of
trouble with the law, not that I could find, and if there
were
any
trouble, I would’ve found it.  He didn’t just stake out her house.  I caught
that same car tailing her around town a bunch of times.  Never got a good look
at him, though—always from the back—and like I said, I wasn’t about to push it
to find out.  I’m curious by nature, but I ain’t stupid.”

“What’d he look like
from behind?”

“Average height, brown
hair.  And that’s all I got.”

“Fat lot of good that
does us.  You just described everybody down at the station.”

“Except for Schott,” I
said.  “He’s bald.”

“I didn’t mean
literally, Steve.  Jesus, for once, would you—never mind.”

Strout said, “Here’s my
thought: he never did anything.  He never approached her, he never got out of
his car.  I doubt he did it.  All signs point to DeShazo.  But this cat? 
Strange, yeah, but to me, that adds up to some joker with a crush or some perv
with a fantasy, scoping her from a distance.  You’ll have to forgive me if I’m
describing you there, Pendragon, and you of all people should know what I’m
getting at.  Kerry, she was private, reserved, but when she opened up, she was
a magnet.  Chances are she said hi to him in a grocery store and the poor son
of a bitch wound up as lovesick as you were.”

“I’m not buying it,”
Thomas said.  “He might not have killed her, but I’d bet there was something
else going on.”

I shifted around to
face him.  “Any idea what it could’ve been?”

“No clue.  We take care
of business when DeShazo gets here, then maybe tomorrow I’ll ask around, see if
anybody was assigned to her for some reason.”

I mentioned earlier
that I’m not familiar with guns.  The only thing I know is that you point, pull
the trigger, and hope you hit whatever you’re aiming at.  They’re loud.  They
put holes in targets.  They kill stuff, as in humans and animals.  They
convince people to do things they wouldn’t normally do.  My knowledge is
severely limited, yet I can tell the difference between the sound of a cricket
chirping and a hammer cocking.

The
kah-chuck
came from Strout’s general direction, and I flicked my head around to see him
holding a revolver, aiming it at Thomas.

I thought that both our
instincts had been correct.  A trap.  An ambush.  A clever ruse to get us
trapped in a squalid hotel room—in Meth Central—where two more bodies would add
to the ‘drug deal gone wrong’ tally.

Thankfully, that wasn’t
what he had in mind.

Before I could say
anything, before Thomas could react, no more than a second later, there was a
subtle
tap-tap
on the door and in stepped Harry DeShazo, as promised.

CHAPTER 16

Thomas and I stood at
the back of Strout’s room, each holding a duffle bag weighing approximately
twenty-two pounds, full of hundred-dollar bills.

Yes, those.

The ones that had been
in my basement earlier that evening—the reason Strout was late to our
rendezvous in the park.  With DeShazo looking on, held in place by the
threatening revolver, demanding to know who we were while Strout waved him off
like a pestering fly, Strout explained how, during our first encounter—when I
shouted at him from my window—a short trail of dirt leading from the edge of
Kerry’s garden to my house had made him suspicious.  They weren’t muddy
footprints, since it hadn’t rained, rather more of a “scatter pattern,” he
said, where the clumps of dirt had fallen away from my shoes.

Not to mention the fact
that I’d been absentminded enough to leave the decapitated three-wood shaft
lying nearby.  Lack of sleep and the incomprehensibility of holding two million
dollars can lead to some mistakes.

Later that day, while
Thomas and I were visiting with Clarence, he’d gone back to inspect things
again.  A trace of a trail and a modified club was enough to lead him to my
shed, where he’d discovered the hacksaw, the three-wood head, and a hint that
I’d been up to something.

I still haven’t
forgiven myself for that boneheaded misstep.  And I need to get better about
locking things that are designed to be locked for a reason.

The most insane thing
about it was, we’d gotten back earlier than he’d expected and when he’d called
and narrated every move I made, the traitorous bastard was
inside my house
,
calling me from the upstairs bedroom where he’d been hiding in my closet and
waiting for a chance to escape.  He’d made it out just as I went back inside. 
“Too close for comfort,” he said.

He hadn’t found the
money yet—he hadn’t had time to search the whole place but absolutely knew that
I was keeping it in there somewhere—and used the secret, “I have information
you want” meeting as sort of a loss leader to get me out of the house again.

Once we’d left for the
park, he’d returned for the third time, found the money in the basement in a
couple of minutes (I should’ve hidden it better—did I mention I’m guilty of not
thinking things through?), dropped it off at the hotel, and then met us by the
statue.

As he talked, something
occurred to me: earlier that night when he’d suggested we all had something in
common, that we were on all three sides of the law—right, wrong, and
victim
—it
hadn’t made any sense.  Yet he was alluding to the fact that I’d been a victim
of a B and E. 

This is what Thomas
called it.  I had no idea what a B and E actually meant until he explained
it—you’d think with all the crime shows I watch, I would’ve figured it out, but
no.  It could’ve just as easily been bacon and eggs.

Breaking and entering.

But not exactly
theft
,
since he stole something that didn’t belong to me.

When I asked why he
hadn’t just taken the money and disappeared, he offered, “That guy right
there—he’s my apology.  Served up hot and fresh.  Kerry deserved better.  The
money’s for my troubles, minus the little bit I…
donated
,” making direct,
measured eye contact with me.  “You can do what you want with him.”

With that, he grabbed
the duffle bags from us, hefted them over his shoulder, and backed out the
door.

Which left the three of
us—DeShazo, Thomas, and myself—staring at each other with equally dazed, “Uh,
what just happened?” expressions and, for the next couple of moments,
absolutely no idea how to react.

Until DeShazo broke for
the door.

Thomas was faster than
me.  He lunged, jumped, and grabbed DeShazo by the ankle, sending him to the
floor.  (A germaphobe’s nightmare.  God only knows what had been spilled, shed,
or squirted there.)

They wrestled, threw
punches, and rolled until DeShazo got on top and used his knees to pin Thomas
down.  

I froze.  I’d never
been in a situation like that.  Never been in a scuffle.  Something had pressed
pause on my internal reactionary response.

Thomas said, “Steve,
get over here!”

I hesitated.

“Help me!”

I focused every bit of
raw emotion, every ounce of pure rage I felt toward DeShazo over what he’d done
to Kerry, and pounced on him, growling, grabbing him from behind and around the
neck, choking him, yanking him backward on top of me, falling back onto that
revolting carpet.  I tightened my grip around his windpipe and squeezed.

Thomas climbed to his
feet and wiped the blood from his mouth, then scrambled over and closed the
door.  With all the commotion, it wouldn’t have surprised me to see a gaggle of
zombie-like meth addicts stumbling into the hotel room, looking for a party.

I held on until he drew
his gun, then I shoved DeShazo away and pushed myself up from the floor,
cringing at what I might’ve put my hands on.  Or in.

DeShazo coughed and
hacked, trying to get a decent breath as Thomas nudged him with a foot, saying,
“Up.  Up.  On your feet.”

And once DeShazo was
vertical, Thomas backed him up against the wall, told him to put his hands on
his head.

DeShazo said, “Don’t. 
I have money.  Lots of it.  Name your price.  Just don’t kill me.”

Would it be uninspired
to say he sniveled?  Trust me, I felt not a drop of sympathy for him.  The red
fingerprints around his neck were already turning blue and purple.  I wished
I’d squeezed harder. 

Thomas said, “Shut up. 
Before I arrest you for murder, I think my friend here has a few questions for
you.”

Did you get that?  He
called me his friend.  Did I praise him, did I thank him, did I run over and
give him a high five?  No.  I let it go.  The recognition was enough.

Let me repeat something
here that you may have forgotten: I’m not a violent person. 

People can change.

I walked over to
DeShazo and uttered what was quite possibly the cheesiest line of my entire
life.  I said, “Oh, I have questions, but I’m gonna ask them with my fists.” 

I punched him,
hard
,
straight in the mouth.

His head popped against
the wall, and when he leaned forward, a tooth fell out.

I was simultaneously
horrified and satisfied with myself.

Calmly, Thomas said,
“That’s enough, Steve.” 

I shook my hand,
looking down at the tooth imprints across my knuckles.  “I’m done.  For now.”

  He let out what
sounded like a chuckle crossbred with a snort.  (Is that what a
chortle
is?  I’ve never really looked up the definition, but chortle sounds like
something a heavy-set old man would do.  When Santa Claus laughs, I picture him
chortling.) 

Thomas said, “You’re
gonna ask them with your fists?”

“Stallone, I think.”

“Figures.”

DeShazo groaned as a
wet, bloody string of saliva dripped from his swollen lips.  “You knocked out
my fucking tooth!”

“Buy another one,”
Thomas said.

“The hell was that for? 
And did you say ‘murder?’  I didn’t kill anybody.”

“Nice try.  You paid
somebody to do it, and when he couldn’t follow through, you did it yourself.”

“I—I don’t—what are—”

“Are you really trying
to pull that shit?  I mean, Strout was here, right?  You saw him?  Steve, you
saw Strout, didn’t you?  I’m not making that up?  There wasn’t some sleazy
ghost in here with bad aftershave, waving around a forty-four?”

I nodded.  “You hired
him to kill Kerry.”

“What?  Kerry who?”

“January Oliver.”

“She’s
dead?
”

I’m a master at reading
people (except for Shayna, the enigma) and I have to say, his stunned response
appeared genuine, but I wouldn’t allow myself to believe it.

Thomas said, “So you
admit that you’re familiar with her?”

DeShazo’s non-answer
was enough.  Of course we knew he was familiar with her, but silence is
compliance.

It’d be kind of gross
to say he probed his swollen lips with his tongue, but that’s what he did.  The
thing snaked out, just the tip, in the empty space where his front tooth used
to be, and tested the severity of the swelling.  First the bottom, then the
top.  He looked at me, then at Thomas, then at Thomas’s gun, which was pointed
at his chest.  How does somebody physically
resign
?  I don’t know how to
describe it.  Maybe slack shoulders, an audible sigh, eyelids that partially
close.  Whatever the case, and however you want to picture it, his whole being
went
whooof
, like everything he’d been holding on to escaped with that
breath. 

“Who are you guys?” he
asked.

“Officer Planck.”  Thomas
opened his jacket, showed the badge clipped to his shirt pocket.

“You’re a cop?”

“That’s what
officer
means, usually.”

“And who’s he?”

“Don’t worry about
him.  Silent partner.”

“Look, Officer…Planck,
was it?  I didn’t know she was dead, on my mother’s grave, I swear I didn’t
know.  But yeah, okay, say I knew her, say I hired Strout, you got no proof. 
If you catch him, who’ll believe
that
shifty son of a bitch?  I’m not
saying I did, either.  You try to lay it on me, I’ll lie.  I’ll say I was
coerced.  Look at my face—you beat it out of me.”

“That’s quite a bit of
confidence for someone in your position.”

“Suck my dick.”

“Wrong room for that,
bro.”

“You killed Kerry,” I
said.  “And I can’t wait to see you rot.”

“Wait a minute,”
DeShazo said.  “Just wait.”  He pushed his greasy hair back.  It fell forward
again, covering his forehead. 

Thomas edged closer and
steadied his aim.

Not that I would’ve
known what to do with it—other than aim, pull the trigger, and hope—but I
longed for a gun of my own.  Anything to stop my hands from shaking.  A
baseball bat would’ve been satisfactory, too.  Something familiar, something
that would calm my restlessness.

DeShazo said, “All
right, yeah, I knew her, but I didn’t kill her, I swear to God.  Listen to me,
listen, let’s work some stuff out here—when did she die?”

“You know the answer to
that,” I said.  “You knocked me out in her house last night.”

“I
wasn’t in her
house
, that’s what I’m trying to tell you.  I drove down here last night to
meet Strout, to get my money back—”  He slapped his thigh, realizing he’d let
something slip.  “What I mean is, he owed me some money for this other thing. 
I was up in Oregon, you know, close enough to drive.  If she died at any time
between six and midnight, I was on the road.  You can check credit cards, can’t
you?  When they were used?  I stopped twice.  Once for gas, and once to take a
leak and get some snacks.  The last one was around ten thirty.  I was an hour
or so away from here.”

“Somebody could’ve used
your card,” I said.  “Set up an alibi for you.  Some lazy kid working the
register doesn’t bother to check your I.D., you’re good.”

“No way.  No way.”  He
lifted his hands.  “You’re talking some serious shit here, man.  I didn’t—it
wasn’t me.  Wait—hold on—wait a second.  The security cameras!  You can check
those things, can’t you?  Get a warrant or whatever it is you do.  Get a
warrant and watch the tapes.  You’ll see me.  Gray t-shirt and a Yankees cap.”

“Still not good
enough,” Thomas said.  “Could’ve been anybody.”

I took a step closer. 
He recoiled.  “You killed her.  I know you did.”

“Oh God, man.  I
promise you it wasn’t me.  I’ll give you this, all right, I’ll give you this. 
I hired Stout to do it—look, send me to prison for that, for conspiracy, but
not for murder.  Or no, don’t.  We can be cool, can’t we?  What’ll it take?  A
million apiece?  Two?  Three?  No—forget the pennies.  Ten million.  Ten
million, however you want it.  You guys could use it, couldn’t you?  Buy
yourselves a mansion down in Belize.  Buy the wife some fancy diamonds. 
Whatever you want—I’ll do whatever it takes.  I didn’t kill her, I didn’t do
it.  Honest to God, that’s the truth.”

Let me point out
something here—if it had been anyone other than Kerry whose memory would’ve
been tainted, I would’ve given some serious thought to taking the bribe. 
Thomas confided in me later that the thought had crossed his mind—hell, that
was a
lot
of money—but he knew he’d never forgive himself.  I wouldn’t
either, honestly, and I didn’t want to be the first in my family to sully the
Pendragon code of honor.

“Steve?” Thomas said,
lowering his gun.

“Yeah.”

“Believe him?”

Here’s the truth: every
single blood cell, hair follicle, brain wave, down to the centimeters of my
intestines,
wanted
to believe that Harry DeShazo had killed Kerry.  We’d
been so sure, so certain, that we had our guy.  Even the double-crossing
schmuck Edward Strout was almost positive that the contemptible wretch standing
in front of me had fired a round into her chest the night before.  He had two
million dollars’ worth of motive, he had intent, he’d admitted to conspiring,
and the conspiring had gone wrong, which could’ve easily led to a feeling of,
“If you want something done right, do it yourself.”