Secret Prey (11 page)

She moved slowly through the apartment, dry-firing the pistol from various hiding spots and corners; corny but fun. After ten minutes, she carried the pistol back to the safe, reseated the magazine, and shut the safe door.

She’d have to get out to the range one of these days; she was losing her edge.

MARCIA KRESGE WAS GETTING COMFORTABLE ON
James T. Bone’s couch: ‘‘Are you going to get the job?’’

‘‘I don’t know. O’Dell’s pretty strong.’’

‘‘How about McDonald?’’

‘‘We can handle McDonald.’’

‘‘Good. He’s an asshole. O’Dell, you know, smokes dope.’’

‘‘So what?’’ Bone said. ‘‘So do you.’’

‘‘I’m not trying to get to be a bank president,’’ Kresge said.

‘‘I don’t think that’s enough to disqualify her,’’ Bone said.

‘‘It would if she was arrested for possession,’’ Kresge said. ‘‘The board wouldn’t touch her with a ten-foot pole.’’

‘‘You’d really wish that on her?’’ Bone asked with real curiosity.

‘‘I’d like to see you get the job,’’ Kresge said. ‘‘And I could fix the bust.’’

‘‘How?’’

‘‘We’ve got the same dealer,’’ Kresge said.

Bone laughed despite himself. ‘‘How’d that happen?’’

She shrugged, not seeing anything funny in the coincidence. ‘‘You know, we all hang out at the same places, and word gets around. This guy, Mark, used to be a waiter at The Falls. He’s working his way through college.’’

‘‘Selling grass?’’

‘‘Grass, speed, acid, coke, heroin, ecstasy. PCP probably. Anyway, he deals to Susan. If somebody tipped off the
police, maybe they could catch him making a delivery. You know, socialite dope ring. The cops would like that.’’

‘‘What if they got your name?’’ Bone asked.

She shrugged. ‘‘I’d get rid of everything before I tipped them, and I wouldn’t buy any more. What’re they going to do? If they even got my name, I’d sue their butts off if they let it out.’’

‘‘Listen,’’ Bone said, now serious, leaning toward her: ‘‘Forget it. I swear to God, Marcia, if anybody tips off the cops about Susan, I’ll whip your ass.’’

‘‘Oooh . . . that could be fun,’’ she said lightly.

‘‘No. It wouldn’t be fun,’’ he snapped.

Sometimes he frightened her, just a bit, she thought. But a bit more than she found pleasant. ‘‘You’re not gonna get this job by looking pretty, you know,’’ she snapped back.

‘‘I know that. I’m working on it,’’ he said.

‘‘I could talk to a couple of people.’’

‘‘Anything you could do I’d appreciate . . . but let me know first.’’

‘‘Hey: If I go into banker’s-wife mode, I could probably deliver two or three votes off that board. That damn Jack O’Grady has been trying to get my pants off for fifteen years: I bet he could pull a couple votes for you.’’

‘‘I think Jack’s already with me,’’ Bone said. ‘‘But encouragement would be good.’’

‘‘Even if I have to take my pants off?’’

‘‘How big a change would that be?’’ he asked.

A pause. Then Kresge, smiling prettily, said, ‘‘Really great fuckin’ thing to say, Bone.’’

‘‘Tell you the truth, I’m surprised the police haven’t spent more time with you. You’re not the most discreet person in the world, and you weren’t divorced when Dan was killed.’’

‘‘I can be discreet when I wanna be,’’ she said. ‘‘Look at us.’’

‘‘Okay.’’

‘‘Besides, a woman cop
did
come around and talk to me—Sherrill, her name was. Last name. She had that big-tit
look you go for. And hell, I told her everything.’’

‘‘But not about us.’’

‘‘She didn’t ask.’’

Bone stood up, turned. ‘‘Anyway: I think McDonald’s in trouble. We know O’Dell’s gonna get a certain number of votes, and I’ll get mine, but it’s McDonald’s that are up for grabs.’’

‘‘How’s McDonald in trouble?’’

‘‘This cop—Lucas Davenport, assistant chief . . .’’

‘‘I know him, actually.’’

‘‘He thinks McDonald’s involved. I’ve talked to him a couple of times and he’s a smart guy. He’s talking to McDonald’s pals and the word is getting out. If there’s even a whiff of involvement, the board’ll drop him like a hot rock.’’

‘‘So anything that would encourage Davenport to look at McDonald . . . that would help.’’

‘‘As long as it didn’t turn back on us.’’

‘‘I’ll see what—’’ The doorbell rang, and Kresge turned her head.

Bone stepped across the room and opened the heavy paneled door. Kerin Baki was there, struggling with an oversized briefcase. As she brought it in, her glasses slipped down her nose, and she jabbed them back as though they’d mutinied. She saw Kresge on the couch and said, ‘‘Mrs. Kresge. Have you spoken to Mr. O’Grady?’’

‘‘We were just talking about that,’’ Kresge said pleasantly. ‘‘Your boss was giving me a very hard time.’’

Baki turned, said, ‘‘Mr. Bone, you should listen to Mrs. Kresge on this.’’

‘‘Christ, you’re conspiring against me,’’ he said.

‘‘
Working
for you,’’ Baki said. ‘‘I printed everything I could find on the mortgage company performance since McDonald took over. There are a few things we can use— not necessarily his fault, but you know how mortgages have been performing . . .’’

‘‘Let me get a Coke,’’ Bone said. ‘‘What would you like, Kerin? Marcia already has a—’’

‘‘Bloody Mary,’’ Kresge said. ‘‘And it’s all gone. I’ll help you . . .’’

‘‘Just sparkling water,’’ Baki said. She began spreading her papers on a coffee table as Bone and Kresge went to the kitchen to get drinks. When Baki finished with the papers, she heard Kresge laugh, a low, husky laugh with a little sex in it; she could see them moving around Bone’s small kitchen, inside each other’s personal space, casually bumping hips.

Their relationship had been clear to Baki for a while now; she wouldn’t tolerate it much longer. She got so deep into that calculation—the end of Bone’s relationship with Marcia Kresge—that she almost didn’t notice them walking toward her.

‘‘Kerin?’’ Bone said curiously. ‘‘Are you home?’’

He was standing next to her, holding out a glass and a bottle of lime-flavored Perrier. ‘‘Oh. Sure. Preoccupied, I guess.’’ She pushed the Perrier aside and went to the papers. ‘‘This stack of papers is the annualized return on . . .’’

BONNIE BONET DYED HER HAIR BLACK, THE DENSE,
sticky color of shoe polish. She dressed in black from head to toe, wore blue lipstick, and carried thirty-five extra pounds. But she was almost smart and could write poetry in Perl-5. She sat across the table from Robles and said, ‘‘Because the motherfucker was going to kill a couple of thousand people, that’s why.’’

‘‘I know you’re lying,’’ Robles said. He’d broken a sweat.

‘‘No you don’t. I’m not lying.’’

‘‘So tell me what kind of a gun you used,’’ he said.

‘‘My father’s .30–30.’’

‘‘Bullshit. You never fired a gun in your life.’’

She sneered at him: ‘‘You think I couldn’t figure out a gun? Every redneck in Minnesota can shoot a gun, but I can’t?’’

‘‘I’m gonna tell the cops about this,’’ Robles said.

‘‘Go ahead,’’ she said. ‘‘You’ve got no proof.’’

‘‘Jesus Christ, Bonnie. I know you’re lying, but you’re pushing me into a corner. You get this fantasy going, you’ll tell somebody else, like one of your fuckin’ novels . . .’’ Bonet laughed but looked away. Robles said, ‘‘Oh, Jesus, who’d you tell?’’

‘‘He doesn’t believe me either.’’

‘‘You told goddamned Dick . . .’’

‘‘Well, you started it . . . the whole fantasy thing.’’

‘‘I was joking,’’ Robles insisted. ‘‘I didn’t want him dead . . .’’

‘‘You got him.’’

‘‘But I was joking . . .’’

‘‘Too late now. You tell the cops about me, I’ll tell them about you.’’

Robles left the bar, sweating, half drunk. Okay, she was lying. But she’d never admit it. She was crazy. Almost for sure . . .

Terrance Robles had made just shy of a half-million dollars the previous year, and he’d spent only a small part of it. With his access to information, he could grow his stake at twenty to thirty percent per year, on top of earnings. If he could hang on for another five years, he could quit. Get out. Buy an old used Cray computer somewhere, and do some
serious
shit.

But he had to hold on.

He could turn Bonet in. Or, alternatively, he could kill her—nothing else would shut her up. She was having too good a time.

Robles bit on a thumbnail, stumbled along the street.

LATE NIGHT: THE MIXED SMELLS OF VINEGARANDGASoline,
one pungent, one metallic; the combination smelling like blood. The vinegar went into the washtub and down the drain, followed by a steady stream of water that would carry it away.

A glass cutter: this had been in the book, which went on to say that it was probably unnecessary, but why take chances? Deep scored lines up and down the bottle, then
more, horizontally, until the bottle was checkered with shaky, intersecting lines. Then the bottle sprayed with Windex, carefully and meticulously wiped with paper towels. No fingerprints here.

Now the gasoline, mixed in the bottle with two fourounce cans of chain saw oil. A strip of old T-shirt for a wick.

The bottle was heavy; a little better than seven pounds.

But it wouldn’t have to be thrown far.

Just far enough
.

SEVEN

‘‘NOW WE’RE GETTING SOME HEAT,’’ SAID ROSE MARIE
Roux. She was drinking coffee from a bone china cup; a matching saucer sat on her desk, and on the saucer, a wad of green chewing gum. ‘‘Harrison White called, and said if you need to interview Wilson McDonald, or if you would like to bring him before a grand jury, McDonald will come over anytime and testify. Without immunity. He will answer any questions, without reservation. Under oath.’’

‘‘And if we don’t need him to do that?’’ Lucas asked. He was facing Roux’s window, the sun streaming in. Another good day. Cold.

‘‘Then knock off the innuendos—the snooping around asking other people about him. White says the snooping could cost McDonald the top job at the bank, and if it does, he’ll see that the city picks up the difference in what he makes now, and what he would have made in twenty-some years as bank president. He thinks it might be forty or fifty million.’’

Lucas grinned. ‘‘Would we have to pay it all up front?’’ Roux smiled back: ‘‘He didn’t say. But he also talked to a couple of people on the city council, and McDonald’s father has been calling around . . . but fuck them. Do what
you need with McDonald. I thought you should know that glaciers are starting to move.’’

‘‘Thanks,’’ Lucas said.

‘‘And, of course, what White says is true. McDonald could be completely innocent, and we could be screwing him out of his lifetime job. In fact, we could even have been set up to do it, with the letter.’’

‘‘Tell you what,’’ Lucas said. ‘‘Let me talk to White. I wanted McDonald bumped, I wanted him nervous, but I don’t need to push much harder. We could back off a bit.’’

‘‘Whatever you think,’’ Roux said. She finished the coffee, peeled the gum off the saucer, and popped it back in her mouth. ‘‘Nicotine,’’ she said. ‘‘Too expensive to throw away before I chew it out.’’

‘‘So I’ll . . .’’ Lucas was getting to his feet.

‘‘Sit down,’’ Roux said. She probed her desk for a moment. ‘‘We have a couple of things to talk about. First, the opium ring . . .’’

‘‘Oh, shit,’’ Lucas groaned.

‘‘And then Capslock has put in for thirty hours accumulated overtime for investigating it.’’

‘‘Rose Marie . . .’’

‘‘He’s your guy, goddamnit. Now, this thirty hours. He took the thirty hours when he was supposedly on disability leave after the pinking shears incident. Now what I’m trying to figure is how . . .’’

‘‘Aw, Rose Marie, c’mon . . .’’

ROUX WAS AMUSING, AND HE LAUGHED WITH HER,
and convinced her to sign off on the thirty hours. But the laughter was like a water bug on a pond, skating across the surface of his mind. He was amused and he laughed, but nothing was deeply funny; life was simply stupid most of the time. Going downhill, again, he thought. He walked back to his office, tired, a little unnerved by the overnight rattling in his brain, and found Sherrill waiting for him.

Sherrill was lanky and dark-eyed, with short black hair and—Sloan’s words—the good headlights. Her estranged
husband had been killed by a crazy outlaw, who was himself killed by Lucas in a close-quarters firefight in the middle of a freak blizzard. It all happened just minutes before the cold-eyed Iowa boy had blown up both Dick LaChaise and Lucas’s marriage prospects. Last winter had been a bad one.

‘‘There you are,’’ Sherrill said. ‘‘Want to come detect?’’

‘‘Detect what?’’

‘‘An anonymous caller phoned the Garfield sheriff’s office and said that a US West lineman saw the killer, or might have seen him. The lineman was working on an exchange box near Kresge’s place. Said that he was talking about it in a bar, thought about calling the cops but didn’t because he didn’t want to get involved. So the sheriff tracked him down, and guess what?’’

‘‘He confessed and threw himself on the mercy of the court.’’

‘‘Nope. He’s down here. They sent him to an NSP warehouse to pick up a bunch of splicer things . . . The sheriff talked to him and called me. He’s the only eyewitness we have so far. I’m going over.’’

‘‘How far?’’

‘‘Ten minutes?’’

‘‘Let’s go,’’ Lucas said.

SHERRILL HAD A CITY CAR PARKED AT THE CURB. THEY
took I-394 west, falling into routine cop chitchat that covered a vaguely uncomfortable tension between them. Sherrill was at least somewhat available, and, rumor had it, would not be averse to exploring possibilities with Lucas. At the same time, word was around that Lucas hadn’t quite recovered from the loss of Weather, and nobody wanted to be the first woman afterwards.

Lucas, on the other hand, with a small reputation as a womanizer, had been expected to make a run at Sherrill ever since her marriage began going bad. He’d never done that. There lingered about them the sense that somebody
ought to make a move, almost as a matter of common politeness.

‘‘Did you get anything good out of Kresge’s office?’’ Lucas asked after a while.

‘‘Naw. But there are some newly humble secretaries and assistants around the place, I’ll tell you,’’ Sherrill said cheerfully. ‘‘Especially around Bone and O’Dell and McDonald. Everybody thinks one of them will get the job.’’

‘‘What about the merger?’’

‘‘That’s apparently on hold.’’

‘‘Hmph. So if somebody shot Kresge to stop the merger, it worked.’’

‘‘Yup. For the time being, anyway.’’

‘‘And this telephone guy . . .’’

‘‘Harold Hanks.’’

‘‘. . . saw the killer.’’

‘‘Maybe. But there’s something odd about the whole thing. Whoever called the sheriff’s office said she heard him talking in a bar. Harold Hanks is a hard-shell Baptist. He told the sheriff he hadn’t been in a bar for fifteen years, since he was born again. But he did see somebody, just like the caller said. But he never connected whoever he saw with the killing.’’

‘‘The caller was a woman?’’

‘‘Yeah.’’

‘‘They knew where the call came from?’’

‘‘A pay phone off I-35. I wrote it down, it’s up north somewhere.’’

‘‘Nothing there, then.’’

‘‘Nope.’’

‘‘Both letters to Rose Marie were probably written by women—one of them for sure, and the one pointing at McDonald has a female feeling to it . . .’’

‘‘Yeah, it does,’’ Sherrill agreed. ‘‘So we’ve got somebody out there who knows a lot more than we do, and she’s leading us in.’’

‘‘Which makes you wonder . . .’’ He looked out the window.

‘‘What?’’

‘‘McDonald’s wife,’’ Lucas suggested.

‘‘Hmm.’’

‘‘He beats her up,’’ Lucas said.

‘‘Yeah?’’ Old story.

‘‘Something to look into,’’ he said.

They rode in the slightly tense silence for another few minutes, then Sherrill blurted, ‘‘Seeing Weather at all?’’

‘‘No. The shrink thinks we ought to spend some time apart.’’ Everybody in the department knew about the shrink.

‘‘But eventually get back?’’ Sherrill asked.

‘‘Maybe,’’ Lucas said moodily. Three teenagers in reflective vests were peering through a surveying total station just off the interstate. All three wore their caps backward.

‘‘You know,’’ Sherrill said, plowing ahead, ‘‘you’ve really got your head up your ass in a lot of ways. You walk around with this cloud over you, mooning over her. Why don’t you do something to get her back?’’

‘‘I’m afraid it’s more complicated than that,’’ Lucas started, a distinct chill in his voice.

‘‘Oh, bullshit, Lucas. If you love her, get her back. Don’t wait for her to work it out—plot something. Suck her in. The thing is, if she gets a little freaky when she sees you, then you’ve got to hang around more. Screw the shrink: the thing is, life goes on, and if you’re around all the time, and life keeps going on . . . the freakiness will go away. It’ll get boring. Tiresome. And if she basically loves you, and you love her . . .’’

‘‘Can we knock this off? You’re bumming me out.’’

‘‘Jesus, what a crock,’’ Sherrill said, angry now.

Lucas was just as angry: ‘‘It’s a crock, all right. I should trick her back? How would I do that? Huh? Get somebody to set up a blind date, and it’s me? Hide in her closet, and pop out when she goes to iron a blouse?’’

Sherrill rolled her eyes and nearly took the car into the oncoming lane; Lucas flinched and she jerked it back to the right. ‘‘Lucas, this is Marcy Sherrill you’re talking to.
I was there when you suckered John Mail, remember? I helped you track the LaChaise women. I heard you order up a traffic stop that you knew would never be made, so when we wasted them, our asses would be covered with the press. I was there, for Christ’s sake. I heard you work it out. So don’t tell me you couldn’t work out some little scheme to get close to her. When it came time to finish off John Mail, you didn’t get moody—’’

‘‘Shut the fuck up,’’ Lucas said.

‘‘Fuck you.’’

‘‘There’s US West,’’ Lucas said, pointing to the right.

‘‘Maybe you don’t want her back,’’ Sherrill said. She missed the turn.

‘‘You missed the goddamned turn,’’ Lucas fumed.

‘‘I’ll make the goddamn turn,’’ Sherrill said, and she braked, looked quickly left, then did an illegal U, bouncing across a median strip.

‘‘Jesus Christ,’’ Lucas said, startled, bracing himself, as the muffler dragged over the curb.

‘‘You want the fuckin’ turn, I’ll make the fuckin’ turn,’’ Sherrill snarled and, ignoring a red light, turned left across two lanes of traffic into the US West parking area. They lurched to a stop in a visitor’s space.

‘‘Satisfied?’’ she asked.

‘‘Yeah,’’ Lucas said. ‘‘Really.’’

SHERRILL WAS OUT OF THE CAR, STEAMING TOWARD
the warehouse entrance. Lucas trailed behind, deflected the door as it slammed on his face, and finally caught her at the service counter, where she flashed her ID at a guard and said, ‘‘We’re here to see Harold Hanks.’’

‘‘Oh, yeah,’’ the guard said. ‘‘He’s waiting up in the canteen on two.’’

‘‘Second floor?’’

‘‘Take those elevators.’’

She steamed on back to the elevators. ‘‘Like you’re Miss Social Life,’’ Lucas said at her back.

Then she was suddenly calm: ‘‘Lucas, I have an active
social life. You just don’t see it.’’ A blatant lie, and they both knew it. The elevator went ding and they got inside.

‘‘Maybe Weather and I don’t recover quite as quickly as you do,’’ Lucas said, as the doors slid shut.

‘‘That’s a horseshit thing to say,’’ Sherrill shouted, really angry now. ‘‘You take that back.’’

‘‘I take it back,’’ Lucas said meekly.

‘‘I’d already signed off on Mike when he got killed,’’ she shouted.

Now he just wanted to quiet her down. ‘‘I know, I know . . .’’

‘‘Jesus, what a jerk.’’

THE ELEVATOR DOORS OPENED, AND A SHORT, ROTUND
man in a brown suit was staring at them owlishly; he’d obviously heard the shouting. ‘‘Is there a problem?’’

‘‘Yeah, him,’’ Sherrill said, tossing her thumb at Lucas, who hovered, embarrassed, in the doorway.

‘‘There are some police officers coming up,’’ the man ventured.

‘‘We are the police officers,’’ Sherrill said. ‘‘We’re looking for a man named Harold Hanks.’’

‘‘The canteen . . . that way, left around the corner.’’

They went left around the corner and Lucas said, ‘‘That was really cute.’’

‘‘Shut up,’’ she said.

HAROLD HANKS WAS A GANGLY, RAWBONED MAN
who wore a billed hat over plaid shirt, jeans, and boots, and though he’d spread out on a couch, he looked as though he’d be even more comfortable standing in a ditch somewhere. He was drinking a Welch’s grape soda from the can while he paged through a copy of
Guns & Ammo
.

‘‘Anything good?’’ Sherrill asked, tipping her head to look at the magazine cover.

‘‘Some. But it’s mostly pistol bullshit . . . You’re Miz Sherrill.’’

‘‘Yes. And this is Chief Davenport. Sheriff Krause says
you saw somebody up by the Kresge place.’’

‘‘Yeah, I guess—but I didn’t tell anybody about it in no bar.’’