The Remake (16 page)

Portillo had nothing to say to that.

“Put down that paper, Brooks,” the captain commanded.

R.J. looked up blandly and raised an eyebrow. “Why? So I can get another staring lesson?”

“I’m talking to you, that’s why.”

R.J. shrugged. “I figured if you had something to say, you would have said it. I’m sorry, Captain, I didn’t realize you were so tough. Go ahead, talk. Or if you want, stare some more.”

Captain Davis turned purple. “You’re in enough trouble already, sport. I might go a little easier on you if you cooperate.”

R.J. tried his hardest to look surprised. “But Captain, I
am
cooperating. I’ve flown three thousand miles at my own expense to answer your questions. If you can’t think of any that’s not my problem.” He folded the puzzle and stuck it back into his pocket. “If you want, I’ll think up my own questions, and then answer ’em, too. You can go for coffee. I like it black, two sugars.”

Captain Davis slammed his hand down on the desk. It sounded like a hand grenade going off. R.J. managed not to shout
eek
or dive under the furniture. But it was a close call.

“Portillo!” he bellowed. “Tell this fucking clown this is serious!”

“I think he heard you, Captain.”

“I heard you,” R.J. said. “But I might be more inclined to believe it’s serious if you start to treat it that way instead of trying to prove what a hard-ass you are. So why don’t I just admit you are really a hard-ass, this is serious, I’m in trouble, and then cut all the horseshit and do some business?”

Captain Davis thought of three or four things to say, all at the same time, but none of them came out so you could actually understand them. The first thing that came out that R.J. and Portillo could make out was, “Lieutenant Kates was right about you.”

R.J. smirked. If Davis had been on the phone to Kates, R.J. understood where the staring business came from. “Kates has never been right about anything. But if you think he is, that explains a lot.”

“He said you’re the biggest pain in the ass in Manhattan.”

R.J. grinned. “Well, that’s a compliment coming from him. What else did he say?”

Now Davis grinned. It wasn’t pretty. “He said he’s been talking to the Connecticut State Troopers. And Connecticut has a body on their hands that might interest you.”

R.J. could feel the skin rise up on the back of his neck. The only people he knew of who had gone to Connecticut were Mary Kelley and Hookshot. If either one had gone over to Torrington and something had happened—“Who is it?”

Davis leaned back, stretching his power play as long as he could. “Guy named William Kelley.”

R.J. could hear Portillo hissing explosively. But R.J. didn’t have enough breath to do it himself. His head was swimming. “Excuse me?” he finally managed to say.

Davis’s grin got bigger and nastier. “Yeah, that’s right. William Kelley. Died in a car crash. Your big alibi ran into a tree, hotshot.” He leaned back and for the first time looked almost happy. “They’ve had him in the morgue for three days. Looking for next of kin. Then they got the wire from us asking about him. Small world, huh, Brooks?” He leaned forward and slammed his hand on the table again. “Now, goddammit, let’s talk about a couple of murders, punk.”

R.J. got over the shock of Kelley’s death in a couple of minutes. But it was two and a half hours of sweat before he got away from Davis and his staring act. At least an hour and a half of it was pure meanness by Davis, hitting up against pure stubbornness by R.J. Toward the end, R.J. knew that Davis didn’t think he had killed anybody or even written the damn letters,
but he also knew that if Davis had a chance to stick him with it, he would.

In a way, R.J. sympathized with that. Davis was under a lot of pressure to stick somebody, anybody, and if he could make R.J. fit, well, that would take the pressure off. And because of who R.J. was it would mean a lot of media attention, which never hurt a cop’s career.

But it also meant that Davis was more interested in covering his ass than finding the killer, and that wasn’t good news. Casey’s life was in danger here and R.J. didn’t feel like taking the chance. There was too much at stake to depend on a clown like Davis. He would never find this guy, unless he saw him in the commissioner’s back pocket while he was kissing it.

And that meant R.J. would have to do it.

With Kelley out of the picture as a suspect, R.J. would be starting all over again, back at square one. And the killer, whomever it was, was out here now, off R.J.’s home turf. That made it tougher. But there wasn’t anybody else, and the stakes were too high—Casey’s life was on the line.

First, though, he had to go back to New York. He wasn’t looking forward to it. He hated funerals, but Mary Kelley was going to hate this one even more, and she would be there alone. She was his client, and he owed it to her to be there. An obligation like that came first, no matter how much every cell in his body was screaming at him to stay close to Casey and keep her safe.

But before any of that he still had to sit through Captain Davis’s torture session. And it was a nasty shock when he realized that he was now the leading suspect for Jason Levy’s murder, too.

He found out the hard way.

After some routine opening questions Davis leaned back and went into the staring routine again. A little smile flicked across his skinny lips and R.J. thought, Uh-oh, here it comes. He looked at Portillo, who shrugged.

“Coroner says Jason Levy was killed early yesterday afternoon,” Davis said.

“All right,” R.J. said.

“Where were you, Brooks?”

R.J. almost choked. “What? Where was I? For Christ’s sake, Davis, you think I killed Levy?”

Davis just smiled. “We know from the notes what the motive was—stop this movie they’re making over there at Andromeda. That sound like something you want to do? Yeah, I thought so. And we know that lawyer, Belcher, was killed for that same reason, at a time when you had motive, means, and opportunity. Just like you had for Jason Levy. So of course, we’d like to know where you were when Levy was killed, since the two deaths appear to be linked.” His sick little smile got a lot bigger. The son-of-a-bitch was really getting off on this. “Where were you, Brooks?”

With a sick lurch to the stomach, R.J. knew they had him in a bad place. “I was at Lieutenant Portillo’s house,” he said, with no hope at all.

Davis played it out, the sadistic bastard. “Oh. Okay. I see. So naturally Lieutenant Portillo can vouch for you, then. Very good. Is that right, Lieutenant? The two of you were together, at your house?”

Portillo looked pale, whether from anger or something else, and R.J. could see his jaw muscles standing out. “I was down here,” he said. “In my office.”

Davis pretended to look surprised. “Down
here
—then you mean Brooks was at your house
alone
?”

“That’s right.”

Davis stared at R.J. again, raising his eyebrows, pretending he’d just discovered something. Just like a real investigator. “Well, Brooks,” he said. “I’m sure somebody else can provide some corboration.”

“It’s cor-
rob
-boration, Captain.”

The smile stayed, but there was a mean glitter in Davis’s
eyes now. “I don’t give a flying fart how you say it, Brooks. Do you have any?”

R.J. sighed. “No.”

“Nothing at all? No UPS deliveries, no passing fire trucks, no telephone calls from U.S. senators? Nothing?”

“Nothing,” R.J. said. “I fell asleep.”

Davis shook his head. “Asleep. Well, well. You must be a sound sleeper then. Are you a sound sleeper, Brooks?” R.J. didn’t answer. Why give the bastard the satisfaction. “Because according to our records here, Lieutenant Portillo attempted to reach you by telephone two times at the approximate time of Jason Levy’s murder and there was no answer.” The smile dropped away and it was all triumphant snarl now. “How do you explain
that,
Mister Movie Star Fucking Brooks?”

R.J. couldn’t explain it, of course. It sounded pretty feeble, even to him, and he knew it was true.

And for the next hour and a half Davis pounded away at it. The same questions over and over. The same veiled threats and cheap scare tactics. It didn’t work on R.J.—he had nothing to say that he hadn’t said already and the Gestapo-style bullying just didn’t work on a guy who’d had it from experts.

It wasn’t getting them anywhere, and it sure wasn’t closing in on the killer. It was pure ticket-punching. Davis was making sure he could show that he had personally spent a good long time grilling the leading suspect.

Finally R.J. had enough.

Davis had asked him the same stupid question for the twelfth time and R J. felt something pop inside. He’d felt it before. It meant he was in a kind of danger zone where he was going to do whatever he had to do and the hell with the consequences. It meant if he had to punch out a police captain to get some fresh air, that’s what he would do.

R.J. stood up.

“Sit down, Brooks,” Davis said. “I’m not done with you.”

“Yes, you are.”

“I said sit down!”

“Am I under arrest?”

“No.”

R.J. took a step closer to Davis. “Are you going to charge me with anything?”

Davis licked his lips. “Not at present.”

R.J. took another step, and another. He felt Portillo’s hand on his arm, trying to hold him back, but he didn’t care. “Am I a suspect in a capital case? Should I get a lawyer?”

“That won’t be necessary at this time.”

R.J. pulled away from Portillo’s restraining hand and leaned right in over the desk. Davis tried to tough it out, but he was looking worried. “Then how would you describe my legal position at this moment, Captain?”

Davis twitched. He shot his eyes to Portillo, maybe looking for help, but he didn’t find any there.

“You are voluntarily assisting the police in their investigation.”

R.J. held the stare for a second. Let the bloated desk jockey squirm. There was nothing he could do. “Voluntarily,” R.J. finally said.

“That’s right.”

R.J. stood up. “I just un-volunteered,” he said. “If you’re in charge of this investigation, I’m no longer assisting. You couldn’t catch a cold in the flu ward.”

“Damn it, Brooks—”

R.J. turned his back on Davis. “Uncle Hank, I’m out of here.”

“All right, R.J.”

“Portillo,” Davis spluttered. “You’d damn well better make him stay—!”

Davis found himself looking into four ice cold eyes. “Captain,” Portillo said gently. “If you are suggesting that I, as a sworn officer, unlawfully detain a citizen who has gone to great personal expense and inconvenience to assist us—”

“That’s exactly what I’m suggesting, goddammit!”

Portillo nodded. “Then I’d like that in writing, please,
Captain.” And he looked mildly at Davis, who made noises for a few seconds and finally gave up.

Davis hit his desk again. It didn’t sound so loud this time. “You’ll die a lieutenant, Portillo,” he finally said.

Portillo stepped up and looked down at Davis. The captain probably outweighed Portillo by a hundred pounds and stood six inches taller, but Portillo filled the room and Davis looked small and insignificant. “Under the circumstances,” Portillo said softly, “that will be a great satisfaction. Sir.” And he looked down at Davis for a good long time to be sure he got the message.

Davis got it all right. He turned bright red. R.J. had to grin as he watched the captain squirm for control. He didn’t find any.

“Will that be all, Captain?” Portillo asked him. And before he could answer, Portillo turned away. “Let’s go, R.J.”

They headed out of the building and into the parking garage without saying a word. But by the time they got to Portillo’s car, R.J. was fighting back an attack of the giggles. As he climbed into the car, he lost the fight and started to laugh.

“Jesus Christ, Uncle Hank,” he gasped.

Portillo stared at him with the same mild control he had used on the captain. R.J. lost it again. Portillo watched him laugh for a minute, shaking his head.

“R.J.,” Portillo finally said. “This is not a laughing matter.”

“I know it, Uncle Hank,” R.J. said, still laughing, “but my God, you were great in there.” R.J. pulled himself together. “I feel like a kid coming from the principal’s office.”

Portillo snorted and started the car. “Davis is not going to suspend you,” he said. “He wants to put you in jail, and he no longer cares how. You have made a bad enemy, R.J.”

“He’ll have to take a number, Uncle Hank. Besides, he wasn’t any friend of mine when I walked in. He’s getting chummy with Kates by long distance.”

But Portillo just shook his head. “We blew it,
hijo
.”

They drove in silence for a few minutes, until the car nosed
up the on-ramp onto the freeway. R.J.’s laughter left him quickly. Uncle Hank was right. There really wasn’t anything funny about this. They had blown it. Given half a chance he could have gotten off the hook with the law. But he’d gotten no chance and had twisted himself more firmly on the hook than ever before.