Bone Rattle

by Marc Cameron

  Maybe, just maybe, things would start looking up.

  Schimmel had a bunk in one of the ATCO trailers out at the Valkyrie mine. It was dry and comfortable enough, but still smelled like other people’s feet. On his off weeks, he lived in a miniscule efficiency apartment on Douglas Island, a couple of blocks from the Breeze Inn. He kept a spritz bottle of Febreze inside the front door, though there was no one here to blame for the stench but himself.

  Childers was pissed at him. The guy had nothing against shooting a girl, but shooting the wrong girl meant they had probably scared his target away – and that made him mad. But what was Schimmel supposed to think? Some chick he’d never seen before came up the road fifteen minutes after the lawyer like they were going to meet. Dollarhyde and the others had the luxury of blaming him now, but every last one of them would have made the same call. They’d get over it.

  Probably.

  Schimmel gave the room a couple of squirts of Febreze and then headed for the bathroom. Experience told him to bring the bottle with him. For some reason, Schimmel’s body was programed to need the toilet every time he got within a block of his house. He could go for a day or two at the mine, but at home, all he had to do was cross the bridge to Douglas Island and his guts started to gurgle. The two gas station corn dogs he’d wolfed down earlier probably hadn’t helped.

  He kicked off his pants, cracked open a Bud Light, and sat on the john, beer in one hand, air freshener in the other, staring at the peeling paint and thinking about the day.

  It had taken Schimmel six hours to get home from the time they’d sped north away from the shrine. Childers got out at the Auke Bay Marina, where he picked up his motorcycle. It was there that Childers had gotten the call from Mr. Dollarhyde about the screwup. He’d told Schimmel to hide the skiff and they’d sort it all out in the morning, but it was obvious he was pissed.

  Schimmel had slowed down near town, putzing past the abandoned tug boat that was anchored in the middle of the channel so as not to draw attention to himself. He’d loaded the skiff on a trailer at the marina north of the city, and then, covering it with a blue tarp, backed it in with a dozen other aluminum skiffs just like it.

  He didn’t like it when Childers talked about “sorting everything out,” but he’d worry about tomorrow, tomorrow. For now, he had other things to worry about.

  Anyone else would have taken one look at the grimy tub and run, or at the very least, run for some shower shoes. Schimmel knew it was dirty, but he reasoned that it was his dirt, so he’d be immune to whatever bugs it held. Naked and chilled, he reached behind the door and grabbed the towel hanging on the peg. It was stiff and slightly sour, but was cleaner than anything else he had. He dropped it on the magazine rack that still held a couple of water-crinkled National Geographic magazines from the previous renter. Schimmel had yet to crack one open, but it seemed cool to have reading material in the john.

  The apartment was cramped and old, but the water heater worked very well. Steam rolled out from the shower curtain, fogging the mirror by the time Schimmel stepped into the grimy porcelain tub.

  He bowed his head, feeling the super-heated water scald his scalp and neck, washing away three days of dirt and grit.

  He caught a hint of the cheap coconut shampoo he preferred, the plain white store-brand bar soap in the caddy at eye level.

  Feeling better, lighter, he grabbed the soap and began to hum.

  Schimmel wasn’t much of a reader, but he’d heard somewhere that most guys only washed their crotch and their armpits when they showered, letting the spray of water clean everything else – more or less.

  Fortunately for Dean Schimmel, he always started with his pits.

  The initial sensation was one more of uneasiness than pain. Something… not quite right. The sting of hot water against his skin made him think he’d imagined it.

  Right-handed, he’d raised his left arm and rubbed the bar of soap liberally around his armpit, sliding it across his chest before transferring to his left hand to repeat the process. Another sting, this one sharp enough to snap his eyes closed. He winced, horrified when he glanced down to see streaks of meat oozing red lines across his chest. Blood poured down his sides, spilling from deep gashes under his arms. His left nipple was sliced completely in half, exposing yellow globules of fat. The water at his feet turned rusty red.

  He grabbed the shower curtain with his free hand, pulling the flimsy rod down on top of him. Collapsing, he sat on the edge of the tub, blood pulsing from between the fingers of the fist that held the soap. He opened his hand tentatively, moving it under the stream of water to wash away the blood. A deep cut at the base of his thumb smiled back at him, pulsing geysers of blood. He gagged, not so much at the sight of his wounds, but from fear. Who would do this? If they were going to kill him, they should just kill him. It took a special kind of sadistic mind to put razor blades in a guy’s soap. He could have cut his junk off…

  Dollarhyde. It had to be Dollarhyde. That guy was a psycho, always licking his lips, watching everyone else’s pain. You could see it in his eyes.

  Schimmel kept his arms down, his hands clenched into fists. This controlled the worst of the bleeding. Blood spurted from his thumb when he grabbed the crusty bath towel and held it against his chest.

  He had to get out of here. But for that, he’d need money.

  He knew a woman at a gallery downtown who would buy the bone rattle. She’d pay him shit, but at least she’d pay him…

  He lifted the towel away to examine the wounds. Thin, scalpel-like lines crisscrossed his chest. He gagged again at the sight of it. Not life-threatening, but still bad. Whoever had sunk razor blades into his soap hadn’t cared if he died or not. Curtains of blood cascaded down his chest and belly, dripping onto his naked thighs. He pressed the towel back to his flesh, wincing from the acid pain under each arm. He struggled to keep from hyperventilating.

  Tape. He needed tape. Lots of tape. And gauze.

  And he needed to get the hell out of Juneau.

  Chapter 27

  Ephraim Dollarhyde’s desk at the main offices of Valkyrie Mine Holdings suited his personality. The rich mahogany was polished to a reflective sheen and smelled slightly of lemon and tung oil. Imported wood seemed sinful with all the beautiful cedar and spruce in the area.

  Inside the desk, locked in a flat metal safe, were files that could burn down the company and put Grimsson in prison for a very long time. Using them would implicate Dollarhyde as well, of course, but he’d been to law school. He knew the first rat to the table got the best deal – and he had a lot to bring to the table. It was far too early for that – but it paid to have insurance. Especially with the informant still out there.

  The irony of the situation was not lost on him – trying to ferret out this informant before he was forced to turn informant himself in order to save his own skin.

  There were only a few people to choose from. His money had never been on Dean Schimmel. The buffoon was hardly smart enough to hide his intentions this long. No, Schimmel was a perpetual screwup, but he wasn’t the type to be setting up secret meetings with the US Attorney’s office. The timeline didn’t work out for that anyway. The same went for Dallas Childers, though he was mercenary enough. In some ways, Childers reminded Dollarhyde of a younger version of himself. More intense on the outside maybe, fortunate enough to have been able to exercise some of his baser passions in war. Dollarhyde had always had to operate in the shadows, convincing some employer that a heavy hand was necessary to keep order. Still, the timing was all wrong for Childers to be the snitch. He’d been waiting to take out the prisoner transport when the meeting with the AUSA was set up.

  Dollarhyde tapped an unsharpened pencil on the desk, racking his brain.

  One of the senators? Maybe. But they both had a hell of a lot to lose.

  The phone rang. It was Fawsey, speaking ninety miles an hour.

  “My son has been arrested,” the senator said, breathless. “JPD has him now, bu
t I’m told the Troopers are pursuing charges on suspicion that he murdered his girlfriend.”

  “Did he?” Dollarhyde said, processing, looking at this from all angles.

  Fawsey gasped. “Of course not.”

  “I have to ask, sir,” Dollarhyde said.

  “Levi’s not like that!”

  “Ah,” Dollarhyde said. “But how would you know?”

  “I would,” the senator said. “Believe me.”

  Fawsey ran down everything he did know, which wasn’t much, then dropped the bombshell. “My contact with the Troopers office said the FBI is coming over to speak with him.”

  “The FBI?” Dollarhyde mused. “They have their hands full with this other murder…”

  “They want to hold him as a material witness,” Fawsey said.

  “To what?”

  Dollarhyde’s office door flew open and Harold Grimsson barged in, both hands planted on the desk, glowering. He obviously also had a source at the Troopers, or JPD, or somewhere.

  “What in the—”

  Dollarhyde cut him off. “I have Senator Fawsey on the line right now, sir.”

  “Put him on speaker!” Grimsson boomed.

  “Harold,” Fawsey said once Dollarhyde hit the button. “I will fix this. I only wanted to make sure we’re all on the same sheet of music.”

  “Oh, we are,” Grimsson said. “But what about Levi? What music is he singing from?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “If the FBI wants to talk to him, then they think he knows something about that AUSA’s murder. Does he?”

  “No…” Fawsey said, sounding hollow. “I mean, how could he? I don’t know anything about it.”

  Dollarhyde went back to drumming the pencil. “He hasn’t told them anything. Otherwise, it would be raining red lights and sirens. If they don’t have a body, it’ll take them a minute to make a murder charge stick. The feds may try to hold him, but a material witness has the same rights as anyone arrested for a crime. You have to see to it he makes bond.”

  “What about this dead girlfriend?” Grimsson asked. “Donita something.”

  “Willets,” Dollarhyde said.

  “They have her body?” Grimsson asked.

  “No.” Senator Fawsey’s voice dropped to a hoarse whisper. “I can’t imagine her knowing anything either.”

  “You and Levi get along well?” Dollarhyde said, trying to calm both Grimsson and Fawsey. Tempers and emotion would get them in real trouble.

  “Yes,” Fawsey said. “Normal father and son stuff, I suppose, but he’s a good boy. We talk.”

  “Be honest,” Dollarhyde said. “Is there a chance he got rid of the girl to protect you? Maybe she heard something she wasn’t supposed to?”

  Grimsson was having none of this. “You stupid bastard. What could your kid possibly know? Do you keep black and white glossies of our business meetings on your desk?”

  “I think they were in my office a few days ago when I got home, using my sofa to… you know. I made a few phone calls that may have mentioned our relationship, some of the problems – all with my lawyer. Don’t worry about him. It’s covered by privilege. If they happened to overhear anything, it’s not much. But I needed insurance.”

  “Insuring what?” Grimsson fumed. “That we all go to prison?”

  “I didn’t give any specifics.”

  Dollarhyde kept his voice even, though he found it next to impossible. “You gave them enough to rouse their curiosity so they could do a little digging.”

  “I’m not even sure they were there,” Fawsey said. “I found the blanket later, after I’d left and come back.”

  “Okay,” Dollarhyde said. “We’ll send an attorney to see that the boy gets out of jail as soon as possible. Tell him to agree to cooperate for now. We’ll get a bond set. File a writ. Whatever it takes.”

  Grimsson nodded.

  “Do you understand me?” Dollarhyde prodded Fawsey to answer.

  “Yes.”

  “Good.” Dollarhyde ended the call. He dropped the pencil and leaned back in his chair, rubbing his eyes.

  “We’ll see what he does when he’s free,” Grimsson said. “If he goes into hiding, he’s a rat. If he comes to us for help, I’ll break out some of my best whiskey and we’ll celebrate that he did what he needed to do and sunk the nosey bitch to keep his father out of jail.”

  Chapter 28

  “Shoulda been us, Cutter,” Lola Teariki said, exhausted, so her Kiwi accent made him Cuttah again. “We’re the ones who arrested Levi Fawsey. We should be in on the interrogation.”

  Cutter stood at the reception desk of the Four Points Sheraton hotel downtown, eyes on his roller cases, waiting for the clerk to code his room key. He’d opted to move out of the lonely Vrbo and closer to town now that Mim and the kids had returned to Anchorage.

  “Technically,” Cutter said, “Rockie Van Dyke arrested him.”

  “She may have slapped the cuffs on him,” Lola said, “but you made first contact.”

  “This is her city.”

  “It’s our country,” Lola said. “My badge says United States Marshal.”

  “Let me know how that attitude works for you,” Cutter said. “Jurisdiction games are for… that other agency. It just pisses everybody off when we need their help – which, I might point out, is every time we go into the field.”

  Lola scuffed her boot on the lobby floor. “I guess so—”

  Cutter’s phone buzzed. The caller ID was blocked. “Speaking of that other agency,” he said before answering. “Cutter.”

  “Where are you?” It was Charles Beason.

  “Where do you need me?” Cutter said.

  “Troopers are telling me the Fawsey kid is scared.”

  “Scared of who?”

  “He’s not giving that up yet,” Beason said. “He says he’ll cooperate so long as he has protection. I’ve already spoken to the judge. She’s issuing an order for the USMS to babysit.”

  “Teariki and I will head to JPD right now,” Cutter said. He kept his voice cheerful, unwilling to give Beason the satisfaction of a whine. Babysitting prisoners and witnesses was in fact the job of the Marshals Service. Cutter didn’t mind. By and large, most protected witnesses were just outlaws who made it to the negotiating table before their co-conspirators. Listening to them, observing their habits, helped Cutter learn what made them tick so he could catch them the next time.

  He dropped his gear in the hotel room, hung the do not disturb sign on the door, and met Lola back in the lobby.

  * * *

  The clear day had given in to steady rain, turning the roads pitch-black, but most residents had gone to bed, making it a quick drive up Egan toward the airport.

  Rockie Van Dyke met them at the employee entrance around back of the PD. Hair plastered to her face with rain, she was spitting mad.

  Her mood was contagious. Cutter cocked his head, suddenly wary. “What’s the matter?”

  “He’s gone,” Van Dyke said. “I went to get something from my car and ended up taking a phone call from my husband while I was out there. Dipshit’s attorney slithered in and produced a writ before I made it back in.”

  “A writ…” Cutter mused. It made sense. This kid was a senator’s son, and the old saying was a judge was just a lawyer with a senator for a friend. State politicians didn’t wield the terrible cosmic power of a US senator, but they surely knew a few judges willing to sign a writ to get someone out of jail. Levi Fawsey was not yet in federal custody, which made it a fairly simple process.

  Lola shot an astounded look at Cutter. “They can’t just snatch him away from us.”

  “I knew you guys were coming with federal paper,” Van Dyke said. “I would have stalled if I’d been here, but my night lieutenant doesn’t like to make waves.”

  Lola’s eyes narrowed, and she cocked her head in thought, pooching her lips out slightly. “So, Daddy’s closing ranks around his little murderer.”

  “I don’t be
lieve the girl’s dead,” Cutter said. “The way Levi talked about her in the present tense. He was a raw nerve of emotion when he came into the restaurant tonight, and not just because he got caught. Someone who’s that upset because his girlfriend fell overboard would have sent out a Mayday to the Coast Guard, the Troopers – all ships at sea. I’m not so sure he wouldn’t have jumped in after her. And he certainly would have dragged the first person he met back to the spot he last saw her.”

  Van Dyke’s nose turned up in disbelief. She shook her head. “Why all the theatrics then?”

  “Oh, he’s definitely hiding something,” Cutter said.

  “Still,” Van Dyke said. “If Donita Willets is still alive, then why didn’t he just go home and keep his mouth shut?”

  A wide smile spread over Lola’s face as she caught up with Cutter’s line of thought. “Because he wants somebody to think she’s dead.”

  Irate pounding came from the back door. It had to be Charles Beason. Only he would have the brass to demand entry to a police station where he didn’t work. He blew in like the enemy side of a claymore mine as soon as Van Dyke opened the door.

  He focused his anger on Cutter.

  “I just heard.” Beason’s head was shaking like it might fall off the end of his neck. “You let him go!”

  “His attorney got him out with a writ,” Cutter said nose to nose with the FBI supervisor. This wasn’t going to be the ass-chewing Beason thought. They were both supervisors, but Beason liked to slip in the fact that FBI supervisors were GS 14s while those of Cutter’s ilk were lowly 13s – for now. “We weren’t here yet,” Cutter said. “But even if we had been, you didn’t provide me with a warrant.”

  “So this is my fault?”

  Cutter didn’t move. “According to you, Fawsey was scared and wanted to cooperate on his own.”