Ashes to Ashes

by Tami Hoag

  “At least Bondurant didn't get you thrown off the force altogether,” Quinn said. “You played bad cop a little too hard this time, Sam.”

  “Bad cop,” Kovac said with disgust. “That was me, and I meant every word of it. I'm fed up to my back teeth with Peter Bondurant, and his money and his power and his people. What Cheryl Thorton told me pushed me over the edge. I just kept thinking about the dead women nobody cared about, and Bondurant playing with the case like it was his own personal live game of Clue. I kept thinking about his daughter and how she should have had such a great life, but instead—dead or alive—she's fucked up forever, thanks to him.”

  “If he molested her. We don't know what Cheryl Thorton said is true.”

  “Bondurant pays her husband's medical bills. Why would she say something that rotten against the man if it wasn't true?”

  “Did she give any indication she thinks Peter killed Jillian?”

  “She wouldn't go that far.”

  Quinn held out the sheet of music. “Make what you want of that. It could say you're on a hot trail.”

  Kovac scowled as he read the lyrics of the song. “Jesus.”

  Quinn spread his hands. “Could be sexual or not. Might refer to her father or her stepfather or not mean anything at all. I want to talk more with her friend Michele. See if she has an interpretation—if she'll give it to me.”

  Kovac turned and looked at the photographs Quinn had taped up. The victims when they were alive and smiling. “There's nothing I hate more than a child-molester. That's why I don't work sex crimes—even if they do get better hours. If I ever worked sex crimes, I'd be in the tank so fast, I'd get whiplash. I'd get my hands on some son of a bitch who raped his own kid, and I'd just fucking kill him. Get 'em out of the gene pool, you know what I'm saying?”

  “Yeah, I do.”

  “I don't know how a man can look at his own daughter and think, ‘Hey, I gotta have me some of that.'”

  He shook his head and dug a cigarette out of the pack in the breast pocket of his limp white shirt. The FBI offices were nonsmoking, but Quinn said nothing.

  “I've got a daughter, you know,” Kovac said, exhaling his first lungful. “Well, you don't know. Hardly anyone knows. From my first marriage, which lasted about a minute and a half after I joined the force. Gina. She's sixteen now. I never see her. Her mother remarried with embarrassing haste and moved to Seattle. Some other guy got to be her dad.”

  He moved his shoulders and looked at the pictures again. “Not so different from Bondurant, huh?” he said, his mouth twisting. The shoulders sagged on a long sigh. “Christ, I hate irony.”

  Quinn could see the regret in his eyes. He'd seen it many times in many faces across the country. The job took a toll, and the people who were willing to pay it didn't get nearly enough in return.

  “What're you going to do about the case?” he asked.

  Kovac looked surprised by the question. “Work the damn task force, that's what. I don't care what Little Dick says. It's my case, I'm lead. They can name whoever they want.”

  “Your lieutenant won't reassign you?”

  “Fowler's on my side. He put me on the support team on the QT. I'm supposed to keep my head down and my mouth shut.”

  “How long has he known you?”

  “Long enough to know better.”

  Quinn found a weary laugh. “Sam, you're something.”

  “Yeah, I am. Just don't ask too many people what.” Kovac grinned, then it faded away. He dropped the last of his cigarette into an empty diet Coke can. “It's no ego trip, you know. I don't need my name in the paper. I don't care what goes in my jacket. I've never looked for a promotion, and I sure as hell don't expect to ever see another.

  “I want this scumbag,” he said with steel in his voice. “I should've wanted him this bad when Lila White was killed, but I didn't. Not that I didn't care about her, but you were right: I went through the motions. I didn't hang in, didn't dig hard enough. When it didn't wrap up fast, I let it slide 'cause the brass was on my case and she was a hooker and hookers get whacked every once in a while. Hazard of the profession. Now we're up to four. I want Smokey Joe's ass on a platter before the body count goes up again.”

  Quinn listened as Kovac said his piece, and nodded at the end of it. This was a good cop standing in front of him. A good man. And this case would break his career more easily than it would make it—even if he solved the mystery. But especially if the answer to the question turned out to be Peter Bondurant.

  “What's the latest on Vanlees?” he asked.

  “Tippen's riding his tail like a cat on a mouse. They pulled him over on Hennepin to ask about his buddy, the electronics dealer. Tip says the guy about shit his pants.”

  “What about the electronics?”

  “Adler checked out the guy's Web page. He specializes in computers and related gizmos, but if it plugs into a wall, he can get it for you. So there's nothing to say that he isn't up to his ears in recording equipment. I wish we could get a search warrant for his house, but there isn't a judge in the state who'd give us one based on what we've got on this mutt—which is nothing.”

  “That bothers me,” Quinn admitted, tapping a pen against the file on Vanlees. “I don't think Gil's the brightest bulb in the chandelier. He's a good fit to the profile on a lot of points, but Smokey Joe is smart and he's bold, and Vanlees seems to be neither—which also makes him a perfect fall guy.”

  Kovac fell into a chair as if the weight of this latest concern made the burden all suddenly too much for him. “Vanlees is connected to Jillian, and to Peter. I don't like that. I keep having this nightmare that Bondurant is Smokey Joe, and that no one will listen to me and no one else will look at him, and the son of a bitch will get away with it.

  “I try to dig on him a little and he damn near gets me fired. I don't like it.” He pulled out another cigarette and just ran his fingers over it, as if he hoped that alone might calm him. “And then I think, ‘Sam, you're an idiot. Bondurant brought in Quinn.' Why would he do that if he was the killer?”

  “For the challenge,” Quinn said without hesitation. “Or to get himself caught. I'd go with the first in this case. He'd get off on knowing I'm here and unable to spot him. Outsmarting the cops is big with this killer. But if Bondurant is Smokey Joe, then who's his accomplice?”

  “Jillian,” Kovac offered. “And this whole thing with her murder is a sham.”

  Quinn shook his head. “I don't think so. Bondurant believes his daughter is dead. Believes it more strongly than we do. That's no act.”

  “So we're back to Vanlees.”

  “Or the Urskines. Or someone we haven't even considered.”

  Kovac scowled at him. “Some help you are.”

  “That's why they pay me the big bucks.”

  “My tax dollars at work,” he said with disgust. He hung the cigarette on his lip for a second, then took it away. “The Urskines. How twisted would that be? They whack two of their hookers, then do a couple of citizens in order to make a political point.”

  “And to push suspicion away from themselves,” Quinn said. “No one considers the person trying to draw attention.”

  “But to snatch the witness staying in their house? That's titanium balls.” Kovac tipped his head, considering. “I bet Toni Urskine can grow hair on hers.”

  Quinn went to his wall of notes and scanned them, not really reading the words, just seeing a jumble of letters and facts that tangled in his mind with the theories and the faces and the names.

  “Any word on Angie DiMarco?” he asked.

  Kovac shook his head. “No one's seen her. No one's heard from her. We're flashing her picture on television, asking people to call the hotline if they've seen her. Personally, I'm afraid finding someone else in that car last night was just postponing the inevitable. But, hey,” he said, dragging himself up out of his chair, “I am, as my second wife used to call me, the infernal pessimist.”

  He yawned hugely and consulted
his watch.

  “Well, GQ, I'm calling it. I can't remember the last time I slept in a bed. That's my goal for the night—if I don't pass out in the shower. How about you? I can give you a ride back to your hotel.”

  “What for? Sleep? I gave that up. It was cutting into my anxiety attacks,” Quinn said, ducking his gaze. “Thanks anyway, Sam, but I think I'll stick to it awhile yet. There's something here I'm just not seeing.” He gestured to the open casebook. “Maybe if I stare at it all a little longer . . .”

  Kovac watched him for a few moments without saying anything, then nodded. “Suit yourself. See you in the morning. You want me to pick you up?”

  “No. Thanks.”

  “Uh-huh. Well, good night.” He started through the door, then looked back in. “Say hello to Kate for me. If you happen to talk to her.”

  Quinn said nothing. He did nothing for a full five minutes after Kovac left, just stood there thinking Kovac had a hell of an eye. Then he went to the phone and dialed Kate's number.

  30

  CHAPTER

  “KATE, IT'S ME. Uh—John. Um, I'm at the office. Give me a call if you get the chance. I'd like to go over some points in these victimologies with you. Get your take. Thanks.”

  Kate stared at the phone as the line went dead and the message light began to flash. A part of her felt guilty for not picking up. A part of her felt relieved. At the core she ached at the lost opportunity to touch him in some way. A bad sign, but there it was.

  She was exhausted, stressed out, overwhelmed, feeling as low as she had in years . . . and she wanted John Quinn's arms around her. She hadn't taken his call precisely for that reason. She was afraid.

  What a rotten, unwelcome feeling it was.

  The office was silent. She and Rob were the only ones left in their section. Rob sequestered in his office down the hall, no doubt writing a long and virulent report to file in her personnel jacket. On the other side of the reception area, in the county attorney's offices, there were any number of assistant prosecutors at work preparing for court, strategizing and researching and writing briefs and motions. But for the most part the building was empty. For all intents and purposes, she was alone.

  Her nerves were raw from spending hours listening to the voice of her dead client confessing her fears of being hurt, her fears of being raped, of being killed, of dying alone, and Kate's own voice reassuring her, promising to look out for her, to get her help, fostering a false security that had ultimately failed Melanie Hessler in the worst possible way.

  Rob had insisted on playing the tapes over and over, stopping and rewinding in sections, asking Kate the same questions over and over. As if any of it would make any difference at all. The cops didn't want to hear about the subtle nuances of Melanie's speech. All they wanted to know was if Melanie had expressed a fear of anyone in particular in the last few weeks of her life.

  He'd been punishing her, Kate knew.

  Finally, he'd hit the nerve one time too many. Kate stood, leaned across the table, and pressed stop.

  “You've made your point. You've had your revenge. Enough is enough,” she said quietly.

  “I don't know what you're talking about.” He said it almost as a taunt, without a speck of sincerity. He wouldn't look directly at her.

  “I like this office, Rob. I like most of the people I work with. But I'm damn good at what I do, and I can get another job in a heartbeat. I won't take you trying to manipulate me and punish me.

  “Now you'll excuse me,” she went on. “Because I've just had the third worst twenty-four hours of my life and I feel like I'm on the verge of a psychotic break. I'm going home. Call if you don't want me to come back.”

  He hadn't said a word as she walked out. At least she hadn't heard him for the pulse roaring in her ears. God knew she probably deserved to have him fire her, but there simply wasn't any tact left in her. All pretense of manners and social bullshit had been scraped away, leaving nothing but raw emotion.

  She felt it flooding through her still, as if some vital artery had ruptured inside her. She felt as if she might choke on it, drown in it.

  And all she wanted was to find Quinn and fall into his arms.

  She'd worked so hard to put her life back together, piece by piece on a new foundation, and now that foundation was shifting. No. Worse—she'd discovered it was built directly over the fault line of her past, just covering up. Not new, not stronger, just a lie she'd told herself every day for the last five years: that she didn't need John Quinn to feel complete.

  Tears welled in her eyes, and despair yawned through her, leaving her aching and empty and alone and afraid. And God, she was so tired. But she choked the tears back and put one foot in front of the other. Go home, regroup, have a drink, try to sleep. Tomorrow was another day.

  She pulled her coat on, scooped up her file on Angie, grabbed her mail and her messages and the faxes that had piled up in the tray during the day, and dumped it all into her briefcase. She reached to turn the desk lamp off, but her hand strayed to the shelves, and she plucked out the little framed photo of Emily.

  Sweet, smiling little cherub in a sunny yellow dress. The future bright before her. Or so anyone with ordinary human arrogance would have thought. Kate wondered if tucked away somewhere in someone's old shoe box there might be a similar photograph of Angie DiMarco . . . or Melanie Hessler . . . Lila White, Fawn Pierce, Jillian Bondurant.

  Life didn't come with any guarantee. There'd never been a promise made that couldn't be broken. She knew that firsthand. She'd made too many with the best of intentions, then watched them crack and come apart.

  “I'm sorry, Em,” she whispered. She pressed the picture to her lips for a good-night kiss, then tucked the frame back into its hiding place, where the cleaning woman would find it and dig it back out.

  She let herself out of the office and locked the door behind her. A vacuum cleaner was running in the office across from hers. Down the hall, Rob Marshall's door was closed. He might still have been there, plotting how to screw her out of her severance pay. Or he might have gone home to—to what? She didn't even know if he had a girlfriend—or a boyfriend, for that matter. Thursday could have been his bowling league night for all she knew about him. He didn't have any close personal friends within the department. Kate had never socialized with him outside the obligatory office Christmas party. She wondered now if he had someone to go home to and complain to about that bitch from the office.

  The snow had finally stopped, she noticed as she took the skyway to the Fourth Street ramp. Six inches total, she'd heard someone say. The street below was a mess that city crews would clear away overnight, though this time of year they might decide to leave it and hope for a couple of warm days to save the city some money for the storms that were sure to come in the next few months.

  She pulled her keys out and folded them into her fist, the longest, sharpest one protruding between her index and middle fingers—a habit she'd developed living in the D.C. suburbs. The ramp was well lit, but not busy this time of night, and it always made her edgy walking around in it alone. More so tonight, after all that had gone on. Between the murders and the lack of sleep, her paranoia was running high. A shadow falling between cars, the scrape of a footstep, the sudden thump of a door—her nerves twisted tight every time. The 4Runner seemed a mile away.

  Then she was in it, doors locked, motor running, heading home, one layer of tension peeling away. She tried to focus on letting the knots out of her shoulders. Pajamas, a drink, and bed. She'd drag her briefcase there with her and sit propped up by pillows on the sheets still rumpled from lovemaking.

  Maybe she would change the sheets.

  The enterprising guy from down the block kept a blade on the front of his pickup five months a year and supplemented his income plowing driveways. He had plowed the alley. Kate would write him a check and leave it in his mailbox tomorrow.

  She drove into the garage, remembering too late the burned-out light. Swearing under her breath, sh
e dug the big flashlight out of her glove compartment, then climbed down from the truck, juggling too much stuff.

  The smell hit her nose just a second before her foot hit the soft, squishy pile.

  “Oh, shit!” Literally. “Shit!”

  “Kate?”

  The voice came from toward the house. Quinn's voice.

  “I'm in here!” she called back, fumbling with the briefcase and the flashlight and her purse.

  “What's wrong? I heard you swearing,” he said, coming in.

  “I just stepped in a pile of shit.”

  “What—Jesus, I smell it. That must have been some dog.”

  The flashlight clicked on and she shined it down at the mess. “It couldn't have been a dog. The door was shut. Gross!”

  “That looks human,” Quinn said. “Where's your shovel?”

  Kate flashed the beam of light at the wall. “Right there. My God, you think someone came into my garage and did this?”

  “You have a more viable theory?” he asked.

  “I just can't imagine why anyone would do that.”

  “It's a sign of disrespect.”

  “I know that. I mean, why to me? Who do I know who would do something that strange, that primitive?”

  “Who've you pissed off lately?”

  “My boss. But somehow I can't envision him squatting in my garage. Nor would I want to.” She limped outside with him, stepping only with the toe of her soiled boot, trying not to smear more feces on her garage floor.

  “Do your clients know where you live?”

  “If any of them do, it's not because I gave them the information. They have my office number—which forwards to my house machine after hours—and they have my cell phone number for emergencies. That's it. My home number is unlisted, not that that would necessarily stop anyone from finding me. It isn't that hard to do if you know how.”

  Quinn dumped the mess between the garage and the neighbor's privacy fence. He cleaned the shovel off in a snowbank while Kate tried to do the same with her boot.