Smoke & Mirrors

by John Ramsey Miller

  “Huh?” he asked.

  “Sheriff’s department,” Brad said. “We’re executing a search warrant.”

  He ran his hands over his hair in an attempt at collecting himself. “We ain’t hiding nothing,” he said in a tone that told Winter the man wasn’t at all sure that was the case.

  “We’re looking for Alphonse’s room, Mr. Jefferson,” Brad said.

  “Next room, but I don’t think he’s in there.”

  “Where is he?”

  “Sommer else probably.”

  “Mr. Jefferson,” Brad said. “How can you live like this?”

  “Axe her,” the man said sadly. “City makes her keep the yard up some. You think you can git ’em to come up in here and ’complish the same thang?”

  “I expect I could call the fire chief and tell him this is a fire hazard and maybe he can make her clean some of this out,” Brad said.

  “At be good, if you can.”

  Alphonse Jefferson’s room was by far the least cluttered room in the house. They searched the room, but there was no gun of any kind to be found, only a few pictures of a man at different ages, a wallpapering of nudes torn from magazines, and a framed less-than-honorable discharge sheet from the U.S. Army.

  The clothes hanging in the closet were neatly ordered, with each of the articles in its own dry-cleaning bag. The closet floor was covered with pairs of shoes in every imaginable style and color. Chains and other items of ornamental gold-plated jewelry had been laid out on the dresser as if for display.

  “No rifles,” Winter said after he’d looked under the mattress.

  “I doubt he would keep it here,” Brad said, moving out of the room toward the kitchen.

  A sink hung on the wall in the kitchen beside a rusted refrigerator. Three mismatched chairs surrounded a table piled with food-encrusted dishes. A gas stove, its surface covered with stacked pots and pans, was positioned below partly closed cabinets. On the floor by the back door—beside an overflowing box piled with more dried bits of feline offal than litter—several bags of trash that had been chewed open by tiny teeth waited to be put on the curb.

  Winter saw the bags shift slightly—a movement so subtle he almost missed it. Pulling out the Reeder .45, Winter nudged Brad.

  “I’ve seen enough,” Brad said, taking out his Python.

  Winter and Brad reached down and each took the corner of a trash bag. They jerked the bag up and aimed down at the man curled into a ball on the floor.

  “Okay, Alphonse,” Brad said, “It’s time to take a ride. I want you to stand up slowly. I don’t want to shoot you, but if you do anything but get up slowly and come with us, I will.”

  The young man dressed in a black jogging suit turned his head up slowly, peered at the handguns, and grinned.

  17

  “I AIN’T DID NOTHIN’,” THE SURLY YOUNG MAN SAID when Brad and Winter came into the interrogation room.

  “I haven’t accused you of anything, Alphonse,” Brad said. The file folders under his arm caught Alphonse’s attention briefly.

  “And you better not. I got my rights, and I know a lawyer. Gone sue you and make me a rich man.”

  Alphonse Jefferson was taller than his grandmother. His almond-shaped eyes were an unnaturally light gray, and he had mocha skin with freckles running like a stream of rusty BBs across the bridge of his nose. His lips parted to reveal teeth that were large and even, each one capped with gold-plated snap-ons. His black velvet running suit had burgundy stripes up the pant legs and sleeves of the jacket, which was unzipped to show his hairless chest.

  “You can say it. You know.” He plucked his lapels. “I look good in black.”

  “How do you think you’ll look in prison dress whites?” Brad asked him.

  “Me in prison?” Alphonse barked laughter at the ceiling. “Aw, man. That’s all you know? You ain’t charging me, then I’m on jus’ walk on out of here and get on back to the bid’ness of doing my bid’ness. You dig?”

  Brad placed the file on the table in front of him. “I want to ask you a few questions.”

  “Uh-uh. I’ll be talking to you through the Johnny Cocoh-ran legal firm. Case you missed it, it was him that got O.J. off.”

  “Johnny’s dead. You sure you want to go that route?” Brad asked.

  Alphonse placed his hands flat on the table. “I don’t gots to answer no questions. ’Bout what?”

  “About Sherry Adams.”

  Alphonse turned his attention from Brad and glared up at Winter, who stood arms crossed with his back against the concrete block wall, looking down at Alphonse.

  “What about her?” he asked suspiciously.

  “You’ve been harassing her, Alphonse.”

  “Who told you that? Them fools are all a bunch of no-count lying player haters, ’cause I’m a smooth dude. What I said was, ‘If she had some of what I got, she would be ruint for everybody else.’ You dig?”

  “I have your Army records,” Brad said, opening a folder and pointing to the faxed pages he’d received before the interview. “They kicked you out for possession of marijuana. At least that was the straw that broke the mule’s back. They obviously didn’t want you bringing down the average IQ of the armed forces.”

  “Those fools got they heads up they asses. Always tellin’ a brother what to do. Racist haters.”

  “It looks like you were deficient in every possible area. Your whole short career was a stack of inadequacy, petty criminality, and impulsive behavior. These records say you shot a rifle like a girl. Except all of the girls in the Army could shoot better than you.”

  “I can shoot a fly off your lily-white butt from far as you can see.”

  “And you stalk women who see you for the loser you are. Can’t let that go, can you?”

  “Sherry Adams’s full a’ herself, prissy ass be-otch. I ain’t never laid a hand on her. Ain’t no crime wanting to change a girl’s mind. She just needs to come around and see what she’s missing.”

  Brad opened the folder and tossed a picture of Sherry Adams’s ruined head onto the table so Alphonse could see it. He stared down at it and frowned, looking away. “What that is?”

  “That was Sherry Adams.”

  “Naw, it ain’t! You lying!”

  Winter understood why Alphonse didn’t recognize her. The bullet had literally exploded her head, and the result looked like pizza topped with almost human features, torn and splattered on the bricks. Her black hair was reduced to tufts forming a border around the skin that remained.

  “Somebody shot her, Alphonse. Maybe somebody that can shoot from as far away as you say you can. Where were you this morning between six and seven?”

  “What?!” Alphonse looked down at the picture, lowered his head, and vomited into his lap.

  Brad put the picture back into the folder and rolled his eyes at Winter.

  Winter shook his head slowly.

  “I ain’t do that!” Alphonse managed to yell, flecks of bile on his chin. “Lord is my witness, it wasn’t me did it. I was sleepin’ in my car up by Bugger’s place. I ain’t never capped nobody. I wouldn’t shoot that girl! I liked her.”

  “I know, Alphonse,” Brad said, standing. “You wouldn’t know which end of a gun the bullet comes out of. Get out of my building before I lock you up for littering.”

  Back in the office, Winter said, “Tell me about Leigh Gardner.”

  “Leigh’s family’s been in the cotton-farming business here since the county was cleared from cypress swamps. Her grandfather and her father grew their land holdings into the three thousand acres you saw, probably another three in woodland, and some other scattered acreage she leases to other planters. Leigh is strictly a cotton and soybean farmer. She learned from her father, studied agriculture at Mississippi State and she knows her business. Her old man was a tough-as-nails businessman and an old-school planter. She runs the place the same way.”

  “Husband?”

  “Divorced. She married a jerk named Jacob Gardner who
se law practice consisted of spending her money. She kicked him out five years ago. He went over to Oxford and set up a private practice, and got in trouble year after that for misappropriating his clients’ funds. Leigh paid back the stolen money to keep him out of jail for the kids’ sakes. He was disbarred anyway. He comes around periodically when he needs something and I’ve heard Leigh gives him an allowance so he doesn’t starve. He used to be able to charm the pants off a nun. Now, not so much.”

  “I think you should investigate him,” Winter said.

  “What for? The killer was a pro.”

  “Doesn’t take a professional killer to hire one.”

  “He wouldn’t have any reason to have Sherry killed.”

  “Maybe Sherry wasn’t the target.”

  “Who would be?” Brad asked.

  “If anything happened to Leigh Gardner, who would benefit?” Winter asked.

  “The kids. Leigh wouldn’t leave Jacob a ten-dollar bill.”

  “Maybe not. But who do you suppose would be their guardian if Leigh Gardner was dead?”

  Brad sat up. “The killer shot her babysitter. Leigh wasn’t even in the area. What are you thinking?”

  “Maybe the killer didn’t know that.”

  18

  ALEXA KEEN OPENED HER APARTMENT DOOR AND had to put down her bag of groceries to answer the telephone. It was rare that her phone rang unless it was someone from the Bureau.

  “Yes?” she said.

  “Alexa?” a familiar voice asked.

  “Sean,” Alexa said. “Hello.”

  “How are you, Lex?”

  “I’m fine. How are you?”

  The silence lasted too long. She put down her shoulder bag, made heavy by the Glock. “Sean, is everything all right?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  “Where are the kids?” she asked.

  “In the next room. We’re at the Peabody. We’ve been trying to decide on places to visit, but it’s really cold and the kids are ready to go home.”

  “Winter told me you were going back to North Carolina.”

  “Then you’ve talked to him today?”

  “He told me about Faith Ann’s deer. I guess she’s excited.”

  “And did he mention the other thing?”

  “What other thing?”

  “The toothpick.”

  “Yes, he told me about it,” Alexa said.

  “The DNA results are on their way to the lab for a comparison. If it’s Styer’s, I’m not sure Winter is up to dealing with him. Lex, he’ll kill Winter without thinking.”

  “Styer?” Alexa heard her voice crack. “Paulus Styer?”

  “He didn’t tell you he’s comparing the DNA to the sample he has for Styer?”

  “He left that part out,” Alexa said, apprehension and dread mushrooming inside her. Paulus Styer was one frightening son of a bitch, and she’d thought he was gone for good.

  “Because he knew you’d go ballistic on him.”

  Damned right I would have. Good Christ! “Sean, you shouldn’t worry. Winter knows what he’s doing.” Alexa hoped she sounded convinced of her words.

  “I’m sorry to pour this out on you. It’s just that there’s nobody else Winter will listen to. If I told Hank Trammel, you couldn’t stop the old buzzard from going there with a tank. And he can barely walk.”

  “Sean, I’m gonna go down,” Alexa said suddenly. “I have some time off coming to me, and if Styer is involved, I want to be there.”

  “That isn’t why I called. I just wanted to talk to somebody who knows Winter and understands the situation. I shouldn’t have called you. You don’t need to go there.”

  “Don’t be silly. Of course you should have called me. I love that old dog too.”

  “I know you do.” Sean’s voice sounded uncharacteristically faint.

  “I’m not in the middle of anything at the moment, except writing a procedural manual nobody is going to read. I’ll just go down there for a couple of days and watch his back. I won’t tell him I know Styer may be involved. He can tell me that when I get there.”

  “I should argue with you, but I won’t. Be careful. He’ll kill you, too.”

  “No, Sean, he won’t.”

  After some small talk, Alexa hung up. She dialed her travel agent’s number from memory and made a reservation for the next flight to Memphis.

  19

  TWENTY-NINE-YEAR-OLD JACK BEALS, A SECURITY officer for the Roundtable, had tailed the kid in the yellow V-neck sweater straight to the Gold Key Motel, a few miles from the casino. The gambler’s name was David Scotoni, a single twenty-three-year-old resident of Reno, Nevada, whose ID checked out as legit. Turned out that the reason a man who lived in a town filled with casinos would fly across the country to gamble was predictable—he was known in Reno as a card counter.

  Counting cards wasn’t illegal, but it gave the player an unfair advantage and was grounds for a casino to invite you to leave and put your mug in the black book system shared by casinos across the country. Scotoni had cashed out his chips to the tune of thirty-five thousand. That was about to be collected and returned to the casino.

  Beals waited to call Albert White until Scotoni had gone into his room on the second level.

  “Target is in a motel room on the second floor of the Gold Key,” Beals told him. “Easy access. I’ll come by tonight and deliver it.”

  White said, “He cashed out for over thirty-five, and he’s won in other places. The thirty-five comes back here. The other we cut up as usual.”

  “Your wish is my command,” Beals said, before hanging up. Whatever he’s taken from the others. Not bad money for a day’s work.

  He screwed the silencer on the .380. The professional from the outside who Jack had been helping to get the lay of the land, the guy whose name was or wasn’t Pablo, had given it to him. Nice fellow, some kind of top-dollar hit man always measuring the world and the people around him like a film director looking for the perfect shot. After putting on a pair of tight leather gloves, Beals climbed from his 1999 Trail Blazer and made sure nobody was watching as he moved up the stairs to Scotoni’s room. Stopping outside the door, he took out his badge case and knocked hard on the door three times. A TV set went off and a voice asked tentatively, “Who’s there?”

  When the young cheater looked out through the peephole, Beals held up a gold five-star badge for the kid to see. “Sheriff’s department, Mr. Scotoni,” he said. “Open the door, please.”

  “What’s the problem, Officer?” the kid asked without opening the door. Beals felt anger rise from within, his heart beating like a bass drum.

  “I’d prefer not to discuss it from out here, sir. We’ve had a complaint.” Beals looked both ways and down at the parking lot. The lot was graveyard still.

  When the kid cracked open the door, Beals shouldered it, propelling Scotoni deep into the room. From the floor, a naked Scotoni looked up at the silenced weapon. The towel he’d been wrapped in was beneath him, and when Scotoni reached to gather it back up, Beals put a boot on it. He heard the sound of water running in the bathtub and he had an idea. He’d been thinking the kid would commit suicide by cutting his wrists, but this was even better. Motioning to the bathroom with the gun’s barrel, he said, “Dave. You need to take that bath.”

  20

  AFTER FOLLOWING JACK BEALS FROM THE CASINO to a motel where Beals seemed to have some business with the man he himself was following, Paulus Styer turned to look into the rear of the van at the tarp under which lay the bound and drugged Gardner girl.

  He turned his attention to the Gold Key—one of several old motels that had been hastily thrown up on a stretch of highway near the original casinos. When larger and finer casinos were built miles away, with newer and fancier motels to accompany them, the Gold Key and its neighbors had been abandoned by the better-heeled clientele, and now subsisted on dregs and scraps from their poorer replacements.

  The Gold Key was a long two-story box, whose rooms faced a p
arking lot on either side. To access the second and third floors, patrons took one of several stairways or the elevator that was located behind the lobby. Time and lack of maintenance had turned the Gold Key into a place where the clientele, even on days when it wasn’t bone-chillingly cold, wouldn’t pay close attention to the comings and goings of strangers. And most of the clients would be sleeping in after a long night of losing money or turning tricks.

  Styer waited until Jack had sneaked up the stairs and shouldered his way inside a room on the second floor. Then he spoke.

  “Cynthia dear?”

  She was still out.

  Styer pocketed his lock-picking tools and patted the survival knife at his side. Then, after checking for witnesses, he climbed from the van, locked it, and walked swiftly but casually toward the stairs.

  21

  WHEN LEIGH GARDNER WALKED INTO BRAD Barnett’s office, the sheriff had just returned from making arrangements for a deputy to deliver the toothpick evidence to the ProCell facility in Nashville via a chartered twin-engine airplane.

  “Okay,” she said. “What’s so all-fired important?”

  “Sit down, Leigh,” Brad said.

  She sat, arms crossed.

  “We don’t think Sherry was the target,” he told her.

  “Oh, really. So you believe it was a hunting accident now? I shouldn’t be surprised you’ve changed your mind already. Keeping your crime numbers stacked for a reelection bid?”

  “No, it definitely wasn’t an accident. I’ll let Winter explain the thinking behind it.”

  Leigh turned in her chair to face Winter. “Okay, Mr. Massey, if Sherry wasn’t the intended victim, who the hell was?” she asked.

  “I think you were,” Winter told her.

  “Why would anybody want to shoot at me?”

  Winter began, “It makes less sense that anyone who could make that shot would target a babysitter out in the middle of nowhere.”