Deep North (A Brenda Contay Novel Of Suspense Book 2)

by Barry Knister

  “Stay in the boat.”

  She took her foot down, looking up.

  “You seen what can happen just now. That’s what I wanted you to see, so we have cooperation.”

  “Please—”

  She was sobbing now, out of control, going to pieces. A song, I Fall to Pieces, Patsy Cline. Jerry glanced over his shoulder. From her expression he saw Ross understood the rope thing had not gone as planned. And there were the nostrils, like people coming down as he worked in their basements.

  “What is it, Jerry?” Marion crossed her arms. “What now? We’re here, you want something. Let’s get on with it.”

  “We’ll get on with it when I say, Marion, so shut your fucking mouth.”

  Lomak had a strong impulse to throw her off the dock. Right now, right here, into the smooth, whalebacked brown glide of fast-moving current just beyond the dock. She was taking over the show, giving orders. What was the expression she’d used so often in court? Let’s go, let’s go, Mr. Lomak, we haven’t got all day. Incredible bitch of a woman. But you had to keep yourself on track. Keep focused. Couldn’t let them knock you off message. That’s what politicians called it on TV, staying on message.

  The one in the boat was whimpering. When he looked, she was slumped now on the passenger seat, rocking. He reached down, got the canvas bag and carried it to the bench. He ripped open the Velcro and set the bag next to Ross before sitting.

  Practiced and efficient from Rohmer’s many rehearsals, he took out the laptop, clicked it on, and got out the two cell phones. Efficiently handling the phones and computer brought a sense of recovery from the mishap with the boat. He used the wireless laptop to log on, waited, then tapped out the online e-mail address of the Rosses’ broker. Waiting again, Lomak readied the two cell phones. He tapped out Rohmer’s number. Louis answered.

  “Yeah, we’re at the falls.”

  “I was starting to worry.” Rohmer was an uptight old woman, a pussy. “You were going to call from the houseboat.”

  “I’m calling now, Louis. Let’s rock.”

  “Put Marion on.”

  He handed her the phone and leaned to hear.

  “Marion? You there?”

  “It won’t work, Louis.”

  “What’s that, Marion? What won’t work?”

  “Whatever this is. It’s too bizarre. Just let it go before someone gets hurt.”

  “Actually, it will work. You can thank wireless technology, and the hotel’s hot spot. As soon as we’re done talking, Jerry will call your broker in Birmingham, Michigan. You’ll be speaking on one line and sending him an e-mail sell order with the laptop. He’ll have questions, but you’re good at those. Plus, the e-mail sell order will be right in front of him. What’s he going to do, Marion, say no to you? You and Drew share a joint account, his-and-her everything. That means you can do this solo. I’ll know everything happened when I dial up your home PC and check your Merrill Lynch account. When the transfer’s effected, it’ll register on your account. It should be slightly more than four million, not less. Then I’ll know it’s in my offshore account.”

  “How—”

  “Carrie. Her high-school chat room. Starting in March. That’s how I learned about your big deal, and everything started falling in place. Especially when she talked about you going to the Boundary Waters. Don’t worry, I never actually chatted with her, she’s fine. Having fun with crazy Brittany—that’s what she calls her. She’s a cute kid, your daughter, I can tell. Nice kid. You should ease up with her, Marion.”

  Ross looked dazed. Seeing her this way filled Lomak with a sense of triumph.

  “Okay, that’s it,” Rohmer said. “As Jerry says, time to rock. You take care now.”

  Still watching her face, Lomak took the phone. She’d been broadsided, down for the count. Ross sat staring past him as he tapped out the broker’s number from the card in his hand. Printed below the phone number, in bold letters was BANCO REAL, and the account number in Costa Rica. Nine digits. He handed back the phone and held up the card for her to see.

  “Good morning, this is Merrill Lynch, Mr. Aronson’s office.”

  “Hello, Toni. Marion Ross.”

  “Well, hi, how you doing?”

  “Let me talk to Leonard, please.”

  “Just a sec.”

  Lomak glanced down to the boat. The shy one was watching. Her eyes were red, face blotchy.

  “Marion, good morning.”

  “Yes, Leonard, something’s come up.”

  “Everything A-OK with your deal?”

  “Change of plans, Leonard—” She looked at Lomak. “Drew needs to do this through some arrangement offshore. He called last night.”

  “I don’t—”

  “Neither do I, but that’s how it has to be. And right now, that’s all he had time to tell me. Something to do with the British end. I’m going to give you an account at—” she glanced at the card “—Banco Real, Costa Rica.”

  “Marion, I don’t—”

  “Leonard, I can’t talk here. Even if I could, I wouldn’t be able to give you the details. All I know is, we have to do this right now. Got a pen? Banco Real, and the following number.”

  She pronounced each digit slowly. Lomak listened to the broker repeat them, then silence. He signaled for her to cup her phone. It pleased him very much, seeing her do as told. All that money, from people like him paying her ticket, setting her up like she was.

  “Tell him you’re sending the order by e-mail for record-keeping,” Lomak said. “To confirm the order.”

  That’s what Rohmer had said to tell her. She uncupped the phone. As she repeated this to the broker, Lomak steadied the laptop on his knees. But thought about it. No, he would make her do it. He placed the keyboard on her knees.

  “Ready?” She was looking at him, but now faced down and began typing, pecking with one hand.

  “I wish you’d tell me a little more,” the broker said. “Drew never—”

  “I know. We’ll both find out more later. Ready?”

  “Just a second… All right, I’m booting it up…I have it. This leaves you…eleven-five and change in the vacation account. Sure you want to do this?”

  “No, Leonard, I’m not sure. But I have to. That’s all I can tell you.”

  “All right, you’re the boss… That’s it, transferred.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I—”

  “Talk to you later.” She pushed the button.

  Lomak took the phone and tapped Rohmer’s number.

  “Jerry?”

  “Hey, Louis. We have a ‘Go,’ we have ignition.”

  “Terrific. Say feenee.”

  “What’s that?”

  “French. It means, we’re done.”

  “Yeah, well, get ready. I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”

  “Understood, I’ll warm up the plane.”

  “If I see that fucker take off, I make a call.”

  “Understood, not to worry.”

  Rohmer hung up. Ross had her arms folded again and was looking at him. He took away the laptop and felt a rush of satisfaction. Of mastery and completion. Now Ross looked to the boat, and Lomak realized he had never really believed it would happen. He had lacked confidence, seen himself along just for the ride, to take Ross over some jumps, as she had done to him.

  He stood. For emphasis, he dropped the laptop off the dock. It hit with a satisfying slap, and now he saw a half-full six pack of beer. It was resting under Schmidt’s seat in the Stratos. There was plenty of time, and he slipped the phone into his shirt pocket. “Hand me that—” He motioned to Heather. “Right there, under the seat.” She looked, saw the beer, and handed it up. Three left, perfect. He took the carton. Five minutes, ten, it didn’t matter now.

  “This is good,” he said. “A toast. Heather?” He raised his eyebrows, holding out one of the bottles as she stared up at him from the boat. He turned. “Marion? No? Sure?” He set down the carton, carried the bottle to the neare
st pier post and snapped off the cap with his palm. Getting the cap off on his first try was like an exclamation point. A high-five.

  Charlie slammed John’s pickup in gear. The tires spit gravel as it moved from the road’s shoulder to asphalt.

  Cradling his Remington, Nielson turned away and began jogging back along the gravel path. Soon he reached the big boulders, and again became conscious of crows off to his right. They were coming down in threes and fours, disappearing behind the pole barn, flying up. From the moment of seeing his father’s truck in Schmidt’s pole barn, working to free Charlie and hearing the crows outside, he’d known Daddy was gone. In a few seconds he would find what was waiting.

  He reached the barn, trotted along the corrugated wall, then stopped at the back. Three spooked birds flew up to a pine bow, but others stayed where they were. They were big and black, a crowd of them working on it, stabbing down.

  Running now, watching them scatter and fly up, he reached the place and saw the boots. He did not need to see more, did not want to see. Laying the rifle on the leaf-strewn body, he grabbed the feet and began dragging, but stopped, feeling the weight of his father, his stiffness. It was wrong this way. Disrespectful.

  Facing away, he set down the feet. Most of the leaves covering the body had been scratched away. Averting his eyes but still seeing, aware that some of the crows were already strutting close again, he knelt at his father’s side. He lay the rifle on his father’s chest, then worked his hands under. He lifted, balancing the rifle.

  So light, his father. Small all his life, but tough. Good people, a good man.

  Crying, Nielson carried the stiffened body followed by birds. He turned on them and they scattered, but did not leave. He carried his father to the back of the barn, along the wall. With his elbow he opened the panel. He stepped to the pickup truck, got the passenger door loose, then worked it open with his hip. He cradled his father with one arm, leaned the rifle against the truck, then worked Lars Nielson’s stiff body into the passenger seat. He looked away as he did this, as much as he could, but the torn, soft flesh of the face, eyes gone… That was the way crows did with anything, you couldn’t blame them, it was their nature, how they lived.

  He looked around for some kind of covering. For modesty, respect. In the crack of light, a drop cloth hung from a nail next to the pegboard. He got it and came back, shook it out. But stopped. It was wrong, sitting him up like that in the truck, with a tarp over him.

  He went to the back and unhinged the truck’s deck, returned to the cab and gathered up the body. He carried it and laid it gently, then jumped onto the truck bed and did his best to straighten his father’s stiff corpse. He got down, brought the tarp and spread it neatly over the body.

  Finished, Nielson got the rifle. He stepped outside, remembered the crows, and gently slid closed the panel. He crossed the drive. At the house he went to double-time, glancing in windows. Nielson stopped, thought he heard something. After a moment, he now moved to the end of the house, and looked. Below the greensward, the man was still seated on the dock. He would not be able to hear anything at this distance.

  Nielson moved forward, down the lawn about twenty feet. He dropped to his knees with the rifle, then lay flat on his stomach. Fort Leonard Wood, boot camp. Some things you never forgot. Body and elbows forming a tripod, he sighted the rifle at the man in the chair.

  On the breeze he heard the voice, saw the phone held to his ear. More than a minute passed. The man nodded, said something more, nodded. He was done. A leather satchel lay open next to his chair. He dropped in the phone, stood and stretched before moving to the plane.

  In that moment Nielson relaxed his grip. Seen briefly in profile, the man seemed a total stranger. The beard was gone, a tweed coat added. No, it was him, the same man in the doorway that morning. Nielson again sighted, holding the man’s back steady in the rifle’s scope, watching as he stepped down onto the plane’s pontoon. He saw through the bright lens that the angle of the plane’s cabin would leave him a clear shot. He sighted lower, seeing the man in the circle of light working open the cockpit door. He hauled himself up, disappeared a second and reappeared inside.

  The door hung open. He was not leaving.

  After another moment he came out and down, holding something. A small case for eyeglasses or sunglasses. He stuffed them in his inside jacket pocket, Nielson seeing that the man was now wearing a turtleneck. Back on the dock, cap off, he ran a hand over his bald head, pulled the cap back on. He smoothed both hands over his pink face, then grabbed up the bag, and stepped down carefully into Schmidt’s utility. The rifles still rested next to the outboard motor.

  Nielson sighted from the rifles to the man. He was now lighting a cigar. Just like that, John Nielson thought. Just like that. Once he had it going, the man sat and turned on his seat to adjust the choke. He pulled the rope, and the motor came to life in a cough of blue smoke. He reduced the choke, stood now and stepped forward, undid the bowline, shoved free. He returned and sat, hand on the tiller. The boat moved slowly from shore.

  Just like that.

  Nielson heard crows. It wasn’t likely this one had done it. You could tell by looking at him—soft hands and pink face, the beard making him look friendly this morning, standing in the doorway. Smiling. Had he shaved it off, or was it fake? Sighting on the man’s motionless back as the boat chugged casually, Nielson thought again of his mother at the window with her rosary. A strange thing to think right now, squinting into the scope, the man’s back in the cross hairs, cigar smoke trailing and the Canadian shoreline opposite. He was getting ready to kill someone, no question, but it was like his conscience was watching. Not to tell him something, just to be there, his mother at the window in her robe, looking out at the bathtub in the ground, the Virgin at prayer, a friend.

  He focused, steadied, and fired. The man bucked forward, head snapping back. Nielson lowered the rifle and stood, seeing him sit several seconds before he pitched forward. Something had knocked the motor’s tiller. The utility began a slow arc to the right.

  Now he would call. Nielson stood, turned and started up the lawn.

  “Rohmer won’t be there.”

  “Is that a fact, Marion?”

  Lomak sipped his beer. Ross was still seated next to him with her arms crossed. Now she crossed her legs.

  “Why would he stay?” she said. “He has the money, the plane. What’s he need you for?”

  “He doesn’t, Marion. Not anymore. But I know his flight plan.” He took a sheet of paper from his breast pocket and wagged it in her face. “This is the number for the air-control tower in International Falls. He leaves, he’s toast. The family that plays together stays together.” He stuffed the paper back in his shirt and drank again.

  She did the thing with her nostrils, foot bouncing. “Let’s just listen. He said he was going to warm up the plane, let’s listen for it.”

  He listened, aware that was what Ross wanted. He hated her again, that face, the wagging foot. In a minute he’d finish his beer, then throw her off the dock.

  He stepped again to the Stratos. The shy one was seated again, holding herself and looking stupid in the oversized parka. Her hair was still stringy. But she was wary now. Different. He faced west, listening over the falls, afraid of seeing the Cessna rise above trees, full of fuel to get to north Texas before having to stop. We’ll be out of this area—that’s what Rohmer had said. No chance of being spotted or stopped. Then it’s dead south, over the Gulf.

  “I’ll tell you what I think.”

  “That’s what’s you do, Marion.” He threw the empty bottle out into the pool. “And that’s all you do.”

  Don’t, he thought. Stay on message. In some way, being in a hurry and wasting Ross would mean he’d lost to her. But he couldn’t help looking above the trees. The thing was to just leave, and everything would be cool. He saw himself driving away and tipping his cap to her, leaving her on the dock with her buddy. It would be better, because that way he could s
end her postcards.

  “He won’t use it.”

  “What’s that, Marion? What won’t he use?”

  Real good, send her postcards. Hey, Marion, what’s the haps? How’s the family? Check out this beach. Perfect. Or a snapshot of him fishing. Duke Wayne hauling in some humongous billfish, a marlin or sail, standing next to Captain Haysoos, whatever. With his shirt off, with the hair and a good tan, Ernest Fucking Hemingway—

  “The plane.”

  “Uh huh. Sure, Marion, he just leaves it here.”

  He looked back down at the woman in the boat, then bent at the knees and held out his hand to her. Or a shot taken of him in a casino, captioned Your hard-earned dollars at work! He smiled, liking that one even better, motioning for the woman to take his hand. Shit, he could send Ross a card every week, that was reason enough not to throw her sorry ass off the dock.

  “You think he owns it?” Ross said behind him. “You think it’s his very own Cessna?”

  “Take my hand.” He didn’t turn but wanted to, to see Ross’s face. Of course he owned it, people rented cars and houses, not planes. He wanted Ross to stop running her mouth.

  Below where he stood, the shy one was still looking up, wary. Something was wrong with her.

  “We’re right on the border of a foreign country,” Ross said.

  Hearing her move on the bench, he straightened. It was just to get to him. To piss him off. “That’s nice. So what?”

  “So, he doesn’t need a plane. He isn’t carrying anything illegal. He can just drive over the bridge at International Falls, into Canada. When he’s good and ready, he’ll leave for wherever he wants. The money’s in Costa Rica, but he doesn’t have to be there. He can go anywhere.”

  Just leave a Cessna? Pick up and just fucking leave? It had never occurred to him.

  “But I may be wrong,” she said. “You’ll know when you get there.”

  He looked at his watch, listening. “Get out.” He motioned to the shy one and she stood. “Come on, get up here.” He waited as she clumsily held to the dock, then jumped. The planks were slick and she fell.