by Nora Kane
“I did,” Howser said as he put away his gun and pulled a pair of unused rubber gloves from his pocket. He put them on and then carefully fished the wallet out of the pocket. When he opened up the folded leather wallet, he found the driver's license in a plastic holder. “Alvin Foley,” Howser read aloud. He looked at Margot, “It looks like he’s from your neck of the woods. Is this another victim?”
“Or the killer.”
“You think the killer just forgot his driver’s license?”
“He didn’t forget it. He left it on purpose.”
“Kind of an odd thing to do.”
“Not necessarily. People who do crime for a living don’t do it with their real I.D. on them. There’s no upside. If they get caught, driving without a license is the least of their worries.”
Howser pointed at Davey’s mutilated body. “Does that look like the work of a professional?”
“Depends on what they were hired to do.”
“People hire people to do that?”
“Thankfully not very often, but it happens. It sends a message.”
“So, this Alvin Foley is some kind of professional killer?”
“Could be. Could be he’s working toward it. We were thinking when Alvin mentioned his master he was talking about martial arts, but maybe he was being taught a different kind of violence.”
“He’s learning to kill.”
“It makes sense.”
“Wouldn’t learning to be a professional killer involve some hand to hand combat? You said he wasn’t very skilled.”
“I didn’t say it was a perfect theory, but there’s a reason they call martial arts self-defense. He wouldn’t be learning to defend himself.”
“It’d be all about the offense.”
“Exactly. He did a good job sneaking up on me and catching me by surprise. I’m betting he caught Davey off guard too. ”
“I would guess so. Davey wouldn’t go down easy. For that matter, neither would Gabe or Gene. Still, who teaches people to do this?”
Margot shrugged. “We’ll have to ask Alvin.”
“You really think that’s what he meant though? It sounds far-fetched.”
“It does, but Hayes was running from something. He was definitely scared. Guys learning to mutilate people sounds scary to me.”
“I don’t blame him,” the deputy agreed. “This is pretty terrifying. If I thought this guy was coming for me, I’d get out of town too.”
“I guess it doesn’t matter. Regardless of if he’s being taught to do this or just came up with it on his own, Alvin Foley needs to go down.”
“Should I see if the crime scene guys are still around and seal off the area?” the deputy asked.
“No, not yet,” Margot told him.
“No?” Howser asked.
“He left his stuff here. There’s a good chance he’s coming back. I’d put out a bolo and run his name, but the easiest way to catch him might be to hide your cars and just wait for him to show up.”
“You really think he’ll come back?”
“It looks like he set this up as a base of operations, and he doesn’t know we’ve found it. I’d guess he picked it because a random house owned by a guy with no real connection to the victim would make a great hideout.”
“Because that’s what a pro would do?”
“Yeah.”
“So, someone needs to stay, with Davey all cut up like that on the floor?” the deputy asked.
“Alvin might notice if the crime scene crew is out here. Plus, you shouldn’t move the body until they’ve gone over the scene.”
“She’s right,” Howser said.
“That’s disgusting,” the deputy remarked.
Howser nodded in agreement and then asked, “Okay, who’s going to stay?”
“That’s up to you guys,” Margot replied.
“I don’t want to,” said the deputy. “I didn’t sign on for this.”
“It’s the job,” Margot told him.
“Not up here. It isn’t. There’s a reason I chose here instead of Denver.”
Howser put the wallet in a bag and handed it to the deputy. “Take this back to the station and run Alvin through the system. Margot and I will wait.”
“Who said I was staying?” Margot said quickly.
“I’m your ride.”
Margot started to say something but stopped. She didn’t see this as an argument she was going to win.
“Consider yourself deputized.”
“Fine, but you move the car and bring that shotgun back with you.”
Chapter 9
Margot was sitting in the dark by herself when the back door opened. Howser had gone to move his SUV and hadn’t returned. She stayed still as someone stepped into the room and turned on the lights.
“Holy shit,” she heard Hayes say as he saw the body on the floor.
Margot lifted her gun and said, “I wasn’t expecting you.”
He looked over at her. “Who are you?”
“Bob sent me to bring you back.”
“I know this might be hard to explain, but that’s a death sentence.”
“I kind of thought you might already be dead.”
Hayes shook his head. “I got lucky. That crazy bastard was going to gut me, but Gabe’s buddy Gene dove out the window and distracted him long enough for me to get to Gabe’s truck.”
“So, you left your cousin to die?”
“No, he was already dead. So was his girlfriend. The psycho wanted me to watch them all die. He said it was my fault, and he was right.”
“Who’s trying to kill you?”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. That’s the problem, the only one who doesn’t think I’m full of shit is the guy who does this kind of thing,” Hayes said as he pointed to Davey.
“Why are you here?”
“The psycho Boog sent was riding the dead guy's bike. I figured, from what I know about Davey from Gabe, he wouldn’t give up easy. I thought maybe the psycho who killed my cousin was hiding out here and maybe my best defense was a good offense.”
“I kind of doubt that.”
“Or I figured I could steal some supplies and money from a guy who didn’t need them anymore before I started running.”
“That sounds more like you.”
“How’d you know I’d come here?”
“I didn’t. I was waiting on Alvin.”
“Who?”
“The psycho.”
Before Hayes could ask another question, they both heard the roar of Howser’s shotgun coming from the front of the house.
“Stay here,” Margot instructed as she jumped to her feet.
She burst out the front door just as Alvin twisted the shotgun out of Howser’s hands. Howser tried to grab it back, but Alvin pulled it away and then hit Howser across the temple with the butt of the gun, knocking him to the ground.
Margot was instantly behind him yelling, “Drop it or I shoot in the head this time!”
Alvin didn’t drop it, but he didn’t point it at anyone either.
“Do you have it in you? Most people don’t,” Alvin asked her.
“You have no idea.”
“You say that like you’ve killed before.”
“More than once. I’m not going to ask you again. Put it down.”
“Did you enjoy it? I enjoyed it. That’s why I was so happy when the master found me.”
“I don’t give a damn what you did or didn’t enjoy. Put it down.”
“The master would find me being caught unacceptable.”
“I don’t care.”
From the ground, Howser drew his pistol. “You’ve got two guns on you, Alvin. You don’t get out of this alive unless you drop that gun.”
“You know, if I’d just gone to the victim’s house with a truck instead of a motorcycle, I would have had those bodies moved before you got there. Instead, I wasted all that time. I just thought it’d be cool to arrive on a bike, kind of like a four horsemen
thing.”
“You can tell us all about later back at the station,” Howser told him calmly. “Right now, I need you to drop the gun.”
“You seemed to have missed the part about the master finding my capture unacceptable.”
He started to raise the gun. Howser shot him in the throat while Margot double-tapped him in the back. Alvin dropped the gun and fell to the dirt.
“I think you might have been onto something with that whole trained killer thing,” Howser conceded as he worked his way to his feet.
Instead of answering, Margot went back inside to check on Hayes.
“Hey, where are you going?” Howser asked.
Margot got back inside to find Hayes gone. The back door was open. She went out and saw the back of his cousin’s truck tearing across a field and picking up another road on the other side.
“Is that Gabe’s truck?” Howser asked as he joined her at the back door.
“Yeah, Hayes took it last night when he got away from Alvin.”
“So, does that mean you’re going to stick around?”
“You know, normally when I bring this kind of trouble somewhere, they can’t wait for me to leave.”
“You know, all sorts of people bring all sorts of trouble to this town. None of them are like you though.”
“You know, I have a boyfriend.”
“And I have a wife, but that could change if you stayed. Even if it didn’t, I could use someone like you. I don’t know if you noticed, but I’ve got a lot of guys who like to wear a badge and carry a gun but don’t really want the job when things get ugly.”
“I was kind of feeling the same way. It’s why I’m doing skip tracing instead of working homicide.”
“Yet, here you are.”
Margot could have told him that was because he dragged her out and didn’t let her leave, but she knew that wasn’t entirely true.
Instead, she said, “I’d really like to go back to my hotel and shower.”
“I think that can be arranged.”
Chapter 10
Margot showered and covered herself in antibiotic cream. She was about to pour herself a glass of Maker’s Mark over ice but decided she needed to call Radcliff first. Too often lately she’d been losing herself in the whiskey and she didn’t want that to happen tonight.
“How goes the search?” Radcliff asked.
“Not good, things got messy. I had to kill a man—or help kill a man. The Sheriff shot him in the throat, and I put two slugs in his back. Either way, I was part of it.”
“Damn, Margot.”
“He killed four people before he ran into our bullets. I don’t feel bad about it.”
“Was it what’s-his-name? The bounty—”
“—Hayes.”
“Yeah.”
“No, it was the guy someone sent to kill him.”
“So, he wasn’t fucking around when he said he was scared.”
“Not even a little bit. You even hear of anyone in the area starting a school for hitmen?”
“No, not anything credible, anyway.”
“How about something not credible?”
“Sure, but nothing I could remember any details on. Why?”
“The guy we shot kept talking about his master, like he was a student. It seemed like he was being taught how to kill people in very ugly ways.”
“There’s a way to kill people that’s not ugly?”
“You know as well as anyone, some are worse than others. We’re talking about mutilating people with a knife and making their friends watch kind of stuff.”
“Who would want to be taught that?”
“I’d say they already know how to do it, they just want to do it better.”
“So, more like serial killer school?”
“Maybe. That actually sounds crazier than a school for hitmen.”
“The whole thing is crazy, but crazy doesn’t necessarily mean false.”
“Trust me, this guy was plenty real though I suppose his ‘master’ could have been imaginary. Didn’t feel that way though.”
“Because he believed it.”
“Could be. Hayes was certainly afraid of something.”
“Wasn’t this guy enough?”
“Yeah, but before he got away from me, he said something that made me think he thought this guy was sent by somebody else. You ever hear of someone called ‘The Boog’?”
“No, but I can look into it. Although, I’ve got local homicides to worry about.”
“I know. I’m not really even asking. I just wanted to talk.”
“Well, I’m here for that.”
“I know. Sorry I’ve been a little distant lately.”
“No need to apologize. So, with Hayes still on the loose, are you sticking around out there?”
“No, this is the last place Hayes is going to be. Considering how fast both I and a budding serial killer tracked him down, I’d hope he’d be smart enough not to stay at another cousin's house. Especially considering how bad it worked out for this cousin. We couldn’t afford to chase him this far so he’s probably going to remain in the loss column. I might ask a few questions to see if I can get a lead on where he’s going next to pass on to Bob. Otherwise, I’m out of here.”
“You know, Shaw thought getting out of the city might do you some good. It sounds like he was wrong.”
“The whole murder thing kind of ruined the mood. I guess it did get me thinking about something else other than Phoebe and Mal.”
“Now you can obsess over this school for budding serial killers.”
“Yeah, I’ll trade out one unhealthy obsession for another.”
“It’d be different at least…or, you could try to have no unhealthy obsessions.”
“I’m not sure that’s possible.” Margot paused before saying quietly, “Coming out here might not have fixed me, but it did make me miss you.”
“I’m in favor of that, as long as you make sure to solve it by coming back.”
“I’m on my way.”
The call ended and Margot poured herself a glass of whiskey.
Summary
