Lou Mason Mystery 03-Cold Truth

by Joel Goldman

  "That's another approach," Mason said. "You're better protection than taking my vitamins. I'm canceling my life insurance."

  "How much life insurance do you have?" she asked with a sly smile.

  "A lot," Mason said.

  "Don't cancel it. I'm a reliable lover, but I wouldn't count on the killer thing."

  "I'll sleep better knowing that. All the same, we need to talk about last night," he told her.

  The police had questioned Mason and Abby separately, testing one version of the events against the other. When they finally got to Mason's house, the last thing they wanted to do was debrief one another.

  "You told me not to go out there," Abby said. "I should have listened."

  "You can't un-ring that bell. Tell me what happened."

  Abby sighed, rolling away from Mason, leaning against the kitchen counter. "Coffee," she said. "I need coffee."

  "Tea," he said. "I don't drink coffee."

  "I'll start a list," she said. "At least make the tea strong."

  "I'll brew, you talk."

  "Okay," she said, rubbing her palms against her sleeves. "The kids were packing up when I got there and Nix was running around, yelling at them to hurry up. He acted like he didn't know who I was, but he hustled me down to his office before I could even tell him why I was there."

  "He didn't want any of the kids to hear what you had to say," Mason said.

  "He played dumb at first, which made me act dumber. I kept telling him what we knew, thinking that would make him talk. Instead, he got real jumpy. Then Centurion showed up carrying the bags with the drugs and the money and they started to argue like I wasn't even there. When I tried to slip out, Centurion slapped me and made Nix duct-tape me to the chair while he cooked up some crack and loaded the syringe. They were going to kill me," she said, the words catching in her throat.

  Mason handed her a steaming cup of tea, Abby held it to her neck, fighting the chill from telling her story. "I know they were arguing about the dope and the cash," Mason said. "What did they say?"

  "Centurion yelled at Nix for not telling me to leave earlier. He said they had to kill me since I'd seen the drugs and the money and that you would come after

  him, but that they had no choice."

  "What about Nix?"

  Abby shook her head. "You were wrong about Nix. You said he was a make-love-not-war type. He laid into Centurion, telling him that the whole scam was his own idea, bragging about using pregnant girls to run drugs and as a source for babies. The bastard called the girls renewable resources. He was willing to split everything with Centurion, but Centurion wasn't going to give him anything. Centurion came there to kill Nix."

  "Did they say anything about the Davenports?"

  "Centurion said it was a good thing Gina and Robert were dead, so they couldn't testify. He called it the best luck they've had. Nix called Centurion an idiot. He said that Gina Davenport gave them credibility and that Robert bought drugs and peddled them to his students. He blamed Centurion for ruining everything."

  "If Centurion didn't kill Gina and if Robert OD'd on his own, how did Centurion ruin anything?" Mason asked.

  "Nix said he shouldn't have come after you, that he should have left you out of it and the cops would have left them alone."

  "What did Centurion say?"

  "That's the part I didn't understand," Abby said. "Centurion said he would have done it even if you hadn't caused him so much trouble. He said it was payback for someone else."

  "Payback for someone else?" Mason asked.

  Abby sipped her tea slowly. "Centurion said he was doing it for someone else that owed you big-time. Nix said that Centurion wasn't paid enough to risk their entire operation. Centurion said he didn't have a choice. Then you blew up the barn."

  Mason tugged at the stubble on his chin, finally understanding why the car-jackers showed no interest when he told them about the baby ledger. They were just supposed to kill him. He searched his memory for someone who not only wanted him dead, but also had the money and means to convince Centurion to do it. Before he could match anyone to those exclusive criteria, Tuffy shimmied through the dog door, rubbing herself against Abby, shoving her nose into Mason's thigh, feinting toward the back door with a grab-the-leashand-let's-hit-the-road stutter step.

  "You're lucky the dog lets you live here," Abby said.

  "We have an understanding," Mason said. "I provide the food and she makes sure I get enough exercise."

  "You better let her take you on a walk. I've got to go home and clean up. Showering with you is too distracting."

  "I've got to catch up with Mickey, Harry, and Blues. I'll call you later. Stay busy. It's harder when you're alone with nothing to do."

  Abby kissed him. "I can do alone," she said, patting him on the chest. "But it's nice not to have to."

  Mason took Tuffy for a spin in Loose Park, tracking down Blues with his cell phone.

  "What have the Hacketts been up to?" Mason asked Blues.

  "Harry and I met down the block from the Hacketts' house last night after Mickey called us. We watched the house for a couple of hours. They had a steady stream of visitors until about ten o'clock. People dropping by like somebody died."

  "Two somebodies died," Mason said. "Centurion and Nix."

  "Heard it on the news while I was sitting in my car peeing into a bottle with your name on it," Blues said. "Somebody in the Hacketts' house turned on a television. Big screen. I could see it from the street. They were watching the live reports from Sanctuary. Did you start that fire?"

  "Got into the habit playing with matches when I was a kid. What happened after the news was over?"

  "Company left. Then things got interesting. Arthur Hackett went for a drive. Harry and I flipped a coin and Harry got the old man. A few minutes later, Carol Hackett left, and I followed her. Arthur paid a visit to Paula Sutton and Carol got some late night legal advice from David Evans."

  Mason stopped in his tracks, forcing Tuffy onto her haunches, straining to reach a squirrel. "Anybody have a sleep-over?"

  "Nope. It didn't look like that kind of a visit to me. Harry said the same thing."

  "Do you think Arthur knew that Carol went out too?"

  "Hard to say. She got home before he did. If she didn't tell him, he wouldn't have known she was gone. Any idea what's going on?"

  "It's coming together," Mason said, telling Blues what Roy Bowen had found out.

  "You still have a pretty big hole in your story, you know that," Blues said.

  "Yeah, the son. Trent doesn't fit into any of this. Neither does this," Mason added. "Centurion didn't set me up to be car-jacked and whacked because I was shining the light on his operation. Somebody paid him to do it."

  "Who hates you that much?" Blues asked. "All the rich people you pissed off are in jail."

  "Hard to imagine, isn't it," Mason answered. "Jimmie Camaya is the only person I can come up with who kills people to get even. Last time I saw him, we were buddies."

  "Jimmie wanted you dead, he'd do it himself and make sure you knew it was him. So, it isn't him. Besides, Jimmie is a businessman and he's got no business with you since your old law firm ate itself alive."

  "Then I'm back where I started. Which is no place."

  "I'll tell you one thing," Blues said.

  "Is this where you make me feel better?" Mason asked.

  "Since you aren't dead and Centurion is, you better keep your head up and your eyes open or go home and lock your doors. What's it going to be?"

  "House calls, but not at my house," Mason said, giving Blues his itinerary.

  "I get overtime on weekends, you know that," Blues said.

  "I've got to stay alive for you to get paid, you know that, don't you?"

  "That's what makes me so good at what I do. You owe me too much money for me to let you get killed."

  "Good," Mason said. "I'd rather owe you than cheat you out of it."

  Chapter 36

  Things don't alway
s work out. Mason knew that, had been raised on it, and had made a living because of it. People plan, pray, and connive and, still, things don't always work out. The brutal truth, Claire told him when he was ten and came home from the roller rink with a bloody nose, is that things generally don't work out, at least not the way people intend. Life is more ad-libbed than scripted, people more reactive than proactive, trouble more easily found than avoided.

  That's the daily dynamic. People manage. The chaos takes on its own unpredictable charm. At the end of the line, most people shrug and say their lives could have been better, could have been worse, that they have no complaints that count and who would listen anyway.

  That's most people. Mason knew that killers were different, whether they were thoughtful, vengeful, or impulsive, jealous, psychotic, or greedy. They demanded order, accountability, and control they imposed through the death of others. They did what they had to do or couldn't keep from doing. Just ask them. But tighten the circle around a killer and learn the meaning of nothing left to lose.

  Mason had not come to this moment in his life by design, proving again that his aunt was right. He had migrated from a small plaintiff's personal injury law firm to a big corporate firm, then to solo practice, always looking for an elusive something he was certain he would find at the next stop. Claire had warned him each time that he wouldn't find what he was looking for in a place. He'd find it in himself.

  What he found was completely unexpected. He could kill a man and cloak it in pop-psychology bromides. He could risk his life without worrying whether he was responding to a heroic imperative or whether he was just too stupid to live. It wasn't only about the law, or justice, or taking the bad guys down. It was about the jolt, the rush of diving into dark water and coming out on the other side alive.

  Sitting in his car outside Paula Sutton's apartment late on Saturday afternoon, the battle at Sanctuary still fresh in his mind, he wondered when taking the dive had become the reason for taking the dive. A gathering chill crept into the car, the sky a slag heap of scrap-metal gray, its broken edges rusted by the failing sun, giving him a different jolt, one that drained the courage he lived on. He was sliding fast toward the hazy ground where rationalization made anything possible and everything right, where strong arms blurred with strong wills, where men killed because they could. It was a world Blues navigated without losing his soul, a dead reckoning Mason wasn't certain he possessed.

  Looking at his image in the rearview mirror, he promised himself that this day, this case would be the last of it, knowing that his promise was more for Abby than for him. She had killed a man, though he didn't mourn Centurion. He felt responsible, not for Centurion's death, but for putting her in that moment when she had to kill one man to save another. He wouldn't let her follow his path. He needed her to retreat from his.

  It was this new calculus, factoring love against loss, that scared him, that could cause a fatal hesitation, fulfilling the prophecy. Swallowing against the dryness in his throat, he stepped out of his car, glancing around for Blues, not finding him or expecting to, knowing that Blues worked best from the shadows.

  Mason liked working from the bottom up, building a strong foundation for a case, each piece snug against the next, each layer supporting the weight of the accusations or defenses above it. This case was the opposite. It reminded him of a child's game made of small cubes stacked one on top of another. Each player pulled out one cube at a time, the loser being the player who caused the stack to collapse by pulling out the last cube holding everything in place.

  Samantha, Mason conceded, was right. Gina Davenport's murder had led to the exposure of Centurion's operation at Sanctuary, a deadly example of the rule of unintended consequences. Centurion's admission that the car-jacking was payback for someone else turned his other assumptions about the case on their head.

  He had been looking for a link between Gina Davenport and Trent Hackett that would exonerate Jordan and convict a single killer. Now Mason wondered if he should look for something that tied him to both victims or someone who had reason to kill all three of them.

  Samantha was convinced that Trent Hackett had orchestrated the elevator attack on Mason, closing her investigation when Trent was murdered. Trent may have been innocent of the act but known of the attempt, the latter enough to get him killed. Mason hoped Mickey found the common thread in Trent's office. He shook his head to clear the internal fog that permeated this case, stamping his feet on the pavement.

  Paula Sutton lived in an apartment complex north of the Missouri River off I-29 and 64th Street. Kansas City was divided by a lot of things, including race, the state line between Missouri and Kansas, and the fight over who made the best barbecue sauce. The river, with distinct worlds north and south of its banks, also divided it. Those who lived south of the river rarely went north, except to go the airport. Those who lived north rarely went south. The reasons lay in the perception that each had it better than the other, neither side able to make the case, both sides comfortable in their parochialism.

  The apartments were new, banners dipped in primary colors fluttering from the arched entrance, shrubs freshly planted around each building, neatly manicured roads winding throughout, a jogging trail threaded like a ribbon across abundant green space, the emphasis on community, not on complex. Each building was named after an island, a salute to bad marketing, Paula's building the Tahitian. Mason checked out the surrounding buildings, disappointed none were named Staten or Rhode.

  Paula lived on the first floor. Mason knocked, peering through a gap in the curtains covering the front window, hearing footsteps, a shadow blotting the peephole, the door not opening. Mason knocking harder, the footsteps retreating, Mason catching a glimpse of Paula through the window, a sleek Doberman on a taut leash at her heel.

  "Paula, it's Lou Mason. We need to talk."

  Paula didn't, but the dog did, Mason hearing its bark from the backside of the building. Paula was running, the dog her escort. He raced around the building, picking up the jogging trail as Paula disappeared around a turn a hundred yards away.

  Mason chose a solid pace, figuring to close the gap without sprinting into the Doberman's jaws, guessing that Paula would be wheezing when he caught up to her, gasping for air and a cigarette. He found her leaning against a tree, holding her side, the dog coiled, its ears flat.

  "Paula, I'm not going to hurt you," Mason said. "I just want to talk."

  "Go away," she said, still heaving. "Or I'll turn the dog loose." She eased her grip on the leash enough for the dog to lurch at Mason, teeth barred, a guttural growl and demon eyes giving the threat its heft.

  Mason backed up a step, keeping his hands at his sides, palms out, his body language lying to the dog that Mason was a friend. The dog didn't buy it, ratcheting its growl to a sharp bark.

  "I'm not going anywhere until we talk," Mason said. "If you run, I'll find you. Besides, you can't bring the dog to the courtroom."

  "No," Paula said, the pain in her side subsiding, her breathing still ragged. "You can't make me."

  A real jogger, a lycra body stocking stretched tightly over his lean, well-muscled frame, interrupted their standoff. Mason guessed he was in his late twenties and, from his quick stop and concerned look at Paula, ready to jump to the obvious but wrong conclusion.

  "Miss," he said to Paula, "is everything all right? Do you need help getting home?"

  "No," Mason said. "This isn't what you think."

  "Yes," Paula said. "He followed me onto the trail."

  The runner turned to Mason, measuring himself, counting the dog as an ally, not certain it would be enough. "Look, man," he said. "Just back away and let me take the lady home." He reached for a cell phone at his waist. "I can call the cops," he added.

  "Do that," Blues said, stepping onto the path, a gun at his side. "Ask for Homicide Detective Samantha Greer. Tell her that Lou Mason and Wilson Bluestone are holding a material witness in a homicide investigation and ask her to send a car for th
e witness, an ambulance for you, and a canine officer to pick up a dead dog."

  "Hey, man!" the runner said, his hands up in the air. "Don't get radical. The lady looked like she was in trouble."

  "She is," Mason said. "Make the call." The runner opened his phone, his hands shaking, his fingers hesitating above the keypad. "It's 9-1-1," Mason added.

  "Right, right," the runner said, nodding, eyes darting between Blues and the snarling dog, wishing he'd kept on running.

  "No!" Paula said, "it's okay. I'm fine," she added, stroking the back of the dog's head. "Really, I'm fine," she insisted.

  The runner drew a deep breath. "Good. I mean, great. That's really great. Glad to hear it, sorry I bothered you," he said over his shoulder as he sprinted away.

  Blues holstered his gun inside his jacket and walked slowly toward the dog, the dog throttling back its growl, Blues taking the leash from Paula, clicking commands at the dog, letting the dog sniff his hand.

  "You two have a nice chat," Blues said. "Rover and I are going for a walk."

  Mason watched Blues and the dog until they were out of view, Paula fishing in her jeans pocket for a cigarette, lighting it, the shakes making her match dance around the tobacco, sucking the smoke like a hungry newborn.

  "Your friend is a freak," she said. "He was going to shoot my dog."

  "You maybe, but definitely not the dog," Mason said. "Blues is very strong on animal rights."

  "Fuck you," Paula said.

  "Sorry, I'm spoken for," Mason said. "Why did you run?"

  "I didn't run. I was taking my dog for a walk. You chased me. Make that assaulted me. I'm going to sue your ass."

  "Fucking me and suing my ass, is that a package deal?" Mason asked.

  Paula threw her cigarette at Mason's feet, grinding it with her heel, blowing smoke in his face. "I'm out of here," she said.

  Mason took her by the arm, pressing his thumb into the notch of her elbow, ignoring her pained yelp. "I know about Jordan's cell phone. I know you called Abby Lieberman and tipped her off about her baby and Gina Davenport."