Life or Death

by Michael Robotham

  The cook has been scrubbing the hotplate, taking no notice of the TV. He wipes his hands and looks at Audie. ‘Are you crying?’

  Audie blinks at him.

  ‘I’ll make you a breakfast burrito. Life is always better with food in your stomach.’ The cook is putting onions and peppers on the hotplate. ‘You doing drugs?’

  Audie shakes his head.

  ‘You a drinker?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘I’m not judging you,’ says the cook. ‘Every man got his vices.’

  The TV news has moved on to a tornado in Oklahoma and the third game of the World Series. Audie turns away, his face prickling, fever in his eyes. He can still feel Cassie’s body against his and hear her breath in his ear and smell her sex upon his fingertips. This is his madness. His fault. Einstein said that the definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over again and expecting the outcome to be different. Audie’s life had been like that. Every day. Every relationship. Every tragedy.

  Leaning into the gutter, his chest heaves and his nose runs and he hurts in places that he cannot name. Bereft and bewildered, he has lost control. Whatever plan he once had doesn’t seem important any more. It doesn’t seem possible.

  Around him people carry on with their lives: commuters, shoppers, tourists, businessmen, boys in baseball caps, beggars in rags – people determined to be themselves, others trying to be someone else. Audie just wants to be.

  32

  Moss waits on the corner of Caroline and Bell streets watching vehicles being paused on red lights and shoved on by green. He looks at his cell phone. Nobody has called him yet. Maybe they were lying to him about the GPS tracking device. Glancing skyward, he looks into the blue white-welted sky and wonders if satellites are watching him now. He’s tempted to wave or flip them the bird.

  A six-door Autocrat pulls up at the kerb and a black chauffeur gets out and tells Moss to spread his legs and brace himself against the car. The chauffeur runs a metal detector up and down Moss’s front and back, along his arms and between his legs. Moss left his .45 under the front seat of the pickup, wrapped in an oily rag, alongside a box of shells and a Bowie knife that Lester threw in for free.

  The chauffeur nods to the car and the rear door opens. Eddie Barefoot is dressed in a dark suit with a flower in his lapel as though he’s going to a wedding or a funeral. He could be anything from twenty-five to fifty, but his yellow curls and spindly legs give him an antique look, like someone who has stepped from a sepia photograph.

  A former Miami wiseguy who came to Houston in the late eighties when the Bonanno crime family was expanding its interests away from southern Florida, Eddie built up his own crew, making a fortune from bank and mail fraud, drugs, prostitution and money-laundering. Since then he’d diversified into legitimate businesses, but there was still no serious action in eastern Texas that didn’t get pieced to Eddie Barefoot. You paid your respects or you paid a percentage or you paid with broken bones.

  The limousine is moving.

  ‘I was surprised to hear from you,’ says Eddie, adjusting the lapel flower. ‘According to my sources, you are still in the big house.’

  ‘You might want to change your sources,’ says Moss, trying to appear relaxed, but scared that his voice might betray him. His eyes are drawn to the depression in Eddie’s forehead. According to the story, a ball-socket hammer did the damage. And the man who delivered the blow, a business rival, was later buried up to his neck in sand and forced to swallow a live grenade. This could be a myth, of course, but Eddie had done nothing to correct the record.

  ‘I also heard you went squeaky. The brothers thought you might have found God.’

  ‘I went looking, but he’d left early.’

  ‘Maybe he heard you were coming.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  Eddie smiles, appreciating the banter. His voice is steeped in the deep South. ‘So how did you get out?’

  ‘State let me go.’

  ‘That’s very magnanimous of the state. What did you give them in return?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  Eddie removes something from the back of his teeth with his little finger.

  ‘So they just let you walk?’

  ‘Maybe it was a case of mistaken identity.’

  Eddie laughs. Moss decides he should join in. The car is speeding along a freeway.

  ‘You know what’s really funny,’ says Eddie, wiping his eyes. ‘You think I’m buying this bullshit. You have precisely fifteen seconds to tell me why you’re here before I throw you out of this car. And just to be clear – we won’t be slowing down.’

  The smiles have gone.

  ‘Two days ago, they dragged me out of my cell, put me on a bus and dumped me on the side of the road south of Houston.’

  ‘They?’

  ‘I don’t know their names. I had a sack over my head.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I guess they didn’t want me recognising them.’

  ‘No, moron, why did they let you go?’

  ‘Oh, they want me to find Audie Palmer. He broke out of prison three days ago.’

  ‘I heard.’ Eddie flicks a finger against his hollowed cheek, making a popping sound. ‘You’re looking for the money.’

  ‘That’s the idea.’

  ‘Have you any idea how many people have tried?’

  ‘Yeah, but I know Audie Palmer. I kept him alive inside.’

  ‘So he owes you.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  Eddie’s face breaks into a smile and he looks like he should be on TV playing a pimp or a drug lord on Law & Order or The Wire. The limousine is heading towards Galveston Bay, passing freight terminals and railway yards and acres of containers stacked like children’s building blocks.

  ‘What’s supposed to happen when you find Palmer?’ asks Eddie.

  ‘They gave me a phone.’

  ‘And then what?’

  ‘My sentence is commuted.’

  Eddie laughs again, slapping his thigh, hoedown style. ‘You just take the fucking cake, boy. Nobody is going to give you a get-out-jail-free card with a record like yours.’

  Despite the disparaging abuse, Moss can sense that Eddie is trying to work out who would run an operation like this without his knowledge. Who had the juice to get a convicted killer out of prison? It had to be someone with serious connections – a government employee in the Justice Department, or the FBI or the state legislature. A contact like that could be valuable.

  ‘If you find Palmer, I want you to call me first, understand?’

  Moss nods, in no position to argue. ‘What do you know about the Armaguard truck robbery in Dreyfus County?’

  ‘It was a clusterfuck. Four people died.’

  ‘What about the gang?’

  ‘Vernon and Billy Caine were part of a crew out of New Orleans. Brothers. They knocked over a dozen banks in California and then came east to Arizona and Missouri. Vernon was in charge. They had another regular, Rabbit Burroughs, who was supposed to be part of the armoured truck job but he got picked up for a DUI the weekend before the robbery. They had a warrant out for him in Louisiana.’

  ‘Who else was in the crew?’

  ‘They had someone on the inside.’

  ‘A security guard?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘What about Audie Palmer?’

  ‘Nobody had ever heard of him. His brother Carl had a reputation for being a screw-up. He was dealing rock in the projects at seventeen – Mexican brown and crank, you name it – a finger in every pie. Later he ran with a crew in West Dallas, mainly cash-machine scams and mail fraud. Served five years in Brownsville. Came out with a bigger drug habit than when he went in. A year later he shot an off-duty dick in a liquor store. Vanished.’

  ‘So where is he?’

  ‘That, my black friend, is the seven-million-dollar question.’

  Eddie seems philosophical rather than aggrieved. Usually he’d know about a robbery of this size in advance, but Vernon a
nd Billy Caine were out-of-towners and Carl and Audie were small fry who probably scoped out the job.

  Eddie pinches his nose as if clearing his ears. ‘You want my opinion? The money has long gone. Carl Palmer is either a mound in the desert or he’s spent the millions trying to stay hidden. Either way he’s been picked cleaner ’n a wishbone on Thanksgiving Day.’

  ‘Where can I find Rabbit Burroughs?’

  ‘Mostly he’s operating on the straight, but he still has a couple of girls hooking out of a laundromat in Cloverleaf. He also works part-time mopping floors at a school in Harris County.’

  A button is pressed. The limousine pulls over to the kerb. Massed water looms on three sides. They’re on the edge of Morgan’s Point, next to a container terminal with an industrial corsetry of cranes and derricks.

  ‘This is where you get out,’ says Eddie.

  ‘How do I get back to my pickup?’

  ‘Fifteen years inside, I thought you’d appreciate the walk.’

  33

  Desiree has been awake most of the night, going over the details of the shootings, hoping an answer might emerge from the static and white noise. She closes her eyes and has to force them open again. Someone is hovering behind her, leaning on a partition.

  Eric Warner chews on a matchstick. ‘I got a call from the Assistant Attorney General’s office. Someone has filed a complaint about you.’

  ‘Really? Let me guess – they say I’m too short for the rollercoaster?’

  ‘It’s not a joke.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Sheriff Ryan Valdez.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘He claims you were abusive, heavy-handed and crude. He said you cast wild aspersions.’

  ‘Did he actually use the word aspersions?’

  ‘He did.’

  ‘I called him a liar and he went and swallowed a thesaurus.’

  Warner leans one buttock on the edge of her desk and folds his arms. ‘That sarcastic streak is going to get you into trouble.’

  ‘If I gave up sarcasm that would leave interpretive dance as my only way of communicating.’

  This time Warner smiles. ‘You don’t normally harass law enforcement officers.’

  ‘The man had no right to be where he was. He should have called for backup. He should have notified the FBI.’

  ‘You think that would have made a difference?’

  ‘A mother and daughter might still be alive.’

  ‘You don’t know that.’

  Desiree sniffs and scratches her nose. ‘Maybe not, but I believe there’s a thin line between cowboy cops and criminals and I think Valdez is dancing on that high wire, laughing at us.’

  Warner tosses the chewed matchstick into a bin. He’s got something else to say but takes no pleasure in the news.

  ‘Frank Senogles is taking over the case.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Seniority. It’s now a double homicide.’

  ‘But I’m still on the task force, right?’

  ‘You’ll have to ask him.’

  There are many things Desiree wants to say, but she bites her tongue and stares at Warner, feeling disappointed and betrayed.

  ‘You’ll get your chance,’ he says.

  ‘I have no doubt about that,’ she replies, glancing at the paperwork on her desk.

  When she looks up, Warner has gone. At least she didn’t embarrass herself by getting upset or pleading. She’ll have to talk to Senogles … be nice to him. The two of them have a history, or what an independent observer might call a love–hate relationship: Senogles would love to get into Desiree’s pants and Desiree hates his smugness and bullying ways. A lot of field agents are aggressive in their dealings with people, revelling in the power the badge gives them. They prod, cajole, lie and intimidate to get results, bragging about these things afterwards, as though they’re in competition with each other. Who can clear up the most cases? Who can piss highest up the wall?

  Being a woman automatically put Desiree at a disadvantage when it came to pissing and her height made her the constant butt of the jokes, but Senogles seemed to regard her very presence in the FBI as a personal affront.

  The task force briefing is at midday. Senogles arrives in a flurry of swinging doors, handshakes, high-fives, telling everybody to gather round. Office chairs roll into position. When the circle has formed, he addresses the agents, appearing to grow in stature as he listens to the sound of his own voice. He’s early forties with highlighted blue contact lenses, a blaze of bridgework and a JFK haircut.

  ‘You all know why we’re here. A mother and daughter are dead. Our prime suspect is this man, Audie Palmer.’ He holds up a photograph. ‘He is a convicted killer and a fugitive, last seen on foot in this vicinity.’ He identifies the area on a large map of Houston.

  Senogles turns to another of the agents and asks about the deceased.

  ‘Cassandra Brennan, aged twenty-five, born in Missouri, her father is a preacher. Her mother died when she was twelve. She quit school in ninth grade and ran away from home a couple of times. Later she trained as a beautician and make-up artist.’

  ‘When did she come to Texas?’

  ‘Six years ago. According to her sister she was engaged to marry a soldier who died in Afghanistan, but his family wouldn’t recognise the relationship. Until a month ago she was living with her sister and working as a waitress, but there was a problem with the brother-in-law.’

  ‘What sort of problem?’

  ‘He took a little too much interest in Cassandra’s welfare. Her sister told her to leave. Since then she’s been living in her car.’

  ‘Any other history?’

  ‘Two outstanding warrants for unpaid parking fines and failing to repay $650 of a single-parent allowance that she was overpaid. Apart from that, no rap sheet, no aliases, no other immediate family.’

  ‘How did she meet Palmer?’

  ‘She’s not on the visitors register at the prison,’ says another of the agents.

  ‘And she didn’t come up in the earlier investigation,’ adds a third.

  ‘She would have been all of fourteen,’ says the first.

  ‘Maybe she was hooking out of the hotel,’ says Senogles.

  ‘Not according to the night manager.’

  ‘Maybe he was getting a slice of the action.’

  A photograph is pinned to a whiteboard – a shot from Cassie’s high school yearbook. She looks coltish and shy, with white blonde hair and a fringe.

  ‘State police are going door-to-door in the surrounding streets, using dogs to search yards and sheds. They’re likely to pick up Palmer before we do, but I want to know where he’s been, who he’s contacted and where he got the gun. Talk to Palmer’s family, friends, acquaintances – anybody who knew him or might offer him assistance. See if Palmer had any favourite places that he hung out as a kid. Did they ever go camping? Where does he feel comfortable?’

  Desiree raises her hand. ‘He grew up in Dallas.’

  Senogles looks surprised. ‘I didn’t see you there, Special Agent Furness. Next time you’ll have to stand on a chair.’

  There is laughter. Desiree doesn’t react.

  ‘So what brings you here?’ asks Senogles.

  ‘I was hoping to be part of the task force.’

  ‘I have enough people.’

  ‘I’ve been keeping tabs on the original robbery and the missing money,’ says Desiree.

  ‘The money isn’t the issue any more.’

  ‘I’ve read Palmer’s psych reports and prison files. I’ve talked to him.’

  ‘Do you know where he is?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, you’re not much good to me.’ Senogles slips the sunglasses from his forehead and puts them in a case.

  Desiree remains standing. ‘Audie Palmer’s mother now lives in Houston and his sister works at the Texas Children’s Hospital. Ryan Valdez was one of the law enforcement officers who arrested him eleven years ago.’

&nb
sp; Senogles props one foot on a chair and rests his elbow on his knee, as though he’s leaning on a fence. There are little webs of wrinkles in the corner of his eyes like hairline cracks in old china.

  ‘What are you suggesting?’

  ‘I think it’s odd that Audie Palmer escaped the day before his release and then turned up outside the house of the officer who arrested him.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘I also think it’s odd that Valdez tried to apprehend Palmer without calling for backup after the motel night manager had positively identified Palmer from a photograph.’

  ‘You think Valdez is dirty?’

  Desiree doesn’t answer.

  Senogles gazes at the officers around the room. He seems to be caught in two minds. He straightens. ‘Okay, you’re on the team, but don’t go anywhere near the sheriff. He’s off-limits.’

  Desiree tries to argue.

  ‘Palmer was outside the man’s house. Valdez had every right to be concerned. Remember who we’re chasing here. If Palmer is launching some sort of revenge campaign, we should be looking at other people who could be targets – the judge, the defence attorney, the DA. They all have to be notified.’

  ‘What about protection?’ someone asks.

  ‘Only if they request it.’

  34

  The old Granada Movie Theater in Jenson Drive has been derelict since the mid-nineties. Boarded up. Spray-painted. Stained with bird shit. Abandoned for the multiplex half a mile away. It was built in the 1950s, when North Houston was the last major shopping area south of Humble and families made a Saturday morning ritual of grocery shopping while their kids watched a double feature.

  Lamont’s Bakery, where Audie had worked part-time during college, had been across the street, but was now a Chinese restaurant called The Great Wall. His boss at the bakery, Mr Lamont, had once told Audie how he met his namesake, the Texas war hero Audie Murphy, at the Granada Theater when he came to Houston to promote To Hell and Back, a movie about his life.