He ducked his head when a car came toward them from the opposite lane. “Turn up the heat,” he said. He was shivering.
She reached out to touch him. He was soaking wet.
He told her to drive to Jason’s apartment. Jason was a freshman at Northeastern, a Reddington boy who’d played soccer with Brian. Sandy and Brian and some of the other Reddington kids had been to a couple of parties at Jason’s.
When Sandy asked him what happened, Brian started crying. They were forced off the road, he said. Jenny lost control, and they went over the bank, rolled over, and landed upside down in the river.
Brian hadn’t been wearing his seat belt. His door sprang open, and the next thing he knew he was in the river. He was groggy and disoriented. He’d hit his head and banged his knee. He started swimming. He ended up on the other side of the river about fifty yards downstream from where the car went in.
He crawled up onto the steep bank. The air was colder than the water. When he looked back across the river, he couldn’t see Jenny’s car. But there was another car stopped there on the street. Its headlights were on, and Brian could see the silhouette of a figure standing there at the top of the embankment, looking down into the river.
He was shivering uncontrollably. He was dizzy and dazed. He couldn’t think straight.
Jenny was dead. He knew that.
He started running. He knew he had to keep moving. He didn’t know where he was going or what he was going to do. All he knew was, he had to get away from Reddington.
He was scared. They’d killed Jenny. They’d tried to kill both of them.
When he found the pay phone, he called Sandy.
He could trust Sandy.
He didn’t know anyone else he could trust.
When Sandy finished, I said, “Why didn’t Brian think he could trust his parents?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I asked him that. I told him I should just take him home. He yelled at me.”
“You said he was confused. He’d banged his head.”
“He wasn’t confused about that,” she said. “He was very emphatic about that. I was to tell nobody that I even knew he was alive. Not even his parents. Nobody.”
“He said they tried to kill him? As if it was on purpose?”
She shrugged. “That’s what he said. I don’t know if that’s what he meant.”
“What else can you tell me?” I said.
“Nothing. That’s it. That’s the whole story. I drove him to Jason’s and left him there. Now you know everything I know. So what are you going to do?”
“I don’t know,” I said.
I took Sandy back to the camera shop. She’d driven her mother’s car to work. It was a little after eight o’clock. I asked her if her mother would be worried. She said she’d called her before I picked her up, told her she had some things to do, wouldn’t be home for a while.
Sandy sat beside me in the car for a minute. Then she turned to face me. “Thank you,” she said.
“For what?”
“For sharing my secret.” She opened the door. “I think Brian knows who murdered Ed and his father, don’t you?”
“I think he’s got an idea,” I said.
“So what are you gonna do?”
“I don’t know.”
“If you try to see him again …”
“I understand,” I said.
I got back to my apartment around nine. I poured a finger of Rebel Yell into a glass, took a sip, nearly gagged, and dumped it out.
I picked up the phone and put it down half a dozen times.
Finally I took a deep breath and dialed Sharon’s number.
Her machine answered.
I disconnected without leaving a message.
It felt like a reprieve.
I was sitting in my office staring blankly at some legal documents on Monday afternoon when Horowitz called.
“Thought you’d like to know,” he said without preliminary. “The ME got a good fix on Professor Gold’s time of death. Figured he’d been dead four days as of Saturday night, give or take about eight hours.”
“So that’s …”
“Sometime Tuesday night, early Wednesday morning last week.”
I thought for a minute. “Jake called me on Tuesday. We set up an appointment for the next day. He didn’t show up.”
“Of course he didn’t,” said Horowitz. “He was already dead by then.”
“Jake died before Sprague,” I said. “So he couldn’t have killed him.” I thought for a moment. “Okay, I get it,” I said. “Sprague killed Jake, then. But who—?”
“Just shut up and listen for a minute,” said Horowitz. “Professor Gold had been tortured with a cigar butt. Judging by the number of burns, he held out for quite a while. But it looks like he finally gave’em what they wanted, because they Moe Greened him. Quick and humane.”
“Huh? They did what?”
“Moe Greened him. Remember The Godfather? One shot in the eye. They dug the slug out of his brain, gave it to ballistics. It was a—”
“A twenty-two hollow-point,” I said. “Same gun that killed Sprague. Right?”
Horowitz chuckled. “You’d probably of made a better cop than a lawyer, Coyne. Right. Gold didn’t kill Sprague, and Sprague didn’t kill Gold, either. Someone else killed’em both.”
I lit a cigarette and swiveled around to look out my office window. It was a brisk late-winter day out there—bright sun, high puffy clouds. A sharp wind was swirling around Copley Square, and the girls were hunching their shoulders and pressing their skirts against their legs as they walked across the diagonal pathways.
“Roger,” I said after a minute, “I appreciate your telling me all this. It’s unlike you to share. Usually you make me tell you things, and then you refuse to reciprocate.”
“Yeah,” he said. “I must be gettin’ soft.”
“Somehow I doubt that,” I said. “What’s going on?”
He let out a long breath. It hissed into the phone. “Truth is,” he said, “I’m off the case.”
“Why? Did you—?”
“Gus Nash pulled some strings.”
“Politics, huh?” I said.
“Ah, I don’t blame him.” Horowitz paused for a moment. “This is a helluva hot case for a DA, especially one who might be looking ahead to a career in elective office. Chief of police runs a couple of teenagers off the road and into the river, then gets himself murdered in a cruddy motel room? College professor from the same dipshit little town, father of one of the dead kids, ends up tortured and murdered in the chief’s barn? Delicious stuff. Helluva case.”
“Yeah,” I said, “But—”
“If I was in Nash’s shoes,” said Horowitz, “I wouldn’t want to work with me, either. Nash knows how I work. I don’t take shit from any DA, is how I work. Fuckin’ DA’s got his job, but it ain’t running a murder investigation.”
“That sucks,” I said.
“Yeah, well, I got plenty of cases. Don’t feel sorry for me.”
“I don’t,” I said. “I feel sorry for Sharon Gold and for the people of Reddington. They deserve to have this thing investigated, not milked for its PR value.”
“Oh, Nash ain’t like that,” said Horowitz. “He’ll do a good job.”
“So what’s going to happen? I mean, it’s still a state-police case, isn’t it?”
“Nash has got Chris Stone working with him.”
“Stone?” I said. “Your old partner?”
“Ah, Stone’s okay,” said Horowitz. “He’s a good cop.”
“Stone’s an ass kisser,” I said. “That’s why you got rid of him.”
Horowitz snorted. “And he got promoted a year later. How it goes.”
“How’s Marcia taking it?” I said.
“Blew her stack. I explained how it works. Good lesson for her. She’ll be okay.”
“Well,” I said, “if you hear anything else …”
“I’m not gonna hear anything,” h
e said. “I’m off the fuckin’ case, remember?”
“Well, if I hear anything—”
“You gotta talk to Stone or Nash,” he said quickly. “I expect one of them’ll be coming around to talk to you. Don’t lose track of what’s important here.”
“Finding out who killed Jake.”
“Yes. And Sprague.”
“Roger,” I said, “are you okay?”
“Me? One less case to drive me crazy, keep me from spending time with my wife? Don’t worry about me.”
“Okay,” I said. “I won’t.”
After I hung up with Horowitz I tried calling Sharon again. Her machine picked up, and I didn’t leave a message.
I thought of calling Evie, but I didn’t. I didn’t know what to say to her. Something was going on. But if I asked her what it was, she’d say nothing, she was fine, and if I pushed it, she’d get annoyed.
I pulled my stack of legal papers back in front of me. Julie had instructed me to get through them by the end of the day. I knew they were all perfect. I never found a mistake in anything Julie drew up.
I’d plowed through about half the pile when Julie buzzed me. I glanced at my watch. It was a few minutes after five-thirty. Normally she’d have the office machines shut down and be on her way out the door by five-thirty on a Monday afternoon.
I picked up the phone. “How come you’re still here?”
“Brady,” she said, “can you come out here for a minute?”
“Sure. What’s the problem?”
“I need to show you something.”
I got up from my desk and went out into the reception area. Julie’s desk backs up to the inside wall, facing the door. She was sitting stiffly behind it, and it took an instant for my mind to register what I saw.
A man was standing behind her. He was gripping Julie’s hair in his left hand, and he was pressing the muzzle of a small-caliber automatic handgun against the side of her neck.
NINETEEN
He wore creased black jeans and a fawn-colored suede jacket over a powder-blue turtleneck sweater. A slender guy, medium height, with short black hair cut military style, squinty eyes, and a slit for a mouth. His face was long and thin, all planes and angles except for an incongruous round piggy nose.
His eyes were as pale as a hot blue flame, and they were boring directly into mine.
“Get your hands off her,” I said.
His lips pulled back over small, pointed teeth into an entirely humorless smile. “Go over there, lock the door,” he said. He gave Julie’s hair a tug for emphasis, and she squeezed her eyes shut and grimaced.
I did what he said, then turned back to him. “What do you want?”
“That envelope in your safe.”
“What envelope?”
He yanked Julie’s hair again. It lifted her halfway out of her chair, and she took a quick breath. He kept his gun rammed into the soft place under her jawbone. “Right now, pal. It’s in your office.”
“Let her go,” I said. “She’s just a secretary. She doesn’t know anything.”
“Sorry,” he said.
He jerked Julie to her feet. His grip on her hair forced her to arch her neck and bend her head back against him. Her eyes were wide and watery. He pushed her around the desk.
“Okay,” I said. “Don’t hurt the girl. I’ll get the envelope for you. I’ll be right back.”
I turned to head into my office.
“Wait,” said the guy.
I stopped.
“We all go in together,” he said. “And if you think I’ll hesitate to shoot her, try me.”
“Sure,” I said. “We’ll do it your way. Just don’t hurt her.”
I went back into my office, and the thin guy pushed Julie in behind me.
“Now what?” I said.
“Open the safe.”
“Which envelope is it you’re interested in?” I said.
He gave Julie’s hair another tug and jammed the muzzle of his weapon into her breast.
She closed her eyes and said, “Oh.”
“Don’t fuck with me,” he said.
“I’m not fucking with you,” I said. “I’ve got a lot of envelopes in my safe.”
“The one the professor gave you. Big manila envelope.”
“Ah,” I said. “That envelope.”
“Do it,” he said.
The framed black-and-white blowup of Billy and Joey, aged seven and five, hung on the wall behind my desk, about shoulder high. I went over there, pushed the photo aside, and spun the knob through the six-number combination. Billy’s birthday, then Joey’s.
I glanced over my shoulder. The guy had come to the other side of my desk. Now he had the muzzle of his gun pressed up under Julie’s chin. Her head was tilted back and her eyes were squeezed shut.
The man’s gun looked like a .22 to me. The only person who knew about the envelope in my safe was Jake Gold—plus whoever had tortured him in Ed Sprague’s barn before shooting him in the eye with a .22.
I turned the handle, pulled the door open, and reached inside the safe. As my hand touched Jake’s envelope, it brushed against the cold barrel of my .38 S&W revolver.
I peered into the safe and rummaged around as if I were looking for the right envelope, and I got my hand around the revolver’s grip. The hammer was down on an empty chamber, the way Doc Adams had told me to keep it. I cocked it with my thumb, and as I did, I coughed loudly to cover the click that would echo inside the safe.
“Come on,” said the guy. “The fuck are you doing?”
“Finding the right envelope,” I said.
I got the cocked gun in my hand and wedged Jake’s ten-by-thirteen envelope against the side of it with my thumb. Then I slid the envelope and the gun out of the safe with my back to the guy, and with my back still to him, I rotated my hand so that the envelope was on top with the gun hidden underneath it.
I turned around and held the envelope to him.
He let go of Julie’s hair and pushed her to the side.
When he leaned across the desk to reach for the envelope, I shot him in the middle of his chest.
The explosion of the gunshot was followed almost instantaneously by the softer report of his little .22 automatic and the simultaneous thunk of a slug smacking into the wall beside my head.
He toppled backwards onto my carpet, moaned and twitched for a few seconds, then lay there motionless. His eyes stared up at the ceiling. The automatic pistol fell out of his outstretched hand.
I went over and kicked the gun away, then turned and took Julie in my arms.
“You shot him,” she mumbled into my chest.
“Yes. He would’ve killed us.”
“Is he dead?”
“I think so,” I said. “Are you okay?”
I felt her head nodding against my chest. “Who is he?” she said.
“I don’t know his name,” I said. “I think he’s the same man who killed Jake Gold and Chief Sprague.”
“But why—?”
“I don’t know.”
“We should get an ambulance,” she said. “And the police. I’ll go call 911.”
“No,” I said. “Call Lieutenant Horowitz. Don’t talk to anybody else. Just Horowitz.”
“But—”
I was still holding her against me. I could feel her trembling. “Call Roger Horowitz, honey,” I said gently. I stroked her hair. “Just tell him I shot a man, and he appears to be dead. Don’t mention the envelope. Don’t mention the safe. Don’t explain anything. Okay?”
“But what if—?”
“Horowitz won’t ask a lot of questions,” I said. “If he does, just say a man came in here with a gun. He shot at me, so I shot him. You were frightened. It’s all a kind of blur. Act hysterical.”
She looked up into my face. Her eyes were wet, but she was smiling. “I am hysterical.”
I patted her back. “You’re doing fine.”
She nodded, then stepped out of my hug and frowned at me. “What�
��s going on here, Brady?”
“It’s better if you don’t know. You’ve got to trust me, okay? The police will be here. They’ll ask you questions over and over. Keep it simple. All you know is, this man came in and held a gun on you. He demanded our money and our jewelry. He grabbed your hair, jammed his gun barrel into your throat and breast, dragged you into my office. I got my gun out of my desk—I keep it in my desk, that’s our story—the top right-hand drawer—and when he saw it, he fired at me, so I shot him. He shot first. Stick with that story. You were very frightened. It happened so quickly. You don’t remember exactly what was said. It’s all kind of a jumble. Play it like that. Okay?”
“You want me to lie to the police?”
“Yes.”
“Brady …”
“I’m a lawyer, kiddo. Don’t worry about it.”
She smiled and rolled her eyes. “Right. Of course. You’re a lawyer. Nothing to worry about.”
“Trust me on this.”
“No ambulance? No 911?”
“Horowitz will ask if you called them. Tell him no, I told you to call him. I’m pretty shook up, too, tell him. He’ll take care of the rest of it.”
She shrugged. “I assume you know what you’re doing.”
“Of course I do.”
“What’s in that envelope, Brady?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t looked. It doesn’t belong to me. Forget the envelope. Don’t mention the safe. There was no envelope, okay?”
Julie nodded, gave me a quick hug, and went back out to her desk in the reception area. I closed my office door and knelt beside the guy sprawled on my carpet. He hadn’t moved since he went down. His eyes were glazed over, and a dark stain the diameter of a softball had seeped over the front of his powder-blue turtleneck. I felt for a pulse under his jawbone and, as I expected, found none.
My office smelled like the indoor handgun range at Doc Adams’s gun club. I realized I was still holding my .38. I put it on my desk. Then I picked up Jake’s envelope from the floor where I’d dropped it, took it over to the sofa, sat down, and opened it.
It held about a dozen eight-by-ten black-and-white photographs. They were grainy and imperfectly focused and printed on cheap paper, but there was no mistaking what they depicted.
Scar Tissue Page 15
