Hard Cold Winter

by Glen Erik Hamilton

  I picked up the wall phone and called the service number on the statement. I entered Trudy’s card number and PIN and had the system read me a list of the last ten purchases.

  The first eight charges were small random debits at Starbucks and bookstores and a deli.

  The last two entries were different. Both on the same day. Saturday. The day Trudy had supposedly left on vacation, or had her family emergency, or whatever it was. Two hundred thirty bucks in groceries at a Safeway in Ballard. And a cash advance of four hundred dollars.

  If I still gave any credence to the tropical vacation story, the groceries erased it. Who buys half a carload of food before getting on a plane? And four hundred dollars felt like a maximum daily amount for a cash advance.

  So Trudy had grabbed food. As much money as she could get. And there had been no more purchases on the card after that.

  She’d gone on the run, or she’d holed up somewhere. If she was on the run, I had no way of knowing where or how. If she had holed up, then it was probably a place she already knew. Somewhere she could go, and stay, at a minute’s notice. She’d already been there four days.

  I walked upstairs, checking out the rooms as I went. A second bedroom, and a third, both large and lonely. Two bathrooms and a sitting room. The top floor was taken up by the master suite, where I found Barrett nodding with satisfaction.

  “Okay,” she said, pointing to each area. “No purse. No phone or charger. There are clothes laid out on the bed. Her laptop is gone and so is one of her pieces of luggage.” She folded her arms triumphantly. “On vacation, clearly.”

  “Clearly,” I said. “What’s that?”

  A shoe box was open on the dresser. It was the cloth lying next to it that had caught my eye when I walked through the door. Yellow silicone. A gun cleaning cloth. In the box were a squeeze can of oil and an empty box of .25-caliber Hornady brand ammunition.

  “That’s Trudy’s dad’s gun,” Barrett said, inaccurately, since the pistol wasn’t here. “Why would she want that?”

  Good question.

  The master bedroom was large enough that Trudy had wall space for yet another half-dozen paintings. And I realized what I hadn’t seen, among all the square footage of her house. No easels, or tubes of acrylic, or blank canvases. Maybe she stuffed all of that gear in a closet every time she worked, but what person living alone in a house made for five or six people would bother doing that?

  “Where does Trudy do her painting?” I said.

  “Oh, she rents a studio. In Ballard. She says the light is better on that side of the city, more western exposure.”

  The Safeway where she’d bought groceries last Saturday had been in Ballard, too. I didn’t have an address on the cash advance, but I was willing to bet it was in the same neighborhood.

  I went downstairs to look at the Amex statement again. Barrett followed. There it was, near the start of the month. Studio Oceania, six hundred dollars. I had taken it to be some outlandishly elite hair salon.

  “What is it?” Barrett said.

  I’d had Miss Yorke as a sidekick long enough. “Just hoping to find plane tickets here. But no luck. Let me check one last thing.”

  I walked down the stairs to the garage, saw what I expected to see, and came back up.

  “Her car’s here,” I said. “She probably took a cab to the airport.”

  “Sure, who wants to park down there for a week?” Barrett glided up to me. “I feel a whole lot better. Thanks for helping me. Us.”

  “No problem.”

  “‘My pleasure’ is I think what you mean.” She pressed herself gently against my side, backing me an inch into the counter, and reached up high with her lips to brush them against the skin under my ear. “We have the whole house.”

  “What about Charlie?” I said.

  “Charlie’s not the only man in my life. We have an understanding.” She arched her back and made a sinuous movement that I’d seen her do on stage. Definitely no lingerie under the dress.

  “Ah.” I placed my hands on her upper arms.

  “You don’t want to?” She smiled against my throat. It was clear from the evidence that part of me did. I pushed her gently away, her body still moving.

  “I’m with someone.” My voice was a little raspy.

  She paused in midwrithe. “Only her?”

  “Right. Sorry.”

  She withdrew. “My poor choice, then.” Her posture changed into the formal deportment she’d shown me at Borealis. “I suppose you think I’m ghoulish.”

  “Grief is about the best reason I can think of. I’m just not your guy.”

  “We should go.”

  As she angrily tapped in the code to leave, my mind went to what I’d seen in the garage.

  I hadn’t lied to Barrett about Trudy’s car. It was down in the garage. A Jaguar convertible. Its sleek looks marred only by the reddish, claylike mud, caked dry and flaking on its sides and tires. Tires with treads like fishhooks.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  FIRST THING IN THE morning, I went to meet John Guerin outside the East Precinct on Capitol Hill. There was a group of bike cops at the curb preparing to set out on neighborhood patrol, in black helmets and black rain jackets and pants. I was dressed similarly, in midnight black running gear and my worn-in Asics. Give me a pair of big-ass mirrored sunglasses, and I’d blend right in.

  Guerin came out of the tall lobby. The detective was in his late forties with wire-rimmed glasses and prematurely white hair. He’d grown a mustache since I’d last seen him, and it was white, too. He wore a camel’s-hair overcoat and a sharp blue suit. Guerin looked more like a successful stockbroker than a cop.

  “Coffee?” I said.

  “Always,” said Guerin. We turned and walked down 12th. “How’s civilian life treating you?”

  “More downtime. Fewer options.”

  “What kind of work are you looking for?”

  “Until recently, I thought I would teach cops.”

  Guerin made a whisper of a chuckle. “Interesting.”

  “Not exactly the family business.”

  Guerin nodded. His posture was so vertical that he hardly seemed to lean at all as we walked. I knew he’d been in the Marines once, but my guess was that he was born like that.

  “What would you teach? Combatives?” he said.

  “Urban tactics, probably.” We rounded the corner onto Pike toward Caffe Vita. “But it’s moot. No openings. Maybe I can learn bicycle maintenance.”

  “How’s that?”

  “Private joke.”

  We went in and ordered and waited for the coffee. The machine took a long time, and a lot of coaxing and prodding from the barista. We took the cups and sat in a two-top on the upper floor, by the window.

  “I want to tell you some things about Kendrick Haymes,” I said.

  “Maurice Haymes’s dead son,” said Guerin.

  “I have some facts and some guesses. They might help. They might not. Either way, I can’t tell you how I came by the knowledge.”

  “Can’t, or won’t?”

  “Won’t, then.”

  “Haymes was found with William Willard’s niece,” Guerin said. “Found by you, I heard.”

  “Word travels.”

  “The Jefferson County sheriff called me three days ago, checking on your bona fides. Have you been looking into Haymes?”

  I sipped my coffee. It had been worth the barista’s trouble.

  “Never mind,” Guerin said. “It’s obvious. If what you know gives a motive for Haymes killing himself, then going on the record is better. It might give their families closure.”

  “If he killed himself.”

  “You think it was homicide?”

  I shrugged.

  “Okay,” said Guerin, “off the record.”

  “Haymes was a gambler. Sports junkie, mostly. There was a ghost book in Burien where he lost a whole lot of money.”

  “Was.”

  “It—ah—might have had som
e trouble lately. Packed up and moved.”

  “Which does me no good whatsoever.”

  “Haymes was also broke, or as broke as it’s possible for a guy with guaranteed dividends to get.”

  “Did his friends tell you this?”

  “No. You heard of a guy named T. X. Broch?”

  Guerin had been leaning forward to take a drink. He looked up at me over his glasses. “Broch.”

  “Kend Haymes signed his Panamera over to Broch. A Porsche. That’s worth at least—”

  “I know what it is. Is this a guess, or are you sure?”

  “I’m sure Kend forked over the car. I’m guessing he was in up to his eyeballs, or worse, with Broch and maybe others.”

  “T. X. Broch,” said Guerin.

  “A guy I talked to described him as an animal.”

  “Any animal you could name would be better. Broch beat a felony rap a while ago, I recall. Assault with intent, on a woman. I don’t know if it was personal or business.”

  “Personal to her.”

  Guerin grunted. “Nothing has stuck to him yet. He’s not flashy, but his lawyers are.”

  “Kend was a loan shark’s dream,” I said. “Broch must have had a very compelling reason, if he killed him.”

  Guerin seemed to think about it. I looked out the window. These few blocks of Pike Street were the part of the Hill that always came to mind when I was far from home. I wasn’t sure why. Broadway was busier, and 15th Ave was closer to the house where I’d grown up.

  Maybe it was because Pike was a little off the main thoroughfares, and yet always active, pedestrians outnumbering the cars most any time of day or night. All of the schools and parks and hospitals were just around one corner or another, but not in sight. Pike was the narrow stream flowing between the boulders.

  “All right,” said Guerin. “Kend’s death gives us some justification to look into his accounts, if I can get backing.”

  “Backing?”

  “This is a Jefferson County case, not SPD. And officially it’s still murder-suicide, last I knew.”

  “Do they really believe that? Or is it just the theory of the moment until they dig up something better?”

  Guerin moved one side of his mouth, making about five percent of what might be called a smile. “The sheriff’s no rube. My guess is that he’s cross-checking every piece of evidence, hoping to find something that will move the needle toward it being a homicide. He might formally request that SPD assist, if I ask him to do so. But I heard that the residue test came up positive on Kend’s hand.”

  “Just in casual conversation, huh?”

  “I took an interest in the case after your name came up. One of the deputies in Jefferson was with our precinct years back, when he started out.”

  “Spies everywhere.”

  “Friends. Not spies.”

  “The residue test doesn’t mean much, you know. If it was murder, someone could put the Glock in Kend’s hand, fire one off into the high trees, take the brass and replace the round to make the count right.”

  “Simpler is better. The murder-suicide tag will remain for now. No point in getting the press and the family all riled up without cause.”

  I drank my coffee. It didn’t taste as good now.

  “Which brings up another point,” Guerin said. “SPD will need the family’s permission to look into Kend’s finances. A court order is out of the question. This isn’t a homicide case.”

  Even if it was, I doubted the SPD could get a judge to sign off on poking into Haymes family business. Hollis’s contacts had found no police records of a break-in at HDC, which could mean it was never reported. Or that the report was quashed. Haymes probably had that kind of political muscle.

  And there had been no photograph of Haymes senior anywhere in his beloved son’s apartment, among all the dozens of snapshots. Somehow I knew there weren’t any pictures of Kend in Maurice’s home, either.

  “You won’t get permission,” I said.

  “Then that road is closed,” said Guerin. “I can question Broch, but we know he won’t melt under a little heat. Broch deals in used cars. He could just claim that the Porsche was intended as a trade-in that Haymes hadn’t claimed yet.”

  “Shit.”

  Guerin tapped the edge of his empty cup with the wooden stirrer. “This is what off the record earns you. A bunch of knowledge without a lot of results.”

  “Thanks a lot.”

  “This wouldn’t be the first time a killer skated for lack of evidence. You know that. Better than most, I’d say.”

  We looked at each other.

  “I’m just hunting down clues, Detective. Junior Crimestopper,” I said.

  “Spare me. You’re not a cop. I don’t think you’re a crook, although some of my fellow officers have different opinions. I’m not sure what you are. And not knowing worries me.”

  “I’m not going to kill Broch for Kendrick Haymes,” I said.

  “Would you kill him for Elana Coll?”

  “No.”

  “Would you feed him to that monster Willard?”

  I didn’t answer.

  “You see where this goes,” Guerin said. “I won’t have you or Willard making this city into a hunting preserve. You’ve given me a lead. Thanks.” He stood up. “Now call it a day before I jail you on suspicion of whatever-the-hell-I-choose, just to keep you safe from Broch.”

  He walked down the stairs and out of the cafe. Leaving his coffee cup for me to clear. Subtle.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  TRUDY DOBBS WAS A pretty girl. All the pictures I had seen of her online verified that. Even in the lousy snapshots, she was clearly better-looking than average. She was tall and attractive and brown-haired, and the more photos I looked at, the more I disliked her face.

  Because I couldn’t get a solid handle on it. Some people had a face that immediately stuck in your mind, because they were beautiful or ugly or just damned unusual. My face fell solidly in the last category, if not the second. But Trudy’s was elusive. She had a beauty mark in a couple of the party pictures, but it seemed to be gone in others. Her nose was strong without being hooked. Her hair was always brown, but sometimes dyed either lighter or darker. She even went soft on the makeup.

  If I were going to ID Trudy Dobbs on sight, I would have to get a very close look, in person.

  Studio Oceania was deep into Ballard, half a block from 65th on one of the few streets that the tsunami of gentrification hadn’t touched. It occupied the upper part of a squat structure, brick on the street level and poured concrete above. An austere Brothers of Scandinavia lodge claimed the bricks. Through its window I saw a meeting in progress, a herd of old walruses in wool sweaters and chambray shirts, sitting in rigidly spaced rows as they scrutinized the speaker.

  The upper two stories looked like an apartment house, except for a forest of wind chimes and mobile sculptures I could see hanging on the balconies. Some of the sculptures were interesting. Most were just trying too hard to be bizarre.

  I imagined the artists crossing paths with the Swedes in the building’s entryway. It was a toss-up which group would be more serious.

  One of the artists came shuffling out, focused on her tablet. I caught the door on the backswing. There were mail cubbies just inside, with the tenant names stuck underneath each in block letters from a label maker. T. D. INNOVS was on the second floor. Trudy’s cubby, like most of the others, had a few flyers stuffed inside of it advertising art events and performances, but no real mail.

  I went up the stairs to look for her studio space. Passing by a couple of open doors to other studios, I got a glimpse into the little rooms. The wide building had been apartments once. Then someone with middling skill had cut new doors and torn out the kitchen fixtures and divided up the living areas into blocks. Some were like cells. Others featured large metal-framed windows. The T. D. INNOVS studio was on my right. It would have a window, I guessed, for that desirable western exposure Barrett had mentioned.

&n
bsp; I knocked very gently. No answer, or sound of movement. I had the lockpicks ready, and opened the door before another artist poked their shaggy head out in the hallway.

  Three things were instantly obvious. It was definitely Trudy’s studio, the walls and easels adorned with her now-familiar compelling abstracts. She’d been hiding out here for days, from the blankets on the floor and the piles of prepackaged foodstuffs still in their Safeway bags, and the smell of recent cigarettes. And she wasn’t here now.

  I didn’t see a purse. But I did find a phone charger on a little paint-spattered table, and more packs of American Spirits in one of the grocery sacks. She was coming back.

  Wait for Trudy right here? There’d be no chance of her slipping away. It would sure as hell be a surprise for her.

  And I could guess how that might play out. Trudy screams. Others come running to find a big, scarred man lurking in the studio of one of their own. I wouldn’t get a chance to confront her, or con her, or even pull some citizen’s-arrest bullshit. She’d probably vanish while the others were busy watching me and calling the cops. If she even bothered escaping. Trudy Dobbs wasn’t even wanted for questioning yet, so far as I knew. I’d be more likely to leave here in handcuffs than she would.

  Okay. So I’d stake out the building and watch, until she showed. If T. X. Broch was suspect number one, then Trudy Dobbs was a close second. And closing. Broch was a psychopath, but I knew Trudy had been at the cabin. Now she was on the run. And armed, if she carried the .25 from the shoe box at her house. Maybe there was a connection between the two of them. The loan shark and the artiste. An improbable pair, but Broch and Trudy had Kendrick Haymes in common, and he had held some dubious secrets himself.

  I locked the door behind me and went down the back stairs. The door at the bottom was exit-only. Good. Trudy would have to come in through the front. Plenty of vantage points from the street. Or maybe I’d join the Brothers in their lodge. They could turn their doubtful glares to the window and help me keep watch.

  Rounding the front corner, I saw the figure of a tall woman halfway up the block, walking quickly away from the building, her back to me. Dark brown hair under a white knit cap. Expensive-looking white leather jacket. Trudy?