Secret Prey ld-9

by John Sandford

  Jim Bone. And Marcia Kresge and Kerin Baki.

  He chewed on the end of his pencil. Baki was a little thin-what would she get out of the killings? Her job? An assistant’s job didn’t seem heavy enough, but hell, it might to the assistant. Bone, of course, had that reputation as a ladies’ man, and supposedly had been sleeping with Kresge’s wife. What if he was also sleeping with the assistant? And if he was, so what? There might be some kind of twisted connection between an illicit relationship between Bone and Marcia Kresge, and the killing of Dan Kresge, but even if they had a relationship, how could that lead to the killing of O’Dell?

  Blackmail? He remembered one of Bone’s colleagues saying that Bone wouldn’t tolerate blackmail. Could O’Dell have tried? But Bone, if he wasn’t bullshitting about the phone records, pretty much had an alibi. Of course, the phones could be finessed.

  Then there was Mr. X.

  A Mr. X who might be killing for the reason everybody suspected-to stop the merger-either to save his job or simply as an expression of the general feeling at the bank. But if the killer was a Mr. X, he’d be almost impossible to find. And nobody knew what jobs would be lost yet. And why would he kill O’Dell, who’d taken a stand against the merger?

  The killing of O’Dell, Lucas decided, had been an insane risk. Neither the McDonalds nor Bone’s group had enough to gain by killing her, to take the risk. If anybody had come along while the killer was going up and down in the elevator, they’d have been cooked…

  Lucas frowned, thought about that for a minute, then called Dispatch. "Is Swanson still at the O’Dell apartment?"

  "Yes, I believe so. You want his phone number?"

  "Give it to me." He wrote the number at the top of his suspect sheet, then punched it into the phone.

  "Yeah. Swanson."

  "This is Lucas. Is Louise Compton there yet?"

  "Yeah, right here, want to talk to her?"

  "Put her on."

  "Hello?"

  "Ms. Compton, sorry to bother you… Could you tell me the exact words that Ms. O’Dell said to you when the doorbell rang? Did you actually hear the doorbell ring?"

  "No, I didn’t hear the bell… She just said, ‘There’s somebody at the door,’ and the next thing I heard was the shots." Compton’s voice was breaking up under the stress of the killing, and ranged from hoarse squawks to sudden squeaks; every word was like a nail on a blackboard.

  "Was she a good friend of yours?"

  "No, not socially-she was my boss. Oh, God, I can’t believe…"

  "You wouldn’t know who she was seeing socially… in a sexual sense, I mean."

  "I… I don’t think she was seeing anyone. Not at the moment. Not for quite a while. She has a friend over at North, but he’s gay. They sort of squire each other around, when she needs an escort. Or he does."

  "And she said that Audrey McDonald had already left?"

  "Yes. She said she put Audrey in the elevator, and ran right back to call me."

  "She put Audrey in the elevator."

  "That’s what she said. And that’s what she usually does-you know, the elevator is right by her door, she steps out to see you off. Like stepping out on the porch to say goodbye to someone."

  "And she always did that?"

  "She always did for me."

  "Thank you. Let me talk to Officer Swanson again." Swanson came back and Lucas said, "So why’d she say, ‘Somebody’s at the door’?"

  "I dunno. To get to the other side?"

  "I’m serious. Why’d she say that? She’s got a guard downstairs, who calls up before he lets anyone in. Or you can get up from the second floor skyway, but you’ve got to have a key card to run the elevator. At least I think you do. I noticed a key card slot when I was riding up…"

  "Huh. You’re right. And I would have thought of that too in about five minutes."

  "So it had to be a friend with a key card who was coming over unexpectedly."

  "Or somebody else who lives in the building."

  "You heard what she said about Audrey?" Lucas asked.

  "Yeah, O’Dell put her in the elevator."

  "The elevator dings whenever the door opens, right?"

  "So if Audrey had just stood there, and let the doors open again after they closed…"

  "It would’ve dinged and if O’Dell was out there she probably would’ve seen the doors opening."

  "Goddamnit. See what happens if you get on there and push the door close button, or the door open button, or both at the same time. See if you can get back off the elevator…"

  "Okay."

  "And check and see if Audrey went out past the guard or what… what time she left the place."

  "I already checked. She left at ten fifty-three."

  "And the guard says that’s right?"

  "That’s what he says. He checked her out."

  "Shit."

  "Besides, if Audrey’d just made a deal, why’d she kill O’Dell five minutes later?"

  "I don’t know," Lucas said. "There could be a million fuckin’ reasons."

  "I’ll tell you what," Swanson said. "I bet it’s a fuckin’ boyfriend that we don’t know about. Either somebody in the building she’d been screwing, or somebody at the bank. I vote for a key card."

  "I’ve got the same problem with that as I’ve got with this firebombing of Weather. People start saying it could be random, but I’m saying if it’s random, it’s weird. Anyone could get firebombed by a random nut, but not Weather: not with her recent history. Anyone could get shot by a pissed-off boyfriend, but not O’Dell-not with her recent history."

  "I see what you mean," Swanson said.

  "Still: Check with the guards and see how many key cards O’Dell had, and see if you can find them."

  "Do that," Swanson said. "What else?"

  "Nothing else."

  "I could go over and beat up Audrey McDonald for a while."

  "Hell, just phone her old man and tell him to do it. Then you can drop by for the confession."

  "You see her leg?" Swanson asked, his voice dropping.

  "Yeah, I saw her leg."

  "I once saw a stripper in a carnival who had bruises like that. Her old man beat her with a rolling pin."

  "That’s some business we’re going to do after we finish with this," Lucas said. "We’re gonna haul McDonald’s blubber-butt down to City Hall and put him away."

  He rang off Swanson and called Sloan. Sloan answered on the second ring: "Sloan."

  "Can you talk?" Lucas asked.

  "Not really. I could step outside."

  "Did you ask Bone about Kresge?"

  "Let me step outside."

  After a moment of shuffling around and some conversation that Lucas couldn’t make out, Sloan came back and said, "Well, I’m in the can. Bone says the phone reception here is better."

  "So what’d they say?"

  "Yeah, they have a relationship, and it started before her old man died-but not until after the separation. At least, that’s what they say."

  "How did you read it?"

  "I think they’re telling the truth about that. They got together at a particular party, and a number of people know about it and know that the party is when it started. I can check all that, but I think they’re probably telling the truth.

  One thing-I took Bone back in the kitchen to ask him about Kresge, and he said he’d appreciate it if I didn’t talk about Kresge around his assistant. He said he didn’t want the gossip getting around the bank, but I got the feeling that he was lying about that. I think the reason was a little more personal, and I’m wondering if he’s boning the assistant?"

  "One more bone joke from anybody and they’re fired…"

  "Fuck you, I’m civil service. Anyway…"

  "I don’t know; she’s pretty chilly," Lucas said.

  "Really? I think she’s pretty comfortable with Bone."

  Now Lucas was surprised. Sloan was the personalityreading genius in the department. "Is that so? Huh."

  "S
he also doesn’t have a completely solid alibi. Kresge does, sort of. She was talking to some other guy-and I get the feeling she may be boning this other guy too-when Bone called with the news that McDonald had left and there was no deal. But this was like on call waiting. She told Bone she’d come over, and then she switched back to this other guy and told him that something had come up with the bank, and they talked about it for a few minutes. Maybe five, ten minutes, because they talked about some other stuff too. And then she hurried right over to Bone’s place and got there about twenty after eleven, and from her place she really doesn’t have time for another stop."

  "Okay."

  "And to tell you the truth, she’s a pretty funky chick; I don’t think she’d kill anyone. She’s not crazy enough."

  "What about Baki?" Lucas asked.

  "I don’t know. I can’t read her very well. Very pretty; and she looks at Bone like a wolf looks at a sheep."

  "Huh. You about done there?"

  "Yeah. Unless you want me to torture somebody."

  "Not tonight. I’ll see you in the morning."

  "Shit’s gonna hit the fan tomorrow morning, dude. TheStar-Tribunehas the police guy standing outside of O’Dell’s, and a business guy standing downstairs here."

  "Freedom of the press," Lucas said.

  FIFTEEN

  Jim Bone had his head in his refrigerator when the phone rang. He picked up the kitchen extension and Kerin Baki said, "Mr. Bone, this is Kerin."

  "Jesus, Kerin, it’s five-thirty. Have you been to bed?"

  "No. Too much to do." She sounded wide awake. "Nancy Lu just called me. McDonald called Brandt out at his farm, and Brandt’s asking for an emergency board meeting at ten o’clock. We’ve got to be ready." Nancy Lu was the board secretary.

  Bone had been drinking milk out of the carton. He swallowed and said, "All right. Do they want the pitch today? What’d she say?"

  "No pitch. They just want to sort things out. But I think you’ve got to go for it today. If you wait, things could get out of control."

  Bone scratched his head: "I don’t think they’d give it to me today, but we might kill McDonald off."

  There was a second of silence, and then Baki said, "Try to be more careful with your language. You talk that way all the time, and it could cause trouble."

  Bone grinned at the phone and said, "Yes ma’am."

  "Bring in your blue suit with the thin chalk line-is that clean?"

  "Yes…"

  "And the red-horsey Herme`s necktie and the usual shoes and so on. Also, wear jeans and one of those mock turtlenecks and the black leather motorcycle jacket and your cowboy boots. I’m not sure which you should wear and we have to talk about that. Don’t shave-you still have that electric razor in your office bathroom?"

  "Yes."

  "Good. Mr. Bone, I think you should leave your apartment in ten minutes and meet me at the bank in fifteen. You should be here before anybody else."

  "I’ll be there. And listen. Call Gene McClure and tell him to get his ass in there. We’ve got to start looking at what Susan was doing. If there’s anything about the murder in her computers, we’ve got to know about it. I’ve been thinking about it all night."

  "Yes. That’s good."

  "Fifteen minutes," he said. He hung up the phone, looked at it for a moment, said, "Whoa," and headed for the shower. No shave? Motorcycle jacket and cowboy boots? Wonder what that was about.

  Bone carried the suit and tie with a white shirt and a pair of black dress loafers into the elevator, and was met by Baki on the twelfth floor.

  "Good," she said, taking the clothes. She was dressed in a tack-sharp blue suit and her hair was perfect. "Gene McClure is on the way in. He should be pretty quick. I scared him a little."

  "Good. Get him to me as soon as he comes in. Now: What’s this about the boots and jacket?" He looked down at himself.

  "We may want to reflect the image of a man who has been working all night to keep the bank going. Nobody else is in. I checked on McDonald, and he hasn’t been in, so as far as anybody knows, we’ve been working all night. Not even McClure knows you’re just coming in. I told him you were out for coffee."

  "I see… Listen, you gotta start calling me Jim."

  "Not yet," she said. "Go get your computers up, and get ready for McClure. I’ve got to mess up my hair."

  "Here…" He reached out and pulled a few strands over her eyes, a couple out at the sides: "My God, you look different," he said. And he thought that in the six years she’d worked for him, this was the first time he’d ever touched her, in any way. "But you’ve got to try to look a little tired."

  "I am tired," she said.

  McClure arrived ten minutes later, wearing a rumpled suit over a clean shirt; the skin on his face was a scuffed pink, as though he’d scraped off his beard with an emery board. McClure was technically O’Dell’s second-incommand, although his position was bureaucratic rather than executive, and he had not been part of her inner circle. Pushing sixty, he was simply waiting for retirement and enjoying himself. But as O’Dell’s technical second-incommand, he was now running her department, if only for a few days.

  "Jim. Kerin told me about Susan. My God…" Bone peered at him and realized that he was really shocked. He liked that.

  "Murdered," Bone said. "I’m as upset as you are, but we’ve got some things to get straight. We’ve got to balance everything out, tear through everything Susan was doing. We’ve got to make sure she wasn’t up to something… unusual."

  "Shouldn’t we wait for the board?" McClure asked doubtfully.

  "No. There’s an emergency board meeting this morning at ten o’clock, and they’re gonna need this information to put together some kind of response," Bone said. Baki walked into the room with a piece of paper in her hand. "If there’s anything unusual in the record, they’re going to want to know ASAP."

  "All right," McClure said. "I’ll get some of the computer cowboys on the way in."

  "They’re on the way," Baki said, lifting the sheet of paper so they could see a list of names. "All of them."

  McDonald was shaken out of bed at eight forty-five; Audrey was up with a cup of coffee.

  "What?"

  "Board meeting at ten. Nancy Lu called an hour ago. I let you sleep as long as I could. You’ve got to be good," she said.

  "Coffee?"

  "Yes," she said. "You go get cleaned up. I’ll get your suit… the charcoal one, I think, since O’Dell’s dead. Wouldn’t that be appropriate?"

  "Whatever…" And he staggered off to the bathroom.

  The Polaris Bank’s board of directors met at exactly ten o’clock in emergency session. All the members were present, plus Bone and McDonald. Bone showed up at the last minute wearing jeans, a motorcycle jacket, and cowboy boots. Wilson McDonald raised an eyebrow at the costume, and turned to see if Brandt had gotten it.

  Before anyone else could say anything, Oakes blurted, "What in the Sam Hill is going on here? Jim? Wilson? Anybody?"

  Wilson McDonald steepled his fingers: "There’s no reason to think that the O’Dell incident is related to the bank. I understand drugs were discovered in her apartment last night…"

  "Drugs?" Brandt buried his hands in his face. "Sweet bleedin’ Jesus. Is the press gonna find out about this?"

  "I would think that the police would make every effort to keep this private. However, I think there’s a good possibility that Susan, as with any drug user, was involved with very unsavory people…"

  "Bullshit," Bone snapped. He was chewing on an unlit cheroot, scowling. "It’s gonna get in the papers. I’d be surprised if it’s not out by tomorrow. And her dealer was a waiter at The Falls."

  "How do you know about this drug thing, anyway?" Anderson asked querulously, looking from Bone to Mc-Donald. And to Bone: "How do you know her dealer?"

  "The police told us about the drugs," Bone said. " Several of us were questioned last night. Another person told me who her dealer was. Told me in confidence."
<
br />   "We may have to know who it is," McDonald said.

  "If the cops ask, I might tell them," Bone said. "But right now, nobody knows that I know, except the person who told me, and the people in this room. If it gets out of this room, it’ll hurt the bank and I’ll want to know why it got out." He looked straight at McDonald.

  "What kind of drugs?" asked Bose, toying with a string of pearls.

  "Just an old piece of hash and a little pot," Bone said. "Nothing serious."

  "Nothing serious?" McDonald said. This time his eyebrows rose almost to his hairline. "Nothing serious? How can you say it’s nothing serious?"

  "Because it’s not," Bone said.

  "I’d disagree," McDonald said. "I think this must be handled very carefully…"

  "More bullshit," Bone said. He looked at McDonald over the walnut table, his eyes glittering. "And I’m getting pretty goddamned tired of your bullshit, Wilson."

  "Listen, pal," McDonald said, but Bone’s voice rode over his.

  "First, it’s not important," he told the board. "If it were heroin or cocaine or crack or methamphetamine, it’d be much more important. With this, it’s a misdemeanor, and we simply issue a press release saying that we were unaware of any drug use on O’Dell’s part, say it may have been related to her glaucoma."

  "Glaucoma," McDonald said. "I didn’t know she had glaucoma."

  "Neither do I, dummy, but by the time the newspapers find out for sure that she didn’t, nobody’ll give a shit."

  McDonald was half out of his chair: "You’re asking to be hit in the mouth, Bone. I’m no damn dummy and I want an apology."

  Bone waved him down into his chair, closed his eyes: "I’m sorry, I apologize. But I’ve been here half the night, ransacking O’Dell’s files with Gene McClure. We’ve established that her department is apparently completely on the up-and-up. Everything is absolutely clean."

  Brandt said, "Good going. I worried about that all the way in from the farm."

  "And we’ve got to stay on top of it," Bone said. "My assistant has prepared a press release…" He opened his briefcase, took out a sheaf of papers, and started passing them around. "It’s all very standard, full cooperation with police, the glaucoma thing, an overnight review of her department with her top subordinates indicates exemplary management with no hints of any banking issues in the murder."