by Gregory Ashe
When Hazard had finished his circuit, Somers was bouncing a pack of sour cream and onion chips on one hand. Hazard shrugged, and Somers nodded.
“Two fifty-nine,” the clerk said when Somers slid the chips under the partition. The register chinged.
“Do you have cash?” Somers asked.
“No,” Hazard said, glancing out the plate door and studying the pumps.
“Why not? You usually have cash.”
“I just don’t.”
“Did you spend it?”
Hazard let his eyes cut back to his boyfriend. “Forget the chips. You don’t need the chips. I’ve got to make dinner for that gaping ass-wound you call a partner.”
The clerk was breathing through his mouth as he watched them.
“If you didn’t want him coming to dinner, you shouldn’t have invited him.”
Hazard let his breath settle in his chest and looked out at the pumps again.
“You did invite him, right?”
“Would you pay for the damn chips, already?”
“Two fifty-nine,” the clerk said.
“He wasn’t just making that up? You actually said those words, invited him to our house?”
“Fine. I’ll pay for the chips.” Hazard got out his wallet, counted out the bills, and slid them under the partition. The register chinged again, and the clerk started the laborious process of counting out change.
“I thought you didn’t have any cash.”
“I forgot.”
“Maybe you forgot about inviting Dulac to dinner.”
Hazard was aware of the sound he was making in his throat; he just couldn’t stop it.
And Somers, damn him, just nodded slowly, as if it explained everything.
“Hey,” Somers said to the clerk, who was trying to get a penny out of the tray and kept fumbling it. “You know a guy named Hoffmeister? He’s police in Wahredua, fills up here sometimes.”
The clerk made a scoffing noise. “He sure does.”
Hazard opened his mouth, but Somers elbowed him before he could speak.
Nodding past the clerk, toward the bar and the club, Somers said, “Gets loaded, huh?”
“Can’t walk, man. Half the time somebody’s got to drag him outside.”
“You?”
“Nah. I just work the till, you know? I keep telling Dragon I can tend. I’m better than the guys he got in there.” The clerk’s puffy eyes got dreamy. “Girls like guys at a bar, you know? You make them a drink, they like that. You ever tell a girl you work a till, though? Jesus Christ, she pretends she’s all understanding until you can’t pay for her drinks anymore, and then she’ll laugh at you, tell you what an asshole you are.”
“That guy, Hoffmeister, does he ever come in here?”
“Nah, man.” The clerk slid the chips and the change toward them.
“Never?”
A flicker of interest showed in the puffy eyes. “You guys cops?”
Somers displayed his badge.
“I don’t want any trouble, man. Dragon told me no trouble. I’m clean, man. I cleaned up. If he thought I was back on the shit, he’d kill me, man.”
“Hoffmeister never comes in here?” Hazard said. “Ever?”
“I don’t know, man. I work nights. Dragon, some of the guys, they talk about what happens in the bar. But I don’t see any of the action. All them titties, you know. And those lucky sons of bitches tending. Got women drooling over them just because they can make an appletini. And I’m stuck here.” He poked the bag of chips. “Sour cream and onion, man. That’s my whole life. You ever try to get a girl like that?”
“No,” Hazard said. “Did Dragon and the other guys talk about anything else with Hoffmeister? Anything besides him getting wasted and dumped at the curb?”
“I don’t know, man. He’s trouble, you know? Donna May Plenge’s brother, that cop knocked some of his teeth out one time. They got into it over one of the girls. Happened with some other guys too. Anybody else, Dragon wouldn’t let him back in. But this guy’s a cop, you know?”
“When was that?”
“Huh?”
“Knocking out that guy’s teeth. When was it?”
“Hey, you’re not going to tell Dragon I talked to you, are you? Because man, he’d shit a brick. I don’t want trouble, I don’t. I’m totally clean. I’m not on the shit anymore, ok?”
Judging by his eyes, Hazard doubted that. “When was it?”
“A few years ago, I guess.”
“You didn’t hear anything about a couple of guys who might have grabbed Hoffmeister, have you? Maybe just wanted to rough him up?”
“Look, man. I don’t know anything about that. I don’t want any trouble. You talk to Dragon, you tell him that’s what I said. I don’t want any trouble.”
Grabbing the chips, Somers nodded. “We’ll be in touch. If you think of anything else, let us know. We don’t want to have to make things hard on you.”
“Shit, man. Shit.”
The clerk was still whining when they stepped into the December night. Hazard pulled in a deep lungful of motor oil and cigarillos and the cheap, glitzy perfume that wafted from the club. The cold made his eyes tear.
Popping a chip in his mouth, Somers crunched it. Loudly. And then another.
“Stop,” Hazard said.
“Do you want to talk to this Dragon guy?”
“I want a client who hasn’t pissed off half the city and most of the county.”
Crunch. Crunch. Crunch.
“Stop,” Hazard said again. “I don’t know. This whole story, Hoffmeister’s whole song and dance, it’s shit. He said Peterson came out here. He said Peterson checked, and there’s nothing on camera. That clerk is a deadhead moron, and he might not have even been on shift when those guys supposedly grabbed Hoffmeister, but all he can tell us is that Hoffmeister comes out here to be an asshole. Am I supposed to run down everybody who’s gotten a bad turn? I’ll spend the rest of my life doing that.”
Somers balanced a potato chip on the tip of one finger.
“Don’t,” Hazard said.
“I like crunching the big ones.” Shrugging, Somers added, “A few years is a long time to carry a grudge about a fight in a strip club. Maybe you’ll need to start running down leads like that, if nothing else pans out, but not yet. Someone’s got a death wish for Hoffmeister. They took potshots. That’s not long years of resentment slowly cooking into the perfect murder. That’s rage, right now. That’s something recent, something big.”
Hazard nodded slowly. “Let’s talk to Dragon anyway.”
When they got inside the strip club, it was a third full, with men at the bar, men at the buffet, men at the wobbly tables in front of the stage. The girl gyrating on the pole looked like she was calculating tax brackets, her face blank and bored and distant. A few of the men hooted and called to her, but most of them looked like they were more interested in the plates of chicken wings they’d loaded up at the buffet. The same glitzy perfume filled the air here like a low-grade migraine, but it was mixed now with the smell of barbeque and baked beans.
They asked for Dragon; what they got was a guy with skinny arms like tire irons. He was probably five-seven, in a white tank, gold chains twisted and kinked across his chest.
“I’m sorry, officers. I don’t know who you’re talking about.”
“Walter Hoffmeister,” Somers said with that buddy-next-door smile. “He’s Wahredua PD. He’s out here pretty often, I understand.”
“That’s possible. I don’t know the names of all the men who come out here; their money is all I’m interested in.” He flashed a grin with gold-capped teeth. “You understand.”
“I think you might remember him,” Hazard said. “He starts trouble. He gets away with it because he’s a cop.”
“I’m sorry, officers. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“We’re not here to jam you up,” Somers said. “
We’re just asking some questions.”
“I always cooperate with peace officers. More than happy to do my civic duty.”
Hazard had met guys like him. Hazard had known guys like him since he was old enough to realize Dore County was an armpit in the bigger world. Hazard wanted to use guys like him to stop up rat holes and plug sewage drains. “So talk about Hoffmeister.”
“Who?” the guy asked.
“We’d like to take a look at the security videos from a few weeks ago,” Somers said.
“Oh,” the man said, like they were pulling on a broken finger. “Oh, oh, oh. I am so sorry, officers, but I can’t help you. Corporate policy. We only provide that kind of material by court order. Not because we’re trying to make your job difficult.” Gold teeth flashed out again. “But we’ve got to respect our patrons’ privacy.”
From behind Hazard came a fresh chorus of hoots, and then a long, resounding belch.
“Yeah,” Hazard said. “Their privacy.”
They worked Dragon for a few more minutes, but the guy slipped away without giving them anything. When Hazard and Somers were back in the Mustang, they sat in silence for a minute, the car idling, the windows fogging with their breath.
“Savanna?” Somers said.
Hazard nodded.
They drove back to town, and to Hazard, the miles were longer now. No more joking. No more bullshitting. Just the radiance of the dash, the flattened, snow-streaked fields, a fox frozen on a fold of the ground, its form cut out against the stars.
In Wahredua, on the edge of Smithfield, the cesspit where everything ended up, Somers stopped the Mustang at a single-story row of apartments. The walls looked like painted plywood; in places, light slipped through chinks. The building crowded the sidewalk, leaving less than six inches of weed-choked dirt. When the engine stopped, the low roar of music filtered through the car.
The painted numbers on each unit had chipped and faded, so they just counted left to right and knocked on the fourth door. The window was dark; no gleam showed between the plywood wall and the door. Hazard knocked again. The building shivered.
“I know you like the whole Big Bad Wolf routine,” Somers said, blowing into his hands, “but I don’t think we can afford to rebuild this place if you knock it down.”
Hazard just hammered on the door again.
Nothing.
“You’re sure this is the address she gave when she posted bail?”
Somers rolled his eyes.
Music and light came from the first unit, at the end of the row. While Hazard and Somers waited, the door opened, and a couple staggered out, illuminated for a flash and then just shadows again, laughing, a woman’s voice asking for a smoke, the man grunting, the pair of them staggering and almost going down before fetching up against the apartment’s wall. More laughter as they righted themselves and lurched away.
“Christ,” Somers said, bouncing on his toes now. Hazard resisted the urge to copy him; the cold seemed worse in town. Trapped here. Congealed, the whole place already entombed in a glacier. “Do you want to try the party? See if anybody knows where she went? She might be there, for that matter.”
Hazard considered for a moment and shook his head. “If she’s there, she’ll bolt before we can get her to talk. And if she’s not, we’ll waste our time. Nobody here is going to tell us anything. Not tonight. I’ll try again tomorrow.”
“Plus, you’re too eager to get home for dinner. Right?”
“Fuck off.”
They waited fifteen minutes in the Mustang, the glow of the dash and the slow hiss of the heater encapsulating them. The effect was disorienting, like they were in space visiting a dead, frozen planet. Then, from inside the first apartment surged the chant of “Keg, keg, keg, keg.”
“Let’s go,” Hazard said.
Somers shifted into reverse, and they pulled away.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
DECEMBER 18
TUESDAY
6:14 PM
SOMERS TRIED TO GET INTO the kitchen to help, but Hazard was moving in bursts of controlled force, shooting towards the frying pan, then adjusting his thrusters and rocketing off for a cutting board, ricocheting in the small kitchen with the high burn of frustration.
“I can—”
“I’m already doing it.”
“I could—”
“No, the pan’s preheating.”
“If you want me to—”
“Sit down.” Hazard pointed with the chef’s knife. “Drink a beer. Drink one for me so I don’t murder this asshole.”
Somers opened a Bud Lite for himself and then opened a Guinness and left it for Hazard on the counter. Taking a seat, Somers drank and watched. His boyfriend was a big man, but he was also a smart man, a very smart man, with a lot of big emotions. It took two more of those ricochets through the kitchen before Hazard snagged the beer and started drinking as he broke down vegetables.
“What time should I tell him to be here?”
“6:30 is fine.”
“He might be late,” Somers said as he sent the message.
“Of course he will be. He’s an asshole.”
The phone dinged; the message from Dulac was the shit-eating-grin emoji and then a thumbs up.
“That was really nice of you to invite him,” Somers said. “You might not believe this, but he’s kind of desperate for you to like him.”
Hazard scraped a diced onion into a pan, where it sizzled in olive oil. Steam wafted up; the smell of cooking onion filled the kitchen, and Somers’s stomach rumbled. Then Hazard snorted.
“What?” Somers said.
Hazard was digging through the refrigerator, pulling out eggs, a package of some kind of meat—Somers couldn’t see what from the table—more veggies.
“Come on, I know he’s annoying.”
“He’s not just annoying, John. He’s probably the most annoying human being in the entire universe.”
“He’s probably not who I would have picked.”
Another snort.
“Do you have allergies?” Somers said. “Or do you need to say something?”
Maybe Hazard was starting to figure out some of those silent rules of relationships because he just bent his head over the cutting board and didn’t answer.
Except: “He’s exactly who you’d pick.”
“Excuse me?”
“And he’s not desperate for me to like him. He’s desperate for you to like him, and he thinks the key to doing that is getting me to like him.”
“That’s not true.” Although there was a certain logic to the second thing. “I would have picked you as my partner.”
“Pass.”
“Well, it’s too late. You’re stuck with me.”
This time, nothing but the click of the knife meeting the chopping board.
“Why do you say I’d pick him?”
Sliding cubes of meat—pancetta, Somers could see now—into the pan, Hazard said, “Because he’s basically the younger version of you: he’s smart, he’s funny, he’s got charisma, most people would find him attractive.”
“You think he’s hot.”
“I said most people. I think he’s a fuckboy with turds for brains.” He ran a spatula, stirring the meat and onions, the frying pork belly now adding its aroma. “And I don’t want you to like him, ok? I think he’s manipulative, and I think he’s going to fuck up your career if you don’t watch out.” Hazard gave another hard thrust with the spatula, sending the frying pan skidding over the glass stovetop. “You already had one asshole partner who fucked things up for you.”
“Is that what this is about? You’re worried he’s going to replace you?”
“Don’t be stupid.”
“That’s not an answer.”
Hazard filled a large pot with water and set it on the stove.
Somers drank, tilting the bottle, the glass cool and smooth against his lips. He knew how to play the Emery Ha
zard Wait-Out Game.
“I’m worried,” Hazard said, a scornful emphasis on the word, as though to mark the choice as Somers’s, not his own, “that you’re not going to see who this asshole really is until it’s too late.”
“What are you talking about? Did something happen between you two? Something I don’t know about?”
Hazard turned his shoulders in, his body angled away from Somers as he dug through the cabinets for pasta.
“You’re such a bad fucking liar.”
“I’m not lying.”
Somers had to take another drink, a long one, to keep from taking the bait. He had to take a few deep breaths. “Ok. I trust you. You’ll tell me when you want to tell me.”
“There’s nothing to tell.”
“Keep digging, my love. You’re just going to have to apologize more when it all comes out.”
Hazard shot him a glare, his cheeks stained wine-red.
“Here’s what I know about Gray Dulac: he’s a fuckboy, yes. And he’s actually kind of good police. He didn’t make a great impression on me when we started, but he’s really hit his stride, and he’s a good guy to work with. He’s not you, Ree. Nobody will ever replace you.”
“What the fuck do I care about being replaced? I’m not police. You need a partner. It’s pretty simple, John.”
Somers wanted to change the tone. He wanted to make things light and easy before Dulac got there, because Lord knew that Dulac was somehow going to press every one of Hazard’s buttons before the night was over.
“Here’s another thing about Gray. He’s a total kid. He likes to tease. He’s always giving me crap about how old we are, about how we’re asleep by nine, noise like that. He’s got this whole fantasy cooked up about how we’re basically an old married couple.”
From his seat at the table, Somers was watching as the knife slipped.
“Son of a fucking cunt-hole bitch.” Hazard slung the knife into the sink, where it clattered, and turned on the water.
By the time Somers got over to his boyfriend, Hazard was already rinsing the wound, cleaning it with soap. But the big man’s chest was heaving, and Somers noticed a slight tremor in the way Hazard held himself: a fight-or-flight need to move.
