Authors: Charlie Price
No response.
“You didn’t have to,” Mick said. “I appreciate it.”
Fitz cursed at the engine.
“I’m in a lot of trouble now. I might need your help.”
“Tough tits, Bucky Boy. Shoulda thought about that a few days ago.”
“No, I mean it.” Mick looked around to be sure this conversation was private. “I think Larry Cassel killed that girl we found.”
Fitz stopped work. Rested forearms on the car fender, listening.
“We, uh, JJ found something there on the river. Pretty sure it belongs to Larry. He’s strong enough. Temper. Big ladies’ man. I think the girl refused him and he snapped and killed her.”
Now Fitz straightened. “Not my business. I got his dad running checks in Idaho and Oregon trying to sew me to a whole mess of trouble. If he connects the dots, I’m doing time.” He waited for Mick’s reaction. Mick didn’t give him one. “I can’t leave the city limits.”
Mick realized he’d often wished for something like this. Do the crime, do the time, something to knock his dad out of this stupid life. But not now. Not today. Today he needed his dad hard and ornery. “Grace is missing,” he said. “Larry may have got her, too.”
His dad pulled a red shop rag out of his back pocket and began wiping his hands.
“I’m going to find him and make him tell me what he’s done,” Mick said.
His dad snorted.
“I have to. Otherwise they’ll pin it on me.”
“You set me up,” his dad said, pitching the rag in a laundry barrel, “somebody set you up. Goes around, comes around. Little late for begging.”
Mick thought about wishing his dad good luck. Realized he didn’t mean it. Walked out.
69
M
ICK LEFT THE
B
RONCO
in an empty driveway a couple of streets over, walked to the studio. The door was unlocked, like he thought. Went straight to his bed and felt under the mattress for his paychecks. Lifted the whole mattress. Looked like his dad had helped himself. Okay, so Mick was keeping the Bonnie if it didn’t get impounded. Wasn’t much else in the studio worth his time. His winter jacket, winter boots, a better pair of jeans, a couple of button shirts. As usual, everything he wanted fit in a grocery bag.
By the time he got to the Stovall trailer, JJ had it open, airing it out. He called her name at the porch steps so he wouldn’t startle her, and she came to the door, clothes dirty, smudged face, wet rag in one hand, Pine-Sol in the other.
“Guess what? This place is a pigsty.” She rubbed her nose with the back of her hand to keep sweat from dripping.
“I remember,” Mick said. “Never knew how you and Grace could stand it.”
JJ winced at the word “Grace.” “Get used to anything.” She stepped out of the way. “Come in before somebody sees you.”
Couch and furniture cushions leaned against porch banisters in the sun. Inside, the place smelled like disinfectant. JJ had swept the rugs and mopped the linoleum. The bathroom door was propped open, the kitchen counter was clear. Gary’s table was empty and the garbage was gone.
“Wow. Somebody could actually live here,” Mick said, nodding appreciatively.
“Yeah. Me. Course, there’s two bedrooms.”
That reminded Mick. “You got Gary’s cell? I want to call Larry’s office. I’ve been driving around looking for Grace, looking for Cassel’s Lincoln. Didn’t see either. You know anybody that’s seen Grace since we let her out?”
JJ shook her head.
“I think he’s got her.”
“Why?”
Mick went back to his theory about the ring owners and who would be the most likely person to have killed Evelyn in a burst of anger.
“There’s a loose string,” JJ said. “Dovey says the ring I saw Hammond wearing is a new one. He upgraded.”
Mick frowned, not understanding.
“More diamonds. So, did he lose the old one’s setting when he dumped the girl at the river, or did he keep his old one and it’s in his jewelry box, or what?”
“Did Paint or Dovey tell you anything about those rings?”
“Yeah, V-Club for sure. Like Grace said, from a long time ago, high school. Hammond, Scott Cassel, Greer, Bolton, and Mackler.”
“What else did Grace say when you first showed it to us?”
JJ looked away, trying to remember. “She named Hammond and somebody else from that group.”
“Didn’t she say Larry had one?”
“I don’t know … hey, I couldn’t find the shotgun. Probably the police.”
“That’s okay. Maybe it’s better without it.”
“I’m meeting Dovey for lunch and then I’m getting money out of my account to bail Gary. He’ll help us.”
“Your account?”
“Long story.” JJ looked around the trailer, assessing what still needed to be done. “Hey, give me a hand? I finish wiping stuff here in the living room, you go through the fridge and toss anything that doesn’t look right?”
Mick’s first reaction: wrinkled his nose. Second, resistant. Didn’t want to get sidetracked from his search for Grace and Larry.
“Leave their bedroom and sheets till I can stand it. Help me finish the kitchen, I’ll get cleaned up, you make your calls. Deal?”
Hard to argue.
* * *
While JJ showered, Mick found a phone book, got the number for the county building inspector. When he called, he got a phone message: Out of the office for the rest of the week. Leave name and number. His message: “This is Mick Fitzhugh. You’ve got Grace and I’m coming after you.” He hung up wondering if that was another mistake. His dad would have said so. “Never let them see you coming.”
Mick fidgeted while JJ showered and dressed. When she came out of the bedroom, he was a little surprised. Had she gotten taller lately? She looked good in T-shirt, jeans, and sandals. He hadn’t had that thought before. When she turned to close her bedroom door, he added to his appraisal. Still looked like a boy from behind, but …
He dropped her off a block away from the courthouse. Couldn’t sit still. Started a street-by-street grid search of Portage. After fifteen minutes he parked. Too much territory, too much gas, and Cassel could be anywhere. Back to the ring. Hammond? Still didn’t fit Mick’s theory. Damn it, what had Grace said? Hammond got Larry on as inspector. What else did Larry do? Mick had seen him try to intimidate Dovey. Looked pretty good at it. With no son on the horizon, would Hammond give Larry that ring and make him an honorary club member? Just might.
The question Mick kept avoiding: Was Grace already dead?
70
C
OULD SHE EVEN MOVE
? How could someplace be this dark? Grace was scared of the answers. How did she get here? She felt her pulse climbing. Breathe!
She’d disarmed Larry, gotten in the car with him. A car accident? Is this the morgue? Do they think she’s dead? She heard herself cry out. Didn’t mean to. And then she did. Started yelling her head off. Stopped, afraid she was lying on something she might fall off of. What if Larry had put her in a well and she was balanced on a ledge, squirm and she’d tip over and drop the rest of the way? She needed to move very carefully. Get some information.
Her left hand first. The right seemed like it was wedged between her body and a wall. She felt her hip, then up to her stomach. She was dressed. Down to her butt. She was on something leather or vinyl. Felt like a wood frame beneath. What? Too flat and hard for a couch. What are those places in cemeteries? Slots for bodies in a big marble building? Her grandmother’d been put in one. Forced her mind off that. A shelf or a table? What kind of table would have a little padding covered by leather? None she’d ever seen.
She pressed her head down. Felt like a thin pillow. Pressed her feet. Same thing. Lifted her hand. Nothing above her that she could feel. She would sit up. When she did, her right hand came up short against a metal chain. A handcuff. Attached to … a pipe running along a cold wall. Should she swing her feet over the side? Feel for the floor? Good questions, but what she really wanted to know right now was how long would her bladder last? She closed her eyes and focused on hearing and smell. She needed more information about her predicament.
* * *
A sharp sound jolted Grace out of uneasy sleep. A door opening. It took several seconds for her eyes to adjust. The light hurt, wavered, finally formed into an image. Hammond, standing in a doorway in a chichi tracksuit. Now Grace could see she was lying on a massage table, cuffed to a drainpipe in a wine cellar.
“Larry thought you might want to use the powder room. My bad. Should have thought of that before.”
Grace took him in: gold chain at the neck, tracksuit, BOSS brand on the sweatshirt, matching pants, tan leather Air-something-or-others. He looked like a Nordstrom’s ad from her hometown.
“Sorry about the cuff. Didn’t want you to hurt yourself. We’ll explain everything whenever you’re ready.”
“Where’s—?” Grace’s voice was rough. She stopped and tried it again. “Where’s Larry?”
“Upstairs.”
“What did he do to me?”
“Nothing. He didn’t touch you. Really. Odorless. Like chloroform. We needed to have a serious conversation. Someplace private. Needed your cooperation.”
Grace watched as his face colored. That was a first. “This is the way you get cooperation?”
Hammond’s face hardened. “There’s a lot you don’t know. Things you need to understand. You want to hit the can or not?”
71
JJ
AND
D
OVEY WAITED
FOR
G
ARY
on the sidewalk in front of the jail. When he appeared, JJ hardly recognized him. He looked smaller, older and crippled. Shuffled as he came toward them like he’d recently been badly beaten.
Dovey stepped back, letting JJ greet him. “Grace is missing,” JJ said. “Maybe she’s run again, but I think Hammond or one of his people took her to shut her up.”
Gary shook his head like it was going to take him a while to readjust to brighter light and pot-free thinking. “Hammond … that’d be crazy.”
“Maybe,” JJ said. “Or maybe she knows something and those guys don’t want her around anymore.”
Gary grimaced like he was getting a headache, said, “Don’t mess with those guys.”
“You’d know?” Dovey asked. Didn’t sound like she expected an answer.
“Just making a living,” Gary said, scanning the nearby area to see if anyone was looking or listening. “I got people that depend on—” He stopped talking as Bolton walked out the front door, saw him and scowled.
“Let’s go home,” Gary said. “Talk there.”
This wasn’t the Gary JJ knew. If he was going to be super-careful about Hammond, then he couldn’t help her.
“You two be okay?” Dovey asked, looking at her watch.
“We’ll walk home,” JJ said. “I’ll call you tonight.”
“You can’t sleep there with him in the trailer.”
Gary glared at the woman.
JJ thought she understood. Dovey’s deal with Paint to keep JJ out of the system for a couple of weeks. “So let me know when you’re home and I’ll join you.”
Dovey thought it over. Nodded.
“Question?” JJ looked at Dovey for permission to ask it.
“Depends.”
“I need to find Larry Cassel. Is he working?”
Gary reacted. JJ shushed him.
“You want to know something, let Paint ask Cassel,” Dovey advised. “But no, he’s not working this week. Sign on his office says back next Monday.”
“How about Hammond?”
“Haven’t seen him.”
Gary was tugging on her arm and JJ left reluctantly, more unsettled than before. What she was thinking seemed impossible, but when they were all traveling together, Grace had seemed genuinely afraid. Would Hammond actually kidnap her? Get rid of her? Could he do that?
* * *
JJ kept checking each street and driveway for Cassel’s Lincoln. She asked Gary what kind of car Hammond drove but got no response. Wished she’d looked out the window the night before when he’d been at Dovey’s. Gary hobbled as quickly as he could, but it still took almost thirty minutes to get to the trailer. Alone, JJ could have made it in half the time.
Once inside, Gary turned on her, so mad he was sputtering. “Goddamn it, shut up about Hammond. You don’t know what you’re doing.” He looked like he wanted to hit her.
JJ hadn’t seen Gary panicked before. Had never seen him like this, even with Jon. She fought an impulse to run to her room and lock the door.
“I’m not going back to jail! Not! Never!” He wheeled abruptly and gimped to his bedroom. If he’d noticed the cleanup, he made no mention.
JJ continued standing just inside the door, shaken, trying to think.
When Gary came back he was carrying a suitcase that he set by the door as he passed and went to Tina’s TV. Cursed. Jerked the plug out of the wall and lugged the TV to the kitchen table, rummaged for a screwdriver.
JJ had always assumed the TV case was solid plastic but Gary had the back off in less than a minute. At that point he got careful, got a wooden spoon from the counter and used it to dig three packages from the mess of wires. Out on the table it was clear two were money. Hundred-dollar bills. Stacks about an inch thick. Gary shoved them inside his shirt. Third package was much smaller, a transparent bag with gray powder. Gary dumped a small mound on top of his hand near his wrist. Snorted. Shook his head. Sniffled. Tucked the bag in his shirt pocket and rummaged in his tool drawer again. Came out with a key ring.
“Mick has the Bronco,” JJ said.
Gary stopped in his tracks. Nailed JJ with a look that made her shiver.
“The hell. Miss Two-shoes spreading the wealth?” He clomped out of the trailer, stopping long enough to jam the money packets in the suitcase.
JJ could hear him swearing and banging things around the side. Looked out the window.
He brought a battery to the Chevy, set it on the ground while he opened the hood. Left and came back with a metal box. Unrolled its electrical cord and plugged it somewhere around the porch. Attached its hose to a front tire.
JJ could hear a rhythmic pumping begin.
Gary left for the side of the trailer again, came back with a heavy red jerry can. Unscrewed the car’s gas cap and poured.