Slash and Burn (24 page)

‘Hi, Imogen,’ I said. ‘I’m glad you came.’

‘If what you say is true, how could I stay away?’

As was to be expected, Imogen Ballard was very nervous. She had only my word that I was her friend and this was a woman who’d been running for her life for the past week. She studied me from behind the sunglasses. ‘I remember you from Jake’s funeral. It’s weird meeting you again after all these years.’

‘I’m only sorry that it’s under these circumstances.’

‘Me, too.’

Taking her luggage from her, I turned towards the parking lot. I’d commandeered the Windstar from my friends, leaving Rink and Harvey to make plans back at the cabin on the lake. I just walked, trusting that Imogen would follow.

In terms of area DFW Airport is the second largest in the United States, encompassing ground between both cities from which it takes its name. We came out from the terminal and headed off to pick up the road north for Pilot Point. We didn’t speak for the first few minutes. She was jumpy; I could be another ploy of Robert Huffman’s to get his hands on her – which to be fair I was, in a way – and could be driving her to him right now. She was putting a lot of faith in a man her deceased brother could no longer vouch for.

‘What do you have on Huffman?’ I finally asked.

‘Why do you want to know?’ In my peripheral vision I saw her shift towards to the passenger door, as though readying herself to leap out of the moving vehicle.

‘I know you have evidence that can bring his business down, but is there more to it than that?’

She didn’t answer immediately. When she did, it was with a question of her own. ‘Are you seeing Kate?’

‘No,’ I said. Then I regretted answering so quickly.

‘Oh, I thought . . .’

‘I was employed by Kate to find you.’

‘When I accessed my voicemail, there were messages from my sister. The impression I got was that . . . well . . .’

I gripped the steering wheel. Changed the subject.

‘I’m pleased that you decided to make contact, Imogen. I know you’re putting a lot of faith in me.’ Taking my eyes from the road just long enough to make a connection with her, I said, ‘Kate’s relying on the both of us.’

Imogen pushed a finger beneath her sunglasses and I got the impression she was wiping away a tear. Then I had to turn my attention to the road. Traffic was very heavy, crawling along in all lanes. We were on the North Stemmons Freeway passing Lake Lewisville, approaching a bridge that spanned a spur of the lake. Road signs advertised turn-offs for Hickory Creek and Corinth; straight ahead was Denton.

‘Where are you taking me?’

‘We’ve a cabin at Pilot Point.’

‘
We
being?’

‘Did Jake ever mention another member of our team called Jared Rington?’

‘You mean Rink? The Japanese guy?’

‘One and the same,’ I said. ‘Except he’s only half Japanese. His father is Scottish. Rink’s there waiting for us. There’s another guy, too. Harvey Lucas.’

‘Don’t know him.’

‘He wasn’t one of our team. But I wish that he had been. He’s good.’

‘Did Kate hire them, as well?’

‘No. They came here to help me get Kate back.’

‘Three of you,’ Imogen shook her head disconsolately. ‘Do you realise how many men Robert Huffman has at his beck and call?’

‘A lot less than he started with.’ I told her what had happened since Kate and I arrived at her house above Little Fork. It was my way of reassuring her that we were on the same side. But I saw horror in her face long before I’d finished.

‘You killed Trent Bolan?’

‘He was going to kill me.’

‘What about Larry?’

‘Got away.’

She pushed her face into her cupped palms and moaned.

‘They’re monsters. Do you know what they did to William Devaney? He was the sheriff—’

‘He was your lover.’

Pushing the sunglasses on top of her head she looked at me with red-rimmed eyes. ‘Yes. He was my lover. But then the Bolans beat him to death. Trent tore his ear off, Joe.’

‘That’s the downside of mixing with people like them,’ I said. ‘Devaney shouldn’t have tried blackmailing them.’

Imogen made a sound of scorn. She snapped the glasses off her head, closing them and pushing them into her purse. I discreetly checked to see if she was packing the way Kate had been but saw only the usual things that accompany a woman, plus a digital video camera.

‘You were there when they murdered Devaney?’

‘Yes.’ Her fingers went to the camera. ‘I was hiding in the woods. I was supposed to record the meeting Will had with Huffman. Will wanted it to use as evidence.’

‘You’re saying that Devaney wasn’t blackmailing Huffman?’

‘Of course not, he was only building a case against him and Roger Wallace. He was going to take the money and the recording and pass them to the state police. Will knew that he was too close to them to do otherwise. He had to pretend to be as dirty as the rest of them.’

‘Why didn’t he bring in the state boys before then? Why use you to record the meeting?’

‘He trusted me. It had gotten to the stage where he didn’t know how many of his own people were involved in the scam. If he went to the state police first he couldn’t be sure the word wouldn’t get back to Huffman. When Jim Aitken turned up with the Bolans it proved he was right to worry.’

‘Jim Aitken told me that after Devaney was killed you made your own demands.’ Looking at her steadily, I said, ‘To the tune of two million dollars.’

‘And you believed that sack of shit?’

‘I had no reason not to.’ I didn’t mention that I’d been torturing the guy at the time.

‘He was lying.’ By the way she turned her face away I knew that he wasn’t the only one.

‘I don’t care,’ I said. ‘What you tried to do was wrong, Imogen, but compared to the things that Huffman and the others did, it’s nothing. The only thing I’m angry about is that your greed put Kate in danger.’

‘I wasn’t blackmailing anyone. I only wanted what was rightfully mine. Huffman owed me money.’

‘A couple of grand,’ I said.

‘Doesn’t matter. He was refusing to pay me for work I’d done at his restaurant. I wasn’t going to let him get away with it.’

‘So you put your sister’s life at risk because of a couple of thousand dollars? I bet it doesn’t seem like such a good idea now.’

‘I never meant for Kate to get involved.’

‘Doesn’t matter,’ I said, throwing her words back at her. ‘She is. She might die, Imogen.’

Her fingers went to her face again, and this time I could detect the tremor in them. That Imogen had attempted to embezzle money from dangerous men didn’t really concern me. There were worse things she could have done: such as trying to demand money from innocent people.

‘Imogen,’ I said. ‘I’ve laid all my cards on the table. You know who I am, who is with me. You know we’re here to help you. If I had any agenda other than getting Kate back, you’d know that too by now.’ I didn’t say that she’d be dead, but she got the message. ‘Tell me what you have on Huffman.’

She nodded, and I detected a nerve ticking at the corner of her right eye. She sucked in a deep breath. ‘I was developing a website and publicity campaign for a restaurant in Little Fork.’

‘Le Cœur de la Ville.’

‘Yes. The owners were planning a grand relaunch. They refurbished the entire building, sank thousands of dollars into bringing it up to date. Little Fork was growing at an exponential rate. A top-class restaurant was a magnificent investment in the town.’

As she spoke, I thought of the last time I’d been in the restaurant; it wasn’t such a great investment now.

‘It came as a surprise when the owners announced that they were selling up. Up until that point they’d been very excited about their plans for the place. I’d reached a stage where I was almost ready to launch the publicity campaign and then the rug was ripped from under me.’

‘Huffman purchased the place. Then he refused to pay for the work that you had done.’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘There was no warning. Practically overnight things turned sour. The owners just left and Huffman moved in. I know things like that happen all the time in business, but nevertheless there was something fishy about it. I was allowed to clear out my equipment from the office that I’d been using at the restaurant. But – and normally I would be ashamed to say this – I took more than what belonged to me. I found files on le Cœur’s computer pertaining to the buyout by Huffman. They showed that the entire deal was a sham: Huffman purchased the building and the business, along with all its assets, for a miserly twenty thousand dollars. It didn’t take much to realise that Huffman had forced the owners into selling. Huffman needed to be brought to book for that, so I took what I’d found to Will.’

‘And this was where Devaney hatched his plan to prove Huffman was employing dirty tactics to purchase land and property?’

‘Will already knew that there was something going on. He told me that he’d been conducting his own investigation into Judge Wallace and the fact that he was rushing Huffman’s purchases through the system. He said that he needed more evidence, though. Something tangible that would prove their guilt.’

Our journey had taken us round Denton city limits and I had to concentrate on the roads while I picked up the spur that would take us along the northern edge of the city to the road up to Ray Roberts Lake. Imogen was silent, as though she’d explained everything. But there were still too many holes in her story.

‘Aitken told me that Huffman paid Devaney off but he refused to back down. He told me that Devaney began to demand more money.’

Imogen stirred beside me. She straightened a little in her seat, but she still had the look of defeat. ‘If he did, it was without my knowledge.’

‘Tell me the truth, Imogen. Devaney went from being a cop to someone who saw a chance at getting rich. And you saw it as a way of getting revenge on Huffman.’

‘OK, Joe, I’ll admit to that. We did see it as an opportunity to take what was rightfully mine. I just wanted to make Huffman pay up. But, despite what you think, we were going to hand the money and the record of the deal over to the state police.’

‘After you skimmed your cut off the top?’

‘No,’ Her face had become very hard. ‘I was going to go through the proper channels. I’d already lodged a compensation claim against Huffman; I intended pushing that through court when Huffman and Wallace were on trial. I had more chance of winning my case for compensation at a criminal trial than I did via any other route.’

‘So you set up the meeting with Huffman?’ I angled the Windstar on to a turnpike, picking up the road to the north. ‘Why in God’s name did you do it all the way out in the woods?’

‘We didn’t have much time to prepare. Huffman was obviously nervous about meeting somewhere the handover could be observed. So we chose the woods above Great Well waterfall. I knew the area well; I knew all the good hiding places. I went ahead, set myself up so I could film the handover.’

‘Except Huffman didn’t turn up,’ I said. ‘Aitken and the Bolans came instead and that’s when they murdered Devaney.’

‘No, Joe. Huffman was there.’

‘But I thought . . .’

‘I don’t think that the others knew, but I saw him. He came to watch and he looked like he loved every second of Will’s death.’

‘You got him on video?’

‘Yes.’

‘And you still have it?’

She touched the camera in her purse. ‘Right here.’

‘Have you made copies?’

‘Of course I have.’

I nodded. ‘Aitken said you didn’t witness the murder.’

‘Aitken couldn’t lie straight in bed,’ she said scornfully. ‘He knows the truth. They murdered Will in front of the camera even though they knew I was there. They had men hiding in the woods and they expected to catch me. Against all odds I escaped them. I had to hide for a full day and night, but I managed to give them the slip.’ She stopped and looked directly at me. ‘Why do you think Huffman’s so desperate to get his hands on me, Joe?’

‘OK,’ I acquiesced. ‘So why Aitken’s story that you then tried to blackmail them?’

‘It was all I could think of to make them back off. Even if I took the evidence to the state police, it wouldn’t have saved me. Huffman would’ve still had me murdered by one of his other men. I thought that I could buy my freedom back. I asked for an inordinate sum of money just to throw them, make them concentrate on that instead of on finding me.’

‘Instead, you made things a million times more difficult for everyone. You should’ve confided in Kate. She’s a police officer. She would’ve known what to do.’

‘I know that now.’ She couldn’t suppress her frustration any longer and it came out as a series of deep racking sobs. For a second I genuinely felt sorry for her.

‘You made some mistakes, but you’re not the only one. From now on we start thinking ahead.’

‘We go to the police with the evidence?’

‘Not yet. That won’t save Kate.’

‘What do we do, then?’