“We’ll find it.”
“You need to find Tony.”
“He’s gone. His house is empty. His car’s still in the impound lot.” Faith tore open a packet of antibiotic. “He used his ATM card to clean out his bank account.” She squeezed some ointment onto a Q-tip. “We’ve got a BOLO on him.”
Will still couldn’t swallow. There was only an empty clicking noise. “Three men were there. Rednecks. Big guys. Fat.” Will couldn’t remember whether or not he’d told her where this had happened. “At Tipsie’s. That’s where Tony killed Eric Haigh.”
She dabbed the Q-tip to his forehead. “I’ll put somebody on the club.”
“They were in the back room. Dell took me there to meet them. I didn’t know until we were inside that that’s what he wanted.”
Faith squirted more ointment onto the Q-tip.
“They knew my Bill Black cover. All of it. They were watching me. Not when I went back to Atlanta—they couldn’t follow me on my bike—but they knew about the hotel, my habits.” Will felt in his pocket for his phone. He looked down at the shattered glass.
Sara had thrown her phone against the wall. Will had watched it break into pieces. He had never seen her throw anything like that before.
Faith asked, “Will?”
His phone was in his hand. The glass was shattered. Will slid it back into his pocket. “One of them was called Junior.” He finally managed to swallow. The pain nearly made him pass out. “He had a gun to my chest. Pearl-handle Smith and Wesson. The knife had a pearl handle. The redneck’s, not Tony’s. We threw that off a bridge.”
Faith ringed the Q-tip underneath Will’s eye. He remembered the redneck cutting him; the first cut of the night.
He said, “My clothes are in a trash bag in my locker. I had to change, take a shower. Tony was in the ER. He cut his hand when he stabbed Haigh. They had to stitch it up.” He felt the need to add, “I don’t know how many stitches.”
Faith said, “His wife found him.”
“Tony has a wife?”
“Eric Haigh. His wife found his body outside the house. There was a lot of confusion at first. She didn’t recognize him.”
Will remembered, “They told us to put him on the front lawn. The order came from Big Whitey.” He saw the question in her eyes. “On the phone. I didn’t meet him. The redneck took the call, then he told Dell where to dump the body, that the order came straight from Big Whitey.”
“We’ll see if we can trace the call to the club.”
“It was a cell, probably a burner.”
“We’ll check it anyway.” Faith tossed the Q-tip into the first aid box. The cotton was soaked red. She told Will, “Haigh’d been missing for two days. His wife didn’t say because he’d been acting weird since the raid. She knew Internal Affairs was involved. She didn’t want to get him into trouble.”
“The raid,” Will repeated. Faith had talked about it earlier, but Will couldn’t recall the conversation. “They tortured him.”
“I know.”
“The redneck told Dell …” He lost his train of thought. “What did I say?”
“The redneck told Dell?” She tried, “We were talking about Eric Haigh.”
The prompt didn’t help. “He said he’d be in touch with me. That he had a job for me.”
“What time were you at the club?”
“Time?” The question didn’t make sense. “What time?”
Will took his phone out of his pocket. The glass was shattered. Still, the screen came on when he pressed the button. He told Faith, “It’s 1:31 a.m.”
Faith tilted his head back up so she could look at him. “Should I take you to the hospital? A different hospital, I mean.”
Will shook his head. He wasn’t going to any hospital.
“I think you have a concussion.”
“Why?”
“Paul Vickery kicked you in the head.”
“When?” Will asked, but that wasn’t the right question. He knew Vickery had kicked him. “I mean, why was Paul at the hospital?”
“Someone took a shot at him.” Faith made herself more clear. “Paul Vickery was at the hospital because someone tried to kill him tonight.”
“I’m sorry I keep forgetting things.”
“It’s all right.” Faith spoke more slowly than necessary. “Vickery was at home. A gunshot was fired through a front window at his house. That’s why he had the bandage on his arm.”
Will couldn’t remember seeing a bandage. “Is he okay?”
“Okay enough to attack you.” She frowned. “He fights like a woman. You’ve got scratches on your neck.” Faith turned his head. “Did he bite you?”
Will looked away. Paul Vickery hadn’t made those marks. Sara had scratched him. She’d kicked him and bitten him and Will hadn’t stopped because everything she did only made him want to fuck her harder.
Faith gave up on the Q-tip. She smeared antibiotic onto her finger and rubbed it on Will’s face. “They went after DeShawn Franklin, too. He was jumped outside a movie theater tonight. His girlfriend started screaming. She called 911.”
“They took him to the hospital?”
“Will, look at me.” She made sure she had his attention. “Someone went after Franklin and Vickery on the same night that Eric Haigh’s body was dumped on his front lawn.”
Will already knew these details, but the way she put them together so succinctly finally made them click. “It was coordinated.”
“Right. Someone was sending a message.” She peeled open a Band-Aid.
“That’s what the redneck said—there’s no use sending a message unless everybody can read it.”
“Well, if you ever see him again, tell him the message was received loud and clear. Turn that way.”
Will turned his head. Faith stuck the Band-Aid on his neck to cover the scratches.
He asked, “Is that why you were at the hospital? Because they were all attacked?”
“I was looking for you.”
“Because of DeShawn Franklin.” Will shook his head. That was wrong. “You went to the hospital because of Eric Haigh. You saw him and you thought they had done the same thing to me.”
“I thought he was you,” Faith said. “His own wife didn’t recognize him. I went to the hospital thinking I was going to have to identify your body.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Thank God Sara wasn’t answering her phone.” She indicated for him to look up again. The scratches were too wide for just one Band-Aid. “It was a real party after that. Paul Vickery and DeShawn Franklin were wheeled in right as I was coming up from the morgue. I was talking on the phone to Amanda.”
“Did you have to tell them Haigh was dead?”
“Yes,” Faith answered, her voice straining. “But then they saw Tony Dell getting his hand sewn up and decided to take it out on him.” She didn’t make Will ask. “It took six cops to get them off the guy.”
“Why’d they go after him?”
“I guess because Dell’s car was parked outside Lena’s house the night they were attacked. I’m sure whoever Vickery’s witness is who saw you at the club also saw Tony. It’s not a leap to think you both had something to do with Haigh’s murder.”
It wasn’t a leap because it was right. “What’s Tony saying?”
“Who knows?” Faith sounded exasperated. “I told you five seconds ago that it took six cops to peel DeShawn and Vickery off Tony Dell. By the time anybody thought to look, Dell was gone. We turned the hospital upside down, but he managed to get away.”
“He probably had ten escape routes already planned.” Will remembered something. He took out his wallet. Cayla Martin’s handwritten note was still in the photo sleeve. “This is Tony’s stepsister. Check her house.”
Faith took the note with some skepticism. “Dell didn’t have any siblings on his background check.”
“It was only a few years,” Will said. “He’s in love with her.”
Her look said she was con
sidering the hospital again.
“I know it sounds weird, but it’s true. She’s a nurse at the hospital.”
“I’ll send a car.”
Will coughed. He looked at his palm, expecting to find blood. “Vickery called me a cop killer.”
Faith shook her head like she didn’t understand it, either. “Maybe he saw you leaving Eric Haigh’s house?” She answered herself. “No, if he saw you leaving Haigh’s, he would’ve killed you in the street. Do you remember seeing Vickery tonight? Or any of them?”
Will considered the question. He could feel it roll around in his brain like a marble that wouldn’t settle. Faith said, “I’m going to call Sara.”
“Don’t.”
“She has a right to—”
“No.” Will grabbed her arm. He let go just as quickly. “She knows everything.”
Faith examined his face. He wondered what she saw. The bruises wouldn’t show for a few hours. The side of Will’s head probably had a print from Paul Vickery’s shoe. The bridge of his nose would be red. His split lip would show blood. The scratch mark. The bite mark. What would she make of those?
She said, “We need to get to the field office.”
Will wanted to go back to Atlanta. He had to get his dog from Sara’s apartment. His toothbrush, the clothes he’d left in the drawers she’d cleared out for him. She shouldn’t have to see any reminders of Will. It was the least he could do.
“It’s over,” he told Faith. “With Sara. It’s over.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.” Will had never been so sure of anything in his life.
Faith closed the first aid kit. She clicked the plastic lock. “Well, that’s her loss.”
“She has good reason.”
“No, she doesn’t,” Faith insisted. “No matter what you did, Sara’s not the woman I thought she was if she can’t forgive you.”
Will held his tongue. She would find out the truth soon enough.
Faith said, “Get in the front seat. We’re going to be late.”
“For what?”
“Branson.” Faith’s tone made Will think maybe she’d said this before. “I saw her at the hospital. She’s ready to talk.”
“Why now?”
“Somebody tried to take out two of her detectives—three if you count Lena. Eric Haigh was tortured and stabbed to death. Jared Long was almost murdered. Hell yes, she’s going to talk to us. She’s getting her files. We’re supposed to meet at the field office.” Faith looked at her watch. “Ten minutes ago.”
“What files?”
“The ones from the shooting gallery.” Faith motioned for Will to move. “Denise Branson has been lying to us all along. She’s finally going to show us her files from the raid.”
Will stared into the bathroom mirror at the GBI field office, assessing his damaged face. Life had left him a wound expert. He knew the difference between a cut that scarred into a thin white line and a cut that left nothing but a faint memory. By his estimation, the only lasting reminder of the night would come from the redneck’s knife. The tiny slice below Will’s eye probably should’ve had at least one stitch. But that had to be done at a hospital, and Will was never going to another hospital ever again.
At least the nausea had passed. His head was aching at a lower frequency. The trembling had stopped, which he took as a good sign that he wasn’t having a stroke or a seizure. Swallowing was still an issue. He found this out the hard way when Faith made him drink two bottles of Coke. Then she’d stood over him while he choked down a pack of cheese crackers. Will had gotten irritated at her for bossing him around, which probably meant that whatever she was doing was working.
He looked at his neck, lightly touching the reddish bruises that were starting to come up. If Will had one talent, it was surviving. He’d made it through the night. The redneck hadn’t done too much damage. Tony Dell hadn’t killed him, though he was obviously capable. Paul Vickery had gotten in many, many good blows, but Faith had probably cracked his ankle, which was a nasty enough payback.
So, Will had survived. He had a right to feel good about that.
But then there was Sara.
When Will was a kid, he’d imagined all the slings and arrows thrown his way were easily portable. He didn’t have to keep them inside. He could shove them all into boxes. After a while, there were a lot of boxes. There was nowhere to put them. They floated over his bed at the children’s home. They followed him to school. They chased after him like bullies when he ran down the street.
As Will got older, storage became an issue. Or maybe the metaphor evolved alongside him. The floating boxes turned into pieces of paper. The papers went into files. The files were put in filing cabinets. The cabinets were locked so that he never had to see them again.
When Sara came into his life, Will forgot about the file room. He forgot about the endless pieces of paper. The rusted cabinet locks that wouldn’t turn sometimes.
That was over now.
Standing in the bathroom, Will put Sara Linton into a file and closed the drawer.
“Will?” Faith knocked lightly at the door. “Are you okay?”
He turned on the faucet to let her know he was alive. The water was icy cold. He wanted to splash some onto his face, but the liquid would probably roll right off. Faith had used so much antibiotic ointment that his skin glistened.
Will opened the door. Faith was standing there with a bottle of water in each hand.
His voice sounded like an old man’s. “Scared I’d die on the toilet?”
“That’s not funny.”
“It can happen,” he croaked. “I read about it in the paper.”
She handed him the water. “You weren’t sick again?”
“No.” He regretted the loss of her previous silence, but he wasn’t cruel enough to tell her. “I’m fine. Thank you.”
“Drink all of that water.” She led him down the hall. “I sent a cruiser for a knock-check on Cayla Martin’s house. Took them forever to find the place. It’s not on MapQuest, Google, anything.”
Will nodded. He would’ve never found the road without Tony’s help.
“Anyway, the point is they eventually found it. Martin was home. She said Tony Dell could go to hell for all she cared. And then she asked if there was a reward for helping to find him.”
Will nodded again. That sounded like Cayla Martin.
“The cruiser’s gonna swing by a few more times before they go off shift to make sure Dell doesn’t show up. Meanwhile, I caught up Amanda on everything that happened tonight. We’re trying to Skype her into the conference room, but there are some technical difficulties.”
Will assumed the problems weren’t on this end.
“Lonnie Gray is here. The Macon chief of police.”
“Amanda called him?”
“Denise Branson did. My hat’s off to her for manning up to the boss. They’re outside talking while we try to get the feed up. And by talking, I mean Denise is mostly listening to him screaming. Gray’s so far up her ass he’s probably in her gallbladder by now.”
Will took a sip of water. “She lose her job?”
“If she’s lucky, that’s all she’ll lose. Gray had no idea Branson was lying to us. She could be looking at obstruction charges or worse.” Faith glanced over her shoulder. “I haven’t told Gray what Vickery did to you yet.”
Will shook his head. “Don’t. I’ll settle it with Vickery.”
“You’ll have to beat Amanda to it. She’s ready to scalp him.”
Will kept shaking his head. “I wish you hadn’t told her.”
“Yeah, well, I wish I hadn’t lost my virginity during a midnight screening of Die Hard. Get over it.” Faith pushed open the door.
The conference room was eerily similar to just about every other conference room at every other GBI field office in the state. Fake oak paneling covered the walls. A long table split the center of the room. Worn pleather office chairs were crammed so tight that two large me
n couldn’t comfortably sit by each other. A small plasma television was on top of a rolling metal cart. Wires hung down to the various electronics on the shelf below. The screen showed what was obviously Amanda’s personal Skype photo. The image had to be from the 1980s. She was dressed for tennis. A wooden racket rested on her shoulder. A Jane Fonda headband poofed out her hair. She was smiling, which was probably the most disconcerting part.
Amanda’s voice squawked from the speaker on the table. “Can you see me waving my hand?”
“No, ma’am.” Agent Nick Shelton, head of the field station, didn’t touch the laptop in front of him. Instead, he jammed his fingers into his eyes as he shook his head. “I’m trying everything I can. Are you sure it’s not on your end?”
“Yes, I’m sure,” Amanda snapped. “I can’t see anything but the GBI logo. There’s no video at all.”
Nick shook his head at Faith. He held out his hand to Will.
“Agent Trent.”
“Is Will there?” Amanda asked. “I can’t see a thing.”
Will tried to make his voice as strong as he could. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Why are you whispering?”
Faith said, “Because he was nearly strangled to death.”
Amanda showed her usual concern. “Sit close to the speaker, then. I don’t want to have to ask you to repeat yourself every two minutes.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I’m going to have a word with that idiot who set up my computer,” Amanda complained. “He’s been out here three times, and it stops working the minute he leaves.”
Faith couldn’t help herself. “You know you can catch more flies with honey.”
“Yes, Faith, thank you. That’s exactly what I need is more flies.”
Will slumped into a chair as the two women exchanged more helpful suggestions. The table was set up for a formal meeting. Five bottles of water were in front of five chairs. Notepads and pens were laid out beside them. Will had been at a lot of briefings where a lot of cops lost their jobs, but he felt sorry about this one. Denise Branson had made a career-ending mistake, but she’d probably done it for reasons she felt were right.
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