“You okay to drive?” she said.
They were headed back to the motel in her Toyota. An ER nurse had given Devlin the top from a pair of scrubs, and his left arm was in a pale blue sling. She saw his face tighten every time they hit a bump.
“I think so,” he said.
“This changes everything. You know that, right? We have to do a story.” She’d called Alysha before they’d left the hospital, filled her in.
“You’ll be identified in this one,” Tracy said. “Police reports are public record, so there’s no reason for us to keep anything back. You willing to talk about what happened, be quoted?”
“I don’t think so. What will the story say?”
“‘Man wounded in Camden shooting was a colleague of murdered bar owner.’ Something like that.”
“Makes us sound like a bunch of gangsters.”
“As opposed to what?”
He didn’t respond.
“Once the story’s out there, other outlets will see it,” she said. “Try to follow it up themselves. As I said, things change fast.”
He adjusted his sling, winced. His face was pale in the dashboard light.
“Alysha got a home number for this Gordon Farrow,” she said. “She’ll call him, see what he has to say.”
“He’ll love that.”
The muffler rattled loudly.
“Sounds like you need to get this thing into the shop,” he said.
“There’re a lot of things I need. And what I need most right now is to get a story written ASAP. Is there anything you want to add since we talked this afternoon?”
“No.”
“And you didn’t recognize the shooter. That on the level?”
“It was. He was young. Thirties, at most. Not someone we worked with.”
“Straight up?”
“Straight up. I hope I didn’t put you in a bad position with Malloy. He’s a smart guy. I think he knows he wasn’t getting the full story.”
“My father always told me the truth is a powerful thing,” she said. “Sometimes you have to be economical with it. Don’t worry about Dwight. I’ll deal with him.”
Pulling into the motel lot, he said, “Don’t stop. Go around back.”
There was a Camden police car parked outside the manager’s office. She saw there were lights on in his room, a square of cardboard taped over the bullet hole in the window. There were two empty parking spaces below it. Cubes of safety glass had been swept into a pile.
She drove around the building.
“It’s the Ranchero over there,” he said.
“The what?”
“The funny-looking blue pickup thing.”
“You drove all the way up from Florida in that?”
“It’s old, but it runs good. It’s got a few miles left in it.”
“Like its owner.”
“Not sure about that part.”
She pulled up behind the pickup. “Got your keys?”
“Yeah.”
“You need anything from the room? You going to be able to get in and get your stuff?”
“There’s nothing I need tonight. And I don’t feel like dealing with anyone else right now, especially the manager.”
“I’m sure he has insurance.”
“Does that cover getting the room shot up, bullet holes in guests’ cars?”
“Probably wasn’t the first time it happened,” she said. “You’ll need a place to stay tonight, though.”
“I’ll find another motel.”
“I’ve got a better idea.” She’d thought about it on the way there. “Come back with me to my place, sleep on the couch. I’m headed back there now to work on the story. If Dwight comes through, there’ll be a cruiser outside all night.”
She watched for his reaction, how he would take it. Worried if she lost track of him tonight, he’d disappear on her.
“Maybe that’s not such a good idea,” he said. “Since someone tried to kill me tonight.”
“All the more reason. It’ll be safer.”
“I don’t want to inconvenience you.”
“Seems the best solution at the moment. If you’re worried about me, an officer will be there to protect you. Or I can lend you a can of pepper spray.”
“No need,” he said. “I have the feeling I’ll be fine.”
Twenty-Seven
Devlin sat on her couch, tried to get comfortable. She’d given him an oversized Rutgers sweatshirt to wear, but it still rubbed against his stitches when he moved the sling. The back of his neck was sore where the gunman had hit him.
Through the front window, he could see her talking to the uniformed officer standing beside his cruiser. The Ranchero was parked under trees on the side of the house.
She’d booted up a laptop after they’d gotten there, written for a half hour, then spent another fifteen minutes on the phone with someone from her paper, talking as she typed.
Something poked his hip. He felt behind the seat cushion, found a remote control for the TV. He set it on the coffee table.
The uniform got back in the car. She came in, locked the door.
“He’s here until eight in the morning,” she said. “Then someone else will spell him. They’ll stay as long as one of us is in the house.”
“That’s nice of them.”
“Dwight was as good as his word. This time.”
“‘This time’?”
“Never mind.”
She went into the kitchen. “I don’t know about you, but I need a drink.”
“What have you got?”
“Some not-so-great wine. About two shots’ worth of Grey Goose.”
“Wine’s all right.”
He shifted on the couch, adjusted his sling again. The dull throbbing in his shoulder seemed to go bone-deep. His arms and sides ached where he’d landed on the blacktop.
She came in with an open bottle of wine and two mismatched glasses, one with antique cars on it. She put them on the coffee table, sat in the room’s only chair. “All the Waterford’s in the washer. These will have to do.”
“Did you send your story in?”
“Desk is reading it right now. It’ll go up online soon. I’ll show it to you. It’ll be in tomorrow’s paper as well.”
“Your friend get ahold of Farrow?”
“She did. He answered, then hung up when she identified herself. When she called back, he didn’t pick up.”
“What’s next?”
“Pay a personal visit. To the Unix office as well. They haven’t responded either.”
“You’re stirring the nest.”
“It’s what we do. At least what we’re supposed to do. You look like you’re hurting.”
“A little.”
She got up, went down a hall to the bathroom. He heard the creak of a medicine cabinet opening and closing.
She came back out with two pale blue pills, set them on the table. “Try these.”
“What are they?”
“They’re for cramps, but they’re pain relievers too.”
“Cramps?”
“Not manly enough for you? Pain or not, your choice. Better to shut up and take them.”
He poured wine into their glasses, set the bottle down. He took the glass with the antique cars.
“I have insomnia a lot,” he said. “Don’t be worried if you hear me walking around out here in the middle of the night.”
“Thanks for the warning.”
He took the two pills, washed them down with wine.
“You’re very cool about this, aren’t you?” she said.
“About what?”
“Getting shot, almost killed. Now you’re acting like it was nothing.”
“I wouldn’t say it was nothing. But I’ve been through it before.”
“I gathered when I saw those other scars. You get all those ‘advising’?”
“Some of them.”
Her cell buzzed in the wicker basket. She got up, took it into the kitchen t
o answer it. He couldn’t hear the conversation.
After a while, she came out, dropped the phone back in the basket.
“That was the night desk. Everyone’s signed off on the story. It’ll be up in a little while.”
“Your name’s been on these stories, hasn’t it?”
“Mine and Alysha’s, yes.”
“That means Farrow knows who both of you are.”
“You think he’s behind all this?”
“Maybe. Probably.”
“What about Kemper?” she said.
“Doesn’t make sense. Risk everything he’s got—his company, his government contracts—on some street-level shootings. He’s someone always measured risk against reward. A lot of risk with this, not much reward.”
“That you know of.”
“Anybody thinks I’m a threat to some worldwide conglomerate is sadly misinformed.”
“Why would Farrow want you and Roarke dead?”
“I don’t know that he did. He’s the only one who could answer that.”
She got up, took her glass to the window, looked out. “I bet our officer friend is wondering what’s going on in here.”
“Not if he got a good look at me.”
“Meaning what?”
“Twenty years and twenty pounds ago, I might have had a chance. Maybe not even then.”
“You never know.”
“You and Detective Malloy seem to know each other pretty well, though. Just from reading body language, I mean.”
She sat back down. “That’s a long story, and not worth the telling.”
“Sorry. None of my business.”
She refilled their glasses. “So, which of those scars did you get in San Marcos?”
He felt his smile fade. “Is that why I’m here?”
She drank wine. “I’m sorry. My turn to apologize. Always on the job. It’s a problem sometimes, turning it off.”
“It’s how you make your living, I guess.”
“I’ve never been good with the work-versus-life thing, finding that balance. And we make sacrifices when we make choices. Thing is, though…what’s going on at the paper now, with layoffs, buyouts, budget cuts? It’s bad. But I can’t think of anything else I can do, anything I’d want to do.”
“Then there’s your answer.”
“I just don’t want to end up one of these bitter people talking about the way things used to be. How everything was better back in the day. Nostalgia is death.”
“I don’t know,” he said. “I think it’s okay to look back. Just don’t stare.”
She laughed, and he felt himself start to relax again. The pain in his shoulder was gone.
“You live here on your own?” he said. “I’m not chasing anyone out?”
“Just me. I don’t even have a cat. I know that’s hard to believe.”
“Does it bother you sometimes, living alone?”
“Occasionally, but I get over it. How about you?”
“It suits me,” he said. “Sometimes I think it’s not so healthy, though. You end up living inside your own head too much.”
“You’re right about that.”
“You’ve never been married?”
“No. Came close once. Engaged.”
“What happened?”
“He was a good guy, a public defender. We tried to make it work, but we had different priorities. When he got offered a partnership at a firm outside San Diego, it was an easy call to make. For him, at least.”
“He ask you to go with him?”
“He did not. I couldn’t blame him.”
“That what you meant by sacrifices?”
“One of them,” she said.
“He still out there?”
“He is. Married, with a kid.”
“Could have been you.”
“Maybe. Sometimes I like to think so. But probably not.”
“I’m prying. I’ll stop. Sorry.”
“Nothing to apologize for.”
He sipped his wine, touched the sweatshirt. “This where you went?”
“Yes, New Brunswick.”
“What for?”
“You mean why did I go there, or what did I study?”
“The second.”
“Journalism and mass media. I minored in art history.”
“That must be useful.”
“Yeah. You ever need someone to tell you the difference between a Velázquez and a Vermeer, I’m your girl.”
“For someone who studied art, your walls are bare.”
“I’ve only lived here seven years. I’ll get around to it soon.”
He caught himself yawning. His eyes felt watery.
“You look whipped,” she said. She got up, went into a hall closet, came out with a pillow and a folded comforter. “These’ll have to do.”
“They’ll be fine.”
She set them on the arm of the couch. “I’ll be getting an early start tomorrow. They’ll want me in the office ASAP, get working on the follows. Other outlets will be on the story now, and I have no intention of getting beat. They’ll be looking for you too.”
“They will?”
“Yeah, they’ll want to talk to you. But you’re not going to talk to them.”
“Why not?”
“Because there’s only one reporter you can trust with this story.”
“Is that right?”
“It is,” she said.
He was falling again. Vaulting the rail, gunshots behind him. But there was nowhere to land this time, only a deeper darkness, a cold void with no bottom.
He woke, kicked out, felt his heel hit something hard. He sat up fast. Pale moonlight came through the front windows, showed the outlines of the room, the empty chair, the dark television. Through the window, he could see the cruiser parked outside.
He pushed the comforter away. Moving hurt. He got his watch from the coffee table, looked at the dial. Three a.m.
“You okay?”
She was standing in the half-darkness of the hallway, watching him. She wore a terrycloth robe over sweats, was barefoot.
He put the watch down, saw what he’d kicked was the arm of the couch. “Was I making noise?”
“You could say that.”
“Sorry.”
His mouth was dry, his throat sore. The wine bottle on the table was empty.
“How are you feeling?” she said.
“Like someone used me for a piñata. Do you have any water?”
She went into the kitchen. He wiped sweat from his face, felt the burn of the stitches when he moved.
She came back, set a bottle of water on the coffee table.
“Thanks.” He cracked the lid, drank.
She settled into the chair across from him, left the light off.
“Have you ever had any counseling? For PTSD, anything like that?”
“I did, a while ago. I guess it didn’t take.”
“You should look into it again. As a vet, you probably qualify for free treatment through the VA.”
“I’m done with that, I think.”
“It might be good to talk to someone, get some of that stuff out. Like you said, it’s not healthy to live inside your own head too much.”
He looked at her, wondering if this was the time to tell it.
“Do you have any more of those woman pills?”
She got up, went into the bathroom, came back out with a single tablet. “Last one. But go ahead, I have a scrip.”
He took it from her, put it on his tongue, and sipped water.
She sat back down. “I’m a good listener if you need one. Part of the job.”
“Sometimes we ask about things we think we want to know. Then, later on, we wish we hadn’t.”
“Try me.”
She was watching him, her face in shadow. If you’re going to do it, he thought, then do it.
“I told you about the village on the river, our mission there.”
“You said your intel was wrong, but you didn�
��t say why. Did you mean there were no government troops there after all?”
He drank more water. “I guess I owe you the rest of that story, if you want to hear it.”
“I do.”
“You may not feel that way afterward.”
“I’ll take the chance.”
“Like I said, Colin and Bell and I had set up a roadblock. We had some fifty-five-gallon drums out in the road, with concertina wire strung between them, a couple Claymores on the shoulders. We were in a technical—a heavy-duty pickup with a .50-caliber M2 mounted in the back. I was on the gun, Bell was manning the radio.
“The sergeant I told you about, Garza, led the raid. Even from where we were, you could hear gunfire, see smoke in the distance. Every once in a while we’d hear a hand grenade go off—a very specific sound. Bell was trying to raise Garza on the radio, get a sit rep, but he wasn’t responding. We had no idea what was going on there.
“Then we heard a motor up ahead, saw this beat-up pickup truck coming down the road out of the jungle, straight toward us. It was going too fast, bouncing all over the place. We didn’t know if it was Herrera’s men, a suicide bomber, or what. Colin fired his AK in the air, but the truck kept coming.”
He drank water, looked down at the floor, then back at her. You’ve come this far, he thought. Tell it all.
“The windshield was cracked and dusty, so I couldn’t see much behind it. I racked the .50-caliber, and the driver started beeping his horn, which struck me as strange at the time. Like we were just going to move aside, let him through.”
“Did you see any weapons?”
“No, but sometimes if you wait for that, it’s too late. As the truck got closer, the driver kept craning his head out the window, shouting something I couldn’t understand.”
“He didn’t stop?”
“He slowed a little. Colin tried to wave him off, but it didn’t work. The truck was about fifty yards away when I opened up.”
“You fired on them?”
“It was a stress reaction. Fight or flight, right? Have you ever seen a .50-caliber round?”
She shook her head.
He held his thumb and index finger a few inches apart. “It’s a big chunk of steel and lead and copper. Will go right through a concrete wall. My first burst vaporized the windshield. The driver tried to swerve at the last minute, cut the wheel hard to the left, ended up broadside to us, about ten yards away. I stitched the passenger side from the front fender to the back bumper. It was like my thumbs were frozen on the trigger.
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