The Grid

by Harry Hunsicker

  “Can’t imagine she’s in any position to be doing any horse trading,” I said.

  “The woman who attacked her was driving an old Monte Carlo,” Moreno said. “Lime green.”

  I walked to the window, stared outside. The parking lot for Bed Bath & Beyond was about half full.

  “I’ve got to be in Sweetwater in the morning.” Moreno stood. “A triple homicide. Can’t throw any more time at a closed case.”

  I turned around. “What hospital is she in?”

  “Parkland. Up in Dallas. I e-mailed you the information.” Moreno headed to the door. “Nice to meet you both.”

  She left.

  Piper and I were alone with our child. We stared at each other for a few moments. I was filled with questions: Where Piper had been. The murder of my deputy. The fallout from the attack. I didn’t know where to start.

  So I said, “Why’d you cut your hair?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “You planning to stick around?” I opened the sack.

  She’d been raised an orphan, a succession of foster homes. She preferred to be off the grid and could disappear in the time it took for the dinner check to arrive, going completely underground, using false names and ID cards that would put a secret agent to shame.

  “That Texas Ranger explained to me what’s been going on,” she said.

  I got dressed. Piper knew my sizes and tastes. Wranglers and a white cotton button-down shirt. Low-heeled boots. A Glock .40 caliber, three full magazines, an inside-the-waistband holster.

  “You’re gonna go after this SarahSmiles person, aren’t you?”

  “Wouldn’t you?” I jammed one of the mags into the Glock.

  A member of my department had been murdered. No one was going to answer for that unless I pressed on.

  She nodded.

  “Why’d you come back?” I put on the boots. They fit perfectly.

  “I heard you were injured.”

  “That almost sounds like you care whether I live or die.”

  “Don’t make me out to be a coldhearted bitch, Jon. If I was going to be with anyone, it would be you. We’ve been over this before.”

  Elizabeth started to cry. Piper shushed her, stroked her head.

  I headed to the door. I wanted to see the hallway, to be in motion. The room felt claustrophobic all of a sudden. Sitting in its narrow confines made me think about missed opportunities and roads not taken.

  Piper said, “Wait.”

  I stopped, a hand on the knob.

  “I’m moving to Mexico.” Her voice was soft.

  Breath caught in my throat.

  “There’s a company that needs a security chief for their CEO in Latin America.”

  I didn’t reply.

  “The CEO is a woman, a few years older than me. The money’s good, and they’ll provide child care and benefits out the ass.”

  “Where in Mexico?” My voice sounded hoarse.

  Silence.

  “Don’t try to find me,” Piper said. “It’s better this way.”

  “Elizabeth is my child, too. I have a right to know.”

  “We leave in a week,” she said. “I thought maybe you and I could spend some time together before we go.”

  A knock on the door.

  I opened it.

  Eric Faulkner stood in the hall. He wore what I assumed was his standard uniform, a plaid shirt and faded jeans. His face was gray and drawn like he hadn’t slept in a while. He was alone.

  “I wanted to come before now,” he said. “Just to say thank you.”

  “I was just doing my job,” I said.

  He glanced over my shoulder. “I’m interrupting. Sorry.”

  No one spoke.

  His arrival wasn’t going to change anything. Piper and my daughter were leaving. I wanted to be with them while I could. But I also wanted to go to Dallas and interview Cleo Fain.

  “Your family?” Faulkner nodded toward Piper and Elizabeth.

  I hesitated for a moment before nodding back and introducing them.

  “I’d like to invite you to my home,” he said. “All of you. We’re holding a small ceremony to honor Price Anderson.”

  Elizabeth gurgled and clapped her hands.

  “Given everything that’s happened,” he said, “I realize that throwing what amounts to a party might seem a little callous.”

  “A man in your position,” I said. “You have to keep up appearances.” I hoped that didn’t sound too sarcastic.

  “Exactly. Glad you understand.” He sighed heavily. “It’s a horrible thing, what’s happened. So many deaths. I think a little closure would be good for everybody.”

  The last thing I wanted to do was spend time with Eric Faulkner. I needed to go to Dallas, to see Cleo Fain.

  Piper came up beside me, Elizabeth on her hip. Eric Faulkner cooed at the child.

  “Tomorrow afternoon.” He handed me a slip of paper. “Here’s my address.”

  Faulkner lived in Dallas.

  “We’ll be there.” I put the paper in my pocket. “Thanks.”

  “Sorry about your colleague,” he said.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Agent Holbrook.”

  I felt the blood drain from my face.

  “You didn’t know?”

  “Know what?” My voice was raspy.

  “She died an hour ago.”

  - CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE -

  Parkland, the hospital where President Kennedy died, had moved.

  The new facility, open only a few months, was across the street from the old one and resembled a huge gray set of Legos. Four or five blocky buildings attached to each other at right angles, forming an L shape around a massive parking garage.

  I was in a waiting area on the fourth floor, in the wing used by the Dallas County jail.

  Everything was white and bright—tile and plastic and metal—except for the chairs, which were upholstered in what appeared to be purple burlap.

  Piper was next to me, bouncing Elizabeth on her lap.

  Across from us sat a woman in her thirties who was missing several teeth and two fingers from her left hand. She smelled like an ashtray and looked like a stripper from Sturgis, wearing a sleeveless Harley T-shirt with no bra and leather chaps.

  Piper said, “This is a great place to bring a child, Jon.”

  It was early afternoon, the day after I’d been released from the hospital in Waco. We were due at Eric Faulkner’s home in a couple of hours.

  “Maybe if we were a real couple,” I said, “we could have lined up a babysitter.”

  “So this is my fault somehow?” Piper asked.

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “But you were thinking it.”

  Back together for less than twenty-four hours and we were already bickering. Why was it so hard to be together with the one that made you better than what you were alone?

  Elizabeth began to cry. The Sturgis stripper moved to the other side of the room.

  I opened the file in my lap and read the first few pages again.

  That morning, Piper and I had contacted a number of people in our network of law-enforcement officers, courthouse rats, and private investigators, an unsavory group who’d given me several bits of information that might help in my upcoming interview.

  On the far side of the waiting area were an elevator and a reception station for the jail’s hospital, a glass enclosure with a uniformed officer sitting behind a computer monitor.

  I closed the file and waited.

  A few minutes later, the elevators opened and two people exited.

  The first was a man with muttonchops, wearing a brown plaid sport coat and square-toed cowboy boots. He was a Dallas PD homicide investigator.

  The seco
nd person wore jeans and a beige linen jacket. This was Cleo Fain’s attorney, Stodghill, a lawyer perpetually on the edge of disbarment for a variety of ethical infractions.

  I slid up behind them as they talked to the officer behind the bulletproof glass.

  “Hello, Stodghill.” I smiled. “I didn’t realize you were taking court-appointed gigs these days.”

  We’d had dealings in the past, none of them pleasant.

  He looked at me and muttered under his breath. Then he said, “My retainer’s been paid—not that it’s any of your business.”

  The homicide detective asked who I was. I flashed my FERC badge and said, “I’ll be sitting in on your interview with Cleo Fain.”

  He protested, but there wasn’t much he could do. A federal badge trumped the local PD. I had no idea if my credentials were still in force, since the person who’d hired me was dead, a fact that bothered me more than I wanted to admit. But at this point, I didn’t really care if I was still a legitimate federal agent. As long as I had that badge, I intended to use it.

  The detective and I handed over our pistols. A jailer opened a metal door and admitted the three of us into the secure area that smelled of rubbing alcohol and sweat. He led us to a room at the end of the hall where a woman with a bandage on her head was handcuffed to a bed.

  We entered. Stodghill sat in a chair next to his client. The homicide detective and I stood at the foot of the bed. The detective pulled a set of pictures from his briefcase, grainy eight-by-tens of a woman in a store of some sort, maybe a tattoo parlor.

  The woman bore a resemblance to the person I’d seen leaving the motel where my deputy had been murdered. My pulse ratcheted up a notch, but I didn’t say anything.

  The detective asked Cleo if she recognized the person.

  Stodghill shook his head. “Don’t answer that.”

  “I thought you and the DA had worked something out,” the detective said.

  “Our discussions with the district attorney’s office are not germane to this meeting,” Stodghill said. “My client will not be answering questions about that photo.”

  “W-what?” Cleo Fain spoke for the first time. “I thought—”

  “Shh.” Stodghill patted her hand. “Everything’s under control.”

  I looked at the detective. “Give us a moment, will you?”

  He shrugged and walked out.

  When the door closed, I turned to Cleo Fain. “Did you recognize that woman?”

  “Are you deaf, Cantrell?” Stodghill wagged his finger at me. “She’s not saying a word about that photo.”

  Cleo looked at her attorney, a concerned expression on her face.

  “Yes, she is,” I said. “Trust me.”

  “This is a typical Jon Cantrell bluff.” Stodghill patted his client’s hand. “All hat, no cattle.”

  I said, “She’s going to tell me everything she knows about that woman for three reasons.”

  Neither of them spoke.

  “First, it doesn’t sound like there’s any deal in the works with the DA.” I wondered but didn’t ask who’d paid Stodghill’s fee. Could it be so easy that he was connected somehow to SarahSmiles? Maybe, but it didn’t matter. I’d have to tear his spleen out before he’d tell me.

  The attorney crossed his arms, a cocky expression on his face.

  “Second,” I said, “everything we say will be off the record.”

  Stodghill snorted.

  “And third, Ms. Fain is going to talk to me because her attorney is going to tell her to as he leaves this room.”

  “That’s not gonna happen.” Stodghill shook his head. “No way I’m leaving you alone with my client.”

  Cleo Fain spoke for the second time. “I d-do what my lawyer says. P-period.”

  Her voice was weak. Words stuttering.

  “How’s your head feeling?” I asked.

  “F-fuck you, f-fed.”

  “I had a concussion a couple of days ago, too,” I said. “Hurt like a mofo.”

  No one spoke. Stodghill’s face was granite, obviously figuring that he’d won.

  I opened the file I’d brought with me and removed a single piece of paper, a picture of a young woman with large brown eyes and a scowl on her face. Across the bottom of the page were the words WASHITA COUNTY JAIL.

  I handed the picture to Stodghill. “You know who that is?”

  He was silent for a moment. Then his face reddened. He tossed the paper at me.

  “You son of a bitch. That’s my fiancée, Darcie.”

  “Darcie Mullins?” I asked. “From Lawton, Oklahoma?”

  He glared at me, nostrils flaring with each breath. After a moment, he nodded.

  “You’re wrong, counselor. That’s not Darcie Mullins.”

  He frowned, a confused expression on his face.

  “That’s Darcie’s kid sister, Laverne. She’s been using her older sister’s ID.” I paused for dramatic effect. “Laverne is seventeen.”

  Stodghill’s eyes grew wide, his skin pale.

  “She’s underage,” I said. “And you’ve driven her across state lines.”

  Stodghill took several deep breaths, flexed his fingers.

  “What’s g-going on?” Cleo looked at her attorney.

  “Give us the room, counselor.” I pointed to the door.

  The attorney stood, mouth hanging open. He recovered and said, “Five minutes.”

  “That’ll work.” I nodded.

  “Wait.” Cleo sat up in bed. “What’s happening here?”

  “Answer his questions.” Stodghill marched to the exit. “I’m gonna get a cup of coffee.”

  The door shut behind him.

  “It’s just you and me, Cleo.” I smiled.

  “M-my attorney. Why isn’t he in here?”

  I shrugged.

  “I have rights.” She pointed a finger at me.

  “Not today,” I said. “Today you get to tell me everything you remember about the woman who hit you.”

  She looked at her wrist handcuffed to the bed. Then she began to talk.

  - CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR -

  Eric Faulkner lived in the most exclusive section of North Dallas.

  His home was the size of a palace, completely at odds with his workingman mode of dress.

  The design was some sort of Spanish-Mediterranean-Vegas hybrid. Fountains and colored tile, oversized balconies, stucco archways. The grounds had been landscaped with palm trees, bougainvillea, and a lawn so lush the grass looked like an ad in a golf magazine.

  There were eight or ten vehicles in the circular driveway.

  I parked Piper’s Jeep Cherokee behind a Mercedes. Piper was next to me, Elizabeth in the rear in a car seat.

  “Look at that house, will ya?” Piper whistled softly. “It’s bigger than the Vatican.”

  I didn’t say anything. The people who moved about in this world were not my preferred social companions.

  “What’s the etiquette in a situation like this?” she asked. “Do we leave our guns in the car or what?”

  I was wearing a pair of khakis and a blue button-down. It was hot out, so I hadn’t brought a sport coat. The Glock Piper had brought me was on my hip in a clip-on holster, plainly visible.

  Piper carried a smaller pistol in her back pocket, not as visible but still noticeable.

  “We always carry our guns,” I said. “Why is today different?”

  “Because I don’t want Elizabeth to think that’s the way normal people operate.”

  A good point. I realized we both wanted our daughter to take a different path in life, one that wasn’t filled with violence.

  I was about to reply when a man approached the car. He was in his thirties and had the appearance of ex-military. I rolled down the window.

  He stood by the driver
’s door and said, “You must be Agent Cantrell.”

  I nodded.

  “I’m Walden, head of house security. Welcome to Mr. Faulkner’s home.”

  “Hi.” I introduced Piper, pointed to the back. “And this is our daughter, Elizabeth.”

  It felt good to say that, even if they were only going to be around for a few more days.

  “Nice to meet you all,” he said. “C’mon in. It’s hot out here.”

  I hesitated, and he seemed to read my mind. “Keep your piece if you want.”

  I looked at the other cars, all expensive luxury automobiles.

  “You’re on safe ground, though,” Walden said. “I’ve got two guards on duty.”

  Piper and I glanced at each other, unsure how to proceed. We were out of our element, mingling socially with a man who had enough money to afford a home like this and a security staff. A lifetime of never being a real part of anything left us both with a desire to fit in.

  Plus, after what had happened at San Saba, I was tired of guns. So I pulled my holster off and put it in the console. Piper did the same with her weapon.

  Together we got Elizabeth out of her car seat. Piper propped her on her hip. I carried the diaper bag.

  We followed Walden toward the front door.

  “Mr. Faulkner has a daughter, too,” Walden said. “Dylan—she’s four. Poor little thing broke her leg a couple of days ago.”

  Elizabeth burped at this nugget of information.

  “There’s a playroom upstairs,” Walden said. “Lots of toys.”

  Elizabeth, who was just starting to understand her voice, said, “Ummmm . . . arrghh.”

  We all laughed and continued walking up the driveway.

  “You can leave her up there if you want a break,” Walden said. “The nanny’s working today.”

  “That might be a good idea,” Piper said. “Babies shouldn’t be at funerals.”

  “It’s not really a funeral. More of a wake.” Walden opened the front door. “Welcome.”

  - CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE -

  Sarah wipes the blood from her upper lip and stares out the front window.

  In the nether regions of her mind, she understands that cocaine can make you paranoid, especially if you haven’t slept or eaten in a couple of days.