by Jeff Lindsay
“So, so, so what’s this about?” Finn stammered. “I mean, it’s been a long-ass time since I—since, since—” He slammed his mouth shut and gulped, looking guilty. “So, what?” he said.
Delgado took another sip, watching Finn sweat. “Riley Wolfe,” he said at last.
“Jesus fuck,” Finn said, barely above a whisper.
“He’s a friend of yours?”
“Oh, jeez, I mean—I ain’t heard from Riley in like—I mean, this was high school, and he left when it—I mean, really, that was the last time I—years ago, okay?” He gulped and took a deep, ragged breath. “What, uh . . . what’d he do?”
“That’s the last you heard from him? In high school?”
Finn nodded vigorously. “Junior year. He left that summer, after junior year, because his mom, and I never, uh—I mean that’s a long time ago, right? And, uh . . .” He trickled to a stop and gulped again.
Delgado watched Finn. He was extremely nervous. Anyone might be nervous talking to an FBI agent, but Finn seemed panicky far beyond that. Part of it was certainly guilt, probably because of some past criminal act. But Delgado was getting a whisper of a message from his instinct, and he trusted it. “Mr. Finn,” he said matter-of-factly, without raising his voice. “Did you know it’s a felony to lie to the FBI?”
Finn had been pale before. Now he turned green. “I, I, I din’t know that,” he said in a gravelly whisper. He pushed a lock of dank hair off his forehead. “I, I got a kid now,” he said. “I can’t, I can’t go back to—”
Delgado nodded and waited.
“Look,” Finn said at last. It took him two tries, and he had to clear his throat before he could speak. “Shit,” he said softly. He hung his head. “It was like maybe ten years ago?” he said in a pleading tone of his voice. Sweat rolled off his face. “And it was just, I din’t—” He stopped, looked up, and licked his lips. “I seen him,” he said hoarsely. “I seen Riley.”
“You saw him here? In Watertown?”
“Shit, yeah. I sure as shit never got away from Water-fuckin’-town, except for—and now, I got to report to my parole officer, so—yeah, it was here. Riley was here.” He nodded and wiped sweat from his face with his sleeve.
“Where did you see him?”
“Salmon Run Mall. He was comin’ out of Dick’s, you know, Sporting Goods? And his hair was different—I mean, different color and all, too? Blond. But I knew it was him, and I go, ‘Riley! Yo, buddy!’ And he’s all like, he didn’t hear me, and he goes back into Dick’s, and I thought, what the fuck, and I followed him.” He gave a snort that might have been laughter and wiped his forehead again. Then he looked up at Delgado and said, “Okay if I smoke?” Delgado nodded, and Jimmy took out a crumpled light-blue pack of generic cigarettes. He lit one with a kitchen match, inhaled deeply, blew out a cloud of smoke. “Yeah. Anyways, I’m like two steps into Dick’s, and I feel, like, it has to be a pistol. Stuck in my ribs, right here?” Finn lifted an arm and pointed to a spot on a level with his heart. “And this voice says, I don’t know, something like, ‘Don’t say nothin’ just keep smilin’ and come with me.’ And I can’t exactly see? But it’s gotta be Riley, right? And so what the fuck, I do what he says.”
Finn took another puff. “He takes me to the food court, it’s like right there close, and he sits me at a table and leans in close to my ear and says, ‘Call me Andrew,’ and he pokes me with the gun again and sits down beside me.” Finn nodded. “It’s him, like I figured it had to be. It’s Riley. And he’s all smilin’ and shit, goin’, ‘Hey, Jimmy, wassup?’” He shook his head and laughed, and opened his mouth to say something but instead slammed it shut and looked around nervously.
Delgado waited. Finn stared down at the floor and puffed his cigarette. Finally, Delgado said, “Did he tell you why he was in Watertown?”
Finn blew smoke out his nose and nodded without looking up. “He said he was just cleanin’ up some old shit. I din’t ask what. I mean, you don’t, not with somebody like him.”
Delgado was reasonably sure that the shit Riley was cleaning up was removing all the files about himself from the school and from Juvenile. He was also sure Finn was telling the truth about not pressing Riley for details. That was in the rules that went with the life, and he knew them as well as Finn. So he just sat and waited a bit longer. Finn finished his cigarette and ground it out on the floor with his foot. “That was the last time you saw Riley Wolfe?”
Finn nodded vigorously. “Swear to God.”
“Did you hear from him? Phone, letter, email, anything at all?”
Finn shook his head, just as enthusiastically. “No. Never. Not once, not nothin’, on my kid’s life. That was it, we just sat at the food court for like half an hour, and that was it, honest to God.” He gulped, wiped his forehead again, and took a deep, shaky breath.
Delgado watched Finn sweat without sympathy. When he was sure Finn was done, he nodded. “Do you have any pictures of Riley?” Delgado asked.
“Pictures? No, uh-uh. He’s not even in the yearbook. It was like a thing with him, ever since he—” Finn stumbled to a stop and gulped again. “Lookit, this was a long time ago, okay? But, uh—I mean, we were kids. Poor kids.”
“Why didn’t Riley want his picture taken?”
Finn sighed. “It started ninth grade. There was Riley and three of us. And after we, uh . . . He wouldn’t let anybody take a picture after we started, uh . . . We boosted stuff.”
“Who were the other two?”
“Rodney Jankowski,” Finn said. “And Tommy Steuben.”
“Do you know where they are now?”
“Sure,” Finn said. “Tommy’s dead. He got drunk and ran his car into a tree three years ago. Rodney, he’s back in the slammer. Midstate.”
Delgado nodded. “What kinds of stuff did you steal?”
Finn flinched a little at the word “steal.” But he nodded and went on. “Riley got a brand-new Walkman. It was a real big deal to him, he always had it on him. Fuckin’ loved music, all the time. And you know. Clothes, cool shoes, and like Hustler?” He shrugged. “Stuff kids would take. You know.”
“Did Riley have any other friends?” Delgado asked. “Maybe a girlfriend?”
Finn gave a snort of amusement. “Oh, man, a girlfriend? Not Riley. He totally was a player. I mean, he had a line of bullshit like you never— Shit, Riley could talk a nun out of her panties.”
“Never somebody special?”
“Naw, not Riley,” Finn said. “Strictly flavor of the week. And every week, right? I never got how— I mean, there was just something about Riley. What, charm? I guess so. He could turn it on and the chicks were just crazy, did whatever he wanted.”
“Any other friends?” Delgado prompted. “Or just the three of you?”
“Just us,” Finn said. “I mean, we was pretty tight, but . . . I dunno. It was always like, I mean, we knew Riley was like, you know. We did what he wanted?”
“Do you know where he went when he moved away from Watertown?”
Finn shook his head energetically. “No. Naw. Uh-uh. It was weird, like—one day they was just gone. Never a word, nothing.”
“Did he ever say where he lived before Watertown?” Delgado asked.
Finn shrugged. “Naw, he didn’t say shit about that—and after he beat the shit out of Cal Simpkins in homeroom, we didn’t ask, neither.” Finn frowned. “I dunno, though. Once or twice he said stuff, like—I mean, he’d say, like, ‘Y’all coming?’ Like a hillbilly or something.” He snorted. “His mother was worse. She was like Gone with the Wind, you know?”
“You met Riley’s mother?”
Finn shrugged. “Couple times, you know. I’d stop by their place to pick him up. Once or twice we stopped at the Friendly’s when she was working, waiting tables, and we’d stop to, you know. So Riley could talk to her, maybe give her a few bucks or somethin
’.” He shrugged again.
“Do you know what her name was?” Delgado asked. “His mother’s first name?”
“Uh, lessee, yeah, you know—I mean, she had a name tag on her waitress uniform? So . . . Shirley? Somethin’ like—no, wait, Sheila. Yeah, that’s it.”
“Sheila?”
“Absolutely.”
Delgado nodded. “So Riley was close to his mother?”
Finn snorted. “Sick close. Like she was the girlfriend that gave the best head in—” He jerked to a stop, looked at Delgado, and actually blushed. “I mean, you know,” he finished lamely. “They were real tight.”
Delgado nodded encouragingly. “He was closer to her than most guys are to their mothers,” he said.
Relieved, Finn nodded vigorously. “Yeah, that’s it, you know. It seemed funny, a guy that hung up on his mother, that’s all.” He smiled and shook his head. “But hey, believe me, nobody ragged him about it. I mean, all the girls he got? Nobody would even think about he was gay or anything.”
“And the mother had a strong Southern accent,” he said. “Any guess what part of the South?”
“Naw, who can tell?” Finn said. “But you know, totally Southern. No doubt.”
Delgado nodded. He knew very well that most people couldn’t tell a South Georgian from an Appalachian accent. For now he was satisfied to know that Riley was from somewhere in the South. It wasn’t much, but more than he’d had. He had one more question, something Finn should know. “You said you stopped by his place. Where did Riley live?” Delgado asked.
“What—you mean, uh—like, here? When he—in high school?”
“Yes,” Delgado said.
Finn shook his head sadly. “Beat-to-shit old trailer, maybe a mile down Evans Road—it’s out by the airport? Practically at the end of the runway.” He snorted. “Piece-of-shit dump. All they could afford.”
“Is it still there?”
Finn snorted. “If it hasn’t fell over,” he said. “Thing was close to rusting out back then.”
Delgado studied Finn a moment longer. Then he nodded and stood up. “Thank you for your time,” he said.
* * *
—
Delgado found Evans Road easily enough. It was a left turn off Route 12F, just before the airport. There were very few houses; it was mostly scraggly trees, brush, and a couple of fields. He didn’t see any trailers, but he drove slowly down the road to the end, where it dumped out onto Route 180. He doubled back along Evans Road, going even slower. Finn had said “at the end of the runway,” so Delgado drove past a tiny old graveyard to a spot where he could see the airport through the trees. There was a rutted, half-overgrown dirt road, or driveway, and he turned down it. It led him toward the airport through trees that grew increasingly close to the rutted dirt road, and finally to a place where an old maple had fallen, blocking the way.
Delgado parked his car and got out. The tree blocking his way had clearly been there quite a while; it was already half rotted through. Even so, there was no way he could get his car past. He took a flashlight and a pair of work gloves from his car, carefully picked his way over the tree, and followed the old road on foot.
Another fifty yards and the road broke out into what had once been a clearing. It was mostly overgrown now—but at the far end, Delgado could see the wreckage of a double-wide trailer.
He pushed across the clearing through the encroaching scrub. Halfway through it, he hit a patch of thorns, some kind of bush. Delgado had no idea what it was, but the thorns tore his pants in two places, and his skin in three. He pulled on the work gloves and disentangled himself.
Moving more carefully now, Delgado worked around the thorns and closer to the trailer, and finally he was standing at the front steps. They were rotted through, of course. So was the trailer itself. It sagged in the middle as if some huge creature had been sitting on it. The front was intact, except for the windows, but the door hung on one hinge at a crazy angle.
Delgado walked slowly around the wrecked trailer. At one end, the encroaching brush was not quite as thick, and he crouched to look underneath. Shards of linoleum hung down where the floor had fallen through. There was a litter of rags, unidentifiable plastic items, and what looked to be half an old wooden chair. He stood up and completed his tour around the trailer.
At the far end, he paused again. The outer wall here had rotted through, and there was a large hole. Delgado worked over to it carefully, watching for any more of the vicious thorn bushes. He peered through the hole and inside the old trailer. The interior was dim, and he flipped on his flashlight and shone it around inside. There wasn’t much to see. The inside was as ruined as the outside. As far as he could tell, there was no furniture or anything else left in there. And with gaping holes in the floor in several places, it would be almost suicidal to try to get in and look.
Delgado stepped away from the trailer and worked around to the front again. He leaned in the front door and flicked the flashlight’s beam around. Nothing but ruined emptiness.
Delgado took a couple of steps back. For several minutes he stood there, not really looking at the trailer anymore. Birds chirped absentmindedly. A very small wind stirred the leaves around him. He didn’t notice. He just stood and thought. Then he turned and looked around the clearing. There was nothing to see but plant life. Delgado chewed his bottom lip for a moment and then nodded. He walked back to the spot at the end where he could see underneath and carefully pushed up close. Getting down on one knee, he stuck his head under and looked up. Above him, the floor was still mostly intact. It seemed an acceptable risk, and he crawled cautiously under the trailer.
At the first pile of rubbish he paused and sorted through it carefully. He found a piece of porcelain, half of a coffee cup. It was the kind of cheap souvenir mug you could buy at most tourist stops, and he examined it carefully. Very faintly, he could make out faded red letters: “RU,” and under that, “F.” Ruby Falls? It could be, if Riley really was from somewhere in the South. But it could just as easily say “RUGBY FOOTBALL.” Or “rubber fangs,” “ruined feet,” or a thousand other things. He put down the shard and crawled forward to the next heap of trash.
He sifted through the junk again, but the items he could identify were no better: The filthy, matted sleeve of a sweatshirt. Two broken plastic plates. A twisted metal fork. Rags, bottles, and rusted cans. Plenty of nothing.
But Delgado was a patient man, and he worked his way to the bottom of the pile. And finally, his patience was rewarded. Just underneath a mound of decomposing something mixed with shards of glass, a corner of something familiar stuck out, and Delgado felt his heart flutter. He carefully brushed away all the gunk on top and took the corner between gloved thumb and forefinger. It came free, and Delgado smiled.
A license plate.
It was old and battered and grimy, but it was intact. Since it had been on the bottom of the heap, the letters and numbers had not faded away completely. Delgado was amazed to note that his hands were trembling slightly as he tilted it to catch the light.
Green letters across the top spelled out “Georgia.” A faded peach made the O, and in the upper right corner a green sticker read “96”—the year this plate had been valid.
Even better, at the bottom was the word “PICKENS.” That would be the county of issue.
Delgado closed his eyes. For a moment he just breathed, listening to his heart race and then begin to slow down. He crouched there in a garbage heap under a moldering trailer, clutching a grubby old license plate and feeling something close to bliss. And then he opened his eyes, crawled back out from under the trailer, and walked down the road to his car.
He was still smiling as he drove away.
CHAPTER
13
Three weeks after the benefit dinner, Katrina was still thinking about Randall Miller. Not obsessively, not constantly, not even frequently.
But every so often, he would cross her mind, just the image of his warm smile and lovely white teeth and the feel of his strong but gentle grip on her arm. Katrina was hardly a giddy young girl, and she told herself she was being stupid to spend any thought at all on somebody she would probably never see again.
But the thought was there in her mind as she waited for her decorator, Irene Caldwell, to arrive for the day’s work. And that wait proved to be much longer than it should have been. Irene was scheduled to arrive at ten—but at 11:30 there was still no sign of her. She wasn’t answering her phone, either. That was very unlike Irene, a responsible and hardworking woman who was always punctual. At first irritated, Katrina began to grow alarmed at the thought that something might have happened to Irene—and the redecoration not even half done! She was just considering what she could do to find out when her phone rang. Glancing at the screen, she saw with some surprise that it was Tyler Gladstone, her attorney.
“Hello, Tyler, what a surprise,” she greeted him.
“And a slightly unpleasant surprise at that, I’m afraid,” he said. “Do I remember correctly that you are currently employing Irene Caldwell?”
Katrina’s stomach lurched. So something bad had happened. “Yes, I am,” she said. “What happened? Is she all right?”
“As far as her health goes, she’s fine,” Tyler said.
“Tyler, please don’t be mysterious. What on earth has happened to Irene?”
“At the moment, she’s in police custody,” he said.
“Police?! Good God,” Katrina said.
“Yes, but she’ll probably be turned over to the FBI in a few hours,” he said. He chuckled. “I’m sorry, that’s not exactly reassuring, is it?”
“But that’s—that’s preposterous, I can’t believe it,” Katrina said. “What could Irene possibly do that— Jesus Christ, Tyler, the FBI?! What did she do?”
“Actually, that’s how I found out,” he said. “The police called me because they want to talk to you.”