I recited it for him. “Make sure she knows we’re all okay.”
“Copy that.”
Both in short sleeves and wearing badges on their belts, Rafael and Travis moved along the perimeter of the crime scene tape until they got to the bench. Ducking under it, they came to us.
“Hey, Raf,” I said. “Detective Travis.”
“Terry is pissed.” Chewing a toothpick, Rafael pushed up his straw fedora and shook his head. “He gets you backup as a courtesy and it’s one of your ops who drops the hammer on somebody in broad daylight, outside the damn library. People are playing chess, reading to their children, and blowing bubbles at a play table. Happy fucking summer vacation.”
“This is Lucy Bishop,” I said. “The guy grabbed her throat and squeezed. Open and shut self-defense.”
“That’s what Moss told us. Still a shit storm, G. We gotta walk the scene, get witness statements, tie up a CS unit for hours, interview all of you.” Rafael sighed. “Where’s Pete?”
“Inside covering our client, Drea Wingard.”
“You talking to Raf?” Pete said. “Tell him I said hi.”
“Pete says hi.” I pointed to my ear to indicate my communicator.
“The head of the library is with us,” Pete added. “I’m not sure if she’s annoyed or scared but she assumes the talk is off.”
“Correct.” I looked at Rafael. “When it’s time, he’ll take Ms. Wingard out the back entrance and put her in your car. You’ll want to talk to her.”
“Guess that means the bookstore is off too,” Pete said.
“Correct again.” I let go of Bishop’s hand and pointed at the purse. “The gun’s in there. Lucy has a concealed carry permit.”
“I hope that’s in here too,” Travis said, taking the purse and hefting it.
Bishop nodded as Travis unfolded a large evidence bag and put the purse inside.
I gestured toward the body. “Your corpse is a white supremacist named Carter John. He was part of the crew that killed my client’s husband.”
“Yeah. Moss said his handle was Mars. Said he musta thought he was the God of War.”
I shook my head. “The leader of a group called Liberty Storm gave his members codenames. I’m pretty sure he tagged Carter John as Mars because of the John Carter books by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the same guy who wrote Tarzan.”
“A super white man who ruled all of Africa.” Travis scowled. “Never could understand why my otherwise intelligent grandfather liked those old movies so much.”
I shrugged. “Well, Burroughs did write science fiction.” After Travis chuckled, I added, “You think Tarzan was a supremacist’s wet dream? John Carter was a confederate soldier who traveled to Mars after the Civil War, got super strength in the lesser gravity, and became a warlord.”
“Seriously?” Travis said. “Almost like Superman.”
“Long before Superman.”
“Wow,” Pete said in my ear. “No surprise a guy like him was on Wally Ray’s radar.”
Excerpt Six
In the Mouth of the Wolf by Drea Wingard, with Grant Gibbons (6)
The Sunday after your meeting with Cropper, you are sitting on the couch in early evening, watching HBO. The phone on Grant’s desk rings. You stand and step over your purse to the desk, picking up the handset at the start of the third ring.
“Hello.”
“Is that you, Andrea?”
The gravel voice on the other end drags your central nervous system through ground glass. Spinning toward the front door, you let go of the phone and drop to your knees. You pull your purse over and fumble to open it.
The handset is on the carpet. “You there, Andrea? Sounds like you dropped the phone.”
You snatch it up. “I’m here.”
“Good. Been thinking about you. We got some unfinished business.”
“That we do, Wally Ray,” you say, pulling the gun from your purse.
“Ain’t no more Wally Ray.” He laughs. “Wally Ray’s gone. Changed. Had to shed his cocoon and fly away quick, ‘cause he was feeling outnumbered. Lotta hungry crows in Maryland these days.”
You take a deep breath. “Then why don’t you come to Virginia, butterfly?” Your eyes shift back and forth from the front entryway to the hallway that leads to the back door. “Ring the bell if you’re outside. We can settle our business tonight.”
“Careful what you wish for, licorice lips. Might be punching above your weight class.”
“My weight class is .357. What’s yours?”
“You couldn’t pull the trigger last time.”
“This time it’s loaded, and I’ve been smoking up the range in Fairfax.”
“You mean—shit!” Pause. “It was too dark to tell that night. I’ll be damned.”
“One way or another.”
More raspy laughter. “I like this tough-ass bitch thing you got going on. New Year’s resolution?”
“Guess you weren’t paying attention last time.” Pausing for a reaction that doesn’t come, you wonder if he is close enough to try something or just trying to get inside your head. “Give me the chance, I’ll see to it you say hi to Brick.”
“And your husband too.”
“I’m pretty sure he won’t be where you’re going.”
A few more seconds pass. “Don’t start thinking you can’t be reached.”
Now it’s your turn to offer no response. Let him wonder about you.
“Jody thought he couldn’t be reached if he stayed offline and kept to himself. Didn’t work for him. Won’t work for you. Not with you trying to write up what he gave you.”
You wonder how he knows, how much he knows, but you say nothing.
“Even without Facebook, Twitter, and all that other shit floating in cyberspace, anybody can be reached. Remember that. Anybody can be touched. Anybody can be put down, even all the way over in jolly old London.”
You take a moment to steady yourself before responding. “Including a chickenshit motherfucker like you.”
He chuckles. “No, you old nigger cunt. I’m a ghost these days, but I can see you anytime I want.” Then he hangs up.
Gun in hand, you open the front door and ease down your flagstone path. You gaze up the street and down. No one is there.
Turning to re-enter the house, you see the small white swastika on the door frame. The paint looks wet.
Packing two large hard-shell suitcases with enough clothes to last two weeks, Grant’s notes and your own, your laptop, and as many cherished belongings as you can fit inside, you sling your purse over your shoulder and for the last time lock the door of a home you have loved.
Later, seated on a bed in the Fairview Park Marriott, where you paid in cash, you use your laptop to close every social media account you have, freeze both your personal and work email accounts, and cancel every credit card in your name. Next, you make a handwritten list of everything you must do over the next week or two:
Meet with your lawyer to update your will and file your name change petition with the court.
Meet with your supervisor to file your retirement papers and set up direct deposit.
Find a realtor who can arrange not only the sale of your Annandale house but the sale or disposal of its contents, someone who also can find you a furnished rental somewhere Wally Ray and his boys would stand out like Frosty the Snowman and his posse.
Call Miranda and tell her to find another place to live—with Ben or his parents if necessary. Stress that she must change her routines and become vigilant. It is unlikely those assholes will make it to London, you will tell her, but it’s best to be careful. Call Dr. Clay and thank him for his help before you withdraw as his patient. Then terminate your mobile phone contract and get your own temporary burner.
Visit the DMV when the legal filing is done to get a new driver’s license and the post office to get forms to revise your passport. Then go to your bank to empty the safe deposit box, close out the checking and savings accounts you shared with G
rant, and open three new accounts in your new name. Transfer the life insurance money into one of the two savings accounts, keeping out maybe ten thousand in cash and travelers’ checks. Designate the second savings account as the recipient of the home sale proceeds and the checking account for pension deposits.
Pay off the remainder of the lease on your Avalon and buy a nondescript used car from a separate dealer. Buy new clothes in a style you wouldn’t ordinarily wear and trade your glasses for disposable contacts.
Finally, find a new hairdresser, one who does not know the old you and will be glad to make you look different.
Maybe you won’t be able to get as far off the grid as Wally Ray, but if he’s gone ghost, you must move closer to invisibility yourself. You remember the article that made Cropper call your husband. In it Grant had written, “Hatred is a monster we unchain at great risk to ourselves.”
Wally Ray, you swear, will regret the monster he unchained in you.
28
After signing my witness statement, I found Tillman Bishop on a corridor bench inside police headquarters. Dressed in the tan, short-sleeved summer uniform of a locally owned HVAC company and sporting a chest patch that said Bishop, he was a large brown-skinned man with a shaved head, salt-sprinkled mustache, broad shoulders, and callused hands. I introduced myself as his wife was interrogated elsewhere in the building.
“She talks about you,” he said, shaking my hand. “You remind her of her favorite lieutenant when she was in the army.”
I sat beside him. “From the beginning, Lucy struck me as somebody I could count on. She never let me down.”
“What’s gonna happen now? She killed somebody. That ain’t something Weisskopf guards do.”
“The dead man assaulted her. Grabbed her throat. I saw it. Her partner saw it. So did the cop who was with me. Her phone got the whole thing on video. Best of all, the woman sitting with her in the interrogation room is one of the best lawyers in Buffalo.”
Tillman Bishop narrowed his eyes at me and swallowed. “I know for a fact Miss Hauser ain’t gonna pay for nobody but a jackleg shyster. How much this lawyer gonna cost?”
“A trip to her Tia Rosita’s in Puerto Rico,” I said. “But that’s on me, not you.”
“I don’t understand,” he said. “You married to her or something?”
“Something.” I offered what I hoped was an encouraging smile. “One of the cops questioning her is a friend of mine too. I’ll be surprised if any charges are filed, though it’ll be awhile before Lucy gets her gun back.”
He shrugged. “Gun ain’t what counts. She is. Thank God I don’t have to give the boys bad news.”
“All that matters.” After a moment I added, “Might be a good idea if you and your family took a trip for a few days. Easier to stay out of the spotlight if you’re off the stage.”
“It’s a good bet Miss Hauser’s gonna let Lucy go.”
“Gideon Rimes! Why am I not surprised to find you here?”
I turned to see Amanda Corso drawing near, white jeans tight as ever and soft-soled canvas flats making no sound on the floor tiles. Her hand slid inside her navy jacket and returned with a pen and her notebook, which was open to a blank page by the time she reached me.
“Excuse me, sir.” I stood and stepped away, touching Corso’s elbow to make her follow. I led her down the corridor and stopped once we were out of Tillman’s earshot.
Corso looked up at me. “I’ve been told a member of your security team—Lucille Bishop—iced a neo-Nazi outside the library on a street full of pedestrians. Furthermore, said Nazi was the same guy who started all the ruckus last night at the art house.”
“Which you covered nicely in your article this morning. Thanks for keeping my name out of it.”
“Didn’t matter. You’re all over YouTube. Care to comment on the shooting?”
“Off the record,” I said. “Background first. Then we go on the record. For starters, you can’t publish my associate’s name. I don’t know how many white supremacists are in town right now to protest the diversity conference or maybe to attack it. Publishing Lucy’s name would endanger her and her whole family.”
Corso sighed and shook her head. “You’re still unclear how off the record works. I already have her name from a police source on the record. Your request that I not publish it is what’s off the record, not the information itself. Meanwhile, you’ve given me something I can’t publish but which may be in the public interest to know, like white supremacists may be here to attack the NCADI. Shall we take it from the top?”
I thought for a moment. “Okay. Off the record: Lucy Bishop is part of the protective detail covering Drea Wingard. On the record: a Black woman who attended the reading at PAUSA was assaulted outside the library this morning and fired a legally registered handgun in self-defense, killing the same man who disrupted the reading. Seems he wanted to disrupt today’s talk too, which the public should probably know. How’s that?”
“Better.”
“His name was Carter John. What happened to him should dovetail with your article. Maybe lead to a series on hate speech.”
“I’m touched you’re thinking of my professional well-being,” she said. “He’s Carter John but the shooter’s name is being withheld out of concern for her safety?”
“Yes.”
“That her husband you were talking to?”
“They have children.”
“Far as I can tell, I’m the first reporter on this inside HQ. If I can get it online soon, the TV and radio people will follow suit and keep her name out of print. Despite what some politicians say about us, we try to be responsible. We are not the enemy of the people.” Corso scribbled something in her notebook. “So why would he attack this woman?”
“Maybe he recognized her from the night before. Maybe he thought she recognized him and would tell someone in charge he was there. Maybe words were exchanged. In any case, he wasn’t alone last night or this morning, which means someone in his group may be unhinged enough to try attacking the conference, for revenge if not for its ideals.”
“A lone wolf?”
“Maybe a pack of wolves.”
She nodded, jotting more notes. “Who’s providing me with this information?”
“An anonymous member of the security team hired by her publisher, which pays for her security wherever in the country she makes public appearances because of constant death threats.”
“Someone who would like to see more cops during this thing at Torrance Towers?”
“I never said that.”
“But you wouldn’t be opposed.” She grinned. “See? That wasn’t so hard.”
Gazing past Corso, I saw Maxine Travis and Phoenix, in a gray suit and holding her briefcase, flanking Lucy Bishop as they moved along the corridor to the bench where Tillman Bishop sat. He stood and opened his arms to embrace his wife, who set a plastic bag on the bench before stepping into his embrace. The absence of handcuffs I took as a good sign. Then Tillman shook Phoenix’s hand after his wife introduced her. As Travis started toward us, I looked at Corso and nodded past her. “Met Maxine Travis yet? She’s new to Homicide after a long run in Syracuse. Bet she’d make a good story sometime.”
Corso turned as Travis reached us and stuck out her hand. “Detective Travis? I’ve heard of you. Amanda Corso of the Buffalo News. Any comment on this morning’s library shooting?”
Travis, who had maybe three inches on Corso, glanced past her at me before taking the proffered hand. “The matter is still under investigation but preliminary evidence points to self-defense.”
“Has Mrs. Bishop been released?”
“No comment other than our decision to withhold the shooter’s name out of concern for her, or his, safety.” She looked at me. “Consider the source of any information that gives a name erroneous.”
“It wasn’t me,” I said.
“I hear the victim was a white supremacist. That why you’re withholding the name?”
“No comment.”
“Is it true the shooter was wearing body armor?”
“No comment.” Travis looked at me again and curled a finger. “You. Come with me.”
I followed her back to the bench, where Phoenix stood with the Bishops.
“I need him for a little while,” Travis said to Phoenix. “Then he’s all yours.”
Phoenix looked at me a moment, lips pressed into a thin smile. “No rush.” She shot a look toward Corso. “I know where to find him.” She paused. “Thanks, detective.”
Lucy Bishop stepped in front of me, her dashiki looking cooler without the body armor sheath, which I presumed was in the plastic bag. “I’m sorry about all this, Mr. Rimes.”
“None of this is your fault.” I pointed to her chin. “May I?”
“Yes.”
Gently, I lifted her chin with my forefinger. A thumb-sized bruise was above the carotid. “No, you have nothing to be sorry about.”
“All the same, please tell Drea and everybody I wish today’d gone down different.”
“I will.”
Travis led me around a corner to a small conference room, where Terry and Rafael were already seated on one side of a rectangular table. It was rare to find Terry in a jacket and tie and Rafael without them, but more surprising was seeing Pete beside Rafael and the Donatellos across the table from them.
“Drea made her statement,” Pete said before I could ask. “She and Ramos are upstairs with a couple unis.”
I nodded as Travis closed the door. She gestured me toward a chair at one end and took the opposite seat herself.
Fingering the file folder and the iPad in front of him, Terry looked at Matt and Mark. “Thank you both for coming. Over the past few hours we’ve taken statements from everyone involved in this morning’s incident at the library. We’re still talking to witnesses but we’re pretty clear on what happened. First, Mrs. Bishop has been released, pending completion of the investigation. ADA Adam Caster observed the interview conducted by detectives Piñero and Travis. Bishop’s carry permit is up to date. Witnesses, cell phone video, and bruising below her jawbone all confirm she was attacked.” He slid the iPad to Rafael.
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