“Thank you.” She smiled at him.
A few minutes later, a bandana with a head under it walked out. He was big and bearded. The bandana was a Confederate flag, which didn’t exactly go with his black Raider Nation T.
“Help ya?”
“Maybe,” Liz said.
“Now there’s an answer,” Bandana Man said. He had a deep voice and seemed to like the sound of it. “Did you know there are 4,628 known species of mammals in the world?”
“Excuse me?”
“There was 4,629, but one of ’em went extinct. The extinct one is the uncurious male.”
“Which makes you a little bit curious,” she said.
“More than a little. When a nice lady I’ve never seen before shows up, asks for me personally, I can’t help wondering how I can help her?”
“That’s just wonderful,” she said. “Are you Chris?”
“If I wasn’t, I’d sure want to be.”
“Very smooth,” she said.
“How’d you happen to select yours truly?”
“Casper gave me your name.”
Chris smiled. “Well, I guess I owe Casper big time. What would you say if — ”
“He told me you were the one to talk to if we wanted to keep something off the books.”
He lost his easy smile for half a second. He slapped it right back on. “That all depends.”
“Now there’s an answer,” Liz said.
“You’re not from around here.”
“If you’re not the one to talk to, why don’t you tell me who that might be?”
He spread his arms. “Now, did I say anything about not being someone you could talk to? But until a man hears what the terms are, he can’t make the call.”
“Why don’t we talk about that?”
Chris gave a quick look inside the store. “I have to make it look like I’m showing you something. Or the boss man, he might think I’m slackin’ off.”
“I want a great, big bike,” Liz said. “One with big old pipes.”
He put his hand on the seat of a yellow Yamaha and said, “This is a nice little bike. Good for your size. And what’s this little something you need?”
“How do I know I can trust you?” Liz said.
“What is it? You want somebody iced?” He chuckled.
Liz pressed her top teeth on her lower lip.
Chris’s eyes widened. “Wow.”
“Relax,” Liz said with a smile. “I don’t want anybody dusted.”
“You were messing with me?”
“How’d I do?”
He snorted a laugh. “You did good, little sister. But just to let you know, I know people who know other people.”
“Then maybe you really can help me.” She looked him up and down. “Where can we talk? Private.”
He looked at his watch. “An hour. In the middle of town, there’s a place called The Hammer. Everybody knows it. They know me. We can get a booth.”
“I look forward to it.”
“You and me both, little sister.”
2:18 p.m.
Mac thought, She is something, this Rocky Towne. A tech-savvy angel from heaven.
In her car, heading back to his house, he said, “Did you need more time with the computer?”
She shook her head. “I copied a ton of files onto a flash drive. Now I just have to look at it, figure out how to get into anything that might tell us where Liz’s mother is.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I’ll take it to Geena’s. She has that boyfriend.”
“What boyfriend?”
“The colonics expert.”
“I still don’t know what you’re talking about, but it sounds painful.”
“Trust me,” Rocky said.
He did. He liked it that he did.
“It’s a long shot, I know,” Rocky said, as she pulled into the drive next to the church. “So you do the praying and I’ll do the prying.”
He didn’t want the car to stop but knew it had to. If only he wasn’t toxic, he could allow himself to love this woman. But he was, and he couldn’t, and he got out of the car quickly before he made a fool out of himself.
“One more thing,” she said. “Remember you wanted me to look at your PO?”
“Yeah.”
“I found something.” She handed him a sealed manila envelope through the car window. “I’ll call you later.”
She drove off, the car kicking up the gravel.
Mac went inside and sat in his old wingback. It felt like freedom. A few hours ago he’d been in jail. Now he was here, thanks to Rocky Towne. He was here and he was free, yet he was not, because a murder charge was hanging over him, ready to drop. Until he was free of that —
He opened the envelope.
Inside was a print out of a webpage, a story from the Orange County Register.
An obituary.
A soldier who died in combat in Afghanistan. Four years ago.
Twenty-two years old. Left a wife and two-year-old son.
Thomas “Tommy” Slezak.
Marine.
3:14 p.m.
Chris had a big grin on his face when he met Liz in the lounge. She was waiting for him in a booth of red vinyl and Formica.
“Cozy little spot you have here,” she said, and not in a friendly way.
“You like it?” he said.
“What’s not to like?”
“I can hear it in your voice.” He winked and slid into the booth. A little too close. She slid away.
“You have that out-of-town way about you,” he said. “Where you from? The big city?”
“Does it matter?” she said.
“Just making friendly conversation before we talk business.”
“Let’s talk business.”
“Don’t you want to have a drink first?”
“No.”
“Mind if I?”
“Fine, but make it fast.”
He slid out of the booth and ambled off toward the bar, calling out hello to some guys sitting on stools. They laughed and clapped each other on the back. The smell of stale beer and body odor filled the place.
Then it happened again. The feeling she was being watched. She looked around the bar. A few heads were turned in her direction. Somebody put on music. It was disco. Disco! The place was in a 1970’s freeze.
And she was in a freeze. Frozen in the moment like an insect in amber.
Like she’d been placed right here in this spot by some giant set of hands. Trapped.
Trapped because there is no way back. Not ever. Arty, why’ d you make me? No, don’t think that way. You had to do it. You’re given cards, the game is rigged by fate. Why fight it? Just keep moving and outsmart it. Like you’re going to outsmart this punk.
When Chris got back with a pitcher of beer and two glasses, he said, “Hope you don’t mind.”
“You going to drink all that yourself?” Liz said.
“Thought maybe I could get you to join me after all.” He started pouring the suds into one of the glasses. His hands were still dirty from his day at work.
“I said nothing for me.” Liz turned the other glass over on the table.
“Now that’s just not in the spirit of things,” Chris said.
“You want to do business or don’t you?”
He poured himself some beer and took a long sip, looking at her the whole time. Some of the foam stuck to his mustache. He wiped it with the back of his hand. Then he said, “What if I want this to be the start of a friendship?”
“All right, Chris, I’ll tell you what. You show me what you can do, and then we’ll talk.”
“Why don’t we do the friendly things first? Get to know each other?”
Liz put her elbows on the table and her palms together. “Listen, Slick, I’m only going to say this once. You want some action, you earn it. Let’s see what you’re made of first.”
A smile sneaked through Chris’s facial hair. “Okay, little sister, you g
ot my attention. And just to let you know, I like to collect.”
“Save that for the local Susies, will you? Here’s what I want, and you get it for me or you can drown in your beer. I want a car. I want a car that’s untraceable. Fake plates. I will pay you for it. I want it delivered in a place where we won’t be seen, and I want the plates taken off my car and then I want my car torched. Now, do you think you can handle that?”
He didn’t answer for a long moment.
“I can do that,” he said. “Only thing is, I’d like to know why.”
“You don’t have to know why. You only have to know that you’ll be paid.”
“How much?”
“A lot.”
“How much is a lot?”
“How much do you want?”
He looked at her over his glass of beer. Now he was thinking. Now he was getting to be dangerous. “I’d say for a thing like this, ten thousand wouldn’t be asking too much.”
“Okay,” she said. “That’s what you’ll get.”
“You really have that?” he said.
“Can you deliver?”
“Oh yeah, I can — ”
“In four hours?”
“Four?”
“That’s the deal. If you can’t deliver, deal’s off.”
“When do I get paid?”
“On delivery.”
He thought about it. “I want some up front.”
“No,” she said. “On delivery.”
“What if I go to all this trouble and you don’t pay off? What if you decide to take the car and shoot me or something?”
She smiled, sighed. “Chris, do I look like a killer to you?”
7:18 p.m.
Rocky, at the computer, rubbed her eyes.
She did not pause to linger over all the docs and e-mails. Leonard had been helpful recovering some of the deleted files and putting them in a readable format. Now she was alone, looking for something, anything, about Liz’s mysterious past.
Liz, who had seemed to want to prevent anyone from looking into it. The secret Liz.
Who are you, really?
I’m going to find out.
7:37 p.m.
Liz parked her car on the little patch of brown grass Chris had described to her. The place he chose for them was three miles outside the town limits in a grove of birch trees.
The moon was bright and full. It was a night you could see things. Good. That would make the transaction a whole lot easier.
She got out and heard, faintly, the sound of a river.
She liked rivers. They washed things clean. If only life was a river.
If only she could be clean.
No, don’t think that, don’t think that. They’ ll get you if you think that.
Don’t hope to be clean, you can’t be clean, you don’t want to be clean.
She heard the sound of a car coming, then the headlights.
She waited.
The lights cut. Liz saw a silhouetted figure emerge from the driver’s side. And another, from the passenger side.
“I said to come alone,” Liz said.
“Gary’s a buddy of mine,” Chris said. “We’ve known each other since we were kids.”
“Why is he here?”
“Just to make sure nothing goes wrong.”
“What could go wrong?” Liz said.
“Maybe you try to get away with something, maybe you try to gyp me. I don’t know. I just know that you can’t always trust the ladies.”
His companion smiled and nodded.
Liz said, “That thing run?”
“Clean and neat,” Chris said. “Rebuilt engine, too. Fake plate, so you don’t get stopped crossing the state line. Maybe we can sell yours for a few hundred.”
“Mine?”
“You won’t be using it anymore.”
“No,” Liz said, “I want it destroyed.”
“I don’t see where that gets anybody. We can at least strip it for parts.”
Liz shook her head. “No deal.”
Chris looked at Gary. Gary shrugged. Chris looked at Liz. “You’re the boss. Now, what about the payment?”
Liz said, “Ask your friend to go wait by the car.”
Chris stuck out his lower lip. “That’s not very nice.”
“I’m not very nice,” Liz said. “You can have your pay, but I deal only with you.”
“She’s tough,” Gary said.
“I like that,” Chris said. “I really, really do. Tough is good.”
For a moment, nobody moved. Then Chris nodded and Gary turned and walked back to the car.
“That better?” Chris said.
“Give me the key,” Liz said.
“Now tough is one thing, but dishonest is another. Let’s do a fair exchange. Same time. Just like a kidnapping.”
“Throw the key on the ground,” Liz said.
Chris laughed. “You have this all figured out, don’t you?”
“Key.”
He reached in his pocket and tossed a key near her feet. “Now you,” he said.
Liz reached in her pocket and pulled out a diamond ring. A particularly impressive one. She held it out. Chris frowned, put his hand out. Liz dropped the ring in his hand.
He looked at it. Then said, “What’s this?”
“A diamond,” she said.
“I don’t want no diamond.”
“It’s worth over ten thousand dollars.”
“So you say. It doesn’t even look real.”
“It’s real.”
“What is it, some family ring?”
“Yes. It was my mother’s engagement ring.”
“Was it now? And you’re willing to part with it?”
“Go get it appraised.”
“Yeah, and you’ll be long gone.”
“Trust me,” Liz said.
“That’s gonna get me in a lot of trouble, I think. You know what else I think? I think you’re trying to con me.”
“I don’t care what you think.” Liz bent down to pick up the key. But Chris stepped on it with a black boot.
“Hold on there,” he said.
Liz straightened up. “What are you doing?”
“I want to know where this came from,” Chris said. “I don’t believe any engagement ring story. I’m thinking maybe there’s more of these.”
“Come on, you’ve got your payment. Let’s get on with it. I want you to torch my car and — ”
Chris backhanded Liz across the face. His knuckles felt like marbles on her flesh. She almost went down.
“That’s enough,” Chris said. “You’re going to do what I want from now on.”
Then he waved at his friend to come join him.
Gary bounded from the car like a golden retriever about to go for a walk.
Liz allowed herself a little sob, to set things up.
“You think you ever had me punked?” Chris said.
Gary was almost to them. Liz put her left hand on her cheek and said, “Please . . .” She reached behind her with the right, turning slightly so Chris would miss it.
“Don’t be so worried,” Chris said. “We know how to treat the ladies.” To Gary he said, “Don’t we know how to treat the ladies?”
Gary said, “I don’t know about you, tubby, but I got it goin’ on.”
Chris said, “Yeah, right. Watch and learn.”
They both looked at Liz. She brought the gun around and pointed it at Chris’s face and fired.
As Chris fell to the ground, Gary yelped like a dog. One quick, high-pitched yap, and then turned and ran.
Liz got him in the back. He went down.
He was crawling and crying when Liz finished him with one to the back of the head.
More fire needed now. Burn them up. Fire, always fire.
Flames erupted. In the trees. All of them, all on fire, flames licking the sky.
The fire had voice, telling her to put the gun in her mouth. It was the only way, the only way.
“No
!”
Liz’s scream died in the sound of the river.
The flames disappeared with it, leaving her in silence.
Monday
9:30 a.m.
Sheriff’s Homicide Detective Kathy Moss stood at the front of the room. The gathered men and women of the sheriff’s department listened attentively as she held up the picture.
“This is Elizabeth Towne,” she said. “You know that her husband was killed in Pack Canyon. Supposedly an accident. But it wasn’t an accident. He was pushed. Pushed by his widow, who is waiting to collect a nice life insurance claim. But there’s more to it than that.”
A young deputy in the front row raised his hand. “Is there sex and violence involved?”
The others in the room laughed.
“Oh, she used sex all right,” Moss said. “She used it on a man named Theodore Gillespie. She had him wrapped up like an early Christmas present, to the point where he would do anything for her. And one of the things he did for her was help cover up the killing of another guy, a well-known heist man. A man who liked to call himself Bill.”
“Not too original,” said the young deputy.
“Which is exactly why it works, Einstein,” Moss said. “Our little lady Liz Towne used a knife on this one.”
“Sweet,” the young deputy said.
“It gets sweeter,” Moss said. “She got this Theodore Gillespie to help her take the body to a little park out there in Malibu Canyon, and then she used the knife again. On Gillespie. After she killed him, she doused him and his car with gas and set the whole thing on fire. Oh yes, she is a sweet one, she is.”
Silence in the room.
Moss gestured toward a square-jawed man leaning against the wall. “This is Special Agent Victor Voltaire, FBI. He’s going to take it from here.”
The heads turned to Agent Voltaire. “It’s not that hard,” he said. “She has crossed state lines. She is a fugitive. But we know the make and model of her car, and the license plate — ”
No!
“ — and we know the direction she’s heading. We have ordered checkpoints — ”
“No!” Liz screamed. She gripped the gun. She would shoot them before they stopped her. Her head felt fuzzy. The gun felt smooth.
She looked at it, and the gun turned into a bottle, a nearly empty bottle, and she realized it was night and she was in the backseat of her car. Her head felt like two halves of a tomato.
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