“I got a taste for Sanka in law school,” he said. “Living in the coffee capital of the U.S., I drink this.”
“Get Leo sprung. I’ll buy you a tanker truck full of the crap,” I said.
“Add one and one, Van. Whatever the hard evidence against Leo is, it’s made them bold. And they have to like the story his personal history tells. I would.”
“You want to plea bargain? Already?”
“I want you to temper your expectations. Unless they screwed up the chain of evidence we’ve got an uphill battle ahead.”
“So let’s go,” I said.
“I’ll send Arronow. He’s good.”
“Ephraim.”
“He can be there tomorrow. I’ll file for an extension on the arraignment from here.”
“How much of a retainer did I give you?”
Ganz rolled the coffee around in his mouth. “And I never asked how that miracle happened. From all your overtime as a bouncer, I’m sure.”
I’d come into money earlier in the summer. Some from selling the land on which my childhood home had once stood, and a lot more from less-legal ventures. Enough to buy a house next door to Ephraim’s, if I chose. A large percentage of that sudden fortune found its way into anonymous donations to causes and people who needed it more than I did. Another chunk became a rainy-day fund. Which for me included legal services.
“Pack a bag,” I said.
“What, now?”
“Truck’s outside.”
“We’re driving? God save me. Your grandfather never gave me this much grief, I knew him thirty years.” He ran a hand through his wild hair. “Let me go inform Jeannie.”
“Tell her you’ll bring her a souvenir.”
“Mercy River. God. Tell me that name isn’t meant as sarcasm.” He padded away down the hall. I checked my watch. If Ephraim moved fast, and the Dodge’s wheels stayed on, we could be halfway out of the state by sunrise.
Three
The town of Mercy River lay in a haphazard jumble in the crease between two colliding hill ranges, as if its buildings and houses had been scattered across the land like big handfuls of dice, most of them tumbling to rest on the floor of the valley, with a few dozen strays left on the slopes above. As the two-lane highway wound its way down the final long slope, Ganz and I had a view across a slender mile of fields and gravel roads and barns that marked the northern edge of the valley. Cattle stood on the arid hillsides, waiting placidly for the early autumn rains and the good grazing that would follow.
“Yee-haw,” Ganz said under his breath. “Ride ’em, cowboy.”
Small forests of pine and juniper topped the peaks in the distance like thatched roofs. On the valley floor, we passed the sheet metal monolith of a grain elevator. The highway led through the fields and gradually straightened as it entered the town proper.
Ganz craned his neck to stare at a sign. “I don’t believe it. It’s actually called Main Street,” he said.
He was dressed casually by his standards, in gray trousers and a blue sport coat over a white dress shirt with no tie. He’d filled two large suitcases with clothes before I’d finally hounded him out of his modernist mansion.
In between calls to roust his people out of bed, Ganz had read me some stats on Mercy River from his iPad. The town’s permanent population was slightly more than nine hundred. It was the Griffon County seat, a county with the sparsest population in the state. Its single school served all grades. Mining and timber had been the chief industries a century ago. Farms and ranches formed Mercy River’s backbone now, plus a handful of restaurants and stores serving the highway, and whatever cash could be gleaned from day-tripper tourists coming to see the painted hills and buttes west of town. The average annual income per person wouldn’t cover my rent in Seattle for a full year.
The name of the town came from the flash floods that had been a serious danger back in the nineteenth century, when prospectors panned the river. One night the water had risen high enough and fast enough to swallow half a settlement. According to the official record, all the tents and sheds had been crushed and swept downstream, but no lives had been lost. Or at least none of significance. It made for a better tale that way.
A sign pointing off the main drag read town hall / sheriff. That was where Leo would be.
“There’s a hotel,” I said, pulling up to the curb.
“Suite Mercy Inn,” Ganz said, reading off the name painted on the pebbled glass of the doors. “Is that a joke?”
“See if your staff can laugh us up a couple of rooms.”
We got out, me stretching the knots from my shoulders after the long drive, and Ganz groaning with actual pain. My face prickled in the wind. I tugged a barn jacket from my travel ruck and zipped it over my Henley shirt.
“I have a couple more calls to make before we visit your wayward friend,” said Ganz.
I shook my head, unwilling to wait. “I’ll meet you at the sheriff’s.”
At the very heart of the town, the storefronts had flat façades and porches, adding to the Old West feel of the street. It was an unexpectedly colorful stretch. Fresh coats of rust-red and sky-blue paint brightened half of the shops, where the planks hadn’t been stained a rich brown. Maybe Mercy River had invested in a quick face-lift for tourist season. A few of the buildings had plaques from the state historical society commemorating their original construction. Post office in 1908, mercantile in 1911. A handwritten placard in a diner window plugged venison burgers. My mouth watered instantly. I added food to my mental list of essential tasks, after I’d seen Leo.
The Griffon County Sheriff’s station had been built much more recently than the wood-sided buildings along Main. It might have been an elementary school, long and low, with picture windows to the lobby and American and Oregon State flags fluttering from individual poles on the broad lawn. I opened the door for a family of backpackers as they exited and went inside.
“Here for a license, sir?” said the deputy standing at the front desk. He was tall and lanky and had blond hair that had retreated far up his scalp, even though he couldn’t have been more than twenty-five. The plastic nameplate above his shirt pocket read thatcher. “Right over there.” He nodded to a teller’s window off to the side, under a wooden sign with words burned into the grain: fishing—hunting—vehicle.
“Is Deputy Roussa still on duty?” I said.
Thatcher glanced at a wall clock. The county uniform was a short-sleeved khaki shirt with olive epaulets, and matching trousers with an olive stripe. He wore the full belt, gun and flashlight and radio, ready to walk out the door if called. Thatcher was a lefty. “She’ll be back shortly. Can I help you?”
“I’m checking on a man who was arrested last night,” I said. “Leo Pak. I’m here with his lawyer.”
“He the Chinese guy?”
Leo was half Korean, but it didn’t feel like the time to argue his ethnicity. “Is he in custody here?”
“Have a seat.” Thatcher’s politeness now carried a touch of the same chill as the wind outside. He swiped his access card on a door and disappeared within. While I waited, I examined the station. The central room had an open floor plan. One other deputy was typing at a laptop at his desk. Beyond him was a windowed door, probably leading to the administration offices. Thatcher had gone off to the left, where I assumed the interrogation rooms and holding cells were located.
The sheriff would have assigned a detective to a murder case. When Deputy Thatcher returned, I’d get that detective’s name and the details on Leo’s arraignment. Ganz could arrange for time with Leo and start building his defense. If there was a defense to build.
The deputy emerged and beckoned to me. “This way.”
I’d expected the cops to make me wait for Ganz. I kept my mouth shut and followed before Thatcher thought twice.
He led me through the interior door into a short hallway. I removed my jacket and held out my arms while Thatcher swiped a metal detector wand over my limbs. My keys and mult
i-tool and phone went into a ceramic bowl on a shelf. He glanced through a small high window on the opposite door before unlocking it. A short row of jail cells occupied the right-hand side of the remaining hall.
“Last one down,” Thatcher said. I walked past the empty cells—two bunks and a steel toilet and sink in each—to the fourth in the row. Thatcher closed the steel door behind me and kept watch through the high window.
Leo lay on the lower bunk, his arm thrown up to shield his eyes. Asleep, maybe.
“Leo,” I said. He didn’t move. “It’s Van.”
His foot twitched. Haltingly, his leg moved off the bunk, his foot in its hiking sock half falling to the floor. He wore jeans—torn and stained with dirt—and a gray T-shirt over his muscled torso. Nothing heavier, although the temperature in the cells must have been under sixty-five degrees. He rolled to one side.
“Christ,” I said. Leo’s left eye was swollen shut, a stripe of crusted blood running from his hairline halfway to his eye. That whole side of his forehead had puffed up like he’d been bitten by an adder.
“Howz your day?” Leo said through fat lips.
“The fuck, Leo? Did the cops do this to you?”
I couldn’t tell if the movement of his head was a nod or a shake. He sat up, as slow as mercury rising.
“Don’t stand,” I said. “Have they had you into the hospital?”
A shake this time. “Told them no.” Leo didn’t like hospitals, distrusted them.
“Who hit you?”
“The firs’ time? Big fucker at the Trading Post. I’m sitting there when he jus’ walks up and whales on me.”
“Out of nowhere?”
“Said I’d killed Erle. Tried to tell him no, but he was kickin’ me by then. The owner went to pull him off and got pasted. I had to hit the big guy with a plate. Then more of his buddies came at me, so I ran.”
“What about the cops?” I said.
He swallowed and stood up, despite my warning, and shuffled to the sink. With some difficulty, he used the foot pump to splash water into his open hand, and then onto his raw face. “I took off out the back. I’d been running the trails up in the hills the past week. Thought I could ditch them, circle around, and find out what was happening. But they had dirt bikes and ATVs. That’s when I called you.”
I imagined the mob chasing Leo, like villagers after the monster in an old movie. Small wonder he ran. They might have lynched him.
“Smart move, calling me,” I said. “I brought Ephraim Ganz. The attorney.”
“What’d I say to you on the phone? I don’t remember.”
“You didn’t have time to say much.”
“They caught up to me,” he said. The simple effort of standing and talking was burning what little energy he had. “Before I could say shit, the town cop nailed me. Fucker was quick with that baton—” He came to rest by leaning against the bars. This close, I could see a virulent purple bruise ringing a slim island of scabbed blood, where the club had struck him.
“What have the cops told you about the murder?”
“Told me? Nothin’. When I came to in the cell here, they asked me a lot of questions about Erle. I’d been working at his shop since I got here last week. Everybody knows that. Asked me why I shot him early that morning, what I did with the money I took. I didn’t say anything.”
“Good. How hard did they ask?”
His face moved, and I realized he was smiling. “I passed out. Kinda put a halt to the whole Q-and-A thing.”
“Leo,” I said. “We’re going to help you. But you got to level with me. Did you shoot Erle?”
Leo’s one good eye met mine, glaring. “Fuck, no, man.”
“Did you have an argument? Why do the cops think you did it?”
“I shouldn’ta called you,” he said. Leo wasn’t a tall guy. His exhausted slump made him shorter still. “It’s a mistake. This’ll get sorted out.”
“You need a doctor. Are you on any scrips right now?” The damn cops probably hadn’t even thought to check.
“Couple. But forget that.”
“Where are you living?” I pressed. “I can get your meds.”
“I got a room at the inn, but—” He tilted his head. “I been stayin’ somewhere else.”
Of course. I should have guessed that. Leo had no problem attracting women when his chiseled face wasn’t beaten halfway to hamburger. “Where’s her place?”
“You should head back to Seattle, Van.”
“I’ll find out who she is. You know I will.”
“South of town. Forty-one Piccolo Road. Just don’t—”
“I can be subtle,” I began, but the door to the outside swung open. A beefy middle-aged white guy in an olive windbreaker emblazoned with the county badge came barreling down the row of cells. Thatcher and a broad-shouldered female deputy followed.
“You.” The cop, a detective or whatever he was, pointed at me. “Get out.”
I turned to Leo. “Hang tight. I’ll be back with Ganz.”
“Out.” He grabbed my upper arm. I went along with it, let him bull me out of the cell block and back into the lobby. Thatcher and the woman deputy—Roussa, I saw as we rushed past—stepped swiftly out of the way.
In the main room of the station, the deputy who’d been working at his laptop waited by the front desk. All four of them surrounded me in a loose circle, the florid-faced detective still squeezing my arm. Other than tensing my bicep to keep his grip from mangling it, I didn’t make a move. Not with two of the deputies already fingering their Tasers and pepper spray. Only Roussa seemed calm.
“I can arrest you now,” the detective said, “or you can tell us who you are.”
“Or both or neither,” I said, “as long as we’re listing the options.”
“You’re not a lawyer.”
“Never said I was.”
“That’s a lie.” Deputy Thatcher stepped forward.
“Shut up,” the detective said. He gave up trying to crush my arm and glared at me from six inches away. A high crest of cedar-colored hair topped his round head. He smelled sharply of menthol cigarettes. “What did Pak say to you?”
“He can hardly talk.” I looked around at the deputies. “Which one of you assholes tried to kill him with your baton?”
“Get your hands on the desk,” the detective said, spinning me around.
I complied, grinding my teeth. He removed my wallet and tossed it to Roussa. Halfway through the detective’s overly aggressive frisk, Ganz strode in the front door of the station, attaché case in hand.
“Is there a problem, Sheriff?” he said instantly. “Ephraim Ganz. I’m this man’s attorney, and I’ve also been engaged to represent Leonard Pak, who I understand may be on the premises. Who is your lead investigator on the case?”
The deputies and the detective stood stunned, as if Ganz had produced a live elephant from his chest pocket instead of a business card.
“I’m Lieutenant Yerby,” said the detective after another second of silence.
“The man in charge. Excellent. Is Mr. Shaw there under arrest? Or is this simply a security procedure before he visits my client?” He gestured to the circle of deputies around me.
Yerby stepped away, letting me straighten up. “Only the lawyer meets with the suspect.”
“Of course. Good to learn the local customs. Now, if you would arrange for an interview room for us . . .”
“Pak was assigned a public defender early this morning,” Yerby said, coming around the desk. “Until the court says you take over, officially I don’t have to do—”
“Judge Waggoner’s office received our paperwork of intent half an hour ago. And signed off on it. Officially.” If Yerby towering over him bothered Ganz, he never gave the slightest hint. Just smiled and held up his hand apologetically. “No way you could know until now. But Mr. Pak is my client, and I am here, and I do need to speak with him about his arraignment. Which has been postponed until tomorrow afternoon, by the way.”
“Seattle,” he said, like that confirmed the worst, and tossed the wallet on the front desk.
“Shaw waits outside,” Yerby said to Ganz. “Leroy, put Pak in Room One. He and his attorney can talk there.” The deputy headed for the cell block. Yerby turned to Thatcher. The anger on his face hadn’t dimmed at all. “My office.”
Thatcher blanched as he quickly followed his boss toward the opposite side of the station. Ganz’s phone rang and he stepped away to start barking instructions into it. I picked up my jacket as Deputy Roussa returned with the plastic bowl containing my keys and other personal effects.
“Thanks,” I said. “Van Shaw. We spoke on the phone.”
“I remember you hanging up.”
“I did. I apologize. It was heavy news about Leo.”
Her expression remained flat. Roussa wore her black hair pulled into a bun. She had bronze-toned skin and a stance that appeared as immovable as a concrete traffic barrier.
“What happened yesterday?” I said. “With Erle Sharples?”
“The lieutenant’s got the file.”
“I’m just trying to understand, Deputy. Leo Pak isn’t some rando with fucked-up impulse control. He had his shit together, last I saw him. He said he’d been working for Erle recently. Where? Doing what?”
“Erle’s Gun Shop. Up on Larimer Road. Erle brought him on for some part-time help. Hand-loading ammo, I think.”
Reassembling fired rounds to be used again, or turning them into specialized higher-quality ammunition.
“That’s skilled work,” I said. “Not something you’d give a guy who was twitchy.”
“Erle said he did it well,” Roussa admitted.
“So you and Erle had talked about him. Had you met Leo before all this?”
“It’s a small town. I’d seen him. Listen,” she said, with a glance toward the door Lieutenant Yerby had left through, “don’t put what happened to your friend on our department. It was the constable who laid him out.”
Mercy River Page 2