“Tire tracks. Maybe even footprints.”
Cochrane’s eyes narrowed. He leaned forward. “What’s going on, Dave? You know something the rest of us don’t?”
“No questions asked, remember?”
“That’s a big ask,” Cochrane said. “Considering.”
“I wouldn’t ask you if I could do it myself.”
“And if I find something?”
“Take photographs, make casts, whatever. But listen, Tom – no report. If you find anything you come back and tell me. Nobody else, understand? Not even Liz.”
Cochrane was silent, looking at him with watchful eyes. If he couldn’t even tell his wife, this had to be pretty damn serious.
“Does Joe know about this?” he asked.
“No.”
Cochrane took a few moments to think about that.
“Something happened,” he said.
It wasn’t a question and Easton didn’t answer it. Cochrane leaned back in the chair, delving into his pocket again for his battered pack of cigarettes. He shook one out and put it between his lips, his eyes never leaving Easton’s. He was a good detective. It didn’t take him long to work it out.
“You talked to Ironheel.”
Easton said nothing.
“He told you something.”
Again Easton made no reply. Cochrane took the cigarette out of his mouth and looked at it as if the answers to his questions were printed on it.
“This is connected to what happened last night, isn’t it?” he said. “That lawyer who got shot? That’s why you want the phone numbers, right?”
Once again Easton remained silent, and the detective made an exasperated sound.
“Damn it, Dave.”
Easton hesitated for a long moment. “It’s something pretty bad,” he said.
Cochrane didn’t even blink.
“How bad is pretty bad?” he prompted, after a while.
Easton was still trying to find the right phrases and couldn’t. If Ironheel was telling the truth, whatever Joe Apodaca was involved in had to be a lot more than what cops called dirty. Dirty was taking a bribe, or looking the other way while a drug deal went down, or putting a drop gun in a dead suspect’s hand. Cold-blooded murder was a long way past all that. He took a deep breath and plunged in.
“I had a long one-to-one with Ironheel last night. He told me Joe killed Robert Casey.”
Cochrane just stared at him, then shook his head side to side.
“Come on, Dave,” he said. “He says Joe Apodaca killed Casey?”
Easton said nothing.
“He’s lyin’ in his teeth,” Cochrane said. “He’d probably tell you his mother was Joan of Arc if he thought it would get him off the hook.”
“Tom,” Easton said patiently. It wiped the derision off Cochrane’s face.
“You mean … you believe him?”
“Yes, I do,” Easton said, and leaving nothing out, told him why.
“Jesus H. Christ,” Cochrane breathed when he came to the end of it. “What you going to do?”
“I’m going to dump the whole thing in Olin McKittrick’s lap. That’s why I came in this morning. That, and to talk to you.”
Cochrane remained silent. He took the pack of Marlboro out of his jacket pocket again and put the cigarette back in, staring at it as if he was trying to memorize its appearance. The silence lengthened. Finally he put the cigarette on the desk in front of him, then took a match out of his pocket, lit it with a thumbnail, and blew it out.
“I could sure use a smoke,” he said.
“You haven’t answered the question.”
“Thought you two were real tight,” Cochrane said. “You and Joe.”
“Used to be.”
Cochrane nodded. “Never occur to you Joe let that happen on purpose?”
Easton frowned. “No, it never did. Why would he?”
Cochrane’s put the cigarette back into the pack and put the pack into his pocket and looked at the wall. It was like he was trying to make up his mind what color to paint it.
“Tom?” Easton persisted.
Cochrane looked at him and he saw uncertainty in his eyes, as if he was wondering whether to proceed. And all at once Easton felt out of his depth. There were undercurrents here of which he was totally unaware.
“I’m lost, Tom,” Easton said.
Cochrane shook his head. “No, you’re not. You’re just letting loyalty get in the way. Look around, Dave. Don’t you see it, feel it?”
“Feel what? What are you saying?”
Cochrane shook his head. “Something happened to Joe. We all knew it and we all sat here and let it happen. Watched him fence himself off, quit talking to the troops, letting anyone get near to him. Anyone except you. So we figured there had to be a reason.”
“You thought, whatever it was, I was in it with him?”
“Everyone figured you were Joe’s boy, Dave,” Cochrane said, almost apologetically. “You practically lived at his house, remember? Then later, when he started to slip, we watched you fixing the fuck-ups, making him look good. So we, uh, adapted accordingly.”
He heard Susan’s voice. He uses you. Can’t you see it? You’re his Mister Nice Guy. You’re his front. No matter what he does, you make him look good.
It was true, Easton thought. For quite a few years now he had been fixing the fuck-ups, as Cochrane had so incisively put it. It was something you did: one cop didn’t roll over on another cop. Especially when the other cop was the one who had taught you everything you knew.
“He was a great sheriff, Tom.”
“No argument.”
Easton drew in a long breath. “I better call McKittrick,” he said.
Cochrane got up out of the chair. “I’m outta here,” he said. “Think I’ll just go get started on those, uh… projects.”
Easton put his hand on the detective’s shoulder. “Thank you, Tom. For everything.”
“Thank me when it’s over,” Cochrane said. As he reached the door he turned, made a sixgun of his hand, pointed it at Easton and bent his thumb to fire it.
“Keep your head down, kid,” he said. “They’re using real bullets.”
Might be good advice at that, Easton thought, and watched Cochrane head for the exit. He would have given a lot to know what was going on in the detective’s head. He waited another ten minutes, then picked up the phone and punched in Olin McKittrick’s home number.
Chapter Thirteen
On the third ring Karen McKittrick answered. She recognized his voice and her reaction to it was sharp and hostile. He had gone to school with her and she didn’t like him any more now than she had then.
“Olin’s busy,” she said. “I can’t interrupt him.” She sounded pleased about it.
“I’ll come over,” he said. “Tell him I’m on my way.”
Like it or lump it, he added silently as she banged the phone down.
The McKittrick house was on Sequoia Drive in the money part of town. Six beds, three and a half baths, a two-acre plot with some nice trees and a well-kept garden. A red two-door Audi A8 was parked at the curb outside. The garage was open; inside were McKittrick’s silver-gray BMW 540i, a couple of trail bikes, an Outback barbecue, an extending ladder, and the usual garage clutter. There was a basketball hoop above the garage door, a horse trailer in the space between the houses. McKittrick’s teenage daughters Kathie and Kirsty were mad about riding.
Easton parked across the street and walked over to the house. The doorbell was the kind with Westminster chimes; Karen McKittrick jerked the door open while it was in mid-sequence. She was slim to the point of flat-chestedness, an angular woman with a narrow face, high cheekbones, and gray eyes that showed no trace of welcome. Her light brown hair was permanent-waved into a cloud of tight ringlets. She was dressed for cool in a short white Lacoste tennis dress with white socks and brand new Nike tennis shoes with dark blue trim. Her makeup was faultless, her manicure impeccable. Her lips were set in a pettish line t
hat completely spoiled the whole effect.
“This really is unforgivable, David,” she said by way of greeting. “After all, it is Sunday.”
“If it wasn’t urgent I wouldn’t bother you,” Easton said, making it brusque. “Tell Olin I’m here, please.”
She stepped aside to let him in and closed the door with just enough of a thump to reinforce her disapproval. He followed her into an airy sitting room with a big picture window that opened on to a deck looking out over a spacious yard. The main items of furniture in the sitting room were a recliner and two sofas upholstered in cream leather, with wall-to-wall white Berber carpets on the floor. Magazines were set out on glass-topped occasional tables so the titles showed: Smithsonian, House & Garden, Bon Appetit, The New Yorker. Half a dozen brand new books that looked as if they had never been read and never would be were stacked on an antique sofa table. Limited edition art prints in silvered frames hung on the walls, which were natural brick painted white. There was a real fireplace with an imitation log fire and a suspended copper chimney. The place had about as much personality as an auction room.
Karen McKittrick turned to face him, deliberately close, one hand on her hip, her head cocked combatively to one side. Her whole stance was aggressive, and he remembered his sister saying Karen was a bully.
“You people could at least let Olin alone on a Sunday,” she said, petulantly. “We were just leaving for the Country Club.”
You people. It wasn’t the first time Karen had let him know she thought cops were not members of the same species as district attorneys.
“No choice, Karen,” he said unrepentantly.
“What’s it about, anyway?”
“Sorry,” he told her bluntly. “Confidential.”
“Oh, for God’s sake!” she snapped. “What are you now, the Secret Service?”
“Where’s Olin?” he asked her, ignoring the jibe.
“Right here.”
Easton turned, surprised McKittrick could move so quietly. Olin was standing in the doorway, dressed like his wife: Lacoste shirt and shorts, the same Nike shoes. His and her tennis gear. They probably had matching rackets, too, Easton thought. Although he didn’t see it, McKittrick must have given his wife some sort of husband-wife signal. Karen turned, giving Easton the benefit of another freezing look. She paused in the doorway as she went out.
“Don’t be long, Olin,” she said, pointedly. “I reserved a table for lunch.”
“I won’t,” he said.
Yes, you will, Easton thought grimly, but didn’t say it.
McKittrick clapped him on the shoulder, hail fellow well met.
“David, you better have a good reason for busting in here like this,” he said, making it jovial, but with the implicit threat still hanging there. Like, if it was really important, he was only joking, but if it wasn’t …
Easton let him have it right between the eyes. “I had a long talk with James Ironheel last night. Off the record.”
McKittrick reacted exactly the way he expected. Puzzlement – you broke the rules? – followed by disbelief – you broke the rules and didn’t consult me?
“And just who the hell said you could do th—?”
“Listen, Olin,” Easton said, bulldozing the question aside. “And listen carefully. Last night James Ironheel told me he saw Joe Apodaca and another man kill Robert Casey and Adam Twitchell. He was out there at Garcia Flat and saw it happen.”
His words seemed to paralyze McKittrick with shock. His skin took on a deathly pallor and his suddenly bloodless lips moved soundlessly. When he finally spoke his voice was a croak of disbelief. He shook his head from side to side, no, no, no.
“I don’t believe … I can’t—”
“Olin,” Easton said flatly. “Shut up and listen.”
In terse sentences he repeated exactly what Ironheel had told him the night before. When he got through, McKittrick began shaking his head slowly from side to side again, as if he didn’t trust himself to speak. Although the air-conditioned room was cool, there were beads of sweat on his forehead. Easton could almost see the thoughts running around in his head like rats in a maze.
“I called Pete Thorne at the Star,” Easton continued. “Ironheel’s story checks out. They ran a piece two days ago about the ranch up at Yellow Lake he says he went out to. Some guy in the music business bought it.”
“I still don’t—”
“Wait,” Easton insisted, not giving him an inch. He told him about going up to the crime scene, and how, even though nobody there had even spoken to them, Joe Apodaca had known exactly where Adam’s body was. While he was laying it all out, McKittrick stared at him as closely as if he were a hypnotist. When he spoke himself, his voice was hardly more than a whisper.
“You believe this … this scumbag?” McKittrick said, his voice a hiss. “Are you off your fucking head? He’d tell you three guys from an alien spacecraft did it if he thought you’d be stupid enough to swallow it.”
“I’m not through yet, Olin,” Easton continued grimly, brushing the objection aside. “Ironheel also told all this to Jerry Weddle. What he’d seen. Who he’d seen.”
He saw the shock deepen in McKittrick’s eyes as the implication sank in. The DA drew in a long, deep breath.
“And ... that means ... that’s why Weddle was killed?”
“What the hell do you think I came over here for?” Easton snapped impatiently. “If Ironheel is telling the truth, and I think he is, Weddle was killed to shut him up. Which in turn means if they find out what he knows, whoever killed Weddle will try to kill Ironheel.”
McKittrick’s eyes continued to avoid meeting his. He looked off-balance, like he didn’t know how he should act.
“You saying you think Joe will try to kill him while he’s in the jail?”
“Maybe not Joe.”
McKittrick frowned. He was getting it together. “What do you want me to do?”
“He’s a material witness, Olin. He needs protection.”
McKittrick went across to the window, looked out. He was thinking hard and it showed.
“Who else knows about this?” he asked.
“Nobody,” Easton said, surprising himself. Instinct cautioned him to protect Tom Cochrane. “You, me, that’s it. I sat up most of the night, trying to figure out what to do.”
McKittrick looked at the clock. Easton could almost hear the gyros spinning inside his head, examining possibilities, assessing consequences. The guy bounced back fast, give him that. Off balance for a few minutes, but not any more.
“Okay,” McKittrick said. “First question: is Ironheel safe in the jail?”
Easton had already given that quite a lot of thought. “Safe enough for the moment,” he said. “Unless ...”
He left the rest unsaid, and waited, watching McKittrick turning the situation over and over in his mind the way a diamond cutter examines every facet of a stone before deciding how to cut it. McKittrick was hard to like, but you could almost admire the way he was getting himself together. He looked up abruptly as a thought occurred to him.
“What about this second man Ironheel mentioned? Did he give you any idea who he might be, or who else might be involved?” he said.
“I thought about having Ironheel go through the mug books, but—”
“No,” McKittrick said decisively. “If Apodaca saw him doing that, he’d want to know why.” He glanced at his watch. “What we need to do now is get Ironheel out of that jail and into a Witness Protection Program. The question is, can I rely on you?”
“To do what?”
“I’ll contact the Department of Justice in Albuquerque, see if they have a safe house available. It’ll probably take a couple of hours, but if I can get something set up, you’re going to have to be ready to run.”
“No problem,” Easton said, not allowing himself to think about his promise to Jessye.
McKittrick’s eyes were alert now, bright, as if his brain was in overdrive. “Okay, here’s what we’l
l do. I’ll set up a meet with the Justice people, then call you, give you a location. You get Ironheel out of that jail and make the meet. Just you, nobody else, you understand?”
“Got it.”
“Fine, good,” McKittrick had his confidence back. He was in command of the situation. “Go back downtown, wait for my call. Be ready to move.”
Easton nodded. “And ... Joe?”
“We can’t move until Ironheel is in protective custody,” McKittrick said decisively. “But as soon as he’s made a statement, I’ll hand the whole thing over to the Attorney-General’s office or Internal Affairs. What happens after that will be up to them.”
“I guess.”
Even as he said it, he realized he had made it sound like he was reluctant for that to happen. McKittrick laid a hand on his shoulder.
“You cops hate to roll over on each other,” he said. “I know that. And I respect your feelings. But if Ironheel is telling the truth, there’s no possible alternative. You’re doing the right thing.”
Easton said nothing. Somehow McKittrick’s approval made him feel even worse. He started for the front door and McKittrick came out with him. Karen was standing in the hall waiting, her face pale and sulky. She looked like she could piss ice-water.
“Olin,” she said tightly, making two words of his name. “We’re going to be late.”
“Shut up, Karen,” he snapped. The pent-up emotions inside him made his voice crack like a whip. “Just shut your face!”
His wife’s eyes widened and her mouth made an `O,’ like a spoiled child unexpectedly slapped. Ignoring her, McKittrick opened the front door to let Easton out.
“Be ready to move as soon as you get my call,” he said. “If you have any kind of problem, call me.”
As he went out into the sunlight Easton felt Karen McKittrick’s eyes burning into his back, hating him for having witnessed her humiliation. He shrugged. Right this moment she didn’t dislike him half as much as he disliked himself.
Chapter Fourteen
It was around three in the afternoon when Joe Apodaca came into the SO building, stopped in reception to speak to Martina, bypassing his own office to come straight through to Easton’s. He was wearing a white short sleeve shirt, dark tan pants, and expensive-looking oxblood loafers with thin gold chains across the instep.
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