by Andrew Gross
The words had the feel of an accusation more than a question. And God knows, over the last twenty-four hours I’d asked it myself a hundred times. “I wish I knew, Carrie. But please, just look for that car. That’s all I’m asking. There have to be cameras. I guarantee you’ll spot it at, or near, both crime scenes. Please . . . ADJ-4. Did you at least write it down?”
She didn’t reply. I didn’t know if she believed me or not. Or if she had been tracing the call all along, and cops were on their way to pick me up right now.
“Did you write it down, Carrie?” was all I could ask.
Suddenly two police cars raced past me the other way, lights flashing, sending shock waves through my heart. Now the answer to whether she’d traced my call was clear. “Thanks . . .” I said, and cut off the connection, my disappointment morphing into outright panic. There were sirens echoing all around. I fully expected the cars to do a U-ey, realizing they’d just gone past me, and surround me on the street. Cops jumping out of their cars with weapons drawn.
But they just kept going. Maybe to that McDonald’s. Maybe to some other fixed point they had triangulated.
I was still free.
I melded into traffic, getting away from there as fast as I could.
My only hope now was to wait for Marv.
“Great job,” Bill Akers said, ducking his head back in. “We missed him. The initial fix was on a fast-food place out on Cassat. We almost had him.”
“Too bad,” Carrie said. “Bill, you think we ought to check out his story? About that car?”
Akers chuckled, indicating that he didn’t give it much credence. “Just let me know if he calls in again. There’ll be other chances. He won’t get far.” He gave her a thumbs-up sign.
She’d done the right thing. Right? Carrie wondered after he left. She’d put out the trace. She’d gotten the proper people involved.
Still, she felt an anxiousness come over her.
She looked down at the sheet of paper on her desk. At the partial plate number staring up at her.
Yes, there probably were cameras around somewhere. And yes, it all did seem just a bit improbable. Why would Steadman kill Martinez? Over a traffic violation, no less. While he was letting him go. Not to mention killing his friend?
And with what gun?
Her heart beat nervously. She’d be a fool. A fool to get involved. What with Raef. And she wasn’t even a detective.
But, yes . . . She slid the number under her desk mat, answering him. I wrote it down.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Carrie drove, later that afternoon, out to Lakeview, pretending to be on department business, just to see for herself where Martinez had been killed. Her eyes darted back and forth across the steadily trafficked street as it led toward I-10.
She wasn’t sure why she was doing this, other than because somewhere deep in her gut, a part of what Steadman had said must have made sense to her. Was it the fact that he’d had no reason to kill Martinez, who was in the process of letting him go? She’d checked on that. Or, like he’d said, where would he have gotten a weapon? And why? Or that it made perfect sense for him to go to his friend’s house, the only person he knew in town who could help him turn himself in. And no sense at all to kill him. Or was it the good things he had done, which she had read about on his website? Or was it his kind face, which didn’t look like a killer’s face, and the way he defended himself. Or, lastly, was it what he had said about his daughter? As if he’d known exactly what she had once said about her own son. Then you’ll understand . . .
Maybe it was that that had hit home the most.
Or maybe it was simply because nothing in Steadman’s story fit the profile of a killer. And everything he had said rang true. He was in town to deliver a speech at a Doctors Without Borders conference. Martinez would have been no more than a random interaction. Not to mention this car, this “blue sedan” he pressed so hard on. What would he possibly have to gain if they couldn’t find such a car? If it didn’t exist. There have to be cameras.
But he was right on one thing—Steadman. That there was no one in the department—not a detective or a patrolman or anyone in the brass; not even the guy who mopped the floors at night—who didn’t want to see him thrown into a cell for Martinez’s murder.
Or who was focused on any other suspect.
No one other than Carrie herself. Carolyn Rose Holmes—she smirked to herself as she slowly drove her way up Lakeview—when did you become the patron saint of lost causes?
Her heart picking up, she passed the turnoff where Martinez had been shot—Westvale, it was called—and stopped for a second to look. It was still cordoned off with police barriers.
To her knowledge, there weren’t cameras on any traffic lights on Lakeview. Which made her task all the more difficult. She’d have to go from business to business and ask around. Kind of like a detective. And do it without drawing attention to herself. At five feet four inches, with shoulder-length strawberry-blond hair, light blue eyes, and a scattering of orange freckles on her cheeks, she didn’t much look like a detective.
And she liked that.
Noting the time, she continued west from the murder site toward the highway. The direction Steadman claimed the blue car with South Carolina plates he so desperately wanted her to find was traveling.
She had taken a glance through the witnesses’ statements. None of the people who saw Steadman exiting Martinez’s car had mentioned the vehicle. Of course the killer would have waited for a gap in traffic before he pounced, and Steadman, rushing back to Martinez to check him out, might have been over him, what, twenty, thirty seconds?
Why do you believe him? Carrie asked herself. Are you in such a state now that you’re a sucker for anyone with a smooth voice who throws on a little charm?
ADJ-4, right . . . ?
She passed a bank, Gold Coast Savings. They must have security cameras. At least, Carrie figured, ones facing in. But obtaining them might be problematic—given that while she had a perfectly valid sheriff’s office ID, it wasn’t exactly a detective’s shield.
Continuing, she passed a row of fast-food outlets and larger malls, all possibilities. But the big stores were all set back well off the street behind large parking lots.
I-10 was just a quarter mile ahead.
Then she saw a gas station. A tall Exxon sign that suggested that the place might have a fairly sweeping view of Lakeshore Drive.
She decided to turn in.
She parked near the office and asked herself one more time just why she was doing this. Then she opened her door.
She went into the service station’s office and asked the guy behind the counter for the manager. He got on the intercom, called out a name, and an affable-looking Indian with a name tag that read Pat stuck his head in from inside the garage. “Can I help you?”
“I’m with the sheriff’s office,” Carrie said. She flashed him her photo ID. Then she pointed toward the road signs. “You know there was a serious incident down the street involving a policeman yesterday?”
“Of course.” The manager nodded. “Traffic along here was backed up all day.”
Carrie asked him, “Any chance you have security cameras that have a view of the street?”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Business was booming for Dexter Ray Vaughn these days.
Booming enough for him to buy, in cash, the run-down row house in Cobb County outside Atlanta that he’d been renting—and fill it with a boss Bose sound system and a sixty-inch Samsung, which, other than a mattress in the bedroom, was pretty much his only furniture. Good enough to buy the tricked-out Ford 450 pickup he was driving lately.
Only problem was, he thought as he glanced around in his T-shirt and undershorts, his wife, Vicki, was always so stoned she couldn’t keep the house in any form other than “Early Shithole.” And the fridge never had anything in it but vodka and stale pizza. But considering the kinds of customers and business associates he had floating throug
h here on a daily basis, it was, like, Who the fuck really cared?
The meth lab in his basement was turning out a hundred grams a day, when he got the urge to work. He had a distro network, both in town and even out in the boonies—if you called his half-witted cousin Del, who sometimes ran for him there, a distributor. More like a sloth who sat in the trees farting and scratching himself.
Not to mention the neat, little side business he had going for himself in pharmaceuticals. Diversified—just like Warren E. Buffett—he had once seen the word in a magazine at his doctor’s office. Local gangs moved some of it locally and provided protection, so Dexter didn’t even have to lose sleep at night worrying about the cops.
Shit, some of the cops were his best customers.
Life Was Fucking-A Good, just like the words on the T-shirt he was wearing and had apparently passed out in last night. He’d been partying most of the night and woken up at two in the afternoon on the couch, with a world-class hard-on. Vicki was nowhere around, probably blowing some Mexican up the street for weed. Dex didn’t really care. Shit, he could call up a half-dozen meth skanks who’d be over in thirty seconds and go down on him for what he’d left out on the table.
But, he got up and sighed, commerce called. His amigos were expecting more inventory mañana. He had to get to the lab. Dex stretched, still a little wobbly, and took the last chug from a can of warm beer he’d left on the rug.
Man, this steady nine-to-five crap was killing him.
The doorbell rang.
Fuck. Who the hell was there? He groaned. Winston, the Jamaican, was supposed to come by, but that wasn’t until around six. Dexter shuffled over to the window, scratching his crotch. He parted the curtain, but was unable to see who was there. He pushed the hair out of his face and reknotted his ponytail, all-presentable like. “Who is it, man?” he called, squinting through the peephole. “Speak and be recognized.”
“Del sends his regards,” the person said.
Fuckin’ Del . . . The guy looked like a rube from Okefenokee. Didn’t that pimply bladderhead know better than to send his hicks around . . . ?
“Del oughta know better,” Dexter said, turning the knob and pushing open the bolt. “He—”
And then the door pretty much exploded in his face.
Before he even knew what was happening, this old dude had forced his way in. Heavyset. Arms like fucking ham hocks. Bald on top. Dexter’s hand shot to his mouth and there was blood on it. “The fuck you doin’, man . . .”
Then his eyes grew wide when he saw a shotgun in the guy’s hands.
“Dude, you outta your fuckin’ mind?” Dexter blurted at him, thinking he knew about ten people right off the top of his head he could get to blow a hole through this guy as wide as a highway. Stupid fool clearly had no idea where he was.
But then the guy’s elbow jerked and the butt of the shotgun caught Dex hard in the mouth. He felt his lip burst open, and when he looked down, he saw three of his own teeth staring up at him from the floor.
“On the couch,” Vance demanded, motioning to the dilapidated tweed thing that sat in front of the wide-screen TV.
“Listen, old man, you must be touched!” Dexter said, spitting blood onto his hand. “You don’t have any idea what the fuck you’re doing here. You think you can just—”
“Sit. On. The. Couch,” Vance said again, this time emphasizing each word with the muzzle of the shotgun.
“All right, all right . . .” Dexter said, lifting his palms. “I’m going. I’m going . . . Just keep it cool, old man.” He shuffled to the couch and sank down. He wiped blood off his mouth. “Look what you done, dude? What the hell is it you want? You need a boost? Weed? X? A little meth maybe? I can get it all. You surely look like you can use some X, there, dude, if you don’t mind me saying so. Got no cash—no worries, we can work something out.”
“I look like I came here for drugs?” Vance demanded, staring down at him. He grabbed the cane chair that was in the middle of the room and plunked himself down on it, facing Dexter Vaughn, the shotgun dangling loosely from his side. The blinds were already down. “You sold some Oxy to someone named Wayne Deloach, back in Acropolis. Through some poor fool named Del.”
“Roxies . . . ? Acropolis . . . ? Nah, never heard of Acropolis,” Dexter said, wiping the blood out of his mouth, surely wondering what was going on.
“You heard of him, though,” Vance replied.
“You some kind of cop?”
Vance shook his head. “Not anymore.”
“Then I’m sorry to tell you, I don’t the fuck know any Wayne Deloach. Though you’re surely right on one thing . . . My cousin Del damn well is a poor fool.”
“A dead one too,” Vance said, looking at him.
The ponytailed dealer swallowed. Vance could tell from the sheen of sweat that had popped up on his brow that he had gotten the guy’s full attention now.
“You said Wayne, right?”
Vance nodded, shifting the gun across from the guy’s knee.
“Still, don’t know him. In fact—”
Vance squeezed the trigger, sending a casing of Remington 341 buckshot into Dexter’s kneecap, causing him to jump up and howl clutching his knee, which, through his jeans, was mostly blood and exposed bone now.
“Look at that! Look what you fucking done, man!”
“I’m gonna give you one more chance to rethink your answer—about whether you knew this Wayne or not—before you become a dead fool too.”
“You fucking busted my knee, you sonovabitch!” Dexter rolled back onto the couch, writhing on the cushions, inspecting the hole in his jeans, blood all over them. “You must be fucking crazy, man. Ow . . .”
“That knee’ll soon end up the healthiest part of you”—Vance cocked the other barrel—“unless you tell me where your Oxy comes from. I know it was you and I don’t give a shit about whatever else is going on. All I want is a name. Whoever it is who supplies you, son. So unless you want to start losing more body parts by the minute and end up on the floor slithering around like a fish in a catch bucket, you better start thinking of some names.”
He lifted the barrel again so it pointed level at Dexter’s midsection. “I got a big fat target, son. The Oxy, boy. I want a name.”
“He’s no one! No one . . . !” Dexter cried out, putting his palms up for protection. “He’s just some jerk-off mule who earns a few bucks bringing them up to me once a month. Hell, it’s all small potatoes anyway. What’s the big fucking deal?”
Vance squeezed the trigger again and the Remington blasted a hole in Dexter’s other knee, taking away much of his shinbone as well.
“Aaargh,” Dex screamed, crying now, falling onto the floor and rolling from side to side in pain. His arms wrapped around both his shredded legs.
“The big deal”—Vance stood up and bent over him—“is that there are people who are dead, son. People who had a lot more worth in life than you, you miserable mess, because of what you do. And others, who won’t get a chance to live their lives out ’cause they were stupid and weak and easily preyed on by the likes of you.”
Dexter rolled around on his back, sobbing.
“Now, I can just leave you as you are, son, and you can get those legs mended—maybe—and you may well even walk one day and prey on some other fool’s daughter. You’d like that around now, wouldn’t you, son, if it turned out like that?”
“Yes,” Dexter said, moaning. “Please . . .”
“Or we can try another part. Say, right here . . .” Vance held the gun over Dexter’s groin. “Shit, probably gonna be useless to you anyway after today . . .”
“No, no, no, no, no . . . !” Dexter covered his crotch, his eyes stretched wide with panic.
“Then you give me the name, son. Who supplies you. Where’d that Oxy come from . . . You can spare yourself a lot of pain, not to mention eventually getting your head blown off.”
“All right, all right . . .” Dexter moaned, sobbing, his face a mishmash of bl
ood and tears. “No more . . . Please, no more. He’s no one. Just some mule who brings it up. Pays for his own use. He’s just a mule. That’s all.”
Dexter gave him the name and told Vance where he could find him.
“Now you gotta get outta here. Please . . . I gave you what you wanted.” Tears ran down Dexter’s face. “Now just leave me. Please . . .”
Vance shouldered the gun, and for a moment he almost did leave Dexter be. After all, the guy would likely never walk in a straight line again anyway.
But then Vance stood there thinking for a minute or so, remembering all that had happened and why he was here. And what his vow was. His gaze bored deeply into Dexter’s helpless, pleading eyes.
“Can’t, son,” he admitted sadly.
He drew the gun over the dealer’s chest, who put up his hands and started muttering, “Please, no, don’t, don’t . . .” and turned his face away.
Vance said, “Sorry, just not the way it works here.”
He squeezed and the recoil lifted his arm all the way up to his shoulders. Dexter’s body jumped off the floor, his “Life Is Fucking-A Good” T-shirt with the winking smiley face on it pooling up quickly with blood.
“Someone’s gotta pay.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Carrie left the Exxon station with an envelope full of security tapes from the morning Martinez was killed. A camera had been focused onto Lakeshore, but the angle was wide enough to catch a view of vehicles driving toward the highway.
She drove back to headquarters by way of Avondale, where Mike Dinofrio lived. Whoever killed him had likely driven via I-95 and gotten off at the Riverside Boulevard exit. From there, it was another six or seven minutes to Avondale. Martinez and Dinofrio had been murdered within about thirty minutes of each other, and Carrie calculated it would have taken approximately fifteen minutes or so to get to Dinofrio’s given traffic and the time of day. Whoever had done it—either the person in the blue car or Steadman via taxi—would have needed to get there fast.