The mist had begun to lift, ragged white fingers reaching toward the sky, then evaporating. The long grass of the fields became clearer by the moment. Cork glimpsed a slender figure sprinting from the farmhouse, a figure with long, dark hair, wearing a yellow sweatshirt, carrying a rifle, and making hard for the south end of the field.
He got on the radio, tried to raise Killen or McGruder, got no answer. He left the Pathfinder and gave chase.
The mist was spotty, heavy in some places, almost gone in others. The long grass was still wet with dew and slapped at the cuffs of his khakis. He cut at an angle he calculated would bring him to the fleeing figure somewhere near the fence at the end of the field. Behind him, the gunfire had ceased completely.
Barbed wire edged the field. When Cork reached the fence, he saw that the figure had stopped. The rifle lay against the wire as the figure bent and spread the strands to slip through. Thirty yards back, Cork went prone in the tall grass, put the stock of his shotgun to his shoulder, and sighted. The mist still lingered between Cork and the fence, but the yellow sweatshirt made an easy target.
“Police,” Cork shouted. “Raise your hands.”
The figure let go of the strands, surprised. A hand shot toward the rifle.
Cork hollered, “Don’t touch the weapon.”
The figure ignored him, swung back, and pulled off a round that went high and wide.
“O’Connor,” Rutledge shouted from somewhere behind Cork.
The figure at the fence corrected its aim, pointed the barrel above the place where Cork lay, and sighted toward Rutledge’s voice.
Cork fired. The figure took half a step back into the fence, then crumpled to the ground, leaving an arm snagged on the wire, raised as if in surrender.
Lydell Cramer’s sister and Harmon LaRusse were killed in the exchange of gunfire at the farmhouse. The dogs, too. The man in the mist whom Cork had shot, Carl Berger, was taken to the hospital in Moose Lake, where he was listed in serious condition and in no shape to be questioned. Rutledge had no doubt that these people were involved in the rez shooting because, in addition to the marijuana operation in the barn and nearly a kilo of cocaine and a sizable stash of crystal meth in one of the farmhouse bedrooms, the sheriff’s people found a cache of weapons that included a Savage 110GXP3 fitted with a Leupold scope. Rutledge sent the firearm to the BCA for a ballistics comparison.
It was going on two o’clock when Cork rolled into his parking space at the Tamarack County Sheriff’s Department in Aurora. A little more than eight hours had passed since he’d said good-bye to Jo and the children, but it felt like days. He was bone tired, and the relief that came with finding the rifle that had probably been used in the shooting at the Tibodeau cabin was tempered by the memory of two bodies lying together in the front hallway of the farmhouse in a pool of their mixed blood. They’d made the choices that had brought them to that end, but always in the stillness after violent killing there was a hollowness inside Cork that held no sense of victory or justice or right, only the empty absolute of death.
Ed Larson joined him in his office, along with Dina Willner. The windows were open to a quiet Sunday afternoon. A slight breeze out of the southwest kept the skies fair and the temperature pleasant. Beyond the little park that Cork could see through his window, the bell tower of Zion Lutheran was etched like a white tattoo against the body of the town.
“When will we know for sure?” Larson asked.
“Simon said he’d pull strings to get the ballistics done ASAP, so maybe tomorrow or the next day.” Cork sat forward, rubbed his lower back. He opened the top right drawer of his desk, pulled out a bottle of ibuprofen, and tapped out four tablets.
“Let me get you some water for that,” Dina said. She went out and came back with a paper cup filled from the cooler in the common area.
“Thanks.” Cork popped the tablets in his mouth and swallowed them down with the cold water.
“Headache?” Larson asked.
“Back,” Cork said. “Wrenched it when I dropped to a firing position out there in the field.”
Larson glanced at Dina. “We might have something that’ll make you feel better. Something on the Jacoby killing.”
“Yeah? What?”
“Tell him your part first, Dina.”
Willner wore a tight black sweater and formfitting black jeans that Cork figured she had to grease herself down to slide into. She looked good and fresh, as if she’d had plenty of sleep, something Cork envied.
“I went to the North Star Bar last night,” she began.
“Another session with the push-up bra?” Cork broke in.
She ignored him. “I talked with a dumpy guy behind the bar, name was Leonard. He told me that on the night Jacoby was murdered, Lizzie Fineday was out but came back in around midnight beat up bad. Her father took her upstairs, then came down a short time later and went out, moving like a man on a mission. He wasn’t back for closing, so Leonard had to do it by himself, which he says is unusual. Fineday always insists on closing.”
“You got all this with a push-up bra? I may have to start wearing one.”
Larson piped in. “I finally caught up with the night clerk at the Four Seasons. He told me that around eight or nine on the evening Jacoby was killed, Lizzie Fineday came into the hotel looking for him. He wasn’t there, so she left a note.”
“He didn’t happen to see what the note said?”
“No such luck. But Jacoby comes in around eleven, gets the note, heads right back out.”
“Think it’s enough to bring her in?”
“It’s thin,” Larson said. “Especially since we’ll have to go through Stone to get to her. But that’s not all.”
He nodded to Willner, who brought from her purse a little Baggie containing several cigarette butts.
“I did some Dumpster diving late last night,” she said. “When I was in the bar the other night, I’d noticed that Lizzie chain-smokes. In the Dumpster, I found a bag of trash that had some mail with her name on it, and these cigarette butts. Doesn’t absolutely mean they’re Lizzie’s, but her father doesn’t smoke, and even if he did I doubt he’d be wearing lipstick, so it’s a good bet they’re hers. We’re sending one of these and one of the hair samples taken from Jacoby’s SUV for a DNA match.”
“That’ll take time.”
Dina shook her head. “We’re not sending it to your BCA lab. We’re using a private lab in Chicago. Flying it out this afternoon. We can have the comparison in forty-eight hours.”
Cork looked at Larson. “You okay with this, Ed?”
“It might not stand up in court, but if it is a match, it’ll give us plenty for a probable cause pickup and hold. It’ll get us past Stone.”
“Lou Jacoby’ll foot the bill?”
“Of course. And he’s supplying the transport. Tony’s already in the air on his way here. ETA in about an hour.”
“Jacoby’s private jet? We’ll have to get down to Duluth for that.”
Dina shook her head. “He’s going to land at the local landing strip.”
“The jet?”
“A small plane.”
“All right,” Cork said. Then to Larson: “You ever connect with Arlo Knuth?”
“Not yet. Every briefing I ask the watch to keep their eyes peeled for him, check all the usual places. Nothing so far.”
“You know Arlo. He can make himself scarce when he wants to.”
“But why would he want to? That’s what I’m wondering.”
“You don’t really think he had anything to do with Jacoby’s murder, do you?”
“No, but I’m thinking he might have seen something that scared him into hiding. I’d like to know what.”
“Stay on it.”
“You know I will.”
With the cigarette butt and the hair sample in an evidence envelope that had been sealed and signed by Ed Larson, Cork drove Dina toward the county airfield, which was located in the little community of Flax on Lake Margery,
three miles south of Aurora.
Flax consisted of a few private cabins, a combination restaurant and gift store called the Cozy Caribou Cafe, and a small gas station with a garage and mechanic, all situated within hailing distance of the lake and the airstrip. Cork parked near the cafe, and they got out and wandered toward the airfield. It was a simple affair, a single landing strip, a small control tower, several corrugated buildings that housed the local planes. The sky was blue and almost cloudless-a perfect sky for flying, Cork thought.
“So, you think Lizzie Fineday was with Eddie at Mercy Falls?” Dina said.
“Sure looks that way.”
“Do you think she killed him?”
“If she was doped up and freaked out, I suppose I could see it.”
“Know what I think? It was her old man. He went ballistic when he saw what Eddie had done, went to Mercy Falls, and killed him.”
“Couple of things about that bother me. Why did Eddie hang around Mercy Falls after she left? And why didn’t he put up a fight?” He gave a single shake of his head. “I’m laying odds it was someone who surprised him, someone he didn’t expect, or at least didn’t expect to have a knife.”
“So you’re back to Lizzie.”
“Not necessarily. I think there was someone else out there, someone with a colder heart than Lizzie has. I just don’t know who or why yet.”
Dina checked her watch just as the drone of an engine came out of the sky to the southeast. “Right on time.”
A plane appeared above the treetops, circled, and made its approach from the north. It touched down, and as it rolled off the runway onto an apron near Cork and Dina, the prop ceased to spin and the engine fell silent. Tony Salguero stepped out. “Sheriff O’Connor. Dina. I hope I haven’t kept you waiting. You have the freight?” he asked.
“Here.” Cork handed over the sealed envelope. He looked at the plane while Salguero signed the receipt. “The Jacobys own a fleet?”
“The jet is Lou’s,” Salguero said. “This baby is all mine. I built her myself.”
“How’s Lou doing?” Dina asked.
Salguero inspected the envelope. “We buried his favorite child this morning, but you know Lou. A mule could kick him and he wouldn’t grunt. He simply takes it out on everyone around him.” Tony looked toward the Cozy Caribou Cafe. “I need something to eat before I head back. How is the food here?”
“Reasonably priced and mostly deep-fried,” Cork said.
“Perfect.” Salguero began long strides in that direction.
They sat on the deck in the cool air of early October, the only ones outside. The waitress was reluctant to seat them there, but Salguero insisted.
“I have been cooped up for hours,” he explained with a stunning smile and Spanish accent.
Cork never drank on duty, but he decided that, having handed off the evidence envelope, he was done for the day. He ordered a beer. So did Dina.
“A hamburger, bloody,” Salguero told the waitress.
“We don’t serve them rare anymore. Health reasons.”
Tony closed the menu and held it out. “I will sign an agreement. If I get poisoned, it’s my own fault.” The waitress didn’t take the menu or put anything down on her pad. Salguero finally tossed his hands up. “All right, cook it any way you please, just make sure the beer is cold.”
“Beer?” Cork said. He looked toward the plane Salguero had to fly back to Chicago. “Should you be drinking?”
“I have flown hundreds of thousands of miles, Sheriff, without a single incident. But tell you what. If I crash I will make certain it is into an empty field.” He smiled pleasantly.
“Have you flown long?”
“My father had his own planes. He flew himself everywhere, to the pampas, the rain forest, wherever he had investments. From the time I was a young boy, I dreamed of flying.”
“The pampas?”
“I am from Argentina. Buenos Aires.”
Cork said, “How long have you worked for the Jacobys?”
“Five years. But I’ve known them most of my life. My father and Lou Jacoby are old friends.”
“So you know them well?”
Salguero grinned, showing beautiful white teeth. “What do you want to know?”
“Everybody keeps referring to Eddie as Lou’s favorite child. Near as I can figure, he was mostly a son of a bitch.”
“No, Sheriff. He was a bastard. Born out of wedlock. That is no secret. But I also think he was born out of love. Eddie’s mother was the true treasure of Lou’s life, and I think that when he looked at their son, what he really saw was Eddie’s mother. Would you not agree?” he said to Dina.
She shrugged. “That’s one explanation. I’m more inclined toward the sick-puppy theory myself.”
“What’s that?” Cork said.
“Lou’s other children have done just fine in their lives, become responsible adults. If Lou died tomorrow, they’d probably grieve but they’d be fine. Eddie was like a sick puppy, always needing Lou. But I think in his way Lou needed Eddie just as bad. Maybe, in fact, that’s why Eddie never really grew up, never learned how to be a responsible man. Lou never gave him the chance to be one.”
The waitress delivered the beers.
“I think I will have that burger to go,” Tony said. “And do you have a men’s room?”
“Inside.”
Salguero followed her in.
Dina sipped her beer. “This is good.”
“Leinenkugel’s. Local favorite.” He took a swallow from his bottle and looked where Salguero had gone. “So. Argentina. A story there?”
“Tony’s family had money,” Dina replied. “When the Argentine economy collapsed, they lost it all. Pretty simple.”
Salguero returned just as the burger was delivered in a paper sack, along with a tab for the food and the beers. He threw money on the table.
“Your beer is on Lou,” he said. Then to the waitress: “Sorry if I gave you a hard time, miss. I have a long trip still ahead of me.”
She smiled into his handsome face. “You were no problem at all.”
He picked up the evidence envelope and the burger sack and started toward his plane.
“Need to gas up?” Cork asked.
“There is an airport in Wisconsin midway that I use for that purpose.” He opened the plane door, tossed the envelope and the sack inside, then looked back at Cork. “I don’t know what it is that I’m taking back, but I hope it helps to find the person who killed Eddie.”
“I’m sure it will.”
Cork stepped away as the engine kicked over and the prop began to spin. Salguero swung the plane around and took off into the wind. He circled back, tilting his wings in salute as he flew over.
Cork said, “Lost a fortune and now he flies for the Jacobys. He seems to take it well.”
“Doesn’t he,” Dina said, watching as the plane disappeared into the southeast.
27
He dropped Dina at her car in the Sheriff’s Department lot, then went home.
He couldn’t remember the last time the house had been so empty. The air felt close, smelled stale, and he realized that he’d left without opening the curtains or lifting the windows. He spent a few minutes going through the rooms doing just that. On the desk in Jo’s office, he found notes she’d scribbled to herself as she’d scrambled to rearrange her schedule. He sat in her chair and felt the slight indentation that over time she’d left in the cushion, and he thought how small her hips were and how good they felt pressed against him in bed. On the floor in Stevie’s room lay a sheet of paper, crayons, and a pair of scissors. Stevie had drawn a crude face on the paper and colored it green. For Halloween, he wanted to be the Hulk and he’d been trying to make a mask, but his work had been interrupted. In the living room, lying open on an end table next to the sofa, was a book Jenny had been reading, The Beet Queen, her place marked with a tarot card that held the image of a skeleton. In the kitchen, as he passed Annie’s softball glove hanging on
a hook by the back door, he leaned to it and breathed in the smell of oiled leather. His family had been gone less than a day, but they’d left behind silence and a deep, painful loneliness that Cork was glad he would not have to endure for long. Every man’s life ought to be about something, he believed, and he was comfortable with the knowledge that his was about family.
But so was Lou Jacoby’s, apparently, a man Cork didn’t admire in the least and with whom he felt he had little in common.
He didn’t know what to do with that, so he let it go. He was exhausted, hungry, and couldn’t get out of his mind the image of Carl Berger’s right arm hung up on barbed wire. He went upstairs to shower, hoping it might refresh him a little. He thought that afterward he would go to the Broiler for dinner.
Half an hour later, as he was coming downstairs, the doorbell rang. When he opened the door, he found Dina Willner standing on his front porch, a grocery bag in one hand and a twelve-pack of Leinenkugel’s in the other.
“I figured after the kind of day you’ve had, you might need a little company,” she said. “So I brought dinner. Hope you like New York strip.”
Cork’s surprise probably showed on his face. “I don’t know, Dina.”
“Look, you just relax.” She squeezed past him into the house. “I’ll do the cooking. Just show me to the kitchen.”
She twisted the caps off two beers, handed a bottle to Cork, and drank the other as she worked. She started charcoal going in the backyard grill and wrapped garlic bread in foil so she could heat it over the coals while she grilled the steaks. Then she began to prepare a salad of assorted greens, red onion, and avocado. She talked the whole while, pleasantly.
“People around here think a lot of your family.” She took a long draw on her beer and tore up lettuce. “They tell me your father was the youngest sheriff ever elected in Tamarack County. That true?” She glanced at him, her brows lifted questioningly above her attractive green eyes.
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