Last Ditch (10 page)

Beneath
the rim
of the table, Rebecca squeezed my knee. Hard. Using her nails. Years of
dating
the same woman had taught me to interpret a wide range of nonverbal
signals.
The nails were a dead giveaway. I knew this one. This was, of course,
the old
"if you start busting this guy's balls and make this take any longer
than
necessary, I'm going to disembowel you and feed your entrails to feral
swine" squeeze. No doubt about it.

Several
calls
to Jed's answering service had failed to turn him up, so I was on my
own. If
things kept up the way they'd been going, Rebecca was going to cripple
me, so I
decided to put an end to the banter.

"I
want to
make a statement," I said. "And then you can take Wessels here back
to the zoo." Nobody moved.

I
pointed at
the pencil on the table by his elbow.

"You
might
want to write this down, Sparky," I said. "I'm not going to be
fielding questions afterward."

Reluctantly,
Trujillo picked up the
pencil.

"You
ready?" I asked. "I'll try not to use any big words."

I
opened my
mouth to speak but stopped. An intermittent yellow light pulsed around
the
room. Wessels noticed too. He bumped himself off the wall, and we
walked out
through the archway and across the huge living room, with Trujillo and
Rebecca in hot pursuit. I opened
the front door and stepped out onto the porch. Not one, not two, but
three
mobile TV units were parked nose to tail out on Crockett Avenue in front of the
house. I
quickly stepped back over the threshold and slammed the door behind me.

"What
in hell
is this?" I demanded.

Trujillo
grinned and shot his
cuffs. "What
did you expect? This is the story of the century, Waterman. You're
about to
have your fifteen minutes of fame. You're lucky Sixty Minutes isn't out
there.
The man who found Peerless Price."

Wessels
began
humming "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance."

"We
don't
even know for sure it's Peerless Price," I countered.

I
knew it was
dumb the minute I said it, but I was way too pissed off to take it
back.
"It could be anybody," I added.

Trujillo
laughed. "Yeah, it's that
other
missing dude with the stainless steel hand."

I
started for
him, but Wessels got between us. I could smell scotch on his breath. I
leaned
out around him, shouting at Trujillo.

"Did
you
call those assholes?"

Wessels
pushed
me out to arm's length and showed me his palms.

"Lighten
up, fuckhead," he said. "We didn't call nobody. You better talk to
her." He inclined his head toward Rebecca. "You better talk to her
boss about that. Anybody called the press, it was him."

"Can
we
get on with this?" Trujillo
whined.

I
stepped
around Wessels-and put my face in his.

"What
you
can get . . . is the hell out of my house." I walked back into the
dining
room, retrieved his suit coat from the back of the chair and handed it
to him.
He draped it over his arm.

"Get
out.
I've got nothing to say to you. You want to talk to me, you call my
attorney
Jed James. He'll be back from Paris
on the tenth of the month."

I
pulled open
the front door. Wessels and Trujillo
stepped out into the night. Wessels fixed me with a long stare that was
supposed to make me soil myself and then headed for the street, but
Trujillo couldn't stand
it; he just had to have the last word.

"We'll
be
back," he said.

"Oooh,
stop it now, Detective Trujillo; you'll have me in such a tizzy I'll
have to
sleep with a night-light."

PAT
BEGAN TO
wheedle. "I'm sure Leo was under a great deal of strain. I mean it's
not
every day one makes that sort of grisly discovery in one's own
backyard, so to
speak." He flicked another look my way. "I'm certain that now that he
can see the spirit of goodwill inherent in this meeting, he will be
more than
happy to cooperate in any way possible."

Suddenly
all
eyes were on me. I took a deep breath.

"I
would
be more than willing to cooperate in any investigation that starts out
with an
open mind."

They
all began
to speak at once. I raised my voice.

"I
will
not, however, have anything to do with an investigation which blandly
assumes
that my father is in any way responsible for the death of Peerless
Price."

Emily
Morton's
throat had begun to redden. "What other conclusion could possibly be
drawn?" she demanded. "Considering the history of the two men,"
she continued, "considering your father's well-documented career as a
professional thug ..."

I
held up a
hand. "All we know for sure is when your brother disappeared and when
he
was found. That's it. As far as I'm concerned, everything else is
purely
speculation.''

The
four-part
choral protesting began anew, so I got louder.

"I
will
also refuse to cooperate with any investigation which is either
unwilling or
unable to respect the privacy of the people involved. This isn't a
sound bite
or a photo op. This is my life."

Emily
Price
Morton began a point-by-point recitation of my father's career. Pat
began to
make excuses. Forrester blabbered about the public's right to know.
Things got
so bad I wished I was doing yard work.

McColl
waited
for the din to subside. "I am given to understand that you have already
had an altercation with a member of the local media. Is that so?"

"I
invited
a couple of them to get off of my property."

"I
understand that you invited them . . . er . . . rather manually."

"I
thought
they were thieves. I was defending my property." Forrester couldn't
resist

"And
what
was it you imagined they were stealing?" Neither could I.
"My privacy."

Two
SECONDS
AFTER I slammed the door on Wessels and Trujillo,
the phone began to ring. I picked it up. She didn't wait for me to
speak.

"Leo,
it's
Bonnie Hart at KOMO. How about we—"

"Bye,
Bonnie," I said as I depressed the button.

Bonnie
Hart was
the afternoon host on KOMO 1000, Talk Radio Seattle. She was a nice gal
and
damn good at what she did. She'd had me on the show a couple of times.
I'd
never realized how difficult radio was until I got a chance to see it
for myself.
Anyone who thinks it's easy to stay spunky while conducting two-hour
interviews
with amateurs, all the while fielding phone calls from listeners who
sound like
they're talking with rented lips, ought to try it sometime. Believe me,
it's an
art. I felt bad about hanging up on her, but not bad enough to take my
finger
off the button. Didn't matter anyway; the phone began ringing in my
hand. I
lifted my finger, counted to three and pushed down again. Rebecca stood
in the
dining room archway.

"I
take it
we're going incognito," she said.

"Big-time,"
I said.

I
unplugged the
phone in my hand and then made my way around in the front of the house,
upstairs and down, dropping the Levelors, closing the drapes and
unplugging the
rest of the telephones. The phones were easy to find. They were all
ringing.

When
I got back
downstairs, Rebecca hadn't moved. "This is going to be a mess," she
said. "They're going to hound us."

"I
know," I said. "I don't know why but I feel like I ought to
apologize."

She
shook her
head.

"It's
me
who should apologize, Leo. I'm the one who wanted to live here. I'm the
one who
insisted. You never wanted any of this."

I
walked over
and gave her a long hug. I was still holding her when the darkness at
the back
of the house gave way to a bright white light She felt me pull back and
then
read the expression on my face.

"What?"
she said.

I
took her by
the hand, pulling her through the dining room into the kitchen. We
stood in
front of the sink, looking out into the backyard, where a TV cameraman
stood in
the middle of the area testing his lights. Closer to the house, on the
near
side of the old greenhouse, stood some guy with his back to us, a
microphone in
his hand, adjusting his sport coat and patting at his hair. I dropped
her hand
and started for the back door, muttering, "Son of a bitch."

"No,"
she said. "Don't go out that way. If you go out that way you'll walk
right
into the camera. Go out the side door."

She
had a lot
more experience ducking newsmen than I did. She was right I'd end up on
the
morning news red-faced with steam coming out of my ears, which was
pretty much
the last thing on earth I wanted. I reversed field and headed back
toward the
living room and the side door. "Leo," she called after me. I stopped
and turned back.

"Stay
calm.
Okay?" When I didn't answer, she said it again.

"Okay,"
I said.

"Promise."

I
took a deep
breath. "I promise to stay calm."

The
lights in
the street cast long shadows over the south side of the house. I stayed
off the
walk, instead moving as far to the right as possible, keeping my right
shoulder
against the hedge. I walked quietly until I was behind the cameraman
and then
crossed to his side in a hurry. No matter. The way he was squinting
into the
eyepiece, I could have been driving a bus.

"All
right," I said. "This is private property. You're trespassing, both
of you. I want you ..."

The
kid flipped
on the bank of lights mounted on top of the camera and started to turn
my way.

I
straight-armed the lens back in the other direction, nearly knocking
the camera
from his shoulder.

I
shook a
finger in his face. "You point that goddamn thing at me and you're
gonna
need a proctologist to get it back."

He
hesitated,
looking over at the other guy who stood slack-jawed, looking like he
was about
to swallow the wireless mike.

"Get
off
my property. Now."

When
the kid
swung the camera back my way, I reached out with both hands. With one I
grabbed
the plastic carry strap on top of the camera and jerked it from his
shoulder.
With the other, I took ahold of his hair, bending his head down by his
knees.

He
began to
scream. "Owww owwww Jesus owwww . . ."

I
kept him in
that position as I backed him up the walk and out toward the street The
brilliant lights bobbed all over the landscape like there was a prison
break as
I pulled him along. Rebecca was standing in the side door shaking her
head. I
pretended I didn't see her.

"Jesus
. .
. owwwww owwww . . . ""

By
the time I
slung him over the curb by the hair, he was a mezzo-soprano, emitting
notes
high enough to open garage doors. He rolled over once and came to rest
in the
sitting position. I got both hands on the camera and made a perfect
two-handed
basketball pass. It bit him right in the chest, bowling him over
backward,
driving the wind from his lungs. Even as he lay gasping like a
tubercular mule,
he never let the camera hit the ground. Good training, I figured.

Mr.
Newscaster
in the lovely black cashmere blazer was about halfway up the walk,
level with
Rebecca and heading my way. When I got close he began to babble into
the microphone.

"We're
here at the home of—"

I
reached over
and nipped the little black button on the side of the mike and then
jerked it
from his hand.

"Wait
a
minute now ..." he began.

I
jammed the
microphone down into the pocket of his blazer so hard that four inches
of it
protruded from the bottom. When he looked down at his jacket in horror,
I
reached out and grabbed him by the hair. The hair was thick, lustrous
and easy
to grasp. Unfortunately for him, however, it wasn't connected to his
head.

The
guy was both
smarter and faster than he looked. Before I could decide what to do
next, he
hotfooted it up the walk and disappeared into the darkness. I turned to
Rebecca
and smiled.

"Good
thing you stayed calm," she said.

I
held the
toupee out like an offering.

"Look
what
followed me home. Can we keep it?"

EMILY
PRICE
MORTON dabbed daintily at the comers of her mouth and then pushed
herself to
her feet. McColl, Forrester and Pat came up out of their seats like
they had
strings attached, standing now in front of their chairs like good
little
soldiers awaiting inspection. I stayed put.

She
swept her
eyes about the room and cleared her throat.