No Way to Die (21 page)

I smiled. “Probably a smart thing,” I said. I nodded to the storeroom. “You guys are busy.”

“We’re swamped,” he said. “Obama’s got everyone scared to death.” He smiled broadly. “As a businessman, I love it.”

“Why are people buying now?” Toni asked.

“Because they’re afraid if he gets reelected, he’s going to shut gun sales down.”

“Do you believe that?”

He shrugged. “Not particularly, but I’m glad my customers do.”

“Spoken like a true capitalist,” I said.

“Damn straight. Make hay while the sun shines, right?”

“That’s what I’d do,” I agreed.

“Good,” he said. “So aside from offering interior design tips and political wisdom, what can I do for you?” he asked.

I pulled out the copy of the sale report that Inez had given us and handed it to Grant. “Take a look at this and see if it rings any bells,” I said.

He took the report and studied it for a few moments.

“Uh oh,” he said. “I don’t like where this is headed.”

“Do you remember this guy?” Toni asked.

“Yeah, I do,” Grant said. “He’s the guy who shot himself a few weeks ago, right? I recognize the name.”

“Do you remember him otherwise?”

He nodded. “You bet. He came in here because some shithead was bothering his girlfriend. He was worried for her and wanted to get her set up. Like the report here says, we sold him a Smith &Wesson M&P360.”

“Do you remember who it was who helped the guy?” I asked. “If it’s okay with you, we’d like to talk to that person for a few minutes and see if he or she remembers anything.”

“That’s easy,” he said. “It was me. See, that’s my signature here.”

I nodded. “We saw that, but we weren’t sure if that meant you were signing on behalf of the store—basically approving the sale—or if you were the one who actually handled the sale.”

“The latter,” he said. “What you said last, there. I worked with the guy.”

“And what do you remember about him?” Toni asked.

“Well,” he said, “he brought his girlfriend in with him.”

“Do you remember what the girlfriend looked like?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he said. “She was pretty cute. Bright red hair, big tits—oops.” He turned to Toni. “Pardon me.”

She smiled. “No worries. I’ve heard the expression.”

Grant was describing Holly Kenworth perfectly. “Do you remember her name?” I asked.

“Let me think,” he said, leaning back and staring at the wall. “I remember it was different.”

“Does the name Holly ring a bell?” Toni asked.

“That’s it!” he said. “Holly.”

“And they seemed like they were a couple?” Toni asked.

“Well,” he said, “I presumed as much.” He thought for a second, and then said, “I mean, it’s not like they were hanging all over each other, nothing like that. But I figured a man brings in a good-looking girl like that, he’s either trying to impress her, or he really cares for her and is worried about her. Maybe that’s all it was.”

“No matter,” Toni said. “We can figure that out later. Do you remember what happened here in the store? Anything they might have said?”

“Yeah,” he said. “As I recall, this guy said that his girlfriend—I’m not sure he used that term—anyway, his girlfriend was being threatened by an old love flame who didn’t want to accept the fact that she’d moved on.”

“They seemed sincere?” I asked.

“Absolutely,” Grant said. “I told him he was right to be concerned. You hear over and over how some scumbags harass their former wives or girlfriends. They laugh at restraining orders. The way I see it, if some idiot’s too fucked up to be able to control himself and stay away from a woman—even if it means risking jail—then that’s the kind of person you need to watch out for.”

“Makes sense to me,” I said. “So they came in asking for some way for her to protect herself.”

“Actually,” he said, “they came in asking specifically for a Smith &Wesson M&P360 .357 Magnum and four boxes of Federal LE Hydra-Shok Hollow Point cartridges.”

“They knew to ask for that?” I asked.

“Yeah. That’s what struck me—that and the fact that the girl was good-looking. They didn’t seem to know shit about firearms, but they’d obviously done some homework. I mean, the girl actually had a list. She said they wanted a simple-to-use, powerful handgun, so they’d picked the S&W .357. For what they described, I couldn’t argue with them. Stone simple, very powerful.”

Indeed. A .357 round actually has more power than my .45, even though the .45 has a bigger diameter bullet. I don’t like shooting .357s, though, because I don't like the heavy trigger pull. Besides, they recoil so hard that it feels like shooting a cannon. They kick like a mule. I never had a problem with stopping power on the .45, and it doesn’t recoil so dramatically. I don’t need anything more powerful.

“So they come in, ask for a .357, and you sell it to them, right?” I ask.

“Let me see,” he said. He used the reference number from the sale report and entered it into a search function on his own computer. A second later, a copy of the actual sales transaction appeared.

“Yeah, that’s pretty much it,” he said. “That and the ammunition, and it looks like a Bianchi holster.”

“And Thomas Rasmussen is the one who paid?”

“Yep. MasterCard. Like I said, I thought he was buying it as a present for her.”

“And you ran the NCIS check?”

“Of course. He checked out fine. He didn’t have a permit, so he had to wait the five days.” In Washington, if you have a valid permit to carry a concealed weapon, you’re exempted from the five-day waiting period from the time of purchase to the time of delivery. Otherwise, you have to wait. “He came back in by himself a week later and picked up the gun.”

“Did they get any range time?” Toni asked.

“Yeah, I recall they did. After the purchase was confirmed, I took them over to the range. I walked them through the basic safety steps, showed them how to operate the gun, that sort of thing. Pretty simple gun, really.”

“Were they able to do it?”

“Well, it was just her. The guy didn’t shoot at all.”

“Okay, was she able to handle it?”

“I remember now—I’d have to say no, she wasn’t up to proficiency standards when she left.”

“How’s that?”

“Well, you know that the .357 is a beast.I think she was scared of the gun. For that matter, after the first couple of rounds, I’m not even sure she had her eyes open when she fired it. She did this thing where she’d aim, then kind of look away and start to close her eyes, then fire. She actually put a hole in my ceiling.”

I laughed. At a range, the bullets are not supposed to hit the floor, not supposed to hit the ceiling, not supposed to hit the walls. They’re only supposed to hit the backstop. Despite this, most ranges are marked with the scars of bullet wounds in the floor, the ceiling, and the walls—mostly from the newbies.

“I thought it was too much gun for her, and I told them this,” he said. “I thought that a .380 or a 9 mil would make more sense, but they insisted. They said they understood and that she would come in and practice. Actually, I know plenty of ladies who shoot a .357 with no problem, but it’s not usually their first firearm. I told her that if she needed to use it in the meantime, just cock it with her thumb, hold on tight with both hands, and let her fly.”

“Use it single-action, then?” I asked. You didn’t technically need to cock the gun before you shot it.

“Yeah. If you cock it first, then the trigger pull is way lighter. It’s a lot easier to shoot, especially for the ladies.”

I nodded. “And is that the last you saw of them?”

“Let me see.” He checked his database. “Well, I can say for certain that he didn’t join the range as a member. He might have come in without joining—we allow people to do that, but we don’t keep records of it. And as for her, what did you say her last name was?”

“Kenworth,” Toni said.

He looked the name up on his computer. “Nope—no Holly Kenworth, either.”

"I hate to ask," he said, "but was this the gun Thomas Rasmussen used to kill himself with?"

"I'm afraid so," I said.

"Damn," he said. "I've been here seven years and this makes three times now. I hate this part of it."

"Guns are a tool," I said. "Most of the time, people use them the right way. Every now and again, though, they get misused. It's not the gun's fault. It's not your fault, either. How many hundreds - thousands of guns have you sold in the same period that were used correctly?"

"Yeah, I know," he said. "Still, it sucks."

I nodded as I stood up. We shook hands. "We really appreciate your help,” I said.

“Not a problem,” Grant said. “Say, on a happier note, how’s that Les Baer I sold you working out for you? Still running like it should?”

“It’s great,” I said. “Not one single malfunction to date.”

“Perfect,” he said. “Just the way it’s supposed to be.”

We said our good-byes and hopped in the Jeep.

* * * *

Our next appointment was at three thirty with Inez Johnson. On a case that has any police involvement at all, I don’t like to go too long between briefings. I don’t want them starting to wonder what we’re doing. Most police officers are suspicious by nature. The best way to avoid feeding those suspicions is to keep them completely “in the loop.”

We had to hustle to cross back over the 520 floating bridge (now up to $20 in tolls for the day).I didn’t figure the meeting would take long, as we were still in the first week and had yet to uncover any real “smoking-gun” type evidence yet. We
did
have a potential conflict between Holly’s testimony and those of Katherine, Stella, and Jonas. We
did
have a potential motivation with Madoc Secured. We
definitely
had an interesting underlying motivator in the Starfire Protocol. But we didn’t have anything solid yet.

We entered the police department’s sixth-floor lobby at three thirty, just as Inez was walking in to greet us. We said hello, and she took us back to her office.

“Detective Johnson,” I said, “do you mind if I start off our briefing by asking you a question?”

“Go ahead,” she said.

“We bumped into a fellow named Nicholas Madoc. He said you gave him our name—you told him we were investigating Thomas Rasmussen’s death on behalf of the family. We wanted to confirm this.”

“Yes, that’s right,” she said. “Two men showed up the day before yesterday and said they were considering offering to help the family—apparently they’ve got some kind of business connection. They asked who they should talk to, and I told them to talk to you. Why? Is there a problem?”

“No,” I said. I told her about Madoc and the strange actions of MST. We also told her about our meeting with Dr. Valeria, with John Ogden, and with the personnel from ACS.

She listened to the report. “Well,” she said, “you’ve been busy. Thank you for the update. I hate to cut you short, but I've had another meeting pop up that I have to attend. I guess we can short-circuit this meeting by you answering one question. If you were me, would you reopen the case?”

“No,” I said quickly. “So far, we have hunches and notions. But do any of these things mean that Thomas Rasmussen didn’t commit suicide? That he was murdered? No. Not yet, anyway.”

“There you are, then,” she said, rising to her feet. “I think you two need to keep digging. Meanwhile, I see no reason to reopen the case at this point.”

“We’ll keep you posted,” I said. “Our suspicions are what you might call ‘growing.’ I think we’re starting to feel like there could be something behind Thomas Rasmussen’s death other than a suicide. If we get anything stronger—”

“Then you give me a call,” she said.

“Right,” I nodded.

I hadn’t expected anything else, but we’d done our job. Five minutes after we arrived, we were through. At least we were cleared from having to report in for the next week or so.

* * * *

We pulled into the parking lot at Logan PI at four thirty. By five, everyone was pretty much wrapped up. We met in the lobby on the way out.

“Kenny Hale,” I said, “a quick question before you take off.”

“What?” he asked.

“Did you happen to leave a message on the door last night with directions for the delivery man?”

“Ah—no,” he said hesitantly. This was a surprise. I turned to Doc.

“Doc?”

Before he could answer, Kenny jumped back in. “I mean, no, it wasn’t for the delivery guy.” He leaned over and pulled a crumpled paper from the trash can by our receptionist desk. “It was for my friend Dale.” He handed me the note. I read it aloud: “Dale—will be at company anniversary party at Merchant’s Café this evening. Please leave disk next door. I’ll get it in the morning.”

“That would do it,” Toni said.

“Do what?” he asked.

“Did you stop to wonder how Madoc knew where we were last night?” I asked.

“You mean—”

“Yep. They came to our office and read your note.”