Redemption (A Joe Burgess Mystery, Book 3) (44 page)

"We got a no-knock warrant?" Kyle said.

"No-knock. Nighttime. You name it. We've got an el primo warrant here. All the bells and whistles. Cars, trash, outbuildings. Boats and boat houses. Some really clever cop drafted this one and some really indulgent judge signed it."

"A policeman's dream," Kyle said.

"Stan? You wanna take Terry's car and go home?"

"Like hell. You guys are not leaving me behind. What's the matter? Don't trust me?"

"Oh, please," Kyle said in a high, fluting voice. "Don't let's start that."

"Start what?"

"You boys stop it. The both of you. If you want to come along, come along. Is either of you up to driving?"

"Oh, yeah," Perry said, "Like you would be, old man, and we wouldn't?"

"Shut up, Stanley," Kyle said. "We're good, Joe. Be nice to find some coffee, though."

They grabbed coffee at an all-night gas station, then drove to the cottage. They left their cars tucked out of sight across the street and follow Burgess down a gravel drive. The rain had finally tailed off and the wind had dropped, leaving behind a chilly stillness that smelled of lake water, decaying leaves, and wood smoke.

The door to the attached garage was unlocked. Parked inside were Claire's silver Mercedes SUV and a dark, older-model American car. A hand on the hood showed the Mercedes engine was still faintly warm. Kyle noted the plate number on the American car and moved away down the drive to call it in, while Burgess and Perry checked the interior. There were dark smudges on the wheel that might be blood, and similar smudges on the seat. No way to know if it was the driver's blood or someone else's.

Kyle returned with a succinct report. "Belongs to one of the Libby's neighbors. Likely stolen. Not yet reported. I called Lovering, gave him a heads up. Let's check the exits."

Before they explored the house, they checked their weapons. They'd tried to keep their guns dry, but safe was always better than sorry. Rain could make a gun stick in its holster. Make things slippery and unreliable.

Gun check done, they fanned out and circled the house. Along with the door from the garage into the house, there was a front door, and, in the back, a series of sliders opened onto a broad deck facing the lake. No lights were visible at the front of the house. When they met at the back, they found lights blazing through the windows, the big, high-ceilinged room lit like a stage set.

On that stage, a dramatic play was in progress. At one end of the room was Mary Libby, pointing the .22 in unsteady hands at Claire. Claire perched stiffly on a wood chair, her fingers curled like claws over the chair's sides. Her ever-perfect dark hair was mussed and she looked sullen and furious. On the floor between them, his back propped against the stone fireplace, was a large man in dark clothes, his wrists and ankles cocooned in duct tape.

All the stage props—overturned chair, broken vase, and scattered books and papers—suggested a struggle. A bloody wound on the man's head, a curled-up rug, and heel marks and a blood trail across the blond wood floor said Mary had surprised Kevin Dugan elsewhere, and dragged him in here. Not an impossible feat for a woman used to hefting sacks of grain and bales of hay.

The man was speaking, loud enough to be heard clearly through the open slider. He was angry, and his voice carried the shake of a bad-ass tough guy realizing he might be on the losing side. Bullies like Dugan were usually cowards. "Look, lady, I don't care what she's told you. I had nothing to do with what happened tonight. I'm just staying a few days with my friend Joey. That's all."

"Like you were
only
staying across the hall from my brother-in-law Reggie until he ended up dead?" Mary's normally gentle voice snapped. "Pardon my French, but that is bullshit, Mister Dugan, and you know it. For the last time, I'm asking you to explain what you were doing at our farm tonight." Her voice had the weary ring of finality as she raised the gun. "In detail. Including what she"—the barrel swung toward Claire, who flinched—"had to do with it."

"Let heaven and nature sing," Kyle whispered. "Go, Mary Libby."

"I'll settle for letting Dugan sing," Burgess said.

He'd expected Mary would go to Portland. Maybe Joey had said something in the car before they'd pulled her off. Maybe it was woman's intuition. She'd sensed that Claire, like a spider crouching at the edge of its web, waiting for victims, would be waiting here to receive a report of the night's work from Dugan. Wanting to know for sure that she could get her hands on Reggie's last asset. She wouldn't have wanted him coming to her house. He understood then what Joey had meant. Claire hadn't so much wanted the property
for
Joey as she'd wanted it
from
Reggie.

"Have you ever been shot in the foot?" Mary lowered the barrel until it pointed at Dugan's. "I've heard you have about seventy bones in your foot." Dugan flopped like a fish, trying to wiggle away. "All those little bones shattered? It's very painful."

"Look," Dugan's tremor had morphed into a whine. "It's not me you want. I'm just the hired man, okay? I just did what she told me to." He jerked his chin toward Claire.

"Shut up, you idiot!" Claire snapped. "Just shut up. You don't have to tell her anything. She's not really going to hurt you. She's just a sweet little farmer's wife. She hasn't got it in her to—" She shrieked as Mary put a bullet into the floorboard.

"My husband is missing, Claire. My dog is dead, and I know you're behind all this. Would you like to see just how sweet I can be?"

Burgess wanted to watch the characters play their parts and hear the plot revealed. To see Claire's entitled arrogance fade into understanding, her lies segue into confession. He wanted to watch Dugan spill his guts, as the lousy piece of shit was clearly preparing to do. But he was a cop. He wasn't supposed to let one person to shoot another, no matter how justified the shooter was or because he was overhearing good information. That was the freakin' job.

"Talk to me." Mary sent another bullet into the floor an inch from Dugan's foot, kicking up a shower of splintered wood.

"Hey! Jesus! Take it easy!" he yelled.

"We have to do something," Burgess whispered.

"In a minute," Kyle said. Beside them, Perry stepped back away from them, getting ready to move when Burgess said go.

"She said no one would think twice," Dugan said. "It was supposed to look like an accident. She said that old wino was just a waste of air and space who'd never done anything in his life except make her miserable. She never said the old fucker would be such a scrapper. He just wouldn't go easy. Took all I had to hold him down in that tub, me and that artist she hooked me up with. Not that he was much help. Asshole had to get pissed before he could do anything." Dugan hesitated and Mary got a look, like she was thinking of shooting again.

Burgess shifted and Kyle put a hand on his arm. "Not yet. Let him talk. Mary wants to hear this, too."

"Old man just gives me this look, ya know," Dugan continued, "and he says, 'You're doing all this for nothing, you know. You tell Claire she's doing all this for nothing. It's too late.'"

Dugan shook his head. "He knew what it was about." He jerked his chin toward Claire. "You want to shoot somebody, shoot that bitch. She said it was gonna be so easy. She gives me money. I get rid of the old guy. She gets the land. Mercer doesn't have to worry about a lawsuit. Everybody's happy. Only she stiffs me, doesn't she?"

The look he gave Claire was so venomous she scrabbled with her feet on the floor, moving her chair away. "Dugan," she said. "I'm warning you. Just shut up."

But Dugan wasn't shutting up. "If you're looking for people to shoot, why don't you shoot that artist, Goodall. He was the old guy's fucking friend, him and that crazy witch. Then she goes and sets him up, and her husband and me, we do the deed."

"Don't believe him, Mary. You can tell what sort of man he is. He'd say anything." Claire's voice was wheedling, shrill. "Come on, Mary, you know things between Reggie and me were over long ago."

Dugan shot a savage look at Claire. "Not so over you didn't want him dead. You still owe me twenty-five thousand dollars, lady. You or your friend Mercer."

"You were supposed to take care of him," Claire said, "
and
bring his brother around. Both. That's when you get paid."

"Take care of
him
. That was the deal. I won't even charge you extra for tonight's work. That didn't quite go as planned. Your kid, see, kinda got in the way."

But Burgess had focused on what had Reggie said. "You're doing this for nothing. It's too late." He flashed on something Maura had said about their trip to Cape Cod. Her dreamy smile when she said "a honeymoon. Just like a regular couple." He tried to remember the language of the trust documents. Was it just for Joey, or did it mention spouse and offspring? If Reggie had
married
Maura, would she acquire any rights?

Claire's scream recalled his attention. "You what? You hurt Joey?" She jumped up. "Oh my God! Is Joey all right?"

The gun rocked unsteadily in Mary's hands. "Sit down, Claire," she ordered. Her set face and taut body told him how badly she wanted to shoot.

"I'm going," Perry said, fading slowly into the dark.

"Your precious Joey turned into a whiny pain-in-the-ass just because I killed that dog," Dugan said. "He's like you, doesn't give a damn about what happens to people. Only tonight, he went soft on me. First he says I can't hurt his uncle, then gets all goofy over a freakin' dog. The fuck did he think we were there for? A tea party?"

"What did you do to my husband?" Mary said. She stepped closer, aiming the rifle at his crotch.

Dugan grinned like he was daring her to shoot. A maniac's grin. Crap like Dugan couldn't help bragging about their bad acts. Guy keeps his mouth shut and no matter how sure you are of what they've done, you can't lay a finger on 'em, but they have to talk about it. Like being a low life POS was a badge of honor and half the pleasure was watching decent people's horror at their acts.

"A little persuasion." Dugan grinned at Mary.

"You didn't kill him, did you?" Claire wailed. "I said convince, Kevin. Convince. He's useless to us if he's dead. You're such a moron, you—"

He had to break this up. Dugan was going to provoke her until Mary shot him. "Terry. We—"

"Mary won't shoot before he's finished. She wants to hear this." Kyle said, a firm hand on his arm.

Burgess was seeing a young Reggie, dazed and weeping, sitting in his apartment, face stark with pain. Reggie, never complaining or confessional, out at the end of his rope. "I'd do anything for her, Joe. Heck, I
have
done everything for her. Changed my major. Seen a shrink. Taking all these drugs, while she takes everything I give and just looks disappointed. When the drugs make me hurt, make me gain weight, make me sluggish and dull, she complains I'm not the man she married. We talk. We agree. She does whatever she wants. What the fuck am I supposed to do, Joe?"

Reggie, wanting so desperately to do right. To be normal, saying, "She doesn't want me. Just some idea of me. Now she's pregnant, when she swore she wouldn't. When she knows I'm not ready. She's like one of those insects that mates and then bites the male's head off."

Reggie had been right. It had just taken Claire a long time to finish biting.

He dragged himself back to the present, turning to tell Kyle to move, to get in there and arrest them before—to hell with Mary—he shot them himself, when sudden pain hit him, starting in his chest and running down his arm. Searing, breathtaking pain that filled his body with burning acid. He couldn't move. He couldn't breathe. The world gone black except for Claire Libby's twisted face.

Was this a heart attack? His career ending here in this soggy back yard, the investigation into Reggie's death unfinished, Maggie's letter unanswered, his unknown son ignored?

For what seemed like an eternity, he was stuck there, battling the gasping pain as he stared down that black tunnel at Claire, the heartless monster who had set all this in motion. Then Kyle's hand landed on his shoulder, gripping hard, Kyle's voice sharp and urgent in his ear. "Don't do it, Joe. Jesus. Joe. Don't!"

God, he hurt. He was on fire. Fuck his career. He should have done this a quarter of a century ago. If he had, Reggie would be alive. Maybe even healed. If he'd only acknowledged Claire's evil. He couldn't pull back.

Kyle's fingers dug in, shaking him. "Goddamit, Joe. Drop it."

Burgess saw the gun in his hands. Leveled. Steady. Aimed right at Claire. And wrenched himself back from the blackness. It took all his willpower to lower the gun, the effort feeling like he was breaking every bone in his arm, the pain of it starting tears in his eyes. He had always known she was a coldhearted bitch. He'd never comprehended the depths of her evil.

"What Dugan just said sounded like a confession to me," Kyle said. His hand stayed on Burgess's shoulder, fierce fingers biting right through the layers. "Come on. Goddamit! Put that gun away."

There isn't a cop alive who doesn't know how it feels to come close to shooting someone. A shooting that feels absolutely justified in the moment. Burgess closed his eyes, dizzy with emotion. Cops didn't get emotional. He should go sit in the car. Let them handle this. Get the hell out of here before he screwed this up for everyone.