The Black Silent (9 page)

"She attacked me when you were out of the room," Frick cut in, "and he's obstructing the investigation. She got the criminals in the building. Is that enough for you?
I'm
the one arresting them, Crew; you're just taking them in. Stop tormenting yourself."

"That's a lie," Haley said. "You attacked
me."
She looked like she might attack Frick for real. Sam grabbed her arm. "I would never hurt Ben," she said more quietly.

When Sam nodded, she set her jaw and stopped talking.

"I can handle it," Crew said.

"See that you do."

Crew asked Sam to turn around and place his hands on the car. Instead of complying, Sam turned and walked toward Frick.

"Floating a badge on a cesspool is unseemly," Sam said, deliberately provoking Frick.

Frick squared on him and raised Sam's gun slightly. "I don't need to listen to—"

In a fluid motion Sam grabbed Frick's gun hand and struck a palm-up blow to Frick's nose, staggering him. At the instant of the blow Frick discharged Sam's Glock, the direction of the shot, which went wild, controlled by Sam's hand on the wrist. They struggled a moment and Sam twisted Frick's hand so that the gun dropped to the ground.

From the corner of his eye Sam saw Haley struggling with Crew, who was trying to enter the fray. Sam saw Crew's hand go for his pepper spray and Haley grab it and pull frantically.

Frick, still suffering from the blow, teetered, took a step back, and caught himself.

Blood poured from his nose, but he was tough and ready to fight.

As Frick tried to unholster his own gun, Sam gut-punched him and reached inside, closing his hand over the top of it. Frick doubled over, and Sam pulled the semiautomatic from its holster and threw it deep into the trees. Sinking to his knees, Frick managed to pick up Sam's Glock. Lightning fast, Sam grabbed Frick's gun hand, pulling it toward himself and pulling the barrel past his body. Incredibly, Frick seemed to let Sam do this. Using Sam's momentum, Frick directed the gun at Crew and fired.

The bullet hit Crew just above the groin and below the protection of his Kevlar vest.

Crew fell with a cry, then lay still in shocked silence.

Haley screamed and went for Crew's middle as if trying to stop the blood, but it was pouring out behind him through what Sam knew would be a gruesome exit wound.

Frick seemed to pause, perhaps shocked by his own success. Sam broke the pistol free and hammered Frick across the face, knocking him unconscious.

Haley was wailing and Crew was calling for his mother. For Sam it was one of the sadder moments in a life that had seen many such incidents. Crew arched his back, rolled his eyes, and died.

Gregory Taula, called "Khan" by everyone who knew him, sat behind a lifeless seafood bar and empty veranda overlooking the ferry terminal at Friday Harbor. He got the nickname when as a cop he killed a houseful of crack dealers after charging the place.

Another officer, a history buff, said he had the grit of Genghis Khan.

He'd been to the coffee shop next door and heard Sam's name a few times and various recitations of the story of Sam's gun and other stories about this quiet "man of mystery,"

including his "miracle recovery from the wheelchair" saga. Khan watched the few people coming and going to the coffee shop, most of them hippie types. He wondered where the Republicans went for coffee in this place. In his mind's eye he pictured this Sam sitting in the wooden chair, reading the paper or a book or God-knew-what-else, and he tried to imagine what he might be looking for up on this veranda. The more Khan heard about this man, the less he liked it.

After a time Khan saw Rafe Black walk into the coffee shop. He knew Rafe was following him, hoping to strike up a conversation and learn more about the job. All the men were curious. Seventeen of them had been flown in on two prop jets from Vegas, and that was a real happening. It said something very big was coming down. Only Khan knew Frick, and knew they were merely on standby.

Khan had issues with Rafe Black. Their mutual employer, Saber Strope, ran a string of Las Vegas strip clubs, some casinos with shabby interiors but a good return for the gamblers, and a small herd of escorts that were nothing more than careful prostitutes.

Rafe got involved with the girls on company time.

With a large mocha in hand, Rafe leaned against the railing on the front porch of the coffee shop—no doubt trying to get up the nerve to come over—trying to be cool. Rafe reminded Khan of Frick, but he was definitely "Frick lite." They were both taken by their own strange needs, which made them weak and sometimes irrational. Frick had a raw cunning that saved him, whereas Rafe just became obsessed with things. Still, Khan could use Rafe's old rage to get things done, and so he took the good with the bad.

Khan hadn't yet figured out what had fed the flames of Frick's madness. If it weren't for the extraordinary payday Frick was extracting from his corporate masters, Khan wouldn't have risked working on such a remote, large-scale operation under Frick's direction.

Suddenly Rafe sat bolt upright. He thought he'd seen a slight hand signal from Khan beckoning him over. He stared. Khan's eyes appeared veiled, even at fifty feet. Then he saw it again. The trigger finger was beckoning. Rafe walked down the stairs and over to the veranda.

Khan's shoes were stylish in a big-city way. The man always wore handmade shoes, Armani suits, fine jewelry, and drove a nice clean Mercedes instead of some pimpmobile. Today he wore a black T-shirt under a casual suit and a leather topcoat. It was completely out of place on this island, but Khan paid no mind to that. That was Khan.

"We got a nice little job here on this island," Khan said. "I need you to remember, Rafe, that you're a Strope man. If we get activated, you're gonna get a ton of money for this one, and so you gonna give it all you got, just like a good Strope man would."

Rafe nodded, knowing better than to smile.

"I've known the guy running this job, name of Frick, for quite a while. Tough son of a bitch. Pro. We gettin' top money for this, so we're gonna do it right. We have been on standby, but I figure we're gonna boogie soon."

"How do you know that?"

"I can smell it. Listen to me, Rafe."

Rafe looked him in the eye.

"Can't be too human, Rafe. Not this time. You gotta be cold and disciplined for this job."

The look on Khan's face made Rafe nervous, but he nodded. "If I gotta, I can eat a baby's eyes."

Khan smiled. "Bring your fork."

H
aley was screaming, but not quite hysterical. In a second or two, Sam had made a calculated decision. He wouldn't kill Frick in cold blood or kidnap him. But since Sam's own pistol was now a murder weapon, it was time to go.

Haley was still shrieking. Taking her by the arm, he led her to her car.

"Wait here," he said, putting Frick's own cuffs on him. The keys to the cuffs were on Frick's key ring and he promptly hurled all the keys into the trees. Then he half-ran, half-hobbled, his bad leg aching, to the building as best he could. Right at the door he met Detective Ranken. For a second the officer stared, obviously trying to determine why Sam was headed toward the building. Sam punched him to double him over, grabbed his hand in a disabling hold, and drew his pepper spray.

"No," the officer choked as the noxious stuff went in his eyes and down his throat.

It was an unusually bad reaction; Ranken curled up in a ball, focusing on nothing but the next breath and the fire in his eyes. It was an unfortunate way for Sam to continue the afternoon, but the worsening situation required that he access Ben's office. It took only seconds to gather up all the whale papers on Ben's desk, then a minute or more to get back to Haley's car.

Haley was talking to herself softly, asking why Frick did it. Tears were running down her face.

"Haley, I need you to focus on saving Ben and put everything else out of your mind until that job is done."

She managed to stop rambling and accepted a tissue.

"Crew was my friend," she said after a moment.

"When we get done with this, we will mourn your friend."

"How many times have you had to do this?"

Sam started the car and accelerated rapidly.

"Too many. I'm calling a friend in the FBI." Sam flipped open his cell phone and called Special Agent Ernie Sanders's personal cell phone.

Ernie answered on the first ring. "What the hell are you doing not calling through the office?"

"I have a real problem."

"You're supposed to be resting on a quiet island and learning about nature."

"Supposed to, yeah."

"So you took on another job?"

"Actually, the job is taking me."

"What's up?" Ernie sounded concerned.

"A bad cop, the guy you looked up for me, one Garth Frick, just fatally shot a good cop, a local deputy. Frick's trying to frame me and a young lady." Sam went carefully through the part of the story Ernie had not yet heard, ending with his best guess at the situation: Haley, Ben, and he were now serious threats to Frick and the Sanker Corporation, and Ben's valuable research was the motivating item.

As he spoke to Ernie, Sam decided on a destination: Haley's house, which was an easy walk to Ben's.

"How the hell can you get into something like this just kicking back?" Ernie asked.

"Trouble always finds me, I guess."

"Sanker is a legitimate business, isn't it?"

"Don't know," Sam said. "But Garth Frick's as bent as you hinted."

"How much does it look like you did it?"

"Superficially, a lot."

"But forensics will support you?"

"Forensics may or may not help, but the truth is the truth."

Emie sighed. "You know I can't jump in and take over a local murder investigation, especially in a matter of hours. Let's see . . . to get federal involvement, you could file a civil rights complaint. Even then we'd have to follow procedures."

"You can call the local dispatcher and get one of the sheriff's deputies on the phone. Tell him it's crucial not to let Frick control the evidence," Sam proposed.

"I'll try, but I'm afraid it's a long shot. Had you considered just turning yourself in to the staties?"

"I'm on an island, Ernie. There are no state police, and Frick's running the locals.

Sheriff's gone, undersheriff too. I'm guessing the timing's no coincidence. That's why they took Ben Anderson this weekend."

Emie said nothing for a moment. "That could be a problem."

Frick's head hurt, and his face had taken some serious damage. His jaw was swelling out of control, but his mind was clear despite the pain. He made his way down the hall of the main office building and lab complex, hands still cuffed, headed for Ben Anderson's office. Jim Ranken walked along, helping to steady him, his pepper-sprayed face red, his eyes looking horrible and still runny. Frick's hands were still cuffed behind his back and he swore unremittingly about the whereabouts of the bolt cutters.

Supposedly there was a spare set of keys to the cuffs in the glove box of Frick's car, but they weren't there. An officer finally arrived with bolt cutters large enough to cut the tempered steel.

It had been almost thirty minutes; Ranken seemed to be breathing again.

"Make sure every available man's out looking for Haley Walther's car," Frick said.

"They are. I think maybe . . ."

Ranken seemed to be struggling for words and it irritated Frick.

"Spit it out."

"Maybe we should call the state attorney general."

"What the hell is the AG gonna do on a holiday weekend? Nothing. We've got two detectives working and about a dozen deputies."

"The AG could give us advice," Ranken said. "They could bring in the state police."

"I'm not gonna have the state police screwing up this investigation before I get the foundation laid."

"But we always—"

"I know what we always do," Frick said. "And I know why we're gonna wait until Monday to do it. In the meantime I can round up a bunch of cops from the mainland and some off-duty state police to help out."

"I—I don't think the sheriff ever conceived of a situation w-where you would be in charge of full-time regular deputies," Ranken stammered.

"Let's review." Frick's words came out like bullets. "A special deputy has whatever powers the sheriff confers. In my case I have full powers. This is logical because I'm an ex-homicide detective. Further, all Sanker matters are assigned to me. This involves a Sanker scientist disappearing from the Sanker facility. Two-oh-one would be next in charge after the undersheriff. He called dispatch and said I was in charge until he returns. So what don't you understand?"

"But you were involved in a shooting," Ranken said. "Crew's dead, for God's sake. And how are you getting off-duty cops in here that fast?"

Frick stopped cold, realizing he was going to have serious trouble with Ranken. "What the hell are you saying?"

"I'm saying you . . . we are parties to this shooting. You're a material witness. We can't just continue to pursue this case alone. Another jurisdiction should be keeping the evidence, not us. That's procedure. Bringing in outsiders to work for us is not."

Frick got directly in Ranken's face. "Robert Chase killed a San Juan deputy! You want me to stop pursuit of a murder suspect?"

"I'm just saying—"

"You heard Sergeant Finley on the phone. It's my investigation and that's an order. Go outside and help get it done."

"You're not going to take those papers from Anderson's desk without a warrant, are you?"

"I'm gonna take any damn thing we need." Frick realized he was losing it. He stepped back. He needed to be careful. "I'm going to follow the law, Detective. Now get the hell outside and help."

Ranken did as he was told, but he had Frick worried. Frick was pretty sure Ranken had questions about who had really shot Crew. He might have even seen part of the scuffle.

Frick began looking for the papers from the model blue whale. It took about ten seconds to realize that they were gone.

He closed his eyes and tried to breathe. Sparks, like fireworks, streaked across the inside of his eyelids. He felt a sort of anger like he hadn't felt since the day he'd beaten the commissioner with a baseball bat. As the commissioner writhed on the floor, in his bloody gray suit, Frick had turned him into a bag of broken bones.