The Killing Game (17 page)

Chapter Eleven

Luke walked over to his coffeemaker and poured himself another cup. He kept a pot going all day when he was in the office and generally managed to make it to the bottom before quitting time, which tended to vary dramatically, depending how many cases he was working on. He also had a bottle of rum stored in a bottom desk drawer, but he was a beer man, so he only brought it out to share with the occasional client.

The coffeemaker had shut down hours before, so Luke placed his cup in the microwave and zapped it for two minutes. It came out hot as Hades. He carefully took a sip, trying to avoid burning off the top layer of his taste buds, but he couldn’t abide coffee unless it was blistering. Something about a one-time ex-girlfriend who’d poured him a cup and said, “Lukewarm. Made for you, sweet thing.” She, of course, was long gone. Anyone who called him
sweet thing
and/or made a play on words of his name would be long gone. Luke’s motto was get real or get out. He’d bent that rule with Iris to unwelcome results.

His cell phone rang. He checked the caller ID. Speak of the devil . . .

He almost didn’t answer the call, but that was the chicken’s way out. Hitting the Answer button, he said, “Hello, Iris.”

“Well, you don’t have to take that tone,” she replied. “I’m calling to give you some good news.”

“Yeah? What’s that?”

“Corkland isn’t pursuing Bolchoy any longer. Not enough evidence, and well, the Carrera brothers haven’t been screaming for your old partner’s head. Guess we’re all just getting along.”

“Kinda figured as much, after the hearing.”

“Just thought you’d like to know once and for all.”

“Thanks,” he said. Actually, it was a relief, though Bolchoy would still give his right arm to be back with the force.

“Want to catch a drink tonight for a belated celebration?” she asked lightly.

He’d been ducking her calls the past weeks. The last thing he wanted was to start something up again with her. When his thoughts turned to women, they went to Andi Wren. Their relationship was a nonstarter in the romance department, but she’d affected Luke more than any other woman in recent history. Whatever happened there—good, bad, or indifferent—he knew he wasn’t going to backslide with Iris just because it was convenient.

“I don’t think it would be a good idea,” he said.

“Now what does that mean?”

“I’ve got a lot to do, and I don’t know when I’ll be free.”
Bock, bock, bock, you chicken. Just tell her!
“Iris, I—”

“What the hell, Luke,” she cut him off angrily.

“I want us to be over.” There.

“I just asked for a drink. God.” She was fuming.

“Yeah, well. No. I’m out.”

“Fine. Be a bastard.”

The click in his ear sounded final and he hoped that was truly the case. With Iris, it was hard to say.

His cell rang in his hand and he gazed at it with a certain amount of trepidation. The number was familiar, but it took him a moment. Helena. She’d made the colossal mistake of attempting to kidnap Emily. Just what he’d told her
not
to do under any circumstances. But no, Helena had driven with her to Los Angeles, ostensibly to save her from being taken by Carlos back to Colombia. But it had turned out that Carlos was just part of the picture. There was another man in LA Helena had taken up with. He was a Hollywood producer—
uh-huh, tell me another one—
who was on the verge of putting together a blockbuster film, and it seemed Helena had dreams of being an actress.

But Carlos had learned where his wife was and had dutifully gone down there and picked up both Emily and Helena. He’d brought his wife back, kicking and screaming, apparently. Luke had learned of the fiasco from Carlos himself, who’d come into Luke’s office and calmly asked Luke if he was having an affair with his wife. Luke had told him no, that he was in a business arrangement with Helena. Carlos had put two and two together and said quietly, “So, she is sleeping with someone else again,” and left Luke mildly alarmed. He’d phoned Helena and told her Carlos had been to see him, but she wasn’t interested in talking to him. She believed he’d been the one to sic Carlos on her and the producer, though Luke had had nothing to do with it, and wasn’t interested in listening to reason. She’d snapped, “I’m not paying you,” before she ended the call, just in case he’d had ideas about going after her for the two hundred dollars she still owed him. Luke had let her off the hook. Sometimes it was in everyone’s best interest to just walk away. So, now she was phoning him . . . ?

“Luke Denton,” he answered.

“You bastard! You told him where I was again!” Helena shrieked.

Called a bastard twice in the space of a few minutes.
Luke generally considered himself an affable kind of guy and was immediately annoyed. “Told who? Carlos? I had no idea where you went.”

“He hired you. He told me he went to see you. And now he’s pressing charges, you fucking asshole. I’ll have your license for this!”

“One: He didn’t hire me. Two: If he had, he would have been afforded the same confidentiality I gave you, so if I had known where—”

“He had me
arrested
. He was just waiting for a reason to get me out of the picture and you gave it to him!”

“Nope.”

“What am I going to do?” she wailed. “You’ve got to help me. You owe it to me!”

“Take a breath, Helena. And put your listening ears on. Carlos did not hire me. He asked me if I was your lover and I said no. He’d already brought you back from LA. That whole idea that Carlos was going to kidnap your daughter? That was a story you gave me. You tried to use me to prove you had a reason to take her first.”

“How do you know this? It’s not true!”

“I know people in law enforcement and the DA’s office. You wanted a credible ally. That’s why you hired me in the first place.”

Silence. He could hear her rapid breathing. She was quick to anger, quick to blame, quick to fight. Iris was cut from the same cloth, which said something about him that he wasn’t sure he liked. Maybe that was why Andi had affected him so much. She was calm. She was an observer. She had yet to blame him for something beyond his control, and that in itself was worth its weight in gold.

“I’ll find a way to make you pay,” she threatened.

“Helena, Carlos is a good guy. You can’t make him out to be a Colombian gangster and expect everyone to believe you just because you say it’s true.”

“You’re all the same!” she spat, and then she clicked off as well. This time he feared the finality he hoped for was a distant dream.

He was back at his laptop, writing up the final report for Helena even if he never gave it to her, when his cell phone rang again. This time he recognized the number immediately because he’d been calling it every week for the past six weeks. “Luke Denton,” he answered.

“Mr. Denton, it’s Peg Bellows.”

Her voice held a modicum of reluctance, something he often encountered when people knew they were returning the call of a private investigator.

“Hello, Mrs. Bellows. Thank you for calling me back.” He kept his voice neutral. Now that he finally had her on the phone he didn’t want to scare her by sounding too eager.

“I’ve been unavailable.”

“Sorry about all the messages. I’m in the middle of an investigation and am trying to interview people who’ve had dealings with the Carrera brothers.”

“You don’t have to be shy about it, Detective,” she said dryly. “I know who you are. You want to put the Carreras away.”

Remembering Bolchoy’s warning that she’d been attracted to the brothers in the beginning, he said carefully, “I know you talked to my partner, Roy Bolchoy, after your husband’s death.”

“Do I think Brian Carrera killed him? You bet. Is there something I want to do about it? No. I just want to be left alone. I don’t want any further involvement.”

“I understand, but—”

“Do you? Understand? I doubt it. I put my trust in them and Ted died because of it. Sometimes I can’t even . . . speak . . .” she said, her voice tightening. “The enormity of it all, and it’s my fault.”

“I don’t think that’s entirely true,” Luke said softly.

“You’re wrong. It
is
entirely true. I urged Ted to go on the boating trip, and I knew Brian was going to put the pressure on to sell. I hate this cabin. I wanted to sell. I begged Ted to listen to them. They were offering a good price.”

Luke was getting a different picture than he’d been told. “But Ted didn’t want to.”

“He suffered from nostalgia. His grandfather built the original cabin and, after a fire, his father rebuilt it into what it is today. Ted wouldn’t touch a nail to renovate, so here it remains. The place I’ll most likely die.”

Anger, he thought. Very likely forged from guilt. “Would it be possible to talk to you in person? I promise I’ll be as quick as I can.”

There was a long pause. He really thought she would refuse him. It hung in the air like a dark threat. “I saw you on the news,” she finally said. “When you were interviewed at your partner’s hearing.”

On the steps outside. He hadn’t been the warmest interview. “I was worried about Bolchoy’s chances.”

“I applauded you. Pauline Kirby is an overbearing bitch.”

“Ah . . .” He cleared his throat, fighting a smile. Maybe Bolchoy had been right. She’d seen him and taken his side against the shark reporter.

“I suppose you can come to the cabin,” she said doubtfully.

“If you would prefer to meet somewhere else . . . ?”

“No. I’m not going anywhere, so if you want to stop by today, just give me a time.”

He looked at the clock. Noon straight up. “Two o’clock?” he suggested.

“You know the address?”

“Yes.”

“Then I’ll see you at two, Mr. Denton. And it’s Peg,” she added.

“And I’m Luke,” he said.

“Luke,” she answered carefully, as if trying it out.

He clicked off, thought about it a second, then reached for the phone to put a call through to Andi. He hesitated with his thumb over her number on his favorites list. It would be better to wait until after his full interview with Peg. He was rushing. Eager to let her know he was making progress on his mission to bring the Carreras to justice. But was he? He had no idea really what Peg Bellows could offer him.

He warred with himself for a few minutes, then grabbed his jacket and headed out into a crisp October afternoon. He would get lunch and go over the case notes he’d written out for himself, part of which were the questions he wanted to ask Ted Bellows’s widow. Preparation. The type of writing he was best at.

She’d been broken after the fate that had befallen her and had retreated from the world. She was proud and alone and refused to be coddled, even when coddling would have fulfilled his own desire to play the hero. He wanted to protect her, wanted to be the one to make her safe, wanted to shine in her eyes....

“Total crap,” he said aloud as he climbed into his truck. Picking up his cell, he punched in his brother’s number. Dallas didn’t answer, so he left a voice message, “Just so we’re clear. I’m not writing any goddamn book.”

* * *

September walked out of the squad room and through the door to Laurelton PD’s reception area. She passed by Guy Urlacher, who slid her a look as she exited the front doors. Guy was a stickler for protocol and had intimidated September with his strict rules when she’d first been promoted to detective. He never intimidated Gretchen, however, who did as she pleased and told Guy he could do many colorful things to his body should he really demand she sign in and out every time she entered or left the building. Over the last year September had become inured to his stiff and small ways and had adopted some of Gretchen’s chutzpah. Now there was a silent, cold war brewing between them, but at least he’d stopped sliding the clipboard her way and demanding her signature.

She was alone and intent on interviewing Grace Myles, Tynan Myles’s mother, at Maple Grove Assisted Living. Weeks had passed since she’d planned to contact the elderly woman to see what, if anything, she could glean from her memory, weeks when she and Gretchen had been drawn into other cases, both of which were Wes and George’s, but for one reason or another on which they’d needed extra help. Gretchen had actually gotten a pot thrown at her by the infuriated husband whose wife and girlfriend had been cheating on him. She’d deflected the missile but not the hot soup it contained and she’d ended up with a scalded arm.

September had helped unravel what had truly gone down among the three of them along with Wes, Gretchen, and George who, true to form, had spent most of his time in the squad room rather than doing legwork. She and Gretchen had helped be Wes’s “partner” while George rode his swivel chair. Lieutenant D’Annibal had seen what was happening, but so far nothing had changed, and because no big cases had come along, the relationships within the squad room were status quo ... except that Wes’s feelings about his partner had taken a slide down the scale. He’d moved from mildly annoyed to pissed off to out and out angry with George.

They were all on edge, actually. Talk of cutbacks had reached the department, and being the newbie, September knew her job would be axed first. She honestly didn’t know what she would do, if that were to happen. She was as attached to her job as if she were already a lifer. And she knew, even though she’d been a media darling for a while, that it wouldn’t cut any ice if and when jobs were cut.

So, Gretchen was with Wes, interviewing several eyewitnesses to a knifing outside a sports club in downtown Laurelton, while George was working the phones and following up on the background of the prime suspect. September hadn’t been needed on the case, so she’d gone back to the list of Aurora Lane residents she’d compiled, anyone who’d lived in the houses over the last thirty years. It was discouraging how little people remembered or knew about the Singletons and/or the eighteen-year-old male whose bones had been found in their basement. She’d worked the phones and walked Aurora Lane and generally bothered people to the point where none of them wanted to talk to her or anyone from the Laurelton PD any longer. Gretchen had tried her own brand of bullying with even less productive results. More interviews with Fairy and Craig had seemed to only confuse them, so for all intents and purposes, she was back at square one.