Injustice (14 page)

I walked over as Henry put Barn down by the shore of the lake, and in the cool autumn dusk, the three of us threw stones into black water.

T
ina was quiet for most of the drive back to the city. I was blissed out with the feelings of a weekend with family. It was so great having Lizzy and Ethan there, having Henry along as one of us, and then to find Toby so unexpectedly summoned into my heart and mind. I felt happy, and I wondered if Tina and Henry were able to experience happiness yet. Tina didn't seem like herself, but I hoped time would eventually work its magic.

I couldn't tell if she was asleep or not. Her eyes were closed and we didn't talk and she didn't change out CDs, but she was restless, changing positions a lot, trying to get comfortable. At one point I thought she was awake and I said softly, “Great weekend, wasn't it, babe?” but she didn't answer.

We approached the city: exit ramps, lane changes, towering streetlamps above the interchanges lighting up the car.

Tina sat up. “I'm not happy,” she said.

“About what, babe?”

She brought her feet up onto the seat, put her arms around her knees, and laid her head on her knees, facing away from me. “Us,” she said.

I tried to get more out of her, but she kept her head turned away from me and said, “Another time, Nick. We'll talk. I just don't have the energy right now. I shouldn't have said anything.”

I hardly slept. I couldn't think how to approach Tina about her unhappiness. Chip called me at six in the morning to say that Jimmy Mailing was dead. Dorsey had just called him. Police had found
Mailing's car, and a body they presumed to be Mailing's, in a parking area at Rokeby Park.

“Got to go,” I told Tina, and I was out the door. I stopped at a drive-through for coffee, and then drove to the park. It wasn't at the amphitheater but at a small gravel lot at the far end of the park. A car had been driven off into the trees, where it was concealed.

My Glock was in the locked glove box. I left it there. I'd have felt silly carrying it with all the
real
cops around.

Yellow tape was already strung; the evidence response team had just arrived. Chip pulled in behind me. Dorsey briefed us: An early-morning runner had called it in. The police ran the plates, which came back registered to Mailing, who was still wanted under a federal contempt warrant for not appearing at the grand jury.

Dorsey and I approached the car, a small SUV. I'm not really used to crime scenes. I attend them only when they relate to an active case I'm involved in or when, as with Lydia, I happen to be in the neighborhood. At this scene, as with Lydia's, I was comforted to find Dorsey at my side.

The body was tipped over sideways across both front seats. There was blood spatter on the windshield and dashboard. I couldn't see the face from where I stood.

“Mr. Mailing is known to you?” Dorsey asked.

I turned away, pretending to clear my throat because I felt that reflexive constriction of throat muscles. I retched quietly, but nothing came up. “Yes, he was known to us,” I said. “But are we sure this is really Mailing?”

Dorsey said, “Do you recognize him?”

There was a lot of blood. He was lying on his right side, and I could see the entry wound behind his ear. The guy's face—what I could see of it—looked out of shape, probably from dying on his side like that. His mouth sagged toward the seat, which was black with dried blood. I couldn't really see what he looked like, so I walked around to the passenger side and peered in through the windshield: narrow face, short dark hair. “Pretty sure that's him,” I said.

Chip came over and looked.

“We'd better have a sit-down,” I said. “Your guys and mine. Assume Mailing was killed because of things he knew.”

Chip left. I stayed and watched as the crime scene techs did their work. I couldn't tell whether they found anything significant. They got the body into the coroner's van. Dorsey was alone for a moment, so I said, “What's it look like, Captain?”

He shrugged. “You saw what I saw. Doesn't look like there was a struggle, does it? Probably a prearranged meeting. Killer approached the car to talk, then pulled the gun and killed him.”

I called Janice, my assistant, and asked her to set up a meeting with Upton and Chip and anyone else Chip wanted involved. Sooner, the better.

It was still early when I left the crime scene. I drove over to the FBI and took my Glock into the basement, where I dotted the paper target with holes. I was getting better: several shots to the head and heart, a few to the organs and extremities, and only a couple off into the wild blue.

Janice called back and said the joint meeting on Mailing's murder would be held at the FBI in twenty minutes.

I went up to the conference room. Chip was there with his colleague, Special Agent Isler, and their boss, FBI Section Chief Neidemeyer. Upton came and so did Pleasant Holly. Dorsey showed up; though it had gone all federal, the troopers had responded to the murder this morning.

“Let's make this quick,” Neidemeyer said.

It was quick. Isler led the discussion. He said that Jimmy Mailing was reputed to be Billman's chief errand boy. “Mailing probably had the most knowledge of who was getting paid to do what.”

The Bureau had no physical evidence pointing toward anyone, but based on motive and reputation, they had two suspects in mind. The first was Subsurface's VP for operations, reputed to have fanatical loyalty to Billman. The second was a state senator known to be way too cozy with Subsurface and Bud Billman.

Neidemeyer said, “Shall we ask these guys to come in and chat?”

“They're both under subpoena to the grand jury on the corruption probe,” I said. “If they know they're persons of interest in a murder investigation, they might be less forthcoming. Let's hold off.”

“Carry on, then,” Neidemeyer said. The meeting was over.

In the evening, I read Barn a story and put him to bed, then took ZZ to Rokeby Park. Back in July, I'd only pretended I was going for a run. I had felt compelled to be in the park at night, almost as if I could
undo
something—like, if I was there and prepared and willing, I could rearrange everything that had gone haywire. It was a passing feeling, long gone now, but I kept going to the park anyway; though I was helpless against the last bad thing, maybe I could head off the next one. I felt useless hanging at home while, out in the black beyond, the next in an inevitable sequence of bad things was swirling itself into existence. I pictured these things like the nascent hurricanes you see in satellite photos: an immensity, indiscernible up close but which, if you get far enough back to look down on the whole of everything, you can discern with absolute clarity. So I kept going out into the night with ZZ, and since I was going out anyway, I actually did start running. I'd never been a runner, but now I surprised myself by enjoying it. I would go running and then get home all sweaty, and I'd peel off my clothes and take a quick shower, feeling strong and youthful, feeling that I'd
done
something.

I ran. And on this particular night I picked at the idea of Tina's unhappiness. She was prone to phases. Of course she was unhappy. Her sister had been murdered. I had asked a few times since then if she wanted to talk. She always said no, in a voice implying that her discontentment had just been a momentary thing. I had let myself think things were mostly okay now. Except that I glimpsed it in her from time to time. I decided I should keep signaling my willingness to talk, but if she kept declining, it would do me no good to pester. She would feel beleaguered. No, it was better for me to quietly work on being more attentive, more present, more “wonderful.”

When I got home, I took my shower and went up to the office.
Tina was there, inhabiting the glow from her desk lamp, her back toward the door but the window above her desk making a mirror, as it always does at night. She looked at me, and I smiled and went over and kissed her on the head, then I settled into my cockpit. “How you doing, sweetie?” I asked.

She shrugged.

“We never finished talking,” I said.

She turned to face me, but I didn't see happiness or annoyance or melancholy in her eyes. She looked perplexed.

I hadn't been surprised the previous night, when she'd said she wasn't happy. I realize now, looking back on it all, that Tina has never been all in. No doubt she could give you a laundry list of reasons for her reticence, but the bottom line is that I have a way of irritating her. True, when life is calm, she's not as susceptible to being irritated, but when times get tough, she seems to find me less and less tolerable.

“You told me you were unhappy,” I said. “Maybe we should—”

“I didn't say I was
un
happy. I said I wasn't happy.”

“And there's a difference?”

“Huge.”

“Well, I'm available to talk anytime you want.”

“Maybe another time,” she said.

I
skipped work and went to pick Lizzy up in Turner. We drove through rural wetlands on our way to intercept the interstate farther to the south. It was early. Mist still lay on the surface of cattail marshes.

This was the first chance Liz and I had had to spend time alone since Lydia's murder. I was on my way to see a lawyer down near the state line a couple of hours away. Lizzy was along for the ride.

“Let's enjoy the morning,” Lizzy said. “There's a pullout a few miles up.”

I gave her a questioning look.

“Ethan and I drove down here a couple times to hike the Wishbone Trail,” she said.

There was so much about this girl that I didn't know. For the past few years she'd been spending more and more time at her mom's house because her school and all her friends were out in Turner, and because Flora's house has more privacy than mine. It might also have been because Flora's husband, Chip, is more laid-back than Tina.

I pulled into the wayside where Lizzy showed me. We parked facing the marsh and sat with the car doors open, drinking coffee from to-go cups and eating carrot muffins she'd baked.

“Good muffins,” I said.

“Liar,” she said, making a face at her muffin. “Maybe I forgot the sugar.”

Lizzy was being humble. She didn't forget anything. More likely she'd gotten the recipe from one of Flora's cookbooks that didn't believe in sugar.

I said, “You know, Liz, if you're not going traveling anytime soon, I might be able to use your help with a few things.”

“What kind of things?”

“Research things. Investigation things. I was thinking if—”

“Wait, shush,” she said. “Listen.” She got out of the car and peered off into the cattails. “Hear it?”

“Hear what?”

“Creak creak drip. Like an old pump.”

I listened. I heard it.
Creak creak drip
. “What is it?”