Lake Country (25 page)

Maya had opened her mouth to ply him for more when the connection snapped into place. A sick thrill crept into her belly. It felt like victory and defeat combined.

She said, “Did you just say bartender?”

“That’s what I said, darlin’.”

“You mean like the bartender they’ve got over at United Hospital?”

“What’s that, now?”

Maya felt her blood heating up. “You mean that bartender from the North End with his head busted? Is that the kind of regular old neighborhood bartender you’re talking about?”

For once, Buck Morningside lacked an immediate reply.

“What did you do, Morningside? Have a couple of your goons go to work on the poor bastard? Is that what you mean by knowing how to ask?”

There was a long silence. Morningside came back sounding noticeably less pleased with himself. “I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t know anything about any of that.”

To her amazement, Maya believed him. “I am so all over your ass,” she said.
“Darlin’.”

Before he could reply, Maya hung up on him, called Barnhill again, and told him everything she’d just heard. Morningside had been right about one thing: The detective was paying very close attention now.

“I’ll notify the state patrol offices in St. Cloud and Brainerd,” he said. “I want you to keep your phone ready so that we can keep track of your position. We’ll send you some company and see what this piece of work has to tell us.”

“He’s a piece of something.”

“Just tell me if you copied everything I said.”

“Oh, I copy,” she said. “Is there anything new on Barlowe and Potter?”

“Sorry?”

“Morningside talked about finding where Barlowe and Potter did their drinking. I’d say that makes them official, wouldn’t you?”

Between the strange look Justin Murdock gave her and the momentary silence on Barnhill’s end of the line, Maya got the distinct impression that she’d missed something.

Barnhill said, “Are you telling me you didn’t see your own station’s news report this morning?”

“I’ve been in a car.”

“So you have,” Barnhill said. “All right. Quickly. So that you understand who we’re looking for, and so that you can keep it in mind from here forward. Are you listening?”

“Listening and waiting.”

“Lily Morse called our hotline five minutes after receiving her morning newspaper,” Barnhill said. “Not long after you and I spoke at the restaurant.”

Maya’s breathing quickened. “Lily Morse called you?”

“We brought her in. Issued warrants on Potter and Barlowe as soon as we’d talked to her.”

“You’ve named
suspects
?”

“This is what I’m trying to explain, if you’ll listen to me.”

“I’m listening.”

“Barlowe and Potter are Marine Corps buddies. Both saw combat in Iraq. One of them’s a stress case, the other was kicked out over misconduct. Neither one of them has a regular job, and Potter has a criminal record. We’re still backgrounding these two, but I don’t like what we know so far.”

It felt surreal to hear all this. Maya couldn’t get past the irony. For the past six hours she’d wandering around inside this story, actively participating in it, and apparently she knew less about what was happening than if she’d simply gone home and watched the news.

But that wasn’t what disturbed her. “You said these guys saw combat?”

“Heavy combat, from what I understand.”

“Where and when?”

“Ramadi in ’05, according to Lily Morse.”

“Lily Morse gave you this information?”

“That’s right.”

Maya squeezed her eyes closed. She felt dizzy and realized she was holding her breath.

“Please don’t tell me,” she said, “what I think you’re going to tell me.”

“Barlowe and Potter served with Lily Morse’s son. Becky Morse’s older brother.”

“Evan,” Maya said.

“That’s right.” Barnhill paused. “Are we on the same page now?”

“Yes.”

“Keep your phone ready. And stay clear of these yahoos. I’ll be in touch with further instructions.”

After the detective hung up, Maya sat numbly in her seat, staring at her lap.

Then she straightened and slapped Justin Murdock around the shoulders. He flinched and swerved the car, and she stopped before he lost control and killed them both.

“Holy shit, why are you hitting me?” he said.

“Why didn’t you tell me about Potter and Barlowe?”

“You didn’t ask!”

“All this time we’ve been driving, you couldn’t have filled me in on the new stuff? Professional courtesy?
Personal
courtesy?”

“You were asleep!”

“Bullshit I was.”

“For like an hour,” Justin said, sounding thoroughly exasperated. “I figured you needed some rest. Damn.”

So maybe she’d nodded off a couple of times, Maya thought angrily. Five, ten minutes, tops.

Then why, now that she thought about it, couldn’t she remember them getting off I-94?

Jesus
, she thought.
I must be losing my mind
. She looked at Justin. He was shaking his head slowly, eyes on the road.

“I’m sorry I hit you,” she said.

“And I thought Kimberly was nuts.”

Maya looked out the windshield, noticing for the first time that Morningide’s Suburban appeared to be trying to put some distance between them. Justin was doing his best to keep pace. The little car’s engine whined as if in pain. She leaned over and checked the speedometer. They were doing almost 90 miles an hour. That was when she noticed the needle of the fuel gauge hovering just below the halfway mark.

“If we lose these assholes because we have to stop for gas,” she said, “I swear to God, I don’t know what’s going to become of me.”

Justin checked the gauge, glanced at her briefly, and put his eyes back on the road. “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “I can drive this thing from here to Winnipeg on half a tank.”

Maya sat back in her seat. She took in a deep breath through the nose, held it for a five count, and let it out slowly through her mouth. “I’m glad to hear that,” she said.

Justin kept his eyes in front of him. After a moment, he smirked. “How do you like my milk carton now?”

While Bryce cleared the rest of the house, searching the place upstairs and down for any sign of Darryl Potter, Toby stayed put with the girl and wondered what he was supposed to do.

She hadn’t made a sound since they’d first come in the door. She just sat on the floor where she’d tumbled off the couch, propping herself up on one hand. She kept staring at Barlowe, still lying where he’d dropped like a sack of potatoes ten feet away. The back of his hair looked dark and sticky where Bryce had clubbed him unconscious with the butt of his gun.

“Hey, I’m really sorry,” Toby said. The girl’s silence was making him nervous. “I didn’t mean to scare you, I didn’t want you to give us away, that’s all.”

She turned and glared at him with such penetrating hostility that Toby wished he hadn’t opened his mouth. He tried to start over. “You’re Juliet, right?”

She looked him up and down. “Who the hell are you guys?”

“We’re here to rescue you.”

She rolled her eyes and pointed at Barlowe. “He was rescuing me.”

Bryce came back then, and Toby had never been so glad to see him. Compared to Juliet Benson, the guy seemed downright companionable.

“Juliet,” Bryce said. “I want you to calm down. Can you do that for me?”

She turned her glare on him. “He needs medical attention,” she said, still pointing at Barlowe.

“Help is on the way,” Bryce told her. “In the meantime, I want you to listen to me carefully and do everything I say. All right?”

“Who are you?”

Bryce put his hands on his hips and surveyed the room, then the girl. “How much do you weigh?”

“
Excuse
me?”

“An indelicate question. I apologize.” Bryce propped his hands on his hips and judged her for himself. Then he grabbed the nearly empty bottle of whiskey from the low table and disappeared with it.

Toby stood there like a fence post as the girl pulled herself back up to the couch. Her feet were all bandaged, and she looked like hell. The place was a wreck. What had happened up here? When had Barlowe showed up? Toby liked the guy, and he hated seeing him on the floor like that. But what was he doing here?
How
was he here? And where was Potter?

Toby heard cupboard doors bang. Silverware rattled. In a minute, Bryce returned with a drinking glass in one hand, stirring a generous shot of whiskey with a spoon.

“Try this,” he said.

She looked at him like he was certifiable. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

“You’ll feel better.”

“What is that?”

“Medicine,” Bryce said.

“I’m not drinking that.”

Bryce tilted his head. “No?”

“Not on your life.”

Bryce shrugged. He turned and handed the glass to Toby. Then he went over to Barlowe, reached inside his jacket, pulled out his gun again, and pointed it straight down at Barlowe’s head.

“If you drink it,” he told her. “You’ll feel better.”

The girl’s eyes went wide. “Wait!”

Toby felt his heart jumping against his ribs like a terrified monkey. The fire in the fireplace seemed to burn hotter all of a sudden. The floor seemed to bend under his feet. Everything slid off kilter.

Bryce caught his eye, then nodded toward the girl.

Toby didn’t know what else to do. He went over and handed her the glass. She looked at him with pleading eyes. Toby didn’t know what to tell her. He didn’t know what was happening. The girl gave up on him, looked back at Bryce.

“Num num,” Bryce said. “Bottoms up.”

She sat without moving.

Toby jumped when Bryce thumbed back the hammer on the gun. It sounded like twigs crackling in the fire.

The girl took out the spoon and gulped the whiskey. She coughed and shuddered as it went down.

“There you go,” Bryce said, reholstering the gun under his arm. “Now. Let’s get you comfortable.”

*  *  *

They got the girl settled in the back bedroom. All the spunk had gone out of her, and she could barely walk on her hurt feet without help. When Toby eased her onto the bed, she promptly rolled over and curled up, facing the wall. He draped an afghan over her and followed Bryce down the hall.

“Dude,” he said. “What was all that?”

Bryce stopped over Barlowe, leaned down to make sure he was still breathing, then checked his pockets. He pulled out a wrinkled wad of folded hundred dollar bills and said, “Well, well.” He counted the money, then pressed it into Toby’s hand. “Here’s two thousand. I guess that leaves nine more. Sound about right to you, numbers guy?”

As Bryce moved on, Toby looked at the bills in his hand. They felt grubby. Touching them made his skin crawl. He almost flung the whole wad away from him.

Then he looked over at Barlowe and realized—now that he held the money—that he didn’t feel quite so bad for the guy anymore. He shoved the cash into his own back pocket, where it belonged.

“So I figure we’ve got about an hour before the boss shows up,” Bryce said. He checked his watch. “Give or take. Should be plenty of time to find out where the rest of your dough went. Meanwhile, I think we can agree, the last thing we need is a reliable third-party witness.”

Toby walked after him. “What did you give her?”

“Just a little sedative.” Bryce jerked a thumb toward Barlowe. “Found it in this clown’s medicine cabinet
yesterday morning. You know, I only lifted the stuff for personal recreation, but I guess it came in handy. See what I mean about things working out?”

Toby didn’t see what he meant about things working out. He didn’t see how this made the situation anything but worse. “Dude, you drugged her.”

“Who drugged her?”

“Fine, whatever,” Toby said, misunderstanding. “
We
drugged her.”

“Who says we did anything like that?”

“She will!”

Bryce shook his head. “If that girl remembers anything after the nap she’s about to take, I’ll be very surprised.”

He took off his coat, folded it over the back of the couch, and sat down in the scuffed leather chair. Looking at him in his T-shirt and shoulder holster, Toby realized that it was the first time he’d ever seen the guy’s bare arms. They looked like bundles of logging cable wrapped wrist to sleeve in tribal tattoos.

Toby said, “What if she does remember?”

“That’s the beauty,” Bryce said. “Even if she does, she doesn’t. No cop in the world is going to be able to accept her account over ours now. Not after everything this poor kid’s been through. And not with that shit in her system.”

Toby couldn’t find a way to argue with the guy. He had all the angles covered.

“The more her story differs from ours,” Bryce said, “the less they’ll be able to believe her. You and me, we haven’t been drugged. See what I’m saying?”

“I don’t know,” Toby said.

“There’s only two people on earth who can tell our
story, kid,” Bryce said. “It ain’t that bartender back in town. And it sure ain’t this clown on the floor with your dough in his pocket.” He spread his hands. “Only you and me, partner.”

At last Toby got it. Not just what Bryce was saying now, about partners, but what Toby had been wondering for hours, only hadn’t had the nerve to ask:

If Bryce had all the angles covered then what did he need a partner for anyway?

The answer was so simple it almost seemed stupid: Bryce didn’t need a partner.

He only needed a corroborator.

They were a lot alike that way, Toby realized.

“So what do we do now?” he said.

Bryce settled back in the chair. “Why don’t you go keep an eye on the girl,” he said. “I should be fine out here.”

Maya scrutinized herself in the visor mirror while Justin talked to Rose Ann on his phone.

It was hardly any wonder that people had been gaping at her all night long. She almost didn’t recognize herself. Her face was pale and her lipstick was gone. Her mascara had settled in dark half-moons beneath her bloodshot eyes, giving her a hollow, spooked-out look. Her hair was a limp, tangled mess. The unsettling image that came to her was the camera photo Barnhill had showed her, hours ago, of Juliet Benson staring up from the trunk of a car.