Certain prey

'I wouldn't be surprised if she's already down there,' Lucas said. 'Goddamnit: we were an inch short about five times in a row.'

'What about the woman in Minneapolis – Garmel Loan?' Malone asked. She ate her cheese sandwich in small, tidy bites, pausing every second or third bite to dab her mouth with a napkin; she looked like a history professor, Lucas thought, but an oddly sexy one. Maybe that somehow explained how she'd been married four times, but none of the marriages lasted. Maybe her husbands-to-be expected a nice, reserved history professor, and got an animal instead; or, maybe, it was the other way around.

'I need to lay in my bed and think about Carmel,' Lucas said. 'Maybe I could z out in the back of the car this evening, going back home. But let me ask you this: given what we have right now, how convincing a case could you make against

Clara Rinker?'

Malone rolled her eyes up, and to one side, thinking. After a moment, still silent, she scratched the back of her neck, and wiggled in her seat. Finally, she said, 'We could probably get her. Sooner or later; give us enough trials, we could get her.'

'But it sure isn't open-and-shut.'

'Not quite,' Malone said. 'We'll probably get some prints, sooner or later. Find something she forgot about. But even if we put them with the prints you got off that bar of soap, all we'd do was prove that she was in Minneapolis. We have a mountain of evidence, we just don't have any direct tie. But I think the mountain would get her. Given the right jury.'

'So the same evidence could be applied to somebody else – it's not impossible that Clara's the wrong person,' Lucas said.

'Well, it's pretty improbable.'

'But…'

'… not impossible,' she agreed.

'You've got a lawyer with your group, don't you? Besides you?'

'Couple of them,' Malone said.

'Would it be possible to send one up to Minneapolis – the smartest one – with the whole Rinker file, and get with one of our assistant country attorneys and make a case against Louise Clark? That she was the shooter? I mean, we found the gun, we found all kinds of evidence that she committed at least one murder; I'd like to see what other evidence we could put together from other cases. If there is any.'

Malone was puzzled: 'But you said that was a put-up job. Why would you want to make that case?'

'Because, just between you, me, and the doorpost, I know damn well that Carmel

Loan helped set up these killings. I don't know exactly why, although sex might have had something to do with it – or it might not have. Maybe it was money, or just for fun. But she's in it, up to her neck. And I can tie Carmel to Clark. If

I can make a case that Clark is the shooter, and I can tie Carmel to her, maybe

I could talk a jury into sending Carmel away.'

'Oh, man, I don't know – that doesn't sound overly ethical.'

'I ain't a fuckin' lawyer I'm just a humble cop,' Lucas said. 'So I don't know about ethics. But could you send a lawyer up? We can work out the details -the ethics – later.'

She was peering at him over the diner table, and said, 'I'm not sure I want to know the details.'

'But you'll send somebody up?'

'I guess.' She had one small crumb of toast sitting on the left corner of her mouth, and Lucas picked up her napkin and dabbed it off for her.

'You had a crumb,' he said.

She shrugged and met his eyes. 'The story of my life…'

Chapter Twenty-Five

Sherrill agreed with Malone. 'That is the goofiest thing I've ever heard.'

Black disagreed: 'How about the Tracy Triplets and the thing with the gourd? You said that was the goofiest thing you'd ever heard. That you'd never see that peak again.'

Sherrill's eyes stayed with Lucas, but she spoke to Black. 'Okay, this is the second goofiest thing I've ever heard. The Tracy Triplets are still first, but only because of the midget. If it wasn't for the midget, this would be goofier.'

Lucas wasn't smiling. 'This is not goofy. You're starting to piss me off.'

Sherrill was waving her arms. 'Lucas, how'n the hell can you convict an innocent dead woman of something she didn't do?' -

'Shouldn't be too tough,' Lucas said. 'We do it a few times a year with innocent live people. How hard could it be to do it with a dead one? She certainly won't care. And we will get Carmel.'

'Jesus, man, I don't know,' Black said. 'This ain't a game.'

'I know. But maybe we'll break something loose.

So what I want, is I want everybody out working on connections between Louise

Clark and Carmel. They were about the same age – did they ever go to the same school? Did they ever hang out at the same place? They must've known each other, so let's make them into friends. Let's put together some ideas that'll tighten up the story on Clark, something we could take her to court on. ..'

'If she were alive,' Black said.

'Yeah. If she was alive.'

'This won't work if Carmel doesn't hear about it. We want her to react,' Lucas said. A half-dozen detectives were crowded into Lucas' office: Sherrill, Black,

Sloan, a guy from drugs, two from sex. Lucas wanted people he'd worked with and could trust. 'We know she's got at least a couple of sources inside the department, so we want you to blab. Gossip. Homicide is tying Carmel Loan to

Louise Clark, and through her, to the killings.'

'Why don't you call some of your pals at TV3?' Black asked.

'I'd rather have them ask me about it,' Lucas said. 'I don't want it to be an obvious plant. Rumors are better than actual stories. In fact, if the newsies hear about it, I'll probably deny it.'

'Refuse to comment,' Sherrill said. 'That always makes their little weenies hard.'

Carmel heard about it almost immediately. 'They're what?'

'They're tying you to Louise Clark. If they can tie you to her, you could be in trouble.'

'But I didn't do anything,' she said with asperity.

'Yeah, well, whatever. Listen, things are getting a little warm around here. I'm getting out of the information business for a while, okay?'

'You mean, "Don't call,'" Carmel said.

'I'm not trying to be an asshole, but they're pulling out all the stops. They've got a half-dozen guys working on it. Davenport told somebody that they'll have you inside by the end of the week.'

'That's absurd.'

'I thought you'd want to know… so I'm signing off, okay? This last one's a freebie.'

'Fuck your freebie,' Carmel snarled.

Black found an invitation to a lawyer's Halloween Ball organized by members of several downtown firms. A photo of four of the women who organized the ball, including Carmel, was on the back of the program, and Louise Clark's name was in the list of people who'd volunteered to help out.

'What you should do,' Lucas told Black, after he'd seen the photo, 'Is get in touch with these other women, and ask them about the relationship between Carmel and Clark. How closely did they work together? That kind of thing.'

'I think Clark was probably a flunky – Xeroxed the invitations, or something.'

'That's fine, but ask anyway,' Lucas said. 'One of the people you ask will call Carmel, and tell her you're asking.. .'

Then Sherrill came up with a strong tie, one that surprised everybody: Louise

Clark's phone records showed two calls to Carmel Loan's unlisted home phone in the week before Clark was killed. Both calls were late at night.

'I can't think why they would be talking – why Clark would be calling her. But it's an amazing tie,' Sherrill said.

'It's almost enough by itself,' Lucas said. 'You know what? I want you to go over and brace Carmel about this, face-to-face. Tell her it's part of the Clark investigation, and we just want the question answered… no big deal.'

Carmel's face was the color of her fabulous bloody-red silk scarf: 'She never called,' Carmel shouted. 'She never called.'