“A military thing, death cards. A sign that was supposed to tell us ‘I was here.’”
Louis caught the bartender’s attention, circling a finger to indicate another round.
“Kincaid, what is Lacey after?” Bjork asked.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, why is he targeting your cops?”
Louis hesitated. “Revenge. Two of his kids, teenagers, were killed by us in a barricade situation five years ago. They fired on the cops and refused to surrender. The girl drew on one of the officers.”
Bjork took a sip of her beer, digesting his words. “What about Cole?”
“He’s at Red Oak until he’s twenty-one.”
“Stiff sentence for a kid.”
“He pulled a shotgun when they took him into custody.”
Bjork shook her head. “Well, pardon my bluntness but given what you just told me why did it take you guys so long to name Lacey as a suspect?”
Louis was glad it was so dark; she couldn’t see his embarrassment. Over what? That Jesse had fucked up? That the DOC was filled with incompetents? That no one bothered to bring up the raid? That Gibralter was too pigheaded to ask for outside help? That he himself had let Lacey go?
Her question hung in the smoky air, waiting to be answered. Maybe he was embarrassed because he had no idea how to answer. Hell, maybe he was embarrassed because he didn’t know what in God’s name to do next.
He met her eyes, seeing again the spread of fine wrinkles at the corners, seeing for the first time the depth on the inside. All right, she was a woman. But she was also a cop. A cop with decades more experience than he had. If anyone could understand about his letting Lacey go, she would.
“We had him once,” Louis said.
“Lacey?”
Louis nodded. “Day after Christmas. We picked him up for running from us when we walked into a bar.”
Bjork waited for more.
Louis sat back. Just say it. “I cut him loose.”
“You didn’t check on him? You didn’t put two and two together?”
“I didn’t know who he was. The name meant nothing. And the DOC had him listed as being in prison. It turned out to be a typo.” Louis let out a breath. “A damn typo.”
Bjork studied him.
Louis stared into his beer. “It was Christmas. I tried to do something decent.”
“Well, Louis, there is decent and then there is dumb.”
“Thanks,” Louis said.
“Did you expect sympathy from me?”
He met her eyes briefly then looked away. “I don’t know what I’m expecting anymore.”
“How come nobody in the department thought of him, thought the barricade situation would — ”
“I have no idea,” Louis interrupted. He stared at a set of carved initials in the tabletop.
“Louis,” Bjork said. “You will get him.”
He looked up at her. “Right.”
She shook her head and glanced at the bar. Her eyes lit up and she waved to someone, who hollered a friendly hello across the room.
Louis stared at her. “You like it here, don’t you?”
“I love it. It’s my home,” she said with a smile. “I mean, I’ve traveled some, lived below the bridge for a year even. But I always come back. I belong here.”
He could almost feel his mind slowing, slowing as it approached this strange bend in the road. Home. That’s what he had thought Loon Lake would be. A safe place that he could settle into. But it was not as it had first seemed. Nothing was as it first seemed. Loon Lake wasn’t a postcard paradise; it was a place of death. Jesse wasn’t a partner he could count on; he was a coward, his judgment clouded by blind loyalty to Gibralter. And Gibralter, what was he? Certainly not the perfect chief.
And Zoe…what he had felt with her. What was that?
“Louis?”
He glanced at Bjork. “What are you thinking?”
“About Loon Lake, the job. My chief.”
“I talked to your chief today. Strange man.”
“He called you?”
“Ya, wanted to make sure you arrived okay.”
“Christ,” Louis said under his breath, looking away.
They were silent, the laughter and music of the tavern floating around them.
“What else did he have to say?” Louis asked finally.
Bjork fiddled with the neck of the Stroh’s bottle.
“What else?” Louis pressed.
“He said he was concerned because you, quote, couldn’t find your ass with two hands, unquote.”
Louis felt the heat creeping into his face but he didn’t look away.
“Sounds like a hard-ass,” Bjork said.
Bjork reached across the table and touched his hand. Louis looked down at her hand. Her nails were short with chipped, rose-colored polish. There was one of those mother’s rings on her finger with three little gemstones. He withdrew his hand and dropped it in his lap.
Bjork sat back, looking at him. Then she quickly raised her bottle and drained it, setting it down loudly.
“Well, I need to call it a night. How about you? You okay?”
“I’ll be fine.”
Bjork stood up, looking down at him. Her eyes were watery in the neon light and he wanted to believe it was from the booze, no veteran-to-rookie sympathy. Or worse, some woman-to-man thing. Christ, he had started the night thinking about what Bjork might look like handcuffed to a bed and now she was looking at him like he was her kid.
“Lieutenant Byrd will have your evidence ready for you tomorrow morning,” she said. “Swing by and pick it up.”
Louis nodded.
Bjork hesitated then extended a hand. “It was a pleasure, Officer Kincaid.”
Louis took her hand. “Thanks, Bjork,” her said softly. “Thanks for everything.”
CHAPTER 22
No doubt about it. He was drunk.
On the drive home from Dollar Bay he had stopped off at the grocery to pick up a six-pack of Heineken. It had taken only two hours to go through that and then he had moved on to the Christian Brothers.
Now he was sprawled on the sofa, staring into the dying fire in the hearth. Something in his fogged brain was telling him to go outside and get more logs but he was too tired to move.
With a grunt, he turned and reached for the bottle on the floor. He brought it up to his eyes, squinting. Empty. He stood and stumbled to the kitchen, jerking open the cupboard. Empty. No booze, no food, no woman, and soon, probably no job. What a shitty week.
Going back to the sofa, he grabbed a hooded sweatshirt, jerked open the door and headed to the lake. He wasn’t sure why. Maybe to just cut a hole in the ice and jump in. Hell, they wouldn’t find him until spring unless, of course, he floated up under some kid’s ice skate like Lovejoy had. That would be just his luck.
He was halfway to the shoreline when it occurred to him that he could be a walking target for Duane Lacey’s rifle. At least he was too drunk to feel the bullet.
Leaning heavily against a tree he stared blankly out at the dark lake. He had to stop this. He had to stop drinking so much. An image flashed into his head, his mother’s sunken face, leathery against the white pillow of her deathbed. For the first time he was beginning to understand how people could drink themselves to death. He ran a shaky hand over his face. No, he was just, what? Stressed out? Under pressure? Shit, all cops drank too much, didn’t they? He wasn’t like her. He wasn’t going to die like she did, liver eaten away, alone and scared.
He looked up. The moon was a sliver scythe in the black sky. Louis squinted across the lake, trying to make out the specks of lights, wondering which one was Zoe’s cabin, thinking about Jay Gatsby. Gatsby, the stupid putz who stood around mooning out at Daisy’s dock.
“Kincaid,” he said, “how in the hell could you be so stupid about so much?”
He heard a noise and spun around, trying to focus on the cabin. He saw a car and wondered why he hadn’t heard it pull up. He let out a breath when he saw Jesse heading to the cabin’s porch. Fucking traitor.
Jesse knocked, waited, knocked again. He started back toward his truck.