She turned her back on him, headed toward the door.
Midnight, the house dark except for the kitchen light. She sat in the living room in sweats and sneakers, running it all through her head. The conversation with Billy. The missing Taurus. The gray Toyota that had followed her. Or maybe not. Maybe it’s just you.
Headlights came through the blinds, crawled across the walls, and were gone. She went to the window, pushed the blinds aside, looked out. It had rained earlier, and now there was mist in the air, a hazy halo around the streetlamps. She saw taillights at the end of the street, turning right and then disappearing.
She went down the hall, checked on Danny. He lay still under the covers. She stood in the doorway for a moment, until she could hear his soft snores.
Another set of headlights swept across the living room, this time from the opposite direction. They seemed to slow for a moment, hang motionless on one wall, and then move on. By the time she got to the window, they were gone.
She got her hooded sweatshirt from the hall closet, pulled it on. The only sound in the house was the ticking of the kitchen clock. In the bedroom, she took the Glock from the lockbox and slipped it into the front pocket of the hoodie, the weight of it hanging heavy.
She went out the back door, down the two short steps, and into the sideyard. The air was thick and damp. She started toward the front of the house, stopped to listen. Nothing except the sound of a TV from the upper window of the house next door.
Headlights again, to her right, slower this time. They pulled up a block away on the opposite side of the street, then winked out. She could hear the low thrum of an idling engine.
She slipped the Glock out, staying close to the wall. At the corner of the house, she stopped. Through the mist she could see only a dim bulk across the street, yards from the nearest streetlight. She wished she’d brought her shield. She’d walk over, gun up, badge whoever it was, be done with it.
Moisture dripped from the gutter above her. She waited, watching. She thought of Danny inside.
Fuck it. Badge or no.
She left the cover of the house and started down the lawn, the Glock in a two-handed grip, pointed at the ground. She heard the crunching of gears, the sound of wet tires.
“Police! Don’t move!” she yelled, the Glock coming up even before she reached the sidewalk. “Turn that vehicle off.”
It pulled hard away from the curb before she reached the street, lights still off, tires squealing. She saw only a blur in the mist as it went past. It reached the end of the street, turned right at the stop sign without slowing. As it did, it passed through the lightwash of a streetlamp. Black pickup, mud flaps. Billy’s truck.
She lowered the Glock and walked back to the house through the mist.
EIGHTEEN
When the man with the dreadlocks came into the garage, Morgan put the muzzle of the Beretta to the back of his head.
“One in the chamber,” he said. “You know what that means, right?”
The man froze. Morgan pushed him toward the Navigator.
“Hands on the hood.”
He did as he was told. He was bare chested in jeans, his dreads loose, a blue bandana tied around his neck. He smelled of reefer.
Morgan used his left hand to pat the man’s pockets, took out a wallet. He put it in the windbreaker.
“Anyone else in the house?” Morgan said.
He shook his head.
“Answer me.”
“No, no one.” A faint accent.
“If there is,” Morgan said, “I’ll shoot you first.” He took the gun away. “Turn around. Go back in.”
The man took his hands off the hood, turned to look at Morgan, the gun. His face was slack with fear. “I don’t know what you want, brah, but there’s nothing here.”
“Go on,” Morgan said.
He went up the steps into an empty kitchen. Morgan followed, pulled the connecting door shut. On the counter were a cell phone and a big automatic, a Desert Eagle.44. The back door was locked and chained. Morgan opened another door, saw steps that led into a basement, listened, heard nothing. The man watched him.
“Living room,” Morgan said.
They went in. The sliding glass door was closed, the vertical blinds drawn. A tall straight-backed chair was against one wall.
“What is this place?” Morgan said.
“How you mean?”
“Who lives here?”
“No one yet. A friend of mine, he sells these places. He’s letting me stay here.”
“Face the couch.”
When he did, Morgan hit him hard on the side of the head with the Beretta. He cried out, fell to his knees. The floor lamp threw his shadow large on the wall.
“Stay there,” Morgan said and backed away. He put the Beretta in his belt, took out the wallet. Inside was a hundred dollars in cash, credit cards in three different names. A Florida driver’s license with a picture, in the name of Jean-Pierre Delva, a Riviera Beach address. He tossed the wallet on the couch.
Delva had a hand to his head, blood coming through his fingers. “There’s nothing here for you, man. That’s all the money I got.”
In the kitchen, the cell began to play music, a tune Morgan didn’t know. Delva looked up.
“Who is that?” Morgan said.
“I don’t know.”
Morgan could sense his nervousness.
“Your girlfriend?”
“Who?”
“The white girl. The one that was here last night.”
The tune played for a few seconds, stopped.
“Her boyfriend know about you two?”
“What boyfriend?”
“Flynn. The deputy.”
“I’ve got lots of women, man. Maybe he know, maybe he don’t. Why you ask me?”
“Get up,” Morgan said. “Sit down over there.”
He rose unsteadily, settled into the wooden chair, looked at his bloody hand, all the fight gone from him.
“Where’s the money?” Morgan said.
“What money, brah?”
The cell phone rang again. They both looked toward the kitchen. The tune stopped.
Morgan took the Beretta back out.
“I’ve come a long way,” he said. “You think I’m just going to walk out of here?”
Delva looked at him. “You from up north, right? You work for that fat man.”
“I don’t work for anybody.”
“I can’t help you, man. I don’t have it.”
“But you know who does.”
“Talk to the woman. She knows. They told me nothing.”
“But you helped set it up, right? So you’ve got a share coming.”
“I passed along some things I’d heard. That’s all.”
“And now they’re holding out on you? Making you wait?”
Delva looked at the floor.
“Who put it together? You, the girl, Flynn. Who else?”
“What do you mean?”
“The other deputy, the woman. Was she part of it?”
“I don’t know who that is, who you’re talking about.”
From outside, the sound of a car engine, low. Morgan looked into the front room. Big windows there, with blinds. No headlights outside. The engine sound faded.
“We have to get out of here,” Delva said.
“Why?”
“They’ve been looking for me. These boys down here don’t play. They coming to talk.”
“About the money? Why they never got it?”
Delva didn’t answer.
Morgan went into the front room, looked out the window. There was a single streetlight down the block, mist hanging around it. The street was empty.
“They’ll come back,” Delva said.
Morgan looked at his watch. Ten minutes after midnight.
“Get up,” he said. “You’re coming with me.”
The phone chimed again. Morgan backed into the kitchen and picked it up, still watching Delva. He opened the phone, lifted it to his ear.
“Yo, papi why you not answering?” A thick island accent. “We outside, boy. Let us up in there. We need to talk, konprann?”