“Warner? From the sound of it he was someone with—”
“He’s been AWOL since yesterday evening. Hunter said he was injured, and I saw the chair he’d fallen in, too. I was with Cass after that.”
“Right.”
“I know,” I said. “You’ve only got my word for that.”
She shook her head. “You were seen on the Circle last night with her, late—by me, remember? I’d started to realize things were fucked up by then, but I was still holding the role. When Brian failed to show later I got properly nervous, and then I was at her apartment first thing this morning. I know it wasn’t you. You didn’t have time, and you were the most freaked-out and bewildered man in the world. And you’re . . . you’re just not that guy.”
“What about the things Hunter said? Asking how much I actually knew about you?”
“I guessed that would come up again.” She held her gun in my direction, handle first. “You want to take this?”
“Of course not. I have no idea how to even use it.”
“Just trying to show you can trust me.”
“It might not even be loaded, for all I know. So—did you come into Cass’s apartment while I was unconscious on the floor, kill her, hand the body off to someone to do all this to it, and dump it here? Then fake the chase afterward to make me believe you were on my side?”
“No.”
“This isn’t still part of the game? The script playing out? You earning your final payout?”
She held up her mangled hand. “Hard-earned, if so.”
“Yes, you got hurt, but Hunter was the wild card nobody expected. He’s the thing that screwed up their game, and Warner’s, too. You weren’t to know about him, either—and that could be the only reason you got injured.”
She shook her head, and I thought I believed her—but part of me didn’t know.
“Still hearing your thoughts loud and clear,” she said. “The answer’s no. But it strikes me that Marie Thompson went to some pains to tell you to come back here. Made it look sincere, too.”
That had just occurred to me. “Maybe in the hope I’d be caught red-handed with the body.”
“We should go,” she said. “Now.”
“Bandage your hand. I’m going to grab a couple of things.”
She headed back into the kitchen. I stayed a moment longer, wiping my face, looking at the sinking body in my pool, remembering swimming there with Steph late on the night of our anniversary, floating in the aftermath of sex and food and thinking how fine everything was.
Four nights ago. That’s how long all this had taken.
“I’ll get them,” I said to the body. My voice was thick, throttled, quiet. “I don’t know how, and I don’t know when, but I will.”
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
By the time I got back into the kitchen, Emily was wrapping a bandage around her hand. I’d forgotten what had been on my list of things to take from the house, and doubted any of them had been important anyhow. The only thing that had merit was a set of clothes for Stephanie. Anything else could stay until the world had been sorted out and I could start living my life here again.
“Going upstairs,” I said. “Two minutes. Then we’re leaving.”
“Roger that,” she said, holding the bandaged hand against her chest as she tried to fasten it with tape. She was shaking. I thought it was unlikely this was from fear, or even from what we’d seen in the pool.
“It hurts, doesn’t it?”
“It really kind of does. I’ve come around to the idea of going to the hospital. You’re wiser than I thought.”
There was a knock at the front door.
Our heads turned together. The knock came again, loud. Then someone pressed the doorbell.
I whispered, “What do I do?”
She had no advice. The doorbell rang again, and then we heard someone speaking loudly on the other side.
“Mr. Moore, it’s Deputy Hallam. I came. So if you’re here, open the door.”
Emily reached behind with her left hand and fanned out to the left. When I saw that she was braced up against the wall, out of sight, I walked across the living room and opened the front door.
Hallam stood lit by the lamp above the doorway. He was alone. His cruiser was parked down in the street. He looked exhausted and spaced-out.
“So, on the way I hear there’s been a shoot-out at St. Armands Circle,” he said, with something like wonder. “Tony Thompson is dead. Marie’s on the way to the hospital, along with some other guy, the alleged shooter. She received three bullet wounds, but gut-shot him in the meantime. She’s probably going to live.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“You don’t sound surprised by the scenario I’ve just outlined.”
“I know who the shooter is. His name’s John Hunter. I know why he did it.”
Hallam caught sight of Emily in the shadows. “Who the hell is that?”
“One of the two people in the world who I trust right now,” I said. “You are not the other. So come in slowly, keep your hands where I can see them, and do not do anything that could look like screwing me around.”
He entered cautiously. Once the door was closed behind him, Emily moved out of the shadow.
“Take his weapon,” she said to me.
Hallam laughed. “Are you kidding me? I still want to know who the hell you are.”
Emily moved her hand to where he could see her gun. “Any cop with half a brain would have established that before he stepped over the threshold,” she said.
Hallam knew she was right, and he didn’t like it. He put his hand on his side holster.
“Lady, I want you to understand something—”
“Her name’s Jane,” I interrupted, before this could get out of hand. “She knows a lot more than I do about this. Jane—this guy’s okay. I think. So everyone just be cool and nobody shoot anyone, okay?”
His eyes still on her, hand there on his gun, Hallam stood his ground. “Whatever it is you believe you have to tell me, Mr. Moore, you got three minutes max. I need to get to the Circle. The call’s out to the sheriff but he’s not there yet and he’s going to be furious if he finds out I’m not, either.”
“I’ll tell you what I know,” I said. “But I need to show you something first.”
“What?”
“It’s out back.”
“I don’t think that’s a great idea,” Emily said.
“He needs to know.”
Hallam saw me glance out through the glass doors to the pool. “Need to know what?”
He leaned forward, peered into the gloom. “What the hell is that?”
I led him out.
Hallam stared down at what was in the pool. He didn’t say anything for a long time. He turned eventually, but his eyes found the forearm lying alongside, and so he kept moving his head until it came to rest on my face.
“Who is she?”
“A girl called Cassandra,” I said. “She was murdered in the small hours of this morning, at the place I tried to get you to come to this afternoon.”
“Who did it?”
“I don’t know. All I saw was blood. They moved the body and brought it here.”
“The crime scene still the way it was? The one at her apartment?”
“Not exactly,” I said. Emily looked away.
Hallam rubbed his mouth with the back of his hand. “This is fucked up.”
He walked back into the house.
“So?” I asked him. “You going to arrest me right now, or do I have a chance of standing my ground? Are they so in control that I have to get out of here for a while?”