It was midnight and Dodge was heading out.
“I don’t believe this,” Des muttered at him.
“And I don’t believe you doubted me,” Mitch exclaimed triumphantly. “If I were a less secure person I would actually be hurt.”
“Hush!”
The Mercedes was nearing the carriage lamps at the entrance to the drive. From where they sat, it was impossible to tell if Dodge was alone in the car. For that matter, it was impossible to be sure that it was Dodge who was behind the wheel. As the Mercedes paused at the road, Mitch reached for his key in the ignition.
Des stopped him with a warning hand. “Not yet. Let him get rolling first.”
Dodge pulled out and headed toward Old Shore Road, leaving plumes of diesel exhaust in his wake. Mitch waited until he’d gone around a bend before he started up the pickup and put it in gear.
“No headlights,” Des cautioned him. “Just zone in on his taillights.”
Mitch took off after the Mercedes in the blackness. Fortunately, there were occasional streetlamps to mark his way. Otherwise he would have driven into a ditch for sure.
Old Shore Road was deserted at that time of night. The Mercedes was about a half mile ahead of them, chugging in the direction of town, its headlights casting a soft, film noir glow in the foggy mist that reminded Mitch of the opening sequence of The Killers, when William Conrad and Charles McGraw are pulling into that sleepy small town in search of the Swede. All that was missing was the ominous Miklos Rozsa score.
Mitch chugged along after it at a steady forty-five.
“Don’t get too close,” Des said anxiously from next to him, her knees jiggling with excitement. “Give him room.”
He grinned at her. “Want to take the wheel, Master Sergeant?”
“Heck no. You’re doing great.”
“You miss this, don’t you?”
“Miss what?”
“The hunt. You are loving this. I can see it in your eyes.”
“Doughboy, it is pitch-black in this cab.”
“So maybe I’m imagining it.”
“So maybe you ought to keep your imagination on the road. Careful, he’s slowing down… Watch it!”
Mitch hit the brakes, coming to a dead stop. Up ahead, Dodge was pulling into the Citgo minimart, even though it was closed up for the night. The illuminated sign was dark, the big floodlights out. There was only the night-light that the Acars left on inside when they went home. Nonetheless, Dodge drove around in back, where the rest rooms and trash bins were, and shut off his lights.
“Man, what the hell is he doing?” Des wondered as they idled there.
“Meeting somebody?”
Des jumped out, shutting her door silently behind her. “Catch up with me real slow,” she said to him through the open window. “Hit your lights when I signal you, got it?”
“Got it.”
She was off and running now, streaking her way toward the minimart, her knees high, her arms pumping. Mitch eased along behind her, seeing her backlit by the night-light inside. Now he could see her cutting across the parking lot toward Dodge’s car, raising an arm high over her head. Now he could see her lowering it…
And now Mitch flicked on his headlights.
And there stood Dodge Crockett intently spray-painting 9/11 WTC on the side of the minimart in two-foot-high red letters.
“Hold it right there, Mr. Crockett!” Des bellowed at him angrily.
First, Dodge froze. Then he hurled the aerosol paint can at her. Then he tried to run, which was futile-Des was faster than he was. He scarcely got twenty feet before she overtook him and threw him roughly to the pavement, jamming her knee into the small of his back. She slapped a handcuff on him and dragged him over to the rear service door, which had a heavy steel handle on it, and cuffed him to that. Then she called for a cruiser on her cell phone. She also got the Acars’ home number and put in a call to them.
Mitch climbed out of the truck and walked slowly over toward Dodge, his eyes hungrily searching Dodge’s face in the headlights for some insight into what was going on in this man’s mind-this man who he had looked up to and confided in and thought of as a friend.
Dodge did not hang his head in shame or defeat. He remained unbowed and unapologetic, the same way he had when Mitch and Will had walked in on he and Becca.
“A cruiser will be here in five,” Des announced, pocketing her phone.
“How about the Acars?” Mitch asked.
“No answer. I left a message on their machine.”
Mitch frowned. It was after midnight-kind of late for them to be out. Then again, maybe they didn’t pick up after they went to bed. A lot of people didn’t.
“This finally makes some sense,” Des said, staring coldly at Dodge “I get it now.”
“You get what?” wondered Mitch.
Dodge wasn’t saying a word.
“Why Miss Barker got weird on me,” she explained. “The old girl clammed right up when I asked her if she’d seen anybody drive by her house after that rock got thrown. Same with Mr. Acar, who was way too anxious to button it all up. Because it wasn’t any stupid kids who were messing with him. It was you, Mr. Crockett, and you’re someone who still matters in this town. Miss Barker knew it was you-she recognized your car. And Mr. Acar knew because you’d warned him, hadn’t you? You’d told him what might happen if he didn’t back off.”
Mitch turned to Dodge and said, “Why have you done this? What did the Acars ever do to you?”
“They’ve cut our morning take-out trade in half, that’s what,” Dodge spoke up, his voice calm and matter-of-fact. “They’re absolutely killing us with those Turkish pastries of hers. The locals haven’t come anywhere near The Works since she started selling them. I begged Nuri to give us a break. I said to him, look, you’ve got a thriving gasoline business. Kindly leave the food trade to us. He refused. I even offered to buy the damned pastries from him myself and sell them at The Works. Again he refused. He just wouldn’t listen to reason. Those Acars are unbelievably stubborn people.”
“So, what, you’re trying to scare them into leaving town?” Mitch asked.
“I’m trying to protect my investment. This is business I’m talking about, Mitch. People play for keeps. Believe me, some fellow who was truly ruthless would have burned this damned place to the ground a month ago and never lost a night’s sleep over it. We will have to shut down half of our bakery operation if they don’t back off. As far as the banks are concerned that’s a red flag. I won’t be able to raise any more capital. I won’t be able to meet my overhead. The Works will go into receivership, and I’ll be cleaned out. I’ll lose everything.”
“In other words, the Acars are smart businesspeople and you’re not.”
“Don’t judge what you don’t understand,” he shot back gruffly.
“Actually, I understand you perfectly, Dodge,” Mitch said.“You’re the single most arrogant egomaniac I’ve ever met. You think the rules that apply to other people don’t apply to you. That you can do whatever you want to whomever you want, up to and including your own daughter. Well, you’re wrong, and it’s amazing to me that you’ve lasted all of these years without finding that out. I guess you’re just a sheltered small-town boy. But let me just ask you this-why did you have to push Tito off of that cliff? And how did Donna qualify as competition? It seems to me she was one of your biggest assets.”
“Now, you wait one minute.” Dodge’s eyes widened. For the first time he seemed genuinely rattled. “I’ve stepped over the line a tad, I’ll grant you that.”
“You’re granting us jack,” Des snapped. “We caught you in the act.”
“I threw a rock through a window,” Dodge acknowledged readily. “I sprayed some graffiti on a wall. But that’s all. You can’t pin those murders on me. I had nothing to do with them. I am not a killer, I swear.”
“All I know,” Mitch said, “is that Donna told me not to look too closely at her business or her marriage. And now she’s dead and you’re out here trying to put a hardworking immigrant couple out of business.”