A young waitress came by, and Lucas asked for iced tea.
When she walked away, Gibson said, “So, Tim McCarthy gave me the message. You’re looking for something on a Brian Dodson.”
“I have his criminal record, which ends in the nineties. Nothing since then on the books. By all accounts he’s living a straight life. Works at a garage in Cottage City, has a little house in Colmar Manor. But yesterday I tailed him down to Barry Farms.”
“That shithole?” said Gibson.
“It’s not all that bad.”
“No? I wouldn’t live there if I did live there.”
Lucas moved on. “Dodson walked into one of the dwellings with a bag over his shoulder, walked out with the same bag. I’m guessing he was conducting some kind of business. Given his criminal record, and the neighborhood, I can assume he wasn’t delivering Meals On Wheels.”
“I had the pleasure of working those districts. In Six-D... I ever tell you about what we’d do to the dope fiends over there by Mayfair Gardens?”
“Yes,” said Lucas, but that wasn’t going to stop Gibson.
“We used to line up the junkies and crackheads, in the dead of winter, and have them take off all their clothes. Said we needed to search ’em, but we couldn’t run the risk of pricking ourselves on dirty needles. So they’d get naked and put all their clothes on the hood of my squad car. And then I’d say to them, ‘All right, now you got thirty seconds to get your shit off my car, ’cause I’m about to take off.’ They’d panic and scramble. Put on whatever they could grab. Later, me and the guys in my unit, we’d see these pipers on the street, wearing mismatched outfits, a Nike and a Converse on each of their feet.”
“Officer Friendly.”
“I know.” Gibson shook his head, his eyes bright with nostalgia. “It was wrong, I guess. But it was funnier than shit.”
“Brian Dodson...”
“Right. Your boy isn’t who you think he is.”
“I already told you, I think he’s dirty.”
“It’s worse than that. His name came up on a wiretap last year, a thing the Feds were working. Dude was talking, said he had a problem that needed to get solved, other dude suggests a guy named Brian Dodson. Said he’d put work in for a triple deuce. Meaning, he’d murder someone for six thousand dollars. These knotheads talk in code, think they’re foolin someone. A retard could figure out the meaning of the words.”
“He’s...”
“Dodson’s a mechanic.”
“I know it.”
“As in The Mechanic, with Charlie Bronson. He’s an assassin.”
“I get you, Pete. I’m just digesting it.”
The waitress served Lucas his iced tea. He sipped it and waited for her to drift.
“Why didn’t the law bring him in?” said Lucas.
“The dude who identified Dodson as a contract man is no longer available to elaborate on the subject.”
“He skipped town?”
“He’s Ten-Seven. That’s police code for Out of Service, Lucas.”
“I’m familiar with the codes.”
“Someone put a bullet in his dome. But the Special Task Force is keeping an eye on Dodson. He’s what they call a ‘person of interest.’” Gibson grinned. “Good stuff, right?”
The waitress served their sides and chicken sandwiches, which were several pieces of bone-in fried chicken served on a piece of bread. How one could eat it as a sandwich was one of the pleasant mysteries of the Hitching Post. Lucas and Gibson commenced to getting down on their food.
They ate silently, ravenously.
A little while later, Lucas wiped a napkin across his face and said, “What about the Cherise Roberts murder? Anything on that?”
“No progress,” said Gibson. “My guy in Homicide tells me that they turned up some interesting details on the victim, but they have nothing as of yet on a perpetrator.”
“What about her?”
“A search of the history on her home computer indicated that she was running a little business on the side.”
“What kind of business?”
“She was trickin.”
“Cherise was a prostitute?”
“Not like the image you got in your head. She didn’t walk the stroll or anything like that. You don’t need to in this day and age. Teenage girls can retail their ass online if they’re savvy. Any girl can be an entrepreneur with the help of the Internet. Cherise even had a prosti name.”
“What was it?”
“I don’t recall. Some kinda name designed to make the creeps get wood.”
Lucas thought of Leo. His brother had expressed no suspicions about Cherise’s character. Leo worked in a public school in the city — he was anything but naive. If this was true, Cherise had been discreet about her secret life. It would cut Leo deep if he were to hear about it.
“If they have the computer history,” said Lucas, “then they have the names of some of her Johns.”
“I’m sure they’ve conducted their interviews,” said Gibson.
“Right.”
“Let the real police do their jobs.”
“I will,” said Lucas. “Thanks for looking into all of this.”
Gibson nodded. “Lunch is on you.”
“If I need you again...”
“You’ve got my number,” said Gibson.
Lucas signaled the waitress.
Ten
Tom Petersen sat behind his desk, reading the one-page report Lucas had typed and printed after his lunch at the Hitching Post. Lucas, seated before the desk in a wobbly chair, watched as Petersen dropped the sheet and folded his hands across his belly.
“I’m not sure what you’re saying here,” said Petersen. “Exactly.”
“I’m giving you a scenario,” said Lucas. “Edwina Christian was seeing a man named Brian Dodson at the same time she was seeing Calvin Bates. My source tells me that Dodson has been identified as a contract killer per Federal wiretaps.”
“That’s interesting.”
“When I interviewed Virginia Christian, she explained a quote I read in the discovery material, something to the effect of her daughter wanting to ‘take care’ of Bates. Virginia said that this meant Edwina wanted to help Bates. That she was on a mission from her pastor at church. But what if Edwina Christian wanted to take care of Bates in a different way? As in, take him out permanently. He wouldn’t leave her alone, and it had become a problem. She had a relationship with a low-rent hit man. Dodson would be the one she’d turn to.”
“I’m getting a warm feeling now.”
“What was the caliber of the slug found in Edwina’s brainpan?” said Lucas.
“Twenty-two.”
“Twenty-twos are used by professionals who like to work close-in.”
“Now the blood is flowing to my pecker.”
“And consider this: one of Dodson’s vehicles is a Ford Excursion.”
“I’m guessing it has a wide axle track.”
“Look up the specs online. It could be that Dodson’s Excursion is the vehicle that laid those tracks down near the woods in Southern Maryland.”
“Yes, it could be. But why?”
“Because it’s a heavy truck?”
“No, I’m asking, why would Brian Dodson murder Edwina Christian? What was the motive?”
“I don’t know,” said Lucas. “Maybe she paid him and he decided to do her instead of Bates. Maybe Dodson and Bates were in collusion.”
“Don’t stray too far into Candy Land.”
“Okay, but let’s stay with the theory that she paid Dodson to hit Bates. Go ahead and access her bank records. You might find a significant withdrawal before her murder.”
“Okay, I’m still with you. But there’s the matter of Bates’s presence near those woods, right around her time of death. The GPS records from his ankle bracelet don’t lie. What was he doing down there? And why would he torch his truck to cover up evidence if he was innocent?”