"Hunt! I'm counting to three, and she dies. One…"
"I don't have it. You shot it away. It's somewhere back in the dark."
This slowed Shiu down for a beat, but he recovered quickly enough. "I need to see you. Get out here."
"I'm on the ground."
"Then crawl. Hands out front. Any sign of a gun and everybody dies, understand? The girl first. You other two, move aside. Let him out."
The only sound was the slow drag of Hunt's body as he pulled it across the last few feet over the floor of the barn. When he started to come into view, it appeared as if he'd been hit twice on the left side. His left arm hung apparently useless behind a bloody left leg, as he pulled himself forward with his good right side into the light. His face was still a smeared mess of dried and fresh blood. His right hand, scratching against the floor as he pulled himself along, left a bloody trail in the ancient dirt.
When his body was a little more than halfway out of the barn, Hunt was breathing hard with the pain and exertion. He stopped and looked up. "You can't do this, Shiu."
"No? What's it look like I'm doing?"
"You'll never sell it."
"No? Funny, I think I will," Shiu said. "After all, it was Devin's gun that shot poor Mrs. Manion. I'm afraid it will look like Inspector Juhle got himself in another firefight-he's known for that, you know. And then he found a reason to shoot you and your people, too. Maybe you double-crossed him somehow. When I came up here after the Manions called me, after all of your threats to their family today, I saw what was happening and tried to stop it. In the end, I had to shoot my partner in self-defense, but unfortunately not in time to save the other victims. I think it works out just fine."
"Except for one thing."
"What's that?"
Hunt paused, making sure that his body was primed to react. "You didn't rack a round on the last reload." As he said the words, Hunt pulled his left hand out from where he'd been keeping his own gun hidden behind his leg.
Shiu's double take took only a fraction of a second before he pulled the trigger on Juhle's Glock behind Tamara's head.
The dry click still hung in the air as Hunt was swinging his own gun up as fast as he could. In one movement, he steadied his left wrist with his right hand and squeezed off one shot.
It hit Shiu high in the forehead.
Juhle's gun went flying as the bullet knocked Shiu backpedaling until he rammed up against the tractor and sank to the ground.
Tamara, too, had collapsed in a heap, and Chiurco had run to her, but Juhle was already moving beyond them, getting to Shiu where he slumped, kicking his shoulder hard so that he fell to one side. Hunt, limping, was right behind him and pulled Shiu's gun out of his holster.
Taking a gasp of breath, he reached over and put a finger to Shiu's neck, leaving it there for a long moment. Then he stood up and faced his friend.
"I don't think he's going to make it," he said.
"Yeah, but enough about him," Juhle said. "Get me out of these goddamned handcuffs."
38
Hunt never used the crutches they gave him at the ER. The bullet had creased the top of his thigh. It gave him a scar he'd be able to brag about for the rest of his life in certain company, but the actual damage, while painful enough and spectacular in terms of blood loss, was never life threatening, although he was going to be limping for a while. His disregard for Juhle's due process in the execution of his plan, though, gave him enough bureaucratic headaches for the next couple of weeks to make up for any physical pain he might have missed due to the wound.
The Napa County DA acknowledged Hunt's role in closing the Palmer matter and in saving the life of Andrea Parisi. Nevertheless, he was not initially inclined to overlook the extra-legal methods against one of the area's most prominent citizens-vandalism, trespassing-that Hunt had employed to get his results. The DA also didn't appreciate Hunt's still sloppy CCW paperwork, especially since it was the gun in question that had fired the shot that killed Shiu.
In the end, though, Juhle's statement about the unfolding of the night's events in combination with Ward Manion's reluctance to pursue prosecution-he just wanted the nightmare to be over-persuaded the DA that he didn't need to file any charges against what was, after all, a satisfactory conclusion to an extremely unusual, difficult, even tragic situation; though the DA did make it clear to Hunt that the next time he came to the wine country to work, he'd be well advised to avoid anything like the methods he'd employed against the Manions. And if his CCW wasn't current, the DA would flat out bust him for it.
But between the rehab on his leg, the visits to Parisi first at the hospital and then at her home during her recovery, and the resolution of all the legal issues hanging fire up in Napa, his business took a serious hit during the first weeks of the summer. The notoriety he had acquired because of Palmer and Parisi did not compensate for the lack of time he could actually spend on billable work, and so he, Craig, Tamara, and Mickey spent virtually all of their time through early July out in the field or in the office, catching up.
It was some measure that his life had at last reverted to near normalcy when he found time to meet Juhle for the first time in a month at Plouf, a French restaurant specializing in mussels, for lunch. It was Bastille Day, a Thursday, and Belden Alley was decked out front to back with the tricolor. A bright summer sun shone directly overhead, the temperature hovered in the mid-seventies.
Juhle sat alone at an outside table under a Campari umbrella, nursing a clear drink with bubbles and ice. He gave no sign that he'd noticed Hunt's approach until he said, "You've still got that sympathy-limp thing going?"
Hunt pulled out his chair and sat down in it. "You want, I'll shoot you in the leg, and you can have one, too. Except I might miss and hit your kneecap by mistake."
"Nobody would believe it was a mistake. Not after the shot that took out Shiu. Which had to be as lucky as the one I got all the heat for. I still can't get over it."
"That wasn't luck, Dev. As you should know better than anybody, hand-eye is my thing. I had him all the way. What are you drinking?"
"Club soda."
"Walking on the wild side."
Juhle shrugged. "I'm on duty. I don't drink on duty. It's one of the perks of the job. But you go ahead."
"I think I will. I've got a few hours for a nice change. Maybe I'll walk home after lunch and take a nap."
"You're still walking everywhere?"
"Mostly, or taking Mickey's cab. I can't work the damn clutch yet in the Cooper." The waiter came up, and Hunt ordered a glass of beaujolais. Both men were having variations on the mussels theme. Hunt watched the waiter walk away. "So," he came back to his friend, "you said there was news."
"Some." Juhle sipped his club soda. "I thought you'd want to know, we closed Palmer this morning. Officially."
"I wasn't really worried about it. It had to happen sometime."
"Maybe, but it's good to have it done. I mean rock solid, which it wasn't ever going to be until we found out a few things we didn't know."
"Such as?"
"Such as the gun, the murder weapon. The idiot didn't even toss it when he was done."
"Where'd you find it?"
"In a storage unit he rented out by his apartment, where he also kept his Beemer convertible." The waiter was back with Hunt's wine, and Juhle went silent until he'd moved away again. He leaned in across the table and lowered his voice. "Along with the cash."
"Cash?"
"A box of it. Same storage unit. Ninety-seven thousand, eight hundred dollars."
"So she paid him a hundred grand. I was wondering about the going rate."
"Yeah, but remember, it was a two-fer. Plus, you could probably do it a little cheaper if one of the hits wasn't a federal judge."
Hunt tasted his wine, took in the sun-dappled al fresco dining area. "You want to tell me something?"