The best ideas always came like this, on waking. Before he even got up to take a leak.
He felt excitement building, the sense of purpose, deep in his gut.
Nick had found his inspiration.
7
Chief Akers’s house sat on a street dead-ending at a small public park. The yard was dominated by a moss-draped oak and a fish pond. A boat was backed into the carport, which was otherwise empty.
Maddy Akers drove a GMC Yukon.
Jolie pressed the buzzer and waited. No one answered. She rang again. Then knocked. Mrs. Akers either wasn’t at home or she was in a deep sleep.
A car turned onto the street from the main drag. From the sound of the engine, it was a four-banger.
The car did a funny thing. It came to a stop three doors down, in the middle of the street. Jolie was a defensive driver and could read car body language—most good drivers can.
This car—an old Toyota Corolla—braked, then crawled forward to the next driveway. The driver executed an awkward turn, rushed and sloppy.
The driver’s head swiveled back in Jolie’s direction, long hair flipping with the motion. Either it was a female driver or a Lynyrd Skynyrd fan. The Corolla went back up to the road, blinker on, and turned right. Too far away to see the license plate.
Jolie’s own take-home vehicle was a Crown Vic with black-walls. It was supposed to look like a civilian’s car, but the jack-in-the-box clown on the antenna didn’t fool anybody. She’d been spotted.
She jogged to her car, started it up, and followed.
On Kelso, Jolie saw the Corolla up ahead, stopped at the light. She stayed in the other lane and to the left, behind an old truck. The Corolla only went a city block before turning in at Bizzy’s Diner. The parking lot was already full. Jolie cruised by, parked at the convenience store next door, and watched in her rearview as the woman got out. The woman was slight and pale. Lackluster red hair fell straight from a middle part. Low-riding jeans. The woman held a ratty shoulder bag close as she jabbered on the cell phone held to her ear. She snapped the phone shut, dumped it in her purse, and walked across the parking lot as if someone might jump out at her at any minute.
Jolie ran the plate: 1989 blue Toyota Corolla, belonging to one Amy Perdue.
Luke Perdue, the hostage-taker at the Starliner Motel, had a sister.
It was in the paper and on the news.
Bizzy’s: pebbled gold water glasses, rabbit-warren rooms, mismatched tablecloths, Friday night catfish buffets. Jolie parked herself at a table in one room where she could look through the doorway and see Amy Perdue in the other.
The woman was still on the phone. She looked more than nervous; she looked scared.
Jolie ordered a big breakfast. The waitress, Eileen, had big platinum curls. Eileen’s son, a Marine lance corporal, came back from Afghanistan with a severe head injury. On Eileen’s days off, she drove three hours to the VA hospital in Biloxi, and three hours back, to visit her son, even though he would never recognize her again.
Eileen never mentioned her son, but she’d been quick to offer Jolie her condolences when her husband died. With Danny, most people pretended it never happened. Even people Jolie worked with and saw every day, people who had worked with him, too. Ignore it and it will go away.
Eileen came by with Jolie’s breakfast and a smaller plate piled up with Bizzy’s world-famous hush puppies. “Heard what happened. You need to stoke up. Nothing like hush puppies to give you a foundation for the day you’re going to have.”
Jolie had already paid her check and was waiting outside by the time Amy walked out of Bizzy’s. She caught up with Amy quietly and fast. “Amy Perdue?”
Perdue spun around and stared at her, eyes wide with recognition.
“Can we talk a minute?”
Perdue looked like she wanted to bolt. An elderly couple in a big car bore down on them and managed to steer past. Amy kept her eyes on them as if they were the most fascinating elderly couple in the world.
Jolie said, “I’d like to ask you about Maddy Akers.”
“Maddy?”
“Mrs. Akers. The police chief’s wife.”
Amy bit her lip. “You know? I’m late for an appointment. Can we do this later?”
Jolie heard the crunch of car tires again and automatically stepped back to get out of the way. A GMC Yukon came toward them between the two rows of parked cars. When it drew even, the window buzzed down and a dark-haired woman peered out. “Amy?”
Amy had gone from nervous to terrified.
The woman hopped down from the Yukon. She wore jeans. A simple top hugged a lean, strong body. Her sunglasses and the haircut and color looked like they cost a tidy sum.
The Yukon was silver. Maddy Akers owned a silver Yukon.
The woman said to Amy, “I’m glad I caught up with you.” She swiped at a stray hair. “I can’t make it in to the apartment today, so you’ll have to handle the eviction yourself. You think you and Niraj can do that?”
Amy reminded Jolie of a rabbit standing up in the road, trying to figure out which way to run. Finally, she nodded.
“I have something to tell you…” The woman stopped. She looked at Jolie’s shield and then at Amy. “Is something going on? Are you in trouble?”
Amy just stared at her.
The woman said, “Are you…?” Stopped, and tried again. “You’re here because of my husband?”
Jolie introduced herself. In the corner of her eye, she saw Amy starting to back away. Jolie gave her a look that said, Stay where you are.
The woman said, “You’re here to tell me about, um…” She stopped, took a breath. “You’re assigned to my husband’s case?”
“You know about your husband.”
Maddy Akers nodded. Jolie couldn’t see past the sunglasses, but the woman looked miserable. Like a sky as storm clouds moved in. She’d staved them off for a time, but now they were racing across the heavens until the whole sky was black. Jolie knew the feeling. She knew what Maddy Akers was going through. Disbelief had turned to stinging betrayal, the question running around and around in her head: Why? All this she felt coming from Maddy Akers in the fraction of a second before the woman started to cry.
She cried silently, tears running down her face. Pressed her manicured fingers against her cheeks, trying to stop them.
Jolie needed to talk to Maddy, now. Amy took advantage of her ambivalence. “Can I go now? I have to be somewhere.”
Jolie nodded. She’d catch up with her later. Amy stormed toward her car with new purpose, shoulders pushing forward like a running back, bag crushed to her chest.
Maddy Akers looked at Jolie. The tear tracks were still on her face, but she seemed composed. “Can we get out of here?”
Maddy locked up her car and got into Jolie’s. They drove in the direction of Gardenia PD, but Jolie made sure the Starliner Motel was on the way. Maddy Akers asked to stop there, which was what Jolie had in mind. Jolie had no plans to take her to the Gardenia PD, where her husband had been the chief, where all manner of emotions would be swirling around and there would be factions and allies and plenty of kid gloves. But she didn’t want to go directly to the Palm County Sheriff’s Office, either. That might make Maddy suspicious. Jolie wanted this to be between the two of them.
They parked outside room nine. Everyone was gone now. They couldn’t go in, but that didn’t seem to bother Maddy. They sat in the car, and the two of them stared at the yellow tape stretched across the open doorway. On the way over, Maddy’d told her she’d been driving around since she heard the news from her husband’s second in command early this morning. Jolie asked her where she went, but Maddy couldn’t remember all the places. “I just drove,” she said. Meridian Beach, Port St. Joe, up to Wewahitchka and back. She turned off her phone because she didn’t want to hear from reporters.