Envy the Night (22 page)

“Why attack the body shop owner?”

“I’m getting to that. They went after her yesterday, then killed one of her employees today. Hung him off the front end of a car and cut his throat. Nasty scene. The way it looks is that they’ve lost track of Temple and figured the people at the body shop were the last who’d seen him, you know, the best chance
of finding out where he went. There’s a guy named Vaughn Duncan involved, too, and supposedly these guys are interested in his car.”

“Who is Duncan?”

“A prison guard from Florida, part of this whole shit storm that’s come up north.”

“Frank’s not from Florida.”

“Maybe not, but his old man certainly had some ties down there. Duncan’s car was the one that had the tracking device. Allegedly.”

“And he’s a prison guard in Florida.”

“Was. Evidently he called in and quit a few days ago, no warning, no two-weeks notice, hasn’t even filled out the paperwork or met any of the usual requirements. The people down there are less than happy with Mr. Duncan. Seems he came into some serious cash about a year ago, too, source unknown. Guy’s working as a prison guard and driving a Lexus, you know something’s wrong.”

“What prison?”

“Coleman.”

“Which part of Coleman? It’s a big complex.”

There was a rustle of papers and then Atkins said, “Phase One. That mean something to you?”

Yes, it certainly did. Manuel DeCaster was locked up in Coleman Phase One. He was the big boss, the ruthless bastard who’d employed Frank’s father, probably still employed Devin Matteson. This was not good news.

“Well,” Atkins said. “You got any ideas? Anything I should be checking out?”

As an FBI agent, as a law enforcement officer, Grady had to tell him. Had to drop that Matteson name and news of the recent shooting, fill Atkins in on the back story. He needed to draw connections for Atkins, get the investigation rolling in the direction it clearly needed to go in. But he couldn’t do it. Not yet. Not without talking to Frank. So for the second time in his Bureau career—and the second time involving Frank Temple III—Grady ignored those professional obligations, ignored his oath. In the end, he settled for a cop-out. Not a bold-faced lie, but a delay.

“I’m not sure,” he told Atkins, “but I know some people I can ask. Let me call around a bit and get back to you.”

Atkins seemed satisfied with that. Probably more so than he would have been if he’d known the first person Grady was going to call was Frank himself.

He still had the number, but when he called, all he got was an error message
saying it had been disconnected. One perk of working for the FBI, though—if the kid had a number, Grady could find it.

He called Helen next, canceled the date with what he hoped she knew was a sincere apology, and then headed for the office. Another perk of working for the FBI—when you told a woman a work emergency had come up, she tended to believe you.

He thought about Devin Matteson as he drove, about that blood debt he’d chosen not to mention to Atkins. Grady could remember a day, maybe two months after the suicide, when young Frank told him quite emphatically that his father had never killed a good man.
The victims were all evil,
he’d said,
and I know you can say he was no better, but the question is, was he any worse?

Grady had argued with him that day, told Frank that no one was entitled to make a character judgment that ended another man’s life—but what had he told himself, not long after that conversation, to justify the misconception he was allowing to flourish?

Devin Matteson was a bad man. That’s what he told himself. Devin Matteson was an evil bastard of the first order, a killer and drug runner and thief, as corrupt as they got. So who cared if the kid thought Devin was the one who’d given up his father? Who cared if he thought Devin was the one who had, essentially, put the gun barrel into his father’s mouth?

Nobody cared. Allowing him to think those things couldn’t do any harm, really, so long as Frank knew better than to take action, seek retribution.

For a long time, Grady had been sure he knew better.

It was a good thing, Ezra Ballard decided as he looked at the clock for the fifth time in ten minutes, that he’d never had children. He wouldn’t have done well with the constant worry.

He’d left the note on Frank’s door at two that afternoon, stopping by the cabin to find that Frank was missing, which wasn’t a surprise until Ezra noticed the boat was on the beach. If he wasn’t fishing and he had no car, where’d he gone? A walk, maybe. That was the only answer. Ezra scrawled a note and used a fishhook to fasten it to the door, then left expecting to hear from his friend’s son within a few hours.

It was dark now, had been for thirty minutes at least, and the phone hadn’t rung. Ezra actually lifted it from its handset a few times, just to check the dial tone. He wished the kid would call. There was something riding the air today
that Ezra didn’t like, something that had taken his mind for most of the day, left him distracted, answering questions only after they’d been repeated. The woman had been in the water again this morning, that beautiful woman swimming alone in the cold lake. No sign of the gray-haired companion, no movement from the car hidden in the trees. Maybe that was good. Maybe they were nobodies, nothing to worry about.

He couldn’t believe that anymore, though. Not after hearing Frank’s story about the attack on Nora Stafford, two men with guns arriving in pursuit of a car whose driver had now joined that woman.

Whoever this gray-haired son of a bitch on the island was, he couldn’t be anyone Ezra wanted around. Now Temple’s boy was at risk, and that sweetheart of a girl who’d taken over Bud Stafford’s shop, and none of that was good.

So what to do about it? Maybe nothing. Maybe it would be best to just wait it out, take his fishing parties after walleye and muskie and come home and smoke a pipe and read a book, and eventually the man and the woman would go away and things would be back to normal.

That was one option. An option he favored until the headlights of a truck washed over his driveway and Frank Temple III arrived, not alone, but with young Nora from the body shop, and right then, even before they got out of the truck, Ezra understood that this thing was not going to be one he could wait out.

They came onto the porch and sat with him and told him what had happened. He listened without speaking, as was his way. People commented on this often, as if it were strange behavior. Ezra didn’t understand any other way to listen. When somebody was telling you something, particularly something important, you shut up and listened and thought about what they were saying. If you were always opening your own mouth, or thinking about what you were going to say, how much did you really hear? Ezra heard it all. Heard it, and considered it.

What he heard now, this description of a man with bound hands and a cut throat, took him back to a place he’d left long ago. Not Vietnam, either, no place so far away. Detroit was across a lake, not an ocean, but to Ezra it was home to more bad memories than Vietnam. He’d seen men die in both places, but the deaths in Detroit were a different sort of killing. In thirty years in Tomahawk, he hadn’t encountered anything like them again. A throat laid open in pursuit of a dollar gained, a bullet through the eye to avenge a dollar lost, those things did not happen here.
Hadn’t
happened here, at least.

But now they’d come to him, Temple’s son and the girl had, and they were right to do so. He could see the doubt in Nora’s eyes, could see her taking in him and his cabin and wondering what Frank was thinking, why they were on this porch instead of in a police station somewhere. Frank understood, though. He’d learned some things from his father, some things he wished not to know. In this circumstance, at least, they would help him. Ezra hoped the kid appreciated that.

“I didn’t think she should go home,” Frank concluded. “Am I wrong? Are these guys already out of town, trying to disappear?”

“No,” Ezra said. “You weren’t wrong, and they aren’t gone yet.”

He was sure of that, though he hadn’t seen the men personally, knew nothing of them. What he did know, just from Frank’s story, was that these two were professionals who’d come all the way up here to do a job. The job didn’t involve beating up Mowery or killing Jerry Dolson, and because these things were happening it was clear that the job was not done. Also clear, then, was the notion that they would not leave until it was.

The girl was tougher than he might have guessed. He could tell that in the way she stood and listened. Frightened, sure, but not panicked. Not frozen. There was a quality of disbelief to her at times, as if she hadn’t reconciled with everything that had happened yet, but that was reasonable. Expected.

“So what’s your advice?” Frank said. “Should we go back to the cops?”

“I don’t think we’ll be able to decide that until we find out exactly who the visitors are, and what they’re running from.”

“How do we do that?”

“Well,” Ezra said, “I’d imagine asking them directly would be a good start.”

Frank and Nora stood there and stared at him, no sound but the buzzing insects filling the air for a while.

“We’re going there?” Frank said. “To the island?”

“I think we should.”

“Without the police.”

“Son, you were the one telling
me
the risks with the police.”

“I know, but . . . you’re saying we go out there now?”

Ezra shook his head. “It were up to me, I’d wait till daylight. You go out there in the middle of the night, you’re gonna provoke a different sort of reaction.”

Frank didn’t respond, and Nora Stafford looked unsettled. Ezra spread his hands and leaned forward, the chair creaking beneath him.

“Listen—you two are worried. Scared. That makes sense. And you’re trying
to decide what to do that will leave you the safest. Also makes sense. But you can’t do that until you understand the situation. That gray-haired guy and that woman, they aren’t the same cut as these men that rolled into town on their heels, but they’ve got some answers. Some things we need to hear.”

Frank nodded slowly. “All right. So you and I go out there in the morning and try to get them to talk.”

“It’s my recommendation, yes.”

“No,” Nora said, and Ezra thought she was objecting to the whole idea until she said, “You’re not going to leave me sitting in some cabin while you go out there to talk to them. I won’t do it.”

Nobody answered her at first. Ezra wasn’t thrilled with the idea; Nora’s involvement had already gone too far, in his opinion.

“They came into my shop and they killed my employee, my friend, a man who’d worked for my family for years,” she said. “If anyone here deserves some answers, it’s not you guys. It’s me.”

Tough to argue with that. Ezra just said, “That’s what you want to do? Talk to them in person?”

“From what I’ve heard, it seems to be what you think is best. But if anyone goes out there, they’ll be taking me with them.”

“Fine,” Ezra said. “We’ll all go, then. First thing in the morning.”

“What if they leave?” Nora asked.

“Be tough to leave that island,” Ezra said, “without a boat.”

Frank’s eyebrows rose. “You’re going to steal it?”

“Not steal it. Might disrupt it a touch, is all.”

“What if they see you?” Nora said. “Won’t that cause problems?”

Ezra smiled at her, and Frank answered for him.

“They won’t see him, Nora.”

Her head was swiveling between them, her lips slightly parted, eyes intense, not saying a word. Frank looked to her.

“You’re in more jeopardy here than anybody. What do you think?”

“I think,” she said after a long pause, “that we should know what it’s all about. If they can tell us that, then I like Ezra’s idea.”

It was quiet for a few minutes, and then Ezra said, “You feel safe at your cabin?”

“I do,” Frank said.

Ezra nodded. “You’ll be safe there tonight.” Ezra had a boat and a rifle with a night scope. Yes, they’d be safe tonight.

“All right,” he said. “I think I ought to go address that boat on the island.
You all go on back home. Rest. It’s done for the day, all right? I believe that. Any trouble does come up, I’ll be around, and I see you got your dad’s gun in case you need it.”

Frank looked down at the gun, then back at Ezra. “How the hell can you tell it’s his gun when it’s holstered and I’m standing in the dark?”

Ezra walked to his truck.

__________

G
rady found an active cell number easily enough, but he couldn’t get through to Frank. He called five times over two hours, got nothing but an immediate voice mail, indicating the phone was turned off. He left two messages. No details, just his numbers and an urgent request to call.

What to do now? He owed Atkins information. Every hour that ticked by made him feel guiltier about that, more aware of the ramifications. If Frank was really responsible for shooting Devin Matteson, then what in the hell was Grady thinking, trying to protect him?

It would help if he would answer the damn phone. One conversation, no matter how brief, would give Grady some guidance. Some sense of how to proceed. Finally, frustrated, he picked up the phone again and called Saul down in Miami. Maybe Jimmy would have insight by now, some new development.

Saul answered on the first ring, his voice tinged with irritation. “Shit, Grady, I was gonna call you tomorrow. Should have known you couldn’t wait on it till morning like a normal person.”

“Wait on what, Jimmy?”

“The hell do you think? Matteson.”

“You’ve heard about what’s going on up there?”

“Up there? What . . . look, Grady, why are you calling?”

Grady stood up, the office not feeling so warm anymore, and said, “Did Matteson die in the hospital?”

If he had, then it became murder. Not just attempted, but the real deal.

“Die? Uh, no, Grady. The boy is loose.”

“What?”

“Matteson bailed out of the hospital under his own power sometime this afternoon. Hasn’t been heard from since.”