Sudden Prey (3 page)

Then the door flew open and the two LaChaise women were on the stoop and their guns were coming up and he shouted, ''No, don't, no, don't,'' and he heard Del yelling, and Candy LaChaise started firing and he saw Sherrill's gun bucking in her hand . . .

CANDY SAW THE MAN WITH THE YELLOW TEETH AND the black hole at the end of his pistol and the woman with the dark hair and maybe--if she had time--she thought, Too late . . .

She felt the bullets go through, several of them, was aware of the noise, of the flash, of the faces like wanted posters, all straining toward her, but no pain, just a jostling feel, like rays of light pushing through her chest . . . then her vision went,and she felt Georgie falling beside her. She was upside down, her feet on the stoop, her head on the sidewalk, and she waited for the light. The light would come, and behind it . . .

She was gone.

LUCAS WAS SHOUTING, ''HOLD IT, HOLD IT,'' AND FIVE seconds after the two women burst from the credit union, there was no reason to fire his own weapon.

In the sudden silence, through the stink of the smokeless powder, somebody said, ''Jesus H. Christ.''

Chapter
Two.

THE MINNEAPOLIS CITY HALL IS A RUDE PILE OF LIVERISH stone, damp in the summer, cold in the winter, ass-deep in cops, crooks, politicians, bureaucrats, favor-seekers, reporters, TV personalities and outraged taxpayers, none of whom were allowed to smoke inside the building.

The trail of illegal cigarette smoke followed Rose Marie Roux down the darkened marble halls from the chief's office to Homicide. The chief was a large woman, getting larger, her face going hound-dog with the pressure of the job and the passing of the years. She stopped outside homicide, took a drag on the cigarette, and blew smoke.

She could see Davenport inside, standing, hands in his pockets. He was wearing a blue wool suit, a white shirt with a long soft collar and what looked like an Herme`s necktie-- one of the anal numbers with eight million little horses prancing around. A political appointee, a deputy chief, his sideline software business made him worth, according to the latest rumors, maybe ten million dollars. He was talking to Sloan and Sherrill.

Sloan was thin, pasty-faced, serious, dressed all in brown and tan--he could lean against a wall and disappear. He could also make friends with anyone: he was the best interrogator on the force. Sloan hadn't taken his gun out that afternoon and was still on the job.

Sherrill, on the other hand, had fired all six shots from her revolver. She was still up, floating high on the release from the fear and ecstasy that sometimes came after a gunfight. Roux, in her few years on the street, before law school, had never drawn her pistol. She didn't like guns.

Roux watched the three of them, Lucas Davenport and his pals. Shook her head: maybe things were getting out of control. She dropped the cigarette on the floor, stepped on it and pushed through the door.

The three turned to look at her, and she looked at Lucas and tipped her head toward the hall. Lucas followed her back through the door, and shut the door against the inquiring ears of Sloan and Sherrill.

''The request for a uniform stop--when did you think of that?'' Roux asked. Her words ricocheted down the marble halls, but there was nobody else to hear them.

Lucas leaned against the cool marble wall. He smiled quickly, the smile here and then gone. The smile made him look hard, even too hard: mean. He'd been working out, Roux thought. He went at it hard, from time to time, and when he'd really stripped himself down, he looked like a piece of belt leather. She could see the shape of his skull under his forehead skin.

''It seemed like a no-lose proposition,'' he said, his voice pitched low. They both knew what they were talking about.

She nodded. ''Well, it worked. We released the voice tape from Dispatch and it's taking the heat off. You're gonna hear some firing-squad stuff from the Star Tribune , the editorial page. Questions about why they ever got inside--why youwaited that long to move. But I don't think . . . no real trouble.''

''If we'd just taken them, it would have come to a couple of witnesses with bad records,'' Lucas said. ''They'd be back on the street right now.''

''I know, but the way it looks . . .'' She sighed. ''If the LaChaises hadn't shot this guy Farris, there'd be a lot more trouble.''

''Big break for us, Farris was,'' Lucas said, flashing his grim smile again.

''I didn't mean it that way,'' Roux said, and she looked away. ''Anyway, Farris is gonna make it.''

''Yeah, a little synthetic cheekbone, splice up his jaw, give him a bunch of new teeth, graft on a piece of ear . . .''

''I'm trying to cover you,'' Roux said sharply.

''Sounds like you're giving us shit,'' Lucas snapped back. ''The Rice Lake bank people looked at the movies from the credit union security cameras. There's no doubt--it was the LaChaises that did it over there. They looked the same with the panty hose, said the same things, acted the same way. And it was Candy LaChaise who killed the teller. We're waiting to hear back from Ladysmith and Cloquet, but it'll be the same.''

Roux shook her head and said, ''You picked a hard way to do it, though: a hard way to settle it.''

''They came out, they opened up, we were all right there,'' Lucas said. ''They fired first. That's not cop bullshit.''

''I'm not criticizing,'' Roux said. ''I'm just saying the papers are asking questions.''

''Maybe you oughta tell the papers to go fuck themselves,'' Lucas said. The chief was a politician who had at one time thought she might be headed for the Senate. ''That'd be a good political move right now, the way things are.''

Roux took an old-fashioned silver cigarette case out of herpocket, popped it open. ''I'm not talking politics here, Lucas. I'm a little worried about what happened.'' She fumbled a cigarette out of the case, snapped the case shut. ''There's a feel of . . . setup. Of taking the law in our own hands. We're okay, because Farris was shot and you made that call for a stop. But there were six or seven holes in Candy LaChaise. It's not like you weren't ready to do it.''

''We were ready,'' Lucas agreed.

''. . . So there could be another stink when the medical examiner's report comes out.''

''Tell them to take their time writing the report,'' Lucas said. ''You know the way things are: In a week or so, nobody'll care. And we're still a couple of months from the midwinter sweeps.''

''Yeah, yeah. And the ME's cooperating. Still.''

''The LaChaises started it,'' Lucas persisted. ''And they were sport killers. Candy LaChaise shot people to see them die. Fuck 'em.''

''Yeah, yeah,'' Roux said. She waved at him and started back toward the chief's office, shoulders slumped. ''Send everybody home. We'll get the shooting board going tomorrow.''

''You really pissed?'' Lucas called after her.

''No. I'm just sorta . . . depressed. There've been too many bodies this year,'' she said. She stopped, flicked a lighter, touched off the fresh cigarette. The tip glowed like a firefly in the semidark. ''Too many people are getting killed. You oughta think about that.''

WEATHER KARKINNEN WAS DOING PAPERWORK IN THE study when Lucas got home. She heard him in the kitchen, and called down the hall, ''In the study.''

A moment later, he leaned in the door, a bottle of beer in his hand. ''Hey.''

''I tried to call you,'' she said.

Weather was a small, athletic woman with wide shoulders and close-cut blond hair. She had high cheekbones and eyes that were dark blue and slightly slanted in the Lapp-Finnish way. Her nose was a bit too large and a little crooked, as if she'd once lost a close fight. Not a pretty woman, exactly, but men tended to drift toward her at parties. ''I saw a TV story on the shooting.''

''What'd they say?'' He unscrewed the beer cap and took a sip.

''Two women were shot and killed after a robbery. They say it's a controversial shooting.'' She was anxious, brushing hair out of her eyes.

Lucas shook his head. ''You can't pay any attention to TV.''

He was angry.

''Lucas . . .''

''What?'' He was defensive, and didn't like it.

''You're really steamed,'' she said. ''What happened?''

''Ah, I'm taking heat from the media. Everybody seems to worry about whether it was a fair fight. Why should the fight be fair? This isn't a game, it's law enforcement.''

''Could you have taken them? Arrested them? Gone to trial, with the people at the other banks in Wisconsin?''

''No.'' He shook his head. ''They were always masked, and always used stolen cars. There was a case down in River Falls, two years ago, where Candy LaChaise was busted for armed robbery. The guy she robbed, the car dealer, was mugged and killed two weeks later, before the trial. There weren't any witnesses and she had an alibi. The River Falls cops think her old nutcake pals helped her out.''

''But it's not your job to kill them,'' Weather said.

''Hey,'' Lucas said. ''I just showed up with a gun. What happened after that, that was their choice. Not mine.''

She shook her head, still distressed. ''I don't know,'' she said. ''What you do frightens me, but not the way I thought it would.'' She crossed her arms and hugged herself, as she would if she were cold. ''I'm not so worried about what somebody else might do to you, as what you might be doing to yourself.''

''I told you . . .'' Getting angrier now.

''Lucas,'' she interrupted. ''I know how your mind works. TV said these people had been under surveillance for nine days. I can feel you manipulating them into a robbery. I don't know if you know, but I know it.''

''Bullshit,'' he snapped, and he turned out of the doorway.

''Lucas . . .''

Halfway down the hall, the paperwork registered with him. She was doing wedding invitations. He turned around, went back.

''Jesus, I'm sorry, I'm not mad at you,'' he said. '' Sometimes . . . I don't know, my grip is getting slippery.''

She stood up and said, ''Come here. Sit in the chair.'' He sat, and she climbed on his lap. He was always amazed with how small she was, how small all the parts were. Small head, small hands, little fingers.

''You need something to lower your blood pressure,'' she said.

''That's what the beer's for,'' he said.

''As your doctor, I'm saying the beer's not enough,'' she said, snuggling in his lap.

''Yeah? What exactly would you prescribe . . . ?''

Chapter
Three.

CRAZY ANSEL BUTTERS WAITED FOR THE RUSH AND when it came, he said, ''Here it comes.''

Dexter Lamb was lying on the couch, one arm trailing on the floor: he was looking up at the spiderweb pattern of cracks on the pink plaster ceiling, and he said, ''I told you, dude.''

Lamb's old lady was in the kitchen, staring at the top of the plastic table, her voice low, slow, clogged, coming down: ''Wish I was going . . . Goddamnit, Dexter, where'd you put the bag? I know you got some.''

Ansel didn't hear her, didn't hear the complaints, the whining. Ansel was flying over a cocaine landscape, all the potentialities in his head--green hills, pretty women, red Mustangs, Labrador retrievers--were compressed into a ball of pleasure. His head lay on his shoulder, his long hair falling to the side, like lines of rain outside a window. Twenty minutes later, the dream was all gone, except for the crack afterburn that would arrive like a sack of Christmas coal.

But he had a few minutes yet, and he mumbled, ''Dex, I got something to talk about.'' Lamb was working up anotherpipe, stopped, his eyes hazy from too many hits, too many days without sleep. ''What chu want?''

His wife came out of the back into the kitchen, scratched her crotch through her thin cotton underpants and said, ''Where'd you put the bag, Dex?''

''I need to find a guy,'' Ansel said, talking over her. ''It's worth real money. A month's worth of smoke. And I need a crib somewhere close. TV, couple beds, like that.''

''I can get you the crib,'' Lamb said. He jerked a thumb at his wife. ''My brother-in-law's got some houses, sorta shitty, but you can live in one of them. You'd have to buy your own furniture, though. I know where you could get some, real cheap.''

''That'd be okay, I guess.''

Dex finished with the pipe and flicked his Bic, and just before hitting on the mouthpiece, asked, ''Who's this guy you're lookin' for?''

''A cop. I'm looking for a cop.''

Lamb's old lady, eyes big and black, cheeks sunken, a pale white scar, scratched her crotch again and asked, ''What's his name?''

Butters looked at her. ''That's what I need to know,'' he said.

BILL MARTIN CAMEDOWN FROM THE UPPER PENINSULA, driving a Ford extended cab with rusted-out fenders and a fat V-8 tuned to perfection. He took the country roads across Wisconsin, stopped at a roadhouse for a beer and a couple of boiled eggs, stopped again for gasoline, talked to a gun dealer in Ashland.

The countryside was still iced in. Old snow showed the sheen of hard crust through the inky-green pines and bare gray broadleafs. Martin stopped often to get out and tramp around, to peer down from bridges, to check tracks in thesnow. He didn't like this winter: there'd been good snow, followed by a sleet storm that covered everything with a quarter-inch of ice. The ice could kill off the grouse, just when the population was finally turning back up.