Vapor Trail (18 page)

“No cartridges found on the scene. No latent prints, no blood or body fluids. They’re still running tests on fibers and residue on the carpet.

“I talked to Albuquerque, and they say Moros was a solid, old-fashioned plodder. Nothing remotely in his past that suggests he’s anything other than what he was. They put the whole incident down to media-induced hysteria.

“The father and mother who accused Moros out there have been in town all summer. No vacations to Minnesota.”

Broker reached in and put the folder back on the front seat of Lymon’s car. “This is your kind of stuff, not my kind of stuff,” he said.

Lymon’s face was unusually candid. “Your kind of thing is Harry, right? Fast and loose, high risk, and no rules. Benish just told me about what happened between you two back in St. Paul. About Harry’s wife.”

“Let’s get out of here, walk a little,” Broker said. He pointed toward the highway. They walked the rest of the way up the drive, crossed Highway 95, and followed an asphalt bike trail that meandered under the shade of the trees.

“So how do you handle what happened with Harry’s wife?” Lymon said.

“You don’t handle it. It’s always there, walking beside you, like we are now,” Broker said.

“I hope I never get put in that situation.”

“Chances are you won’t. A big part of living is believing that bad stuff happens to other people. Usually it works that way.”

“Up on top of the water.”

“There it is. But you’re right. Harry is my kind of thing.”

Lymon studied Broker carefully. “Explain your kind of thing.”

“Sure. Start with fundamentals. What was the world’s first recorded murder?”

“You’re patronizing me,” Lymon said, guarded.

“Uh-uh. C’mon. Answer the question.”

“Cain kills Abel. God asks Cain where his brother is, and Cain says, ‘I know not. Am I my brother’s keeper?’” Lymon quoted.

“God interrogates his suspect.” Broker nodded. “The suspect denies the crime. But Cain gets busted. That’s a fairy tale. What’s missing that would make it real?”

Lymon stared at him.

Broker continued. “What’s missing is the tip that put God onto Cain. Once you add the snitch, you have the world’s first solved crime.”

“And you think Harry’s the snitch on the Saint.”

“There it is. My job is getting Harry to talk.”

They walked in silence for thirty seconds. Then Broker said, “The gossip says you’re sleeping with Gloria. Are you?”

Lymon avoided Broker’s eyes and looked into the trees. “I might have strayed a little . . .” He held up his left hand, palm inward, and stared at the gold band.

“Bad question. Nobody tells the truth about sex. Or the Saint,” Broker said.

Lymon made a face.

“So what’d she do, take you like an antidote to Harry? She’s still in love with him, isn’t she? Must be hard on her, being stuck on a guy who shouldn’t have his ticket punched into the twenty-first century,” Broker said.

“The human heart is . . .” Lymon said.

“Dog food, remember?” Broker nodded back toward the house. “Was Harry protecting her?”

“What do you mean?”

“Let me put it a different way. Where was Gloria the night Moros got killed?”

“Down in the gym, working out.”

“Anybody see her who can vouch for the time?”

“Me.”

“Anybody see the two of you?”

“No, we were alone.”

“So you could have been somewhere else.”

“Prove it.”

Broker squinted at the younger man. “That’s what Harry used
to say when people suggested he killed Dolman.” Broker turned and walked back toward all the cop cars lining the driveway. He was about ten feet from his car when his cell phone rang.

It was Janey Hensen, and she was crying.

“Broker, I need some help. Drew and I had this fight, and he totally lost it, says he’s moving out, and the thing is, Laurie is—she took it kind of hard and she hurt herself. . . .”

Hurt herself?
“Did you call nine-one-one?” Broker said.

“It’s not like that exactly. I need some help talking to her,” Janey said.

“Okay. I’ll be right over.”

You will regret this.

Broker did not play games with women. And one of his basic rules was not to meddle in other people’s marriages, especially when an old girlfriend was involved.

Janey and Drew lived in a Victorian on the South Hill that looked like a three-layer wedding cake. From their front porch you could look over the town and see north down the river valley. Drew had kept Restoration Hardware in the black when he rehabbed this tusker.

Then all the trivia dropped away when Janey met him at the door and he saw the bloody towel in her hands.

“She cut her hands up. I don’t think it’s bad enough for the emergency room, but it’s just horrible,” Janey said.

“Calm down, breathe through your nose,” Broker said as he moved swiftly into the house toward the sound of the crying child.

Laurie sat on the kitchen floor blubbering. She held her hands out in front of her with bloody gauze stuck to her fingers. More blood was smeared on her T-shirt and shorts.

Immediately, Broker looked for signs of serious injury.

Blood smears, no great quantity. Nothing arterial. He removed the gauze pads and evaluated the wounds on Laurie’s hands.

One fingernail was split to the quick, and tiny bits of abraded skin hung from several fingers. Her knuckles were a mess.

Quickly, he felt over the rest of her body; he asked her to move her feet, asked if her back or neck hurt. As Broker worked through his checks, Janey said, “Laurie, honey, this is Phil Broker; he’s a friend, a good friend.” She turned to Broker and said, “I’ll show you.”

She swept Laurie up in her arms, settled her on a hip, and carried her out the back door.

Janey was talking too fast; her eyes and hair were spiky with tension. “About an hour after Drew made his scene and left, I found Laurie out here, in the corner of the yard.”

She put her hand on the back of Laurie’s head and pressed her to her chest, instinctively murmuring, “It’s okay, it’s okay . . .” as she led Broker to a corner of the yard where tall hostas and ferns grew in the shade. “There,” she said, inclining her head.

Broker saw the freshly dug hole in the flower bed. Several gauze pads and some ripped pieces of dirty cardboard were scattered around.

“She . . . she was digging with her bare hands,” Janey said, rocking Laurie back and forth. “Samantha was Laurie’s cat and slept at the foot of her bed for years. We had her put to sleep last May, and we buried her out here in the flower bed. Then today, after Drew left, Laurie disappeared, and I found her crying out here. And I went out there and . . .”

Janey balled her free hand into a fist. “She’s just six years old, for Christ sake. It’s not fair she has to go through this. It’s just not fair. How could he do this to a kid, his own daughter? Fucking men. Goddamn fucking men and their fucking.”

“Shhh, easy, let’s get her back in and look at those hands.” Broker put his arm around her and started her back toward the house. But Janey was clasping and unclasping her hand, blinking rapidly. So Broker said, “Focus, Janey. We gotta do something about Laurie; forget the other for now.”

“Laurie, right,” Janey said.

They went back in the kitchen, and Broker sat Laurie down on a chair, then squatted to get at her level. Laurie was tall, with blond hair plaited in two braids. She had blue eyes like her father. She had tears in her eyes like her mother. He looked to Janey.

“I’m on it. Hot water. A clean sponge. Some disinfectant . . .” Janey said, starting to move.

“And hydrogen peroxide if you have it, clean towels, and all the first-aid dressings you have, adhesive tape, and a sharp scissors,” Broker called after her.

As Janey set about assembling the items, Broker spoke to Laurie. “First we have to clean up your hands and see how bad they are.”

“Leave me alone,” Laurie sniffled.

“I will, but first we have to wash your hands.”

“I don’t want to wash my hands,” Laurie cried and waved her hands feebly in the air.

“They must hurt a lot,” Broker said, his voice conveying just a touch of admiration.

“They do hurt,” Laurie admitted.

“Well, we don’t want to get stitches, do we?” Broker said.

“Stitches?” Laurie said. Apparently that jogged a precrisis memory. “I don’t want any stitches.”

“Well, then you better let me look. If you don’t, we might have to go to the hospital.”

As Broker was examining Laurie’s hands, Janey put a pan full of hot water down. Then she put down a sponge, more gauze pads, adhesive tape, and a brown plastic bottle of hydrogen peroxide.

“Hold her,” he told Janey. Janey kneeled down on the floor and put her arms around her daughter. “It’s all right; Mommy’s here,” she said. She held her tight as Broker cleaned away the coagulated blood and dirt and tried to ignore the girl’s screams. These intensified as he trimmed away the abraded skin with the scissors, then peaked when he poured the peroxide. Her hands foamed up white with tiny red bubbles.

“Hold her, good; Laurie; you’re doing fine.”

After blotting the hands dry, he took the tape and gauze and started bandaging. Soon she looked like a taped prizefighter just about to put on the gloves.

There was more holding and soothing with Janey, and in a few minutes Laurie was over the worst of her tears. Then she stopped crying altogether and said, “Am I a broken home, now?”

“What?” Broker said.

“There’s a boy in my first-grade class named David Knoll, and he’s a broken home. Are you going to live here now?” Laurie said.

Broker cocked his head. “No, no I live someplace else.”

“Mom yelled at Dad and said he had a girlfriend. I wondered if you were her boyfriend?”

“No, actually, honey . . .” Broker reached in his pocket and pulled out the five-pointed county deputy star.

Laurie’s eyes widened, and she asked in a whisper, “Are you a wizard?”

“No, no; he’s a police officer,” Janey said.

“Are we in trouble?” Laurie asked, hunching her shoulders. “Is that why Dad left?”

“I’m here because I have a problem,” Broker said quickly. “You see, one of the things police officers do is rescue cats that get in trees. Well, I took this cat out of a tree today, and now I have it at home. But it’s not a grown-up’s cat. It’s a kid’s cat because it doesn’t want anything to do with me.”

“What color is it?’ Laurie asked.

“Ah, it’s gray I think.”

Janey moved closer to Broker, their shoulders grazed. The anger in her face transformed into something warmer. Broker turned his attention to Laurie, took one of the clean towels and wiped her nose.

“Let’s take a ride. Go out to the river, collect a cat, and maybe order a pizza,” Broker said.

“You sure?” Janey said, and the expression on her face was far more probing than her words.

“You two need a breather. So we take a drive, clear the air, and I bring you back,” Broker said. He looked around the kitchen at the too-bright Italian patterns in the wall tile. The copper pots and pans hung on hooks like brass shouts.

“Okay. He could come back, and I want her more prepared for”—Janey closed her face around a harsh thought—“whatever.”

Janey went upstairs, leaving Broker in the middle of the light, airy downstairs that had lots of houseplants in planters and throw rugs on the gleaming hardwood floors. The Mission Oak furniture and the floor lamps had been selected with an Art Deco flair. The color coordination of the sofa, chairs, and carpet was impeccable. And the kid who lived in all this perfection had been driven to dig up a dead cat.

Janey returned with a stuffed bunny that had blue vertical stripes, and which Broker recognized as Goodnight Bunny from the book of that name. Then he went out and backed the Crown Vic right up to the back door so they didn’t show the whole neighborhood Laurie’s bandaged hands.

As they were pulling out of the drive, a stout woman in her fifties stood at the right side of the driveway.

“Who’s that?” Broker asked as they drove by.

“Mrs. Siple standing with her big ears right on the property line
as usual,” Laurie said, obviously imitating something her parents had said.

“What’s her story?” Broker asked.

“She hates Dad,” Laurie said from her mom’s lap. “She called the cops on him.” Then Laurie dropped down low in the seat and chanted under her breath, “Hag. Witch. Prune. Daddy’s going to put her in a book.”

Janey shook her head. “She made all these ridiculous charges, but it was really about the property line.”

“It’s a small town,” Broker said. The biggest single complaint to police in the city of Stillwater concerned property line violations.

Broker made small talk with Laurie. They discussed his favorite movie when he was a kid, which was
Peter Pan.
And his favorite food, sloppy joes. What about pizza? Laurie asked. Broker said he’d never had pizza, maybe they could try some now? Laurie liked that idea.

They drove north on 95, past the cop car rally in A. J. Scott’s driveway, to Milt’s place. They put Ambush the cat in a plastic carry basket, drove back past all the cop cars again, picked up the pizza Janey had ordered on her cell, and returned to the house on the South Hill.

While Laurie got acquainted with Ambush, Broker took directions from Janey and went to call on Drew.

Drew Hensen kept a studio at the north end of town over a rambling antique warehouse. Broker parked and studied the layout. Access to the studio was up a flight of wooden stairs; there was a long porch overlooking Main Street.

Broker crossed the street, went up the steps, and peeked in through the screen door; there was a small kitchen, a futon in an alcove, and one big room full of shelves, books, a taboret, a computer,
and a drawing table at which Drew sat, hunched over.

Broker knocked on the door. “Drew. It’s Phil Broker.”

Drew came to the door and cocked his head. “Hello, this is twice in two days. Come in.”

“It’s about your daughter,” Broker said.

Drew, who’d worked around a lot of cops, was immediately alert. “What about my daughter? Is this
official
?”

“No, no; Janey called me up . . .”

Drew stared. Refocusing. “Janey called
you
up,” he repeated.

Pipes rattled in the wall, and then a slender blonde came out of the bathroom. She was dressed for the weather in tennis-type skirt, a sleeveless top, and sandals. Her blue eyes were magnified behind granny glasses.

“This is Lisa Mertin; she writes children’s books,” Drew said.

Broker and Lisa said hello. Drew turned back to Broker and said, “Now what about Laurie?”

“She cut up her hands. She was upset and tried to dig up Samantha,” Broker said.

Drew winced at Broker’s language. “Christ. Janey and I had a fight, and there you go—the kid soaks it right up.” He turned to Lisa and gestured at the drawing board. “Look, this isn’t going to work out today.”

“No problem. Take care of home,” Lisa said. She picked up her purse, came over, and pecked Drew lightly on the cheek. “I hope everything’s all right. I’ll leave you two.” Then she walked from the studio.

Lisa impressed Broker as being sharp and businesslike, with none of the bovine qualities that Janey had attributed to the other woman.

“Lisa is one of my authors; she was in town for a book signing today, so she dropped by to discuss this new project we’re working on,” Drew said.

“Whatever. Drew, look, I think you better go see Laurie,” Broker said.

Drew blinked several times and then stared at the empty doorway where Lisa had just disappeared. “We’re trying something new. You see, Rowling’s success with
Harry Potter
tells us that kids don’t want all this PC coddling. We should prepare them for the real world: villains, danger, and even death. I was thinking of calling it
Bullies, Bad Guys, and Things That Bite
.”

Drew’s eyelids fluttered after he finished speaking. Broker’s gut read on the man hadn’t changed since they’d met years ago; Drew still kept a one-second delay between himself and reality.

Finally, Drew shook his head. “The dead fucking cat?”

“Her hands are torn up a little; she doesn’t require stitches, but . . .”

“Torn up.” Drew paused a beat and then said, “I suppose you’ve been talking to Janey.”

“A little. I ran into her at the grocery store last week.”

“Uh-huh. Well, you should know, she’s been pretty twitchy lately. Since the terror attack in New York, she’s obsessed with being vulnerable. She worries about poison in the food and water; smallpox being released at the State Fair . . . she watches C-SPAN coverage of the congressional hearings on terrorism.

“And then there’s the personal side. I tell her Lisa is dropping by the studio, and she accuses me of having an affair. Christ—I work with six female kids writers in Minnesota. Two of them are fat, and two of them are lesbians,” Drew said.

“What about the other two?” Broker said a little too fast.

Drew made an attempt to stare Broker down, decided against it, and looked away. “Okay, so I blew up in the kitchen. And Laurie saw it. Now this has happened. What’s next?”

Broker looked around the studio, and his eyes settled on the big duffel bag full of clothes sitting on the futon in the alcove.
Obviously, Drew was leaving some stuff out. Like walking out of his house with a packed bag. Broker said in a level voice, “I think you should go see to your daughter.”

“And I want to see her,” Drew said. “I just don’t want to see . . . who’s with her right now.”

Broker said nothing, but his arms were crossed tight over his chest in a body language knot. Drew pulled the studio door shut. Side by side, he and Broker went down the stairs two at a time. On the street Drew shook Broker’s hand, mumbled a fast thanks, turned, and jogged toward the line of parked cars.

Broker got in his car and drove back to the house north of town where the dogs had found the body. The voyeur rush had subsided, and now only a few county cars remained. Mouse was talking to Joe Timmer, the chief investigator for the Ramsey County medical examiner. As Broker walked up, they were indulging in copper gallows humor about how the news media would handle the incident.