Cutting Loose, page 4
“These are very bad guys, Al.”
“I hear you.”
“Maximum care. Just try to contain them. No more than that, right now. Can you keep this line open?”
“Sure.”
Esposito picked up another phone and called Austin.
Sol turned from the window set in the back door, and Max saw his expression.
“What?”
“They’re out there, in back. I caught movement down a ways, past a garage.”
“We don’t go now, we don’t go at all,” said Carey.
“Gimme a few minutes,” said Sol, hefting the green bag.
“Jesus, Sol,” said Carey, seeing him sway, but Max waved her down.
“Sol, if you’ve got a move, this is the time to make it.”
“You want me to come with you?” said Carey.
“No. Just be ready.”
Sol opened the back door and stepped out, carrying the bag, as coolly as though he were taking out the trash. The sheer nerve of it made Carey go cold, but there was no response and no sign of movement from outside. He turned left and took a few steps, then sank to his knees. Max, watching, blew air and said, “This is turning to shit.”
“Yeah, maybe.”
An instinct made her return to the living room, where Gary, ashen-faced, had moved closer to the front door. Colt in hand, she said, “Gary—relax. Take a seat. Enjoy the break from routine.”
“Uh—you bet,” he said, and sat slowly on the couch.
Max walked back in and said, “Gary—try very hard to keep us sweet. You hear me?”
“Yes, sir.”
“’Sir’ is the way it works. Keep thinking along those lines.”
“Give me your keys, Gary,” said Carey, and he silently handed them over. She locked the front door from inside, then returned to the kitchen and looked through the window. Sol had moved; she breathed out slowly.
Sheriff Forbush, turning, saw a KCTV news crew pull up, and walked over to them. Ted Nugent, the reporter, who had great hair and a chiseled profile, smiled as he opened the car door.
“Al, always a pleasure.”
“Likewise, Ted.”
Four police vehicles now blocked the road, and Forbush had deployed all his personnel to contain the duplex and to clear some of the houses. He had also asked a neighboring force for assistance, since the situation might develop before the FBI arrived.
“It’s a big one, Al, is what I’m hearing,” said Nugent.
“Yeah. Waste of my time trying to keep it under wraps, I guess, so yeah. . . .”
“Carey Astaire, that commie gal?”
“Yeah, maybe. It’s a possible ID, no more than that.”
The intercom in his vehicle squawked, and he said, “Give me a minute.” He picked up, and Esposito said, “Al, I’ve got an Agent Leveson ten miles away. He’ll be with you pretty soon.”
“Okay.”
“Anything moving?”
“Nope. Just contained, like you say.”
“Is that realtor still inside?”
“Yeah.”
“How long has he been in there?”
“Twenty minutes.”
Esposito was silent for a few moments, then he said, “Okay Al. Let me know when Leveson gets there.”
“You bet.”
Rick Lafitte, sitting in a bar in Monterey, ran a finger up the side of his frosted glass of German lager and finally relaxed. The FBI had continued to give him a hard time after the initial interview, coming to his home and his office on the bay, inconveniencing and embarrassing him in front of clients. That very day, he had phoned them, and was passed around the system for a few minutes, until an agent who said his name was Gormley came on the line.
“Rick Lafitte here—”
“Yeah, Rick, what can I do for you?”
“Gormley, huh? Okay—listen, you guys have been on my ass for how long now? Enough, for Christ’s sake. This is such a pile of manure. Charge me or butt out.”
He carried on in that style for a while, then waited for a reaction, but there was silence on the line.
“Hey, Gormley, you still there?”
“Sure, Rick.”
He waited, then said, “And?”
“Uh—you are no longer a person of interest.”
“I’m not?”
“Right.”
His anger and frustration were suddenly left hanging.
“You care to flesh that out?”
“Not really, Rick. We aren’t looking at you right now.”
“That’s it?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s all you got to say? After putting me through the wringer all this time?”
“Have a nice day, Rick,” said Gormley and hung up.
He picked up his glass and took a deep drink. That passage in his life was now over, though a part of him regretted never seeing her again. The TV was on over the bar and news footage was constantly being replayed of some outrage in, he supposed, the Middle East. Suddenly a picture of Carey filled the screen, looking at him. He thought for a moment he was imagining it.
“No way,” he breathed to himself. “Phil,” he called to the barman. “Be a nice guy and give me more sound on that story.”
“You bet.”
A local channel had taken a story from another network; its logo, KCTV, was bottom right, and a reporter was standing in front of a police barrier, talking to camera. The time displayed showed that the footage was already an hour old.
“. . . but that was before law enforcement surmised that the three suspects in a series of bank robberies in the Bakersfield area of California, and also of the recent raid on the Mutual and General in Medina, were holed up in a residence some hundred yards behind me.”
That was the loop of film they kept replaying.
“The FBI have warned—“
A sudden explosion behind him made the camera jump. The force must have been considerable because the reporter hunched forward. Part of the roof of a house had disappeared.
“Holy shit—” said the reporter.
Rick’s jaw dropped. “Jesus.”
Smoke started to rise.
“Carey,” he whispered to himself. “You crazy fucking broad.”
Esposito, clad in protective clothing, leaned forward as Leveson pointed.
“Right there.”
There was a depression where the body had been; it formed the negative image of someone in a fetal position—the classic ‘S’ shape. The acrid smell of a house fire doused by water hung in the air, stinging Esposito’s nostrils. He straightened up to ease his back and looked around at the devastation; two houses and part of a third had been destroyed. The firemen had been unable to approach the scene until they had authority from the police; the result of that was what lay around him—a scene that Forensics would need all their skill to interpret.
“Local police managed to clear a few houses beforehand. This guy?” said Leveson. “Not a resident. Everyone’s accounted for. He’s kinda crisp—not a lot to go on. Astaire got out with the other guy. This one—well, either Lindemann or Monckton. What the deputies covering the back said suggests it was Monckton who was with Astaire—the slight build. Lindemann is a bigger guy. Therefore, odds are, our guy right here was Lindemann. Local coroner—seems competent—says six feet two. Which matches.”
The body was under local jurisdiction, but the coroner was content to let the FBI take a second look, and they had no cause to dispute his findings. Bomb debris was lodged in the skull, and the lack of smoke in the lungs confirmed that he was dead before fire ravaged the body. The teeth had survived, and attempts to find dental records were continuing.
The bomb had exploded in the house next to the duplex. An ATF agent named Rogers, who was still looking for remnants of the device, had already found twisted parts of two pipes and metal end-caps, as well as scraps of silver-coated copper wire wrapped in blue insulation. When Esposito spoke with him, he said the maker had considerable skill, though it was still no more than a well-made pipe bomb.
“But that can still tell us a lot. People think a bomb destroys evidence. It doesn’t—it just disperses it. So there’s data we can run with—the source of the wiring—it’s thirty gauge—the plastic, the coloring. It makes a signature.”
“Uh huh,” said Esposito. “So, this guy—the dead guy—he placed the bomb? It blew him up?”
“If he’d been right by it, he’d be in worse shape.”
“Right. So—”
“Maybe the timer was set wrong. If he was the guy.”
“Sure.”
“He was in the house where it went off,” said Rogers. “Two rooms away. It packed a punch all right.”
“And the owners were on vacation. . . .”
“Right.”
“The bomb—just a maneuver to cause mayhem so they could get away,” said Rogers.
“Yeah. And Lindemann—”
“You can’t get it right every time.”
A couple of fences had been flattened and a laurel hedge divided by a car-shaped gap.
“Astaire was at the wheel,” said Sheriff Forbush, and Esposito nodded.
“Side-swiped that fire hydrant. Glass here’s from the back window. Deputy Blucher put a bullet through it. Pretty sure he put a couple through the off-rear door as well.”
“No fire returned from inside the vehicle?”
“Right. The guy, Sol Monckton, was leaning forward against the dash. You guys say he’d taken a slug in Medina. Seemed to be out of it, what Blucher says. The realtor, Gary Winters, mentioned there was medication on a sideboard.”
Esposito knew from the Medina bank manager, Lionel Purvis, that Monckton had been hit, and it was Purvis who, after looking at photos, had conclusively identified Monckton and Lindemann. Gary Winters, in shock, one eardrum perforated, had finally been able to talk to Leveson but had nothing of substance to add. He had prised a window open, slipped out, and was abreast of the building next door when the bomb inside it went off. He staggered down the street, his clothing singed, lucky to be alive. Winters had had a bad day.
All accounts made clear that Max Lindemann was not in the vehicle: that was certain. Esposito looked around slowly at the destruction; police bullets had broken a few house windows, and a dog had been wounded. Residents had been billeted overnight at local hotels until the FBI was finished, but the crime scene had been reduced to the three burnt buildings to allow them to return that evening. Beyond the police barriers was a small army of media people, impatient for information: this was a major story. Every law-enforcement agency in the country was looking for Astaire and Monckton; it would surely be only a matter of time.
Texas Air National Guard helicopters from Camp Mabry were conducting maneuvers close by when the incident was broadcast, and the commander instructed them to seek the vehicle in question, a tan Plymouth Duster. Police roadblocks were set up at major intersections, and border crossings were alerted, but the result was a blank. Not a whiff of Astaire and Monckton was found, in spite of intense media coverage. The Plymouth seemed to disappear, and none of the leads that came in proved to be useful.
Esposito was an old hand and he knew that sometimes you had to take the long view. This was as big a case as any he had dealt with, and he had no intention of letting it slip through his fingers. Two months later, sitting at his desk, he put down a copy of the San Antonio Register that suggested the FBI was a country mile from finding Astaire and Monckton. He had declined to give them an interview, and this was the result. The hell with them, he thought to himself: it’s over when it’s over.
They were out there, and he was going to find them.
PART TWO
ONE
Emmett Capps, rising through the dark waters of a bad dream, saw light above, and hit the surface to hear the phone ringing. He shook his head and picked up.
“Yeah, Capps.”
“Buck Soto.”
“Buck—Jesus. How the heck are you?”
“I’m okay.”
Emmett swung his feet off the bed, coughing.
“How’s it going, Emmett?”
“Yeah—got a couple of live ones.”
“The Diner shooting?”
“Yeah, that. And—uh—the Gillis thing.”
“Sure.”
It was 3 pm on a Saturday afternoon. Emmett had intended to go fishing but tiredness after a long week overcame him and he lay down for a few moments, The clock on the bedside table told him he had been asleep for an hour.
“Look, I know it’s down time, Emmett.”
“Gimme a break.”
Until eighteen months before, Captain Buck Soto had been his boss, but Emmett was reassigned after a case that led to his temporary suspension.
“Gil will talk to you Monday, but I thought I’d give you a heads-up. You know the Weiss thing? That. You had dealings with him. My guys are tied up, and he’s over your way.”
“How did Gil react when you said my name?”
“He just said okay. Why? Aren’t you guys cool?”
“I never know.”
“Yeah, he doesn’t say much. But then, neither do you.”
“I guess.”
“Give the guy a smile.”
“He’ll think I’m on something.”
“Good point.”
“So—Weiss.”
“Right. Would it screw up your schedule to go see him?”
“No. I’ll make time.”
“Thanks, Emmett. I don’t need to tell you he’s dirty. I’ve couriered the book over to Gil, if you want to give it a look.”
“Sure.”
“Some new stuff in there you won’t have seen.”
“Okay.”
“We have the leverage. We just need some names.”
“Right.”
“So, Emmett . . . are the fish jumping?”
“There’s a couple of stretches where I catch a few.”
“Seeing anyone? Getting some action?”
“On again, off again.”
“We’ve all been there. Emmett—we’ve got to catch up. Have a beer.”
“Right.”
Monday morning, Captain Gil Kramer had other things on his mind when Emmett walked into his office. Kramer was a big, raw-boned fellow who reminded Emmett of photographs of Pat Garrett which showed that same tall, gangling build, prominent nose and brooding eyes. He had turned himself cater-corner to his desk to accommodate his length, legs crossed, and said, “Yeah, Emmett, come on in,” lifting a hand.
“Got a case here I want you to take a look at, keep our colleagues happy in Austin.”
Emmett saw the cardboard case-file that Kramer nodded at, which was turned to face him.
“The Weiss business. I want you to give Buck Soto a call—he’ll bring you up to speed. Lewis tells me Weiss is in and out of that packing plant, so he’s around. But we have something else on our plate right now, and I’m giving it to you.”
Kramer put a note on the table. “Address. Some ten miles east. A citizen has a metal barrel in his front yard. Opened it, maybe hoping it was beer. He struck out, for sure. There’s a body in there. The wife started with the screaming routine, giving it her best shot. You want to avoid the smell, back off fifty yards. I’ve sent a team out there—Mack is holding till you get there."
“Okay.” Emmett picked up the file and the address and Kramer looked at him without expression; Emmett nodded and walked out.
It was a middle-income neighborhood where crime was rare, a quiet enclave bounded by a curving river that separated it from downtown. Emmett knew the street from a party that a colleague had thrown, and parked behind a Forensics truck. A knot of police officers stood in front of the garage of a two-story Georgian, and Mack Travis, turning as he spoke to a police photographer, saw Emmett and waved.
"Emmett, yeah—what we've got . . .” he said, as Emmett approached, pointing at a barrel standing about three feet high. The unmistakable smell of death hung in the air. Mack, lean and neatly-dressed as always, six months away from retirement, lifted his chin to indicate a citizen standing a few feet behind him; police conversation could sound brutal, and Emmett nodded.
"Uh, Mr. Kruger," said Mack, turning. "This is Ranger Emmett Capps, who leads on this case."
Kruger and Emmett shook hands, and Mack said, "Sir—I'm gonna take a few minutes here with Ranger Capps to lay out what we know, and then—it's hard, I understand that—but Ranger Capps, I'm guessing, will need you to say it over again, in your own words."
"Okay."
"So, give us a moment first, if that's okay."
"Sure."
A medic was sitting next to a slim woman dressed in tan slacks and a white shirt with a pie-crust collar, who seemed unresponsive and subdued. Emmett guessed this was Mrs. Kruger and that she had been given a sedative. Her husband, solidly-built, dressed in a tartan shirt and neat jeans, glancing at her with concern, seemed shocked also, but Emmett could tell his brain was functioning.
"Yeah, Emmett," said Mack, as they moved away a few paces. "The barrel—it's been sitting in their garage since they bought the place six years ago. Now they want to sell. So they have to do something with it. It's sealed. What the heck is it? Too heavy to toss in a dumpster. So—they get a neighbor who's a practical sort of guy to take a look at it, and he says, Best thing, open it up, see what we've got. So, he gets his angle grinder. Sitting over there, big guy with the beard."
"Right."
"He gets to work, does his thing, and pretty soon he gets some purchase on it, finally gets a crack in the rim, and there's this—uh—aroma coming out that tells you it's off the grid in there. He knows trouble when he smells it but keeps going for a while, then sees something that spooks him, backs off some and says, call the cops. Decedent is probably female—there's what looks like a piece of jewelry round a wrist. Less decomp than you’d expect."
"Uh huh."
A forensics team gave them room; Emmett nodded at a couple of guys he had worked with before, then looked into the barrel. The odor was as overpowering as that from any body he had dealt with. It claimed the throat and sinuses, and seemed to adhere to the skin.
"No way to end your life," said Mack.
It was difficult to look at such a sight with dispassion, but Emmett had seen a lot and his gaze did not waver.
