Having left Kiley behind, Bartlett, Michael, and I stood in the warm breeze of the parking lot, bathed in the colorless glow of a full moon.
“Don’t take that keeping in touch too literally,” Kathy said softly, as if the parked cruisers nearby might report back to their masters. “There are lots of drug investigations that happen in this state without task force blessing or involvement. Right, Jon?”
He merely nodded, his eyes on the invisible horizon. “Is that true what you said about forfeiting any assets federally,” I asked, “even though this is a state case?”
“Sure,” she answered. “They’re separate issues. The forfeiture’s a civil matter. If we pitched it to a state judge, whatever money we got would probably end up in the General Fund. The feds work on the incentive system.” She jerked a thumb at the barracks behind us. “People like Steve can be thin-skinned, but they’re as broke as the rest of us.”
“And as open to legal bribes,” Jonathon added, as if to himself.
“What I’d like to know,” Kathy said to me, her face coming closer and her voice flattening slightly, “is what you were doing digging into Doyle openly enough that Deets found out about it three seconds later. I thought we were putting the Padget case on the back burner for a couple of days ’til we got more background.”
“I yielded to impulse,” I admitted. “After we found where Jasper was killed, or probably killed, I went to see Padget. I kept thinking of him twisting in the wind… ”
I was surprised by her reaction. “How is he?”
“Not good, and he’ll probably get worse. His real problem is he’s not being straight with us. He said he first met Jan Bouch through a domestic call to their house. I checked the log. He never went on any such call. Emily did, though, more than any other officer.”
There was a long pause. Jonathon brought his gaze from the night sky to me. “Which tells you what?”
“That maybe we won’t be going to Burlington quite as soon as I thought.”
I drove home in the morning’s early hours, the only car on the road for the entire trip, my brain struggling with the dozens of loose threads we’d identified so far, many of which didn’t even look like they came from the same fabric.
By the time I crept into the bedroom, the various scenarios had started bleeding into one another like wet inkblots, and with about as much clarity. I dumped my clothes on the floor and slipped in under the sheet, fully expecting to spend the night’s remaining hours staring at the moon in the skylight overhead.
“Been having fun?” Gail’s voice floated in the air like a comforting caress.
I reached over and kissed her cheek. “Non-stop. Sorry I woke you up.”
“That’s okay. I got to bed early tonight. What were you doing?”
“Smoothing political feathers… I wish I could start answering questions instead. They’re beginning to breed like gerbils.”
She rolled over and draped one arm across my chest. “Tell me.”
Normally, I would have begged off, for her sake if nothing else. It wasn’t like she didn’t need all the rest she could get. But her interest was genuine, and she was one of the best sounding boards I had. I gave her a guided tour of the tangled mess we were confronting.
After a few moments’ reflection, she commented, “Sounds like you need to find out what those two young cops are up to.”
“And how Jan Bouch plays into it.”
Gail punched the pillows behind her head and slid to a semi-sitting position. “I know Anne Murphy.”
It was more than a statement of fact. “Does this have anything to do with what you said a few days ago, about how ‘we’ needed to do something about all this?”
“I have a background that could be useful here-outside the SA’s office.”
I knew what she was referring to-two decades of counseling women at the local crisis center, being on the boards of half the social welfare organizations in town, even heading the town’s board of selectmen for a stretch. She had the political and social bloodlines of a thoroughbred. “What’re you thinking?” I asked.
“That maybe Anne will tell me things she wouldn’t share with you.”
“Which we might be able to use to slip through Norm’s back door?”
She laid a hand on my forearm. “Maybe. I’m going to do this strictly by the rules, briefing Derby if necessary. But I’m hoping a man of Norm’s ego wouldn’t think his wife could betray him, even inadvertently, which in my book makes her a good way to get at him.”
“God, how you’ve wandered from your days in the commune.”
She slugged me in the shoulder. “Lucky for you.”
Chapter 15
WHEN WE WALKED INTO THE SQUAD ROOM the next morning, Harriet Fritter gave me a broad smile and a slip of paper that said, “Call Greg Davis ASAP.” She also told me I should get more sleep.
I closed the door to my small corner office and sat, exhausted, looking at the note from Davis. The urge to follow Harriet’s advice and rest my head on the tabletop was suddenly hard to resist. I sensed only bad news lurking behind the “ASAP” in the note.
Reluctant to stir up the anxiety and despair that clung to this case like ground fog, I dialed his home phone number, suddenly worried that I hadn’t voiced my concerns about Brian Padget by telling Davis the young cop needed counseling-and wondering if I was about to be told the consequences of that oversight.
“We’ve got a small problem,” he said after I’d identified myself. “Your connecting Emily Doyle to those calls to Bouch’s place has spread like wildfire. There’s all sorts of rumors you’re investigating her, too. What’s going on?”
I remembered wondering whether Davis or that quiet dispatcher had been the one to spill the beans. Davis’s obvious irritation seemed to clear that up. Nevertheless, I kept my response tactfully vague. “Too many people are shooting their mouths off. Bill Deets was in my face last night about Doyle and Padget both, not long after you and I were seen fiddling with the computer.”
In the brief silence following, I could hear him connecting the dots. Only then, and only briefly, did I feel sorry for the dispatcher’s coming fate. “Can you tell me about Doyle?” he finally said.
“Only that we have a whole lot less than what her supposed friends are dishing out. She’s come up on the radar screen a few times, and we are checking those events out. That’s standard procedure… ”
I stopped, hearing his weary, “I know, I know,” echoing in the background. I volunteered, “Would it help if I came up there and talked to them?”
He was hesitant. “Probably not. The chief and the town manager have already gotten hold of this. I don’t think anything you could say now would make any difference.”
“What have they done?” I asked, stunned that things could get so bad so fast.
“Nothing yet. I just know they’re keeping an eye on us. They haven’t called a press conference or anything, but it won’t be long before Shippee caves in and briefs at least the president of the village trustees. After that, it’ll be public knowledge in about five minutes.”
“Is the department even vaguely functional right now?”
He sounded faintly insulted. “Of course it is. Morale stinks, but the job’s getting done. Christ, we don’t have any choice with Deets at the task force and Brian out on leave. We’re using the part-timers more, so that’s helping a little-it disperses some of the depression. But I’d be lying if I didn’t say this whole thing’s put Emily in a pretty tight spot.”
“I’m going to have to talk to her, you know.”
“When?”
“Could be as early as today. Depends on some other things I have going.”
“Could that take place outside the building?”
“Sure. You name it. And I’ll give you some warning on the timing. How’s Brian doing? He seemed a little better when I left him yesterday, but I meant to tell you, I think he ought to find a counselor soon. He doesn’t seem to realize what kind of freight train he’s facing.”