'Don't know,' Rinker said. 'I'll be back tonight at ten-fifteen on Northwest.'
'I'll pick you up. I think we're cool for this very moment, but we can talk when you get back.'
On the plane, eyes covered with a black sleeping mask, Rinker dozed, and between small patches of sleep she thought about Carmel. She could solve quite a few problems by simply killing the other woman. But there were problems with that.
Carmel wasn't stupid, and she might already have taken out some kind of insurance: a note written in a check book, or left in a safe deposit box, with what she knew about Rinker. A note that would be found only after she was dead.
Another problem: this Davenport guy was as close to Rinker as he was to Carmel.
How had he gotten there? Did he know even more? Was he digging around the bar in
Wichita? Carmel was a source of information about Davenport, which could be important…
A final reason not to kill Carmeclass="underline" Rinker actually liked her. Like some kind of sister, something Rinker had never had. Rinker smiled when she thought of
Carmel's invitation to do Mexico. She'd been planning to go, by God, and if they got out of this, she would. Get a couple of thong bikinis and a nice close bikini wax, some of those drinks with little paper umbrellas and lots of pineapple, and maybe do a couple of those Mexican dudes.
As to Davenport himself, Rinker had read the BizWiz report, and Davenport sounded like a smart guy. And mean: he was a stone killer, no doubt about it. He was like one of those Mafia guys she'd known, a guy running a big coin-op company or garbage-hauler, a businessman who kept a gun in his pocket.
Of course, she'd killed three or four of those. Not even geniuses were bulletproof.
In Minneapolis, sitting in front of a muted television, Carmel considered the possibilities. Maybe, if she had a chance, she should kill Pamela, or whatever her name was. It would only make sense, from a criminal-defense point of view.
There really was only one perfect witness against Carmel, and if Pamela were gone, then Davenport could go shit in his hat.
She sighed, got up and wandered into the kitchen, got a glass of orange juice.
She'd really hate to kill the other woman: she actually liked her. Pamela could become a friend, for God's sakes, the first real one Carmel would ever have had.
She sipped the juice and wandered back past all of her perfect black-and-white photos, barely seeing them. If she was thinking about killing Pamela, then it was probable that the other woman was thinking about killing her. And maybe was equally reluctant to do it, for some of the same reasons.
If things should change, Carmel thought, if it became really necessary to get rid of Pamela, she damn well better move first and fast. She wouldn't have a second chance. She glanced at her watch. Time to go get her at the airport.
Rinker tossed her light bag in the back seat of the Volvo, and Carmel said, 'I can think of three possibilities.'
'Which are?'
'We do nothing. I sat down with a legal pad tonight and tried to work out the worst possible scenario. I can't see how they could ever, ever have come up with enough against us to arrest either one of us. If they did, I don't see how they could convict either one of us, unless you've left fingerprints behind or dropped your billfold or something.
'Nothing like that,' Rinker said. 'What are the other two possibilities?'
'Our major problem is Davenport. Forget the FBI, forget these other cops who are digging around. If we get rid of Davenport, they'll never figure out who we are.
On the other hand, getting rid of him would be more than risky, it'd be dangerous. He's not only violent, he's lucky. One time he was shot in the throat and would have died, except a surgeon was standing right there with a jackknife and did an emergency tracheotomy and they made it to the hospital. ..'
'Are you joking?'
'No.'
'Ah, man, that's the most scary thing you've said about him: that he's lucky.'
'The third possibility is that we set up and run a little play – a little pageant – that would somehow make all these killings make sense. The alternative theory: it's one way you can beat what seems like an open-and-shut case against a client. Give the jury something that makes more sense, or seems to… If we created exactly the right pageant, even if
Davenport knew there was something wrong with it, they couldn't get out of it.'
'What are you recommending?' Rinker asked.
'Number one. Do nothing. Sit and wait. I don't think anything more will happen.
We know the cops are on the phone in Washington, so we never use it again. I'd love to see their file on the case, but that won't happen unless they make a move on Hale…'
'All right. So we sit.'
They rode in silence for a while, then Rinker asked, 'What if this car is bugged?'
'They're not that smart,' Carmel said. 'This is Mom's car. She even uses it, when I don't need it, and she wants to haul something – bulbs or plants or something. But I need a car that nobody really knows about, especially when I've got a hot case. Sometimes, you don't want people looking at you.'
'Your folks get divorced?'
'No, my dad killed himself,' Carmel said. 'He was an endodontist, did root canals all day. He got tired of it, sat down in his chair one afternoon when he'd finished with a patient, wrote a short note to the world and strapped on a nitrous oxide mask.'
'Jesus.'
'Yup. A good way to go, I guess, but he had to work at it, a little. Had to override some safety things, pinch off an oxygen tank and so on. When I go, I don't want to have to think about it. I just wanna go.'
'I don't wanna go. Not for a while,' Rinker said.
'What about your folks?' Carmel asked.
'My dad took off when I was a baby,' Rinker said. 'And my good old step-dad used to fuck me once or twice a week until / took off.'
'Your step-dad still around?'
'No.' Rinker looked out the window. 'He went away one day. He hasn't been seen since.'
'Like your dad,' Carmel said.
'Not exactly, no,' said Rinker.
Chapter Sixteen
Sherrill came back from St. Louis with blue circles under her eyes. 'Didn't get any sleep?' Lucas asked. He tried to keep his voice flat, but there might have been a tone to it, he thought.
'I had to fuck all the guys on their organized crime squad. That kept me up nights/ Sherrill said. They were alone in his office.
'Hey…' He was offended.
'Hey, yourself… the way you asked the question,' she said.
'I was just trying to…'
'Forget it. Anyway, I didn't get any sleep. Every night I'd roll around in the bed and the blankets were too heavy and the pillow was too thick and the room smelled bad. And I'd think about you and me.'
'Uh-oh.'
'I tried not to,' she said. 'I just couldn't help myself. I was wondering if we did the right thing. I was wondering if I ought to get you someplace and screw you blind, just one more time. Or two or three more times, but not forever. Just sort of good-bye.'
'I had the feeling you'd already done that,' Lucas said.
'Yeah, I did,' Sherrill said. 'Besides, sex wasn't really our problem, was it?'
'Nah. The sex was pretty wonderful. At least, from my point of view.'
'So what was it?'
'I think, uh, you might be a natural upper, and I'm a natural downer…'
'Yeah…'
'That's what you concluded?'
'I concluded that I oughta get a new boyfriend, and you oughta get a girlfriend, then we'd be done with it.'
'I'm too tired to look,' Lucas said. 'You get one.'
'Yeah.' Sherrill said. She nibbled on her bottom lip. 'Maybe.'
Lucas said, 'We're dead in the water, here. The feds are still sitting on their wire tap, on Tennex, but nobody's calling.'