Dax nodded calmly. Gerry was incredulous. Every time he wanted to kill the kid, he found himself asking questions instead. He did that again now.
“Want to explain why she’d stay quiet?”
“Her personal history. She’s been involved in a car wreck that left a movie star in a coma and, eventually, dead. People hate her for that. It’s always amusing to me just how much people care about some asshole in a movie, but they do. Her boss, Bauer, thought the Tara Beckley case might make Abby confront those demons.” He smiled at that, then said, “Sorry. That one kind of broke me up. I mean, how’s it going to help? But Hank Bauer, may he rest in peace, didn’t strike me as a particularly skilled psychotherapist. It was an effort, though. You have to appreciate friends who make an effort.”
Gerry could hardly speak. The kid’s attitude was that astonishing. “You talked through all this with them?” he managed finally. “You got their life stories but no phone?”
“I really only had the chance to speak with Mr. Bauer at length.”
Gerry needed a drink. Needed to lie down. Hell, both. Lying down and drinking at the same time, that was what this called for. “Abby Kaplan is going to bring cops down all over this.”
“I disagree. You’ve got to think about the story she has to tell them. You really think the police are going to buy that? I had this same conversation with her, and my guess is that it lingered. She’ll think about it before she calls, at least. I’m sure of that.”
He hadn’t gotten the phone, he’d killed a man, and he’d left a witness alive, and if any of this bothered him in the slightest, it didn’t show.
“The phone, however, remains a concern,” he said.
“No shit, it remains a concern!” Gerry shouted. “That’s what I need. I didn’t ask you to kill some hick in Maine, I asked you to get the phone!”
“Well, things come up.”
Things come up. Holy shit, this kid. Gerry rubbed his temples and forced himself not to shout. “You said Abby Kaplan had the phone.”
“That’s what I was told. She showed up in good faith for the boss with phones and chargers, like the salvage guy said she should have. They weren’t in a box. When I broke into her apartment, I found the box. Empty. There were no phones in the apartment either. But it’s not a lost cause. You can help me with that.”
Gerry lowered his hands and stared. “I can help you with that.”
Another nod.
“How might I be of service to you, Dax?”
The kid ignored the sarcasm and said, “I could talk to your client.”
You didn’t ask to speak to the client. Ever. You pretended there wasn’t a client.
Gerry said, “Are you out of your fucking mind?”
“I understand it’s not protocol, but—”
“You understand it’s not protocol. Well, that’s reassuring. Why would you possibly need to speak to—”
“But I think it’s time to consider that someone else has the phone,” Dax finished. “It’s difficult for me to locate that person if I don’t understand the value of the phone, do you see? I’ve come up with an alternative, though, if you don’t want me to have an open dialogue with your client.”
“I do not want you to have an open dialogue.”
“Then in lieu of that, we’ll have to settle for a lesser option. Suggest to your client that he give me the phone that Carlos grabbed by mistake. Let me work off that. Oltamu’s personal phone gives me a starting point.”
The client did not have Oltamu’s personal phone. Gerry still did. It was in the drawer just below his right hand.
“Could you do that much?” Dax asked, and there was something about his eyes that gave Gerry the uncomfortable sense that the kid knew Gerry had the phone. He was sniffing around the edges, asking questions that he shouldn’t, questions that he knew better than to ask.
“You’re not your father or your uncle,” Gerry said.
Dax’s face darkened. Barely perceptibly, but it was the first anger Gerry had ever seen him display.
“No,” he said. “I’m not. I’m better than them.”
Gerry snorted. “You think?”
“Unquestionably,” Dax said. “They’re dead.”
He was giving Gerry that flat stare again, the one that sent spiders crawling into your brain.
“Think it over,” he said. “I’ll get back to work regardless. I will get the right phone, and I will kill Abby Kaplan if she’s still alive. These things will happen, but they’ll go slower if I don’t have some insight into the situation. And speed’s important at the moment.”
He stood up, and Gerry almost told him to sit his ass back down, but what was the point? He wasn’t wrong; speed was important now.
The German was coming.
25
Abby made the call from a service plaza off the turnpike where there was always plenty of traffic. She was in Hank’s car, and she knew she’d have to dump that soon, but for now it was the best of bad options. She thought about calling 911, decided against it, and called David Meredith directly.
“What’s up, Abby? I gather you heard about our boy Carlos. Neat twist, eh?” He was cheerful, and the disconnect was so jarring that for a moment Abby couldn’t speak. David had to prompt her. “Hello? Did I lose you?”
“No, sorry. Yes, I heard about Carlos Ramirez. I’ve also got a lot more detail on that than you can imagine, and it’s all bad. I’m going to tell it to you once, so you’re going to want to take notes or record it. Recording it would be better. I won’t be able to call back and go through it again, at least not right away.”
Silence. Then: “Abby, what in the hell are you talking about?”
“Can you record me?”
“No. Not here. But I can call you back from—”
“Take notes, then.”
“Abby—”
“Hank is dead,” Abby said, and her throat tightened, but she swallowed and kept talking. “He’s in the passenger seat of my car, which is wrecked in the trees at the end of his road. It looks like he died in the wreck, but he didn’t. He was murdered, and I nearly was, and it’s all got something to do with that accident at Hammel College. I don’t know what, but it—”
“Abby, whoa, slow down here. He was murdered? You need to—”
“I need to talk, and you need to listen and write it down,” Abby said. “I’d love to trust you, but I’m not sure that I can right now. I was pretty well set up. The story I’m about to tell you sounds crazy, but it’s the truth. You need to hear it. Can you just listen?”
Another pause, and then Meredith, sounding dazed, said, “I’ll listen.”
“Write it down too.”
She told him about the call from Hank, and her arrival at the house, and the way things had gone from there. Told him about the generator and the Gentleman Jack and how she’d started the car and, with an assist from Hank, made it out the door. Told him how many hours had passed while she lay unconscious in the woods and what she’d found upon waking.
Meredith didn’t interrupt, which was a relief. Abby wasn’t sure how she’d respond if the man started asking questions, if his voice held any doubt or disbelief.
“You’ll find him there, and you’ll think that I’m out of my mind, but do me the favor of taking a good, hard look for physical evidence that shows I’m wrong,” she said. “Maybe it’ll be in Hank’s blood. Maybe you’ll find a bullet. Maybe the kid screwed up something at the house... but I kind of doubt that. Just promise me you’ll look.”
“Of course we will,” David said, the first time he’d spoken in several minutes. “But you’ve got to come in. You know that, Abby. Running from this thing... it’s the worst choice. Nobody will believe you if you run, no matter what we find.”