They’d brought the dog in. The dog trained to sniff out money saturated with particles of cocaine. The dog had found the stash.
Like Keith said, under the antelope. A hidden niche was built around an old chimney base.
Empty. So it wasn’t where Keith hid it, and the feds didn’t have it. If they did, they’d be posing with it on TV. And Keith had been exact about one thing-find me a thief.
In a bathroom, off the den, he found a box of Band-Aids and put a square patch over the bruised cheek. Then he sat down on the couch. The stuffed twelve-point white tail and the antelope peered down with glass eyes from the wall over the hole in the paneling. Two armchairs, the couch, a coffee table. A desk that served as a storage platform for Keith’s trophies. Pistol. Skeet. Golf.
Connect the dots. Caren found the money, took it, along with the tape. Had it on the trip north. Did something with it. Hid it. James knew. Then it all happened and-not like James stole it. Nobody asked him about it.
But proving it? His eyes roved over the musty basement.
Jeff had said this was where Caren set up the camera. Keith must have been brain-dead to bring the bad guys and a suitcase full of money right into his house.
Why would he do that? Caren would have to know…
Caren knew. He knew Caren knew.
Conventional wisdom: The control freak went out of control.
Broker pictured it, working a nervous rhythm with his palm on his thigh. Keith the perfectionist, spurned. So Keith the racist. The drunkard. The dirty cop. Wife beater. Murder-er.
People were pleased to see him go down. Almost like a group of siblings getting back at their tormenting, stronger, smarter older brother. Love and hate tangled tight. “And he did this and he did that and he…”
The only hot-button sin Keith had neglected on his suicidal plunge was drowning puppies.
When he was good, he was very, very good. When he was bad, he did it perfectly.
The wall clock said twenty to twelve. He was going to be late for lunch with J.T. Merryweather. As he let himself out, he debated whether to go in the living room and collect the strewn tree decorations and pack them. Her father had died, but her mother could still be living in Williston and might want them.
But he could not act on the impulse. This was still Keith’s house, and he was very aware of trespass. Broker turned away from the living room, walked out, closed the door behind him, put the house key back where he’d found it.
He got in his truck, fastened his seat belt, turned the key and drove west, toward St. Paul.
43
U.S. 94 formed a moat in front of the cement bastille that was St. Paul Police Headquarters. Broker grabbed an exit and parked in the visitors’ lot.
A beefy cop behind a bullet-proof bubble in the lobby squinted at Broker’s badge and ID, called up to J.T., and pointed to the elevator. Broker knew the way to Homicide.
J.T. Merryweather was a really black man with fine Carib features and pouchy lavender circles under his eyes. He had given up the cigarettes and had put twenty pounds on his hips that he disguised with expensive tailoring. Coming into the Homicide bay, Broker noticed that J.T. was spending twice what he used to on suits and shoe leather. J.T. was a captain now. He had his own alcove and desk.
J.T. spotted Broker and reached for a ringing phone. “Be right with you. I’m up to my ass, putting this new gang task force together.”
Officious. Not making solid eye contact.
A chubby detective waddled by. Broker quipped, “Hey, Reardon, still keeping Sara Lee in the black, huh.”
Expressionless, Reardon said, “Nothin’ personal, Broker, but fuck you.” He shouldered by.
The treatment. Janey had called it right. Keith was a plague carrier. Broker had touched him. The dismissive distance set a boundary, implied in J.T.’s gesture and the THE BIG LAW/251
brush-off from Reardon. And the other Homicide cops in the room-most of whom knew him-barely acknowledged his presence. None of the old horseplay or lurid jokes.
No bitching. Always a bad sign.
Not one of us anymore.
Broker found himself on the receiving end of the tribal cop stare-suspicion and disapproval. Guilty until proven innocent. Either way-unworthy.
J.T. finished his phone call, got up, grabbed his overcoat and walked Broker past the cold-eyed Homicide cops, out of the bay, into the hall, toward an elevator.
“Keith do that to your face?” J.T. said offhand.
“How-?”
“Deputy out in Washington told us. Word’s out Keith was yelling something about you owing him.” J.T. smiled, and it wasn’t a smile at all.
Broker, blindsided, stopped and stared at his old partner.
J.T. shrugged. “You don’t have a whole lot of friends here right now. But that shouldn’t bother you, you always liked to operate alone.” They entered the elevator and rode down in silence.
At ground level, on their way out of the building, they passed the chief. Prester Dobbs was skinny and balding. An import from San Francisco. His loose neck flesh and big popped-out eyes reminded Broker of an ostrich.
Head in the sand, the street coppers agreed privately. Keith had said it out loud. Among other things.
Dobbs’s blue button eyes struck Broker’s and glanced away. They knew each other, not well, but enough to chat in the hall. The chief turned away without a greeting.
J.T. said from the side of his mouth, “Chief don’t even want anybody saying Keith’s name in the building anymore.”
J.T. grabbed an unmarked car from the lot, and they shot through the downtown loop, turned left and parked in front of a hydrant next to Galtier Plaza. Broker followed J.T.
into an overdecorated Italian restaurant.
Too loud, too many people. Tables too small. Triple canopy hanging baskets of ferns. Going in, it was clear they knew J.T. They were seated immediately.
Away from his colleagues, J.T.’s manner relaxed. His world-weary gaze became more curious than suspicious. But still at a distance. There was no small talk. No catching up.
No congratulations on J.T.’s promotion or showing pictures of Kit. Ten years ago they’d got off on foxhole camaraderie, taking chances for each other. Wrestling assholes full of PCP
down to the cuffs on the pavement.
J.T. scowled at him, like he read his thoughts. “Look,” he said, “you picked a loser to come back on. Being out to Washington County having prayer meetings with Keith. Not saying it’s fair, but there’s this shit-rubs-off thing. Some of the guys think you need a bath.”
“What do you think?”
“I’m listening.”
Broker took a cigar from his pocket. The ferns about wilted as he clipped the end. J.T.’s eyes enlarged with disapproval.
“You can’t do that in here.”
“Not going to smoke it. Going to chew it.”
“Man, that’s disgusting.”
Broker rolled his stogie in his mouth to the dismay of a waitress who informed him that, even unlighted, the cigar upset other customers, who had complained. Broker put it out of sight and they ordered. Lasagna for Broker. J.T. had the fettuccine.
J.T. took a piece of fresh baked bread from a wicker basket and dipped it into a small bowl of olive oil and nibbled. He chewed, swallowed and let his smoky gaze settle on Broker.
“So, what do you want.”
“I need some computer time, a credit work-up on Tom James, the reporter who was with Caren.”
“Not my area. Put it through channels,” said J.T. crisply.
“You’re a lot of help,” said Broker.
“Don’t give me that, go talk to the feds. They’re all over this thing. Check out bad-ass Agent Garrison. We call him the Lorn Ranger,” said J.T.
Annoyed, Broker drummed his fingers on the table. “Okay, let’s get right to it. Why did Keith turn?”
“Ask the feds, they made the case.”