"It might be seen as a forced resignation."
"It's common knowledge that I'm planning to leave soon."
"Next month, under completely different circumstances," Andy said, thinking about Kerney's windfall inheritance. "Erma's estate will be settled, the land sale will be closed, and you'll be a rich man. Did you know this is the biggest murder case in the department's history? If you leave now, some people might say that you weren't up to the challenge."
"I don't give a rat's ass what people think."
"I know that," Andy said, not believing it at all, but pleased that more emotion had returned to Kerney's voice. "By the way, Major Hutchinson agrees with your theory that this wasn't a spree murder. It doesn't fit the profile. Spree murders are emotional, disorganized, unplanned, with no cooling-off period. The perp made it look good until he got to Langsford."
"I put a cop down today, Andy."
"One of the victims has to be the real target. Everyone else was murdered to cover it up."
"I know that. You're not listening to me."
"Yes, I am. You put down an armed and dangerous felon who hid behind a shield. Who refused to comply with your lawful orders, tried to kill you, and had stolen property in his possession. That's the word from the city PD and the district attorney's office. If Shockley's bullet hadn't clipped the top of the unit's door frame you'd both be dead."
"Are you saying I'm cleared?"
"For now. Because you supervise the internal affairs unit, I've asked the local DA to handle any follow-up investigation. That way we can avoid speculation about a departmental whitewash."
"Regulations require you to place me on administrative leave until the investigation is complete," Kerney said.
"Or I can relieve you from your current duties and reassign you. Give me thirty days, full time, as lead investigator on this case. Hutch will take over the division. I'm promoting him to deputy chief after you leave, anyway."
"That's not much of a reassignment," Kerney noted.
"It satisfies the regs," Andy said, as he pointed out the window at the mobile command center. "That's your office for the duration."
Kerney didn't speak for a moment.
"You still keep your rank as a deputy chief." Andy said.
"I don't give a damn about the rank. Does Hutch know about this?"
Andy nodded. "He also knows that you recommended him for your job."
"I'll do it on one condition: I leave as soon as an arrest is made within the thirty-day period. Agreed?"
"You want out that bad?"
"I'm done with it, Andy."
"Okay. You're booked into a local motel. Give me your house key and a list of what you need from your apartment, and I'll have it here from Santa Fe by morning."
"What made you so sure I'd go along with this?" Kerney asked, as he dropped his house key on the desk.
Andy smiled. "Because you're bullheaded."
"That's it? I'm bullheaded?"
"And you love a challenge. Go catch this killer, Kerney."
Kerney walked into the small office at the back end of the mobile command trailer where Nate Hutchinson was planted behind the tiny desk.
"Good deal," Hutch said, grinning at Kerney.
"Meaning exactly what?"
"Chief Baca talked you into staying on."
"Only long enough to train you for my job."
Hutch's smile spread. "Thanks for putting in a good word for me."
"You earned it on your own, Hutch."
"Thanks, anyway." Hutch hesitated before continuing. "This thing with
Shockley."
"What about it?" Kerney asked.
"He didn't give you a choice, Chief."
"That doesn't give me much comfort. I could have handled it better. What have we got on the victims?"
"So far, very little, including Vernon Langsford. The state parks use a one-page application form for camp hosts that captures almost no personal data. They don't run background checks and don't gather next-of-kin information."
"How long before we get the details on Langsford and the others?"
"We found letters from family and friends in the out-of-state victims' travel trailers. I've passed the information along to agencies in Arizona, Iowa, and California. They're making contact with people now. I've asked the Ruidoso Police Department to get me what they can on Vernon Langsford."
"Why haven't we sent an agent up there?" Kerney asked.
"Everybody's still working the crime scenes, Chief."
"What's come in from the field so far?"
Hutch stood up and waved a hand at the papers on the small desk. "Here it is. I'll get out of your way. Shockley was way over the edge, Chief."
"How so?"
"During the last two years, he made at least five D.W. I traffic stops involving women. He coerced them into having sex and then let them go without making an arrest."
"Has a victim come forward?"
Hutch shook his head. "Shockley used his own blank tapes to record the sex acts with his unit's video camera. Duran found them in his apartment."
"Are you kidding me?"
"Some of it makes everything but hardcore porno films look pretty tame."
"I want to see those tapes."
Hutch pointed to the cassettes on the shelf next to the wall-mounted combination TV and VCR. "They're gonna turn your stomach."
"Has Andy seen them?"
"Not yet, but he knows about them."
"Has Agent Duran run down Shockley's stolen-car ring?"
"He's working on it. Chief Baca said I'm to manage the division while you take the lead on the homicides."
"That's correct."
"With Chief Baca's permission, I'm going to release what we have on Shockley to the media. I don't want anybody in or outside of the department thinking Shockley was anything but a psycho who never should have worn a shield."
"You don't have to do that for my sake, Hutch."
Hutch shook his head and stepped toward the door. "I'm not. It's for all of us, Chief. The district attorney wants to meet with you again in an hour."
"Tell him I'll be there."
After Hutch left, Kerney watched the videotapes. By the time the last one finished playing, anger flushed his face. Shockley liked to sodomize his victims. In each tape he positioned himself at the front of his unit, bent the women over the hood and held them down with a hand on their necks. Then he'd smile at the camera with a smug, satisfied look on his face. The images made Kerney almost want to shoot Shockley all over again.
He rewound the last tape, no longer feeling quite so lousy about taking Randy Shockley's life, and thought about Paul Gillespie, the small-town cop who'd been killed by a woman he'd raped. Nita Lassiter had shot Gillespie with his own handgun at the Mountainair Police Department.
Kerney had solved the case with some lucky breaks and had come out of the investigation convinced that Nita Lassiter had more than an adequate reason to blow Gillespie away.
Nita's trial had concluded last month, and she'd been found guilty of manslaughter, a third-degree felony. Because of mitigating circumstances, she'd been sentenced to one year minus a day in the county jail, with work-release privileges so she could continue her practice of veterinary medicine.
A lot of cops and prosecutors around the state were upset when Kerney testified on Nita's behalf at the sentencing hearing. They didn't like the idea that a senior state-police officer could find any thing redeeming about a convicted cop killer, no matter what the justification might be.
Now that he'd put Randy Shockley down, he wondered how much more character assassination he'd have to face. Maybe he'd go from being known as a turncoat who sided with a cop killer to being called a cop killer himself.
He rewound the last cassette. With Hutch making sure all of the hard facts about Shockley got out, that might not happen. For the first time in hours, Kerney smiled. It was a damn fine gesture on Hutch's part.