"That's interesting," is all Marino has to say about it.
"You said you're going back to the motel when you leave here?" Jay asks Marino.
"Yeah, Vander's going to see if we might have any luck with prints."
"Prints?" Stanfield murmurs from his sickbed.
"Jesus, Stanfield," Marino blurts out in exasperation. "They teach you anything in detective school? Or did you get sent ahead several grades because of your goddamn brother-in-law?"
"He is a goddamn brother-in-law, you want to know the truth." He says this so pitifully and with such candor that everybody laughs. Stanfield perks up a little bit. He sits higher against the pillows. "And you're right." He meets my eyes. "I shouldn't have told him one peep about this case. And 1 won't tell him nothing else, not a word, because it's all politicking to that one. It wasn't me who dragged in this whole Jamestown thing, just so you know."
Pruett frowns. "What Jamestown thing?"
"Oh, you know, the dig out there and the big celebration the state's planning. Well, thing is, if the truth be known, Din-widdie got no more Indian blood in him than I do. All this horse crap about him being a descendent of Chief Powhatan. Pshaw!" Stanfield's eyes dance with resentment that I doubt he rarely touches. He probably hates his brother-in-law.
"Mitch has Indian blood," Mclntyre says somberly. "He's half Native American."
"Well, for Christ's sake, let's hope the newspapers don't find that out," Marino mutters to Stanfield, not buying for one second that Stanfield is going to keep his mouth shut. "We got a gay guy and now an Indian. Oh boy, oh boy." Marino shakes his head. "We got to keep this out of politics, out of circulation and I mean it." He stares right at Stanfield, then at Jay. "Because guess what? We can't talk about what we think is really going on, now can we'? About the big undercover operation. About Mitch being undercover FBI. And that maybe in some fruitloop way, Chandonne is all wrapped around what- ever the shit's going on out here. So if people get all caught up in this hate crime shit, how do we turn that around when we can't tell the truth?"
"I don't agree," Jay says to him. "I'm not ready to say what these murders are about. I'm not prepared to accept, for example, that Mates and now Barbosa aren't related to gun smuggling. I do think without a doubt their murders are connected."
No one disagrees. The modi operandi are too similar for the deaths not to be related, and in fact, committed by the same person or persons.
"I'm also not prepared to totally ignore the idea that they're hate crimes," Jay goes on. "A gay male. A Native American." He shrugs. "Torture's pretty damn hateful. Any injuries to their genitalia?" He turns to me.
"No." I hold his gaze. It is odd to think we were intimate, to look at his full lips and graceful hands and to remember their touch. When we walked the streets of Paris, people turned to stare at him.
"Hmmm," he says. "I find that interesting and maybe important. I'm not a forensic psychiatrist, of course, but it does seem in hate crimes the perpetrators rarely injure the victims' genitals."
Marino gives him an incredible look, his mouth parting in blatant disdain.
"Because you get some redneck homophobic sort, and the last thing he's going to go near is the guy's genitals," Jay adds.
"Well, if you really want to go around this mulberry bush," Marino acidly says to him, "then let's just connect it to Chan-donne. He never went near his victims' genitals either. Shit, he didn't even take their fucking pants off, just beat and bit the shit out of their faces and breasts. Only lower body thing he did at all was to take off their shoes and socks and bite their feet. And why? The guy's afraid of female genitalia because his own's as deformed as the rest of him." Marino surveys the faces around him. "One good thing about the bastard being locked up is we got to find out what the rest of him looks like. Right? And guess what? He ain't got a dick. Or let's just say that what he's got I wouldn't call a dick."
Stanfield is sitting straight up on the couch now, his eyes wide in amazement.
"I'll go with you to the motel," Jay says to Marino.
Marino gets up and looks out the window. "Wonder where the hell Vander is," he says.
He gets Vander on the cell phone and we head out minutes later to meet in the parking lot. Jay walks with me. I feel the energy of his desire to talk to me, to somehow come to a consensus. In this way, he is like the stereotype of a woman. He wants to talk, to settle matters, to have closure or to rekindle our connection so he can then play hard to get again. I, on the other hand, want none of it.
"Kay, can I have a minute?" he says in the parking lot.
I stop and look at him as I button my coat. I notice Marino glancing our way as he gets the trash bags and baby carriage out of the back of his truck and loads them into Vander's car.
"I know this is awkward, but is there some way we can make it easier? For one thing, we have to work together," Jay says.
"Maybe you should have thought about that before you told Jaime Berger every detail, Jay," I reply.
"That wasn't against you." His eyes are intense.
"Right."
"She asked me questions, understandably. She's just doing her job."
I don't believe him. That is my fundamental problem with Jay Talley. I don't trust him and wish I never had. "Well, that's curious," I comment. "Because it appears people started asking questions about me before Diane Bray was even murdered. Right about the time I was with you in France inquiries began, as a matter of fact."
His expression darkens. Anger peers out before he can hide it. "You're paranoid, Kay," he says.
"You're right," I reply. "You're absolutely right, Jay."
Chapter 25
I HAVE NEVER DRIVEN MARINO'S DODGE RAM QUAD Cab pickup truck, and were circumstances not so strained I would probably find the scenario comical. I am not a big person, barely five foot five, slender, and there is nothing funky or extreme about me. I do wear jeans, but not today. I suppose I dress like a proper chief or lawyer, usually in a tailored skirt suit or flannel trousers and a blazer, unless I am working a crime scene. I wear my blond hair short and neatly styled, am light on makeup and, other than my signet ring and watch, jewelry is an afterthought. I don't have a single tattoo. I don't look like the sort who would be roaring along in a monster macho truck that is dark blue with pinstriping, chrome, mud flaps, scanner and big, swooping antennas that go with the CB and two-way radios.
I take 64 West back to Richmond because it is quicker, and I pay close attention to my driving because it is a lot to handle a vehicle this size with only one arm. I have never spent a Christmas Eve like this and I am increasingly depressed over the notion. Usually, by now I have stocked the refrigerator and freezer, and have cooked sauces and soups and decorated the house. I feel utterly homeless and alien as I drive Marino's truck along the interstate, and it occurs to me that I don't know where I will sleep tonight. I guess at Anna's, but I dread the necessary chill between us. I didn't even see her this morning, and a helpless feeling of loneliness settles over me and seems to push me down in my seat. I page Lucy. "I've got to move back into my house tomorrow," I tell her on the phone.
"Maybe you should stay in the hotel with Teun and me," she suggests.