"And you came here instead of visiting the dealership?"
"I called the dealership. She had a message on her line saying she wasn't in today. So I came here. Don't ask me any more questions, Mr. Karch. I'm asking you the questions."
"Fine."
He waved his hands in surrender.
"You said there's a homicide in this? Well, I know Cassie Black probably better than anybody around here and I'll tell you right now there's no way she's involved in a homicide. No way."
Karch thought of Hidalgo's body lying on the bed in the Cleo's penthouse.
"We'll have to agree to disagree on that, Agent Kibble. The evidence speaks for itself. And after all, remember, we're talking about an ex-con here, one who served time in Nevada on a murder conviction."
"It was a manslaughter and we both know the circumstances. The law held her responsible for her partner's death but she was twenty stories below when he went out the window. Somebody may have pushed him, but it wasn't her."
"Is that what she said? That somebody pushed him?"
"It's the way she had it figured. She said the casinos had to make an example of him. He got pushed."
"That's bullshit, but never mind. How did she get out here?"
"She had her parole transferred. Once she got the job lined up with Ray Morales at the dealership it was a cinch. She had a lawyer petition and the parole transfer was approved. She knew Ray from Vegas when she was a dealer. Ray's an ex-con who made it in the straight life. He wanted to give her a shot at it. He probably also wanted something else but Cassie never complained."
Karch had thought Morales was an ex-con. When he'd put him down on the floor of the finance office Morales had taken it with a certain dignity you never saw in citizens. The woman was like the rest of them. She started to whimper and was going to shout so he'd had to shoot her first.
"So did you get close to her?" Karch asked. "Close enough to know what made her blood move?"
"You mean why she started ripping off high rollers in Vegas?"
Karch nodded.
"You ask me, I think it had something to do with her father. A degenerate gambler. I think she thought she was getting back at the casinos or something. I don't know."
"I don't think you do. You mind if I sit down? I've got a bad back."
He brought his arms up behind his back as if stretching the muscles. He kept talking the whole time.
"I'm on a pension from Vegas Metro. Partial disability. Wrecked my back chasing down a guy dusted on meth. He picked me up and threw me down a flight of stairs…"
None of it was true. It was all part of the sleight of hand. As he talked his left hand went under his jacket and picked the. 25 out of the silk pocket inside his rear belt line.
"I have never seen that kind of power in a single human being…"
He brought his hands forward and clasped them together in an ad-libbed stretching motion during which he transferred the gun to his right hand. He then held it palmed at his side as he groaned and sat down on the bed. Kibble was now about four feet away and still holding her weapon at her side. She held the Sig by the barrel in her other hand and also at her side. Karch knew he had her. But he wanted to get more information from her first.
"Tell me about the kid she and Max Freeling had," he said.
Kibble appraised him for a moment before answering.
"What kid and what's it got to do with a hot prowl in Las Vegas?"
Karch smiled and shook his head.
"She didn't come here because some guy offered her a job selling cars, Agent Kibble. She came because she and Max had a kid and that kid ended up out here."
He looked up at her.
"But I think you know that, don't you?"
"I don't know anything about where the child is but, yes, you're right. Cassie was pregnant when she got arrested. Kept it a secret till it showed. By then she had pleaded out and was at High Desert Correctional. The child was born there. She nursed the baby three days and then it was given away. She put it up for adoption."
Karch nodded. He hadn't known the details but had already figured out the main aspects of the story.
"You got kids, Agent Kibble?"
"Two of them."
"Three days. That long enough to make a bond? A bond that nobody can break?"
"Three minutes is enough."
"You know I'm tired – "
He leapt up off the bed and stuck the. 25 into the collar of fat that was Kibble's neck.
"-of your sarcastic way of answering me, Agent Kibble. It is – "
He slapped the Beretta out of one of her hands and then reached over and took the Sig Sauer from the other.
"-really starting to bug me."
Kibble froze and her eyes widened.
"What are you doing?" she asked.
"I'm sticking the short barrel of a twenty-five pop gun into your fat neck, Agent Kibble. I'm now going to ask you a few more questions and you're going to leave the bullshit out of your voice when you answer. Am I right about this?"
"Yes," she whispered. "Like I said, I got two kids. I'm all they got, so please don't – "
Karch sidestepped her and then pushed her down onto the bed. He put the. 25 back into its pocket and pointed the Sig at her. He reached up and made sure the silencer was still properly attached. He waited until her frightened eyes looked up at him before he spoke.
"Well, if you want to see them again, you answer a few questions and without any of that fat lip anymore."
"Okay, okay. What questions?"
"What else you know about the kid she had? The girl."
"Nothing. Just the one time she told me about the birth and stuff. That was all she ever mentioned about it."
"Why'd it come up?"
"I was showing her pictures of my boys and she just mentioned it. It was at the beginning and she had just come out from Nevada. I was trying to get to know her a bit and she seemed like a good girl."
"What else she say? She didn't say her kid ended up out here?"
"Never mentioned it. She said she told Max she was pregnant on that last night – the night he went out the window."
"That night?"
"That's what she said. She said it was going to be their last job. She told him she was going to have a baby beforehand and Max got all protective. He wouldn't let her do the hot prowl. So he did it."
"What are you saying, that she was supposed to be the one who went up into that room?"
"You didn't know that?"
"How could anybody know? Max ended up splattered across a craps table and she never talked. She took a plea instead. Now I fucking know why."
Karch winced. The pieces of that night were coming together. He thought he understood everything now – six years too late. He turned and stepped away from the bed as if turning from a bad memory. In the mirror over the bureau he saw Kibble's posture stiffen as though she were going to make a move. Then she saw him watching her in the mirror.
"Don't do anything stupid, Agent Kibble. Remember those two kids of yours. What did Cassie Black say about Max trying to fly that night?"
"She wouldn't talk about it, especially with me. There was just this one time that she talked a little bit about it. And she said Max had to have had some help going through that window. That's all."
"Yeah, well, she was right. But the help came from her, nobody else."
"What, you were there?"
Karch looked at her a long moment and he could see fear rise in her eyes.
"I'm asking the questions now, remember?"
He paused to allow her to answer but she didn't. Karch raised the aim of the Sig up her wide body, over her face and to the wall behind her until he was pointing at the woman walking on the beach in the poster.
"Tell me about Tahiti."
"Tahiti?" She looked backward at the poster on the wall. "Tahiti was a dream."
"Was?"
"She went there with Max once. Blew the take on one of the jobs and went there for a week."
Karch looked over at the wastebasket next to the bed table. The photo of Cassie Black and Max and the umbrella drink could be seen over the lip of the can. He knew without a doubt then that it had been taken in Tahiti.