She closed one eye and with the other peered through the telescopic sights. The barrel was pointed toward the window. Then she lowered the rifle. And laughed that clucking laugh of hers again when she saw the look on Kay’s face. ‘I just used the telescopic sights. I took this over after my husband died.’
Kay shivered at the thought that she herself and her car had probably been in that viewfinder as she drove up toward the house.
‘So you saw a person you believe to have been Tomás Gomez pass here yesterday morning.’
‘Yes. He parked in the passing space down there.’
Kay took out her notebook.
‘What kind of car was it?’
‘Oh, sweetie, I don’t know much about cars. But it was a big one. Nice car.’
‘Colour?’
‘Mostly wood.’
‘Wood?’
‘Wood-panelling. My husband’s car had the same thing. I’ve seen it here several times.’
‘Really?’
‘Before yesterday it was three weeks ago. He came walking up the road with another man. The other man was white. Probably one of those crazy artists, I thought to myself.’
‘Artists?’
‘Yes. They disappeared into the trees along that track you see there. Probably on their way to that nasty house of horrors they’ve made for themselves in there.’ Mrs Holte shuddered. ‘Uergh.’
The time was twelve thirty when Kevin Patterson stepped out of the SUV in front of the US Bank Stadium. The square was almost deserted, but loud music and cheering could be heard from inside the stadium. Patterson assumed someone was doing a display of trick-shooting, something involving a gun. Four security men accompanied him to the VIP entrance, passing what remained of the line at the public entrance. Some stared as though not quite sure where they had seen his face before, because he didn’t play for the Vikings and he wasn’t a TV preacher either, he was just the mayor. But there were some who did recognise the face, and one voice called out: ‘Make America great again!’
Patterson smiled and waved back even though he knew the man was a Trump supporter and would vote Republican. And that the guy probably didn’t know that the slogan wasn’t invented by the Trump campaign team but had a long history and had been used by both parties at various times.
Inside the VIP entrance Patterson was led past the elevators and up to the private boxes and a large, rather provisionally furnished room. A window with a view of the podium and lectern out on the ground was obscured by a thick tarp.
A man wearing a pinstriped suit and with an accreditation ID around his neck approached and introduced himself as Ted Springer from the Joint Terrorism Task Force. He assured the mayor that everything was under control and he would be able to walk out to the lectern at the time arranged.
Patterson walked across to the tarp, pulled it to one side and looked out. It was a fantastic stadium. In his speech at the opening of the stadium he’d said that even an old cornball like him could get tears in his eyes looking around the place. He’d asked his speechwriter to take some of the best lines from that earlier speech and add them to the one he was due to deliver in twenty-five minutes. Suddenly something dazzled Kevin Patterson, a quick, bright flash. The man who had been the mayor’s chief of security for the last ten years must have registered it, because he leaned close to Patterson and asked in a low voice, ‘Anything wrong, sir?’
‘No, no, it’s er...’ Patterson began. ‘Have the private boxes been checked? I think I may have seen something up there.’
‘They’ve been temporarily closed, sir. Do you want me to double-check with the security man there?’
‘No, no. I’m sure everything is as it should be. There’s so much glass around here. Lot of glass, lot of reflections.’
Patterson looked at his watch. Twenty-four minutes.
There were four of them in the tiny room and the air stank of sweat, hospitals and some men’s perfume that Rooble Isack assumed came from the man in the sickbed.
‘Well, Dante,’ said Rooble, ‘do you want a deal or not?’
Marco Dante looked over at his lawyer, Al Gill. Rooble had heard about Gill. He was the type who would sell his own grandmother if the hourly rate made it worth his while. Until yesterday Rooble and the Aggravated Assault Unit had been concentrating on finding out who shot Marco. Then JTTF entered the fray, asking that no stone be left unturned in the Gomez case, and suddenly search warrants they would normally have had to beg for were being thrown at them. The Aggravated Assault Unit had found enough in Marco’s garage to charge him as a front man for the extensive sale of illegal weapons. On conviction he faced a possible four-year sentence.
‘We want you to drop the charges relating to the front-man activity,’ said Gill, shifting his gaze from Rooble to Rooble’s colleague and then back to Rooble again. ‘But if you want my client to provide you with information about Tomás Gomez you’re going to have to drop illegal possession of weapons and the sale of weapons too.’
‘You mean you want us to drop everything?’ said Rooble.
‘Gomez is a killer,’ said Gill. ‘He has already made one attempt on the life of my client and is certain to try again if it becomes known that he has provided you with information that could lead to his arrest. As a free man my client will probably be able to deal with this, but given Gomez’s gang connections he would be an easy target in jail.’
‘Gang connections?’ said Rooble. ‘Is Gomez a gangbanger?’
‘Think of it as a foretaste of the kind of information my client will be able to provide you with. Do you want the rest, or don’t you?’
Rooble sighed. ‘OK, all charges are dropped.’
‘On whose authority...?’ Gill said.
‘It’s already been cleared with Superintendent Walker of the Homicide Unit. Let’s hear you, Dante.’
Dante looked at Gill, who gave a short nod.
‘Tomás Gomez came in and bought a gun a while ago,’ said Dante.
‘You know it was him?’ asked Rooble.
‘He didn’t exactly show me his ID, but I’ve seen pictures from the security camera on the TV news and yeah, it was him all right. He bought an M24 with telescopic sights and the whole shebang.’
‘Including this holster?’ Rooble Isack asked. He held up a photo.
‘Yes.’
‘Carry on.’
Dante shrugged. ‘There’s isn’t a lot more to tell. He didn’t say much. In fact, he didn’t say a single word. Just pointed to what he wanted, paid and left.’
‘Had you seen him before?’
‘How do I know? The guy was wearing sunglasses, he had a hoodie pulled up.’
There was silence in the room.
Rooble leaned forward to Gill.
‘Explain to your client that this isn’t worth what we’re offering to pay. And tell him I agree with you, Gilclass="underline" if we drop the deal and have him sent to jail then he’ll be a sitting duck for Gomez’s gang.’
‘Now listen here, Detective Isack—’ the lawyer began, but was interrupted by Dante.
‘OK, OK. Like I said, I’m not certain who Tomás Gomez is, but he reminds me of a guy who disappeared a long time ago and no one knew what happened to him. A cold-blooded, brutal killing machine. They called him Lobo. I sold an Uzi to him a long, long time ago. Must have been back in the eighties.’
‘I remember people talking about a guy called Lobo when I was in Homicide,’ said Rooble. ‘It was before my time, but I understood that he was either dead or had gone back south of the border again.’
‘What you mean is, you never found him, right?’ Dante laughed bitterly. ‘So, I’m not saying this was Lobo, I’m just saying this Gomez guy looked like him. And he had the same tattoo on the back of his hand. One of those five-pointed stars drawn with just one line.’