Chapter 27
Mitch sat bolt upright and automatically reached for his pistol on the nightstand.
The burner phone rang twice more before he realized that’s what had awakened him, not the rocky front porch step, which he’d been subconsciously listening for while he slept.
He grabbed the phone and swiped to answer. “Tucker?”
“Nooo, John Bowie.”
“Oh. Oh? Hey, bro. Wait. How’d you get this phone number?”
“Officer Clarence.”
“You gotta be shittin’ me.”
“No. He’s here with me now. He was waiting for me when I got here and asked if he and I could talk privately in my office. About you. It’s turning out to be an interesting conversation. I’d like for you to be in on it.”
“Hate to disappoint. I’m a little tied up.”
“Where are you?”
“Isn’t it a little early to be calling, hammering me with all these questions? It’s not even eight o’clock, and I’m not usually due in until nine.”
“Don’t use that pissed-off voice with me,” John said. “You’re up to something. I want to know what.”
“Hasn’t Clarence filled you in?”
From the background, the cop warbled, “I’m sorry, Mitch.”
“Save it. And why are we on speaker?”
“Because you’re tied up,” John said.
Mitch cursed under his breath.
“I didn’t want to rat on you,” Clarence said. “I didn’t want to get you in trouble, but—”
John interrupted him. “He didn’t want to betray your trust, but felt duty-bound to report what he did for you in the wee hours of this morning. You placed this officer in an impossible situation.”
“That officer could’ve talked to me about the impossibility of his situation before going to you.”
“I tried, Mitch,” Clarence said. “I went to your apartment on my way to work, hoping to talk to you in person, but you weren’t there. I thought I might be able to persuade you to stop stalking Dr. Reede.”
Dylan had been lying still, but Mitch had been aware that she was awake and listening. At the mention of her name, he saw out of the corner of his eye that she came up on her elbows.
Into the phone he said, “I’m not stalking Dr. Reede.” Fucking her till my balls are blue, but not stalking her.
“What would you call it?” John said. “Sending Clarence over to her house to see if she had company? That’s the definition of stalking. You’ve arrested men for less.”
“Has Dr. Reede herself accused me?”
John said, “After Clarence told me about this, I called her.”
“Oh? And?”
“Her service tried to reach her on her cell phone, but got her voice mail.”
“Hmm, interesting. Typically she returns calls in a timely fashion,” Mitch said.
“I’m not buying your innocent and dumb act, Mitch. I know you too well. You’re not at home. You’re not here. Where are you?”
“Uh.” He was sitting naked on John’s side of John and Beth’s bed. Dylan was reclined naked on Beth’s side of John and Beth’s bed. He said, “All good here, John.”
“I didn’t ask how you are. I asked where you are.”
“Okay,” he said, sounding put out. “You wanna know what I’m up to? I’ll tell you. I got stuck last night.”
“Stuck where?”
“In the gut.”
“In the… You mean stabbed?”
“Incised. I’ve got a red line running left to right across my belly like a thin smile.”
“Jesus. Clarence, did you know about this?”
“No, sir. Now I feel really terrible.”
Mitch muttered, “You should.”
“Mitch, how bad is it?” John asked.
“It’s all right. I got it taken care of.” He looked at Dylan and winked.
“How’d it happen? Where? Who did it?”
Mitch debated with himself about how much he should disclose, then said, “I was following a lead on the Bayou Coeur murders. I know you told me to stay off that case, but I had a notion that just wouldn’t let go.
So I went to New Orleans to take a look around.
Ran into some trouble.” He paused before adding, “Here’s where you chew my ass. ”
John grumbled something indistinct, exhaled heavily, then said, “I’m glad you’re all right. What provoked it?”
“I guess the guy just didn’t like my looks. He jumped me, whipped out a switchblade, sliced me, ran like hell.”
“Did you go after him?”
“No. Even I had better sense. Wasn’t my turf, it was his. I didn’t want to get trapped there by either his buddies or local police, so I split.”
“Give me a description of him. I’ll alert NOPD.”
“Negative.”
“Only to put this guy on their radar,” John said.
“Nope.”
“Then you can add obstruction of justice to stalking a prominent psychologist.”
“Damn,” Mitch sighed. “All right, but better all around if you don’t ID me as your source.”
“Understood.”
“Okay. He’s a little guy. Early twenties. Swagger. Out to prove he’s a badass. Even before he attacked, I had him pegged for a street-smart, scary dude.”
“Not much of a description.”
“It’ll have to do.”
John said, “Hold on. Lear and Nix are coming this way. Head them off, will you, Clarence? Tell them I’ll be with them in a minute.”
“Mitch, I’m really sorry,” Clarence said.
“Yeah, yeah. Have a nice day.”
There was shuffling and a door closing, then John said in a low voice, “You were hanging around Malone’s, weren’t you?”
“Are we off speaker?”
“Yes.”
“Then, yes. Guilty.”
“Mitch—”
“Not now. Later, you can have at me, but right now, listen up. The asshole with the switchblade works for Malone. Goes by the name of El Paso. A recent addition to the corps, and I doubt Malone hired him full-time to hassle the homeless population, which is what he was doing when he jumped me. He’d attacked two others before me. He’s dangerous.”
“Where’d you get all this information?”
“A reliable source.”
“Tucker?”
“A reliable source.”
John knew that was a yes. “Then are you sure your attacker didn’t recognize you from your previous line of work?”
“I don’t think so.”
“But?”
“But, if he did, Malone will learn that I was lurking just outside his place. He won’t like it a bit. So I’m going to lay low and wait to see how he reacts. That’ll determine what I do next.”
“Don’t make a move without my knowledge.”
Mitch said nothing.
“Mitch, I mean it.”
“I heard you. Not without your knowledge.”
John hissed with irritation. “Where are you laying low?”
“It’s not on anyone’s radar. Prohibition-defying Cajuns saw to that.” He need say no more.
He could envision the dent between John’s eyebrows getting deeper, which it tended to do when he was concentrating. At last, he said, “Playing a hunch here. It occurs to me that Dr. Reede isn’t at home and can’t be reached on her cell phone. And neither can you.”
“You’re a genius.”
“She’s with you,” John said. Elaborate cussing followed.
“I know what it looks like, but—”
“Looks like you’re holed up with your therapist.”
“See? As I said, genius. Do you want to hear why we’re holed up, or not?
” After a pause, he continued. “If Malone learns that the knifed homeless man was in fact an ex-narc, and he wants to know what’s going on inside said ex-narc’s head, who better to ask than the ex-narc’s therapist?
That’s why I enlisted Clarence the Tell-all Tattletale to watch her house last night. ”
“That sounds like one of your convoluted rationalizations for pulling a stunt.”
“Sounds like that, but isn’t. Did Clarence tell you about the car outside her house?”
“Yes.”
“Trying to find out who owns that car will take you down a rabbit hole that goes all the way to China, but I’d bank on it belonging to Malone. Who else would take a sudden interest in Dylan Reede to the extent of watching her house?”
“You,” John said. Then he sighed. “But I get what you’re saying. So your plan is to keep her under lock and key—my lock and key, by the way. How does she feel about it?”
Mitch looked at her and raised his eyebrows; she gave him a bashful smile. “She came around,” he said. “Like Beth did when you stashed her here.”
“That was different.”
“Damn right it was,” Mitch said. “You didn’t know who your bogeyman was. I know who mine is. And yet I can’t—”
“Hold on, my desk phone is ringing. Could be Darcy with something new on Bayou Coeur.”
Mitch stood by while John answered the incoming call. He reached over to stroke Dylan’s arm. With a rueful smile, he said, “Some morning after, huh?”
Before she could reply, John was back. “Mitch, it’s Mary.”
“Calling you?”
“Because she couldn’t reach you. She’s upset. They’re in the ER.”