Chapter 42
CHAPTER 42
I can’t believe I almost lost him.
While I pull off Garrett’s wet clothes, wrap him in warm blankets, and settle him on the sofa with a steaming mug of tea, he tells me about his meeting with DeMarco, about being knocked off the road by Romero’s thugs, about the warning shot two feet from his head, and about his five-mile trek through the woods.
“We need to call the police,” I tell him.
“You could have died back there!”
“The official story, Brea,” Garrett says, “is that I lost control of the car on the icy road. That’s what we’ll tell the police.”
“What about the dent in your rear bumper where they hit you?”
“Dent? Hell, the whole back end got shredded when I went into the ditch. It’s just cheap plastic. People can’t tell one dent from another unless they call in the FBI. Which they won’t. It’s Litchfield. The insurance company will declare the car a total loss and it’ll get junked for parts.”
“So, to be clear, you’re saying that you’re not going to report a crime that happened tonight just so we can keep working on our book.”
“Right,” says Garrett.
“Something like that.”
“And now, because that lowlife Seymour Washington is representing DeMarco, we have to work with him again?”
“Until we find another way to get DeMarco to spill what he knows.”
“Or what he says he knows.”
My phone rings.
I don’t recognize the number.
Probably the police checking in.
“Hello?”
“Is this Brea Cooke?” A male voice.
Crisp. No-nonsense.
“Who’s asking?”
“I’ve been trying to reach Garrett Wilson, but he’s not answering his phone.”
“Right. Again, who are you?”
A short pause, and then: “This is Burton Pearce.”