A Welcome Grave

13

It took an hour to put together the possibilities. Alex Jefferson didn’t receive many phone calls in the early hours of the morning, but there were a few. Karen was right: The bills were detailed, and they went back eight years. I found three early-morning calls in the previous month’s bill and recorded all the numbers. One was from an 812 area code, which I recognized now as belonging to southern Indiana. That had been the first call from his son in many years. The other two calls were local numbers, and I noted them and moved on.

I’d gone through five years when I got another hit. On July fifth, Alex Jefferson received a call on his cell phone at 1:36 A.M., again from a number with an 812 area code. The call had lasted eleven minutes. The next call on the record, this one outgoing, had been placed at 1:52 A.M., to a number with an area code from northeastern Ohio, between Cleveland and Pennsylvania, the Ashtabula area.

I went through the rest of the bills, just because they were there, and found five additional calls that had come in around one or two in the morning. While I recorded each number, I wasn’t optimistic that they would matter. What was interesting, though, was the prevalence of calls from that 812 number.

“Would you have an address book or a phone list around somewhere?” I asked Karen. “Anything that would show old numbers?”

“A Rolodex in the office.”

I wrote the 812 number down and handed it to her. “See if you can find this. I think it belonged to his son at one point.”

Five minutes later she returned with confirmation. “The Rolodex says that was Matt’s cell phone number. I just tried to call it, and I got some woman who had no idea who Matt was.”

“I bet he stopped using it several years ago. The last number he called from is different. All I needed to know was that it belonged to him at one time.”

“So you’re getting somewhere?”

“I don’t know, but I’ve got a list of numbers and call times that I can check out. It’s something to do. There are other places to look, too, and I’ll be working on them soon.” I paused and then added, “Hopefully, with some assistance.”

Joe was on his way out of the house when I pulled into his driveway. He was wearing jeans and that big parka again, holding his car keys in his hand. He stopped walking as I put the window down and glanced in at me.

“Bad timing, LP. I’m on my way to physical therapy.”

“Skip it,” I said.

He tilted his head and peered in the car, looking at me with surprise. “What?”

I turned to face him, making sure he could see my black eye and battered lip as I shut off the engine. “I need you for a minute, Joe. Is that okay?”

He managed a nod. “Sure. I guess we better go inside.”

We went in and sat in the kitchen. Or I sat, at least. He poured himself a glass of water, drank a little, and then leaned against the counter.

“Well,” he said. “What’s up?”

I told him what was up. He didn’t say a word. Just stood there and drank his water and refilled the glass once. I was in a chair at the little kitchen table, everything in the room so damn neat and ordered and so . . . Joe. When I was finished with the story, I met his eyes.

“I’m starting to drown in it a little bit, Joe. I’m starting to feel a little over-matched. Maybe I shouldn’t. Maybe I should be good with all this, be all collected and focused and calm about it, everything that you’d be if you were in my shoes. But, damn it, I’m used to working with a partner. Used to working with you. Then this shit keeps stacking up, and I’ve got cops talking about murder charges, and guys putting bags over my head and guns against my skull, and I turn around and look in my corner for you, and you’re not there.” I softened my voice, leaned back in my chair. “I don’t see you there, at least.”

He stared at me, no clear emotion on his face, and then he finished the rest of his water and set the glass aside. He shook his head.

“I’m sorry to hear you say that. But you have to admit, I didn’t know about most of this until five minutes ago.”

“Right,” I said. “Because you haven’t been around. Don’t misunderstand me—you getting healthy is the most important thing. But did you have to go so far away to get healthy?”

“I’ve been right here.”

“Did you have to go so far away to get healthy?” I repeated, and after a pause, he nodded, getting it this time.

“All right,” he said. “That’s fair enough.”

It was quiet for a moment.

“I’m not blaming you for anything,” I said. “Shit, Joe, you took those bullets for me. Because of me. If I can realize that and somehow be pissed at you for all of this, then I’m pretty damn self-absorbed. I’m just saying that . . .”

“What?”

“That I could use you right now. That I need some help. Okay? I need some help.”

He ran a hand through his gray hair and nodded. “Then I’ll help. Of course I’ll help. Damn, LP, you had to know that.”

“I did. I do. But you have to understand the kind of distance you’ve been keeping lately. It’s my fault that you’re gone—”

“It’s not your fault.”

“The hell it’s not. It’s absolutely my fault, and I understand that. But do you think that makes it easy for me to approach you, ask you when you’re going to come back?”

Something changed in his eyes then. Something a stranger or casual acquaintance wouldn’t pick up on, but that I couldn’t help but notice after years of working so closely with him.

“Are you coming back, Joe?”

He picked up the empty glass and rinsed it. Rinsed water out of a glass with more water, then set it back down as if he’d accomplished something.

“Look,” he said, “the issue of the day is what’s happening with Karen. Right?”

“Right.”

“Okay. Then let’s get focused on that, LP. You aren’t going to need to worry about having a partner if they send you to prison.” He paused, then smiled slightly. “On second thought, maybe having a partner is exactly what you will need to worry about if they send you to prison.”

I was laughing then, and so was he, and it felt damn good. Shit, when was the last time Joe and I had laughed over anything? I couldn’t think of it. We laughed about the prospect of me in prison, a real howler of a subject, and then he pulled up a chair and sat down across from me, resting his bad arm on the edge of the table.

“So what have you got? Other than a beat-to-shit face, what have you got?”

“A vague reference to an old sin, a list of late-night phone calls, a missing fifty grand, and that’s it. Had a photograph of the murder victim, but not anymore.”

He frowned. “I don’t like your decision on that one. You could have guessed that, I’m sure. That’s evidence, LP.”

“Same word I used to motivate myself when I burned it.”

He sighed and drummed his fingers on the table. “Well, we aren’t going to accomplish much if we stay in this kitchen, are we? Better get down to the office.”

I looked at the clock. “How long was the therapy session supposed to go?”

“An hour.”

“Would they let you start late if you told them you got held up with something important?”

He shrugged. “Probably.”

“Then go to your physical therapy,” I said. He started to shake his head, but I held up my hand. “Joe, go to it. I said you getting healthy is the most important thing, and I meant that. But come on by the office when you’re done. Come on by, and give me a hand.”

He hesitated before nodding. We left the kitchen and walked outside. I paused at the door to my truck, and he slowed down and looked back at me. I said, “Thank you,” just as he said, “I’m sorry,” and then we both just nodded at each other. I climbed in my truck and started the engine, then drove to the office, feeling better than I had in a long time.

Good enough that I could almost forget about the question he’d left unanswered.

I’d been in the office for fifteen minutes before Targent and Daly showed up. All I’d accomplished so far was to boot up the computer and crack the windows, let a little of the Indian summer day bleed into the room. I heard their steps on the stairs as I settled back into my chair behind the desk, and for a moment I thought it was Joe, deciding to pass on therapy after all and get an early start on this. Then someone knocked on the door, and I had a bad feeling I knew my visitors.

I pulled the door open, and Targent greeted me with a cheerful smile.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Perry.”

They came inside. Daly was carrying a black leather bag, and he walked past me and sat on one of the old stadium chairs that occupy the center of our office, relics from Cleveland Municipal Stadium. Targent came in, too, but he stayed on his feet.

“What are you doing here?” I said.

“Well, you drove off in such a hurry the other night I didn’t have a chance to wrap up our chat.”

“I wrapped it up, Targent. And I’m busy. So this better be damn important, because if you’re just visiting, I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

He nodded, looking at me with a curious expression. “Speaking of visiting—you been doing any in places where you’re not wanted?”

“Nope.”

“Because,” he gestured at his own face, pointing to his eye and then to his lip, “you’re a little banged up there.”

“Uh-huh. That’s a souvenir from the guy you should be arresting.” I knew where we were headed, and it wasn’t going to be good. I should have reported the attack. I’d waited because I hadn’t talked to Karen yet, and my chances of getting an honest answer about any extortion attempts seemed better if I went alone. Now that was about to blow up in my face.

“The guy I should be arresting?” Targent’s eyebrows arched.

“I was interrogated about some things last night. Rather vigorously. The guy put a bag over my head and asked me what had happened with Jefferson’s son, in Indiana.”

Targent turned and looked at Daly. Then he looked back to me, and when he did all that was left on his face was anger.

“You were interrogated about Jefferson’s son.”

“Yes.”

“Well, someone is in trouble,” he said. “Whoever failed to get this police report to me and point out that it has a direct impact on my murder investigation, they are in some kind of trouble. We must have an incompetent asshole in our midst. Because I’m quite sure you had a police report made, and yet that report never made its way to my desk.”

I held his eyes while I shook my head.

“You didn’t,” Targent said, and now that low voice had the full force of his rising fury behind it. “You were approached—no, attacked—by a man you had every reason to believe was involved in a homicide, and you didn’t feel it necessary to inform the police? Is that what I’m understanding?”

“I wanted to talk to Karen.”

“She’s running the homicide investigation?”

“No.”

“So you are?”

“No.” I paused but spoke again before he could jump in. “The last time we talked, you were full of shit, Detective. You blocked me in the driveway and gave that entertaining speech about the movie plots and generally wasted my time. You think I was in a hurry to sit down with you again?”

“I’d like to think you would be in a hurry to see this crime solved. Holding back information like this is not a help, Perry. It’s a crime. You were a cop, you know that.”

“Look, Targent, if I’d come to you last night it wouldn’t have helped. The guy was gone, and what lead would my story have given you? Nothing. All he left me with was vague talk and a collection of bruises.”

“You held back critical information in a homicide investigation—”

“I’m giving it to you now. You think you would’ve broken this case if I’d called you at two in the morning? Come on. I’m giving it to you now, and that’s enough. We can spend the rest of the day arguing about it, but if you’re so interested in getting this case closed, like you say, you’ll be smart enough to realize that’s not going to help. If you’re more worried about winning some sort of macho pissing contest with me, then go ahead. We can waste as many hours as you like.”

“Okay,” he said. “We won’t argue about that, but I’m not ready to leave yet, either. There’s a matter I think you’re going to want to discuss with us.”

“You don’t have anything I want to discuss.”

“No?” His eyes had changed, the anger replaced by the hard glint of a poker player sitting on a hand he was sure the others at the table weren’t anticipating.

“No.”

“Not even a Russian by the name of Thor?”

I looked at him for a long time, trying to keep my face impassive and hoping nobody could hear the thudding increase in my heart rate.

“You don’t know a Russian named Thor?” he said. “I’d try the last name, but there’s no chance I’d even get in the ballpark. Too many consonants. Or maybe it was vowels.”

“What’s he got to do with this?”

“So you do know the man?”

“I didn’t say that. Just tell me why you’re asking about him. Tell me that or get the hell out of here.”

Targent smiled, enjoying the tension he heard in my voice. “After Jefferson’s body turned up, we searched his vehicle and pulled some prints. There were several different sets there, but only one turned up a match on our computers. Two fingers of the right hand of a Russian mobster named Thor. A gentleman who’s been charged with four crimes and investigated in maybe thirty others and convicted of none. Word about this guy is that he’s a hitter. Serious protection for Dainius Belov, and I’m quite sure you know who he is.”

His words slid in and out of my brain. I couldn’t focus on anything other than a Russian with the palest blue eyes I’d ever seen, eyes that belonged to some ancient glacier. Did I know Thor? Targent had asked. Proof of that acquaintance was standing in front of him. Thor had saved my life once. Saved it while taking the lives of a few other men, sure, but when you’re the one who comes out alive you tend not to worry about the other side of the equation so much.

“We were pretty intrigued by this guy, right from the start,” Targent was saying. I blinked hard and stared at him, struggling to pay attention, to look calm, and not like I’d just been kicked in the stomach.

“Yeah?”

“A guy with that sort of reputation, you kidding me? Looked like a good fit. Problem was motive, Perry. All we had connecting Jefferson to this guy were those two fingerprints in the car. Nothing else. Not a phone record, not a mutual acquaintance, nothing. Then we learned something very interesting about you.”

He motioned at Daly, who reached into his bag and pulled out a sheaf of papers. Targent took them and shuffled them for a minute, then spoke again.

“We’re acquainted with a homicide detective named Swanders. That one familiar to you?”

I nodded.

“Right. Turns out you two were working the same case about a year ago. Guy named Wayne Weston got whacked. Trail ran back to the Russian mob, Belov’s crew. You played a pretty heavy role in the way everything shook out on that one. Dangerous stuff, is how they wrote it up in the papers. The interesting thing about the newspaper articles was that they were filled with loose ends. I hate unanswered questions, you know? So I threw a few of those questions at Swanders. The way he remembers it, right around the same time this Weston case was going on, the Russians had a bit of an internal shake-up.”

I sat down on the chair behind my desk, leaned back, and gave him indifferent, as bored an expression as I could muster. It wasn’t much.

“We asked around about this shake-up. There are a couple guys with the department and a few more with the FBI who keep a tight watch on the Russians. They remember the situation. Seems about three of the Russians who were affiliated with Belov just disappeared.” He snapped his fingers. “Poof. One day they were here, wreaking havoc on the city, and the next, they were gone. Then there’s you, a guy who by all accounts should have been viewed as a major pain in the ass by these Russians, and yet . . . you’re still here. Some of the cops who work on these guys? They find that pretty damn incredible.”

“If you’ve got prints from this Thor, and he’s got such a history, seems like you should be talking to him, not me.”

“We’ve talked to him,” Targent said. “Tried to, at least. He lawyered up right away. I’m wondering if maybe we asked the wrong questions.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised. None of your questions seem particularly bright to me.”

“You’ve got the motive. Thor didn’t, not that we can see, but you do. And when we prove you’re connected to him, Perry? Shit’s gonna turn pretty damn interesting, I’d say.”

I leaned back and smiled at him. “Targent?”

“Yeah?”

“Get the hell out of my office. Immediately. You’ve been crowding the line with me, and today you jumped over it with both feet. I’m done tolerating your stupidity.”

I stood up and went to the door, opened it, and stood there looking at him expectantly.

“You don’t think we’ll be able to connect you to him?” Targent said.

“You’re done. Leave.”

“I’m guessing we can make that connection,” he said, starting for the door. “I’m guessing you and this guy have some serious history.”

They brushed past me and went outside, and I slammed the door behind them. When I heard their car start up in the parking lot, I looked at the clock, wondering when Joe would be done with therapy, hoping he’d have some advice about how to handle a ghost with a Russian accent and translucent blue eyes.