Killer Swell

27

I left my cell number with the hospital staff and asked them to call me if anything changed with Carter. I fought the guilt of leaving the hospital and let one of Liz’s officers drive me over to an Avis counter at the Embassy Suites on La Jolla Village Drive.

After fifteen minutes of paperwork and avoiding the various sales pitches of the rental agent, I walked out to the lot with keys to a Chevy Blazer. It had tinted windows and gray leather interior that still smelled new. I missed the aroma of salt and wax in the Jeep as I pointed the SUV in the direction of the Crier home.

When Kate and I had dated, I had dreaded going to her house. The size of it, the smell of the money, the disapproving looks all had made me uncomfortable. I didn’t have the nerve to stand up to it when I was a teenager, the guts to tell them I was good enough for their youngest daughter. Now, getting out of the Blazer, I knew that nothing in that house would prevent me from saying what I wanted to say.

Ken answered the door, barefoot and wearing navy shorts and a tan Polo shirt. “Noah.”

“We need to talk.”

He waved me in, and we went to the large living room across from the entryway. Two white-leather sofas faced one another, divided by a marble-topped coffee table. Several large abstract paintings hung on the wall, reds and yellows tied together in ugly formation. The color on the canvasses couldn’t remove the sterile feel of the room.

Ken sat down across from me on one of the sofas. “What can I do for you?”

“Why was Kate here in San Diego?” I asked.

He shrugged. “I’m not exactly sure. We assumed it was to spend the week with us.” He paused for a moment. “She probably needed some time away from Randall as well.”

“How did you get her out of it?” I asked.

He frowned, half circles at the corners of his eyes. “I’m sorry?”

“How did you get her out of whatever trouble she was in?”

“I’m confused.”

“No, you’re not,” I said. “Kate had some sort of deal working with the DEA. The way I figure, she got caught in something bad. Why else would she have been working for them?”

He thought about that and decided to lie. “Noah, I have no idea-”

I stood up. “I quit.” I started walking toward the door.

“Noah,” he said, his voice harsher. “Hold on.”

I turned around. “Tell me the truth, now, Ken. Right now. Marilyn didn’t tell me everything. I’ve learned more from staying away from you two than talking to you. I know Kate was involved in something that was way over her head. And I have a pretty good feeling you’re the only one that could’ve set it up. You wanna screw around with me, then I’m done helping you.”

He leaned back in the sofa, the leather collapsing around his body. “She was arrested six months ago.”

I walked back into the room and sat across from him.

“Heroin,” he said, his mouth tightening. “She got stopped for speeding up in Marin County. It was under the front passenger seat and was visible when the cop came to the window for her license and registration. There was enough to charge her with intent to sell. A felony.”

I felt my eyes twitch. The idea that Kate had had that much heroin didn’t seem real to me.

Ken turned and stared out the massive window. The view looked down over the west end of Mount Soledad and La Jolla Shores, barely glimpsing the far edge of the Pacific.

He shook his head. “I couldn’t let her go to jail.”

“What was she doing with the drugs, Ken?” I asked. “Did she have a problem?”

He laughed bitterly. “Oh, she had a problem. From what I learned, she experimented with it during college. Battled with it from then on.”

“She couldn’t shake it?” I asked, trying to picture a strung-out Kate in an Ivy League dorm room.

“She tried rehab several times, but never lasted more than six months clean.” He looked at me. “It was killing her. Until about a year ago.”

I didn’t understand. “What happened?”

He smiled sadly. “She kicked it, on her own. No help from me or doctors or counselors. Just dug in her heels and stopped.”

That sounded more like the Kate I had known.

“Then what was she doing with heroin in her car?” I asked.

His mouth puckered for a moment, like he was trying to get down some awful food. “It wasn’t hers.”

I looked at him, doubtful. “From what you’ve just told me, that’s pretty hard to buy into.”

“I know. But it wasn’t hers, Noah,” he said, his voice tight.

“Whose was it, then?”

He turned to the window again, shaking his head as if he still couldn’t believe what he was about to say. “It was Randall’s.”

I leaned back into the sofa and listened.

“Randall had a…problem, as well,” Ken said. “When they first got married, they were perfect for one another. Just a couple of yuppie junkies with too much money.”

He licked his lips, as if he were trying to get the taste out of his mouth. “I’d really given up. Figured she was going to die, thought we’d get a call in the middle of the night and have to pull her out of the gutter. I tried to do what I could. But it didn’t matter.” He paused. “When Kate cleaned up, I assumed Randall had, too.”

“But he hadn’t,” I said.

“I’m not exactly sure,” he said. “Kate said he had, but I think he may have been dabbling, if that’s the appropriate term.”

“Why?”

He shrugged. “Just his appearance when we went to visit. One day he looked fine, next he looked like crap. I learned to recognize the signs after dealing with Kate.”

He rubbed his hand over his face. When I was in high school, I had alternately wanted to impress Ken Crier and kick his ass. Now I just felt sorry for him.

“Anyway, it was his car Kate was driving. She told me she didn’t know it was there and she was just as surprised to see it under the seat as the cop was. We were at a point where I knew she wasn’t lying to me anymore.”

“But the police didn’t believe her?”

His eyes fired up again. “She covered for his ass, Noah. She took the blame.”

“Why?”

“Because he was on probation,” he said, almost spitting it out. “Is on probation. Got arrested about a year and a half ago for possession, pleaded down to a lesser charge.”

I tried to take it all in. Kate and Randall were both users. Maybe dealers. The good doctor had gotten caught and escaped with a tiny slap-as long as it didn’t happen again.

“So she covered for him,” I said.

“Yeah.”

“And he let her.”

An ugly smile twisted his mouth. “And he let her.”

Cheating on Kate and then getting her into this crap. I now had two reasons to beat the crap out of Randall Tower.

“I set it up,” Ken said. “I got the San Diego DA to arrange with the DA in Marin. They brought her down. She had to make four buys.”

“They miked her and everything?”

“The whole deal.”

I could feel the anger building in my stomach. She’d finally gotten her life together and ended up dying, trying to cover her husband’s ass.

“And Randall let her,” I said again.

Ken Crier nodded slowly, not saying anything, a mixture of anger, guilt, and sadness playing across his features.

We sat there for a moment, him staring out at nothing, me trying to remember the girl I’d loved in high school.

“What was going to happen after the last buy?” I asked.

He swung his gaze back to mine, his eyes red. “They were going to take the recorded conversations and the drugs she bought and hopefully get Costilla. They thought this was their chance to take him down.”

“Was she going to testify?”

“Not in court. It was going to be done through paperwork and by video. She wouldn’t have to enter the courtroom. Once they had what they needed, she was done and clear. She told me she was going to leave Randall, to start all over…” His voice trailed off.

“What?” I asked.

His eyes were someplace else, maybe back to that last conversation with his youngest daughter. “I thought maybe she was going to try to find you, Noah.”