Live Bait

34

Marty hadn’t taken a relaxed breath since Gino and Magozzi had dropped Jack off that morning. The cops might have thought that Jack was shooting at phantoms in Wayzata, but Marty had that twist in his gut he used to get on the job when things were about to go bad. He’d handed most of his chores over to Tim and Jeff and spent all his time tailing Jack, his gun stuck in the back pocket of his jeans, his shirt hanging over it to keep from scaring the customers.

Lily, as usual, had complicated everything. She wasn’t about to talk to her son, but apparently she wasn’t going to let anyone kill him either. The minute Magozzi and Rolseth left, she’d planted herself within two feet of Jack, and there she had stayed ever since, mother on a tether. Also mother in the target zone.

Marty had caught himself balancing on the balls of his feet once, ready to dart in front of them both in case the lady in the straw sandals suddenly dropped her basket of flowers and morphed into a mad gunman. Two things about that moment had surprised him: first, that he was looking at everything with a cop’s eye again, seeing the potential for danger everywhere; and second, that he could still balance on the balls of his feet. As far as he could remember, he hadn’t been able to balance flat-footed for a year. He’d laughed out loud at that, and Lily and Jack had both looked up and stared at him with strange expressions, probably because he didn’t laugh very often these days, or more likely, because being followed by a laughing gunman might be a little disturbing. So he’d slipped back into his stone-faced demeanor by remembering how damn irritating this whole thing was, and the two people he was guarding so assiduously were the cause of it. Jack should be in protective custody, telling the cops everything he knew, and Lily should be making him do it. They should be taking care of each other instead of relying on him for everything. Christ, this was exhausting. Three days ago he’d been in a drunken stupor with a gun stuck in his mouth; now he was a pseudo-cop, a pseudo-bodyguard, and the hardest-working man in the nursery business.

And goddamnit, he’d thought then, nearly laughing aloud again, it almost felt good.

But those hours had been more like playing cop than the real thing. When Gino called shortly before 2 P.M. and told him that someone really had taken a shot at Jack that morning, pseudo-anything flew out the window, and Marty started thinking like the man he had once been, not so long ago.

He shouldn’t be trotting around the nursery after Lily and Jack like a guard dog on a leash. He should beating the truth out of Jack, finding out who killed Morey, doing the job he had been trained to do, and most important of all, he should be closing the goddamned nursery.

‘What do you mean, you’re closing the nursery?’ Lily and Jack demanded almost in unison.

They were all in the front of the greenhouse, unloading plants from a pallet onto an outside table. The place was packed in spite of the sweltering weather, and the plants disappeared almost as soon as they set them down. Jeff and Tim were manning the outside registers, and there was a long line at each counter.

Marty kept his voice low. ‘Ballistics came back on the slugs at Jack’s house this morning. The same person who killed Rose Kleber and Ben Schuler took a shot at him. So just in case this asshole decides to try again, we’re going to get these customers out of the line of fire, close this place down, and you two are going to do exactly what I say from this moment on.’

He waited for one of them to protest, but it never came.

‘I’ll start getting the customers out of here,’ Jack finally said.

‘No you won’t. Come with me.’

Marty led them both to the bench at the greenhouse entrance, sat them down, then stood in front of them like some burly Colossus, facing the parking lot.

Lily had been acquiescent for about three minutes. Marty figured that was an all-time record. ‘For heaven’s sakes, Martin, do you expect us to sit here all day?’ she asked.

He didn’t even turn around to look at her. ‘Gino’s sending a car over. When it gets here, Jack goes back to the house and stays there with the officer, you hear me, Jack?’

‘I hear you.’

Officer Becker pulled into the parking lot a few minutes later, got out, and introduced himself to Marty. He was young, blond, and deceptively fresh faced, but Tony Becker had been at the warehouse when the Monkeewrench firefight went down last fall. It had hardened him in a hurry, made him watchful and sharp, and Marty liked the way his eyes kept moving, checking everything out.

‘This is Jack Gilbert,’ Marty explained quickly. ‘He’s the target. Take him back to the house and stay with him.’

After they left, Marty called Tim and Jeff over from the registers. ‘We’re closing the nursery. I want you two to get all the customers out of here.’

‘You’re closing the nursery?’ Jeff Montgomery asked.

‘That’s right.’

Both boys looked over his shoulder at Lily, who nodded slightly.

‘Okay.’ Tim Matson shrugged his broad shoulders, glancing back at the line at the registers. ‘We’ll just finish checking these people out…’

‘No. We’re closing now. This minute. Apologize, tell them it’s a family emergency, get them out of here. And then I want you two out of here. Don’t bother with the till, don’t bother with the tapes, just go.’

Marty knew he was scaring them – they looked like a couple of teddy bears with their eyes wide and suddenly worried – but that was what he wanted. Two scared kids hightailing it out of here, back at their own places, safe.

‘Is there a problem, Mr Pullman?’ Jeff asked. ‘Because if there is, maybe we could stay and help you out?’

‘You can’t stay,’ Lily said from the bench. ‘Somebody might be trying to shoot Jack. I don’t want you here. I want you safe.’

Tim and Jeff looked at her in disbelief, trying to take it in, and Marty knew they were thinking about Morey getting shot just a few days ago, wondering how and if it all pieced together, and what kind of an animal would try to destroy the family that had been so good to them. He prepared himself for a barrage of questions, but as it turned out, he’d underestimated them both, forgetting that they were nearly men, and that the protective instinct blooms early, pushing everything else aside. They both straightened, squaring their shoulders, puffing up.

Jeff, who’d been driving Marty crazy for days by ending every sentence with a question mark, suddenly looked like a man instead of a boy, his blue gaze steady, his mouth set and determined. ‘Is that why the cop came?’

Marty nodded.

‘One cop to guard this whole place? Let us stay, Mr Pullman. Let us help.’

Great, Marty thought. Just what I need. A couple of adolescent heroes. ‘Listen, kid, I appreciate the offer, but we don’t really think anything’s going to happen here. We’re just being extra-careful. Officer Becker and I have it under control, and the only thing that might mess it up is having to worry about the two of you on top of everything else. If you really want to help, get rid of the customers – right now – and go home.’

Tim, his dark hair dripping sweat, went immediately to the bench and sat next to Lily. ‘You shouldn’t stay here either, Mrs Gilbert. If we have to leave, I want you to come with us.’

Lily smiled at Tim and patted his hand. ‘You’re good boys. Stop worrying. Tomorrow we’ll put Jack in a safe place, and everything will be back to normal.’

Marty looked at her as Tim and Jeff started clearing out the customers. ‘How are we going to do that?’

‘Do what?’

‘Get Jack to a safe place? ‘

‘Easy. You’re going to talk him into it.’

‘You don’t have enough scotch for that.’

‘Pfft. I have a case in the basement.’