Play To Kill

Chapter Eleven

Gino had the passenger seat of the Cadillac on full recline, but his eyes were wide open. Magozzi kept glancing over to make sure he blinked.

'Close your eyes, for God's sake. You look like you're dead.'

'I am dead, or might as well be, and I am never going out with you after dark again. First you take me to a drag club, then to some poor dead sap's apartment so I can see the sorry remains of his sorry life, then to the county jail. Christ. I had a better time at my vasectomy. What time did you drop me off?'

'Four a.m.'

'And what time did you pick me up?'

'Seven-thirty, just like always. Jeez, Gino, you got three hours. What are you complaining about?'

'No, I did not get three hours, because the little man toddled into our bedroom at a quarter after five and hurled all over me. Why do little kids get the flu all the time? It's not even flu season. It pisses me off. And why do we have to get up and work our regular shift when we worked all night? They don't let pilots do that. So many hours in the air, you gotta take so many hours off. Shit. Even truck drivers have rules like that. But cops? Nah. No sleep? No problem. Load your weapon and get out there. I'm an armed man with a brain you could stir with a straw. Now, that's just plain stupid.'

Magozzi yawned. 'Tell you what. I got three hours' sleep. Ask me before you shoot somebody.'

'Okay.'

Magozzi pulled onto Summit Avenue, and a few blocks later through the open wrought-iron gate of Harley's driveway. 'Up and at 'em, partner. Time for our play date with the Feeb.'

'You're not going to go off on this guy and get us thrown in the pen, are you?'

'You want me to make nice with a Fed? Your onions fall off in the shower or what?'

'This is a little Fed. A hapless soldier. He didn't make the decision not to pull cops in earlier. Besides, I'm too weak to referee one of your pissing matches.' He got out of the car and stretched, looking around. 'Man, I keep forgetting to get the name of Harley's gardener. Look at those peonies. They're just about enough to break your heart. You know what I think of when I see peonies? Cheerleaders. Don't ask me why.'

'I will not. I promise.'

Gino veered to the right of the walk and tromped across Harley's perfect lawn to the koi pond, his favorite feature of the house. He pulled a bag of miniature marshmallows out of his pocket and tossed a few in the water, then started humming the Jam theme music while he waited for the feeding frenzy. After a few seconds he called over his shoulder. 'Hey, Leo. These guys aren't moving today.'

Magozzi sighed and joined him at the pond's edge. 'Of course they're not moving. They're dead. That's why they're floating on their sides.'

'Aw, shit. I loved those big guys. What do you suppose killed them?'

'Marshmallows.'

'Now that was just plain mean.'

As far as Gino was concerned, the really cool thing about coming to Harley's mansion in the morning was that it always smelled like his grandmother's house. Which meant that it smelled like animal fat. This was not permissible breakfast food in the home he loved so much, because Angela wanted him to live forever instead of letting him die young, fat, and happy. Bacon, sausage, the occasional flat steak, sometimes pork - these were the aromas that filled his memory, reminding him of Grandma's oak table and tin sink and the cast-iron pan spitting grease on an old wood-burning stove. Every time he showed up here in the morning he half-expected Harley to show up in an apron with yellow sunflowers and crinkly gray hair pulled back into a bun.

Grace was waiting for them in the breakfast room, her eyes fixed on the cup of coffee that was cradled between her hands. Gino wanted desperately to hate this woman, because she messed with the mind of the best friend he would ever have in this life; but there was something about her that tugged at him.

'You had food of the gods for breakfast,' he said with a smile, and Grace nodded.

'Harley cooked cholesterol. He knew you were coming. By the way, we checked the dates on the murders confirmed so far, including your river bride. Lots of time between all of them, so your traveler theory is still alive, Gino.' She looked back at Magozzi. 'Any breaks with the river body?'

'Nope. We got an ID on the guy, a timeline that shows him leaving a club alone, and the last person who saw him alive is a pickled judge who can't remember his own name half the time. How about you? Any luck tracing the film?'

She shook her head. 'Nobody's been able to trace it. We think that tactic is a dead end - whoever did this is too good to leave tracks.

'Did you bring our films?'

Magozzi patted his sports-coat pocket. 'Ten bodies, some fresh, some not so fresh, just like you asked. It was a pretty weird request, Grace.'

'If Roadrunner's idea works, these disks are going to teach our software program how to tell if a murder is real or staged. He can explain it better than I can. How long can we keep them?'

'No real hurry, all the cases are cleared. But I signed for them, and they have to go back to the locker eventually, so don't give them to your pet Fed.'

She gifted him with her rarest of expressions - a tiny, one-sided smile. 'You're going to like Agent Smith. He reminds me a lot of you. Now, can I have the disks? We need to get started. Food's still warm in the kitchen if you want to load a plate to bring upstairs.'

Gino did a drill turn toward the kitchen, but Magozzi stopped him.

'Maybe later. We'll meet with Smith first.'

Charlie was waiting for them at the top of the stairs, floppy ears trying to stand erect, stubby tail trying to make a breeze. He went for Gino first, as he always did, standing on his hind legs so his tongue could reach the man's face. 'This dog really loves me.'

Grace grunted. 'That dog assumes you always have food on your face.'

Roadrunner covered the fifty feet from his workstation to the doorway in about ten strides. 'You got my films, guys?'

Magozzi and Gino just stared at him, speechless for a moment.

'Jesus, Roadrunner,' Gino finally managed to eke out. You're wearing jeans.'

The tall man's Adam's apple bobbed in embarrassment.

'Leave him alone,' Harley bellowed across the room. 'I've been trying to get him in real clothes for years and I don't want you messing it up. Damn Lycra's so hot we had to keep the air on arctic for him to survive up here while the rest of us got frostbite.'

'Oh.' But Gino couldn't stop staring.

'You know what, Roadrunner?' Magozzi said. 'That's a really good look for you. Kind of Gary Cooper. Long, tall cowboy.'

'Yeah?'

Yeah. Here are the films you asked for.'

'Oh, gee, thanks, this is going to get things rolling' The long, tall cowboy hurried back to his desk, smiling.

Harley gave Magozzi a thumbs-up from across the room, then tipped his black beard toward the table in the far corner by the window. John Smith was sitting alone, tapping away on a laptop. 'Hey, Smith. Meet Minneapolis's finest. Leo Magozzi and Gino Rolseth.'

Smith stopped typing and stood up, and the three men took each other's measure in an instant. Grace looked on in obvious bemusement. Men always measured themselves against each other, which wasn't all that different from women, except that men did it so damn fast. There was an instant of locked eyes that apparently revealed everything they needed to know about each other. Women spent a lot longer with preliminary social chatter, while their real attention was focused on what Magozzi had told her was the superficial.

Women look at clothes and makeup and weight and all sorts of silly shit…

What women do that?

Women who aren't you, Grace. They're loo king for flaws. But men look for weaknesses first. Kind of an enemy assessment.

Grace had smiled at him. They're both kind of an enemy assessment, aren't they?

'Good morning, Detective Magozzi, Detective Rolseth. I'm Special Agent John Smith. I'm afraid we haven't had much success tracing the posted film of your homicide…'

'Grace told us.'

'… and I understand from your Chief that MPD is also hitting a dead end on the local investigation.'

Gino pulled out a chair and sat down. 'Great. Now we've established that we're all big fat failures.'

'I certainly didn't mean to imply-'

Yeah, yeah, sorry. I'm operating on really low voltage this morning. But you gotta remember, our investigation just got started late last night. Up until then, our homicide was ruled an accident, so don't count out the MPD just yet.'

'On the contrary. We're counting on MPD. Toward that end, the Bureau would like to offer any assistance you might require. If you need help on the ground in evidence collection, canvassing, forensics, or suspect interviews, Special Agent in Charge Paul Shafer has committed to provide the manpower…'

'Thanks, but we've got it covered,' Magozzi interrupted, still standing, taking the high ground. 'We put twenty more officers on site early this morning, blanketing the area between the club our vie left and where he ended up in the river. Any more would be overkill.'

'Still, some extra eyes and hands might be helpful.'

Magozzi finally sat across from Smith and leaned forward, eye to eye. 'Straight up, Smith. I don't feel like dancing this morning. Washington wants the case, right?'

Smith looked right back at him. 'That was the initial recommendation.'

'You have absolutely no jurisdiction here.' Magozzi always spoke very slowly, very softly just before he started to bellow. Gino closed his eyes and waited. Wishful thinking is about the only thing you've got connecting our case to your five. There is no way our Chief will voluntarily sign off on passing the ball to the Feds.'

'I'm sure you're right, but- '

'This is MPD's case, and we don't need a parade of suits stomping all over our scene or interviewing potential witnesses or suspects. We've been down that road before, and when you start dividing tasks and information between agencies, a lot of it tends to get lost. Is it like that in D.C., or is Paul Shafer the only asshole in the organization?'

Smith leaned back in his chair. 'Lord, no, he's not the only one.'

Gino snickered.

'And remember, I said that was the initial recommendation. I talked them out of it, at least for now. Just keep me in the loop, and I'll do the same from my end. That's all I ask.'

Damn, Magozzi hated it when people did this to him. You get all prepped for battle and then the jerk you're ready to stab through the heart lays down his sword. 'Fair enough,' he grumbled.

'I got something here,' Harley hollered from across the room, and everybody gathered around his computer. He pointed to some lines of text on a monitor bigger than Gino's TV. 'Check this out. It's an encrypted post I hacked from one of your hot sites, Smith. It says, "City of Lakes. Bride in the water. Or would that be a groom? Near beer." Whatever that means.'

'The film showed the old Grain Belt sign across the river,' Magozzi said.

'Then that's gotta be your case, guys.'

Magozzi shrugged. 'Sure. But this thing is all over the news, which means it's all over the Web.'

'I know. But you said your guy drowned two nights ago, right?' 'Right.'

'Well, this thing was posted the day before the murder.'

The absence of sound in the room was profound, like a vacuum had sucked the air out of it. 'Are you sure?' Magozzi finally asked.

'Positive. This sick bastard was pre-advertising and then he posted his trophy film to prove he did it.'