Scavenger hunt

Chapter 7

"I have no intention of running phone numbers for you," said Jane Holt, keeping a steady pace in spite of the twinge in her left ham-string, the one that was always tight.

Jimmy didn't answer.

"I'm not going to do it," Holt repeated. Seagulls screamed overhead as she ran along the waterline. Her dark hair was pulled back, elegant somehow, even in nylon shorts and a Catalina marathon T-shirt, but her legs were too muscular for the debutante she had once been. The T-shirt was untucked, covering the.380 auto clipped to the waistband along her back, and the handgun would have been out of place at a deb ball too. "You know I can't."

"I wouldn't ask except I'm having trouble pulling-"

"Is that why you came this morning?" Holt stopped now, confronting him.

"I'm having a hard time pulling up Walsh's cell phone calls," said Jimmy, not answering the question. "He didn't have credit, so he had to use prepaid cards, and they're hard to trace. Rollo says you have to go through central billing, and-"

"Private citizens aren't supposed to trace calls. Even police have to get a court order."

"I don't think Walsh is going to complain that we violated his civil rights."

"That's not the point." Holt adjusted her weapon-a tiny callus had long since formed where it rubbed against the small of her back. Jimmy had noticed the small roughened patch of skin the first night they made love and tenderly kissed it, guessing exactly the cause. The first lover of hers who had figured it out. Maybe if she dated cops once in a while… But she didn't like mixing business with pleasure. Until Jimmy. He wasn't police, but he had the same heightened survival instincts and street smarts as a good cop. Or a good crook. She sometimes thought his journalism was just an excuse to work the middle ground between right and wrong, an opportunity to keep company with the dregs and the desperadoes, the high and the mighty too. Getting involved with him was a bad career move, particularly for someone as ambitious as she was. She didn't care. She didn't have to explain things to him, didn't have to make excuses for her silences, didn't have to hide her anger and frustration with the job. Plus, he was wicked in bed-and even better, he allowed her to be wicked too. Holt started running again, wanting to change the subject. "Sergeant Leighton asked me today if you would autograph this month's copy of SLAP for him."

"I told you, I had no idea that Polaroid was going to make it into print-"

"One of the detectives posted your page on the bulletin board. They drew a crown on your head. Do you want to know what they drew on the twins?" Holt made it sound like good times in the squad room, but she knew that the other detectives lionized Jimmy only to humiliate her. "What is it, this thing men have about twins? Is it the challenge?"

"More like a death wish." Jimmy tried to keep up. "I need your help, Jane."

"You have to let Helen Katz work the case. You don't even know if it's a homicide or not."

"Walsh was murdered."

"It's only been four days. Wait until the coroner's report is released, then you'll know." Holt started running again, increasing her pace, forcing him to push himself to keep up with her. She was tan and fit, in her mid-thirties, crow's-feet starting at the corners of her eyes, and some serious vertical lines in her forehead from thinking too much about things that thinking couldn't do anything about. They had been together almost a year now. Jimmy liked her wrinkles, but a couple of weeks ago she had looked in the mirror and actually started thinking about getting botox injections. Jane, you've been living too long in southern California. She could hear Jimmy a couple of steps behind her, breathing hard. She ran faster.

A Rhode Island WASP with breeding and a law degree, Holt had intended to become a prosecutor, entering the police academy more for the training, an adjunct to her legal career rather than an end in itself, but after graduating second in her class, she gave up all thoughts of the courtroom. Being a prosecutor was all about making deals and taking long lunches with boring people, she had told Jimmy. If she wanted that, she would have gone to work at her father's hedge fund. Holt was a detective now, a by-the-book cop with a designer wardrobe and the best arrest-to-conviction ratio in the department.

"If it was an accident, what happened to the screenplay?" said Jimmy.

"I don't know. Neither do you."

"I know Walsh was killed for it, that's what I know."

"Walsh could have hidden the script where it wouldn't be found. He could have given it to someone else to read, someone he thought could help him more than you." Holt's explanations made perfect sense, but she knew that Jimmy wasn't going to give up. He never quit-it was one of the things about him that she was attracted to.

The thing about her job that never ceased to amaze her was the look of relief on so many suspects' faces when she arrested them. Some of them actually sighed when she read them their rights. There was no real pleasure in arresting them. Other suspects though, smart ones with plenty of career options, rich ones, thought the law was their servant, something to keep the little people in check and ensure that no one stole their Porsche. The smart ones were always shocked when she arrested them; they insisted that she had made a mistake, politely at first, then threatening her with lawsuits and calls to the mayor, then finally, when they realized it was really happening, happening to them, the fear took over. She enjoyed that.

Jimmy's brother, Jonathan-he had been a special case. Smarter than anyone else Holt had ever arrested, a successful plastic surgeon, handsome, urbane-and a serial killer who called himself the Eggman. He had written Jimmy an anonymous letter at SLAP, taking credit for his kills, taunting him. A police task force had concluded that the Eggman was a hoax, but Jimmy wouldn't be dissuaded. Those instincts of his again, those lovely instincts. Jonathan had been startled when she arrested him, but it hadn't lasted long. As she snapped on the handcuffs, he had looked at her with contempt, as though he knew something she didn't. Maybe he did. He should have gotten life without parole, minimum, but after a hung jury at his first trial, Jonathan had pled guilty to one count of homicide, second degree nonetheless, and was sentenced to an indeterminate stay at a facility for the criminally insane. A "facility"-that was how the judge referred to it.

Running full out, Jimmy stumbled, tumbling onto the beach.

Holt looked back, and he was already on his feet, sand stuck to one side of his face. She slowed to a walk and allowed him to catch up with her.

"The husband murdered Walsh, either by himself or by hire," Jimmy gasped, breathing through his mouth. "Killed him and took the screenplay he was working on-the screenplay and all his notes. Maybe the husband was just taking care of loose ends, but if he found out that the wife suspected him, she could be in danger."

That got Holt's attention.

Jimmy bent forward, trying to catch his breath. "A few days before he was murdered, Walsh sat across the table from me and told me he was innocent. He said that the man who had framed him was going to kill him. Walsh was an arrogant man, but he was scared that night, too scared to hide it. He begged me to save him, but I didn't believe him then. Now… now I do."

"Then let the authorities handle it."

"The authorities? Give me a fucking break." Jimmy stood up, still holding his side. "I clean up after myself."

Holt took his hand. "All I'm saying is that until there's an official finding on the cause of death, you're just spinning your wheels. If you're right and Walsh was murdered, then I'm sure Detective Katz is up to the task. She'll find the wife before anything happens to her. Helen Katz is a good cop." She smiled. "Crude but thorough."

"Katz doesn't know about the wife."

Holt stopped in midstride. "I beg your pardon?"

"I didn't tell her about the wife or the letter she sent. I just told her Walsh was working on a screenplay."

"You withheld evidence in a possible homicide?"

"Yes, I did, detective."

"That's not funny. It's a crime."

"I told her all she needed to know."

"You decided what she needs to know?" Holt shook her head. "I'm required to inform Detective Katz about this. Otherwise, I'm as culpable as you are."

"Let your conscience be your guide. That's what I do."

"That's not the way the law works."

"The law is written by judges, and judges are just lawyers who kissed the right ass. I don't need laws to tell me what I should do."

"Perhaps-perhaps you were just speculating about the existence of a letter. Of the wife and the husband when you told me about them."

"Yeah-perhaps."

Holt adjusted her automatic as she looked up and down the beach. It was barely past sunup. There were just a few other runners far down the strand. The hard core. Like her. She had only a few ironclad principles. One was to never have a drink before five P.M. Another was, no matter what happened the night before, get her run in the next morning. She used to have another ironclad principle, following not just the letter of the law but the spirit too. She looked at Jimmy, but he didn't flinch.

"I let Walsh down," Jimmy said. "Seven years he sat in prison, thinking he had murdered a high-school girl. Murdered his future too. I think about what it must have felt like to read that letter from the wife after all that time inside, after all the things he had seen. Just the chance that he hadn't really killed Heather Grimm-that he could reclaim everything that had been taken from him, everything, Jane."

Holt wanted to smooth the pain from Jimmy's face, but she didn't make a move, still angry at him for implicating her in the suppression of evidence.

"Walsh was a mess the night I met him, so loaded he could hardly stand, but he sized me up right away. I was on a scavenger hunt, but so was Walsh. He was looking for someone to change his luck, to turn the tables on the man who had put him away. Walsh had a con's instincts: Seize the advantage-that's how you survive in the joint, you don't waste any opportunity, you take your best shot because you might not get another. That's why he told me about the letter. He thought I was going to help him." Jimmy looked like he wanted to hit somebody. "I guess he was a bad judge of character."

"You didn't do anything wrong."

"I didn't do anything."

"If the coroner's report rules Walsh's death a homicide, you have to tell Katz."

"Katz could get the wife killed. Cops don't have to move quietly, they just have to get results. Katz will elbow her way into people's lives, hauling them in for questioning, insisting on answers. Me, I'll move light and easy."

"Tell her what you know, Jimmy. If you don't, I will."

Jimmy looked into her eyes, slowly shook his head.