The Murder Book

CHAPTER 45

Aimee and Bert sat in the third row of the Suburban. Aimee clutched Bert's sleeve. Bert's eyes lacked focus.

I got in next to Milo, in the second row.

At the wheel was Stevie the Samoan, the bounty hunter Georgie Nemerov called Yokuzuna. Next to him sat Red Yaakov, crew-cut head nearly brushing the roof.

"How'd you find us?" I said.

"The Seville car got tagged, and I got hold of the tagger."

"Tagged?"

"Satellite locating device."

"One of Coury's car gadgets?"

His hand on my shoulder was eloquent: We'll talk later.

Stevie drove to Highway 150 and pulled over just short of the 33 intersection, into a tree-shaded turnaround where three vehicles sat. Toward the rear, half-hidden by the night, was the pickup truck, front end facing the road, still loaded with fertilizer. A few feet away was a dark Lexus sedan. Another black SUV- a Chevy Tahoe- blocked both other vehicles.

Stevie dimmed his lights, and two men stepped from behind the Tahoe. A muscular, shaved-head Hispanic wearing a black muscle T-shirt, baggy black cargo pants and a big, leather chest holster, and Georgie Nemerov in a sport coat, open-necked white shirt, rumpled slacks.

The muscular man's T-shirt read: BAIL ENFORCEMENT AGENT in big white letters. He and Nemerov approached the Suburban. Milo lowered his window, and Nemerov peered in, saw me, raised an eyebrow.

"Where's Coury?"

Milo said, "With his ancestors."

Nemerov tongued the inside of his cheek. "You couldn't save him for me?"

"It was over by the time we got there, Georgie."

Nemerov's eyebrow arched higher as he turned to me. "I'm impressed, Doc. Want a job? The hours are long and the pay sucks."

"Yeah," said Yaakov, "but de people you got to meet are deezgusting."

Stevie laughed. Nemerov's smile widened reluctantly. "I guess results are what counts."

"Was there anyone else?" I said. "Besides Coury?"

"Sure," said Nemerov. "Two other party animals."

"Brad Larner," said Milo. "That Lexus is his. He and Coury arrived in it, Larner was driving. He was parked near the house, waiting for Coury, when we spotted him behind the truck. Dr. Harrison and Caroline were tied up in the truck bed. Another guy was at the wheel."

"Who?"

Nemerov said, "Paragon of virtue named Emmet Cortez, I wrote a few tickets for him before he went away on manslaughter. Worked in the auto industry."

"Painting hot rods," I said.

"Chroming wheels." Nemerov's grin was sudden, mirthless, icy. "Now he's in that big garage in the sky."

"Rendered inorganic," said Stevie.

"Steel organic," said Yaakov. "Long as deyr someting left, he steel organic, right, Georgie."

"You're being technical," said Stevie.

"Let's change the subject," said Nemerov.