The Bodies Left Behind

  He pictured her stripping.

  The image aroused him for a few minutes until the throbbing in his arm tipped him out of the mood.

  He examined the wound closely. Hart had taken paramedic training courses--because his job often involved physical injuries. He now assessed the wound and concluded that he didn't need a doctor. He knew several medicos who'd lost their tickets and would stitch him up, no questions asked or gunshots reported, for a thousand bucks. But the bleeding had stopped, the bone was intact and, though his bruise was impressive, the infection was minor. He'd start on antibiotics later today.

  Hart showered under a stuttering stream of water, doing his best to keep his arm dry.

  He returned to the bed, naked, and lay down. He wanted to consider the night, to try to make sense of it. He thought back several weeks--to a Starbucks in Kenosha, where he was meeting with a guy he'd worked with a few times in Wisconsin. Gordon Potts was a big, hulking man, not brilliant but decent and someone you could trust. And he could hook you up with dependable labor when you needed it. Potts had said he'd been approached by a woman in Milwaukee who was smart, tough and pretty. He vouched for her. (Hart now realized that Michelle had bought the credentials with a blow job or two.)

  Hart was interested. He was between jobs and bored. There was a deal going down in Chicago but that wasn't until mid-May. He wanted something now, needed some action, adrenaline. The same way that the tweaker Hart had killed in the state park last night needed to slam meth.

  Besides, the job was a lark Potts told him.

  A few days later Potts had hooked him up with "Brenda"--the fake name Michelle had offered--in a coffee shop in the Broadway District of Green Bay. She said, "So, Hart. How you doing?"

  She shook his hand firmly.

  "Good. You?"

  "I'm okay. Listen, I'm interested in hiring somebody. You interested in some work?"

  "I don't know. Maybe. So how do you know Gordon Potts? You go back a long ways?"

  "Not so long."

  "How'd you meet him?"

  "A mutual friend."

  "Who'd that be?"

  "Freddy Lancaster."

  "Freddy, sure. How's his wife doing?"

  Michelle had laughed. "That'd be tough to find out, Hart. She died two years ago."

  And Hart had laughed too. "Oh, that's right. Bad memory. How does Freddy like St. Paul?"

  "St. Paul? He lives in Milwaukee."

  "This memory of mine."

  The Dance...

  After his first meeting with Brenda-Michelle, Hart had made phone calls to both Gordon Potts and Freddy Lancaster to verify times, dates and places down to the tenth decimal. A dozen other calls too, after which he was confident that nobody was working for the law. Brenda Jennings was a petty thief with no history of informing on her partners--and was also, Hart now knew, an identity Michelle had stolen.

  So he arranged another meeting to discuss the job itself.

  Michelle had explained she'd heard that Steven Feldman had been making inquiries about swapping old bills, silver certificates, for newer Federal Reserve notes. She'd looked into the situation and learned about some meatpacking executive who'd hidden cash in his summer home in the 1950s. A million bucks. She gave Hart the details.

  "That's a lot of money."

  "Yeah, it is, Hart. So you're interested?"

  "Keep going."

  "Here's a map of the area. That's a private road. Lake View Drive. And there? That's a state park, all of it. Hardly any people around. Here's a diagram of the house."

  "Okay...This a dirt road or paved?"

  "Dirt...Hart, they tell me you're good. Are you good? I hear you're a craftsman. That's what they say."

  As he'd studied the map he'd asked absently, "Who's 'they'?"

  "People."

  "Well, yeah, I'm a craftsman."

  Hart had been aware of her studying him closely. He looked back into her eyes. She said, "Can I ask you a question?"

  A lifted eyebrow. "Yeah."

  "I'm curious. Why're you in this line of work?"

  "It suits me."

  Hart was somebody who didn't believe in psychoanalysis or spending too much time contemplating your soul. He believed you felt in harmony or you didn't, and if you bucked that feeling you were making a big mistake.

  God, doesn't the boredom just kill them? It would me. I need more, Brynn. Don't you?

  Michelle had nodded, as if she understood exactly what he meant and had been hoping for just that answer. She said, "It looks like it does."

  He got tired of talking about himself. "Okay. What's the threat situation?"

  "The what?"

  "How risky's the job going to be? How many people up there, weapons, police nearby? It's a lake house--are the other houses on Lake View occupied?"

  "It'll be a piece of cake, Hart. Hardly any risk at all. The other places'll be vacant. And only the two of them up there, the Feldmans. And no rangers in the park or cops around for miles."

  "They have weapons?"

  "Are you kidding? They're city people. She's a lawyer, he's a social worker."

  "Just the Feldmans, nobody else? It'll make a big difference."

  "That's my information. And it's solid. Just the two of them."

  "And nobody gets hurt?"

  "Absolutely not," she had said. "I wouldn't do this if there was a chance anybody'd get hurt." Brenda-Michelle had smiled reassuringly.

  Lots of money, nobody hurt. Sounded good. Still, he'd said, "I'll get back to you."

  Hart had driven home and researched what she'd told him. Sitting at his computer, he'd laughed out loud. Sure enough, it was all true. And he was confident that no cops in the world would come up with a sting like this. They offered drugs, perped merchandise, funny money, but they didn't suggest a caper out of a Nicholas Cage movie.

  Then came the big day. They'd driven up to Lake Mondac in the stolen Ford together. He, Compton Lewis and Michelle. The two men had broken in and, while they held the Feldmans at gunpoint, Michelle was supposed to come into the kitchen, tape up their hands and start interrogating them about the money. Instead of the duct tape, though, she was carrying a 9mm subcompact Glock. She'd walked past Hart and shot the couple point-blank.

  In the ringing silence that followed she turned around and walked into the living room like nothing had happened.

  Hart had stared at her, trying to figure it out.

  "The fuck did you do?" gasped Lewis, who'd been poking around in the fridge for food, rather than where he should've been--watching the front of the house.

  "Don't worry. I know what I'm doing." She'd started going through the briefcase and backpack.

  The men had been staring in shock at the bodies, while--they'd assumed--she was looking for a key to a secret room or lockbox or something. Hart himself had been frantically tallying up the offenses they'd just bought into. Felony murder being number one.

  Then he saw her reflection--she was coming up behind him, lifting the gun.

  He leapt sideways, instinctively.

  Crack...

  The tug on his arm.

  Then returning fire as she escaped.

  Lying in the spongy bed now, Hart knew exactly what had happened. There was no hidden treasure. Michelle had been hired to kill the Feldmans--Brynn had suggested as much as they'd sat in the van beside the meth cookers' camper.

  Her plan was to leave Hart and Lewis in the Feldmans' house, the fall guys.

  And Hart couldn't help but laugh now. He'd hired Compton Lewis for exactly the same reason Michelle had hired Hart: an insurance policy, a fall guy. In case the robbery went bad and people ended up dead, Hart had been going to kill Lewis and set him up to look like the sole perp. That was why he'd gotten a loser he'd had no previous connection with. That scenario had nearly played out on the interstate. With Michelle, Brynn and the little girl together--and Hart had the squad car to escape by--it was time to conclude the evening. He killed Lewis and was about to kill the other
s with the SIG when who shows up but Brynn's husband?

  I was thinking with my contacts, guys in my crew, and your, you know, the way you plan things and think, we'd be a good team.

  Oh, you sad bastard, Hart thought. You really did believe that, didn't you? And here you were, 50 percent dead from the first time we sat down together, you tugging your green earring and scoffing about why were we in a faggot place like this that only sold coffee and not a real bar?

  With sleep closing in, he pictured Michelle. Of all the people he'd worked with and for--dangerous Jamaican drug lords, South Side gangstas and OC bosses throughout the Midwest--the petite, young redhead was the most deadly.

  The cloak of sweet, the cloak of helpless, the cloak of harmless--hiding a scorpion.

  He speculated about the two women together last night. What on earth had they talked about? Brynn McKenzie was not a woman easily fooled, and yet Michelle had been the consummate actress. He thought of those surreal moments in the van with Brynn.

  So, Michelle was a friend of the family? Is that how she got mixed up in this whole thing? Wrong time and wrong place, you might say. A lot of that going around tonight....

  The Trickster.

  In the Feldmans' house he'd glanced quickly at a credit card in her purse and gotten her name. Michelle S. Kepler, he believed. Maybe Michelle A. There'd probably been a driver's license but he hadn't bothered to look for it then. He'd have to find her--before the police did, of course. She'd give him up in a minute. Oh, he had some work to do in the next few days.

  But then, like Compton Lewis, Michelle faded from his thoughts and he fell asleep with only one image in his mind: the calm, confident eyes of Deputy Brynn McKenzie, sitting beside him in the front seat of the van.

  You have the right to remain silent....

  THEY RETURNED FROM

  the hospital at 8 P.M. Brynn and Graham picked up Joey from the neighbor's house and they drove home. Brynn got out of the car first and went up to the deputy, Jimmy Barnes, the one whose birthday was today. The balding, ruddy-faced man was parked on the shoulder in front of their house, all grim and quiet--the way everybody was in the Kennesha County Sheriff's Department, because of Munce.

  In fact, the way a lot of people throughout the town of Humboldt were.

  "Nobody's come by, Brynn." He waved to Graham. "Made the rounds a few times."

  "Thanks."

  She suspected that Michelle, whoever she was, would be long gone but the woman seemed frighteningly obsessed.

  And, she reflected, Hart too knew her last name.

  "Crime Scene's got what they need. I locked up after."

  "They say anything?"

  "Nope. You know the state boys."

  It'd be against the laws of nature for the brass and the slugs from Lake Mondac not to match those collected in her house.

  Barnes asked, "Wasn't her friends? She was making all that up?"

  "That's right."

  "And your mom. Heard she'll be okay?"

  "She'll live."

  "Where'd she get hit?"

  "The leg. Hospital another day or two. Therapy."

  "Sorry about that."

  Brynn shrugged. "Lot of people don't make it round to see therapy."

  "Lucky."

  If your daughter bringing an armed killer into your house is luck, then I guess.

  "'Night now. Somebody'll make the rounds off and on."

  "Thanks, Jimmy. I'll see you tomorrow."

  "You'll be in?"

  "Yep. You have a package for me?"

  "Oh, yeah." Barnes reached into the back and handed her a heavy paper bag. She looked inside at a well-worn department Glock and two extra clips, along with a box of Winchester 9mm hollow points.

  He then lifted a clipboard. She signed for the weapon.

  "You got a clip loaded. Thirteen. None in the bedroom."

  "Thanks."

  "Get some rest, Brynn."

  "'Night. And happy birthday."

  As he drove off she checked the clip anyway and chambered a round.

  The family walked inside the house.

  Upstairs she put the gun in the lockbox and returned to the kitchen.

  Joey had eaten pizza at the neighbor's. He walked around, staring at the bullet holes in the walls until Brynn told him not to.

  Brynn took a long shower, the water hot as she could stand, and tied her hair back after towel-drying it. Didn't want the noise of the dryer. She changed the bandage on her face, threw on sweats and went downstairs, where Graham was heating up spaghetti from last night. She wasn't hungry but felt she'd abused her system enough in the past twenty-four hours and was expecting it to go on strike if she didn't start to pamper soon.

  They went into the dining room and ate for a while in silence. She sat back, looked at the label on her beer. She wondered what exactly hops were.

  Then she asked Graham, "What is it?"

  "Hmm?"

  "There was something you wanted to say at the hospital."

  "Don't remember."

  "You sure? I think you might."

  "Maybe something. But not now. It's late."

  "I think now is good." She was chiding but serious too.

  Joey came downstairs and was channel surfing in the family room, sitting on the green couch.

  Graham stuck his head in the door. "Joey, go upstairs and read. No TV."

  "Just ten min--"

  Brynn started to speak. Graham continued into the family room. He said something that Brynn couldn't hear.

  The TV shut off and she caught a glimpse of her sullen son climbing the stairs.

  What was that about?

  Her husband sat down at the table.

  "Come on, Graham." They rarely used each other's name. "What is it? Tell me?"

  Her husband sat forward, and she saw he was lost in debate. Eventually he said, "Do you know how Joey hurt himself yesterday?"

  "The skateboard? At school?"

  "It wasn't at school. And it wasn't just three steps in the parking lot. He was 'phalting. You know what that is?"

  "I know 'phalting. Sure. But Joey wouldn't do that."

  "Why? Why do you say that? You don't have any idea."

  She blinked.

  "He was 'phalting. He was doing close to forty or fifty on the back of a truck down Elden Street."

  "The highway?"

  "Yes. And he'd been doing it all day."

  "Impossible."

  "Why do you say that? A teacher saw him. His section teacher called, Mr. Raditzky. Joey skipped school. And he forged your name to a note."

  With yesterday's horror less immediate, this news was shocking. "Forged?"

  "Went in in the morning. Left and never came back."

  Was this true? She looked at the ceiling. A black dot of a bullet hole was in the corner. Small as a fly. The slug had come all the way through here. "I had no idea. I'll talk to him."

  "I tried. He wouldn't listen."

  "He gets that way."

  In a harsh voice Graham said, "But he can't get that way. That's not an excuse. He kept lying to me and I told him no skateboarding for a month."

  "Are you sure--" Her initial reaction was to defend her son, to question Mr. Raditzky's credibility, to ask who the witness was, to cross-examine. She fell silent.

  Graham was tense, shoulders forward.

  More was coming.

  But, fair enough. She'd asked for this.

  "And the fight, Brynn. Last year? You told me it was a pushing match. Mr. Raditzky told me what really happened."

  "He was a bully. He--"

  "--was just taunting Joey. Talking to him is all. But Joey hurt him bad. We almost got sued. You never told me that."

  She fell silent. Then said, "I didn't want word to get around. I pulled some strings. It wasn't all on the up-and-up. But I had to do it. I wanted to protect him."

  "He's not going to break, Brynn. You spoil him. His bedroom looks like a Best Buy."

  "I pay for everyth
ing I bought him myself." She instantly regretted the barbed words, seeing the grimace on Graham's face. This had nothing to do with money, of course.

  "I don't think it's good for him, all that indulgence. You don't have to be mean. But have to say no sometimes. And punish him if he doesn't listen to you."

  "I do."

  "No, you don't. It's like you owe him, like you're guilty about something and paying back this debt. What's it all about, Brynn?"

  "You're making it into something more than it is. Way more." She gave a faint laugh, though she felt her heart chill--the way her skin had when the cold, black water rushed into her car at Lake Mondac. "His fight at school...it was just something between Joey and me."

  "Oh, Brynn, that's the problem. See? That's what this is all about. It's never been 'us.' It's always you and Joey. I'm along for the ride."

  "That's not true."

  "Isn't it? What's this all about?" He waved his hand around the house. "Is it about us, the three of us, a family? Or is it about you? You and your son?"

  "It's about us, Graham, really." She tried holding his eye but couldn't.

  No lies between us, Brynn...

  But that was Hart. And it was Keith.... Graham was different. This is so wrong, she thought, being honest with bad men, while the good ones get lied to and neglected.

  He stretched. She noticed that both their beers were exactly three-quarters full. He said, "Forget it. Let's go to bed. We need sleep."

  She asked, "When?"

  "When what?"

  "Are you leaving?"

  "Brynn. This is enough for tonight." A laugh. "We never talk, not about anything serious. And now we can't stop. Tonight of all nights. We're exhausted. Let's just get some rest."

  "When?" she repeated.

  He rubbed his eyes, first one, then both. He lowered his hands, looked at a deep scratch inflicted at some point last night in the woods. A tear in the skin from a thorn or rock. He seemed surprised. He said, "I don't know. A month. A week. I don't know."

  She sighed. "I've seen it coming."

  He looked perplexed. "Seen it coming? How? I didn't know it till last night."

  What did he mean by that? She asked, "Who is she?"

  "'She'?"

  "You know who. That woman you're seeing."

  "I'm not seeing anybody." He sounded put out, as if she'd delivered a cheap insult.

  She debated but kept to the course. She said harshly, "JJ's poker games. Sometimes you go. Sometimes you don't."