Theresa Monsour (31 page)

The three running figures were illuminated by yard lights as they cut across the leaf-covered lawn. The drizzle had turned into a hard rain. Steam poured from the detectives' mouths as they hollered and ran.

Murphy: “He's going over the fence.”

Duncan: “The fuck he is.” In two strides, Duncan passed Murphy. “Stop, you dumb fuck,” Duncan yelled. “I'm a cop.”

Trip had his right leg over the fence and was about to throw the left one over when he saw Duncan racing toward
him. He hesitated for an instant and then tried to pick up his left leg. The pant cuff was caught on the bottom of the fence. He reached down and pulled; it wouldn't budge. He thrust his right hand into his right pants pocket and pulled out the straight-edge. Opened it and reached down to slice his pant leg free. Too late. Duncan was almost on top of him. Trip straightened up, cranked his right arm back and took a swing. Duncan tried to dodge the blade, but it caught him on the chin and he stumbled backward. A shot rang out. Trip dropped the knife with a howl and clutched his left shoulder with his right hand. He saw Murphy bearing down on him, her gun raised. “Don't move!” she yelled. Trip pulled his left leg as hard as he could. The cuff ripped off. He threw his leg over the fence and ran down the alley, his right hand clutching his left shoulder.

Murphy shoved her gun into the waistband of her skirt and climbed over the fence. She landed on the other side, pulled her gun out. Duncan was right behind her. She eyed his face when he landed on the other side of the fence. Blood was oozing from his chin. They ran after Trip. By the glow cast from a streetlight, they saw him turn right when he hit the end of the alley. “His truck,” she said.

“I'm getting my wheels,” Duncan said, and ran ahead of her. At the end of the alley he took a left on the side street and ran toward Summit. He dug his keys out of his right pants pocket while he went and pulled his cell phone out of his left pocket. Called for backup while dripping blood down the front of his shirt.

Murphy got to the end of the alley and took a right. Followed Trip down the side street. She squinted through the rain and the night as she ran. She couldn't see Trip ahead of her. She looked for his truck at the end of the block. Gone. “Damn,” she muttered. She stopped at the corner and looked up and down the side street. Up and down the street that crossed it. Nothing. She turned and jogged back toward Summit. She wanted to catch Duncan to tell him to call for backup. As she ran, she rubbed her arms and
pushed the wet hair off her face. She was soaked and cold. Her sweater and skirt were matted against her like a second skin. She got to Summit and scanned the street. An empty space between the Range Rover and the Mercedes. Duncan's Cadillac was gone.

She heard the squeal of tires. It had to be Duncan. She scanned the side street. Didn't see anything. Then Trip's truck came rumbling out of the alley, took a mad left onto the side street and headed for Summit. She stepped into the middle of the road to stop him. He kept coming. She raised her gun. He kept coming. She dove between two sedans parked on the side street and jumped on the trunk hood of one. Dropping to one knee, she aimed for Trip through the cab window on the passenger's side. As the truck roared by, she pulled the trigger. She heard the crackle of shattering glass but couldn't tell if she'd hit Trip. The truck kept heading for Summit. It would take Trip downtown. To the highways. To freedom.

As the truck rolled into the intersection, a black bullet shot down Summit and broadsided the driver's side. The thunder of metal slamming into metal. A hubcap rolled down Summit toward the reception house and another wobbled down the side street past Murphy. “Axel!” Murphy slid off the car trunk, shoved her gun in her waistband and ran to the intersection. Broken glass and bits of metal crunched under her shoes. She heard sirens in the distance and her own voice drowning them out. “Axel!”

She ran to the Cadillac. The front of the car was crumpled and the windshield was shattered. She tried to open the driver's door. Locked or jammed. She pulled with both hands and yanked it open. Duncan was lying back in the seat. He was wearing his seat belt; it saved his life.

His eyes opened. “Sorry I'm late.”

She reached inside and wrapped her right hand around his left. She eyed his body but was afraid to touch him. “Where does it hurt?”

“Everywhere.” He laughed. “Ouch. My poor Caddy.”

“Don't move,” she said. His eyes started to close. “Axel. No. Don't. Stay with me. Talk to me. Where were you? You dropped out of the sky.”

His eyes fluttered but stayed open. “Drove to the end of the block and took a U-turn. I heard rubber burning. Figured he was coming out of the side street. Gunned it when I saw him.”

“Why? We would have caught up with him.”

“Couldn't risk a chase. The way he used his truck like a weapon, he could've taken out a bunch of people.”

“You never drew your gun.”

“Not a fair fight. He didn't have a gun.” His eyes started to close again.

She squeezed his hand. “Axel. Stay with me.”

Two squads pulled up. Then a third, followed by a fire rig and two paramedic units. She stepped aside so the paramedics could work on Duncan. She ran over to Trip's truck. The driver's side was punched in. Paramedics were crawling all over the cab. “How bad is it?” she yelled to one leaning in the driver's side. She looked past him into the truck. Didn't see evidence that airbags had gone off. She figured Trip had been in so many accidents, he'd stopped replacing the bags or disengaged them. “Is he conscious?” She had to know if he killed Denny and his friends. Wanted to ask how many others he'd murdered. “I'm a cop. Can I talk to him?”

The paramedic pulled his head out of the cab. “You the shooter?” She nodded. “Between that and the crash, he's gone.”

She didn't know why she asked her next question: “Which finished him?”

“ME will have to sort that one out.” He ducked his head back inside.

Another paramedic, a woman, came around to the cab from the back of the truck. She was shaking her head. “Never seen anything like it.”

The impact of the collision had caused Trip's truck to jettison half its load. Curled up in the middle of Summit
Avenue—amid a pile of cowboy linen and bloody towels and packaged dress shirts and Elvis memorabilia—were two bodies. A partially frozen old man. A frozen middle-aged woman. The man was clothed and had a sheet wrapped around his neck. The woman was nude. She had a plastic bag and duct tape wrapped around her neck and coins embedded in her eyes. A dime in one and a nickel in the other.

SEARCHING FOR THE perfect surface, Murphy turned the pumpkin around and around on her kitchen table. She stepped back, pointed to a flat spot. “How about here?”

Sitting at the table, Duncan pulled the pumpkin toward him. “Fine.” He raised the small serrated knife to stab the top and start carving. He had to use his left hand; his right arm was in a sling.

“Wait,” she said.

He sighed and set down the knife. “This is painful.”

“I want it nice,” she said. She walked to the refrigerator, pulled out two bottles of Grain Belt, shut the door and set the beers on the table. “I think some alcohol will improve my artistic vision.” She took a chair on Duncan's left. The chair to his right was occupied by his crutches.

He tried to unscrew the cap by hugging the bottle with the sling and using his left hand. The bottle slipped and tipped.

“Let me. Stubborn.” She took the bottle, unscrewed the cap and handed it to him. Unscrewed the cap off hers.

“No more St. Pauli Girl?” he asked.

She took a sip. “Fussy s.o.b.”

“You should be nicer to me.” He took a long drink, set the bottle down. “I had one broken foot in the grave.”

She set down her bottle and turned the pumpkin around with both hands. It was sitting on sheets of newspaper. “A couple of busted bones, a few bruises. You didn't even have your big toe in the grave. You can thank your fat-ass Caddy for that.”

“Don't speak ill of the dead,” he said, and took another sip of beer.

A knock at the door. “Trick or treat!”

Murphy stood up. Grabbed the bowl of candy off the counter and went to the door. Pulled it open. Three boys dressed as bums in ratty clothes. She dropped a Hershey's bar into each sack. “Who do you guys belong to?” Only the relatives of yacht club members bothered hitting the houseboats.

“
The Commodore
's our grandpa,” said the tallest bum.

“Don't fall overboard,” she said.

The shortest bum saluted. “Aye, aye.” The trio tromped down the dock. She heard them greeting the barking Tripod next door. She shivered in her jeans and sweatshirt. Another cold night, she thought, but at least it wasn't raining on the kids. She closed the door.

While her back was turned to him, Duncan had picked up the knife and cut off the top of the pumpkin, sawing quickly and sloppily with his left hand. He steadied it by wedging it between his body and the sling. “Axel,” said Murphy, coming back to the table. “That looks like shit.”

He pulled off the top by the stem and thrust his left hand inside. Started pulling out gobs of seeds and string and dropping them onto the newspaper. “It's already seven o'clock. Halloween is almost over. Who cares how it looks? Get it done and get it out there so the kids have something to smash.”

“We have a different tradition out here on the river.” She
sat back down. “My jack-o'-lantern ends up feeding the carp.”

Duncan noticed something in the newspaper and scraped away some seeds with his knife. “Here's an ad for some GWPs.” He tried ripping it off with one hand and tore the ad down the middle. “Damn.”

She leaned over and ripped around the torn ad. Picked it up and read it. “ ‘German wire-haired pups.'s I've been thinking about a dog, too. Same breed, as a matter of fact.”

“Great for pheasant. When they're on point, nothing prettier.”

She set the ad on a clean spot on the table. “You hunt?”

“You betcha. Missed the opener. I was hoping to get out before the season ends.” He glanced at the crutches. “Maybe it won't happen.”

“We could go out together.” She took a sip of beer. “I could hold you up while you shoot.”

“Thanks a bunch,” he said dryly.

Her cell phone rang. She looked over at the kitchen counter. Wondered if it was Jack or Erik. She'd taken a break from them since the crash and concentrated on nursing Duncan. His injuries weren't life-threatening and the only permanent reminder he'd have of the case was the scar on his chin. Nevertheless, she felt guilty about what had happened and responsible for helping him heal. After his release from the hospital, she'd stayed with him and camped out on his couch. After a couple of days, they'd moved to her boat for his recuperation. She still took the couch.

The phone kept ringing. Duncan wiped his left hand on the edge of the newspaper. “Want me to get it?”

“Forget it, Speedy.” She stood up and walked to the counter, took a breath and picked up the phone. “Yeah.”

Amira: “How's your friend, honey?”

Murphy thought the way her mother asked that question made it sound like Duncan was a kid with a scraped knee. “He's much better,
Imma
.” Murphy smiled at Duncan.

Then her mother asked a question Murphy had been trying to answer herself: “Gonna take that job he offered you?”

From his hospital bed, Duncan had asked Murphy to join him on a new five-state task force he was helping form with other homicide chiefs from around the Midwest. Police departments throughout Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa and the Dakotas were being tapped. The detectives would cross jurisdictions within their own states and even cross state lines to work on high-profile felonies. The states and feds would reimburse the home departments for hours spent working on the special cases. Duncan told her that assigning her to the Bunny Pederson case had been his way of auditioning her for the job.

“I don't know, Ma,” Murphy said into the phone. With her personal life a mess, it didn't seem a good time to overextend herself on the job. “Thinking about it.”

Duncan eyed Murphy. The minute she hung up the phone, he jumped on her. “I don't believe you. It's the opportunity of a lifetime for a cop. You get to skim off the cream. The most challenging homicide cases.” He jabbed the knife into the middle of the pumpkin and started cutting out a triangle for the nose.

Murphy sat back down. Picked up her beer bottle. “Sweet's case was challenging, and I couldn't tie up all the loose ends. Maybe I'm not good enough.”

“That's a load of crap.” Duncan started carving a crooked smile below the nose.

The unanswered questions would always bother her. The bodies that bounced out of the truck were clearly Trip's handiwork. Evidence also credited him with the deaths of Pederson and Kermitt. The Eau Claire murder looked like his doing, but there was no forensic proof. How many others he'd killed while on the road would never be clear. Murphy was sure he'd murdered Denny and his buddies even though the only proof she had was the
Flintstones
mug. She got it back when they went through Trip's
trailer. She kept it on her desk at the cop shop, a reminder of a high school love and a high school killer.

She took a long drink and set the bottle down. Picked at the label. “I couldn't answer the biggest question.”

Duncan kept carving. “Motive.”

“Why did he waste all those people? I know he hated Denny and his pals for beating him up. I get that. The ranger was in the park at the wrong time, saw Sweet burying Pederson or something. There's the motive for that. But why did he kill Pederson in the first place? To plant the finger and find it and play hero? Why did he kill Ingmar and that guy in Eau Claire and God knows how many others? His father. Why did he kill his father?”

Duncan managed to carve one fat tooth in the middle of the jack-o'-lantern's big grin. “Trip was a dope fiend with a fucked-up family life.” He accidentally cut off the tooth. “Shit.”

She took another sip of beer. “How fucked up did it have to be for him to slit his father's throat and stuff him in a freezer? What did his father do to deserve that?”

Duncan stabbed the pumpkin above the nose and started on the right eye. “Sweetie and his pappy were both pieces of shit. You couldn't even find anyone who liked them enough to claim their bodies, right?”

“I found a phone number for someone in Baton Rouge. I thought it was Trip's mother. Frank's ex. Anna. I told her Frank and Sweet were dead.”

Duncan finished the right eye, a triangle the same size as the nose, and started on the left. “What'd she say?”

“She said, ‘What goes around comes around.' Then she hung up on me.”

He finished carving the second eye and popped out the triangle. “Sounds like a wrong number.” He put the top on the jack-o'-lantern.

“No. That had to be his mother.”

“Why do you think that?” He picked up his beer and finished it. The front of his sweatshirt and the sling were dotted with pumpkin string and seeds.

“Trip wrote that in my yearbook.” Another knock at the door. Murphy got up from the table.

“Wrote what?”

“What goes around comes around.”
She grabbed the candy bowl and headed for the door. “Must be their family motto or something.”