Here and Gone(60)

‘It was very clean,’ Mitchell said. ‘We found nothing but a few traces of bleach, like it had been scrubbed out.’

‘How about my cruiser?’ Whiteside said, letting his voice harden. ‘You want to search that too? Or maybe my house? I got a cellar. You want to look in there?’

‘That won’t be necessary,’ Mitchell said, turning away. ‘For now.’

‘Release the pictures,’ he said.

Mitchell stopped. ‘What?’

‘The T-shirt and the jeans. With the blood on them. Release those to the press, let them know they were found in her car. That’ll put this to rest.’

‘I’ll think about it,’ Mitchell said. ‘Is that all?’

‘Yeah, that’s all.’

Whiteside scanned the room as Mitchell walked away, dared anyone to look at him now. They all made themselves busy with their maps and their laptop computers.

‘Anyone got something they want to talk to me about?’ he asked, his voice booming.

Not a one of them looked up.

‘Didn’t think so,’ he said.

He went to the side door, hit the push bar, and stepped out onto the ramp. A dry want at the back of his throat. Not for a drink. He craved one of Collins’ cigarettes, imagined the heat of the smoke in his chest.

As if summoned by the thought, his cruiser pulled into the parking lot. Collins had been using it while the feds searched hers. She drove to the rear of the lot to find an empty space, the rest taken up by the state cops and the FBI vehicles. He descended the shallow ramp and walked in her direction, met her halfway.

‘You hear the news?’ he asked.

Collins looked over his shoulder, made sure no one else was in earshot. ‘Some of it. What do we do?’

‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘The press still think she’s crazy. They still want to see her burn. I might be able to encourage them a little.’

‘How?’

‘Let me worry about that.’

‘Maybe …’

She stood there, her mouth opening and closing, an idea too fearful to reach her tongue.

‘What?’ Whiteside asked. ‘Just say it.’

‘Maybe there’s a way out. Maybe it’s not too late.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘We tell her she can have her kids back if she swears not to implicate us. We find them out wandering somewhere, we’ll be heroes, so long as they keep their mouths shut. There’s the half-million reward the father put up. It’s not as much as we wanted, but it’s not nothing.’

He grabbed Collins’ upper arm, squeezed hard. ‘Stop it. You think like that, you’ll finish us both. Just hold your nerve. We do the exchange tomorrow, then it’s over. All right?’

Her eyes brimmed as she nodded. ‘All right.’

‘Good,’ he said. ‘Now pull yourself together. One more day, that’s all.’

Whiteside turned to walk away, but Collins spoke again.

‘The girl’s sick,’ she said.

‘Sick how?’

‘She’s got a fever, a rattle in her chest, sleeping a lot.’

‘What about the boy?’

‘He’s fine. It’s just her.’

‘Shit,’ Whiteside said. He put his hands on his hips and stared at the hills as he thought. ‘You have medicine at your house, right? For your boy.’

‘Some,’ Collins said.

‘Any antibiotics? Penicillin, Amoxicillin? Anything like that?’

‘Amoxicillin,’ Collins said. ‘I need to keep it on hand in case Mikey gets an infection.’

‘Okay, give her some of that. Bring it out this evening if you can. Give her a double dose to get her started.’

‘But it’s Mikey’s.’

‘Then get him some more.’ He looked around, lowered his voice. ‘Goddamn it, Mary, you gotta start thinking right. Don’t fuck this up.’

Whiteside walked back toward the station, willing his anger to be still.





33


Private Forum 447356/34

Admin: RR; Members: DG, AD, FC, MR, JS

Thread Title: This Weekend; Thread Starter: RR

From: DG, Friday 6:02 p.m.

RR – Are we still going ahead? I don’t know what anyone else thinks, but I’m getting a little nervous. We’ve never had media attention like this before.

From: MR, Friday 6:11 p.m.

I’ve been wondering the same thing. Should we cut our losses at this stage?

From: FC, Friday 6:14 p.m.

I’ve paid my half mill already. I assume we all have. I didn’t throw down that kind of money just for the evening to be cancelled over some news reports.

From: MR, Friday 6:18 p.m.

FC – There’s a lot more at stake here than money. If you can’t afford to lose half a mill, then you don’t belong in this group.

From: FC, Friday 6:20 p.m.

MR – Fuck you. I can afford to lose more than you made last year and not even break a sweat. If you want to chicken out, go ahead.

From: MR, Friday 6:23 p.m.

FC – Easy to say, when you’ve got your father’s safety net to catch your fall.

From: DG, Friday 6:27 p.m.