Let the Devil Out (Maureen Coughlin #4)(11)

“We were highly motivated,” Maureen said. “Our survival instinct is epic.”

“Some of my people,” Preacher said, “they were highly motivated, too.”

Maureen sat next to him on the bench. A couple of noisy, dissatisfied ducks tottered in her direction. They had an arrogance to them, Maureen decided. The way they demanded things from you but never looked right at you while they did it, giving you one reluctant eye, like aristocrats demanding tribute. She kicked at them. “Beat it.” The goose hissed at her, lowering its head and spreading its broad wings. “Jesus.”

“This is their turf,” Preacher said, his thick arms extended over the top of the bench. “Most people feed them. You really gonna hate on them for expecting to get what they’ve always gotten? You don’t look any different to them than the rest of us do.” He smiled. “Just another sucker.”

“They’re f*cking annoying.”

“They’re f*cking birds in a park,” Preacher said. “They’re doing what they’re supposed to, tryin’ to eat. It’s not personal. They’ll go away in a minute.” He raised his chin at something over Maureen’s shoulder. “Look, there you go. Salvation.”

A young girl, no more than two or three years old, waddled much like a duck to the edge of the lagoon. Her pink puffy jacket rode up on her ribs. Her shock of curly red hair blew in the breeze. In one hand she held a plastic Bunny bread bag. She reached into the bag with her other hand, throwing fistfuls of white bread into the grass. Crumbs stuck to her fingers. She screamed with delight as the ducks headed in her direction, quacking up a storm, wagging their tail feathers, putting on a show as they snatched the bread out of the grass. More ducks came paddling over from out on the lagoon, attracted by the fuss. Maureen worried the goose would make a power move for the bread bag. She wondered if the girl’s parents stood close enough to protect her from the goose if the bird got aggressive, or to rescue their little girl if she got overexcited and tumbled into the lagoon.

Maureen decided she was close enough to the little girl to intercede if disaster struck.

Or maybe, just maybe, Maureen thought, a little girl could feed the ducks at the park on a fall afternoon for a few minutes without something terrible and violent happening. She rubbed her temples with her fingertips. She wished she’d brought her cigarettes on her run.

She turned to Preacher. “Tell me you’ve got good news.”

“You’re not going to take it that way.”

“You’re killing me, Sarge,” Maureen said. “Just straight killing me.”

“When you go see Commander Skinner for your badge, he’s going to ask a favor of you.”

Maureen took a deep breath and held it. Keeping quiet these past six weeks, she’d been led to believe that was the favor. Now there’d be more. She felt foolish for being surprised. She blew out her breath. “How big a favor?”

Like it mattered, she thought. Like she wouldn’t do it, whatever it was, to get her badge back.

“The FBI wants to talk to you,” Preacher said.

Maureen sagged on the bench, as if her bones had turned to putty. “You are f*cking kidding me. That wasn’t supposed to happen. That was the deal.”

“I’m not kidding,” Preacher said. “And it’s not as bad as it sounds.”

“Is my phone tapped?” Maureen asked, sitting up. “Is that why we’ve been meeting in the park like a couple of f*cking spies? Am I being surveilled?”

“I wanted to talk to you,” Preacher said, “before the FBI did, and before you went in to see the district commander. So you could have your tantrum with me, instead of the DC.” He turned to her. “Is that even a real word, surveilled?”

“What do they want?” Maureen asked. “I made my statements already. Detailed statements.”

“The Sovereign Citizens kid,” Preacher said, “the one who that Leary woman murdered on Lyons Street, the one who went to that reform school with Caleb Heath, name was Gage. Clayton Gage. His father has been in town asking questions. He’s been to HQ and Homicide a couple of times, making angry demands.” He shrugged. “It was his son who got killed, peckerwood shitheel that he was.”

Maureen winced. “Tell me we’re not back to covering up that traffic stop again. I can’t. We did our best with that. It wasn’t worth the lies we told. Not about Gage, not about Leary. I’m exhausted even thinking about it.” She waved her hand. “Atkinson is lead detective on the Gage homicide now anyway. I secured the scene the night it happened, took a quick look at the body. The FBI knows all this. That was it. The father can talk to Atkinson. She doesn’t want to do it, that’s not my problem.”

“What I’m hearing,” Preacher said, “is that the feds think the father might be a source of useful intel on the Citizens and the Watchmen Brigade militia and whatever else his son might have been into. The money, the guns.”

“He’s involved, the father? He’s part of the Sovereign Citizens movement?”

“Unknown at this time. That’s probably the main thing the FBI wants you to find out when you talk to him.”

“Wait—what? You’re shitting me. Preach, the Citizens, the Watchmen, they tried to kill me. And the feds picked me for this because…?”