The Drifter (Peter Ash #1)(63)

But it was another thing entirely to kill an innocent man in cold blood. A man whose only fault was that he kept an evening appointment to fill an oil tank, and had the principles to do his job well. To not take the money.

It was wrong, Midden knew that. Midden had thought he’d done so many wrong things that it didn’t matter anymore. That nothing mattered.

He wasn’t sure that was true anymore.

He thought he might be starting to unravel.

He looked around the basement. The concrete blocks were cracked and buckling inward with the pressure of the soil. It smelled musty and damp. That basement leaked every time it rained, and had for years. Black mold climbed the walls. How anyone had lived in that house was beyond him. But it hadn’t started out such a ruin. It had been like any other house once. Someone’s pride and joy. Now it was at the edge of collapse, and its owners had fled.

Midden had killed more people than he could remember. More than he could count.

So what was one more? Just one more, he told himself.

Of course, it would be more than one, before they were done.

His path was laid long ago. He was committed to this course. He already knew what the end would be.

He took the target pistol from under his jacket and looked at it.

It was light in his hand, an assassin’s weapon. The .22 had no stopping power, not unless the bullet went into the skull. Then it would bounce around inside like a Ping-Pong ball, turning the brain into scrambled eggs. It was a very efficient weapon. Little blood. Almost no mess.

He held the grip in his fist and put the barrel to his temple.

Just to see.

There were other ways, of course. He hadn’t decided yet.

And he had work yet to finish.

He would not be unreliable.

He moved to the bottom of the stairs and waited for the driver.





   PART 4





29



The next morning, Peter decided to risk the library to read the newspaper accounts about the murder of Skinner’s wife.

It was a high-profile killing with a great deal of press but not, as it turned out, much information. Most of the discussion revolved around Martha Skinner herself, who was widely considered to be a saint and had used much of her considerable family fortune to fund her charitable works in the city.

The early articles were detailed and intent. It seemed as though every quote came from a friend of the deceased or the department spokesperson, who gave a thin account of the killing and repeated that the Milwaukee police were sparing no effort to find the killer. There was discussion of a task force to combat home invasions, but it turned out that home invasions were not such an epidemic, and perhaps a special team of investigators would be enough.

After the first few days, the articles moved off the front page, and the sparsity of information became more apparent. The MPD spokesperson continued to repeat that all possible leads would be followed, but that there were few clues, no apparent motive, and random killings were the most difficult to solve.

As the weeks passed, the articles became sparser yet, until they were just short status reports noting the lack of progress in the investigation. The final article was a few paragraphs noting the disbanding of the special team of investigators. The case was still officially open but unsolved.

On his second time through, Peter found something.

At the very end of an early article, there was a single statement, probably unauthorized, by a Detective Frank Zolot, who told the reporter that it was standard police procedure to consider members of the family as potential suspects until cleared.

But nothing else from Detective Zolot in the articles that followed.

Peter went to the Milwaukee police website, found the Criminal Investigations Division, and called the number.

“Hi, I’m trying to reach Detective Frank Zolot. Can you give me a phone number?”

“Hold, please.”

The vague hush of electronic limbo. Then, “Zolot.”

“Hi,” said Peter. “I want to ask you about Martha Skinner.”

“I can’t comment on an open investigation. Call the press office.” Zolot’s voice was flat and fading out toward the end, the receiver already headed back to the cradle.

“Wait,” said Peter. “I’m not a reporter. My name is Peter. I have some information. I’d like to talk.”

“I can’t comment on an open investigation,” Detective Zolot said again. But there was a different quality to the statement, a kind of attentive caution.

“Actually,” said Peter, “I’m not really calling about Martha Skinner. It’s about someone else. A friend of mine.”

A pause. Peter could hear the noise of a busy office on the other end of the phone. People talking, the sound of hard-soled shoes on a wood floor. The distinctive sound of an old file cabinet drawer as it opened and closed.

“You know Sobelman’s? Burger joint by Marquette?”

“No.”

“Nineteenth and Saint Paul. Just south of the freeway, west of the river. Fifteen minutes.”

“I’ll find it,” said Peter.

But the phone was already dead.

—

Sobelman’s was in a restored corner building just south and west of downtown, between a packinghouse and a dry ice warehouse.

Peter could tell from the outside that the white static wasn’t going to like it. Not enough windows. So he stood on the sidewalk, drinking in the smell of hamburgers that seeped through the closed door.