Neon Prey (Lucas Davenport #29)(9)

“News media?”

“Parked all over, all day. WVUE outta New Orleans is running a promo saying they’ve got big breaking news on it, and I suspect they’ve heard about the barbecue thing. They’re holding it close, they wanted to interview Tremanty at 6:05 this evening, but he told them to suck on it . . . So . . . you bring anything but suits?”

“Oh, yeah. Talked to Rae. I got my backwoods gear. Even brought a pair of gum boots.”

“You’ll need them. We’ve killed three canebrake rattlers and a cottonmouth. We had a Fish and Game guy there who didn’t like it, he wanted to catch and release over by the river, but most of the guys shoot first and talk to Fish and Game later. Somebody bought a box of CCI snake shot, and we’re all loading it at the top of the stack.”

“I basically don’t do snakes,” Lucas said.

“I noticed that about you when we were down in Texas,” Bob said.


ON THE WAY NORTH, they talked about their previous work together in Washington, D.C., and Texas, and about the Minnesota senator who was shot to death, after their Washington investigation had ended, and exactly who might have done it.

Bob gave Lucas an inch-thick stack of paper on Deese and the man believed to be his main employer, Roger (“Rog”) Smith. Smith was a graduate of the University of Alabama’s law school in Tuscaloosa who’d turned to loan-sharking as a natural outgrowth of his law practice, along with his principal ownership of a major bail bond business. Lucas tucked the paper away in his pack. “I can’t read in a car, I’d puke on your front seat. Just talk to me.”

“Smith loans some chump twelve hundred dollars at twenty percent so the chump can call up Smith’s bail bond business and give the money back on a ten-thousand-dollar bond, which requires him to hire Smith’s firm to defend him.”

“Got the whole thing sewn up,” Lucas said. “What happens if the client is convicted?”

“Well, for one thing, the judge would probably have to give back his share of the twelve hundred dollars in bond money.”

“You’re a hopeless cynic,” Lucas said.

“I’m a hapless Louisianan,” Bob said.


THEY ARRIVED at Deese’s place at two o’clock in the afternoon. A line of TV vans was parked out on the highway, but the track to Deese’s house had been closed, with a Louisiana state police car parked across it. The cop recognized Bob and waved them through.

“I understand this Tremanty is cute,” Lucas said.

“Rae is mooning over him.” He glanced sideways at Lucas. “She told him that he looks like your son. And you know? He does.”

“I’m not old enough to be an FBI agent’s father,” Lucas said.

“Sure you are, if you started early, maybe on one of those out-of-town college hockey trips.” They had to pull to the roadside fifty yards short of the house because of the accumulation of parked cars. “Come on, I’ll introduce you to Sandro.”

“Not Sandy?”

“No. It’s Sandro. Or Tremanty. Rae calls him Ess-Tee,” Bob said.

“He’s not a total asshole?”

“I hesitate to say it, but he’s okay.”

“That helps. Let me get my boots.”

They got out of the truck, and Lucas popped the back door, unzipped his Tumi suitcase, folded his suit coat into it, got the gum boots out, traded his shoes for the seventeen-inchers, and tucked his pant legs neatly inside. They walked down to the house, past another cop checking IDs, and went in. Several tables with folding legs had been set up in the living room, stacked with computers and paper. The house was cool, an air conditioner rumbling on the second floor, but humid enough to make the air feel liquid.

Tremanty was standing behind a computer operator. The FBI agent was as tall as Lucas, with the same dark hair and blue eyes, but slender. Looking over his shoulder, he saw Lucas and Bob, came around the table, and said, “How ya doing, Dad?”

“I’m okay,” Lucas said, as they shook hands. “As your father, I’d like to tell you how to run this investigation.”

“Fuck that,” Tremanty said.

Lucas turned to Bob. “A fed said ‘fuck.’”

“Not for the first time. It’s shocking, I know.”

Rae came in from the back. “Lucas Davenport, suites hotels and business-class travel. You sweetie.”

She gave him a hug and said to Tremanty, “See? I told you. He must have visited Virginia thirty-one years ago.”

Tremanty said, “I’ll check with Mom.” To Lucas: “Listen. I’m glad to have you. I’ve heard about you from a couple people in Washington. You’re welcome to everything we’ve got, but you ought to start by following Bob and Rae around the scene in the back.”

“I’ll do that,” Lucas said. “And thanks. I’ll try to help without getting in your way.”

They nodded at each other, and Rae said, “This way . . . Hey! Like your shoes.”


RAE CALLED the back lot a jungle, and it was, but now roped with crime scene tape and new-cut trails. The undergrowth was so heavy that Lucas worried about getting bit above the knee by a snake wrapped around a vine. He’d seen pictures like that—Garden of Eden pictures, with a snake encircling the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.