Walk the Wire (Amos Decker #6)(65)

Robie said, “Be at this address in a half hour.” He gave the destination and clicked off.

Decker looked at Jamison, who said, “What?”

“Change of plan.”

He punched the address into his phone, and they set off.

*

It was fifteen miles outside of town at what looked to be an abandoned apartment building.

“I guess this was a casualty of the last bust,” said Jamison as she pulled their SUV to a stop in front of the structure and they climbed out. “So where’s this Robie guy?”

Robie stepped out from the shadows of the front entrance and called out softly to them. “Follow me.”

He led them down a covered walkway that led to the rear of the building.

He opened a door there and motioned them inside.

As she passed him Jamison said, “Nice to meet you, Robie.”

He simply nodded.

Inside, Robie closed and locked the door and led them past an empty, stained pool and down an interior corridor, illuminating the way with a small tac light. He opened another interior door and motioned them in.

When he closed the door behind him, a small light came on in the room, brightening it, if feebly.

In a chair sat Blue Man, dressed in a regulation suit and tie that would have allowed him to blend in at most any event in Washington, DC, but made him stick out conspicuously in London, North Dakota.

“Mr. Decker, Agent Jamison, please sit,” said Blue Man.

“Who the hell are you?” said Decker.

“A wise question. Your phone should be buzzing any moment, ah.”

Decker lifted out his vibrating cell phone and hit the answer button.

“Ross? What’s going—? What?” Decker glanced at Blue Man. “Yeah. We are. Okay. You’re sure? Right. Thanks.”

He clicked off and looked at Jamison. “Bogart says this guy is on the up-and-up, and we should listen to him.”

Jamison nodded and noted that Robie stood with his back to the door they had come through. “I don’t think we have a choice anyway,” she said, studying Robie’s granite expression.

Blue Man motioned to the two chairs in front of him. “Please.”

They sat.

Blue Man said, “I understand there have been developments?”

“If you call the coroner on the case offing himself a development, then, yes, there have been developments,” said Decker curtly.

“And the reason?” said Blue Man.

“His wife thought it possible that he was being blackmailed for sexual indiscretions,” said Jamison.

“And you believe her?” said Blue Man.

“I don’t believe anybody just because they tell me something,” said Decker. “And I’m not sure if present company is excluded or not.”

“I would have been disappointed had you answered otherwise,” said Blue Man benignly. “Any other developments?”

“I’ve got somebody tracking down Ben Purdy. He has family in Montana.”

“The ‘ticking time bomb,’ as you told my colleague?”

“Yes.”

“Any thoughts on that?”

“Yeah, all of them apocalyptic.” Decker paused and studied Blue Man. “And you’re involved in this why? Because you don’t strike me as the law enforcement type.”

“I have no authority whatsoever to do anything in this country. Neither does Robie.”

“Well, you’ve run right over that rule.”

“That certainly is one interpretation. Anything else?”

“We think Pamela Ames was the target, not Hal Parker.”

“Why?”

“They tried to make it seem that she was there servicing Parker as a hooker, but I believe that was fabricated.”

“Why would they do that?” asked Robie.

“To explain away why Ames was at Parker’s house. If it wasn’t for sex, then why? She lived at the Colony. She would have known Irene Cramer. It’s perfectly plausible that when Ames left the Colony she would reach out to Cramer for assistance. In fact, I think she did. And it might have been then that Cramer told Ames something that later made Ames suspicious. Whoever killed Cramer might be very worried that Ames knew something that could lead back to them. And it’s also possible they might have had reason to get rid of Parker. It was a stroke of genius to get them both out of the way at the same time, and make it seem like Parker was the only target and Ames was in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“What would Parker have known that could hurt them?” asked Blue Man.

“He was a trained tracker. He found the body before the rains started. Now, the killer had to get the body out there. And it couldn’t have been lying out there long at all because it hadn’t been attacked by animals. So I doubt the killer carried her for miles to place her there. And the ground out there is relatively soft.”

“So he would have left tracks,” noted Robie.

“Yes. And if he did maybe Parker saw them.”

“But why wouldn’t he have told the police about that if he did?” wondered Jamison.

“Now that’s an interesting question,” said Decker. “Because it opens lots of possibilities.”

“Interesting,” said Blue Man. “Very interesting.”