Thick as Thieves(71)

He wanted to tell her that everything was going to be all right. But he didn’t know that everything was. Besides, what a fucking hypocrite that would make him.

They declined dessert and coffee. Rather than hassle with a credit card, he left cash on the table. Angie looked disappointed to see them go.

As they headed back toward Penton, he watched to see if anyone followed them from the area of the restaurant. No one did.

“Okay. Tell me,” he said. “How did you learn it was Rusty?”

“I’d gotten the reports and was leaving the courthouse. He pulled up behind me on the parking lot. I recognized the sound of his car’s engine.” She described the scene and recounted their conversation. “To tell it, it sounds perfectly harmless. But it didn’t feel that way. My skin was crawling.”

“With good reason. That detective didn’t point you out to him. He’s had you in his sights since you moved back.”

“But why?”

“Hold that thought.”

Well before they reached the city limits of Penton, he turned off onto a narrow side road that amounted to a rutted dirt lane. If one didn’t know it was there, he would drive past without even seeing it.

Arden asked, “Where are we going?”

“To the scene of the crime.”

Even at high noon, it was an ominous environment. After the sun went down, the threatening aspects were intensified by the encompassing darkness. Trees that competed for sunlight during the day formed a canopy that moonlight couldn’t penetrate. Insects were intimidated into silence. Nocturnal creatures went about their business furtively. Fowl sheltered in their nests. The aura of menace was unrelieved.

When the road came to a dead end, Arden spoke his name with apprehension.

He said, “You should recognize the place by the description in the police report.”

She undid her seat belt and leaned forward to peer through the windshield. Had the headlights not been reflecting dully on the murky water that channeled through the gnarled knees of the cypresses, she wouldn’t have known the lake was in front of them. When he cut the headlights, it disappeared.

“This is where they found Brian Foster,” she said in a whisper.

“Parts of him. In those cypresses.” He pointed to the copse growing out of the lake.

She turned and looked at him. “What does this have to do with Rusty?”

“Rusty killed him.”





Chapter 28



Judy Dyle summoned her family to the dinner table.

All three of the children were involved in sports and other extracurricular activities. Their after-school schedules required more coordination than the D-Day invasion. Furthermore, the schedule was constantly changing, making a set time for the evening meal impossible. Most nights, they ate in shifts, which suited Rusty just fine.

But Judy insisted that at least one night a week they have dinner as a family.

Tonight was the night. Lucky him, Rusty thought sourly. He took his place at the head of the table. At Judy’s direction, their daughter mumbled her way through a short blessing.

Just as she pronounced the amen, Rusty’s cell phone rang. Rescue! He pushed back his chair.

Judy said, “We agreed to ban cell phones at the dinner table.”

“I didn’t agree.” Ignoring her glower, he left the table. As he entered his study and shut the door, he looked at the readout on his phone and answered. “Angie, baby. You horny for me?”

“You wish. Listen, we’re busy, so I’ve got to be quick. I’m calling to ask a favor in exchange for some juicy skinny.”

“You have it backward, sweetheart. You do me the favors. In exchange, I don’t tell your boss that you dip into the till on a regular basis.”

“He knows. He and I have worked out our own swap. Do better, Rusty. You’ll want to hear this.”

Her coyness annoyed him, but that steakhouse got a lot of traffic through it. Angie stayed attuned to the pairs, groups, and individuals who came in, and if she saw someone or something that she thought was out of joint and would be of interest to him, she reported it. She was one of his best informers.

“Okay,” he said, “what can I do for you?”

“My kid sister is popping opioids like they’re M&M’s.”

“Where’s she getting them?”

“Her new live-in boyfriend. He’s your basic lowlife, leech, and lecher. Put him away. My family will get her into treatment.”

She gave him their names and where they were shacked up. Rusty promised to sic the SO’s dope detail on the boyfriend. “Now, your turn. What have you got for me?”

“Ledge came in tonight.”

“That’s not exactly a news flash.”

“No, but he usually comes in alone. This evening he had a woman with him.”

“A woman not Crystal.”

“Not Crystal.”

Although Rusty figured he already knew, he asked what the woman looked like.

“Thirtyish. Blond. Bambi eyes. No muffin top. Pains me to say, I wanted to scratch her eyes out. It’s not like Ledge to cheat on Crystal, at least not out in the open.”

“You know this because you’ve tried.”

“Don’t be tacky. Anyway, knowing how it is with the three of y’all, I thought you’d enjoy hearing that he was tomcatting. He said it was a business meeting, but, you know. He had hungry eyes, and not for his tender T-bone.”