Mr. Mercedes (Unnamed Trilogy #1)(85)
Brady is thunderstruck. Why in God’s name would she do that? Hodges is old, he’s fat, he’s ugly. She can’t really be having sex with him, can she? The idea is beyond belief. Then he thinks of how his mother relieved his worst headaches, and realizes—reluctantly—that when it comes to sex, no pairing is beyond belief. But the idea of Hodges doing it with Olivia Trelawney’s sister is infuriating (not in the least because you could say it was Brady himself who brought them together). Hodges is supposed to be sitting in front of his television and contemplating suicide. He has no right to enjoy a jar of Vaseline and his own right hand, let alone a good-looking blonde.
Brady thinks, She probably took the bed while he slept on the sofa.
This idea at least approaches logic, and makes him feel better. He supposes Hodges could have sex with a good-looking blonde if he really wanted to . . . but he’d have to pay for it. The whore would probably want a weight surcharge, too, he thinks, and laughs as he starts his car.
Before pulling out, he opens the glove compartment, takes out Thing Two, and places it on the passenger seat. He hasn’t used it since last year, but he’s going to use it today. Probably not at the funeral parlor, though, because he doubts they will be going there right away. It’s too early. Brady thinks they’ll be stopping at the Lake Avenue condo first, and it’s not necessary that he beat them there, only that he be there when they come back out. He knows just how he’s going to do it.
It will be like old times.
At a stoplight downtown, he calls Tones Frobisher at Discount Electronix and tells him he won’t be in today. Probably not all week. Pinching his nostrils shut with his knuckles to give his voice a nasal honk, he informs Tones that he has the flu. He thinks of the ’Round Here concert at the MAC on Thursday night, and the suicide vest, and imagines adding Next week I won’t have the flu, I’ll just be dead. He breaks the connection, drops his phone onto the seat next to Thing Two, and begins laughing. He sees a woman in the next lane, all gussied up for work, staring at him. Brady, now laughing so hard tears are streaming down his cheeks and snot is running out of his nose, gives her the finger.
9
“You were talking to your friend in the Records Department?” Janey asks.
“Marlo Everett, yeah. She’s always in early. Pete Huntley, my old partner, used to swear that was because she never left.”
“What fairy tale did you feed her, pray tell?”
“That some of my neighbors have mentioned a guy trying cars to see if they were unlocked. I said I seemed to recall a spate of car burglaries downtown a couple of years back, the doer never apprehended.”
“Uh-huh, and that thing you said about not turning into an uncle, what was that about?”
“Uncles are retired cops who can’t let go of the job. They call in wanting Marlo to run the plate numbers of cars that strike them as hinky for one reason or another. Or maybe they brace some guy who looks wrong, go all cop-faced on his ass and ask for ID. Then they call in and have Marlo run the name for wants and warrants.”
“Does she mind?”
“Oh, she bitches about it for form’s sake, but I don’t really think so. An old geezer named Kenny Shays called in a six-five a few years ago—that’s suspicious behavior, a new code since 9/11. The guy he pegged wasn’t a terrorist, just a fugitive who killed his whole family in Kansas back in 1987.”
“Wow. Did he get a medal?”
“Nothing but an attaboy, which was all he wanted. He died six months or so later.” Ate his gun is what Kenny Shays did, pulling the trigger before the lung cancer could get traction.
Hodges’s cell phone rings. It’s muffled, because he’s once more left it in the glove compartment. Janey fishes it out and hands it over with a slightly ironic smile.
“Hey, Marlo, that was quick. What did you find out? Anything?” He listens, nodding along with whatever he’s hearing and saying uh-huh and never missing a beat in the heavy flow of morning traffic. He thanks her and hangs up, but when he attempts to hand the Nokia back to Janey, she shakes her head.
“Put it in your pocket. Someone else might call you. I know it’s a strange concept, but try to get your head around it. What did you find out?”
“Starting in September of 2007, there were over a dozen car break-ins downtown. Marlo says there could have been even more, because people who don’t lose anything of value have a tendency not to report car burglaries. Some don’t even realize it happened. The last report was logged in March of 2009, less than three weeks before the City Center Massacre. It was our guy, Janey. I’m sure of it. We’re crossing his backtrail now, and that means we’re getting closer.”
“Good.”
“I think we’re going to find him. If we do, your lawyer—Schron—goes downtown to fill in Pete Huntley. He does the rest. We still see eye to eye on that, don’t we?”
“Yes. But until then, he’s ours. We still see eye to eye on that, right?”
“Absolutely.”
He’s cruising down Lake Avenue now, and there’s a spot right in front of the late Mrs. Wharton’s building. When your luck is running, it’s running. Hodges backs in, wondering how many times Olivia Trelawney used this same spot.
Janey looks anxiously at her watch as Hodges feeds the meter.
“Relax,” he says. “We’ve got plenty of time.”