The Devil Went Down to Austin (Tres Navarre #3)(61)

"The shoreline," I said. And then, realizing it only as I said it: "There's an access road about two hundred yards south. I passed the entrance driving up."

"Wouldn't the police have scoured that entire area?"

"Probably not."

Ruby lifted her eyebrows in challenge. "I think you owe me a walk."

She gave me her hand. I pulled her up.

There wasn't a trail to speak of, but the terrain was fairly easy. We hiked through agarita bushes, pushed past live oak saplings. Limestone outcroppings made a ridge along the water, in one place high enough to be a diving spot. The remnants of a fraying rope swing hung from the branch of a massive water cypress. Instead of evoking childhood memories, it just reminded me of a lynching tree.

I wasn't sure what we were looking for, and nothing screamed "clue."

There was only the glint of water, the ground thickly littered with cedar needles and leaves.

By the time we got within sight of the access road, we were no wiser, no cooler, and I was down several quarts of blood from the chiggers and ticks and mosquitoes.

Ruby stopped in front of me, turned. "Nothing," she decided.

I was about to agree with her when I caught myself staring at the water. The ground at my feet was littered with something besides cedar needles—a large scatter of sunflower seed shells.

I crouched down.

"What?" Ruby asked.

I looked back toward Jimmy's house. The shore curved between here and there, with a clear line of sight along the cove. You could

see the kiln, the dock, Ruby's sleek Conbrio. You could easily stand here in the woods at night, undisturbed, and munch sunflower seeds while you watched Jimmy's dock.

Perhaps you could study a murder scene you'd just left, like a painter standing back from his canvas. And if you were so inclined, you could discard a piece of evidence without much worry that it would ever be found.

I looked over the edge of the limestone ridge. The water rippled two feet below. It was shallow here, and one glint under the surface was a little brighter than the rest.

Sheer luck. It's scary how often it boils down to that. But there I was looking at it from the only right angle to see it—a .380 calibre brass casing in the water, flashing like a coin in a fountain.

CHAPTER 25

I met Vic Lopez the next morning after my UT class. I had never wanted to get through a discussion of Gawain and the Green Knight with more haste.

The state crime lab was an unassuming yellow brick box wedged between two warehouses at the back of the Department of Public Safety complex. Black and white state trooper units lined the street. In the visitors' lot, Lopez sat on a loading bay between two stacks of crates, waiting for me.

He slid down from his perch. "You have any idea how many markers this cost me?

Putting my neck on the line to get evidence processed on a day's notice? It's goddamn irregular, man."

Lopez wore his normal smile, but his tone had an edge that told me joviality was not to be reciprocated.

"You drop the names I gave you?"

Lopez put his finger on my chest. "IRREGULAR. Word gets around I'm running to DPS 'cause some private dick found a piece of brass in the lake—I'm going to be laughed out of the deputies' quilting club."

"But if I'm right . . ."

He sighed, checked his watch. "Ten minutes. And these people are serious about appointment times."

He leaned back against the loading bay, fished a pack of cigarettes out of his coat pocket.

"You interviewed Garrett yesterday?" I asked.

"We had a friendly conversation. Hard not to be friendly, with Miss Lee present. I heard Matthew Pena learned that lesson."

"You still haven't filed charges."

Lopez plucked out a cigarette, pointed it at me. "I only smoke when I'm pissed off. Just so you feel honoured."

"You're waiting for ballistics on the casing."

He checked his watch again. "I told my sergeant to be here at 11:15. He wants to observe the test himself."

"You told me it was at eleven o'clock."

"I got to have time to look first, don't I?"

"And I'm irregular."

"And a bad influence. Did I mention that?" He sparked a flame from his lighter. "Your friend died early Friday A.M. This is Tuesday. Five days is a hell of a long time in homicide, you know that? They started throwing me new cases yesterday—a couple of drownings. A momandpop shooting. You think my sergeant likes me churning a case from last week?"

"That piece of brass was over a hundred yards down the shore, Vic—down a rocky path."

"We've got your word for that."

"And Ruby McBride's. You're going to tell me Garrett rolled down the shoreline in his wheelchair?"

"As I remember, you were at the lake that night, too."

"If you really thought I'd planted evidence, we wouldn't be here now."

He tried his cigarette, didn't seem to like the flavour much. "What I think, Jimmy's killer met him at the water that night. The killer was able to drug him—maybe a laced beer, some kind of drink. That meant spending some time together, talking in the truck for more than a few minutes. Drugs start to kick in, Jimmy starts to fade. Killer took a .380, put the muzzle about two inches from Jimmy's head, and told him goodbye. It was intimate, Navarre. Like an old friend. You want to tell me Matthew Pena could pull that off, get that close to Jimmy Doebler?"