Mr. Mercedes (Bill Hodges Trilogy, #1)(56)

“Got your message,” Hodges says. “Call back when you can.”

He kills the phone, then sits still, drumming his fingers on the edge of his desk. He tells himself it doesn’t matter who catches the psycho sonofabitch, but it does. For one thing, it’s certainly going to mean that his correspondence with the perk (funny how that word gets in your head) will come out, and that may put him in some fairly warm soup. But it’s not the important thing. The important thing is that without Mr. Mercedes, things will go back to what they were: afternoon TV and playing with his father’s gun.

He takes out his yellow legal pad and begins transcribing notes on his neighborhood walk-around. After a minute or two of this, he tosses the pad back into the case-folder and slams it closed. If Pete and Izzy Jaynes have popped the guy, Mrs. Melbourne’s vans and sinister black SUVs don’t mean shit.

He thinks about going on Debbie’s Blue Umbrella and sending merckill a message: Did they catch you?

Ridiculous, but weirdly attractive.

His phone rings and he snatches it up, but it’s not Pete. It’s Olivia Trelawney’s sister.

“Oh,” he says. “Hi, Mrs. Patterson. How you doing?”

“I’m fine,” she says, “and it’s Janey, remember? Me Janey, you Bill.”

“Janey, right.”

“You don’t sound exactly thrilled to hear from me, Bill.” Is she being the tiniest bit flirty? Wouldn’t that be nice.

“No, no, I’m happy you called, but I don’t have anything to report.”

“I didn’t expect you would. I called about Mom. The nurse at Sunny Acres who’s most familiar with her case works the day shift in the McDonald Building, where my mother has her little suite of rooms. I asked her to call if Mom brightened up. She still does that.”

“Yes, you told me.”

“Well, the nurse called just a few minutes ago to tell me Mom’s back, at least for the time being. She might be clear for a day or two, then it’s into the clouds again. Do you still want to go see her?”

“I think so,” Hodges says cautiously, “but it would have to be this afternoon. I’m waiting on a call.”

“Is it about the man who took her car?” Janey’s excited. As I should be, Hodges tells himself.

“That’s what I need to find out. Can I call you back?”

“Absolutely. You have my cell number?”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah,” she says, gently mocking. It makes him smile, in spite of his nerves. “Call me as soon as you can.”

“I will.”

He breaks the connection, and the phone rings while it’s still in his hand. This time it’s Pete, and he’s more excited than ever.

“Billy! I gotta go back, we’ve got him in an interview room—IR4, as a matter of fact, remember how you always used to say that was your lucky one?—but I had to call you. We got him, partner, we f*cking got him!”

“Got who?” Hodges asks, keeping his voice steady. His heartbeat is steady now, too, but the beats are hard enough to feel in his temples: whomp and whomp and whomp.

“Fucking Davis!” Pete shouts. “Who else?”

Davis. Not Mr. Mercedes but Donnie Davis, the camera-friendly wife murderer. Bill Hodges closes his eyes in relief. It’s the wrong emotion to feel, but he feels it nevertheless.

He says, “So the body that game warden found near his cabin turned out to be Sheila Davis’s? You’re sure?”

“Positive.”

“Who’d you blow to get the DNA results so fast?” When Hodges was on the force, they were lucky to get DNA results within a calendar month of sample submission, and six weeks was the average.

“We don’t need DNA! For the trial, sure, but—”

“What do you mean, you don’t—”

“Shut up and listen, okay? He just walked in off the street and copped to it. No lawyer, no bullshit justifications. Listened to the Miranda and said he didn’t want a lawyer, only wanted to get it off his chest.”

“Jesus. As smooth as he was in all the interviews we had with him? Are you sure he’s not f*cking with you? Playing some sort of long game?”

Thinking it’s the kind of thing Mr. Mercedes would try to do if they nailed him. Not just a game but a long game. Isn’t that why he tries to create alternate writing styles in his poison-pen letters?

“Billy, it’s not just his wife. You remember those dollies he had on the side? Girls with big hair and inflated tits and names like Bobbi Sue?”

“Sure. What about them?”

“When this breaks, those young ladies are going to get on their knees and thank God they’re still alive.”

“I’m not following you.”

“Turnpike Joe, Billy! Five women raped and killed at various Interstate rest stops between here and Pennsylvania, starting back in ninety-four and ending in oh-eight! Donnie Davis says it’s him! Davis is Turnpike Joe! He’s giving us times and places and descriptions. It all fits. This . . . it blows my mind!”

“Mine, too,” Hodges says, and he absolutely means it. “Congratulations.”

“Thanks, but I didn’t do anything except show up this morning.” Pete laughs wildly. “I feel like I won the Megabucks.”