David Levien - Where the dead lay

“Ter,” she said, and the man stopped, too. Even in silhouette Behr recognized him from the Tip-Over Tap Room. Then the man turned and stepped away from the backlight toward him, and Behr saw those dark malevolent eyes, flat as flint. It was him.

“Schlegel,” Behr called out, part statement, part warning, part war cry.

A stainless and black automatic was clutched in Schlegel’s hand as it rose from his belt. Behr felt the air go out of him as he bent his knees and lunged forward and to the right and reached for the small of his back. He had an angle as his gun jumped into his hand. It wasn’t at all like the time he’d pulled it at Francovic’s gym, deliberate and slow. This was instinct, survival. The taste of metal came to the back of his throat. A familiar cold darkness squeezed his chest that he was unable to breathe through.

Schlegel pulled the trigger and his gun bucked while Behr was still raising his weapon. Behr felt an overwhelming impulse to fire back as fast as he could and for as long as he could until he’d gone empty. Giving in to it would mean his death. He saw Schlegel’s gun jerk again. More rounds were coming his way, and worse, he realized his eyes were locked on his opponent. With an effort as physical and demanding as any he’d ever put forth, Behr held fire as he leveled his weapon and hunched down over the sights and focused only on the front blade. It grew sharp in his vision-Schlegel’s body a mere blur ten yards away-and he fired twice. Behr raised his weapon to put a third round into his target’s head, to finish the Mozambique, but there was nothing in his sight picture-Schlegel was down.

A cold wave of adrenaline hit Behr like a six-foot breaker. He started to shake as noise and color rushed back in around him. He felt his chest heaving and became aware of a high-pitched screech and looked to the girl who was crouched down in a tiny ball not far from Schlegel. She was screaming. Behr took a step forward and extended his left hand toward her.

“Stay… stay right there,” he said, not hearing the words clearly, as his ears were ringing from firing in the enclosed space without ear protection. The girl broke off her scream and looked up at him. Then she rose and bolted for the open loading dock door. “Hey,” Behr said feebly, but he didn’t consider going after her. She stumbled and fell as she jumped the three feet from the dock to the parking lot, but got to her feet and darted away with the speed, if not the grace, of a cat.

Behr moved toward the fallen man, cautious, his gun raised ahead of him and saw that Schlegel was hit twice, about two inches apart, in the chest, just left of center mass. The slow, heavy rounds of the big-bore revolver had done their work. A coarse, bronchial grating noise accompanied Schlegel’s breaths, followed by the telltale bubbling of a sucking chest wound. Blood and urine pooled beneath his body. The silver automatic rested five feet from his hand, and it was clear he’d never touch it again.

Behr dropped to a knee right next to Schlegel. “Aurelio Santos. Was it you?” he asked.

After a moment, Schlegel issued a weak nod. “It was all of us…”

“You, your sons, and that partner?”

Another weak nod came from Schlegel. “And the Chicago guys,” he added.

“Who?” Behr demanded, a cold chill running through him.

“Bobby B… some guy Tino… a quiet one.”

“Pros?”

A third, almost imperceptible nod came from Schlegel. “Had to. Couldn’t handle the guy.”

“You wanted to know where he’d put the girl?” Behr asked, but Schlegel’s eyes got glassy. Behr slapped him a little, trying to bring him around.

“Who pulled the trigger? Was it you?” A feeble hand came up and waved at Behr. He couldn’t tell if it was Schlegel saying no or a pointless attempt to shoo him away. No more details came forth. Behr realized he was as close as he’d ever likely be to knowing exactly how it went down that night-and that he was headed to Chicago.

Then he asked the pointless question, the one cops, detectives, and investigators rarely profited from. The one for which he both already had the answer and also never would. Not a satisfactory one anyway. “Why?”

“We shouldn’t have never even been there,” Schlegel rasped. “The fucking skank. My son…” A wheeze was followed by a gurgle, and then all sound stopped.

Terry Schlegel had ceased being. Behr sat down on the cement floor next to the body to wait.

Behr drove south on I-65 toward Seymour as he slowly came out of the haze in which he’d spent the last several hours. The cops had gotten there within moments. A pair of uniformed Speedway officers, then a second pair of Northwest District boys stormed the place before the brass arrived. Behr had his weapon holstered and sitting on the ground next to him and had his wallet held open so they could see his tin when they walked in. It was the last conscious thing he’d done before he was overcome by shock at what had happened, and why tiny hurtling bits of metal had stopped another man, but had passed him by and left him alive. Nobody did much talking until Pomeroy walked in. Behr was vaguely aware that they’d locked down the building and the surrounding block. Paramedics and medical examiners and crime-scene photographers dealt with Schlegel’s body. Numbered evidence cards were set up next to the shell casings he had fired. Investigators were locating the rounds in the wall high and to the right behind Behr, though they had only found three of the four so far. Four rounds. Schlegel had fired first and at twice the rate as Behr and for whatever reason he had missed. Behr knew the model of gun. It had a notoriously long trigger pull. Maybe it had caused Schlegel to yank his shots. That could happen without sufficient practice. And even with practice, it wasn’t easy. They handed Behr a bottle of water and helped him up.

Pomeroy oversaw his questioning, during which Behr gave a dry recitation of what had led him to the garage-leaving out his contact with Pomeroy and the Caro Group-and what had occurred in it. They told him he’d have to come down to the shop and run through it again soon and that he could bring counsel. When the cops recording him and taking notes were done and had drifted away, Pomeroy told him that they’d collected Flavia Inez and that she was giving a statement. They’d also picked up Victoria Schlegel, who was currently under suicide watch at Carter Hospital in an hysterical condition. Charles Schlegel had been discovered stabbed to death after a 911 call, in an apparently unrelated incident, though Behr didn’t believe much in “unrelated” anymore. Kenneth Schlegel and Knute Bohgen were currently unaccounted for and would be sought for questioning. It was going to take a while, but a slew of charges ranging from criminal conspiracy, to promoting gambling, to extortion, to murder would eventually be mounted against them.

“They’ve gone to ground,” Pomeroy said. “I wouldn’t worry about them right now.”

Behr nodded blankly.

“I’ll get this back to you as soon as I can,” Pomeroy said, raising a plastic bag that contained Behr’s gun and holster. Behr nodded once more.

“Some special family you turned up,” Pomeroy said, shaking his head.

The work continued around them, though it had slowed as it entered the wrap-up phase. Equipment was being packed. Silence had fallen between them when Behr asked, “Can I go?”

Pomeroy eyed him for a moment before agreeing.

• • •

What the hell does he know of family? Behr wondered. Other than that he’s just helped destroy one. He was headed south toward the remaining vestige of his own. Behr had passed Seymour and had reached the small town of Vallonia, where his ex-wife Linda, remarried and a stepmother, had lived for the last six years or so. He didn’t need directions to get to her place. He knew the way. He’d be embarrassed to admit how many times he’d made the southbound drive, how many times he’d parked down the road from her house and watched her comings and goings. He’d managed enough restraint not to talk to her but seemed unable to stop looking. The visits had ended over a year ago, though. A case had consumed him back then, and of course he’d met Susan. She filled a place in him he didn’t think could be filled, and the need to drive south had vanished. Which is what made it all the more strange for him to be rolling down the smooth gravel drive past the mailbox that read “Vogel,” Linda’s last name now, and parking right in front of the house. He seemed unable, or unwilling at least, to stop himself as he walked to the door and knocked.