Dan Simmons - Hard Freeze

"December. Just after Jimmy died."

Hansen leaned closer. "You sold your gold badge for five thousand dollars, Detective . This situation—with Frears, with Kurtz—is worth a hundred times that. To you, Myers, me."

Brubaker rolled his eyes toward Hansen. "Half a million dollars? Total?"

"Apiece," said Hansen.

Brubaker licked his lips. "Drugs then? The Gonzagas?"

Hansen denied nothing. "Are you going to help me, Detective? Or are you going to continue asking insulting questions?"

"I'm going to help you, Captain."

Hansen lowered the Glock-9. "What about Tommy Myers?"

"What about him… sir?"

"Can he be trusted to do as he's told?"

Brubaker looked calculating. "Tommy's not on anybody's payroll except the department's, Captain. But he does what I tell him to. He'll keep his mouth shut."

Hansen saw the shrewd glint in Brubaker's eyes and realized that the detective was already planning on how to eliminate Tommy Myers from the payoff once the work was done. Half of a million and a half dollars was seven hundred and fifty thousand for Detective Frederick Brubaker. Hansen didn't care—there was no drug money, no money of any sort involved—as long as Brubaker did what he was told.

Hansen's phone rang.

"I lost them on the downtown section of the Thruway," said Myers. He sounded a little breathless. "But I got a make on the license plates. Byron Farino of Orchard Park."

Hansen had to smile. The old don was dead and the Orchard Park estate closed up, but evidently someone in the family business was still using the vehicle. A woman had been driving, Myers had said. The daughter back from Italy? Angelina?

"Good," said Hansen. "Where are you?"

"Downtown, near the HSBC arena."

"Go over to the Marina Tower building and find a place to watch the garage exit."

"The Farino bitch's penthouse?" said Myers. "Sorry, Captain. You think this Frears and the others are there?"

"I think so. Just keep a good watch, Detective. I'll be down to talk to you in a bit." He disconnected and told the other detective what Myers had said.

Brubaker was standing at the front window of the duplex, watching the snow pile up on the small rooftop terrace there. He seemed to have no hard feelings after having a 9mm pistol pressed against his head. "What next, Captain?"

"I'm going to drop you at the main precinct garage to get another car. Take the battering ram with you. I want you to knock in the door at Joe Kurtz's office. Make sure that no one's there and then join Myers at the stakeout at Marina Towers."

"Where will you be, sir?"

Hansen holstered his Glock and adjusted his suit jacket. "I've got a meeting with the Boy Scouts."

"According to the radio," said Angelina, "the real storm's going to hit this evening."

"Lake Effect," said Arlene.

John Wellington Frears looked up from the book he was perusing. "Lake Effect? What is that?"

Like true Buffalonians, both Arlene and Angelina were eager to explain the meteorological wonder that was a cold arctic air mass sweeping across Lake Erie, depositing incredible amounts of snow on the Buffalo area, especially in the "snow belt" south of the city along the lake.

Frears looked out the twelfth-story window at the blowing snow and blue-black clouds moving toward them across the frozen river and lake. " This isn't the snow belt?"

The penthouse was a pleasant enough place of refuge during the long winter day. Kurtz knew that it was literally the lull before the storm.

A little before noon, Angelina brought the bodyguard Marco into the corner kitchen, where Kurtz stood with binoculars, looking down at the Pontiac and the old Chevy parked back-to-back along Marina Drive. Seeing Marco, Kurtz touched the pistol on his belt.

"It's all right," said Angelina. "Marco and I have had several long talks and he's in this with us."

Kurtz studied the big man. Marco had a good poker face, but there was no denying the intelligence behind those gray eyes. Obviously Angelina had appealed to the bodyguard's loyalty and good nature—and then promised him shitloads of money when this dustup with the Gonzagas was over. With the $200,000 she'd taken from James B. Hansen's safe that morning, she could afford a few payoffs.

Kurtz nodded and went back to watching the watchers.

James B. Hansen's audience with the Boy Scouts and their troop leaders went well. Captain Millworth gave a short speech in the briefing room and then the scouts and their leaders came up to have their photographs taken with the homicide detective. There was a photographer there from the Buffalo News , but no reporter.

Later, Hansen walked across the street to the courthouse for a private lunch with the Mayor and the Chief. The topic was the bad press the city and Department were getting because of the increased drug trade flowing through Buffalo to and from Canada and the resulting increase in murders, especially in the African-American community. The Mayor also had concerns about Buffalo being the first stop for Islamic terrorists carrying explosives in from Canada, although one glance exchanged between the Chief and Hansen communicated their skepticism about someone wanting to bomb Buffalo.

All during these activities, Hansen was considering the complicated mess that had blotched out like an ink stain on felt over the past few days. If possible, he would like to continue in his Captain Millworth persona for another year or so, although the events of the past twenty-four hours made that very problematic. A lot of people would have to be buried, and soon, in order for him to maintain this identity.

Well , thought Hansen, I've already buried a lot of people. A few more won't matter .

Hansen had always been excellent at multitasking, so he easily made comments and handled the occasional question from the Chief or Mayor while pondering strategies for the resolution of this Kurtz-Frears problem. It bothered him that he still could not get in touch with Dr. Howard Conway in Cleveland. Perhaps the old fairy had taken his muscled pretty-boy and gone on vacation.

When Hansen's cell phone first rang, he ignored it. But it rang again. And then again.

"Excuse me, Chief, Mr. Mayor," he said, "I have to take this." He stepped into the small sitting room next to the courthouse dining room and answered the phone.

"Honey, Robert, you've got to come home. Someone's broken in and—"

"Whoa, whoa, slow down, sugar. Where are you?" Donna should have been at the library until three.

"They closed the library because of the storm, Robert. The schools are shutting down early as well. I picked Jason up during his usual lunch hour and we came home and… someone's broken in, Robert! Shall I call the police? I mean, I did, you are, but you know what I mean—"

"Calm down," said Millworth. "What did they steal?"

"Nothing, I think. I mean, Jason and I can't find anything missing from the house. But they left the door to your basement office open, Robert. I peeked in… I'm sorry, but I thought they might still be in there… but the door was open and the door to a big safe is open in there, Robert. I didn't go in, but they obviously did, the thieves, I mean. I didn't know you had a safe down there, Robert. Robert? Robert?"

Hansen had gone cold all over. Spots danced in front of his eyes for a minute. He sat down on the small couch in the sitting room. "Donna? Don't call the police. I'm coming home. Stay upstairs. Don't go in the office. You and Jason stay where you are."

"Robert, why do you think—"

Hansen broke the connection and went in to tell the Chief and the Mayor that something important had come up.

Marco showed them the marina pay phone where Little Skag would be calling for his weekly information update. Marco said that Leo usually did the talking. Kurtz, Angelina, and the bodyguard had left the apartment tower by its south door, out of sight of Brubaker and Myers, parked on the street to the north. Angelina told Marco to return to the penthouse, and Kurtz rigged the small cassette recorder and microphone wire the don's daughter had supplied.