C. Box - The Highway

“That’s right,” Legerski said. “The guy was a fucking bulldog. I tried to steer him toward the church but he wanted to start kicking doors down tonight. And he wanted me to go along with him. We wouldn’t have had time for any kind of damage control before the shit hit the fan.”

The trooper held out the phone he’d taken from Cody’s body. “He’s got someone working the back end, some broad. I think I know who it might be. She’s been sending him texts and e-mails all night. That was her who called-someone named Cassie. Most of the stuff she sent is just things she pulled off the Internet and forwarded. But I saw where he asked her to pull the cases on those missing girls.”

Pergram just stared. He didn’t get what Legerski was saying.

“You’re the one who pointed him toward the church,” Pergram said. “He was going where you pointed him.”

Legerski sighed impatiently and his eyes flashed in the moonlight. For the first time, Pergram wondered if the trooper would pull the gun he’d used on Hoyt and kill him now that the dead cop and his pickup were buried. After all, he could pin everything on the Lizard King.…

“Try to keep up with me here,” Legerski said patiently. “I thought he’d work through the sheriff’s department in Livingston or through the state. That means me, where I could direct traffic and make sure the investigation got stymied whenever it got too close. I had no idea he’d be crazy enough to show up tonight, or show up at all himself. Normal cops don’t do things like that. He’s not even in his county, so even if he wasn’t suspended he’d need permission and cooperation down here. But by coming here himself … it screwed up everything. I had no choice.”

“But did you have to kill him? I didn’t like the asshole either, but-”

“He was starting to ask about you,” Legerski said. “Tonight. We hadn’t even gone out to the compound yet and he was already asking about you. ”

Pergram felt his mouth go dry, and it wasn’t just a symptom of the white crosses.

“He was going to put things together pretty fast,” Legerski said. “When the church thing didn’t go the way he wanted-and you know the situation there-he was going to shift his attention to you. With his helper up in Helena checking missing persons and with access to all the law enforcement databases, it would be a matter of time before he came after you.”

Pergram said, “Which means you might be exposed.”

“Which means I’d be exposed.”

“For a minute there, I thought you were trying to help me,” Pergram said. “I feel better now when I know you’re only looking out for yourself.”

Legerski snorted. “We’ve got this thing. But we aren’t exactly blood brothers.”

Pergram acknowledged the truth of that with a nod. He wished he wasn’t so addled from exhaustion right now so he could think more clearly. He had the suspicion Legerski was setting something up but he couldn’t figure out what it was.

Why wouldn’t Legerski simply pull the untraceable throwdown piece he’d used on Hoyt and pop him? Then set up some kind of semiplausible narrative where the Lizard King went down for his acts?

Then it came to him. And he relaxed. He hoped his face didn’t portray what he’d just realized-that Legerski could never harm Pergram as long as Pergram knew where evidence was that could incriminate him.

“So what do we do next?” Pergram asked, thinking of the steps he’d need to take to make sure the trooper didn’t get ahead of him and figure out how to eliminate him from the picture.

“I know what we don’t do. We don’t spend any time with those girls except to dump off some food and water.”

“Fuck that,” Pergram said. “I didn’t deliver them so we could keep them holed up. I need what I need.”

“You’ll get it,” Legerski said, his tone once again fused with the firm arrogance he’d used earlier. “But you’ll have to wait until we’re clear. Once we’re clear, we do the whole thing just like we talked about. But not until I say we’re clear. Got that?

“It’ll get hot for a couple of days,” Legerski said. “I’ve got to be nimble. This broad”-he shook the phone as if she were inside-“knows he met with me. I’ll be the first stop when they look into it, so I’ve just got to cooperate and not throw off any suspicion. I can do that-I’ve done it all my life. And it won’t take long before things go cold. They always do when there aren’t any solid leads.”

Pergram stared hard at the trooper. Not for the first time, he considered what his world would be like without him. He thought about the.308 in the pocket of his jumpsuit, and ran through a scenario where he drew it, worked the slide, and put a bullet into Legerski’s face. He’d practiced the move enough so he knew he could do it quickly.

But then what? The next steps flummoxed him, although he savored the thought of having those girls to himself. At least until they came for him, the cops.

And he recalled why they’d gone into business together in the first place. Legerski needed a delivery mechanism for victims. And Pergram needed local protection.

“We still need each other,” Legerski said, as if reading his mind.

“Yeah.”

“So we stay away from them except to dump off the food. We do this together or not at all.”

“Yeah, okay. But how long are we talking about? I’ve got another run in two days.”

“That should be enough time,” Legerski said.

“So what are you going to do?”

Legerski turned from him and fixed on something in the dark outside the windshield. “I’m going to work it from the inside,” he said softly. “I’m going to stay on top of everything that’s going on by making sure I’m in the middle of it. I’m going to take control, because that’s what I do and that’s what I’m good at. I can take this thing to dead-end after dead-end until there’s no place else to go. The case will probably stay open for years, but there’s no way they’ll ever close it. I’ll make sure it gets tied up into knots.”

“You can do that?”

“Hell, yes. I’ve already gotten rid of the only real threat. If someone follows up they won’t have that crazy look in their eyes. We’re dealing with the typical nine-to-fivers here and they don’t have anything to go on.”

Pergram tried to think like a cop, now that he was more relaxed. “But instead of two missing girls we’ve now got a missing cop, too.”

“Ex-cop,” the trooper said. “And no one can ever determine where the girls went missing unless you fucked something up somewhere. They could have disappeared in Yellowstone, or Wyoming, or Idaho. No one knows where they ended up, right? You didn’t fuck anything up?”

“I don’t think so,” he said, his mind spinning, recalling everything that had transpired.

“Then all they’ve got is a suspended alcoholic who drove down here in the middle of the night and never came back. No one saw him except you, me, and Jimmy. They sure as hell won’t find his vehicle. How are they going to figure that one out? Especially if the lead investigator on the highway-me-gently steers them to where there’s nothing to go on?”

Pergram nodded. He got it. Legerski was way out ahead of him already. So far ahead, Pergram thought, that he’d probably already figured out how to throw him under the bus. Except …

“What about Jimmy?”

“We can trust Jimmy.”

“Can we?”

“Yeah,” Legerski said softly, “I’ll make sure Jimmy is no problem.”

He said it in a way that gave Pergram confidence.

“What about the gimp?” he said. “She’s probably running her mouth and scaring the shit out of those new girls. She’ll have them wanting to die before we get to them.”