C. Box: The Highway

“Here you can clearly see he’s turned his headlights out,” Tubman said, looking at the first two photographs. She’d used the night-vision setup on her digital Canon Rebel. Cody had taught her how to use it, she thought with a stab of guilt. The full moon had really helped as well.

Tubman said, “The only possible reason he’d do that would be so the citizens up on the bench wouldn’t notice a vehicle. That’s the only real explanation, since we all know the Tokely residence was empty.”

She nodded once but said nothing.

“What’s this in his hand and under his arm?” Tubman asked, looking at the next few photos. “It looks like a bag of something. A paper bag.

“And here he is standing on the front porch looking back. Trying to see if anyone is watching him. Is it possible he could see you?”

“No, sir.”

“That’s obvious,” Tubman said, practically rubbing his hands together with joy. “Because in the next shot he’s bending down picking the lock. That’s breaking and entering right there, as well as proof that he’s trying to do something worse. Because if he had a legitimate reason to go back into that house, all he had to do was file a request for the keys from the evidence room.”

She tried to swallow but her mouth was dry.

“So we jump ahead,” Tubman said. “The next few shots show nothing, just his vehicle and the dark house. But that tells us something right there, because he made a decision not to turn on any lights. Why would an investigator do such a thing? Why would a red-blooded, honest cop sneak into a crime scene and bump around in the dark? Gee, that’s a tough one,” Tubman said with heavy sarcasm.

“And here he comes out of the house. How long was he in there, Investigator Dewell?”

She cleared her throat but had trouble speaking.

“How long? I didn’t get that.”

“Seven minutes, sir.”

“Seven minutes. That’s a very short period of time to do a thorough investigation or follow up on a lead, don’t you think?”

“Please, sir,” she said.

“Okay, be that way,” he said dismissively. He turned his attention to the last few prints.

“He comes out after seven minutes and what do you know? He no longer has the paper bag! He must have thrown it away inside because he’s such a stickler for littering, don’t you think?”

She said nothing.

“And here he is looking around again. Trying to see if anyone saw him. Do you think at that point he was suspicious of you?”

“He might have heard my car, sir. I started it up because I was freezing and I wanted to turn the heater on.”

“But he didn’t see you.”

“No.”

“And he hasn’t asked you what you were doing last night?”

“No.”

Tubman sat back in his chair with a grin and looked at her. He said, “Good work, Investigator Dewell. Damned good work. I’ve finally gotten that son of a bitch, thanks to you.”

She looked away.

“I know you didn’t feel comfortable following him when I asked you,” Tubman said. “But you did your duty. You should be proud. No one wants a crooked cop in their department, much less a crooked partner. Why do you look like I shot your dog?”

“I just don’t feel good about this,” she said. “He’s such a great cop in so many ways.”

“Bullshit,” Tubman said sharply, sitting forward and glaring at her over the prints. “He’s been a pain in my ass since we hired him. There’s a good reason why he got kicked off the Denver Metro police force-because he’s a renegade. He might have solved some cases but who is to say he didn’t plant evidence then?”

She said, “He had the highest arrest rate in Denver. I looked it up. And he’s got the highest rate here. He’s your best cop when it comes to solving felonies. You know that.”

“What I know,” Tubman said, “is that the happiest day of my career is when I see his ass going out my door.”

Before she could respond, Tubman reached for his phone and punched the intercom button.

“Hoyt,” Tubman said, “I need to see you in my office.”

He grinned as he lowered the handset onto the cradle.

Cassie felt like she’d been punched in the stomach. She said, “You’re going to do this while I’m in the room? You’re actually going to do this now? So he knows who brought him down?”

Tubman waggled his eyebrows like Groucho Marx. He said, “I need a witness to the execution.”

“I’d rather it not be me, sir.”

“You’re looking at this all wrong, Dewell,” Tubman said. “You brought down a crooked cop. The Independent Record will love it. The Billings Gazette will love it. And the voters will love it.”

She took in a ragged breath of air and exhaled it through her nose. “I’m not running for anything,” she said.

“Keep up this good work,” he said, “and someday you might be. I mean, plenty of years from now.” He meant it as a good-natured joke but she didn’t smile.

There was a knock on the door.

“Come in, Investigator Hoyt,” Tubman said.

Cody took in the scene quickly. She watched as he squinted at the prints, at Tubman’s triumphant grin, and turned to her without saying a word.

His face didn’t twitch but the light went out of his eyes as he looked at her. They were the eyes of a man who had lost it all.

5:49 P.M., Tuesday, November 20

The Lizard King watched as the lot lizard approached the Mack parked next to his. She tottered on her high heels and held her arms out for balance as if navigating a high wire. She’d be at his truck in five minutes, tops. Less if the driver refused. Because she was on the other side of the Mack at the driver’s door, he couldn’t see her.

He was barely breathing, and he felt himself becoming aroused. Not by her, but by what he was going to do to her.

The dome light went on in the cab of the Mack as the driver opened his door to answer the knock. The Lizard King could see the back of the Mack driver’s bald head and a dark crown of fuzz that wrapped from ear to ear in the back. The bald head nodded up and down. He was talking to her.

“Come on, buddy,” he whispered. “Do it or don’t. Quit fucking negotiating. Get out your forty bucks and stop trying to make a deal. ”

The last three words came out in a shout.

The Mack cab light doused. He couldn’t see inside but he hadn’t seen her enter. The driver pulled the wrap-around cab curtain closed.

There were four kinds of sleeper cabs on the road, from the “coffin” type with a tiny twenty-four-inch bed accessible through a porthole-like hatch to the lavish studio sleepers that were practically camper trailers with wide beds, showers, sinks, and entertainment centers. Between the extremes were “condos” where the bed lifted to the ceiling to allow some headroom and “midroof” models where the bunk was on the bottom with storage compartments on top. The Lizard King preferred the midroof, but all of the designs were big enough to allow two people to cavort inside. Lot lizards didn’t need much space.

Then there she was, coming around the front of the Mack, her hand out on the grille of the truck for balance. The driver in the Mack had sent her away. She was shaking her head as if she couldn’t believe it. It was obviously a refusal from the driver. Maybe he’d said something, or gotten a quick free grope, he thought. She paused and quickly composed herself; smoothing her hair down on the sides and tugging at the hem of her skirt. Then she put on her game face and looked up and started toward his door as if nothing had happened.

The ten seconds it took for her to rap on his door seemed like an eternity. Then he heard it: three blows. These girls weren’t subtle, he thought.