Douglas Preston: Brimstone

"I don't understand what you mean, sir."

This was getting irritating. "D'Agosta, I can read your mind like a book. I don't give a shit what happened before in your life. What I need is for you to get with the program."

D'Agosta didn't answer.

"Take this morning. I saw you talking to that intruder for a good five minutes, which is why I had to intervene. I don't want to be riding your ass, but I can't have one of my sergeants eating up his time explaining to some shitcake why he has to leave. That man should've been ejected immediately, no discussion. You think you can do things your way. I can't have that."

He paused, scrutinizing Sergeant D'Agosta carefully, thinking he might have detected a smirk. This guy really had a problem.

The lieutenant caught the glimpse of a loudly dressed presence to his right. It was that same scumbag in the Hawaiian shirt, baggy shorts, and expensive sculpted shades, approaching the grape arbor as cool as could be, once again inside the police cordon.

Braskie turned to D'Agosta, speaking calmly. "Sergeant, arrest that man and read him his rights."

"Wait, Lieutenant-"

He couldn't believe it: D'Agosta was going to argue with him. After everything he'd just told him. His voice became even quieter. "Sergeant, I believe I just gave you an order." He turned to the man. "I hope you brought your wallet with you this time."

"As a matter of fact, I did." The man reached into his pocket.

"No, I don't want to see it, for chrissakes. Save it for the booking sergeant down at the station."

But the man had already extracted the wallet in one smooth movement, and as it fell open, Braskie caught the flash of gold.

"What the-?" The lieutenant stared.

"Special Agent Pendergast, Federal Bureau of Investigation."

The lieutenant felt the blood rush to his face. The man had set him up. And there was no reason, none, for the FBI to justify their involvement. Or was there? He swallowed. This needed to be dealt with carefully. "I see."

The wallet shut with a slap and disappeared.

"Any particular reason for the federal interest?" asked Braskie, trying to control his voice. "We've been treating it as a simple murder."

"There's a possibility that the killer or killers might have come and left by boat from across the sound. Perhaps Connecticut."

"And?"

"Interstate flight."

"That's a bit of a stretch, isn't it?"

"It's a reason."

Yeah, right. Grove had probably been laundering money or dealing drugs. Or maybe he was even involved in terrorism. These days, with all the shit going down in the world, you couldn't break wind without a phalanx of feds dropping down on you like a ton of manure. Whatever the case, this put a whole new spin on things, and he had to make the best of it.

The lieutenant swallowed, held out his hand. "Welcome to Southampton, Agent Pendergast. If there's anything I or the Southampton P.D. can do for you, just let me know. While the chief is on vacation, I'm acting chief, so you just come to me for anything. We're here to serve."

The man's handshake was cool and dry. Just like the man himself. Braskie hadn't seen a fed quite like him before. He looked even paler than that artist who used to come out here-what was his name?-the weird blond guy who did the Marilyn Monroes. Autumn or not, by the end of the day, this guy was going to need a quart of Solarcaine and a pitcher of martinis before he could even sit down.

"And now that we've straightened things out," the man named Pendergast said pleasantly, "may I ask you for the courtesy of a tour? I trust the immediate workups have been completed, clearing the way for us." He looked at D'Agosta. "You will accompany us, Sergeant?"

"Yes, sir."

Braskie sighed. When the FBI arrived, it was like getting the flu: nothing you could do about it but wait for the headache, fever, and diarrhea to go away.

{ 4 }

Vincent D'Agosta followed Pendergast and Braskie across the lawn. Over in the shade of a vast patio, the South Fork homicide squad had set up an impromptu interrogation center with a video camera. There weren't too many people to interview beyond the domestic who'd found the body, but it was toward this shady spot that Pendergast directed his footsteps, walking so swiftly that D'Agosta and Braskie almost had to jog to keep up.

The chief detective from East Hampton rose. He was a guy D'Agosta had never seen before, small and dark, with large black eyes and long lashes.

"Detective Tony Innocente," said Braskie. "Special Agent Pendergast, FBI."

Innocente rose, held out his hand.

The domestic sat at the table, a short, stolid-looking woman. For someone who had just discovered a stiff, she looked pretty composed, except for a certain unsettled gleam in the eyes.

Pendergast bowed to her, held out his hand. "Agent Pendergast."

"Agnes Torres," she said.

"May I?" Pendergast looked inquisitively at Innocente.

"Be my guest. Videotape's rolling, FYI."

"Mrs. Torres-"

"Miss."

"Thank you. Miss Torres, do you believe in God?"

Innocente exchanged a glance with the other detectives. There was an awkward silence.

"Yes," she said.

"You are a devout Catholic?"

"Yes, I am."

"Do you believe in the devil?"

Another long pause.

"Yes, I do."

"And you have drawn your own conclusions from what you saw upstairs in the house, have you not?"

"Yes, I have," said the woman, so matter-of-factly it sent an odd shudder through D'Agosta.

"Do you really think the lady's beliefs are relevant?" Braskie interjected.

Pendergast turned his pale eyes on the man. "What we believe, Lieutenant, shapes what we see." He turned back to her. "Thank you, Miss Torres."

They continued to the side door of the house. A policeman opened it for them, nodding at the lieutenant. They gathered in the foyer, where Braskie paused.

"We're still trying to get a handle on ingress and egress," he said. "The gate was locked and the grounds were alarmed. Circuit breakers and motion sensors, activated by keypad. We're checking out who had the codes. The doors and windows to the house were also locked and alarmed. There are motion detectors throughout the house as well as infrared sensors and lasers. We've tested the alarm system and it's working perfectly. As you can see, Mr. Grove had a rather valuable collection of art, but nothing seems to be missing."

Pendergast cast an admiring glance toward one of the nearby paintings. To D'Agosta, it looked like a cross between a pig, a pair of dice, and a naked woman.

"Mr. Grove had a party last night. It was a small party, five in all."

"Do you have the guest list?"

Braskie turned to D'Agosta. "Get the list from Innocente."

Pendergast stayed D'Agosta with a hand. "I should prefer that the sergeant stay here and listen, Lieutenant, if you could spare another officer."

Braskie paused long enough to cast a suspicious glance at D'Agosta, then gestured to another cop in the room.

"Pray continue."

"By all accounts, the last guest was gone by 12:30. They all pretty much left together. From that point until 7:30 this morning, Grove was alone."

"Do you have a time of death?"

"Not yet. The M.E. is still upstairs. We know he was alive at 3:10A.M. because that's when he called a Father Cappi."

"Grove called a priest?" Pendergast seemed surprised.

"It seems Cappi had been an old friend, but he hadn't seen Grove in thirty, forty years. They had some kind of falling-out. Anyway, it didn't matter: all Grove got was the answering machine."

"I'll need a copy of the message."

"Certainly. Grove was hysterical. He wanted Father Cappi to come over right away."

"With a Bible, cross, and holy water, by chance?" Pendergast asked.