Greg Iles - Sleep No More

Penn looked at the police technician. “Satisfied?”

After the cop nodded, Penn took Waters’s arm, led him outside, and helped him into the passenger seat of the Audi. Then he got behind the wheel and started the engine.

“I know that was hard to take. Makes you feel like a felon, doesn’t it?”

“I’m fine. I’m glad Tom Jackson wasn’t there.”

“Yes. Informal questioning is hard to control. When your mind is on something else, you tend to say things you might not have meant to say.” Penn pulled the Roadster out of the lot and onto the highway. “But I have a feeling Tom is going to hit you hard this afternoon.”

Waters nodded, but his mind was already far away.

The little convertible quickly ate up the distance to downtown, and as Penn turned into the back lot of Waters’s office, Waters glanced down Main Street and saw Cole’s silver Lincoln protruding from the line of cars parked on the left.

“What are you going to do between now and three?” Penn asked.

“Probably stay right here.”

“Do you mind me asking why?”

“I’m going to try to do some work. Some mapping. It’s all I can think to do.” He lied because Penn could not help him in the way he needed help. “Something normal, you know?”

“I understand. But Cole may show up today. Be careful about confrontations at this point. Today is a critical day, and we don’t know what he knows about you and Eve.”

“I doubt he’s even coming in today.”

Penn squeezed Waters’s arm and gave him a warning look. “Don’t trust him, John. Never again. Cole Smith does not have your best interests at heart.”

“I hear you. Do you have my tape?”

Penn reached into his pocket and brought out the small plastic case, then passed it to his client.

“Thanks.” Waters shook his hand, got out, and closed the door.

“I’ll pick you up here at a quarter of three,” Penn said.

Waters nodded, then turned and trotted up the back stairs.

Cole sat at his desk, staring at the signed Number 18 Ole Miss jersey framed on the wall, but the glassy sheen in his eyes made it clear that his mind was elsewhere. Waters walked softly into the room and stopped a few feet from the desk.

“Hey!”

Cole whipped around as though he’d heard a gunshot. “Shit, Rock! Don’t sneak up on me like that.”

“Are you expecting company you don’t want to see?”

Cole splayed his hands on the desktop as if to steady himself. “I’m always expecting that.” He slid open his top drawer and took out what appeared to be a short-barreled Magnum.357.

“What the hell is that for?”

Cole laughed. “Don’t worry, it’s loaded. Where you been?”

“Giving a blood sample to the police for a DNA test.”

“Shit.” Cole’s smile vanished. “Did Penn Cage tell you to do that?”

Waters was taken aback. “How do you know Penn is my lawyer?”

“Lily told me. She called up here a little while ago, worried sick.” Cole slid the.357 back into the drawer.

What the hell is Mallory up to? he wondered. She could have called my cell phone. Why would she call Cole?

“I didn’t think Penn Cage took clients. I thought he just wrote books.”

“He’s doing it as a favor to me.”

“Celebrity lawyer, huh? I hope he knows what he’s doing.”

“He knows what he’s doing in court.” Waters let his eyes drill into his partner’s. “But that’s not the kind of help I need right now.”

Cole’s big head turned slowly, like that of a battle-scarred old bull. “Talk to me, John Boy.”

“I need to stay out of jail. I don’t give a damn what happens later, but I need to stay free right now, for as long as possible. And to do that, I need an alibi.”

Cole looked at him with sympathy. “I’d like to help you. But it’s too late. Cowboy Tom Jackson called me an hour ago and asked where I was the night of the murder. I had to tell him I was home watching HBO all by my lonesome. I couldn’t say you were there, because for all I knew, you’d already told him you were somewhere else.”

“Shit.” Waters cursed his paranoia. Because he hadn’t trusted his friend, he’d screwed himself on the alibi.

“I warned you about this.”

“I know.”

Cole stood and squeezed his powerful hands together. “Sit down, Rock. You look like you’re about to pop a blood vessel.”

“I don’t want to sit.”

“Sit your ass down. I can’t think with you standing up.”

Waters took the leather chair opposite Cole’s desk, and the big man began to pace the room.

“How much time does Penn think you have before the cops bring you in?”

“Probably not much. They’re questioning me this afternoon.”

“Well, let’s just cut to the chase. Did you kill that crazy bitch or not?”

Waters looked at the floor. “My hands strangled her. But I didn’t kill her. I know that now. Not that it’s much comfort, given my situation.”

“But that’s your joy juice on the slides down at the crime lab?”

“Yes.”

Cole gave a theatrical groan. “What about Lily for your alibi? I’m sure she’ll swear you were home when the murder happened.”

Waters looked up at his partner. “Lily’s not Lily anymore. I can’t trust her to act in my best interest. That’s why I’m here.”

Cole stopped in midstep and stared as though Waters had just sworn the world was flat. “I thought the possibility of being cornholed for forty years in Parchman Farm had finally cured you of this Wuthering Heights, Mallory’s-back-from-the-dead bullshit. But it hasn’t, has it?”

“No. And I’m here because you’re the only guy I know who might be crazy enough to believe me.”

Cole scratched the back of his neck, amusement in his eyes.

“But even if you don’t believe me,” Waters continued, “I know you’ll do anything you can to help me.”

“ Now you’re talking,” Cole said. “Okay, lay the weirdness on me.”

“Mallory’s inside Lily now.”

“Tell me I didn’t just hear that.”

“I’m serious. Mallory passed into me on the night Eve died. She killed Eve to shut her up, and to hold the murder over my head. Then she passed from me into Lily.”

Cole began to pace again, moving in a wide circle around Waters. “Why would she do that?”

“Because she thought I’d never leave Lily for Eve.”

“Huh. Would you have?”

Waters thought about it. “I’d like to say no, but I can’t honestly tell you. Did I risk losing Lily and Annelise just to sleep with Eve for two weeks?”

“I guess now we’ll never know.”

“Don’t be so sure. Last night, I convinced Mallory to leave Lily alone. To move into some other woman, on the condition that I would leave Lily for whoever it was. Now I’m afraid I might be arrested today. Penn says it won’t happen, but I have a feeling it’s going to. And if it does, Mallory might decide to stay right where she is. Inside Lily. She’ll be alone in the house with Annelise, and I’ll be stuck in jail.”

“That scares you?”

“What do you think?”

Cole stopped behind Waters and laid a hand on his shoulder. “What exactly do you want me to do?”

“If I’m arrested, I want you to bail me out. I’m going to give you access to an account with enough money to do it.”

“You don’t need me for that. Lily will bail you out of jail in a heartbeat.”

“I told you-”

“Lily isn’t Lily anymore…right.”

“That’s right. And I have no way of knowing what she’ll do until she does it.”

Cole took his hand from Waters’s shoulder, walked to his desk, and sat on its forward edge. “Okay, I’ll bail you out of jail. What else?”