R. Jagger - A Way With Murder

“Let me ask you something,” she said. “Was Bristol in Denver last weekend?”

He scratched his head.

“Not that I know of. He never mentioned anything. We don’t have any clients there-”

“Did you see him in town, last weekend I mean?”

Waterfield shrugged.

“He was out of the office Friday. As for Saturday and Sunday, I didn’t go in, so I don’t know. He might have been there, he might not have.”

Waverly focused.

“He was in Denver,” she said. “I’ll bet anything. He flew in Friday and killed a woman there Friday night. Then he flew back Saturday or Sunday.”

“A woman was killed there?”

She nodded.

“The same way as Kava,” she said. “She was dropped from a roof. She was wearing a red dress, the same as Kava. A lot of his pictures had women in dresses blowing up. That’s how they’d look if they were falling.”

She waited.

Waterfield retreated in thought.

“This is a serious game you’re playing,” he said. “Give me the photos, I’ll return them to Bristol and you two can go your separate ways.” He held her hand. “I’m not doing this so much to keep my job but more to prevent anything from happening to you.”

“What does that mean?”

“What do you think it means?” A beat then, “Don’t back him into a corner.”

“He killed Kava.”

“You don’t know that.”

“Yes I do.”

“All you know is that they had a relationship,” Waterfield said. “In hindsight, he had the exact same relationship with lots of women.”

Right.

True.

“Here’s what I’m going to do,” she said. “I’m going to keep the photos. I’m going to find out who the other women are besides Kava. I’m going to find out if they’re alive or whether they met some strange demise.”

Waterfield shook his head.

“Go tell him,” Waverly added. “Tell him exactly what I’m going to do. Tell him one more thing, too. Tell him to get that look out of his eyes.”

“What look?”

“Just tell him, he’ll know what I’m talking about.”

Waterfield shifted his feet, looked down at them and then back up.

“I guess this is it between us.”

Waverly sighed.

“I can’t give the photos back.”

Waterfield nodded.

He understood.

“We did have something though, didn’t we?”

She squeezed his hand.

“We did.”

Waterfield looked into her eyes.

Then he turned and was gone.

Day Two

July 22, 1952

Tuesday Afternoon

River kept one eyeon the ground for rattlesnakes and cactus and the other eye on Alexa Blank walking beside him. As the graveyard of rusty machinery loomed closer and closer, the woman’s eyes took on a more pronounced edge. She was picturing what it would be like out here alone at night.

“Do you get out into the country much?”

She shook her head.

“No.”

“You’ll hear coyotes,” he said. “Sometimes they bark like dogs and sometimes they yelp like wolves. Most likely they’ll be far off. If they get your scent though they might come close to try to figure out what you are. They might even sound like they’re circling and getting ready to attack. They won’t, that’s the thing to remember. No matter how many of them there are or how close they get or how loud they get, in the end they’ll just go away. Do you understand?”

“I don’t think I can do this.”

River put a hand on her shoulder.

“This is the safest place in the world for you right now. Trust me.”

“I don’t like being alone.”

“You’ll be fine,” he said.

“What about mountain lions?”

“They’re rare.”

“But they might come around, right?”

“Theoretically I guess it’s possible.”

A hundred steps laterthey passed the first rusty hulk and then wound deeper into the guts of the mess. River pointed to a trailer.

“That’s your new home.”

The woman stared at it in disbelief and shook her head.

“No, no, no. I can’t do this.”

River grabbed her hand and kept her in pace. “Come on, I want to show you something.”

Inside the dead hulk he showed her rope, chains, food, toilet paper and all the rest.

“I set this up to keep you here,” he said. “This proves that I wasn’t joking when I said I was hired to take you. Take a good look around because this is what my replacement is going to do if he gets his hands on you.” A beat then, “Wait here.”

He stepped outside.

Thirty seconds later he came back and handed her a gun.

“I had this stashed for emergencies,” he said. “You take it, you keep it with you at all times. Use it if you have to. Do you know how to fire it?”

No.

She didn’t.

“I’ll show you before I leave,” he said. “Here’s the important thing. Stay inside this structure. You need to look like you’re being held captive.”

“Why?”

“Because, what I’m going to do is say I took you before I got the message that the contract was rescinded,” he said. “Someone might demand proof. They might make me bring them here. If that happens, I can’t have you sitting around outside getting a suntan. Do you understand?”

Yes.

She did.

“I’ll be back tomorrow to check on you,” he said. “Well, correction, it will either be me or a woman named January.”

The woman’s face contorted.

“I can’t do this,” she said. “I can’t be alone out here at night. There’s no way.”

“This is the best place.”

“I want to go to a hotel or something.”

“No, you need to be here. It needs to look like you’re being held captive.”

She shook her head.

“I can’t stay here.”

River shifted his feet and frowned.

“I hate to do this but you’re not giving me a choice.”

With that, he flung her over his shoulder, carried her to the back wall and chained her leg.

“You tricked me!”

“No I didn’t. This is for your own good.” He tossed her the gun. “To fire you flick the safety off and pull the trigger. Spend tonight figuring out who wants you taken. The sooner we figure that out, the sooner we can deal with it.”

She flicked the safety offand pointed the barrel at River’s chest.

“That wouldn’t be a good move,” he said. “I’m the only one who knows where you are.”

He turned and headed out.

The gun exploded.

A bullet passed so close to his head that his hair moved.

“You better come back tomorrow,” the woman said.

River turned and looked at her.

“I already told you I would.”

Then he left.

Day Two

July 22, 1952

Tuesday Afternoon

Dollface.

That was the name of the bar Brittany Pratt was at in New York the night she died, according to the reporter’s notes. It was an upscale jazz club in Manhattan. “Sounds something like the Bokaray,” Wilde said as he dialed.

A gruff man’s voice answered on the third ring.

It turned out to be the manager, a guy named Marty Brown. Wilde explained that he wanted to know if a man who looked like Robert Mitchum was in the club on August 14, 1949, the night a woman named Brittany Pratt took a dive off a roof.

“You’re asking me about something that happened three years ago? That’s nuts.”

“Yeah, I know. But-”

“Ask me what I had for breakfast. That I might remember. I’d have a fifty-fifty chance.”

Wilde exhaled.

“This is important,” he said. “Let me rephrase it. Have you ever seen a man in there that looks like Robert Mitchum?”