John Sandford - Stolen Prey

He was still reading when Ingrid Caroline Eccols called. Lucas’s secretary stuck her head in the door and said, “ICE is on line one.”

Lucas picked it up and said, “Hey, Ingy.”

“If I was there, and had a gun, I’d shoot you for calling me that,” ICE said.

“Yeah, I know, but you’re not,” Lucas said. “So how you doin’, ICE?”

“Good. I just heard a funny joke. You want me to tell it to you?”

“Not especially,” Lucas said. “You have a very limited sense of humor, and you don’t tell a joke very well. You tell me one every time I see you, and they’re never funny.”

“Fuck you, Lucas. My rate just went up to two and a half.”

“Tell the joke,” Lucas said. “Come back down to two hundred, and I might even laugh.”

She told the joke in what was supposed to be a heavy southern accent, but actually sounded more like deep Minnesota country hick:

Mary Sue, Brenda Sue, and Linda Sue were sitting on their front porch in Tifton, Georgia, on a hot afternoon, drinking lemon drops with a little extra vodka. After a while, Mary Sue said, “When I had my first baby, my husband gave me a brand-new Cadillac ragtop automobile.”

Brenda Sue said, “What a marvelous, generous man he is,” and Linda Sue said, “Well, ain’t that nice?”

And they drank some more lemon drops, with a little extra vodka, and then Brenda Sue said, “When I had my first baby, my husband gave me a brand-new split-level house, with central air.” Mary Sue said, “That’s such a magnificent gesture. You must’ve been so proud.” And Linda Sue said, “Well, ain’t that nice?”

And they had a few more lemon drops, with a little extra vodka, and Mary Sue asked Linda Sue, “What’d you get when you had your first baby, Linda Sue?” And Linda Sue said, “When I had my first baby, my husband sent me off to Switzerland, to go to charm school.”

Mary Sue said, “Charm school? Well, did you find that helpful, Linda Sue?”

Linda Sue said, “Oh, ever so much. I used to just say, ‘Fuck you.’ Now I say, ‘Well, ain’t that nice?’”

Lucas faked a fake laugh-he actually thought the joke was kinda funny, and that she told it well-and ICE said, “Well, ain’t you nice,” and then, “Listen, I’m taking the deal. I told Shaffer that it was only as a favor for you, because you used to be my employer. Which means, you owe me.”

“Not much, if you get two hundred bucks an hour. I might buy you a cheeseburger someday,” Lucas said.

“It’ll be more than that, I promise you,” ICE said. “Anyway, I’m in. I need somebody to meet me at Sunnie and get me online.”

“I’ll have somebody do that,” Lucas said. “When do you want to hook up?”

“I’m gonna buy a bag of sliders and then I’m on my way,” she said. “An hour.”

“Somebody will be waiting,” Lucas said.

Lucas called Shaffer to tell him that ICE was on the way, went to the murder book, but only briefly. Then he tossed it on his desk and kicked back, and considered the problem.

He’d had a thought when he was talking to Rivera, and Rivera and Martinez were going through all the papers, and not finding any more than he had.

The torture of the Brookses had continued until they were all dead: the last of them had apparently died as the torture was continuing. Which probably meant that the torturers hadn’t gotten what they wanted.

What nobody had considered was the possibility that the Brookses had no idea what they were talking about. That they hadn’t given anything up because there was nothing to give up. That Sunnie was not involved with the narcos.

He thought about that for a moment, but couldn’t twist a story around so that it made sense. The narcos had to know who they were dealing with … didn’t they?

But why had the Brookses taken it down to the bitter end?

Why?

Virgil Flowers called. “I’ve been talking to victims, and we have one more report of horse shit odor. Wasn’t mentioned in the police report because the victim didn’t think to do it. The pattern is what you said it was-I think they’re out of a triangle with the bottom line from Mankato to Owatonna to Rochester, with the point up in the Twin Cities. Or a big circle around Faribault. Somewhere in there. But there’s something else going on, too.”

“Yeah?”

“A guy who runs a stable out by Waterville came home a year ago, after a weekend up in the Cities, and found out somebody had stolen a big pile of horse shit.”

“You’re joking,” Lucas said.

“I’m not joking. There’s rumors that somebody else is missing a pile of horse shit, too, but I haven’t run that down, yet,” Flowers said. “Anyway, a couple that sounds like the pair who jumped you were in Waterville just before this shit was stolen. They were driving a big old beat-up Ford flatbed with side panels, the sort of thing you’d want if you were stealing horse shit. People say they were sort of at loose ends.”

“Virgil, if you’re fucking with me…”

“I knew you’d think that, but I’m not,” Flowers said.

“All right. But if you are fuckin’ with me…”

“Lucas … listen, this isn’t going to take long. These aren’t big-time crooks. I’ll get something in the next few days.”

“Keep me up,” Lucas said.

He hung up with the feeling that Flowers was fucking with him. Horse shit thieves?

He was pushing paper again when Del called. He was talking fast: “What’re you doing? Right this minute?”

“Trying to choose between Caspian mocha and Castilian Cafe au Lait when I paint the hallway.”

“All right. Listen, can you get down to South St. Paul? Anderson just pulled into a junkyard by the river. I think he’s going for it, and I need some backup.”

“The sculpture?”

“The sculpture. You still keep your running gear in the office? The shoes and pants?”

“Sure. You think-”

“Change into it and get your ass down here,” Del said. “Bring somebody else, too, if you can find anybody. Down by the river, by that little airport.”

Lucas got specific directions, then went out to the main office and found an agent named Jenkins, who wasn’t too busy, got him moving. Back in his office, he took his gym bag out of a file cabinet, sniffed it-not bad, he must’ve washed it after his last run-closed the office door, changed into gray sweatpants and a dark blue hoodie over an Iowa Hawkeyes T-shirt, and running shoes. His Beretta went under the hoodie.

Jenkins was a very large man who, with his sidekick, Shrake, had a reputation for asking questions later. They took Jenkins’s personal car, a three-year-old Crown Vic that Lucas felt would work better with the riverside gestalt than would a Lexus.

“Is there gonna be any shooting?” Jenkins wanted to know.

“Nooo … probably not,” Lucas said. “I just needed somebody large to load up this sculpture, if we find them. They weigh like three tons, it’s gonna take some work. A crane or forklift or something.”

“Screw that,” Jenkins said. “My hands were made for love, not for heavy labor.”

They took twenty minutes getting south, and found Del waiting in a beat-up Jeep Wrangler in a park off Concord Street.

“I’ll drive,” Del said.

“You sure you got them?” Lucas asked.

“Eighty-three percent,” Del said. “There’s a big old metal shed down there, used to be a barge terminal. It’s big enough to hide the low-boy with the crane. And the thing is, before he came over, he drove around for a while, like he was trying to figure out if anybody was tailing him.”

“And you being a genius tracker, he never saw you,” Jenkins said.

“That’s right. We wound up down here,” Del said.