Harlan Coben - Deal Breaker

“Because he won’t tell me.”

“And what makes you think I will?”

“Because you’re not a complete asshole.”

Larry’s mouth twitched toward a smile, but he caught himself. “Coming from you,” he said, “that really means a lot.”

Myron said nothing.

“This is important, huh?”

Myron nodded.

Larry sat back. “Burke didn’t get the magazine in the mail. He heard about it from a private detective.”

Myron shifted in his chair. “Otto was having Christian investigated?”

Larry’s tone was flat. “A man of Otto Burke’s unquestionable integrity would never stoop to such a level.”

“Under the desk,” Myron said, “you’re crossing your fingers.”

Again the twitch/smile. “This doesn’t leave this room, Bolitar. You understand?”

“Cross my heart.” Myron motioned such with his hand.

“Burke has a whole security division,” Larry explained. “They poke into everyone on the payroll. Including yours truly. They also have a source network all over the place. The credo is pretty simple: If you got dirt on a Titan, Burke will pay top dollar for it. So one of these sources came across the magazine.”

“How?”

“I don’t know. Maybe he’s a steady reader.”

“Do you know his name?”

“Brian Sanford. A true sleazeball. He works out of Atlantic City. The casino route. Spies on gamblers, that kind of thing. A Titan puts a quarter in a slot machine, he reports it, especially since that whole Michael Jordan thing started. Burke likes to be kept informed. Gives him the edge in negotiating.”

Myron stood. “Thanks. I appreciate it.”

“Hey, Bolitar. This don’t make us buddies or nothing. We talk again, I still hate your guts. You got it?”

Myron said, “We’re having a warm moment now, aren’t we, Larry?”

Hanson leaned his elbows on the desk, pointing a finger at Myron. “I still think you’re a little pissant piece of dog shit. And next time I see you, I’ll prove it.”

Myron spread his arms. “Come on, Larry. How about that hug now?”

“Wiseass.”

“Does that mean no?”

“Do me a favor, Bolitar.”

“Name it, bright eyes.”

“Get the fuck out of my office.”

Myron called Brian Sanford. Answering machine. Myron said he had a real big case, one that paid ten grand, and he’d stop by his office tonight at seven o’clock. Brian Sanford would be there. For ten grand, a guy like Sanford would let his mother take a bullet in the gut.

Myron dialed his office.

Esperanza said, “MB SportReps.”

“Did you show Lucy the photo?”

“Yep.”

“And?”

“You found your buyer.”

Myron said, “Lucy was sure?”

“Positive.”

“Thanks.”

He hung up. An hour to kill. Myron headed over to the county medical examiner’s office-Dr. Adam Culver’s old office. Just a hunch, but worth checking out.

The building was a one-level brick building. Institutional, almost like a small elementary school. The furniture was metal chairs with thin padding, again like a schoolteacher’s. The waiting room magazines were preWatergate. The tiled floor was worn and yellowed with age, like the “before” shot on a Mr. Clean commercial. There was nothing even remotely decorative.

“Is Dr. Li in?” he asked the receptionist.

“I’ll buzz her.”

Sally Li was dressed in hospital scrubs, but there was no blood or anything on them. She was Chinese, approaching forty, but she could have passed for much younger. She wore bifocals. A pack of cigarettes was stashed in her front pocket. Cigarettes with a surgeon’s gown. Like bowling shoes with a tuxedo.

They had met a couple of times in the past. Sally Li came to many Culver family functions. She had been Adam’s right-hand woman for the past decade. Myron greeted her with a kiss on the cheek.

“Jessica told me you were looking into Adam’s death,” she said without preamble.

He nodded. “Can we talk for a minute?”

“Sure.” She led him to her office. Again, institutional. No personal stuff. Lots of pathology textbooks. A metal desk. Metal chair. A small tape recorder she probably used during autopsies. Her degrees on the wall. She wasn’t married, had no children, so there was no picture on the desk. Big ashtray, though. Overflowing.

She struck a match, lit up, and said, “How’s tricks?”

“An MD smoking,” Myron said. “Tsk, tsk.”

“My patients never complain.”

“Good point.”

She took a deep drag. “So what do you want to know?”

“Did you and Adam ever have an affair?”

“Yes.” No hesitation. She looked him right in the eye. “About four years ago. Lasted a week.”

“Did Adam have a lot of affairs?”

“Got me. A few, I guess. Why do you ask?”

“I’m just trying to put a few things together.”

“Vis-à-vis his murder?”

“Right.”

She took off her glasses. “What does Adam’s love life have to do with it?”

“Probably nothing,” Myron admitted. “How had Adam been acting the last couple months?”

“A bit wacko,” she said. Again no hesitation.

“In what way?”

She gave that one some thought. “Businesswise, he wasn’t letting me help him on a lot of big cases. He was keeping them all to himself.”

“And that was unusual?”

“That was unheard of. We always worked on big cases together.”

“These cases,” Myron said. “Were they the girls found in the woods upstate?”

She looked at him. “You want to tell me how you knew that?”

“Just a guess.”

“Hell of a guess, Myron.”

“You said big cases. I read the papers. Those are the big cases they keep talking about.”

Sally didn’t believe him, but she didn’t push it either.

Myron said, “So what else was there?”

She took another deep drag. “He was very distracted. You’d talk to him, he’d nod, but he wouldn’t listen.”

“Anything else?”

Sally crushed out the cigarette, though it still had plenty to go. She lit another. “A new way to quit smoking,” she said. “I smoke the same amount of cigarettes, but I take less puffs each day. Gradual slowdown until I quit entirely. At this rate it should take no more than twelve years.”

“Good luck.”

“Thanks.”

“So what else was there?”

Another puff. “Adam was ordering a lot of weird tests on the last girl they found in the woods.”

“What do you mean, weird tests?”

“Superfluous tests. In my opinion, anyway.”

Myron said, “You never got a positive ID on her, right?”

“Right.”

“So maybe he was running the tests to see if he could get a handle on her whereabouts.”

“Maybe. But he sent them out one at a time. He’d wait for one test to come back before he’d ask for the next one. Anthropological measurements, shape and size of cranium, pelvic bones, ossification of the bones, fusing of sutures on the skull-all one at a time.”

“So what do you make of that?”

She shrugged again. “I don’t make anything out of that. It’s just an example of what I meant by acting strangely. Distracted. The case was a weird one to start off. The girl’s skull had been crushed by the perp, but that wasn’t what killed her. In other words, she had been buried alive in those woods. She died trying to claw her way out.”

Silence.

“This girl,” Myron said, “what was she wearing?”

Sally stiffened a little. Then she leaned forward. “Okay, Myron, what’s going on?”

“Nothing. Why?”

“You know why.”

Myron stopped. “The girl’s clothes are missing.”

“Yes.”