Dana Stabenow - A Taint in the Blood

She got home to a blinking red light on the answering machine, her first this time in town. She pushed the button, smiling a little, expecting some heavy breathing and a few rude remarks from Brendan.

“Yes, this is a message for Kate Shugak,” a pleasant female voice said. “Ms. Shugak, this is Rosemary Watson, secretary to Erland Bannister. Mr. Bannister is having a party tomorrow evening at his home in Turnagain, and he wonders if you might like to attend. Seven o’clock, drinks and hors d’oeuvres-oh, and semi-formal dress, please.” Directions were given and the message ended.

Kate stared at the answering machine. It sat on the kitchen counter, squat, black, and unrevealing. She played the message again. Rosemary Watson repeated herself.

“Christ,” Kate said.

She went into the kitchen, filled a glass with ice, and poured a Diet 7UP over it. She took it into the living room and curled up on the window seat to watch the joggers go by.

Erland Bannister. Victoria’s brother, the president and CEO of Pilz Mining and Exploration, PME Corporation after the post-bankruptcy restructuring. He hadn’t been president when Victoria went to jail, but he had been on the way up.

She remembered the response of the man on Brendan’s witness list: “Does Erland know about this?” She had the feeling that if Erland hadn’t known about her investigation into Victoria’s thirty-year-old case he did now.

She went upstairs and climbed back into Jack’s shirt and socks. She went back downstairs and stood looking into the refrigerator for a while, as if it might hold the secrets to the universe, which refrigerators sometimes do. She wandered back out into the living room and ran a finger down the spines of the video library.

On impulse, she called Brendan. “What are you doing home on a Monday night?” she said when he answered. “On any night, for that matter?”

“Pining away by the phone, waiting for you to call,” he replied promptly.

“You like tequila, don’t you?”

He was amused. “Sure, why? You want to get me drunk and take advantage of me?”

“There are a few bottles rattling around in the cupboards over here. One of them is a bottle of something called anejo. You want it?”

“I’ll be right there.”

He was, in fifteen minutes flat, and Kate fetched the bottle from the kitchen, along with a glass. He immediately slammed back a shot. “All right,” he said, looking impressed. He offered her the glass. “Your turn.”

She shook her head.

“Right, I forgot, you don’t drink. Darn, now I don’t have to share this bottle.”

She laughed. “I’ve been calling the numbers on your list.”

He leaned back into the easy chair, a big man comfortable with his size, and let his eyes run up the expanse of smooth skin between the bunched top of the thick socks to the tail of the blue plaid shirt. “What about them?”

She smiled. Flirting was the thing Brendan McCord knew best how to do, next to litigation.

“The response has been”-she hesitated-“mixed.”

“Getting hung up on by the elite?” Brendan asked.

“How did you guess?”

“Yeah, well, hang on to your hat, because I’ve got some more bad news for you.”

“Great.”

“The investigating officer is dead.”

Kate searched her memory. “Sgt. Charles Baltzo?”

“Yeah.”

“Damn,” Kate said with real feeling. “Do you know of anybody else who was around at the time of the murder? Someone who might know something about the case?” She added, “Who is actually alive?”

“I can see where alive would be good,” Brendan said gravely.

“Also, is Henry Cowell still practicing in Anchorage?” He raised an interrogatory eyebrow. “Victoria’s defense attorney. I looked in the phone book. He’s not there.”

He thought. “I don’t know the name.”

“Could you find out where he is?”

He poured himself another shot. “What’s it worth to you?”

She raised an eyebrow. “I figured you got your payment in advance.”

He looked at the bottle and opened his mouth, and the doorbell sounded.

Kate’s pulse scrambled. “Excuse me,” she said, and went to the door.

Jim Chopin was on the doorstep, his face like a thundercloud. It seemed that Kate had credited him with more self-control than he actually had.

“Jim,” she said, unable to keep a grin from spreading across her face. “How nice to see you again. What’s-”

He stepped inside, shoved her against the wall, and kissed her hard.

“Who is it, Kate?” Brendan said from the living room.

Jim raised his head. “Who the hell is that?” He stalked into the living room, hands knotted into fists. Kate pulled herself together and followed.

Jim looked from Brendan, shot glass in hand, taking his leisure in the easy chair, to Kate standing next to him in Jack’s shirt and socks and apparently very little else. He looked back at Brendan and said, “Get out.”

Brendan thought about that for a little longer than Jim thought strictly necessary. He moved, but Kate grabbed his arm. “Thanks for coming over, Brendan,” she said. “Let me know what you find out. I’ll be here.”

Brendan saw the barely repressed glee in her eye and threw in the towel, at least for tonight. “All right, don’t shoot. I’m gone.”

He lumbered outside. The door had barely shut behind him when Jim turned and tossed Kate up into his arms. He took the stairs two at a time.

“Oooooh,” she said, “I feel just like Scarlett O’Hara.”

“Shut up,” he said.

He woke up alone again. “Son of a bitch” he said.

While Jim was jerking on his pants, full of a fine, righteous wrath, the source of which he did not bother to identify, Kate and Mutt were out for a run on the coastal trail. She didn’t run as a habit, but at home simple maintenance around the homestead kept her fit. In town, she took her exercise where she found it. Considerate of Jack to buy a house so close to the coastal trail.

She was feeling much more limber this morning-the benefits of regular sex on the various muscle groups were not to be denied-and she ran smoothly, stretching her legs out in front of her, carrying her arms at midtorso, breathing deeply in and out, with no hint of labor. It was another day of unbroken sunshine, Susitna and Denali and Foraker were on her right, and she felt good. Hell, she felt great, every cell in her body was singing. Mutt, loping next to her, tongue lolling out of the side of her mouth, legs and haunches moving like pistons, looked not unhappy herself. Mutt knew how to live in the moment, to savor it, not to fear or try to second-guess the future. Kate decided that Mutt had a lot to teach her, and picked up the pace.

They trotted down a hill and around a curve, and a park bench appeared. It was occupied.

There were two boys, one lying on the bench, the other beneath it. Both were asleep. Two bikes lay on their sides on the grass nearby.

The boys looked to be about ten and twelve, respectively. Kate slowed to a halt and stood looking down at them. Their eyelashes stood out darkly against their cheeks and their faces were smooth and innocent enough to break her heart.

She could think of a number of scenarios that would result in the boys sleeping on a bench next to the coastal trail, chief among them trouble at home, a fight between parents maybe, resulting in the boys getting out of the house until it was all over.

There was also the possibility they had not left their home voluntarily, that they could have been thrown out. Or had run from punishment, or abuse.

She found herself reluctant to disturb them. At least in sleep, there was respite from whatever troubled them awake.