Jeffery Deaver - The Bodies Left Behind

As the manager recited an address in Minneapolis, Brynn transcribed it and told the young deputy, “Check this out. Fast.”

Asked about phone calls and visitors, the woman said there were no outgoing calls but the guest, Harding, met in the coffee shop with a skinny man with a crew cut, who the manager thought was rude, and a pretty woman in her twenties with short red hair. She looked a bit like the woman in the other composite picture the manager had seen.

Getting better and better…

Then the woman added, “The thing is, he never checked out.”

“He’s still there?” she asked.

“No, Officer. He checked in for three days, went out the afternoon of the seventeenth and then never came back. I tried to call but directory assistance doesn’t have anybody listed in Minneapolis, or St. Paul, by that name at that address.”

She wasn’t surprised when Jackson slipped her a piece of paper that read: Fake. A parking lot. No name in MN, WI, NCIC or VICAP.

She nodded, whispering, “Tell Tom we’ve got something here.”

Jackson disappeared as Brynn was scanning through her notes, flipping pages. “What about a credit card?” she asked the manager.

“Paid cash. But the reason I called: he left a suitcase here. If you want to pick it up, it’s yours.”

“Really? I’ll tell you, I’d like to drive down there and look through it. Let me rearrange a few things and give you a call back.”

After they disconnected Brynn slouched back in her chair.

“You okay?” Tom Dahl asked, stepping into her cubicle, looking cautiously at her eyes, which she supposed reflected a certain gleam.

“I’m more than okay. We’ve got ourselves a lead.”

MICHELLE ALISON KEPLER -now brunet and severely collagened-sat in the bedroom of a ritzy house in a ritzy neighborhood of Milwaukee. She was painting her nails dark plum, their color on that terrible night in April.

She was reflecting on a truth that she’d learned over the years: that people heard what they wanted to hear, saw what they wanted, believed what they wanted. But to exploit that weakness you had to be sharp, had to recognize their desires and expectations then subtly and cleverly feed them enough crumbs to make them think they were satisfied. Hard to do. But for people like Michelle it was necessary, a survival skill.

Michelle was thinking in particular of her companion that night: Deputy Brynn McKenzie.

You’re their friend?…From Chicago?…I heard you and Emma worked together… Are you a lawyer too?

My God, what a straight man you were, Brynn.

Michelle had found herself in a tough situation back there at the house. The Feldmans were dead. She’d found the files she’d been after and destroyed them, which meant she no longer needed Hart and Lewis. But then Hart had reacted like a cat…and the evening went to hell.

The escape into the woods…

Then finding Deputy Brynn McKenzie. She knew instinctively just what role to play, a role that the country hick deputy could understand: rich, spoiled girl, not very likeable but with just the right touch of self-questioning doubt, a woman who’d been dumped by her husband for being exactly who that husband encouraged her to be.

Brynn would be irritated at first, but sympathetic too, which is just how we feel about most people we meet under difficult circumstances. We never like victims-until we get to know them and recognize something of them within us.

Besides, the role would keep Brynn from wondering why she didn’t quite seem like your typical houseguest mourning the deaths of her host and hostess, murders she’d just committed.

I wasn’t lying when I said I was an actress, Brynn. I just don’t act onstage or in front of the camera.

But now it was three weeks later. And things were turning around. About time. She sure deserved a break. After all the outrageous, unfair crap she’d been through on April 17 and afterward, she’d earned some good luck.

Stuffing cotton balls between the toes of her left foot, she continued painting.

Yep, God or fate was back on her side. She’d finally managed to track down Hart’s full name and address-he lived in Chicago, as it turned out. She’d learned, though, that he wasn’t spending a lot of time there lately; he was frequently in Wisconsin, which was sobering, but expected, of course. He was looking for her as diligently as she was looking for him.

He was looking for a few other people too, and apparently he’d found one. Freddy Lancaster had stopped returning phone calls and text messages. Gordon Potts would also be on Hart’s list, though he was hiding way out in Eau Claire.

Michelle was cautious but not panicked. She’d cut nearly all ties between herself and the events of April 17. Hart knew her real name-he knew it from looking through her purse that night-but locating Michelle Kepler wouldn’t be easy; she always made sure of that.

Ever since her teens Michelle had been an expert at working her way into other people’s lives, finagling them into taking care of her. Playing helpless, playing lost, playing sexy (with men mostly, but with women too when necessary). She was presently living with Sam Rolfe, a rich businessman in Milwaukee (nobody saw, heard or believed what he wanted to better than Sam). Her driver’s license listed an old address and her mail went to a post office box, which she’d changed first thing on April 18, no forwarding.

As for the evidence implicating her in the Lake Mondac crimes-well, there wasn’t much. She’d stolen from poor Graham’s truck everything that contained her fingerprints-the map she’d given Hart and her purse. And when she’d swapped boots with her poor dead “friend,” Michelle had wiped down her Ferragamos with glass cleaner (Brynn, leaving $1,700 Italian leather? God, I hate you).

Now, the evidence from Lake Mondac was no longer a threat. But one very real risk remained. It needed to be disposed of.

And that would happen today.

Michelle dried her toenails with a hair dryer, pleased with the results, though irritated that she hadn’t been able to get to the salon; with Hart loose she had to limit her trips out.

She left the luxurious bedroom and stepped into the living room where Rolfe sat on the couch with her daughter, Tory, five, and her son, Bradford, a skinny boy of seven, who didn’t smile much but had a wad of blond hair you just could not resist ruffling. She couldn’t look at her children without her heart swelling with a mother’s love.

Rolfe had a pleasant face and lips that weren’t too disgusting. On the negative side, he needed to lose about forty pounds and his hair smelled of lilac, which was gross. She hated his tattoo. Michelle had nothing against tats in general but he had a star on his groin. A big star. The pubic hair grew through part of it and his belly covered up another part depending on how he sat.

Oh please…

But Michelle was no complainer if the script didn’t call for complaining. Rolfe had plenty of money from his trucking company and she could put up with making her sculpted body frequently available to him in exchange for…well, just about anything she wanted.

Michelle was an expert at spotting the Sam Rolfes of the world-men who heard, saw and believed. If God gives you a lazy streak, a slow mind for school or a trade, expensive tastes, a pretty face and better body, then you damn well better be able to sniff out men like that the way a snake senses a confused mouse.

Of course, you had to be watchful. Always.

Now, seeing her son and Rolfe laugh at something the TV judge was saying, looking like father and son, Michelle was enraged with jealousy. She had a momentary urge to tell Rolfe to go fuck himself and to walk out the door with her children.

But she pulled back. However angry she became, which was usually red-hot angry, she was usually able to control it. Survival. She did this now and smiled, though she also thought, with some glee: No blow jobs tonight, dear.