Laura Lippman - No Good Deeds

Seemed to emerge. That’s what intrigued Tess. Youssef’s murder had been a mise-en-scène, an elaborate play. Yet the multiple stab wounds still struck Tess as awfully personal. Thirty-nine stab wounds wasn’t an act. The scenario had been faked, but the rage had been real.

She reached for the scar on her knee, remembering the night she had used far more bullets than strictly necessary to defend her own life. She had fired until the gun was empty, and she would have done that if the weapon had held ten, twenty, a hundred bullets. If she could dig the man up and shoot him again, she would.

“I wish I could talk to the widow.”

“I hardly recommend that course of action.” Tyner was cupping his hands around the frigid glass of red wine, but not the way a wine lover might. He was rubbing them back and forth like a Boy Scout making a fire from twigs, trying to bring his drink to room temperature.

“No, no, of course not,” Tess agreed automatically. “Why not?’

“Because to Mrs. Youssef you’re the woman who’s shielding someone who could help police solve her husband’s murder. Besides, what would that accomplish?”

“Lloyd told us everything he knew. He’s done as a source of information. Whatever happened to Youssef, Lloyd was at arm’s length from the origin of the plan, an errand boy, assigned to use the card and create an alternate reality.”

“So he claimed. Did it ever occur to you that Lloyd might have been directly involved in the murder and that he’s spinning the story to deflect suspicion?”

The question caught Tess off guard. She was so sure she had considered every angle of Lloyd’s story, processing it through what she thought of as her cynic meter.

“No,” she said. “He didn’t recognize Youssef’s face. Lloyd’s not sophisticated enough to lie on that many levels. How can you be an accessory to murder if you don’t know what the guy looks like?”

“By helping to cover up the crime,” Tyner said, his voice uncharacteristically gentle, which always troubled Tess more than his usual rages. “Which is what Lloyd did, Tess. Don’t lose sight of that. He helped someone conceal a murder and create a chain of evidence designed to confuse investigators.”

“But until he met me, he didn’t even know that the two things were related.”

“So you say. So you believe. But you can see why homicide detectives might be a little more dubious. It’s not unreasonable to think that Lloyd is now trying to cover his ass, distance himself from a crime.”

“Sure, if they had him on another charge and he offered up this story to save his own neck. But no one had any leverage over Lloyd.”

“ You did. You could have turned him in to the police for stealing Crow’s car. Which, with Lloyd’s record, meant more time inside.”

“Only, what he told us checked out. The police have confirmed now that they always knew about the ATM charges but had been sitting on them because they thought it was something that only Youssef’s killer could know.”

Youssef’s killer -Tess heard the echo and made the same argument in her head that she had been making to Tyner. Lloyd didn’t know what Youssef looked like, so he couldn’t be directly connected to his murder. Youssef was dead in a state park when Lloyd bought his sandwich, while Youssef’s car was crossing into Delaware. He couldn’t have been there. Right?

Tyner took a sip of his wine, frowned at the taste and the temperature but pressed on. “Even if you’re not going to cooperate with Howard County police, I think you should go down there-with me of course-and pretend to be a good citizen. Okay? Maybe we can argue that Lloyd was a client who made an oral contract with you to keep his identity secret and that you expose yourself to a civil lawsuit by breaching that promise.”

“But no contract entitles me to shield criminals, right?”

“True.”

“And Lloyd has broken the law. In fact, on just the first ATM withdrawal, I think he might be in felony territory. Or some kind of fraud.”

“Yes, it’s a serious charge. Why don’t you introduce me to Lloyd, let me take him on as a client? I can’t make your deal with him privileged after the fact, but I can help him.”

“I made a promise-” she began.

“Yes, but you didn’t know you could face jail time for it. Crow will understand, Tess. Lloyd has to speak to the police. I’ll get him immunity, if possible, protect him every way I can. But this can’t go on.”

“I guess not.” Tess pulled out her cell phone again. “Crow and the dogs will be glad to have me home. You know, it’s not that I gave my word to Lloyd so much. It’s the promise to Crow that I would keep my promise to Lloyd. That’s the one I can’t break.”

“I’m sure the Howard County detectives will be very moved by that sentiment,” Tyner said, but Tess hardly heeded his sarcasm. The phone was ringing unanswered at home, kicking into voice mail after the usual five rings. She tried Crow’s cell. It went straight to voice mail, which indicated it was off. Should she try the Point? No, he didn’t work Tuesdays. She felt a little clutch of panic, silly, she knew. But he was usually so accessible. If not at her beck and call, at least at her call. She was the one who forgot to check in, neglected to say where she was going to be. They had spoken-when had they spoken? Last night. A sweet, easy call. He said he missed her but he understood why she couldn’t say where she was. She assured him that she didn’t think he would ever tell anyone where she was. She just wanted him to be able to claim ignorance of her whereabouts with a clear and sunny conscience.

Privately, she thought Crow a rotten liar. But she hadn’t told him that. No, their last encounter had been nothing but pleasant.

“Tyner, you have my permission to set up the meeting with Howard County for tomorrow. But if you don’t mind, I’m going to throw some money down and run home.”

Jenkins knew he should just leave the Howard County cops alone, let them do their jobs. But they were such incompetent mopes. Nice but ineffectual. When were they going to find the broad and drag her in? He couldn’t keep from calling just one more time, checking to see if they had made any progress.

“So,” he said, knowing that small talk was neither expected nor welcome. “You got the name yet? You got the broad?”

“No,” admitted the detective, a feeb named Howard Johnson, poor guy. Worse yet, he had hair as orange as the old restaurants and eyes the same blue color as the trim. It was like his parents had peeped into the bassinet and said, Let’s make his life hell! “The PI has dropped out of sight. Not at home, not in her office, not answering her phones.”

“You sitting on her house?”

“Not yet.”

Rubes.

“But her lawyer just called. She’s willing to meet.”

Really. But then he had expected as much. Still, he gave an impressed whistle, as if he chalked all this up to Johnson’s formidable skills. “Huh. Look, Howard, I know I promised to keep the fed’s collective nose out of this, but can I come to the interview? Not participate,” he added hastily, sensing even over the phone line that he had pushed a little too hard. “Just watch, through the glass.”

“Sure, but…why do you want to watch some stupid woman PI stonewall her way to the grand jury?”

“Just got a feeling about this one.”

“Me, too. But my feeling is that it’s the kind of red ball that’s going to sink me. I almost wish you guys had taken over this one.”

Jenkins hung up. He did have a feeling, a literal one in his gut, which was cramping from nerves. He poured himself a tumbler of Jameson and forced it down, reasoning that his stomach and his throat would just have to get over it and live with the burning reflux, because the rest of his body needed it bad. Take one for the team, esophagus. Take one for the team.