Lisa Jackson - Wicked Game

And it was a pain in the ass.

“If we knew those bones were your little girlfriend, then we could take this investigation to the next level. And waiting for the damn DNA results is Chinese water torture. Unless you’re sleeping with one of the lab techs, nobody gives a shit about a rush order. Even then it’s fifty-fifty.”

“You know from experience?” Mac asked mildly as he stopped for a red light and the RV, driven by an older woman in a trucker’s cap, pulled alongside.

“If I did, I wouldn’t tell. Your complacency scares me, McNally. When did that happen?”

Twenty years ago, he thought. And it wasn’t complacency. It was cautiousness and diligence and awareness. But there was no way he was going to convince Gretchen she might not be employing her best investigative skills. She had all the answers already. No use in him wasting his breath.

As the light turned green and some idiot in a Ford Focus ran the light, crossing in front of him, he hit the brakes. Gretchen swore. “For the love of Christ, we oughtta pull that moron over!”

“The traffic guys’ll get him,” he said, gunning it to get in front of the RV, then whipping the cruiser into the gravel lot of the diner.

Inside, the Dandelion was painted bright yellow and the booths were covered in green plastic. Mac slid into one and Gretchen sat down opposite him as a waitress offered coffee, turned over the cups already on the table, and filled them each with a stream of steaming liquid. “I’ll give ya a minute,” she said around a wad of gum. “Specials are written on the board.” She indicated a chalkboard hung near the counter, then wandered off to a table of four men in their sixties.

Mac stared through the window to the outside lot.

“What do you ask them-these ‘friends’ of Jessie Brentwood’s?” she queried sarcastically as she picked up a plastic-encased menu and scanned it. “What kind of investigation is this? I should probably know.”

He felt irritation flare and tamped it back down. “Don’t piss me off.”

“What? I can’t ask questions?”

“You know the drill. Don’t act like you’re an idiot.”

“You’re a piece of shit, McNally. You act like the Lone Ranger. No, worse, you wouldn’t even trust Tonto. You seem to think that this case is yours and no one else’s.”

It has been. For twenty years.

He didn’t have time for this. It was annoying as hell to be saddled with her. But it won’t be for long, he reminded himself. His partner would get restless and move on. With that thought in mind, he decided to be more conciliatory. “We just talk. About what was up twenty years ago. Cover the same ground. See if anything else pops up, something they might have forgotten they’re supposed to keep secret.”

“Like they’re part of a conspiracy? All in it together.”

“Not quite.”

“And this guy is one of the ones you call the ‘Preppy Pricks.’”

Mac nodded. As men they didn’t seem as privileged or entitled as they’d been as teenagers, but he wasn’t able to completely forget their behavior when they were younger.

“Do you write off this meal?” Gretchen asked, flipping the menu over. “The department doesn’t pay for it.” She gave him a look and he realized she was asking. As if anyone would give him special treatment.

“The department doesn’t pay for much.”

It was her turn to grunt an assent.

Mac watched a blue Jetta pull in and park. Seconds later a woman climbed from the driver’s side. Mac felt his gut tighten, but he showed no emotion. Rebecca Ryan, now Sutcliff. He recognized her instantly and remembered his last conversation with her as if it were that morning.

“I didn’t talk to her before she left,” Becca had said to him, seated on the front steps of the high school. She’d been nervous talking to a cop, her hands clasped in front of her, almost as if she’d been praying, her book bag on the step beside her, and she’d glanced into the parking lot. Her hair had been long and a light enough brown to appear almost blond, her eyes hazel and wide. It was her profile that reminded him of Jessie Brentwood, whom he’d only seen pictures of, though full on, Becca’s face was rounder, appearing more innocent whereas Jessie appeared to have secrets filling her head, a wicked little smile teasing her lips, her eyes a shade of green and gold that reminded him of a restless ocean.

He’d quizzed her up and down, backward and forward about Jessie, but Becca Ryan had known little, basically nothing. She’d run with Jessie’s crowd and that was it.

“I didn’t ask her to come here,” he said now, his gaze following Becca’s entrance into the diner.

“She’s one of ’em?” Gretchen asked, her head swiveling with interest.

“Yeah. Rebecca Sutcliff. She must be meeting Hudson Walker.” Has Sutcliff, now a widow, somehow hooked up with Jessie Brentwood’s ex?

At that moment a large, beat-up pickup wheeled into the lot and parked next to the Jetta. Mac tore his gaze away from the approaching Becca to witness Hudson slam the door to his truck and stride toward the diner’s front entrance.

How long had they been an item? he wondered.

Becca waited for Hudson, but they didn’t so much as touch as they entered the diner. Mac was shifting his thoughts on how he planned this interview to go when Gretchen took the bull by the horns and gestured toward a nearby table. “Let’s move over here.” She grabbed her cup of coffee, slid from the booth, and shifted to a chair. Mac would have agreed that the table was a better choice than the intimacy of a booth, but her ever-constant decision-making-never so much as waggling an eyebrow at him for direction or corroboration-really bugged the hell out of him.

It was evident Walker and Becca Sutcliff were together and, Mac guessed from the looks they passed between them, definitely a couple. He made quick introductions all around, then they sat and the waitress poured a couple more cups of coffee while a busboy swabbed at their recently vacated table.

Becca’s hair was scraped into a ponytail. She wore a black-and-white plaid scarf around the neck of her leather coat, and the way she pulled the scarf from her neck was nothing short of sinuous, at least in Mac’s opinion. He remembered very clearly how she’d been as a teenager: wide-eyed, skinny, skittish, and smart enough to keep her thoughts to herself. He hadn’t put together that Hudson Walker might be more interested in her than his own girlfriend, Jessie Brentwood, but then maybe that was just conjecture on his part now.

Hudson Walker had filled out over the years and had earned a few more lines around the corners of his eyes, as if he squinted in the sun a lot. He was dressed down, jeans and shirt, lightweight jacket-a far cry from Christopher Delacroix III’s tailor-made wool suit. The man’s tie had probably cost more than Mac took home in a week.

Hudson took a seat across from Mac’s. He gazed across at Gretchen, who was sizing him up but good. “You’re Hudson Walker,” she said. “The vic’s boyfriend from twenty years ago?”

“The ‘vic’ being Jessie Brentwood? You’re saying you identified her body?” Hudson asked, turning to Mac.

“Still unconfirmed,” Mac said. “We’re waiting for DNA.”

Hudson swivelled his gaze to Gretchen. “I dated Jessie, yeah.”

Walker was weightier since high school, more in demeanor than actual pounds. And Mac understood before the man said a word that Hudson Walker had no intention of helping him any more now than he had when he was younger.

“You wanted to see me,” he said in a tone that let Mac know just how he felt about that.

Mac opened his mouth, but Gretchen jumped in again. “Everybody said Jessie Brentwood ran away, but then those bones showed up.”