Ridley Pearson - The Body of David Hayes

“You’ve got the roles reversed,” Boldt said. “If anyone’s putting himself at risk, that would be me.”

“I got briefed on the operation of this thing,” LaMoia said. “Besides, you’re technically challenged operating a toaster, for Christ’s sake.”

“Two minutes,” Boldt said. He came around the car. LaMoia popped the trunk so that it was already open, and Boldt drove them toward the warehouse.

He glided the car into position, LaMoia directing him with hand signals. LaMoia flew out the passenger door, lifted the trunk, then left it unlatched as he slapped the car to signal Boldt’s retreat.

As Boldt pulled away, he saw LaMoia struggling with what appeared to be a very heavy metal box. It looked like a miniature window-mounted air conditioning unit. Three blocks away he reversed the Jetta so it aimed back toward the unseen warehouse. One eye tracked the second hand on his wristwatch while he divided his attention, focused on the darkened street before him.

All at once, Boldt heard a loud explosion, and his foot went to the accelerator faster than conscious thought. He removed his weapon and laid it in his lap as he drove at a breakneck speed down the rough, potholed roadway. He caught sight of the orange glow in the sky and the smudged black plume of smoke billowing from what turned out to be a phone pole. An electric transformer on the pole was afire, raining viscous drops of flame down onto the crusted blacktop below like some medieval cauldron.

Boldt saw LaMoia by the side of the building, embracing the bulky steel device in both arms. The car rocked as LaMoia deposited the device into the trunk. The detective hurried around to the passenger side and said, “Go,” although he was only partially inside.

Boldt hit the accelerator hard, and the Jetta raced off. No sign of any trouble behind them, as both men strained toward their respective door-mounted mirrors.

“Shit!” LaMoia said. He was sweating and breathless. “Little kink they’re going to have to work out. I hit the button and that transformer blew like it was part of the plan.”

“So it worked,” Boldt said, somewhat astonished.

“Apparently so.”

“The transformer. That could help us. Whatever happened in that warehouse, maybe it gets blamed on the transformer’s problems.”

“You think it’s designed to do that?” LaMoia asked, suddenly beaming behind a smile. “Yeah, I suppose that’s possible,” he said. “Power company gets blamed for it. I like that. That’s what they get for raising our bills every six months.”

Only then did it fully dawn on Boldt that the master videotape of his wife’s indiscretions was now erased, and that at the same time Svengrad’s import company had been dealt a serious setback, losing all their business data.

He heard sirens behind them, responding to the burning transformer.

“Thing scared the shit out of me when it blew like that,” LaMoia said, reliving the moment. He was twisted around in his seat trying to get a look toward the fire. But he gave up and came back around, facing the windshield.

“Definitely not something we want terrorists to have.” He explained himself, saying, “The way I see it, I was just doing a little homework.”

“John LaMoia, the good student,” Boldt suggested. “Why doesn’t that work for me?”

“Give it a rest, Sarge.”

As Boldt drove, the sun brightened the eastern horizon. Boldt would be in bed before it was fully dawn.

“Thank you, John.” Said to the windshield, but as sincerely as he could make it.

“I love shit like that. Blowing stuff up. Setting shit on fire. My pleasure, Sarge, believe me.” LaMoia chuckled to himself. “Besides, what are friends for?”

Boldt searched the papers the following morning for any mention of an unexplained power outage in south Ballard. He found a paragraph about the transformer fire. He’d been placed on administrative leave pending a full review of the Special Ops at the theater and WestCorp Center. Pahwan Riz and Marc O’Brien were too experienced not to recognize internal interference when they saw it. Proving it would be next to impossible, given the loyalty of Daphne, John, and Bobbie Gaynes. Boldt would ride it out, as he’d ridden out other challenges in the past.

Danny Foreman was taking early retirement, no charges filed.

Liz returned from a meeting at the bank that Tuesday afternoon, Boldt having gassed up the car and packed it for the drive to Wenatchee. They were to pick up the kids there and keep driving. Sun Valley. Yellowstone, with the tourists gone. They would loop around on one of the most beautiful highways in the country, on the western border of Montana, and on up to Coeur d’Alene, where they’d spend most of the next week doing nothing. Boldt didn’t know how it would go; he wasn’t great at doing nothing.

Liz was quiet for the early part of the drive. She’d climbed in with a stack of papers, her purse, and a newspaper.

“What’s going on?” he asked.

“I’m not going to be offered a contract with MTK.”

“You’ve been fired ?” This news hit Boldt in the center of his chest. Not only did Liz love the job, but she’d been one of the top five officers in the bank. There’d never been any question of her being worked into the merger.

“The tape, maybe,” she said. “You think?”

Again, he felt the wind knocked out of him. “No?”

“Or maybe Danny got me in trouble trying to save himself.”

“I would have heard about that,” Boldt said, though he wasn’t so sure all of a sudden. “Fired?”

“Phillip doesn’t trust me-that’s at the bottom of it. Nor should he! I’ll get a good letter. I keep the pension. It’s an honorable discharge,” she said, trying to make light of it.

He knew how devastated she had to be, and admired her for her display of courage. “I seriously doubt it was the tape,” he said. Then asked, “Are you okay with this?”

“No. But I am ready for a change. Consulting, maybe. More time at home afternoons.” She added philosophically, “You never fully undo something like this. If there’s one overriding lesson, for me anyway, it’s about the repercussions of our actions. Maybe there’s some closure now. I’ve carried this-we’ve both carried this-for a long time. It would be nice to get it behind us.”

Boldt glanced into the rearview mirror, the road receding behind them, and he nearly mentioned the symbolism to her but thought better of it. He kept it to himself. He hoped Svengrad would be jailed over tax evasion, but he wasn’t sure he’d ever stop looking over his shoulder. Svengrad had a long reach. He kept this to himself as well.

Liz was quiet for a few minutes, looking out her window as if the sights there were new to her. Then she reached down and unfolded the newspaper and opened it, fingering through to the business section. “Did you read this morning’s paper?”

He had, but he claimed not to have. Nothing got past her.

She turned it over to below the fold. “Tell me about this.”

Boldt kept driving, eyes on the road.

“An adoption agency, an inner-city soccer program. Was I supposed to miss this?”

He adjusted the rearview mirror, still saying nothing.

“Six million dollars in anonymous donations between the two. How much longer until another eleven in similar donations makes the news?” She said, “You must have forced David to do it, because this isn’t like him.”

“We negotiated certain conditions to his receiving protection, it’s true. Testimony on Danny’s behalf is part of it. Danny wasn’t trying to make himself rich; he was trying to clear a case that no one else cared about. He went about it the wrong way, but Hayes overheard some important statements that Danny made-some, while beating him. Geiser will roll on Svengrad. It’ll come down like a house of cards.”