Sandra Brown - Smoke Screen

“I’ve done crazier things lately,” she said, pushing open the passenger-side door. “Ever since you kidnapped me, the rules of standard and sane behavior have ceased to apply.”

They went up to the front door, and Britt rang the bell. They waited, but a minute passed and no one came to answer. “Sound sleeper,” Raley said. “Or else he’s inside with his service revolver trained on us while he’s calling in backup. But somehow that image doesn’t jibe with the man I saw yesterday. He’s no Dirty Harry.”

Britt tilted her head to one side as though listening. “Do you hear that? Water running?”

She followed the sound to the corner of the house, then along the side of it toward the back. Walking behind her, Raley glanced over his shoulder to see if anyone on this placid, tree-lined street had a bead on his broad back. If there was a sniper, he didn’t see him. But then he wouldn’t, would he?

He wondered what Butch and Sundance were doing right now. Searching his cabin again for something they might have missed yesterday? Had they been dispatched first thing this morning to return and eliminate the dual problem of Raley Gannon and Britt Shelley? Finding the cabin abandoned, were they now scouring the city, checking hotels and motels for recent check-ins that fit his and Britt’s descriptions? Or were they just laying low, waiting for him and Britt to pop up again? Whatever, he felt certain the pair hadn’t been pulled off the job, and they wouldn’t be until it was finished.

So his paranoia wasn’t an overreaction. It wasn’t silly. He would continue to watch his back.

Pat Jr. kept a neat backyard. There was a sandbox and a swing set, but also a lawn of lush Saint Augustine grass and pretty flower beds. Using a hose and nozzle, Pat Jr. was watering a bed of red flowers with waxy green foliage. His back was to them, and he didn’t hear their approach.

To announce them, Britt said, “Those are beautiful begonias. They must be the hybrid that likes sun.”

Pat Jr. was so shocked to see them, he dropped the nozzle. The water pressure caused it to flip and roll, spraying wildly until he recovered his wits enough to rush to the faucet at the foundation of the house and turn it off. He was dressed in civilian clothes. A badge was clipped to his belt, but Raley noted that he wasn’t armed.

His eyes darted back and forth between him and Britt. To her he said, “You’re wanted for murder.”

“I didn’t kill Jay Burgess.”

“Clark and Javier think you did.”

“They’re wrong.”

He looked at Raley. “What are you doing with her?”

“We want to ask you some questions.”

“About what?”

The suburban backyard was as peaceful and benign a setting as could be, but Raley still felt exposed. “Inside.”

Pat Jr., who should have been reading Britt her rights, looked ready to bolt and run, or wet himself, or be sick on the begonias, but after a long hesitation, he nodded and led them toward a screened back porch. He went in ahead of them, something no savvy cop would do.

The porch was casually furnished. Britt chose a wicker chair, Raley took the matching settee, and Pat Jr. remained standing. “I can’t let you leave here. You know that.”

Under other circumstances, his aggressive posturing would have been comical. Raley certainly didn’t quail from it. “Is anybody else here?”

Pat Jr. shook his head. “My wife volunteers two days a week at the hospital. She drops the kids off at her mother’s. Did you plan to hold us hostage?”

It was such a ludicrous notion, Britt didn’t even honor it with a reply. “The last time I saw you, your wife was expecting.”

“With our son. We’ve had a girl since then. They came close together. Just a little over a year apart.”

“Belated congratulations,” she said.

The man seemed to mistrust her politeness. Nervously, he licked his misshapen lips, calling attention to them. His mouth and jaw were out of kilter. His mouth stretched toward the left side of his face, his jaw stretched toward the right. His nose, too, was off center and crooked. Raley wondered about the nature of the accident that had rearranged his face and couldn’t help but compare the young man with his late father.

Pat Sr. had been average looking, tall and slender, not brawny, but certainly beefier than his son. Until the morning that he’d woken up with Suzi Monroe beside him, Raley had known Pat Sr. only through Jay. Their paths had crossed a few times, always in Jay’s company, and always socially. He’d seemed a nice enough guy. He wasn’t gregarious, but no one was when around Jay, who was always the center of attention. In his company, no one else was allowed to shine. But Pat Sr. wouldn’t have shone anyway. He came across as reserved, serious, a man who could intimidate with his stoicism.

Raley saw nothing resembling Pat Sr. in his son, and the differences between them went beyond the physical. Pat Jr. possessed none of his father’s stolidness. He was unsettled. Sweat beaded on his upper lip, and he couldn’t keep his eyes focused on any one spot for too long.

Despite these giveaways to his nervousness, he made another futile stab at seeming courageous. Addressing Raley, he blurted, “You left town in disgrace. Why’d you come back?”

“So you did recognize me yesterday at Jay’s funeral.”

“Of course.”

“Why didn’t you come over, say hi? Was it because you remember the circumstances of my getting fired and leaving town?”

Pat Jr. wet his lips again. “I remember my dad talking about it.”

“Oh, yeah? What did he say about it?”

“I…I don’t remember details. Just that you were involved in some sort of sex scandal and a girl wound up dead.” He looked at Britt. “Are you in cahoots with him now? I could have the whole police department here in under two minutes, you know.”

Britt didn’t even blink. Raley actually smiled. Rather than following through with what was so obviously an idle threat, Pat Jr. looked nearer to crying. “Whatever it is the two of you are doing, you’re going to get caught.”

“What do you think we’re doing?” Raley asked calmly.

“Evading capture.”

“I’m not wanted.”

“She is!” he said, his voice cracking. “You’re aiding and-”

“Abetting. I know. Sit down.” Raley put menace behind the order and the other man crumpled. He dropped into the chair behind him, again looking like he might throw up. Raley was afraid he would have a heart attack before he could ask him the important questions, so he started with something easy. “I didn’t see your mother yesterday at the funeral.”

“She’s in a…a facility. Alzheimer’s.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Britt said.

“Me, too,” Raley said.

“At first I thought her symptoms were part of the grieving process, you know, after Dad was killed, but she just kept getting worse. Couldn’t trust her to be alone anymore. She’s been there two years.”

“It must have been a terrible blow to her.”

Pat Jr. looked over at Britt. “What?”

“Your father’s death.”

“Oh. It was. Terrible for all of us.”

“Refresh my memory of how it happened,” Raley said.

“It’s painful. I don’t like to talk about it.”

Raley just stared back at him unsympathetically.

Reluctantly, Pat Jr. complied. “Dad was off duty. He’d gone to the supermarket for Mom. On his way back, he saw some guys fighting in an alley. He used his cell phone and called it in, said the officers on that beat should come check it out.” He raised his narrow shoulders and released a sigh through his twisted mouth.

“We can only speculate what happened after that. The best guess is that the fight turned violent quickly and Dad was afraid somebody was going to get hurt before the patrol officers could get there. In any case, he left his car and went into the alley.”