Linwood Barclay - Parting Shot

Maureen lowered her menu. “What are you talking about?”

“Him and his new girlfriend. They were in that booth over there, checking out each other’s tonsils.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“How’d you even know that?”

He explained how he had, by chance, come to see Trevor and Carol Beakman on the surveillance video.

“I wasn’t looking for them. I was looking for something else and there they were.”

She eyed him suspiciously. She was about to ask him something when Axel suddenly appeared at the table.

“Hey, Detective, how’s it going?”

Duckworth introduced the man to Maureen.

“Dinner’s on the house,” Axel said.

Duckworth smiled. “I’m afraid I can’t accept. Goes against the rules. But I do have a favor.”

“Shoot.”

Duckworth told him what it was. Axel said it would take him a few minutes, and would return when he had things ready.

“And I’ll get some of those double-breaded jumbo wings,” Duckworth said.

Axel looked at Maureen. “Garden salad,” she said. “Oil and vinegar dressing.” She paused. “And an order of potato skins with extra sour cream.”

Axel nodded and slipped away.

“You had me worried for a second there,” Duckworth said.

“I’m having one of your wings, too.”

“I’ll have one of your potato skins.”

“I thought I’d share my salad with you instead.”

He rested his back against the seat and sighed. “Like I said, I’m sorry about earlier.”

She took in a long breath through her nose.

“What? I know that look. There’s something on your mind.”

Maureen sighed. “I don’t know how good things are between him and this Carol girl, anyway.”

“Why do you say that?”

“I heard him talking to her. On the phone. When I went upstairs to get ready.”

“Okay.”

“He sounded angry with her. I think it may have had something to do with you, but there was something else.”

“Like what?”

“Something she wanted to do, but he wasn’t that keen on her doing it.”

“You don’t know what it was?”

She shook her head.

“So, you’re an eavesdropper.”

Maureen nodded.

Duckworth grinned. “Nothing wrong with that. But you know what? Whatever it is that’s going on between them, it’s their problem, not ours.”

“I know.”

“Things’ll work out. I mean, I didn’t even know about her until today, so if they’re on the skids, it’s not like it was some long-term relationship.”

“I just want him to be happy.”

Axel brought their drinks. “I got it all set up for you. Your food’s going to be a few more minutes, if you want to take a quick look now.”

Duckworth said to Maureen, “I’ll be right back.”

He followed Axel to the office he’d been in earlier in the day. The bartender had brought up the security video from two nights ago on the computer screen.

“What was it you wanted to see?” Axel asked.

“The man who was already at the bar when Brian Gaffney came in. The one I thought was him.”

“Oh yeah, this guy,” Axel said, pointing to the screen. “The one I asked for ID.”

“At a glance,” Duckworth said, “you could almost mistake one for the other. I mean, they’re not twins, but they’re wearing much the same clothing. Same build, hair color, et cetera.”

“Yup.”

“Speed it up again?”

Axel advanced the video. When it reached the point where Brian Gaffney got up to leave, Duckworth had Axel slow it down.

“So there he goes.” Soon after that, Trevor and Carol slid out of their booth and left too.

The man with a passing resemblance to Brian was still at the bar, looking most of the time at his phone, as though playing a game.

“Speed it up again.”

The video advanced. Duckworth asked Axel to slow it down when the man got off the bar stool and started heading for the door.

He noted that the time was 9:43. Eleven minutes after Gaffney had left.

The man was passing by a table of four men sharing a pitcher when one of them suddenly grabbed his arm, pointed and said something.

“What’s going on there?” Duckworth asked.

“Yeah, I remember that. They were giving him a hard time for a few seconds on his way out.”

“He do something to piss them off?”

“Not that I saw. But one of these guys, he yells at him, ‘Hey, you, big baby.’ Or something like that.”

Duckworth nodded slowly, getting as good a look as he could at the man. “I’ll be damned.”

“You recognize him?” Axel asked.

Duckworth just smiled. “Thanks for your help. This is better than a hundred free drinks.”

He returned to the table, where Maureen was taking a sip of her wine.

“Some guy tried to pick me up while you were gone,” she said as he settled back into the seat.

“You’re kidding,” he said.

“That’s the wrong answer,” she told him.

“Who was it?”

“That one over there, at the pool table, about to take a shot. Not bad looking for someone who’s seeing seventy in the rear-view mirror.”

“I suppose I’ll have to shoot him,” Duckworth said. The waitress arrived with their food. “But I’ll eat first.”

“Good God,” Maureen said, looking at the pile of wings on her husband’s plate. “I might as well just call the ambulance now.”

He picked up a wing, bit into it. “I think they got the wrong guy.”

“What?”

“They didn’t want Brian. They wanted the Big Baby.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Maureen said.

I couldn’t see us making Manhattan that night. But I didn’t want Jeremy to spend the night at my apartment, in case there were people who already knew we were here. The black van I’d seen out front had rattled me. It might or might not have anything to do with the brick that got thrown through the front window of Madeline Plimpton’s house. It had not been a black van I’d seen speeding away from her place.

I grabbed my bag, and the cooler, which we had packed with the sandwiches and a few other snacks, and headed down to the street. I locked up my place, dumped the stuff into the car, and told Jeremy to get in. There was something else I had to do first.

I got down on my knees and, with a flashlight I took from the glove box, inspected the undercarriage of the car. Then I felt inside the wheel wells, patting my hand on the insides of the fenders. Finally, I gave the bumpers a good going-over.

“What was that about?” Jeremy asked when I got in behind the wheel.

“One time,” I said, “somebody attached a tracker to my car. In fact, not one, but two.”

“Whoa,” Jeremy said. “Cool.”

I glanced over at him. “No, it wasn’t. I got someone killed.”

“Oh, shit. When was this?”

“Four years ago.”

“What happened?”

I ignored the question.

I got us out of Promise Falls and went south on 87 toward Albany. The plan was to get around the capital, then continue on in the same direction toward New York. We dug into the cooler and killed off all the sandwiches in the first hour. Jeremy didn’t have much to say, and I didn’t feel all that much like talking.

We were about to pass the exit to the Mass Pike, around Selkirk, when Jeremy suddenly said, “Can we get off at the next exit?”

“What for?”

“It’s right here. Get off! Get off!”

I hit the blinker and took the exit. “What’s going on?” I asked.

“When you get to the end of the ramp, take a right,” he said.

“What I’m gonna do is pull over until you tell me why you made me get off the thruway.”

He seemed to need a few seconds before he could work up the nerve to tell me.