Spell Blind

CHAPTER 18

True to his word, the cop from narcotics called Kona. And she did the rest, just as I’d known she would.

In this case, doing the rest meant placing a call to Mateo Fuentes, in the public defender’s office. Mateo had been working in the P.D. office for several years now, and I can tell you as a former cop that I hated it when Mateo worked one of my cases. The guy was tenacious, brilliant, articulate, and sneaky as hell. In other words, he was the perfect trial lawyer. He could have made a mint in private practice, but he never went that route. Don’t get me wrong: public defenders are, as a rule, good people and they tend to be good lawyers-competent if not spectacular. But generally speaking, the shining stars in the P.D. office can find better jobs with the D.A. or in private practice. Public defense is crap work. At least half the time the lawyers there find themselves defending people they know or suspect are guilty. The pay is low compared with what most lawyers make, and the hours are nothing special.

Most guys with Mateo’s talent would have been out of there years ago. But Mateo was a believer. He felt that he owed something to the community, and he was convinced that poor Latinos often didn’t get a fair shake from the legal system. Hell, I couldn’t argue the point. So he pulled in a modest salary, he drove a Ford compact instead of a BMW sedan, and he fought for the legal rights of the folks in his community.

Despite the fact that he had shredded me in court a couple of times, and had managed to spring at least two guys who I know to this day were guilty, I liked Mateo a lot. And seeing as I was now in jail, I wanted him in my corner.

He was there at the door to my holding cell at seven a.m. sharp, his suit rumpled, but a great big smile on his face.

“Fearsson,” he said. “Got yourself in a mess, didn’t you?”

It’s testament to how tired I was that I’d been lying on a stainless steel pallet and he still woke me from a sound sleep.

“Hey, Mateo,” I said. “Still eating tamales, I see.”

Mateo was a big guy. Not tall, mind you. Just big. The buttons on his dress shirts always seemed to be straining to the breaking point, and he walked with a bit of a waddle. I would have guessed that he was only a couple of years older than me-maybe in his mid-thirties-but I already worried that one of these days he was going to drop dead of a heart attack.

“Not true,” he said, as the guard unlocked the door to my cell. “My wife has me on one of these no-fat, no-carb, no-protein diets.”

I laughed and frowned at the same time. “It can’t be all of those. That leaves nothing, but water.”

He shrugged and made a face. “That’s how it seems most of the time. Grab your coat. You’re outta here.”

I sat up, wincing as I did. My entire body hurt, though whether from the attack at Robo’s or from sleeping on a metal bed I couldn’t say for certain. “You posted my bond?”

“No bond. No evidence, no real cause, no case. No more jail.”

I stood and grabbed my coat. “Really?”

“Yeah.” We started walking. “I said something about the Constitution and they got all panicky. Decided they’d be better off letting you go.”

“Mateo-”

He stopped, turned to face me. “The only charge that had any legs at all was aggravated burglary. You went into the dead guy’s house, and you were carrying a weapon. Given that you knew the guy, given that you found the door unlocked at that hour, given that Kona was willing to vouch for you, it took me about ten seconds to get that reduced to trespassing, at which point they decided you really weren’t worth their time.”

I patted his shoulder. “You’re a good man.”

We walked on, following the corridor toward the front of the building.

“You’re not supposed to use the P.D.’s office for stuff like this, Jay,” he said. “I sprung you for old-time’s sake, and because it was Kona who called me. But I have more important cases to deal with, and the office is pretty strapped right now.”

“How about I pay you for your time then? Or rather,” I said, knowing what he’d say to that, “how about if I pay the office?”

“You’ve got your own business now, don’t you? Private investigations?”

“Yeah.”

“How about you do some pro bono work for us? I don’t have anything in mind right now. But in the future.”

I stopped again and held out my hand. “Anytime,” I said. “And every time. You understand?”

He shook my hand and grinned. “In that case, you can get your ass hauled off to jail whenever you like.”

The jail seemed pretty well lit, but when I stepped outside, I had to shield my eyes from the sun and squint until they were almost closed. I remember as a kid visiting the mountains north of Flagstaff after a winter storm, and the sun on the fresh snow was the same way: so bright that it hurt. The only difference was, on this day it already had to be ninety degrees. I couldn’t remember another spring as hot as this one.

When my eyes finally began to adjust, I saw Kona standing across the parking lot with her back to the building. She was talking to someone, and I started toward her.

“I’m parked over here,” Mateo said, gesturing toward one of the side streets. He held out his hand again. “Stay out of trouble, all right?”

I shook his hand and grinned. “Thanks again, Mateo. I owe you.”

“Buy me dinner, then. Just me, don’t invite my wife. I want to be able to eat something.”

“You got it.”

I started walking toward Kona, knowing that I owed her, too. When I was about halfway to her, she turned to face me, and I saw that she was talking to Billie. I slowed.

Kona laughed at my expression. What choice did I have? I walked the rest of the way to them.

“Hey, partner,” Kona said, still laughing. “I called Billie for you.”

“I see that.”

“I figured you’d need a ride back to your car, and believe it or not, I have more important things to do with my day.”

“And Ms. Castle doesn’t?”

Billie smiled; she was enjoying this. Who knew that giving me a hard time had become too big a job for one person?

“Sounds like you had a long night,” Kona said a moment later, her expression growing serious.

“Even more than you know.”

“Billie told me about the club. And I heard that you called the ambulance to Q’s place. Plus Robby. That about cover it?”

“Not quite.”

Kona’s eyebrows went up. “Tell me.”

“We off the record? I don’t need any more trouble with the PPD today.”

She hesitated, then nodded.

“You working another homicide from Mountain View? In the 733?”

She narrowed her eyes. “Yeah, now that you mention it. Antoine Mirdoux, right?” She pronounced his last name like “Murduchs”.

“Actually, it’s Mirdoux,” I said, using the French pronunciation. “Antoine was Creole.”

She nodded. “Should have known that.”

“Anyway, I made the 911 call from his place.”

“What were you doin’ there?”

“I talked to Antoine a few days ago, same day I went to see Orestes. Q thought he had some connection to our guy. Turns out he was right. The guy who killed Robby also killed Antoine, and nearly took out Q.”

“Robby died of an overdose.”

I shook my head. “No, he didn’t. There was. .” My eyes flicked toward Billie. “I saw that color on him, too.”

“Damn it,” she said. “So, you’re telling me I now have three murders that I have to explain to Hibbard and Arroyo?”

“Afraid so. What’s happening on your end?”

“Not a whole lot,” she said. “I did learn a bit more about Shari Bettancourt.”

“Let me guess. She did some kind of community or charity work. Something that involved working with troubled kids.”

Kona’s jaw dropped. “How the hell did you know that? She’d been working at the free drug clinic in South Mountain for five years.”

I nodded. “That figures.”

“How?”

“I think that Antoine and Shari, and even Robby Sommer, have been helping our guy pick his targets. Or maybe he’s been watching them for potential victims. But it’s no coincidence that they’re all dead.”

“Damn. You’ve learned more in five days that we did in the last three years.”

“Yeah,” I said. “Well, don’t get all happy just yet. If he’s killing them off, that might mean that he doesn’t need them anymore.”

“You mean he might be done killing?”

I shook my head. “I doubt that. But I think he’s been trying to. .” I broke off, eyeing Billie once more. “I think he’s had a specific purpose in mind all along, and if he doesn’t need them anymore, that might mean he’s succeeded. And that can’t be good.”

“No, I guess not.”

“We have to find this guy, Kona.”

“Sounds like you’re well on your way to doing that.”

“Yeah, if he doesn’t kill me first. He nearly had me last night. I’m lucky I’m not lying in the OME with Robby and Antoine.”

“How’d you fight him off?” Kona asked.

“I had help.”

That took her a minute. Her eyes lit up. “You mean. .? He helped you?”

“First time for everything, right? He’s taking this seriously.”

Kona exhaled through pursed lips. “I guess.”

“Hey!” I said, alarm bells going off in my head. I looked from Billie to Kona. “Did you make sure you were off the record before you started talking to her?”

Before Kona could answer, Billie scowled at me. “That’s not fair, Fearsson!”

“No, it’s not,” Kona added. “She told me we were off the record.”

I winced, then rubbed a hand over my brow. “I’m sorry, Billie. I had a long night.”

Her expression didn’t change, but after a few seconds she nodded.

Kona took my arm and led me a few steps away from Billie. “Listen,” she said. “Along those lines, she was asking me some questions while we were waiting for you.”

“What kind of questions?”

“She wanted to know if you’d ever spoken to me about magic.”

Not surprising. “What did you tell her?”

“Well, I wasn’t sure what to say. So I told her that you had, but that you were subject to occasional psychotic episodes, and you’d probably have forgotten all about it by now.”

I stared at her. After a minute she started to laugh, as did Billie.

“What did you tell her, Kona?”

“She told me that you had,” Billie said, walking over to us. “And she said that as weird as it sounded to her at first, she’d come to believe you.” She shrugged. “So I’m wondering if I shouldn’t do the same thing. I haven’t made up my mind yet, but that’s how I’m leaning.”

“I like this one, Justis. Don’t screw it up.”

I had to laugh. “Thanks for the advice.”

“I gotta go,” Kona said. “You look terrible. Get some sleep, all right?”

“Yeah, I’ll try.”

We held each other’s gazes for a few seconds. “I’ll swing by your place after my shift ends,” she said. An old ritual tied to the phasings.

“Thanks. See you then.”

Kona smiled at Billie. “Nice to meet you.”

“You, too.”

Billie and I faced each other. After a few awkward seconds, Billie said, “She’s great.”

I nodded. “She was a good partner. Listen, I’m sorry about what I said. I was out of line.”

She shrugged. “You had a rough night.”

“Not that rough. I should have known better.”

“Come on,” she said. “Let’s get you out of here. I know you miss being a cop, and hanging out around the city jail probably isn’t the best cure for that.”

Smart woman.

We started walking to Billie’s car, which was parked in a municipal lot nearby.

“You missing work on account of me?” I asked.

“No. I wrote something last night that I scheduled to post this afternoon. I have the day free.”

“Lucky for me, huh?”

“How are you feeling?”

“Tired mostly. A little sore from last night.”

“Well, Kona’s right. You should get some sleep.”

We reached her car, got in, and she drove me to Tempe. My car was still there outside Robby Sommer’s house. The place was deserted, but the police had left a strip of yellow crime-scene tape across his front door. Billie stared at it now; I could tell she was troubled.

“Who was he?” she asked.

“A drug dealer. He was also Claudia Deegan’s boyfriend for a short while.”

She nodded, shuddered. “How do you get used to this?”

“Who says I’m used to it?”

She turned to me. “Sorry. I just thought. . I don’t know. You don’t seem upset.”

“I’m not sure it’s the same thing. I’m not going to mourn the loss of Robby Sommer. I don’t think the world’s that worse off without him. But you never get used to seeing people die, and I have every intention of finding the guy who killed him.”

“You think it’s the same person who killed Claudia? You think the Blind Angel Killer did it?”

I hesitated, but only for a second. “Yes. And I think he nearly killed me.”

“Did he. .?” She pointed at Robby’s house. “Was this person killed. .?”

“With magic?”

She nodded again.

“Yeah, I’m sure he was.”

“This is getting weirder and weirder.”

“Yes, it is. You know, I really need to get out of the city for a little while, to clear my head. You want to come with me.”

“You need to sleep.”

I shook my head. “I can’t. I slept a little in the jail, and. . I’ll sleep tonight.” That was a lie, but the rest was true.

Concern creased her forehead. “You’re tired.”

“The desert will help. It always does.”

Billie continued to gaze at me for a few seconds more. Then she surprised me. “All right.”

I smiled. “Good. I need to stop at my office first, then we can drive back out to the monument if you like.”

She shook her head. “No, I want to meet your father.”

That was the last thing I’d expected her to say. “My father? Billie, that’s. . I usually go to his place on Tuesdays.”

“So this week you’ll see him twice.”

I let out a breathless laugh, shook my head, frowned. Boy, she’d caught me off guard. It had been years since I’d taken anyone out to my dad’s place. Kona had come with me once, several years ago, and that had gone well. But still, taking Billie to meet him seemed. . risky in some way.

“What I told you last night was true,” I said. “He has these episodes. There’s no telling what state he’ll be in when we get there.”

“Is he dangerous?”

“Of course not,” I said without hesitation.

She shrugged. “Then I’ll deal with it.”

I didn’t know her very well, yet. But I could tell when she had made up her mind.

“All right,” I said, getting out of the car. “I need to stop by my office first. Follow me?”

We parked around the corner from the office and I led Billie inside.

“Wow, Fearsson,” she said, turning a slow circle in the middle of the room. “I’m impressed.”

Wood floors and a fancy coffee machine will do that, I guess.

I keep a fresh set of clothes at the office, just in case. I grabbed these now, and changed in the bathroom. Then I checked the answering machine. I had only two calls-the first was from an insurance company I’d worked for the month before. I’d quit because they were trying to deny a claim I’d told them to pay. Now they were threatening legal action if I didn’t resume work on the case.

I glanced at Billie, and she grimaced.

“You get a lot of messages like that?” she asked.

“Not too many,” I said. I erased that one and played the next.

“Fearsson?” said a voice on the machine, sounding young and scared. “You there, dog? I know we said eleven, but. . but we gotta do it sooner. I’m in trouble here, man. Real trouble. I’ll be at my place. Come as you soon as you can.”

“Who was that?” Billie asked.

“That was Antoine Mirdoux.”

“Mirdoux,” she said, her forehead creasing. “You mentioned him to Kona. Isn’t he-?”

“He’s dead. He was killed last night.”

I checked the time on the message. It had come in right around the time I was talking to Kenny Moore in Robo’s. I wondered again if Antoine had been trying to set me up, if maybe Red had been trying to lure me into Mountain View and had only resorted to attacking me in the bar when that didn’t work. Had he killed Antoine because the kid had failed him? Had he been so angry after failing to kill me that he took it out on ’Toine?

“What’s going on in there, Fearsson?”

“What?” I blinked. “In where?”

She walked over and stopped in front of me. Then she tapped my temple gently with her index finger. “That head of yours. I can see it churning away.”

I was about to tell her that it was nothing important, but that wasn’t true, and I’d had to lie to her too many times already. I didn’t want to now.

“I’m wondering if Antoine is dead because of me, because I survived the attack at Robo’s.”

“Do you think that’s possible?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. My mind’s muddled.” I almost said something about the phasing starting that night, but I stopped myself in time. “I’m working things out,” I told her instead.

She nodded, then took my hand and pulled me toward the door. “Well,” she said. “Maybe you should do that somewhere else.”

“Why?”

“Because if you’re right, then this guy is still after you, and I don’t want to be here when he tracks you down.”

I planted my feet, forcing her to stop. “Aren’t you the one who accused me of being paranoid?”

“Yes. But I was also the one who didn’t believe in magic.”

“And you do now?”

Billie gazed at me a moment. Then she dropped my hand and clapped three times.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“Come on, Fearsson. ‘If you believe in magic, clap your hands’?” She shook her head. “Didn’t you ever see Peter Pan?”

“A really long time ago.”

“You’re hopeless.” She took my hand again and dragged me out the door.