“You aren’t done,” Doran said. “Keep talking.”
After a moment, Gaglionci spoke again, but he kept his eyes shut.
“I went back to Jefferson and said I knew about his son, and now he’d be paying a lot more than the fifty. He went crazy. Said his son hadn’t killed the girl. He thought you were coming after him because he framed you, and going after his kid because he helped. But when he found out what you really thought . . . that you believed his son murdered the girl, it changed things. He told me he was going to the police, explain what had happened, give himself up for what he did. He wanted me to go back to you one more time, give you the fifty you wanted and tell you he was going in, that you’d be cleared. I said I didn’t like that idea . . . he went to the cops, cops would come for me.”
Gaglionci coughed, and although his eyes went wide with pain I didn’t see any blood in his mouth, no sign of critical internal injury. Doran gave him a few seconds, then lifted the gun and moved it back toward Gaglionci’s chest. That got him talking again.
“I told him I thought he was lying, that his son killed her, and he wouldn’t have spent so much money otherwise. He laughed, said it was never his money and that anything he gave me was pennies to the guy who killed her. I’d gone to see that girl’s family with Jefferson and Brooks’s father. I knew how rich he was. So I went to Paul Brooks.”
“Told him that Jefferson was talking about going to the police,” Doran said.
“It was a gamble. Worked out.”
“You killed Jefferson and got rich and still went after his wife for money. Wanted to turn your half million into three and a half. Let Perry deal with the cops.”
Gaglionci didn’t respond, just watched Doran. His wound wasn’t bleeding badly anymore, and Doran was right—I’d seen worse. Gaglionci wasn’t going to die tonight. Not from that, at least.
Doran stared at nothing, the gun in his hand. He sat that way for a while, and then he shook his head slightly and looked at Thor, making sure he was still just standing there, no weapon in view. When he stood, it was with the slow, unsteady motion of an old man who’d sat for too long. The gun barrel lifted off Gaglionci’s chest and came around to me. Doran used his free hand to toss me the handcuffs he’d removed from Amy’s ankles.
“Put those on him.”
I walked around Doran, knelt over Gaglionci, took his wrists, and fastened the cuffs. Gaglionci didn’t try to fight me, didn’t take his eyes off Doran.
“All right,” Doran said. “We’re going to take that van and get out of here. You drive, Perry. Me and my buddy here will ride.” He tapped Gaglionci with his foot.
“You go wherever you want with that piece of shit, but I’m not going along. I’m taking Amy out of here.”
“He’ll take her.” Doran nodded at Thor. “I got no problem with that. Walk her down to meet your partner, and then they can take her to the cops or the hospital or wherever the hell they want. But you and me, we got a trip to take.”
“Where?”
“To see Paul Brooks. I wasn’t kidding when I said I’d finish this tonight, and either you go with me now, or people start shooting again. I don’t know how that would turn out, but I do know your girl’s safe now. Be a shame to jeopardize that again so soon.”
Amy sat between them, right where the crossfire would be if anyone pulled a trigger. It wasn’t worth it to challenge him. Not now, when Amy was safe and the danger—at least here, in this spot, in this moment—was done.
“Get her out of here,” I said to Thor. “Get her someplace safe. I’ll go with him.”
42
There was an old van parked behind the trailer, set back on a dirt access path cut into the trees, screened from sight. Doran had keys for it. I drove down the gravel road, Doran in the seat beside me with a gun, everything just as it had been on our trip to the lake except for the addition of Gaglionci bleeding all over the backseat of the van. Doran sat with his back pressed against the door and the gun aimed at my head. We drove past the trailer down the rutted gravel road and came to a stop where Joe’s car was parked sideways, blocking the exit. Joe was not inside.
“Step forward and put your gun down,” Doran called loudly. He had both windows down, the gun pressed in the soft tissue under my chin. “I’ll count to five, and then your partner dies.”
There was a movement in the trees to the left, and Joe stepped forward. He hadn’t lowered his gun, but I was a hell of a lot more confident that he wouldn’t take the shot than I had been with Thor.
“Go on and holster it, Joe,” I said. The pressure from Doran’s gun under my jaw made it difficult to talk loud enough. “Amy’s safe. She’s in the trailer with Thor. Let us pass and then get her out of here. That’s what matters.”
Joe holstered his gun. His face was pale in the glow from the headlights, his thin gray hair damp and windblown.
“Get her out of here,” I repeated.
“I will.”
“Move the car,” Doran said. “Then go somewhere and wait. We’re almost done here, but don’t get stupid. Any cops show up behind us, your partner will die. That’s not just talk, Pritchard.”
Joe walked back to the Taurus and started the engine, backed it out of the way, and sat with the motor running while I drove us past. I looked in the rearview mirror as we pulled away and saw the taillights of the car moving toward the trailer where Thor and Amy waited. She was safe.
“Brooks still in the winery?” Doran said.
“I don’t know.”
“Don’t lie. He lives out there. I remember there was a house. Big, fancy-ass house. That’s where he lives, isn’t it?”
I didn’t answer.
“Your woman is fine,” Doran said. “You got that? You saw her, Perry. She’s fine, and you can thank me for that.”
“Thank you,” I said, and I was serious. Regardless of whether he held a gun on me now, he’d been ready for Gaglionci in a moment when I had not.
“Shooting Gaglionci was my pleasure, Perry. My absolute pleasure. I may well do it again before the end of the night.”
Behind us, Gaglionci was quiet. I could see his face when I looked in the mirror, though, the shine that showed his eyes were open and watching us. Even unarmed and injured, with handcuffs on, he still seemed like a threat.
“When you took off, I thought you were gone,” I told Doran. “Headed for the highway or something.”
He shook his head. “Only two buildings in that entire camp are still solid. The third cabin and the trailer. Once I figured out he wasn’t in the cabin, I knew they had to have moved to the trailer. It made more sense, being closest to the road and I knew he wouldn’t have left her alone.”
“Where’d you get the gun?”
“Inside the trailer. That’s where I’d been staying for the last few weeks. I knew where the gun was, but he didn’t.” Doran shifted in the seat and lowered the revolver. “Point is, your girl is safe now, so you can just relax, all right? Shit’s done, as far as you’re concerned. Me, I got a little left to handle. You just got lucky enough to go along for the show.” He cocked his head at me. “Jefferson’s kid—why’d he kill himself? If he wasn’t responsible, why’d he do that?”
There was regret in his voice, and it surprised me. I looked back at him for a moment, then away.
“You told him you were going to kill him, Doran. Torture him and kill him. I think he believed you.”
“Why let it come to that, though? Why not go to the cops, give Brooks up? If he’d done that . . .”
“Giving Brooks up would mean giving himself up, too. And his father. His father would have gone to jail. They might have been estranged, but I don’t think he was ready to do that. By the time he guessed that his father was already dead, I was standing in front of him, and he assumed you weren’t far away.”
