Rutledge spoke up for the first time. “I sent the tape to the BCA lab in Bemidji this morning to see if there’s something we can get from fibers or anything else the roll of tape might have come into contact with before it was used for the murders.”
Larson said, “Me, I don’t like either of the Reinhardts for this. Too brutal. And stupid. Buck’s a lot of things, but stupid’s not one of them. And he’d have to know that the Red Boyz wouldn’t let something like that go unanswered. It’s no wonder he’s carrying these days.”
“So who’s at the top of your list, Ed?”
“Seems to me this has all the earmarks of a drug hit. I spoke with Gordon Wingaard, our DEA guy down in the Cities, on the phone a little while ago. He’s inclined to believe the same thing.”
“Who did the hit?”
“Some things we know. Some things we can only speculate about. This is what we know. In California, Kingbird became a member of the Latin Lords, a gang with strong ties to the cartels across the border. The Latin Lords are a big part of the Mexican pipeline that funnels drugs to the Midwest. DEA has been aware for some time that the Lords have been using reservations as depots. Sovereign territory, for one thing. And on the reservation, so much gets tied up with family connections that people don’t talk to the law. DEA has had an eye on the Red Boyz, hoping to intercept shipments, but they haven’t been able to come up with anything, probably because the Red Boyz know ways on and off the reservation that none of the rest of us do.”
“That’s the speculation part?” Cork asked.
“DEA also speculates that the Red Boyz have been able to thin the ranks of the competition in the North Country through a disciplined campaign of intimidation.”
“And so this might be the competition fighting back?”
“DEA certainly likes that possibility. They’re talking to people they know, and they’ve promised to keep us in the loop.”
Cork studied his loose sign a moment, looked up at the thick cloud cover, then dropped his gaze back to the men below. “I don’t want to complicate your speculation, but there’s another possibility I think you ought to consider.”
“Yeah?” Larson said. “What’s that?”
“Lonnie Thunder.”
“I’m listening.”
“According to Meloux, Thunder was running scared after Kristi’s death. Kingbird took him to see Henry, hoping Meloux could help him find some courage.”
“Like the Wizard of Oz,” Rutledge threw in.
“Only Thunder didn’t stick around long enough for the wizard to give him anything. I’m thinking that if Thunder was in a panic and afraid Kingbird was going to turn him in, he might have been desperate enough for what happened out there.”
Rutledge nodded as if he liked the idea. “Which makes it even more incumbent upon us to find him.”
“Yeah, well, good luck.”
“The sheriff’s a little ticked at you, Cork,” Rutledge said. “She feels like you deserted her. Me, I think I can understand. Must be tough.”
“What’s that?”
“Being in the middle. Not the law, but not quite quit of it either. Situation like this Kingbird incident, with your Ojibwe friends on one side and a lot of your white friends on the other. Easier, I’m sure, just to step away and let go of any investment in the outcome. Still…” He shook his head in a troubled way. “I’d guess that’s hard to do when you’re watching it all play out in your own backyard.” He started to turn, as if to head back to the cruiser, but offered what seemed to be a sincere afterthought. “Listen, would you like us to keep you apprised of our investigation?”
Cork said, “No.”
“All right then.” Rutledge walked away.
“Take ’er easy, Cork.” Larson joined the BCA agent at the cruiser.
Cork watched them drive off under the gray overcast that had threatened rain all day but had not delivered. He turned back to his work, picked up his hammer, and pounded the next nail as if it was all that held the world together.
EIGHTEEN
T hat night Cork was responsible for dinner. The schedule of meals they’d all worked out for the week called for spaghetti and tossed salad. The spaghetti sauce was Prego. The salad came in a bag. This was a meal Cork could handle.
Shortly before five, Jo called to say she would be late. Opposing counsel in a trust dispute wanted to meet to discuss a settlement. Annie called a few minutes later from school to say that she and Cara Haines were going directly from softball practice to the Pinewood Broiler. Cork knew there’d been some kind of falling out between the two friends and was glad they were patching things up. He and Stevie ended up eating dinner on television trays while they watched a rerun of The Simpsons.
“What do you say we head over to the Broiler for a little apple pie a la mode?” Cork suggested.
“Or French silk,” Stevie said, and his eyes danced with delight at the prospect.
They were halfway to the Broiler when Cork’s cell phone rang. He pulled it from the pocket of his jacket and glanced at the ID. A pay phone.
“O’Connor,” he answered.
There was a lot of static on the line, and Cork could barely hear the voice at the other end. “Cork, this is Oly Johnson. Got a call there’s a fire at Sam’s Place. We’re on our way. Better get your ass over there, too.”
Oly Johnson was the fire chief in Aurora.
The line went dead. Cork slapped his cell phone closed, tossed it to Stevie in the backseat, and hit the accelerator.
“What is it, Dad?” Stevie asked in a frightened voice.
“Fire at Sam’s Place,” Cork replied.
Cork sped through Aurora. At Second Street, he took the corner too fast and wide and barely missed hitting a pickup in the oncoming lane. He took the turnoff to Sam’s Place too quickly and the Bronco drifted on the gravel road. He brought it around and shot toward the Burlington Northern tracks. He sailed over the raised track bed and pulled into the unpaved parking lot. The old Quonset hut stood solid and silent, looking no different than it had when Cork left that afternoon.
“Where’s the fire, Dad?” Stevie asked.
Cork turned off the engine. “Hand me the flashlight in my toolbox back there.”
Stevie unbuckled and rummaged around in the toolbox behind him, then passed the flashlight to his father.
“Wait here,” Cork said. “And make sure your door’s locked.”
He got out of the Bronco and circled Sam’s Place slowly, poking the beam here and there. Back at the Quonset hut door that faced the parking lot, he inserted his key in the lock and swung the door open. The dark inside was both familiar and unsettling. In the silence there, he realized he didn’t hear any sirens coming his way. He considered the call from Oly Johnson, and understood that, of course, there was something incredibly not right about it coming from a pay phone. In his panic over the destruction of Sam’s Place, he’d let himself be fooled. Hoax? he wondered. Warning? In the second before he heard the shot, he thought, Ambush.
The chunk of the round hitting the side of the Quonset hut came almost simultaneously with the rifle report. Cork spun into the cover inside Sam’s Place. Another report and another round hit the wall outside, penetrated, and struck the cupboard over the sink. This time Cork was able to tell the direction from which the shot had come. A hundred yards south was a stand of poplars that surrounded the ruins of an old ironworks. It was good cover, and with a nightscope anyone who was a decent shot could bring down a target wandering in the parking lot.
“Dad!”
