ransom his company car.
“And just think how he’ll feel when he reads that we’ve crushed a criminal conspiracy that reaches into the highest levels of Santa Barbara society,” Shawn said triumphantly. “We may even take out some of his neighbors.”
Gus wasn’t sure that people in Steele’s economic bracket actually had neighbors, except in the way astronomers discuss neighboring galaxies. But that didn’t seem as important as the other question banging against his skull. “What conspiracy is that?”
“The phony impound man,” Shawn said. “We know he’s a criminal. We know he’s hiding something.”
“That doesn’t mean there’s a conspiracy reaching into the highest levels of Santa Barbara society,” Gus said. “Maybe he’s a loner. Or maybe his partners are even lower down than he is.”
“You can’t have the ultimate bad guy being some poor schmuck,” Shawn said. “Your really good villains are the wealthy elite.”
“You were watching another Law and Order marathon when I was unconscious, weren’t you?”
“That has nothing to do with it,” Shawn said. “You want your hero to go up against the entrenched power structure, a lone knight in dented armor tilting at the windmills of wealth and influence in what’s supposed to be a class-free America.”
“Didn’t we just free the widow of a multimillionaire by scamming a confession out of a woman wearing Wal-Mart’s bargain line?”
“Is that a trick question?”
Gus was spared answering by the arrival of a nurse, who shooed Shawn and Tara out of the room. After a moment she was joined by a doctor, who gave Gus a quick once-over and approved his release. Gus spent the next fifteen minutes filling out insurance paperwork and the following forty-five coaxing his fingers into bending sufficiently to button his shirt. At least it was a fresh shirt. Sometime in the night Shawn must have stopped by Gus’ place and picked up a change of clothes for him.
When an orderly wheeled him to the hospital’s front door, Shawn and Tara were waiting by her red Mercedes. They kept waiting as he made his way across the sidewalk. Each step was an agonizing ordeal, as he forced stiffened and bruised muscles to contract and relax. After what felt like another hour, he made it over to them.
“Tara’s offered to take you home, bud,” Shawn said.
“It’s the least I can do. If there’s anything else, please let me know.”
“Thanks, but you don’t have to,” Gus said. “You’ve already done so much.”
“Anyone would have done the same thing.”
“For a complete stranger? I don’t think so.”
“Well, we’re not strangers anymore,” Tara said. “I’d like you to think of me as your friend.”
“Works for me,” Shawn said.
“In that case, there is one thing I’d like to do before I go home,” Gus said, gritting his teeth against the pain. “If you wouldn’t mind driving back up that hill, I want to see the man who really is responsible. And put an end to his criminal enterprise, no matter how high or low it reaches.”
Shawn looked like he was going to argue; then he relaxed into a grin. He turned to Tara. “Do you mind making one quick stop?”
Gus sprawled out across the red leather of the backseat as Tara piloted them back to where she’d first seen him. Normally he would have used the travel time to work out an action plan with Shawn. But no matter how helpful Tara was being, it didn’t feel right to discuss their process in front of her. So Gus used the trip to experience every minor bump in the road as a wave of pain coursed through his entire body.
Which turned out to be just as beneficial a use of time as planning would have been. Because when the Mercedes pulled up across the street from the impound office, he heard Shawn mutter a confused expletive. Pulling himself up in the seat, Gus looked out the window.
The area in front of the shack was surrounded by police cars. Uniformed officers and plainclothes detectives stood outside the front door. Two EMTs loitered by their open, empty ambulance.
“What’s going on?” Gus said.
Shawn surveyed the scene. “I’d say you’re not the only victim of the criminal conspiracy. Looks like they’ve taken out one of their own. Or as they say in Law and Order-chung chung. ”
Chapter Five
In cooking, no procedure is simpler or more foolproof than roasting a chicken. You turn the oven on to 350 degrees, slap the bird in a roasting pan, and pull it out after an hour or so. Of course there are plenty of ways to improve this basic recipe, but as long as you follow these easy steps, you’ll end up with a tasty dinner.
Even with a dish this basic, there are ways to destroy it. Let’s say you set the oven to something like 120 degrees and leave the bird in for a couple of days. You might think of it as slow roasting. But you won’t be cooking the chicken so much as speeding up its decomposition. And if you’ve forgotten to remove all those quick-to-spoil innards from the cavity, you’ll end up with a dish that’s almost as toxic as it is disgusting.
Whoever killed the attendant at the impound yard apparently didn’t know the rules for successful roasting. He had left his victim’s body in the 110-degree metal shack overnight, and he definitely hadn’t done any cleaning beforehand.
Which is why seven of the eight members of the Santa Barbara Police Department called to the scene were still standing outside the shack’s door, their faces covered with handkerchiefs, paper bags, or take-out coffee cups when Tara’s red Mercedes pulled up across the street. And why the eighth, one of the techs from the crime lab, blasted out onto the tarmac, fell onto his knees, and heaved just moments after he’d gone in.
Shawn leaned back over the front seat. “I guess our work here is done. Want to go home?”
“What do you mean our work is done? We haven’t done anything.”
“The guy who tried to kill us isn’t going to be trying again anytime soon. And it’s not like we can wreak any good vengeance on him now.”
Shawn was right. They could go home. For a moment, Gus imagined what it would be like to ease his aching muscles into a warm bath. And to stay there for a month. But then he remembered why his muscles hurt in the first place.
“We’re detectives, not rubber duckies,” Gus said.
“Duckies?” Shawn said.
“Never mind,” Gus said. “Let’s break this thing open.”
Shawn beamed at him. Those were exactly the words he wanted to hear. He threw open his door and marched across the street.
“Isn’t he amazing?” Tara said.
“Yeah, amazing,” Gus said, struggling to pull the door handle all the way back. “Would you mind helping me out of here?”
Tara slid out of the driver’s side and opened the back door for Gus. He grabbed the handle over the window and hauled himself to the doorway, then realized he was stuck. His top half was already leaning out toward the pavement, but his legs were trapped in the well behind the front seat, and he couldn’t lift them over the threshold. In about two seconds, he was going to tip over and fall face-first onto the asphalt.
“Little help here,” he called.
Tara grabbed his shoulders just as he was beginning to topple. Gently, she eased his trunk back into the car, then lifted his feet over the threshold. She held out a hand to help him get up, but he waved it off.
“I’m okay now,” he said. “Thanks.”
“Would you like me to help you across the street?”
Gus looked at the gaggle of police officers standing outside the shack. The open ambulance waiting for a body. He remembered how he had felt when he saw his first corpse. There was no need to put this poor woman through that.
“You’ve done enough,” Gus said. “In fact, you might as well go home. We can get a ride with one of the
