34
SINCE getting the news at the dealership Cassie Black had felt as though she were underwater, in some kind of surrealistic otherworld that had no bearing on her life. Deep down she knew it was an instinctive defense mechanism. It allowed her to continue, to move and do what needed to be done.
She now stood in the backyard of Leo's house staring at the dried blood streaking the jagged piece of glass standing in the bottom frame of the sliding door. Just seeing the glass confirmed what Karch had told her. She knew now that Leo was dead. If she went into the house she would find his body. And whatever way she found it would constitute an image she would never be able to remove from her memory.
She looked down into the pool at the vacuum standing motionless at the bottom. But almost immediately her eyes were drawn back to the door with the jagged glass. She knew she had to go in. Finally, she nodded once to herself and walked up to the door. And immediately she could see his body on the floor of the office. An eighteen-wheeler going by on the freeway behind the property drowned out the awful sighing sound that came involuntarily from her throat. She stepped over the glass and into the house.
Leo's body was sprawled face up to the side of the door. Blood seemed to be everywhere. Despite the horrible tableau the scene created, her eyes were drawn to what unmistakably appeared to be, if not a smile on his face, a look of satisfaction. Cassie crouched next to him and touched his cold cheek.
'Oh, Leo,' she said. 'What did I do?'
The tears started coming again. She tried to pinch them off by tightly closing her eyes and balling her fists.
Finally, when she opened her eyes again, she tried to study the body and the surroundings as maybe a detective would. She wanted to know what had happened. The fact that Karch had come to her and demanded the money meant Leo had stood up. She looked at the bloody drag marks on the tile floor and put it together. Leo had done it. He had gone to the glass. He had done it for her.
'Leo…'
She closed her eyes again and leaned her head down to his silent chest.
'I knew we should've run.'
She straightened back up with a new resolve. She would get away. She knew it was a selfish choice but she also knew that if she failed that Leo's noble death would be for nothing. That was Leo's hope in the end. His last prayer. That was what put the smile on his face. She would honor that.
She stood up and looked around the office. It had been completely destroyed by Karch's search. But he had been looking for two-and-a-half million dollars, not for what she looked for now. She stepped over the body to the overturned desk and looked at the debris on the floor. Leo's astrology books and papers and notebooks were scattered about. The contents of the desk drawers had been dumped. Amidst the clutter she saw two envelopes on the floor, both addressed to Leo and with the same odd return address, just the numbers 773. She stooped down and picked them up. Both were empty. One was postmarked two days before in Chicago and then she knew. Karch had found the passports. He had them.
Cassie abruptly stood up and her head hit the red I-Ching coins that dangled from the ceiling and would have been directly over the upright desk. She looked up at them for a moment and then grabbed the desk chair and moved it over. She climbed up on the chair and unhooked the string of coins. She wanted something of Leo's to take with her. If not for luck, then just to remember him by.
As she got down she knew there was no point in going through the rest of the house. Karch had the passports and there was nothing else inside that she had wanted. She walked over to Leo's body and once more looked down on him. She thought of the song she had listened to so many times on the way to Vegas. She hoped there had been an angel to whisper in his ear.
'Good-bye, Leo,' she said.
She carefully stepped over the glass and through the broken slider out to the backyard. She walked to the pool's edge and looked down at the vacuum. Tracing its hose to a coupling in the wall, she walked around to the other side and then got down on her knees and reached into the water. She grabbed the hose and started pulling it up and out onto the pool's concrete skirt. It was heavy work and twice she almost toppled into the water. Eventually, the vacuum head and debris bag came to the surface and she wrestled it onto the concrete.
Water turned the white concrete dark and soaked the knees of her black jeans. She didn't care. She struggled with the collar of the debris bag but then saw the zipper running alongside the bag. She quickly zipped the bag open and spread it. Inside the bag was another bag, a heavy-duty white plastic bag with its mouth tied in a knot. She carefully lifted it out of the vacuum bag and then worked her fingers into the knot. It was too tight and she didn't have the fingernails for the job. She reached into her back pocket for the Swiss Army knife and used it to cut the knot off the bag.
Cassie looked inside. The bricks of hundred-dollar bills were there. Still wrapped in plastic and as dry as the day they were cut at the mint.
She closed the bag and looked across the pool at the broken sliding door. From this angle she could see the tops of Leo's shoes pointing upward. She silently said her thanks to him. He had said to her when he told where the money would be kept that the best hiding place was one in plain sight. He had been right.
Cassie looked down at the water. Her struggling with the vacuum had created a small current. Floating by her on the surface was a dead hummingbird, its tiny wings spread like an angel's.
35
KARCH slowly stood up when ordered to by the woman with the gun.
'Who the hell are you?'
He nodded, hoping it would be a gesture taken as a sign of his full cooperation and compliance.
'My name is Jack Karch. I'm a private investigator. My license is in the inside right pocket of my jacket. May I get it out and show it to you?'
'Maybe later. A PI? What do you want with Cassie Black? And take two steps backward and lean against the wall.'
She was slowly coming further into the room. He did as he was told and leaned his shoulders against the wall as he spoke. He saw her eyeing the Sig, which was still on the bed.
'I'm on a case. A hot prowl in Vegas. A hotel room. A high roller was taken off for a lot of money. If you don't mind me asking, who are you?'
The woman was at the bottom of the bed. Keeping her eyes and the aim of her Beretta on Karch, she bent forward and reached her free hand for the gun.
'Agent Thelma Kibble, state parole.'
'Oh, yeah, Kibble. I was going to try to reach you today to talk about Black.'
'Since when does Nevada allow its PIs to run around with silencer-equipped weapons?'
Karch did his best to look surprised.
'Oh, you mean that? That's not mine. I found that in the drawer there. That's Cassie Black's. And you might be careful how you handle it. I think it's evidence.'
'Of what? You said it was a hot prowl.'
'They found the body of her old partner, a man named Jersey Paltz, in the desert. He was shot.'
Kibble looked down at the weapon in her left hand. Karch was about six feet away from her. He decided it was too risky to make a move from that distance.
'Tell you what, Mr. Karch, why don't you very slowly open up your jacket for me?'
'Sure.'
Karch slowly opened his jacket, exposing the empty shoulder holster.
'I know what you're going to say,' he said quickly. ' 'Empty holster, the Sig must be his.' Not true. I have a
