‘Gotta be the only one like it in the world.’
‘I hope so.’
‘Come on, don’t be such a killjoy. There’s probably some deep meaning behind it.’
‘Or not.’
‘Yeah, or not. But it’s unique, you gotta give it that. And how often do you see flowers on a water tower? Makes you feel better about drinking the water, right? I mean, White Bear has a bear on their water tower and you can’t help but think about the whole bear in the woods thing.’ Gino heard a muted beep and pulled out his cell phone. ‘Well, glory hallelujah. This piece of crap finally picked up a signal.’
‘Weather’s clearing up. Either that, or we’re close to what might be the only tower for miles. Better talk fast.’
Gino nodded and pushed speed dial. ‘Got a pile of messages from the office while this thing was in a coma. Maybe Tinker and McLaren solved the case while we were gone and we can go on vacation. Hey, Tinker, we’re on our way back. What’s the word? What do you mean, turn around? We just left, and let me tell you, this place is like a third-world country. Instead of cell towers, they got teapots in the sky and houses in the middle of lakes… all right, all right, hang on.’ Gino pulled out his notebook and a pen and started scribbling while he listened.
The phone call was taking a long time, and Gino was silent for most of it, which was a good sign, as far as Magozzi was concerned – it probably meant that something had broken on the case in Minneapolis. By the time he pulled into the lot of the Swedish Grill, Gino was in the middle of telling Tinker about the snowman on the lake.
‘… still can’t tell if it’s the same doer. This guy’s chest was blown wide open, so it wasn’t a twenty-two, like Deaton and Myerson, and the victim wasn’t a cop, but he was law enforcement. A parole officer out of Minneapolis, name of Steve Doyle. Tinker? Hey, Tinker. You still there?’ Then Gino went silent again and just listened, his expression grim. ‘We’ll take care of it on this end,’ he said at last. ‘In the meantime, find out where Weinbeck was Friday night, when Deaton and Myerson got hit. I’ll call you back.’ He flipped the phone closed and looked at Magozzi. ‘We’ve got to go back to the sheriff’s office.’
Magozzi raised his brows. ‘You don’t want to eat first?’
‘We don’t have time.’
‘You drive, I’ll talk.’ Gino turned on the roof lights while Magozzi fishtailed out of the parking lot and pushed it as fast as he could on the road back toward Lake Kittering.
‘Steve Doyle’s been missing since yesterday. His last appointment was with an asshole named Kurt Weinbeck, who just checked out of Stillwater for damn near killing his pregnant wife. Weinbeck is a no-show at his halfway house, Doyle’s office is trashed and there’s some blood, and his car is missing from the ramp. The wife’s files and contact info are missing, too, so Tinker figures Weinbeck’s going after his wife, and guess what? She lives up here in Dundas County – someplace called Bitterroot.’
‘So Weinbeck is probably Doyle’s shooter.’
‘He looks good for it.’
‘No way a twenty-two put a hole like that in Doyle’s chest.’
‘Yeah, I know. Which means he probably isn’t our snowman killer. Tinker said the TV was still on in Doyle’s office when they got there. At the time of Weinbeck’s appointment yesterday the channel was doing wall-to-wall coverage of the park fiasco, so he could have seen it, maybe figured he could pin Doyle’s killing on our killer if he just built a snowman around him.’
‘Maybe. Or maybe he switched guns. Maybe he’s good for them all.’
‘Not likely, but wouldn’t that be roses? All tied up in one neat package. I could be home by six eating Angela’s spaghetti.’
‘We’re dreaming.’
‘Tell me about it. Domestics are the only things on Weinbeck’s sheet. Those yellow-bellied bastards don’t usually go around popping cops, but Tinker and McLaren will look at it anyway. Anyhow, back to Weinbeck’s ex-wife – calls herself Julie Albright now – Tinker gets her on the horn to warn her, and she blows him off, says she’s not worried, if you can believe that.’
‘Maybe she’ll change her mind when we tell her her ex killed his parole officer to get to her.’
‘That would change my mind. So the upshot is he wants us to talk to her in person, try to get her into protective custody, either with the locals or with us. This Weinbeck character isn’t messing around.’
‘She might be harboring him. It wouldn’t be the first time that happened.’
‘That crossed my mind.’
17
Iris was sitting in the oversized leather chair in the sheriff’s office – her office, now – stuffing another bite of a peanut-butter-and-pickle sandwich in her mouth, feeling strangely guilty for eating at all while there was a BCA team on the lake outside her window, addressing the messy aftermath of the violent death of a human being. Every time she closed her eyes she saw the frozen horror of Steve Doyle’s dead face, and still she ate the damn sandwich. There was something wrong with her.
The paper in front of her was filled with the scribbled notes she’d taken during Detective Rolseth’s call. Just looking at them gave her a headache.
The upside was that if this Kurt Weinbeck character really was Steve Doyle’s murderer – and by all accounts, it sounded like he was – her first homicide was already solved. The bad news was, he was still loose, probably somewhere in her county, stalking one of her citizens, and it was ultimately her responsibility to catch him before he could murder anybody else.
Her butt sank so far into the cushy chair that she felt like she was being swallowed, and her feet didn’t touch the floor. Surely a sign from on high if ever there was one. She didn’t fit in the chair, she didn’t fit in the office, she didn’t fit in the job. The last bite went down like a dry brick, peanut butter sticking to her throat.
By the time she got downstairs Sampson was already in the lobby, and the Minneapolis detectives were coming through the front door. Magozzi gave her a nod of recognition, and Iris nodded back. That, she decided, was the secret to communicating with men. Whenever possible, use signals instead of words. Words just confused them.
Magozzi was thinking that Iris Rikker was looking a little worn around the edges, and small wonder. First day as sheriff of a peaceful rural county, and already she had one body, and maybe a murderer hanging around, trying to raise the count to two. No way she could have bargained for that when she put her name on the ticket.
Sampson, on the other hand, seemed surprisingly nonchalant. He looked up from retying his boots. ‘I called Julie Albright, let her know we were coming.’
Gino was stamping his boots on a doormat that was already soaking wet. ‘Our guy talked to her, said we might have a tough time talking her into protective custody.’
‘You got that right. She thinks she’s safe in Bitterroot.’
Gino’s thoughts went back to the airport parking lot two days ago, when they were pulling a half-dead woman out of a trunk. She’d thought she was safe, too. ‘No place is safe when you’ve got one of these bastards going after a woman, and this one’s worse than most, because he’s willing to kill other people to get to her. We all need to be on the same page when we talk to Julie Albright or we’re never going to get her under the wing.’
Sampson straightened and shifted his utility belt under his parka. ‘The thing is, I’m not so sure we’ve got anyplace half as secure as where she is right now. Take a look at Bitterroot first; see what you think. You ever been out there, Sheriff?’
Iris shook her head, sticking to her new signaling plan.
‘I’ll drive, then. You might want to ride with us, Detectives. It’s kind of tricky to find unless you know the back roads.’
‘Fine by me,’ Magozzi said. ‘How far away is this town?’
‘It isn’t a town, it’s a corporation.’ Sheriff Rikker was having trouble with the zipper on her parka, and it was frustrating her. ‘According to Lieutenant Sampson, some of the employees live on site. Julie Albright is one of them.’
‘Ten minutes as the crow flies,’ Sampson said. ‘Twenty in a car.’
