Extreme Prey: A Novel Part 12

"Could be anytime-they left here fifteen minutes ago. If they don't stop anywhere . . ."

"I'll have to move," she said.

"Go."

"I never did like Joe," she said. "You think he would have talked?"

"Yeah, he would have given them up, sooner or later," Palmer said. "He was a talker, not an actor, and he never did like the idea of direct action. Hey, listen, I'm calling you from a pay phone. If you need to call me about anything, find a pay phone so they can't connect cell phone calls. These guys claim to be state agents, but they're not. They're from one of the federal alphabets, or I'll eat my shorts."

"Smart about the phone," she said. "Gotta run."

- LAWRENCE WALKED OUT of the lunchroom, past the office, told the secretary that she was feeling ill, and then scurried home, on foot, two blocks down the street. She lived in an old house, built in 1927, and not well maintained; but she was sixty-two and had suffered from three episodes of breast cancer. She'd only need the house, she often thought, for a few more years.

A bay window, looking out at an arbor thickly covered with Concord grapes, served as her home office. There'd once been a semicircular seat in the bay area, but she'd had a local carpenter replace it with a work surface, with four file cabinets fitted beneath the wooden surface. A laptop, a Canon printer, and a box with miscellaneous office supplies sat on top of it.

Anson said the cops had left fifteen minutes before his call, so that was now twenty-five minutes: she had little time. She turned on the laptop and as she waited for it to come up, dug a thumb drive from the office supply box. She plugged the drive into the side of the computer, went to look out the front windows, saw no unfamiliar cars, went back to the party mailing list, rolled through it to "Purdy," and deleted the entry for Marlys. She had another list on paper, but they'd have to turn the house over to find that one.

She was about to save the edited list, but then thought for a second, rolled farther down, and deleted the name Betsy Skira.

That done, she saved the edited list, brought it back up to make sure that the references to "Purdy" and "Skira" were truly gone, shut down the computer, pulled the thumb drive and dropped it back in the box.

She checked the front windows again and, still moving quickly, went to the back door, picked up a wicker basket, pushed through the door, and walked out to the side-yard garden, where she hurriedly cut free a cabbage, peeled off the outer leaves, and dropped the head in the basket. Moving to the cuc.u.mber patch, she pawed through the wide green leaves and found three good cuc.u.mbers, picked them, dropped them in the basket; pulled some carrots, which were getting old and woody but looked and smelled good. In fact, all of it looked and smelled good: she could live out her life growing fresh vegetables.

Then she waited, pulling weeds. n.o.body showed. She walked to the back door, got a hat, put it on, went back to the weeds.

Marlys Purdy was going to a direct action. Lawrence wouldn't have seen that coming, though she'd known that Purdy bore an unflinching anger toward America's wealthy overlords, the banks, the military, the media, and all the rest. Something that they shared. She was intensely curious about what Purdy was going to do. Anson said it was huge . . .

She was still pulling weeds when two unfamiliar vehicles, a sedan and an SUV, pulled up to the house.

- LUCAS AND ROBERTSON had stopped at a sandwich shop before heading out to Hills. Following Lucas's navigation system, they'd come into Hills on a back road, over a narrow bridge, and were at Lawrence's house a minute later. Lucas knocked on the door, got no response, so Robertson leaned in and knocked harder, and they were turning away when a woman called, "h.e.l.lo?" They turned and saw an older woman in a wide straw hat, watching them from a sprawling side-yard vegetable garden.

"Miz Lawrence?" Lucas called back.

"Yes? Who are you?"

- LAWRENCE WAS ONCE a very good-looking woman, Lucas thought: brown-eyed, still shapely into her sixties, with an engaging smile and a still-dark ponytail threaded with silver hair. She was shocked by the murders: "Joe was such a great man! Everybody liked him. I can't imagine any party members are involved."

"We don't think it's a party thing at all," Lucas said. "We think it's a person who's gone off the tracks. Probably a woman, with a gray-eyed son, distinctively gray-eyed, around thirty . . ."

Lawrence scratched the side of her nose and said, "You know, I don't know all the members by sight-a lot of them dropped out a long time ago-but that description doesn't ring a bell with me. Not at all."

"What we're looking for is a membership list, people we can contact who might know who this woman is," Lucas said. He went on to explain a bit: that there was a possibility of a conspiracy aimed at Michaela Bowden.

Lawrence was shocked by that and couldn't conceal it. But she could turn her real shock in a different direction . . .

"The party . . ." she sputtered. "The party would never be involved . . . Michaela Bowden, my G.o.d . . ."

"About the membership list?" Lucas prompted.

"Of course. Normally, I'd want to see some kind of legal doc.u.ment, a subpoena or something, but since Joe was killed and you think Mike Bowden, my G.o.d . . . We, you know, the party, has some well-founded fears of the police, but since it was Joe . . . and besides, I know it wouldn't have been any of our members."

"We're interested in the killings, not the politics," Lucas a.s.sured her.

"I'm still going to give Anson a hard time about giving my name to the pigs," she said, now with a quick grin.

"Yeah, well, oink," said Robertson.

"Haven't heard that pig thing for a while," Lucas said, as they went into the house.

"It is kinda sixties," she said.

They watched as she plugged a thumb drive into her computer, brought up the membership list, and printed it out. "If we could get two copies . . ." Lucas said.

"Of course."

- LUCAS'S PHONE BUZZED at him and he found a message from Neil Mitford: "Crash meeting in Iowa City at two p.m. Gov and Mike face-to-face. Can you make it?"

He sent back: "Yes. Fifteen minutes away. See you at two."

Lawrence handed them the printouts and said, "Could I interest you guys in a cabbage and cuc.u.mber salad? Fresh as you can get."

"We just had sandwiches," Robertson said. "Some other time."

- THERE WERE A HUNDRED and eighty names on the list. Robertson knew every town in the state, as Lucas knew every town in Minnesota, and began by sorting them into two geographical groups.

One group was tightly arrayed around Iowa City. The other was more scattered, but generally east of Des Moines and west of Iowa City, and most were not too far north or south of I-80. "Which one do you want?" he asked Lucas.

"You pick."

"If I take the I-80 group, I could go home at night," Robertson said.

"Then take it," Lucas said. "I'll get my room back at the Sheraton in Iowa City, and work out of there."

They exchanged phone numbers, and as they did, Lawrence came out on the porch, chewing on a carrot, and called, "You guys be careful."

Lucas held up a hand and Robertson said, "Nice old lady."

TWELVE.

Lucas found Mitford in a Sheraton suite, talking on a phone and simultaneously tapping on a laptop. He spotted Lucas and pointed at a chair, and a moment later Sally Rodriguez, the Bowden PR woman, came in, twiddled her fingers at Mitford, went to a coffee service, poured herself a cup, and took a phone call.

She dropped into a chair next to Lucas, still talking on the phone-"I told him that there was a good reason to hire the Barkers, and that I didn't want to tell him the reason, but that it was a good one. You tell him I don't want to hear about this other group. I want the f.u.c.kin' Barkers. And I better get the f.u.c.kin' Barkers. If I don't get the f.u.c.kin' Barkers, he doesn't get paid. Okay? Okay. Good-bye."

As she was doing that, she'd dug into her tote for another phone and punched up a number with her thumb. When she said "good-bye" on the first phone, she went to the second and said, "We're good for KCRG at four o'clock, and I spoke to Broderick about the Barkers and he says he'll get them there. Okay? Okay."

She hung up and picked up the cup of coffee, looked at Lucas, who said, "You say 'f.u.c.k' a lot."

"Only when it's necessary. In a campaign, it's necessary a lot," Rodriguez said.

"Who are the Barkers?"

"A band. They wear T-shirts with dogs on them. Black Labs, I think, though I actually wouldn't know a black Lab if one bit me on the b.u.t.t," she said.

"Why wouldn't anybody want to have the Barkers?" Lucas asked.

"If you're the event manager? Because the Barkers suck. You're also fronting your own band that would pick up a quick grand for an hour-long gig and get pictures with the next president," she said.

"Why would you want a band that sucks?"

"Because a state senator's brother plays in it," Rodriguez said. "Plays the accordion. Badly. Mostly waltzes. But the senator can deliver Monroe County."

"Ah."

Her phone beeped with a message and Rodriguez glanced at it: "Mike will be here in eight."

Mitford had gotten off the phone and said, "I'll have the gov here in seven."

"Good. We've only got about twenty to get this all sorted out," Rodriguez said. She tipped her head at Lucas: "How far can we trust him?"

"He can be tricky, but ultimately, he can keep his mouth shut. If he wants to," Mitford said.

"If he wants to?"

"Yeah. He gets to decide. Not us, because he no longer works for the state, and because he's unG.o.dly rich. But you can talk to him," Mitford said.

Rodriguez checked Lucas out again, then said, "Okay. As long as you can talk to him. How'd he get rich?"

"In one word, software," Mitford said. "Every nine-one-one system in the country uses it. And when I said unG.o.dly rich, I meant unG.o.dly."

"Thanks for not talking behind my back," Lucas said.

"That's okay," Rodriguez said. "Say, have I mentioned the 'Friends of Mike' opportunity for affluent supporters? I have a brochure in my bag."

"Forget that, I want to hear about the murders," Mitford said. He looked at his watch. "Make it short. The gov will be here-"

"In six, I know," Lucas said.

- HE TOLD THE MURDER STORY in three or four minutes. The two weasels took it in without comment, and when he was done, Mitford said, "I'll get the gov," and Rodriguez said, "I need to make a phone call," and they both left.

A minute later Norm Clay walked in with a man and woman that Lucas didn't know. Clay asked Lucas, "Did you see Rodriguez?"

"She went to make a call. You're two minutes early."

The man and woman looked at their watches and Clay opened his mouth to say something, when Henderson walked in the room, trailed by Mitford, Alice Green, and another woman that Lucas didn't know, but had seen, always with a clipboard.

"Norm," Henderson said to Clay, with a smile. They shook hands and Henderson wrapped his arm around Clay's shoulders and asked Lucas, "Did I ever tell you what this ol' boy did one minute after the Obama nomination in-"

"No, no, no, I had nothing to do with that," Clay protested. "I wasn't even there. I was in Amsterdam. Or Rotterdam, one of the two. Completely out of the country."

- RODRIGUEZ WALKED BACK into the room and muttered, "Five seconds," and they all turned to the door and four seconds later, Jubek, Bowden's security chief, came through the door with Bowden two steps behind. Everybody who was sitting got to their feet. Bowden had had her hair blown and was fluffing it with one hand. She was wearing a blue suit with a silk American flag scarf, and was carrying a cell phone in one hand.

As she stepped through the door, she spotted Henderson and said, "Elmer."

"Mike, good to see you," Henderson said. They air-kissed, so as not to disturb the makeup on either one of them. "Wish the circ.u.mstances were different."

"Yeah, well, they aren't. Let's get to it," Bowden said.

At that moment, four men in suits walked in; three Lucas didn't know, but Robertson trailed in behind them. State cops, he thought.

Rodriguez said, "Mrs. Bowden has already met these gentlemen, but Governor Henderson, this is Chuck Stevens, a.s.sistant chief of the Iowa campaign security team . . ."

"I've already met Chuck," Henderson said, and the two men shook hands.

". . . and three of his a.s.sociates," Rodriguez concluded.

Mitford said, "Lucas was just telling Sally and me about the murders. Why don't we start there, so we're all on the same page."

Bowden looked at Lucas and said, "Let's hear it," then immediately looked down at her phone and began texting.

- LUCAS RECAPPED the day's events, beginning with the early-morning call from Bell Wood, of the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation, his interviews with the Iowa cops in Mount Pleasant, his conclusions about the murders, and finally his contacts with Anson Palmer and Grace Lawrence.

"Bottom line is, I believe that we'll be able to track down the shooters. Whether we'll be able to hang the murders on them, I don't know-that would mostly depend on the Iowa criminal investigation-but I think we'll at least be able to identify them and make sure that they're . . . neutralized as threats," Lucas said.

Bowden looked up from her texting long enough to ask, "How long before you get them?"

"I don't know. Could be a couple of days, couple of weeks, depending on what the crime-scene crew in Mount Pleasant finds. If they don't find anything identifying, it'll be a while."

"You're saying you have no solid idea," Bowden said.

"No, I do have a solid idea-within a couple of weeks," Lucas said. "That'd be fairly quick on a murder investigation where you don't pick up the killer immediately. I don't have a solid idea of how that will work with your campaign schedule and what you think it's necessary to do in Iowa."

"I think it's necessary to go to the state fair," Bowden said. "We're already slotted in there."

Lucas: "As I see it, the problem breaks down into two areas. First, you're not willing to leave the state. If you did that, you could probably be made almost completely secure and we'll get at the threat and cancel it out. And second, your security is static, designed to protect you from people who try to get close. If these people are serious and intelligent, I don't think your static security will be enough, even if your guys are good, as I know they are. These people won't come after you by jumping out of a crowd with a pistol-it'll be a rifle and it'll be carefully set up."

Bowden looked at Stevens, the a.s.sistant chief of the Iowa campaign security team. "Will I be safe at the fair?"

"Safe as we can make you. We plan to flood the walking route with highway patrolmen, both in uniform and plainclothes, plus our security team, and your security team. We've already pre-spotted all the possible shooting platforms and we'll be working the whole area from the time it gets light in the morning, right up to your walk. We'll have plainclothes and uniformed guys both on the street and in the crowd, walking right with you." He hesitated, then said, "I don't know Mr. Davenport, though one of the top people at the division knows him and says he's very good. Given his thoughts, I'd be a fool if I told you that you'd be perfectly safe. If you walk, we'll give you everything we've got, but I'd prefer that you were walking in New Hampshire or Georgia. You're a year away from the nomination-we'll get these guys, and you can walk the state fair next year."

"Thank you," Bowden said. "I a.s.sume if I'm shot, you'll catch the shooter."