Page 119 of Cougar Point

“What?”

“It has blood on it. Victoria’s blood. She had it wrapped around her stump earlier.”

I peer closer, being careful not to turn my back on Lucas. Goddamn, he’s right. It wasn’t obvious because of the dirt and the fact the bandana was red anyway, but there the stains are, unmistakably.

“Any more desperate accusations, Detective?”

I want to put my fist through his face. He was panicking there, before he realized he had a legit excuse for the bandana being in his SUV. Too late: his instinctive reaction betrayed him. A guilty conscience will give you away every time.

“We’ve got more, Lucas,” I say, glancing down at his bloodstained shoes. We already have a shitload of circumstantial evidence. If we find the money, we’ll hang him.

“You’re bluffing,” he says. He doesn’t sound at all sure, though.

“Blood. Shoeprints. Fingerprints. The gun was in Missy’s weak hand. Ballistics on the distance she supposedly fired the bullet from. We saw where the bag with the money was on the floor in that killing room. You admitted to killing Duke. We find his bandana in your car. How many others did you kill? Not counting your wife and daughter.”

His features are a mask of rage but Ronnie doesn’t move.

He swallows and his fists unclench. “What do you want?”

Ronnie says, “You really were a good detective, Lucas. Before you panicked when your wife wanted a divorce. What did she say? Was she taking your daughter and threatening to clean you out? We know you had money trouble before your wife died. We know her life insurance didn’t pay out, so you missed the big payday.”

I don’t know if the part about the money trouble is true but it sounds plausible. She’s getting good at this stuff. Lucas remains quiet. That’s not good since he’s a homicidal maniac and he’s armed. The only thing standing between him and a death sentence is us. I’m not afraid to admit that I’m afraid. Wemay have pushed him too far. But how will he explain shooting us right outside of a crime scene with officers everywhere? He can’t. I just hope he’s cognizant of that.

“What do you want?” he asks.

“Three-way split,” Ronnie says, and Lucas laughs out loud.

“If I had the money, why would you get a third each?”

“A third of ten million dollars is a lot of money, Lucas,” I say.

He shakes his head. “You’re trying to con me. Trying to get me to incriminate myself. You don’t want the money.”

I laugh and glance at Ronnie. “Looks like this guy didn’t do his homework on me.” I step in closer and lower my voice. “You think I’m some kind of incorruptible straight arrow? You don’t know shit about me, Lucas. We’re more alike than you want to admit. Everybody in my family is in jail or dead. I’ve bent rules, I’ve cut corners, I’ve killed suspects. So far I’ve been lucky—all of them have been ruled good shootings—but my luck will run out one day. You think I won’t take three million dollars to walk away from all this? Some days I feel like I’d walk away for a buck-fifty and a jelly donut. Hell yes, I want the money, Lucas.”

I’m pretty convincing, if I say so myself. I think that’s because some of that is true. Maybe more than I’d like to admit.

He thinks for a split second and says, “Let’s not do this here.”

Ronnie says, “I’m fine right here. You get the money and we’ll split it.”

“You think I’m stupid?”

He takes his phone out and taps a few times, and my phone dings.

“GPS coordinates for a safe place. I’ll meet you there in fifteen minutes.”

Ronnie starts to speak, but I interrupt her before she blows this. “Fifteen minutes, Lucas. Have the money or we go to Longbow.”

“Now, you listen. Closely. If you try to double-cross me, you’ll…” He shuts his mouth and turns his face away. “Fifteen minutes.”

He gets in his SUV and we watch him drive away.

SEVENTY-SEVEN

We need to catch up enough to keep Lucas in sight so he can’t ambush us. I see him a couple of miles ahead and he’s driving like a madman. I get to the top of a rise and his car has disappeared. Ronnie pulls up the GPS coordinates using my phone. I turn off the main road where there’s a cut in the heavy guardrail, and we follow the GPS along a gravel and mud road leading up a bumpy rise to the top of a cliff about seventy-five feet above the road.

A one-room log cabin can be seen in a small clearing. The cabin has seen better days. The tin roof is rusted with pieces missing. The porch boards look rotted out from where we sit, but the cabin commands a view across Drayton Harbor where dozens of boats are berthed. From up here I can see the little oyster bar where I’ll never return. Lucas’s dark SUV is parked beside the cabin but there is no sign of him.

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