Curse of the Jade Lily (Mac McKenzie #9)

“I’ll be in touch, McKenzie,” he said.

He stood and nodded at Rask. “I am sorry about all of this, Lieutenant,” he said. “I truly am.”

He left the room a moment later. Rask got up and carefully closed the door as if he were fighting the impulse to slam it.

“Our federal tax dollars at work,” I said.

Rask turned slowly toward me. The scowl on his face reminded me of the Tiger tanks that chewed up Tom Hanks and his men in Saving Private Ryan.

“Tell me about Tatjana Durakovic,” he said.

“Didn’t I mention her last night?”

“It must have slipped your mind. ’Course, you have a history of withholding vital information from the police, don’t you?”

“I never actually met the woman.”

“Tell me.”

I did, giving up Heavenly’s name along the way, recalling our conversation without explaining the details of how we came to have it.

“You’re saying that this Tatjana is in Ontonagon, Michigan?” Rask said.

“I’m saying that’s where I was told she was from. I have no idea where she is now or where she was last night when Tarpley was killed. What time was that, by the way?”

Rask paused for a moment as if he were weighing the consequences of his next statement before he made it.

“I need a favor,” he said.

“A favor? From me?”

“That’s right.”

“Well, I’m not promising anything, but you can always ask, LT.”

“Call me Clay.”

That made me pause. I’ve known the man for half a dozen years, and we’ve never had what you might call a warm relationship. Usually it was downright frosty. In any case, he’s never called me by my first name and I’ve never used his.

“No, LT, I don’t think I can do that.”

Rask nodded as if I had passed a test. He sat next to me and leaned in. His speech started slow and calm but increased in ferocity toward the end.

“It took a lot to just sit here and listen to those sonsabitches talk, pushing people around, making demands. Who the hell do they think they are? They come into my house and tell me which homicides I can investigate and which homicides I can’t? In my house? I don’t give a shit what the mayor says. I don’t give a shit what that politician he appointed chief of police says, either. Cooperate with federal authorities? If I don’t bend over and kiss my own ass for the FBI or the DEA or those incompetents at Homeland Security, I sure as hell am not going to do it for these miserable bastards. No, no, no.” He held the third “no” like it was the final note in a trumpet concerto. “You know what I’m going to do? I’m going to investigate this homicide. I’m not going to redline it just because these bastards find it inconvenient. I’m going to discover who killed Patrick Tarpley and why. You’re going to help.”

“I am?”

“You’re damn right you are.”

“Why would I?”

“Because you used to be a cop, McKenzie. Here’s your chance to be a cop again.”

“Don’t do this to me, LT.”

“You’re going through with the exchange. If the thieves call back, you make the deal.”

“You want me to steal the Lily?”

“What? What are you talking about? Did I say that? Did I say steal the Lily and give it to those assholes? I did not. Give the Lily to the insurance company like you’re supposed to. If those assholes want the whajamacallit so bad, they can go to court like civilized people. But, McKenzie, listen. When you make contact with the artnappers, you need to give me every scrap of information about them that you can. You know what to look for, what to listen for. You know people, too. Don’t look at me like that. The people you know, you can get information that I can’t. You do this for me, McKenzie. Meanwhile, I’ll pursue the investigation on the down low. When I get anything, I’ll tell you. You do the same.”

Like you would do that, my inner voice said.

“In that case, when was Tarpley killed?” I asked aloud.

“The ME fixed the time of death at between one and four A.M. Monday,” Rask said. “He couldn’t narrow it down further because of the extreme cold.”

“The Lily was stolen at two…”

“Tarpley was probably clipped between, say, two thirty and four, then.”

“The artnappers first contacted the museum at eight. According to the museum’s security footage, Tarpley handed off the Lily to at least two accomplices inside an SUV. Maybe they clipped him later for his trouble. That would sever any identifiable connection between them and the heist and leave them with one less partner to share the ransom with.”

“Always an incentive.”

“But, LT—”

“What was he doing in Wirth Park, in the middle of the night, in the cold, in the snow?” Rask said, finishing my thought. “We spoke to his wife. Her name is Yvonne Tarpley, called Von. Twenty-two years younger than her husband. Pretty. At least she was pretty before we told her we found her husband—you know how grief can, what it does to some people.”