Bury the Lead

41



LOGIC TAKES A BUM RAP. It is the way I live my life. I probably ask myself the question “Is it logical?” more often than I ask, “Is it right?” Because logic is almost always right, and as far as I’m concerned, it should be the primary basis for human behavior.

Yet I am often told that I am “too logical” by people who don’t understand that there is no such thing. Those people worship emotion and passion, and that’s fine. Their mistake is in thinking that such feelings are inconsistent with logic, when in fact they should be using logic to drive that fire within them. If you’re desperately, passionately in love with a woman, you don’t win her over by picking your nose. It wouldn’t be logical.

I guess that’s one of the reasons I’m so disconcerted by what I’ve been through these past few months. I’ve been trying to apply logic in order to figure it out, when all along it’s been a madman calling the shots. People have been literally dying all around me while I have been figuratively hunched over my desk, trying to apply logical theorems to the work of a vicious psycho.

Lassiter was angry because Daniel reneged on a deal, and he wanted revenge. So far it makes sense. But then he went out and killed five women and got Daniel on and off a legal hook, before killing Daniel himself. Why go to all that trouble? Why not just go out and kill Daniel in the first place? There is just no logical answer.

It’s been three days since my conversation with Dominic Petrone. I’ve shared what he said with Laurie, and while she couldn’t provide any real insight as to Lassiter’s behavior, she was less surprised by it. I suppose that comes from her years on the police force, during which she dealt with an unending list of villainous screwballs.

I also told Pete Stanton about the Petrone conversation. I value his advice, and I can trust him to keep it to himself. He was so interested to hear what I had to say that he didn’t make me take him to an expensive restaurant to say it.

I call Vince every day, but he’s still pretty much in a fog. He’s not ready to go back to the newspaper and says he doubts whether he ever will. I know it’s going to take him time to bounce back, and I’m frustrated that I’m powerless to speed up the process.

I’ve decided against sharing Petrone’s revelations with Vince. I know he has a right to know, but right now I just can’t see myself telling him that his son murdered his daughter-in-law. Maybe I’m looking for an excuse, but I know he wouldn’t believe it anyway; he would assume that Petrone had some reason to lie. Since he knows Petrone, he also might confront him about it, thus demonstrating that I revealed what Petrone told me, despite his warning not to. It could result in my untimely and very painful death, which would complicate matters greatly.

I haven’t been in the office since Daniel’s death; what little productive time I’ve spent has been at the foundation. There’s something comforting about taking care of those dogs. They absolutely need me to provide food and shelter and comfort and life, and I know exactly how to provide them. It’s all very logical.

I’ve also gotten to spend a lot more time with Tara, which is always good. We go on extended walks in the park, just like the one we’re on now. Tara seems to appreciate the world more than I do; each bend in the path provides new sights and especially smells that captivate her. I both admire and envy this.

We are passing the Little League fields, a place that holds countless pleasant memories for me, when my cell phone rings. It is an unwelcome intrusion, and I’m sorry I brought it with me. I see on the caller ID display that it is Vince calling.

His voice is crisper, more alert, and his message is to the point. “They found Tommy Lassiter.”

I’m very pleased to hear this, but my primary reaction is surprise. I had become convinced that Lassiter would never get caught, and I also assumed he was long out of this area.

“Where was he?” I ask.

“In a motel on Route 4.”

“Is he talking?”

“I doubt it,” Vince says. “He’s been dead for three days. Shot in the head. The maid saw the Do Not Disturb sign on the door, but the place started to stink, so she decided to disturb.”

“Any idea who did it?”

“Someone who knew him . . . he was having a beer and eating a sandwich. Somebody else’s beer was there also, but Lassiter’s was mixed with a drug to knock him out. The coroner thinks he was unconscious when he took the bullet.”

“So it had to be someone he trusted,” I say.

“Damn straight,” says Vince. “If Lassiter thought he was in danger, a marine division couldn’t have killed him.”

What Vince is saying makes sense, but I still think Petrone was behind it. “It’s got to be Petrone,” I say, since Petrone had said to me that if he found Lassiter, we’d be “talking about him in the past tense.”

Vince shrugs. “I don’t care who did it. I’m just glad it got done.”

“Thanks for letting me know, Vince. You doing okay?”

“Yeah. I’m getting there. You up for Charlie’s later? There’s a college game on.”

Laurie and I were planning to spend a quiet night at home, but I know she’d want to support getting Vince back into the world. This news about Lassiter seems to have given him a lift, and I don’t want to do anything to discourage it. “Sounds great. Okay if I bring a date?”

“Only if it’s Laurie.”

We meet at seven-thirty, and by seven-forty-five the table is covered with burgers, french fries, and beer. The game is on ESPN 2; it’s Boise State versus Fresno State. The NCAA claims to be against gambling, yet they don’t complain when ESPN buys a game like this for national broadcast. Do they think there’s a single person east of Idaho who would be interested in Boise State-Fresno State if they weren’t betting on it?

I take Boise State minus seven points. For the entire first quarter, Vince is yelling at the bartender to adjust the color, refusing to believe me when I tell him that the football field in Boise is actually blue. My mind is filled with interesting tidbits of knowledge like that.

Boise is up twenty-one at the half when Pete Stanton comes in. He tells the bartender he’s going to run a tab, but the tab he’s talking about is mine.

“I knew I’d find you losers here,” he says, then turns to Laurie. “Female company excepted.”

Laurie smiles. “Exception noted.”

“What’s the score?” Pete asks.

“Twenty-eight-seven, Boise,” I say.

“Who’d you take?”

“Boise.”

“Damn,” he says, shaking his head. “Money goes to money.”

Like most of his comments, I let this one slide off my wealthy back. “Anything new on Petrone?”

He nods. “Yeah, the word on the street is he didn’t hit Lassiter. He wanted to, but somebody beat him to it.”

“You believe that?” I ask.

“Yup. The people who told me would know one way or the other. And the word is that it had to be somebody Lassiter trusted. Also, the gun was a Luger. Not the Petrone group’s weapon of choice.”

“So who could it have been?” I ask.

“Come on, you want a list of the people that would want to see Lassiter iced?”

“I’d be at the top of that list,” says Vince.

Pete frowns. “You’re not confessing, are you, Vince? ’Cause I’m off duty.”

“Nah. But if I had a clean shot at him, I’d have taken it.”

I’m getting that disconcerting, “where the hell is the logic?” feeling again, and Laurie picks up on it. “Let it go, Andy,” she says. “You’re out of it now.”

But even if I wanted to drop it, Vince doesn’t. “If someone else killed Lassiter besides Petrone, you think that person could have killed Daniel as well?”

I shake my head. “No, I think it was Lassiter that shot Daniel.”

“Why?” Vince asks. “I still don’t see what he had against him. I mean, to frame him like that and then kill him . . .”

I don’t know what the indoor record is for quick, embarrassed eye contact, but Pete, Laurie, and I are certainly smashing it. The three of us know about Petrone’s accusations against Daniel, but we’ve left Vince in the dark. Right now that doesn’t feel right, and Laurie seems to agree. Her slight nod tells me she thinks we should come clean with Vince.

“Vince, there’s something I’ve got to tell you, something Dominic Petrone said.”

“What?” asks Vince, and he literally prepares himself for a bombshell by gripping the table with his hands.

“He said that Daniel hired Lassiter to kill Margaret and then reneged on the payment. That’s why Lassiter did what he did; he was getting revenge on Daniel.”

“He’s full of shit.” It’s a knee-jerk reaction, made without thought. A defense of his son.

“I didn’t say he was right,” I say. “I just thought you had a right to know.”

“He’s wrong,” Vince says.

“Of course he is,” says Laurie.

“Did he say why he thought so?” Vince asks.

“No. But he didn’t say it’s what he thought. He said it’s what he knew.”

Vince takes a drink from his bottle of beer but finds it empty. He looks around for the waitress. “Whose ass do you have to kiss to get a beer around here?” It’s Vince’s way of ending this part of the discussion, and it’s fine with me.

I signal to the waitress that she should bring beers for everyone. Telling a man his son is a murderer is thirsty work.