Max stayed on the gravel by the side of her small wooden deck, letting him have that advantage. The clothing she wore smelled of grass and the spice of Witt’s skin.
“So are you going to tell me or do I write this story my way?” He was too young to act the tough guy, his skin too unlined, his brown eyes nowhere near hardened.
“Tell it your way.”
His mouth tightened. “They found Bud Traynor dead last night.” He watched her for a heartbeat. “Shot in the heart.”
If he expected a reaction, he got none. Max willed each muscle rigid. “I heard.”
“Did you know they found a ring identified as belonging to Julius Hartman in his desk drawer along with a newspaper article on your husband’s murder?”
Julius Hartman? A ring. Scarface. Julius Hartman. Dennis Martin. They shouldn’t have had names like everyone else. It didn’t fit. Just like Bud’s death didn’t fit. Cameron’s leaving was the only thing she understood.
“He’d written the names of your assailants under each composite printed in the paper. Dennis Martin. Julius Hartman.”
The world around her shrunk to this man, to his voice. Max closed her eyes as if that would stop her from hearing a name attached to Tattoo.
“Leonard Small.”
She tipped her neck, the blood draining from her head. Spots danced before her eyes.
“Your friend Bud had their addresses written down, too. It’s almost a foregone conclusion that ballistics will match Traynor’s unregistered gun to the first two deaths.”
Cameron’s unregistered gun. “What about Dennis?”
Keen eyes narrowed. “Dennis. The way you say it—” He tapped his pen on his chin. “How do you know he’s the one Bud Traynor didn’t get to?”
She knew what he was thinking, that she’d hired Bud to do her killing. The little man didn’t have a clue into Bud’s psyche if he thought that. Okay, so he was over six feet, but he was little to her. “It was in the phrasing of your question.”
She had him there. He couldn’t remember exactly what he’d said. Big mistake. As a reporter, he still had a lot to learn. He went on. “Armed with his name and the address of his dwelling found in your friend’s desk, the police attempted to apprehend Mr. Martin, both for questioning about your husband’s murder and for his own protection.”
“Bud Traynor was never my friend.” It was important for even Riley Morgan to know that. Her heart sank slowly to her stomach. She could have finished the story for him, described it as if she’d been there, with all the gory details. She let him tell her instead.
“Unfortunately for him, he fled by way of the roof.”
Unfortunately for Dennis, he hadn’t believed her.
“The police say he’d intended to jump to the next building when they caught up with him, but he didn’t make it.” Riley had an uncannily steady gaze. Maybe he wasn’t such a pup despite his mistakes. “Do you know what his last words were, Mrs. Starr?”
“Why don’t you tell me?”
His voice lowered, and somewhere in it, she almost heard Dennis Martin. “Fuck the bitch, I can make it.”
She stood in the stone silence of morning. “How do you know all this?”
“I’ve got good sources.” He searched her face. “They also tell me your boyfriend’s suspension has been lifted.”
Witt hadn’t told her, but her anger didn’t rise the way it could have. They’d had other things that needed to be said.
“So you’re both clean,” he went on. “Bud Traynor will go down as the vigilante slayer of your husband’s killers. There’s nothing to connect you. Your boyfriend is exonerated in the shooting death of another of your ... adversaries, shall we say.”
Witt had also planted the ring, the article, and Dennis Martin’s whereabouts in Bud Traynor’s house. He’d planted evidence. To protect her. Witt had compromised his principals. For her. Was that stupidity or love? Or more of Bud’s Karma?
Or her dear departed husband had given her his final gift of freedom.
“So it looks like you’re off the hook for everything, Mrs. Starr.” Riley walked to the edge of the wooden porch and stepped down to the gravel. He was still taller. She needed her high heels instead of Sutter’s tennies.
His voice came low, from the depths of his gut. “But I know you put Mr. Traynor up to those killings. I’ll be watching you, waiting for you to slip up.” He gave her a rapacious smile. “You’re going to be my biggest story.”
*
“You shouldn’t have faked all that stuff in Bud’s house.”