“What?” Hodges calls. It’s all he can manage without bursting into mad brays of hilarity, which would hurt his side as well as Holly’s feelings.
“I found a site called Fishin’ Hole Hypnosis! The start-page warns parents not to let their kids look at the demo screen too long! It was first noticed in the arcade game version back in 2005! The Game Boy fixed it, but the Zappit . . . wait a sec . . . they said they did, but they didn’t! There’s a whole big long thread!”
Hodges looks at Jerome.
“She means an online conversation,” Jerome says.
“A kid in Des Moines passed out, hit his head on the edge of his desk, and fractured his skull!” She sounds almost gleeful as she gets up and rushes back to them. Her cheeks are flushed and rosy. “There would have been lawsuits! I bet that’s one of the reasons the Zappit company went out of business! It might even have been one of the reasons why Sunrise Solutions—”
The phone on her desk begins to ring.
“Oh, frack,” she says, turning toward it.
“Tell whoever it is that we’re closed today.”
But after saying Hello, you’ve reached Finders Keepers, Holly just listens. Then she turns, holding out the handset.
“It’s Pete Huntley. He says he has to talk to you right away, and he sounds . . . funny. Like he’s sad or mad or something.”
Hodges goes into the outer office to find out what’s got Pete sounding sad or mad or something.
Behind him, Jerome finally powers up Dinah Scott’s Zappit.
In Freddi Linklatter’s computer nest (Freddi herself has taken four Excedrin and gone to sleep in her bedroom), 44 FOUND changes to 45 FOUND. The repeater flashes LOADING.
Then it flashes TASK COMPLETE.
16
Pete doesn’t say hello. What he says is, “Take it, Kerm. Take it and beat it until the truth falls out. Bitch is in the house with a couple of SKIDs, and I’m out back in a whatever-it-is. Potting shed, I think, and it’s cold as hell.”
Hodges is at first too surprised to answer, and not because a pair of SKIDs—the city cops’ acronym for State Criminal Investigation Division detectives—is on some scene Pete is working. He’s surprised (in truth almost flabbergasted) because in all their long association he’s only heard Pete use the b-word in connection with an actual woman a single time. That was when speaking of his mother-in-law, who urged Pete’s wife to leave, and took her in, along with the children, when she finally did. The bitch he’s talking about this time can only be his partner, aka Miss Pretty Gray Eyes.
“Kermit? Are you there?”
“I’m here,” Hodges says. “Where are you?”
“Sugar Heights. Dr. Felix Babineau’s house on scenic Lilac Drive. Hell, his fucking estate. You know who Babineau is, I know you do. No one kept closer tabs on Brady Hartsfield than you. For awhile there he was your fucking hobby.”
“Who you’re talking about, yes. What you’re talking about, no.”
“This whole thing is going to blow up, partner, and Izzy doesn’t want to get hit with the shrapnel when it does. She’s got ambitions, see? Chief of Detectives in ten years, maybe Chief of Police in fifteen. I get it, but that doesn’t mean I like it. She called Chief Horgan behind my back, and Horgan called the SKIDs. If it’s not officially their case now, it will be by noon. They’ve got their perp, but the shit’s not right. I know it, and Izzy does, too. She just doesn’t give a rat’s ass.”
“You need to slow down, Pete. Tell me what’s going on.”
Holly is hovering anxiously. Hodges shrugs his shoulders and raises a finger: wait.
“Housekeeper gets here at seven thirty, okay? Nora Everly by name. And at the top of the drive she sees Babineau’s BMW on the lawn, with a bullet hole in the windshield. She looks inside, sees blood on the steering wheel and the seat, calls 911. There’s a cop car five minutes away—in the Heights there’s always one five minutes away—and when it arrives, Everly’s sitting in her car with all the doors locked, shaking like a leaf. The unis tell her to stay put, and go to the door. The place is unlocked. Mrs. Babineau—Cora—is lying dead in the hall, and I’m sure the bullet the ME digs out of her will match the one forensics dug out of the Beemer. On her forehead—are you ready for this?—there’s the letter Z in black ink. More all around the downstairs, including one on the TV screen. Just like the one at the Ellerton place, and I think it was right about then my partner decided she wanted no part of this particular tarbaby.”
Hodges says, “Yeah, probably,” just to keep Pete talking. He grabs the pad beside Holly’s computer and prints BABINEAU’S WIFE MURDERED in big block letters, like a newspaper headline. Her hand flies to her mouth.