“While holding this fucking gun to my head!”
“Then he walked back, laid the revolver on that little boulder there, came back here, and sat down on the shore. Do I have that right?”
“I told you he was fucking nuts, didn’t I? What did he think, I wouldn’t go for the gun? Dumb fuck just sat there grinning at me.”
DeMarco smiled. “He even left your knife here so you could cut yourself free afterward. He knew your only hope would be to get back out to the road. But the harder you ran, the faster you’d bleed out. He wanted you to experience your death. Every terrified moment of it.”
Inman shivered. “And you think that’s fucking funny?” He made an attempt to hurl the empty revolver at DeMarco, but with his wrists still bound, the handgun barely cleared the water and clattered against the rocks.
The urge was strong in DeMarco to pick up the revolver, clean it off, take it home where it belonged, the only thing he had left of his father. But it had to stay.
DeMarco looked away from Inman then, down the lake and across the water to the trees. They were still dark in the rising mist, but behind them the soft orange light of morning glowed.
“Hey, asshole,” Inman said. His voice was softer now, pleading. “You just going to sit there and let me die?”
“I would never do that,” DeMarco answered. “Come ashore.”
Inman dragged one foot forward, then the other. The cement blocks scraped over the lake bottom and churned up the mud. Finally he stood shivering and hugging himself only a few feet from DeMarco. He said, “You going to get these fucking blocks off my feet or what?”
“Of course,” DeMarco said. He then laid his left hand atop Huston’s head a final time, raised his right hand toward Inman, and put a bullet through Inman’s heart.
Sixty-Three
Bowen laid the slender sheaf of papers down on his blotter, then looked across the desk at DeMarco, who was gazing out the window. Early afternoon sunlight gave the air beyond the glass a stunning clarity. The few remaining leaves on the twin maples in the barrack’s front lawn trembled like brown flames in a guttering breeze. Bowen said, “It’s nicely written, I’ll say that much for it.”
DeMarco smiled. “I’ve been taking a crash course.”
“How about we go through it together. I’m still puzzled about a thing or two.”
“Have at it,” DeMarco said.
“Last night at your place. So Huston just showed up out of the blue. Knocked on the back door. You let him in. You take him into your living room. But you don’t remember much about your ensuing conversation.”
“Only what’s there in the report. And for that I have your little white pills to thank. I was spacy from the time he woke me pounding on the door until Inman coldcocked me.”
“In the kitchen.”
“Correct.”
“Where you went to get a couple of beers.”
“Get some beer, make some sandwiches… Huston hadn’t eaten since I saw him at the lighthouse.”
“So you go out to the kitchen, just you, and there’s Inman standing.”
“Big, bald, and ugly.”
“And how did he know where to find Huston?”
“Are you asking me to guess?”
“I’m asking you to surmise. Speculate. Ah what the hell; take a guess.”
“Maybe he was watching my place, hoping I would lead him to Huston.”
“If he wanted to kill Huston, why didn’t he do it when he had the chance last week?”
“I guess I should have asked him that. My bad.”
“What do you fucking think?”
“I think maybe he initially thought Huston would be arrested, convicted, disgraced, put away where Inman’s buddies could have some fun with him. Obviously Inman likes to play with his victims. Problem was, we couldn’t find Huston, and I was starting to make Inman nervous. So he decided he’d better take out the one remaining person who could pull him out of a lineup.”
Bowen rubbed a hand over his cheek. Then he ran both hands through his hair. Then he said, “So you go into the kitchen to get Huston something to eat, and there’s Inman, and he decks you. Just like that.”
“I was still groggy, remember? Reflexes were slow. Thanks to you. In a fair fight, I would have kicked his ass in six seconds flat.”
“Okay, sure. Next thing you recall is looking up from the kitchen floor to see him dragging Huston out the door.”
“I also recall this little dream I had. Something about mermaids on the linoleum. Should I have put that in the report?”
Bowen leaned back in his chair. “So you pull yourself together, make your way outside, and you’re just in time to see your car going down the alley behind your barn.”
“You’re an attentive reader, Kyle. It’s nice to know you take my writing seriously.”
“How about if you take this conversation seriously?”
“Absolutely.”
“Every question I’m asking you, the press is going to ask me. I’d like to not come off as a complete moron.”
“It’s a little late in life to be making that decision, isn’t it?”