As he finished the coffee, his cell phone vibrated. When he checked, he had received a text message.
Earlier, when Krait had returned to the Lamplighter Tavern, seeking the name of the big man on the end stool, the bartender had pleaded ignorance.
Five minutes after Krait left the joint, however, Liam Rooney had phoned someone. In this text message were the number that had been called and the name of the person to whom that telephone was registered—TIMOTHY CARRIER.
On screen appeared an address for Carrier, too, although Krait doubted that it would be of immediate use to him. If Carrier was the barfly and if he had hurried to Laguna Beach to warn the woman, he would not be witless enough to return home.
In addition to a name and address, Krait had wanted to know the occupation of this guy. Carrier was a licensed masonry contractor.
Krait stored the data, and the phone vibrated again. A photo of the mason appeared with megapixel clarity, and he was without doubt the man in the tavern.
In the wet of business, Krait worked alone, but he had awesome data and technical support.
He pocketed the phone without saving the photo. He might need to know more about Carrier, but not yet.
A final cup of coffee remained in the pot, and he sweetened the brew with a generous slug of milk. He drank it at the table.
In spite of the boldness with which the kitchen and garage had been combined, the space was cozy.
He liked the entire bungalow, the clean simplicity of it. Anyone could live here, and you wouldn’t know who he really was.
Sooner or later, it would come on the market. Acquiring the property of a person he had murdered would be too risky, but the thought pleased him.
Krait washed his cup, his plate, his fork, the coffeepot, and the FDR mug that had been used by either Linda or her guest. He dried them and put them away. He rinsed the stainless-steel sink, then wiped it dry with paper towels.
Just before he left, he went to the Ford, opened the driver’s door, stepped back just far enough to avoid being splashed, unzipped his pants and urinated in the vehicle. This didn’t please him, but it was necessary.
Pete Santo lived in a modest stucco house with a shy dog named Zoey and a dead fish named Lucille.
Handsomely stuffed and mounted, Lucille, a marlin, hung above the desk in the study.
Pete wasn’t a fisherman. The marlin had come with the house when he bought it.
He had named it after his ex-wife, who had divorced him when, after two years of marriage, she realized that she couldn’t change him. She wanted him to leave the police department, to become a real-estate agent, to dress with more style, and to have his scar fixed.
The marriage collapsed when she bought him a pair of tasseled loafers. He wouldn’t wear them. She wouldn’t return them to the store. He wouldn’t allow them in his closet. She tried to put one of them down the garbage disposal. The Roto-Rooter bill was huge.
Now, as sharp-toothed Lucille peered down at him with one glaring gimlet eye, Pete Santo stood at his desk, watching as the Department of Motor Vehicles home page appeared on the computer screen. “If you can’t tell me what it’s about, who could you tell?”
Tim said, “Nobody. Not yet. Maybe in a day, two days, when things … clarify.”
“What things?”
“The unclarified things.”
“Oh. That’s clear now. When the unclarified things clarify, then you can tell me.”
“Maybe. Look, I know this might get your ass in a sling.”
“That doesn’t matter.”
“Of course it matters,” Tim said.
“Don’t insult me. It doesn’t matter.” Pete sat at the computer. “If they bust me out of the department, I’ll be a real-estate agent.”
He entered his name, badge number, and access code, whereupon the Department of Motor Vehicles records surrendered to him as a nubile maiden to a lover.
Bashful Zoey, a black Lab, watched from behind an armchair, while Linda dropped to one knee and, with cooing sounds and declarations of adoration, tried to coax the dog into the open.
Pete typed the license number that Tim had given him, and the DMV database revealed that the plates had been issued for a white Chevrolet registered not to any law-enforcement agency but to one Richard Lee Kravet.
“You know him?” Pete asked.
Tim shook his head. “Never heard of him. I thought the car would turn out to be a plainwrap department sedan.”
Surprised, Pete said, “This guy you want to know about—he’s a cop? I’m scoping out a cop for you?”
“If he’s a cop, he’s a bad cop.”
“Look at me here, what I’m doing for you, using police power for a private inquiry. I’m a bad cop.”
“This guy, if he’s a cop, he’s seriously bad. At worst, Petey, by comparison, you’re a naughty cop.”
“Richard Lee Kravet. Don’t know him. If he has a shield, I don’t think it’s one of ours.”
Pete worked for the Newport Beach Police Department, but he lived in an unincorporated part of the county, nearer to Irvine than to Newport Beach, because even pre-divorce, he couldn’t afford a house in the city that he served.
“Can you get me this guy’s driver’s license?” Tim asked.
“Yeah, why not, but when I’m a real-estate agent, I’m going to wear whatever shoes I want.”
On her belly, Zoey had crawled halfway around the armchair. Her tail thumped the floor in response to Linda’s coaxing.
The one small lamp left most of the room dusted with shadows, and the alchemic light from the monitor gave Pete a tin man’s face, his smooth scar shining like a bad weld.
He was handsome enough that a half-inch-wide slash of pale tissue, curving from ear to chin, did not make him ugly. Plastic surgery would reduce or even eliminate his disfigurement, but he chose not to submit to the healing scalpel.
A scar is not always a flaw. Sometimes a scar may be redemption inscribed in the flesh, a memorial to something endured, to something lost.
The driver’s license appeared on the screen. The photo was of the killer with the Mona Lisa smile.
When the printer produced a copy, Pete handed it to Tim.
According to the license, Kravet was thirty-six years old. His street address was in Anaheim.
Having rolled onto her back and put all four paws in the air, Zoey purred like a cat as she received a gentle tummy rub.
Tim still had no evidence of a murder-for-hire plot. Richard Kravet would deny every detail of their meeting in the tavern.
“Now what?” Pete asked.
As she charmed the dog, Linda looked up at Tim. Her green eyes, though remaining wells of mystery, floated to him the clear desire to keep the nature of their dilemma strictly between them, at least for the time being.
He had known Pete for more than eleven years, this woman for less than two hours, yet he chose the discretion for which she wordlessly pleaded.
“Thanks, Pete. You didn’t need to climb out on this limb.”
“That’s