Dirty Money Read online

  “Not any more.”

  “Okay.”

  “Don’t worry, Sandra, I’ll get rid of him.”

  “Not in that truck,” Sandra told him. “We don’t want any problems with that truck. I’ll deal with it.”

  “The dirty bastard.”

  “Up ahead, you got Route 518.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Take the left on 518, the right on 26A, right on 47, it’ll take you back to this road, then just head on up, same as before.”

  “And you’ll be up there.”

  “I’ll do the cutout, catch up with you later. Here comes 518.”

  The traffic light up ahead was green. The van’s turn signal went on, and then the follower. They went off to the left, and Sandra continued north, saying to McWhitney, “You wanna tell me about him?”

  “His name is Oscar Sidd, he’s supposed to know about moving money out of the country.”

  “You told him what we’ve got.”

  “So we’d have some place to take it after.”

  “And you just happened to forget to mention your friend Oscar to me.”

  “Come on, Sandra. I never thought he’d pull something like this. What does he want, something to fall off the back of the truck?”

  “If he forgot to mention to you, Nelson, that he was gonna take a drive up here today, he wants more than a skim, doesn’t he?”

  “The bastard. He’s out of his league, if that’s what he’s thinking.”

  “He is and it is. If you see me, a little later, don’t slow down.”

  “There you go insulting me again.”

  “Have a nice ride, Nelson,” she said, and broke the connection.

  A few minutes later she was stopped at the red light for the intersection with Route 47. When it turned green, she drove more slowly, looking for a place to roost, and found it at a small wooden town hall on the edge of town, up a rise higher than the road. Saturday afternoon, it was deserted, no cars in the parking lot beside the building. She pulled in there, up the steep driveway to the parking lot beside the town hall, then swung around to face south, opened the passenger window, and waited.

  Not quite ten minutes, and here came the van. Well behind it, but with no intervening vehicle this time, came Oscar Sidd in his no-brand jalopy. Sandra popped the glove compartment and took out her licensed Taurus Tracker revolver, chambered for the .17HMR, a punchier cartridge than the .22, in a very accurate handgun.

  As the van went by, Sandra leaned over to the right window, curled her left hand onto the bottom of the frame, the side of her right hand holding the Tracker on the back of her left, and popped a bullet into Oscar Sidd’s right front tire.

  Very good. The car jerked hard to the right, ran off the shoulder, and slammed into the rise, jolting to a stop. The windshield suddenly starred on the left side, so Mr. Sidd’s head must have met it.

  Sandra started the Honda, closed the right window, put the Tracker away, and drove back down to the road. When she went past the other car, its hood was crumpled and steaming, and Mr. Sidd was motionless against the steering wheel.

  Redial. “Nelson?”

  “What’s happening?”

  “That’s me behind you now. See me?”

  “Oh, yeah, the black waterbug.”

  “Thank you. Can you find that church from here?” Because she wasn’t sure she’d be able to.

  “Sure.”

  “Then I’ll stay back here,” she said, “keep an eye out, see are there any more friends of yours coming along.”

  She did recognize the road the church was on, when McWhitney turned into it, and hung back even farther than before. There had still been no roadblocks, though she had seen the occasional police car, moving as though with a purpose, not just idly on patrol.

  What had changed in the world? She’d considered talking it over with McWhitney and decided it was better not. If everything was okay at the church, fine. If it turned out there was some sort of trouble there, let McWhitney walk into it, at which point Sandra would just drive on by, nothing to do with that van, and head for Long Island.

  There it was, church on the right, white house on the left. McWhitney turned in at the house, because that’s where Parker would be, and Sandra lagged back so far that McWhitney was already out of the van, looking impatient, before she pulled in beside him. She opened her door, McWhitney said, “You wanna take a lotta time here?” and a gunshot sounded from the house.

  10

  It had been the worst week in Nick Dalesia’s life, but it never quite went entirely all to hell. Every time things looked hopeless there’d be one more little ray of possibility, just enough to get him moving again. He was beginning to think that hopelessness was the better option. More restful, anyway.

  Public transportation had seemed like the best way to get clear of the search area right after the robbery. Who knew that all he had to do to get himself scooped up like a marlin in a net was buy a sandwich to eat on the bus to St. Louis, paying for it with a twenty from the bank?

  He was certain he was done for then, with all those lawmen’s hands on his elbows, and he spent the first night in the solitary holding cell at some state police building in western Massachusetts trying to figure out what he could trade for a better deal.

  The money certainly. McWhitney: he could point a finger right directly at that bar of his. And Parker, he could give them leads on him, too. And the story of the killing of Harbin for wearing the federal wire, and the names of the other people present at that meeting. There was a lot he could give them, when he added it all up. He was still going to do serious time, and he knew it, but he’d be a little more cushioned than if he’d walked in empty-handed.

  But then, early next morning, they didn’t question him at all, so he didn’t get to tell them which top lawyer they should call, who happened to be a guy Nick didn’t know but had read about in the newspapers, and who would be perfect for Nick’s defense, and who would be bound to take the job because this was a high-profile case and that was a lawyer who liked high-profile cases.

  But then none of that happened, and then, early in the morning, he was rousted out and put into a small office with a cup of coffee and a donut. It was the US marshals who had their hands on him, and they didn’t care to question him about anything, they were just there to conduct him to someplace else.

  One marshal in the room, an automatic sidearm in a holstered belt strapped over his coat, his partner gone off to see about transportation. The coffee was too hot to drink, so Nick threw it in the marshal’s face, grabbed the automatic, whammed the guy across the forehead with it, and headed for the door.

  Locked. The marshal must have a key. Nick turned back and the guy was conscious, coming up to a sprawled seated position, groping in a dazed way inside his coat, coming out with something.

  The son of a bitch had another gun! Nick lunged across the space between them, shoved the automatic barrel into the guy’s chest to muffle the sound, and shot him once.

  All the guy had needed to do was lie there till Nick was out of the room, then yell like an opera singer, but no. Nick found the keys, and got moving.

  Getting through and out of that state police building had been very tough. It was a maze, and the alarm was already out. He eventually went out a window to a fire escape and down to where he could jump onto the roof of a garage, and then get to the ground and gone.

  He kept the automatic. He’d paid for it, he’d paid a lot, and he was gonna keep it.

  He carjacked an early-morning commuter drinking his cardboard container of coffee at a red light, but he couldn’t keep that vehicle long; just enough time to get to some other town. And while he drove, he tried to think where to go next.

  Forget transportation, public or otherwise. Any traveling he did would get him picked up right away. What he had to do was go to ground and stay there, maybe a week, maybe even longer.

  But where? Who did he know in this part of the world? Where would he find a safe place t
o hunker down?

  He was just about to abandon his carjacked wheels when he remembered Dr. Madchen. Not a criminal, not somebody the police would have any reason to look at. But Nick did have a handle on his back, because the doctor had some kind of connection with the local guy in the setup of the robbery, and the doctor would provide him an alibi.

  When, just before the robbery, it had looked as though the doctor was calling attention to himself, being coy, being stupid, Nick and Parker had gone to his home to have a word with him. That was all it took, and in any case the robbery went wrong so quickly there was no alibi in the world that would help the local guy and so, after all, the doctor did nothing. Which meant he was clean; but if Nick asked him to help, he would help.

  The week at the doctor’s house was grueling. Nick had a terrific sense of urgency, a need to take action, but there was never anything to do. All week the television news told him the heat was still on, and he knew he was the reason why. If it was just the bank’s money, they’d ease off after a while, but he’d killed one of their own, and they weren’t about to let up.

  He kept trying to make plans, come to decisions, but there was simply not a single move he could make. If he left Dr. Madchen’s house, how long would it take them to catch up with him? No time at all. But how could he stay here, like this, as though his feet were nailed to the floor?

  He had never thought before that he might some day go crazy, but now he did. The jangling electric need to do something, do something, when there was nothing to be done; there was nothing worse.

  He thought sometimes he’d kill the doctor, take his car and whatever valuables he had in the house, and head north. But then he’d remember the roadblocks, and he knew it couldn’t happen. He didn’t have safe ID. They had his picture. What was he going to do?

  By Friday evening, when the doctor told him the maid would be coming back tomorrow and Nick couldn’t stay at the house any longer, Nick was ready to go, it hardly mattered where. He’d been more beaten down by the week of inaction than if he’d spent a month in a war zone. When the doctor gave him the ultimatum—too timid for an ultimatum, but that’s still what it was—he actually welcomed it, as a change, any change from being in this paralysis, and he knew immediately what he was going to do.

  “Tomorrow,” he told the doctor, “when you go get this Estrella, you’re gonna drive me somewhere,” and the next day he had the doctor drive him past the church, but without stopping or pointing it out or making it seem as though the church had anything to do with his plans. But then, a little farther on, where the road curved and dipped down to a bridge over a narrow stream, Nick said, “Stop here, I’ll get out and you drive on.”

  The doctor stopped, beside the road just before the bridge, and Nick got out, then stooped to look back into the car and say, “We never met each other, Doctor. If you make no trouble for me, I’ll make no trouble for you.”

  “I won’t make any trouble.”

  Nick believed him; the doctor’s face looked as whipped as his own. “Thanks,” he said, and shut the car door, and the doctor’s Alero wobbled away over the bridge and out of sight.

  Nick saw no other cars as he walked back to the church. Would it all be the same? He was counting on it. His idea, if it could even be called an idea, was to grab as much of the money as he could, steal a car from somewhere around here, then drive it strictly on back roads, keeping away from the roadblocks.

  Canada was still the best hope he had, if he had any hope at all. He’d head north, up through the winding little roads in the mountains. He’d sleep in the car and only use the bad money in places where he would immediately be moving on, paying only for food and gas.

  Somewhere up near the border he’d have to leave that car and walk, however far it was until he reached some town on the Canadian side. There, he could do a burglary or two to get some safe Canadian money, steal another car, and make his way to Toronto or Ottawa. There he could come to at least a temporary stop, and try to figure out the rest of his life from there. It wasn’t much of a plan, but what else did he have?

  The church looked the same. When they’d first holed up in here, McWhitney had kicked open the locked side door so they could carry the boxes of money in, then they’d kicked it shut again so that it looked all right unless you really examined it. Had anything been done to change that? Not that Nick could see. He leaned on the door and it fell open in front of him.

  The money was still there, up in the choir loft, untouched. Nick filled his pockets, then went downstairs and outside, this time not bothering to pull the door shut.

  He was going to keep walking down the road, looking for a vehicle parked outside somebody’s house or a passing driver to carjack, when he glanced at the house across the road and decided it wouldn’t hurt to see what might be inside there that could be of use. He expected the place to be empty, but was quiet as a matter of habit, and when he walked into one of the upstairs bedrooms somebody was asleep in there, on the floor, covered with a rough-looking quilt.

  A bum? Nick edged closer, and was astonished to see it was Parker.

  What was Parker doing here? He had come for the money, no other reason.

  So where was his car? Nick had been on both sides of the road and he hadn’t seen any car. Was it hidden somewhere? Where?

  He hunkered against the wall, across the room from Parker, trying to decide what to do, whether he should go look for the car, or wake Parker up to ask him where it was, or just kill him and keep moving, when Parker came awake. Nick saw that Parker from the first instant was not surprised, not worried, not even to wake up and find somebody in the room with a gun in his hand.

  We used to be partners, Nick thought, with a kind of dull disbelief. Could we be partners again? Could we get out of this mess together?

  We’re not partners, he thought, as Parker looked at him with that lack of surprise and said, “So there you are.” I don’t have partners any more, Nick thought. I only have enemies now.

  “Where’s your car?” he asked.

  Parker bullshitted him. He danced around without moving, without trying to get up from the floor, just saying things, dancing around. He doesn’t have a car. But why doesn’t he have a car? Somebody dropped him off, some woman dropped him off, some woman Nick doesn’t know dropped him off.

  Bullshit! Where did this woman come from, all of a sudden? Why is Parker asleep here? Now angry, angry at Parker, at the marshal, at the world, Nick pounded the pistol butt on the floor and demanded, “What are you doing here?”

  “I wanted to look at the money.”

  “You wanted to take the money.”

  No, Parker told him, no, too early for that. And more bullshit, more bullshit, while Nick tried to figure out what Parker was up to.

  “You were out, you were free and clear, and you came back.” With sudden tense suspicion, with a quick shiver up the middle of his back, he said, “Is Nelson here?”

  But Parker said no, he didn’t travel with McWhitney, and Nick could believe that. But what was he doing here? With sudden conviction, Nick said, “You’re waiting.”

  “That’s right,” Parker said, and as though it didn’t matter he flipped that rough quilt off his legs.

  Nick didn’t like that movement. He didn’t like any movement right now. Aiming the automatic at Parker’s face, on the brink of using it, only holding back because he needed to know what was going on here, who was Parker waiting for, where was there a car in this for Nick, he aimed the automatic at Parker’s face and yelled, “Don’t move!”

  “I’m not moving, Nick. I got stiff, that’s all, sleeping here.”

  “You could get stiffer,” Nick said, and as he said it he knew he couldn’t wait any more. He didn’t care about Parker any more, didn’t need the answers to any questions, didn’t have any questions left.

  But Parker was still talking, moving his hands now, saying they could help each other, saying, “And I got water,” holding up a clear bottle in his left hand.r />
  Water? What did Nick care about water? But he looked at the bottle.

  “It’s just water. Check it out for yourself,” Parker offered, and slowly lobbed the bottle toward him underhand, in a high arc, toward the ceiling, toward his lap.

  Nick’s eyes followed the movement of the bottle for just a second, for one second too long, and something like a great dark wing slashed across the room at him, Parker lost and hidden behind it, the quilt twisting toward him through the air. He fired, with nothing to aim at, and a hard hand chopped down on the gun wrist. The automatic skittered away across the wood floor and Parker’s other hand clawed for his throat. Nick screamed, kicked his heels to the floor to jolt himself away, flopped over to his right, found his elbows and knees beneath himself, and lunged out and away, up off the floor and through the closed window.

  THREE

  1

  Parker reached for that fleeing body, but the hours spent asleep on the floor had left him too stiff, his movements less coordinated than he was used to. He missed Nick entirely, and watched him crash through the window, the force of his impact taking out the wooden crosspieces and mullions, shattering the glass, leaving a jagged hole with fresh wind blowing in.

  Cursing the stiffness, Parker turned the other way and grabbed the automatic off the floor. Then he used the wall to help him to his feet, and hobbled to the gaping window.

  Nick was out of sight. He’d landed on weedy lawn back here, twelve feet down, with the woods half a dozen fast paces away.

  Fresh blood hadn’t yet darkened on the zigzag edges of glass. Nick was hurt out there. How badly?

  A sound on the stairs, behind him. Had Nick come in? Without his gun?

  Parker moved to the corner farthest from the doorway and waited. He heard the heavy steps coming up the stairs, and then silence. He waited.

  “Parker?”

  Parker leaned against the wall behind him. “Nelson,” he said.

  McWhitney appeared in the doorway, his own gun loosely in his hand, but reacted when he saw what Parker was carrying: “Whoa! What’s this?”