Alex Kava Bundle - Alex Kava [765]
“We recovered a casing in the wall behind her,” Pakula answered. “It’s a .38, but that’s all I know right now. It looks like there were two guns used. Ballistics report probably won’t be back until tomorrow.”
“What do we know about her?” Grace was anxious to find out why Jared Barnett may have singled out this young woman, this bank teller.
“Her name is Tina Cervante,” Pakula began, not needing a file or notes. “She was twenty-three years old, single, lived with two girlfriends in West Omaha. She’s from Texas. All her family’s down there. She came up to go to college, dropped out and landed the bank job. I’m gonna talk to one of the roommates later today. But here’s something interesting. About a year ago she got busted for DUI, her third offense. Pretty serious stuff. Guess who her fucking attorney was?”
Grace was more interested in the woman’s hands. “Hold on a minute.” She pulled the sheet back and checked out her toes. “She probably lived with two roommates because she wasn’t making enough money to be out on her own. Maybe she even had some college loans to pay, especially if her parents were pissed off that she didn’t stick with it. And yet she could afford to have her fingernails and toes professionally manicured? Maybe even on a routine basis.”
“She’s also had a nose job.” Frank pointed to a hairline scar that Grace would never have noticed otherwise. “A very professional job. Not cheap. Probably within the last six to eight months.”
“So she had screwed-up financial priorities. It’s an epidemic with kids that age.” Pakula sounded impatient, as if talking from experience, perhaps reminded of his own daughters. “She could have had someone else helping out or taking care of her. What I wanna know is how an attractive, clean-cut young woman like Tina Cervante ends up with a scum-sucking attorney like Max Kramer.”
“Kramer was her attorney on the DUI?” Grace wondered if Pakula was simply fishing for something. Kramer handled all kinds of cases. A DUI wouldn’t be anything unusual, especially since the client was an attractive young woman.
“It’s not my job to pass judgment,” Frank interrupted. “But I’m not sure how clean-cut a young woman with three DUIs could be. Also…” He brought over a stainless-steel basin from the equipment tray and lifted the towel off to show them. “She was about two months pregnant.”
CHAPTER 36
9:00 a.m.
The nausea had finally passed, though Andrew’s panic had not. While Jared and Charlie prepared for their cross-country trip, Andrew’s mind raced. He tried to go over everything he had brought with him and then began visualizing the contents of the cabin. He remembered there were several dull knives in one of the kitchen drawers, a poker for the fireplace—which he couldn’t see anywhere—but nothing else. Even as the light crept over the treetops in brilliant oranges and began to illuminate the dark corners of the cabin, it seemed hopeless.
His vision still blurred without warning, going in and out of focus like the TV reception. He hardly noticed his shoulder anymore. What did it matter that he couldn’t move his right arm when his entire body had become numb?
He tried to test his feet, but Jared was suddenly there waving the gun at him. He wondered why they didn’t just get it over with, just put him out of his misery. His answer came soon enough, and he couldn’t help remembering one of his father’s favorite sayings, “Be careful what you wish for.”
Jared plopped down in the chair opposite him. The gun was tucked inside the waistband of a pair of Andrew’s jeans, held there by a leather belt and strange buckle, some kind of carved emblem Andrew didn’t recognize. He was staring at the belt buckle, when he realized Jared was talking to him. He caught only the last words.
“…Pretty fucking good. How do you know all this stuff about murder?”
That’s when he saw his latest hardcover in Jared’s hand, his trigger finger inside the pages, marking his place. He must have taken it with him for his nap in the back bedroom. He was reading Andrew’s book. Jesus! And now he wanted to sit and chat about