Vertical Burn - Earl Emerson [94]
As soon as G. A. was out of earshot, Robert Kub approached, but before he could speak, Finney went on the attack. “You really see him take a ticket stub out of that jacket pocket?”
“Sorry to say that I did.”
“There’s no way he could have been the one who put it there?”
“G. A. wouldn’t do that.”
“Who would?”
“You’re telling me Annie Sortland isn’t going to ID you?”
“I don’t know what she’s going to do.”
After Kub left, Diana touched Finney’s shoulder and said, “I’ve been up to visit her, but they won’t let anybody in. G. A. was on the ward, too, arguing with one of the doctors. I think he was trying to get in to see her.”
As she spoke, Charles Reese stepped within hailing distance, a crooked smile on his face. He stared past Finney as if he wasn’t there. “How are you doing, little lady?”
“Fine, Chief. You?”
“I’d feel better if your boyfriend would listen to reason. They tell me the case against him is rock solid.”
“It doesn’t sound like it to me.”
Watching the sun gleam on Reese’s dark hair, it occurred to Finney why he wasn’t behind bars. After boasting to one and all that he had a witness who would finger Finney, G. A. was afraid Annie Sortland would come out of her drug-induced stupor and name someone else. Even if G. A. wasn’t conspiring to frame him, he might have guessed Finney hadn’t left his jacket at the fire scene and he should have known Finney had gone to him in good faith the night before the fire. He certainly knew Finney had not purchased that movie ticket stub. What he didn’t know was whether or not Annie Sortland would ID him. If she ID’ed someone else, G. A. would end up looking like a boob, since he’d already told half the department Finney set the fire.
Because Finney had chatted with Annie that morning, he, too, had assumed she would name him. But there was at least one other person she might finger: the arsonist, whoever that was.
“I can see why G. A. would want to harass me,” Finney said. “But you’ve already done your damage.”
Reese was smiling with just the left side of his face, the right side dead and wooden. “What we got here is a public relations nightmare. Much as I hate to admit this, losing Bill Cordifis last summer was about the best public relations coup the department has had in a while. You are going to single-handedly put us back to square one, the son of a former chief indicted for arson.”
After Reese left, Diana said, “Why did they come?”
“They’re trying to turn the screws. G. A. thinks he can get me to crack. Kub told me he does that with people he’s building a case on.”
“You catch the game G. A. was playing? First he exaggerates how bad it’s going to be for you. The death penalty—he’s maximizing there. Then he pretends he’s on your side. That’s where he minimizes. You didn’t really mean for anybody to get hurt. You were just lighting a match. Maximization and minimization. Cops have been using it ever since the rubber hose was banned.”
“I don’t know,” Finney said, putting a stupid look on his face. “I think it was working. I almost confessed.” She stared at him a moment before he burst into laughter.
Laughing together, they hauled the kayak out of the water.
46. HAPPIER THAN A DEAD PIG IN THE SUN
Sadler was so pissed off he could barely see straight. He’d run into the Kmart off Delridge to buy a pair of mats for the new truck, and came out less than five minutes later to find a big dent in his driver’s door. Hell, he hadn’t even turned off the motor. It was a beautiful truck, spruce-green with chrome running boards, an extended crew cab, and tires bigger than some third-world countries. Hell, it was brand-new. He’d picked it up two weeks earlier from Midway Motors in Fife for just under twenty-nine and a trade-in on his three-year-old Firebird.
Three errands to run while he was in Seattle, and already one of them had gone tits up. Some asshole had put a perfect pie-sized dimple in the driver’s-side door, probably with a boot, some self-righteous parking lot Nazi who