She's Not There, стр. 31

“You want me to work Waukesha?” It was unheard of—they never crossed boundaries. She decided not to question it further since at least he wasn’t reaming her out about being at Schindler’s the night before.

“They’re in a bind because two detectives were in an accident yesterday and are still in the hospital. Find this Peacock broad and get over there.”

Maggie told him she would report to Waukesha right away and would call David too if he wanted. He wanted.

She knew exactly why TJ’s cell phone was off but had no clue about a boyfriend from West Allis. Lisa had told her TJ was seeing an MPD detective, but it didn’t mean there weren’t a few wannabes hanging around.

She called David and told him she’d pick him up on her way to Waukesha, then tried Jeff’s phone as she pulled on her clothes. “Jeff, is TJ with you? Her phone’s not on.”

“Yeah, she’s right here. You caught us between meetings; we’re at Dunkin Donuts having coffee.” She heard him say, “Maggie,” followed by the sound of the phone changing hands.

TJ asked, “Hey, what’s up?”

“Waukesha got a report of a suspicious car with a man sitting it, parked across the street from Eric’s last night and Thursday night. The guy’s name is Eddie Wysecki; he owns a bar in West Allis. They talked to him this morning and he claims he’s been seeing you. Says he’s worried you’re cheating on him, so he was trying to find out what you’re up to. Do you know him?”

“Shit, no, I never heard of the asshole. Never been in a bar in West Allis—that town is a shithole.”

“That’s what I thought—about Wysecki, not West Allis. Damn. He had to know his story wouldn’t check out, so he must have wanted to stall us. He’s probably in the wind by now.”

“Well, for Christ’s sake, why did they leave the guy alone?”

“I guess because they really didn’t have anything on him. And remember what day this is.”

“Well, it ain’t my fuckin’ birthday!” TJ’s language grew increasingly colorful as her anger escalated.

Maggie was in too big a hurry to pacify TJ. “David and I are assigned to the investigation. For today, anyway, because it’s the first weekend of deer hunting season. You must remember what it was like when you were a cop.”

“Yeah right. Ten long days of cluster-fuck.”

TJ closed the phone and handed it back to Jeff. He’d been admiring the way her sweater hugged her body—and how her amazing blue eyes flashed when she was angry. She’d been so good to him last night. It was hard to meld the woman who’d held him until he fell asleep with this person next to him slinging smut. “You eat with that mouth?”

She gave him a dark look and ordered two more donuts.

39             

Just beginning to break a sweat, he fought to keep from dropping the 125 pound weight he was pressing when he heard the announcement on the morning news. The woman in the woods—she wasn’t Lisa Rayburn. He’d fucked up. Who the hell was Danielle Ventura and what was she doing in the woods?

He hated it when he failed to accomplish something he’d set out to do, but he dared not act again so soon. Schindler’s house would be as secure as Fort Knox now. It would be impossible to get to Rayburn. If he was lucky, she and her band of followers would figure out she was the real target and back the hell off.

The scene in the woods had stoked an urge to resume his hobby. He needed an outlet, but it couldn’t be Rayburn.

He would have to choose carefully.

40             

Maggie and David met Zabel and Feinstein at the Waukesha station, where the four of them went over the details of the case while they drank charred, police-station coffee out of Styrofoam cups and waited for the search warrants on Wysecki’s bar and apartment. Wysecki was still nowhere to be found.

When the warrants came in, the other officers asked which one they wanted. Surprised at being given a choice, Maggie and David ended up at Wysecki’s bar.

The bar was in a blue-collar neighborhood of aging, two-family duplexes and taverns on nearly every corner. Two West Allis uniforms stood sentry, and informed them that Wysecki hadn’t shown. His bartender pulled up a moment later. A tall, stoop-shouldered man in his seventies, he hurried to the door and held it open for them.

The place smelled overwhelmingly of stale beer, but the floors and the surface of the bar were spotless. An ancient manual cash register stood open and empty. The bartender explained that he’d taken the receipts the night before and dropped them in the night deposit after closing.

In the back of the building was a tiny, unisex bathroom across a short hallway from a combination office and storeroom. A stained, wooden desk piled high with papers, receipts, advertisements, and an overflowing ashtray took up most of the room. The rest was piled to the ceiling with cases of beer, soda, and kegs. On the wall behind the desk hung the ubiquitous girlie-calendar.

A door at the back of the room, nearly hidden by a stack of old signs, opened to a cellar reeking of mildew. David called the bartender in and asked what they used the cellar for.

“Not much. The vendors don’t like hauling deliveries downstairs for a small account. Just a buncha’ old junk down there.”

After moving the signs aside, Maggie and David made their way down sagging wooden steps lit by a single light bulb suspended from the cobwebbed ceiling.

Maggie wrinkled her nose at the musty odor. “Probably hasn’t been used in years. Should I go to the car for flashlights?”

“No, I think there’s another light. Let’s see if it works.” David turned on a hanging bulb in the middle of the room. The bartender had been right—the cellar was filled with junk. Mostly old bar stools, their stuffing oozing out like hernias. And enough beer signs to be a collector’s dream except for the rust and mold marring their surfaces.

Maggie hated old basements; they tended to be ripe with disgusting things like spiders and rats. “Let’s get out of here.”

“No, we’d better go through everything. I’ll finish here if you’d rather wait upstairs.” He poked through a stack of old cardboard boxes filled with ancient, yellowing papers from the business.

“Man, it’s stuffy down here,” complained Maggie. She couldn’t wait to get out of the cave-like cellar. “David, stop a minute. Do you smell that?”

“Smell what?”

“Your nose must be plugged. I’m getting a whiff of a really nasty odor. Something died and it smells like it’s still here.”

David walked to the back of the room. “Yeah, I’m getting it now.” He walked closer to an area behind the furnace and pushed aside a stack of boxes. “This metal door in the wall is for an old coal chute. Let me see if I can get it open.” He tugged on the metal handle, stumbling when it opened easily in his hand.

An undeniable odor of death wafted from the dark interior. Human or animal? It remained to be determined since there wasn’t enough light to see inside the opening. Maggie’s face scrunched up in revulsion as the smell diffused toward them through the doorway. The blackness beyond the opening was absolute, the odor palpable.

“I’ll go up for the flashlights and make sure the bartender stays put,” Maggie offered.

“All right. Bring the Vicks, too. Have those patrolmen find out if there’s anyone from the Medical Examiner’s office who hasn’t gone deer hunting.”

When Lisa and Jeff returned to the house Saturday, there was still a patrol car parked at the curb, and the security guard’s car sat next to the garage. Quickly deemed ”robo-cop” by TJ, the guard circled the grounds and house at regular intervals, effectively protecting the residents from the media.