Hidden Prey

Andreno, and said, “You pushed it too far.” Andreno shrugged.
    “You’re joking me again,” she said. “Why do American men joke so much? Do you ever discuss?”
     
    O N THE DRIVE up to Virginia, Nadya again asked about going to see Raisa Reasons. “I believe there are some useful things that I could tell her.”
    “Listen . . . you’re not really a cop, are you?” Lucas asked. “You’re some kind of intelligence agent. You can tell me, because I know you’re not a cop.”
    “Why is this?”
    “Because you know some stuff that cops know, but you don’t know other stuff. Daily things. What we see every day. You don’t know why you shouldn’t go see Reasons’s wife.”
    “Well, why shouldn’t I?”
    “Are you a cop? I won’t tell anybody what you say.”
    She thought about it for a minute, then said, “No. I’m a major with the SVR. I’m in the Counterintelligence Division.”
    “Now we’re getting somewhere,” Lucas said. “Reasons and I figured out that you weren’t a cop the first time we went to the morgue, to look at Oleshev’s body.”
    “Yes?” She may have been discomfited, but didn’t reflect it. Instead, she seemed amused and interested.
    “Yes. You flinched when you looked at the body. Cops your age don’t flinch. They’ve seen two hundred bodies and are interested inwhat they’re going to find out, they don’t really feel much about looking at another dead guy.”
    “Why would that tell me about talking to Raisa Reasons?”
    “ ’Cause you’d know it wouldn’t do any good. When you’ve been a cop for a while, you figure out that the best thing in domestic disputes is distance,” Lucas said. “Just simple distance. You get a husband and wife breaking up, and one of them goes after the other, the one thing that’ll end the violence, end the anger, is distance. If you can’t find the other person, don’t know where she is, pretty soon the violent feelings dissipate and everybody goes back to living their lives.”
    “But I could tell her—”
    “What’s to explain? She knows what happened. What’re you going to tell her, that it didn’t feel good?”
    “No, I—”
    “That it did feel good?”
    Small smile. “No, but—”
    Lucas kept interrupting: “That he really loved her, but their marriage was troubled and he was lonely? That makes his death her fault. That he really wasn’t serious? That devalues her marriage, that he could sleep with somebody so casually.”
    “Maybe tell her that I’m sorry.”
    “If you’re sorry for her, that’s patronizing, and it’ll really piss her off. If you’re sorry about the situation, that’s obvious, and she won’t care how sorry you are. None of it does any good,” Lucas said. “The best thing to do is go home, get some distance. You know the saying ‘Let sleeping dogs lie’?”
    “I know it, but this dog is not sleeping,” Nadya said.
    “She’ll be okay, when the shock wears off. The Duluth guys will manage her, they’ll take care of her, and after a while, you won’t be so important. She’ll have other things to do and other things to think about. What to do with herself.”
    “Without Jerry,” Nadya added, the gloom settling back.
    “Without Jerry, but with some money,” Lucas said. “Jerry had a lot of insurance coverage. She’ll be okay.”
    Nadya sighed and stretched and yawned and finally said, “Maybe you’re right.”
    “Of course I am,” Lucas said. “I’ve seen it a lot. Best thing to do: get away from it if you can.”
     
    M AISY R EYNOLDS WAS two minutes out of the shower, looking good in a cowboy shirt with pearl buttons and tight riding jeans; she smelled like Irish Spring soap. “I’m getting ready to go to work. If you guys keep coming around, I’ll probably get fired. They’re really mad about what you’re doing. About Anton.”
    “How long have you worked for him?” Lucas asked, as he and Nadya followed her into her trailer. The place smelled like celery and carrots and beer. She pointed them at a tiny dinette, and Nadya and Lucas settled into chairs. Lucas took his laptop out of his briefcase and set it on the tippy Formica-topped table.
    “Six years. He’s not a bad guy. He’s paternal, I guess you’d say. A little bit cheap, but you can talk to him. He doesn’t mess with your tips.”
    “How about his kids?”
    “The son is just like his dad. The daughter’s an asshole.”
    “But this job, it must be good enough, if you can keep horses