Secret Prey

it.’’
    ‘‘What are the chances it’s someone else?’’ Lucas asked.
    Ogram scratched his bald spot with his right middle finger. ‘‘I don’t know. Ten to one against. Hundred to one. Not enough for court, but if you come to me and say we’ve got a partial and a suspect, and we get this much . . . I’d say we got him.’’
    ‘‘Jesus,’’ Lucas said to Mayberry. ‘‘This can’t be true.’’
    ‘‘Why not?’’ Mayberry asked.
    ‘‘It’s too easy,’’ Lucas said. ‘‘It’s never this easy.’’ And to Ogram: ‘‘I kind of need to pin down the odds.’’
    ‘‘I know a guy at the FBI who could give you an idea. He fools around with that sort of math thing. Statistics and odds and chances.’’
    ‘‘Call him,’’ Lucas said. ‘‘And call me in Minneapolis when you find out. Wilson motherfuckin’ McDonald.’’
    Lucas headed for the elevators with Mayberry two steps behind. Lucas pushed the call button, turned and jabbed a finger at Mayberry: ‘‘Hey: You’ve got a slug, right?’’
    ‘‘Piece of one, anyway.’’
    ‘‘And the ME took a piece of one out of O’Dell—the banker woman who got shot. Let’s get them together and do an analysis and see if they match.’’
    ‘‘Okay—you guys want to do it?’’
    ‘‘Sure. Send it over.’’
    ‘‘It’ll be twenty minutes behind you,’’ Mayberry said. ‘‘Hot dog, I love this. This case has been open forever.’’
    LUCAS CALLED SLOAN FROM HIS CAR, SAID, ‘‘WE GOT A break in the Kresge case: get Sherrill and Del if they’re around, and meet me at my office in twenty minutes.’’
    ‘‘Who done it?’’
    ‘‘Our pal, Wilson McDonald.’’
    ‘‘You’re shittin’ me.’’
    ‘‘I shit you not,’’ Lucas said. ‘‘The problem is gonna be proving it.’’
    He punched Sloan off, found his notebook, looked up the number for Bone’s office, and punched it in as he accelerated out onto I-94. Bone’s assistant took the call: ‘‘Chief Davenport: Everybody’s up in the boardroom right now. I think they may be picking a new CEO. So unless it’s a major emergency . . .’’
    ‘‘Is Wilson McDonald in there?’’
    ‘‘Yes, of course. He’s one of the candidates.’’
    ‘‘Thanks. I’ll call back.’’ She’d told him what he wanted to know: that McDonald was there, at the bank.
    SHERRILL WAS SKEPTICAL.
    More than skeptical: she was absolutely nasty. ‘‘We got diddly, Lucas. I don’t care what the odds are, if it doesn’t work in court, it doesn’t work. And the goddamn killing is so old that there’s no chance of making a case.’’
    ‘‘Helps to know who did it,’’ Del said. Sherrill had come in wearing jeans, high-top Nikes, a suede jacket, and a slightly too tight fuzzy white sweater that showed her figure to exceptional advantage. Lucas, Sloan, and Del were resolutely meeting her eyes, though the pressure eventually got to Del and he slumped back in his chair and looked up at the ceiling.
    ‘‘C’mon, Del, look at the Cat case,’’ Sherrill said. ‘‘ Everybody in the office knows George Cat killed his old lady. It doesn’t do any good, because we can’t prove it. It’s gonna be even harder with McDonald, because McDonald has every lawyer in the world.’’
    ‘‘Still helps to know,’’ Del muttered.
    ‘‘Because we think Wilson’s done about four of them,’’ Lucas said. ‘‘If we can put together a pattern, argue it, and have semiconvincing evidence on one, a jury’ll pack him away.’’
    ‘‘So what do you want?’’ Sloan asked.
    ‘‘I want to tear him apart. I want to look him over with a microscope. I want to get a search warrant and pull his house down.’’
    ‘‘Don’t think we’ve got enough for a warrant,’’ Del said.
    ‘‘So let’s fuckin’ get it,’’ Lucas said. ‘‘Sloan, can you break away from the Ericson case for a couple of days?’’
    ‘‘For a while,’’ he said.
    ‘‘Ask Frank. And if he says okay, look at O’Dell again. See if there’s any way McDonald could have finessed it to get into the apartment. Del, you look at Arris again. See if there’s anything else. Marcy, you take Ingall. I’m going up north again, right away. I want to think about the Kresge thing again. See if I can figure out how he did it. Let’s meet again tomorrow at nine o’clock. And I’ve got my car phone if you need me before then.’’
    ‘‘Why don’t you get a real walk-around phone?’’ Del asked.