Storm Prey

must’ve known that they’d put it together, that they’d be after him.
    Or maybe he was simply too damn dumb.
    Janis echoed in his head as he climbed into his car, and he thought, No. Not Right. Dead is just another word for nothing left to lose.
     
     
    DEL CAPSLOCK was leaning against the barrier wall, watching crime-scene techs working through the white van, when Lucas pulled onto the top level of the Blue Ramp. A couple of airport cops were observing, and Marcy was standing at the van. Del was wearing a Russian Army greatcoat, a black watch cap and galoshes, and looked like a guy who might have been hired to shovel the snow.
    Lucas parked and Del ambled over and said, “Shrake told me about what happened this morning, and then Everson mentioned this deal.”
    “You look at her?”
    “Yeah. Not much to see,” Del said. “I guess you know who did it.”
    “Guy named Joe Mack,” Lucas said. “He’s one of the guys who stuck up the hospital, and probably killed the other two guys who were with him. Dumb sonofabitch.”
    “You’re looking pretty grim.”
    “I’m feeling pretty grim,” Lucas said. “Woman had a couple kids, and we met one of them. A preschooler. Cute. Scared for her mom. And herself.”
    “Ah, jeez.”
     
     
    MARCY HAD NOT TURNED to look toward Lucas, so he and Del walked up behind her and Lucas touched her shoulder and asked, “How you doing?”
    “I’m okay,” she said. She glanced at him, then peered back into the van. “But we got him. More blood, and it’s not hers. Same deal as at the hospital—she tried to fight whoever it was, scratched him.”
    Marcy stepped back a foot or so, and Lucas leaned past her. The dead woman was on her back, her legs spread, her eyes still open. Stiff, either with rigor mortis or the cold.
    The anger bit at him again. Not necessary: a woman dead because of nothing. Lucas backed away, then asked to the technician’s back, “You see any other damage? Head wounds? Was she hit with anything?”
    “She might have been hit a couple times,” the tech said. “She’s got some abraded skin on her cheek and forehead, but she died from strangulation.”
    “Was a cord used, or . . .”
    “Looks like fingers,” the tech said. “Like he crushed her windpipe with his thumbs. Really dug in.”
    “Raped?”
    “No sign of that. Her clothing is fine.”
    “So he just killed her,” Lucas said.
    “Looks like it.”
    “Okay. We need to go over every inch of the van. We need everything you can get from the driver’s seat and the passenger seat... We need to know if she drove over here, or if Mack did.”
    “Okay.” The tech sounded annoyed: of course he would do that. Lucas backed out.
    “What are you thinking?” Marcy asked.
    “What Lyle Mack said—that Joe took a cab into town, went to Macy’s. I went to Macy’s, up to the men’s department. There were two salespeople up there and neither one remembered anybody like him.”
    “Did you think they would?” Marcy asked.
    “I wanted to check. He’s gotta get a coat from somewhere. Anyway, they hadn’t seen him. It’s possible he carried the coat to another checkout desk. I’d want to see the receipt before I believed it, but it’s possible.”
    “And the point is . . .”
    “The point is, Joe didn’t seem like this big an asshole.” Lucas waved at the van. “He seemed like this hang-out guy. He seemed like a ‘how ya doin’?’ guy. He might do a burglary, he might strong-arm somebody, he’d steal something if he thought he wouldn’t get caught, but... not this. This freaks me out.”
    “He was panicked. Something cracked. I mean, look at the guy in the hospital. Somebody kicked him, didn’t mean to kill him ... dumb guys, trashing around,” Marcy said. “How many times have you seen it? A hundred?”
    “Yeah, yeah. It’s just that everybody keeps saying what a basically good guy he was.” He looked back at the van. “I’ll tell you what—that wasn’t done by a nice guy. He looked right into her eyes and choked the life out of her.”
     
     
    THEY WERE still talking when Virgil called: “We’re leaving the hospital.”
    “Nothing happened with the kids?”
    “Nope. Sara’s still got problems. They’re now saying they could go tomorrow.”
    “How’s Weather?”
    “She’s okay, but it’s wearing on her,” Virgil said. “There are Minneapolis cops over here, talking to people who might have been around when the pharmacy got hit. It’s pissing