Winter Prey

right?”
    “What?”
    “You were the guy who killed the Maddog after he sliced up all those women. And you were in that fight with those Indian guys.”
    Lucas nodded. “Yeah.” The Crows coming out of that house in the dark, .45s in their hands . . . . Why’d she have to bring that up?
    “I had a friend who did that New York cop, the woman who was shot in the chest? I can’t remember her name, but at the time she was pretty famous.”
    “Lily Rothenburg.” Damn. Sloan on the steps of Hennepin General, white-faced, saying, “Got your shit together? . . . Lily’s been shot.” Sweet Lily.
    “Oh, yes,” Weather said, nodding. “I knew it was a flower name. She’s back in New York?”
    “Yeah. She’s a captain now. Your friend was a redheaded surgeon? I remember.”
    “Yup. That’s her. And she was there when the big shoot-out happened. She says it was the most exciting night of her career. She was doing two ops at the same time, going back and forth between rooms.”
    “My God, and now it’s here,” Carr said, appalled. He looked at Lucas. “Listen, I spent five years on the patrol before I got elected up here, and that was twenty years ago. Most of my boys are off the patrol or local police forces. We really don’t know nothin’ about multiple murder. What I’m askin’ is, are you gonna help us out?”
    “What do you want me to do?” Lucas asked, shaking away the memories.
    “Run the investigation. I’ll give you everything I can. Eight or ten guys, help with the county attorney, whatever.”
    “What authority would I have?”
    Carr dipped one hand in his coat pocket and at the same time said, “Do you swear to uphold the laws of the state of Wisconsin and so forth and so on, so help you God?”
    “Sure.” Lucas nodded.
    Carr tossed him a star. “You’re a deputy,” he said. “We can work out the small stuff later.”
    Lucas looked at the badge in the palm of his hand.
    “Try not to shoot anybody,” Weather said.

CHAPTER

3
    The Iceman’s hands were freezing. He fumbled the can opener twice, then put the soup can aside and turned on the hot water in the kitchen sink. As he let the water run over his fingers, his mind drifted . . . .
    He hadn’t found the photograph. The girl didn’t know where it was, and she’d told the truth: he’d nearly cut her head off before she’d died, cut away her nose and her ears. She said her mother had taken it, and finally, he believed her. But by that time Claudia was dead. Too late to ask where she’d put it.
    So he’d killed the girl, chopping her with the corn-knife, and burned the house. The police didn’t know there was a photo, and the photo itself was on flimsy newsprint. With the fire, with all the water, it’d be a miracle if it had survived.
    Still. He hadn’t seen it destroyed. The photo, if it were found, would kill him.
    Now he stood with his fingers under the hot water. They slowly shaded from white to pink, losing the putty-like consistency they’d had from the brutal cold. For just a moment he closed his eyes, overwhelmed by the sense of things undone. And time was trickling away. A voice at the backof his head said, Run now. Time is trickling away.
    But he had never run away. Not when his parents had beaten him. Not when kids had singled him out at school. Instead, he had learned to strike first, but slyly, disguising his aggression: even then, cold as ice. Extortion was his style: I didn’t take it, he gave it to me. We were just playing, he fell down, he’s just a crybaby, I didn’t mean anything.
    In tenth grade he’d learned an important lesson. There were other students as willing to use violence as he was, and violence in tenth grade involved larger bodies, stronger muscles: people got hurt. Noses were broken, shoulders were dislocated in the weekly afternoon fights. Most importantly, you couldn’t hide the violence. No way to deny you were in a fight if somebody got hurt.
    And somebody got hurt. Darrell Wynan was his name. Tough kid. Picked out the Iceman for one of those reasons known only to people who pick fights: in fact, he had seen it coming. Carried a rock in his pocket, a smooth sandstone pebble the size of a golf ball, for the day the fight came.
    Wynan caught him next to the football field, three or four of his remora fish running along behind, carrying their books, delight on their faces. A fight, a fight . . .
    The fight lasted five seconds. Wynan came at him in the stance of an