A Hard Ticket Home (Mac McKenzie #1)

A Hard Ticket Home (Mac McKenzie #1) Page 25

“No, I killed him with a slingshot.”

Along with fear-induced insolence, I also have a problem with authority. To my mother’s great embarrassment, I was thrown out of the Cub Scouts for refusing direction. Not Boy Scouts, mind you. Cub Scouts.

“Tell me about it,” he said patiently.

I told him I found the deceased pounding on my door. I told him the deceased was brandishing a sawed-off shotgun. I told him I gave the deceased a choice, but not a chance.

“Hmm,” he grunted.

“Chief?” a voice called from downstairs.

“Up here.”

A moment later, the sergeant entered my bedroom carrying several plastic bags. He set them all on the mattress, then held them up one at a time.

“Wheel gun. Twenty-two caliber. Choice of professionals everywhere. The bullet doesn’t pass through the body. Instead it bounces around inside, nipping at various vital organs. He was carrying it in his waist band.”

A second bag.

“Two twelve-gauge shotgun shells. Fits the sawed-off. I left that in the car.” While looking at me, the sergeant added, “Apparently he didn’t feel the need for a lot of ammo.”

A third plastic bag containing a brown wallet.

“Minnesota driver’s license in the name of Bradley Young. Photo matches the dead man. Ran the Buick. Also owned by the dead man.”

“Ever see him before?” the chief asked.

I shook my head.

The fourth bag held a white number ten envelope.

“Don’t have a firm count, but I figure at least three thousand dollars in twenties and fifties.”

“This doesn’t make sense,” I interrupted. “He comes at me like a professional, but using his own car? Carrying his ID? The motive stuffed in his pocket? That’s amateur night.”

“Not a pro,” the chief said softly. “A soldier. A member of the rank and file recruited for this one job.”

“A gang-banger?” I asked.

The sergeant referred to his notebook before offering, “No colors, no insignia, no visible tattoos.”

“Hmm,” the chief grunted again.

“So why would he want to whack you?” the sergeant asked.

It bothers me when people use words like whack, waste, hit, off, do, grease, zap, and burn when they mean kill. It’s like they’re trying to pretend sudden, violent death isn’t such a terrible thing.

“The word is kill,” I told the sergeant.

He replied angrily, “You don’t think I know that?”

Of course he would.

“You still haven’t answered the question,” the chief reminded me. “Why would he want to kill you?”

“I swear to God I don’t know.”

“Think about it.”

“I have. Believe me, I have.”

The idea that the murder attempt was somehow connected to my search for Jamie Carlson flared bright. If you found a woman who didn’t want to be found and twelve hours later someone tried to assassinate you, what would you think? Only a young woman, married, with a child, living your basic upper-middle-class American dream—I couldn’t make it work. I decided to keep my suspicions to myself until I had a chance to see her again. Why drag Jamie into this if she was innocent? She had enough to worry about.

“It doesn’t make sense,” I said.

“Hmm.”

A few minutes later I was on the front porch again. The sergeant was directing a couple of technicians from Ramsey County around the body of Bradley Young. The techs moved quietly, efficiently, with the easy camaraderie of men who share the same profession.

The chief didn’t have a crime, he had self-defense. An investigation would be conducted—about twenty percent of all deaths rate an official inquiry, including one hundred percent of all deaths where the victim is shot three times in the chest. Evidence would be presented to a grand jury. In the meantime, I thought it would be wise for me to cooperate completely, so when the chief said, “You’re coming down to the house with us, I want a written statement,” I nodded my head vigorously.

Besides, I needed to get away from the body of Bradley Young before I again became nauseous over what I had done.

“Johnson. Take off the cuffs.”

Johnson moved behind me with his key.

“Do I have to?” he asked.