Junior killed her girlfriend that means she had a reason to go after Junior.”
“She didn’t seem like a killer.” Jessie said. “And why would she kill Becky?”
“I don’t know.” John said. “Maybe by mistake. She botched her first attempt at revenge with Junior, but was successful with Freddie. She’s getting better and she thinks she can kill with impunity because she’s got the perfect fall guy. She’s gonna try to hit Junior again to finish the job. That’s gotta be her next move.”
“We’d better call Reyes and Borgano.” I said. “I doubt they even know who Gretchen is.”
“That would be one way to handle it.” John said.
“You had something else in mind?”
“Cops don’t like partisans. And they especially don’t like partisans who are on the side of their chief suspect in a murder investigation. Coming to them with a theory, no matter how plausible, would probably just bring their suspicion down on us, and I’m not sure we could stand up to it.”
“What do you mean?” Jessie asked.
“I mean that if you know where David Telano is and you’re helping him, you could wind up in jail.” He saw that Jess was about to protest, so he held his hand up and continued. “This is serious Jess. I know, I know, you just talked to him on the phone a couple of times. But if that weren’t true, and you had been helping him, then going to the police would be pretty stupid unless you had something more concrete than theories to give them. Hopefully we’ll have video proving she was in Lakeview the night of the murder. That’s a good first step, but we’re going to need more than that.”
“Like what?” I asked.
“I’d say she probably intends to finish what she started with Junior before the police find David. One of us had better be watching her at all times starting immediately, then when she tries to get to Junior we alert the authorities anonymously. Unless she tries to do it in Lakeview, in which case Ben and I swoop in to save the day and become the Guardian Security Agents of the century.”
This was a side of John I had never seen before. “When do we start?” I asked.
“Tonight.” He said. “Let’s hope she isn’t killing the bastard right now as we speak.”
“Hang on.” Jessie said. “Gretchen Salle’s girlfriend was murdered. If I were her I’d want to kill Junior too. How can we just feed her to the wolves? What she’s doing is kinda right.”
“She’s trying to feed David to the wolves.” I said.
“That’s true.” John said. “And what about Becky Pierson? She didn’t do anything.” He took a sip of coffee. “Anyway, if Gretchen went down the cops would figure out that Junior killed Amanda, ‘cause that’s what started the whole thing. He would go down too. Hell, Gretchen might wind up getting a slap on the wrist if she could find a good lawyer. She could plead it down to ten or twelve years -she only killed one innocent person. Freddie Divos was a bad bastard who had it coming.”
Gretchen Salle did not appear on any of the surveillance footage. John had dropped off the DVDs and gone to see what he could find out about National Custom Gunsmith and Gretchen Salle. Jessie and I watched hour upon hour of footage, mostly in fast forward until we saw something promising, at which point we would back it up and watch it again at regular speed. We were inevitably disappointed. The whole exercise was very tedious and made Jessie pine for a bong hit. Getting high looked pretty good to me too, so we went through the routine of calling all the people we knew who sold or smoked weed, but only found everybody with the same complaint. It was an unprecedented weed shortage.
When John came back later that afternoon he was disappointed to hear that we hadn’t spotted Gretchen on the videos. “I got her address.” He said. “So I’ll start watching her right away. We’ll do it in shifts.”
“What about the gun place?” Jessie asked.
“Oh it’s an interesting place with an interesting owner. I’m not sure how it’s connected to Freddie, but I think we can find out.”
“How?” I asked.
“You’re going to go over there tomorrow.” He said. “You’re going to buy a gun.”
NINETEEN
We set up a schedule for who was going to watch Gretchen over the next few days. John watched her that first night, and then it was Jessie’s turn on Monday morning. I rode out with her early. Gretchen Salle lived in a house on Wilbur Avenue, just outside a new subdivision adjacent to the Shoreston Mall and it’s immense parking lot. Her closest neighbor was a boat repair place across the street that looked like it was in need of some repair itself. Her place was a colonial two-story house, painted light blue with white trim. A neat garden grew around the lawn and there were two old bicycles on her porch. John’s car was next to the boat repair place, and we pulled up behind him. He got out and walked back to Jessie’s open window. “She got in a little after eleven.” He told us. “I think she’s still asleep. The Honda’s hers. If she goes anywhere near Lakeview or Everett, or anywhere you think Junior Pierson might be, call me.”
“Jesus Pap, you look terrible.” Jessie said.
“Thanks.”
“You shouldn’t stay up all night. It’s not healthy.”
“I used to do it all the time when I was on the force,” he said, “and for long periods of time. One night’s not gonna kill me.”
I said goodbye to Jess and got out of the car. John gave me his keys and told me to drive his car. We went to a Bob’s Big Boy near his place and ordered breakfast. I had coffee, he had juice. He told me the gun place opened at eleven and gave me four hundred dollars cash. “That should be enough to get you a decent piece.” He said. “The owner is named Dennis Reston, and you should ask for him. Don’t pump the guy for information, just mention that you were a friend of Freddie’s and see how he reacts. You’re there to buy a handgun, that’s all. If we get nothing else out of it, at least you’ll have the gun. Consider it a gift from me.” I thanked him and wondered why he seemed nervous. We ate our food and talked about people in Lakeview and the employees at the Guardian Security Agency.
National Custom Gunsmith looked pretty run down. The gray paint was peeling, and the G in the sign was crooked. The glass door had iron bars on the inside, and there was a sign that said that the store was under twenty-four-hour surveillance. A loud electronic ping sounded as I opened the door. The place smelled like oil. There were racks of rifles along the wall and display cases showing off a huge variety of handguns. One case held knives, brass knuckles, pepper spray and Tasers. There was a radio on, tuned to a classic rock station, and the wall behind the cash register was crowded with political bumper stickers, all right-wing.
I’d been in the store a few minutes before an old guy came from the back room and asked if he could help me. He was stooped-over and gray, and looked like a heavy smoker. “Is Dennis here?” I asked.
“Who’re you?”
“I’m Ben.” I said. “A friend of a friend.”
“What Friend?” He asked.
“Freddie Divos told me about this place. He said Dennis would set me up with a handgun.”
“Shame what happened to Freddie.” The guy said, shaking his head.
“Yeah.” I said.
“Wait here.” He told me. He turned and slouched into the back room. I looked at some handguns and then at some pictures taped to the inside of the glass counter near the cash register. They were of an older, tough-looking guy posing with dead animals in various locales. He didn’t just hunt dear, there were pictures of him holding birds, kneeling next to a moose carcass, and on a boat next to a shark. In one picture he was holding a long snake that didn’t look dead, it was twisting up, trying to bite him, and the background looked like jungle. The picture that stood out from the rest was him in desert camo, standing with his arms crossed over a black plastic body bag. It looked like he was on a runway, you could see part of a plane and some mountains in the background. This had to be Dennis Reston.
The man from the pictures came from the back room wiping his ha
nds on a small towel. “Who’re you?” He asked.
“Ben Perkins.” I said. “You must be Dennis.”
He flipped the towel over his shoulder and leaned on the counter. “You knew Freddie how?”
“From Lakeview.” I said. “I’m a security agent there.”
“Heck of a job you guys have been doing lately.” He said. “Now what can I do for you?”
“I want to buy a handgun.”
“Your first one?”
“Yeah.”
“You looking to take out David Telano if he comes back to Lakeview?”
“Nah, nothing like that.” I said. “I just need it for self protection, and to exercise my second amendment right.” I nodded toward a framed sign that had the second amendment written out in biblical looking script.
“Alright. What kind would you like?” He spread his hands as if he were presenting a meal he had prepared.
“I really don’t know much about guns.” I said. “Something loud and powerful, but I don’t have much money.”
“How much were you looking to spend?’
“Four hundred is my limit.” I said.
“They don’t pay very much over at Lakeview huh?”
“No.”
He pulled out a couple of guns in my price range. He went down the differences in them and it was mostly incomprehensible to me. It reminded me of how kids I knew in school would talk about Dungeons and Dragons. The gist of it was that guns were equal in performance, but looked