“I’m very aware of how it looks,” I said. He put on sunglasses and we got up.
“And I’m reminding you of how it looks,” he said in my ear as he followed me down the aisle. We could have moved out of the Travel-Eze for more luxurious quarters in Asheville. But where we stayed did not seem important to anyone by the time we met Marino at the Coach House restaurant, which was famous for reasons that were not exactly clear.
I got a peculiar feeling immediately when the Black Mountain officer who had collected us at the airport let us off in the restaurant parking lot and silently drove away. Marino’s state-of-the-art Chevrolet was near the door, and he was inside alone at a corner table, facing the cash register, as everyone tries to do if he’s ever been touched by the law. He did not get up when we walked in, but watched us dispassionately as he stirred a tall glass of iced tea. I had the uncanny sensation that he, the Marino I had worked with for years, the well-meaning, street-smart hater of potentates and protocol, was granting us an audience. Wesley’s cool caution told me that he knew something was very off center, too. For one thing, Marino had on a dark suit that clearly was new.
“Pete,” Wesley said, taking a chair.
“Hello,” I said, taking another chair.
“They got really good chicken fried steak here,” Marino said, not looking at either of us.
“They got chef salads, if you don’t want nothing that heavy,” he added, apparently for my benefit. The waitress was pouring water, handing out menus, and rattling off specials before anyone had a chance to say another word. By the time she went on her way with our apathetic orders, the tension at our table was almost unbearable.
“We have quite a lot of forensic information that I think you’ll find interesting,” Wesley began.
“But first, why don’t you fill us in?” Marino, who looked the unhappiest I’d ever seen him, reached for his iced tea and then set it back down without taking a sip. He patted his pocket for his cigarettes before picking them up from the table. He did not talk until he was smoking, and it frightened me that he would not give us his eyes. He was so distant it was as if we had never known him, and whenever I had seen this in the past with someone I had worked with, I knew what it meant. Marino was in trouble. He had slammed shut the windows leading into his soul because he did not want us to see what was there.
“The big thing going down right now,” Marino began as he exhaled smoke and nervously tapped an ash, “is the janitor at Emily Steiner’s school. Uh, the subject’s name is Creed Lindsey, white male, thirty-four, works as a janitor at the elementary school, has for the past two years.
“Prior to that he was a janitor at the Black Mountain public library, and before that did the same damn thing for an elementary school in Weaverville. And I might add that at the school in Weaverville during the time the subject was there, they had a hit-and-run of a ten-year-old boy. There was suspicion that Lindsey was involved…”
“Hold on,” Wesley said.
“A hit-and-run?” I asked.
“What do you mean he was involved?”
“Wait,” Wesley said.
“Wait, wait, wait. Have you talked to Creed Lindsey?” He looked at Marino, who met his gaze but fleetingly.
“That’s what I’m leading to. The drone’s disappeared. The minute he got the word we wanted to talk to him–and I’ll be damned if I know who opened his fat mouth, but someone did–he split. He ain’t showed up at work and he ain’t been back to his crib.” He lit another cigarette. When the waitress was suddenly at his elbow with more tea, he nodded her way as if he’d been here many times before and always tipped well.
“Tell me about the hit-and-run,” I said.
“Four years ago this November, a ten-year-old kid’s riding his bike and gets slammed by some asshole who’s over the center line coming around a curve. The kid’s DOA, and all the cops ever get is there’s a white pickup truck driving at a high rate of speed in the area around the time the accident occurred. And they get white paint off the kid’s jeans.