“I’m not at liberty to say. You know how Tucker is about leaks.” Tucker sure as hell wouldn’t want the King of Cash’s name bounced around.
“Must be somebody big,” Greer said.
“He is.”
“Marvin’s no genius, but he’s bright enough to figure that now that Malone is dead, he’s lost his bargaining chip. No quid pro quo. He’s going to prison for a long time whether he talks to you or not. He’ll want to know what’s in it for him.”
“Tell him I’m promising a reduced sentence, a room with a view, better food, cigarettes, dirty magazines, conjugal visits once a week.”
“That’ll never happen.”
“I know that, but he doesn’t.”
“That’s coercion.”
“I’ll beg forgiveness later.”
“Whoever you’re after, you want him bad.”
“I do. And so does Tucker. And so should you. Davis may seem like a nobody, but he may know something that could be key to nailing a fat prize, and I shit you not. Federal, state, and local would all love a piece of this guy.”
While Greer was mulling it over, Mitch looked toward the other side of the room. John was at the door of his office, craning his neck, watching him, saw him looking, waved him in. Mitch held up his index finger.
“Look, I’ve got to run,” he said. “Talk to Davis over lunch. If he hem-haws, bump it up to conjugal visits twice a week. Call me right away to let me know what he says.”
“This number?”
“This number. And, Marshal Greer?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks for not hanging up on me.”
Having delivered Beth and Andrew to the Bowies’ house and seeing them safely inside, Dylan drove straight to the medical building. The parking lot was empty, so she parked close in and used the employee door to enter, ducking her head against the rain.
Without anyone occupying the building, the wet rubber soles of Beth’s borrowed sneakers sounded abnormally loud against the terrazzo floors, as did the rear elevator’s grinding gears as it made its slow ascent up to the sixth floor.
She let herself into her office through the private exit and was about to pull that door closed behind her when she hesitated. She was often here after hours when the building had emptied. Mitch had admonished her for leaving after dark alone, but she’d shrugged off his overprotectiveness. It came naturally to him; he was a cop.
But the dreariness of this rainy day had created a false dusk inside the empty building. In light of recent events, being alone felt eerie enough that she decided to leave that door ajar for no longer than she would be here.
She flipped on the light and was about to walk into the sessions room when she noticed an empty water bottle standing on the round table near the window. The janitors who came early each morning to clean the building’s offices must have overlooked it.
But as she surveyed the room, she also noticed that the cushions on the sofa that patients used had been sloppily misplaced. Mitch had shoved them aside when he’d been here, but that had been days ago, and they’d been righted several times since then. She didn’t think that rearrangement could be attributed to the janitorial crew.
Giving in to uneasiness, she went into the lobby. A low light shone down from the top of Ellie’s computer monitor, but it was left on permanently to serve as a nightlight. Her desk was as orderly as ever. She had been the last one here, so Dylan went over to the main door to make certain that she had secured the office when she left for the long weekend.
Of course she had. The door was solidly closed and locked. But a sheet of paper was lying on the floor. Apparently, it had been pushed in under the threshold.
It was a notice that the cleaning service personnel had had an outbreak of Covid and that, out of an abundance of caution, they wouldn’t return until Monday. They apologized for the inconvenience.
Chiding herself for wasting time on a case of the jitters, she returned to the patient room, straightened the pillows, tossed the empty water bottle into the wastebasket, then walked into her inner office and reached around the doorjamb to turn on the light.
Chapter 41
After thanking the US marshal for not hanging up on him, Mitch immediately disconnected and practically jogged across the CAP unit, almost running smack dab into Clarence, who placed himself directly in his path.
“Uh, Mitch, I—”
