“Somebody murdered Bud Light last night, but we can’t figure outhow the killer even knew where he was. Did you talk to anyone about making the call?”
“Not a single person. Not a single fuckin’ person. I’m talking about how I used to go out with hookers. I don’t want anyone to know that. Not now. I’m respectable. Back when I was a kid, it wouldn’t have been so bad if people found out. Now I’m in business. So no: I didn’t talk to anybody. I got no idea where Bud was staying.”
Virgil took a shot: “Where are you right now?”
The man said, “Somewhere in the Twin Cities metropolitan area. Or western Wisconsin. Listen, I been reading up on you two guys, on the crime sites. I think you got a chance to catch the killer. If you think I can help you with something else, put up a note on the AnneCashInvestigations true crime site that says, ‘Big Dave, call home’ and I’ll call this number. Also, I’ve recorded this call, in case this info gets you somewhere. I’ll want my cut of the five mil.”
Virgil took another shot: “So your name is David?”
The man said, “No. And guess what? I’m not big. Now I’m going to throw this particular phone down a sewer. Don’t ask me to call unless you’re serious—these things cost twenty bucks apiece.”
“Wait, wait, wait,” Virgil said. “You think it’s possible that Jepson killed her?”
“Nah. Not from what I read in those files, all that stabby shit. He was a pretty mellow guy. I think it was real, too, the mellow. Everybody said so.”
“Why wouldn’t he have called us?”
“Same reason I didn’t. Doris’s murder was a big deal. I believe everybody who knew her or slept with her was running for cover. She had professional people as customers. Who wants to get his name in the paper as a john? Or as a pimp? Or a rape and murder suspect?”
“Why do you say ‘rape’ like you knew she was raped?”
“Because that’s what the cop files say, and the newspapers said, back when she was killed. That she was raped and stabbed. Listen, Doris didn’t have many customers. If Roger hooked her up with someone and she got murdered by a crazy guy that very night…and this killer sounds like a maniac…then Roger would know who he was. I believe he would have called you. If he didn’t, he probably didn’t hook her up with anyone. She probably went somewhere private with someone, got raped and murdered. That second sex guy, the guy with the DNA…he’s the guy you’re looking for.”
—
Then he wasgone, a light blinking out. Virgil looked at his phone for a few seconds, said, “Damnit,” and redialed. Nothing.
“Down the sewer pipe,” Lucas said.
Virgil tried once more, got nothing. “What do you think?”
“We need to talk to Jepson.”
“Loco’s body shop…” Virgil punched it into his phone. “Well, it still exists. We can be there in half an hour. If you want the thrill of lights and a siren, we could cut three minutes off that.”
“You’re a fuckin’ drama queen, you know that? Everybody says so. No lights, no sirens, just…peace and quiet. But hurry a little.”
“You think this is real.”
“It feels that way,” Lucas said. “It feels like we got something.”
—
Loco’s Body &Tirewas on the frontage road off Highway 13, on the south side of the metro area. If the sign outside hadn’t tipped a stranger to its purpose, it might have been reckoned a junkyard. Along, bare-metal building with a corrugated steel roof, it was surrounded by cars sunk in islands of weeds, either in the process of being stripped for parts or waiting for trips to an actual junkyard. The front of the place had two overhead doors, with four hoists visible inside, one occupied by a battered Subaru, the other by a beat-up Ford pickup.
The interior was as junky as the outside: a circle of salvaged car seats sat inside the entry door, around a rickety table covered with empty Coke and beer cans, and an oversized ashtray. Shoulder-high piles of worn tires were stacked against one wall. Red tool chests sat between the hoists, with steel wheels hung from the walls over a “For Sale” sign, on which the local wit had scrawled “cheap” with black paint. The whole place smelled of diesel exhaust, and the metal walls carried a patina of exhaust oil and dust.
Two men were lounging on the car seats, two more were working on the vehicles on the hoists, all four of them in oil-spotted coveralls. Virgil parked at the entrance and he and Lucas got out of the Tahoe and walked to the two men on the car seats.
“Can I help you?” one of the men asked; he sounded doubtful. Virgil’s Tahoe was ten years too young for Loco’s.
“Is Roger Jepson around?” Virgil asked.
The man asked, “Who’s askin’?” while the second man glanced at the guy who was working on the pickup, who’d paused in his work to look at Lucas and Virgil.
Lucas said, “I’m a U.S. Marshal, my partner’s with the state BCA…”
Virgil asked the man at the pickup, “Are you Roger?”
