The Big Run-Off (Holden Burke #1)

Seventeen

Caroline Wendice sat stiffly, her gloved hands placed carefully in her lap, moving slowly over each other. There was a undertone of hers that seemed nervous, but only slightly. It was one that I could tell she didn't want me to sense. 'You're sure about this?' she asked me.

I shook my head. 'But it's as good a guess as I've got.' I was a little nervous, too.

'I suppose you're counting this all on luck, now.'

I shrugged. 'I have been pretty lucky lately. Not lucky enough to save your ex-husband, but I've had enough lucky breaks to be here right now instead of sitting on my ass while someone innocent rots away.'

'There could be one lucky break too far. Mitchell Ramsey hasn't been punished yet.'

'But he will be.'

She sighed again. 'You're one of those idealists, I suppose.'

'I'm not so sure about that. See, the nature of my business is to get results, which might be it's only saving grace. That's the thing, Ms Wendice: people think that all detectives do is solve crime, but we don't. Nobody can solve a crime, that's just a myth. A crime could only be solved by it not happening in the first place. The only thing we can do, really do, is to try only to understand a crime. It's difficult, maybe usually close to impossible—but it's all we have.'

'And you understand my ex-husband, is what you're saying?'

'I understand greed,' I said. 'Greed never changes. Ramsey killed, and your ex-husband was killed, because of it. Just the same as people have been killing and dying for centuries.'

She made a sound and looked out the window. 'You're getting philosophical, Mr Burke.'

'I guess I am. I'm sorry, I don't mean to. I get chatty in cars.'

She didn't say anything else, and eventually filled the silence with the lighting of another cigarette. I let her, even though it made the confines of the car smell stuffy and ashen.

I just drove. I drove us as fast as I could through the orange flame of the afternoon, with the idea slowly burning in my head that if Pearson's evidence was where I thought it could be, and if under the possession of who I suspected, that they both might be in danger.

I wrenched a hard turn off the motorway and into the neighbourhood I was headed toward. I was repeating the address in my head with the hopes that it was still the same as when I had glanced at it earlier. I stopped the car. Caroline Wendice jolted. She looked out the window. 'Is—where are...'

'Come on.'

I didn't wait for her. I moved up the footpath and to the front door. I knocked.

'It's me again,' I called.

Caroline was rushing behind me, trying to catch up. I took a step back, and could see a light string of smoke rising from behind the house. 'Go around,' I said.

'What?'

'Around. Go around the back. Quickly.'

She looked both ways, and found a gate to the right of the house. She disappeared into the brush as I tried to knock again. The door was locked.

Then I heard a scream—a light, quick scream that sounded as if it had jumped from Caroline Wendice's silvery voice. I sprung down the steps and ran through the side gate.

Caroline was standing stiff at the edge of the back yard. Mackenzie Loman froze when she saw me.

I was panting a little. 'Didn't you hear?' I said. 'It's me again.'