Having showered and dried her hair, Tess felt more comfortable, if not recharged. She needed to sleep, but sleep still eluded her. Sitting in a tub chair at the hotel-room desk, she ran her fingers over the papers spread before her. Some were taken from the file supplied by Clancy’s office, and she also had the electronic file up on her iPad now that she had Wi-Fi coverage. Other papers she’d printed off earlier on the hotel’s laser printer downstairs, stuff she’d found while researching Albert Sower and his known accomplices. She could have done with a pin board on which she could arrange the mugshots she’d sourced from various agencies into a flow chart she could follow. Spreading them on the desk was inconvenient and she was certain she was missing something.
Po had looked in on her earlier, but finding her dressed in a hotel dressing gown, her bare legs poking out the bottom, he’d coughed his apologies and left her to it. She’d heard him banging around in his own room; slapping and grunting followed the commotion and she wondered what the hell he was up to. Lurid images went through her mind of the ex-con self-flagellating with his leather belt, until she recognized the rhythm of the noises as a rigorous workout. In the small hotel room he probably felt confined, and resorted to what he had done when locked up in a cell at Angola. He spent the time keeping fit and healthy, in mind as much as body. Afterwards, his door opened and clicked shut behind him and he padded away. After all his cardio work he’d gone outside to put a dent in it with a few well-earned cigarettes.
Of course, there was more to Po leaving his room than assuaging his nicotine craving. They’d made themselves targets of Sower’s people, and Po was taking his role as Tess’s guard seriously. She assumed he’d gone out to check she was safe from immediate harm while she worked.
She couldn’t sleep, but neither could she think straight. She got up and went to the window, teased a gap between the vertical blinds, and peered out. It was early evening, but down here in the sub-tropics the sun had set, and it had done so much faster than the familiar slow roll to the horizon it made up north. Daylight to darkness in less than the half-hour since last she’d peeked outside. Street lamps made the street visible, but cast a yellowish nimbus around everything. Pedestrians on the opposite sidewalk were unaware of her scrutiny. Cars whistled by without pause. There was no hint of Po, he was probably around the other side of the building adjacent to the parking lot where he could watch both their car and the entrance to the hotel.
She’d sent down for coffee earlier, and room service had delivered a pot, but it was now tepid at best. She should send for a fresh one, but the caffeine wouldn’t help her sleep. Did she really expect to sleep? Not with the kind of images that had been flooding her mind since they’d bugged out of Morgan City. She believed any sleep she might get would be fraught, disturbed by violently tortured faces, and two of them hers and Po’s. Hell, were they actually setting themselves out as bait? Inviting Sower’s pet killer to come after them? Should she be downstairs with Po, on high alert, not sitting in her room in a fluffy dressing gown?
But she didn’t believe they were in imminent danger. His abductors would have had their hands full dealing with Crawford Wynne, and she didn’t expect their day would end with another abduction attempt. But how could she be certain? She still had no idea who they were up against, but judging from how Mitch Delaney died, they were uncompromising in their violence. And they were good enough at their jobs that they’d outwitted Tess and Po, beating them to Wynne. So who knew how and when – never mind if – they’d come for them?
She checked her cell phone. Still no response from Clancy. What was keeping her? Then again, Tess hadn’t exactly been reliable in getting in touch with her employer.
Tess hit the number for Clancy’s cell.
It rang out and went to voicemail.
Hmmm. OK, it was out of office hours, but wasn’t that why Clancy had given Tess her personal number in the first place? So that she could make contact whenever she needed to?
She hit the end button. Waited a few seconds and then redialled. The phone went to voicemail again. ‘Uh. Hello, Emma. It’s me, Teresa Grey. I was just calling with a quick update and to ask if you’d gotten anywhere with that licence-plate number I sent you. Anyway, I appreciate that you might be busy, so, as and when you get this message, if it’s convenient to do so, could you please call me back? I, uh, I’d really appreciate it …’
Tess hung up and immediately felt sick at the fawning tone she’d used. Hell, she sounded like a nervous wreck. What impression would that give Clancy? She’d best get her act together or Clancy might recall them without need of the police kicking them out of Louisiana. She tightened the belt on her gown, walked back across the room to where her notes were strewn on the desk. She flicked through various pages, then placed one on top. The page contained a photograph of a man in his late twenties, with longish dark brown hair, and a moustache and goatee. From the look of the photo it was a number of years out of date. It wasn’t a professional shot, or posed, but one gleaned from a news agency website, where John Torrance had appeared in a story tying him to Albert Sower. Torrance had been arrested, but acquitted through ‘lack of evidence’ in an assault case. Tess studied the face in the picture, mentally removing the long locks, the facial hair. Was Torrance the second man she’d seen driving the car before it rammed theirs this morning? She couldn’t be certain, because her view of him had been in the mirror, and fleetingly before she recognized the other as the man who’d planted the tracking device, and who she’d almost walked into at the airport.
She picked up her phone again and hit Clancy’s number. When it again went to voicemail she hung up, scrolling through her contacts list for her brother.
Alex answered after only two rings. ‘Hey, little sis, how you doing?’
‘Hey, Alex. I’m good. Fine.’ She exhaled noisily.
‘How’s Louisiana working out for you?’
‘Hot. Sticky.’ She grunted. ‘It’s a mess, Alex.’
More than fifteen hundred miles away her brother pondered for a second or two. ‘Didn’t that Po dude work out for you?’
‘It isn’t Po,’ Tess reassured him. She thought about telling Alex everything that had happened since their arrival in the South, but it would only worry him. He’d be directly on the phone to their mom and Tess knew she’d then have to fend off calls from her supposedly well-meaning mother questioning her abilities and demanding that she return home immediately. She could do without it. ‘It’s only the situation I’ve gotten caught up in here. It’s not as straightforward as I hoped.’
‘Po’d best be treating you like a gentleman or I’ll have something to say to him when you get back.’
Because of Po’s volatile nature, Tess felt she should warn Alex about brushing his bristles the wrong way, but that would make him suspect there had been an issue with Po in the first place. ‘Po’s not the problem. In fact, he’s been a great help, and you can relax. He hasn’t tried it on with me or anything creepy like that.’
‘Not that you’d tell me if he had, right?’
‘That’d be too weird,’ she said, and they both laughed in unison.
‘Y’know, Tess, I’m not against you getting together with a guy. Hell, it’s about time you did, but you could do a whole lot better than an ex-con.’
Yes, Tess wanted to say, you’d be happy to see me back with a clean-cut guy like Jim Neely. Well, given the choice, she’d take Po over that grade ‘A’ asshole any day! However, she clamped down on the response. Why the hell had she grown so defensive over Po anyway?
‘For now I prefer my young, free, and single status, thanks,’ she said.
‘Well, two out of three aren’t bad, sis. There’s none of us getting any younger. You don’t want to end up an old maid.’
‘Speak for yourself, Alex. You’re what now? Thirty-three? Isn’t it time you had your own place, your own wife and kids? You can’t stay tied to Mom’s apron strings forever.’
‘I’m working on it. But to be honest, I haven’t found anyone who launders my clothes or cooks as well as Mom yet. I do love my home cooking.’ He was playing it up. It wasn’t the first time they’d had a similar conversation. When her relationship with Jim Neely had collapsed, Alex was the one to offer a shoulder to cry on. He’d had his fair share of experience in floundering relationships, and had been in a good position to offer advice. In the last few weeks he’d been seeing a woman he’d met through work, but he hadn’t shared any details about her, despite Tess’s urging. Alex claimed he preferred to see how things progressed before introducing his new girlfriend to the family. Tess doubted it would last much longer than Alex’s other relationships. Not because her brother was difficult, or wasn’t a good catch, but because theirs was a relationship Alex hinted might be deemed inappropriate, and she thought he meant by Portland PD. He was equally as duty driven as Tess, so would he jeopardize his career because of this woman? She thought his reluctance to come clean about her before their relationship grew serious was to protect his position, and quite possibly his lover’s too.
‘How is the mystery woman?’ she teased. ‘I take it she isn’t a ready-made wife, then? Or is that the problem: she’s already somebody else’s wife?’
‘Hey, let’s not go there, OK?’
‘Suits me, bro. But that goes both ways.’
‘OK. Deal. So what’s up?’
‘Are you on duty tonight?’
‘Graveyard shift,’ he said, and she pictured him glancing at the clock, checking how soon he must leave for work. ‘So, I’m guessing this isn’t a social call. What is it you want, Tess?’
‘Who says I’m not homesick and want to hear a familiar voice?’
‘You’ve only been gone a couple of days. You haven’t had time to get homesick. What is it you’re after?’ He said the last in a world-weary tone, as if she asked lots from him. She didn’t.
‘I was wondering if you could run a licence-plate number for me.’ Tess waited. Police officers could be seriously disciplined if they used law-enforcement resources for personal reasons. But, having been there and done it, she knew there were ways and means of getting around the system. She’d taken a sneaky glance at Jim Neely’s record – actually his lack of one – when first they’d begun dating, to ensure there was nothing in his past that would come back to hurt her. She also knew of cops who ran the sheets on boyfriends and girlfriends of their children on the sly. Alex also knew the deal and couldn’t worm his way out of helping by quoting protocol.
‘Give it me,’ he said.
She told him the licence number and heard him scribbling it down. ‘I could do with the owner details ASAP. Can you ring me back as soon as you have them?’
‘I’ll see what I can do.’
‘There’s something else, Alex.’ She told him John Torrance’s name, and his age, the only details available on the printout she had. ‘Could you maybe get a glimpse at his rap sheet? I could do with knowing as much about him as possible.’
‘John Torrance? That’d be John “Jacky Boy” Torrance, right? From here in Portland?’ Alex grew serious. ‘I know that a-hole. He’s a punk. What’s he got to do with what you’re mixed up in?’
‘Maybe nothing,’ Tess admitted. ‘His name just came up in my enquiries. He might have nothing to do with anything. But just in case he has, well, an idea what he’s like, and what he’s capable of, would be a great help.’
‘He’s a low-level thug. But that means nothing. Watch out, Tess, and I mean watch out. Sometimes it’s the inconsequential ones who turn out the worst to deal with.’
‘Amen to that,’ she said, thinking of the strung-out addicts who’d ended her career, and who’d murdered their grandfather. ‘I’ll be careful, Alex.’
‘See that you do,’ he said, and sounded exactly like their mom.