Bobby Girard’s auto-body shop was outside of town, located down a dirt road beside a hay field. A modular home sat across the street from three prefabricated garages. A hand-painted sign on the gate said only GIRARD’S, as if anyone who made it this far should already know what kind of business it was. That assumption wasn’t a bold one; there was nothing else on the road.
Behind the garages, abandoned and gutted cars fought a losing turf war with the hay field. A tow truck was parked alongside a battered pickup with a snowplow attachment. The high sun gleamed off the snowplow blade, a reminder not to be fooled by summer in Maine—there would be snow again soon enough.
The fence around the property was gated and locked; a dirty NO TRESPASSING sign dangled from the chain. Barrett parked and got out into the dust that rose when Johansson pulled his cruiser in. It was a windy day, and the breeze pushed the dust into Barrett’s eyes and mouth. For a moment, he smelled paint on the wind. Then the gust died down, and only the fresh-cut-hay smell lingered.
Johansson got out and looked from the garage property over to the house. He wasn’t wearing a hat, and in the sunlight, his close-cropped blond hair showed a lot of gray. He’d put on weight in his months working the case. The waistband of his uniform pants should have been earning hazard pay.
Neither of them spoke at first. Barrett knew they’d both been thinking about the autopsy result for the entire drive. He took a breath and tried to clear his head, focus on the task at hand, and not think about the arrest that was taking place in the western mountains.
“What was it Broward said about this outfit?” he asked. “Informal operation? Guess so. Closed for business at one o’clock on a Friday.”
“Chop shop, maybe.” Johansson sounded as distant and detached as Barrett felt, and he looked like he’d been a long time without sleep. He didn’t have sunglasses, and he kept blinking in the brightness as if he were confused.
The killings had gone into motion on a Friday too, Barrett remembered. A hot and windy Friday, not so different than this. Here the hay rippled and the barbed wire hummed, but back in Port Hope there would be whitecaps on the bay, and down past the old orchard and the graveyard, the pines would be swaying above the pond.
“Barrett?” Johansson said.
“Huh?”
“I just asked if you want to try the house.”
“Oh. Right. Sure.”
They walked across the road and knocked on the front door. Nothing. They stood on the porch and looked back at the property. Nothing moved among all those cars except for a starling that hustled in and out of the shadows of a windowless Oldsmobile resting on cinder blocks in the weeds.
“Did you call Howard?” Johansson asked.
“No. Not yet. You?”
Johansson shook his head. He was staring at the old cars without any focus.
“Pregnant,” he said. Then, when Barrett didn’t respond, he added, “Jackie was an only child.”
“I know.”
Johansson blinked, shook his head as if to clear his vision, and said, “Do we wait or go looking for him?”
Barrett was about to suggest they leave to find a neighbor when the wind gusted, whistling over the wire fence and lifting dust from the dirt road, and he smelled the paint again. This time the wind held long enough that he was certain.
“He’s working over there. Somebody is, anyhow. Smell that paint?”
Johansson cocked his head, hesitated, then nodded. “I do.”
They crossed the road and walked past their cars and up to the gate. It was chained shut and padlocked, but here the smell of the paint was even stronger, and there was a faint, staccato thumping from inside one of the garages. Barrett cupped his hands and shouted a hello. No response. Tried again; same result.
“Climb the fence?” Johansson asked.
“Why not.” Barrett slid his badge case out of his pocket and folded it over his belt so it was visible. The fence was basic chain link, and the gate had a crossbar that made climbing easy. He went up and over and dropped to the gravel on the other side.
The closest of the three garages had an office built into one corner. He went over and checked the narrow window. It was dark inside, and the cluttered space was filled with stacked furniture, the file-cabinet drawers hanging open as if they’d been ransacked.
“They’re out back,” Johansson said. “I can hear them now.”
They walked down the rutted, hard-packed dirt lane. There were a dozen old cars between the garages, jammed in at odd angles, as if they’d been spilled there instead of parked. As they neared the last building, the thumping sound resumed, and now there was an undertone to it, a soft hiss.
“What the hell is that?” Johansson said.
“Air hammer, maybe?” Barrett said. “They’re also spraying paint.”
The biting chemical smell was strong back here. There was something about the hissing sound and the clatter of the air hammer amid all the empty, broken cars that made the place feel ominous even under the bright midday sun.
He looked the cars over, trying to assess why they had not been hauled into the field with the others. Maybe they needed to be scavenged for parts, and the others already had been? They were missing hoods or doors or wheels, wounded soldiers on a forgotten battlefield.
“Chop shop, maybe,” Johansson said again, walking toward the back building. He’d gone about ten paces before he realized Barrett was no longer beside him and turned. “What are you doing?”
Barrett was staring at a truck that rested in the weeds behind the garage. It was missing its wheels and its body seemed to be suffering from a skin disease, gray flesh pocked with rusty sores. The chrome grille was bent and one headlight was cracked, but the square face of the truck was intact, and you could read the word DODGE stamped into the top of the grille.
They made a million of them, Barrett thought, but he left Johansson and walked to the truck. The color was right except for the hood. No black-on-white, no Halloween cat. Nothing that matched Kimberly’s story. Of course, that could have been painted over. If anyone had painted over this truck, though, he’d done one hell of a job—it was tough to match thirty-year-old paint and rust spots.
He came around to the back of the truck and then pulled up short, his blood seeming to thicken in his veins.
The weathered license plate was Maine 727CRC.
“Barrett, what in the hell are you doing?” Johansson called in a low voice.
Without speaking, he motioned for Johansson to join him, then pointed wordlessly at the plate.
“Son of a bitch,” Johansson whispered. “He’s here.”
“Or he’s long gone and driving another vehicle. But the plate is right.” Barrett stepped forward and looked in the bed. It was filled with junk, old cinder blocks and some scrap lumber and a chain. On the inside of the tailgate, a splash of rust-colored stains was visible.
His pulse began to speed up again. Slow warmth spread into his fingertips as he rounded the truck and looked at the hood. It had not been replaced, and it had not been repainted.
“Right truck,” he said. “But what in the hell was she talking about with the paint?”
“I think we can forget about Kimmy for the moment,” Johansson whispered. “Let’s call this in.”
The soft clattering resumed from inside the garage, thunk-thunk-thunk, as the air hammer pounded metal. The smell of paint rode heavy on the wind. Barrett walked to the passenger door, pulled his shirttail free, wrapped his fingers in the fabric, and tried the handle. Unlocked. The door creaked open and he looked in at the long bench seat.
There was no extended cab, only a bench seat in front. I usually get stuck in the middle because I’m small, right? But Cass took the middle that night. She wanted to be close to Mathias.
“It is the right truck,” he said again under his breath.
There was no sound except for the hiss of the paint gun.
“We need to call this in,” Johansson repeated.
“Yeah.” But Barrett didn’t move. He was scanning the cab now, looking at the collection of fast-food receipts and candy wrappers and Uncle Henry’s trader magazines that littered the floor and seat.
“Hey!”
The shout was so loud that Barrett rocketed up and smacked his skull on the door frame, a brain-rattling shot that left him dizzy as he stepped back.
A short, muscular guy with unkempt hair and uneven stubble was walking toward them with swift, officious strides, like an umpire hustling across the diamond.
“What the hell are you doing inside my—”
The man stopped short when he saw Johansson’s uniform. Barrett fumbled his own badge loose from his belt, still wincing from the blow to the head.
“We’re police,” Johansson said. “I need you to calm—”
“I know why you’re here,” the man said, his voice going high and unsteady. Barrett could see him clearly now. It was Jeffrey Girard.
“Calm down,” Johansson said.
But Girard was retreating, backing toward the garage, where a pedestrian door stood ajar.
“Stop moving,” Johansson barked. “Stop moving!”
“I know why you’re here,” Girard repeated, and then he turned and moved to the door with that odd, urgent walk.
“Stop right there!” Johansson shouted, and then he drew his gun.
Girard ducked through the open door and vanished.
Johansson swore and rushed forward, his gun raised, but Barrett caught him by the arm.
“Easy! We don’t need to escalate.”
Johansson was buzzing, his eyes wide, muscles tensed, jaw locked.
“He said he knows why we’re here.”
“He ought to,” Barrett said. “Now call it in. We’ve got Girard and we’ve got the truck. Let’s not screw this up.”
His eyes were still on the doorway where Girard had vanished. Against the sunlit day, it was just a square of blackness. Somewhere beyond, the hissing sound continued.
Johansson lowered his gun. He kept it in his right hand and used his left to key the radio that was just below his collar. He’d only had time to say “Unit one-forty-three” before there was motion inside the door and Jeffrey Girard stepped out of the darkness and into the daylight with a shotgun in his hands.
“Put that down!” Barrett shouted, sidestepping to get behind one of the gutted cars as he drew his Glock nine-millimeter duty pistol, the first draw he’d ever made in his career. Before he’d even cleared it from the holster there was the double-clap of two gunshots.
Girard had been holding the shotgun across his chest, not pointing it at them—at least not yet—but now he fell back against the door and slid down, leaving a bright streak of blood against the white paint on the door.
“Damn it, hold your fire!” Barrett shouted at Johansson, who was standing in place, gun leveled out in front of him in one hand like an amateur pistol shooter at the range. He’d fired so fast he hadn’t even gotten into a two-handed grip. He’d just lifted and shot.
And hit.
“I thought he was shooting!” Johansson said, still holding the odd pose, as if the scene were frozen until he broke it, as if this could be rewound. “I heard shots!”
“That was the air hammer,” Barrett said, and he could see a little of the color drain from Johansson’s cheeks.
“Oh, shit,” Johansson said, and then he finally lowered the gun.
Barrett looked at the writhing, bleeding man in the grass just in front of the garage and said, “Give me cover, and do not shoot unless you have to.”
He stepped out from behind the car and advanced on Girard with his own gun held in front of him. Shooter’s stance, two-handed grip, careful stride. Just like he’d been taught at the academy, which was not all that long ago.
Girard was holding his stomach with both hands. The shotgun was just in front of him. He looked from Barrett to the shotgun and then back.
“Do not move,” Barrett snapped. “Just stay down. We’re going to get you help. Do not move, though.”
The paint fumes wafting out from the open door stung his eyes and made them water as he advanced. He didn’t want to blink, was afraid of what might happen in that brief instant. Jeffrey Girard watched him approach and tried to speak. Instead of words, though, he made a sound like a stifled yawn and then bright blood ran over his open lips and down his chin. He looked at Barrett plaintively, the sort of look you could give only when you understood that you were badly hurt and were helpless to fix it.
Then he reached for the shotgun.
Barrett tensed his finger on the trigger, but Girard didn’t try to pick up the shotgun or even close his hand around the stock. Instead, he pushed it with an open palm, sliding it a few pitiful feet closer to Barrett, like an offering.
“Thank you,” Barrett said, understanding that this meant surrender. He kept his Glock trained on Girard while he reached out with his left hand and pulled the shotgun away, out of reach. Then he waved Johansson forward. Johansson had been speaking into his radio, but now he hurried forward—moving too fast, too upright. Everything about him had been too fast today.
“Sheriff and state en route. And an ambulance,” he said.
Barrett wanted to help Girard because that level of bleeding would kill him fast if it wasn’t stopped, but there were others inside to worry about. A swirl of training and assault simulators spun through his mind as he tried to steady his breathing and bring his heart rate down.
“We need to clear that building and then help him,” he said. “I can’t turn my back to that door to help him until we clear it, do you see?”
Johansson nodded. He face was awash with sweat, and his breath was coming fast and ragged. It was not the face you wanted to see on someone who might need to provide cover fire for you.
“Whoever is in there is probably just working on a car, okay?” Barrett said. “Be alert but not anxious. You got me?”
Johansson nodded again, crab-walking closer, and when he brought his gun up, Barrett almost wanted to tell him to put it down. Barrett took a breath, gathered himself, and then went through the door and spun toward the light, keeping low, gun drawn. Almost immediately he saw a bulky figure in the center of the room.
“FBI! Hands in the air, hands in the air!”
When the big man in the bulky suit and mask turned toward him and pointed the gun, Barrett nearly shot him. The visual was simply Gun, he is pointing a gun, shoot him now, kill him now, but the gun was blowing blue paint into the air.
The man was dressed in a heavy protective suit, wearing a mask and ear protection, clueless to the chaos outside. In front of him was a half-painted car, its windows covered in clear plastic and tape. He stared at Barrett for a second, blowing the paint into the air between them, and even through the mask, Barrett could see his wide eyes, the absolute confusion in them.
That was when Johansson whirled in and screamed, “Drop it, drop it!”
“Not a weapon, it is not a weapon!” Barrett shouted back, and he was reaching for Johansson’s arm when the man in the suit dropped the paint gun and stumbled back, hands in the air.
“Stay there! Do not move!” Johansson’s hands were shaking, and Barrett sagged against the wall, thinking of what could have happened in here. He’d been through dozens of close-quarters simulations at Quantico, each of them designed to be challenging scenarios, but nobody had ever dreamed up a paint gun and the staccato clap of an air hammer. Even the simulator programmers weren’t that sadistic.
“Go get him, and be easy,” Barrett said. The man in the suit was down on his knees now, hands held so high he had to be close to dislocating his shoulders. He was terrified. “Get him secured. I’ll be with Girard.”
He went back outside and into the daylight. The hot copper smell of blood was mingling with the chemical odor of paint now, a sickening pairing, and he had to swallow against the rise of bile in his throat. Jeffrey Girard was curled up like a child, hugging his abdomen. There was blood all over. It shone ruby-colored in the sun.
Barrett holstered his gun, unbuttoned his shirt, and peeled it off, no other material to hold pressure with in sight. He had a first aid kit in his car, but it was for cut fingers, not gunshot wounds. He balled the shirt up and knelt beside Girard. There were sirens in the distance now.
“Let me help you.”
Girard didn’t want to take his hands off his wound. He made a low moan and pressed them harder against himself, and blood bubbled between his fingers. He looked at Barrett’s shirt with doubtful eyes. He knew he was bleeding out and he was afraid to let up on the pressure even for an instant. So primal—I can’t afford to lose any more of this. Barrett put the shirt over the wounded man’s hands. It was not going to matter much either way. Unless those sirens closed the gap awfully fast, it was not going to matter.
He leaned over Girard and said, “Did you kill them? Jackie and Ian? Did you kill them?”
Girard stared at him. His eyes were glassy and distant. Barrett wanted to smack him, get his attention. It was past that point now, though. So far past that point.
“Did you do it? Or did you help Mathias Burke?”
Nothing. Barrett could feel the warmth of the man’s blood even through the shirt.
“Please talk,” he whispered. “Please tell me how it happened.”
Girard’s head drooped forward, his neck muscles loosening. His mouth fell open and a thin stream of blood ran out of it.
“Fuck,” Barrett said, speaking in a calm, reasonable voice into this day gone mad.
He stood and went over to the shotgun. It was a heavy black Remington twelve-gauge. He broke the barrel and looked for the load.
Empty.
He closed his eyes for a moment. Took a breath. Then he snapped the barrel shut so that it would look better when they found it in the grass. He wanted to do that much for Johansson. It was a mean-looking gun when you thought it was loaded. It was a mean-looking gun and it had been in a suspected murderer’s hands and the air hammer had been clattering like a semiautomatic weapon.
It had been tougher out here than people would understand.
Barrett was kneeling by the body again when Johansson came out to join him. The sirens were louder now and they could see the first cars up on the hill. Two cruisers, running like hell.
“It’s his cousin inside,” Johansson said. “Bobby. I cuffed him. Just to…I didn’t know what the hell to do with him.”
Barrett nodded. He didn’t tell Johansson that the shotgun hadn’t been loaded. It was better that he not know that detail when the incident-review team asked him how it had happened.
“I didn’t know what the hell to do,” Johansson repeated, his voice urgent, almost pleading. “I’ve never been in a firefight before.”
“We still haven’t,” Barrett said, and then he walked to the gate to meet the oncoming police, shirtless and bloodstained, his badge held high.