The Bone Tree (Penn Cage #5) - Greg Iles Page 0,15

to meet Colonel Mackiever.”

“Oh, God,” Sonny breathed, looking for a place to sit down.

CHAPTER 4

SHERIFF WALKER DENNIS’S Tahoe hums swiftly through the Louisiana night, his roof lights dark, his siren silenced. The dry blast of the heater sweeps past my face, the muted crackle of the police radio barely audible beneath it. The heat aggravates the cigarette burn on my left cheek, but after enduring all I have tonight, the pain seems inconsequential.

“I tried to keep a lid on this to delay the state police,” Sheriff Dennis says, “but some firemen mentioned names on the radio. It’s out now. And when a man as rich as Brody Royal dies, people are gonna want to know everything. We’ll be lucky to make the station without state police cruisers flagging us down.”

Twelve miles east of us, this highway crosses the Mississippi River into Natchez, but our destination lies several miles short of that. The Concordia Parish Sheriff’s Office is housed in the basement floor of the parish courthouse between Vidalia and Ferriday, Louisiana. The highway between those two towns runs through the worst sort of sprawl: small-engine repair shops, oil field service companies, salvage yards, boat dealerships, and an ever-changing line of marginal enterprises. All have parking lots where state police vehicles could lie in wait for us.

“I’m going to videotape your statements when we get there,” Sheriff Dennis says, “but I’d just as soon know ahead of time what you’re going to say. I don’t want to talk you into a corner you can’t get out of.”

“Thanks, Walker.”

“Are you and your fiancée straight on your stories?”

“Yeah.”

“Good. Because whatever you say is gonna get picked apart by a lot of agencies.”

I nod but add nothing.

“I got the basic gist of what went down, but why don’t you tell me who killed who, and in what order.”

I take a breath and organize my thoughts before speaking. “Two of Royal’s men knocked out the Natchez cop who was guarding the parking lot at the Examiner before they snatched us. I think they probably killed him, because I felt no pulse in the van. Once we reached Royal’s, those two guys hauled his body away.”

“Can you give me a good description?”

“Decent. I’d like to kill the sons of bitches.”

“If they killed a cop, you’ll have to get in line. Who died next?”

For a moment I can’t speak. Walker considers it a given that cop killers will die violently, and he’s so caught up in the moment that he doesn’t realize he just condemned my father by extension.

“Royal and Regan were torturing Caitlin and me in the basement,” I tell him, “in Royal’s gun range.”

“Jesus, Penn. I’m sorry. I always heard Brody had some kind of million-dollar collection down there. Never saw the place, though.”

For an instant the two putative assassination rifles flash behind my eyes. “A million might be low,” I murmur. “Royal was trying to find out who had visited Pooky Wilson’s mother before she died. He knew there was a witness who could place him at the scene of Albert Norris’s death.”

“How did he know that?”

“Between you and me . . . I told him, earlier tonight.”

Walker gives me an angry glare. “Damn it, Penn.”

“I know. I’ll pay for that the rest of my life. But it’s done now. During the torture, Henry Sexton and Sleepy Johnston busted in to try to save us. We heard gunshots upstairs. They pretended to be SWAT, but Royal didn’t fall for it. When Sleepy Johnston came through the door, Brody got the drop on him. After Brody figured out who he was—by calling his lawyer, Claude Devereux—he shot Johnston in cold blood.”

“So this Sleepy Johnston was the guy who went to see Pooky Wilson’s mother before she died?”

“Right.”

“And he was the one who called in tips to me as ‘Gates Brown’?”

“That’s right. And visited Henry at the hospital.”

“How the hell did Johnston know that Royal had kidnapped you?”

“He was watching Brody’s house when we were brought there. He’d been following Royal ever since he got down here from Detroit. That’s why he was in a position to see Royal and Regan burn the Beacon building. He just didn’t get up the nerve to call your office until today. Or yesterday, I guess. Technically. Even after living in the North for forty years, Sleepy was still scared shitless of Royal and the Knoxes. He didn’t think Brody would ever pay for what he’d done.”

“Why did he use a baseball player’s name as an alias?”

“After Sleepy moved to