“He’ll head straight for El Salvador. You’ll never see him again.”

“Probably. But why should I lose sleep over it? He might develop a guilty conscience about running out on you.”

“So you know he killed Speakman?”

“Must have, or you wouldn’t have told me where he was at.”

“I realized that mistake too late.”

“Lost your famous timing, Number Ten?” The detective formed a sad face. “Gee, that’s too bad. And just when you needed it most.”

“Let him go. Your quarrel is with me, not him.”

Rodarte chuckled. “Well, you’ve got that right.”

“You want me to go down.”

“What gave me away?”

“You want me to go down for Bill Bandy. But not because you think I killed him. You know I didn’t.”

Rodarte grinned. “You’re getting warmer.”

“You know I didn’t because you did.”

“And they call jocks dumb.” He snorted. “Of course, it did take you five years to figure it out.”

“The Vista boys hired you to muzzle him permanently.”

“It was sort of an audition. There was word going around that Bandy’s days were numbered. The Vista trio were afraid he was going to turn them over like he did you. I’d been wanting to do some moonlighting for them, but they’re a tight little clique. It’s hard to win their trust.”

“So you seized an opportunity.”

“I offered my services.”

“Thinking that if you rid them of Bandy, they’d welcome you into their fold and put you on their payroll.”

Rodarte beamed his ugly smile. “Who better to help out with problems like Bandy than a homicide detective who can steer murder investigations in the wrong direction?” He began to laugh, deep inside his chest, then out loud. “It was a great plan, and then it got even better. Swear to God, Burkett, when you showed up at Bandy’s place, I nearly pissed my pants. I couldn’t have planned it any better.”

“You were there when I arrived.”

“In the back room. Before I snapped his neck, he swore up and down he didn’t have a secret stash, but have you ever known a bookie who didn’t lie? If I returned some skimmed funds to Vista in addition to getting rid of Bandy, think how pleased they’d be.

“So I was back there tossing the place when I heard the door. You came barging in like a bull elephant with a grudge to settle. When I realized it was you, I could barely contain a fit of the giggles. While you were woe-is-me-ing over Bandy’s body, I sneaked out back.”

“And called in an anonymous nine-one-one.”

“At a pay phone around the corner. Soon as it went out over dispatch, I radioed in, said I was in the neighborhood, volunteered to check out the alleged homicide.” He grinned. “You know the rest.”

“You had a golden opportunity to kill me, too. Why didn’t you?”

“I was afraid to, afraid that would piss off the Vista boys. I thought they might have special plans for you, and it wouldn’t sit too well if I robbed them of the pleasure. In hindsight, I should have taken you out.”

“Those five years were awfully long for me, but they must have been torture for you,” Griff said. “As long as I was alive, you were vulnerable. You’ve been scared shitless I would figure it out. That’s why you’ve been hassling me, pretending you were acting on behalf of Vista, knowing all along I hadn’t stolen from Bandy. You didn’t find anything in his back room, did you?”

Rodarte shrugged. “Maybe he wasn’t lying after all.”

“You’re still not in Vista’s fold. Apparently they weren’t impressed.”

“Not yet.”

“But you’re hoping that killing me now will win their approval.”

“It can’t hurt. They don’t like you.”

“They like you even less.”

“We’ll see.” He laughed abruptly. “You know what’s really funny? I didn’t even have to bring about your downfall. You did that all by yourself. Fucking a paraplegic’s wife. That’s low, Burkett. Even for the likes of you. The only thing,” he said, pulling his face into a pucker of concentration. “What was that half mil for? Was he trying to buy you off?”

Griff just stood, glaring at him.

“Not going to tell me? Okay. Doesn’t matter anyway.” He leaned forward and casually picked the pistol off the ground, then turned and fired a bullet directly into Manuelo’s chest.

Without a sound, the Salvadoran fell backward into the makeshift grave.

CHAPTER 38

GRIFF GAVE A STRANGLED CRY AND LURCHED FORWARD. “You killed him!”

“Not me, Burkett. You.” Rodarte pitched the pistol toward the open grave, where it landed in the dirt. “You ran the man down. By the way, remind me to ask Mrs. Speakman how you learned about this place. Anyway, you ran Ruiz down here, forced him to dig his own grave, then, using the weapon of a policeman you assaulted, you shot Ruiz in cold blood so he couldn’t testify against you at Foster Speakman’s murder trial.”

Griff was still staring at the empty spot where Manuelo had been standing seconds before. He looked at the pistol, much too far away to retrieve. His gaze coming back to Rodarte, he held up his clean hands. “They’ll know I didn’t fire the pistol.”

“Oh, you will. After you’re dead. Don’t worry. I’ll set it up to look convincing.”

“Laura knows the truth.”

Rodarte winked. “I have ways that’ll convince her otherwise.”

Forgetting every rule of self-preservation, Griff lunged.

Rodarte reacted, getting off two shots before Griff grabbed the wrist of his gun hand and wrenched it. Rodarte screamed in pain and dropped the pistol.

Payback time, Griff thought as he slugged Rodarte hard in the mouth. He swung his left fist at the detective’s cheekbone and felt the skin split. But his satisfaction was short-lived because of the pain in his left shoulder, like a branding iron being gouged deep into the flesh. Only then did he realize that he’d been struck by one of Rodarte’s bullets. However, the pain only fueled his rage. He struck mercilessly.

Rodarte fought back with a vengeance. He landed a punch in Griff’s gut, and when Griff staggered back, Rodarte sidestepped and threw another at his kidney. The angle wasn’t good, so the blow didn’t have full impact, but it was enough to cause Griff’s knees to buckle.

He caught himself before he fell and, acting reflexively, kicked backward, connecting solidly with Rodarte’s shinbone. That slowed the detective down long enough for Griff to come around to face him again and catch a fist in his ribs rather than his kidney.

They hammered at each other until Griff lost all sense of time and place, till his hands hurt almost more than the bullet wound, more than any other bleeding part of him. Rodarte’s mouth was a ghoulish maw, from which he continually spat blood. His eyes were crazed with hatred. And Griff knew that Rodarte would fight till one of them was dead.

Not long ago, he would have thought, Fine. I’ll kill the bastard, or he’ll kill me, and either way it won’t matter much. But now he wanted to live. He wanted to live for a long time, and with Laura. That hope kept him fighting even after the fight had gone out of him and every effort was tremendous.

The sweetest sound he’d ever heard was the wail of sirens. They were coming from far away but rapidly approaching. While they were a relief to Griff, they seemed to madden Rodarte and renew his flagging strength and determination.

He bared his blood-covered teeth and charged. Griff feinted left, then right. Rodarte plunged forward headlong, tripped over a deep rut made by a tractor tire, and fell facefirst into a nest of coiled barbed wire.

He shrieked like a banshee, but later Griff wondered if it was from the pain caused by the vicious barbs, or from fury over being defeated.

Griff stood watching as Rodarte struggled to free himself, but his frantic attempts to escape the wire only increased its hold on him. The barbs became embedded in his clothing, his flesh.