Bob Ahnert. .

Louis watched the plane circling. But Bob Ahnert remembered clearly, remembered things he didn’t want to tell. Kitty was still talking to him. And he was still listening.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

“I figured you’d be calling sooner or later,” Ahnert said.

“We need to talk,” Louis said.

There was a silence on the other end of the line. “All right,” Ahnert said. “I’m on duty. You’ll have to come out to the substation.” He gave directions and hung up without another word.

Louis was an hour’s drive into the wasteland of the Corkscrew Preserve before he saw the radio tower that Ahnert had told him to watch for. It led him to a sun-bleached cinderblock building set in the flat gray-green scrub land, land that looked untouched by the recent hard rains. There were no trees, nothing to give shelter from the sun. The only break in the monotonous landscape was the line of electrical towers marching like skeletons to the horizon.

Louis parked next to the Lee County Sheriff’s Department cruiser in front. As he got out of the Mustang, he saw Bob Ahnert emerge from the building.

Why was Ahnert wearing the standard green uniform? He was a detective, wasn’t he? Louis’s eyes dipped to the name tag on Ahnert’s shirt. SGT. AHNERT. Had the guy been busted in rank? Is that why he was sitting out in a substation in the middle of nowhere?

Ahnert removed his glasses, drew out a handkerchief and started to wipe them.

“You must want something pretty bad to drive all the way out here,” he said, putting his sunglasses back on and resting his hip against his cruiser.

“I know now what was missing from Kitty’s homicide file,” Louis said. “The second lab report. That’s what you were talking about, wasn’t it?”

Ahnert drew a cigar out of his breast pocket and lit it. He didn’t have to cup a hand; there wasn’t one whiff of a breeze out here.

“Did you find it?” Ahnert asked.

“No.”

“So that’s why you’re here. You want me to tell you what it said,” Ahnert said.

“Yes.”

Ahnert drew on the cigar. Louis could see his reflection in Ahnert’s sunglasses.

“Is she talking to you yet?” Ahnert asked.

Louis stiffened slightly. “Yes,” he said.

For a moment, Ahnert didn’t move. Louis could hear the faint hum of the electrical lines above. He could feel the sun on his neck.

Ahnert took the cigar out of his mouth. “The semen inside her was blood type AB-negative,” he said.

“That proves Cade didn’t rape her,” Louis said.

“You’re not going to prove anything on my memory,” Ahnert said. “You’re going to have to find that report. Why haven’t you gone back to Duvall’s old defense records?”

Louis shook his head. “I can’t get access.”

Louis waited for Ahnert to say something, but he just chewed on the cigar, watching Louis through the sunglasses.

“I have reason to believe that Duvall buried the semen report and let an innocent man go to prison,” Louis said.

“Duvall was a winner. Why would he do that?”

“I don’t know.”

“What about two killers? You consider that?”

Was Ahnert talking about Cade and Ronnie acting together? It was sickening, the image of Ronnie raping Kitty and then Cade killing her to shut her up. Was that what Cade meant by blood being thicker than water?

“Cade and Ronnie. . together?” Louis asked.

Ahnert said nothing, just moved the cigar to the other side of his mouth.

“Sergeant,” Louis said, “was that where you were going with this twenty years ago?”

A lone white egret took sudden flight and Ahnert watched it rise and disappear against the bleached sky. “April 9th. That’s the day she was killed. I remember it was hot, like summer was coming early.” He paused. “ ‘April is the cruellest month, breeding lilacs out of the dead land, mixing memory and desire, stirring dull roots with spring rain.’ ”

He looked back at Louis. “It doesn’t matter where I was going twenty years ago.”

“It mattered. It still does,” Louis said. “I think you still want to solve this case. I think you’re the only one who does.”

“Besides you, you mean.”

“Yes.”

Ahnert was silent for a long time, looking out over the desolate landscape.

“It’s over for me,” he said. “She’s yours now.”

Louis was surprised to hear a hint of relief in Ahnert’s voice. What the hell had happened to this man twenty years ago? Had he been so obsessed with finding Kitty’s killer that it had destroyed his career and the rest of his life?

He suddenly heard Mobley talking to him as he leaned over the bar at O’Sullivan’s.

He stole an item that belonged to the victim. A gold necklace. Some kind of heart-shaped locket. Guess Ahnert needed the money.

Ahnert hadn’t needed the money a cheap gold necklace would have brought, and he wasn’t obsessed with finding Kitty’s killer. It was her he was obsessed with.

“Why did you stop investigating?” Louis asked.

“I was told to.”

Louis shook his head. “I don’t believe that.”

Ahnert finally looked back at Louis. “I was hung up on a dead girl.” He looked away. “It’s sick, isn’t it?”

Louis ran a hand over the back of his neck. It wasn’t the sun that was making him sweat.

“I’m just trying to give her justice,” Louis said quietly.

Ahnert didn’t answer. He tossed the cigar into the sand and squashed it out with his boot. Then he picked a bit of wet tobacco off his lips and flicked it away.

“Forget justice,” he said. “Give her some peace.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine

It was on the drive back to Fort Myers that Louis remembered something Ronnie Cade had said the very first time he had gone out to J.C. Landscaping. Ronnie had mentioned that his father had bailed him out of jail when he was a teenager. That meant Ronnie probably had a record. And there was a slim chance that the record could lead to a blood type on file somewhere. But he needed Mobley’s help to get it.

The reception area outside Mobley’s office was empty when Louis got there. He looked at the wall clock. Past five. Mobley’s door was shut, the lights off. He was about to leave when the Amazon came in, carrying a freshly washed coffeepot.

She smiled at him. “What are you doing back here?”

“I needed to see the sheriff.”

“Too late. He cut out early today. He won’t be back ’til Monday.”

“Damn,” Louis said under his breath.

“Can I help?” she asked.

Louis almost told her no, but nodded. “Yeah, maybe you can. Can you check to see if someone has a record?”

“Sure. What’s his name?”

“Ronnie Cade.”

She gave him a look, but went to the computer terminal at the back of the room. Leaning over the chair, she brought the monitor to life and looked back at Louis.

“Got a social or a birthday?”

“Sorry.”

She typed in the name, then looked back at him. “I got two. Ronald John or Ronald Walter?”

“Hell, I don’t know. Do you have birth dates or anything else there?”

“I got one in nineteen-forty-nine and one in nineteen-thirty-two.”

“It’s got to be forty-nine.”

She pecked at the keys, then the printer in the corner started pumping out a piece of paper. She ripped it off and brought it to Louis.

Ronnie Cade had one charge: a DUI from 1976, the result of an accident with injuries. Finally, a break. Any accident victim who had been treated at a hospital was always tested for alcohol. And they were routinely blood-typed.

“Excuse me,” Louis said.

The Amazon had been putting away the coffee filters and she looked back at Louis over her shoulder.

“Is there any way you can check to see if the hospital records for this accident are in his file?” Louis asked.

For the first time, she gave him something other than a smile. “Hey, I’ve clocked out. I gotta go pick up my kid at the baby-sitter.”