Identity Crisis (Sam McRae Mystery 1)

“Probably. Of course, try hiding from organized crime. It’s not all that easy to just disappear. I guess when the heat started to come down on Knudsen, he must have turned to the FBI. By that time, he’d changed his name. Jergins was assigned the case, but never had a chance to meet Garvey, or the man he thought of as Garvey, who was supposed to have a disc Knudsen gave him. When we didn’t find the disc at the murder scene, Jergins figured Knudsen had it.”

“Why is Jergins so interested? Is the disc evidence in a prosecution?”

“No. As I understand it, Jergins wanted to use the information to force Stavos to rat on the Mob.”

“I see. Either cooperate with the feds, or they’d send the information to Stavos’ big boss.”

“In which case, Mr. Stavos would become history,” Derry said.

Cute. A blackmailer for greed turning evidence over to a blackmailer for justice. One had to admire the symmetry.

After I left Aces High, I took another detour toward Gibson Island.

With the wind ruffling my short hair, I raced down the road, singing a high-pitched tune over the roar of my car’s motor. The air was damp and close, and at sixty miles an hour, it slapped at me like a moist towel.

I wondered about Ash. Could he have used Knudsen and Schaeffer to steal the money, then killed them? He could have planted those files to make them look guilty. But why would he set up Melanie?

What about Ash’s tax problems? Maybe the situation with Garvey’s 1099 had something to do with him not really being Garvey. Maybe Ash was a victim here. If I asked him a few more questions, the worst he could do was tell me to pound sand. Well, maybe it wasn’t the worst he could do. Thing was, even though Ash struck me as indolent, rich, and irresponsible, I couldn’t imagine him killing anyone.

A blue line of water appeared in the distance, with the Gibson Island guard station looming in the foreground. I was thinking up an excuse for the guard, when I noticed a silver Lexus racing off the island. Ash’s car. It flew by me in a silver blur.

I found a place to turn around and followed him.

Chapter TWENTY-SEVEN

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Ash was out of sight. I put my foot to the floor. The wind roared, as the speedometer needle passed eighty, inching toward eighty-five. I was getting every penny’s worth of the work that had gone into fixing my car. The old heap actually had a lot of giddyup. I swore to maintain the thing religiously from then on.

The silver Lexus gleamed in the distance, moving into the right lane and signaling to get off at the Baltimore-Washington Parkway. I followed, pushing it on the turn, my tires kicking up dust as they hit the dirt shoulder. He had a good lead on me, but parkway traffic was light. I mashed the pedal again.

Ash got off at the exit for Baltimore-Washington International Airport. I followed him past the hotels and down a side road toward long-term parking. As he entered the lot, I pulled over and watched him park. He got out and hauled a large suitcase and a shoulder bag from the trunk, then strode toward a bus shelter. A shuttle bus circling through the lot stopped at the shelter, and he got on. The bus rolled off toward the terminal. So much, I thought, for that.

I found a pay phone off the parkway and called the PG police. I was starting to feel like one of their operatives. Derry wasn’t back, so I left a message about Ash. The rest was up to him.

Maybe Ash planned to leave town all along. Maybe not. One way or the other, I couldn’t do a thing about it.

f f f

Barbara answered the door in pajama pants and a cropped white T-shirt. I could hear the TV in the background. One of those morning talk shows where cheating boyfriends and drug-addicted daughters come to confess their sins before an audience clapping like trained seals.

“What do you want now?” she said.

“Why didn’t you tell me Greg Knudsen and Tom Garvey were the same person?”

She smiled. “So what about it?”

“So it’s quite an oversight.”

“I don’t have to talk to you.” She started to close the door.

“It’s either me or the cops.”

She held up, squinting at me. “Whadda you mean?”

“They might be interested in hearing about your argument at the gym with Bruce Schaeffer. They might like to know about your financial situation since Knudsen, the prodigal father, came back to town.”

“Prod-what?”