Memory Man (Amos Decker 1)

Bogart pointed at the door of the morgue. “He left a message on…on my agent that was directed at you.”

“I know he did.”

“Which means you must know this guy. You must have done something to this guy. He calls you bro.” Bogart shouted out this last part.

Decker gave one last heaving breath and pushed off the wall, standing on his own. “I don’t know this guy. And I’m not his bro.”

“You say you never forget. Well, apparently neither does this guy. You did something. Maybe you didn’t realize what it was, but he’s killed…he’s killed…” Bogart’s voice trailed off and he lowered his weapon and then stared at the pavement shaking his head, his expression one of complete despair.

Decker rubbed at the cut and bruise on his cheek where Bogart had punched him. His tongue pushed against the loosened tooth.

“He’s killed a dozen people, including my family and Special Agent Nora Lafferty,” said Decker.

Bogart glanced up at him and nodded slowly. “Including Nora.” Bogart put his weapon away. “Look, I’m sorry I…If you want to press charges, go ahead. It was indefensible.”

Decker said, “I’m not sure what happened, other than I stumbled and fell and took you with me. Pretty clumsy. But then I’m a big, fat, out-of-shape guy. I think you might need to dry-clean your suit and see to that cut on your head.”

Bogart rubbed at some dirt on his sleeve and then glanced at Decker. “Where do we go from here?”

“With all we’ve done we’ve really gotten nowhere. You find anything useful at the Army base?”

“Nothing. It was a petri dish of crap. All degraded to mush. And the Pentagon has yet to get back to us. Not sure what they could add anyway. What about that story in the paper?”

“I talked to the reporter.”

“Lancaster told us. Gave us the IP info. My guys are tracking it, no luck so far.”

“I doubt it will lead anywhere. Too obvious.”

“So we’ve still got nothing, then?” said Bogart miserably.

“We have a lot of things, if we can make sense of them. We have Sebastian Leopold.”

“But he had alibis for both sets of murders.”

“But not Lafferty’s.”

“So you’re saying he’s working with someone? That’s what you meant when you said no one can be in two places at the same time?”

Decker nodded.

“But how can you be sure he killed Nora?”

“I can’t. But I don’t think it was Leopold who carved those words in her.”

“Why?”

“I met Leopold. I would’ve remembered this guy if I’d seen him before. But I don’t, which means I didn’t. That leaves his partner. This guy wouldn’t have allowed Leopold to do it. It was personal. I’m his bro. No one else. He’s the one with the beef against me.”

“But Decker, how could you have run across this other guy and not remember him? If he hates you so much that he’s slaughtering people?”

“I can’t answer that because I have no answer,” admitted Decker. “But I promise you that I will.”

Chapter

34

DECKER STARED UP at the front of the bar. Then he looked on the right side of the façade and then on the left. The buildings here were brick and dilapidated.

He walked down the stairs and into the dark, smoky interior.

He gazed around and saw two working-class men at a booth in the back, both hefting beer mugs. There was a woman alone at a counter-height round table with a glass of white wine in one hand and a half-smoked cigarette in the other. As he watched she placed her cigarette in a black plastic ashtray and set her wineglass down, pulled a compact and lipstick from her purse, and redid her mouth.

Decker passed by them all and walked up to the bar. The same barman was there. Decker sat and ordered a Coors. The barman poured out the draft, skimmed off the foam on top with a butter knife, and slid it across, in return for which Decker passed him a fiver and told him to keep the change. This got the man’s attention.

“You were in here before,” said the barman.

Decker nodded and sipped his beer. “I was. With the other guy.”

“Yeah, that other guy. Weirdo.”

“Has he been back in?”

“Nah.” The man started to wipe down the mahogany bar using a rag with a circular motion briskly applied.

“Had he been in before?”

“Couple times.”

“You ever talk to him?’

“He never talked to nobody. Except you.”

“He live around here?”

“Don’t know. Only saw his back leaving the place. Never saw him past that.”

“I don’t see that waitress around.”

The barman chuckled. “That’s right.”

“What happened to her?”

“Her?” He chuckled harder and then stopped wiping, put his elbows on the bar, leaned across, and said, “You call it a her. Maybe I don’t.”

“Then what do you call it?”

The barman pointed a finger at Decker. “Now that’s a damn good question. I don’t do the hiring here. I just pour the drinks and wipe stuff down and throw the occasional drunk bastard out the door.”

“Who hired her?”

“Management, whoever they are. Place has been sold four times in three years. Only constant is yours truly, and I wouldn’t be here ’cept I can’t find nothing else that pays better.”

“So are you saying she was a guy in drag?”

“Or something, yeah. Don’t know for sure. And I wasn’t about to check to confirm. I don’t hit from that side of the plate.”

Decker closed his eyes and the frames flipped through his head.

Tall, thin, blonde curls.

That hid pretty much all of her face.

Or his face.

And maybe the Adam’s apple, the surefire giveaway. Only surgery could take care of that.

“You have any info on the person? Must have given a name, address. Stuff for payroll?”

“Management has all that. And they’re not even local. Maybe even another state. Think they rolled up a bunch of businesses and combined it into one entity. Economy of scale or some shit like that. I bet they’re making a crapload of money, me not so much.”

“So none of those records are kept here?”

“No.”