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“Are you here about the ad?” he asked.
“May I?” I said, and popped the hood before he could refuse. “It is. It’s the same car. One-seventy cubic inch straight-six engine, 101 horsepower, three-speed transmission on the floor—I know this car. My father taught me how to drive a stick in this car. I knocked out three transmissions before I caught on. Power steering, power brakes, bucket seats—it has a push-button AM radio, not even FM, am I right?”
Sochacki nodded. “I restored it with as many original parts as I could find.”
“I even remember the tire pressure,” I said. “Twenty-four psi front and back. You’re selling this?”
“Yes.”
“How much?”
“The ad said eight thousand . . .”
“I’ll take it.”
“Just like that?”
“It’s a work of art. It should be in the Louvre.”
“Actually, I think it’s in the Smithsonian,” Sochacki said. “I don’t know. You said you owned a Mustang just like this one.”
“Exactly like this one.”
“What happened to it?”
“I spun it out on Mississippi Boulevard near the Lake Street Bridge and busted the A-frame.”
Sochacki winced as I said it. His forehead furrowed and his eyes grew narrow. Suddenly I knew what his wife meant when she said none of the previous potential buyers were “worthy.”
“I was a dumb kid,” I said. “I’ve become much more responsible since then.”
Sochacki nodded, but I don’t think he believed me.
“What happened to your face?” he asked.
I almost told him I had been in a car accident, but caught myself in time. “I ran into a door,” I said.
“Sure you did.”
“Will it help that I was once a cop?”
“Was?” Sochacki said. “Why aren’t you still a cop?”
“That’s kind of a long story.”
Sochacki nodded again.
I was losing ground fast.
“I promise to treat the Mustang with all the love and respect that she richly deserves,” I said.
“Are you married?”
“No.”
“Then you don’t know much about love and respect, do you?”
I couldn’t win with this guy.
“Only what my parents taught me,” I said.
Sochacki gently closed the hood of the Mustang and gave it a loving pat. She wasn’t going anywhere.
“Actually, I didn’t come about the Mustang,” I said.
“Oh?”
“I wanted to ask about a case you worked a dozen years ago.”
“What case?”
“Brian Becker.”
“Brian Becker . . .” He squeezed his eyes shut as if he could conjure an image of the man from behind the eyelids.
“Carbon monoxide poisoning,” I said.
“Sure. Killed himself in his garage. It was eventually ruled an accident.”
“Only you didn’t believe it.”
“What makes you say that?”
“I read your supplemental. You did everything to prove Becker was murdered but conduct a seance.”
“If I had thought it would work, I would have tried it,” Sochacki said.
“Why didn’t you believe it was an accident?”
“You read the entire file?”
“Yes.”
“Then you tell me.”
“Two domestic assaults in nine days prior to Becker’s death.”
“Yeah. Plus the eleven contacts we’d had with him before that.”
“Still. . .”
“I admit it, I couldn’t prove anything,” Sochacki said. “There was no insurance claim. No property changed hands. There was no money in joint accounts. Except for getting the asshole out of her life for good, Merodie Davies didn’t profit at all from Becker’s death. Neither did anyone else that I could find. There was no evidence of foul play—no bruises, no contusions on the body, no signs of a struggle; he wasn’t anchored to anything. There was nothing there. Nothing. My partner knew it. The boss knew it. The county attorney knew it. I suppose I knew it, too. It just—it just didn’t feel right. You said you were on the job.”
“Eleven and a half years in St. Paul.”
“Then you know what I mean.”
“I know.”
“At first I thought it was the woman in the bar. Maybe she slipped him something. ‘Cept the ME said no way. There was nothing in Becker’s blood but booze.”
“Tell me about the woman in the bar.”
“From what witnesses told me, she was drinking alone until Becker arrived. Then they drank alone together. After an hour or so they left. I never could get an ID on her. Witnesses said she had long auburn hair. Said she was a beauty. Said they never saw her before or since. I had hoped she paid for her drinks with a credit card or personal check, but she was all cash.”
“Was she waiting for him?”
“Witnesses said she was waiting for someone. Whether it was for Becker specifically or anyone who walked through the door, I can’t say.”