Page 96 of Devoted in Death

“I never been there, but I heard it’s right nice.”

“It sure is.”

“Maybe we can arrange for you to spend some time in a cage there.” Eve slapped her hand on the file, making all two hundred and sixty pounds of Jimbo jump in his chair. “Since this man was killed there.”

She slammed the photos of Robert Jansen, broken and battered, faceup.

Jimbo went white. “Holy crow! Holy crow! Is he dead?”

“What do you think?”

“Holy crow. I never did that! I never hurt nobody.”

“What kind of vehicle was it,” Banner asked conversationally, “you and your pa towed in from down along Highway 12 last August?”

“It was... I don’t know what you’re talking about.” But Jimbo twisted his big hands together, and stared at the photograph. “Did he get himself murdered?”

“They beat him,” Eve said, voice hard. “They burned him. They tortured him, then, when they were done, they tossed him off a ridge and left him for your goddamn holy crows. And before that, they did this.”

She shoved the dead pictures of Jansen across the table. “Bashed his head in, dragged him into the brush to rot until somebody found him.”

“I know about that. I know about that, ’cause it was Petie West and his mama who found him. But we didn’t do nothing.”

Eve dumped the rest of the photos out. “They killed all these people. Tortured them. Somebody’s son, daughter, sister, father. You took the vehicle they left on the side of the road. How much did you get for it?”

“We... I ain’t saying we did any such thing. But if we did, it didn’t hurt anybody.”

“We could trace the damn vehicle, Jimbo. We don’t know who they are.”

“You don’t know who they are,” he said slowly.

“Do the right thing, Jimbo.” Banner spoke gently. “If you don’t you are hurting people. You’re hurting the people they have right now.”

“They have people?”

Eve pushed Campbell’s picture, Mulligan’s picture over. “They have these two people. They’re torturing them. They may have already killed the woman. The longer you cover yourself, the less chance they have of getting out of this alive.”

“I gotta look after my ma.”

“They’ve got mothers, Jimbo,” Banner reminded him. “How would your ma feel if somebody had you, and there was somebody who could maybe help, but he didn’t?”

“My pa said if we told they’d put us in jail.”

“If you don’t tell, I swear to God I’ll see you both in cages, as long as I can manage it,” Eve promised. “If you help us out, give us something that helps us find these people, save this woman, this man, I’ll keep you clear of jail. And the charges currently against your father for assaulting my detective go away, too.”

“You can do that?”

“I will do that. But you come clean, and now. No more bullshit, or the deal’s off. You’ve got ten seconds.”

“I wanna think—”

“Nine. Eight. Seven.”

“Okay, all right.” He waved his big hands in the air. “It was just sitting on the side of the road. It didn’t have no registration in it or nothing. Had fuel right enough, and the battery was charged good and proper. But the engine was finished. Somebody’d worked on it, but it wasn’t going anywhere. So we towed it in. Somebody’d come around looking, we’d’ve given it back. Nobody did. We didn’t know about the dead man till later on, and then Pa said we had to be quiet or maybe they’d think we done it. We didn’t hurt nobody.”

“What kind of vehicle?”

“Quarter-ton pickup. A ’52, so it was showing its age. A ’52 American Bobcat, steel-gray exterior, black interior. You could see how it’d been wrecked once, and had good bodywork.”