Scorcher by John Lutz Page B

that you neglected to tell me?” Carver asked.
    “Nope. Every card in this hand’s faceup, Carver. I advise you to play it that way with me, you wanna keep your ass out of a sling.”
    Carver didn’t like even being in the same game with Mc­Gregor. There was no way to know where he stood. He told McGregor the story he’d fed Adam Kave, then asked if that dovetailed with what McGregor had told Adam to set up the family to hire Carver.
    “It all tallies,” McGregor said. “Adam Kave’s mistaken; I did say your son had been killed in Saint Louis, not Chicago. I figure he was testing you. Old bastard didn’t sell all them wienies and become a multitrillionaire by taking things for granted.”
    “How do you read his relationship with his son?”
    “Easy. They didn’t get along.”
    “And with his wife?”
    “He loves her. A lot.”
    “Nadine?”
    “The young cunt? She’s around, that’s all. Guy like that, wrapped up in his business and his own high-powered life, his kids are just there, like furniture.”
    That was all pretty much the way Carver had sensed the scheme of relationships in the Kave household. Yet there were undercurrents. Thinking in stereotypes and forming snap judgments could lead a few degrees off course in the beginning of a case, and miles from the right destination at the end. Like navigating at sea.
    “You know anything about Nadine’s fiancé, this Joel Dewitt?” Carver asked.
    “Yeah, we checked on him. Got himself a used-car and Honda motorcycle dealership here in Fort Lauderdale.”
    “Elana’s against the marriage. She thinks Dewitt’s a crook.”
    “I knew a car dealer once wasn’t a crook,” McGregor said. “He’s dead now; I think he’s stuffed and in a museum somewhere. Now he’s gone, there ain’t a one won’t sell you a car knowing it’ll turn wheels-up the last day of the warranty. Sure Dewitt’s a crook. All legal, though. He doesn’t have a record. Tell you something, Carver, I didn’t know the wife objected to the marriage. See, you’re paying dividends already. Fucking wealth of information. You make me feel smart I made arrangements with you. You wanna feel smart?”
    “It’d be a welcome change.”
    “I bet. Anyway, the lab says the accelerant used to torch your son and the restaurant guy was the same as what was in a can found in Paul Kave’s makeshift lab.”
    “You’re building a heavy case,” Carver said.
    “All we need is the neck to hang it on.”
    “I’m working on that, McGregor.”
    “I gotta go, Carver. But listen, you cover your ass. This Paul Kave is a dangerous punk, and he’s supposed to be smart as well as nuts. He knows you’re after him and might decide to do something about it, double around on you and have himself another barbecue.”
    Carver saw his son’s curled and blackened body again. Clenched his eyes shut. Thought about a barbecue-sauerkraut hot dog. Oh, Jesus!
    “Carver?”
    “I’m here.” Barely. He was feeling dizzy. He braced himself with the cane. The smell of exhaust from the highway came at him again. Heat seemed to crawl up his pants legs.
    “You go careful, now. I wouldn’t want to lose my man on the inside.” A low chuckle. “Other hand, I wouldn’t want you to lose your determination. ”
    “You don’t know what determination is,” Carver said, “till you know me.”
    “You’re wrong there, old buddy,” McGregor said. He hung up the phone.
    Carver stood for a moment watching the highway waver like an undulating ribbon in the bright sun. He considered Mc­Gregor’s warning about Paul Kave doubling around on him. Tigers did that, he’d read somewhere, circled around behind whoever was stalking them. Stalked the hunter. As if they were pissed off anyone would dare try to track them, and they wanted to teach whoever was after them a deadly lesson. Tigers were supposed to be a bitch to hunt.
    The heat from the concrete was seeping up through the soles of Carver’s shoes. He limped back to