Page 80 of The Devil's Advocate

‘Oh God, I didn’t know. I’m in town and thought I’d swing by and see him. Is the sheriff inside? We used to work together, long time ago,’ said Bloch.

Both patrolmen stood still and cast their eyes on Bloch. They looked at how she stood. Back straight, thumb in her belt, head high and with an ease around them both.

‘Where did you two serve together?’ asked the patrolman.

‘I was in the 2ndPrecinct, Mobile. A bail jumper pulled an armed robbery as he passed through my beat and ended up here. Lomax wanted him found before his bankroll ran out and he got the idea to start robbing people here. We got him, in the end. Well, Lomax got him.’

They had listened close to all she had said. There were over four hundred cops in Mobile, and nobody knew them all. Bloch sure sounded like a cop. She didn’t tell them she was an ex-cop gearing up to take a bite clean out of Lomax.

‘That sounds like Colt. Anyways, he’s not here. He’s probably at home.’

‘I’d like to pay my respects,’ said Bloch.

‘We can pass on a message. I’m sure …’

‘In person. It would be rude not to,’ said Bloch.

The patrolmen looked at each other, shrugged and one of them started giving directions. Bloch thanked them. They had bought her routine, and even if they had some doubts about Bloch, they thought even if they were wrong, the sheriff could easily handle himself against a woman.

Bloch guessed they were that stupid.

Back in the car, Bloch typed the address into the satellite navigation. Got nothing but a general area north of the town. She took off and told herself she would find it. The property sat a few hundred yards south of Devil’s Creek – a narrow, fast river that fed into the Luxahatchee River.

As she got closer to the red pin on her navigation system, the road turned from a two-lane to a single lane, and then on the left she saw a gap in the trees. A dirt road with a mailbox to the right of it. She stopped the car. Reversed back. The mailbox had a name written on it in white paint.

Lomax.

She reversed a further ten feet, then swung the car onto the track.

Her headlights were already on full beam, but they couldn’t penetrate the trees. The track swung left and right, around great oaks, which meant her field of vision extended only as far as the next corner – usually no more than fifty feet or so. Then, without warning, the dirt road straightened and there in front of her was what looked like an old colonial house. Yet it was too pristine to be anything other than a new house built in the old style. It was white, with a wrap-around porch. Bloch pulled in and parked beside the sheriff’s cruiser.

When she got out of the car she was hit with the sound of the crickets and cicadas singing their midnight love songs.

The ground had been torn up. A lot of cars had been through recently. Glancing around, she saw tire marks all over the grass, some even leading behind the house. The lights were on inside. On the first floor at least. Kitchen and lounge, probably. Bloch found herself stomping up the steps, her boots thumping the porch boards, making sure her presence didn’t come as a surprise. That would not be wise in this town, in a house that stood alone. Especially not at night. Especially not when the owner was armed. Especially not when the owner only needed a small excuse to unload a shotgun in your face.

She took a step toward the front door. The top half of the door had frosted glass. There were curtains behind the door, held back in a bow with pelmets.

One floorboard creaked so loudly it was almost a scream. One more step and she was right at the door. She raised her arm, closed her fist, pulled it back.

Knock.

The second knock coincided with another noise.

The sound of a .45 handgun firing a single shot.

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

LOMAX

He woke sometime later in his bed. It was dark outside, and there was a noise downstairs. Footsteps, and something else. Lomax took his Sig Sauer .45 ACP from the lockbox on the top shelf of the wardrobe, checked the load, cocked it and stepped lightly into the hallway.

The lights were on downstairs. He descended slowly, the muzzle of the weapon sweeping back and forth until he saw a man in his home, carrying dishes.

In the kitchen, Randal Korn wiped his hands on a towel and then pressed the start button on the dishwasher before closing it. The dirty dishes left by the mourners had been cleared.

‘You can put the gun down,’ said Korn, without looking up at Lomax on the stairs. ‘I thought you could use a hand to clean up. It seems the least I could do.’

Lomax didn’t answer. He just came down the stairs, casually, but he didn’t put the gun down. Instead, he held it by his side and watched Korn move around the kitchen, filling the coffee machine with water, then coffee grounds, and then setting it to brew.