Page 2 of Making His Bones

I looked back at the phone. The biggest by far, as confirmed by this Irish study, were the Congolese. Wait a minute. What the fuck am I looking at? With contempt, I handed the phone back to Knoxie. Their friend had just been apprehended by the FBI and they were laughing like goons about erect phallus size? I spat at the Prospect, “This penis curse isn’t the one he meant. I’ll bet he meant his real ancestors, the kind you find in your family tree.”

The Prospect abruptly stopped laughing. It was eerie how he could turn off his emotions like a spigot. I’d definitely gotten myself in trouble by being unable to do that. He narrowed his eyes suspiciously at me. “You know Kneecap?”

“Of course not,” I muttered, turning away from the gang.

And practically banged right into Special Agent Susan Underhill.

“You’re exposing yourself 180 degrees,” she hissed. “You just can’t keep a tight lid on it.”

I felt guilty, but since I loathed Susan Underhill, I hissed back, “What am I doing wrong? I’m trying to get intel from these guys.”

“You’re not an investigator. You don’t conduct interviews or run down leads. You fucking analyze DNA in a fucking lab and that’s where you belong, not the field.”

“Oh yeah?” I said boldly. I had to think of something better than that. “Maybe I’ll just stay here for a couple weeks. I have family nearby.”

“You can play detective all you want,” Susan spat, “but you’re nothing more than a glorified lab rat.”

Luckily Booker was at the door of the archery range, gesturing for me to enter. I waited for Susan to go first and I ducked under the yellow crime scene tape.

Agents swarmed in the archery store. Looking for what, I don’t know, because Kneecap had killed his wife fifteen years prior in another state. That was the crime we were prosecuting, not him smoking a spliff. This town was well-rounded. I told a forensic tech to bag half a piece of pizza in a garbage can. That was pretty much all I needed to verify that Kneecap was, indeed, Rufus Cole of Joliet, Illinois, soon to go on trial in that state for the murder of his wife, Marnie. I told the tech to bag any used tissue from the bathroom, too. We’d have ample DNA evidence.

I removed my earpiece as I turned the knob of a strange door in the back of the counter area. “Aaron McGill, Attorney at Law” was painted on the glass of the door, old timey style. It was, indeed, a regular lawyer’s office with shelves of legal manuals and an enormous framed vintage Grateful Dead poster on the wall. A back window looked out onto an alley where a few Harleys were parked.

I was about to leave when I heard metallic rattling. Discerning it came from an upright locker, I tiptoed closer. There was no rat jiggling that handle. Or . . . was it?

First a hand appeared clutching the edge of the door. Then a bad comb-over, and eyes shifting from side to side. I stood stock still, so maybe he didn’t see me. A man in a suit with a fluorescent orange tie crept out of the locker.

“Aaron McGill?” I asked.

He jumped a mile, clutching his heart. But he remained suave. “Yes, that’s me. I was just . . . meditating inside that locker. What’s all the brouhaha about?”

My lips curled into a smile. I had not smiled much in the past ten years. “Well, you should know. Didn’t you hear before you went off to meditate?”

“Yes, I may have heard something about Kneecap, ah, Elmore Ruxton, being cuffed and taken away by a large force of men. And a sniper peeked in my back window. You see, it’s, ah, very urgent that I not become enmeshed in this pointless and partisan persecution of one of Pure and Easy’s finest merchants.”

“Why is your office behind an archery range?”

McGill adopted an “aw shucks” expression, hands deep in pockets. “Well, when you have only one client, who needs to advertise?”

I took the bait. “One client? Who?”

“As you may have noticed, there’s a contingent of Pure and Easy’s finest with a particular stake in this archery range, and indeed, Kneecap is a member in good standing of—“

“The Bare Bones MC,” I said, suddenly realizing “MC” meant “motorcycle club.” The—mostly—handsome guys outside. Kneecap had worn a black leather vest, too.

“Correct, miss.” I liked that he called me “miss” although I was still barely on the happy side of middle age.

McGill was moving about the room, locking file cabinets with small keys on his keychain as he said into his cell phone, “Appoint a new manager to oversee this madhouse, Ford. Okay. Sounds good. Who? Who’s Gray? Is he that handyman who—okay. I see your point. No one knows him. What if he’s got a criminal background too? All right, Torino.”

I got it. The Prez, Ford, was nicknamed Torino. Very cute.

“Miss,” McGill said pointedly. He sat at his desk to shut down his computer. “Why did Kneecap talk about spitting into a tube?”

I shook my head. “I’m not at liberty to say.”

McGill nodded. “He appears to have been talking about DNA. Can you nod or shake your head?”

I was so proud of my work, of course I had to nod.