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Noah said, “Who is it?”
The phone continued to hop around on her desk. “Nee—” she began and stopped herself. She was the only person who called Zeke by the childhood nickname she’d given him. Noah knew about it but no one else did. “Zeke,” she corrected.
Everyone stared. While they didn’t know that she had always called him Needle, they did know something of the history between her and Zeke. After Josie had been kidnapped as an infant, the woman posing as her mother, Lila, had gotten heavily into drugs. Zeke had been her drug dealer. At a young age, Josie had begun to think of him as “Needle” because he always brought her mommy needles. Although he didn’t do much to stop Lila from abusing Josie, he had stepped in the couple of times during which Lila was doing her worst. Josie had lived her entire life being angry with him for not doing more and yet, as the years wore on, she couldn’t help but wonder how much worse things would have been if he hadn’t helped at the critical times that he did.
The phone stopped buzzing, the screen fading to black.
She still harbored anger toward him though she tried hard to fight it. Last year, during a case, he’d actually saved her life, taking a bullet for her. Josie had done her best to look after him since then, but Zeke wasn’t much for being looked after. She’d given him her number in case he needed anything. This was the first time he’d used it. A strange feeling tickled the back of her throat. Worry? Had she crossed some emotional barrier that now allowed her to worry about the man who represented the worst time of her life? Zeke was a lifelong criminal and above all else, a survivor. He couldn’t possibly need help.
He probably wanted something from her.
Her fingers brushed the screen. Did she want to deal with this right now?
As she pushed the phone away, it buzzed again, startling her. His name appeared once more. She glanced over at Noah. “It’s up to you whether to answer or not,” he said. “We can send a marked unit to the East Bridge to check in with him.”
With a sigh, Josie picked up the phone. Ignoring the stares of everyone else, she said, “He’s not going to talk to a uniform.” She swiped answer and pressed the phone to her ear. “Zeke? What’s going on?”
“JoJo?” he said, his voice scratchy. “Thought you might want to come down here. I’m pretty sure I’m looking at a dead body.”
TWENTY
Near Central Denton, the East Bridge crossed a wide branch of the Susquehanna River. Beneath it, a hotbed of drug activity thrived no matter how hard the police department tried to stop it. A small number of the city’s homeless population also lived under the bridge, taking shelter beneath tents and other makeshift dwellings. Zeke had made a home for himself in a small shack about a half mile down the riverbank, in a small copse of trees, away from the majority of people who congregated at the bridge. When they arrived, Josie and Noah found him sitting outside of it in a camping chair that Josie had bought for him a couple of months earlier. It was olive drab green, just like the threadbare jacket he’d seemed to have been wearing all of Josie’s life.
A nearly toothless smile spread across his face when he saw her. His white beard was longer than she’d ever seen it, the ends of it yellowed. “JoJo!”
Josie handed him a carton of cigarettes. He cradled the box like he was holding a newborn, looking down at it almost lovingly. “What’s this for?”
“It’s not for anything, Zeke,” she said. “Just take it.”
He stood and disappeared into the shack, secreting the carton away. From inside, they heard his voice. “I sure do appreciate that, little JoJo.”
Noah called back, “What’s this about a dead body?”
Wordlessly, Zeke emerged, walking past them toward the river. Josie and Noah followed until they left the trees behind. Under their feet, the terrain turned to frozen mud and rocks. Ahead, the river rushed and churned. Josie couldn’t help but think of the Sharon Eddy scene next to Kettlewell Creek. She looked all around them but didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. Zeke walked them to the edge of the water and pointed across the river, at the sky. The sun was sinking fast, daylight fading. Above the opposite bank, three turkey buzzards and a handful of crows circled, sailing on thermals. Josie dropped her gaze from their outstretched wings to the ground directly across from them. The other riverbank had always been too steep for any of the East Bridge residents to utilize. A road ran alongside the bank, but it was little used, especially in winter when cars were more likely to find icy patches and go toppling into the water.
Noah said, “What are we looking at?”
But Josie saw it. Something red broke up the otherwise brown and gray brush along the incline that led up from the river to the road. She pointed at it. “There.”
“How do you know that’s a body?” Noah asked Zeke. “Lots of people toss their trash over there.”
Zeke raised a brow at Noah, giving him only a passing glance before addressing Josie. His hands disappeared into his jacket pockets and came out holding a cigarette and lighter. “Last night I was out here taking a piss. I saw a pair of headlights. That’s not that unusual. People do drive down that road sometimes, but these ones stopped right in the middle of the road. Then they turned away and next thing I know, I see brake lights. Same place.”
Josie said, “You’re saying the car stopped and turned so its trunk was facing the river?”
He put the cigarette between his lips and talked around it. “Yep. Then a couple minutes later, I heard something. Like something heavy falling, crashing down the bank. Then another noise like the trunk closing. After that, the car went back the way it came.”
Josie asked, “What time was this, Zeke?”
“I don’t know. Last night.”
“Can you narrow it down at all? Closer to dinner time? Midnight? This morning?”
Zeke lit his cigarette and took a long pull, exhaling a cloud of smoke as he answered. “I don’t know. It was late. I know ’cause it was real quiet. Probably middle of the night.”
Josie knew he didn’t have a watch. The only access he had to a clock was his phone, and she wasn’t even sure how he kept it charged out here. Still, she had to try again, “Think, Zeke. Can you narrow the time down at all? Within a couple of hours?”
“How the hell would I know, JoJo? I was holding my dick, not my phone.”
