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She looked different; yet even in her bulky bulletproof vest and Sam
Browne belt, fully loaded with 9 millimeter Glock, nightstick, flashlight,
handcuffs, and Mace, she was as thin and reedy as ever. Drawing close,
Sonja spoke in a low voice. You seem to have gotten yourself in a jam.
They re not going to arrest me.
People who act like you shouldn t get cocky.
I inhaled slowly. Except for those hours skating last night, it might
have been the first full breath I d taken all week. Despite the fact that I d
seen her three times previously, and she d beaten me up two of those
times, she had a calming influence on me.
Standing close, she said, You re right. He s not going to press charges.
Why did you do it?
Long story.
What s going on, Gum? You want to talk?
Oh, how I wanted to talk. I was bursting with secrets. I wanted to tell
her about the bonds and my complicity, and I wanted to tell her about
Chief Abbott and the smoke room, and how he d tried to torture infor-
mation out of us. I wanted to explain how I hadn t had anything to do
with Sears s death even though, if things went south, I might get con-
victed of it. Trouble was, if I told her any of these things it would be the
last time I d see her. Or daylight.
When a minute passed and I still hadn t replied, she said, I guess
the firefighter you hurt wrote a letter to the chief of the department
about you.
Complaining? Already?
No, before. He wants you to get an award for trying to save your
lieutenant.
I didn t save him.
For trying. She looked me over. I knew that just as she looked dif-
ferent in her uniform, I looked different with my helmet and my collar
turned up, sweating from the body heat my turnout gear captured.
You re a surprise a minute, Gum.
So are you, Pederson. For a fraction of a second, I thought I saw her
208 E A R L E ME R S ON
blush. Maybe it was the touch of vulnerability that made me blurt it out.
Maybe I was coming to the end of my rope. I think Tronstad set fire to
that car.
The guy you just knocked down? Wasn t he at the station with you
when it started?
These people were visiting our station. They left, and then this hap-
pened.
Are you all right, Gum?
I m serious.
I know you are. Do you realize you just accused a fireman you work
with of a double homicide? Did he know those people? Did he have
something against them?
He met them once before.
Why would he want to kill two people he met only twice? She d
been giving me the look she would have given a favorite crazy brother
right before she was forced to commit him to the loony bin. It doesn t
make sense.
Maybe you can go over and put the bug in the detective s ear? Maybe
if they put some pressure on him, he ll say something incriminating.
Could you do that without telling the detectives it was me who put you
on to it?
They re going to want to talk to you.
I can t.
Why not?
Maybe a police dog could sniff out explosives in his locker . . . This
sounds crazy, doesn t it?
Just a little.
The driver roughed him up.
They re saying he was sixty-eight. How could he rough up any-
body?
I was trying to think of a way to explain without getting dragged into
it, but of course, that was impossible. Okay. Off the record. Can you talk
to me off the record?
No. I don t know what you re going to say.
Okay. Forget I said any of this.
T HE S MOK E R O OM 209
Now you re telling me your friend didn t set that fire?
I m saying I must have been delusional. Duress. Can you accept
that?
I suppose.
I turned to walk away. One last thing?
What is it?
I hate to bring this up again, but I left something at your step-
mother s
Anything between you and her stays between you and her. Leave me
out of it.
In addition to the rest of it, there could be little doubt in her mind
now that I was obsessed with Iola.
32. FINDING JESUS AND KILLING YOUR FRIENDS
ODDLY ENOUGH, WE got another car fire at a little after five in the
W
morning, another plume of royal black smoke arching into the sky in bil-
lowing coils. This one was in an area of apartment houses near the Alki
Point Lighthouse. In my mind I could still feel the stiff and crinkly
charred pelts of the two dead bodies earlier.
Four of us responded to the second car fire: me, Johnson, Lieutenant
Covington, and a firefighter called in on overtime, whose name I forgot as
soon as she told me. Tronstad had been sent home on disability, his eye
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