Read Online Hounded by David Rosenfelt - Free Book Online Page A

looks groggy, and when Laurie says, “Sit down,” he sees the gun and eagerly heads to the nearest chair.
    “You just made a big mistake,” Haller says to Laurie. The net effect of that statement is that Marcus seems to edge slightly toward Haller, the first movement of any kind since we settled in. He isn’t crazy about anyone threatening Laurie, and Haller is smart enough to pick up on it.
    “Okay,” Haller says, raising his palms in a gesture of surrender. “What do you want?”
    I jump in again. “As I mentioned, we want to talk about Pete Stanton.”
    “That piece of shit ain’t getting out of jail alive. I got people in there.”
    “Is that why you set him up for the Diaz hit?” I use words like “hit” to demonstrate my street cred; I am as cool as they come.
    “What the hell you talking about?”
    “Why did you hit Diaz?”
    “Who is … is that the guy Stanton iced?”
    I didn’t come here for a confession, or for Haller to unburden his soul to us. I am here looking for a reaction, so that I can judge whether it is real or not.
    This is real.
    It’s clear that Tommy Haller had nothing whatsoever to do with killing Danny Diaz, or setting Pete up to take the fall for it.
    But at least we had a fun morning.

 
     
    Edna is helping Ricky with his homework when we get home.
    That is unusual in itself, since it’s almost July, and school doesn’t start until September.
    The mystery is cleared up when Edna speaks. “What’s a four-letter word for ‘king of the jungle’?”
    “What are the letters?” Ricky asks.
    She points. “See this? The first letter is an ‘l.’”
    Ricky thinks for a moment, then brightens. “Lion!”
    Edna looks up at us and says, “The kid is good.” Tara and Sebastian, who are lying on a blanket together munching on chewies, don’t seem terribly impressed.
    Edna turns back to Ricky and says, “Now we need a three-letter word for insect, starting with a ‘b.’” Before he can answer, she looks up at me and says, “Oh, Richard Wallace called; he said it’s important.”
    Laurie starts to praise Ricky for his crossword puzzling prowess, while I head to the phone to call Wallace. I usually have instincts regarding when I’m about to hear good or bad news. Unfortunately, those instincts are only correct on the bad side; good news never seems to arrive when anticipated.
    This time alarm bells are going off in my head; prosecutors don’t call during the pretrial phase to share happy defense news. The only question, as I dial the phone, is how bad this is going to be.
    Wallace gets on the phone immediately and gets right down to business, another bad sign. Within moments, the signs are no longer important; the ominous words take over.
    “There is a new development, Andy. I wanted to tell you myself before it hits the media.”
    “What is it?”
    “We executed the search warrant on Pete’s house. The officers found heroin—street value over a hundred grand.”
    I don’t know what I expected, but it wasn’t this. “That’s insane, Richard.”
    He doesn’t seem inclined to take my word for it. “It’s real, Andy.”
    “I would be involved with drugs before Pete would,” I say, and I mean it. Pete is about the most antidrug person I know. In fact, I once did him a favor and defended his brother on a drug charge. I got him off on a technicality, but the scare got him to turn his life around. I saw firsthand Pete’s attitude about the subject; his using or dealing heroin is not within the realm of possible reality.
    “I’m sorry, Andy, but it gets worse. Diaz had informed on Pete that he was dealing. So it goes directly to motive. It’s all in the discovery.”
    “I haven’t seen that yet.”
    “I know,” he says. “It’s on the way to you. Because it involved an informant, I had to navigate some police politics before I could share it. But it’s there.”
    “It’s bullshit, Richard. This whole thing is bullshit. I don’t know how the drugs