The Killing Moon: A Novel

CULLEN STOOD A COUPLE of careful feet away from his backyard swimming pool, still wearing his dress shirt and pants from the office. He maintained the pool from the beginning of June through the end of August, keeping it skimmed, pH-balanced, and algae-free for his wife and two sons and their daily summer guests, even though Cullen himself did not know how to swim. Witnessing the childhood drowning death of his older sister had left him with a pathological fear of immersion. Once every year or two, on a warm night and with his wife close at his side, he would sit at the edge of the shallow end for a few minutes and dip in his bare legs up to his shins, stirring the water he cleaned so diligently all season. His wife had grown up with a pool and thought it important that the boys not suffer for their father's phobia. So he had taken upon himself its care and feeding as a way of managing his fear, of localizing the source of his dread, trapping it here in his backyard, as one might take on the care and feeding of a chained dragon.

Why he had so much respect for Maddox, he supposed. Someone who could wade in over his head, swim around, touch bottom and resurface time and time again. Someone who could go under and hold his breath there for so long.

The crescent moon, silver as a scythe, grinned at him from the surface of the still and silent water. Cullen's sister's name had been Emily, and when she ran her hair had flown off her shoulders like golden wings. He had adored her.

A light came on in the second floor of the house. The shadow of his wife, whose name also happened to be Emily, passed the window of the upstairs bathroom. Rubbing in hand cream, getting ready for bed, her nightly routine.

Cullen stepped farther back from the edge, returning his attention to Maddox on the cordless. "You heard about the cadet class?"

Maddox said, "What?"

"A trainee class from New Braintree is being bused your way first thing in the morning. One hundred and something recruits for a field search of the state forest."

"The Borderlands?"

"I guess they had some K-9s indicate."

They were disconnected briefly, and a recording asked Maddox to please deposit seventy-five more cents.

Cullen said, "Where are you calling from?"

"A pay phone outside the gas station here." Tones sounded as Maddox's coins fell. "My point is, the guy's hitting on this cult stuff, which is bullshit. He's floundering. Desperate."

"See, Hess bet the house on the ditchdigger and his blood DNA, and lost. He thought he had a quick arrest to pad his clearance stats, told his sergeant it was a done deal, and now here he is, still working the same folder. Burning up manpower and money. Frankly, he got lucky with the sex offender angle, buying him a few more days. Because the DA won't be seen as soft on pedophiles. But he's got a very small window of time left to find Sinclair, and the sill's slamming down hard on his fingers."

"I think he's in deeper shit than he knows."

"You don't see Sinclair for this, but you're the only one. Hess is on the right track here. He's got blood, he's got hair—even if it is wig hair—he's got treads from the brand of sneaker the suspect was known to wear. He's got fibers from the offender's apartment—"

"He's got what?"

"Fibers matching a living room rug. As well as a few skin cells he likes for Sinclair, that he's still waiting on tests for. See? All your dancing around him is bullshit and counterproductive. Just come out to him. Our thing is dead and all but buried."

"No way. Not yet."

"If it's Sinclair—and, plainly, it is—then we've already lost. The case is nothing. It was thin to begin with, relying on the word of a convicted sex offender. But a convicted sex offender who's also a killer? Find a DA in this country, in this world, who would bring that case."

"It's not over, Cullen."

"You don't want it to be over, and neither do I. And stubbornness is a good trait, and as a lawyer I respect it. But I like common sense too. I know you're tight with Chief Pinto-I-can-never-pronounce-the-name. You two obviously go way back."

"Pinty."

"He's a good man."

"Cullen. It's more than that."

"Nobody likes to lose. Everybody wants to be the hero. But when you're down five runs in the ninth, one swing of the bat won't win it for you. You play small ball, keep the inning alive."

A pause. "Okay."

Cullen frowned at the moon smiling at him from the water. "But you're still gonna get up there and take your swing."

"I'm finishing this job."

"We're in the shit enough as it is. If Sinclair is found to have benefited from a deal with the DA's office before committing a capital crime—"

"Benefited how? The assault charges against Bucky Pail were a get-out-of-jail against his DUI."