“Benton’s got a gun, maybe a knife to his throat. They cuff him, double-locking with the key. And why do that? Because he’s law enforcement and knows what your average Joe don’t know about double-locking. Usually, all cops do is click shut the jaws of the cuff when they’re hauling somebody in. The prisoner squirms, the cuffs tighten. And if he manages to get a hairpin or something similar up there to override the ratchets, then he might even spring himself free. But with double locking, no way. Can’t get out without a key or something exactly like a key. It’s something Benton would’ve known about when it was happening to him. A big bad signal that he was dealing with someone who knew what the shit he was doing.”
“I’ve heard enough,” I said to Marino. “Go home. Please.”
I had the beginning of a migraine. I could always tell when my entire neck and head began to hurt and my stomach felt queasy. I walked Marino to the door. I knew I had wounded him. He was loaded with pain and had no place to shoot, because he did not know how to show what he felt. I wasn’t even sure he knew what he felt.
“He ain’t gone, you know,” he said as I opened the door. “I don’t believe it. I didn’t see it, and I don’t believe it.”
“They will be sending him home soon,” I said as cicadas sawed in the dark, and moths swarmed in the glow of the lamp over my porch. “Benton is dead,” I said with surprising strength. “Don’t take away from him by not accepting his death.”
“He’s gonna show up one of these days.” Marino’s voice was at a higher pitch. “You wait. I know that son of a bitch. He don’t go down this easy.”
But Benton had gone down this easy. It was so often like that, Versace walking home from buying coffee and magazines or Lady Diana not wearing her seat belt. I shut the door after Marino drove away. I set the alarm, which by now was a reflex that sometimes got me into trouble when I forgot I had armed my house and opened a slider. Lucy was stretched out on the couch, watching the Arts and Entertainment network in the great room, the lights out. I sat next to her and put my hand on her shoulder.