Burn Out by Marcia Muller

Author:Marcia Muller
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: FIC022000
ISBN: 9780446543019
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 2008-10-26T16:00:00+00:00

Thursday

NOVEMBER 8

I woke in the morning to my cellular’s ring and, as I reached for it, was shocked to see that it was after ten.

Hy. “Sorry I haven’t called, McCone. I’m in Tokyo.”

“A crisis?”

“No, major new client who wanted to meet in person. I tried to leave a message on the ranch machine before I went, but I think it malfunctioned. Squawking noises, like an enraged chicken.”

“Damn machines. I swear they make them with a chip that tells them to die the day after the warranty expires. I’ll pick up another.”

“Good. I had to rush to catch my flight and I’ve been jammed up ever since, so I haven’t had time till now to call your cell. What’s doing?”

I explained what had happened since we last talked. “I may have to go to Sacramento. Where’s the best place around here to rent a plane?”

“El Aero at Carson City Airport. Ask for my buddy Pete. He’ll give you a discounted rate.”

Hy had “buddies” in airports throughout the country—sometimes I thought throughout the world. “Will do. When will you be back stateside?”

“I don’t know how long I’ll be here, and when I get back home I’ll have to play catch-up. Any idea when you’ll be coming to the city?”

“I’m not sure. This case—”

“Uh-huh. Now it’s a case. Welcome back to the land of the living.”

Hy was right, I thought as I stepped into the shower. Since last winter, I hadn’t been living—at least not in the sense that I usually did. Although I wasn’t yet sure that I wanted to make the reentry, I turned up the water’s heat, washed vigorously, and emerged into a new and better day.

There had been a call on my cell while I was in the shower. Ted, with his daily report. I dealt with him, spoke briefly with Patrick, and got off the phone.

Freedom from the tyranny of the agency.

While I was eating breakfast in the motel’s coffee shop, the phone rang again. The number on the screen was Jane Ironwood’s. While I don’t usually talk on the cell in a public place, there were few other patrons and none seated near me, so I picked up.

The voice that spoke was throaty—what in old movies they called a whiskey voice. “Of course I remember Miri,” she said after I explained why I’d called. “She was a pleasure to have in our household, more like family than the other children in trouble we usually took in. And we loved Hayley as if she were our own granddaughter. But eventually Miri married Jimmy Perez and they moved to Mono County.”

“You sound as if you didn’t approve of the marriage.”

“When Miri met Jimmy, he’d been around our neighborhood for a little more than a year, doing gardening and handyman work. We never used him because I’d heard that he was unreliable. My husband and I questioned whether he’d be able to give Miri, Hayley, and any future children they might have a good life, but he said he had a brother who owned a ranch outside of Vernon and would give him a good job.

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