“Dandy,” said the captain, leaving them and joining his crew in front of the house.

The two agents stood off to the side. More onlookers lined up along the sidewalk across the street. Two more police squads and another fire truck were pulling up. A television crew was setting up a shot from a neighbor’s front yard across the street.

With the back of her hand, she wiped the perspiration off her forehead. “Why did he do this?”

“The fact that they were jailed made it into the late edition of the news,” Garcia said as he stared up at the engulfed house. “Front page. Shrink and his brother questioned in the death of disabled father. Not a long piece. Just enough.”

“How’d the paper get the story so quick? Who dropped the dime to the reporters?”

Garcia answered both questions with a single shrug.

“Did it include the sick family background?” she asked.

“No, but he saw it coming. The water torture. Abusive parents. All of it would have been laid out. Intimate, embarrassing, private stuff.” He paused. “At the same time, I’ll bet money that the media misses the public circus at the tower.”

“What makes a good news story?”

“This does.”

“Why is that?”

“Neat pictures,” he said as flames shot through the roof.

For twenty minutes, they stood and watched wordlessly while firefighters ran back and forth with their hoses and axes. The sun hadn’t yet come up, but the entire block was bathed in light, an unearthly red glow cast by the blaze and the emergency vehicles.

“Do you believe in hell?” she asked, her eyes glued to the frantic ballet.

“Yeah, I do,” he said.

“So do I,” she said.

Chapter 43

TWO BODIES WERE carried out of the smoking shell. The agents intercepted the twin gurneys as they were being wheeled to the Ramsey County medical examiner’s hearse parked on the street. Garcia whipped out his badge and showed it to the ME investigator. “Can we have a last look-see?”

“Sure thing.” The investigator nodded to the men at the head of the gurneys. They positioned themselves at the top of the carts, their backs blocking the view of the photographers and nosy neighbors. Each man reached down and slowly unzipped his bag partway.

Bernadette and Garcia looked from one sooty corpse to the other. Luke had put a bullet through his own temple, but not before nailing Matthew in the chest. The elder brother had looked after his younger sibling to the end.

“We’re good,” Garcia told the gurney crew. “One of our people will meet you over at the lab for the autopsy.”

“You know about the letter?” asked the ME investigator.

“CSI showed us,” said Bernadette.

While his men zipped the bags up over the bodies, the ME investigator took out his notebook and clicked his pen. “Can you help us out on locating next of kin?”

“My agent tells me the doctor’s spouse and children are at their Scottsdale place,” said Garcia. “Elizabeth is the wife’s name.”

“Lucky for them they weren’t home,” said the investigator, scribbling. He shoved the pad and pen back into his jacket. “Wasn’t the bureau involved in a bad deal last night, too? Some weird-ass business with a fella getting shot and then going off that tower on the West Side? I didn’t get the call, but I heard one of your agents …” His voice trailed off as he got a good look at Bernadette’s eyes.

Garcia and Bernadette stared at him, and he clamped his mouth closed. Without another word, he and the gurney crew turned around and finished their trek to the hearse.

“I wonder what he heard about ‘one of your agents,’” Bernadette said out of the side of her mouth.

“Who gives a shit?” snapped Garcia.

“Right,” said Bernadette, watching as Luke and Matthew were loaded into the hearse. They’d be sharing the morgue with Charles Araignee.

“NOW WHAT?” asked Bernadette as she and Garcia walked toward their cars.

He nodded to an empty bus stop. “Let’s sit down for a minute.”

They went over to the bench and dropped onto the wooden seat. “I’m beat,” she said.

He stretched his legs out in front of him. “Me, too.”

In a front yard across the road, a woman raked leaves into an orange garbage bag while a little boy in a cape ran circles around her. “When’s Halloween?” Bernadette asked.

“Why do you keep asking that?” Garcia asked with irritation. “It’s soon. A week or so.”

“I guess I’d better get some candy.”

“Don’t bother,” he said. “As far as I know, kids don’t trick-or-treat downtown.”

“That’s too bad. I like Halloween. We used to go to a barn dance when we were kids, with costumes and everything.”

“I don’t have any hay on hand, but you can come over to my place and pass out treats if you want. Tip back a few beers and grill some brats while we’re at it. Make a night of it.”

“I’d like that,” she said.

“Great.”

“Do I have to wear a costume?”

“Not unless you really want to,” he said.

She stretched out her own legs and smiled, resisting the urge to make a crack about coming as a French maid. She cleared her throat. “Uh, I hate to ask …”

“Go ahead.”

“That thing at the tower. How much trouble am I in?”

“I’m gonna try like hell to keep this away from the OPR,” he said, referring to the Office of Professional Responsibility. “The OPR gets its mitts on it, you could be talking some serious beach time.”

“A suspension?”

“Do you want me to lie to you?”

“Yes, please,” she said meekly.

“Let’s talk about this later,” he said.

She liked that strategy. Bolting up, she announced, “I’m starving. Let’s go get something to eat.”

He got up off the seat. “How about a joint on Grand Avenue?”

A gust of wind slammed her, and she hunched her shoulders against it. “I don’t care where we go as long as it’s heated.”

“The one with the walleye basket on the menu. I can’t remember the name of the place, but there’s a neon fish in the front window.”

“Tavern on Grand. It’s between Dale and St. Albans, right?”

“Right.”

“Meet you there,” she said.

“My treat,” he said, and dashed across the street to his car.

WITH ITS log cabin decor—made complete by a chandelier constructed of antlers—Tavern on Grand was the quintessential Minnesota restaurant. They were well ahead of the lunch rush, so she and Garcia had their pick of tables. They took a booth in a dark corner, with Bernadette’s seat facing the wall. She practically ripped the menu out of the server’s hands.

“I’ll give you a minute,” said the waitress, a pretty twenty-something with long black hair and wearing a short black skirt. She moved on to another table.

“What are you getting?” Bernadette asked Garcia.

“The walleye,” he said, unbuttoning his coat. “It’s the house specialty. Comes with the works: potato, coleslaw, roll. They have this jalapeño tartar sauce that is out of this world.”

“I’ll get the same,” she said, setting down the menu.

He slid out of the booth, took off his trench, and dropped it onto the bench. “I’ve gotta use the head. Order for me if she comes back.”

She unzipped her leather bomber jacket and pulled off her gloves. “What do you want to drink?”

“Pop. Any kind, as long as it’s not diet.”

After he left, she continued perusing the menu. She might want an appetizer. The crab artichoke dip sounded great, and so did the stuffed mushrooms and the potato skins. She turned in her seat and searched for the server. She was on the other side of the room taking orders from a table filled with flirty young men. Bernadette returned her attention to the menu. Maybe instead of the walleye, she’d get the ribs.