Page 43 of Two Kinds of Stranger

But, having closed the folder on Cross, his right leg stopped hammering his heel into the footwell. His hands rested lightly on top of the file, his head still and his gaze fixed on the road ahead.

‘What’s wrong?’ asked Bloch.

‘Huh? Nothing, I’m fine. . .I. . .I’m fine,’ he said.

Bloch said nothing.

They drove for another half a mile.

‘What’s wrong?’ asked Bloch again, uncomfortable now with Lake’s calm demeanor. She had never seen him like this. It was almost like he’d been unplugged.

‘Nothing.’

‘What did you see in that file?’ she asked.

‘Same as you.’

‘Come on, what’s on your mind?’

‘This isn’t going to work,’ said Lake. ‘If this guy Cross has a problem with somebody, there’s no way we’re going to persuade him to let it go. There are a lot of red flags in this file, particularly in his juve history. The illegal images of children on his laptop, the animal cruelty. . .’

The steering wheel squeaked as Bloch strangled the leather at the memory of reading that in the file herself. She couldn’t abide any kind of mistreatment of children or animals. Cross had three juve convictions for torturing neighborhood pets. There was a detailed history of what had happened in each case, but Blochcouldn’t bring herself to read any of it. When he was arrested, they checked his computer and found something worse than animal cruelty.

Lake continued, ‘He was bad before he did his first year in an adult prison. Seems like he learned a lot from his time inside, mainly how to play the system. He has a long list of known accomplices, but most of them are dead or back in prison. Apart from one–Bruno Mont. I saw his rap sheet. He met Cross in juve?’

‘Timeline fits. And I made some calls. Mont was fifteen years old, locked up for assault. He’d knocked out four of his mother’s teeth. After that he graduated to armed robbery and spent another eight years inside. It’s not in the file, but he killed a man during that stretch,’ said Bloch.

‘How come it’s not in here?’

‘He was initially charged, but the DA bought a self-defense argument. Mont refused to join a neo-Nazi gang; one of their crew tried to take him out. A CO caught a shiv in the leg during the attack. Mont was stabbed eight times, but still managed to kill his attacker. He’s a steroid junkie and the rage took over. The attacker bled out after Mont tore his jaw off of his face.’

‘Holy shit, how big is this guy?’

‘Six-five, three hundred pounds and change. Cross is cruel and dangerous, but he’s smart. I think he likes to get Mont to do his wet work. Like killing his elderly wife.’

‘Any sign of Mont being involved in the beef with Kevin?’ asked Lake.

‘None so far, but we need to be careful when we pull up at Cross’s place. Make sure he doesn’t have any visitors before we knock on his door.’

Lake opened his mouth to speak, hesitated, then decided to spit out.

‘Cross is a sociopath and an obsessive compulsive. I don’t think he’s gonna back off no matter what we do here.’

‘We know he’s smart,’ said Bloch. ‘The smart play is to drop this and move on.’

Lake nodded, said, ‘I don’t think it’s a question of intelligence. There’s a narcissistic element to his personality. In his eyes, Kevin robbed him of a lot of money and he wants payback. He won’t stop.’

‘Let’s see how it goes. Be positive,’ said Bloch.

‘You’ve been reading those self-help books again.’

‘Being positive doesn’t hurt.’

‘Okay, then, I’mpositivewe’re not going to achieve anything tonight.’

Bloch drove the rest of the way in silence, unnerved by Lake’s stillness.

She pulled up outside a one-story stucco house in a neighborhood that had once been perfectly pleasant, but which time and weather and neglect had rendered poor. Garbage littered every sidewalk. None of the neighbors cut their lawns, and the white picket fencing that surrounded them had fallen down or rotted away, or been replaced altogether by aluminum poles and chicken wire.