Free Whisper Death by John Lawrence Reynolds

and you’ll see your motel straight ahead of you. I’ll have your man ready in an hour. That should give you time to check in, get settled and decide whether you still want him or not. How long will you need him?”
    Bonnar stepped aside to permit the well-dressed young man who had been standing at the counter to leave the police station.
    McGuire said an hour at the most.
    Bonnar pointed his finger at McGuire, jabbing the air as he spoke. “Okay, McGuire,” he warned in a tone that bordered on a threat. “You sign him out and take total responsibility for his well-being. You bring him back here for the night. Then you pick him up again in the morning and you’re out of my hair. Ain’t nobody can say I was sorry to see the backs of you.”
    He leaned against the door frame and watched as McGuire and Innes walked down the palm-lined path to their rented car.
    They drove several blocks into the afternoon sun before Innes spoke. “This is crap,” he said from the passenger seat, staring out the window at the passing landscape.
    â€œWhat is?” McGuire pulled the car into the centre lane, ready to turn left onto Palm Canyon Drive, the main business thoroughfare.
    â€œTaking Crawford out of there. What the hell we need that responsibility for?”
    â€œSomething is scaring the hell out of him,” McGuire answered, his voice tight. “Whatever it is, we won’t get it with Bonnar around. We’ll take him to the motel, maybe give him a beer and see if he loosens up. Then back in the cell overnight and on the plane in the morning. I’ll stay cuffed to him all the time. What’s the worry?”
    â€œWhy not just interrogate him back in Boston?”
    â€œBecause something happened here.” McGuire told Innes about the visit from the two Secret Service men. “If they’re hiding anything from us, I want to deal with it here. Not long distance. And not with Bonnar stonewalling us. Let’s get it settled now.”
    â€œCrap,” Innes muttered.
    â€œI don’t like being screwed around with,” McGuire replied. “Never have.”
    Innes turned to him, unimpressed. “Not your case, Joe.”
    â€œWanna bet?”
    The motel hadn’t deserved Bonnar’s sneering comment. It was clean and modern, the dark two-storey building, an entire block in length, set well back from the road among thick shrubbery and palm trees. As McGuire wheeled the car into the parking lot, two young children in bathing suits dashed along a pathway clutching towels and plastic toys. Diners were seated at tables near the motel’s restaurant windows overlooking the landscaped grounds leading to Palm Canyon Drive. Birds chattered among flowering bushes flanking the building. Part of a large national chain, the motel boasted all the amenities for vacationing families, including a large swimming pool, sauna, exercise room and playground.
    A strange place to bring a murderer, McGuire mused. But then, so is any place. He left Innes to register them at the motel office, and walked quickly around the grounds; his eyes alert for danger signals, ambush points, escape routes, anything that represented risk. Everything seemed normal. The walkways were busy and well lit. There was too much shrubbery and it was too thick, but no location was perfectly safe, perfectly secure. He timed the walk from the car to the building. Fifteen seconds, twenty at the most. On an open pathway in full view of the restaurant.
    It would do.
    McGuire and Innes were directed to a large and airy room on the second level with two double beds and a sitting area overlooking the pool. Innes stood at the window gazing down at children and their parents splashing in the water or offering their near-naked bodies to the late afternoon sun, while McGuire inspected the bathroom and splashed cold water on his face.
    â€œYou want to eat first, or pick him up right away?” McGuire asked