Deception by Randy Alcorn Page A

deception is fatal.”
    “Jesus said the truth sets us free,” Jake said. “In an investigation, once you see through the lies, when you discover the truth, don’t you feel free?”
    “It’s an adrenaline rush. Nothing like it.”
    “Well, then, we’ll pray that God will help you see the truth. To see through the lies.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “In your investigation. The Palatine case.”
    “Okay. I guess your prayers can’t hurt.”
    “Who knows?” Jake said with a cocky smile. “Since it’s the God of all truth and the Enemy of all deception that we’re praying to, our prayers may even help.”
    “Fine,” I said. “Fine” is what Jack Bauer and Chloe say whenever they don’t like a situation, such as having to cooperate with terrorists.
    I escaped by going over to the jukebox, a vintage Rock-Ola straight from the sixties boasting “Stereo” in ostentatious letters, like they’d split the atom. Three songs for a quarter, just like the old days. Rory told me he’d added new selections. I spotted one and selected C3: “Bridge over Troubled Water.”
    “Wow,” Jake said. “Takes me back to Nam.”
    I nodded. As we listened, Jake and I relived memories half a world away and almost a lifetime ago. Clarence was probably thinking of his brother who died in Nam. I found myself sitting in the Mekong Delta with Neal Crane, a Mississippi farm boy, and listening to Simon and Garfunkel in the evening, when it cooled down to the midnineties.
    I heard Neal’s twang as he said, “What’s up, bro?” and backslapped me with his big right arm. Neal and I would talk about friendlies and hostiles, about Old Miss football, about our dreams after the war, maybe living near each other and raising our families. Two months later Neal stepped on a land mine. He was gone.
    Rory waded into our sea of Garfunkel-induced melancholy to bring us burgers and onion rings. That quickly we were back at Lou’s, jibing and laughing again.
    Jake and Clarence turned down dessert, but it didn’t keep them from hefty bites of my huckleberry pie with French vanilla ice cream. Clarence took some extra insulin. I sipped my coffee. The pot Rory brewed for me was nice and dark, which is why I always go over the top and give him a 10 percent tip.
    “Okay if I talk about the investigation?” I asked, noting the closest people were sitting three booths away. “Off the record?”
    They nodded. I got up and put quarters in the jukebox to get cover from the Four Seasons, Turtles, and Monkees. There’s a speaker over our booth that projects into the room but allows us to hear each other.
    I told Jake about the solitaire game and the ace of spades.
    “At first I thought it proved he was interrupted. He was about to play the ace, but something happened—phone rang, somebody came to the door, he heard a noise outside, whatever. But now I don’t buy it. Interrupted before you turn it over? Sure. But after you see the ace? Nah. Phone rings, teakettle whistles, someone comes to the door, maybe you stop turning cards. But once you turn up an ace, you play it instantly, before anything else.”
    “You make it sound like a science,” Clarence said.
    “I was testing it last night. You see an ace, you play it, in a heartbeat.”
    “Yet there it sat,” Clarence said. “So what’s your point?”
    “Somebody else placed it, not Palatine. Probably the murderer. Pulled it out of the deck after he killed the professor.”
    “You’re sure?”
    “Somebody sat down in front of the cards and messed with them … and maybe turned to type that stuff on the computer too. And why the ace of spades? Random? I don’t think so.”
    “Isn’t it the death card?” Jake asked.
    “Exactly. Symbolism.”
    “But who kills someone, then sits around fiddling with cards?” Jake said. “Why risk being caught?”
    “Maybe he was relishing what he’d done,” I said. “But he was unusually comfortable at a murder scene. Why wasn’t he more afraid of