Kill Game

by Cordelia Kingsbridge

  “Hey, Dominic.” Martine swiveled around in her chair. “Are you here to see Levi?”

  “What?” he said, thrown off balance not by her words, but by her tone of heavy insinuation. “No, I’m not here to—to see him. I mean, I’m here, and I’ll see him, but that’s not—”

  Her smile was bright and mischievous. She definitely knew about the kiss, and since she wasn’t pulling her gun on him, she must know he’d stopped it before things had gone too far.

  Sighing, he gave up. “I saw the report on the murder last night that could be a Seven of Spades copycat, and I was curious. I could just as easily be coming to see you.”

  “You could,” she said. “But you aren’t.”

  There was no point in denying it. Dominic wasn’t even sure why he’d come when he knew that seeing Levi again would be crazy awkward, but he hadn’t been able to stay away. Maybe he just wanted to check on Levi after what must have been the mother of all hangovers.

  Yeah, that sounded good. He’d stick with that.

  It didn’t matter right now anyway, because Levi’s desk was empty. “So, was it a copycat?” he asked.

  “Oh, absolutely,” Martine said without a trace of doubt. “Any rookie could see it was the victim’s husband. We don’t have enough to arrest him yet, but Levi’s interrogating him now—whoops, guess I spoke too soon.”

  Dominic turned around to see Levi heading toward them. Levi’s eyes widened a bit when he saw him, but other than that, he demonstrated an impressive lack of reaction.

  “Dominic,” he said as he came to stand behind his own desk.

  “Levi.”

  “He was curious about the copycat,” Martine chimed in.

  “I thought you weren’t going to get involved in the case anymore,” Levi said.

  “I’m not. Doesn’t mean I can’t check in, does it?”

  Levi seemed to find this argument acceptable. “Barton didn’t confess, but I’ve got him on edge. With any luck, he’ll do something stupid like going straight to wherever he stashed the murder weapon.”

  “Good,” said Martine. “Another wife-killing creep in prison where he belongs.”

  Dominic’s eyes traveled over Levi’s desk while he listened, taking in every detail, and his attention was snagged by the one thing that was out of place. Levi always had coffee on his desk, but it was usually in either a reusable travel mug or a foam cup from the coffee shop down the street. The cup he had this morning bore the logo of a hotel Downtown, nowhere near where he lived, nor on the way between his home and work.

  “Are you staying in a hotel?” Dominic said, before he thought better of it.

  He had the pleasure of seeing Levi completely shocked for a couple of seconds before he looked down at his desk and understood how Dominic had figured that out.

  “Damn,” Martine said appreciatively. “You’re good.”

  Levi’s cheeks were a little red, and he didn’t quite meet Dominic’s eyes. “I broke up with Stanton.”

  Dominic took a step back. “Why?” he asked, feeling sick. Please, God, let it have nothing to do with him. If Levi had left his boyfriend of three years because of one kiss and some mutual attraction—

  “It had nothing to do with . . .” Levi hesitated, glancing around the busy bullpen. “With anything that’s happened recently. It was a long time coming.”

  They both looked at Martine, who continued typing away at her keyboard. “This is my desk, you know. If you two need to speak in private, there are better places for you to do that.”

  “We don’t need—” Levi said, but was interrupted by the ringing of his desk phone. He picked up the receiver. “Detective Abrams.”

  Moments later, his face went as rigid and lifeless as a mask. He set the receiver down and pressed the speakerphone button on the base.

  “Can you say that again, please?”

  “I didn’t kill Patty Barton,” said a raspy electronic voice.

  The entire bullpen jolted into action like a kicked anthill. Dominic watched in astonishment as several people rushed out of the room, and Martine leapt from her chair to whisper frantic orders to some nearby personnel.

  Levi just stood where he was, vibrating with tension. “Why should I believe you?”

  “I gave you my word. Five days. There’s still one day left.”

  “Holy shit,” Dominic said under his breath. This was the Seven of Spades calling. There was a serial killer on the phone with Levi right now.

  “It’s important to you to be considered a person of your word, isn’t it?” Levi was holding onto the edge of his desk with one hand, his knuckles white.

  “Of course.”

  “Then you must be angry that someone stole your signature for his own crime. Are you planning to kill Drew Barton?”

  There was a weighty pause. “Not if you arrest him first.”

  Levi’s eyes fluttered shut. When he opened them, he looked across the room at Martine. She pointed to a computer and then shook her head, throwing her hands in the air. Dominic didn’t know if that meant that they hadn’t been able to trace the call, or that the trace just hadn’t been helpful.

  “I know you think you’re different,” Levi said, biting out every word. “You tell yourself you’re special—that what you’re doing is honorable. But the truth is that you enjoy killing. You get off on it, so you’ve talked yourself into believing you’re on some kind of noble crusade. At the end of the day, though, you’re just a murderer, and the only difference between you and Drew Barton is that you’re fucking crazy.”

  He banged the phone receiver down on the base, ending the call. Everyone in the room gaped at him.

  “You just taunted a serial killer,” Dominic said, as if Levi was somehow unaware of what he’d done.

  “Ask me if I fucking care,” Levi snapped. “I’m sick to death of these games. If the Seven of Spades wants to come after me, I’d love to watch them try.”

  He grabbed his cell phone and keys from the top drawer of his desk, then slammed it shut so hard the entire desk rattled.

  “I’m going to do whatever’s necessary to nail Barton to the wall,” he said to Martine. “You coming?”

  She grinned and hurried after him, pausing only to retrieve her purse and pat Dominic’s back on the way out.

  Dominic left the building at a slower pace, rattled by what he’d just witnessed. Hearing the Seven of Spades speak, even in that electronically altered voice, had chilled him to his bones, and he worried that Levi had put himself in greater danger by provoking them.

  Lost in his thoughts, Dominic was startled to realize that his wandering feet hadn’t brought him to his parked truck, but rather north along the Strip. He stopped in his tracks and stared at the soaring pyramid of the Luxor.

  It would feel so good to go inside and sit down at a blackjack table or even a slot machine—let the rush of endorphins take over and everything else fade away. It was the only thing that would relieve this stress. He wouldn’t let it get out of control this time. He’d learned his lesson, he could handle it for just a couple of hours . . .

  Dominic clenched his hands into fists, unable to look away.

  It took hours for the rage kindled by the Seven of Spades’s call to burn itself out. Levi didn’t fight it; instead, he let it drive him, powering through the Barton case with a fierce determination that no obstacle could stand against.

  By the end of the day, he had over a dozen statements from friends, relatives, and neighbors confirming that Drew and Patty Barton were well known for their angry, at times violent altercations. Several of Barton’s colleagues had asserted that there had been about an hour in the middle of the previous night’s event when he’d been nowhere to be found. Verizon had come through with a spate of nasty texts exchanged between the couple right around that same time. Reviews of the venue’s security tapes showed that, while Barton had been wearing the same jacket later in the evening, as well as the same color shirt, the shirt’s collar was a different style,
and the trousers were a subtly lighter hue.

  The real clincher had been when the officers combing the Barton’s neighborhood had found a hastily wiped kitchen knife tossed into someone else’s garbage can ten blocks away. The crime lab was processing the knife now, but a warrant had already been issued for Barton’s arrest, and Levi had put out the APB himself before calling it quits. He’d had officers keeping tabs on Barton all day, and one of them would bring the bastard in. Let him cool his heels in a jail cell overnight; then they’d see if he was ready to talk.

  Levi returned to his hotel wrung out but pleased with the day’s work. He could admit that the Seven of Spades case had rocked his confidence in his abilities as a detective, but wrapping up a homicide in less than twenty-four hours had gone a long way toward restoring his self-esteem.

  He stashed his gun in a drawer, stripped down to his underwear, and gathered a pile of fresh clothing. He was just entering the bathroom when his cell phone rang.

  Glancing at the screen, he saw it was only Martine—now that the Barton case was taken care of, she’d want to talk about his phone call with the Seven of Spades. That could wait until after he’d taken a long, hot shower.

  Levi stepped into the bathroom, closed the door, and let the call go to voicemail.

  “Hi, I’m Dominic, and I’m a compulsive gambler.”

  “Hi, Dominic,” said the twenty or so people seated in the ring of folding chairs.

  He remained seated as well; this group had always been informal. “I don’t come here very often.” He flashed a sheepish smile at Gus, the group leader. “But it’s been a stressful week in more than one way. I didn’t mean to, but this morning I spent over an hour walking up and down the Strip, staring at the casinos and fantasizing about going inside.”

  There were nods and murmurs of empathy all around the circle.

  “I’ve always been drawn to gambling—all the way back since middle school. It didn’t get really bad until after I finished high school, though. I was in community college, and I hated it. I was constantly looking for any distraction, any excitement, and gambling played that role for me. I wasn’t legal yet, but when has that stopped anyone?”

  A few people laughed. Dominic chuckled as well.

  “I realized pretty quickly that I couldn’t gamble the way other people did,” he said. “Once I started, I couldn’t stop until someone made me stop, no matter how much money I’d lost. I thought about gambling all day, creating strategies, reliving my wins, imagining how I could have avoided my losses. It took over my life, became the only thing I cared about. I was terrified of what was happening to me, but instead of asking for help, I dropped out of school and enlisted in the Army.”

  His family hadn’t been thrilled by the news, but they hadn’t been shocked, either. Though at that point he’d still been doing a good job of hiding his addiction, they’d known he was unhappy in college and looking for a way out.

  “I thought the Army would save me—and for a long time, it did. Being a soldier taught me discipline and self-control; it gave my life structure, and most importantly, it gave me a purpose greater than myself to focus on. I was able to stay away from gambling for eight years. I thought I was ‘cured.’ So I finished up my second contract and came home when I was discharged.”

  He cleared his throat, rubbing his palms up and down his thighs. No matter how many times he told this story, it never got any easier.

  “The problem was that I’d gotten used to having a mission, and without one, I lost that sense of purpose. I had no job and no goals. I missed the sense of fraternity I’d had with my fellow Rangers. After my years of service, civilian life was like a black-and-white movie. I wasn’t angry or sad, but nothing interested me, excited me, made me happy. Gambling was the only way I could fill that void.”

  He had to stop again. The others in the circle were respectfully quiet; they’d all had different experiences, but there were core truths to a gambling addiction that everyone here could understand.

  “It was so much worse the second time around.” He cringed at the onslaught of memories he usually kept buried deep in the back of his mind. “I was of legal age, living on my own, and I wasn’t accountable to anyone. I’d spend eighteen hours a day in casinos. I blew through all my savings and then got into massive debt. My mother and siblings had to bail me out over and over again. But no matter how bad it got, I literally couldn’t stop. I hated myself so much.”

  As he choked up, a woman he’d known for a couple of years, Anita, took his hand and squeezed it gently before letting it go. She gave him an encouraging smile.

  “My dog saved my life,” he said. “When she was about seven months old, she got pancreatitis. She needed bloodwork, IV fluids, medication—and I couldn’t pay for any of it. There were three dollars in my checking account and all my credit cards were maxed out. I had to call my mother and beg her to cover the bills.” He swallowed hard. “I’ve never been so ashamed before or since. Here was this puppy who loved me and trusted me, and I’d let her down. If my mother hadn’t helped, she could have died, and it would have been my fault.”

  It’d been one of the worst moments of his life, the crushing realization that he was so out of control he couldn’t protect his own dog.

  “Rebel gave me the courage and determination I needed to stop. Until that point, nothing else had been enough. But taking care of her was my job, my new mission. I finally got help, and whenever I feel that compulsion creeping back up, I think about her—about how much she needs me to stay in control. That’s what I thought about earlier today when I was so tempted. And I think it’s important to the recovery process to have something or someone that gives you a reason to stay on track. I didn’t care that much about hurting myself, but I’d never hurt her. She keeps me strong.”

  He sat back in his chair, breathing out with the relief of unburdening himself. “Thank you, Dom,” Gus said as everyone clapped. “Anita, would you like to go next?”

  The remainder of the meeting proceeded as usual, with a few people sharing their stories and everyone commiserating with each other’s struggles. At the end of the hour, they stood and joined hands for the Serenity Prayer to wrap things up. Dominic hung out for a bit afterward, helping to straighten out the rec room and chatting with a few people over coffee and chocolate chip cookies.

  He felt much better when he left the church, calmer and more centered. It was getting late, so he’d have to stop somewhere for dinner on the way home, because his refrigerator was empty. Or maybe he’d see if Carlos and Jasmine wanted to go out somewhere.

  Debating his options, he backed out of his parking space. As he was waiting to turn out of the lot, his phone chimed with an incoming text from an unfamiliar number.

  Detective Abrams is in danger. He needs your help.

  Before Dominic could process the bizarre message, it was followed by a second text containing a street address he didn’t recognize and a room number.

  He turned on voice-to-text and joined the stream of traffic. “Who is this?”

  His answer came in the form of a photograph—a seven of spades playing card.

  A chill ran down his spine, but he kept his hands on the wheel and his focus on the road. “Nice try.”

  Please. It’s my fault he’s in danger, and there’s only so much I can do to help him.

  Dominic drove another block, chewing on his lower lip, then cursed and pulled over to the side of the road. If there was a chance Levi’s life was at risk, even a small one, he couldn’t ignore it.

  “Why don’t you call the police?” he asked as he programmed the address into his GPS.

  I reported a disturbance at Detective Abrams’s hotel, but I couldn’t be more specific or they would know it was me. They’d suspect a trap, and the delay could cost him his life.

  Dominic waited for a break in traffic, got back on the road, and followed the highlighted route. He was surprised to see he wasn’t far away; with luck on his side, he could reach th
e hotel within a few minutes.

  “How do you know I won’t do the same?”

  Because you’re already on your way.

  There were few things Levi enjoyed more than a long, self-indulgent shower, especially after a stressful day. He pushed aside all thoughts of murder, Stanton, and the difficult call he’d have to make to his parents, and concentrated only on the hot water pounding the tense muscles of his shoulders and back.

  When he finally got out, he dressed in the T-shirt and sweatpants he’d left folded beside the sink and took his towel with him, scrubbing his hair as he opened the bathroom door.

  He paused on the threshold, an internal sense of not right freezing him in place.

  The room was lit by the overhead lights he’d turned on earlier. The door was locked, the security chain thrown. Everything was in its place, exactly how he’d left it.

  But there was a breeze—not the icy gust of air conditioning, but a genuine, fresh-air breeze.

  His eyes slid sideways. The curtain over the balcony door fluttered just a bit. He hadn’t opened that door once since he’d stayed in this room.

  Dropping his towel on the floor, he eyed the dresser on the other side of the room that held his gun. He might be able to make it—

  The closet near the door burst open and Drew Barton strode out, training a gun on Levi in a two-handed grip. “Don’t move,” he ordered.

  Levi lifted his hands into a semi-passive stance and then went still. “How did you get in here through the balcony? We’re on the fifth floor.”

  “I got onto your balcony from the room next to yours and forced the sliding glass door.” Barton was sweating profusely, his face shiny and his hair matted to his forehead. His hands trembled around the grip of his gun, but his eyes were bright with resolve. “You’d be surprised what people are capable of when they have nothing to lose.”

  “Not really,” said Levi.

  That’s it, come closer, he thought as Barton walked toward him, circling around the bed so there was nothing between them. Keep going, come on, come on—