by Sandra Brown
"Of course."
He reached for her hand and guided it to his lap."Show me." Later, just
as he was drifting off to sleep, she said, "A visit to Flarra will cheer
me up. I'll go see her tomorrow."
"Good idea. I'll send Errol to drive you."
"Don't bother. I can drive myself."
Pinkie thought about it a moment. His uneasiness hadn't been entirely
allayed either by their conversation or their lovemaking. She'd given
him a plausible explanation for her recent melancholia, but he suspected
there was more to it than her dislike for Bardo.
Doubts could cripple the thinking of a reasonable man. Mistrust and
jealousy were weakening and destructive. On the other hand, Pinkie
preferred erring on the side of caution to being a fool. Especially when
dealing with a woman.
"Errol will drive you."
"Say, you're sure you're okay with this?"
The woman formed a pouty frown and toyed with the buttons of his shirt.
"Of course I'm okay with it. Would I have invited you to my place if I
weren't?"
"But we only met an hour ago."
"Doesn't matter. It didn't take me even that long to know I wanted you
tonight."
He grinned."Then what are we waiting for?"
Groping each other along the way, they stumbled up two flights of
stairs. The old house had been converted into six apartments, two on
each of the three floors. Her unit was small, but nice. The windows in
the bedroom overlooked the private courtyard in the rear.
It was in front of these windows that she did a clumsy striptease for
him."See anything you like?"
"Nice," he murmured, reaching for her."Very nice."
She had absolutely no sexual inhibitions. Either that, or she was too
high to care what he did to her. But after a while her appetite was
satisfied, and she became tired and cantankerous.
"I'm sleepy now." "So go to sleep," he said."It won't bother me."
"I can't sleep with you doing that."
"Sure you can."
That earned a giggle from her."You're sick, you know that?" "So it's
been said."
"You sure you wore a rubber?" "I said I did, didn't I?"
"Yeah, but I couldn't see. Come on now, really, stop. I'm tired.
We'll save it for another time, okay?"
"The night is young, sweetheart."
"Young, hell," she groaned."It'll soon be time to get up."
"You're just coming down off your high. What you need is a little
pick-me-up."
"I can't do any more drugs tonight. I've got to be at work in a few
hours. Let's give it a rest for tonight and hey! That hurt."
"It did?"
"Yes. Now cut it out. I'm not into that shit. Ow! I mean it, goddamn it!
Stop that!"
"Relax, honey. The best ic vet tr) eame No pun intended."
Raymond Hahn drove himself home from city hall, one eye on the rearview
mirror all the way. He was good at his job, mainly because he was
scrupulously careful. His cover was a job in a three-man accounting
office, but his paycheck originated at the N.O.P.D. Ostensibly calling
on clients, he moved facilely through neighborhoods, meeting people and
setting up networks of drug users and dealers.
It was dangerous work. He could spend months winning the confidence of a
paranoid dealer, constantly putting his ass on the line, and then have
all his efforts wasted. A prime example was the snafu at the warehouse
where Kev Stuart had been killed.
It didn't take a rocket scientist to deduce that somebody in the
division was tipping the dealers of impending raids. But that was an
inner-office problem. His problem was to stay alive by seeing that his
cover wasn't blown.
He'd been working undercover for three years, which may have been too
long. He was tired of continually having to look over his shoulder,
tired of being suspicious of everyone, tired of living a double life.
Lately, he'd been toying with the idea of relocating and going into
another line of work. There was one major drawback: No other occupation
would give him easy access to drugs. That was a bonus to his present
job, and no small consideration whenever he thought of leaving it.
After making sure that nobody had followed him home, he unlocked the
door of his apartment and slipped inside, then secured all the dead
bolts. Every time it was necessary for him to be arrested and jailed, it
gave him the shakes. He played his part so well that sometimes even he
was fooled into thinking that the make-believe was real.
He and Burke Basile were on the same team. Nevertheless, the guy scared
the hell out of him. It was frightening to think what Basile would do if
he learned about his habit. He wouldn't want to get on Basile's bad
side. The guy was all business. So straight-as-an-arrow, in fact, that
he hadn't endeared himself to other cops of the N.O.P.D.
Taking graft was the accepted modus operandi. It was the rule, not the
exception. Some cops figured that in a crime-crazy society, it made
sense to look away from petty malfeasances, and to get tough only on
crimes that were a threat to human life.
Burke Basile saw it differently. A law was a law. It was either right or
wrong, legal or illegal, period. He didn't preach. He didn't have to.
His silent reproach was effective enough to make cops on the take
mistrustful of him. Now that Kev Stuart was dead, the only other officer
Basile could regard as a friend and drinking buddy was Doug Pat.
And being the boss's friend didn't win him any favors among his
colleagues, either.
Not that Basile seemed to mind being out of the fraternal loop. In that
respect, Hahn thought, he and Basile were somewhat alike. He worked
alone, and he liked it that way, just as he suspected Basile did.
He doubted Basile ever cried over his unpopularity.
Hahn undressed in the dark. His girlfriend got pissed if he woke her up
after she'd fallen asleep. She resented his staying out late and leaving
her alone when he went carousing. She thought he was an accountant and
didn't understand his penchant for nightclubbing even on weeknights.
Their schedules often clashed, but, actually, the less they saw of each
other, the better they got along. Their relationship was based almost
strictly on convenience. When she invited him to move in with her, it
was more convenient for him to accept than to come up with a reason to
decline. Besides, they liked the same drugs. They bonded best when they
got stoned together. The rest of the time, they were more or less
compatible, but not what you could call intimate except when they had
sex.
He knew his main appeal was the drugs he brought home to her, but that
didn't bother him. He even suspected her of cheating on him, but since
he had to be out nearly every night, he couldn't really blame her.
He just hoped she didn't contract a sexually transmitted disease.
The public-service announcements on TV warned against relationships such
as theirs, but, hell, his odds for getting whacked by a drug dealer he
had set up were far greater than his dying of AIDS.
He slid in beside her and was grateful that she didn't stir. He didn't
want a scene. Not after everything he'd been through tonight, including
a couple hours in jail. What a freaking zoo!
He'd been locked in a cell with two redneck brothers covered in homemade
tattoos, who'd opened up a third brother's scalp with a can opener
during a family dispute. Their other cell mate was a transvestite who
cowered in the corner and wept in fear of the abusive rednecks.
He'd cried so hard over their insults that his fake eyelashes had come
unglued, and that had brought on another crying jag, which had prompted
more shouted invectives.
Raymond never had been a good sleeper, but tonight he found it
particularly difficult to relax and shut off his skittering thoughts.
After a while, he sat up, thinking that a joint might help relax him.
He reached across his sleeping girlfriend and switched on the nightstand
lamp.
What he saw barely registered before he sensed movement behind him.
Raymond Hahn died with a silent scream on his lips.
Burke knew something was up the moment he reported for work. The men
lurking around the coffee machine mumbled good mornings as he
approached, but no one made eye contact, and by the time he had poured
his coffee, they had scattered.
At his desk, he shrugged off his jacket but hadn't even had time to hang
it on the coatrack when Pat opened the door to his office and called him
in. Burke left his jacket on his desk but carried his coffee with
him."What's going on?"
Pat closed the door to give them privacy."Sit down."
"I don't want to sit down. I want to know what the hell's going on."
"Raymond Hahn is dead."
Burke sat down.
"He and his girlfriend were found in their bed this morning."
Burke took a sip of coffee."Am I to assume he didn't die of accidental
or natural causes?"
"They were murdered."
Pat went on to explain that the woman worked as a teller at a branch
bank. She clocked in by six-thirty in order to open up the drive-through
window at seven. When she didn't show up and hadn't called in sick, a
co-worker went to check, expecting to find her hungover or stoned.
She'd failed one random drug test, but had been given another chance on
the promise she would get counseling for substance abuse. The co-worker
found the apartment door unlocked. She went inside.
"It was ... a mess." "Don't spare me the details," Burke said
irritably."I'm not going to faint."
"Well, the woman from the bank did. The girl sustained several stab
wounds. Initial coroner's report is that only one of those wounds could
have been fatal. The killer took his time and enjoyed killing her.
It appears she'd also been sodomized, but whether before or after she
died hasn't yet been established. Hahn was luckier, if you could call it
that. He had only one wound in the side of his neck, but it was well
placed. The killer knew where to stick him for a quick and silent kill."
Burke left his chair, took his coffee with him to the third-story
window, and stared out of it while sipping coffee from his personal mug,
which was decorated with multicolored sea horses. Barbara had bought the
souvenir mug on a rare vacation to Florida. He didn't remember how long
ago that had been. Eons. At least it seemed that long ago. He could no
longer imagine doing something as carefree as going on a trip to the
beach and shopping for silly souvenirs. Any frivolity in his life had
died the night he shot and killed Kev Stuart.
"Clues?"
"The crime unit is on it, but so far it looks clean. Something might
turn up in autopsy. The girl's rectum and vagina were bruised and
abraded. But there wasn't visible semen on her."
The lab was wasting their time and manpower. There wouldn't be any
evidence. Bardo liked knives, and this sounded like his kind of hit.
His favorite pastime was rough sex, but even in the heat of his sordid
passion, he would have been careful to use a condom. He was too smart to
leave a DNA fingerprint behind, although they might get lucky and find a
tissue or hair sample.
Burke had sent Hahn to jail last night. Had the undercover officer been
wallowing in the drunk tank while his girlfriend was being raped and
killed by Bardo? Had he come home and caught them together?
"Signs of struggle?"
"None," Pat replied."I can't figure how he managed to kill both of them.
Did he ice Hahn, then terrorize the girl before killing her?"
"Maybe. Or ..." Burke thought about it."Or he did the girl first, then
waited in the apartment until Hahn got home."
Pat frowned doubtfully."Hahn was undressed and in bed when he got hit."
"Hahn was late coming in. The killer hid until poor Ray was in bed.
He probably got into bed without turning on the light. I do it all the
time when I don't want to wake up Barbara. Hahn didn't see that his
girlfriend was dead. He didn't see the blood or realize that anything
was wrong." Burke gripped the coffee mug tighter."That sounds like him."
"Who?"
"Bardo. Bardo would have thought it was funny that his victim locked him
in instead of out."
'"Why would you think it was Bardo?"
"We arrested Hahn and Sachel. Duvall shows up here in the middle of the
night. We know that Sachel is on Duvall's secret payroll. Bardo is his
hired gun. Our undercover man gets hit. Figure it out. It can't be a
coincidence."
'"Of course it can!" Pat exclaimed. Burke came around to face him, but
Pat continued before he could say anything."You know as well as I do
that Hahn was a junkie. It appears the woman was too. The hit could have
been over a drug deal gone south. It could have been a love triangle. It
could have been " '"That Duvall knew Ray was ours and wanted to put him
out of commission, while at the same time teaching us a sound lesson."
"All right, it could," Pat conceded, coming to his feet."But I don't
want you to take this personally. Like it only happened to you.
The whole division will feel shitty about it. We're a team, Burke.
We've got to work together. We can't let a few setbacks send us spinning
out of control. We must continue to work methodically."
This managerial bullshit speech was uncharacteristic of Doug. He usually
reserved the textbook pep talks for when he addressed the entire group.
In private, he and Burke were more candid with each other.
"What else?" Burke asked.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean there's more, isn't there? What is it you're dreading to tell
me?"
Pat rubbed the back of his neck. He was a slender man, with a high,
smooth forehead and a receding hairline. This morning, he seemed years
older than he was."You're too smart for your own good."
"Yeah, I get that all the time," Burke said impatiently."What?"
"Sachel declined our deal."
"Give me fifteen minutes with him." "It won't do any good, Burke. He
turned it down before we even laid out the terms. He left absolutely no
room for negotiation."
"He's goin
g to risk a trial?"
'"No, he's going to enter a guilty plea. To all charges."
"Son of a bitch," Burke swore."Duvall got to him."
"That would be my guess, yeah."
"Jesus, is the guy immortal?" He barked a caustic laugh."He beats us at
every turn."
"Duvall doesn't play fair. We abide by the rules."
Burke gnawed the inside of his jaw, muttering, "Maybe it's time we
didn't."
"Come again?"
"Nothing. Say, Doug, I gotta get out of here."
"Burke " "Catch you later."
He slammed the door behind him, grabbed his jacket as he sailed past his
desk, and headed for the exit, nearly colliding with Mac McCuen.
"Hey, Basile. I've been looking everywhere for you. We need to talk."
"Not now." He wasn't in the mood for McCuen. Right now he couldn't
stomach McCuen's unflagging optimism and irritating, inexhaustible
energy. Without even slowing down, he said, "Later, Mac."