Cuts Like a Knife: A Novel (A Kristen Conner Mystery Book 1)

by M. K. Gilroy

  I unbuckle my seatbelt, push open my door, slide my legs outside the car, and stand up and feel a gentle summer breeze. Actually, summer doesn’t officially start until June 21, but growing up, summer always began on the last day of school—at least in the mind of a school-aged kid. It’s now the end of May. Have we been on this case for two months? It’s been in the eighties during the day, but it’s probably seventy-five degrees right now and it feels great. I push my car door shut and take another deep breath, stretching my tight back.

  I feel an explosion on the left side of my body as someone slams a fist into my kidney. I throw up in my mouth as I go down like a rag doll.

  Someone whispers, “Don’t even think you can get away with messing with my life,” in my ear before I pass out in a swirl of dark, all-encompassing pain.

  58

  I LIFT MY head slowly. I am laying in a small bed, but have no clue where I am at or what my situation is. A light shines through a crack under the door. My instinct is to call out and find out what I am up against. Stupid idea. A brass band is playing Pavarotti meets the Rolling Stones. I breathe slowly. In and out. My head begins to clear. I lay still—I don’t want to alert my captor or captors that I am awake. I keep my breathing as slow and quiet as possible.

  I take stock. I wiggle my fingers and toes. Check. All present and accounted for, even if they feel slow and unresponsive. Drugged. Not good. I roll my neck back and forth. Everything in working order there, too, but there is now a group of renegade dwarfs that have booted Pavarotti and the Stones and who are swinging pick axes on the inside of my cranium.

  I lift one arm and then the other, glad to find I’m not restrained. That is a big mistake on someone’s part. Just because some gorilla can punch like a heavyweight boxer when I’m not looking doesn’t mean he is going to withstand a quick shot to the trachea if I get even half a chance at him. I clench and unclench my fists to get the blood circulating. I begin practicing a couple of attack moves in my head. You are going to have to seize the element of surprise.

  I hear footsteps outside my door. I barely breathe. I am pretty sure there are at least two sets of shoes on hard flooring. Maybe three. Might be one person wearing some kind of soft sole. Not what I wanted to hear. More than one captor is going to make escape more challenging than I was hoping for. Does the Cutter Shark have a partner? Multiple partners? My mind quickly runs through a list of drills and strategies for neutralizing two opponents.

  The door swings open. One of my assailants creeps slowly toward me. Have I alerted them I’m awake? Then the other turns on glaring lights to blind me. I am as ready as I am ever going to be. I was already moving before he reached the bed, and now I drive the heel of my hand in the direction of his face with the simplest karate punch in the book. He twists his head sideways and gets a forearm up to partially block my punch in a trained move. I know I landed a decent blow that did more than graze his cheek. I was hoping to catch him on the bridge of his nose, which would have temporarily blinded and immobilized him.

  I spin up and off the bed to kick and throw another punch. I aim at his groin and throat in a split-second combination—but I don’t think either landed enough to do any damage. Not good. I am light-headed from the sudden change of positions—the drugs haven’t worn off as much as I’d hoped. My movements are too slow. Before I can continue my attack, a pair of muscled arms from my second captor wraps me up tightly from behind. I’m not done fighting. I kick up and backward and hear a heavy oomph. I got him in the groin but not as good as I want because instead of falling down in a fetal position he holds on, cursing in English and Spanish. He pushes me face down on the bed and brings his weight to bear on me. I snap my head back and catch him on the eye’s orbital socket. But I still can’t get free.

  Now a second set of hands is holding me down and yelling something. I feel the pinprick of a hyperdermic needle enter my upper arm. There was a third person.

  I am sorry I wasn’t better prepared, Mr. Barry. I’m sorry I wasn’t careful enough, Mom.

  • • •

  I’m sitting up in bed drinking a glass of water. A tray with a bowl of untouched chicken noodle soup is beside me.

  Don is sitting across from me, an ice pack on his left cheekbone. Zaworski is standing by the door shaking his head and trying not to smile. Martinez is sitting on the other side of the bed. He has an ice pack on his lap. Enough said.

  “No nos pagan lo suficiente para este tipo de trabajo,” Antonio says to me with a weak smile.

  “What’s that mean?” I ask him.

  “I can answer that,” Don interrupts. “‘We don’t get paid enough to do this job,’ and for the record, I think I agree with Martinez on this one.”

  Zaworski walks back over to my bedside. “Kristen, now that your head is clearing a little, you’re sure you can’t tell us anything more about who attacked you?” he asks again. “I’m talking about the parking lot where you live, not here in the hospital,” he says, looking at Don and Martinez with a barely concealed smile.

  “I can’t say with any degree of confidence, sir,” I answer.

  “You didn’t get a look at his face? Not even a glimpse?” Martinez asks.

  “I never saw him coming.”

  “You didn’t recognize his voice?” Don asks.

  “I didn’t.”

  “Was he disguising it?” Zaworski asks.

  “Possibly, but I’m not sure it mattered. I was fading fast when he spoke. He did whisper.”

  “What did he say again?” Don asks.

  “Something about me not getting away with messing up his life.”

  “So it’s possible it’s this Dell guy?” Zaworski asks.

  “I know he was angry with me. We dated off and on for almost six months. He was having a real hard time accepting that I didn’t have feelings for him and was cutting him off completely. Then he saw me having lunch with Reynolds last Saturday afternoon and left me an angry message.”

  The three men say nothing. Zaworski tries not to look surprised. Sometimes the boss is last to know.

  “He’s got to be the guy,” Martinez says with enthusiasm and then immediately winces from the movement.

  “I don’t know,” I say. “First of all, I have never seen any evidence of violence in Dell. Really, he’s a gentle soul.”

  “But you said yourself you never really got to know him,” Don says. “Heck, I’m your partner and I don’t remember you saying anything of substance about him; just that he had wormed his way into your family.”

  “Yeah,” I agree, “I really didn’t get to know him. That voice message took me by surprise.”

  “So why don’t you like him for being your attacker?” Zaworski asks, puzzled. “He seems perfect. He was obsessed with you, it sounds like, so he definitely has the motive.”

  “Well, for one thing,” I answer, “I’m just not sure Dell could hit as hard as this guy did. I’ve never been punched like that. I’m not saying Dell didn’t work out and was weak or anything. I’m saying this guy knew how to punch.”

  “But you don’t got no meat on you, girl,” Martinez says. “And who stands up to a well-placed kidney shot?”

  “I could have had a thirty-pound spare tire and the result would have been the same. Martinez, you would have gone down same as me.”

  “That’s not saying much,” Don says with a wicked smile.

  “You want to see how easy it is to take me down, amigo?” Martinez challenges back.

  “Ladies, not now,” Zaworski says, cutting them off. “Kristen, can you think of anyone else? No other enemies or scorned lovers?”

  “He wasn’t a lover,” I say with a sternness that makes even the captain back off. “If you don’t count my family or Internal Affairs and someone in the office who writes me nasty Post-it notes, I really can’t think of anyone else that mad at me right now. Everything’s good with Jeff and Patricia as of last Sunday, and you met Jeff yourself, Captain, so you know if he wanted to hurt someone, it wou
ld be in the wallet and happen in a court of law. Honestly, I’m flying below the radar these days.”

  “What is this Post-It notes thing you are talking about?” he asks, frowning.

  “It’s nothing,” I answer. “Someone is having some fun at my expense. Just a harmless prank.”

  “We don’t prank in my office,” Zaworski answers. “I want those notes.”

  “I’m not sure I kept them.”

  “And you deleted a threatening phone message from this Dell Woods. Use your head, Kristen. If there are any more notes or messages, you keep them. And you give them to Shelly to give to me.”

  Shelly is still my chief suspect. I wonder if he will get them . . .

  “Now think, Kristen,” Zaworski says. “Because if you can’t come up with somebody else, I’m going to assume it’s this Woods guy.”

  “What about the punk we collared a couple months back?” I ask, looking at Don. “Hard last name, Polish or Russian I think. Started with an I.”

  “Couldn’t be him,” Zaworski breaks in. “He’d still be locked up.” He squints at me, like I should remember that. Maybe the drugs they’ve given me are stronger than I thought.

  Don’s frown deepens. He slaps his leg and mutters something.

  “What?” I ask.

  “Incaviglia. The punk. He got cut loose. I stayed late at the office so I could do something with the family tomorrow morning. As arresting officers, you and me got an email after hours tonight. There was a big bureaucratic snafu. The punk got in line and gave somebody else’s name and walked out of Cook County Jail.”

  “You have got to be kidding me,” Zaworski says.

  “Not the first time something like this has happened recently,” Martinez adds. “With all the budget cuts they can’t keep up down there. My el primo works there and says it’s getting sloppy.”

  “You’re telling me the punk who about beat an old man to death and who gave me a brand-new scar just walked out the front gates of our judicial system?” I ask. I’m stunned. I feel sick to my stomach. I want to let someone have it. I count to ten and take a couple deep breaths. Weariness overwhelms me. I’m too tired to stay focused.

  “Guys, I can barely keep my eyes open,” I say. “But I don’t think it was Incaviglia. Now that kid was tough, I’ll admit. But I don’t think he weighed 170 pounds. I don’t think he could generate the power the guy who punched me had.”

  “Well, we’re going to let you catch some sleep and get rested up,” Zaworski says. “You think of anything or anybody, you call me directly. Not even Squires gets the first call.”

  Before they have a chance to exit, Big Tony Scalia comes through the door and beelines over to my side.

  “I promised your daddy I’d look after you and I’m doing a crummy job of it,” he says, giving me a kiss on the cheek and smoothing my hair down.

  He turns to look at Don and then at Martinez and starts laughing. Zaworski, who I’ve seen smile maybe two or three times in the not quite two years I’ve been in his department, finally lets loose and joins Tony. Don rolls his eyes. Martinez still looks a little glazed.

  “I guess you can take pretty good care of yourself,” Scalia says.

  Don and Martinez are not amused.

  “You all got anything on the attacker?” he says to the three men present.

  “We’re not sure. It might be this Woods guy or maybe an escaped prisoner that Kristen collared,” Zaworski says. “But she doesn’t think either could punch like the guy who hit her.”

  “I got a call from Soto,” Tony says to me. “He heard you got sucker punched and wondered about that guy he had working for him in the training room. Says he hit on you.”

  “Timmy,” I respond with my eyes half open. “He’s a lot more likely than Dell or the punk.”

  “We got a name?” Zaworski asks Scalia. “If so, let’s get an APB out and bring him in for questioning.”

  “Consider it done. We’ll get some officers on it.” He turns toward me and continues. “By the way, Soto is on his way down here. He swears he’s going to kill Timmy or whoever it is that did this. With his bare hands. He’s also not happy with someone in this room. He thinks she’s not taking the personal threat of the Cutter Shark case seriously enough and is being way too careless.”

  “Any truth to that?” Zaworski asks.

  Before I can answer, more visitors arrive. Konkade and Blackshear enter the room first. Is anyone going to let me sleep off the rest of the knockout shot they gave me? Both come over and give me a pat on the shoulder. Both look at Don and Martinez with incredulity. Konkade whispers something in the captain’s ear. Zaworski quickly glances up toward the door. On cue, Willingham and Van Guten enter. This is getting interesting. I think we’re having a party. I’m starting to wake back up now.

  Willingham ignores Zaworski and walks over to the side of my bed. He takes my hand and looks at me kindly. If Willingham hadn’t decided to be an FBI bigwig, he would have made a great doctor. His bedside manner is impeccable.

  “How are you doing, Detective Conner?”

  “Fine, sir, thank you for asking. As soon as the pain medicine wears off, I’ll be out of here and back to normal.”

  “I hear you don’t have the doctor’s clearance.”

  Despite the ice packs—sure hope their ice machine is industrial strength—my side still aches dully. I was also passing a little blood as of an hour ago. Until there’s no blood in the urine, Dr. Singh is not letting me go home.

  “They’re just being cautious,” I say.

  “That’s good,” he says. “Wouldn’t be a bad idea for you to do the same. Don’t get in a hurry to get out of here. You’ll slow down recovery.”

  “Yes, sir,” I answer as he gives my hand a reassuring squeeze.

  “When did I become ‘sir’ to you?”

  “Sorry, Bob. I promise to be cautious.”

  He likes that and chuckles. Then he turns toward Zaworski and the smile is immediately gone. The two men lock eyes. I don’t think either is willing to blink first.

  Van Guten breaks the impasse. “Why don’t you gentlemen clear the room and let our intrepid detective have some privacy. You can run your task force meeting out in the hall.”

  “Good counsel, Leslie,” Willingham says. “However, I think Captain Zaworski and I might have a private conversation in my car. Can you get a ride back?”

  “No problem. I’ll catch a cab,” she says.

  “I can give you a lift,” Martinez says, straightening his collar. Leslie doesn’t look very excited about that suggestion.

  She gives Don, who is now standing, a playful but firm nudge toward the door. Everyone but Leslie begins to shuffle out. I notice that Don has ditched his ice pack, probably in the foolish hope that everyone will forget I got a pretty clean punch off before I was subdued. His dark skin might hide discoloration—but he’s already got a golf ball swelling on the side of his face.

  Martinez isn’t letting go of his ice pack. But he seems to be taking my counterattack more in stride than Don. He moves gingerly as he follows the others out of the room. With the men gone, Dr. Leslie Van Guten closes the door and walks over to me. She looks at me without saying anything for a moment. I feel like a bug under a microscope.

  “So what was my ex-husband working on tonight?”

  “Come again?” I answer, confused.

  “In Durango.”

  “I have no idea what you’re . . .”

  My head is spinning. I’m sure it’s the reaction she was hoping for. She is now looking at me with detached amusement.

  “I guess he didn’t mention that to you. Typical Austin. What I want to know is why he’s in Colorado.”

  “You’re the Mensa member; why are you asking me?”

  “Clever and correct,” she deadpans. “Let’s just say the deputy director and I are not absolutely sold on the way Major Reynolds is conducting this entire investigation, and he’s not keeping the chain of command as apprised as he should.
”

  “Well, Leslie, at least he’s doing something.”

  And I’m sticking up for the guy who didn’t bother to let me know that I am working a case with his ex-wife? Why?

  “We have processes for a reason. But no matter. Reynolds is good. Very good. And after tonight, I think the threads are all coming together anyway. We have you to thank for that.”

  “How is that?”

  “What sedative did they give you—or are you just that slow? I think you’re the only one on the team who hasn’t figured this out yet.”

  I say nothing. I am too doped up to work out anything hard and I’m fading fast. I can’t for the life of me figure what she’s talking about so I say nothing, but it must center around Reynolds and this Durango lead. Thanks for making me look like a fool, you jerk. She just looks at me, I guess to see if the uncomfortable pause will coax me into blabbing.

  Not going to happen, girlfriend. I’m basically shutting down and she realizes it. She turns and leaves without another word.

  She could learn something from Willingham’s bedside manner.

  Dell can’t be the Cutter Shark . . .

  59

  “YOU’RE STAYING AT our house,” Kaylen says. “There is no way you’re staying here by yourself.”

  Kaylen, Klarissa, my mom, and I are at my kitchen table. It’s eleven on Saturday morning. I left the hospital twelve hours ago, but suddenly I wish I was still there, safe from my overly protective friends and family. Don and Martinez, fortunately not holding grudges, drove me home. Vanessa was already at my place when we arrived and had brought flowers, stocked my fridge, and done some cleanup, including a couple loads of laundry. I was thankful beyond belief that the place was fairly clean before she got there, though I don’t think I’ve ever vacuumed the traps of my sinks.