by Brenda Novak
“She can’t – you can’t – ”
“You know how this works, Flood. It’s your case, but my call.”
Finally, Flood spun around and stomped angrily down the corridor toward the elevators. Slater gazed after him. Police, Sergei Petrovich had insisted, but could he have meant a detective?
Cruz sat on the edge of Angie’s bed and took one thin hand into both his large, brown ones. An IV catheter ran from her other hand to a unit of blood. Another to a unit of saline, and a final one in her neck probably led to a feeding tube.
She looked terrible.
“You look great, Angie.”
“Quit scammin’ me, Cruz.” She tried a weak smile. “I’m no beauty at the best of times, but now – ” Her fingers fluttered uselessly on the blanket while huge tears pooled in her round, dark eyes.
“It’s okay, it’s okay,” Cruz soothed. “You’re a fighter, Angie. You’re going to be all right. They’re taking good care of you here.”
“I worry about my boys,” she ventured.
“Sharon’s got everything under control.”
Angie tried to snort, but failed, ending in a spate of coughing. “Shit, Sharon’s got nothin’ under control.” She sighed deeply. “Don’t matter. She’ll do.”
Cruz smiled at her spirit. “Yep, she’ll do. In a pinch,” he added after a moment.
This time she managed a croaking laugh.
“What can you tell us about your kidnapping, Angie? Who did this to you?”
Slater took the visitor chair in the room and scooted it close to the other side of the bed while Angie told them what’d happened to her from the time she left Jesus Saves until she woke up in the hospital. She shuddered as she described each blow and punch delivered to her, the terror of being choked to death. How she’d been absolutely certain she would die.
When she finished, she fell back, exhausted.
Slater explained how the elderly man had found her and managed to get her to safety. “He’s your hero, Angie.”
“Guess I owe that man a big thank you,” she said softly.
“Can you identify the person who did this to you?” Cruz asked.
“I sure can,” she whispered, her throat parched and scratchy with all the talking. “I always knew he hated me and my boys, despised all the street people, always rousting them, makin’ their life harder than it need be.”
“Who?”
Even though Slater and Cruz were sure that the person involved in the deaths of two homeless people in Rosedale and Angie’s kidnapping was law enforcement, they were still shocked by her next words.
“It was Officer Rawley,” she declared. “Jeff Rawley, that mean son of a bitch.”
Angie’s identification was enough confirmation for Slater to get an arrest warrant. He wasn’t going to violate procedure and risk losing the case on a technicality. Since the suspect was a cop, he wanted the arrest to go smoothly and without push-back.
Luckily, Sergei had looked through dozens of six-packs, finally pointing to the person he’d seen kidnap Angie Hunt. With both testimonies, Slater could take it straight to a judge.
He wisely chose one who wouldn’t mind being awakened in the middle of the night to sign an arrest warrant for Officer Jeff Rawley.
When informed, Lieutenant Flood was skeptical. “One of our own? You must be nuts, Slater. I’ve known Rawley for years. You’re barking up the wrong tree. This is gonna fall apart in court. You’ll see.”
The arrest was slick. Jeff Rawley feigned shock and sputtered about his rights when Slater and his deputy, along with Santiago Cruz, knocked on his seedy apartment door. He was outraged that the warrant allowed them to search the premises, but didn’t resist arrest.
It was almost too easy, Cruz thought, when they found concrete evidence that Rawley was involved in the death of Dickey Hinchey.
“Sheesh, it’s Murder 101,” Slater said to Rawley. “Don’t hang on to incriminating evidence, man.”
Slater held up the bloody remnants of what appeared to be Dickey Hinchey’s tee shirt, and the cheap little ring the homeless man always wore on his pinky finger. Cruz recognized it immediately.
Slater cuffed Rawley and placed him in the squad car, “This is good evidence. The case will hold up in court.”
“You think Rawley did them all?” Cruz asked.
Slater shook his head. “I have to believe it. The D.A. won’t buy anything else.”
Cruz felt suddenly exhausted. All he wanted was to get back to Slater’s house and check up on the ever-interesting Dr. Jones. He’d been gone from the ranch too long. Anything could’ve happened in his absence.
Chapter 61
Frankie was gone.
When Cruz arrived at the ranch house, she was nowhere to be found. Cole was resting in the master suite and looked a helluva lot better than he had yesterday. He could sit up in bed, eat a little, and even go to the john on his own.
What he couldn’t do was tell Cruz where Frankie had gone, and how she’d gotten away without transportation, isolated as Slater’s ranch was.
“She’s taken my old truck,” Slater said when he arrived an hour later after booking Rawley in the Bigler County Jail. “Must’ve hotwired it because I’ve got the only key to it.” He eyed Cruz thoughtfully. “Were you aware she had such ... skills?”
“Yeah,” Cruz complained, “something else her father must’ve taught her, along with how to handle firearms.”
“Where would she go?”
“I’d guess to see that father who taught her so much.”
“You figure she can handle herself?” Slater frowned as he reached for a beer in the refrigerator. “If someone from Stark’s gang is after her, she’s not safe.”
“She’s not safe from me,” Cruz said flatly. “I might just throttle her.”
Detective Flood was still smoldering from the news that one of the officers in the Rosedale Police Department was a serial killer. At least that’s the crap Sheriff Slater and Santiago Cruz were trying to shove down his throat.
But evidence was evidence, and Flood would do his duty despite the gloating he saw in Cruz’s eyes. The man had been a burr up his ass for a long time now, and him being in on the arrest didn’t sit well with Flood.
Still, he’d get the credit for closing the case. Sacramento PD be damned. They could figure out on their own whether Rawley had done the homeless hag in their county, or if it was someone else.
Not Flood’s problem.
Slater had hinted about another killer, someone other than Jeff Rawley, but Flood wasn’t buying that hogwash. He wasn’t going to muddy the waters by taking a wild theory to the district attorney. They had their man – as much as he didn’t like it – and he wasn’t going to give up the limelight of a good arrest by chasing down a rabbit hole.
Still, hard to believe a mealy-mouthed beat cop like Jeff Rawley was capable of all that mayhem. You never really knew a person deep inside, he guessed.
The guard on Anson Stark’s payroll managed to get the inmate a sit-down with his second in command, Bones Griff. They met in the corridor adjacent to the dog run where Stark went for his daily exercise. A small part of the hallway wasn’t secured by video cameras, a flaw in the supermax’s design.
As they stood near the entrance to the SHU exercise yard, Stark could barely control his fury. He seldom allowed himself to lose control of his temper. In fact, he could remember only two times in his entire life when he’d gone into a blinding rage. Even when he committed murder, he did the deed with cold calculation.
Now Bones was testing him to his limits.
“Perkins blew it. I had to put a gang member on her,” Bones explained in a puerile tone. “He was supposed to get both of them, but something happened. The bitch fought back. Who knew she’d be so ... lethal.”
“I don’t want explanations. I want results.” Stark’s face purpled with unleashed anger. He took several deep breaths before continuing. “What about Cole Hansen?”
Bon
es shook his head. “Left him bleeding to death on the doc’s bedroom floor.”
“He ran out on a job before completing it?” the Professor asked flatly.
Bones felt a shiver of cold trickle down his spine. “Yes, but he – it’s complicated. The situation was dangerous. He had no choice.”
“I don’t care!” the Professor grabbed Bones by the throat, pressed his thumbs on his windpipe. Although the leader of the white gang was a half foot shorter than his lieutenant and seventy pounds lighter, he took Bones down with the ease of a street fighter.
Bones gagged, suffocated, saw stars flicker behind his eyeballs. He sank to his knees, saw black before the Professor let go.
“You were supposed to put Perkins on the job.”
Bones coughed and sputtered, still kneeling. “He – he had to tie up some things first.”
The Professor grabbed a hank of Griff’s hair, pulling tightly until the skull felt like it was on fire. “Perkins owes the Lords first. Understand? If he doesn’t have the job done by this time tomorrow, I’ll gut you like a fish.” He paused and took a cleansing breath. “Nod if you understand.”
Bones nodded, feeling the warm, wet flow of urine stain his pants.
“You, Bones, not Perkins. See that it’s done.”
Crossing the street from the hospital emergency room exit to the parking lot, Frankie was so engrossed in her thoughts she didn’t see the car until it was almost on her. The vehicle slammed into her body and the front bumper lifted her into the air, helicoptering her wildly before depositing her on the hard concrete curb.
In the way that physicians do by reflex, Frankie assessed the damages to her body with a clinical coolness, even while the sharp, hot pain of broken bones and bruised flesh seized her mind.
Serious damage, likely not fatal.
Hearing the screech of tires peeling out of the parking lot, emergency room personnel rushed outside, and quickly attended to Frankie. They staunched the bleeding and loaded her on a gurney while a room was prepared. Thankfully, Frankie had lost consciousness soon after her head hit the asphalt and was relieved of the knowledge of her condition.
Chapter 62
“I shouldn’t have left her,” Cruz said, waiting outside the emergency room while Frankie’s ribs were taped and her abrasions attended to. “After the first two attacks, I should’ve been more cautious.”
“Horseshit,” Slater said, not unkindly. “We couldn’t have anticipated this.”
“I should’ve.” Cruz stared at his hands, fixed on the long brown fingers. “Maybe it was a simple hit and run – nothing else.”
“Maybe, but stop beating yourself up,” Slater advised. “Won’t do Frankie any good now.”
Cruz shook his head in frustration. “I don’t know what else to do. I feel so – ”
The emergency room doctor interrupted him. “Good news, moderate concussion, a few broken ribs, bumps, bruises and abrasions, but she’ll be fine.”
In his relief Cruz staggered a half-step back before he righted himself. Thank God.
“We’ll keep her overnight just to be sure,” the doctor added, looking down at the patient chart. “You can see her now before they wheel her up to her room.”
Frankie looked pale, but far better than Angie Hunt had. She smiled wanly when she saw Slater and Cruz peek around the curtain. “I know, I know, it was a stupid move, going out on my own.”
“Damn straight,” Cruz growled as he reached for her hand.
For a long moment they looked into each other’s eyes, each afraid of what they’d see – or not see – reflected there.
“You missed all the action,” Slater announced. “We caught our killer.”
The fragile moment between Frankie and Cruz passed.
“Who was it?” Frankie said.
“Officer Jeff Rawley, a RPD beat cop, notorious for harassing and abusing street people. Angie identified him. And Sergei Petrovich picked him out of a lineup.”
“And the car that hit me?”
Cruz squeezed her hand. “No luck.”
“So Anson Stark or some gang member is still after me,” Frankie whispered.
“Maybe not, but I’ll put a deputy on your door tonight,” Slater promised, his eyes not quite meeting hers. “And when you’re discharged, you can come back to the ranch.”
He didn’t add, where you should’ve stayed in the first place, but Frankie saw the reproof in his expression.
When the attendant came with a wheelchair, Cruz leaned over and kissed her softly on the forehead. “You scared the hell out of me,” he whispered against her cool flesh.
Then, regardless of the audience, Frankie held his face in both her hands and pulled his face toward her. Her lips were soft and firm and full of promise. “Me, too.”
Cruz might be crazy, but he figured he had a day while Frankie was in the hospital, to do some investigating on his own. He knew she had secrets, some about her work at Pelican Bay, more about her father who’d been moved out of ICU to a regular ward at Sutter General in Sacramento.
“First thing tomorrow I’m going to make a trip to Pelican Bay to speak with Visitation Officer Walt Steiner,” he told Slater when they returned to the ranch to check on Cole.
Standing at the kitchen counter, Slater drank deeply from his coffee. “Why’s that?”
“He’s the man Frankie went to Crescent City to be near. She trusts – trusted – him. I’d like to check him out. He might give us some answers.”
“Maybe,” Slater said doubtfully.
“He’s known Frankie since her father went to prison. If nothing else, he can tell us about Roger Milano’s case and the trial.”
“I’ll go with you.”
“Long as there’s a guard on Frankie’s door,” Cruz warned, and left for his apartment to pack an overnight bag.
Walt Steiner greeted them at check-in, and after surrendering their weapons and badges, Cruz and Slater followed the visitation officer to a shoebox of an office.
“You didn’t give me much information on the phone,” Steiner began, suspicion darkening his hazel eyes. “If I wasn’t so worried about Frankie, I wouldn’t have agreed to this meet.”
“I understand, sir,” Cruz began, only to be interrupted.
“Don’t bother with excuses, just get to the point.” Steiner was a beefy man, average height and broad, with weathered skin and a military-cut hair style. “Is she all right?”
Cruz and Slater exchanged glances. On the long drive to Crescent City, they’d discussed how much to tell Steiner about Frankie and the events in Rosedale.
“Yes,” Cruz replied. “Frankie was, ah, injured in a car accident, but she’s recovering and we have a guard on her hospital room.”
Steiner sat in his chair, leaned against the too-small desk, his thick arms covering the pad. “What happened? Wasn’t she in the Rosedale house?”
Cruz took the plastic chair opposite Steiner’s desk, although the man hadn’t asked them to sit down. “She was attacked in her father’s home.”
“She wasn’t injured,” Slater added quickly, “but we moved her to another place.”
“What?” Steiner jumped to his feet, like a boxer ready to face an opponent. “Nobody knows about that house. She’s changed her last name. The house is in her father’s name. No one knows that.”
“Her name?” Puzzlement crossed Cruz’s face. “What are you talking about?”
Steiner collapsed into his chair, sighing. “She didn’t tell you?”
Cruz shook his head.
“It’s not my place to reveal her secrets,” Steiner began. “Let’s just say that Frankie changed her last name about a dozen years ago.”
“Why?”
“Actually, it was her father’s idea. To protect her against anyone wanting retaliation and using Frankie to get it. He didn’t want her associated with him.”
Cruz kept shaking his head like an idiot. “I don’t understand.”
“You don’t have to, young ma
n,” the grizzly older officer snapped. “You just have to keep her safe.”
“I’m trying,” Cruz snapped back, feeling the sting of Steiner’s words.
“Frankie can tell you what she wants you to know,” Slater advised Cruz trying to cool down the heated conversation.
He addressed Steiner directly. “We’re also here about another matter – the Lords of Death.”
If Steiner was puzzled by this statement, nothing showed on his face. “What about them?”
“We figure they’re into some kind of new – let’s just call it – enterprise. Something to do with a loyalty ritual for incoming gang members. ‘Blood in and blood out?’ We want to know who’s in bed with them.”
“You figure this has something to do with Frankie’s attack?”
Cruz decided Steiner wouldn’t help them if they didn’t tell him everything – well, almost everything. “Frankie was attacked and threatened in the prison parking lot, right here, before she fled to Rosedale.”
“Ah hell, I knew it was something bad.”
“Then why didn’t you go to her, check up on her?” Cruz accused the older man.
The man shifted on his chair, his eyes hooded. “I told her where to go, but then I – I got tied up with something.”
“Well, she’s had two attacks on her, not counting the one that’s landed her in the hospital right now.” Cruz wondered belatedly if he should be so frank with the man.
“We think it has something to do with an investigation she was making into the medical records of inmates who were members of the Lords of Death,” Slater continued.
Walt frowned in confusion. “She told me nothing about that. What trouble has she gotten into?”
“You’ve got some C.O.’s on the take, Steiner,” Slater warned. “And it’s related to two homicides in my county, maybe a third one.”
After a long moment Walt stood, clearly dismissing them. “I can’t help you. We have confidentiality issues here at Pelican Bay.”
“My ass,” Slater said, as they left. “He’s covering for something.”