by Lee Killough
Allison shrugged. “Maybe.” Between sips of the light, apple-flavored wine she reported the whole day and night’s activity.
Honora continued studying the canvas but Allison knew that her grandmother heard every word. Sure enough, as soon as Allison finished talking, she said, “You sound concerned about Kerr.”
“The idea that Blondie lured Demry to Manning is just a step away from the truth. And look at the composite of Blondie he put together.” She tossed the Polaroid on the table.
Honora came over to the table to study it. “This is that computer program you’ve told me about? It makes the face look almost photographic, doesn’t it? But not very...specific.”
Allison wrapped both hands around her wine glass. “Definitely not specific enough. It looks like any one of us. Which he hasn’t missed. Tom Sweet thinks I ought to send Kerr on wild goose chases.”
Honora lifted her brows. “And you’re listening to him? Have you joined Earth Now?”
Allison rolled her eyes. “Of course not!” She had no quarrel with their political activism, per se. After all, the clan practiced plenty of that in manipulating the City Council and County Commission to keep Arenosa the way they liked it. Earth Now, however, went much farther...promoting wars, weapons sales, and enterprises that depleted the resources humans depended on...lobbying against anything that improved medical care and controlled human reproduction. Pushing dangerously close to the line the hunter had crossed, they even encouraged anti-abortion snipers and clinic bombers. Why? Hating humans was a waste of energy when they were likeable as individuals and runaway breeding and depleting resources would crash their population soon enough anyway.
Honora leaned down to kiss her forehead. “I know you have better sense. So ignore Tom. If you’re worried about Kerr, why not just distract him? Sex is very effective that way.”
Allison raised her brows. “Baba, are you telling me to take him as a lover?”
Honora ticked her tongue. “Certainly not. I never command matings except for genetic gain.”
One responsibility alphas had. The households originally creating this clan by alliance, not blood relationship, had since mingled their bloodlines so much by interbreeding that only the alphas could keep the relationships straight...to ensure matings avoided close ones.
“I remind you,” Honora said, “that some of us have honorably served the household on our backs and we must all do whatever necessary for the clan.” She refilled her wine glass. “You might find it even enjoyable. I’ve probably mentioned before that humans were always my favorite lovers. They may have limited stamina, but they’re so...” Her voice warmed. “...generously equipped.”
Allison had to laugh. “I’ll keep that in mind. But sex would only complicate things. I need a clear head and he might become more attentive than ever.”
Honora shrugged. “You may be right.” She raised her glass in a toast. “Then here’s to being fast on your feet, child, and staying ahead of him.”
19.
He should have follow Allison’s example and gone home, Zane reflected. The screen of his electronic dictionary had gone blank. When would he learn to change the battery the minute the lettering began to fade?
At the far end of the office, Gordon Viapiana, the squad’s Night Watch detective, stood up and turned toward the printer, the overhead lights gleaming on the polished ebony of his head.
“Do you have a thesaurus?” Zane asked.
Viapiana glanced around. “Thesaurus! You’re writing reports, son, not the Great American Novel. Fancy words just confuse the brass and make defense attorneys harass you for trying to sound air-roo-dite.”
“I take it that’s a no on the thesaurus?”
Viapiana grinned. “Check Goodnight’s desk. She uses sesquipedalian bullshit to skewer assholes unawares.”
Furnishing the LEC, someone with clout had made the city pop for good desks...a generous L with the computer peninsula projecting into the room and a hutch section against the wall with shelves above the desk surface and a double bank of drawers below. Allison’s shelves held a small library along with phone books from most of the area cities, stacked letter trays filled with forms, case books both empty and crammed full, a digital clock taped to a bundle of red tubes and wiring so that it looked like a dynamite bomb, and a large color photograph of the Northern Lights. But the books were all law enforcement and criminal investigation texts and included neither a thesaurus or dictionary. He picked up a stack of department memos that appeared to be sitting on a book, careful not to dislodge any of the sticky notes shingling the side of the file cabinet between her and Carl Ng’s hutches, but found only another phone book.
Maybe she kept them in a drawer to avoid standing up each time she wanted them. He opened the top drawer closest to the peninsula. And stared in disbelief at neat stacks of snack cracker packs, granola and energy bars, packages of nuts, candy bars. The last thing he expected in Allison’s desk was a junk food hoard.
“Better not touch anything in there,” Viapiana said. “Don’t ask me how, but she always knows when anyone has...and who it was.”
“Allison really eats all this?”
“It beats the hell out of me why the woman isn’t big as a truck.”
Zane closed the drawer and tried the one next to it.
Bingo. A dictionary lay inside, with a thesaurus under it.
After taking out the thesaurus, he started to return the dictionary and close the drawer, but a line on a computer printout under them caught his eye...animal attacks on humans. Zane picked up the printout and scanned it. He frowned, puzzled. Asking for incidents of animal mutilation he could understand. She wanted to know if their psycho started with animals and worked his way up the food chain. But why ask about animal attacks on humans? Did she think an animal might be involved after all, despite the lack of animal tracks around the body?
Why had she never mentioned running this computer search? Not that she had any obligation to tell him everything she did. Still...the idea that Blue might really have seen a giant dog was something they could have kicked around. Partners did that kind of thing. Not her, though, he reflected, fingering the printout irritably. She had also left him behind when she went off to interviews and while he reported his progress to her, she never returned the favor. Canvassing this evening was the closest he had come to feeling like a partner.
As he started to drop the printout back in the drawer, he realized that the bottom sheet of the printout had a different feel than the rest. It came away from the printout, a separate sheet...a teletype with the results of an NCIC query. It looked like the same one he made this afternoon. Was he happy or not that when he told her about his query she said nothing about having already sent one?
A tick mark caught his eye. Reading the line beside it, he raised his brows. Her query had wider parameters than his. Had she sent for details of this Coral Gables case? If so it was something else she never bothered to mention.
What was the problem? Was it a matter of being slow to accept him after working so long with Garroway? Or something else? He glanced at the Polaroid of the composite. The Station bartender’s comment came back to him: I know chicks who look like that, most of them your fellow cops. And Allison’s hasty? assertion that none of her family could know Manning. Yet she asked about females with Blondie’s descriptors in her NCIC query, and had been eager to know Tonya’s description earlier. Despite referring to Blondie as “he” and insisting no witness had seen a female in the vicinity of the crime scene, she appeared concerned about females. An uneasy sensation rippled through Zane’s gut. What did she know that she was holding back?
Wednesday, April 4
1.
She had not slept well. Images of Demry’s body invaded uneasy dreams, morphing into other victims. Allison woke and could not go back to sleep when one victim with his face shredded beyond recognition had a shock of flaming hair.
Giving up, she dressed and drove to the office, where she switched on her computer
and brought up yesterday and last night’s incident reports. Mother and Lights she hoped Blondie was Manning’s lover and the hunter had not gone somewhere else for a victim last night, such as The Bullpen out by the rodeo grounds, and picked up one of those students from the bull riding and bull fighting school...then run her hunt through the pens of the rodeo grounds, or down one of the airport runways, or out on Lacabra Island.
Munching granola bars from her food drawer, she searched for fatalities. The unattended death Regan discovered came up, and a two vehicle accident by the airport with one driver killed. No others. She felt little relief, however. That vagrant yesterday had not stumbled over Demry’s body until seven in the morning. A victim from last night might not have been found yet.
Speaking of missing bodies... She called Communications. “I put in a request to Coral Gables yesterday for details on one of their cases. Has an answer come back yet?”
“Sorry, no,” the dispatcher said.
“Let’s repeat the request, please.” Things did get lost and go astray. She dug the NCIC teletype out of her desk drawer and read off the information that would let Coral Gables know what case she referred to.
As she did so, she caught a whiff of Kerr’s scent...and realized it came from the teletype sheet. The computer printout had his scent, too, she discovered, sniffing it. That son of a bitch had gone through her desk! When he came in–
A chill stifled her anger. Why had he gone through the desk? Did something make him suspicious of her?
A check found his scent on only the two top drawers and inside only this drawer. Because he found what he wanted? Or maybe she read too much into this. His scent covered the thesaurus. Drew’s Bible quote yesterday ran through her head. No...even if he came across the teletype and printout accidentally, he had still read them. A quick check of the teletype found to her relief that the dispatcher had torn off the transmission time. So at least Kerr did not know she sent the query before he ever heard of Blondie. After debating whether to move the items or destroy them, she decided to leave them. If he happened to look again and found them gone, he might wonder why.
After fetching more coffee from the vending machine out by the elevator and setting out more granola bars, she started her reports.
A familiar scent and the sound of footsteps in the doorway interrupted her concentration some time later. “Morning, John,” she said without turning.
Garroway lumbered over and dropped into side chair at the end of her peninsula. “I hoped I’d find you here early. Guess who interrupted my evening.”
Not someone he welcomed, obviously. She took a guess. “John Glass?”
He grunted. “Close enough. Seems he wasn’t satisfied with the Sentinel’s coverage of Demry’s death. He called the paper and KGLF...told them we’re ‘endangering public safety by withholding the information that Demry’s murder was a savage mutilation by a homicidal maniac.’” Garroway delivered the quote in an even thicker drawl than usual. “The paper and radio station called the Public Information Office for more details. Dan Browning called Maldenado, who called Estevez, who ordered me to deal with it.” He sighed. “I surely may regret this promotion. Just how much did you tell Glass?”
She mentally reviewed her interview with him. “Nothing about homicidal maniacs. But he’s sharp enough to deduce it from the victim’s face and a few details I felt compelled to give him because his kind becomes a major hemorrhoid if you stonewall.”
Garroway grimaced. “He’s a pain in the butt anyway.”
No surprise. She raised her brows. “So I assume the result of all this telephone activity is a press conference?”
“At nine o’clock.” He loosened his tie and flipped open the top button of his shirt. “One nice thing about being on a desk...most of the time I can forget the suit coat and be comfortable. Look, I’ll field the questions but I want you there, too, to demonstrate the A-team is on the case.”
Dismay jolted her. “I can’t be there. A cousin is flying me up to Austin to interview Lionel Manning, with Hal DiChristafero–you remember him?– backing me up, and I need to land by nine at the latest.” She hoped Manning picked up Kerr’s message.
Garroway eyed her. “Do you anticipate arresting Manning today?”
She disliked the tone of that but warily gave him an honest answer. “Probably not.”
“Then send Kerr. I’ll get--”
“Kerr!” No! Her mind raced, hunting an excuse not to send Kerr. He could not tell if Blondie had been in Manning’s place. “He’s been on the job five minutes!”
Garroway shrugged. “Coming into Investigations with high recommendations from his commanding officers. He should be able to handle an interview. DiChristafero can help him if necessary. I’ll get authorization to fly him up in the chopper.”
Son of a bitch! “John...I need to be there.”
“I need you here more.” Garroway pushed to his feet. “Oh, Kerr will have to handle the update for morning briefing, too. Quarter to eight, we meet with Browning, the Chief, and Estevez in the Chief’s conference room so you can brief them on the case, then we’ll discuss the press conference strategy with Browning.”
Allison stared after the departing back in disbelief. Whatever happened to Sure...handle it any way you want, Allison. When they presented him with that lieutenant’s badge, there must be some button they pushed, too. Brass, of course!
2.
Zane stumbled into the office with a jumbo mug of coffee, hoping the caffeine kicked in soon. He would have been better off staying up all night than settling for the nap he fitted in between reaching home and time the alarm went off.
“You look like you’d better have one of these with that.”
He found Allison thrusting an energy bar at him.
“You’ll be reporting on the case in Briefing this morning, then flying to Austin to interview Manning.”
Zane blinked. Before he could ask why, she pushed on, firing information at him. He scrambled to take it in. She had phoned Manning, playing the role of Dr. Kerr’s nurse, and confirmed the eleven o’clock appointment. An Austin Homicide detective would meet him at the PD helicopter pad. She had set up an interview with Demry’s PI as well. He should be ready in case Manning or someone else, say Blondie, threatened violence, but avoid confrontation that could lead to that. Remember what happened to Demry. At the first sign of trouble...back off and call for backup.
The intensity in her voice brought a vivid memory of Pedicaris’s comment at the crime scene on losing body parts. “I’ve got it. What will you be doing?”
“Going to the circus.” Allison headed out the door, then glanced back. “Oh, until you buy your own, you’ll now find my thesaurus and dictionary on my desk shelves.”
He almost dropped the coffee.
Minutes later Carillo came out of his office carrying a printout and ran through a list of wants and warrants, department memos, and overnight activity. Then pointed at Natalie Herrera.
While she updated on her rape investigations, Zane sipped his coffee and considered the subtext of Allison’s parting comment. It had come through loud and clear: buy his own reference books and stay out of her desk. Viapiana was bang on about her. She must be psychic. Or psychometric. Which made him wonder if she also knew he read the computer search and NCIC teletype.
His telephone rang. A male voice said, “I know this blonde you’re looking for, but she’ll only talk to you...just you, not Goodnight. Don’t even tell her about this call. Your blonde will meet you across the street at Quickie’s in fifteen minutes.” Before Zane could ask any questions, the line went dead.
“You’re up, Kerr,” Carillo said.
He hurriedly organized his thoughts and reported what they had on the case, shoving aside speculation about his anonymous caller’s information. Then he gritted his teeth through Hugh Bass’s summary of the convenience store robberies he and Carl Ng were working, impatiently waiting to escape.
Briefing had held him up five
minutes past the time set by his caller. Racing down the stairs to ground level and jogging across the parking lot and Brazos Street toward Quickie’s suggestive sign--“Want it fast and hot? Have a Quickie!”–took another five. Zane crossed his fingers that his blonde had waited.
The handful of customers at the umbrella-shaded tables outside included no blondes of either sex who looked tall and slim enough to be the one he wanted. He tried inside, straining to see after the glare of sunlight.
“Over here, cowboy,” a contralto voice purred.
She sat at one of the little window tables with a tall Styrofoam cup of coffee. If she were Blondie, no wonder she set Demry’s testosterone pumping. Zane’s wanted to react, too. A tousled platinum mane framed high cheek bones and dramatic eyes and brushed cleavage exposed by a t-shirt slashed into a plunging neckline. The wrapped denim skirt exposed long legs enticingly displayed by her perch on the tall chair. The picture of an Elvish princess in touch with her inner tramp.
She gestured toward the other chair. “Have a seat, Detective Kerr.”
He took it, setting his Stetson and sunglasses on the table. “What’s your name?”
Zane almost expected her to give him a female alias, but she said, “Peter Makepeace.”
Makepeace? Zane felt his brows shoot up.
Makepeace said, “Sergeant Drew Makepeace is my uncle. That’s why the cloak and dagger stuff...because this is so embarrassing.”
“Embarrassing?” An odd way to react to being a material witness in a murder.
“Yeah.” Makepeace grimaced. “First off, I swear I didn’t have anything to do with killing that guy. Not directly, anyway, but...” He grimaced again. “Well...I pulled a dumb stunt that maybe is the reason he got killed. So I can’t face Drew or Allison. At least, not yet.”
Interesting. Zane dug his notebook from his inside coat pocket. “Tell me about it.”
Makepeace took a deep breath. “Yeah. Well, I work for A&A Repossession Services? I’m a repo man...and a damn good one. This is one of my working outfits. Not bad, huh? It’ll get me into a guy’s pants for his car keys almost every time.”