by J. R. Ward
“Not fast enough—you go to see Payne like this—”
“She doesn’t need the viewing pleasure, either. I’m just going to stay scarce for a day. Payne’s in recovery and is stable—at least, that’s what Jane told me, so I’m going to go to my forge.”
Butch held out his glass. “If you don’t mind?”
“Roger that.” V poured some for his boy, took another drink for himself and then yanked on some bottoms. Holding his arms out, he did a turn. “Better?”
“All I see are ankles and wrists—and FYI, you’re pulling a Miley-frickin’-Cyrus with that belly flash. Not attractive.”
“Fuck off.” As V grabbed another hit from the bottle, he decided that getting drunk was his new plan. “I can’t help it that you’re a goddamn midget.”
Butch barked a laugh and then got back to serious. “If you pull this shit again . . .”
“You asked me to take your clothes.”
“That’s not what I’m talking about.”
V tugged at the turtleneck’s sleeves and got absolutely nowhere with them. “You’re not going to have to step in, cop, and I’m not going to get myself killed. That’s not the point. I know where the line is.”
Butch cursed, his face going grim. “You say that, and I believe you think it’s true. But situations can spiral—especially that kind. You can be riding that wave of . . . whatever it is you need . . . and the tide can turn against you.”
V flexed his gloved hand. “Not possible. Not with this—and I really don’t want you talking to my girl about this, true. Promise me. You need to stay out of this.”
“Then you have to speak with her.”
“How can I tell her . . .” His voice broke, and he had to clear his throat. “How the fuck can I explain this to her?”
“How can you not. She loves you.”
V just shook his head. He couldn’t imagine telling his shellan he wanted to be hurt physically. It would kill her. And he absolutely didn’t want her to see him like this. “Look, I’m going to take care of this myself. All of it.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of, V.” Butch swallowed the rest of his Scotch on a oner. “That’s . . . our biggest problem.”
Jane was watching her patient sleep when her cell phone went off in her pocket. It wasn’t a call, but a text from V: Am home & goin 2 forge 2 wrk. Hw P? & u?
Her exhale was not about relief. He’d come back about ten minutes before full-on sunrise, and he wasn’t seeing her or his sister?
Screw this, she thought, as she stood up and walked out of the recovery suite.
After doing a handoff to Ehlena, who was in the clinic’s exam room updating the Brothers’ files, Jane marched down the corridor, hung a left into the office, and went out the back of the supply closet. No reason to futz around with the lock codes; she just ghosted through—
And there he was, about twenty yards down the tunnel, walking away from her . . . having passed the training center on his way to go even deeper into the mountain.
The fluorescent ceiling lights illuminated him from over his head, hitting his huge shoulders and his heavy lower body. Going by the gloss, his hair looked wet, and the lingering scent of the soap he always used was the confirmation that he’d just showered.
“Vishous.”
She said his name once, but the tunnel was an echo chamber that batted the syllables back and forth, multiplying them.
He stopped.
That was the only response she got.
After waiting for him to say something, to turn around . . . to acknowledge her, she discovered something new about her ghostly state: Even though she wasn’t technically alive, her lungs could still burn sure as if she were suffocating.
“Where did you go tonight,” she said, not expecting an answer.
And she didn’t get one. But he’d halted right under a ceiling fixture, so even from a distance she could see his shoulders tightening up.
“Why aren’t you turning around, Vishous.”
Dear God . . . what had he done at the Commodore? Oh, Jesus . . .
Funny, there was a reason that people “built” lives together. Although the choices you made as husband and wife were not bricks, and time was not mortar, you were still constructing something tangible and real. And right now, as her hellren refused to come over to her—hell, even show her his face—an earthquake was rumbling under what she had thought was solid ground.
“What did you do tonight,” she choked out.
At that, he pivoted on his heel and took two long steps toward her. But it wasn’t to get close. It was to step out of the direct light. Even still . . .
“Your face,” she gasped.
“I got into a fight with some lessers.” As she went to move forward, he held up his palm. “I’m fine. I just need some space right now.”
Something about this was off, she thought. And she hated the question that jumped into her mind—to the point where she refused to let it out.
Except then all they had was silence.
“How’s my sister?” he said abruptly.
Through a closed throat, she replied, “She’s resting comfortably still. Ehlena’s with her.”
“You should take some time off and have a rest.”
“I will.” Uh-huh, right. With things like this between them, she was never going to sleep again.
V dragged his gloved hand through his hair. “I don’t know what to say right now.”
“Were you with someone else?”
He didn’t even hesitate: “No.”
Jane stared at him . . . and then slowly exhaled. One thing that was true about her hellren, one thing you could always take to the bank, was that Vishous didn’t lie. For all the faults he had, that was not one of them.
“All right,” she said. “You know where to find me. I’ll be in our bed.”
She was the one who turned away and started walking in the opposite direction. Even though the distance between them broke her heart, she wasn’t going to badger him into something he wasn’t capable of, and if he needed space . . . well, she would give it to him.
But not forever, that was for sure.
Sooner or later, that male was going to talk to her. He had to or she was going to . . . God, she didn’t know what.
Her love wasn’t going to survive forever in this vacuum, though. It just couldn’t.
FIFTEEN
The fact that José de la Cruz hit a Dunkin’ Donuts drivethrough on the way into downtown Caldwell was one hell of a cliché. Collective wisdom had all homicide detectives drinking coffee and eating doughnuts, but that wasn’t always the truth.
Sometimes there wasn’t time to stop.
And man, screw the television shows and the detective novels, the reality was, he functioned better on caffeine and with a little sugar in his bloodstream.
Plus he lived for the honey dips. So sue him.
The call that had woken him and his wife up had come in at close to six a.m., which considering the number of nighttime ring-a-dings he got was almost civilized: Dead bodies, like live ones with medical problems, didn’t play by nine-to-five rules—so the nearly decent hour had been a novel benediction.
And that wasn’t the only thing going his way. Courtesy of it being a Sunday morning, the roads and highway were bowling-alley empty, and his unmarked made excellent time in from the burbs—so his coffee was still pipin’ hot as he piloted himself down into the warehouse district, pulling rolling stops at the red lights.
The lineup of squad cars announced the location where the body had been found even better than the yellow warning tape that had been wound around everywhere like ribbon on some fucked-up Christmas present. With a curse, he parked parallel to the brick wall of the alley and got out, sipping and walking his way over to the knot of grim-looking blue unis.
“Hey, Detective.”
“S’up, Detective.”
“Yo, Detective.”
He nodded at the boys. “Mornin’ all. How we d
oing?”
“We didn’t touch her.” Rodriguez nodded over to the Dumpster. “She’s in there and she’s had initial photographs taken by Jones. Coroner and the CSI types are on the way. So’s the man-sogonist.”
Ah, yes, their faithful photog. “Thanks.”
“Where’s your new partner?”
“Coming.”
“He ready for this?”
“We’ll see.” No doubt this grungy alley was plenty familiar with people tossing their cookies. So if the greenhorn lost his proverbial lunch, s’all good.
José ducked under the tape and walked over to the Dumpster. As always when he approached a body, he found his sense of hearing grew almost unbearably acute: The soft chatter of the men behind him, the sound of the soles of his shoes on the asphalt, the whistling breeze off the river . . . everything was too loud, like the volume of the whole damn world was cranked up into the red zone.
And of course, the irony was that the purpose of his being here, on this morning, in this alley . . . the purpose of all the cars and the men and the tape . . . was perfectly silent.
José gripped his Styrofoam cup as he peered over the rusted lip of the bin. Her hand was the first thing he saw, a pale lineup of fingers with nails that were split and had something brown under them.
She’d been a fighter, whoever she was.
As he stood over yet another dead girl, he wished like hell his job would go through a slow month or week . . . or for shit’s sake, even a night. Hell, a career slump was what he was really gunning for: When you were in his line of work, it was hard to take satisfaction in what you did. Even if you solved a case, someone was still burying a loved one.
The cop next to him sounded like he was on the business end of a bullhorn: “You want me to open the other half?”
José almost told the guy to pipe down, but chances were good he was talking like he was in a library. “Yeah. Thanks.”
The officer used a nightstick to push the lid up far enough for the light to stream in, but the guy didn’t look inside. He just stood there like one of those stiffs in front of Buckingham Palace, staring out across the alley while focusing on nothing.
As José rose up onto the balls of his feet and got a look, he didn’t blame the uni for his reticence.
Lying in a bed of metal curls, the female was naked, her gray, mottled skin strangely luminous in the dawn’s diffused light. Going by her face and body, she looked to be in her late teens, early twenties. Caucasian. Hair had been cut off at the roots, so close in places that the scalp was lacerated. Eyes . . . had been removed from their sockets.
José took a pen out of his pocket, stretched downward, and carefully pushed her stiff lips apart. No teeth—not a one left in the ragged gums.
Moving to the right, he upped one of her hands so he could see the underside of the fingertips. Sheered clean off.
And the defacement didn’t end at the head and hands. . . . There were gouges in her flesh, one at the top of her thigh, another down her upper arm, and two on the insides of her wrists.
Cursing under his breath, he was certain she’d been dumped here. Not enough privacy to do this kind of work—this shit required time and tools . . . and restraints to keep her put.
“What do we have, Detective?” his new partner said from behind him.
José glanced over his shoulder at Thomas DelVecchio, Jr. “Have you had breakfast yet?”
“No.”
“Good.”
He stepped back so Veck could have a look. As the guy was taller by nearly six inches, he didn’t have to arch up to see in; all he did was tilt at the hips. And then he just stared. No lurching over to the wall and throwing up. No gasping. No real change in expression, either.
“The body was dumped here,” Veck said. “Had to be.”
“Her.”
Veck looked over, his dark blue eyes smart and unfazed. “I’m sorry?”
“She was dumped here. That’s a person. Not a thing, DelVecchio.”
“Right. Sorry. She.” The guy leaned in again. “I think we’ve got ourselves a trophy keeper.”
“Maybe.”
Dark brows shot up. “There’s a lot missing . . . on her.”
“You watch CNN lately?” José wiped his pen on a tissue.
“I don’t have time for TV.”
“Eleven women have been found like this in the past year. Chicago, Cleveland and Philly.”
“Shiiiiiit.” Veck popped a piece of gum in his mouth and chewed hard. “So you’re wondering if this is the beginning for us?”
As the guy ground his molars, José rubbed his eyes against memories that bubbled up. “When did you quit?”
Veck cleared his throat. “Smoking? ’Bout a month ago.”
“How’s it going?”
“Sucks ass.”
“I’ll bet.”
José put his hands on his hips and refocused. How the hell were they going to find out who this girl was? There were a countless number of missing young women in the state of New York—and that was assuming the killer hadn’t done this in Vermont or Massachusetts or Connecticut and driven her here.
One thing was for sure: He’d be damned if some motherfucker was going to start picking off Caldie’s girls. Wasn’t going to happen on his watch.
As he turned away, he clapped his partner on the shoulder. “I give you ten days, buddy.”
“Till what.”
“Till you’re back in the saddle with the Marlboro Man.”
“Don’t underestimate my willpower, Detective.”
“Don’t underestimate what you’re going to feel like when you go home and try to sleep tonight.”
“I don’t sleep much, anyway.”
“This job ain’t gonna help.”
At that moment, the photographer arrived with her click-click, flash-flash, and her bad attitude.
José nodded in the opposite direction. “Let’s back off and let her do her thing.”
Veck glanced over and his eyes popped as he got glared at but good. The fuck-off reception was no doubt a news flash for the guy—Veck was one of those types women gravitated to, as the last two weeks had proven: Down at HQ, the females were all over him.
“Come on, DelVecchio, let’s start casing this joint.”
“Roger that, Detective.”
Ordinarily, José might have had the guy call him de la Cruz, but none of his “new” partners had lasted much longer than a month, so what was the point. “José” was out of the question, of course—only one person had called him that on the job, and that bastard had disappeared three years ago.
It took about an hour for him and Veck to nose around and learn absolutely nothing material. There were no security cameras on the outsides of the buildings and no witnesses who had come forward, but the CSI guys were going to crawl all around with their headgear and their little plastic baggies and their tweezers. Maybe something would turn up.
The coroner showed at nine and did his thing, and the body was cleared for removal another hour or so after that. And when folks needed a hand with the body, José was surprised to find that Veck snapped on a pair of latex specials and jumped right in that Dumpster.
Just before the coroner took off with her, José asked about the time of death and was told about noontime the day before.
Great, he thought as the cars and vans started to pull out. Nearly twenty-four hours dead before they found her. She could well have been driven in from out of state.
“Database time,” he said to Veck.
“I’m on it.”
As the guy turned away and headed for a motorcycle, José called out, “Gum is not a food group.”
Veck stopped and glanced over his shoulder. “Are you asking me for breakfast, Detective.”
“Just don’t want you passing out on the job. It would embarrass you and give me another body to step over.”
“You’re all heart, Detective.”
Maybe he used to be. Now he was just hungry himself and h
e didn’t feel like eating alone. “I’ll meet you at the twenty-four in five.”
“Twenty-four?”
That’s right; he wasn’t from here. “Riverside Diner on Eighth Street. Open twenty-four hours a day.”
“Got it.” The guy put on a black helmet and swung a leg over some kind of contraption that was mostly engine. “I’m buying.”
“Suit yourself.”
Veck slammed the kick start down and juiced the motor. “I always do, Detective. Always.”
As he tore off, he left awake of testosterone in the alley, and José felt like a middle-aged minivanner in comparison as he schlepped over to his oatmeal-colored unmarked. Sliding behind the wheel, he put his nearly empty and totally cold Dunkin’ Donuts fister into the cup holder and looked past the tape to that Dumpster.
Nabbing his cell phone out of his suit jacket, he dialed into HQ. “Hey, it’s de la Cruz. Can you patch me over to Mary Ellen?” The wait was less than a minute. “M.E., how you be? Good . . . good. Listen, I want to hear the call that came in about the body over by the Commodore. Yup. Sure—just play it back. Thanks—and take your time.”
José shoved the key into the slot at the steering wheel. “Great, thanks, M.E.”
He took a deep breath and cranked the engine over—
Yeah, I’d like to rahport a dead bahdy. Nah, I’m not giving my name. It’s in a Dumpstah in an alley off Tenth Street, two blocks ova from th’ Commahdore. Looks to be a Caucasian female, late teens, early twenties . . . Nah, I’m not giving my name. . . . Hey, how ’bout you get down the address and stahp worrying ’bout me. . . .
José gripped his phone and started to shake all over.
The South Boston accent was so clear and so familiar it was like time had gotten into a car wreck and whiplashed backward.
“Detective? You want to hear it again?” he heard Mary Ellen say in his ear.
Closing his eyes, he croaked out, “Yes, please . . .”
When the recording was finished, he listened to himself thank Mary Ellen and felt his thumb hit the end button to terminate the call.
Sure as water down a sink drain, he was sucked into a nightmare from about two years ago . . . when he’d walked into a shitty, run-down apartment that was full of empty Lagavulin bottles and pizza boxes. He remembered his hand reaching out to a closed bathroom door, the damn thing quaking from palm to fingertips.