by Beverly Bird
“No.” The word came out of her too fast. Molly felt herself flushing a little. “You went to the trouble to get here, and I’ve got the better part of a bottle of wine left. Besides, it really burns my toast to let those bastards dictate my personal time.”
Danny stared at her for a moment, then felt himself grinning in spite of it all. “Yeah. It would.” He thought about it. “You could pull out of the rec center. That would fix the problem.” Before he could react, the red rocking chair cushion was sailing in his direction. It hit him in the face. “Dream on,” she muttered.
“I was just trying to fix your problem.”
“I think I’ll resign from the P.D. instead and make the center my full time occupation.”
“You’re going to have to give up this apartment then. I got my first paycheck today and I can tell you it’s not going to take you far.”
It happened again—another new sensation sliding through her, wrapping itself around her heart. This time it was respect. Molly cleared her throat carefully. “You gave up a lot when you left the Mercados. And you didn’t have to. You probably would never have done time if you hadn’t left the mob. You were a bodyguard. Small fry, really, at least to law enforcement. If you had just stayed with them, you probably would never have gone to jail, and you’d be living so much better now.” But he’d stood on principle, she thought.
“A man does what a man has to do.” Danny went into the kitchen to get the wine bottle.
“Why didn’t you get even with them, with the mob?” she asked when he came back. “Why didn’t you talk after you were in jail?”
This was inching too close to dangerous ground. Danny wondered if Carmine’s boys had wired her apartment. He hoped to hell not, or they would know that he was here in spite of all his efforts to lose them. “I knew that eventually I’d be walking the streets again,” he said finally.
She blanched. “And they’d kill you for it then.”
“If they didn’t get me before I even set foot out the prison doors.”
“Oh, Danny.” Something in her eyes hurt him.
“Molly, I made my choices. I went in knowing what I was getting in to. I got out knowing there would be no easy way out. That was what I tried to tell Bobby this afternoon.”
Her eyes sharpened. “Bobby?”
“Bobby J.” He’d been so wrapped up in seeing her—and what did that mean?—that he’d forgotten what he had come by to tell her. “He sneaked into my apartment this afternoon.”
“Bobby J. sneaked into your apartment?” She looked dumb-founded. “Why?”
“To talk to me. I think to find out why I’d done what I’d done.”
“Why you got into organized crime?”
“Mostly why I got out, and how.”
Her face cleared. She beamed. “This is big.”
“Very big.”
“I’m blown away.”
“So was I. I’m just worried about what it is that he’s into—you know, that he would come to me with questions, that he felt that kind of…I don’t know, rapport with me.”
Molly frowned. “I hadn’t thought of that.”
“I did, and long before today. Molly, there’s something about him. Something desperate. It sounds like his mother takes the money he earns—doing whatever it is he’s doing—to buy liquor. Probably drugs, too. That’s my take. That kid’s going to snap.”
“He’s doing something he knows is wrong…and for all the wrong reasons,” she murmured.
“Yeah. I think if he actually thought he was helping his family, he’d never get out. He’d be a career criminal. But he knows he’s not helping them because his mother gloms onto the money.”
“You were helping your mother,” she said, “but you got out.”
“No. That was different. I always had to pay for things behind her back. She never really accepted the money.”
“I’d like her then,” Molly said suddenly, surprising him.
Something cold dove inside him to banish the heat he’d felt only moments before. He hoped to hell that she and Mona wouldn’t meet in the afterlife. What was he doing here?
He was here because there was nowhere else he wanted to be, he answered himself, and no one else who would understand Bobby J.’s overture. He was here because the lure had been too great.
“I’ll try to talk to Bobby again,” Molly said.
“It won’t do any good. Not with this kid.”
Her spine snapped straight. “Why not?”
“You’re a cop.” She snarled something under her breath but he interrupted her. “Let me work with this and see what I can accomplish. This kind of situation is why I went to work there at the center in the first place.”
She was not going to feel these weird sensations for him anymore. Molly clapped a hand to her stomach as it rolled around inside her. “I can put officers on him, try to keep a covert eye on him to find out what he’s into.”
“He’d pick them out in a heartbeat. Besides, it doesn’t sound as though you have many friends within the department at the moment.”
More important, she didn’t know which ones she could trust.
Still…“He’s just a kid.”
“He’s street smart. Think of your brother.”
Molly flinched, but she knew he hadn’t meant it to hurt her this time. “There’s got to be something I can do.”
“There is. For once in your life back away from the wall. Stop hurling yourself at it. Let me take care of this.”
Molly hesitated. “Okay.” She trusted him with this, she realized. Deep down, in her soul, she trusted Danny with Bobby J.
Maybe they were on the same side after all.
“What was that?” he asked sarcastically.
“I said okay.”
“Got a calendar anywhere? I want to mark this day.”
“Don’t push your luck.”
He held his hands up in surrender. “Not me.”
Molly snorted. “Knock it off. Innocence doesn’t suit you.”
He raised a brow. “Yeah? What does?”
“Horns, a tail and a pitchfork come to mind.”
He laughed, but this time it hurt something inside him. It was too close to the truth. “Molly, I really should go. I only came by to tell you about Bobby J.”
She hesitated. “You could have called. Ron has my phone number, too.”
“I wanted to see you.”
Everything—everything—inside her moved this time. “Why?”
“Do you really want me to answer that?”
She opened her mouth with a quick response, then she sighed. “I—no. No, I don’t think I do.” Not with her current problems with the department, she thought. It would just complicate things if there really was any kind of…consorting going on.
Danny wasn’t sure what he would have said anyway. He wasn’t sure if he knew the answer to her question, and if he did, if he wanted to face it. A cop.
Molly sprang suddenly to her feet. Moment over, he thought. Amen.
“Want to kiss me goodbye?” she quipped.
“Want me to?”
She tilted her head to the side in a dangerously provocative way. He watched those curls spill to her shoulder, and his fingers itched again. Reach for her, just reach for her. She won’t hit you this time, she won’t stop you.
“Well?” he challenged.
“Hold on. I’m thinking about it.”
“Too late. You lost your chance.”
“I could change your mind about that.” Her eyes glinted at him.
“You’re trouble,” he said softly.
“Yes. Everywhere I go.”
Danny stepped around her fast and headed for the back door.
“Coward,” she whispered after him.
“Watch yourself. Someday I’m liable to call you on that.”
Excitement slid under her skin again, hot and expectant. This was crazy. Then he was gone, the door swishing quietly shut behind him.
Moll
y sat slowly on the floor again and gulped her wine. It finally occurred to her she’d never actually found out why he was using the back door.
The man stroked the small pin on his lapel thoughtfully. “This is a problem.”
“The kid’s shaky,” the second man agreed. “And he’s associated with her through that rec center she’s always hanging out at.”
“If he says anything to her, it will just fan her flames. All right, yes, I see your point. Talk to the boy. If he says anything about…disassociating himself from us, he’ll have to be eliminated.”
“Why not her? She’s been snooping around personnel now. The IAD charge didn’t even slow her down. And she’s starting to talk about bad cops.”
“Relax. Officer French is enjoying her last days as well. We’re not going to give her time to repeat that theory to anyone.”
Molly knew she wasn’t supposed to be this happy. Her life was a shambles.
She really couldn’t have anything to do with Danny, she thought, at least not if she wanted to keep her career intact. If she had a sane cell in her brain, she would avoid him for all she was worth right now. And yet she couldn’t stop thinking about him…or smiling when she did. It went beyond any kind of sense that she should be on cloud nine this morning over something—someone—she couldn’t possibly have, but she bounced into the war room anyway, cheerful.
Gannon and Hasselman were there.
“Top of the morning to you all,” she greeted them, and went directly to the crime book table.
“With a name like French, something tells me you’re not Irish.” Gannon lifted a brow at her as he finished writing out a report.
“You’re one crazy female, you know that?” Hasselman muttered as he poked at the force computer that still wasn’t working right. Molly watched him for a moment to see if he was actually doing anything to it, then she pulled out a chair and picked up a fresh pile of filing.
“I love this stuff.” She sighed. “I live for it. It’s the only way I know what’s going on around here.”
“Maybe because nobody wants you here,” Hasselman retorted.
Gannon sat back and crossed his arms over his chest. “Frank, I think those are fighting words.”
“Where’s your camera, Hasselman?” Molly asked.
“What camera?”
“You know, point, focus, click? That camera.” She didn’t look directly at him as she spoke, but she kept one corner of her eye on him.
“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”
Either he was an excellent liar, Molly thought, or he had never taken pictures of her and Danny at two o’clock in the morning. She was inclined to go with the latter.
“I’m out of here.” Hasselman stood from the computer. “You work with her,” he said to Gannon.
“Actually, I don’t find her all that unpalatable.” Gannon waited until Hasselman was gone, then he asked, “Want to lift that no-parking thing now?”
So he knew about the IAD matter. It punctured Molly’s balloon a little. She let her breath out carefully. She liked Joe—but someone had obviously let the word around that she suspected cops were working for the mob. Molly looked over to meet his steady gaze.
“If I do it at this point, it’s as good as admitting that I had a personal reason for asking you.”
“Did you?”
Molly stayed silent. Gannon finally nodded, getting her message. “Okay. But can I give you some advice? Stop being so…I don’t know, out there with the likes of Frank.”
Molly sighed. “I don’t know how to be any other way, Joe. I just wanted to find out if he knew anything about those pictures.” Then something occurred to her and she looked at him sharply. “Do you know who took them?”
Gannon held up both hands as though to ward off a blow. “No. I have no idea who started your mess. But you do tick off a lot of people around here.”
“Why do you think that is, Joe?”
He didn’t hesitate. “Because you’re smart. And you’re honest. You came from a larger P.D. in a rougher city so you probably have experience they don’t have, like I said before. And you’re a woman. Through the last century, female officers have made up maybe 1 percent of our number. This is South Texas, Molly, land of the Texas Rangers.”
“Yeah, well, there have been a few pistol-packin’ mommas in these parts, too.”
He laughed. Molly didn’t think he’d ever done that with her before. “I’m just saying, IAD asked me about that no-parking sign.”
“What did you tell them?”
“That I thought the building was a fire hazard.”
Molly closed her eyes briefly in relief. “Thank you, Joe.”
“You’re welcome. Now would you like a little more advice? Why don’t you start hitting this room after your shift is over so no one sees you here?”
“There’s never anybody here anyway.”
“They have eyes on this room, Molly. It belongs to them.”
Her heart jerked. He was telling her that he thought there were bad cops involved here—and that they were behind her IAD problem. First Spence Harrison…and now Joe Gannon.
She was definitely on the right track. Now all she had to do was prove it.
“They have to sleep sometime,” he said. “You work the four-to-midnight, so come here afterward while they’re sleeping.”
Molly stood from the table. “Okay, I guess the filing is all yours then.” She grinned at him and scooted out the door.
She was halfway down the corridor to the parking lot door when she skidded to a stop and turned back to look thoughtfully at the records office. She had returned Danny’s file days ago. She’d done it before he’d acknowledged—sort of—that the police department might have been involved in his arrest, at least to some extent.
Who had gone to Danny’s condo and found money that shouldn’t have been there? she wondered now. Who had thrown cuffs on him on the side of the road and never considered that he was heading in the wrong direction at the time? None of the officers named in that report had thrown a red flag at her the first time she’d read the file—because she’d been so wrapped up in the issue of Danny’s crime and what it meant to her attraction to him that she hadn’t been paying attention to what those names might mean to her “bad cop” theory. Molly went back to the office and stepped inside.
“Hi, Gale.”
“Well, if it’s not persona non grata,” the woman responded, looking up from her computer.
“Ouch. You heard.” Obviously the news was all over the police station, Molly thought.
Gale came to the counter. “Eli Tripician was just here picking up copies of all your arrest records.”
Molly’s heart hitched. “Is that good or bad? This is the first time anything like this has happened to me. I don’t know what to expect.”
“It’s good. He’s already putting a case together for your merit.”
Molly nodded, breathing a little better. She really had to pay the man a visit. “Well, anyway, I need that Daniel Gates file back.”
“IAD has it.”
This time her heart fell like a burned-out meteor. “They know I took Danny’s file?” That was bad.
“I’m sorry. When they first inquired if you’d been in here lately, I didn’t know what was afoot. I would have tried to cover for you—as much as I was able.”
Molly was trying to digest too much at once. Her thoughts scurried then stuck on the one thing that really bothered her. “Damn it, now I can’t even find out who picked him up and who got the money back.”
“Well, that’s actually not true. Everything we get through here is scanned into the computer system so we have that record as well as a hard copy.”
“There’s a computer copy?” Molly perked up.
“Give me ten minutes or so to print it out, then come back.”
Molly nodded. “I will.”
She moved down the hall to personnel. Evie Castelano looked up and grinned when she saw h
er. “Ah, our resident bad girl.”
Molly sighed. Already this was getting old. “Who’d you hear it from?”
“The first time? Paulie McCauley. Then I heard it again at the water cooler.”
“From anyone who’s on the task force?”
Evie scratched her temple. “I don’t think so, but I have trouble keeping track of who all is on that list unless they come here looking for something.”
“Have any of them done that?”
Evie shook her head. Her beehive jiggled. “Only you.”
“So am I on the approved list yet?”
“Sorry, honey. I’ve been waiting for word and I haven’t gotten it.”
“Well, don’t hold your breath.” Molly started to turn away, then she went still.
Evie’s keys—or someone’s keys—were right there on a far corner of the counter, right next to a paper cup of convenience-store coffee and a paperback novel. Would the one to this room be on there? The woman came to the counter and picked up the coffee cup to sip from it slowly.
They were her keys.
“What’re you going to do about the charges?” Evie asked.
Molly jolted and pulled her gaze from the keys. “I’m going to kick some serious butt. I’m going to do whatever it takes to clear my name.” Then she glanced at the keys again. She realized that her heart was beating a little too hard. She left the personnel office.
“Here you go,” Gale said when she returned to the records room. The woman passed a new file to her.
Molly opened it. She scanned it for what she wanted. “Beau Maguire. I’ll be damned.”
“What?”
“Beau Maguire went to Danny’s condo and confiscated the money.” It didn’t mean a thing, Molly told herself. She was too much the investigator to overlook the obvious. Maguire had been on patrol in that area during that shift. He had taken the call to check the situation out. It was a perfect cover, she thought. It offered an almost too-perfect explanation for his involvement in the whole thing.
If she could just get into the personnel shift records, she could find out if that area had been his regular patrol of if he’d been strategically moved there for the afternoon. She thought of Evie’s keys again and her heart skipped a beat. She found herself wondering if Maguire owned a camera.