Driving Reign

by TG Wolff

  DRIVING REIGN

  The De La Cruz Case Files

  TG Wolff

  Copyright © 2020 by TG Wolff

  All rights reserved. No part of the book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

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  The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Cover design by JT Lindroos

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  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Driving Reign

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Books by the Author

  Preview from Cutthroat by Paul Heatley

  Preview from Never the Crime by Colin Conway and Frank Zafiro

  Preview from Together They Were Crimson by Ryan Sayles

  For Kathy. Who knew life could be so wonderfully surprising?

  Chapter One

  “She’s not dead.” Cleveland homicide Detective Jesus De La Cruz stood beside the hospital bed, watching the sheet over the woman’s chest rhythmically rise and fall.

  “I know she’s not dead. I wouldn’t have ‘MD’ after my name if I couldn’t tell a comatose patient from a dead one.” Dr. Oscar Bollier had the ruffled look of a man above caring what society thought. He normally spoke in a tone underwritten by arrogance. Today, superiority was replaced with something Cruz couldn’t read. It was more than sad; less than desperate.

  “So why am I here?”

  “Because she shouldn’t be.”

  The cop and the doctor met by chance, a wrong room number left on a message. Cruz had been in the bed, the right side of his face doing an imitation of dog food after the bloody night that ended his undercover narcotics career. The doctor took an interest in the cop suffering through alcohol withdrawal. He had been patient, returning daily, throwing a life preserver to the drowning man. Eventually, Cruz grabbed on.

  And so, he waited with equal patience for the story of the not-dead woman to unfold.

  “Her name is Sophie DeMusa. She’s a senior at Case Western Reserve University and works as a waitress at Three Witches. Do you know it?”

  Cruz shook his head.

  “It’s one of those hip places on Murray Hill, close to campus. She lives in the apartment below. She was found in her bedroom, nasty cut on her head, and a handful of pills in her stomach.”

  The richness of the girl’s Mediterranean heritage showed through the pallor of unconsciousness. Her heart-shaped face featured the sculpted contours of a Greek or Roman maiden. Her eyes tipped up, though, nearly cat like. Exotic. Objectively beautiful.

  Beauty was what it was. Not necessarily happy or healthy or stable. Beautiful people killed themselves just as often as the rest of us.

  “She didn’t try to kill herself,” Bollier added, reading his mind.

  Cruz mentally rolled his eyes. Maybe physically, too.

  “She wasn’t the kind to take pills,” Bollier said quickly, a bite in his voice now.

  “Pills didn’t cause that wound.” The side of the woman’s head was shaved, the short stubble disrupted by a line of stitches.

  “She hit her head on her nightstand.”

  When no further explanation came, Cruz waded in. “Since you called me, I assume you think someone other than her put those pills in her belly?”

  “Someone had to at least help. She wouldn’t turn to suicide.”

  Cruz exhaled slowly, searching for solid footing. If he heard it once, he heard it a hundred times. He wouldn’t do this or she would never do that. Denial was a slow, deep river. “Good people make bad decisions, Oscar. We both lived that truth. I’m sympathetic to the woman’s situation but not hearing anything needing my attention. I’m sorry she did this, but she needs a counselor, not a homicide detective. Call Dr. Edna,” he suggested, referring to Bollier’s psychiatrist friend who had been helpful to him during the Drug Head case. “She’s your better bet.”

  “You’re my better bet.” Bollier turned a hundred-thousand watts of ill-tempered doctor on him. “I said she wouldn’t kill herself, you’ll have to take that as fact, and since she wouldn’t, somebody else tried to. She lives in Cleveland, she was found in Cleveland, she’s in the hospital in Cleveland. You, a Cleveland detective, need to do your damn job and find her killer.”

  Cruz stood his ground, stamping out the temptation to go toe-to-toe with Bollier. Instead, he probed the reason behind the temper. “Who is she to you?”

  “She’s just a girl.” His gaze dropped to her face, his expression softening. “An acquaintance.”

  A lie. If anything got to him about his job, it was the number of lies. Big ones, little ones, lies of omission, of exaggeration. The lies were so old, they had their own AARP card.

  “Why are you looking at me like that? Stop it. You’re thinking too hard. You’re going to help her.” It wasn’t a question.

  First the lie, now an order. Cruz fought the instinct to push back because he respected the asshole doing the pushing. “Look, Oscar, I know you don’t want to hear it, but many suicides or attempts come with a plethora of friends and family who didn’t see it coming. Mental health issues can be overlooked and explained away by the people closest. At least now, you can get her the help she needs.”

  “I’m a doctor, you twit. I’ve forgotten more about suicide than you’ll ever know. One five-minute conversation and you’ve made up your mind. You’re not even going to look into the circumstances.” Bollier lifted his chin, exuding dominance and superiority. “In the years we have known each other, I have never asked for you favors or to use your position in anyway. Conversely, you have ‘picked my brain’ on your cases and asked me for connections to help you find the answers. You owe me. The entire department owes me. I’m calling in my marker. You won’t honor your obligation; I’ll call Montoya direct.”

  Cruz couldn’t think for the insult coursing through his veins. His mentor, his AA sponsor, was keeping a tally? Threatening to go over his head to homicide’s commander?

  Fuck peace-making.

  “You son of a bitch, you can—” Words flooded him now, articulating where the arrogant fucker could shove his threats. Except, some infinitesimal part of his brain told him anything he said now, he would regret. Or worse, he wouldn’t. “No. I’m not doing this with you. I’m walking away and if you’re as smart as you claim, you won’t follow.” He stalked out the door into the busy corridor.

  “She doesn’t have another option.” The pompous, white bread voice followed him down the hall. Nurses and orderlies stared as the words fell on deaf ears. “If you don’t step in, her killer gets away. I know you Jesus De La Cruz. You won’t let that happen. You won’t—”

  The doors to the floor closed behind him, cutting off the sermon.

  Cruz seethed as he stalked the circuitous route out of the hospital. Never in his thirty-three years on this planet had he so misjudged someone. He’d known from day one Bollier could be an asshole. He’d witnessed it, was entertained by it. Over the years, he fell into the delusion that he was immune from the tirades, that their relationship went deeper than superficial shit. He played the sap, short and simple, sitting bright-eyed and bushy-tailed waiting for the almighty Dr. Oscar Bollier to dispense bits of wisdom.

>   The thought of a tally was a sucker punch to his gut. The threat of going over his head a solid shot to the solar plex. The fucker knew where to hit him. Preoccupied, he hadn’t noticed the rain soaking his shirt or thought to use the coat he carried.

  He threw the coat in the car. “Damn him.” He started the engine, cursing Bollier as the chill penetrated to bone. Unthinking, he turned the heat on maximum and was blasted with air only a few digits above freezing. “Shit.” He turned it off with a jabbing finger, then threw the car in gear wanting only to get the hell out.

  A horn blared.

  Cruz slammed on the brakes, narrowly avoiding the car driving behind him down the aisle. “Shit. Shit, shit, shit.” He punctuated each word with a fist to his city-issued steering wheel. Taking a deep breath, he tried again, turning out of the parking garage and into the driving rain that matched his mood.

  Needing something more than his own company, he left University Circle for the suburb sitting atop the hill. In a one-bedroom apartment of a mixed-use development lived the woman who was an artist, a kindergarten teacher, and the best thing to happen to Cruz since…ever. Aurora Williams had tricked him into a date last Valentine’s Day and they’d been together since. Just three weeks shy of a year.

  A whole year. There had been tough months. She stood by him when he was more cop than boyfriend, when he’d been falsely accused of heinous behavior.

  Minutes later, he ran up the steps to her second-floor apartment two at a time, using his key to leave the rain behind. The door opened to the middle of her apartment. Blessed heat and the scent of his woman enveloped him. “Hey, baby, it’s me.”

  “Be right out.”

  Her large bedroom was on his right. Directly in front of him was the generously sized bathroom, door closed. To his left was the galley kitchen and living room all in one oversized space with a door to the small porch. He tossed the coat over a high-back chair back.

  Aurora’s corner unit had windows on the front and the side, filling the space with natural light even on the rainy day. In front of the room, a new canvas sat on an easel. Simple pencil lines hinted at what it would become. A couple, dancing. There were so few lines, no more than maybe ten, but he could see the man, his arms around the woman. Her head was back as if laughing. He remembered the dance. Hell, he remembered the moment. It was her birthday last fall. The last warm night, as it turned out. She wore purple and the heels he loved. He wore a dark gray suit she liked taking off him. It was a good night. A very good night.

  “Hello, baby.” Her arms snaked around his waist. “You’re wet. You should get out of that shirt. Why didn’t you wear a coat?”

  He turned and brought her in for a real hello. Aurora was mixed race, her father black, her mother white. He couldn’t say she resembled either. She had inherited her mother’s green eyes but instead of blonde hair, she had thick black hair that fell in rings. Barefoot, she fit perfectly under his chin and was tantalizingly close to mouth-to-mouth in those stacked heels of her painting.

  “Wow. Talk about your hellos. What did I do to deserve that?” She kissed his chin before stepping away, pulling him toward the bedroom.

  “Nothing and everything.” Something caught his eye. He clasped her hand and raised it. A white bandage covered the meaty part of her palm. “What happened?”

  “Oh, it’s just a little cut. Not a big deal.”

  He held on when she tugged, then peeked under the white tape. “That’s not a little cut. How did you do it? It’s pretty clean. Was it a knife?”

  While Cruz had worked the night before, Aurora had gone out with bride-to-be Erin Davis and the rest of the bridal party. Cruz was the best man to the groom, Matt Yablonski, the narcotics detective who was his closest friend. The big day was less than a month away, and, to his mind, the women used it as an excuse to shop, giggle, and party.

  “Stop it, Zeus,” she said, calling him by the nickname she’d given him on their first date. He wanted her to call him “Cruz,” but she couldn’t kiss a man she called by his last name. She pulled her hand away. “You’re sounding like a detective again. I thought you had plans today.”

  “I was going to help Yablonski clean out his basement, but he cancelled because of that.” He pointed out the window to the rain. “It’s January. What the hell is with this thirty-seven-degree rain shit? If it’s going to be cold, be cold. Twenty. Twenty’s a good number.” He went to the window, annoyed at the thick, gray clouds. “Let it snow, let it snow, let it fucking snow.”

  She cocked her head as if studying his pose. “What happened between you and Matt?”

  Yablonski and Cruz had worked narcotics together until the night that changed Cruz’s face, his life, and his career. Last year, Cruz made a call looking for information and met the bald man with the copper wire beard for breakfast. There was nothing subtle about the now-narcotics detective, including the way he ramrodded back into Cruz’s life. It was a welcome intrusion.

  “Yablonski has nothing to do with this.” Cruz had just gotten off the phone and was considering what to do with his now free Saturday when Bollier called. The memory got him worked up all over again. “You want to know what the fucker did?”

  “Matt?”

  “Bollier!” He gave her the play-by-play, finishing with the grand insult. “He’s calling in his marker. His marker. Like he’s been keeping fucking score for these last three years.”

  “Huh.” She ignored the shouting and the swearing. “Who’s the girl?”

  “Sophie DeMusa. Apparently figuring out who she is part of the little puzzle he’s created for me. He said she was, get this, an acquaintance. How does a fifty-something highbrow doc get to be acquainted with a college senior? He’s lying. I don’t know if I’m more pissed about the lie or the blackmail.”

  “He didn’t blackmail you.”

  He glared his disagreement with her assessment.

  “He’s strong-arming you, which is totally different. I wonder why?”

  “Because he’s an asshole.”

  “Stop it.”

  “He called me a twit, Aurora.”

  “And what did you call him?”

  “A son of a bitch, but that’s not the point. Don’t take his side.”

  “I’m not taking sides.” She unbuttoned his shirt, peeling the transparent material from his body. She opened the drawer filled with his clothing. Fingering through the folded shirts, she selected a soft cotton shirt in a blue she would call “sky.” “I know he hurt your feelings, but this is when you should think like a detective.”

  Denial was instant. “My feelings aren’t hurt and I’m still wet.”

  “Of course they are but put them aside. Oscar needs your help.” Aurora took a towel from a folded stack of laundry and patted his chest dry. “Why didn’t he just ask?”

  He snorted, lifting his arms to give her better access. “Oscar Bollier doesn’t ask for help. Ever. It’s like he thinks less of himself if he can’t do it alone.”

  “He always helps other people. He doesn’t think less of them.” She dried his back and then attended to the long braid hanging to his shoulder blades.

  “I’m surprised he called me at all. He’s never done it before.” It was true, he realized, and uncomfortable.

  “Well there’s your answer. That was him asking for help. You just missed it.”

  “I don’t miss things.” Even as he said it, he remembered his surprise at the request. He practically ran out of the house for the chance to help Bollier in one one-hundredth of the way he’d helped him. The memory humiliated him. “Maybe. Why the strong-arm then, Ms. Detective?”

  “Well…you weren’t going to help him so maybe,” she shrugged, “maybe this is important to him, and he needed a way to make you say yes.” She tossed the towel aside. “Why did you turn him down?”

  “I didn’t. I mean I did, but it wasn’t because I didn’t want to help. She needs a psychiatrist or a psychologist, not a hom
icide detective. She isn’t dead.” He pulled the dry shirt on, the warmth pleasant after the cold. “The girl tried to commit suicide, baby. Plain and simple. Some people can’t get past the emotion to accept the facts.”

  “That’s not Oscar, Zeus.” She frowned, her full lips pouting in consideration. “He’s pragmatic to a fault. The man doesn’t know how to handle emotions, if you ask me.”

  Aurora was right. Bollier thought with his head, not his heart. He put aside the feelings he refused to consider were hurt and thought like the detective he was. Bollier’s analytical mind didn’t have room for denial. There was more to the story, which meant this was his request for help. It was as subtle as a sledgehammer on a cantaloupe.

  “Cut Oscar a break,” she said softly. “Everyone needs one, every now and then.”

  “I guess.” He sighed, accepting he was going to give in. “He lied to me, too. He said she was only an acquaintance, but you should have seen the look on his face when he was next to her bed. What kind of secret does he have he can’t tell me?” This last question he posed to himself.

  She pulled away, leading him out of the bedroom. “Not all secrets are bad. Neither are all lies. Don’t jump to conclusions. He’ll tell you when he’s ready.”

  “You think so?”

  “Either that, or you’ll figure it out. You’re a detective. A damn good one. Do you want coffee?” She let go of his hand as she went into her narrow kitchen and the coffee maker sitting on the counter.

  “You know I do.” He went to the ceramic lotus flower he’d given her on their second date. Today it sat on a corner of the kitchen counter. It was cheap, and she knew it. He joked Buddhist monks made it. Mexican Buddhists based on the sticker on the bottom. It had become one of their inside jokes. Cruz picked the flower up, liking that each time he was in the apartment, it was moved.

  The paper under the trinket caught his attention. In big red letters were the words Final Notice. He thumbed through the stack of bills, half of which were overdue.