Fatal Threat

by Marie Force

  Sam looked down and saw the entire area was already purple. “Got hit by a car.”

  “Sam...this looks bad.”

  “Can you take an X-Ray or something?”

  “No, I cannot take an X-Ray. You need to be in the ER.”

  “I’m not going to the ER. I have a case to close and a wedding to be in. Too much to do for that shit show.”

  “What if you broke your hip?”

  “I’ll deal with it after the wedding.”

  “You’re ridiculous.”

  “So I’ve been told.” Sam buttoned her shorts. “Thanks for the consult, Doc.”

  “Anytime. Let it be noted you’re going back on duty against medical advice.”

  “So noted.”

  Sam made her way painfully along the hallway that led to the pit, figuring if she could walk on her leg, nothing was broken. Before the last turn, she almost ran smack into her good friend Detective Ramsey. This day just kept getting better.

  “Well, look who it is. Our resident whore. Who else have you fucked besides Archelotta and Farnsworth?”

  Sam had never fucked the chief, who’d been like a beloved uncle to her growing up, but she’d learned the hard way not to let Ramsey get a rise out of her. It was because of him that she was awaiting word on whether the grand jury would indict her for assaulting him.

  “Sorry you have nothing to do, Ramsey. Should I talk to Lieutenant Davidson about all the free time you seem to have?”

  “Maybe I should spend some of my free time the way you spend yours, fucking my way to the top.”

  “Might be a good plan since the old-fashioned work-for-it path hasn’t really yielded the results you were hoping for.”

  His eyes narrowed and his mouth tightened with rage. “You fucking miserable cunt.”

  “Awww, is that supposed to hurt me? You’ll have to do better than that. I hear that one by ten a.m. every day from the scumbags I arrest. You’d get along well with them. Gotta run. Unlike you, I actually have a job to do.”

  She went around the corner to the pit and nearly crashed into Gonzo in her haste.

  “Holy shit,” he said. “That was intense, but you won that round.”

  “Heard that, did you?”

  “Yep. I was standing by in case you needed backup.”

  “Thanks. I’m learning to fight with my words rather than my fists.”

  He patted her on the head. “Awww, my little girl is growing up.”

  Sam laughed and hobbled the final few feet to her office, where she grasped her desk for support. “That’ll be the day, when I finally grow up.” She took a swig from one of the many abandoned bottles of water on her desk, downed a couple of painkillers she found in her desk drawer and then lowered herself gently into the chair, trying to ignore the excruciating flash of pain that came from her hip. Fucking hell. It had better not be broken. “Where is he?”

  “Interview 2.”

  “Cruz!”

  He popped up from his chair and came around the wall of his cubicle to her office. “You rang?”

  “I need you to play good cop for me.”

  “What else is new?” he asked with a long-suffering sigh.

  Sam glanced at Gonzo.

  “Adding it to the list.”

  God, she loved working with them. “I want you to pretend to be deeply concerned about his injuries. Ask him how he feels, if we can get him anything. Let him show you his so-called busted ribs. Kill him with kindness. Got it?”

  “Yep.”

  “We’ll give you ten, and then Gonzo and I will show up. You punch out when we go in.”

  “I never get to have any of the fun.”

  “You have all the fun because you get to work with me.”

  “I think some days she honestly believes that,” Freddie said to Gonzo as he went out the door to do her bidding.

  “Our young Freddie is coming along very nicely,” she said to Gonzo when they were alone. “His sarcasm is particularly well developed.”

  “Wonder where he learned that fine art?”

  “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

  “As well you should.”

  She put her head back against the chair and closed her eyes. “Tell me everything we know about this guy. Leave nothing out.”

  Gonzo recited a criminal history that dated back to high school, beginning with shoplifting, vandalism and other minor offenses that had landed him in juvie by his fifteenth birthday. After six months there, he’d upped his game, getting into more serious offenses. “His most recent arrest, a month ago, was for assault with a deadly weapon. He’s out on personal recognizance awaiting trial. Has a public defender on the case. I read the arrest reports. They’ve got him screwed, glued and tattooed, as you would say, on the assault.”

  “I love when a suspect is out on PR and we can threaten to revoke his bail.”

  “It does give us some good leverage.”

  “So if he’s already screwed, then what’s the motive on taking a job torturing info out of someone?”

  “Money,” Gonzo said. “Maybe he wanted to get himself a better lawyer or has kids to support while he’s inside. Could be anything.”

  “That’s where I need to hit him. Find out what the soft underbelly is.”

  Freddie returned. “I’ve greased the skids for you, LT. He’s still outraged but not quite as much as he was before I went in. The ribs are definitely bruised, but I don’t think they look broken.”

  “My ass is not fat enough—yet—to break ribs, despite what he says. No word about lawyers?”

  “Surprisingly, no.”

  “Good job. Thanks.” She put her hands flat on her desk and hauled her not-fat-enough-to-break-ribs ass out of the chair, swearing when pain whipped through her, leaving her sweaty and light-headed.

  “Jesus, Sam,” Gonzo muttered.

  “I’m fine. Let’s go.” She let Gonzo lead the way so she could take her time walking the short distance to Interview 2. Outside the door, she took a deep breath and blew it out. This was for Peter, and she was determined to get it right.

  “Ready?” Gonzo asked.

  She nodded. “You handle the nuts and bolts. I’ll take it from there.”

  “Got it.”

  They stepped into the room, and Fields visibly recoiled when he saw Sam behind Gonzo. He was black with cornrows that nearly touched his shoulders, a muscular build, big hands and a mean, pissed-off look in his eyes.

  “That’s the fat cow bitch that landed on me,” Fields said.

  “You might want to watch your mouth,” Gonzo said. “She’s the boss around here.”

  “She ain’t my boss.”

  Gonzo slapped his hand on the table. “Shut the fuck up. We do the talking here. You do the listening and the answering. Got it?”

  Fields crossed his arms and glared at him. “I can shut this whole thing down with one word. Don’t forget that.”

  “Go ahead and do it.”

  He continued to glare at Gonzo, but he didn’t say the word that would put a stop to the proceedings.

  Sam found that interesting. It was a sign that he wanted to talk. Good. She wanted to hear what he had to say.

  Gonzo went through the motions required to record the interview, and once he had secured Fields’s muttered “Yeah,” he stepped back to give Sam the stage.

  “I don’t wanna talk to you.”

  “Sorry, you’re stuck with me.”

  “I know who you are. Uppity bitch who thinks she don’t need security when her old man is the vice president.”

  “Oh, good, so I don’t need to introduce myself. That saves me some time.”

  “I ain’t done nothing. I don’t know what you want with me.”

&n
bsp; “If you haven’t done anything, why’d you run?” Sam asked.

  “You got no idea what it’s like being a black man in this country. If the cops show up at our doors, we run.”

  “All you had to do is tell me what I needed to know, and if you hadn’t done anything wrong, I could’ve gone on with my day and you could’ve gone on with yours. The reason you have a cut on your head and are crying that some bitch hurt your ribs is because you ran.”

  “You broke my ribs! I can barely breathe!”

  He seemed to be breathing just fine as far as she could tell. “We’ll get you to the hospital as soon as you answer a few questions for us.”

  “Like what?”

  “Who hired you to befriend and then murder Peter Gibson?”

  His face lost all expression. It went totally blank.

  Sam knew shock when she saw it. He hadn’t expected that question. Not even kinda.

  It took a full thirty seconds for him to recover from his shock, long enough to confirm Sam’s suspicions about how Peter’s murder had gone down.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he finally said. Every trace of cockiness and bravado was now gone. He was scared, and it showed.

  “Yes, you do. You know exactly what I’m talking about.”

  “I don’t know anyone by that name. Peter who?”

  She produced the photos of the two men together that Archie had taken from the security video near Peter’s building and put them on the table, each one making a liar out of him.

  “Oh, that guy. We only hung out a couple times. I never knew his last name.”

  “We can put you at his place ten times in the last four weeks. In all those visits, you never asked for his last name?”

  Fields stared at the photo array on the table, his jaw moving back and forth. After a long period of silence, he said, “I think I’d like my lawyer, please.”

  “I can certainly make that call for you,” Sam said, “but before I do, I want to explain a few things to you. We know you’re the one who killed Peter. I believe that when we get back the crime-scene reports, your prints are going to match those we found at the scene. We also know that torturing him for information about me wasn’t your idea. Even though you killed a man, you’re small potatoes to us. We want the person who hired you.” After pausing to let that sink in, she said, “If you lead us to the person who hired you, we’ll recommend leniency for you.”

  “Sure you will,” he said with a snort of disbelief.

  “I’m willing to put it in writing if that helps.”

  “I’d want the offer spelled out, on the table, no loopholes.”

  “All right,” Sam said. “Give me an hour to pull that together.” She stood, sucking in a breath from the pain radiating from her hip. “Should I hold off on calling your lawyer?”

  “No, make the call. I want him here to tell me you ain’t screwing with me.”

  Sam slid her notebook across the table. “Write down his name.”

  He did as she asked and pushed the notebook back to her. Then he crossed his arms and went back to glaring at her, indicating he was done talking until his lawyer arrived.

  Sam took the notebook and moved toward the door, ignoring the pain radiating from her hip as she went out to the hallway, where Captain Malone and Faith Miller were standing after exiting the observation room.

  “What can we do for him?” Sam asked.

  “I can’t go any lower than manslaughter,” Faith said. “He tortured a man to death. That someone else paid him to do it and he’s willing to give that person up is the only reason I’m not charging him with murder one.”

  “Can you write it up for me?”

  “Yep. I’ll do it right now.”

  Sam handed her notebook to Gonzo. “Call his lawyer and get him over here right away. I want the ringleader, and I want him now.”

  * * *

  AN HOUR LATER, all the parties were in position and Faith had drafted paperwork that would charge Fields with manslaughter rather than murder.

  “That was the best the AUSA could do,” Sam said.

  “How much time is that?” Fields asked his lawyer.

  “Could be fifteen to twenty, less for good behavior, and you’ll be required to testify.”

  Fields shook his head in disbelief. “That’s all I get for handing you the biggest fish you’ll ever land in your life? I want better than that.”

  “The AUSA was very clear. That’s the best she can do.”

  “It ain’t good enough.” Once again he crossed his arms and glared at her. “You want something from me. I want something from you. That’s how this is gonna go.”

  Aggravated, Sam blew out a deep breath. “Let me talk to her.”

  “You do that.”

  Once again, Sam limped from the room, trying not to notice that the pain was worsening by the hour. “You heard that,” she said to Faith in the hallway. “Without him, we’ll never get the mastermind.”

  “Let me call Tom,” she said of Tom Forrester, the US Attorney.

  “Make it quick. I’m afraid he’s going to shut down completely.”

  “If he does that, we’ll charge him with murder one.”

  “We need him, Faith. Make the call.” While she waited, Sam leaned against the wall outside the interrogation room and tried to breathe through the pain.

  “You need the ER, Sam,” Freddie said.

  Where had he come from? “Later. I need Peter’s killer more than I need the ER.”

  Faith returned a few minutes later. “Felony assault. Five to ten. That’s as low as I can go.”

  “Let’s see what he says.”

  Sam took the offer to Fields, who consulted with his attorney.

  “We’ll take it,” the attorney said. “But we want it in writing before he’ll say a word.”

  “The AUSA is writing it up now—and again, I’ll remind you that you will be required to testify to whatever you’re about to tell us.”

  Sam thought she saw fear in his expression, but it was gone as fast as it came. “We’ll wait.” Again with the crossed arms. Again with the glare.

  Sam glared right back at him, and they coexisted in uneasy silence until Faith knocked on the door and handed the paperwork to Gonzo, who brought it to her. Sam took a quick look at it before handing it over to Fields’s attorney. “If everything is to your liking,” she said, “start talking. I want the full story. That deal is contingent upon you being straight with us. It can be rescinded at any time until it goes before the judge.”

  Fields rested his arms on the table and leaned in. “Christopher Nelson.”

  The name meant nothing to Sam, but Gonzo gasped.

  “Who?” she asked.

  “Christopher. Nelson.”

  “The president’s son,” Gonzo said.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  SAM STARED AT HIM. “You’re going to sit here, look me in the eye and tell me the president’s son hired you to torture information out of my ex-husband that could be used against my current husband?”

  “Nah,” Fields said. “That ain’t what he hired me to do. Just sorta ended up that way. Your boy Peter wouldn’t give it up without a fight.”

  “What specifically did Nelson hire you to do?”

  “He wanted me to become friends with him and find out anything he could about you and your husband. But Peter didn’t want to talk about you. He said that was over and he’d moved on. Christopher didn’t like that. After a coupla weeks of Peter stonewalling me, Christopher said I had to get the info any way I could, or I wouldn’t get my money. So that’s when shit got real.”

  Sam’s stomach lurched at the thought of what Peter had endured and how he’d tried to protect her at his own expense. She
hid her emotional reaction from Fields, his lawyer and Gonzo by taking copious notes.

  “How did you meet Christopher Nelson?”

  “One of his people approached me at a bar I hang out in. Said he had a business opportunity for me. Seemed easy enough. Hang out with the guy and get info about his ex-wife and her husband the vice president.”

  “You said one of his people approached you. Who was that?”

  “A guy named Stan. I don’t know his last name.”

  “Did he tell you who he represented?”

  “Not at first. He only said his client was looking for information and asked if I might be willing to help out for ten grand to make friends with him and ten more if I got info they could use. I need the money, so I jumped on it. I mean there ain’t nothing criminal about taking money to be friends with someone.”

  There was so much Sam could say to that, but she held her silence so he’d keep talking.

  “When did you find out who Stan worked for?”

  “About three weeks later when the boss man was getting fed up with how long it was taking. They had me come to a hotel room at the W. Fancy-ass place, and when I walked in there, this other guy Christopher was there. He got in my face about me having to pay back the money they’d already given me if I didn’t get some results—and soon. He wanted something—anything he could use against you and the vice president.”

  “Did he say why?”

  “Not to me, and I didn’t care about the why of it. I wanted the full twenty K.”

  “Did you know who he was?”

  “Not at first.”

  “When did you figure it out?”

  “Stan clued me in, and that’s when I started to get scared of what was gonna happen to me if I didn’t get what he wanted.”

  “Whose idea was it to torture the info out of Peter and have him do an interview with the media?” Sam asked.

  “Stan suggested I might want to get physical with him, and one thing led to another.” A look of genuine remorse crossed his face. “I never expected it to go as far as it did, though. I thought he’d give it up easy because he had nothing nice to say about you. But he refused to give us anything we could use against you.”