“Station, where else? I pulled night watch, what else? I thought you might like to know; Fish is holding Paula Royce as a material witness in the Broderick case. She’s got more guards on her than Fern Esterhazy had up at County before her old man bailed her yesterday.”
“She’s out and Paula’s in. There’s a moral under there someplace, but I’m too sore to dig it up.” I breathed some air. “It seems to me that witness Horn smoked was under heavy guard too.”
“Thank God there aren’t many like him.”
“One was too much,” I said. “And you know damn well there are getting to be more just like him all the time. What happens after the trial? To Paula, I mean.”
“That’s the feds’ headache. New name, new place, I guess. Until someone recognizes her again. Those Colombians put on a lot of miles.”
“I never got around to thanking her. She had a chance to rabbit when Horn and I were scuffling, but she gave it up to save my hide.”
“It evens out. You saved hers. Besides, you’ll get your chance when Fish subpoenas you to testify.”
“Like hell. He’ll jerk her in and out of the courtroom like a piece of chicken in a four-bit pot of soup and I’ll still be sitting there with my mouth open when she’s gone.”
“Yeah, well.” His tone lightened. “I hear you’re getting your ticket back.”
“By slow freight. Proust’s a man of his word when you get one out of him that doesn’t have just four letters in it, but he’s not fond of my guts. I’ll be back in harness by Groundhog Day if he doesn’t decide to take a vacation first.” I wet my lips on the edge of my glass. The stuff tasted like sour grapes. “How’s the cop business?”
“We drag ’em in, their lawyers pull ’em out. What’s to say?” He stopped talking. In the background a two-finger typist pecked two keys and said, “Damn!” Someone had the squad room radio tuned in to a ball at the Hyatt Regency in Dearborn; the reporter was shouting at the top of his lungs to be heard over the music and buzzing crowd noise.
“I’m leaving the department,” Bloodworth said. “Today’s my last day.”
“Sorry to hear it. God knows Iroquois Heights needs all the good cops it has. Where do you go from here?”
“I haven’t thought about it. I don’t plan to for a while. I’ve got some money saved up. First I’ll take a little vacation, but I won’t go anywhere. Sleep with my wife. Play with toy planes. Go out and look at a movie. They tell me they talk now. Then maybe I’ll sit down and think about what it is I want to do. I sure don’t want to be a cop.”
“I know the feeling.” Once I was virgin. Once I had never killed anyone. Once.
I wished him luck. He thanked me. We didn’t have anything to say to each other after that except good-bye, and we made a mess of even that. For a long moment we listened to each other’s breathing. Then he broke the connection.
I picked up my drink and went to the window. The first flakes were just starting to come down, spinning out of the black pall above the light, no two alike, spinning down and down toward the smug shiny slickness of the deserted street. Delicate flakes, the first of the first big snow of the long nightmare of winter in Michigan.
“Lose a killer, lose a cop.” I drank liquor and watched the snow cover the glassy surface stretching on and on into darkness.
A Biography of Loren D. Estleman
Loren D. Estleman (b. 1952) is the award-winning author of over sixty-five novels, including mysteries and westerns.
Raised in a Michigan farmhouse constructed in 1867, Estleman submitted his first story for publication at the age of fifteen and accumulated 160 rejection letters over the next eight years. Once The Oklahoma Punk was published in 1976, success came quickly, allowing him to quit his day job in 1980 and become a fulltime writer.
Estleman’s most enduring character, Amos Walker, made his first appearance in 1980’s Motor City Blue, and the hardboiled Detroit private eye has been featured in twenty novels since. The fifth Amos Walker novel, Sugartown, won the Private Eye Writers of America’s Shamus Award for best hardcover novel of 1985. Estleman’s most recent Walker novel is Infernal Angels.
Estleman has also won praise for his adventure novels set in the Old West. In 1980, The High Rocks was nominated for a National Book Award, and since then Estleman has featured its hero, Deputy U.S. Marshal Page Murdock, in seven more novels, most recently 2010’s The Book of Murdock. Estleman has received awards for many of his standalone westerns, receiving recognition for both his attention to historical detail and the elements of suspense that follow from his background as a mystery author. Journey of the Dead, a story of the man who murdered Billy the Kid, won a Spur Award from the Western Writers of America, and a Western Heritage Award from the National Cowboy Hall of Fame.
In 1993 Estleman married Deborah Morgan, a fellow mystery author. He lives and works in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Loren D. Estleman in a Davy Crockett ensemble at age three aboard the Straits of Mackinac ferry with his brother, Charles, and father, Leauvett.
Estleman at age five in his kindergarten photograph. He grew up in Dexter, Michigan.
Estleman in his study in Whitmore Lake, Michigan, in the 1980s. The author wrote more than forty books on the manual typewriter he is working on in this image.
Estleman and his family. From left to right: older brother, Charles; mother, Louise; father, Leauvett; and Loren.
Estleman and Deborah Morgan at their wedding in Springdale, Arkansas, on June 19, 1993.
Estleman with actor Barry Corbin at the Western Heritage Awards in Oklahoma City in 1998. The author won Outstanding Western Novel for his book Journey of the Dead.
Loren signing books at Eyecon in St. Louis in 1999. He was the guest of honor.
Estleman and his fellow panelists at Bouchercon in 2000. From left to right: Harper Barnes, John Lutz, Loren D. Estleman, Max Allan Collins, and Stuart M. Kaminsky.
Estleman and his wife, Deborah, signing together while on a tour through Colorado in 2003.
Estleman with his grandson, Dylan Ray Brown, shown here writing an original story on “Papa’s” typewriter at Christmastime in 2005 in Springfield, Missouri.
Estleman with his granddaughter, Lydia Morgan Hopper, as he reads her a bedtime story on New Year’s Eve 2008. Books are among Lydia’s favorite things—and “Papa” is quick to encourage this.
Estleman and his wife, Deborah, with the late Elmer Kelton and his wife, Anne Kelton, in 2008. Estleman is holding his Elmer Kelton Award from the German Association for the Study of the Western.
Estleman in front of the Gas City water tower, which he passed by on many a road trip. After titling one of his novels after the town, Estleman was invited for a visit by the mayor, and in February 2008 he was presented the key to the city.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook onscreen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
copyright © 1983 by Loren D. Estleman
cover design by Mumtaz Mustafa
978-1-4532-2051-1
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