Kiss of the Blue Dragon

by Julie Beard

  “Oh, no,” I said, waving her off with a weary laugh. “No interviews.”

  “Come on, Angel. Mike won’t talk and you’re a hero, too.” She uncrossed her long, trim legs and leaned forward. “Think about it. Defying the constraints of the criminal justice system, a retributionist risks her life and confronts the terrifying underworld to save her own long-lost mother. What a story!”

  “The last thing I need right now is publicity.”

  “Maybe you don’t, but your profession does.”

  I gave her a weary look. “You mean, because of the Gibson Warrants?”

  “Yes. Those warrants are just the ammunition the establishment has been looking for to knock your profession out of the box.”

  I gazed at Marco, who stood at the other end of the garden. Lola had cornered him. He nodded politely, even charmingly, while she regaled him with her nonsense. A man who took the time to charm an old woman couldn’t be all that bad.

  “Maybe it is time the police took back the streets,” I said.

  “But they can’t,” Soji said. “Things are too far gone. Until Congress can get organized crime out of the criminal justice system, it’s every man, or woman, for himself. The common people have to have recourse. CRSs came out of a genuine need in the community. That need will be there for a long time to come.”

  I looked at her askance. “Boy, you’re sounding bleak tonight.”

  She sipped her wine and smiled wistfully. “I just see what’s going on out there. And I’m not sure your mother would have come out of this alive if not for you. Well, I won’t pester you. If you decide to talk to the media, you know where to find me.”

  Hank came up behind her and leaned down to kiss her cheek. “We call her Killer,” he said to me. “She’ll hound you until you surrender. She’s relentless in her pursuit of a story and skeptical once she hears it. When she was little and her mother would say ‘I love you,’ Soji would always verify it with at least two sources.”

  “Stop!” Soji said, playfully slapping his hand, which rested on her shoulder.

  I smiled, recognizing the signs of true love. Funny how easily I could see it in others, but could not even imagine it for myself. I made an excuse about wanting more wine and left the lovebirds so they could tease each other in privacy. I headed toward Marco and my mother.

  After our heart-to-heart last night I felt closer to Lola than I had in years, and I had new respect for her. But she still had a knack for getting on my nerves, and I was afraid if I didn’t rescue Marco she’d soon be dropping hints about me to him and planning our wedding.

  “I’m sorry to interrupt,” I said, “but you have to come with me, Detective. We need to talk.”

  I slipped my arm in his and pulled him away as he still listened politely over his shoulder to Lola, who hadn’t even paused to take a breath. She continued a long-winded story about how perfect I was as a child, adding that there was, nevertheless, no accounting for how kids turn out and she had done her best. She grew louder as we receded. She was like a press agent who didn’t know she was supposed to downplay her client’s faults.

  “I’m sorry,” I muttered as we broke from Lola’s gravitational pull. “You’re a very patient man.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Marco said. “She’s charming.”

  “In the last few days I’ve grown to appreciate my mother, but she’s still easier to take in small doses.”

  “She’s one of a kind.”

  “Thank God.” I looked back just as she followed Mike into his coach house. “This will be interesting. I give Mike five minutes before he touches her third eye and puts her into a trance.”

  “Now, that’s a good skill to have. I heard you did that to one of the officers outside of Lola’s apartment. He thought it was some kind of voodoo.”

  “Nah, just old-fashioned concentration.” I tried to pull my hand away from his arm, but he squeezed it against his ribs and wouldn’t let go. I looked up, brows furrowed.

  “I want to talk to you, Baker.”

  “May I go first?”

  He smiled. “Sure.”

  “I need you to help me find those Chinese girls who were kidnapped from the Mongolian Mob. I know where they are.”

  “Okay,” he said.

  I raised a brow. “Okay? That means yes?”

  “Last time I looked it up in the dictionary it did.”

  I crossed my arms and squinted doubtfully. “Why are you being so easy?”

  “I’ll agree to anything as long as we don’t have to talk about it tonight. This is a party, remember? You do know how to have a good time, don’t you?”

  I exhaled. “Oh, yeah. I’m supposed to relax.”

  “Enjoy yesterday’s victory before you set out tomorrow to save the world. Besides, you and I agreed we can’t work together, remember?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Oh, yes. I forgot about that. So what did you want to talk about? It had better not be business.”

  His eyes turned sultry. “My conversation requires privacy.”

  “Okay, come on up to the deck.”

  He took my hand in his and tugged me up the stairs. When we stood in the privacy afforded by the surrounding tree branches, his presence engulfed me. We were still holding hands, but I couldn’t quite look him in the eye and acknowledge the intimacy. Together we gazed down on the beautifully lit garden.

  “For two people who can’t work together,” I said, “we seem to be getting along rather well.”

  “But this isn’t work.” He pulled my hand, forcing me to turn and face him. “At least not for me.”

  He reached out and very carefully stroked my cheek with the tips of his fingers, like an alien wondering at the miracle of human skin. Then his hand moved in and cupped the back of my neck. A shiver coursed through me from head to foot as I shut my eyes.

  “You’d better go, Marco, before we get into trouble,” I forced myself to say.

  “I’ve never been able to resist trouble.”

  I opened my eyes, knowing we stood at a cliff and wanting to measure just how many inches remained until we plunged over the edge. He pulled me into his arms, bending just enough to make the fit perfect. A flash fire spread over me. I gripped his strong shoulders, and instead of pushing him away, I tugged him closer.

  “Angel Baker,” he whispered in a husky voice, “I want you in a way I’ve never wanted anyone before.”

  His mouth was a magnet, pulling me in. I somehow managed to put the breaks on two inches from his mouth. His breath was warm and sweet.

  My hands clawed down to the small of his back and settled on the taut, narrow muscles thinly covered by his damp dress shirt. My mind was racing, screaming to push away. Our mouths moved closer while every other muscle in my body strained in a last attempt to keep some distance. With our noses almost touching, we breathed in sync, ragged and hot.

  “Marco, kiss me,” I murmured, shocked by the words coming from my mouth. Kiss me like it’s the last time.

  His lips brushed mine with a hello caress. His day-old whiskers brushed my chin. The friction pricked a sudden urge to screw him until he begged for mercy. Hungry, I parted his mouth with my own and delved inside. Then all bets were off as our mouths fused.

  With a fierce groan he lunged, briefly bending me back, then pulled me upright. Our bodies pressed to get closer. It was impossible. But we tried, melding lips, chests, hips and legs into one.

  When the phone rang, I didn’t hear it at first, even though it was pinned to my blouse, perhaps because it was. The sound couldn’t escape. But my brain, which was floating in the stardust clouds of planet Venus, finally registered the Morse code-style ring I’d programmed for urgent calls from Mel Goldman. It took a moment for my head to clear enough to remember my P.I. was still staked out at Lancaster’s Shelter. I’d told him to use the urgent-only number if Tommy Drummond showed up.

  I pushed Marco away. “Shit!”

  “What is it?” he asked.

  I popped th
e ear button off the receiver and planted it in my right ear. “Baker here. Make it fast.”

  “Angel,” a frantic voice replied. “It’s Mel. He’s here!”

  “Drummond?”

  “Yeah, the big ape is on a rampage. He busted into the shelter.”

  “Call the police.”

  “I did. But I don’t think they’re gonna get here before he blows away his wife and kid. He already gunned down the guard Myrtle had on duty.”

  “I’m coming,” I said tersely, then hung up.

  Three strikes and you’re dead was Judge Gibson’s now-infamous warning to restraining order violators. But in Drummond’s case, I was afraid it was his wife and kid who were about to die.

  Chapter 17

  Life Interruptus

  Unfortunately, Marco had driven to my house in his hydro SUV and not in one of the Chicago P.D. aero cruisers. I wanted to fly over the broken pavement quaintly referred to as roads that lay between Wrigleyville and the northwest side. Instead, Marco’s land vehicle negotiated every pothole along the way with teeth-clattering determination.

  I briefly considered going alone but couldn’t take the time to use public transportation. Besides, Marco would have followed me. Hank and Sojourner jumped into the television station’s solar Humvee they’d driven from work and followed at a breakneck pace. I hoped they were coming as friends, not journalists. Either way, I had a bad feeling we’d need witnesses to whatever we’d find at Lancaster’s Shelter and was glad they were coming.

  I asked Mike to stay and watch over Lola, just in case Vladimir Gorky decided to pay a visit. Besides, I didn’t want her to burn the house down smoking contraband. And I certainly didn’t want Mike to chance taking a bullet from Drummond after he’d already risked his life for me in the tunnels.

  With Marco yanking the steering wheel left and right every two hundred yards to maneuver around vehicles that crawled at a turtle’s pace, I briefed him on the Drummond case.

  “Whatever does or does not happen tonight,” I said in conclusion, “will be on my conscience forever. It was my job to intimidate him.”

  “You were doing this pro bono, Baker, get over it.” He risked taking his eyes off the road long enough to skewer me with a razzing frown. “Why do you think everything that goes wrong is your fault? You did your best. What you should feel bad as hell about is trying to handle Drummond without going to the police.”

  “I didn’t think they’d help,” I said softly as I watched the brick bungalows whiz by. I didn’t want to tell him the rest of the story: that I’d forged a Gibson Warrant and used it to threaten Drummond, a threat that apparently failed.

  We arrived an amazing fifteen minutes later and parked on the opposite side of the street. Two police cruisers hugged the other curb, red strobe lights flashing.

  “Stay here,” Marco said.

  “Hell no!” I shot back.

  “That’s an order,” he growled through clenched teeth. “I don’t want this getting messy. I’m not going to jinx my career at the starting gate because a CRS was stupid enough to think she could handle a creep like Drummond instead of letting the authorities handle it.”

  I punched him hard in the arm, then grabbed his shirtsleeve and said with feral intensity, “Fuck you, Marco. This is my case, dammit. Mine.” My case. My fault. No one else’s.

  Adrenaline ricocheted through my body and my muscles flexed and pumped, ready for a fight. I threw open the door and bolted around the front of the SUV, but stopped when I saw how eerily quiet it was. The drone of an obscenely loud police radio grated the silence. Two officers filling out forms on electronic clipboards stood behind yellow laser beams blocking off the crime scene.

  Crime scene. I was too late. I broke out in a cold sweat. What had happened? Just then Mel Goldman came hobbling over, rubbing his shiny bald crown in the manic way he reserved for tragedies.

  “Angel, oh, thank God. Angel, it happened so fast.”

  Numb, I turned and tried to focus on what he was saying. Most of it was a blur drumming in my ears. With beady eyes full of woe, Mel recounted the events like a machine gun, his stained teeth shooting out words like bullets.

  “Nothin’ happened for days,” he said, wringing his hands. “Like you told me to, I notified the cops I was here and what the situation was. I had a special number to call and everything in case Drummond showed up. I didn’t say nothin’ about the fake warrant, but told them Drummond could be lethal. I had my partner here when I was sleeping, so we never missed a beat.”

  “Yeah, yeah, get to the point, Mel.”

  “But suddenly Drummond shows up an hour ago, I’d say. He sprays the storefront with bullets then walks right through the door where the glass was a second before. I called the cops, then you, and officers were here not two minutes later, but by then he was back out here. Suddenly a vehicle zooms by spitting out bullets a mile a minute, splattering his brains on the sidewalk. He—”

  “Shut up, Mel, I don’t want to hear any more.”

  I turned to the crime scene. Marco had crossed the street and was talking to the two officers. Sojourner and Hank had parked and came jogging my way. Impatiently, I held up a hand.

  “Don’t bother me now. Talk to Mel.”

  They stopped abruptly, nodded in understanding, then went to grill the P.I. I had a funny feeling Soji had placed a call into the newsroom, but I hoped not. The last thing we needed was a media circus.

  Marco must have resigned himself to my presence at the crime scene. When I crossed the street, one of the officers briefly disengaged the yellow laser so I could join them in the containment zone. Marco was deep in conversation with the lead officer.

  I took a moment to look closely at what had been hidden by the police cruisers—a dead body laying in a pool of shiny, candy-apple-red blood. Pink brain matter littered the sidewalk. I recognized the lilywhite beer gut hanging out from the bottom of his shirt and the beefy hands. Definitely Tommy Drummond.

  Dear God, I prayed, let this be the only casualty tonight. Please let his wife and child be safe.

  “I’m going inside,” I said to Marco.

  He frowned at me, then nodded his permission to the junior officer, who radioed my clearance to the investigators inside.

  I made my way through the front office until I found the hall that led to the large communal family room. My feet were leaden, unwilling to go farther. I saw two uniformed officers, but otherwise the room was empty. I pushed onward and saw as I drew closer that the door on the far wall was open and people mingled outside in the playground area. Probably shelter residents. I prayed they had suffered no more than a terrible fright. Where were Janet and Lin? I couldn’t see them.

  When I stepped inside the room, my gaze found blood spots on the carpet, a spray pattern that grew denser as I followed it to the left, near a corner. There in an awkward pose lay Janet Drummond, dead. Her blood-drenched body seemed frozen in time. Life interruptus. With her head tilted back, her pale blue eyes seemed to beseech a heaven that had not heard her final pleas.

  I took two running steps forward, as if I might be able to do something to help her. She’s dead. Dead. Not even “I’m sorry” would help her now. And I was. So very sorry.

  I stopped abruptly, then reeled back a step when guilt hammered me. Pain seared my forehead, then flowed through my body like hot, sick lava. I covered my face with trembling hands.

  “Don’t blame yourself,” came a familiar voice. Myrtle. She cupped my upper arm with a warm hand. “He would have done this to her eventually. It was just a matter of time. You gave her hope, Angel. In the end, Janet was really hopeful she could make a new life for herself.”

  Was it better to die with hope unfulfilled or embracing despair? I didn’t know.

  “Angel, you did the best you could.”

  I lied, Myrtle, I wanted to say. I lied to him about the warrant because I didn’t have the guts to shoot the creep. And he deserved to die. I lied because I thought I was clever enough to
bluff him into leaving Janet alone, and cleverness is never enough when you face pure evil. I misjudged everything. I’m a disgrace to my profession. Worse, a fool.

  I lowered my hands and took in a shallow breath. “Is Lin…?”

  “She’s alive. She’s upstairs.”

  “How is she taking it?”

  “Well.” Myrtle’s eyes moistened. “Too well. I don’t understand that child. She doesn’t seem to feel anything at all.”

  “She won’t until she’s safe.” I turned away from the body and Myrtle turned to face me.

  “Are you going to be all right, dear?”

  “I always am, Myrtle, it’s my curse. But what about Lin? What will happen to her?”

  “She’ll have to go into temporary foster care until a long-term foster arrangement can be made. When the social workers sort out her legal status, I imagine she’ll be adopted.”

  Foster care. If she landed in the wrong place, she’d never be safe enough to feel like a normal child should.

  “Let me take her.” The statement shocked me as much as Myrtle. It was a huge commitment.

  “Angel, are you sure?”

  “Yes,” I said with more confidence. “I went through the foster parent training program a few years ago, even though I never actually took anyone in. I’m still registered. My house would be perfect. Mike speaks Chinese. And I…I know what it’s like for a child. I’ll be kind to her, I promise.”

  “Of course you will,” Myrtle said as she stroked her chin. “Well, it would only be for a week or two at the most. And she really does need someone who can speak her language. I’m sure she feels very isolated. I’ll make the recommendation tomorrow. Meanwhile, you go home and get some rest. And don’t blame yourself.”

  “I won’t.”

  We shared a rueful smile, both knowing I would.

  But guilt and other indulgences would have to wait. First I had to deal with the media circus that was forming under the big top outside.

  Chapter 18

  A Hill of Beans

  By the time I stepped outside, a WFYY satellite cruiser was camped across from the shelter. Soji had already cornered Marco. The handheld digicam her photographer aimed at Marco’s face put out a blinding light. Marco strained not to blink as he smoothly answered her questions about the murders. Cruisers from two more television stations pulled up and reporters jumped out with e-pads, clearly frustrated to see Soji scooping them on the first interview.