by Rick Murcer
“What do I look like, the Internet? I got nothing.”
“I don’t think I want her after all,” said Wymer. “She’s too mean. Just like the wife.”
Manny ignored him and bent closer to the girl’s face. “I wanted to do this the easy way . . .” He turned to Ross and Sophie. “Detectives, take her downtown and book her as an accessory to murder and anything else that you can think of.”
The young prostitute’s eyes grew the size of small tires. “Murder? What? I didn’t . . . All right, all right.” She looked at Manny, and he saw the scared little girl that had become a woman long before her time. His heart broke a bit. He wondered what had happened to her and promised himself to find out, but not tonight.
“Frank, take the cuffs off, and for God’s sake, lift that tree stump off her.”
Wymer swung his leg off her for a second time and unlocked and removed the handcuffs, rubbing his wrist. “I think a bag of M&Ms would help ease the pain.”
“My name’s Shannon and I’m . . . seventeen. And I didn’t kill nobody. I don’t even like to see no dead animals.”
“Fair enough, Shannon. Tell me how you got this gig.”
“I called my contact and he said he got a call from some woman asking for someone like me, tall and stuff, to show up here, wearing all black, including this hoodie thing, which is so not cool, but he said the trick would be triple my normal fee. I need the money, so it’s all good.”
She gave Manny a pathetic look. “I’m not gettin’ paid, am I?”
“No, but maybe we can swing a good meal.”
“Do you like M&Ms?” asked Frank.
Manny gave him a look, and he shuffled over to his partner.
“Anything else?”
“I swear. It was just like always. He calls, I go.” She wagged her head. Then her eyes brightened. “Wait! My contact said the phone number on his caller ID was strange-ass.”
“Strange? Like how?”
“I don’t like giving away this stuff. I could get hurt.”
“I promise, you won’t get hurt. We’ll make sure you don’t.”
“You cops always say that. Whatever. Anyway, like I said, the call came from a strange place.”
“Where?”
She looked at Frank. “I’d like some of those M&Ms.” Then back to Manny.
“It came from the ICU at Eagle Memorial Hospital.”
Chapter-41
Standing on the stoop, outside the apartment complex, Manny’s mind raced. They had been set up, of course, but it didn’t make sense. Why? What purpose? And why give them the right place and time, but not the unsub? It was almost like a chess game with a third player countering each move. He hated where this was leading. He’d called dispatch to send a unit to Gavin’s room, just to make sure he and Stella were safe. Maybe the call originated from the man, or woman, who shot Gavin . . . in fact, that was a sure bet. Manny tried to fight the story that logic was trying to sell him, but the knot in the pit of his stomach refused to allow him to win that fight.
Could what I am thinking even be conceivable?
He wanted to talk to Mike again about his back-up weapon, where it was the last time he saw it, but maybe he already knew that answer.
If Shannon was telling the truth, and he was sure she was, there was no denying the possibility that Stella saw something, or someone, that didn’t belong at the ICU. He closed his eyes and gave in to the thoughts.
Was Stella involved?
It sounded alien, contrived, except for a persistent ring of truth.
Stella involved? A few days ago that was pure fantasy. He’d known her for seventeen years. She’d been a great mother and wife. Supportive, witty, practical. She loved her family. Maybe dealing with Lexy’s death had been too much. But he hadn’t noticed anything different in her behavior. She had changed her hair, lost a little weight, but nothing drastic.
Sophie drove the car to the front of the building, got out, and stood on the sidewalk. “Hey, Ross and Wymer took Shannon out for a late supper and then are going to take her home.”
“Good. Remind me to check on her when we get a minute to breathe.”
“I know this is tough, but we have to talk to Stella to see if she saw anything. I mean, come on; it was right on that floor. The nurse’s station is only fifty feet away,” said Sophie, reaching to adjust her leg holster.
He nodded, face tight-lipped, watching her wrestle with the holster. Manny had another thought.
“Do you know what kind of back-up weapon Mike carried?”
“Yeah, I do. We bought ours at the same time. It was a Firestorm .22. Why?”
Suddenly all of the pieces clicked together. His stomach clutched even harder, and a small wave of nausea washed over him. It was becoming all too clear. Hadn’t he suggested to Sophie that the person who shot Gavin could be a woman? And all of the victims were shot with a .22.
He took out his cell phone and spoke to Sophie. “We’re going to the hospital.”
“Okay . . . but . . . oh shit. You don’t think it could be Stella, do you?”
Manny didn’t reply as he tapped his foot on the concrete, waiting for Stella to pick up. The call went to her voice mail. His angst rose higher.
“Stella’s not answering. Let’s go.”
Sophie flipped on the siren and burned the tread off the front tires, heading for the hospital.
“Mike wasn’t lying. Stella was the shooter at his apartment complex. But why make the call from the hospital?” asked Sophie, sliding on her NASCAR Victory sunglasses.
“It’s almost 11 p.m. Sunglasses? Really?”
“Relax. I got this.”
Manny stared at the streetlights as they whizzed past his window. “Yeah. You got the first part. The call from the hospital only makes sense if she wanted us to know it was her. That means one of two things. She wants to get caught, to talk about whatever she’s done. Or . . .”
“Or what?”
“Or she’s lost it. Hell, I don’t know. Maybe something to do with Lexy’s death.”
“Come on, can that happen? I mean, especially to her.”
“I think it could. And to almost anyone, if the circumstances were right. But I could be pissing in the wind. We need to talk to her.”
“What do you mean ‘lost it’? Like psycho?”
“It means she might become a second cousin to Argyle.”
“Any chance she’s just in a bad mood?”
“I wish it were that simple. The thing is, I didn’t notice anything different about her . . . but again, I could be all wrong here.”
“You don’t sound too convincing.”
Manny sighed. “I don’t feel too convinced.”
Sophie adjusted her glasses. “That’s just plain scary.”
“The mind can convince itself of anything, given the right conditions. Controlled studies show that with enough exposure, people will do just about anything that they have some predisposition to do. They just need a nudge in that direction.”
“More scary crap . . . and how do you know this stuff?”
“Sometimes I wish I didn’t. Too many books.”
Sophie pulled up to the front door of the hospital, and they jumped out of the car, lights still flashing.
“We’ll know in a couple of minutes,” he said.
They rode the elevator to the ICU and were greeted by the two officers standing in front of Gavin’s door. They were talking to the nurse Manny had seen earlier in the morning.
“Could you guys go get a cup of coffee?” he said to the two blues.
They nodded and left.
He turned to the nurse. “Don’t you ever sleep?”
She grinned. “I might ask you the same thing. I’m pulling a double, or maybe a triple. I forget.”
“We know the feeling. How’s he doing?”
“He’s unchanged, but hanging in there.” She glanced at Sophie, then back to Manny. “What’s going on?”
He let out a sigh of relief.
“Nothing. We got some bad info, that’s all. Is Stella in his room?”
The nurse shook her head. “No. She left a couple of hours ago. She said enough was enough for the day. She wanted to be alone.”
Manny ran his hand through his hair. No denying the truth now. “Did she call anyone before she left?”
“She did, about 8:30. She asked to use the phone, saying her cell was dead. I reminded her there was no cell phone use inside the ICU anyway. We’re not supposed to do it, but I let her make the call. It’s against hospital policy, but what they don’t know won’t hurt them. She thanked me and said she’d be back in a few hours.”
“In this case, I’m glad you ignored policy. Can you print out a phone log?”
She reached into her pocket and handed him a piece of paper. “I already did. Tech support brought it up a minute ago. I figured, once those officers got here, something was up. I thought you might need that number.”
“Good thinking. You want a job?” cracked Sophie.
The nurse laughed. “I wouldn’t trade places with you guys for a million bucks.”
“The feeling’s mutual,” smiled Manny.
A buzzer sounded, and a blue light flashed furiously outside one of the other rooms. “Gotta go.” Then she was hustling down the hall.
“I rest my case. I couldn’t do that.”
“I see what you mean. But those little nurse outfits are cute. I could get one and cut it really short. Do you think Josh would like it?”
“You mean Randy, your husband?”
“Him too. But I’m thinking about building a better relationship with the Feds. Couldn’t hurt.”
“You’ve got issues, you know that?”
“True, but that’s another reason to love me.”
“Keep reminding me. Put out an APB on Stella—that sounds so damn ridiculous—I’m going to check on Gavin, and then we have to get to the airport. Alex wouldn’t be happy if we were late for the forensics meeting. Maybe the six of us can figure out what she’s up to.”
“I’ll wait here for the other guys to come back. Maybe I’ll get to see more blue lights.”
Manny moved closer to Gavin’s bed and wondered what his take would be on all of this. Then it occurred to him what Gavin’s view would be.
“The truth,” he would say. “Always go after the truth. It might hurt sometimes, but you can’t go wrong with it.”
He wondered if Gavin could follow his own advice, given that his wife probably shot him at point-blank range. Manny thought he could.
Turning to leave, he saw a yellow piece of paper on the table beside Gavin’s bed. Manny’s name was printed near the fold in Stella’s handwriting. His heart rate pranced as he reached for the note and unfolded it slowly, reluctantly, like the words would speak a sermon he didn’t care to hear, one of damnation and revelation at the same time. He was right.
“Don’t worry about looking for me. I’m in the wind for as long as I want to be. There’s another mess that I cleaned up for you. You’ll have to find it yourself, if you can.”
Several blank lines down, written as an afterthought was a three-word warning.
“Your time’s coming.”
Chapter-42
“We have trouble. She didn’t go where she was supposed to, and I think she figured out it was a setup somehow.” The tall woman took a long draw from her cigarette and released it. The gray-blue smoke rose and danced in front of her face, then slowly drifted away.
“I know,” replied the shorter member of the Justice Club.
“What? It’s only 11:30. How in the hell do you know?”
“How in God’s name do you think I know? The real question is how did Stella find out this gig was a con?” Curiosity dripped from the shorter woman’s voice.
“Oh no. Not me. Let’s get this out of the way. It wasn’t me. I didn’t tip her off. I agreed with you on this one. Remember?”
The shorter woman heard the anger in the other’s voice. That was good enough for her. “Fair enough. I believe you. But that’s not important now anyway.”
The taller woman let out a long breath. “You’re right. If she’s gone rogue, we’re all in trouble.”
“She knows everything about us. What we do. Where we go . . . and what we’ve done.”
“Almost true. She doesn’t know everything.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means we have a trick up our sleeve,” said the tall woman.
“What kind of trick? When we did this, we promised no secrets, and now you’re telling me that’s not true?”
“Relax. I’m pretty good at covering our asses, and this was a need-to-know thing.”
“I appreciate your concern. But trust is trust, and right now I’m not feeling it. So, no more horseshit. What is it?” demanded the shorter member of the Justice Club.
“You’re kind of cute when you get pissy,” the tall woman giggled.
“I don’t feel cute. Get to it.”
The tall woman took another drag from her cancer stick and released it. “There’s a fourth member of the club.”
Chapter-43
Sophie stood near the door of the waiting room, killing time fumbling through her bag until Manny came out of Gavin’s room. She wanted to remind him of their busy dance card for the next few hours and that they needed to go, but she suspected he was close to full-bore cop mode and didn’t need any reminders—of anything. He was almost scary when that persona kicked in. Like he was born to pull miscellaneous facts into full-blown pictures that made sense. There were things no one else could see, and leaps no one else could make. Putting together Stella with Gavin’s shooting, Mike’s gun, Blake Harris’s murder, then the setup at the apartment complex had to be killing him on the inside. And she suspected he had it figured out long before he said anything.
She dabbed on a few strokes of lip liner and pulled out a stick of gum. Manny told her once that he had had dinner at the Crosby’s place so many times that their home felt as familiar as the rural farmhouse near the town of North Star where he’d grown up. Stella and Gavin had even become somewhat surrogate parents after his parents had died in a car accident fifteen years ago. He and his family had become a real part of Gavin’s and Stella’s lives, even being a kind of big brother to Mike. Now everything was haywire, nuts, and changed forever. Stella’s newfound purpose, or whatever the hell she was thinking, was at the center of it all. Sophie shivered.
How would she handle finding out that her surrogate mother had gone off the deep end, shot her husband, and was murdering men after burning off their johnsons with acid? (Although she’d met a few men over the years that could use the acid treatment: her ex, for one.)
Manny’s MO was about to come into play, like usual. He’d suppress any emotional ties and go to work. She admired that trait in him and, although it exacerbated the workaholic addiction he fought so hard to control, it also scared her. How far into the dark would he choose to walk to totally disconnect his emotion from the job? She worried a time was coming when he couldn’t make it back, that the dark would be more appealing than the light. But as long as Louise and Jen were with him, she thought he’d be okay. They were his reason.
Manny walked out of Gavin’s room, a note hanging from his hand and a look on his face that could only be described as hollow.
“Is Gavin okay? ‘Cause you look like he just bit it.”
“No, he’s fighting hard.” He handed Sophie the note.
She read it, and her eyes darted to his face. “Manny I . . . I . . .” She couldn’t remember all the times he’d been there for her. The divorce and her remarriage, the affair with Lynn Casnovsky, and everything in between. Always strong, as reliable as the sunrise. It was her turn.
Sophie did something rare for her—she stopped talking and hugged him.
He squeezed her back, and then he stepped away. “Thanks Sophie. This one hurts. Thirty-six hours ago, I had lunch with them. We laughed about Stella’s diet-plate special.
Now she wants to take me out?”
“You’re the brains, but it seems to me we won’t know what’s really going on until we bring her in.”
He smiled. “That’s good thinking from the one who says she never does.”
“Hey. I have to leave something for you to do. I kind of like having you around.”
“The feeling’s mutual. But enough of the touchy-feely stuff. It’s time to go to work.”
He stood up straight, and Sophie watched most of the pain on his face disappear like rain on a desert highway. He was no longer Manny Williams, the surrogate son, the caring man who loved the Crosbys, but Manny Williams, the cop. The transformation was startling and comforting at the same time.
As they reached the elevator, a small smile formed on her face. If she knew her partner—and she did—the bad guys were in deep shit.
Chapter-44
Manny greeted the FBI agents seated around the table, careful to regard Chloe the same as Josh and Max, but he couldn’t ignore the tingle that danced in the middle of his chest. She looked . . . amazing.
“Long time, no see,” said Manny.
“Too long,” pined Sophie, batting her eyes at Josh.
“Ah . . . it’s been thirty-six hours, but good to see you . . . both,” replied Josh.
“So you did miss me, didn’t you?” said Sophie.
“Absence makes the heart grow fonder, detective,” smiled Josh.
This time, it was Sophie’s turn to wear a slack-jaw expression. Manny watched to see how his loquacious partner was going to react to being put on the other side of the innuendo fence. Before she could respond, Alex came to her rescue.
“Well, well. I’m glad you two cleared out your schedules so that you could join the rest of us, who are up at freaking 12:30 a.m. working instead of sleeping, like normal people get to do.”
“Sorry. We got tied up at the hospital,” apologized Manny as he and Sophie sat.
“Besides, it does you good to get your panties in a bunch once in a while,” said Sophie, that infamous mischievous look prancing in her eyes.
