In Pursuit of Justice (6 page)

Catherine watched Rebecca deftly manipulating the slim slivers of wood, remembering the way those fingers had felt on her skin. “You’re going in tomorrow, aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Does your captain know you’re coming?”

“Not yet.” Rebecca’s smile was thin. “He’d probably refuse to see me until after I did the thing with Whitaker.”

“The department psychologist.”

“Uh-huh.”

“But you
are
going to see him, right?”

“No choice. There’s been a lot of bad press the last few years—reports of excessive use of force, vigilantism, escalating suicide rates among the ranks, and a million other things. So now,
anything
involving an officer—whether it’s a complaint or an officer-involved shooting or even sometimes just
drawing
your weapon—can land you in counseling.”

“But with you there’s reason,” Catherine offered gently, knowing that no officer wanted to be reminded of their vulnerability or of the fact that emotions were one thing outside of their control. Rebecca had said very little about the shooting or about the fact that she had almost died. It was hard keeping silent, but Catherine knew that she could not be the detective’s lover
and
her therapist; she would have to rely on Whitaker to help resolve whatever the experience had brought up for her.

“Maybe.” The silence grew heavy between them, and finally Rebecca asked, “What is it?”

“I’m worried about you,” Catherine confessed.

“Don’t be. I feel fine. I’ll be fine.”

“All right.” Her fears would make little sense to Rebecca, for whom life was so much more black and white. Cops like her did not fear possibilities, because only the facts mattered. Reality for her detective was defined by events, not eventualities. “Just…be careful.”

What an inadequate request.
Don’t get hurt. Don’t get killed. Don’t leave me now, not after touching me like this
.

“I’ll do everything by the book. I promise.” She’d seen the uncertainty in Catherine’s eyes, and it killed her to know she’d put it there. She’d keep her word, too. As much as she could, and still do what she had to do.

*

It had been more than two months since Catherine had last watched Rebecca’s transformation from the woman she had held through the night into the cop. Oh, the cop was always there—whether on duty or not—surfacing for an instant in the sharp appraisal of a stranger who approached on the street or evident in the fleeting shadows that marred her clear gaze when some memory momentarily escaped her ironclad control, but never so much as when Detective Sergeant Rebecca Frye began her morning routine.

First she pulled on a crisp, starched shirt, creased tailored trousers, and a matching blazer. Then, she slid the case that held her gold shield into the breast pocket of her blazer. Her holster, empty now, she gathered in one hand, but later it would be snugged against her chest. As she assembled the symbols of her identity, Rebecca’s expression became more remote, her carriage more guarded, and her eyes more distant. It was a frightening thing to witness when what Catherine needed most from Rebecca were the parts she so naturally hid away.

“You’re awfully quiet,” Rebecca remarked as Catherine gathered her briefcase, beeper, and cell phone from the small table just inside the front foyer. They’d showered separately, and when she’d joined Catherine in the kitchen, they’d barely had time for a cup of coffee and toast. Nevertheless, there was a shadow of discomfiture in Catherine’s face that wasn’t usually there.

“Am I?” Catherine smiled, realizing that she had indeed been preoccupied. “I suppose I am. You would make a good psychiatrist, Detective.”

“And you’re doing that shrink thing again—avoid and divert. Ask a question, change the subject.” Rebecca’s tone was teasing, but she leveled her eyes at the woman in the understated elegant jade suit. “That’s a cop’s trick.”

They were only two feet apart, but the air between them was thick enough to walk on. It was a distance that if left unbridged would grow, and Rebecca had reached out. Catherine dropped her briefcase and stepped across the gulf, sliding her arms around the tall blond’s waist.

“I’m trying to get used to the fact that things will be different now.”

Rebecca put her hands on Catherine’s hips, under the edge of her jacket, and kissed her softly. A moment later, she said firmly, “No. They won’t.”

“Call me later?”

“Count on it.”

*

At 7:10 a.m., she walked into the squad room and sensed the knot of uncertainty and unease in her stomach loosening. Everything looked, and smelled, the same. Same shabby mismatched desks fronting each other in randomly placed pairs, same sickly institutional green paint on the walls, same worn gray tiles on the floor. The odor of stale smoke, old coffee grounds, and honest sweat permeated the air. She couldn’t help but feel a wave of relief when she saw that her desk was exactly as she had left it. Her mug was there in the middle of a stained blotter, a pile of dog-eared file folders balanced precariously in one corner, and the phone was angled precisely the way she always placed it when she was working. Even the rumpled hulk of a man seated at the desk opposite hers looked exactly the same. Fiftyish, gray-haired and balding, forty pounds over his fighting weight—stereotypical flat foot right out of Ed McBain.

“Is that your only suit, Watts?” she asked as she shed her jacket to the back of her chair.

William Watts looked up at the sound of the deep, cutting voice, his expression impassive but his eyes quick and sharp as they took her in.
Thin, still pale, and edgy. Not too bad, considering
. He smiled, but it didn’t show on his face. Not much did. “What, did I miss the memo about the dress code?”

“Yeah, the one that recommends the laundry for that suit every few months.”

He grunted, watching her slide open the bottom left hand drawer of her desk and place the empty holster carefully inside. She didn’t look right without it, but she still looked damn good to him. He was relieved to find that he could look at her and not see the river of blood spreading over her chest. For a few weeks, especially while she was in the ICU, he’d been afraid he’d never stop seeing it.

“How come the cap didn’t say anything about you coming back?”

“Because he doesn’t know it yet.”

Her smile was thin, and there was a new hardness in her eyes. He’d thought her tough before; now she was stone. Maybe that’s what it took to come back after what she’d been through. He didn’t really want to know. “Well, if it will get me off these goddamned cold cases, I’ll go in with you.”

She studied him, a big part of her wanting to dislike him still. Mostly because he was sitting in Jeff’s chair, and Jeff Cruz, her partner of six years, was dead. But Watts, in his typical roundabout way, had just offered to back her up with the captain. He’d had her back once before, when it really counted. When it had been the only thing that mattered more to her than the job. When it had been Catherine’s life. But right now, she needed to stand alone. To prove that she still could.

“I can handle it.”

“Right,” he replied uninterestedly, reaching for another file on another old case that hadn’t been solved and never would be.

“Thanks, Watts.”

When he glanced up in surprise, all he got was her retreating back, but he smiled anyhow.

*

“Come in.”

“Morning, Captain.”

Captain John Henry looked up from the stack of departmental reports he’d been perusing as the door to his small office closed, and he registered the identity of the unmistakable voice he hadn’t heard for weeks. “Frye.”

They eyed one another for a few seconds, taking stock. They’d worked together for eight years. They respected one another. And they took nothing for granted. She stood in front of his desk as relaxed as she ever got, which was to say, hands loose at her sides but muscles coiled and set to spring. He leaned back in the leather chair, his one concession to comfort, with his summer-weight blended gabardine jacket on, tie tightly knotted beneath a snowy white collar, his handsome mahogany features inscrutable. He placed his pen on the desktop.

“I take it you have something to say?”

“Yes, sir. I’m ready to work.”

He sighed. “Sit down, Sergeant.”

She did, crossing one calf over the opposite knee, her hands motionless on the armrests. The last time she’d sat in this room, she’d come perilously close to insubordination and had nearly torpedoed her career. Catherine had been sitting beside her, and Henry had asked the psychiatrist to put her own life in danger to catch a psychopathic killer. Rebecca had disagreed with her superior—vocally and repeatedly. She still didn’t know why he hadn’t slapped her down that day but had put her in charge of the operation instead. The one time she’d seen him since then had been in the hospital, when she’d awakened to find him sitting nearby. She vaguely remembered him saying that she’d done the department proud.

“I don’t suppose you remember that there are protocols for this situation.” Frye was his best detective, but she didn’t always play by the rules, at least not the bureaucratic ones. Most effective cops didn’t. But there were some rules he couldn’t bend.

“I know that,” she replied. “I was just hoping to speed up the process.” She waited a beat. “And I wanted to check out the lay of the land.”

“Spit it out, Sergeant. I’ve got a busy day.”

“My desk is still out there. I want to make sure my job is, too.”

Henry got up and walked to a small side table where an antiquated coffee machine stood warming a half-filled pot. He poured a mug full and answered with his back turned. “If things hadn’t turned out the way they did, you could have been suspended for ignoring any number of basic rules of procedure. You didn’t call for backup; you endangered yourself and a fellow officer, not to even mention putting a civilian at risk. Jesus. What a field day the press could have had with that if she’d been hurt. You were lucky.”

The scar on her chest picked that moment to start itching. When it did that, she wanted to tear through the hard red flesh until it bled. She didn’t move a muscle. Calmly, she said, “Yes, sir.”

“No one cares about that, now. You’re a hero.” He settled a hip against the counter and sipped the coffee. His wife bought the blend for him. He was grateful she’d consented to marry him for more reasons than he could count, and every time he poured a cup, he remembered it. Smart woman. “I can’t say you haven’t been missed.” He almost smiled at his own understatement. Jesus, when had he become a bureaucrat? “With you out and Cruz…gone, I’ve been hurting for senior detectives.”

“Watts is experienced.”

He studied her, remembering quite clearly her vociferous objections to working with—what had she called Watts—a lazy fuck-up? He’d give a lot to know what really went down out there between the two of them that night. Whatever it was, Frye was standing up for Watts now. “He’s not sergeant material. Here’s the drill—you’ll have to ride a desk until I have every piece of paper authorizing your return signed and in my hands.”

The tightness in her chest began to ease. “I’m going to the range this morning. There’s nothing wrong with my shooting arm. I’ll re-qualify and get my weapon back, so I should be okay for street duty after that.”

“Nice try, Frye. Not until the shrink signs off, and you know how slow they are.” He held up a hand when he saw the fire jump in her eyes. “But, maybe we can work around it.” He walked back behind his desk, took a thick blue folder off a pile by his right hand, and opened it in front of him. “This just came in. The brass wants us to be part of a task force the feds are setting up—”

“Uh-uh. No way. Not a combined jurisdictional deal. That’s a dead-end job. Making nice with assho—”

“Sergeant.”

She clamped her jaws closed so hard she was certain Henry could hear them snap. She’d expected some kind of repercussions after what had happened with Blake. The press might have made her out to be a hero, but that didn’t make it true. Henry had every right to be pissed off about the way she’d skirted the chain of command, but she didn’t figure he’d bury her in some back room, pushing paper with the feds. Okay, fine, she’d crawl if it meant street duty.

“Captain, please…”

“Hear me out, Frye.” His tone was surprisingly conciliatory. Continuing to scan the memo, he read, “Justice, Customs, and the Philadelphia PD are to set up a multilevel task force aimed at identifying and apprehending those individuals and/or organizations responsible for the production and distribution of child pornography, including the procurement of subjects.”