In Pursuit of Justice (8 page)

“Huh.” Watts shifted in his seat and tried to find someplace to stick his knees. He didn’t see how the sarge managed to fit behind the wheel, her being so tall. “What’s that mean?”

“Nothing good.”

“What about me?”

Slowly, she turned her head and looked at him.

He stared back. “Us being partners and all.”

“We’re not…” She stopped herself, remembering that something in the man, something that rarely showed but that she sensed nonetheless, had made her trust Catherine’s life to him. He would never be Jeff, and it would never be the same. But then, what was? “I’m supposed to be the desk jockey. I’ll need legs.”

“Yeah, sure. I can think of worse things than driving around talking to whores and pimps and perverts.” He fumbled in the inside pocket of his shapeless sports jacket for his cigarettes, then caught himself. She wouldn’t let him smoke in her ride. Shit.

“Look. I can get a uniform. I wouldn’t want you to actually have to work—”

“No way. I’m getting a hard-on just thinking about it.”

Rebecca’s hands tightened on the wheel as she suddenly recalled all the reasons she couldn’t stand him. “Just forget it.”

“Hey,” Watts said quickly. “Joke. That was a joke. It takes a lot more than that to give me a—”

“I don’t need to know about that, Watts,” she assured him as she smoothly changed lanes to avoid a slower driver. “I’ll fill you in when I’ve met with the suits from DC. If there’s something I can use you on, I’ll let you know.”

“Good enough.” He sat back, glad to be out of the squad room, happy to contemplate some real work. Even if it was with a bunch of bureaucratic assholes who didn’t know dick about police work. The sarge could handle them. He’d give her a week before she was back on the street.
Frye, a desk jockey. Sure. And I’ve got a ten-inch pecker
.

Staring straight ahead through the windshield, she added, “I never thanked you for that night we nailed Blake. I counted on you to save Catherine’s life. You came through for me. I owe you.”

“Nah, you don’t. We both hit him.” He shrugged. “Besides, I couldn’t let him waste the doc. Guess I got a soft spot for dames. But you know, Sarge, you can’t let yourself take ’em too seriously. You’re finished if you do.”

Rebecca smiled to herself, deciding not to be offended. “Catherine is special.”

“Oh, man,” Watts moaned, shaking his head in mock sadness. “You’re already a goner.” He cleared his throat. “But I wouldn’t mind if you didn’t make yourself a target like that too often. The IA investigation after that shooting went down really busted my balls.”

She turned her head again and regarded him unblinkingly. “You’re breaking my heart, Watts.”

Then she ignored him for the rest of the trip as she piloted the sleek car through the streets. He just sat grinning happily to himself. Frye was back. Things were looking up.

*

Five hours later, Rebecca sat with the Vette idling at the curb on a narrow street in Old City, a mixed neighborhood of historic landmarks and renovated factories turned upscale condos, surveying the address that the anonymous female voice had given her when she’d called the office of Avery Clark, U.S. Department of Justice, Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section. CCIPS.

Alphabet soup—initials and acronyms. Frigging feds just love them
.

The four-story, brick-fronted warehouse looked nothing like a government building, and Rebecca was certain it wasn’t. What she wasn’t sure of was what it
was,
and why the task force was going to be run out of there instead of One Police Plaza or the Federal Building at 6th and Walnut. This looked private. But that couldn’t be. There just wasn’t any precedent for a /files/16/32/92/f163292/public/private coalition on an active investigation, and certainly not when the feds were involved.

She shut off the engine. She wouldn’t find out what was going on in there by sitting outside in the street waiting for a clue. Besides, as bad as this was going to be, there was the possibility that it could lead her places. Places she wasn’t going to have easy access to any other way. Hopefully, this task force would open some doors that would bring her closer to understanding what the hell had gone wrong with Jimmy Hogan and Jeff.

The wide reinforced door to the ground floor was locked, and she pushed the bell next to an intercom. A disembodied genderless voice requested, “ID.”

Slowly, she opened the fold-over leather case displaying her badge on one side and a police photo ID opposite and held it up to a small camera mounted in the corner of a narrow recess above the entrance. The door lock clicked open, and she pushed through into a surprisingly well lit garage that occupied the entire ground floor. A sleek black Porsche Carrera convertible sat in the center of the large room. At the rear, she could make out a freight elevator with yet another intercom and no visible access panel. Probably remote controlled.

“Third floor,” a voice instructed as she approached the lift, and several more cameras swiveled to follow her progress across the room. The whole setup made her skin itch, but she never even twitched. She did, however, unbutton her blazer as she stepped into the double-wide elevator car to allow access to her weapon. That at least was something that had gone well. An hour on the range with Watts to get her groove back, and then she’d nailed every one of the recertification targets. She had her badge and her gun. She was back.

The elevator moved soundlessly upward and opened onto another huge space, this one lit by sunlight from the floor-to-ceiling windows on the wall opposite her as well as rows of overhead tracks. Through the windows, she had an unimpeded view of the waterfront and the river beyond. Prime Old City real estate. Definitely
not
city property.

Rebecca took her time getting her bearings. Lots of computers, lots of other assorted electronic paraphernalia, and lots of communication equipment. It looked like a government operation from the scope and probable cost of the hardware. The government always went big on the technical stuff and skimped on the manpower.

“Detective Sergeant Frye?”

Rebecca turned slightly to her left and surveyed the woman who approached across the highly polished wood floor, right hand extended.
Five-ten, one-forty, muscular build. Black hair, deep violet eyes, about thirty. White T-shirt, leather blazer, jeans. Heavy platinum band on the left hand ring finger.

“That’s right,” Rebecca replied, taking the outstretched hand. The grip was cool and firm but not overpowering. Confident, like the stance and the voice. Clearly not Avery Clark, but someone used to being in charge.

“J. T. Sloan.” She indicated a slender blond man, who looked like he could have been a Ralph Lauren model, seated at one of the computer consoles. “My associate, Jason McBride.”

Nodding to him, Rebecca said, “I was supposed to meet Clark from Justice.”

“He called,” Sloan said, her expression carefully neutral. “Said he’d been detained at the Federal Building. There’s a meeting set for here—0730 tomorrow.”

Rebecca frowned. It was starting already. The inevitable meetings and lousy communications that usually ended up wasting more time than anything else. “With whom?”

“Him, someone from Customs, you, and us.”

“What department are you with?” Rebecca asked, feeling the beginnings of an enormous headache gathering behind her eyes. She was tired, and that added to her annoyance. Christ, she’d only been on her feet half a day. She shouldn’t be tired.

“We’re private.”

The words came as a surprise, although they shouldn’t have. Rebecca looked around the state-of-the-art room and thought about Jeff the last morning she’d seen him alive, two-finger pecking a report out on an ancient electric typewriter. This show was too elaborate for the police department, and somehow too sleekly efficient for the feds. “Your place?”

“That’s right.” Sloan nodded, watching the detective who had slipped both hands into the pockets of her trousers, hands which Sloan was pretty certain were clenched into fists.
This is one unhappy cop. Wonder whose shit list she got on to pull this assignment
?

“There’s supposed to be a uniform assigned here,” Rebecca remarked, trying to decide whether she should ask about the operation or wait for the guy from Justice. She had no idea what these two were doing on the task force, and she didn’t want to advertise her own ignorance of the situation. “Our department’s paper chaser.”

“Haven’t seen anyone,” Sloan observed noncommittally. “Anyone else on your team?”

“Another detective,” Rebecca replied carefully, wondering why she’d asked. Damn, she hated coming in cold on an operation, and the file Henry had given her had been very light on details. “You?”

“Just us.”

Rebecca made no comment.
Looks like this is going to be a very small group, which means someone, somewhere, wants to keep whatever we find under tight control. Usually when the government is involved, there are so many management-level types in on the action that they’re falling all over one another. This seems just the opposite. Interesting.

Jason had turned on his swivel chair and was watching the two of them, his head moving imperceptibly back and forth with the stops and starts of the staccato conversation. The two women regarded each other steadily in the loud silence—Sloan, darkly good looking and unconcernedly casual, Frye starkly handsome and tautly reserved.
Lots of room for fireworks here.

Sloan considered the upcoming operation and assessed the complexity of alliances and allegiances likely to be a factor. The past history with Justice was much further from her mind now than it had been a year ago, but some memories never fade completely, despite apologies and retractions and concessions. Avery Clark had never been an enemy, but neither was he a friend. He’d called her because he needed her, and she didn’t owe him anything except her expertise. She owed this detective, who was most likely going to end up with the dirty part of the job, even less. She studied the blue eyes studying her.

“Why don’t we grab some coffee, and I’ll fill you in on what I know.”

*

Rebecca glanced at her wristwatch, a functional unadorned timepiece with a broad leather band and solid gold face. She wore it every day, just as her father had until the day he’d died. 4:59 p.m. She stretched her long frame in the uncomfortable straight-backed chair in the small, windowless room and thought about the spacious waiting room outside Catherine’s office.
Thick oriental rug, shaded floor lamps, a coffee table with up-to-date magazines. Professional, but human. Warm and welcoming.
Like Catherine.

She remembered that first night—her own impatience, the pressure of a horrendous case, Catherine’s calm, firm resistance to being questioned. A stalemate that had eventually led to something far different. Just a few months ago, two very dissimilar women finding—

“Sergeant?” a male voice asked as the door across the tiny anteroom opened with a creak. The plain entrance to the inner office carried no identifying label or occupant name.

“Yes.” She stood, her face carefully blank.

A middle-aged man with thick, unruly brown hair and a linebacker’s build dressed in a plain white shirt and dark trousers, sleeves rolled to mid-forearm, extended his hand and stepped toward her. “Rand Whitaker.”

She shook his hand and followed him into another bland room crammed with an institutional-appearing desk, a wall of mismatched bookcases, and two generic armchairs after he said, “Come on in.” Fluorescent lights in a drop ceiling and wall-to-wall dark gray carpet completed the impersonal space.

“Have you done this before?” he asked as he settled behind the desk in a swivel chair that squeaked in protest.

“No.” She eyed the plain manila folder that lay closed in front of him. The label was obscured, but she knew what it was. Her jacket. Everything the department had accumulated on her during her twelve years of service. To her knowledge, there were no reprimands, no inquiries, no investigative reports in that file. There were two citations.

“You understand this is routine after an officer-involved shooting or a serious injury to an officer in the line of duty. In your case…” He regarded her intently, then continued, “It’s both.”

I understand I won’t be able to get back to work until you say I can. I understand that you’re supposed to be here to help the rank and file, but you’re not one of us. And I understand that cops aren’t allowed to have problems, at least not the kind of problems that you deal with
. She met his gaze directly. “Yes, I understand.”