Manhattan Flame (A Bridge & Tunnel Romance Book 2) (2 page)

But he wasn’t going to back down. “Talk to her. Send a cruiser over. According to her this happened ten or fifteen minutes ago.”

Reilly said, “I’m going to show you something.” He sounded companionable enough, but Kevin knew the man was anything but. “Come with me.”

The sergeant stomped out to the front desk, as Kevin trailed tightly behind, and Tasha seemed to stiffen at their approach. She folded her arms and a distinct look of distrust shielded her otherwise frightened features.

“What’s your name?” he barked, making a display of eyeing the monitor, the report on the counter, anywhere but Tasha in order to make her feel small.

In this moment, Kevin genuinely despised him.

“Tasha Buckley,” she said clearly with a faint street-lilt in her tone. “You want to hear what I have to say?”

“I know what you think, Sweetheart.” Tasha screwed her face up at the endearment and then her eyes went slack as if this wasn't her first rodeo with an authority figure who just plain didn't like her. Reilly pounded on, asking, “Have you been drinking this evening?”

“What?” Her fist was on her hip now and she swung her other hand up. “Hell, no. No, I don’t need this.”

“So is that a yes?” he pressed.

“No, Officer,” she barked back in a thick New York accent. “I haven’t been drinking. I’ve been taking pictures down at the pier.”

“Are you on drugs?”

The second the sergeant had asked, Tasha’s eyes snapped to Kevin, widened, and her mouth drifted open, appalled. Reeling in her emotions in a way that impressed him—if he were in her shoes, he'd probably explode—she turned to Reilly and stated, “No, Sir, I have not been drinking and I’m not on drugs. I don’t do drugs. I do photography. That’s my thing.”

Reilly was staring at Kevin now as though the two of them might chuckle about this later, but Kevin didn't find it funny and was about to assert as much when Tasha spoke up.

“You don’t want to believe the young black woman whose trying to do you a favor? Fine. Believe this.” She had her camera in her hands now and clicked a few buttons then turned the view screen towards them and Kevin saw clearly what looked like two men strangling a third on the pier.

Reilly seized the camera for a closer look.

“Rapid-fire,” said Tasha. “Click through it fast, it’ll play like a movie.”

The sergeant took her suggestion and as he clicked through the frames, his pale eyes locking on the screen, Kevin could tell the man was having a hard time pulling his foot out of his mouth. And if he wasn’t mistaken, he thought Reilly looked a strange mix of pissed and scared. Then again, insult brought with it a wealth of emotions and the sergeant was obviously insulted that Tasha Buckley had stood her ground and been right.

Kevin liked this girl, but he managed to suppress the crooked smirk that was threatening to overtake his expression.

“Wait here,” ordered Reilly, as he took her camera with him deep into the bullpen.

Kevin watched him and it wasn’t until Reilly slammed his office door shut that he returned his gaze to Tasha. She looked put-off and he couldn’t blame her so he reinforced the good she was doing by mentioning, “He’s hardheaded, but this is solid. I’m glad you came in.”

“Hardheaded?” she challenged. “I could think of a better word.”

The smile he’d been holding in came out and felt good, and to his surprise it was contagious. She let a small smirk form across her face and as her lips parted, he took a moment to eye her straight teeth and the snaggletooth—an incisor—that he hadn’t noticed before.

When the silence between them, the lingering eye contact, lasted for too long, he asked, “Photographer, huh?”

“Almost,” she sighed. “Right now I’m working as an assistant, but I’ve got some stuff coming up.”

“Stuff?”

“An exhibition down in Chelsea. Nothing too major,” she went on, modestly—it sounded like a hell of a big deal to Kevin. “That’s why I was taking shots near the pier.”

“At night,” he questioned.

“At dusk, moody lighting. It’s good for about an hour and I kept fighting myself to just go home.” She shook her head as if wrestling with herself.

“It’s good that you didn’t go home,” he asserted. “You witnessed something that shouldn’t have happened and now we have a decent chance of catching whoever did this.”

With that in mind, Kevin glanced over his shoulder and wondered why in the hell the sergeant hadn’t sent officers over to the pier yet.

Tasha stole his attention, asking, “You ever go to the galleries around Chelsea?”

“Huh?” Her question registered three seconds after she’d asked it and he blurted out, “Not really. Demanding life up here in Harlem if you can imagine.”

“I can,” she said, her brows floating up and in delayed reaction he realized she was taking an interest in him—asking about galleries, commenting on his busy cop's life. He held her gaze and sensed there was more between them than the straightforward cop-civilian dynamic, one he might like to explore.

Finally, Reilly lumbered back, joining him behind the counter, but Tasha’s jaw had dropped and what she said next came off sassy as hell, “Where the hell's my camera?”

“Hey!” barked Reilly at her swearing. “It’s called evidence and we need it.”

“Like hell you do,” she objected. “You need the shots, I’ll put them on a flash drive for you. You’re not taking my camera!”

“Calm down,” demanded Reilly in a voice so loud you’d think Tasha had just assaulted him. “It’s already logged into evidence. You’ll get it back when we don’t need it anymore.”

Her jaw had dropped to the floor, but she snapped it shut, cooled off in a manner that to Kevin didn’t seem fair—why should Tasha have to keep a level head when Reilly was treating her like a criminal for Christ’s sake?—and then she asked, “When will I get it back?”

Smugly, the sergeant said, “After the trial,” then turned to Kevin. “Help her fill out the 501-67-B458 so she can get her property when the time comes.” And with that he stalked off again without so much as thanking Tasha for coming forward in the first place.

Kevin couldn’t look at her he was so ashamed. Sensing her frustration was enough to send his guts twisting and his chest tightening. He was furious for her and hated that in a sense she was being punished for having helped.

Hunting around the shelving unit, he finally located the form Reilly had advised and set it on the counter. He wanted to tell her that he was sorry, but words were too small. If she had a photography exhibition coming up, he hoped for her sake she had a spare camera lying around somewhere, because the unfortunate fact of the matter was that she wasn’t going to get hers back for a very long time.

And yet, as he collected her information and filled out the form, he wondered why Reilly had shot down Tasha’s very reasonable offer. She could’ve easily transferred the images onto a flash drive. It would certainly serve as evidence whether they had the camera or not. Was Reilly being a jackass? Was he getting off on giving her a hard time and making her life miserable? What was the damned point of keeping her property?

Once he had filled out the form in its entirety, he told her, “It’ll take a day for us to process this and get an internal file number assigned, but at that point we’ll give you a copy to hold on to.”

“Great,” she said as if the information was anything but.

As she scraped her teeth over her lower lip and slapped her hands on her thighs as if concluding the nightmare that had befallen her, Kevin offered her a comforting smile and said, “Good luck with your art show.”

“Yeah,” she grumbled. “I’ll sure as hell need it.”

He watched her walk through the lobby, her swaying hips, her bouncy black curls, to his great relief noting the heels she wore—she wasn’t
that
tall—and when she'd disappeared beyond the glass door, he walked briskly through the bullpen, making a beeline for the sergeant’s office.

“Send me out, Sarge,” he demanded. “I want in on this one.”

“To the pier? I already sent a cruiser.”

He glared at him, but Reilly’s eyes were just as steely.

Reilly ordered, “Shut the door on your way out.”

Kevin didn’t just shut the office door. He slammed it.

Chapter Three

The photography studio was in crisp divide. White, floor-to-ceiling seamless paper cloaked the front half of the room. At the back was a smattering of industrial lights, illuminating an Amazonian bombshell whose teased black hair spilled over the daring, sable-fur bikini she was modeling.

Tasha hung off to the wayside with a clipboard in her hand and noted the various lenses, angles, and apertures being used, and tracked their correlation to the model’s outfits, while her boss, Hans Janz hunched into his Nikon Coolpix L820, pacing around his subject and firing off shots.

She would kill for that camera. Hell, at this point there wasn’t much she wouldn’t do to have a basic Kodak in her hands for a few days. The thought of her precious Canon locked in an evidence room at the police station was enough to set her teeth on edge.

“Leg up on the block,” Hans demanded, alerting the model to the white cube his scenic designer had provided.

While he waited for the leggy twenty-year old to play around with the prop, he tilted his head, stretching the side of his neck, and plowed his fingers through his coiffed blond hair that to Tasha looked waxy with product.

Hans seemed annoyed that the model was struggling. He paced off towards one of the Flashpoint monolights and made a few adjustments.

Tasha bit her tongue not to make a suggestion concerning both the angle of the light and the possibilities the model could explore kicking and mounting the cube. But if she had learned anything working under Hans Janz’s laughable tutelage, it was that assistants were meant to be neither seen nor heard.

The model, whose name was Shivana, had moved to New York City from Trinidad when a modeling scout from IMG had so-called discovered her—as if any young adult were an island that some Manhattan hotshot could stake his flag in. She pitched her stiletto heel on the cube in a way that concerned Tasha she might twist her ankle. Worse was the fact she had also braced the cube with her left hand, which had caused such a forward bend that her breasts were threatening to spill out of the strips of fur that some designer—a man no doubt—called a bikini.

Tasha snuck a glance at Hans, as he rounded a folding table where his DIT specialist was logging the digital shots he'd taken into a laptop. He seemed consumed, eyeing the monitor, so Tasha risked the scolding she would surely get stepping across the white paper and approached the model.

Demonstratively, she guided the girl aside, taking her place, then set her sneaker on the cube. Communicating only in body language since Shivana spoke very little English, she arched her back, tossed her head, and worked the white block in a way she was sure Hans wanted.

The model smirked nervously, yet memorized all she was shown, and before Tasha slinked away, she gestured to her own chest, indicating the model needed a quick tuck to be on the safe side.

“Off the set!” yelled Hans, as he barreled towards her, fuming and pointing angrily at the white paper she had trailed across. “Look at these scuffs!”

She didn’t see a single scuffmark, but apologized profusely anyway, adding, “Coffee? Espresso? Red Bull?”

“Why don’t you keep behind the lights and help me forget I hired you, hmm?”

In addition to pressing her mouth into a hard line to stifle what might tumble out, she felt eyes on her and instinctively glanced at the model, who was gaping as if appalled on Tasha’s behalf. She might not be fluent in the language, but Hans’s tone had read loud and clear.

The shoot picked up again—Hans clicking frames as he worked his way around the model, Shivana hiking her long leg over the cube and confidently selling
the idea
of the bikini she wore.

Making her way to the very back of the studio, Tasha neared the refreshment table and poured herself a cup of coffee, which she doctored with cream and sugar. She didn’t need caffeine so much as air and there wasn’t any within an eight-yard radius of her agitated boss.

Impacting her sour mood was all that had transpired two nights ago. It killed her not to have her camera, but as bad as that felt, she couldn’t shake how offended she was, having been dismissed by that cop. What was he, a lieutenant, a sergeant, the captain? He was a bastard as far as she was concerned. Few things were worse than not being believed. And being made to feel like a criminal herself when she had only meant to report a very serious crime was outlandish.

And what would come of her statement? An investigation? A trial? Nothing? As terrible as it might be to wish this would all go away, it seemed better than the alternative: testifying in a trial. And when would that happen? Months down the road or years?

At least that guy who'd been working at the desk was on her side or had been, she thought as she stirred her coffee and tossed the wooden stick into the trash. Who knew what he thought now? Maybe his superior had convinced him that Tasha was some kind of troublemaker.

She reminded herself that all they needed to believe her was already in their possession—her camera, those photos, the frame-by-frame blow-by-blow that had taken place on the pier—but it didn’t make her feel any better.

If she had her choice, she would rather be considered a crazy person and have her Canon around her neck than be believed and even thanked and not have it.

She realized her shoulders were tense so she forced out a long exhale, loosening her muscles. That cop, what was his name? She’d read the name on his badge too quickly—Wright? He had told her to call in or swing by to get the form, which would be her ticket to retrieving her camera, and that was exactly what she planned on doing. Once she had the report number, she could call the station every day if need be.

And that’s when she fully understood what was really eating her. She hated not being believed. It was worse than being taken advantage of. She felt like she'd been brushed under the rug, disrespected, discarded, and she just plain couldn’t stomach it.

As she made her soundless way back to the front of the studio where Hans was switching out the full memory card from his camera with a fresh one, she downed her coffee and worked up the nerve to interrupt.

“Hans?” She said softly, nearing her boss, as the DIT specialist popped the full memory card into a gadget beside his laptop.

“She’s fantastic, isn’t she?” he commented without looking at her.

Tasha glanced at the model, who was ducking behind a folding screen to get into her final outfit. Agreeably, she told him, “She is. She’s so unusual looking. These shots are going to be ground breaking.”             

Hans shot her a crooked smile that she hoped indicated he was in a good mood.

“I was wondering...” she said, trailing off and studying his face. “Well, unfortunately I had a mishap with my camera, and… I know there are five hanging around the studio and if I could borrow one for a few days-”

His snorted laugh cut her off, but she swallowed hard and pressed on.

“I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t need it.”

“I’m sorry,” he said curtly. “They don’t belong to me. Those cameras are the property of the studio.”

She happened to know that wasn’t true. Feeling bold and also feeling downright sick of being dismissed, she challenged him by asking, “Then should I ask someone at the front desk?”

That got his attention and he straightened up from eyeing his camera. His cold blue eyes locked on her and the washed-out apathy on his face was replaced with disgust.

Fortunately or not, he didn’t have a chance to vocalize what he really thought of her request, because Shivana was stomping out from the changing area in puffy, white winter boots that reminded Tasha of a cross between Uggs and overgrown shrubs, and a sleek, beige one-piece bathing suit.

Hans yelled out, “Fabulous!” and neared his model, lifting the camera to his face.

It seemed to take an eternity for Hans to capture the final look as modeled by Shivana. As always, Tasha hung out behind the bright lights and took notes, fantasizing all the while about how she might launch herself out of this crappy job and into the life she had always envisioned for herself.

For some reason as she ran down the particulars of making her photography dream a reality, Officer Wright kept popping into her thoughts.

Between the surrealism of entering the police station and her overall shock of having witnessed a murder, Wright had struck her as the one aspect that wasn’t completely otherworldly. He had been kind and gentle, treating her with respect. He had seemed to care—a rare trait she seldom found in people other than her closest friends, Greer and Jennifer, much less in a cop. And he had handled her in a manner that had made her feel good, genuinely proud, about coming forward. 

But it wasn’t only his attitude that had Tasha’s thoughts wandering. She couldn’t recall ever giving a cop a second look, and Officer Wright’s looks were deserving of more than a single glance. He reminded her of the artsy guys she'd gone to Cooper Union with—sharp, discerning eyes the color of which were too hazy to guess, laid-back stubble along his jaw, a muscular build though hidden as if he didn’t quite realize how fit he was, a distinct sensitivity that poured through his words and actions—which was why the fact that he was in law enforcement, dressed in a uniform, and taking down crime reports was so bizarre.

Hans shouted, “That’s a wrap!” startling Tasha from her daydream.

Of course she would now be exiled to cleanup duty, but she tackled her obligations quickly, turning off the lights, helping the stylist gather garments in the changing area, and finally locking up when everyone else had slipped out into the lobby, chatting and making promises of drinks—
soon
and
definitely
and
great job, babe
—that none of them intended to keep.

When finally she returned the studio keys to the front desk attendant and signed out on behalf of her boss, she felt a great weight lift from her shoulders—she had made it through her day—but soon another, even heavier force began baring down on her.

All that lied in store for her at the 26th.

Dusk was settling over TriBeCa, as she walked briskly along Canal Street towards the A train. She paused briefly to wrap a scarf around her neck—the chill of the evening having settle in—before descending the subway stairs. And as she threaded the silky fabric into a loop, she sensed eyes on her.

Glancing over her shoulder, she caught sight of a man just as he diverted his gaze. He was standing a quarter of a block away and as pedestrians swallowed him, hurrying past, Tasha studied him. He was short, stalky, Russian-looking in his black windbreaker and sweatpants. Comfortably dressed yet donning a thick gold chain around his neck as well as a few bulky rings on his fingers, he struck her as a creep if anything, and because of it she hurried down into the subway, swiped her MetroCard fast when she reached the turnstiles, and managed to duck into a train just as its doors were closing.

The ride uptown was rocky and drawn out. There wasn’t a seat available so she held onto the handlebar that spanned the ceiling and kept her eyes down. The subway lights flickered and at times cut out all together, but she was used to it, as well the bucks and flares of the train car, the occasional crazy person addressing anyone who would listen, the juveniles who break dancing and blaring their boom boxes in hopes of spare change.

When the doors opened and the intercom voice announced 163rd Street / Amsterdam Avenue, she forced her way between a tired looking hospice nurse who hadn’t bothered to change out of her orthopedic shoes and an older black man who smelled like stale cigarettes, and spilled out onto the platform.

Crazy as it might have seemed, she liked the underground scent where concrete met with the electric rails, a pungent mix of mothballs, bleach, and human life filled the air, and sometimes Tasha thought she couldn’t get enough. Nothing smelled quite like the bowels of New York City so she wasn’t shy about breathing deeply as she huffed and puffed her way up the many steps and in minutes emerged onto the darkened street.

It hadn’t been a long ride, fifteen minutes tops as fast as the express train tended to fly, but night had fallen over the city.

When she reached the street corner, she paused for the light and gave the crosswalk button a few firm presses. She felt warm so she tore her scarf from her neck and tucked it into her purse, and again the eerie feeling of being watched came over her.

She glanced up at the cross signal, which was still a solid, red, Do Not Walk sign, so she made cautious work of taking in her surroundings, slowly pivoting and looking over her shoulder.

The man.

Gold chains, black windbreaker, sweatpants that seemed strangely expensive—he was rounding onto the street from the subway and before he could touch eyes with her, she turned, caught sight of the flashing walk signal, and booked it across the street.

It wasn’t lost on her that the man’s attire, his dark hair and entitled manner, reminded her of the men she’d witnessed toss another dead into the Hudson River.

Was he following her?

She quickened her pace and hung a right, mapping the same route she had taken two nights ago to the precinct, and told herself she was reading too much into this. New York was filled with doppelgangers. She wasn’t being followed. That couldn't be the same man who she had seen on Canal Street. Her eyes were playing tricks on her because she was rattled about her camera. Besides, if she was being trailed, no one in their right mind would follow her into a police station, she told herself, as she flung its glass door open, strangely hoping to find a familiar face behind the front desk.