Signature Kill (30 page)

“Copy,” Behr said. “Are we done here?”

“Yeah,” Breslau said, releasing his grip. “You and me are done.” Then the lieutenant stalked off to his car and gunned it away.

Behr stood there alone in the street. He had nothing. No cases, no money, no family, and whatever passed for his soul buried by the shovelful on the edge of an Iowa field. Nothing, save for one thing—Susan was safe. His son was safe. Mistretta was safe. So was the rest of Indianapolis for just this morning or just this moment because he had done the one thing he was able to in the world, which was put monsters in the ground. And he had a door. One door to knock on, and maybe walk through.

She stood there dressed in her work clothes, without any makeup, her blond hair pulled back, looking young and fresh and beautiful. She was everything he wasn’t. The baby was playing on the living room floor behind her. Distrust and exasperation came to her eyes when she first saw him, but whatever she read on his face made it go away in an instant. There was only silence between them, the sound of a kid’s show on the television in the background.

“Oh, Frank,” she finally said, “you look like you’ve been through it.”

“I have,” he said. “Can I please come in?”

She gave him a sad, kind smile, and with a gesture that proved no act of mercy was a minor one, she opened the door and let him inside.

David Levien is the author of the Frank Behr novels:
Thirteen Million Dollar Pop, Where the Dead Lay,
and
City of the Sun
. He has been nominated for the Edgar, Hammett, and Shamus Awards, and is also a screenwriter and director. He lives in Connecticut.