A Killing Gift

son. The party was like a wake-everyone reminiscing over his life as if he were already dead and gone to Florida.

'Hey, congratulations, pally. You watch yourself in West Palm.' His successor, Bob Estrada, patted him on the back on his way out. 'Lucky bastard,' Estrada muttered.

Bernie snorted again. Yeah, real lucky. Lorna had won the lottery, literally, then died of cancer only a few weeks later. You couldn't get any luckier than that. Lorna had finally gotten the millions she'd prayed for all those years so they could retire in the sunshine and spend time together. Then she had to go and die and leave him to do it alone. What was Florida to him without her? What was anything?

He slipped out the door, thinking about all the others who'd passed before they should have. In thirty-eight years as a cop he'd seen quite a parade of death. Each former human who'd passed away too soon had been a little personal injury for him that he'd covered with macho humor.

The worst of all were the officers and civilians, the bodies all over the place in the World Trade Center attack. Smashed fire trucks and police cars. And the fire that had gone on and on. You couldn't get the smell of smoke and burned flesh out of your nose in Chinatown for months. Refrigerators in apartments down there had to be replaced. Thousands of them. The smell wouldn't fade. And that was the least of it.

When the unthinkable happened, Bernardino had been CO of the detective unit in Fifth Precinct on Elizabeth Street in Chinatown for over a decade. Too close to Ground Zero for comfort. Everyone in the precinct worked around the clock because nobody had wanted to go home or be anywhere else. They'd stayed on the job twenty- four/seven for weeks longer than absolutely necessary. People who'd retired years ago came back on the job to help. And they came from other agencies, too. Retired FBI and CIA agents manned the phones, directed traffic. Whatever had to be done. He shook his head thinking about it.

All through those long, long days, the cops who worked the front lines waited with the rest of the world for the second shoe to drop. They'd responded to hundreds of bomb threats a day, telling themselves they were fine. Doin' okay. But the truth was none of them were okay. The worst for Bernie was that he'd let Lorna down. He'd been out fighting a war on New York and hadn't been home for her in her last year of life.

Amazing how one thing could tip a person over. He hadn't been there for Lorna long before she'd gotten the cancer. That was what ate away at him. He hadn't been there when she was well. Then as soon as things were back to 'normal,' people were out the door. Retiring left and right. And now he was out the door.

Bernardino was a retired cop on the street on a humid spring night, and he was immediately enveloped by a deep warm fog. He looked around and was startled by it. You didn't see real pea soup in New York that often anymore. The thickness of it was like something in a movie. Downright dreamy. While he'd been inside, the haze had dropped low over the Washington Square area, blurring figures, lights, and time. Maybe that was what got to him. Bernardino dipped his head, acknowledging to himself the spookiness of the night. But maybe he was just drunk.

He shuffled his feet a little as he headed north on a side street he knew as well as his own home. He'd parked his car on the other side of Washington Square. He walked slowly toward it, muttering his regrets to himself. Lively, funny, rock-solid Lorna had faded in a few short months. He remembered a social worker's warning to him at the time: 'Denial isn't a river in Egypt, Bernie.'

But he just didn't believe she would die. The smell of Italian cooking followed him down the block. He was a warhorse, a cop who'd always looked over his shoulder, especially on really quiet nights. But tonight he wasn't a cop anymore. He was done. His thoughts were far away. He was feeling sluggish, old, abandoned. All evening his buddies had punched and hugged him, told him they'd visit. Told him he'd find a new honey in Florida. He'd be fine. But he didn't think he'd ever be fine.

Out of the fog came an unexpected voice. 'Hey, you're number's up, asshole.'

Like a blind dog, Bernie turned his big head toward the sound. Who the hell…? Then he burst out laughing. Harry was pranking him. Ha ha. His old partner from years ago following him to his car to say goodbye. His number was up-his retirement number.

'Harry, you old devil!' Bernardino had been unnerved for a moment but now felt a surge of relief. 'Come out here where I can see you.' He spun around to where he thought the sound originated.

'Nopey-nope. Ain't going to happen.' An arm snaked around Bernardino's neck from behind and jerked hard.

Bernardino didn't even have time to lean forward and flip the guy before the grip was set. Despite his size and heft, he was positioned for death with very little effort. After only a very few panicked heartbeats, his neck was broken and he was gone.

Two

It took Detective Sergeant April Woo only a second to realize that Bernardino had gone. The plaque from the Department for his wall and the watch from his cronies for his wrist were still sitting on the bar. He hadn't said his formal good-byes. But April was always finely tuned to what was going on around her, knew him, and knew he'd slipped away. She clicked her tongue. No doubt he was sad and hated to part, but there was no need to be rude.

'What?' Poppy Bellaqua followed her gaze to the bar, where her new driver, Martha Ciciatelli, was ostentatiously avoiding alcohol, downing San Pellegrino in a wineglass.

'Bernie took off,' April murmured.

The inspector lifted her shoulder. The movement caught Martha's eye. Want to go, boss?

Poppy raised five fingers for five minutes. 'Maybe he's taking a piss,' she said.

'Uh-uh.' He'd have to pass the two of them to get to the men's room. Bernardino was a real old-school cop. He would not have been able to resist stopping to heckle the inspector, who was CO of the Hate Crime Unit, and the Chinese officer he'd promoted to detective who'd made good. Bernie would have tried to disconcert Poppy with his teasing. He would have called April cara. Nothing offensive, just guy stuff.

'Miss me, cara?' he'd say. And, 'When are you going to marry that bum?' Then something about her becoming an inspector herself someday. Yeah, he'd have done that.

A familiar chill feathered the back of April's neck. Something was wrong. She knew it for sure. Sergeant April Woo was an ABC, an American Born Chinese, as far from old China as a New Yorker could get. She had thirteen years in the Department-nearly twelve as a detective, and three of those as a sergeant. She'd solved a number of major homicide cases with her former supervisor, now fiance, Mike Sanchez. Recently she'd been studying for the lieutenant's test and would take it in a couple of weeks. Everybody said April was a comer, a big boss in the making. But the magic of old China was formed in the foundation of her soul just like fossils were preserved whole in prehistoric stone.

Sometimes that ancient superstition informed April that vengeful ghosts from another age were about to wreak havoc on a human life. The ghosts and demons couldn't be banished. They had a life of their own. April didn't exactly believe in Chinese magic, and certainly didn't talk about it, but the supernatural was in the air nonetheless. The unexplainable happened. All the time. There was no way to hide from it.

'I'll be right back,' she said, already on her feet and trailing her words behind her. Her handsome chico turned his head from his conversation with Chief Avise when she rose. He had his own radar. All cops did.

Time to go? In cop talk there was body language for everything. She pointed at the forgotten gifts. Be right back. He nodded and returned to the shop talk.

April tapped Marcus Beame on the shoulder. 'Looks like the lieutenant forgot his toys.'

'He was just here a second ago. Did he leave already…?' Marcus seemed surprised to have missed it. April raised a delicate eyebrow. Marcus was too busy flirting with Martha to pay attention to his old boss.

'Anything you need, Sergeant?' Martha jumped in quickly. 'Want me to go after him?'

'No, I'll do it.' April scooped up the two gifts and was out the door without further discussion.

Then, like Bernardino hardly a minute earlier, she was stopped by the unusual fog. In a few hours it had