come back for more?”
“That’s irrational.” Once the message was routed, she turned in the chair to look up at Brooks. “It’s all dishonest, it’s extortion. Asking for a guarantee’s not logical, and would cost another twenty-five thousand. He should either agree to the payment or ignore any other communications.”
“Side bet, ten bucks.”
“I’m sorry?”
“I have ten dollars that says he’ll come back whining for a guarantee.”
Her brows drew together. “You want to wager on his response? That doesn’t seem appropriate.”
He grinned at her. “Afraid to put your money where your mouth is?”
“That’s a ridiculous expression, and no, I’m not. Ten dollars.”
He drew her to her feet, into his arms. Swayed into a dance.
“What are you doing?”
“Making sure we’ll make a nice picture dancing at our wedding.”
“I’m a very good dancer.”
“Yes, you are.”
She laid her head on his shoulder, closed her eyes. “It should feel strange, dancing with no music, making wagers, while we’re orchestrating something so important.”
“Does it?”
“No, it really doesn’t.” She opened her eyes in surprise when her computer signaled another incoming e-mail. “So quick.”
“He’s on the edge. Squeeze play.”
“I don’t understand what that means.”
“Baseball. I’ll explain later. Let’s see what he has to say.”
How do I know you’re not going to come back for more later? Let’s work out a deal.
“That’s a very foolish response,” Abigail complained.
“It cost you ten dollars. Keep it short. Say: ‘You don’t. No deals. You’re up to $125,000, clock ticking down.’”
She studied him a moment: that slightly crooked nose, the hazel eyes—a wash of green over amber now— the shaggy black hair in need of a trim. “I think you’re very good at extortion.”
“Thanks, honey.”
“I’ll put the pasta on while he considers. That’s what he’s doing now? Considering?”
“Sweating, pouring a drink, trying to figure out who’s screwing with him.” Oh, yeah, Brooks thought, he could picture it. “He’s probably thinking about running. Not enough time to make running plans, so he’ll pay, and start making them.”
At the counter, he popped an olive from the tray into his mouth, then topped off her wine. And when her back was turned, tossed a slice of pepperoni to Bert.
By the time she’d boiled the pasta, drained it, the signal came through.
Onetime payment. Come after more, I’ll take my chances with the Volkovs. Spend it fast, because I’m coming after you.
“Big talk.”
“You understand him very well,” Abigail noted.
“Part of the job. You have to understand bad guys to catch bad guys. Where were you figuring to have him wire the money?”
“I have an account set up. Once he’s transferred the funds, I’ll distribute it to a charity for children of fallen police officers.”
“That’s commendable, and I don’t like denying kids, but …”
“You have another recipient in mind?”
“Keegan. Can you transfer Cosgrove’s payment to Keegan’s account?”
“Oh.” Her face lit up as a woman’s might when given rubies. “Oh, that’s
“I have my moments.”
“More than moments. It implicates both of them. It gives the FBI cause to bring them both in for questioning.”
“Honey, it fucks them both inside out.”
“Yes. It really does. And yes, I can do it. It’ll take me a few minutes.”
“Take your time. Bert and I will go for a little walk while you work.”
He snagged a couple more slices of pepperoni on the way out—one for him, one for the dog. A nice evening for a stroll around, he thought, with time to check out the progress of the garden, think about what he might do around the place on his next day off.
“This is our place,” he said to the dog. “She was meant to come here, and I was meant to find her here. I know what she’d say to that.” He laid a hand on Bert’s head, rubbed lightly. “But she’s wrong.”
When Bert leaned against his leg, as he often did with Abigail, Brooks smiled. “Yeah, we know what we know, don’t we?”
As they circled around, he saw Abigail come to the door, smile.
“It’s done. Dinner’s ready.”
Look at her, he thought, standing there with a gun on her hip, a smile on her face and pasta on the table.
Oh, yeah, he knew what he knew.
“Come on, Bert. Let’s go eat.”
Brooks spent a chunk of his morning—too big a chunk, in his opinion—meeting with the prosecutor on the Blake cases.
“The kid’s crying for a deal.” Big John Simpson, slick as they came and with one eye on a political future, made himself at home in Brooks’s office. Maybe a little too much at home.
“And you’re giving him one?”
“Save the taxpayers’ money. Let him plead guilty to assaulting an officer, resisting, the trespass. Got him locked on the vandalism at the hotel, the assaults there. All we give him is a buy on the deadly weapon. We’d never make attempted murder stick. He gets five to seven inside, with mandatory counseling.”
“And serves two and a half, maybe three.”
Big John crossed his ankles above his mirror-shined shoes. “If he behaves himself, and meets the requirements. Can you live with that?”
“Does it matter?”
Big John lifted a shoulder, sipped at his coffee. “I’m asking.”
No, they’d never make the attempted murder stick, Brooks admitted. A couple years inside would do one of two things, he calculated. It would either make Justin Blake into a halfway decent human being, or it would finish his ruination.
Either way, Bickford would be free of him for a couple years.
“I can live with it. What about his old man?”
“Big-city lawyers doing their big-city shuffle, but the fact is, we’ve got a lock there. We got the phone records proving he called Tybal Crew. Got three separate witnesses saw Crew’s truck outside the house on the day in question. Got the cash money turned in, and Blake’s fingerprints are on a number of the bills.”
He paused a moment, recrossed his ankles. “He’s claiming he hired Ty to do some work around the place, paid him in advance ’cause Ty needed the money.”
“Say what?”
