“You say that now, but I have a feeling I’ll pay for it at some point.”
She agreed with a purposeful nod. “Aye, that you probably will.”
“Well, don’t sugarcoat it.” I offered the comment with its own thin lacquer of sarcasm.
“Aye, I won’t.”
“Uhmm-Hmmm!” The sound of Ben clearing his throat intervened before our conversation could dip any closer to the danger zone. “You two want me to get you some gloves and ring the bell?”
“No,” I said in a quiet tone, chagrined that our verbal discontent had been witnessed.
Felicity simply shook her head.
“That was quick,” I said.
“Yeah. No reason to drag it out. So listen,” my friend began as he reached up and massaged his neck. “There’s been a bit of a change in plans here.”
“She didn’t pull you off this completely, did she?” I asked, shunting my un-quelled annoyance off to another target.
“No,” he returned. “No, she didn’t. Believe it or not, she actually wants you and me to go look at somethin’.”
Felicity immediately pushed away from the countertop next to me and started from the room. As I reached out for her, she shrugged away from my hand and turned. She raised a finger and stared back at me, cold fire in her green eyes. A single tear was advancing across her cheek, and she held her rigid position for a weighty measure of time before she finally spoke. “Aye, go. You go, but you’d best come back.”
With the unmistakable instruction given, she turned on her heel and strode through the pass-thru into the dining room.
“I didn’t say I was going to…” My words trailed off almost immediately as I realized they were falling short of reaching her; not that she would have been paying attention if they had.
“Dammit,” I muttered as the lightning bolt of realization struck me square between my eyes. “I’m not sure, but I think I might have just figured out what your sister was trying to tell me.”
“She’s good for doin’ that kinda shit to people,” Ben affirmed.
“Yes, she is.”
“So, is Felicity gonna be okay?” he finally asked.
“Yeah, eventually,” I told him.
“Should you maybe go talk to her?”
“Not now.” I shook my head. “I’ve been married to her for a long time, Ben. Trust me, this is something that will play out later when we’re alone.”
“You sure?”
“Oh yeah,” I guaranteed him. “I’m sure.”
“How ‘bout you? You gonna be all right?”
“Yeah.” I was still staring after my wife. “Yeah, I think so. I’m just not sure how I feel about being a matador.”
“Do what?”
“Nothing. Forget it.” I reached up and rubbed my temple for a moment. “So what’s the deal? What’s so important that Albright needs us to look at it right now?”
“Well, so anyway,” he stumbled over the words a bit, “so what happened is the phone company managed to peg the number Porter used. It was a cell just like we thought.”
“Well, that’s good, right?” I asked.
“Not for the guy it used to belong to,” he replied.
“You mean he killed someone else already?”
“Not exactly.” He shook his head. “More like before.”
“Before?”
“Yeah.” He visibly grimaced as he spoke, both looking and sounding as if he really didn’t want to tell me. “We’ve actually known about this guy for a few days.”
“A few days?” I almost couldn’t believe what he was saying. “What do you mean you’ve known about him for a few days? Why haven’t you said anything?”
“Look, Rowan,” Ben huffed. “The Major Case Squad doesn’t report to you, you know. There was no reason to get you involved.”
I was more than just slightly angered by what I had just been told, and my voice came out as a thin hiss. “But if this happened a few days ago, maybe if I had gotten involved THEN, Randy would still be alive!”
He glanced through the passage into the dining room then back at me with his eyes wide. “Keep your voice down, Rowan,” he ordered in a strained whisper through clenched teeth. “There were reasons you weren’t called.”
“They’d damn well better be good ones,” I hissed back. “Because I lost a friend today and if I could have prevented it…”
“You couldn’t have, so drop it,” he interrupted with the stern instruction.
I took a deep breath and let it out slowly as I glared back at him. I knew I had to trust that what he was telling me was true, but the reality was a hard lump in my throat, and I was finding it hard to swallow.
“Look, Row,” he sighed. “We need to move on this. Carl Deckert from county homicide is waiting for us at the scene right now.”
“Why now?” I demanded, barely managing to keep my voice even and low.
“I don’t know.” He shook his head. “Bee-bee has a bug up her ass about this all of a sudden, and she’s already got Deckert waitin’ for us.”
“I couldn’t care any less about what she wants right now, Ben,” I told him.
“Yo, Kemosabe,” he appealed. “I’m on your side here, but let’s go have a look-see. This is a damn sight better than being banned from the investigation. Maybe you can do some hocus-pocus or somethin’, and we can nail this fuck before anyone else gets killed.”
“So you’re going to let me go at this my way?” I was demanding as much as asking.
“I didn’t say that,” he returned. “I’m not lettin’ you put yourself in danger over this.”
“What about Felicity?” I asked. “I’m not so sure I want to leave her right now.”
“Because of that little deal a minute ago?”
“No, because Porter obviously knows where I am, so I’m sure he knows she’s here too.”
He shook his head and waved me off. “I know what you’re sayin’, but it’s covered. There’s a copper out front and one in the alley.”
I started to object, but he held his hand up to stifle me before continuing. “Let me finish. If that ain’t enough for ya’, Mandalay is on her way over with another Feeb, and they’ll probably be here any minute.”
There were very few people besides him whom I would trust with Felicity’s safety, and FBI Special Agent Constance Mandalay was one of them. I’m certain he was playing that fact as his trump card to my impending objection.
“You’re sure?” I pressed.
“Yeah, I’m sure,” he told me. “I talked to her right after I got off the phone with Albright. They’ll probably be pullin’ up about the time we head out the door.”
Back up the hallway, the doorbell chimed as if cued by some ethereal director.
“Well?” My friend looked at me expectantly and gave a quick nod as if to say, “told you so.”
“Okay,” I agreed. “Okay, I’ll go. Just one thing: How are you going to stop me?”
“Stop you what?”
I didn’t explain. I just closed my eyes and rubbed my forehead as my ever-present migraine sidestepped any attempts to keep it at bay. Even worse, it began inching up the scale. “Nothing. Don’t worry about it.”
CHAPTER 14:
“Kass-perzik-somethin-oww-ski, according to his driver’s license. First name, Joseph.” Ben looked at me and
