Ghost Hunter

Chapter 33

ELLY RATTLED THE HANDCUFF THAT CHAINED HER RIGHT wrist to the chair. 'We want our lawyers.'

'Yeah, we know our rights,' Doreen said icily. Her wrist was fastened to the chair on the opposite side of the table.

Grayson DeWitt scowled at them. He had taken up a post at the kitchen window where he could keep watch on the alley. His elegant, silver-and-gray pin-striped jacket was draped neatly over the back of a chair. The sleeves of a white-on-white, hand-tailored shirt were rolled up high on his forearms, revealing an expensive looking wristwatch. The silvery metal grip of the gun tucked into the handmade shoulder holster matched the suit and looked like a custom design.

'You'll get your lawyers,' Grayson said. 'Right after Cooper Boone shows up. If it's any comfort to you ladies, he's the one I'm after.'

Rose rumbled softly. Elly gripped her tightly with her free hand, trying to convey with voice and body language the idea that taking a bite out of the detective was probably not a good idea.

Rose seemed to have gotten the message. She was obviously seriously annoyed, but she had settled down to a semifluffed state with only her daylight eyes showing.

'What makes you think Cooper will return here any time soon?' Elly asked.

'If he doesn't come back, I guess you'll have to take the fall for him.' Grayson's media-bright smile did not reach his eyes. 'But I've got a hunch he'll show up. There's a fortune in chant down in the trunk of your car. Can't see him walking away from it.'

Doreen made a disgusted little sound. 'This is all about you making yourself even more famous by bringing down a Guild boss, isn't it?'

'The chiefs of the Guilds have gotten away with murder, literally in some cases, ever since the organizations were founded,' Grayson said in righteous tones. 'The bosses think they don't have to live by the same rules as everyone else. Slapping one in prison on dope charges will be a wake-up call to the others.'

'Doreen's right,' Elly said. 'This isn't about bringing the Guild bosses in line. It's all about your image as a heroic crime-fighter. I don't think Cooper was your initial target. First you went after Ormond Ripley. Arresting him would have given you some real splashy press. But you screwed that up, big-time, didn't you? So now you're going to try to take down a visiting small-town Guild boss.'

'Not like he'd have the guts to go after the local Guild chief,' Doreen sneered. 'He knew he couldn't touch Mercer Wyatt in his own town.'

'That's enough,' Grayson snapped. 'Boone may not be the most powerful Guild boss in the City-State Federation, but he's a boss, nevertheless. When he goes down, people are going to notice.'

Elly changed position slightly in the chair, trying to ease the growing stiffness in her right shoulder. 'Tell me, where does Palmer Frazier fit into this?'

To her surprise a faintly baffled frown crossed Grayson's square-jawed features. 'Who in green hell is Palmer Frazier?'

'I'll give you a few clues,' Elly said, watching him closely. 'He's tall, good-looking, sandy-haired, and dresses as well if not better than you do. When I knew him he always wore an amber-and-black-steel watch made by Luchane. And he drinks only Founders Reserve scotch.'

Doreen stiffened a little in her chair. Her eyes widened.

Grayson shook his head impatiently. 'I don't know who you're talking about.'

He was telling the truth, Elly thought. What was going on here?

'I can't help but notice that you're doing a great job of watching the alley,' she said after a couple of minutes of silence. 'Going to be a bit awkward if Cooper comes back in through the front door, isn't it?'

'I've got men on the rooftops on Ruin Lane and overlooking both ends of the alley,' Grayson said, sounding coolly satisfied. 'No way Boone can return without being seen.'

So much for hoping that Grayson was working alone, Elly thought glumly.

Doreen studied Grayson. 'How did you find out that Cooper Boone had stashed drugs here in Elly's car?'

Grayson shrugged. 'The usual way. An informant tipped me off.'

'Would that be the same helpful, reliable informant who sent you into The Road to the Ruins to search for a drug stash?' Elly asked brightly.

Grayson's excellently hewn jaw clenched. 'My informant has been one hundred percent accurate all along. Something went wrong the other night at The Road.'

'It sure did,' Elly said. 'Just like it's going to go wrong again today.'

'I've been thinking about the raid,' Grayson continued softly. 'It's not beyond the realm of possibility that Boone and Ripley are partners in the drug distribution ring. Maybe you'd know something about that, Miss St. Clair?'

Elly raised her eyes to the ceiling. 'Get real, DeWitt. Your problem is your informant, whoever he is. He's manipulating you. Can't you see that?'

Grayson's expression solidified. 'If you had any sense, you'd start spilling whatever you know about Boone. Sure, you're sleeping with the guy but, trust me, he won't repay you by protecting you. Drug dealers only care about their own hides.'

Elly opened her mouth to argue, but she closed it again very quickly when Doreen uttered an anguished groan and dropped her forehead down onto a bent arm.

'I think I'm going to be sick,' Doreen said.

'My friend needs a doctor,' Elly said. 'You can see she's been badly hurt.'

Grayson glanced absently at Doreen. 'She'll live. Those bruises are a day old. If she wanted a doctor, she should have gone to the emergency room yesterday.'

'Thank you for your sympathy,' Doreen muttered without raising her head.

Grayson lounged against the window frame. 'What happened to you, anyway? Looks like you got beat up by your boyfriend.'

Doreen did lift her head at that. She glared at him wordlessly.

'So that's it.' Grayson shook his head in disgust. 'You two ladies run with some real bad company, don't you? One of you has a boyfriend who beats her, and the other,' he switched his gaze to Elly, 'has a guy who gets her involved in a major drug peddling operation.'

'Cooper is not dealing drugs,' Elly said fiercely.

'The thing you should know is that drug dealers don't appreciate loyalty in a woman. Hell, they don't appreciate anything except die profits they make off the crap that they sell.' Grayson smiled a humorless smile. 'Boone found a real winner in you, didn't he? I'll bet you're the one who cooked up the dope for him, aren't you? We knew there had to be an expert botanist or chemist involved in this thing. It isn't that easy to make chant out of the psi-bright herbs. Not the kind of thing you do on a kitchen stove, that's for sure.'

'If you found dope in my car it's because someone put it there to implicate Cooper and me,' she said icily.

Fury leaped in his eyes. 'I don't plant fake evidence, Miss St. Clair.'

She shrugged. 'Then it must have been your informant.'

He snorted. 'Oddly enough, I hear lines like that a lot from people in your situation all the time. It's known as the SODDI defense.'

'What's the SODDI defense?'

'Stands for 'some other dude did it, ' Grayson said dryly.

'If you don't believe that your informant is manipulating you, how do you explain the screw up at The Road the other night?' Elly asked. 'Think maybe you've got a leak in your elite little band of intrepid detectives?'

'It's a possibility,' he said. 'When this is over, I'll find it.'

'Maybe it's your tailor.' Elly studied his elegantly draped trousers. 'Next time you're in the dressing room getting fitted, you might want to watch what you say.'