Breaking Silence

distinctly nasty, and I realize I’ve roused him from bed. He doesn’t seem the least bit pleased to find me standing at his door.

“You Rankin?” I ask.

“Who the fuck else would I be?”

Frowning, never taking my eyes from his, I hit my lapel mike, let Skid know I have him. Rankin is one guy I don’t want to be alone with too long. “You’re a real charmer, aren’t you?”

“That’s what all the chick cops say.”

I roll my eyes. “I bet.”

A moment later, Skid comes around the corner, his boots crunching through snow and dry leaves. Rankin glances at Skid, then turns his attention back to me. “What do you guys want?”

He’s standing in the doorway, squinting as if the light hurts his eyes. I’d like to take a look inside the house, but I suspect he’s not going to invite us in. I try anyway. “Can we come in?”

“I’ll come out there.” I have to back up a step to let him out of the house. “I didn’t do anything,” he says as he steps onto the porch.

Rankin isn’t tall and doesn’t have a lot of bulk. But he’s got the rangy look of a street fighter, all wire and sinew, with the reflex speed of a rattlesnake. Part of an intricate-looking tattoo runs up the side of his neck like a serpent tail. Despite his diminutive size, I find myself wanting to avoid any kind of tussle.

I hear Skid coming up the steps behind me. “I understand you were involved in a confrontation in town a couple of days ago,” I begin.

“Who says?”

“A little bird,” Skid puts in.

“Don’t remember no confrontation.”

Looking at Rankin, I understand what Skid was saying about his eyes. They’re vacant. Though he’s looking at me, I get the strange sense that he’s not really seeing me. There’s a blank countenance to his stare, like there’s not a whole lot going on as far as thought processes. He’s thinking, but I get the uneasy impression they’re not the kind of thoughts a normal person has.

“I’m a peaceful fuckin’ guy,” he adds, looking pleased by his audacity.

Badass or not, he’s seriously starting to annoy me. “You harassed an Amish woman outside the Butterhorn Bakery.”

Skid eases past us and makes a show of peering through the open door at the interior of the house.

“Don’t recall no Amish woman.” Rankin glances over his shoulder, keeping an eye on Skid.

“I have an eyewitness who says you argued with her and verbally abused her.” When he says nothing, I add, “In case you missed that segment of Law and Order, sport, lying to the cops is against the law.”

“Okay. Fine.” He raises both hands as if in surrender. But his attention is still divided between me and Skid, and I realize he doesn’t want Skid looking in the house. “I might’ve talked to an Amish woman. Last time I checked, that wasn’t against the law. Or did I miss that segment, too?”

“You did more than talk to her. You harassed her. Grabbed the reins of her buggy without her permission.”

“She pressing charges or something?”

“Or something,” Skid echoes.

I frown at him because he’s not helping, then turn my attention back to Rankin. “You had an argument with her, and now she’s dead. You have a history of stalking women. You were arrested for sexual assault. That puts you on my hit list. If I were you, I’d think real hard about cooperating.”

His eyes widen and he takes a quick step back. “You gotta be shitting me. You think…” He backs up another step. “I didn’t do nothing to that chick, man!”

Skid stops looking through the open door and comes up beside me, his eyes on Rankin. “You got a meth pipe on your coffee table, dude.”

“What? You’re full of shit. That ain’t no pipe.” Rankin crosses to the door, yanks the knob, and slams it shut. “You ain’t got no business looking in my fuckin’ house, man.”

“It was in plain sight,” Skid says amiably.

I glance at Skid. “I wonder what else he has in there?”

“Where there’s a pipe, there’s usually meth.”

“That sounds like reasonable cause,” I say conversationally.

“This is a bunch of crap.” Rankin breaks in, his voice incredulous. “I ain’t got no pipe in there! I ain’t done that shit in months. You guys are full of shit.”

“Tell us about the Slabaugh woman, and maybe we’ll let the pipe go,” I say.

“Ain’t no damn pipe!”

“Calm down.” Sobering, looking a little badass himself, Skid steps toward him. “You’re an inch away from getting your ass carted down to the station. You got that?”

“Okay! I’m cool!” Rankin glances over his shoulder, toward the woods. For an instant, I think he’s going to bolt. All he’d have to do is vault the rail. Twenty yards and he’d be in the trees.

I sidle right, positioning myself between him and the porch rail. “Tell me what happened between you and Rachael Slabaugh.”

“Nothin’! I swear to God, I was just messing with her. You know, flirting.”

Flirting. Coming from the mouth of a man arrested for sexual assault, the word pisses me off. A hard rush of anger shakes me, jarring my brain, like a dog shaking a stuffed animal. I envision myself pulling my baton, giving him a couple of good whacks, taking him to his knees. I grapple with my temper, yank it back hard.

“You’re a real Romeo, aren’t you?” Skid comments.

Rankin turns his head and spits. “Fuckin’ hayseed Nazis. You can’t come on my property and jack with me like this. I got rights.”

“We can do it at the station if you prefer,” I say.

Some of his belligerence slips away, but I know it’s only temporary. “Look, man, I already told you, I didn’t do nothing to that Amish chick. I swear. I just talked to her. That’s all.”

“I got a witness says you were verbally abusive.”

“I mighta stepped over the line a little. I ain’t exactly the polite type. But I didn’t put my hands on her. I swear.”

“Where were you yesterday morning?” I ask.

“I was here. Slept in late.”

“Can anyone verify that?”

“My girlfriend.”

“The one you beat the crap out of a few weeks back?” Skid asks.

He swings around to face Skid. “She fell.”

“So she said.”

I hear Rankin’s teeth grind, like hard chalk against slate, and I put my hand on my baton. “Rankin,” I warn.

“I didn’t touch that bitch!” he shouts. “You can ask her.”

“What’s her name?” I snap. But I already know. I read the emergency room report before leaving the station. Two weeks ago, Rankin’s current girlfriend, Lauren Walker, made a trip to the emergency room of Pomerene Hospital with broken ribs and a broken nose. Suspicious, the attending physician asked her what happened. She claimed she fell down some stairs. It’s an old story, one that’s retold far too often. The doctor notified me, but the next day when I went to her apartment for a statement, she was nowhere to be found.

I look at Rankin, daring him to make a move. “You know we’re going to check with Lauren.”

“Go for it. I was here. All fuckin’ night. We slept late.”

“I find her marked up, and we’ll be back for you,” I say.

“You guys don’t have shit on me.” He looks from me to Skid, gives an incredulous huff. “You’re fishing. Well, I ain’t biting, so hit the fuckin’ road.”

There’s nothing I’d like more than to cuff him and haul him into town. He’s a rude, drug-using, woman-