Fire and Ice (4 page)

Snatching her phone off the desk she snapped off the speaker and spoke directly into the phone.

“In that case, Mr. Corcoran, I’ll meet you at the Country Club at noon. No, please, that won’t be necessary. I have a squad car and will be between appointments. But thank you. I’ll see you at noon.”

Punching off the phone, she glared at Sam. He ignored her obvious anger and came into her cubicle and plopped down in the armchair beside her desk.

“Do you always listen to other people’s private conversations, Commander?”

Sam frowned slightly, ignoring her question as if she hadn’t asked it.

“Are you sure that’s wise, Lieutenant? Having lunch in Corcoran’s private dining room doesn’t exactly put you on an even playing field with your witness.”

Annika drew up in her chair, forcing herself to respond calmly—which wouldn’t be easy. She knew that Sam was right. She never should have agreed to have lunch with Corcoran. The man was not only a witness but at least for the time being was also a potential suspect in a massive crime. It was just that seeing Sam in the doorway and knowing that he overheard Corcoran’s slimy invitation had rattled her. Responding to his carefully phrased question, Annika clipped out her words as confidently as she could.

“I’ll decide the best time and place to interrogate my witnesses, Commander. And… yes… ordinarily I would not have agreed to do that over lunch… but it was the only time he could meet today….”

Her words trailed off. From the expression on Sam’s face it was clear he knew that the reason she’d agreed to have lunch with Corcoran was because Sam had startled her. It didn’t help that it was the truth. Before she could tell him to leave, he surprised her.

“I apologize, Annika. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop.” He smiled slightly. “I actually came by to see if I could convince you to have lunch with me. I know we left off yesterday on a bad note. I was hoping we could start fresh today.”

Annika was startled. Both by his offer and by the shivery sensations she felt when he called her by her name. Before she could answer, he continued.

“How about you take along a ‘partner’ to your lunch with the Irishman? It doesn’t hurt to change the rules of engagement when confronting a guy as manipulative as Brennan Corcoran. We can double-team him.”

For a short moment, Annika wanted to agree. Of course. It was exactly what they should do. Having Sam join them uninvited would throw Corcoran off his game. Perturb him. Make it more likely to get genuine information from him. But, as enticing as the proposition was, Annika knew she couldn’t accept. There was something about Sam that threw her off
her
game. She was a master interrogator but yesterday she’d blown the interview. It wasn’t Corcoran who unnerved her, it was Sam. He unsettled her. Made her want to put up her guard, protect herself from the gorgeously refined black man who had her stomach in a twitter.

When she hesitated, Sam grinned and dove in.

“What do you say, Lieutenant? How about letting me tag along? Help you stave off the unwelcome overtures.”

Annika reeled back. That did it. He’d made her decision for her. Raising her chin, she firmed her expression.

“Thanks for the offer, Commander. But I’ve been staving off unwelcome overtures for most of my life. I’m good at it.”

Sam pressed his lips together in a straight line and regarded her thoughtfully. It was clear that he’d inadvertently pressed one of her buttons, but Sam decided it was too late to pull back. Instead, he pressed forward.

“I take it my overtures also fall in the ‘unwelcome’ category?”

When she didn’t answer, Sam unwound his lanky frame from the chair and headed to the door.

At the doorway, he turned and nodded.

“Suit yourself, Lieutenant. Have a nice lunch.”

Before Annika could respond, he was gone.

Chapter 4

“Let me tell you, little lady. That policy I wrote up for Brennan Corcoran and that big fancy development of his is tighter than a tick on a hunting dog’s ass. And if you ever tried to pry off one of them suckers, you know it’s a lost cause.”

Before Annika could tell the puffy-faced, red-nosed insurance agent that she had not had the ‘pleasure’ of picking off ticks from anyone’s ass, Owen Haggerty continued. “Nobody, including Brennan C. Corcoran, is gonna defraud my company using a policy
I
wrote.”

Annika settled in her chair, assuming keen interest in what the unpleasant little man was saying. She’d learned that the less she said, the more these blowhards would fulminate and the more information she got. Haggerty was a caricature of a Northwoods redneck. Even if the way he was leering at her and adjusting the front of his pants was annoying as hell, at least she could add to her dictionary of colorful expressions.

The pudgy man leaned back to give his gut room to splurge over the top of his belt.

“Yep, good ole Brennan. You’d never know that stuffed shirt’s from around here. You’d think he growed up among them Boston elites. Hell no. He grew up next to the reservation with white trash poorer than the Injuns. That daddy of his? He made everything you’ve heard about Micks and how they got them red faces child’s play. But the way Brennan prances around here now? Hell, his nose’s stuck so high in the air, he could drown in a rainstorm if he ain’t careful.”

He looked her over then wiped at the drop of spittle hovering in the corner of his mouth. He had the decency to acknowledge her frown.

“Sorry, honey. I know I’m starin’ at you. But I ain’t never seen a fire inspector who looks like you. I—”

Annika cut him off. “I understand. And, my name is Lt. Nilsson. Now if you would, please go back to the policy you wrote for Lakeside Estates….”

Owen shrugged, then dove back into what was clearly one of his favorite subjects.

“We fraud busters know the ins and outs of arson. Hell, I don’t have to tell you. Arson is big business. A quarter of all the fires in the USA is caused by arson. People burning their own houses down or payin’ someone else to do it. It’s a damn expensive crime, too. Costs all of us taxpaying saps more than a couple billion a year. That’s with a ‘b’, sweetheart! And you know how many torchers we catch?” Annika did know, but who was she to trouble this know-it- all with current statistics?

“Hell. We’re lucky if we catch fifteen percent of them. And,
convicting
the assholes?” He barked a harsh laugh. “Given the criminal-coddling justice system we’re saddled with, we’re lucky to convict two per cent of the burners.”

Annika broke into his rant, attempting to get him to focus. “Obviously if you can prove arson, your companies don’t pay out. But what if you suspect it, but you can’t prove it?”

Owen rubbed his fleshy hands together and gave her a salacious grin.

“Honey. That’s why we depend on people like you. You give us credible information we might not get on our own. But if between you and us and Connor’s guys, we can’t prove it was arson, we just bottle those fuckers up in court as long as we can. Instead of them bleedin’ us, we let their shysters bleed
them
into conceding.”

He pursed his lips and squinted at her.

“Now don’t misunderstand. Ole Brennan ain’t dumb. He’s been around. He’s a fuckin’ banker. If anyone knows how to make money under the table, those guys do. Ever wonder why the people who in charge of
our
money are richer than the whole damn bunch of us? Think about that, tootsie.”

Annika interrupted, not bothering to tell him once again, to call her by her official title. “Was there anything unusual in the policy you wrote for Lakeside Estates? Anything you don’t usually include?”

He frowned at her, then admitted, “Yeah. Brennan insisted on a clause that said if there is a fire or other damage to that hoity toity project of his, and we can’t prove it was intentional, then the insurance company will make good on all his legal fees. I added the clause after I jacked up his premiums 35%. He agreed and has been payin’ through the nose.”

As she made her way to the door, he slouched up next to her, bumping against her as if by accident.

“Uh, Miss, I mean, Lieutenant, if you’re gonna be around for a while, it would be my pleasure to show you a little bit of this town. We professionals have to stick together….”

Annika brushed by him. “Thank you, Mr. Haggerty, but I’m focusing on the Lakeside Estates fires. Thank you for your help. I’ll call you if I have additional questions.”

She pushed her way through the door and headed to her squad, sucking in a much needed gulp of fresh air. She smothered a groan. First a scumbag like Owen Haggerty, and now she had Brennan Corcoran to look forward to. At a private lunch, no less! She kicked herself for the hundredth time for spurning Sam’s offer to accompany her. But she wanted to do things her way, right? Great. Onward and upward.

~~~

After the fifth insinuating suggestion and as many ‘
my dear’s,
Corcoran acknowledged that Annika wasn’t impressed by his unctuousness and dropped his ingratiating overtures. His true colors began to show themselves. After listening to ten minutes of all the benefits Lakeside Estates would bring to Chicadia Falls and how lucky the town was to have him as a resident, Annika began to push back. Using Sam’s technique, she poked at the sore spots she knew rankled under his fawning exterior.

“I know you said that Lakeside is your first development project. But I imagine over the years you’ve had many run-ins with the insurance industry. At least that’s what I usually hear from business leaders.”

Corcoran huffed. “Damn straight. We businessmen are accustomed to dealing with those scoundrels. That whole industry is a sham. They pretend they want to protect you and then spend a fortune trying to deny your claim.”

“Has that happened to you, Mr. Corcoran?”

“Hell, no. I’m proud to say that I’ve never lost a suit I’ve brought against an insurance company. That’s because I know them for the greedy bastards that they are. They’re like that redneck Owen Haggerty. They think the money is theirs.”

Annika smiled at him. “Mr. Haggerty said something to that effect about bankers. He wondered why the men who control everyone else’s money are the richest men in town.”

Corcoran sneered. “What Haggerty
doesn’t
want to admit is that we’re just a hell of a lot smarter than they are.”

Annika nibbled on her salad, congratulating herself that she’d wormed her way past his obsequious façade. She pressed her advantage.

“I’m impressed that your first foray into housing development is on such a grand scale. I’d have thought you would have started smaller, been part of other ventures, before launching something so ambitious.”

His eyes narrowed, but he ignored her underlying insinuation. Annika was confident he’d been involved in other projects, she just hadn’t found them—yet.

“You need to understand, Lt. Nilsson, it is difficult for visionaries to think small as lesser men do.” His voice tightened. “Besides, I got tired of lending money to small-minded men and watching them rake in the dough on projects that should have failed—or could have been more successful if they were willing to act on a grander scale.”

Building on his obvious antipathy to wealthy men and the insights she’d picked up from Haggerty, she pricked at his underlying vulnerabilities.

“You grew up with John Roberts, the Chief?”

Corcoran glowered. “We grew up in the same town. He lived high and mighty on one side of the tracks. Let’s just say my family lived on the other side. Of course that bastard could afford to be a cop. Do anything he wanted, including going off on some officer gig to Vietnam. The rest of us managed to get college deferments. Granted we aren’t heroes like the Chief and that smart aleck Nate Stryker or from what I hear that
nigg
…, black man you work with, who is some uppity guy’s son.”

Annika was stunned that Corcoran had revealed himself in such an ugly manner. She folded her napkin and placed it on the table.

“If by ‘some uppity guy’s son’, you mean Commander Carter, you are correct. The commander’s father is the Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court.”

Corcoran missed her aversion and sneered, “Yes, so I heard. Wonder how that happened? How many qualified white men he stepped over to get to that position?”

As if seeing her distaste for the first time, he dropped his mask. Drilling her with a hard reproachful glare, he asked, “May I presume that disapproving look means that you don’t share my views about black men and their ‘unusual’ paths to success? Or can I presume that you and the c
ommander
have had a ‘go’ at it?” His lips curved in disgust. “That’s not surprising. You young girls are easily swayed by the exotic, the forbidden. No matter how distasteful such behavior is to the rest of us.”

Annika rose with as much dignity as she could muster, willing her voice not to shake. “You are seriously out of line, Mr. Corcoran. Thank you for lunch. If I have additional questions—and you can be sure that I will—I’ll inform your office what time you should be at the police station for the interview. Good day.”

Chapter 5

“Nate wanted to see you when you got back, Lieutenant. He’s in his office now with the Commander. I’ll let them know you’re on your way.”

Annika clicked off her phone and groaned. Oh great. Just what she needed, to make a bad day worse. First the ridiculous brush-off she gave Sam, then the smarmy little insurance drone, and to top it off her luncheon interview with Corcoran. But Detective Stryker’s secretary hadn’t given her a choice. Now she’d have to answer to the big guy. Try to explain why she’d agreed to interview her prime witness/suspect over a private luncheon date. Ugh! She doubted Stryker would think much of her excuse that the visiting Commander had her so tied in knots she couldn’t think straight. She could only imagine Nate’s disgust when Sam told him what she’d done. But hell, what could they expect from a woman—and a blonde one at that?

Resting her elbows on her desk, Annika held her head between her hands and scrubbed at her temples trying to release the tension. But it was going to take a lot more than that to ease the strain she was feeling. Wonder if the Motel 6 has an outcall masseuse? One who has about four hours available to work on a pitiful stressed-out woman? But, damn, one look at the tension knots on her neck and shoulders and any masseuse worth his salt would run for the woods. No, she may as well get used to it, accept it. This is just how it’s going to be. Tension headaches. A roiling gut. And shaky legs whenever a certain tall, lean, gorgeous guy comes within ten feet of her. With a sigh, Annika stood, took a deep breath, squared her shoulders and headed off to face the two most intimidating men she’d ever met.