Shield of Justice (12 page)

“Look, Sarge, I’m not any happier about this than you are, but that’s the way it is. So it’s a bitch. There’s nothing we can do about it.” He waited for some reaction, but Rebecca stared past him at some small spot on the opposite wall, her jaw clenching spasmodically. Watts shook a cigarette out of a crumpled pack, lit it, and leaned against the door, apparently content to stay there all afternoon. Another muscle in Rebecca’s face twitched.

“I’m going to check in with Homicide, fill them in on some background on Zamora. Maybe I can help,” she said reluctantly.

Watts blew a perfect smoke ring, watching it float and break apart, considering her words. “The Homicide dicks can handle the case, Sarge. They’re not going to screw up when it’s one of our own. Why not let them do their jobs. We’ve got plenty on our plates right here.”

“I didn’t ask for your opinion,” Rebecca said heatedly, shouldering him aside and pushing the door open.

“Oh, fuck it,” Watts muttered as he listened to her footsteps echo in the stairwell.

Rebecca slammed out through the door into the parking lot. Watts was right, and she knew it. Still, she had to see for herself that everything possible was being done to find Jeff’s killer.
I have to do something.

She slid into her car and started making calls. She finally tracked down the whereabouts of the investigating officers and drove to the waterfront. The crime scene crew was still there, too. She could see Dee Flanagan standing on the edge of the pier, just above the floating dock where Rebecca had found the bodies. Several other techs were scouring the parking lot, walking the grid, collecting evidence.

“I’m sorry, Frye,” Dee said gruffly when Rebecca walked up beside her. Like Rebecca, like most cops, her way of coping with almost anything that angered or hurt her was to concentrate on the job.

“Yeah. Thanks,” Rebecca said, her tone just as raw but her eyes revealing none of her pain. “Anything?”

Flanagan, dressed in faded but pressed jeans and a dark blue T-shirt with “CSI” stenciled in yellow on the breast above a police logo, grunted. “Plenty. This place sees hundreds of people every day—tourists, locals, homeless, kids looking for a place to make out, junkies looking for a place to score. Lots and lots of trace evidence. Ask me if I have anything that looks hot.”

“Anything?” Rebecca repeated.

“Dick is what I got,” Dee said with a grimace. “No shell casings. We’re cutting out a section of the dock now that looks like it’s got a slug in it. Let’s hope it isn’t too deformed to give us an image on the rifling marks…
if
we ever find a weapon to match it to.”

Rebecca looked away, knowing that the bullet must have exited the skull of one of the victims and embedded in the wood. She hoped it hadn’t been Jeff. “What
can
you tell me?”

Dee ignored the angry tone because she could see that Rebecca was suffering. “The ME has the bodies now, and I don’t have a full report yet. But I do know that they were both shot at close range. No indication they resisted. It was probably over in a matter of minutes.”

“Any sign of a weapon?” Rebecca asked dispiritedly.

“Not yet,” Flanagan replied. “I’ve got techs searching drain pipes and dumpsters for a mile on both sides of the highway.”

“Divers?”

Flanagan pointed to a twin-engine vessel bobbing on the river, “Police” in blue block letters on the bow. “They’re in the water now looking for the gun. But I doubt a professional would have tossed it around here. And this guy was definitely a professional.”

“Yeah,” Rebecca agreed. “Will you call me?”

Dee Flanagan studied her. “You look like shit, Frye.” Rebecca stared at her, and Dee nodded. “Yeah, I’ll call you.”

Rebecca climbed down to join the two Homicide detectives in charge of the case, who were standing beside the chalk outlines on the small loading dock where she had found Jeff and Jimmy Hogan. She stared at the spot, envisioning Jeff’s body contained within the impersonal white lines. At length, she turned to the man and woman who were regarding her uncomfortably.

“I don’t suppose you found a witness?” Rebecca asked, breaking the silence.

“Oh sure, and Santa Claus, too,” the heavy-set, forty-something, disgruntled man replied. “We’ve had uniforms sweeping the area since dawn, rousting every vagrant in a six-block radius. Apparently, no one saw or heard anything last night. We’re starting on the vendors and museum workers now, hoping somebody noticed something yesterday afternoon.”

The small, dark-haired woman in an impeccably tailored, expensive looking suit extended her hand. “I’m Trish Marks. Sorry about your partner.”

Rebecca shook her hand. “Thanks.”

Marks nodded, then continued briskly, “We assume Cruz met Hogan sometime around four, based on the preliminary time of death. This place is still pretty busy then. Nobody would notice two men in a crowd.”

“Perfect spot for a hit,” Rebecca said flatly. “Anyone could have approached them, flashed some firepower, and walked them down to that dock without attracting attention. It’s isolated down there, but if there were a crowd of civilians up here, Jeff and Hogan wouldn’t have started a shoot-out. Often the easiest crimes to pull off are those carried out in broad daylight. Obviously, this time it worked.”

Again, Marks nodded. “Most of the people who were here yesterday are probably miles away now—tourists. If we find a witness, it will be pure luck, but we’re going to put it on the air. Set up a hotline number. Offer a reward for information leading to an arrest—the usual routine. We might get something that way.”

“What about the people Hogan’s been associating with? He must have gotten on to something a lot heavier than we expected. He made somebody nervous.”

“We haven’t had a chance to go through all his reports. He was pretty sketchy with his sources,” the younger detective said. “There are probably a dozen possibles.”

Rebecca raised an eyebrow, clearly irritated that they hadn’t gotten to Hogan’s notes yet. Her reaction did not go unnoticed.

“Listen, Frye,” the man, who had yet to introduce himself, said pointedly, “we’ve been out here since two fucking a.m. We’ll get to the reports. We’ll roust anybody we have to, even without due cause. We’ll find out who’s behind this, okay? But cut us some slack here.”

Rebecca’s shoulders sagged slightly. She was tired. She knew these two and everybody else had been busting their balls all night trying to get a jump on the case before the slim trail went cold. But this was her partner, and she wanted more.

“Right,” she said, straightening her back and heading toward the narrow stairs that led up to the pier.

“We’ll keep you informed, Frye,” Trish Marks called out. “And we’ll get the bastard.”

At 5:45 p.m., Rebecca found herself parked in a tow-away zone in front of the University Hospital, wondering why she had come. She had driven to the medical center directly from the pier, never even considering her destination. Now that she was here, she couldn’t decide whether to go in or leave. She wasn’t thinking very clearly. On some level she knew she had come because Catherine Rawlings represented the only sane haven in an agonizingly bleak landscape—a calm sanctuary she sorely needed.

Despite her despair, however, she resisted, distrusting the longing for comfort. If she relented, if she let down her guard and surrendered to her yearning for the solace of Catherine’s embrace, what would she do if she were wrong? What would she do if Catherine found her lacking, as all the others had? Surely, it was much better never to acknowledge the need than to let it loose and be devoured by it.

God, what’s wrong with me? I’m a cop—this is all part of the job. I can’t fall apart just because things are a little rough. I’ve got to get myself together.
She was reaching for the ignition key when a soft hand on her shoulder interrupted the action. Looking up, she realized Catherine was standing beside the car, studying her quizzically. Hesitantly, she smiled and said, “Hi.”

“Hello. I saw your car as I was coming back from the outpatient clinic. What are you doing here?”

“I don’t know,” Rebecca answered dully
. I am so tired. I remember how warm your hands were on my skin.

Catherine took a close look. Rebecca’s eyes were red-rimmed and darkly shadowed; her hands trembled where they rested against the wheel. The combination of emotional shock and exhaustion was clearly catching up to her. This was not the razor-sharp, controlled detective who had charged into her office the night of Janet Ryan’s assault. This was a woman on the verge of collapse.

The doctor pulled the driver’s door open. “Move over, I’m driving.”

To her own amazement and too numb to protest, Rebecca complied. As they drove, she stared at Catherine’s hand resting protectively on her thigh, thinking how delicate Catherine’s long fingers were. The hand felt good, there on her leg, like an anchor holding her in place. “My apartment…”

“I know where I’m going,” Catherine replied with confidence, rubbing her palm in light circles on Rebecca’s leg. She kept her eyes on the traffic, hearing the utter weariness in the detective’s dull tone and wanting desperately to comfort her. Comfort, she imagined, was not something Detective Frye accepted easily.

Rebecca was surprised when Catherine pulled up in front of her own brownstone. She allowed herself to be led up the wide stone stairs and waited silently while Catherine opened the door. The living room in daylight was bathed in shades of muted grays and soft maroons as the late-afternoon sun streamed through sheer drapes and glinted off the walls. It was a beautiful place, warm and soothing and so very graceful. Just like Catherine.

“Take off your blazer,” Catherine said gently as she slipped out of the light silk jacket she wore and tossed it aside along with her briefcase. She turned to Rebecca, who was still standing just inside the door, a faintly confused look on her face. “Here, let me get that.”

Catherine tugged Rebecca’s jacket off her shoulders and down her arms. Folding it neatly, she laid it over the back of a chair. She fumbled slightly with the shoulder harness but managed to slip it off the detective’s body. Reaching down, she pulled the pager from her belt and placed it with the holstered gun on the chair. She kissed Rebecca lightly on the lips as she took her hand. “You’re off duty now, Detective Frye,” she whispered as she led the exhausted woman into her bedroom.

“You don’t have to do this,” Rebecca protested faintly as Catherine unbuttoned and removed her shirt.

“I know. But I want to,” Catherine replied, pulling the belt free from the taller woman’s trousers. As Rebecca watched, she neatly deposited the trousers on the chair and then undressed, too. Holding out her hand in invitation, she whispered, “Come to bed.”

The sheets were cool against Rebecca’s skin. When Catherine lay down next to her, she pressed her face against the fullness of her breasts, sighing. “You feel good,” she murmured, moving just enough to nuzzle a nipple with her lips. “I think I’m waking up,” she mumbled a moment later, running her hand slowly over Catherine’s hip.

Catherine laughed softly and wrapped her arms around the drowsy woman. “There’s plenty of time for that. You’re going to get some rest now. Doctor’s orders.”

“Not good…with orders.” Rebecca sighed and closed her eyes.

Catherine stroked the tight muscles beneath her fingers, feeling them gradually relax as Rebecca’s breathing shifted to the steady cadence of sleep. Still caressing her, she, too, closed her eyes, now content, indeed more satisfied than she could ever have imagined, just having Rebecca safe in her arms.

*

It was dark when Rebecca opened her eyes, disoriented for an instant in the still, dark room. Quickly focusing, she became aware of Catherine asleep alongside her, softly encircling her with an arm flung possessively across her breasts. Rebecca lay motionless, savoring the new sensation of Catherine’s skin against hers, turning carefully to see her face, not wanting to awaken her. She absorbed the image of Catherine in repose, memorizing each detail, surprised at how natural it felt to lie beside her.

Then she began a slow, careful exploration of Catherine’s body, following the contour of her breasts and belly and hips with her fingers. Catherine pressed closer, murmuring softly in half-sleep. Rebecca gasped sharply in surprise as Catherine slipped one leg between hers and rolled over onto her with a throaty laugh.

“Hello, Rebecca,” Catherine whispered, bracing herself above the length of Rebecca’s firm body as she teasingly rocked against her. She was rewarded by Rebecca’s deep groan of pleasure. “How do you feel?”

“Just fine,” Rebecca whispered in reply, reaching for her.

A cry caught in Catherine’s throat as Rebecca’s hands found her breasts. She continued her rhythmic motion, thrusting steadily as they rode one another’s thighs until they were both wet and moaning. Suddenly she shifted to straddle Rebecca’s body, entwining her fingers in the damp curls at the base of her abdomen. Tugging gently, she exposed Rebecca’s erect clitoris, rubbing lightly with her thumb, drawing a groan from Rebecca as the skin tightened around the shaft. Rebecca reached between Catherine’s legs, seeking to complete the circle.

“Ahh…” Catherine sighed as Rebecca slid into her. “That will make me come.”

“Good,” Rebecca gasped, arching under Catherine’s continued caresses, the pressure about to peak. “I’m almost there.”