An Intimate Murder (The Catherine O'Brien Series) (24 page)

He was on his feet in a flash.

“Don’t you have to identify yourself or something? Isn’t that some rule or something?”

Funny how those who actively disregarded the law wanted the Police to play by the rules, like good little boys and girls.

“Only if you asked if we’re cops.”

I took a seat in a straight-backed, wooden, kitchen chair to his left and Louise moved to his right. If he decided to bolt, we had him covered.

“You didn’t ask,” I said. “You were too worried about whether or not I’d given money to the gentleman in the lobby. Then you invited us in just as sweet as you could be, and then read us what was on the menu.”

His gaze jumped between Louise and me.

“Sit down, Mr. Vincent,” Louise said. “We’re not here to ask about where you get your lunch money. As I said, we have questions about a friend of yours.”

Markus glanced at the door. The muscles in my arms and legs tensed in anticipation of the chase.

Jane, who was still protecting herself as if she were concealing the crown jewels somewhere on her body, stood in the direct path between Markus Vincent and the door. I tried to will her out of the way, but she wouldn’t budge. If Vincent sprang for the door, she would take a full-on body check, and that I couldn’t stop.

Finally, he sagged in resignation. His brain must have calculated the distance between him and the door and between him and me. He had even calculated the
X-factor
, which was could I take him down if given the chance. Even though Markus Vincent stood a full foot or more, taller than I, he must have decided I could.

I had trained for this situation and Markus Vincent had trained to be a world-class burn out.

He returned to the couch, and retrieved a cigarette from a small pencil box on the coffee table. V dug thru his pocket and pulled out a Zippo.

“I’m not rolling on my suppliers so if that’s who you’re asking about you can just forget it.”

His punk-ass attitude had returned in force. He ran the Zippo over his pant leg, producing a flame, lit the cigarette, and glared at us through the smoke, ala James Dean only not as cool.

Louise settled into a ratty, old recliner. Her perfectly tailored designer clothing was startlingly out of place against the nineteen-seventies, burnt orange plaid, polyester fabric of the chair.

“Was Chad Luther here yesterday?”

Markus Vincent twitched.

“That stick? Why are you asking about him?”

“Was he here?” Louise repeated the question slowly as if Markus had suddenly turned soft in the head.

“Yeah, he was.” His reply was as slow and deliberate as her question. “Why?”

“What did you do when he was here, Mister Vincent?” I asked.

“No.” He held his palm out to me and shook it back and forth like a Dairy Princess in the Holidazzle Parade. “No more, Mister Vincent. It’s V or I won’t answer any more questions.”

He returned to his sprawl position with his arm draped across the back of the couch. His half smile on his face said check and mate. There he was wrong. Frankly, I didn’t care if he wanted us to call him the Sultan of Brunei, as long as he answered the questions.

“Fine. What did you do when Chad was here,
V
?”

“Can’t tell you.”

He adjusted the crotch of his low hanging pants as if his package needed more room and eyed Jane suggestively. He got the reaction he was looking for. Jane let out a disgusted grunt and turned away from him.

I snapped my fingers in the air to return his attention to me.

His half smile returned. “I can’t answer your questions on the grounds that it may incriminate me.”

Louise reached into the pocket of her coat and pulled out a pair of handcuffs.

“That’s fine. Let’s go to the station. Then you can call your lawyer,” she said. “I’m sure our DEA guys would like to get their hands on you.”

“You said you weren’t here for me.” He mewled as Louise took his right wrist and locked the first metal shackle on him.

“As long as you were cooperating we weren’t.” Louise pulled his left arm behind his back and locked the second cuff in place.

“I’m going to the press,” he whined. “I’m going to tell them you set me up and abused me.”

He craned his skinny neck around so he could see Louise.

“They’ll believe me too. The press already hates the police.” He laughed. “Then I’ll sue.”

Jane Katts finally snapped out of the trance of disgust she’d wrapped herself in, and stepped toward V. She pulled her press pass from her bag.

“I am the press,” she said. “And the only thing going in the morning edition will be a story about how you were so chicken shit about going to jail, you rolled over on your suppliers and their suppliers. I might throw in a sentence or two about how you wet yourself and cried like a baby when the officers handcuffed you.”

His face went pale and he narrowed his eyes at her.

“You can’t print that. It’s a lie.”

“It’s as true as the story you were going to feed to the press.” Jane shrugged. “I see no harm and no foul.”

Jane might be more useful than I initially thought. The struggle in my mind liking Jane for who she was, and hating her for what she is, took a slight lean in Jane’s favor.

V pulled at the cuffs with no success. His face wrinkled and twisted, like there were worms squiggling for freedom under his skin. Then tears puddled on his bottom lid.

“You can’t.” His voice cracked. “They’ll kill me if you print that.”

Jane gave a one-shouldered shrug. “That’s your problem not mine.”

Tears rolled down his face. “Lady, I’m not lying. They will kill me.”

His words didn’t seem to penetrate Jane’s icy shell. She turned her back to him, clearly enjoying the torment. Payback truly is a bitch.

“Lady, I’m serious. They’d fucking cut my balls off if you print that story.”

Jane slid her gaze up and down him in the same lewd manner he had used on her. Her eyes finally came to rest on his crotch.

“From what I can see, it would be no big loss.” She looked up at him and grinned. “Of course, my silence can be bought.”

V’s entire body moved at once. His arms went one way his legs the other.

“You name it sweetheart. I got cash stashed everywhere. How much do you want?”

“I’d be afraid to touch your money.” Jane’s lips turned down in disgust. “God only knows what kind of diseases your clients carry on their cash.”

V stepped toward her. “You name it. Smack? Blow? What?”

“Information on Chad Luther,” she said. “You tell these officers everything, and I won’t even remember who you are when we leave here.”

Relief rippled through him. “I’ll tell you everything you wanna know.”

He lifted his arms behind him and turned his wrists toward Louise.

“Little help here.”

Louise pushed his hand back down.

“I think we’ll leave those in place until the interview is over,” she said. “Just so you don’t forget any of the good pieces. Get comfortable, V.”

Louise placed a hand on his shoulder and pushed him onto the couch. With his wrists bound behind his back, he had to lean over his knees at an awkward angle.

“What were you and Chad Luther doing yesterday?” Louise asked.

He shook his head back and forth, frustration oozing from every pore. Then he muttered something under his breath.

“V.” I decided to let him off the hook. “We’re looking for corroboration here. We already know what Chad said you were doing yesterday.”

He lifted his eyes toward mine. I could read the doubt in his eyes as clearly as I could read the headlines in the morning paper.

“Anyway,” I said. “Everything you’ve offered us so far is enough to take you in.”

He grimaced.

“I had a few people over. Sort of a party. I was the host. We were watching the football game.” His words were tentative. “I had some money on the vi-queens, who lost. The losers.”

“Get on with it,” Jane said, apparently uninterested in debating the record of the Minnesota Viking’s with a fair weathered fan any more than I was.

His eyes sliced toward Jane. All the sexual heat, gone.

“As I said, I was the host. We did a few recreational drugs,” He admitted.

“Finally,” Jane said. “Let’s go.”

Louise loosed V’s hands. His acne studded face drooped in stunned disbelief. Then the pieces dropped into place and V realized we weren’t here to arrest him.

A flood of questions rolled at us, starting with, “You think Chad killed his parents, don’t you?”

“We’re just covering all the bases,” Louise said. “Thank you, for your help.”

“Wait!” He touched my upper arm. “What about me?”

I considered him for a moment. “Try to remember to get a name before you buzz someone in the front door. If you don’t, you’ll never know what you’re going to get.”

I waited for understanding to show on his face. The only expression was complete confusion.

We arrived at the office in time to get a slice of the giant cake the department had purchased for the Chief.

“I’m going to call my boss.” Jane stormed away from the streamer festooned break room.

I could almost hear her impassioned plea to her superiors at the paper, the description of the psycho cop who destroyed her recorder and confiscated her cassette tape. My esteemed reputation was growing faster than a kid with new shoes.

After scarffing down a piece of cake and seven or eight cups of punch, I decided to make a pit stop in the ladies room. I entered the stall and locked the latch. The bathroom door opened and someone came in. I waited for shoes to appear under one of the stalls next to me. No shoes appeared. Not so unusual. Maybe she just needed to check her makeup or fix her hair.

I finished my pee break and pulled up my jeans. As I unlatched the lock, the door swung in with the force of a major-leaguer hitting a homerun. The edge of the metal door struck the left side of my face. White-hot pain burst through my sinuses and my eye. Tears streamed down my face. I raised my arms to block another assault and stumbled backward. The back of my calves bumped the toilet halting my retreat.

The door catapulted in again.

I turned but there was nowhere to escape. My shoulder flared with pain. All the air oomphed out of my lungs.

The last thing I remember was falling face first toward the toilet. Then I heard a woman yell, “bitch!” before everything went dark.

Ice-cold hands touched my neck.

“Catherine, can you hear me?”

The voice was muffled and fuzzy.

“Catherine?”

I opened my eyes. Something blocked my left eye and all I could see was white. Then a swell of pain thudded through my head.

“Oh, shit,” I moaned. “That fucking hurt.”

Louise smiled down at me. “Take it easy, Catherine. We’ve called an ambulance.”

“No.” I pushed myself upright. “I don’t need an ambulance.”

My left hand slipped on the damp toilet seat. That’s when I realized the seat wasn’t the only thing that was damp. The hair stuck to the sides of my face was soaked.

Louise put her hand up to stop me from lifting myself off the filthy, wet floor. Behind her, a crowd had gathered and heads peaked through the door like a sideways Whac-A-Mole game.

“Wait for the ambulance, Catherine,” she said. “You’re hurt worse than you think.”

“Who hit me, and why am I wet?”

“We don’t know, and you fell into the toilet.”

Oh God. That was what I was afraid she’d say. The muscles over my shoulder blade cramped and then spasmed. The burning pain sucked the wind from my lungs.

“Crap!”

I hunched forward and panted until the pain receded.

“Help me up. I promise to wait for the ambulance but I don’t want to stay on the floor. It’s nasty.”

I reached my hand out toward her. Louise slipped her shoulder under my right armpit and hauled me to my feet.

“Be careful,” she said. “The floor is slippery.”

She toddled me out, slow and guarded like a nursing home patient. Pink puddles of toilet water and blood spread into the grout. Three deep impressions creased the outside of the stall door.

Louise led me to the sink. She turned the taps on, hot first and then cold. Investigators crowded the tiny bathroom. The hallway outside roared with the questions of the gathering crowd, wanting to know what happened and if they could help.

Too many cooks in the kitchen.

Louise ran a paper towel under the tap then dabbed at the left side of my face under my eye.

“Can you see out of your left eye?”

“No, only a little blur. My lids are too swollen. Who the fuck did this to me?”

“They’re checking the videotape. No one saw anything.”

She pulled two clean towels from the dispenser. Again, she ran them under the water, this time she folded them into a square, pressed it over my eye, and held it in place.