The Ringer (6 page)

He had no desire to chase his tail. Instead, he changed the topic. “Who’s the daddy?”

“Are you putting in an offer?” The low-key woman cackled. “A wealthy aristocrat like yourself? Will the kid hold his pinky up or down when he drinks tea?”

“Glad to provide the chuckles.” He pulled up to the building where its owner, two days prior, was bludgeoned to death.

According to her neighbors, the sweet, old lady who wouldn’t hurt a fly had met a horrible fate. Regardless of her unflappable charm, someone decided to beat her into the hereafter anyway.

They got out of the car and headed toward the brick four-story walk-up. The neighborhood, at one point, had been a well-to-do middle class but, over the past twenty years, had changed. A rush to migrate to the suburbs had transformed the community, and little by little, family buildings sold for next to nothing.

“Did you see that?” Raff asked him.

The sun dipped behind the buildings. Twilight hit fast. Jax noted movement by a hedge alongside the alleyway. Police tape still covered the door of Edith Collins’ building. No one should have been there.

“I’m going to check it out,” Raff said before she took off after the villainous shrub shaker.

His partner had never been a fan of crime scenes. In the past, she’d told him it was nothing better than a shell after CSI processed the property. If she hadn’t hitched a ride, he would have never taken her in the first place.

He clumped up the stone steps while he dug in his pocket for the key to the lock the police put on the door. He ripped the yellow ribbon away from the entryway without the slightest idea why he needed to come back to the crime scene.

Not that he wanted to admit it, but this case was a dog. If he didn’t give it one more shot, it would be dead in the water. Once a file came across his desk, he did his best to see it through.

He walked inside the widow’s home and popped the holster of his gun. He couldn’t see two feet in front of him, but he smelled the acrid scent of iron and funk.

He hesitated to take out his flashlight since the beam would pinpoint his exact location. Instead, he felt his way along the wall and headed to the back of the house toward the kitchen.

The old wood boards groaned underneath his feet. Jax decided to just check the first floor. The rest of the building was closed off since the owner had been too old to make it up the stairs.

Not hearing anything suspicious, he kept to the side of the hallway until the sound of rotting planks creaked under the feet of someone else’s weight.

“Police!” He called out. With his gun pointed straight in front of him, he hit the kitchen light switch with his free hand.

Metal from a weapon caught his eye.

Instinctually, he fired three rapid shots into his assailant’s torso. The intruder’s body jerked back with the first bullet and then settled into a lifeless free fall.

Jax kept his gun trained on the motionless corpse. He needed to make sure the intruder wouldn’t get up from the floor. He kicked the gun out of the perp’s reach and looked into his face. “Shit,” he growled, recognizing the man right away.

“Shit!” he said again before he got down on one knee to take the pulse of his old snitch. Dead eyes, wide open and full of condemnation, stared at the ceiling while his blood ran cold.

“Jax!” Raff’s scream came from the front of the house before she gave emergency dispatch their location. The sound of her work boots came at a quick clip toward him.

“Kitchen,” he shouted before he glanced at his watch.

“Oh, hell, Thornbird,” Raff said, rounding the corner with her gun out. “Is that?”

“Yep, Nookie,” he confirmed. He picked up the weapon and took a picture of the serial number before he dropped the cartridge of the Glock to check for bullets.

“What?”

“Empty,” he told her.

“Crap, damn it!” She repeated his sentiments from earlier. “It’s starting. They’re doing exactly what they said they would.” Raff grabbed the blonde tips of her hair and pull at them in frustration. “What now?” Angry blotches attacked Raff’s face and neck.

Jax didn’t have enough time to calm her down, so he did the best thing for the both of them. “Go! Get out of here!”

“What?”

“Leave.”

“But I’m the one who called in the shots fired.”

“Do what I say,” he commanded. They had a few more minutes alone, and he couldn’t waste any of it on her.

Raff opened her mouth to protest but must have decided against it. Instead, she turned on her heels. He waited until he heard her steel-toe boots hit the weather-beaten porch outside before he moved.

A junkie, plain and simple. Nothing but a petty thief by day and a hophead by night, he would sell out his mother for a hit in a pinch. Nookie was the go-to snitch for everyone in narcotics, a dope fiend through and through. Armed robbery was not Nookie’s thing. Jax recognized a setup. In the distance, the faint sound of sirens seeped into the old home. Jax determined the uniforms were probably only blocks away. With minutes to spare, he pulled the gas oven from the wall and yanked up the loose floorboard closest to the outlet. He dropped the perp’s Glock down the open hole before he shoved the oven back into place. After this setup, he knew the evidence would have to go into the right hands. In other words, no one from his division could find it.

The sirens from the emergency white and blues were on the next street. He hurried down the hallway and threw the wooden plank into the closet. He rearranged moth-eaten clothes to hide the board before the uniforms pulled up to the curb outside the house.

***

The present
….

Lane stared out the small cabin window at the cops who boarded other trains in search of Jax. Once their cab pulled from the station, the shivers running throughout her body went away.

Still clad in a stingy towel, Lane was embarrassed but at least dry. She listened to Jax’s strange tale.

“I don’t get it. Why would your division set you up? Are you sure Raff had nothing to do with this?” She spoke up for the first time since he’d started to unravel his web of deceit.

“Some guys from the unit warned her to either help or get out of the way.”

“Why would they warn her?”

“Raff transferred into the unit. They didn’t trust her.” He put his hands behind his head to rest on them. The man took up the entire cabin couch with his big frame. At the moment, his closeness was a bit much for her to handle. With murder, mayhem, and sex swirling in her mind, she needed to put some distance between them.

“They warned Raff to leave. Whether she was aware of their plan beforehand didn’t matter much.”

“Seems arrogant,” Lane huffed.

“Sure, but they don’t care. The city is theirs to run.”

“But why?”

“Why are they arrogant or why are they setting me up?”

The modest towel tied around his waist inched farther up his muscled thigh. Lane tried to stay focused, but the stress from the past day and uncertainty of the future played havoc inside of her.

“Both.” She swallowed, afraid she would say something in the way of
take off that towel and come here
. A good line out of anyone else’s mouth.

“There are some strange cases I’ve come across. One night, I stayed late doing paperwork when this homeless guy came in wanting to file a report about his friend. I could have blown him off like most of the detectives in my squad would have, but there was something about him.” He shrugged. “So I dug and found a John Doe who matched his friend’s description, but he had already been cremated.”

“What’s wrong with that?” She had always assumed John Does were cremated if they weren’t claimed.

“At the time, nothing, but the acceleration of the process threw up some red flags. I kept at it until I found more John Does who matched missing persons’ reports. Most of them appear connected, but I can’t quite figure out how.”

Lane pushed her hair back and blew out a breath. “This makes no sense.”

“Unlike other cops, I didn’t have to watch the clock. I could do the work on my private time which must have made someone awfully nervous.” He closed his eyes. He looked wiped.

“How does any of this tie into last night? You’re on the front page of the newspaper, wanted for questioning in the mark’s murder. A murder you didn’t commit.”

“I think he was the snitch of one of the detectives I work with.” Jax rubbed his hand across his face.

“Who, the guy who shot at us?”

He merely shook his head. Lane could tell by the red in his eyes that the sleep loss had begun to catch up with him.

“Let’s pick this up later,” she suggested. They would need to work on all cylinders to get out of this mess. “After you grab some Zs you should consider imploring the kindness of your wealthy friends. I think you could use it. I’m going to dry out your clothes the best I can and—”

Jax was out of his seat and directly in front of her.
Fast reflexes
. She had no choice except to feel the strength of his body against her needy one. “I’ll understand if you want out,” he told her. “I can send you somewhere safe until this is all sorted.” He held her tight against him.

Gold flecks twinkled throughout the hazel in his eyes. Jax was so close if he tilted his head just a few inches lower, he could kiss her. A taste of his lips would be enough. But fear shouldn’t have been a good reason to sexually attack him.

“I’m a big girl. You’ll be the first person I tell when I’ve reached my limit. Besides, I don’t believe in coincidences. One or both of us were marked to die last night. We should find out why.”

He held onto her a moment longer and stared into her eyes. He searched for something. A truth of some sort, she wasn’t sure. However, if he continued to touch her, she wouldn’t be responsible for her raging hormones.

She tried to move back but bumped into the cabin wall.

“Thank you,” he told her. “For saving me back there. You were great, and it was a lot to ask, so thank you.”

A knot formed in her throat while tears threatened to come. Unable to speak, she nodded. It had been a long time since she had encountered such genuine kindness from a man, and she didn’t want to ruin it with blubbering.

Once she was positive she wouldn’t cry, Lane eased past him. “You’re welcome,” she threw over her shoulder.

Julian Blanchard, captain of the first district in Chicago, Illinois, sat calmly as the city’s mayor chewed him a new one.

The two most powerful men in Chicago sat across from his desk. Everyone pretended they were just in the neighborhood for a friendly chat. However, Julian wasn’t a fool. Years of dedication circled the drain, all thanks to one entitled rich prick named Jackson Thornbird.

“Captain, we must commend you on the success of your district.”

Julian nodded and took in the accolades, ready for the other shoe to drop. Wise to the way of the powerful, he had worked very hard to become one of those “elite few.”

“The crime rate has gone down significantly, and your squad did a marvelous job finding the side-alley rapist,” the commissioner said. Julian noticed he’d begun with a compliment, which meant he would swing down the axe next.

“Now we don’t want this thing with Thornbird getting out of hand. He’s high society with lots of connections to the upper crust of our fair city.”

Our corrupt city
, Julian didn’t bother to say. Everyone knew about the dirty politicians of Chicago, and he sat amongst two of the filthiest.

“My suggestion, cut the wild card loose from the unit and let I.A. do to him what they will.”

Jax Thornbird had a privileged life and, as far as Julian could see, the douche bag merely enjoyed the game of cops and robbers.

He had given his squad explicit instructions to make Thornbird’s life a living hell. It hadn’t been enough to scare the boy off. “He was at the scene of a grisly murder. “If he’s involved in any—”

Mayor Ryan held up his hand. He hated anything that resembled actual work.
This visit must be killing him.

“Many of Thornbird’s relatives and close personal friends are big donors. We all have the same goal in mind. Every one of us would like our city to continue running in pristine fashion.

“It frees our pockets up for the conventions and the summer festivities. To cross one of the wealthiest families in Chicago would not be conducive to what we are trying to accomplish here,” Mayor Ryan finished with a tight smile.

Both men stood.

“I.A. can handle Thornbird,” the commissioner needlessly added his two cents..

“Excuse me, but if Internal Affairs had dealt with this properly, Thornbird would’ve been arrested for the junkie killing on Madison a few months back,” Julian seethed with contempt. Thornbird was damn near untouchable.

“Don’t want to point fingers,” the commissioner said. “But an open and shut shooting
is
what you promised.”

Julian winced at the flat-out accusation.

“You’re a shoo-in for the city’s Top Cop, son. Don’t blow it,” Mayor Ryan threatened before the two men walked out of the door.

Julian ran through his options and found he had few where Jackson Thornbird was concerned. He hated the punk and promised to make the asshole pay.

With only an hour of sleep, Jax sat on a park bench not too far from the Lincoln Memorial. He had spent the last five hours from Chicago to Washington hashing out a plan. To say he was dog-tired was an understatement.

He had dropped Lane off at a private airport with explicit instructions of what to do if he didn’t show up at the scheduled time.

“This better be good, Thornbird,” Armand Oswald said.
No eye contact.
  Army wouldn’t hesitate to put him in handcuffs. With a beautiful golden retriever by his side, he took a seat next to him on the bench. The dog popped a squat at the feet of his master.

He wouldn’t call him a friend, or even a close associate. At the most, Army could be slotted into the acquaintance from college category.