I started the next day early. Really early since I hadn’t really slept. Instead, I’d spent a healthy amount of time on the Internet, looking up the coin Yuri had forced on me. It was a Russian Imperial 5 Ruble, 1885, worth several grand, depending on who you asked. Maybe I should be happy about scoring such a big reward, but I couldn’t help but think about the consequences of accepting it.
I stuck the coin in my pocket, and turned to less professional pursuits, like the numbers and letters on the crumpled piece of paper I’d saved from last night. Chance wasn’t my only friend on the force, and I’d called in a favor to get Red’s plate run. Red, aka Heather Deveaux, not only drove a fancy car, she had a posh Chicago address. According to LinkedIn and Avvo, she was a doctor, an ophthalmologist, and part of a group of eye specialists located in the Windy City. Either she hadn’t gotten around to updating her profile or she was between jobs. Or she was only here for a visit.
A doctor. Make that surgeon. Whatever. I wondered where Jess had met the good doctor. On a case was the most likely answer since she was a workaholic. Or maybe some do-gooder on the softball team finally decided to make good on their promises to find the coach a gal. They didn’t understand that Jess didn’t need any help getting dates; she just wasn’t big on relationships. Other women our age seem to think all dates came with the possibility of more. I knew better. Jess was probably banging Dr. Deveaux for fun. And who could blame her? Dr. Red was a hottie. I’d have banged her if I’d seen her first.
But I hadn’t, and the fact that Jess had, crawled under my skin and made me restless. I wasn’t sure if my restlessness was more about Deveaux or Jess. I shut down my laptop and changed into tattered sweats and a Notre Dame sweatshirt left behind by a one-night stand. As I recalled, that particular Irish hadn’t fought me. Not much anyway. I shook off the memory. Not getting laid last night had as much to do with my edgy mood as the string of questions I had about Diamond, Jess, and the surprise visit from Yuri. A run would calm me down.
My neighborhood woke slowly. It was after eight, and signs of life were limited to the garbage truck collecting the remains of last night’s fun from local bars and convenience stores. Fine by me. I liked quiet mornings since I usually spent them tucked in bed. Not having regular hours worked well with my tendency to work at night and rest in the mornings.
I ran twice as far as usual, but the racing thoughts coursing through my brain were not to be outdistanced. I focused on the professional, not the personal. Yuri’s instructions to me, to speak to Bingo, spooked me more than I liked to admit. For several reasons. First, even though I knew Bingo’s gambling biz was illegal, I hadn’t pegged him for being involved in organized crime. But Yuri wasn’t the kind of guy to sling around rumors. So who was Bingo in business with and why did Yuri want a piece of it? Had to be big to draw his interest.
Jess might know. Or know someone who did. The cops were always trying to catch the Petrov family in the act, but usually it was the Feds who were on Yuri’s tail. I honed in on Jess instead of the other person who might know about the Bingo angle—my dad. He’d known Bingo since before I was born. Surely, he had to have picked up some intel during hundreds of poker games over the years.
Where to start? Jess or Dad? It was still early by my standards. Dad wouldn’t be up, or God forbid, he might be at Maggie’s place, and/or she at his. Chance would either be at home or on the job. Or maybe she’d stayed in, brewed coffee, and scrambled eggs for Dr. Red. Ick. If that mess was happening, it needed to be interrupted.
After a quick shower, I made a call and then swung by her place. The Beemer was still parked in the drive. Lovely. I could stay or I could go. I didn’t want to bear witness to the domestic bliss probably happening inside, but why should I change my habits because Jess had changed hers?
I resisted the urge to block the Beemer in and parked on the street. I was halfway to the door when it opened and Dr. Red strode down the walk. She wore a sharply tailored black suit with a light blue shirt. I don’t know much about fancy clothes, but the shirt looked soft, like silk. She was taller than I remembered, partly because of the high-heeled black pumps. Where was she going, all dressed up?
I smiled and took a stab. “Job interview?”
“Excuse me?”
“Just a guess, Dr. Deveaux. Or maybe you’ve already landed a cush job at a private practice. That’s what you’re used to, right?”
“Do I know you?” She wrinkled her forehead for a moment, and then the shade of recognition fell. “Oh wait, you were at the softball game. You’re a friend of Jessica.” She said Chance’s name, slow, enunciating each syllable.
Jess-i-ca? Did she really call Chance Jess-i-ca? What other special couple things did the two of them share?
“I am a friend. An old friend. And what are you?” I had intended to use a more subtle approach, but she had an edge about her that put me off. Confident, superior. Qualities I usually found attractive, but coming from her, the attributes left a sour taste. Like they weren’t genuine, like they were covering something else. I stared her down until she answered.
“I’m a friend too. A new friend.” She smiled. A smarmy smile, and added, “New friends are a treasure, don’t you agree?”
Okay, that did it. I hated her. “Weren’t you on your way out?”
She glanced back at Chance’s front door, like the last thing she wanted to do was leave if I was staying. “Yes, I suppose I was.”
“Well, don’t let me keep you.” I swept my arm in a grand gesture toward her car. Her very expensive car, which looked totally out of place in front of Jess’s modest house.
She took a step, then stopped. “I do need to go, but I’ll be back. Soon.”
I watched her drive off. If her parting words were meant to be some sort of threat, I wasn’t buying. No way was a woman like that going to steal Jess’s heart. I tried not to wonder why I cared so much.
Jess’s paper was still in the yard. I picked it up and carried it to the door, which swung open before I could raise my finger to press the bell.
“What’re you doing up?” She stood in the doorway, her blond hair wet, her long-sleeve shirt unbuttoned to reveal a flat plane of well-toned muscle. Sexy. Delicious. I tried to ignore how freshly fucked she looked.
“Nice greeting. Thought you’d be in a better mood, Jessica.”
She squinted at me, likely trying to divine what I meant without having to ask. I left her guessing. “Are you going to invite me in?”
“I need to get to work.”
“You’re late already. John will cover for a while longer.” Chance had recently been reunited with her old partner. For the past few months, she’d been stuck with a loser named Elton, who thought the way up the ladder was on the back of his more experienced partner. Unlike Elton, John didn’t consider me a near felon, and he knew Jess and I went way back. When I called him this morning, he’d let me know that Jess had called and said she was going to be late. I’d correctly assumed she was still at home and headed right over. Apparently, my timing had been perfect. Now that Dr. Red was gone, Jess could make coffee for me.
“Come on in. We can talk while I get ready.” She didn’t wait for an answer, and left me in the doorway while she strode off in the direction of her bedroom. I’d only been here a few times in the light of day. Normally, I showed up late at night and whatever happened between us occurred in the dark.
I liked her place. It looked lived in. Pictures on the walls, mementos on the shelves. The pots and pans hanging in the kitchen were used for cooking, not dust-gathering, potential weapons like they would be at my place. And she owned the place, which meant no nosy landlord snooping around. I followed her to the bedroom and made myself comfortable on the unmade bed while she finished getting dressed with a leisure I didn’t usually see. I felt smug that I, not the doctor, had the pleasure of this particular intimacy.
She let me ogle for a few minutes before she asked, “Are you going to stare at me or tell me what you came for?”
“Maybe you’d like to come now.” I patted a spot on the bed beside me. “Care to join me?” I was only partly kidding, but I added a laugh to give her an out and save face in case she blew me off.
She didn’t laugh me off. No, she did something far worse.
“I’m seeing someone.”
“What does that mean?”
“Don’t make me say it.”
Our casual relationship was over. I could read it in her eyes. I was torn about whether I wanted her to speak the words. We’d relieved each other’s stress for ages. Was she really cutting me loose? For a hot broad in a fancy car?
Looks like I’d answered my own question, but I pushed the point. “Are things between you and Dr. Deveaux that serious?”
She whipped around. “How do you know her name?”
“Magic.”
She shoved me in the shoulder. “Leave it be, Bennett. My girlfriend isn’t one of your jumpers.”
“Girlfriend?” I hadn’t meant to say that out loud, but the word tumbled out before I could stop it.
She blushed. Apparently, my shout made Jess as uncomfortable as it made me. It’s one thing to announce something and another again to have it reflected back at you. I stared at Jess’s reddening face. I’d seen her face assume lots of different expressions—anger, pain, humor, passion—but never anything that resembled embarrassment. I grabbed her arm. “Sorry, didn’t mean to yell. What’s up with you?”
She shrugged out of my grasp and put several feet of distance between us. She was acting like I was a disease she might catch. I stared her down until I drilled through the surface. She wasn’t embarrassed about calling Heather Deveaux her girlfriend. She was embarrassed about me. About the fact I’d still show up on her doorstep, looking for casual sex, when she’d probably already whispered words of promise to the doctor.
“So I guess you are pretty serious about her.” I was the master of the obvious today.
“I like her. A lot.”
“Tell me about her. Does she have a job yet? Is the job market better here than in Chicago?” I hated acting all casual about the subject, but I figured it was the only way I’d get any info at all. If pushed, I’d have to admit my curiosity was more about envy than interest.
“Let’s not do this, Bennett. Did you have some other reason for dropping by? Mornings aren’t usually your thing.”
She knew me. And I’d come to rely on that. I wanted to tell her I’d come by the night before, but she’d been too busy for what we normally shared. I wanted to know details about Deveaux, but she didn’t want to share what had become her preferred form of intimacy. I resolved to find out some other way and focused instead on the original reason for my visit.
“What’s Yuri Petrov up to these days?”
Her face got stormy and I smiled. This was the Jess I knew. “Stay away from him.”
“Don’t have to tell me twice. Problem is he won’t stay away from me.” I described our chance meeting the night before and showed her the gold coin. “It’s an Imperial Five Ruble. I Googled it.”
“It’s old. Bet it’s worth a fortune.”
“You know a good pawn shop?”
“Don’t be stupid. Did Yuri give this to you?” She didn’t wait for my answer. “You should give it back. You keep this, he owns you.”
My turn to step back. “No one owns me.” I stared hard to make sure she got the full implication of my words.
“Chill. I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know. Yuri’s people have been very active lately. I don’t know what they’re up to, but I think they’re squaring up for a big move.”
“Any reason it might have something to do with Bingo’s place?”
She shook her head. “I don’t get how Bingo could be involved. Yuri’s not into gambling.”
“But Vedda is. And when I showed up asking Bingo about Vedda’s guys, he practically threw me off the property. There’s something I’m missing, but I don’t know what it is.” I started to mention the prescription I’d gotten from Laura the night before, but she cut in to warn me off again.
“Is there a reason you care? Is Hardin not giving you enough work? Stick to what you do best and leave the detecting to those who get paid for it.”
I thought about the other jumpers still on my list. Her comment about detecting pissed me off, but she was right. I wasn’t a cop, nor did I want to be. Wasn’t my job to stop crime. I should go for the sure thing and leave the loose ends for someone who cared. There was only one reason for me to chase down whatever Vedda, Petrov, and Bingo were into, and Jess named it before I could.
“Unless you’re so hot for the Fed that you’d scare up trouble you don’t need. That’s never worked well for you before.”
Diamond. We’d somehow circled back around to her. “Why don’t you like her?”
“I don’t know her. And neither do you. But I do know this—once you go as deep undercover as she did, it’s hard to ever be honest.” I started to protest, but she held up a hand to stop me. “Hear me out. Maybe honesty isn’t the best word, but the line between truth and fiction becomes shady. It has to or you can’t survive. I’m not faulting her, but I believe she’ll use you to get what she needs. Don’t count on her needs to be the same as yours. Be careful.”
She cared enough to warn me from danger, but that kind of caring wasn’t what I’d come looking for. I wasn’t going to beg and she wasn’t offering. The realization made me act like a spoiled two-year-old who couldn’t stand to see someone else playing with her toy. “Why don’t you stick to running the doctor’s life, not mine? I can take care of myself.”
“Then why don’t you do that? As I recall, you showed up here without an invite. You can leave anytime you like.”
She didn’t deserve my anger, but I didn’t have anything else to offer. I stood and started toward the door, pausing when she called my name.
“Luca.”
I turned around. “Yeah?”
“Be careful. I mean it.”
She frowned, with worry not anger. I recognized the look. I’d seen it before and had even welcomed her concern, but right now, I’d trade a pound of her concern for an ounce of something deeper. When had the balance between us shifted from need to want? I shoved the question deep. I didn’t have answers. At least none I wanted to explore. I left without another word and she didn’t try to stop me.
*
I drove home and took a nap. I planned on a long one to compensate for getting up too early for absolutely no reason whatsoever, but precisely at the moment my eyeballs started REMing, a loud and unrelenting knocking jerked me out of sleep. At the same instant, my cell phone started ringing. Boy, was I popular. I glanced at the phone—unknown number. Again. That made at least five I’d gotten in the last week. I pushed ignore, grabbed the Colt from my nightstand, and strode to the door, ready to shoot up whoever felt the need to knock so damn loud at eleven in the morning. I swung the door wide and waved my gun. “What the hell do you want?”
“Put that thing away. You could kill somebody. And put some clothes on before you answer the door. Didn’t your mama teach you any better?”
My landlord, Ernest Withers, averted his eyes, but his red face signaled he was truly mortified to have seen me half-dressed. I’d answered the door dressed only in an old, ratty T-shirt, sporting a big gun. I probably looked ridiculous, but I didn’t care. He was the one who’d interrupted my nap, after all. “My mama taught me not to beat on people’s doors in the middle of the day.”
He shuffled in place, but he didn’t back down. “I came for the rent you owe. Don’t you own any clothes that don’t have holes in them?”
The non sequitur didn’t faze me. I was used to his eccentric ways. His ways, and the fact that he overlooked most of mine, were a large part of the reason I stayed in this dump. I usually paid my rent around the middle of the month, and considered the delay a free line of credit. This month, I’d gone into the third week before he’d caught me. It wasn’t that I didn’t have the cash. It was just that there were so many more fun things to do with money than pay for a roof over my head. I thought back to the other night when I’d blown a large part of my stash at Bingo’s. That’d been fun, but paying Withers now would put another serious dent in my cash flow. I hunted around until I found my jeans on the floor where I’d shed them and pulled a small wad of bills from the pocket. I peeled off a few bills, about half the rent, and handed it to him. “Here’s most of it,” I exaggerated. “I’ve got steady work. I can get the rest to you next week.”
He snatched the bills from my hand before I could change my mind and sighed heavily while he counted it out. “Luca, I have a business to run. You may be able to work whenever you like, and do God knows what in the middle of the day…” He cast a disparaging look from my smashed hair to my crumpled attire. “But I have bills to pay.”
“Aw, come on, Withers. I’ll get you your money. I always do.” I waved the Colt again. “Now run along or I’ll report you to the housing authority for being a slumlord.” I had no idea if there was a housing authority who made sure cheapskates like me have decent housing for almost no money, but I played the bluff well. He scurried off and I hit the bed again, but this time sleep was elusive. Instead of counting sheep, I counted unanswered questions about Diamond, Bingo, Vedda, Petrov. And Jess. All subjects I knew less about than I should, but more than I wanted.
After an hour of futile ciphering, I gave up on sleep and consulted Hardin’s list. The next jumper listed was Otis Shaw. Bond had been posted at fifty grand, a healthy payout. Time to collect some funds and forget about gamblers, gangsters, and girls. For now, anyway.
I’d saved this particular jumper for a reason. Apprehending him was going to be more work than the others. Otis Shaw wasn’t a small-time thug. He’d been charged with murder, and he’d cut out the day his trial was supposed to begin. He wasn’t a psycho kind of murderer. The person he shot down was a childhood friend turned rival in a dispute over drugs and a woman. To guys like these, the drugs were probably more important than the woman, but she’d probably been what had tipped the scale from anger to gunshots. Finding her would likely lead me to him.
The Internet gave her last known in just a few clicks. I dressed in the Colt, Sig, and my trusty switchblade, and headed out the door. By now it was one o’clock and I was starving. I should definitely eat before taking on Shaw. I glanced down the street. Maggie’s place was open and it was easy. Maybe she’d have some good gossip. Maybe my dad wouldn’t be there hanging on her arm. Wasn’t sure why their relationship bothered me, but maybe I was just tired of seeing all the bachelors in my life suddenly coupled up. Jess, Dad, my brother.
Jess’s words from the other day rang in my head. Are you going to be in the wedding? Hell no, I wasn’t going to be in the wedding. Mark hadn’t even told me there was a wedding. I didn’t blame him. We didn’t share much since he’d hightailed it out of town to get away from the life-sucking drain of our parents’ house. He’d had it the hardest when they spiraled into divorce. Me, I’d never believed in happily ever afters, but he’d always harbored fancy notions about true love, destiny, and all that crap. When he finally figured out Mom and Dad would just as soon beat each other to death as look at each other, he was devastated. He told me once, when he was in college, he no longer believed in marriage.
Fast-forward and Mark was engaged. If it could happen to him, it could happen to anyone. Was no one safe?
Maggie’s place was mostly empty. I grabbed a barstool and laid a twenty down. I had a tab, but lately I felt funny using it, like it was nepotism. Stupid, I know, but with everyone blurring lines around me, I clung to my independence. I can’t always afford principles, but I liked it when I could.
Maggie bounced over and shoved the twenty into my breast pocket. Well, I’d tried to be principled. “You hungry?” she asked.
“Very.”
She nodded, poured me a glass of tea, and left with an “I’ll be right back” tossed over her shoulder. The tea was okay, but I’d have preferred a beer. A couple actually. Probably best I didn’t indulge. If I started drinking, I wouldn’t be hungry anymore. I hoped for a burger. And fries. Protein and grease to fortify me for the job ahead.
She returned in a few minutes. “Your lunch will be ready in a minute. Have you talked to your brother?”
“You sound like my mother. You bucking for the role?”
She didn’t flinch. “Not a chance, girl. But it would make your dad happy if you were involved in the wedding.”
“I haven’t been asked. Hell, I’ve barely been told about it.”
“I don’t think it’s been long in the making.”
“Really?” Mark was the last person I’d expect to get married on the fly. “Is she pregnant? Maybe they’ll elope.”
“Not a chance. Girl’s parents want a big shindig. They have money. Society folks. It’s going to be quite a to-do.”
With that threat, she took off again, hopefully to check on my lunch. While she was gone, I tried to picture my dad stuffed into a rental tux, standing alongside fancy rich folks, making a toast to his son, the groom. I wondered which of my mother’s husbands she’d choose to bring to the affair. She’d remarried so often, I stopped keeping track. Her string of husbands all had money, the primary prerequisite for marrying my mother. Dad and I would be out of place at a society wedding. High school educated, blue-collar misfits. Nerdy Mark should be out of place too. How he had gotten hooked up with money, high-class money at that? Last time I’d talked to him, the most exciting thing in his life was being on the brink of cracking some kind of code. I didn’t understand a word of what he’d said, but I knew it had been the most important thing in his life. Granted, our conversation was several months ago, but what happened to change all that?
“Here you go.” Maggie slid a plate in front of me, a huge smile on her face. I decided her smile had to do with the joke she was playing on me. Instead of a big burger and crispy fries, I was staring at a turkey sandwich on wheat bread. With leafy greens that looked suspiciously like spinach. And a fruit cup where the fries should be. Fresh fruit.
I pushed the plate back toward her. “You running low on food back there?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I mean this looks a little healthy. I eat this, I might have a reaction.”
“Like feeling good?”
“I feel just fine.”
“You eat crap. This is good food.”
“You force feed your other customers with this stuff?”
“You’re not a customer. This is on the house.”
I pulled the twenty back out of my pocket and tossed it on the bar. “How many French fries will that buy?”
She sighed. “You’re just like your father.” It wasn’t a compliment.
“You try to get him to eat like this?”
“He says he likes it, but I think he sneaks off and eats junk when I’m not around.”
I grinned because I knew he did. My mother had given up trying to get him to eat right when I was still in diapers. “You can’t change people.”
“That right, Luca? Bet you thought your brother would never get married.”
We’d talked about my family before she’d ever met my father. Bartender/drinker kind of talk. Didn’t think she’d retain or remember anything I’d whispered into my beer. “You’re right about that.”
“What about you? You ever going to get married? Whatever happened to that nice cop that helped Billy out? You two seemed to get along real well.”
And there went my appetite. Maggie didn’t usually refer to cops as “nice.” They were pesky rule-mongers who badgered suffering business folks. But she’d taken a shine to Jess after Jess had helped her no-good brother out of a jam.
I started to reply with a “we’re just friends,” but stopped myself when I wasn’t sure if “friends” was an accurate characterization of what we were to each other. We’d gone to the police academy together, bonded over a shooting that got out of hand, and had been fuck buddies ever since. I used Chance when I needed info on a case. She used me to fill in on her softball team. I didn’t know what to call our relationship, but friends seemed both too much and too little. Didn’t really matter anymore because Jess had a girlfriend and, like all women who hook up for the long haul, their friends become second-class citizens.
I felt even lower than that.