Most Wanted

49

HOW FUNNY, MELANIE THOUGHT, DYING DOES FEEL like you’re still alive, but there’s no white light. The next second she opened her eyes. Slice slumped to the ground, a flap opened in the top of his skull.

“Nice work,” Rommie said. “It was him or us. Motherfucker woulda bodied us for sure.”

Wearing an expression of pure disgust, Rommie flipped over Slice’s lifeless body with his shoe so it lay facedown. Melanie was shaking all over. She couldn’t believe it. She looked down at the gun clutched in her tightly bound hands, and then back at Slice. She’d just killed a man.

Seeing the state she was in, Rommie pressed his advantage. He leaned over, picked up Slice’s gun in his left hand, and leveled it at her.

“Okay, Melanie, you had your fun. Enough cops and robbers. Drop the weapon.”

Rommie looked dangerous as a stray dog in pain. Sweat poured down his forehead into his eyes. He wiped his face with his cut right hand, leaving a trail of blood. This was a side of him she’d never seen before. Unbeknownst to her, he’d already walked a mile down the path of corruption. No telling how much farther he’d go. He’d probably be willing to kill her. Dropping the gun was not a risk she could afford to take.

“No,” she said, raising it instead, to point at his chest. “You drop yours.”

The surprise in his eyes was gratifying. But then his expression changed.

“Wait a minute,” he said. “That’s my gun, isn’t it? You picked it up off the floor?”

“Yes.”

He laughed. “It’s empty!”

She studied his face, holding the gun as steady as her shaking hands would allow. Rommie didn’t look like he was lying.

“I don’t believe you. You’re bluffing,” she said, trying to sound strong despite the trembling in her legs.

“I went to the range this morning because I was due to qualify,” Rommie said. “Emptied the clip, except for one bullet, which you did me the favor of pumping into my friend’s head there.”

Holy shit, was he telling the truth?

“You would never leave your gun empty like that,” she said, definitively, as if she could will it to be so. “You would reload.” Then again, remember the fuck-up she was talking to.

“Sometimes it pays to be sloppy, kid.”

Rommie advanced on her with an evil grin, his gun pointed right at her head.

“What are you doing?” she shouted. “Get back!”

“You worried I’ll kill you, Melanie? L’il ole me? I’m flattered.”

Panting in terror, but determined, she pointed the gun at Rommie’s legs and squeezed the trigger. Right away, she knew it felt different. There was no tension. The trigger snapped back uselessly, making a hollow, clicking noise. Rommie closed the gap between them and ripped the gun from her hands. He shoved it into his waistband, then grabbed her by the throat with his blood-slicked hand, backing her straight up against Benson’s desk.

“Everything I did for you, and you try to blow me away? What kind of friendship is that? I’ll remember when the time comes to figure out what to do with you. Which is right after you tell me where those blueprints are.”

“Let go!” she choked out. “Let go, and I’ll tell you!”

He dropped his hand and backed off, and she sucked in a ragged breath. Adrenaline born of pure fear was the only thing keeping her functioning. She needed a plan. She needed more time, and a way to call the cops. But how? The blueprints were right outside. And after the wild-goose chase she’d sent him on once today, Rommie wasn’t likely to fall for another.

As if to confirm her thoughts, he raised Slice’s gun and placed it to her temple.

“Now-or you’re fucking dead in five seconds.”

“Outside, in the planter next to the door,” she blurted. Shit! She’d given up her last bargaining chip. But she had to. Rommie, like his buddy Slice, was stupid enough to kill her without getting the blueprints first. Now she’d have to come up with another way to stay alive.

His eyes narrowed. “Why there? Why should I even believe you had ’em in the first place? You fed Slice a line so he’d let you live. Who’s to say you’re not playing me now?”

“I had them, I swear. I got them out of the trap in Jed Benson’s Hummer.”

That registered. Rommie obviously knew about that trap.

“How?” he snarled. “When nobody else could figure out how to open that fricking thing?”

“Dan did it.”

“O’Reilly.” He nodded. “But you stashed them in a planter? Ohh, I get it. You want to go outside. This is all a goddamn scam, isn’t it, Melanie? I take you outside to get the plans. You make a scene on the street. Start screaming or something. And somebody calls the cops. You must think I’m pretty fucking stupid.”

He jammed the barrel of the gun hard against the side of her head, making her wince. But still, she’d heard it. She’d heard her opportunity, clear as a bell, and it gave her hope. He had the gun, but she could outwit him. She had to. There was no other choice.

With the gun pressed to her head, she managed to feign a shrug of indifference. “If you don’t believe me, make me stay here, and you go check it out.”

Rommie cast her a savage look, but her playacting had worked. He relaxed and backed off a step, keeping the gun leveled at her, albeit with visible effort. She could tell he was in pain.

“This better fucking be straight.”

“It is.”

“The upper floors are sealed off, you know. The only way out is past me,” he said.

“I’m not going anywhere, Rommie.”

“I come back and a fucking hair on your head moved, you’re dead.”

“I understand.”

He backed away, keeping his gun trained on her until he reached the hallway, then turned and made rapidly for the basement door.

As his footsteps receded down the hallway, Melanie hurried over to the desk and dropped to her knees. Heart pounding, she retrieved her cell phone from under the desk where Slice had thrown it, what seemed like a lifetime ago. It was a lifetime ago-Slice’s lifetime. She glanced at his stiffening corpse, lying inert on the floor like some grisly piece of debris, surrounded now by a shiny, dark pool of blood. She wouldn’t let herself think about what had happened, what was still happening. Not now, or she’d fall apart. She had to get herself out of here, so she could live, so she could see her daughter again. Tiny baby girl, nena preciosa. Get home to Maya, then think about everything else. She’d have plenty of time later to come to terms with it all. She’d have the rest of her life.

Clutching the phone in her bound hands, she turned it on. She dialed Dan O’Reilly’s pager number as fast as her thumb would move, the whole time thinking she might just be calling another calamity down upon herself. But even if Dan was bad, wouldn’t he save her life? She just couldn’t believe that their whole relationship-everything she’d read in his eyes, the things he’d said, that kiss-was all an elaborate act. Anyway, she was running low on options. At the prompt she punched in the numbers for the town house’s address, followed by the code she and Dan had come up with. Lucky seven, he’d said. It damn well better be. Then she turned off the phone, threw it back under the desk, and hurried to the exact spot where she’d been standing when Rommie left the room.

ROMMIE CAME BACK CARRYING THE RED TUBE. He hurried over to Jed’s desk, pried off the lid, and spread the blueprints on the marred surface.

She took a step closer, and he spun around with lightning reflexes, raising his gun.

“Stay away, Melanie. Now that I have these, I’ll blow your fucking brains out if you mess with me!” His eyes were deadly. He wasn’t bluffing. She backed off a step.

“I was just curious about the trap.”

“Yeah, well, curiosity killed the prosecutor,” he said, breathing hard, still sweating profusely. He gestured with the gun to a spot right beside the desk. “Get over here where I can keep an eye on you.”

She moved as commanded, watching him warily.

“This is no game, understand? There’s two hundred kilos of Colombian heroin stashed somewhere in this room. I’m not talking about stepped-on shit either. I’m talking pure. You know what that’s worth? Twenty million wholesale!”

Her eyes went wide. This was even bigger than she thought.

“Yeah, that’s right. Don’t look so surprised. You think I’d risk myself for small-time shit?” She didn’t answer. “Huh, Melanie?”

“No. Of course not.” She needed to calm him down. Drag things out. Keep him talking until help arrived.

“Everything you know, and you hadn’t figured it out?” He eyed her skeptically.

“I knew Jed Benson’s murder had something to do with corruption, with drugs. I figured it was related to Delvis Diaz and the old Flatlands murder case. I knew that much. But that you were involved? No. I never guessed,” she said. Until I learned your fingerprints put you at the scene, you scumbag, she thought.

“Yeah, I was pretty careful, wasn’t I?” A boastful smile crept across his face. This wouldn’t be so hard after all.

“You covered your tracks pretty well, Rommie. How did you manage it?”

“I guess I can afford to tell you now, huh?” he asked, gesturing meaningfully with his gun. “How’s that saying go? ‘If I tell you, I gotta kill you’? So anyway, it was like this: Jed and Slice teamed up years ago. They locked Diaz up for those kids Slice bodied, and then they took over the candy store. Threw me a piece of the action now and then, enough to support me and all my alimony payments in fine style anyway, though not near as much as I deserved. Slice was the front man, Jed laundered the money, and I kept the cops off. Pretty good scam, huh? It woulda kept going, too, but Jed started holding back. There’s a major shipment stashed in this room somewhere he didn’t want to share. He figured Slice wouldn’t find out, but he didn’t count on me. See, Jed took my loyalty for granted. A lot of people did.”

So that was it. All those years, when Rommie was the butt of jokes, he’d had a chip on his shoulder.

“Jed didn’t respect you?” she prompted.

“That’s right. And he found out how wrong he was, the hard way.” He smiled savagely.

“There were four or five guys in the room when the murder went down. I take it you were one of them?”

He shook his head. “Nuh-uh. Don’t go there, Melanie. Don’t be stupid.”

Knock yourself out, you scumbag, she thought. I know you were in on it. I have your prints on the kerosene can. You’re dead in the water. If I get out of this room alive, that is.

“Whatever you say,” she said aloud. “So who did kill Jed, then?”

“Just some mopes from Slice’s crew. Blades.”

“Any insiders? Law enforcement?” she asked.

“You mean like Randall Walker?”

“Randall was involved in Jed’s murder?” she asked. So it was true. But at least he hadn’t mentioned Dan. Yet. Had her call for help been in vain?

Rommie chuckled mirthlessly. “In the murder? No way. Guy’s fucking useless. I had to practically hold a gun to his head to get anything out of him.”

“Then why did you bring him up just now?”

“I thought that’s who you meant when you said law enforcement. Randall did only, like, low-level shit for me. Mostly tell me what you were up to, so I could keep tabs on the investigation.”

Jesus, who could you trust? People really sucked. She had liked Randall, liked him a lot.

“Why? Why would he do that?” she asked.

“He didn’t have much choice. I had something on him-we’re talking ancient history now, but it was major. We were doing an undercover deal, years ago. The buy money disappeared. Twenty large, to be exact, not chickenshit. I pinched it, but Randall didn’t know that. He signed it out from the vault, so his ass was on the line. I convinced him his only option was falsifying the reports. So we both said the perp pulled a gun and stuck us up. Swore out statements and everything. Once Randall lied under oath, I had his pecker in my pocket. Simple as that.”

“Did he set up my witnesses? Did he give you Rosario Sangrador? Or Amanda Benson? Is that how you got to them?” She felt sick to her stomach at the very thought.

“No, he wasn’t in that deep, and I didn’t need him for that anyway. I had an in over at your office, remember? With your boss? Show up a few minutes early for a date. Wander around. Take a peek. No telling what you could learn. I had the run of the place.”

“You killed them?”

“You think I’m stupid enough to get my hands dirty like that? No way. I gave Slice the locations and took care of the doors. Like, I sent Randall Walker off on an errand. But Slice did the rest. That’s why I’m gonna get away clean.”

Rommie giving up those innocents to be slaughtered by an animal like Slice. Who ever knew a cop could be so twisted?

“But it was you who stole the bank records and fingerprint reports from my desk,” she said.

“Can you blame me? I asked nicely first, but you wouldn’t share.”

“And down in the file room the other night, when the tape was stolen from my bag? That was you, too, wasn’t it?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Bernadette didn’t know anything, did she?” Melanie asked.

“Nah. Nothing. She never would’ve gone along with it.”

“So you used her.”

Rommie shrugged. “You could put it that way. She’s all right, your boss. But not really my type, if you know what I mean.”

And Bernadette was so far gone on this guy! ¡Hombres desgraciados! Men were such dogs! Speaking of, it was time to ask the question she’d been dreading. Even if the answer wasn’t the one she was hoping for, she had to hear the truth, if only to better estimate her own chances for survival.

“What about Dan O’Reilly?” she whispered. She held her breath, waiting for his answer.

Rommie stared back at her in surprise. “O’Reilly? You’re fucking kidding me! He’s a goddamn choirboy.”

The relief she felt at that answer was greater than when she’d opened her eyes to find herself still alive and Slice dead on the ground. Dan was clean! And that made her happy for a lot of reasons.

But her exultation was short-lived. A cloud passed across Rommie’s face. She’d come to the end of his patience.

“You got me fucking wasting time here!” he shouted suddenly, his face reddening. “Just stand there and shut up, or I’m gonna decide I don’t need a hostage, if you see what I mean, Melanie.”

He looked down at the blueprints. After a few minutes, he walked over, nearly tripping on Sophie’s legs, and pressed a small switch set into the wooden bookshelves behind Jed Benson’s desk. With a fluid glide that spoke of Sophie’s talent, a section of the shelves slid inward, opening a narrow doorway to the hidden room beyond.

“Shangri-fucking-la! And so easy! Only that moron Slice coulda missed it the first time. I’m going in, but don’t you move, you hear me?” Rommie waved his gun at her, then disappeared into the opening.

After only a few seconds, he stumbled back through the opening to the trap, looking almost drunk.

“The drugs!” he shouted, coming over to her, searching her face desperately. “The drugs are fucking gone! First the money in the bank account, now the drugs!”

He pulled out a cell phone and dialed frantically, his hands, covered with now-drying blood, shaking violently.

“Disconnected!” he shouted, pitching the phone across the room with all his strength. “Fucking bitch disconnected her phone! She took the drugs, the money, everything! She double-crossed me!”

“Who, Bernadette?” Melanie asked, confused. Hadn’t he said Bernadette knew nothing about this?

“No! No! Nell!” He slumped against the desk, burying his face in his hands, pulling at his hair. “Fucking bitch! I did all this for her! The way Jed treated her. A fine woman like that, and he’s doing every stripper in town. She said she loved me, wanted him dead so we could be together. Just pinch one shipment, she said, and we’d be set for life, get a big villa in the Caymans right on the beach. All I needed to do was bring Slice down on Jed. All this for her, and she stabs me in the back!”

“So you lied before when you said Jed held out on Slice. You were covering for Nell. Jed never held out. You set him up.”

“He deserved it, the bastard. Treating me like a fucking lackey. Jesus, I can’t believe it. Nell, that double-crossing bitch!” He kicked the desk furiously, several times in rapid succession.

“Any woman who would condone the killing of her own daughter…”

“Of course she didn’t condone killing Amanda. She didn’t know. I even tried to avoid it because I knew it would upset Nell.” He drew a sharp breath. “Oh, my God, that’s it, that’s it! That’s got to be it. She must’ve heard about Amanda. She’s upset with me. That’s why she ran. I have to find her.”

“I’m not so sure about that,” Melanie said.

“What do you mean?”

“Nobody could locate Nell to break the news of Amanda’s death. So when I was driving back to town before, I called her hotel. They told me she’d checked out. The concierge had booked her a ticket to Switzerland. He booked it yesterday. Before Amanda was killed.”

Rommie’s face crumpled.

“Switzerland. Beyond the reach of any extradition treaty,” Melanie said.

Rommie shook his head in disbelief, looking to Melanie as if she could explain this terrible betrayal. He had a wild glint in his eyes that made her think she’d better get out of the room fast. She started to move toward the door.

“Where the fuck do you think you’re going?” he yelled, raising his gun once again.