Dead Fall

There was only one way up to Mick O’Neill’s penthouse apartment on Davis Islands, South Tampa. Two ways down. You could take the express elevator up, which required use of a key to access the private floor. Coming down you could also use the elevator. Or — option two — fall sixteen stories to the unforgiving sidewalk if O’Neill’s protection team tossed you off the roof. No one but a suicidal fool would choose option two, but it appeared that this was the case with William Murray.

Murray was a fool but I’d never tagged him as being suicidal. He enjoyed life too much. It was because he valued his hide that he’d made the mistake of answering the summons to O’Neill’s lofty pad. Murray had angered the Irishman, but thought he could charm his way out of a kneecapping. Sadly, when he’d hit the ground at one hundred and twenty miles per hour, his kneecaps were the least of it. He’d burst on impact and there was little left of him that was recognizable. Apparently, if the Medical Examiner’s report was to be believed, he’d broken ninety-two percent of the bones in his body. CSI examiners had used tools akin to snow shovels while removing him from the sidewalk.

Not a pretty image.

William Murray was a low-level street hawker, his wares not entirely lawful, and beneath my usual circle of friends, but he was likable in his own way. He didn’t deserve ending up as sidewalk pizza for Mick O’Neill’s amusement.

It didn’t take a genius to figure out what had happened up on the sixteenth floor.

Murray had gone in, cap in hand, tried to lighten the mood somewhat with a self-deprecating joke or two, but his geniality hadn’t won him any friends. Mick O’Neill was someone I’d been hearing a lot about lately, and none of it had anything to do with his humanitarian ways. Murray would have been slapped around, threatened perhaps, and then O’Neill would have lost any patience he had with the man and ordered that Murray take an impromptu swan dive from the roof.

That’s the way the cops believed that events transpired, and I for one was with them. However, there was no evidence, no witnesses coming forward to offer their support. In fact, all four men and two women in O’Neill’s penthouse at the time of Murray’s death swore that they hadn’t seen him. The first they knew of his “suicide” was when the sirens of the first responders arrived on the scene and one of O’Neill’s “home helpers” took a look over the balcony. O’Neill had extended his assistance to the police investigators, throwing open his home to them, and no trace evidence had been found to place Murray in the apartment. The cops knew O’Neill was lying, and even pulled him — plus his pals — in for questioning, but with no evidence to incriminate him or any of the others in Murray’s death, they were released without charge, and O’Neill was offered a humble apology for wasting his valuable time.

The police moved on.

They understood that they couldn’t make anything stick to O’Neill, and to try was a waste of their resources, their time, and their energy. Their best strategy was to hope that O’Neill would slip up another time, and they’d send him down for this future crime. Typically, I didn’t have the patience to wait.

I’ve never been known to keep my peace. I’m impulsive. When something bites me, I bite back. And right now the fact that O’Neill was smirking over the crushed body of a friend was gnawing at me like a junkyard dog on a bone.

My initial response was to front the Irishman in his lair, then beat the truth out of him before letting him feel the breeze in his thick mane of silvery hair as he plummeted to earth. To do that I’d also have to send his protection detail off the roof, because no way would they be blind witnesses this time. Admittedly that plan was a bit too harsh. Plus, to do such would ensure that I was the one that the police sent to prison for the rest of my life.

My friend, Jared Rington, had cautioned me against doing anything rash. But then Rink’s always more level-headed than me. He prefers to think things through, formulate a plan, and initiate it when the time is right. I’ve always been the go for broke, fly by the seat of my pants, kind of guy. And in the past, what I’ve lacked in subtlety I’ve gained in a healthy dose of luck and daring. But Rink was correct this time: if I went to O’Neill’s penthouse carrying this much anger, then the inevitable ending would see one or all of us taking a fall — quite literally for some.

It was an effort to dampen down the urge to take violence to O’Neill, but I managed. I soothed my ego with the old adage that revenge is a dish best served cold. It worked for a while.

Then Candice Berry turned up dead and the rage surged afresh through my veins.

“What are you doing here, Hunter?”

I pursed my lips at Detective Holker’s question, didn’t bother with an answer because whatever I said wouldn’t soothe him.

“Stay back behind the line, goddamnit, this is a crime scene.” Holker waved over a man-mountain of a uniformed cop. “Make sure this asshole doesn’t step a foot nearer my scene.”

“Nice to see you, too, Detective Holker,” I said.

The uniform posted himself in front of me, crossing arms like hams on his chest. He was a humorless kind of guy, I could tell, and big enough to ruin most people’s day. He wasn’t large enough to block all of the view. Candice Berry was under a white sheet, but I could tell from the blood seeping through it that her death hadn’t been easy.

“What happened to Candice, Detective?” I asked.

Holker shook his head wearily. He shoved a latex-gloved hand through his salt and pepper hair and approached me. He placed the same hand on the big uniform’s shoulder, squeezing reassuringly. “I’ll handle this, Buck.”

The big cop grunted in monosyllables, but moved aside.

“Joe, you being at my crime scene isn’t helping.” Holker was shorter than I, but not by much. His Cuban heels helped balance the disparity and he studied me eye-to-eye. “How’d you even know what happened to Candice? I’ve only been here minutes.”

“News travels fast on the streets,” I said, “especially when it’s bad news. Candice Berry was much loved by her friends and neighbors.”

“ ‘Much loved’ being the operative words. She was a hooker, Hunter.”

“It was her way of making a living, supporting her kids,” I corrected. “Being a hooker doesn’t make her a bad person.”

Holker shrugged, but the move didn’t do much to stir the shoulders of his overly large suit. Holker had lost some poundage since last I’d seen him. Didn’t look in the best of health. But then, when you make a living from violent death and chasing down the scumbags responsible, you could be forgiven for not looking your best.

“You scanning the police channels, Hunter? Tell me you’re not like those other ambulance-chasing parasites who call themselves private eyes these days?”

“Never chased an ambulance in my life, and I don’t call myself a private eye, neither.”

“But you’re not denying scanning our radio traffic?”

I held up my empty palms, shook my head. I was telling the truth. It was one of my work mates at Rington Investigations, Raul Velasquez, who’d given me the heads-up on Candice’s murder. “I just happened to be passing,” I said, and this time I was lying through my teeth.

Holker squinted around the grimy alleyway between two warehouses off Guy N. Verger Boulevard, close enough to McKay Bay that the occasional breeze carried the tang of brine, and close enough to Causeway Boulevard that the exhaust fumes of vehicles passing to and from Clair Mel practically overwhelmed the smell of the sea.

“And what brings you to Palmetto Beach,” the detective asked, “or rather this end of Palmetto Beach? It’s not as if you’ve chosen the nicest lookout over the bay. I’d have thought Desoto Park was more your kind of place for passing time.”

“Didn’t say that I was passing time, I said I was passing. I had business down on Lehman Street.”

“What kind off business?”

“The private kind.”

“And if I were to ask them, the port authority cops would confirm that?” Lehman Street was deep in the port district and the area heavily monitored by Tampa Port Authority officers.

“Knock yourself out,” I said, my face flat and concealing the lie. “If you want to waste time checking on my movements instead of concentrating on finding Candice’s murderer?”

“Maybe you’re one and the same. Oh, no, wait! You don’t do your vigilante thing to women and kids, do you? Just the bad guys that deserve it.”

“Allegedly.”

“Allegedly, my ass.” Holker shook his head, his mouth twisting in a lopsided smile. “I’m just ragging you, man. I know this isn’t your style.”

Eyeing the formless shape beneath the stained sheet, I said, “Any idea whose style it is?”

“Like I said, I just got here a few minutes ago. I haven’t come to any conclusions yet. And — even if I had — I wouldn’t be sharing them with you. No offense, but it doesn’t help my clean-up rate when my prime suspect turns up dead.”

I didn’t respond to his words. There wasn’t much point. Like a number of cops in Tampa, Florida, Ben Holker had made his mind up about me. But like those others, he’d realized that my worth as an ally in their fight against crime was more than the trouble of trying to put me away. Some had even gone as far as helping me out with information on certain criminals, particularly those that lawful process couldn’t touch. It was a mutual arrangement of sorts. Their badges wouldn’t allow the kind of proactive law enforcement I took to those villains’ doors.

“This isn’t Candice’s patch,” I pointed out.

“I’m aware of that, Hunter.” She was generally found working the street corners between East Seventh and East Palm Avenues in Ybor City. “Maybe she was picked up by a shy john who wanted to find somewhere more private for their dirty rendezvous.”

“Maybe,” I concurred. “How’d she die?”

Holker thought about divulging the information, but realized that soon enough it would be readily available via all the media channels. “Nine millimeter to the back of the head.” He made a gun out of his fingers and mimed shooting.

“Any sign of rape?”

“Hunter, you know what business Candice was in. How would I tell?”

“I’m talking scratches, bruises, as if she tried to fight off an attacker,” I said.

Holker shook his head. “That’s the damndest thing. Apart from the hole in her skull there are no other signs of injury. I know what you’re thinking: why’d a john bring her all the way here, then shoot her without having his wicked way first?”

“That’s what I’m thinking,” I agreed. “If sexual gratification wasn’t the motive, Candice was lured here and then shot for another reason.”

“Shit. Listen to you. You sure you don’t want me to get you a nice new detective badge to flash around?”

“Holker, you can like me, or you can hate me, but you have to admit I’m right.”

“Personally I don’t give a damn about you one way or another. Right now you’re stopping me from doing my job. Time you left, buddy.” Holker nodded at the big uniformed cop standing just out of earshot. The big man stirred. I held up a hand, indicated that I was going. But I didn’t, I turned back to Holker.

“She was murdered by her boss, and we both know who that is.”

“Sheridan Brown?” Holker snorted. “You think she’s the type to put a bullet in the skull of one of her favorite girls?”

“I’m not talking about her madam, or even Whalen, I’m talking about Sheridan’s top boss.”

“Man, you ain’t the only one that’s got a boner for Mick O’Neill. But it’s a bit of a stretch saying he’s the one responsible for shooting Candice.”

“Just saying,” I said.

Holker squinted at me.

“What?” I asked.

“Is that why you were down on Lehman Street? I just bet there’s a clear view from there across Hillsborough Bay to Davis Islands.”

“Depends which way you’re looking,” I said, but it did little to dissuade Holker. He knew as well as I did that you could stand on Lehman and get a good view over the water to Mick O’Neill’s penthouse apartment on Channel Drive.

Despite years of fooling terrorists as to my true intentions, Holker could see right through me. I guess I was a bit rusty, it had been nigh on six years since I was active with Arrowsake, the UN coalition counterterrorism group I was part of for fourteen years, and it hadn’t been necessary to fool the villains and crazy men I’d gone up against in retirement. They generally knew I was there with only one thing in mind.

Beyond Candice’s shrouded corpse two CSI techs were discussing something. Farther back, Holker’s partner was heading our way along the alley. Likely she’d been checking for possible witnesses to the crime in one of the adjacent warehouses. When she saw me her frown told me everything.

“Look at what the cat dragged in,” said Detective Bryony VanMeter.

“More like what the cat coughed up with its latest fur ball,” Holker added.

“Hi, Bryony,” I said.

“What are you doing here, Hunter?”

“Déjà vu,” I said to Holker.

“He’s sightseeing,” the detective told VanMeter.

“Nothing much to look at around here,” Bryony said, then with a nod toward Candice, “Nothing nice, any way.”

Bryony VanMeter was very nice to look at, but I wasn’t about to say so. Not while Holker was around to get the wrong impression. “I was just leaving.”

“Yeah,” Holker said, with another gesture toward Buck, the uniformed cop. “You were. And I suggest you go back to your office by another route than Davis Islands. Avoid Channel Drive… you get me?”

“I get you, Detective,” I said.

VanMeter hadn’t a clue what we were talking about, and it showed in the way her mouth hung open a slither. I watched her tongue dart over her teeth, and pulled my attention away before she caught me looking.

Big Buck was at my shoulder. I spared him a glance, then a last one for Candice. “I’ve no intention of going there.”

Sheridan Brown wasn’t her real name. It was a pseudonym more befitting the madam of a brothel. Then again the brothel also had a pseudonym, and proclaimed to be a massage parlor. Anyone with any brains knew what went on behind the smoked glass windows, and that the masseuses were happy to straighten out kinks not necessarily found in bunched shoulders and lower backs. The cops pretty much left Sheridan and her girls alone, preferring that they kept their trade off the sidewalks, but some of the older girls had began soliciting on the nearby street corners when they were no longer viable posing as masseuses. As cover for their illegal activities, they generally went out with a bunch of flyers, handing them out to likely takers and offering “extras.” Some cops had laughingly referred to Sheridan’s al fresco scheme of employing the older girls as her way of ensuring that she couldn’t be prosecuted for age discrimination in the workplace.

Even when I was with the British Armed Forces, and later with Arrowsake, I had never slept with a prostitute. The practice just didn’t appeal to me. But neither was I such a prude that I frowned on the oldest profession. To some women it was a lifestyle choice, and who was I to cast aspersions? It was only when women — or God forbid, children — were coerced, forced, and trapped into prostitution that I took umbrage. Not with the women themselves, but with their pimps and handlers. But I had nothing against Sheridan. She ran a clean shop, and also looked after her staff well, and only after they came to her seeking gainful employment. Higher up the ladder, though, that’s where the issue lay.

Sheridan Brown was allowed to operate so long as the majority of her profits went to Marvin Whalen, who owned Sheridan’s and a number of other massage parlors throughout Tampa. Marvin “Moby Dick” Whalen was of course only fronting the chain of parlors on behalf of his boss man, Mick O’Neill. It was the likes of Whalen and O’Neill I couldn’t tolerate.

When I arrived at Sheridan’s parlor, the cops had not yet paid a visit. Sooner or later they’d question Sheridan about Candice Berry, and it would be a waste of all their time and energy. Stuck between a rock and a hard place, Sheridan could neither blab about her bosses, or about what Candice had been up to before she was grabbed off the street corner. Her position was untenable. But I hoped that she’d be more truthful with me. Some of the girls working the streets jokingly referred to me as “Our White Knight” because I’d come to their rescue on more than one occasion, and had even taken out a deviant scumbag preying on the younger girls last year. When I say taken out, I mean the evil game that he was playing. Carl Riley would pick up girls, then beat and rape them, all under the threat of a knife. One night I used the knife on him. Without major reconstructive surgery there was no fear he’d entice a girl into his car again, and if and when he did, he wouldn’t have the tools necessary to rape them. I’d left his family jewels in a jar alongside his rape kit of duct tape, rope, and knife, when I dumped him outside an ER.

I parked my Audi A6 opposite Sheridan’s Parlor and fed the parking meter. Before crossing the busy street I adjusted my SIG Sauer P228 in the small of my back, allowing my shirt to hang over it. I didn’t expect trouble from Sheridan, but who knew if Whalen or one of his underlings were on hand to ensure she said all the right things when the cops did show up? There was no hint from the opaque shop front that anything was amiss, or that Sheridan had even heard the news concerning Candice yet, but she’d know all right.

The Floridian sun was beating down mercilessly, but the streets were packed with tourists, and as I approached the parlor I received more than one knowing look from passersby. I ignored them, and entered the shop, the little brass bell above the door tinkling. The front of the house looked like any other salon or parlor I’d ever graced, and there was no hint of what went on behind the door to the right of the reception counter. I ignored the posters on the walls proclaiming the treatments — everything from Shiatsu, to Swedish massage, to something applied by the way of heated stones — and asked the receptionist if Sheridan was in.

The woman behind the counter was Seminole, with raven hair, high cheekbones, and dark eyes. She was a stunner. She was also suspicious. Offering her my most open face, I said, “Don’t worry, I’m not a cop.”

“Isn’t that exactly what an undercover cop would say?” she asked, her voice as sweet and mellifluous as warm honey.

“Yeah, but then anything he would later say or hear would be deemed entrapment. Don’t worry, I’m not a cop and I’m not here to cause Sheridan any problems. I’m a friend.”

“What’s your name?”

“Joe Hunter.”

Her eyelids closed a fraction. “I’ve heard of you.”

“Good things, I hope?”

She smiled, but didn’t enlighten me. She checked that no one else was about to enter the shop. From inside the smoked glass wasn’t as opaque. People moving past the windows appeared as dim shadows, but none looked to be interested in entering. “Wait here, I’ll go and see if Sheridan can see you.”

With that the woman went through the interior door and closed it behind her, but not before I noticed that her white uniform smock was cut inordinately short and revealed a splendid set of dusky legs set off by six inch heels. I briefly wondered what the rest of the uniform concealed, before scolding myself to keep my mind on the job.

Less than a minute later the woman was back. “Would you like to come through?” she said, holding open the interior door for me, leaning up against the frame.

“Thank you,” I said and went forward. The woman didn’t move, and I had to squeeze past her. We were so close I got a pleasing waft of her perfume, and felt the warmth rising from her. Her eyelashes batted up at me and I could see my face reflected in her dark irises. My earlier resolve about never making out with a prostitute wavered slightly, and I told myself that the beauty was a receptionist, not one the actual girls. But I was kidding myself, and so it seemed was the beauty, because I heard her chuckling at my expense before the door swung shut behind me.

Sheridan Brown was waiting for me at the end of a corridor. Doors to the left and right had been closed, and from behind them I could hear moans of pleasure and the gentle strains of relaxing music. All that you’d expect to hear in a massage parlor. Yeah, right.

Sheridan showed me into her office and I sat on a leather chair against one wall. She perched herself on her desk, crossing long legs as she studied me in turn. Sheridan was in her early fifties now, but there was no denying her beauty. She was part Cuban, part African American. She had a delicious tilt to her eyelids, and full lips, straight black hair to her shoulders as sleek as a panther’s hide. The only thing to spoil her looks was the sadness I caught behind her green eyes.

“You’ve heard about Candice?’ I said.

Sheridan nodded. “I’m expecting the police around anytime soon. I wasn’t expecting you to show up, Joe.”

“Normally it would be none of my business, but I think Candice’s death is tied to something else I’m looking into.”

She surprised me by saying, “William Murray’s suicide?”

“We both know it wasn’t suicide,” I said, “the same way we both know that Candice wasn’t murdered by a random killer.”

Sheridan didn’t reply. She leaned behind her and picked up a pack of Marlboros and flipped them open. She thumbed a cigarette to her lips, then paused, looking at me. She took the cigarette out of her mouth. “Would you like one?”

“I’d kill for one, truth be told. But I’ve given it up. Three years, three months, and twelve days since I had my last one.”

“You actually keep count?”

“I was told things would get better, but I think it was lies. I still crave a cigarette every day. I keep count of how long it is since I gave up just so I can prove the doctors wrong.”

“Why not give in to the inevitable? You’ll return to them sooner or later.”

“I’m a sucker when it comes to inevitability,” I agreed. “But this is one thing I’m sticking with. My other vice — too much caffeine — keeps my mind off nicotine most of the time. I’ll take a coffee if you’ve one on the go.”

She shook her head apologetically. “I send out to Starbucks when I need a kick start,” she said. Placing the Marlboro between her lips she paused once more. “Do you mind if I smoke?”

“Go for it. This is your place, after all.”

Sheridan laughed to herself as she struck a match. She spoke around the cigarette as she puffed to get it going. “You’re very accommodating, Joe. Some of the johns we get in here are happy to snort coke, or to smoke crack, but pull out a Marlboro in front of them and they get all holier than thou.”

“Hypocrites,” I said.

“Isn’t it a little hypocritical of you giving up smoking when you chance injury or death all the time? I mean the odds of cancer finding your lungs before a bullet does are kind of slim.”

“I wasn’t aware that my activities are such common knowledge,” I said.

“Joe, you’ve taken down more mobsters than Eliot Ness. Everyone on the streets knows that. So do the cops, for that matter. What we don’t know is how you keep getting away with it.”

“Funny isn’t it? I was just wondering the same about Mick O’Neill.”

She went quiet, concentrating on her cigarette. I knew she was thinking hard on how much she could trust me to keep my mouth shut.

“O’Neill was responsible for murdering William Murray; I think he was also behind Candice’s murder. But I need validation, Sheridan.” I waited, hoping my words were enough to prompt her. But she surprised me yet again. She hopped off her desk and walked back and forth, one arm across her chest, the other hand holding her cigarette an inch from her mouth. Then coming to a conclusion, she nodded at the door.

“I think it’s best that you leave, Joe.”

“A minute longer, that’s all I need.”

“There’s nothing I can tell you.”

She was afraid and it was understandable. She didn’t want to end up in an alleyway with a slug in the back of her head the way Candice had.

“So don’t say a thing, other than tell me if I’m on the wrong track, and then I’ll be out of here. No one will hear your name from me, OK?”

She halted in her pacing. Her chest rose and fell a few times before she resigned herself and sat back against the desk.

“Candice saw or heard something she wasn’t meant to. Am I right?”

Sheridan’s silence told it all.

“Maybe she overheard Whalen or one of his boys bragging about what happened to William Murray?”

She shook her head almost imperceptibly.

“But Whalen does know, yeah?”

Her mouth pinched around the cigarette butt.

“Whalen was at O’Neill’s place when Murray supposedly jumped from the roof?”

She took out the cigarette and blue smoke wreathed her features. “I didn’t say that.”

“Hang on,” I said, “are you telling me that Candice was at O’Neill’s penthouse, too? With Whalen?”

“I’m not telling you anything of the sort,” Sheridan said. “All I’m saying is that William Murray was a nice guy. Candice was a nice girl. You understand what I am saying?”

I did.

I stood up.

“Did Candice mention what O’Neill was so pissed at her boyfriend for?”

“Not to me,” she said.

“OK, last question and then you’ll be rid of me: was Whalen the one who took Candice on a drive to Palmetto Beach?”

“I’m going to admit that, am I? Don’t forget who owns this building, and who owns me for that matter. If anything happens to Whalen, then that’s my livelihood down the can.”

“Not necessarily. See the thing is, these criminals do certain things through the books to make their businesses appear aboveboard and legal. I can guarantee you that the lease you signed on this place, it will still stand whomever your next landlord is. Plus, the next person to own the building might not take so much off you to turn a blind eye.”

“Better the devil you know…” Sheridan was thinking hard, and I could see that the sadness had gone from her gaze, now replaced with something much harder.

“So Whalen is a devil, then?”

“Put it this way,” she said. “Whalen’s boys turned up to collect his usual take of the profit and Candice was standing outside handing out flyers. Then they were gone and so was Candice.”

“That’s all I needed to hear.”

We said our goodbyes and then I saw myself out. I passed the Seminole beauty, who was sitting at the front counter, and she batted her eyelashes at me. “How was everything, Mr. Hunter?” she said teasingly. “Did Sheridan look after you? Maybe you’ll come back, yes? When the boss isn’t in next time?”

I chuckled. “My relationship with Sheridan is strictly professional.”

“Sheridan’s not the only pro you’ll find here,” she assured me.

“You are shameless,” I told her with a grin.

“I am,” she replied with a wink.

I headed for the exit door, grinning like a mad thing, but the expression was wiped off my face as the little bell tinkled above the door and in stepped Detectives Holker and VanMeter.

“Now why doesn’t it surprise me to find you here?” demanded Holker.

“Old war wound,” I said, rubbing my shoulder. “The hot stone treatment works wonders for me.”

I caught a disapproving glance from VanMeter, as if it pained her to find me in an establishment like this. I thought that maybe it was wishful thinking, but then her next glance went to the Seminole woman and it was definitely one of the green-eyed variety. She knew that we’d been flirting like crazy and that annoyed her as much as my being there at all.

“You should get your head massaged,” VanMeter suggested. “Maybe it’ll allow some good advice to sink in. Stay away from our investigation, Joe.”

Despite how official she made it sound, I knew she was giving me a friendly warning. VanMeter was one of those cops who actually appreciated the fact I was around.

“If I find you interfering in our investigation again, I’ll make sure you go in on a charge,” Holker added.

“I was just offering my condolences to a mutual friend of Candice Berry,” I said, more for Holker’s sake than anyone. “There’s no law against that, is there, Detective Holker?”

“Just get outta here, goddamnit,” Holker snarled.

I was about to say something to knock the jumped up little shit down a peg or two, but the Seminole woman got in before me. Obviously she’d been listening keenly to our conversation, and taking names.

“Detective Holker, it’s so good to see you again so soon. Are you here for your usual, or is there something ‘special’ you wish to try this time?”

Holker practically spluttered, and I caught an amused glint in VanMeter’s eye.

I went out of the door and my grin was back in place.

It was short-lived, though, because as soon as I was on the street — the very place from where Candice Berry was taken — my mind was back on Marvin Whalen and Mick O’Neill.

Marvin Whalen would have people believe he’d earned his nickname for his prodigious manhood, but he was having a laugh. He’d gained the moniker “Moby Dick” because he was huge, blubber-fat, and white as snow, like Captain Ahab’s aquatic nemesis. Even under the Floridian sun, he had the sort of complexion that didn’t tan. His short hair, a pale reddish color, was wispy, and he’d either had his eyebrows and lashes burned off in a barbecuing accident or he was naturally hairless. To be honest, his wasn’t the kind of physique I had any desire to imagine nude.

He walked across the street in front of where I’d parked my car, flanked on both sides by two whip-thin Hispanics, his huge belly bouncing with each ponderous step. He was wearing a pale blue shirt that both me and my friend Rink could have fitted inside, and Rink’s built like a pro wrestler. He was also wearing cargo pants, big pockets on the side, and huge white sneakers that glowed ethereally under the street lamps. He didn’t appear to be carrying, but I guessed his homeboys were. As well as baggy jeans and white wife beaters, they had suit jackets on, and as hot as the night was, there was only one reason they’d do so: to conceal the guns in their shoulder rigs.

I made myself a bet that the Hispanic dudes were the same guys who’d lifted Candice Berry off the street outside Sheridan’s Parlor. The gun used to murder her would have been dumped soon afterward, but I also wagered it had been replaced by a new one. Whalen’s crew were into good old fashioned intimidation to extract protection money, and I doubted either of the chumps with Whalen could frighten a little girl without waving a gun under her nose.

Whalen led the way to his crib, a loft apartment over a Thai restaurant. When I’d cased his building earlier I’d grabbed myself a take-out snack of shrimps and noodles, and a large black coffee in a waxed cup. The greasy boxes and empty cup lay in the passenger foot well of my Audi. I’d had a long wait before Whalen returned home, still I guessed my ass wasn’t as chafed as his, judging by the way his cargo pants rode up with every knock-kneed stride he took.

After satisfying my hunger and caffeine habit, I’d spent the rest of the time cleaning and maintaining my gun. Loaded, and ready to go, I leaned forward in my seat and fed it into its carrying position at my lower back. Whalen and his buddies had reached the door up to his loft apartment by then, and I watched as the big man took out a key on a long chain and undid the locks. Partly I expected him to wave off his bodyguards, but it seemed the day’s business wasn’t yet at an end. That suited me fine. Under Whalen’s order one or both of the Hispanics was probably responsible for abducting and murdering Candice, and it was better that I dealt with all of them in one go than have to hunt them down individually. Whalen went inside first, followed by the two skinnies. The door was closed. By now it was late enough that the Thai restaurant had closed its doors, but there was most likely staff members still inside. I didn’t doubt that some of the immigrant workers lived on the premises. I’d no intention of placing any of them at risk, but neither did I want any witnesses to what I had in mind. I waited another half hour until all the lights went off and whoever was inside had locked down tight and retired for the night. I pulled on leather gloves. I then left my car and angled past the front of Whalen’s place and down a narrow alley that ran to the back of the restaurant.

Earlier I’d reconned the alley and knew what I’d find at the back.

I moved through the rear service yard, avoiding Dumpsters and a stack of piled crates by memory and approached the metal fire escape that would take me up to the back of the loft. My earlier scouting mission warned of creaking stairs, and now I went up them, avoiding any that would shriek under my weight and announce my approach. I made it to the top without raising any alarm. There I crouched, listening. There was no hint that any witness had seen me from the restaurant, and Whalen and his buddies were laughing too hard to notice the subtle noises of my ascent.

Having jimmied the locks already, I gently eased open the back door, and my ears were assaulted by drunken hilarity. Finished work for the night, the trio was celebrating with liquor and beer. As a background accompaniment to their laughter, I could detect the exaggerated moans and cheesy soundtrack of a skin flick playing on TV. It was like walking in on a college frat party.

The three of them had their backs to me. Whalen was sprawled out in an easy chair that had become misshapen beneath his weight. The two bodyguards — or whatever their role — were on a large couch. They had cans of Bud in hand, joints in their mouths. On a large plasma screen TV three oiled-up naked girls were writhing in mock ecstasy and being very inventive with a can of whipped cream and various items of fruit.

“Now that’s the kind of diet I want to go on!” Whalen whooped, to his friends’ lascivious agreement.

“Yeah. Talk about getting one of your essential five a day,” I said.

My joke didn’t elicit any laughter.

The two Hispanics dropped their cans of beer, and struggled to complete a further two tasks at the same time: they tried to get up and pull out their guns. They weren’t the best when it came to multitasking. By the time they’d struggled partway up from the sunken couch, and inserted their hands under their armpits, I had the barrel of my SIG jammed to the nape of Whalen’s neck.

“Sit down,” I snapped, “and show me your hands. Otherwise those girls are going to be covered in your boss’s brains.”

The skinnies weren’t as stupid as they looked. They showed empty palms.

Without losing contact with his head, I moved around Whalen so that I could face the three of them, and ended up with my SIG wedged under his nose. The rims of his lashless eyelids were puffy and red as Whalen squinted up at me.

“Who… who are you and what do you want?” he managed to say, though my gun barrel bumped his teeth a couple of times.

“I’m called Joe Hunter. Heard of me?”

Something moved in the recesses of his gaze and I knew that he had. The Hispanics shared a glance, and I recognized fear. Good enough, I thought. They knew who I was and what I was capable of. That should smooth the process of getting answers from them.

“Do you know why I’m here?” I asked.

Whalen shook his head slightly, fearful of making too big a movement that might jostle my trigger finger. “No,” he wheezed.

“Candice Berry,” I said.

“Wh… who…?” Whalen said.

I withdrew the gun from his mouth, brought it down on the side of his big skull. The clack of metal on bone was louder than the moans of the onscreen antics. “Don’t play me for an idiot,” I growled, and stepped away from him so that I could cover all three.

Whalen pressed a palm to his injured head. It began to swell instantly, and a trickle of blood streaked down his cheek and dripped from his chin. “Son of a bitch,” he groaned.

“Hurts, does it?” I asked. “Not as bad as a bullet to the back of the head.”

As I said it, I watched the Hispanics for a reaction and again I caught a nervous glance between them. The one to the far left squinted at his pal, shook his head very slightly.

“OK,” I went on, directing my question to the Hispanics. “Let’s get down to business, shall we? Which one of you murdered Candice?”

“Wasn’t me, man,” the one on the right said very quickly.

His friend shot him a look to curdle milk. “Wasn’t me, either,” he added lamely.

“What do you say, Whalen? Which of your buddies pulled the trigger?”

Whalen patted at the bleeding lump on his head. “I couldn’t say, man. I wasn’t there.”

“Just like you, isn’t it? You point the weapon but haven’t the balls to pull the trigger. So you get these dickless fools to do it for you.”

The man on the left was growing more nervous by the second. His tongue was darting in and out as he licked dry lips. He made a show of reaching for an ashtray, supposedly to douse his joint. I played stupid, as if I was fooled by the innocuous move. I even gave him further opportunity by holding Whalen under my gaze.

“Pointless denying it. We all know who killed Candice, and it doesn’t matter who was the triggerman. You were all in it together, and to me that makes you all equally responsible. What I don’t get is why any of you would take the fall for an asshole like Mick O’Neill.” I smirked at the way Whalen’s head came up at mention of his boss’s name. “Ah, I see I’ve guessed right,” I went on. “O’Neill had you kill the woman. For what? Because she’d witnessed what happened to William Murray?”

“I ain’t saying nothing, and neither are any of my guys,” Whalen said angrily. He cast a surreptitious glance at the Hispanic who was now creeping a hand toward his left ankle. “What you goin’ to do: shoot us? Better that what O’Neill will do to us if we squeal.”

“One thing I do know, Whalen. O’Neill won’t have you dropped from his roof. Fat bastard like you hitting the deck, he’ll have to have the foundations to his building rebuilt.”

“Fuck you,” Whalen snapped. He was actually braver than I’d initially taken him for. He tried to draw my fire by flicking out his hand and sending a palmful of his blood toward my face. His distraction would have worked if I hadn’t been expecting it. I stepped deeply to one side, and the blood sprayed over the TV screen. At the same time, I aimed my gun not at the fat man but at the Hispanic on the far left, who was coming up with a snub-nosed revolver in hand, the one which he’d snuck out of the holster on his ankle.

I fired before he did, and my round struck him in the throat, destroyed his trachea, and he fell back, gurgling on the blood flooding his throat.

His friend let out a scream, a mixture of terror and rage, and fought to pull his gun from his shoulder holster. I shot him through the chest, then, as his hands flopped, put another round in his open mouth.

By then, Whalen was up, and he knew he was a dead man and went for broke. He lurched at me with his hands going for my neck, intent on crushing the life from me. He’d more chance at killing me if he fell on top and smothered me to death. He wasn’t armed, and I wasn’t happy about killing him in cold blood. But then I thought about Candice Berry, and pictured her children waiting at home for their mom who’d never return to them, and decided, fuck it. I shot Whalen through the heart, three times in quick succession.

He crashed down on his front as I sidestepped his girth. Even if the gunfire hadn’t already woken them, the thump of his body on floorboards would rouse the Thai staff downstairs. Time to get out of there.

Ideally I’d planned gaining an admission from Whalen and his cronies, and though it probably would have ended in them dead, had hoped to rig the scene so that it looked like they’d fallen out and killed each other. Having blasted them all with my gun it meant I had to get rid of the weapon before it was tied back to the scene through forensic investigation and ballistics reports. Pissed me off: I liked that gun.

Holker and Vanmeter would suspect that I was responsible for the deaths of Whalen and his crew, but I was certain that I couldn’t be incriminated. My gun had been stripped to its component parts, the barrel drilled out to destroy the unique rifling, and then each bit deposited out in Hillsborough Bay. Gloves, clothes, and shoes had all been incinerated and I’d scrubbed my hair, face, and body to remove even the tiniest trace of gunshot residue. There was no CCTV footage available, and no one had seen me as I returned to my parked car — or if they had, I got no hint of them. My greatest fear was that one or more of the Thai restaurant staff had got a look at me, but maybe loud noise and crashing weights was a feature they’d come to expect from an upstairs neighbor like Whalen and they’d slept through the entire incident. That, or being largely illegal immigrants, they’d keep their mouths shut for fear the police started digging into their backgrounds.

I didn’t let fear of discovery slow me.

Whalen hadn’t exactly admitted that O’Neill had ordered Candice Berry murdered, but neither had he denied it. His reactions, and outspoken denials, were enough to confirm it to me. Sure, such evidence would never sway a jury in court, but that’s why O’Neill continued to get away with his crimes. Well, no longer. Rink would have been proud of me: I devised a plan.

In the early hours of the following morning, I was standing on Columbia Drive, looking up at the back of O’Neill’s building. I’d kept my word to Holker and hadn’t gone near Channel Drive, but there was no need when there was a back way into the building one block over. To my right I could see the runway lights of Peter O. Knight Airport, but there were no flights taking off or landing. There was no traffic on the roads, and no pedestrians. I walked forward, dressed now in black T-shirt, black combat trousers with bulging pockets, black boots. I’d replaced my SIG Sauer for another one of the same model from one of my stashes throughout the city. Some people have queried why I prefer a 9mm SIG Sauer to other guns. The pat answer is that it’s the gun I’m most familiar with from my days training in the skill of Point Shooting, but that’s only part of the story. See, 44 and .357 rounds are man killers, whereas the smaller 9mm round can’t be relied upon. However, a .44 or .357 will also put a hole right through a man’s torso, and that’s fine if he’s the only one in your line of fire. When I was taking on terrorists, often there were hostages to take into consideration. Last thing you wanted was to plug a terrorist, only for the bullet to also hit the innocent person behind them. I always preferred a 9mm, so that there was less chance of collateral damage.

When William Murray took his one-way flight to earth, there had been two women in O’Neill’s apartment. Long ago I’d promised I’d never willingly make war on women or children — of course that’s a rose-tinted view of the world, because there are some nasty, evil, and dangerous bitches out there — and it was a promise I’d rather keep. If it was avoidable I didn’t want to shoot O’Neill and also kill his girlfriends behind him.

Other residents lived in O’Neill’s building. The ground and next floor up was utilized as office space. Floor three was a communal area. Floors four through fourteen were leased to people with more money than sense. Floor fifteen — in order to promote the privacy of the penthouse suite — had been left vacant. Two elevator shafts gave access, one of which was an express service used strictly by O’Neill and guests. The second elevator only went as far as floor fourteen, but that was close enough for my purposes. I slipped inside the building, avoided the sleeping concierge, and entered the elevator. The car rode smoothly to the fourteenth floor and the doors whispered open.

Although there was only one official route to or from the penthouse, those with fire and safety regulations in mind had other ideas. There was a stairwell that could be accessed via the penthouse, which joined the staircase the other residents of the building would use in the event of a fire or other emergency. On fourteen, a fire door blocked access upward, but could be opened from the other side by anyone fleeing the penthouse by the simple manipulation of push bars. If I’d had a sledgehammer at hand, I could have forced a way through, but that would alert O’Neill that I was coming. Instead, I made my way to a window and slid it open. I leaned out, looked up and saw that there was a similar window to the fifteenth floor six or so feet above my head. The walls were decorated with ornately carved features, and offered hand- and footholds for a daring climber.

Luck and daring was always something I relied upon. I clambered up onto the sill, then inserted my fingertips between two concrete seams and hauled myself up and out. I’ll admit that the climb wasn’t the easiest or even most skillful, but I made it to the next sill a few minutes later. Here, the outer sill was two feet deep and I was able to crouch tight to the side of the building, exposed to anyone on the ground but also relatively safe from a long fall. I’d come prepared for the next obstacle, and took out a glass cutter from my pants pocket. It was a contraption that could be attached to a window by way of a suction cup and had a diamond-tipped scribe at its circumference. Pressing cup to window, I pulled over the lever that caused the cup to concave, create a vacuum to seal it solidly to the glass. Then I wound the handle around a few times. When I tugged on the suction cup it came away, still attached to the circle of glass I’d cut. Then it was a simple task to insert my hand through the gap, throw the catch and shove open the window. I placed the glass cutter and circle of glass in my pocket. And then I was on the stairs and on my way up to O’Neill’s pad.

I could see that the short flight of stairs was rarely used. Dust stood like icing sugar on each step. I didn’t bother avoiding it, but my boots would have to go the way of the ones I’d worn to Whalen’s apartment. I made it to the top and found a featureless door, with no handle. It could only be opened from within O’Neill’s penthouse. That was assuming I wanted to use a door handle. I took out a screwdriver and went to work on the hinges, working out the pins. The door wasn’t a security fixture after all. Once the pins were out, I wedged the screwdriver into each hinge in turn, giving each a gentle twist to break the friction of the workings. Afterward I listened, checking that I hadn’t raised the alarm.

When I was happy that no one had stirred from slumber, I used the screwdriver to lever the door out of the frame, and the entire thing came loose in my hands. After jiggling the door lock free of its retainer, I carried the door out of the way and set it down. The screwdriver went in my opposite pocket, and I took out my gun, plus a Gerber knife.

The penthouse was huge, taking up most of the upper floor, but it had been separated into a number of rooms and I found myself in a utility passage. Cleaning supplies dominated one room, a laundry another. I doubted O’Neill was familiar with either space, and suspected that his live-in home helps handled all the domestic chores around the place. I moved past them and found another door. Gently I tried the handle and this one gave in my grasp. I teased open the door. All was in darkness, but at the far end of the hall shone a dim night-light, which offered enough illumination to guide me. I could smell a hodgepodge of odors, cooking smells, cigar smoke, alcohol, and men’s farts. I had expected to find the penthouse plush, but it was more akin to a crack house I supposed that money didn’t necessarily make you house-proud. I moved into the main living area. Expensive furniture was half buried beneath discarded clothing, food wrappers, newspapers, and beer bottles and cans. O’Neill and his crew looked to have been celebrating and I could only assume that it was because the threat of Candice Berry had been removed.

I turned from the room, seeking O’Neill’s bedroom.

That was when a door burst open behind me and a huge man leaned out, wrapped his arms around me and lifted me up in the air. The giant shook me like a rag doll, while someone else grabbed my gun hand and ripped loose my SIG. Before I could think of using the Gerber on them, my own gun was shoved in my face. “Drop it, asshole!”

I dropped the knife, and the monster holding me slung me down on the floor. My head ringing, I blinked up as a light came on and stark beams filled the place. Standing over me was a trio of men I recognized as O’Neill’s buddies from the day William Murray went off the roof. Thankfully, the women weren’t around. Which went to prove that I’d walked into a trap.

Another man came out of a bedroom farther down the corridor. He was fully dressed — albeit casually — in loafers, blue jeans, and a pale green shirt. His silver mane of hair, long at the back and curled at the temples, gave him a wannabe Richard Branson look. He stood gloating as he tapped the screen of his iPhone.

“When I got word of Marvin Whalen’s untimely death, was it any wonder I’d prepare for a visitor of my own?” asked Mick O’Neill. He was in his late fifties, had been in America for the best part of twenty years now, but he still retained a Dublin accent. There was some suggestion he had been a real IRA hitter in the old days.

My mouth tasted of blood. I’d bitten my tongue when O’Neill’s pet gorilla had thrown me to the floor. I swallowed before answering. “You were expecting me?”

“I was. You could have come earlier and saved me the long feckin’ wait.”

“Sorry to inconvenience you,” I said.

“Sarcastic bastard,” O’Neill said. He flicked his hand at the big man. “Get him up off the floor.”

The big man hauled me up and fed his arms through my elbows, yanking both arms up my back. The other two men pointed my weapons at me.

“What you going to do?” I asked O’Neill. “Hand me over to the police? Or will you make me take a dive off the roof the way you did William Murray?”

“You won’t go the same way as that little tow rag. You’re going out the same way as you came in. Shame, eh?” He grinned at his men. “Some burglar tries to rob my apartment, only to slip and fall to his death when cutting his way in through the window? Take this prick back down the way he just came, boys.”

I was bundled back past the utility rooms and to the door I’d lifted out of its hinges.

“Remind me to have something a bit more sturdy fitted, will you, lads? I can’t be having every Tom, Dick, and Harry swanning in and out of here whenever they like,” said O’Neill.

The four of them hemmed me into the space at the bottom of the stairwell, the big man still holding me tightly. O’Neill studied where I’d cut the glass from the window. He indicated the bulges in my pockets. “Take out his glass cutter,” he told one of the men. To the other, he said, “Go fix the door. It can’t be seen that he actually made it further inside than here.”

While one of the men went to see to resetting the hinges, O’Neill called after him, “Make sure you leave the door open for us to get back in. Everything will go to shit if we get trapped out here.”

Then O’Neill was back in my face.

“The feck’s any of this got to do with you, anyway?”

“William Murray was a friend of mine,” I said.

“He was a two-bit little thief, and he was skimming money off my profits,” O’Neill said.

“Is that it, the reason you had him thrown from your roof? He stole from you?”

“I had to make a statement to all the other little skanks who run the streets for me,” O’Neill said. “That little punk, Murray, actually came to me on bended knees, tried to reason with me. He said he was in a relationship now, he’d got hisself a girlfriend, and the extra money he skimmed was to help feed her bastard brats. The feckin’ nerve of it! He stole from me to feed a whore’s offspring? What does he think I am, the feckin’ Red Cross?”

After pulling out my glass cutter, the thug handed it to O’Neill. O’Neill took it from him, wiped it down with the tails of his shirt, then approached the window. “Have to make this look real if I’m going to fool the cops a second time,” he crowed as he pulled open the window. He leaned out, allowed the glass cutter and circle of glass to drop. A few seconds later I heard the tinkle as both hit ground. “Hell, that’s a long fall.” O’Neill grinned. “Not as far as Murray fell, but still far enough.”

“You’d made an example of Murray,” I said, “thrown him off the roof, but why kill Candice Berry?”

“I didn’t. Marvin Whalen sorted that out for me, as you already know.”

“You’re splitting hairs, O’Neill. It was your order that murdered the woman.”

“Aye, it was at that,” he said. “When we chucked her boyfriend off the roof we didn’t know he’d brought her along with him. She was down there,” he pointed toward the plaza, “waiting for him. Fair enough, she didn’t speak to anyone about what happened. She knew better. But it wasn’t a risk I was about to take. I’m careful like that. Same as when some of my boys end up murdered by some fucked-up vigilante. I take precautions. Got you dead to rights, my lad.”

“You got me,” I said, and I offered him a smile.

“What you looking so feckin’ pleased about? Another few seconds and you’re going to learn what those other two did: you don’t fuck with Mick O’Neill.”

“You got me,” I repeated. “But I’ve also got you, you murdering piece of shit.”

O’Neill was slow to catch on.

“Did you get everything you needed, Detective?” I said, for effect leaning down so I could speak closer to the hidden microphone taped to my chest. In my ear Bryony VanMeter said, “Enough to put him away for life, Joe.”

Along the hall there was the repeated boom of a ram smashing into a door as the police arrest squad began breaking their way into the fallow space.

“What the hell?” O’Neill shouted angrily. “You’re wired?”

“Yes,” I said, “and the Tampa PD just recorded your full confession.”

“Son of a…” O’Neill shook his head in despair. Then his features grew hard again. To his two pals he said, “Throw this fecker out of that window. We might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb.”

I didn’t bother begging for my life, or try to tell him that it was over, that he was caught. It wasn’t my style. I leaned down, said into the microphone, “Best get in here fast, O’Neill’s so distraught I’m not sure he’s going to hang around to be arrested.”

My words were enough to give the trio around me pause. It was all I required. I whipped my skull backward, cracking the hard crown into the bridge of the nose of the big guy holding me. His hold on me loosened marginally as he reared back, eyes shutting in reaction to the blow. I jerked down with my arms, clenched him to me and kicked out, finding O’Neill’s testicles with the toe of my boot. The third man cried out harshly, bringing up my gun. Everything happened within moments, a confusion of grunts and curses, and the cracking of the gun. Amidst the scuffle I’d twisted forward at the hips, hauling my captor up and onto my back, and it was his face that took the bullet, not mine.

I dropped the dead man, even as his friend stepped back in dismay at killing his buddy. I didn’t halt my momentum, and went at him, scooping aside his gun hand and head-butting him full in the face. The man went down on his back, unconscious, the gun spinning away from his grip.

I let the gun lie.

Instead I grasped the flowing hair of Mick O’Neill, twisted it tightly in my grasp and tore him toward the window.

“No, O’Neill, don’t do it!” I yelled for good effect and then slung the screaming man out of the window. “Holy shit!” I cried. “He jumped. Jesus Christ, he jumped rather than be taken alive.”

The cops would hear my cry, even if they didn’t hear the wet splat of Mick O’Neill’s body striking the ground fourteen floors below us.

The scuff of feet on the stairs alerted me to the fourth man. Finished rehanging the door in its frame, he’d returned to investigate what all the noise was about. He was still clutching my Gerber knife as he stared in horror at the dead giant, his unconscious mate, and the apparent disappearance of Mick O’Neill.

I placed my palm flat over the microphone, blocking his words as he said, “I can’t believe what you did to Mick, you bastard.”

“Proportional retribution,” I said. “He got his just desserts.”

“Fucker,” the man yelled, “I’ll kill you for that.”

The man dashed down the stairs and, unarmed, I took a few steps away from him. The man raised his arm, came at me, and I prepared to deflect his blow.

I didn’t need to.

A gun cracked and the man’s head disintegrated under the impact of a .357 round from Detective Holker’s sidearm.

Two days later, I was sitting in a Starbucks, nursing the largest black coffee they served. Sitting directly opposite me, Bryony VanMeter stirred sugar into a concoction already laden with cream, syrup, and God knew what else.

“You’re one lucky son of a bitch, Joe Hunter,” she said.

“I knew that when you agreed to have coffee with me.”

“What, you think this is some kind of a date?”

“I think of it more as a prelude to a date, to see if we’d be compatible for more than an hour or so. Though, I’m not sure we have much in common, judging by the way you’ve just destroyed that coffee. All that gunk you’ve piled on top… it’s sacrilege,” I grinned.

Bryony shook her head in mock despair. “You know exactly what I’m talking about.”

I shrugged, sat back. “What do you suspect, Detective?”

“Whalen and his crew,” she said.

“Nothing to do with me,” I said. “Why would I come to you and offer to get a taped confession from O’Neill if I was responsible for killing Whalen?”

She leaned closer, pulled open the collar of her blouse. “Don’t worry, Joe. I’m not wired the way you were. You can tell me the truth.”

I enjoyed the view down the front of her shirt for a second too long. She straightened up, frowning at me. “And I don’t buy O’Neill committing suicide, either.”

“You were listening in. You heard me try to stop him, but he’d have none of it. He knew it was his only way to avoid spending the rest of his days in prison. He jumped. Shame there weren’t any other witnesses to clear my good name, but…”

“Yeah, one was dead, the other unconscious, and if Holker hadn’t been so trigger-happy…”

“All’s well that ends well,” I told her. “You got your confession from O’Neill. He owned up to throwing Murray off the roof, and for ordering Whalen’s crew to murder Candice. Some unknown but public-spirited vigilante took down Whalen and his boys for you. Holker saved my life, killed an attempted murderer in the act. Plus, you arrested the guy that killed the monster who was trying to throw me out of the window. That’s one guy who can be sent to prison: so a nice tick in the box for Tampa Homicide. That’s some case clear-up rate, whichever way you look at it. I think even my buddy Holker will be happy. And what has it cost you? A promise that I won’t be prosecuted for breaking into O’Neill’s building, and an agreement to have a coffee with me.”

“Hmm,” she said. She picked up her concoction and sipped. Then she grimaced.

“Too sweet?” I asked.

“Not sweet enough,” she replied.

“Honest, Bryony,” I said with a wink, “when you really get to know me, I’m a sweet guy.”

She thought about what I’d said. Stirred more sugar in her brew. Tasted it once more. Then she pushed the cup away, her gaze never leaving mine. “I make better coffee at my own place,” she said.

I drained my cup, said, “Let’s go to your place, then. I’d never turn down an offer like that.”