Home > Connections in Death (In Death #48)(12)

Connections in Death (In Death #48)(12)
Author: J.D. Robb

Zoner smoke, with a chaser of Erotica, hung in the air like dreamy fog.

A dozen people, Eve counted, with most too naked to conceal any weapon. Still, she kept a hand on her own when she rapped a fist against the jamb.

“NYPSD.”

The few people not completely dazed with drugs or sex, scrambled. The man in the chair just shoved one of the women to the floor, waved away the second. And with a half-smile, adjusted his erection back in his pants.

Mixed race, with skin the color of Peabody’s coffee regular, he had hard dark eyes and a long, thin scar down his left cheek, a tat of a blade dripping blood on the other.

He wore his hair in tight black-and-red braids that rained down his back from a band at his nape. The black, long-sleeved tee didn’t quite hide another slicing scar down the side of his throat.

She saw one of the naked guys start to reach under the gel couch, then freeze when both air rifles gave their cocking snicks.

“Yo now, everybody just chill it, right?” Slice spoke in a gravelly baritone, kept that half-smile in place. “We got us some company. I know you.” He pointed a long finger, bumpy at the knuckles at Eve. “Sure I do. Seen you right up there.”

He gestured to the screen and a closeup of swollen genitalia hard at work.

“Y’all bring me a famous cop and her rich man. We need some refreshments! Bulge, get some clothes on and go on down there and pull Toro off the door. Mofo doesn’t have the sense to tell us we got company.”

“Everybody’s fine right where they are,” Eve said. “We’re looking for Dinnie Duff.”

“What you want with that little ho?”

“I’ll talk to her about that.”

“Now she’s a ho for sure, but she’s my ho. We look after our own, don’t we?” he said to the room at large. “You here to give her trouble?”

“Is she in the house?”

Slice bared his teeth at her, a grin and a challenge all at once. “Got your hard ass on tonight, do you?”

“It’s always on. Is she worth a raid? There’s enough Zoner hanging in the air for me to haul every one of you in.”

“We be out again in a flash.”

“Yeah, maybe, but considering I’d have probable cause to look for more?” She scanned the room, noted that more than a couple of people in the room knew that flash wouldn’t work for them. “Maybe not. Dinnie Duff.”

“Fuck all.” He shrugged it off, shoved the second woman to the floor. “Likely she’s working under at Wet Dreams. I ain’t seen her.”

“How about we look?”

“How about I see a warrant?”

Now Eve smiled. “I can get one in under five minutes. I doubt that’d give you time to move out all the illegals and weapons, and anybody underage in here. But we can play it out and see.”

“Fuck all and you with it.” No longer smiling, he got to his feet. “Bolt, you’ve been banging that bitch most recently. Where’s she at?”

“Work, she said. She needs the scratch.”

The one called Bolt took his time pulling on pants, scratching his naked belly. The look in his eyes, Eve thought, was fierce despite the lazy movements.

Pissed, Eve thought. This one’s pissed he got caught with his pants down and no weapon in his hand.

He was white with a tough, compact boxer’s build, spiky red hair, his gang tat over his heart. Two lightning bolt tats jagged down his arms.

“When did you last see her?”

“I don’t keep a leash on that bitch.” As if to prove it, Bolt reached over to squeeze the closest breast. Hard enough the owner of the breast yelped. “Said how she needed some scratch, had shit to do and couldn’t party tonight.”

“Which is her flop?”

“Man, she ain’t got her own. Why she needs the scratch, so? She’s been flopping with me for the banging. What the fuck, Slice, we don’t need to put up with this shit. We got rights and shit. You gotta stand up, man, tell this bitch to suck it.”

“I know what I got,” Slice snapped back. “I ain’t taking no shit from cops in our place.”

Eve took out her badge, held it up, and aimed a cold stare at Slice. “You said you know me, then you know I’m a murder cop. Do you think I’m here to roust your ho for off-license sex work, for illegals?”

“Don’t know why the fuck you’re here.”

“I’m here because Dinnie Duff is a person of interest in a murder investigation. You keep up this bullshit, you’ll be one, too. Where is she?”

He laughed, and as if on signal, a few of the others joined in.

“You gotta be smoking something good if you’re looking at that bitch for some murder. She squeaks if she sees a bloody thumb. She ain’t killed nobody.”

“Lyle Pickering would disagree if he could, but he’s dead.”

Slice’s face went stony, and the lingering laughter cut off. “You saying Pick’s dead? You saying he’s dead and Dinnie did him?”

“I’m saying he’s dead, and I need to talk to her. Where is she?”

“How’s he dead?”

“Where is Dinnie Duff?”

“We said she ain’t here. And ain’t no way she’d do something to end Pick. Bangers stick, and that boy was a Banger.” He booted one of the women on the floor. “Loose, you know where she’s at? You say it straight.”

“Must be working, Slice. She said, like Bolt said, she had shit to do, needed scratch. She ain’t paid up her share for flop in a while. You said . . .”

“Go ahead.”

“You said she had to pay up or find someplace else ’cause spreading it for Bolt wasn’t enough for her share. She said she had shit to do. That’s all.”

“That’s right, I did.” He nodded slowly, looked back at Eve. “Bitches gotta pay same as anybody and fucking only pays so far. Pick’s dead, you oughta look at the Dragons. We don’t kill our own.”

“He’d disavowed you.”

“Disavowed’s shit.” Slice’s eyes fired out hate—a violent, frustrated hate. “He wants to live his life like a sack, that’s on him. But once you take the oath, you’re one of us. Even that ho Dinnie knows how it is.”

She considered pushing, but she’d planted the seeds, formed her impressions.

“I will find her. If anything happens to her in the meantime, I’ll be coming for you.”

“Come all you want, bitch. I’ve taken on harder asses than you.”

At that Roarke let out a quick laugh. “Keep thinking that,” he advised, then turned with Eve toward the steps.

Outside, Zutter puffed out his cheeks. “He’ll send some boys to find her. If you want to get to her first, we need to go under. We’re going to need more cops.”

“How well do you know Slice?”

“I watched him fight his way up to top dog,” Norton said. “The gang’s what he’s got.”

“Would he put a hit on her for what I told him?”

Zutter rubbed his chin as he and Norton studied each other. They both shook their head.

“He’d want to talk to her, squeeze what she knows out of her.”

“If he ordered the hit on Lyle, he already knows,” Eve pointed out. “And if he did, she followed his orders. Would he take her out now?”

“More get her out,” Norton said. “Maybe he did already. Get her gone somewhere until he figures things settle.”

“So, either way, he’s not going to execute her.” Eve stood in the wind, calculating while the neon on the tat parlor began to buzz like a small swarm of bees. “If he didn’t order the hit, squeezes out she was part of it, does he follow the code, have a trial?”

“That’s how he rolls. He’ll gut her himself if it comes to that, but not before they stand her up, make her blubber first.”

“Okay. Sit on the place, tag me if you see anybody leave and head to the underground. That’s a couple blocks west, right?”

“Affirmative.”

“And where’s Wet Dreams from that entrance?”

Now Zutter pushed back his uniform cap, scratched his head. “First tunnel to the right, next left. It’s not down deep. LT, you shouldn’t oughta go down there without a force.”

“Just getting the lay. Appreciate the assist.”

“It’s what we do in this little piece of heaven on earth, right, Zut?”

“You got it.”

Roarke slid behind the wheel. “A couple blocks west, is it?”

“Yeah, then we’ll take a trip to Wet Dreams.”

“Darling Eve, life with you is a never-ending series of them.”

“Funny.”

She directed him to park in a loading zone, switched on the On Duty sign. From the trunk, she studied her choices, and took out two jagged bladed knives, passed one to Roarke.

“Thank you, darling. It’s just my size.”

She knew him, knew he could handle himself. Knew he’d enjoy it.

“What’re you carrying?”

He opened his coat, took from the inside pocket a police-issue stunner.

“Jesus, I should arrest you.”

“Promise you will when we get home.” He leaned in to kiss her. “You know how it thrills me.”

“Still funny,” she muttered. “Keep it handy.”

“You think he might just order that hit?”

“The minute I went in looking for her, she was in the crosshairs. I lean toward the uniforms’ opinion,” she added. “If she was following his orders on Pickering, he’ll hide her until things cool off. But . . .”

“You’re thinking of his reaction, weighing whether it was genuine.”

“It felt real, so if she went rogue, she’s finished. But he has his code, so it’s more likely he’ll try to get to her before I do, haul her in for a trial. And whether or not he ordered the hit, he has to make it look like he’s following the code.”

   
Most Popular
» Nothing But Trouble (Malibu University #1)
» Kill Switch (Devil's Night #3)
» Hold Me Today (Put A Ring On It #1)
» Spinning Silver
» Birthday Girl
» A Nordic King (Royal Romance #3)
» The Wild Heir (Royal Romance #2)
» The Swedish Prince (Royal Romance #1)
» Nothing Personal (Karina Halle)
» My Life in Shambles
» The Warrior Queen (The Hundredth Queen #4)
» The Rogue Queen (The Hundredth Queen #3)
fantasy.readsbookonline.com Copyright 2016 - 2024