But Flynn was already satisfied that no one had tipped her off to the search warrant, for the anticipated visitor was standing in the open doorway and flashing his FBI credentials for all to see.
"Hello, Johanna." Special Agent Marvin Argus made a slow turn to acknowledge the others in her company and deigned to grace them all with his most condescending smile.
One night's sleep and he was back in arrogant form with all the old confidence that so annoyed her. Johanna's politics were pacifist, and yet she wanted to smack this man each time they met. Everyone did. He was from the Chicago bureau, and all the people in this room would be strangers to him, yet there was overt hostility in every face that turned his way – and a bit of confusion as well. Argus might be their first encounter with a male-heterosexual princess.
"So which one of you is Flynn?" He grinned at the angriest man in the room, the detective who sat with Johanna. "You? Well, this is my case now. Check with your lieutenant if you like. I won't be offended. But this interview is definitely over. And all the evidence your guys collected? That's mine."
No one paid any attention to Johanna as she rose from her chair and walked toward the pet carrier. This was where she had hidden the packet or dangerous letters in a sleight of hand while locking the cat inside. With no sane regard for the possible discovery of this evidence, she opened the carrier's door, and Mugs flew out. No, he shot out of that small opening, all but flying across the room, as if she had deliberately aimed him at Special Agent Marvin Argus.
Only a few more minutes passed before she had her life back again, her possessions and her peace. She closed the door on the departing invaders, then turned to the cat, who delicately sniffed the abandoned bags of papers and clothing. Mugs had won the hearts of all the police. And the bleeding FBI agent had not been offered any first aid for his wounds.
Oddly enough, it had been a profitable afternoon – reassuring and informative. The New York detective might have been a formidable opponent, but now Flynn was officially off the case. And the Chicago police had been miserly in sharing information with him. He had tied her to only two murders, a very modest body count.
Chapter 5
RIKER WAS ONE UNHAPPY MAN AS HE ENTERED THE Greenwich Village restaurant. He was responding to a summons from a revered icon of NYPD, a retired captain who continued to police his children, keeping track of all their transgressions. Brother Ned was the good son, who so seldom required this personal attention. All the blackest marks belonged to Riker.
Dad still harbored grudges from a teenage-runaway episode also known as the Mexican Rebellion. After a summer-long flight from the old man's tyranny, Riker had returned home to Brooklyn. Covered in road dirt and ragged, he had sported long hair and a boy's first beard, a defiant combination that had guaranteed him some fireworks. But the old man had met him at the door in cold silence and never said a word to him all that day. Years later, Riker had chanced upon an open drawer in his father's desk. It was usually locked, for this was where the old man had kept his only valuables, the badge and the gun. And there Riker had also found a third object, the single postcard mailed home from Mexico, the only shred of proof that his father had missed him, worried over him and possibly loved him.
The retired captain was seated in a corner booth. The bartender hovered over the table and personally poured out the single-malt whiskey, not trusting this special customer to a waitress. Into his late seventies, Dad had retained his ramrod posture and all his hair, thick and white. The old man did look sharp in his dark suit and tie so like the silk threads he had worn as a police detective. Drawing closer, Riker saw his father's lips move, probably rehearsing a lecture that would amount to only a few spoken words; the central point would be driven home by the famous glare of disappointment.
Riker knew he would not be forgiven for the clumsy error of getting shot, nor for the greater mistake of not fighting a medical discharge. And there was one more possibility for this meeting. Had Dad discovered that one of his sons had been busy committing criminal acts today? The old man's information network was uncanny. Already planning lies of protection to cover Mallory's part in foiling a search warrant, Riker rounded a pillar, and now he could see that the old man was not alone. His drinking companion was also dressed in a suit, and one of the stranger's pant legs was torn.
Mugs? Oh, yeah.
Riker owned a pair of jeans with those same distinctive claw marks. A bandaged hand was more evidence that this man, probably a detective, had paid a recent visit to the Chelsea Hotel. Damn Johanna. He had warned her to play nicely with the police. The man's face was shielded by a potted fern, but Riker could assume he was a cop from Flynn's Greenwich Village precinct.
"Sir?" This was all Riker said by way of a greeting to his father, a man with no use for long sentences. A grunt of acknowledgment would have been more to Dad's liking.
He was introduced to his father's guest by name, rank and no wasted words, "Special Agent Marvin Argus, FBI." This was the same man who had come looking for Jo yesterday afternoon. At the time, Riker had not taken Argus for a federal agent. He had never met a fed with a girly fringe of bangs plastered to his forehead.
The FBI man shifted his seat in the booth, making room for Riker to sit beside him. "So you're the hero cop. I heard you left the force."
"That's not final," said Riker's father, hoping to put an end to this interminable babble. Dad leaned forward, glaring at the agent with a silent suggestion to just get on with it. The old man's tense body language put his son on notice that he was here under duress, that everything about this meeting stank. And just as clear was Dad's dislike for this agent from the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Riker wondered how many old favors had been called in to get his own father to act as a lure for this meeting.
"I'd like to talk about your employee, Johanna Apollo," said Agent Argus. "Oh, sorry – you know her as Josephine Richards. Hey, I never got your first name."
Ignoring this question and declining the space the agent had made for him, Riker elected to sit with his father on the other side of the table. And now that the lines were clearly drawn, he could see the agent backing up in his mind and rethinking his tactics.
Dad almost smiled. Almost.
Argus's grin was forced. "You probably think I'm here about that homicide at the playground. Well, you'd be wrong." He toyed with his cufflinks while waiting in vain for some show of interest. Riker's father rapped one knuckle on the table, and the agent all but snapped to attention, saying, "I'm investigating the murder of an FBI agent, Timothy Kidd. Johanna's also connected to that one. But you already knew that." You're guessing.
Riker shook his head in denial. "I don't know squat. The lady's a very private person." In a lighter tone, he said, "So, she killed a fed, huh?" He turned to his father to see if this also warranted a near smile.
Sit up straight, said Dad's cold gray eyes, and not one more smart-ass remark.
And Riker did sit up a bit straighter, force of habit from correction sessions at the dinner table every damn night of his childhood. Over the years, he had learned to decipher the words behind the old man's every glance in his direction. With a more sober attitude, he turned back to the FBI man, asking, "What do you want?"
"A little of your time." Argus leaned back against the booth's red leather cushion. "Let me tell you about this dead agent, a real sweet guy. And just between us?" He paused to flash a quick smile, still trying to curry intimacy. "Timmy was always a little spooky. Toward the end, he definitely had a few screws loose. But I think you would've liked him. One damn fine investigator – as good as it gets."