"I'll deal with that later," she whispered. "What about Susannah? You said they released her?"
"Forensic evidence proved out her story. Her husband's prints were on the knife, hers overlaid his. So she picked up the knife after he did. So yeah, KCPD released her." Jazz cleared her throat. "Problem is, she's already had one attempt on her life since they let her go. We had to step in again."
McCarthy. Omar's bloody corpse flashed in front of Lucia's eyes again. "Anyone—" McCarthy " — hurt?"
"No, the shooter tried for a sidewalk hit. McCarthy got her behind a car in time. No damage."
"No red envelopes?"
"Evidently, saving her life isn't important." The grim set of Jazz's face told Lucia what she thought about that. "I chewed Laskins a new asshole trying to get Simms to tell us what happened to you. No comment from the jailhouse psychic. He'll put himself out for strangers, not for his own. Bastards, all of them. I'm sick of this fucking circus."
Lucia smiled faintly. She could well imagine Jazz on the phone with Borden's boss, reading him the riot act. Laskins wouldn't have been pleased. For all she knew, Jazz might have hopped a plane to California, where Simms was jailed, to try the psychic in person.
Borden was looking elsewhere, deliberately taking himself out of the conversation. She wondered if Jazz had considered the ramifications of having him in the room, and then realized that Jazz nearly always considered the ramifications. That was part of the contradiction of the woman. She was impulsive and rash, and she also saw consequences coming a mile ahead. That didn't mean she allowed them to dictate her course of action.
Lucia cleared her throat again. "She's still with him? With McCarthy?"
"Yeah. He put me in charge of finding you." Jazz shrugged, eyes glittering. "Called him every night to tell him that I hadn't. And every night, he told me that I'd better find you, or it'd be my ass."
"You did find me."
Jazz nodded. "Yeah, tripped over you getting admitted to the hospital. World-class detective, I am. But on the bright side, guess I get to keep my ass."
Lucia drank more water. Borden raised the pitcher inquiringly; she shook her head. "I wish I knew what—what happened." Because anything could have. That was a disturbing void in her life. "When can I get out of here?"
"When you can gnaw through the straps," Jazz said. "I want you here until you can kick ass and take names."
That, Lucia thought, would take nothing more than a decent meal, a walk around the building and a fresh set of clothes.
Because she was so very, very ready to kick ass.
It took something more than an afternoon—a day and a half, to be exact—for the various doctors to present themselves and sign off on her release. She'd grimly demonstrated her ability to walk, eat, drink and pee in sufficient quantities to get everyone off her back.
Ben McCarthy didn't show. She kept expecting to turn around and see him walking through the door, kept expecting to feel his presence behind her. Didn't happen. But then, she reminded herself, he was working. Doing her job, in fact.
That didn't stop her from feeling irrationally annoyed about it.
She felt weak, but it was the kind of weakness that only movement and exercise would cure. She started off by scorning the wheelchair and taking the stairs, with Jazz and Borden clumping along behind her.
"Did you bring me a gun?" she asked Jazz before they hit the ground floor exit.
For answer, Jazz jumped down to the landing, reached in the inside pocket of her leather jacket and pulled out Lucia's P95 and shoulder holster. Lucia ran through the checklist on the gun, ratcheting the slide, examining the clip, ejecting the bullet in the chamber and reloading. Everything worked smooth as silk.
"She cleaned it for you," Borden said.
Jazz shrugged. "No big deal." Then she grinned and nudged him with her elbow. "Besides, nude girls cleaning guns turn him on."
"More than I needed to know. From both of you." Lucia removed her coat and put the holster on, settling the gun snugly against her ribs. While she was putting the coat on again, Jazz pushed past her to reach the door first.
Protecting her, Lucia realized. She blinked, smiled slightly and followed.
Once again, Manny had given up his Hummer to the cause; Lucia was starting to like the damn thing. It certainly gave one a feeling of security, riding high above traffic. It also presents a fine target, and it's easy to follow.
Jazz wanted to take her straight home, but Lucia wasn't having any of it. "Has Susannah said anything about her husband's business yet?"
"Not a word. Ben's been working on it, but she doesn't seem to trust anybody. Why? You want to take a run at her?"
"Absolutely." Mostly, she had to admit, she wanted to see McCarthy.
"And you don't think you should be, you know, resting…?"
"Apparently, I've been resting for almost a week. The last thing I need is more sleep. I need to think and I need to move. It's time to get into this thing, Jazz. I have a hunch that it's larger than we can see right now."
Jazz took the next right turn. "Far be it from me to get in the way of your hunches." She sounded amused, but not dismissive. Progress, of a sort. "I'm going to keep digging. Somebody had to see you being carried into the Raphael. You damn sure weren't walking on your own."
Borden said nothing. He had a laptop computer open, and he was typing away.
"Counselor," Lucia said. He looked back over his shoulder at her, eyebrows raised. "Shouldn't you be in New York?"
"Actually, GP&L is considering opening a branch office here," he said. "I'm fact-finding. We have seven corporate clients here, not to mention some other vested interests. And the air travel's getting old. They don't even feed you anymore on the plane."
"Tragic," she agreed, straight-faced. "Was this your idea, or your boss's?"
"Mine."
"Sure about that?"
He lost the friendly smile. "Meaning?"
"Meaning, are you sure that you're not doing the Cross Society's work instead of your firm's, setting up here?"
"They're not mutually exclusive."
"I'm not so certain."
He blinked and turned around even farther. The laptop was in danger of sliding to the floor. "So you think we're the villains now? Is that it?"
"We?"
That wasn't Lucia speaking. It was Jazz. Borden looked at her, stricken. "I mean…"
"Yeah," she said. "I get what you mean. Your loyalty's still with the Society. We means people who aren't in this car."
"Jazz—"
It was a lost cause, and Borden knew it. He turned to face the road.
It occurred to her that he'd be updating Laskins about what they were doing, and through Laskins, the Society and Simms. But she couldn't tell Jazz to turf him; she could see how important he was to her, and truthfully, she liked Borden. She liked his off-center smile, his quick intelligence, his wit, the passion in his eyes when he looked at her partner.
But she didn't like what he represented, at the moment. And she wasn't sure she liked him knowing where Susannah Davis was hidden.
They pulled into an apartment complex parking lot-not a complex Lucia was familiar with, more of a cheap, run-down establishment. The paint was peeling, and even the spring flowers in their landscaped beds looked cheap and struggling. It was the sort of place drug dealers rented, and hookers, and people who couldn't afford better. The sort of place where people averted their eyes from their neighbors and hoped that the noise in the apartment next door wasn't a felony being committed.
But Jazz's instincts were, as always, sound. It was also a place where women with bruised faces weren't necessarily worth comment.