He reminded himself that he was winning. The ally who had turned on him was dead and he was alive. There was still Joe Carver out there somewhere, but soon Carver would be dead too. There was no need for anybody to think too hard about who won and who lost. The winners were alive and the losers dead.
26
JERRY GAFFNEY AWOKE just after 11:00, his usual hour, but he didn’t feel quite right. There was a distinct tightness in his right arm—more like a pain—and he wondered for a second whether he’d been stabbed. No, it wasn’t as bad as that. He tried to roll to his back and realized what was wrong. His wrists were handcuffed behind him, and that was a feeling he’d felt before.
He drew in a breath in a gasp and sat up. He swung his legs, then realized that he was being restrained. A rope was tied around his ankles and then to the bed frame.
“Good morning.” It was Sandy Belknap’s voice.
The relief he felt was like a cool breeze touching his sweating forehead. She was still here. If this was serious, she’d have left him like this, gone somewhere else, and called the cops. He could still talk her out of this. “Good morning,” he said. “This is an interesting development.”
“Yeah. Interesting.” He still couldn’t see her, because she was somewhere behind him.
He said, “I assume these are my own handcuffs.”
“Yes, they are. Nice girls don’t have their own sets of handcuffs, I think. If they do, none of them ever told me about it.”
“Well, this is a pretty cute trick.”
“Yes,” she said. “You’re looking pretty cute over there, all bare-naked and trussed up. But I’m thinking that the joke has been on me all along.”
“I don’t follow.”
“Well, there was a part of my conversation with Joe Carver this morning that you didn’t hear. It wasn’t on the speaker.”
“What did I miss?”
“He knew that two men with red hair, one bright red—that would be you, the bright red—talked to me about a month ago at Wash, and that what we talked about was him.”
“So why have I got handcuffs on?”
“I’m getting to that,” she said. She walked around the bed and he could see she was dressed in blue jeans, running shoes, and a University of Missouri T-shirt. Her hair was pulled back in a tight ponytail. “The other thing he said was that these two men were brothers, a pair of thugs named Jerry and Jimmy Gaffney, who work for a gangster named Manco Kapak.”
He looked at her in disappointment. “Well, of course, when we’re investigating a series of class-one felonies we don’t always go into crowds of unidentifiable people waving badges and using our real names.”
“It’s pretty amusing to watch you sitting there making all this stuff up, and I’ll bet you could say more of it than I can listen to. But I’ve been up since that call, thinking.”
“Good. Can you please unlock these handcuffs so we can have a real discussion about this?”
“Want to know what I thought?”
“Sure I do, but I’d like to have these handcuffs and ropes off first.”
“Sorry. What I was thinking was that the way you and your partner treated me, and the way you treated my ex-boyfriend, well, it was kind of overbearing. The word Joe Carver used was ‘thug.’ I wouldn’t have used that word, but I might have said ‘bully.’ And then I thought, ‘Would a cop do that?’ and ‘Would a cop really sleep with me?’”
“Have you walked by a mirror lately? Ninety percent of cops wouldn’t be able to help themselves. The others are straight women. As for your boyfriend, I was doing my duty. A police officer, even if he’s just made what’s technically an error in judgment, sleeping with a witness, can’t let a contact with an angry civilian turn into a free-for-all, with everybody having an equal right to throw punches. We don’t hold debates or try cases. We have to take charge and remain in control.”
“Wow. Did you see that on TV?”
“It’s part of standard police training.”
“So is not getting citizens to sleep with you.”
“I admitted I made a mistake. Rules are rules, but you’re the strongest temptation I ever came across, by a mile. I know it was against regulations, but at that moment, I honestly didn’t care. Right now I feel sorry that I failed, but I’d do it all over again.”
“You’ve got the Oscar wrapped up, so don’t overact.”
“Why are you suddenly being so cynical?”
“While you were asleep I decided to do some checking. Your name is Detective Sergeant Allan Reid. That’s what it says on your ID. But your driver’s license, credit cards, and everything say Jerry Gaffney. Your badge says ‘patrolman.’”
“My police ID is accurate. My badge is the one I got coming out of the academy, because the number belonged to my father. I still carry it because it makes me feel like he’s looking over my shoulder.”
“You tricked me, and you used me. But I had fun with you yesterday and last night. And without intending to, you forced me to take a look at what I was settling for as a boyfriend. It’s something I needed. For those reasons, I’m not inclined to call the cops—the real ones—and have them come and haul you away like this. Instead, I’d like you to put on your clothes and skedaddle.”
Jerry Gaffney looked at his feet, then into her eyes. “I guess I’d be stupid not to leave, huh?”
“I have the impression that impersonating a cop is a felony.”
“It is. Want to unlock me?”
“You have to promise not to try anything.”
“All right. I promise.”
“I sure hope you’re not under the foolish, mistaken impression that I won’t have the heart to shoot you if you pull something. I’m a farm girl from Missouri. My dad is a gun nut. All the Belknaps are shooters.”
She walked around to the front of him, pressed the magazine release on his gun and took out the magazine, then pulled back the slide to eject the round in the chamber, closed it, and tossed the gun on the bed. Then she reached into her nightstand and took out a .38 revolver. “If I have to shoot you, I’ll use my own gun. I’m used to it.”
He smiled. “Shoot lots of guys?”
She looked into his eyes for a couple of seconds, as though searching for some sign of intelligence. Then she tossed his clothes on the bed, walked around behind him, unlocked his handcuffs, and stepped back, her gun in her hand.
Jerry Gaffney dressed, not slowly, but not making any unexpected or quick moves. When he was ready, he said, “Sandy, I apologize for lying to you. I regret it more than you know.” He stood and walked toward the side door.
“Wait.”
He stopped and looked back at her.
“Oh, this is stupid,” she said. “Never mind.”
“What?”
“I said never mind.”
He turned and went to the door, opened it, and stepped across the threshold.
“Wait.”
He stopped.
“Are you really a thug working for a gangster?”
“I’m a security professional working for Manco Kapak. He’s not a gangster. He owns Wash in Hollywood and a couple of clubs in the Valley. Once in a great while I’ve had to step in and physically prevent somebody from doing something foolish. I don’t think that makes me a thug.”
She sighed. “Better, but still not nearly enough. Don’t you see? I’m a daylight person. I can’t have a guy who’s even a little bit of a thug once in a while—a night person. Even dating a cop was going to be a bit over the line, but I kind of tried you on, because I thought you got your scars protecting people from bad guys, and if it didn’t work out, at least I gave a heroic guy a nice time. I could do that. But not somebody in a shady business, especially not somebody who’s a bit of a con man. I can’t be in a relationship with a guy and know there’s no particular reason to believe anything he says. So that’s that. You have to go. If I see you again, we’ll have to do the police thing again, using real police. If you come in the wrong way at the wrong time, I’ll have to shoot you.”