him out now and again, and one who isn’t fussy about where the percentage comes from. Cohen’s in it, too, and that builds trust. I go down, you go down.”
“Again, I’d defer to Mira, but wouldn’t that be the sort of bond Jones would trust? Add in profit, the tangible buildings. Jones may believe what he tells Cohen falls under attorney-client privilege.”
“Wouldn’t surprise me. It doesn’t surprise me, either, we’re on the same page. Cohen knows about the murders. Accessory before or after the fact yet to be determined.”
And she’d damn well determine.
“How soon can you get me those hard numbers?”
“It won’t take long.”
“And put together in a way that gets me a warrant.”
Now his eyebrows rose. “What? Like a report?”
“Not that formal, just clear so I can send it to Reo, so she can pump up a judge.” She smiled. “I’ll owe you one.”
“I’ll collect more carefully next time. Actually, free pass on it. I said I wanted to bugger the bastard, so there’s the satisfaction.”
“Hold that thought,” she said when her comm signaled. “Dallas.”
“Sir, Officer Trace. Cohen just left the residence with a small suitcase. He got in a Rapid. We’re tailing.”
“Keep on him, Officer. Let me know where he lands.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Gave him his walking papers,” Roarke assumed when she clicked off. “And good on her.”
“What does that even mean? Who needs papers to walk? But he’s on the move, so we should do the same. I’ll get Reo on tap, let her know you’re sending hard data for the warrant.”
“All right then.” He rose, then frowned. “I think it must be like firing someone. The pink slip sort of thing. You know, you’re done, start walking.”
“Then why papers?” she insisted. “A pink slip—and nobody gets an actual pink slip—is a paper, not papers. So a walking paper. Why not say she told him to take a hike? And that doesn’t work, either, because he got in a cab.”
He decided he wanted a second glass of wine for the work, poured one, smiled at her. “I adore you, Eve.”
“Yeah, yeah, start walking.”
13
Cohen didn’t go far. He checked into a hotel about ten blocks from the residence.
So, Eve thought, he got his pink walking paper and took a hike in a Rapid.
Now she had to wait for the wheels to turn. Roarke to Reo, Reo to a judge, then back to her.
She got coffee, sat with her boots up, studied the board.
The simplest theory:
Pickering slipped up somewhere, and his CI status leaked. Not only did he break with the gang, not only was he having his gang tat removed, going to lame meetings, working some shit-ass job, but he was ratting out his own brothers and sisters to the cops.
That’s a pisser.
Instead of a trial, a beatdown and a slit throat, Jones decides another way. Having so close a connection—friends since childhood—having Pickering betraying his family looks bad on leadership. He tells Duff to set him up, enlists three young low-levels or wannabes to stage the OD. The OD for humiliation.
You humiliate me, I humiliate you to death.
She could see that. She’d have given Jones more credit for cunning, but she could see it.
Duff. Maybe she whines, or makes demands. Maybe she makes noises about telling someone. Have to take her out. Same three killers, and give them the go-ahead to have their fun with her while they’re at it.
Harder to see that, harder to see the strategy in the location of the kill, but it could play.
It just didn’t sit easy in her gut.
“If not you, who?” she wondered. And trained her eyes, her thoughts on Kenneth “Bolt” Jorgenson.
That one, she thought, just sat easy.
A violent criminal since childhood, with a father who goes to prison for nonviolent crimes—and erases the family stability.
One minute, Eve thought as she paced, you’re a rich kid with all the perks. Nice digs, nice threads. You hook school when you feel like it, bully whoever you want to bully.
Then bam, your father’s in a cage, your mother’s looking for work. No more rich kid because your family sucks.
Eve circled back to Jorgenson’s photo, and found, yeah, he just sat right in her gut.
He finds a new family, one more to his taste, with the Bangers. Gets into trouble, some real trouble—but he likes it. Likes trouble.
Then he physically attacks his own mother only to get his ass kicked by his sister. That had to sting.
He worked his way to lieutenant under Jones, she mused. But he wants more. Maybe—Mira territory—he was still