The Dangerous Edge of Things - By Tina Whittle Page 0,49
seat. “All of this is off the record, right?”
“For now.”
I dug inside my tote bag and pulled out the manila envelope with Rico’s illicit info inside. “Here. Have a look at this.”
Garrity pulled out the materials and read a couple of lines. “Where did you get this?”
“I forget.”
“You forget?”
“Yeah. I know that’s odd.”
“Not really. You wouldn’t believe the kind of things people forget once they start talking to a cop.” He shut the folder, but left it lying in his lap. “So Eliza was into B and E too. What do you want me to do about it?”
“I don’t know. I promised Janie I’d keep it out of circulation, but now that it seems like Eliza’s old partner is working my turf, I want it put in the right hands.”
“Does this have anything to do with why you were at Boomer’s earlier?”
His eyes would have been really beautiful, I decided, if he hadn’t been forever narrowing them at me, like I was on the witness stand. “Is this still off the record?”
He agreed. So I told him the truth. Mostly. I left out the part where Nikki had been watching me, kind of de-emphasized the whole “meeting a creepy stranger at midnight” thing, but other than that, my version was right on the money.
He sipped his coffee. “That was borderline idiotic, you know, the kind of stupid thing—”
“You’re one to talk. Boomers is a little out of the way for something that’s not even your case.”
“So? I’m a cop. You’re a civilian. End of argument.”
“I’m a liaison now, Detective.”
He gave me the cop eye. “A what?”
So I told him everything about that—the ball-breaker of a morning meeting, my new position, Trey’s near-pummeling of Steve Simpson, the fact that Landon and Trey and Simpson were all “suspicious” now, the sighting of the mysterious Dylan Flint.
When I was done, he shook his head. “Jesus. Marisa’s got Trey on an investigation? He doesn’t do investigations.”
“His point exactly. She shot him down. I swear, you should have seen her, like you crossed Scarlett O’Hara and the Terminator.”
“That’s what they want, you know.”
“Who?”
“Her clientele. Ever since 9/11, every CEO in Fulton County wants to know how to kill somebody with a spork, and they want to know how to do it without messing up their suit. Phoenix draws ’em like catnip. But I’ll tell you one thing—I don’t like it in there. Maybe I’ve just been a cop too long, but I can’t shake the feeling that those walls have ears. And eyes. And who knows what else.”
He dropped his voice, narrowed his gaze. “I don’t even take a piss in there if I can help it.”
We sat on my hood while the Kennesaw officers finished their look-around. Some of them had known Dexter, had bought from him. They’d introduced themselves, told me how sorry they were for my loss. Every single one was polite, well-scrubbed and white as cream of wheat.
I rubbed my eyes until I could see straight. “So tell me, Detective—what were you doing at Boomer’s?”
“Off-duty curiosity. Bulldog used to sell in that parking lot. I wanted to see if he’d been around recently.”
“Had he?”
“Not that the manager knew of.” He made a serious face. “Have you told Trey about any of this?”
“I tried to tell him about the juvie records, but he went all stickler on me.”
“Then you need to tell him a different way.”
I was about to let him have it for that one—like Trey being Trey was my fault—when the Kennesaw officer tapped my shoulder. “Ma’am? I hate to interrupt, but does this mean anything to you? We found it behind some boxes under the window. Looks like your perpetrator dropped it through the burglar bars.”
He showed me the target, a picture of me in the center, the bull’s eye a blasted hole. I felt the blood drain from my face, and an involuntary tremor started in my hands. Tears sparked, blurring my vision. Garrity moved to stand in front of me. “Hey, hey.”
“Damn it, I hate crying.” I wiped my eyes. “But I’m running on two hours sleep, and now I’m being threatened—again—and I don’t even know why, and I’ve got a shop full of guns that I can’t even carry yet, and—”
“What do you mean, ‘threatened again?’”
The officer handed me a tissue. I blew my nose. And then I explained.
***
Once I calmed down, Garrity went off to ask the deputies some more questions. I huddled on my hood, arms wrapped around my knees. I felt empty, but