Back in Black (McGinnis Investigations #1) - Rhys Ford Page 0,5
at the estate, but the cops assured me they would be there in a few seconds, drawn by the barrage of calls from outraged residents at the sounds of shots being fired in their safe, elite neighborhood. The dog fell into step behind me, and I trudged out to discover Central Dispatch hadn’t been wrong. A few minutes later, two cop cars screeched to a halt after I’d made it out the side gate.
The enormous black-and-tan Doberman promptly pissed on the sidewalk, then rolled over on his back when the cops began shouting for me to put my hands up. All in all, it was the shitty beginning of what was probably going to be a long night, and I still hadn’t done any recon on the estate I’d been sent to scope out.
An aurora borealis of red-and-blue swirls churned above the formerly dim street, courtesy of the phalanx of cop cars crowding the tree-lined sidewalk. Their bright, saturated lights pushed away the milky orange-yellow coming from the streetlamps that sparsely dotted the side of the road. This part of Brentwood was very much old-school Los Angeles, clinging to the outdated opinion that their intimate, cloistered neighborhood was kept safer by darkened streets and heightened security. Because of the area’s proximity to the observatory, the local lighting was subdued to prevent the ambient glow from bleeding into the already not-so-dark night sky that hugged the city. But I could have used a little bit of light. Until the cops arrived, I could barely see my hand while standing in front of the estate where I’d found Mrs. Brinkerhoff’s body.
“Now, let me get this straight, you were hired to check out a property for a security firm owned by Montoya’s boyfriend, when you were pursued and shot at by Ralph Branigan.” Lieutenant Dell O’Byrne stood silhouetted against the floodlights, her pen furiously dancing across the page in the notebook she was using to document the scene.
“Is Ralph Branigan the guy in the sheep costume?” I asked. “I’ve just been calling him Lamb Chop and other names in my head. He had a gun. And was shooting at me. I didn’t stop and ask him his name.”
“Yes, the man you’re calling Lamb Chop is Mister Branigan.” O’Byrne’s dark eyes flicked up the page, their depths filled with an annoyance that I could see through the shadows clinging to her strong face. “Help me out, McGinnis. Just give me the facts first. Then you can give me all the commentary you like. What were you doing that prompted Branigan to come after you with a gun?”
“I don’t know. Could have been me looking through the window and getting a good look at him schtupping that blond lady.” I shrugged as nonchalantly as I could, but my brain was still having a hard time wrapping around the details of what happened. “You know, the former nun. Mother Mary Stigmata or whatever her name is.”
“I’m trying to be serious here, McGinnis.” Another glance up, but this time there was a hint of a smile tugging at the corner of her mouth.
“O’Byrne, I just spent the last half hour of my life running away from a gun-toting crazy man in a sheep costume with his dick waggling around through a flap in the front because I caught him having kinky sex with a former nun who is now a powerful California lobbyist for faith-based charities. He was trying to kill me. Sicced the ex-nun’s dogs on me, who thankfully thought it was all just a game of tag, apparently, but the damned bullets were real.” I held my hand up, pinching at the air with my thumb and index finger. “He missed me by this much. And just when I thought I’d gotten away from him, I stumble across a former client’s dead wife. If I can’t laugh at any of this, I’m going to lose my mind.”
O’Byrne was a whipcord-lean Latinx with a beautiful face, a serious demeanor, and a scowl fierce enough to stop a herd of rampaging toddlers dead in their tracks. We hadn’t seen eye to eye when she first rolled into her position with the LAPD as a senior detective, but over the years, I must’ve done something right, because she eventually retained me as a consultant with the department. I’d been a detective with the LAPD when I was shot by my partner and best friend, Ben, who’d somehow gotten into his head he was in love with my boyfriend,