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“Oh, how the other half live.” He fastens the Velcro straps and eyes me across the roof. “God forbid we just buy a ticket on a regular commercial flight, huh?”
“Get the fuck out of here. Tell me you hated your all expenses paid, private plane, helicopter, and yacht experience to the Caribbean recently.” I flash him my middle finger and grin when he laughs. “My brother has a plane: the plane will be used. Why would I squish my wife into a regular seat sitting next to some onion smelling motherfucker if I don’t have to?”
“I’m just noticing how, not so long ago, you swore you would have nothing to do with the New York Malones. You were an emancipated man,” he taunts. “They were dead to you.”
“Uh-huh.” I flatten the strap at my ribs and check the gun I already secured to my thigh. “And sometimes, things change. My father is dead now, which means my brothers and I can be a family again without him trying to create a five-way war between blood.” I re-holster my weapon. “I trust them. With my life, and with Minka’s. That’s all that matters to me.”
“Like I said,” he snags his coffee and slams the door closed, “oh, how the other half live. I can be happy for your ass, sitting on those comfy private jet seats. And I can be jealous at the same time. I’m a skilled multitasker like that.”
“And jealous of my wife, too,” I tease. “I hit the jackpot, and you pissed off the first broad you’veactuallyliked in years.”
Unimpressed, he flashes his badge at the uniform guarding the barricades. “Detectives Fletcher and Malone. This is our homicide.”
“Go on in.” He grabs the police tape and lifts it for us to pass through. “I haven’t been any closer than I am now, Detectives. So I don’t know what you’re gonna find. But I’m hearing whispers.”
“Yeah?” I duck beneath the tape and turn back when I straighten out, holding my coffee and pulling as much warmth from the cup as I canmanage. It’s not winter yet, but fuck if my breath doesn’t puff white ahead of me anyway. My ears sting under the cold pre-dawn darkness and my nose smarts at the tip. “What things are you hearing, Officer?”
He gulps, the bob of his Adam’s apple telegraphing the nerves firing through his veins. “I heard we’ve got a cop killer on our hands. People are starting to worry.”
“Heard anything else?” Fletch’s jaw tightens as he looks the rookie up and down. “Anything else we need to know about?”
“Not yet, Detective. This one’s been kept kinda quiet. Orders came down from the brass pretty quickly. That’s when you were called in.”
“Come on.” I turn from the uniform and start toward our vic. “He’s just a kid, and the fact that Lieutenant Fabian has already come out means we have a shit-show ahead of us. It’s not surprising folks are whispering amongst themselves.”
“Yeah?” He lifts his chin and nods toward the taped off area, a body lying dead on the sidewalk, arms splayed wide, and a puddle of blood following gravity down the slight incline that leads to the gutter. Then we come to a stop just six feet from our new vic’s face, unseeing eyes staring back at us. “Probably don’t need to run fingerprints on this one.” Snarling, he strides closer and stands over Detective Wright’s dead body. “Goddammit!”
MINKA
“I’m choosing to be mature about all this.” And to prove it, I sit at my desk, one leg folded over the other and my hands clasped in my lap—which is a vast improvement on themeI see in my mind. Shouting. Frustrated. Ready to hurt some people.
It’s not my fault I was never taught how to control my emotions during my formative years.
“Who has offered you a new position?” I stare down my nose at a stubborn Seraphina Lewis, her perfect hoity-toity skirt suit and her silky brown hair. I don’t know how she makes it look salon-perfect every single day.
Another subsection of wisdom my parents failed to impart onto me.
“This doesn’t have to be ugly, Fifi.”
“You mean like how you’ve treated me like crap from the moment I handed you my resignation letter?” She raises a single, pointed brow and stares straight back into my eyes. Challenging. Daring. She doesn’t have a job to lose at this point, so I figure she’s at the, ‘Fuck it! Let’s go,’phase of our back and forth. “I expected professionalism, first and foremost. And when professionalism would slide, I expected respect between friends.”
“Professionalism would exclude you from quitting just because a guy hurt your feelings!” Mature…? Nah. “Friendship would make certain you speak to me about what’s bothering you before it becomes an issue. You didn’t even give us a chance to work through this.”
“I gave you a month! I could have walked thatday. Left mydesk, ignored the phone, deleted my email. I’ve been headhunted foryears, so it’s not like I’m here because I need to pay the rent.”
“Fifi—”
“I gave you a month to find someone else. To find peace in this change. I risked my new job by telling them to wait another month, and for every single day I was here, you did nothing but pout and shout. Nonstop.”
“I don’t want you to leave.” I burst up from my chair, sending the metal structure rolling backward until it hits the bookshelf lining my wall. Then I circle my desk and barely stop short of smacking her when I pass. That would be assault,yada yada yada. “I don’t want to spend a month getting to know Carol?—”
“Callen.”
“Whatever! I don’t feel it’s necessary for me to dedicate brain space to remembering her name. Because I rememberyours. I wantyoursto be the one I hear when I pick up the phone.”
“You don’t even use my proper name!” I guess she’s disinterested in maturity, too, because she stands, meeting me on my level and turning her back to the crowd gathering outside my office. Aubree. Doctor Raquel. Xavier Campbell. Hell, even Doctor Patten has stuck around long after her night shift ended to see us duke it out. “My name isnotFifi. It has never been Fifi. When you first uttered that god-awful name, I corrected you in hopes you would never use it again. You want to lecture me about names, Mayet? Cut the shit and use the one I ask you to.”
“Watch your tone.” I bring my eyes around again and match her glare with one of my own. “This is my office, Seraphina. My building. And you’re providing the staff a poor example of how one behaves inside the George Stanley.”
