Kovacliska - Dust To Dust Part 5

body. The gun they said he had killed his killer with that night, the last night of his career.

He hears a little cry of fear and guesses it must have come from his own body, though it sounds far away. His hands try to push at the wheels of his chair, as if his body were trying to escape the fate his Mind has already accepted.

Strange.

He wonders if it was this way for Andy-fear swelling as the noose tightened around his throat. G.o.d, the feelings that image sets loose inside him!

Embarra.s.sment, rage. Guilt and hate and love.

"I loved him:'he says, his speech slurred. Spittle runs down his chin from the corner of his mouth. "I loved him, but I hated him! He did that. It was his own fault."

Saying it is like plungin a knife into his chest over and over.Yet he

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can't stop saying it, thinking it, hating Andy, hating himself.What kind of man hates his own son? He cries again, a loud, agonized wail that rises and falls and rises and falls, like a siren's call. Only the demon hears him. He is alone in the world, alone in the night. Alone with his demon, the Angel of Death.

A man should never outlive his kids. He ought to die before they can break his heart. Or before he can break theirs. You killed him. You hated him. You killed him "But I loved him too. Don't you see?"

I saw what you did to him, how you broke his heart. He did everythingfor you, and you killed him.

"No. No," he says, tastmig tears. Panic and anguish swell like a tumor in the base of his throat. "He wouldn't listen. I told him. I told him ... G.o.dd.a.m.n him:'he sobs. "G.o.dd.a.m.n f.a.g."

The pain tears out of him in a raw scream and he flails his arms at the demon, pawing like an animal.

You killed him.

"How could I do that?" he cried. "My beautiful boy!" You wantfree of it, Mike?

End the pain.

End the pain....

The voice is seductive, tempting. He cries out again, nearly choking on the fear as it thrusts up his throat.

End the pain. It's a sin!

It's your redemption. Do it, Mike.

End it.

The cold barrel of the service revolver kisses his cheek. His tears roll over the black steel.

End the pain.

After all these years. Do it.

Sobbing, he opens his mouth and closes his eyes. The flash is blinding.The explosion is deafening. The deed is done.

Smoke drifts in sinuous strings in the silent air. Time pa.s.ses. A moment. Two.

Respect for the dead. Then another flash, and the whir of a motor drive.

The Angel of Death slips the photo in a pocket, turns and walks away.

D U S T.

T 0.

C H A P T E S H E W 0 K E F R 0 M a restless, dream-filled sleep and saw him, He stoodbeside her bed, backlit by the grainy light that seeped around the bathroomdoor: a huge, faceless silhouette with shoulders like mount am slopes.Panic exploded like a bomb in her chest. Shards of it wedged in her throat,making her gasp for breath. It tore down through her stomach like shrapnel.Themuscles in her arms and legs spasmed at the shock. Run!He raised both hands and let go of something as she started to come up off themattress. She saw it coming as if in slow motion: the thick, twisting body of a snake.The colors of it were very clear to her: the creamy underside, the brown and black pattern on the back.

Arms flailing, she launched herself up and forward. For a split second, confusion tipped her brain this way and that.The world went pitch-black. She couldn't see. She couldn't feel. Her feet didn't seem to be under her, though she was running as hard as she could.

Something hit her on the side of her right eye and cheek.The force was like a sledgehammer connecting to her skull. Her neck snapped back and she thought she might have cried out. Then all motion stopped and she realized the thing that had hit her was the floor.

Oh, my G.o.d, I've broken my neck. He's still in the room.

I can't move.

She felt consciousness ebb away like a slippery thing. She clawed at it with her will, forced her brain to continue functioning.

If she could move her legs ... Yes. If she could move her arms . ..Yes.

She pulled her arms in tight to her sides and slowly pushed up from the floor.

Her head felt as heavy as a bowling ball, her neck as fragile as a broken toothpick. She sat back on her knees, cradling her face in her hands, pain coming like a pulse. Realization blinking on and off in her mind. Neon bright, then blackness. Neon bright, then blackness.

It wasn't real.

It didn't happen.

It hadn't been a dream, though, not really. More like a hallucination. She had been awake but not conscious. Night terrors, the experts called them. She was an expert by experience.Years and years of it.

Now came the familiar wave of despair. She wanted to cry but couldn't. The protective numbness had already begun to set in. She didn't welcome it, merely resigned herself to it, and slowly, unsteadily rose to her feet.

Still holding her head in one hand, she turned on the lamp on the dresser.

There was no one in the room. The light reflected a warm glow off the creamy tone-on-tone striped wallpaper. The bed was empty, the curved upholstered headboard naked of its usual pile of Pillows. She'd thrown the pillows to the floor on either side of the bed, and had knocked her water gla.s.s off the nightstand. A wet stain darkened the ivory rug. The alarm clock lay on the floor near the empty gla.s.s: 4:39 A.M.

Moving carefully, in pain, she went to the bed and pulled the covers off.

There was no snake. In the logical part of her brain, she knew there had never been, yet her gaze scanned the floor. She half expected to see the dark, slender shape disappearing beneath the closet door.

She worked on regulating her respiration, the exercise nearly as familiar to her as breathing. Her head was pounding. Pain was like a kmife in her neck.

She felt sick to her stomach. She gradually became aware of a stickiness in the hand that cradled her head, and knew it was time to a.s.sess the damage.

D U S T.

T 0.

D U S T 123.

Amanda Savard stared at herself in the bathroom nurror, dinily taking in the surroundings reflected around her image. Soft, elegant, feminine: the environment she had created for herself to give a sense of security and belonging. The same words generally described the image she presented the world, but now she looked as if she'd gone five rounds in a boxing ring. The area around her right eye was swollen from the impact of the falls and bright red where skidding across the rug had burned her skin. The color blazed against the pallor of her face. She pressed two fingertips gently around the wounds, fee ling for fractures, the pain making her breath hiss through her teeth.

How would she explain this? How could she hide it? Who would believe her?

She took a washcloth from the linen cupboard, wet it with cold tap water, and

touched it to the raw spots, gritting against the urge to wince. She tookthree Tylenol and went back to the bedroom. Awkwardly she stripped off thenightshirt she'd sweat through, and pulled on an oversize sweatshirt and apair of leggings.The house was silent. Everything was normal according to the security systempanel on the wall beside the bedroom door. She'd gone through'her nightlyritual, checking locks before going up to bed. And still the sense of dangerlingered. She knew from experience the only thing to do was to walk throughthe house and prove there was no intruder.She took her gun from the drawer in the nightstand and went out into the hall,moving like a minety-year-old woman. Room by room, every light in the housewas turned on, every room checked, every window, every lock. All of the lightsremained on. Light was a good thing. Light chased away the ghosts in theshadows.Those ghosts had been haunting her for so long, it was a wonder theystill possessed the ability to frighten her. They were as farmiliar asfarmily, and as deeply hated.In her office, Kenny Loggins; came on at the flick of a switch on the bookcasestereo system. A quiet, gentle song about the holidays and memories of home.The emotions it evoked in her were emptiness, loneliness, sadness, but sheleft the song on anyway.She liked this small room at the back of her house. The s.p.a.ce was cozy andfelt safe, and looked out on her backyard, which was very private and dottedwith birdfeeders. She lived in Plymouth, a suburb that bent and twisted aroundmarshes and woods and Medicine Lake. It wasn't uncommon to see deer nosing around the feeders, though none wasbraving the security light tonight.Three photographs she'd taken of themthrough the window hung in small frames in the office. One held a ghost image,her own reflection in the gla.s.s superimposed over the animal as it stared ather. She closed the blinds, too edgy to expose herself to the outside world. Sheneeded to feel enclosed. Her bedroom was her sanctuary when she had to getaway from work. The office was her sanctuary when she had to escape theshadows of her life. There was no escape from anything tonight.Her desk was neat, the shelves and cubbyholes above it well organized. Billsand papers properly filed, paper clips in a magnetic dish, pens in acherrywood cup. There were no photographs and only a few mementos, including abadge kept in the far upper-right-hand nook of the shelves. Her constantreminder of why she had become a cop in the first place. She rarely looked at.i.t, but she picked it out now and held it in her hand and stared at it for along while, acid burning in her stomach.Spread on the otherwise uncluttered surface of the desk was a copy of theMinneapolis Star Tribune, open to the pages most people skipped on their wayto the sports. The piece that interested her was an inch long, stuck down nearthe bottom. DEATH PULED ACCIDENTAL. There wasn't even a photo.That seemed a shame, she thought. He'd been so handsome. But to most of themetro area, he would never be anything more than a few lines of type, skimmedover and forgotten.Yesterday's news."I won't forget you, Andy," she whispered. How could I? I killed you.Her hand closed tightly on the badge until the edges bit into her fingers.DARKNESS STILL CLOAKED Minneapolis as Amanda Savard arrived at city hall. Mostof the lights that shone in office windows facing the street were left onovernight. No one came in at this hour, which made it the perfect time for herto sequester herself in her office without being seen. The longer she couldavoid that, the better. Though there would be no ducking the funeral in theafternoon. At least she would be able to get away with dark gla.s.ses for theoccasion. D U S T T 0 0 U S T Even now, with little chance of running into another human, she wore blacksungla.s.ses with frames just large enough to cover the damage she'd done toherself She had swathed her head in a 'de black velvet scarf that wrapped around her neck and trailed, wi dramatically back over her shoulders. Drama had not been her goal. Hiding was.Her footfalls echoed in the empty hall, boot heels ringing against the oldfloor.The distance to Room 126 seemed to stretch out before her. Inside her gloves, her hands were sweating. She gripped her keys too hard. The adrenalinefrom the dream had never entirely burned off, the residue leaving her feelingboth jittery and exhausted. Dizziness swam through her head at random moments.Her legs were weak and her head pounded. She couldn't turn her neck to theright, and she felt nauseated.She put the key in the lock and pulled up short, the skin p.r.i.c.kling on theback of her neck. But the hall was empty-what she could see of it. She pa.s.sedthrough the Internal Affairs outer office without bothering to turn the lighton, and went directly to her own office, where she'd left on the desk lamp.Safe. For an hour or two. She hung the scarf and her coat on the wall-mountedrack near the door, and went around behind the desk. She slipped thesungla.s.ses off to check her reflection in the mirror of her compact. As ifthere had been some chance of a miracle between home and here. The burns around the right eye looked angry, red, shiny with antibiotic gel.There had been no hope of covering them with makeup, and no way to keepbandages in place.The area directly around the eye was puffy and bruisedpurple and black."That's a h.e.l.l of a shiner." Savard bolted at the sound of the voice. She wanted to turn her back, butrealized it was too late. Embarra.s.sment and shame flooded her. Anger andresentment rushed in their wake. She grabbed the sungla.s.ses and put them back on. Kovac stood Just inside her door looking like something out of a RaymondChandler novel: long coat with the collar turned up, hands stuffed in thepockets, an old fedora slouching down over his forehead."I suppose getting popped in the face is a common hazard of working IA."126 T A M "If you want to see me, Sergeant, make an appointment," she said in thechilliest tone she could manage."I've already seen you."1 1 Something about the way he said it made her feel vulnerable. As i f he hadseen something more than just the physical evidence of what had happened toher, something deeper and more important."Did you go to a doctor for that?" he asked, coming closer. He pulled thefedora off and set it on her desk, then ran a hand back over his short hair.His gaze was narrow and zoomed in on the damage she'd done to herself "Nasty.""I'm fine:'she said, glad to have the desk as a buffer. She moved to the farend of it on the pretext of putting her compact away and stowing her purse ina drawer. The dizziness swirled through her and she kept one hand on thedesktop to steady herself"And I should see the other guy, huh?" Kovac said. "There was no other guy. Itook a fall." "From what? A three-story building?" "It's none of your business.""It is if someone did that to you."He was paid to protect and serve, as the saying went. It was nothing personal.She shouldn't have wanted it to be. "I told you-I fell."He didn't believe her. She could see that. He was a cop, and a good one. She'dmade it her business to find out. Sam Kovac had years of experience listeningto the nuances of lies. And while she wasn't exactly lying, neither was she exactly telling the truth.

She watched Kovac's gaze slide to her left hand, in search of a ring.

Wondering if there was an abusive husband. The only ring she wore was on her right hand. An emerald that had been pa.s.sed down through the women in her mother's family for a hundred years.

"Believe me, Sergeant. I'm the last woman who would let a man get away with this," she said.

He weighed the idea of saying something more, drew breath for it, then stopped himself "You didn't come here to see about my well-being."

"I ran into Cal Springer last Might," Kovac said. "You'll be proud to know he's still sweating bullets over your investigation."

"l have no interest in Cal Springer. I told you, the Curtis case is closed.

The investigation was full of mistakes, but none of the D U S T.

T 0.

D U S T.

allegations of impropriety bore fruit. None that would stand up in court, at any rate."

"Incompetency is Cal's forte, but he's too big a chickens.h.i.t for impropriety.

What about Ogden? I hear he threw down Curtis's watch atVerma's place."

"Can you prove it?"

"I can't. Could Andy Fallon? Ogden was on the scene when my partner and I got to Fallon's house on Tuesday."

"No, he couldn't prove it. We closed the case," she said, struggling to keep her focus over another wave of unsteadiness. Pain pounded her head like a hammer. "He was moving on to other a.s.signments." Not by choice. By order. Her order.

"Did Ogden know that?"

"Yes, he did. What was he doing there atAndy's?" "Sightseeing. "

"That's ghoulish."

"Stupid too, but I don't think he's the brightest bulb in the chandelier to begin with."

"Have you questioned him about his presence at the scene?"

"I have no right to question anyone, Lieutenant," Kovac reminded her. "The case is closed. A tragic accident. Remember?"

"I'm not likely to forget."

"I a.s.sumed Ogden and his partner responded to the radio call. I had no reason to think he'd have any other motive to be there. Silly question-was there bad blood between him and Fallon? Had Ogden threatened him?"

"Not that I'm aware of. No more animosity than the usual, I should say."

"You're all used to having people hate you." "So are you, Sergeant."

"Not my own kind."

She let that pa.s.s. "Resentment comes with the territory. People who do bad things don't like to suffer the consequences of their actions. Bad cops are worse than criminals in that respect. They have the idea they can hide behind the badge.When it turns out they can't ...

"I can check the case file," she said, letting out a long, carefully measured breath. She felt hot and clammy with sweat. She needed to sit down, but she didn't want to show weakness in front of him, nor 0 A 0.

did she want him to think she would pull the case up on the computer while he waited. "I don't expect to find anything. At any rate, you and I both know in our hearts that-despite what the ME ruled-Andy probably committed suicide."

','I don't let my heart get involved, Lieutenant. I let my gut do my feeling for me."

"You know what I mean. He wasn't murdered."

"I know Jie's dead," Kovac conceded stubbornly. "I know he shouldn't be."

"The world is full of tragedy, Sergeant Kovac," she said, breathing a little

too quickly. "This is our piece of it for the week. Maybe it would make moresense to us if it were a crime, but it wasn't.That means we deal with it andmove on." "Is that what you're doing?" he asked, moving to the end of the desk where shestood. "Dealing with it?"Savard got the feeling he wasn't talking about Andy Fallon anymore. He seemedto be looking at the marks on her face-what he could see of them around thesungla.s.ses. She started to take a step back, but the floor didn't quite seemto be under her foot. Blackness closed in around her, and the dizziness camein a rippling wave.Kovac moved quickly, catching her by the upper arms. She brought her hands upto his chest to steady herself"You need to see a doctor," he insisted."No. I'll be fine. I just need to sit for a mi'mite."She pushed against him, wanting free. He didn't let go. Instead, he turnedher, and this time when her knees gave out, her b.u.t.t hit her chair. Kovacpulled the sungla.s.ses off her face and looked into her eyes."How many of me do you see?" he asked. "One is plenty.""Follow my finger," he ordered, moving it back and forth, then up and down infront of her face. His expression was grim. His eyes were a smoky shade ofbrown, a hint of blue in the depths. More interesting up close than from adistance, she thought absently.'Jesus," he muttered, staring at the area around her right eye. One big handcame up and cradled that side of her face gently, thumb pressingexperimentally against the bones. "Ten bucks says that scars."D U S T T 0 D U S T "It won't be my first," she said softly.His hand stilled. His gaze found hers, searching. She turned away. "You needto see someone:' he said again, sitting back against her desk. "You might havea concussion. This is the voice of experience talking." He pointed to ab.u.t.terfly clip holding together a gash over his left eye. The area surroundingit was mottled purple with a yellow tint."Did you have a concussion?" Savard asked. "That might explain some things. 11"Naw. My head's like granite. Maybe you and I have something in common afterall," he said, as if he'd given the subject some thought. "I imagine you havea job to do, Sergeant:' she said, moving herchair toward the desk and hoping the motion wouldn't make her dizzy enough tofall off or to vomit. Kovac didn't move. She didn't like the proxinlity atall. He could have lifted his hand and touched her hair, touched her face theway he had a moment ago.She didn't like him behind the desk. That was her s.p.a.ce. He had breached adefense, and she imagined he knew it."You don't want to talk about Andy Fallon," he said quietly. "Why is that,Lieutenant?" She closed her eyes in frustration, then opened them. "Because he's dead and Ifeel responsible.""You think you should have seen it coming. Sometimes you can't," he said."Sometimes you're watching for one thing, and life belts you with a suckerpunch out of nowhere." He pantomimed a slow left hook that pulled up justshort of her injured eye.Savard stared at him. "You probably have an actual murder to investigate:' shesaid, reaching for the telephone. "I suggest you get to it."He watched as she dialed to get her messages. He didn't look happy, but then,she'd never seen him happy. Perhaps he never was. Something else we have incommon, Sergeant, she thought.He went back around the desk reluctantly and picked up his hat. "It's notalways smart to be brave, Amanda:' he said quietly.

"You may call me Lieutenant Savard."His mouth hooked up on one corner. "Yeah. I know. I just wanted to hear how itsounded." He paused. "When you saw Andy Sunday night, did you have a gla.s.s ofwine?" "I don't drink.We had coffee." 130 T A M 0 A 6 "Mmm. Did you know Andy changed his sheets and did his laundry before hekilled himself?" he asked. "Strange, huh?"Savard said nothing."See you at the funeral," he said, and walked out.She watched him go, her messages playing to a deaf ear.D U S T T 0 D U S T 131 C N A P T E F 0 R F 0 R T Y Y E A R S the uniforms had liked having breakfast at a placecalled Cheap Charlie's, which was located in the no-man's-land northeast ofthe Metrodome. Run-down, with a filthy fifties exterior, the place had spat inthe face of progress, recession, gentrification, and everything else thatmight have changed it in the years it had existed. Cheap Charlie's had no needto change. Their clientele was cops. The decades could come and go, but copswould never change. Tradition was all.Mike Fallon had probably eaten here as a rookie, Liska thought, looking at theplace through the blue bag serving as her pa.s.senger's window. She had luckedout and caught a parking spot in the front just as a radio car was pullingout. She had eaten here as a rookie.They had probably all been served by the samewaitress, a woman called Cheeks. In her heyday, before modern photography,Cheeks had looked like a chipmunk with a full load of nuts in her mouth. Allcheeks, no chin, and a b.u.t.ton of a nose. In the intervening years, gravity haddone its thing to the point that jowls would have been a more appropriatenickname, but Cheeks had stuck.She was working the counter this morning, a shrunken doll with132 slitted eyes and a leaning tower of dyed-black hair, pouring coffee andsmoking a cigarette in defiance of all known health codes. Not one cop in theplace would reprimand her, and the place was a sea of um'forms and mustaches.Alot of the detectives ate breakfast here as well. Kovac among them some days.Tradition. She went to the counter and took a vacant stool beside Elwood Knutson, hergaze scanning the room."Elwood, I thought you were too enlightened to eat here."" I am '" he said, regarding a plate smeared with the remains of bacon andeggs. "But I've decided to try the Protein Power diet, and I couldn't think ofa better place for the required breakfast. See, it's so out, it's hipagain.What's your excuse?""I haven't had a really good heartburn in a long time." "You're in for atreat." "Bingo," she said to herself as she spotted Ogden. He had wedged himself intoa booth at the back and had an expression on his face that suggested he hadn'thad a proper bowel movement in too long. Because of the angles, she couldn'tsee his breakfast partner and the recipient of his sour scowl.Elwood didn't turn, studying Liska instead. "Something I should know about?""Something you might know about. Do you remember when that uniform Curtis wasmurdered off duty?""Yes. Part of a string of gay crimes. A serial killer in the making.""Supposedly. What do you know about gay-bashing in the department?"Elwood nibbled thoughtfully on the end of a bacon strip. He wore a mouse-brown porkpie hat with the brim bent up in front."I know I find it deplorable to hara.s.s or discriminate on the basis of s.e.xualpreference," he said. "Who are we to choose for others? Loveis rare "Thank you. That's admirable. I'll send your mailing address to the ACLU,"Liska said dryly. "We're not talking about you, Elwood." "Who are we talkingabout?" She glanced around discreetly for eavesdroppers, hoping for a few. "I'mtalking about the uniforms. What's it like in the trenches? Department PCpolicy aside, what's the att.i.tude among the rank and file? I heard Curtis hadcomplained to IA about hara.s.sment.What was0 U S T T 0 D U S T that about? Are they still letting Neanderthals into the club? I thought thatwent out with Rodney King and the LA riots.""Sadly, the job attracts them," Elwood commented. "It's the badge. It's like ashiny coin to a monkey."The uniform on the other side of Liska looked around her to give Elwood adirty look."Might have been an orangutan in a past life," Liska whispered. She took a sipof the coffee Cheeks had poured for her and was instantly reminded it was timeto change the oil in the Saturn. "Anyway, I know that Curtis investigation wasa major cl.u.s.ter f.u.c.k.""That was Springer's. His conception was a cl.u.s.ter f.u.c.k.""That's true, but it was a uniform that screwed the pooch on thatinvestigation, the way I hear it. Big dumb ox of a guy name of Ogden. You knowhim?" "We don't travel in the same social circles, I'm afraid.""I'd be more afraid if you did," Liska said, sliding from the stool. She madeher way toward the back of the diner, fielding greetings without looking,holding her gaze on Ogden. He still hadn't noticed her, and his conversationwith the man she couldn't see was becoming more intense. She couldn't make outthe words, but the anger was distinct. She wished she could have come inbehind him and blindsided him, but the diner was too narrow. He finally sawher and straightened, nearly tipping over a gla.s.s of orange juice."I'd go with prune if I were you," she said." I hear those steroids can stop aperson up like concrete.""I don't know what you're talking about," Ogden said. "I'm no steroid juicer."A comeback stuck in Liska's mouth as she got her first look at Ogden's diningcompanion. Cal Springer. And he couldn't have looked more guilty if he hadbeen caught with a hooker."Hey, Cal. Interesting company you keep. Is this how you don't look bad to IA?Hanging out with the guy they think screwed your case? Maybe people are wrongabout you. Maybe you really are as dumb as you look.""Why don't you rmind your own business, Liska?""I wouldn't be much of a detective, then, would P" she pointed out. "Look,Cal, I'm not on your a.s.s here. I'm just saying it looks bad, that's all. Youshould think about these things ifyou want to be a political animal."T A 0 A G He turned toward the window. No view there. The plate gla.s.s was fogged overwith smoke and hot breath and airborne grease."Where's your partner these days, Cal?" Liska asked. "I need to talk to him.""Vacation. Two weeks in Hawaii." "Lucky stiff."Springer looked as if he would have preferred two weeks in hen to thisconversation. Liska turned back to Ogden and asked him point-blank: "Howd you and yourpartner come to be at the Fallon scene?"

Ogden scratched at his flattop. His scalp was fish-belly white between thefine, short hairs. "Caught the call on the radio.""And you just happened to be in the neighborhood." "That's right.""Dumb luck. Well, thatd be the kind you'd have."Ogden's little eyes looked like BBs set in dough. He rolled the slopedshoulders back. "I don't like your att.i.tude, Liska."Liska laughed. "You don't like my att.i.tude? Guess what, Ox," she said, bendingdown to get in his face. "You're a few evolutionary limbs below me in the coptree. I can s.h.i.t my att.i.tude all over your head if I want and n.o.body willlisten to you complain about it. Now, if I don't like your att.i.tude and Idon't-that's a problem."Why were you there?" she asked again. "I told you, we caught the call.""Burgess had the first response. Burgess was first on the scene." "We thoughthe might need help.""With a DB." "He was riding alone. He had to secure the scene.""So you and Rubel came and tromped all over it. And it was just a happycoincidence that the Vic turned out to be the IA investigator that was on youfor the Curtis screw-up.""That's right."Liska shook her head in amazement. "Were you busting rocks with your head whenthey were pa.s.sing out brains? What were you thinking?You want IA on youagain?"Ogden looked around, scowling at anyone he thought might be listening. "Weresponded to a call. How were we supposed to know the DB was Fallon?"D U S T T 0 D U S T 135 "But when you found out, you stayed. You put your prints all over his house ""So? He offed himself. It wasn't like somebody did it for him." "You couldn'tknow that. You still don't know that. And it's never your call to make as longas you're in a uniform.""The ME ruled it," he said. "It wasn't a murder.""It wasn't a spectator sport either, but you couldn't resist, could you? Didyou take a couple of Polaroids to share with the rest of the h.o.m.ophobes backin the locker room?" Ogden slid out of the booth and stood up. Liska tried to hold her ground, buthad to take a step back or be forced back. One big vein stood out in a zigzagon his forehead, like a lightning bolt. His eyes were cold and as flat asb.u.t.tons. The chill of fear that went through her was instinctive, and that wasfrightening to her in and of itself Fear was not a common companion."I don't answer to you, Liska"' he said in a tone that was both quiet andtaut. She met his glare with her own, knowing she was poking a stick at a bull. Itrmight not have been the smartest tack, but it was the one she'd chosen andthere was nothing to do now but ride it out. "f.u.c.k up another one of my crimescenes and you won't have to answer to anyone, Ogden.You won't be wearing abadge anymore."The vein pulsed like something in a horror movie, and color pushed up from histoo-tight collar into his face.41 Hey, B. 0., let's rock W roll."Liska knew it had to be Ogden's partner, Rubel, coming toward them from thefront of the diner. Still, she didn't turn away from Ogden. She sure as h.e.l.lwould never have turned her back on him. He couldn't seem to break his fixation on her. The rage within him swelled with every short breath. Shecould see it, feel it.Liska's brain flashed on the crime scene photos from the Curtis murder. Rage.Overkill. A human skull smashed like a pumpkin. People around them werestaring now. Cal Springer got up from the booth and beat a path for the front door, narrowly missing bangingshoulders with Rubel. 11 B.O., come on. Let's do it," Rubel ordered.Ogden looked at him finally, and the tension snapped like a twig. Liska feltthe air rush out of her lungs. Rubel gave her a once-over from behind a pairof mirrored shades. 136 T A M He was defimitely the better-looking of the two. Dark hair, square jaw, builtlike Michelangelo's David on steroids. He was the brains of the pair, sheguessed, when he herded his partner toward the door. Hustling Ogden away fromtrouble, much as he had done that day at Fallon's.She followed them out to the sidewalk. They were headed toward the cornerparking lot across the street."Hey, Rubel!" she called. He turned and stared at her. "I need to speak withyou too. Alone. Come to the CID offices at the end of your shift."He didn't answer. His expression didn't change. He and Ogden walked away, thecollective width of their shoulders taking up the entire sidewalk.If Andy Fallon's death had not been ruled an accident or suicide, Ogden wouldhave been high on the list of suspects.Was he stupid to have shown up at thescene? Maybe not. Responding to the dead body call had given him ampleopportunity to legitimately put his fingerprints all over Andy Fallon's house.How did you force a man to hang himselPA chill went through her, and Liska knew it had little to do with thetemperature and everything to do with the fact that she was looking at anothercop and trying to see what was rotten about him.The little bell rang on Cheap Charlie's door as it swung open behind her."Call me a stickler f6r details," Elwood said, "but I was of the impression wedon't investigate closed cases."Liska watched the unliforms get into a cruiser. Rubel was the driver. Ogdenrode shotgun.The car dipped down on its springs as he got in on thepa.s.senger's side."Who do we work for, Elwood?" "Technically or figuratively?" "Who do we workfor, Elwood?" Kovac had raised them all on this. "The victim.""My employer hasn't properly notified me to terminate my services," she saidwithout any of her usual humor.Elwood gave a big sigh. "Tinks, for someone so determined to get ahead, youdevote a lot of time to putting your backside in a crack." "Yeah," she said,digging her car keys out of her coat pocket. "I'm an oxymoron. Emphasis on themoron." D U S T T 0 D U S T 137 C N A P T E R T H E W 0 R L D I S full of tragedy, Sergeant Kovac.Savard's voice stayed in his head as he drove toward Mike Fallon's. His mindplayed the trick of making her sound breathy in a s.e.xy way. It made the playof light and shadow on her face dramatic and soft, the look in her eyes fullof mystery.That part was true enough. Amanda Savard was a puzzle, and he'd always foundpuzzles too tempting. He was usually pretty good at them, but he knewinstinctively this one would be more difficult than most, and the odds of anykind of payoff weren't good. She wouldn't appreciate his trying, that was ford.a.m.n sure. You may call me Lieutenant Savard."Amanda," he saidJust to be defiant. She wouldn't like knowing he was sayingher name while he was alone any more than she liked it in her presence. Maybeless. She couldn't boss him around if she wasn't there to hear him, andcontrol was her big thing. He wondered why, wondered what events had shapedher into the woman she was. "What's your tragedy, Amanda?"