Cavanaugh on Duty

chapter 10



Years of working on his own had predisposed Esteban to working best alone.

Which was why he thought he’d get an early start this morning and come in while the office was still empty. But the moment he walked into the squad room, he saw that he’d thought wrong.

Because it was more than an hour before the morning shift came on, the rest of the area was still empty. However, the desk butted up directly against his was not. Kari was there, although it was anyone’s guess whether she was conscious or not. She’d obviously put her head down to grab a few winks.

Apparently the winks were still going on. Her head was resting on her arms, which she’d drawn close together and crossed in order to afford herself a tiny bit of comfort.

Not that they would give her all that much, he judged. From what he’d seen of them, her arms were rather toned. It was obvious that she liked to keep herself fit. He could relate to that.

He could almost, he thought, relate to her, as well.

Though he wouldn’t admit it to her, she was right about remembering him from high school. All sorts of memories came flooding back to him. They had gone to school together, although he’d been a year ahead of her.

Even so, they’d shared a couple of academic classes. He might have been a jock back then, but he was determined to use his athletic abilities to propel him up the road to getting a higher education. Securing a football scholarship meant he could spend more time studying, less time working to pay for that education. He’d set his sights on lofty goals.

And she was a junior with looks and brains—and if he recalled correctly, she’d been far more interested in using those brains, rather than her feminine wiles, to get ahead. He found that admirable.

And, at the time, rare.

He also remembered another very pertinent thing about her. She was not part of the circle of girls he had found perpetually clustered around him. She was always off somewhere in the background. He’d catch her looking his way once in a while. Looking, but not joining.

He remembered wondering if she was shy.

He also vaguely remembered being intrigued by her. But there were so many more willing and available girls back then that he didn’t have time to find out what her story was.

Even though he’d wanted to.

And then he’d graduated and gone off to college.

But those brilliant blue eyes of hers, and that certain tilt of her head when she smiled—that he remembered. That stayed with him.

Now that all seemed like it had happened a hundred years ago, he thought, putting the tall container of coffee he’d bought at the coffee shop down on his desk. The person he’d been, that jock with the world at his feet—that was someone else from another lifetime.

The life he now had had begun when he’d been called out of his class at the academy and taken aside by the chief of police. The man—ironically the brother of the current Chief of D’s—had told him as gently as he could about his mother and brother’s deaths and what his stepfather had done to avenge Julio.

It had all taken place within a twenty-four-hour period.

Only twenty-four hours. And just like that, the light had gone out of his life.

Out of his world.

Avenging his family by taking down all the members of the cartel that he could seemed like the only reason for him to go on drawing breath. So he’d done just that. And he’d done it well.

And then, even that had been taken away from him.

The Chief was right. He’d had to flee or die. As if the latter mattered.

Every morning, he got up, wondering why. And yet, he did...and he found himself putting one foot in front of the other. And, these past few days, somehow arriving here. To work with a vibrant woman he pretended not to recognize.

Sometimes he wondered if all sense had left his world, as well....

Drawn back to the present, he couldn’t help but note that Kari was still out like a light. She must have put in one long night.

Rounding his desk, he came around to her side and lightly tapped his partner on the shoulder. When that didn’t seem to rouse her, he did it again, a little harder this time.

He was about to do it a third time—it was either that or yell in her ear—when Kari abruptly jerked her head up from her desk, as if suddenly aware of not being alone anymore.

She looked up at him and blinked, trying to focus eyes that were still somewhat blurry from lack of a decent night’s sleep. She was acutely conscious of his almost overpowering aura. That, and his intense blue eyes. With effort, she struggled to pull herself together.

“You spend the night here?” Esteban asked gruffly.

It was a rhetorical question. She was wearing the same thing she’d had on yesterday, so unless she was particularly attached to the light blue pencil skirt and jacket, she hadn’t gone home to sleep or even to get a change of clothes.

God, but her neck hurt, Kari thought as a razor-sharp pain speared through her. She rubbed her hand across the area, trying to get back a little feeling into it. She wasn’t having much luck. Kari stifled a gasp when she felt his hands on her neck, kneading and creating more tense muscles than he was eliminating. She pulled away.

“I’m okay,” she said a bit too quickly. The last thing she needed was having him touch her like that. “I guess I must have fallen asleep,” she muttered. She certainly hadn’t intended to do that when she’d sat down at her desk last night. She had only wanted to review a few things, but as usual, time had gotten away from her.

“Is that for me, or did you just decide to redecorate yourself?” he asked, allowing a glimmer of amusement to show through.

When she looked at him, obviously confused by his question, Esteban leaned over and plucked off the Post-it note that had somehow gotten itself attached to her forehead. He held it up for her to see.

There was nothing written on it.

“Using invisible ink again?” he drawled.

“Keep it,” she muttered. She didn’t recall writing a note to anyone. “Consider it a gift.”

He glanced down at the steaming-hot coffee on his desk. The lid was still on, but tiny whiffs of steam were escaping from the sides.

“Here.” He picked up the container and placed it on her desk. “I think you need this more than I do.”

Removing the lid, she proceeded to take the container into both her hands as if it held life-affirming liquid. She looked at it longingly, but refrained from taking that first sip.

Instead, she protested, “But then you don’t have one.”

“I can get one from the coffee machine down the hall. As long as it’s hot, that’s all that matters. Besides—” he nodded at the container she was holding “—that’s not my first one of the morning. And if it’s all the same to you, I’d rather you had my coffee than I had your bullet lodged somewhere in my torso because you were half-asleep when the gun went off.”

Having heard enough, she took a deep sip and then sighed contentedly. “And they said that chivalry was dead.”

“They,” Esteban replied as he headed out into the hallway to get a container of coffee to replace the one he’d just given her, “were right. This is a purely selfish move on my part. I figure I need to stay alive if I’m ever going to dance on Jorge Lopez’s grave.”

The name meant nothing to her, but she ventured a guess as he walked back into the room three minutes later. “Jorge Lopez. I take it that he’s the one who runs the drug cartel.”

“Yes, he is.” The answer was automatic. And then the significance of her rhetorical question hit him. “What do you know about the cartel?” Esteban asked suspiciously, watching her closely.

Still cradling the cup in both hands, Kari realized that she might have slipped. Was she supposed to know the drug lord’s name or not? She hated playing games like this.

Kari shrugged in response to his question.

“Same thing that everyone else does,” she answered. “That the cartel is evil and should be eradicated before all those vulnerable kids wind up either dead or getting hooked—or both.”

She’d almost blown it, Kari upbraided herself. She hadn’t made up her mind yet whether to tell him that she knew about his family and offer her condolences, or to just continue playing it by ear for the time being.

For now, she went with the latter.

“Why do you ask?” Kari said innocently.

His eyes held hers for a long, penetrating moment before he looked away. “No reason. Just thought maybe you’d heard something.”

She decided to push it a little further, since that was what she would have done under normal circumstances. “Like what?”

“Like me getting back undercover.”

He really wanted that, didn’t he? She felt bad for him. But she also knew that saying so was the fastest way of getting her head handed to her.

So instead, she cracked, “And give up this glamorous life where you can shower, shave and put on clean clothes in the morning? Surely you’re kidding.”

“Yeah,” he muttered, his voice a monotone. “Dunno what I must have been thinking. So why did you stay here?” he asked. She hadn’t given him an answer yet.

“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I thought that maybe if I stared at that board hard enough, and it was quiet enough, something I’d missed before might just come to me.”

He looked at her, mildly interested as he sampled his coffee from the vending machine. It was particularly bitter—but not particularly hot. It was hard not making a face.

“And did it?”

“Yeah—that I still have no idea what the connection is between these two victims.” There was frustration evident in her voice. “What we need,” she told him, “is more data to work with.”

“Maybe there doesn’t have to be a connection,” he suggested, setting the offending container of coffee down on his desk. “Maybe the killer just doesn’t like nice, retired people who try to make a difference. Maybe seeing them go about their lives makes him feel worse about himself.”

Kari looked at him, impressed. But then, she recalled, he’d struck her as being smart back in high school. A jock who not only actually studied for exams—but who did well on them.

“That sounds very philosophical,” she told him with a smile.

Esteban tossed off her compliment with an indifferent shrug. “Psych 101.”

“Hey, Hyphen, Fernandez...get in here.” Lieutenant Morrow stepped out of his office and called out to them.

Kari pulled herself up to her feet, waiting for the drained feeling to leave her. She handed Esteban back his coffee container. It was still half-full.

“Thanks,” she told him, nodding at the container. And then she indicated the lieutenant, who’d already gone back into his office and was waiting for them to follow. “I don’t think I like the sound of that.”

Esteban said nothing. Taking the container back, he left it on his desk standing next to its smaller, rejected brethren, and followed behind Kari to the lieutenant’s office.

Morrow didn’t bother closing the door, giving them the impression that they weren’t going to be in there all that long.

The impression was right.

“You got another one,” he announced the second Esteban was in the office.

She didn’t have to ask what he meant by “another one,” because she knew. Still, she could hope that he was wrong. “You sure it’s our guy?” Kari asked.

The look he gave her said he hadn’t gotten to where he was by making mistakes. “It’s him, all right. Throat slashed from behind.”

Kari asked the next logical question, since she was trying to establish just what the killer’s M.O. was. “Retired?”

Morrow looked at her, a puzzled furrow stretched across his brow. “What?”

“The victim,” Kari underscored. “Was she—?”

“He,” Morrow corrected.

Esteban surprised her by picking up the thread and asking the lieutenant, “Was he retired?”

The lieutenant shook his head. “Some of his coworkers found him at work when they came in this morning. That’ll give them nightmares for a long time,” he speculated. “He was an accountant,” Morrow added, then produced the all-important slip of paper and held it out to Kari. “Here’s the address.”

Kari looked it over before sliding the paper into her pocket. She really should have gone home last night and gotten a decent night’s sleep. That would have helped her more than finding out about Steve’s— Esteban’s—past, she told herself.

With a sigh, she looked in her partner’s direction. “Okay, let’s go.”

“Why the long face?” he asked as they walked out of the lieutenant’s office. “You said you wanted more data,” he reminded her. They stopped at her desk so she could pick up her purse.

She did and they were on their way. Only then did she answer his question.

“I meant more data about the other two victims. I didn’t want a third body to turn up.” That was the last thing she had wanted.

“Maybe you should have been more specific,” he told her.

Aghast, she shot him a look as they waited for the elevator to arrive. “What are you suggesting...that there’s a serial killer fairy or a homicide genie out there, granting me three wishes?”

The elevator arrived and they got on. Since there was no one else in it, they continued talking. “No, just something more along the lines of ‘careful what you wish for,’” he answered.

She was just punchy enough to see the merit in his argument. That alone convinced her that she needed more sleep.

“Well, if I did have three wishes...” she began.

“Yeah?” God help him, he was actually curious. Was this woman getting to him after all? He was going to have to watch that, not let himself risk opening up to her. You never knew who was listening, he thought.

“I’d wish my partner talked more to me.”

That made him laugh. “Again, careful what you wish for,” he warned.

“Why? Because you’re going to turn into a chatterbox and talk my ear off?” Now that was funny, she thought. “There’s more of a chance of me sprouting wings and flying—or our serial killer turning himself in and making a full confession,” she tossed in, “than you suddenly running off at the mouth.”

She had that pegged right, Esteban thought. “Hey, I’ve got an idea—why don’t you just enjoy the peace and quiet?” he suggested.

She pretended it was an honest question and gave him an honest answer. “Because peace and quiet make me nervous,” she admitted.

He laughed dryly, thinking she was joking. But one look at her face and he could see that she wasn’t. “That’s a new one.”

She could see by Esteban’s expression that he didn’t believe her. Having nothing to lose, she decided to set him straight.

“No, really,” she insisted. “When my surroundings are peaceful and quiet, I know that it’s just a matter of time before something happens to shatter that...and at least half the time, what shatters peace and quiet is really not a good thing.”

They got out on the ground floor and began walking to the exit and the parking lot beyond.

“So you catch yourself waiting and holding your breath until whatever you know is going to happen—” she paused, then said “—happens.”

In a way, they weren’t all that different, always expecting some sort of chaos, Esteban thought. That was the way he lived his life, as well.

“Easy to peg you for a Cavanaugh,” he commented. “Your family’s always in the thick of it, all that constant action,” he added in case she wasn’t following his reasoning.

“We like keeping busy and keeping the peace,” she told him.

“Or being in the middle of all the noise,” he countered, giving the general situation another interpretation.

She inclined her head, not seeing the need to challenge the point he’d just made.

“There’s that, too.”

* * *

Unlike the other two victims, the third victim—a Ronald Hays—was in his early forties and, according to the coworker that they interviewed, Hays was far too busy with his social life to volunteer for any sort of activity. “Don’t get me wrong—when they passed the hat around for Vera, Ron gave just like everyone else. Maybe even a little more,” he added after thinking it over.

“Vera?” Kari asked, waiting for some kind of an explanation from the man who claimed to be the deceased’s closest friend at the accounting firm.

The interviewee nodded. “Vera Wells,” he clarified, but the name still didn’t mean anything to her. “Vera’s husband was in a car accident, and the bills just went through the roof in record time. We took up a collection in the office to help her cover a little of what the insurance didn’t. Ron didn’t even stop to count what he was putting in,” he told them proudly, “just grabbed a handful of bills out of his wallet and slipped them all into the collection envelope.

“But he didn’t have time for stuff like coaching some Little League team or mentoring a kid having trouble in his math class.” The man laughed to himself as he recalled a specific incident.

“Remember something funny?” Esteban asked him.

The question, coming from someone like Esteban, instantly sobered the man being interviewed.

“Hell, when Ron got that jury summons in the mail, it put him in a bad mood for a week—especially when the boss told him his pay wasn’t getting docked, that the company looked favorably on that sort of thing.”

“Wait.” Kari held up her hand, trying to understand. “You’re saying he became angry because his pay wasn’t getting docked?”

“Yeah. He was going to use that not-getting-paid thing as an excuse for getting out of jury duty. But since the boss said it was his patriotic duty to go down for jury duty, he had to go. And he wound up getting put on a case, too.” The man paused to laugh, shaking his head as he began relaying more things about the incident. “I can tell you that really got him mad.

“Turns out, the case didn’t last all that long. It started to, but Ron told me he pushed through the deadlock, convincing everyone else that the guy was guilty. They voted to convict the guy and Ron hightailed it back to work.

“But you see, he just didn’t have time for volunteering and selfless stuff like that.” As if suddenly aware of the picture he’d just painted of the victim, the man’s friend quickly added, “But that really didn’t make him a bad guy.”

“No,” Kari agreed. “It didn’t.”

But what did? she couldn’t help wondering. What made Ronald Hays, Mae Daniels and William Reynolds “bad guys,” at least in the killer’s eyes?

That, she thought, was the question that needed answering.