“He’ll be okay, Morgan.” Casey’s reflection in the glass was stern, but his voice was gentle. “You okay listening to this?”
“Yeah, ’cause no one listened to him before,” Kane replied. “Because the someone listening to him now is me… and Sanchez. This is fucked up. This kind of shit happens to him, and we’re putting it out in front of him like it’s nothing.”
“This isn’t nothing, Morgan,” Casey snapped back. “Sanchez is damned good at what he does. He knows how this goes down. He’s doing well with the kid. You said it yourself. There’s no way you can sit across of St. John and ask him these questions. Where does that leave me when I’ve got a cop that can’t do what needs to be done because he’s got a thing for a suspect?”
“He didn’t do this,” Kane said, shaking his head. “He didn’t kill Shing. I don’t know who did, but it wasn’t Miki St. John.”
“Willing to risk your badge over that? Because from where I’m standing, that’s what you’re doing.” The man stabbed his finger at Kane’s chest. “You’re letting your dick lead you around, Morgan. I don’t like it.”
“It’s not my dick, Loo.” He tightened his mouth and stared at the men sitting behind the one-way glass. Miki was trembling but holding his own, almost robotically going through the pictures, but there was a gleam of something insane lurking at the edges of his eyes. “This is fucking killing him. Whoever murdered Shing was angry. You saw the body. St. John doesn’t have that kind of rage inside of him. And there’s no fucking way he could have lifted up Shing’s body and dumped it in his own car.”
“People do strange things,” Casey said, shrugging. “Maybe Shing came over to his house to shake him down for money. ‘Give me a million dollars or I’ll tell the tabloids you were a whore?’”
“Shing couldn’t have done that without implicating himself,” Kane pointed out. “Miki was underage. Hell, he was barely into puberty. What Shing did was wrong, and someone he did it to probably killed him for it, but that someone wasn’t Miki.”
“You’re going to have to shake out the foster father,” the lieutenant rumbled. “Tried to have the uniforms pick him up, but he went to ground.”
“I’ve got people looking for him.” He shifted on his feet and leaned against the glass again. “I’m wondering if Vega didn’t do Shing and leave him in Miki’s car as a warning. That could be the money angle. ‘This could be you if I don’t get my cash.’”
“Any sign of a blackmail threat?”
“No, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen,” Kane replied. “He’s good at keeping secrets. He might have kept that one. I’ll work on him.”
“You do that,” Casey agreed. “In the meantime, get your arms around Vega. He might become a victim in this like Shing did. He might not be the murderer. We have to work that angle too.”
“Last thing that guy is now is a victim,” Kane growled. “We hunt down Carl Vega and do what? Protect him from whoever’s doing this shit? I’ve got to put Miki in front of him and say what? ‘Yeah, sorry about your screwed up childhood, but we need to take care of the man who hurt you because someone might kill him too?’ If whoever got Shing came for Vega, if I wasn’t a cop, I’d say we let the guy finish the job.”
“You’re better than that, Morgan. You know that.” The Lieutenant nudged Kane around until the man faced him. “You’re too close to St. John. I’m tempted to yank you from this case.”
“It’s not like that—”
“Damned if it’s not,” Casey cut him off. “You start something with St. John and it compromises this case, I’ll have your ass. Do you understand me, Morgan?”
The lieutenant didn’t wait for him to answer. Casey grunted and quit the room, leaving the door open behind him. Kane rocked back on his heels, his hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans, and watched Sanchez gather up the printouts he’d shown Miki. The singer remained seated, his arms tense from gripping the chair’s sides.
He looked shell-shocked, his hazel eyes open wide enough to dominate the rest of his face. The lips Kane lusted for were now bleeding from Miki’s teeth worrying at them, and his tongue dabbed at the chap, playing at the raw spots. His damp hair had dried to a tousle around his face, falling down in a straight line to his jaw, and Miki tucked a length behind his ear to get it out of his eyes.
Sanchez whispered something to the young man that Kane couldn’t hear, but Miki nodded and stood, nearly stumbling back down to the ground when his weight shifted to his right leg. Sanchez reached for him, but Miki yanked his arm away, holding up a hand to ward off the cop while using the other to brace himself against the table.