But it wasn’t darkness. It was Mumford’s midsection, blocking the pipe opening on the other side of the culvert. She knew that she’d just blasted three bullets into him.
He collapsed, disappearing from view.
Eve rose to her feet, aiming her gun over the roadway, and saw Mumford on his back in the culvert. He was gurgling, his gun out of reach of his grasping fingers. She looked over her shoulder and saw Duncan, Ross, and Clayton coming down the hillside against the backdrop of a dark sky roiling with smoke and flame.
They’re alive.
She holstered her gun, lifted herself out of the culvert, crawled across the roadway, climbed back down into the trench, and made her way over to him.
Mumford was hit in the thigh, stomach, and chest. She guessed that he must have caught the last bullet as he fell. Blood seeped out of his leg, bubbled out of his mouth, and trickled out of his nostrils. He was bleeding out externally and drowning in his own blood internally at the same time. He was conscious, but couldn’t speak, his eyes wide with terror.
Eve got on her knees beside him in the muck and blood, took his trembling hand in hers, and looked into his eyes. He weakly gripped her hand, afraid of what was coming next. She held his hand tight, making sure he knew that he wasn’t alone, that she’d stay with him until the end.
It came an instant later. His hand went limp, his pupils became wide and black, and his body seemed to deflate, like a punctured air mattress.
She’d killed him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
In the wake of Michael Green’s murder, Grayson Mumford’s killing, and the explosion that shattered windows throughout Craftsman’s Corner and burned down two buildings, a hillside, and two estates in Hidden Hills, Captain Roje Shaw accepted responsibility for the debacle and wisely took an early retirement.
No civilians were injured or killed in the blast. But Duncan broke his left arm and opened the wound on his face again. A piece of metal punctured Ross’ left side, narrowly missing his heart, and had to be surgically removed from one of his ribs. And Eddie Clayton broke his sunglasses.
Eve was immediately placed on leave, very much against her will. The Officer-Involved Shooting investigation unit determined the shooting of Grayson Mumford was justified, but the department psychologist, who Eve was ordered to see, declared that she needed to take some time off to cope with the psychological toll of the killing.
But a vacation was the last thing Eve wanted. She’d had enough of that already over the last few months while recovering from the injuries she’d sustained on her first two major cases.
She’d only suffered some lacerations, some nasty bruises, and a ruptured eardrum, so she felt that she wasn’t really wounded this time. Not physically anyway and, as long as she kept busy, she wouldn’t be emotionally, either.
That’s why at the start of her second week of involuntary leave, she took an early-morning flight to Raleigh, North Carolina, rented a car, and drove straight to Durham for a very late lunch at Edna’s Chicken and Waffles.
The place was downtown, on the ground floor of an old art deco–style building that was once a Kress department store, the name still etched into the stone. The dining room was packed with Duke University students in logo clothes, retirees, and a couple of uniformed Durham police officers.
Edna’s was famous for buttermilk fried chicken, waffles, and biscuits, all slathered in flavored butter and maple syrup and drizzled with candied pecans. It was death on a plate, but that was basically all there was on the menu—only the choice of butter and waffle flavors, types of drizzles, and the number of pieces of chicken changed.
Her waitress was an attractive young woman whose bottle-blonde hair and pale-white skin stood out among the largely African American staff and clientele. She could have been a college student working her way through school, waitressing between classes to take some of the financial burden for tuition, room, and board from her parents. Or a single mother struggling to support her child by working three jobs. Eve had a vivid imagination.
“What can I get you, ma’am?” the waitress asked. The “ma’am” sounded awkward somehow coming out of her mouth.
“I’ve never had fried chicken and waffles before,” Eve said. “Should I have it with the cinnamon butter, the maple syrup, and candied pecans on top or on the side?”
“Slather it all on. Go for the full experience,” she said. “Trust me, it’s delicious.”
“You talked me into it. How many times a month can you eat here without having a heart attack?”
The waitress motioned to an old couple. “I’m told that they’ve been coming here just about every day for years and they seem to be doing fine.”
“How about you? Was the six pounds of grease, salt, carbs, and sugar a shock to your system the first time?”
The waitress laughed. “On the contrary, it’s Southern Crack. You’ll be back again for dinner and again for breakfast in the morning. You’ll have to wean yourself off of it.”
“How long does it take?”