“You were jumping for joy.”
“Oh, yeah. Turns out you nicked an artery in the leg of one of those gang members. They got him to the hospital just before he would’ve bled out. Somebody had tried to stitch the wound with a sewing needle.”
“And that’s my fault?”
“Was it your bullet? Anyway, forget that. We got bigger fish to fry. Feds are thinking about charging you with use of a weapon of mass destruction.”
“Are you serious?”
“Ranger, you poisoned a whole section of the city with whatever spewed out of that crop duster.”
“I dropped a stink bomb.”
“That’s your defense?”
“How about the fact that it worked? Locals and Feds who spent the rest of the night interrogating me have reclaimed the neighborhood. You know what’s going on here as well as I do, D.W.”
Tepper continued to simmer, doing his best not to seem to see her point. “Oh yeah? What’s that?”
“I got it done when they couldn’t. And since when is skunk oil a weapon of mass destruction?”
“Since you dropped it on the city of San Antonio, Ranger.”
“I tried to play ball here, Captain. Took my intentions to Deputy Chief Alonzo, who practically spit in my face.”
“Speaking of which, you’ve looked better.”
Caitlin touched the bruises on her face, left by her fight with Diablo Alcantara, and tried to move the jaw he’d cracked with an elbow. Paramedics were pretty certain it wasn’t broken, but she was supposed to go for precautionary X-rays just to make sure. Her hands, too, were badly scuffed and bruised, knuckles swollen like those of the ex-boxer her father, Jim Strong, had busted, as peacefully as he could, when the retired fighter was having what he called one of his “episodes.”
“Good thing SAPD let me take a shower and change clothes,” Caitlin told him. “Otherwise, you wouldn’t be able to stand the smell of me, never mind the sight, thanks to that weapon of mass destruction.”
Tepper shook his head, easing into his mouth the second cigarette he’d tapped out. “You mean stink bomb?”
“Camouflaged the scene, to boot.”
“I’m sure you had the whole thing thought out.”
“As much as I could, under the circumstances.”
Tepper held up a cigarette lighter that looked more like a soda can, jerry-rigged with a computer lock to the top of his desk. He watched Caitlin shaking her head as he lit up.
“What, you need me to explain why I gotta keep a lighter so heavy it gave me tendonitis chained to my desk? Do you really?”
Caitlin settled back in her chair. “You want to kill yourself, D.W., that’s your business.”
“Then why do you keep stealing my cigarette lighters? You know what’s worse for my health than Marlboros? You. You and this Lone Ranger role you’ve fallen into. Problem being that every time your trusty horse, Silver, leaves shit in the streets, it tracks right back here.”
“No pun intended.”
“Huh?”
“Never mind.”
Tepper nodded, puffing away and making sure Caitlin could see the smoke. “That’s what I told the chief of police and the commissioner for public safety: Never mind. Never mind that Caitlin Strong had a crop duster buzz east San Antonio, contaminated a quarter of the city, and shot up a street. Never mind all that. She’s old school. One riot, one Ranger, just like she told Deputy Chief Alonzo. Right or wrong?”
“Wrong. Because there was no riot. That’s why I did what I did.”
“What you always do, Ranger,” Tepper said, with the cigarette holding to the side of his mouth. “Last night took Hurricane Caitlin to a whole new level. Forget hurricane, you’re a full-fledged tsunami now. They don’t name tsunamis, do they?”
“Guess there aren’t enough of them.”
“Lucky me, having one all to myself, then. You know that desk downstairs I refinished a couple weekends back?”
“The one where the varnish never quite dried?”
Tepper frowned. “It’s all yours, Ranger. Catch up on your paperwork until we get the mess you caused last night sorted out.”
“I don’t have any paperwork to catch up on.”
“Then catch up on mine—fitting, given that most of it is about you. Department of Public Safety wanted your head on a platter this time, but they ended up settling for your ass in a chair.”
“How nice of them.”
“Don’t worry. You can keep your gun. Just in case the office gets attacked by somebody likely gunning for you anyway.”
“Should I keep another weapon of mass destruction at the ready, too?”
“Long as it doesn’t stink up the place.”
*
Downstairs, Caitlin was still staring at the empty desk, which was chipped and sticky with undried varnish and set in a darkened corner of the first floor, when her cell phone rang. She leaned against the desk chair, listening to it squeak, as she answered the call.
“Hello.”
“Caitlin Strong?” a muffled male voice greeted her.
“Who is this?”