The soap was listed as nontoxic, so he figured that would be okay. He’d skip the wax setting, though. When the bubbles came out, the stench improved, but Mingus tried to bolt. Peter had a good grip on the collar and almost got pulled into traffic. Soaked through himself, he had to tie the dog’s rope collar to the coin-op machine.
The soap smelled like plastic strawberries, but that was a definite improvement over the original stench. Mingus tucked his tail and cowered on the wet concrete as Peter used his own hairbrush on the dog’s matted fur. Maybe a haircut was the best solution. For both of them. He’d have to buy some clippers. He sure wouldn’t be using that hairbrush again.
Then back to the warm water, rinsing away the strawberry-smelling soap, talking gently. They were both shivering in the late-autumn air. When Mingus growled, Peter said, “Watch your manners, dog. I’d rather be somewhere else, too, but this has got to get done.”
The dog growled again. This time it was the tank-engine rumble, the sound that meant business.
Peter looked up to see a black Chevy Caprice roll slowly into the car wash. It had no city seal on the door, no light bar on the roof, but the tan municipal plates and folded spotlights by the side mirrors clearly marked it as a police car.
The driver parked in a way that would appear casual to someone who hadn’t run tactical missions in three countries. But the Caprice now blocked Peter’s truck from an easy exit. Unless he was willing to jump a high curb and crash through a fence in a restored forty-year-old truck with a custom mahogany cargo box. Which he wasn’t. Even with the bullet holes.
The cruiser door opened and Detective Lipsky unfolded his lean marathoner’s frame, surveying the scene. Peter remained crouched over Mingus. Hairbrush in one hand, collar in the other. Man and dog both soaked to the skin.
Lipsky looked down at him, those X-ray eyes surprisingly pale in the daylight. “I guess you really are a dog lover,” he said. “That’s illegal in fifty states, but I keep an open mind. You two need a little more private time?”
It didn’t look good, Peter had to admit. He said, “The dog didn’t mind the pepper spray, but I did.”
Lipsky wore a chocolate-colored topcoat over a moss-green blazer and dark blue dress pants, no tie. “Yeah, I took a nice long shower myself,” he said, crossing his arms comfortably. “In my own house. Where I happen to live. Suit’s already at the dry cleaner’s.” He glanced at Peter’s jeans and shirt, the same he’d worn two days before. “You do have more than one change of clothes, right?”
Lipsky was trying to get into his head again. This wasn’t the direction Peter wanted the conversation to go. “Any news on those license plates from the other day?”
Lipsky ignored the question. He gave Peter a steady stare, apparently done with the banter. “It wasn’t hard to find you,” he said. “I can tell that truck of yours from a mile away. You are still a suspect in that killing. And apparently a nuisance at UWM, you and that dog both. Your truck plate came in with a request for information.”
“I’m not hiding,” said Peter. “I have work to do. What about those license plates?”
Lipsky shook his head and watched the traffic. “The Impala turned up stolen, owned by a white kid lives on the south side. His dad called it in that afternoon. They found it in a parking lot at Mayfair Mall, with a couple of bullet holes in the rear end.” He said, “The other plate, the Ford SUV, I think you got the number wrong. The number you gave me is for a BMW sedan, not a Ford SUV. Owned by a dry cleaner in Brookfield, seventy years old. No record. I talked to the guy, said he hasn’t been downtown in years.”
Peter knew he hadn’t gotten it wrong. His face must have showed something.
Lipsky put a curious look on his face. Maybe it was even genuine. “What do you care about that Ford?”
Mingus whined. Peter went back to work with the hairbrush. “I told you the guy in that Ford almost ran me over, right? What really happened was he almost hit my dog. That’s why Mingus ran off that night. That guy was driving like a complete asshole. I wanted to have a talk with him about civic responsibility.”
“Mm,” said Lipsky, clearly not buying a word of it. He looked at Peter as if measuring him for a suit he knew wouldn’t fit. “Is that where you got that beautiful shiner? In a conversation about civic responsibility?”
“What, this?” said Peter, touching the multicolored bruise on his cheek. “Just a misunderstanding. Could happen to anyone.”
“A misunderstanding,” said Lipsky. “With a couple of ex-Army tough guys who got patched up at Saint Mary’s night before last, am I right? They gave the ER doc a line she didn’t believe.”
Again, not how Peter wanted the conversation to go.
The detective smiled. “I like to check the hospitals after a shooting,” he said. “See what might connect up.”
Mingus abruptly ducked his head and backed out of the wet rope collar, then dashed gleefully to the far side of the parking lot. After shaking himself thoroughly, he looked at Peter, tongue out in a canine grin.
“Shit,” said Peter.
Lipsky measured up the bruise with his X-ray eyes. “What happened, they call you a jarhead?”