FOUR
I TOOK STATE Street to the parking garage and idled at the entrance. There was a lot of police activity on the second level. I leaned out my window, took a ticket from the machine, and rolled into a ground-level spot.
“Stay here,” I said to Lula and Briggs. “I’ll go investigate and report back.”
I took the stairs and walked to the back of the garage, where cop cars were angle-parked and yellow crime scene tape was already in place. I spotted Joe Morelli standing inside the taped-off area. He’s part of the Crimes Against Persons unit, mostly working homicide cases, so someone was probably dead on the cement floor.
Morelli also happens to sort of be my boyfriend. He’s six feet tall and all lean muscle. He has a lot of wavy black hair, his brown eyes can be soft and sexy or hard and assessing, he’s got a dog and a toaster, and his grandmother is even crazier than mine. Today he was wearing a blue dress shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows, jeans, and running shoes. He had his Glock clipped to his belt, and his hands were on his hips as he stared down at the guy sprawled on the pavement.
I ducked under the crime scene tape and moved next to him. The guy on the ground was facedown in a pool of dried blood. He had a hole in the back of his head the size of a potato.
“Holy crap,” I said to Morelli, “he looks like he’s been shot with a cannon.”
“It’s the exit wound,” Morelli said. “Whoever killed him flipped him over. Half his brain is splattered on the silver Honda over there.”
A wave of nausea rolled through me, and I felt myself break out in a cold sweat.
“You’re kind of white,” Morelli said. “You’re not going to do the girl thing and faint, are you?”
“ ‘The girl thing’? Excuse me?”
Morelli grinned. “You’re such a cupcake.”
I sucked in some air and made an effort to settle my stomach. So big deal if I am a cupcake. Seemed to me it was a lot better than being a bagel.
“Who is he?” I asked.
“Tommy Ritt.”
“Oh boy. He’s one of Poletti’s poker buddies.”
“And you’re after Poletti,” Morelli said.
“Yes. That’s why I’m here. Poletti owns this property. I was hoping to find him holed up here in a Winnebago.”
“Sorry, I haven’t seen any Winnebagos.” He turned his attention to me. “Mike Kelly said he saw you with Ranger last night.”
“It was business.”
Morelli continued to look at me with what I call his cop eyes. They’re hard and unwavering. An emotionless stare he uses to extract confessions from killers in the interrogation room.
“Not going to work,” I told him. “I have nothing to confess.”
That got another grin. “You know all my tricks.”
I raised an eyebrow, and his grin widened.
“Randy Briggs showed up on my doorstep this morning,” I said. “He claims Poletti tried to run him down with his Mustang and took a shot at him. And then someone shot a firebomb into his apartment.”
“I heard about the apartment. I didn’t know it belonged to Briggs. What’s his connection to Poletti?”
“He was Poletti’s accountant.”
“Ow. Not a healthy job choice. Did Briggs stop by to tell you he was on his way to Argentina?”
“Something like that. I don’t suppose you have any idea where I might find Poletti?”
“Not at the moment,” Morelli said, “but I’ll let you know if something turns up. We’ll be looking for him too. He’s a person of interest in this shooting.”
“He’s driving a tricked-out black and silver Mustang. And he’s probably packing a rocket launcher.”
Morelli ducked under the tape with me and walked me to the stairs. “Bob misses you,” he said.
Bob is Morelli’s big orange, floppy-eared, shaggy-haired dog.
“I miss him too.”
Morelli pulled me behind a van and wrapped his arms around me. “How about me? Do you miss me?”
“Maybe a little.”
“The Yankees are playing Boston tonight. You could come over, catch the game, and spend the night.”
“No can do.”
“Okay, I’ll throw in a pizza.”
“Tempting, but no.”
“Working?”
“If only it was that simple. Briggs is staying with me.”
“You hate Briggs.”
I blew out a sigh. “I don’t hate him. I just find him enormously annoying. Poletti exploded his apartment. He needed a place to stay.”
The cop part of Morelli’s brain put the pieces together. “You’re using Briggs as bait to get Poletti.”
“I’d rather think of my generosity as a charitable act.”
“So why is this charitable act keeping you from spending the night with me?”
“I don’t trust him alone in my apartment. He’ll drink milk directly out of the carton and sleep in my bed.”
“Maybe I can arrest him for something, or you can get Ranger to shoot him. Nothing serious. A flesh wound that would send him to the hospital for a day or two.”
“Boy, you must really miss me.”
“It’s Bob,” Morelli said. “Bob’s desperate.”
Morelli slid his hand under my shirt, kissed me with some tongue action, and I felt heat rush through my stomach and head south. A cop on the other side of the garage yelled for Morelli, and Morelli broke from the kiss.
“Think about it,” Morelli said, stepping away, turning toward the crime scene. “Ranger would probably like the opportunity to shoot someone.”
I took the stairs to the ground level and returned to my Explorer.
“What’s going on up there?” Lula asked.
I put the car in gear and drove out of the garage. “Tommy Ritt is facedown on the cement, and his head has a big hole in it.”
“How bad is it?” Briggs asked.
“All the king’s horses and all the king’s men aren’t going to put Tommy Ritt back together again.”
“It’s Poletti,” Briggs said. “He’s freaking nuts.”
“Where we going now?” Lula asked. “I’m tired of sitting in this car with short stuff here. He’s kind of creeping me out in that wig.”
“I could take it off,” Briggs said, “but then Poletti might put a bazooka up your butt.”
Lula glared at him. “Is that a dig at my former profession? Because I wasn’t that kind of ’ho. That’s a specialty ’ho what does that.”
“Cripes,” Briggs said.
I took State Street to Stark Street and counted off blocks. The lower part of Stark wasn’t so bad, with legitimate bars, tenement-style apartment buildings, and mom-and-pop businesses. As the street went on it got progressively worse until it resembled a bombed-out war zone where only the rats and the crazies lived.