I wouldnt have let Fox catch this case. Then youd have no way in on it at all. As it is, youve just got to cool your heels for another few hours and you guys will be a team on it. He paused, and some of the anger went out of him. Between the two of you, youre the best Ive got in the area of organized crime. So lets let bygones be bygones and do our respective jobs here.
Raphael heard what Plattsmier didnt say. The case was going to blow wide open. The city of Philadelphia was on the verge of an ugly mob war. None of them doubted it.
Which made Plattsmier right. They had work to do.
Take her for now, like Fox said. Plattsmier thrust a thumb at the brunette.
Raphael glanced her way, and damned if she didnt do it again, that deep indrawn breath, that squaring of her shoulders. I have a name, she said stiffly.
Plattsmier wasnt impressed. He rarely was. Good, he said. Give it to him. He pointed at Raphael and left the room.
Raphael looked at Allegra. He wanted to talk to her. Allegra traveled in these circles. Shed probably know more about this murder than Charlie Eagan and his supporters had forgotten. And all of that information would be pertinent to the case.
Three more hours.
While he chilled, waiting for the clock to chime midnight, hed have to see what he could do with this shoulder-squaring brunette with the wild hair. Lets go into the kitchen, he suggested.
He went ahead of her. As Kate followed him, her chest began to hurt and it felt hard to get air. A man had just been killed! Shed held herself together, had called the cops, had kept that crazy blonde from ruining any evidence the authorities might need. Shed done everything right! And this cop, this Montiel, seemed to think it was all just some kind of reunion with his pal out there in the other room.
Kates stomach felt sour. If she didnt keep her hands tightly fisted, she knew they would begin to shake again. She bit back a groan as she stepped around the broken china on the floor and sat on one of the stools next to the kitchens center island. She was cold to the bone in spite of the heat. Maybe the dead guys air-conditioning had finally kicked on.
To keep her teeth from snicking together, she asked, What did you do?
Montiel glanced at her, then he poked his nose into the baking sheet with the potato thins. To Kates disbelief, he popped one into his mouth.
Stop that!
He looked at her again. What, youre saving them for McGaffney?
No! No, of course not. Its just
He watched her levelly. Kate found she couldnt explain why she was so appalled.
It was his irreverence, she decided. He stood there, not so much tallmaybe five foot elevenbut with the kind of presence that seemed to bleed life from everything else in the room. He had dark blond hair, golden really, and it was unkempt and too long. She doubted if he had shaved since morning. The T-shirt he wore, a well-washed and faded blue, was untucked. He had bottle-green eyes, but as he waited for her to finish her perusal they went to the color of the sea on a cloudy day. Theyd hold secrets, Kate realized.
Where had she gotten that from?
The answer was there beneath his infuriating indifference to what had just happened. It was at odds with it. Kate had never had a talent for nuances, except maybe in recipes. She had never been very good with people, or with reading them. Yet she felt a certain intensity beneath Montiels who-gives-a-damn manner.
Hed come to investigate a murder and he was eating her potato thins. But his eyes were darkening and turbulent.
What did you do? she asked again, more softly.
With what? he countered, moving on to munch a scallion.
What did you do to anger the commissioner so you cant work until midnight?
Doesnt matter. Were here to figure out anything you saw or heard tonight.
He was eyeing the one remaining filet now. Miss dinner? she asked.
That brought his gaze to her again sharply. What?
If youre that hungry, Ill reheat it. Theres nothing wrong with it. Its juststale.
Stale.
Prepared, then permitted to return to room temperature.
Permitted? Who used words like permitted in casual conversation? The fact that she did irritated the hell out of him. Coupled with the fact that he was exiled with her in the kitchen, it made Raphaels voice rough and gravely. I coldcocked Gregg Miller on Eyewitness News.
Kate felt something like shock move through her system, feather-light and cold. Shed almost forgotten her question. That killer? The one
The one, he agreed flatly. Then I caught a thirty-day suspension from Internal Affairs for my trouble.
Why? Why did you hit him?
What he did wasnt enough?
As near as Kate could remember, Miller had killed four women, had held the entire city in the grip of terror for the better part of a month. She hadnt really followed the news broadcasts all that closely. Between her catering business and her second job cooking at a diner, between all the chores one had to do in order to keep on top of life, thered been precious little time for her to peruse the media accounts of the murders. But she knew Miller had been preying on single women in their late twenties and early thirties.