Devil's Bargain

“Like I took a double-barreled shotgun blast to the chest,” Jazz said. “By the way, remind me to send thank you notes to the Kevlar people.”

“You’re taking it easy, right? Cardiac bruising’s nothing to take lightly.”

“I’m fine,” Jazz assured her. “No exertion for me for at least two weeks before they let me out of here. And then I’m on light duty for a month, they say.”

Lucia nodded and tucked her glossy straight hair back behind an ear, then walked over and seated herself. “They said you could have died. Commotio cordis. Sudden noninvasive impact to the chest, disrupting the heart rhythm.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t die,” Jazz said. She didn’t really want to talk about it, or about that moment when she’d felt her heart stop, or the light and the visions.

“You heard about the envelope they found at his house, right? The one postmarked yesterday morning?”

The killer—his name had been, prosaically, Dave Je

“Good thing he doesn’t check his mail,” Jazz said somberly.

“I think all this happened at the last minute,” Lucia said. “There was a voice mail on your cell phone telling you to check FedEx as soon as you got in, but it came while you were in the air.”

“Yeah, and I was a little busy panicking over the plane hurtling toward the ground,” Jazz said. “I’m guessing the people sending us the messages? Not Actors. At least, not Leads.”

“You think?” Lucia smiled slightly. “Presuming we buy any of this crap.”

“Presuming.”

Not that either of them would admit to it.

Jazz shook her head and let herself sink down on the pillows again. The world seemed soft-edged. Gentle. Quiet. Trees rustled outside of the hospital window and blended with the sound of turning pages as Lucia settled in with a book.

“Sleep,” she heard Lucia whisper, as her eyes drifted shut. “I’ll be here.”

Two weeks later, on the day she was scheduled to leave the hospital, Jazz had a new visitor. Lucia was gone to get the car; Borden had disappeared for a meeting with some attorney or other to go over paperwork. Even Ma

She supposed that meant he was improving. That, and the love bite on his neck that without a doubt must have come from the lips of Pansy Taylor. Who didn’t hate him.

She was getting her clothes together, heartily ready to get the hell out of the hospital, when the door opened behind her.

It was Ke

The KCPD detective leaned against the closed door for a couple of seconds, staring at her, and crossed his arms. “You don’t look so bad,” he said. “Heard you took one in the chest.”

She tapped her breastbone lightly. “Flak vest.”

“Heard you damn near shot the face off a baby-raper.”

She didn’t answer that one. She wasn’t happy with that memory, even knowing who the man had been, what he’d done. Even knowing that firing that shot had allowed a beautiful little girl to return safe to her mother.

There was no way to avoid seeing it, over and over again, in her nightmares.

“Bet you think you’re the golden girl, don’t you?” Stewart asked, raising his eyebrows. He looked pale and doughy and unpleasantly shiny, as if he’d been jogging. His eyes were open wide, his pupils too small. She’d always wondered if he took drugs. He never quite looked right in the head to her.

“Is there a point you’re going to get to, or are you just here to kiss my ass?” she asked. She wished she had a gun, because Stewart made her feel the lack, but of course that wasn’t possible in the hospital. Though she strongly suspected Lucia was always packing.

Stewart pushed away from the door and came toward her. “What’s the crap I’m hearing about photos that show McCarthy across town at the time of the murders?”

“It’s not crap,” she said, and folded up a black hoodie before stuffing it in her canvas bag. “They’ve passed every test. My partner also found one of the guys in the pictures. He’s willing to testify to their authenticity.”

“It’s crap,” Stewart repeated. He was closer now. She could smell a sharp, metallic scent coming off him, like gun oil and sweat. “I know exactly where he was. Pumping rounds into the backs of the heads of three people.”

“Pictures say different.”

He was way too close. In her space, trying to get her to react, and boy, she wanted to. She wanted to slam her fist into his face, but she knew better, knew he was waiting for it and besides, she’d promised the doctor she’d be good.

“The pictures are fakes,” he said softly. “I’m going to prove it. McCarthy’s not getting off on this one. Not ever.”

She gave him a slow, liquid smile. “Evidence is going before the court next Tuesday,” she said. “It’s exculpatory. The conviction’s going to be vacated.”

Stewart’s eyes flared heat, then narrowed. “Maybe he doesn’t make it to Tuesday.”

She almost hit him. Almost reached for his throat.

She said nothing.

Behind him, the door opened, and Jazz looked over his shoulder to see Lucia standing there, tense and ready. “Jazz?” she asked.

“I’m fine,” she said. “Detective Stewart was just dropping off—what was it you were dropping off?”

“Congratulations,” he snapped, and turned and walked away, brushing past Lucia as if she wasn’t even there.

Jazz let out a slow breath, tilted her head and got a similar wide-eyed look from her partner.

“Well?” Lucia asked.

“I think we’d better go warn Ben,” Jazz said. “Just in case.”

Jazz hadn’t given it much thought, really, about how much time Lucia had spent in and around Ellsworth during the investigation. How many times she must have dropped in to talk to McCarthy.

But when they sat down at the table in the visitor’s area—no claustrophobic booths here, it was just open plain tables with preformed benches, much more accessible—and McCarthy walked in from the prisoner’s door, the first one of them he smiled at was Lucia, and that look…

That was a look Jazz had never seen in his eyes before.

She glanced sideways at Lucia, who was staring back, and caught the same glint.

Well, she thought blankly. Huh. That’s…interesting. She couldn’t decide if it was interesting-bad or interesting-good. McCarthy had always been her territory, more or less…not in a romantic sort of way, but in a proprietary sense, anyway. He’d been her partner. Her friend.

She cut her eyes toward Lucia again as McCarthy walked over and slid onto the bench across from them. Yes, that was the look. A hungry look. Something open and—odd, for Lucia—vulnerable.

“Hey.” McCarthy nodded at Lucia, and then—with reluctance, it seemed to Jazz—transferred his smile to her. “Jazz. You look good. How you healing up?”

“Not so bad,” she said. “I guess there can’t be too many people who’ve taken it like that and lived to tell about it. Even with a vest.”

“Not too many,” he agreed. His hair had grown out more, and was curling on the ends. Silver threads gleaming all through it like hidden treasure. His eyes flicked over to Lucia again, as if he couldn’t keep them away for long. “But you’re taking it easy, right?”

“Yeah, yeah, everybody interrogates me about that. I’m fine, okay? How about you? How’s the arm?”

He extended and flexed it. “Healed,” he said. “Ribs, too. Collarbone’s still a little tricky, but it’ll do.”

“We want to make sure you keep them that way,” Jazz said. “Stewart came to see me this morning.”