Violets are Blue

Chapter 116

I finally got to rest up, to stop being a cop for a while. Kyle Craig was in a maximum-security cell at Lorton prison. The district attorney was confident there was more than enough evidence to convict. Kyle's expensive New York lawyer was screaming that he had committed no crimes, that he'd been framed. Isn't that amazing? The murder trial would be one of the biggest that Washington and the rest of the country had ever seen.

The thing was, I didn't want to think about Kyle, or his trial, or some other psychopathic killer anymore. I hadn't been to work in weeks, and it felt good. I felt real good. My ice pick wound was healing pretty well. The scar would be a souvenir. I was spending as much time as I could at home. I'd painted most of the house. I had been to two of Damon's concerts in a row. I was on a roll.

I was working on a jump shot with Ja

It was around eleven o'clock, and I was playing the piano on the sunporch. The house on Fifth Street was quiet, everybody sleeping except for me.

The phone didn't ring, and what a sweet, simple pleasure that was.

No one came to the door with bad news that I didn't want to hear right now or maybe ever again.

No one was watching me from outside, in the shadows, or if they were, at least they weren't being a nuisance about it.

I concentrated on getting into some songs by D'Angelo, and I was doing a pretty good job of it: "The Line."

"Send It On."

"Devil's Pie."

Tomorrow? Well, tomorrow was a big day too.

I was going to resign from the D.C. police force in the morning.

And something else, something good for a change: I thought that maybe I was falling in love.

But that's another story, for another time.