Robert Crais - Free Fall

“Okay.”

“There was another man with Floyd, but I don’t know his name. He was a police officer, also.”

“What did he look like?”

“Bigger than Floyd, with very short hair. Blond.”

“Pinkworth.”

She nodded. “Yes, that’s right. Floyd called him Pink but I didn’t realize that was a name.” She was trying to be brave and she was doing a good job.

“Did Floyd threaten you?”

She nodded.

I said, “Did they hurt you?”

“Not really.” She made an uneasy smile, as if she didn’t want to say anything that would cause trouble. “He sort of grabbed me a little, that’s all. I think he’d been drinking.” When she said it, she sort of brushed at her right arm. She wore the sweatshirt with the sleeves pushed above her elbows and on her forearm where she brushed there were angry red marks, the way there might be if someone grabbed hard and twisted.

I touched her forearm and turned it to look at the marks and a sharp pain throbbed behind my eyes. I said, “Floyd.”

She took her arm back, and made a sort of dismissive laugh. “I don’t think he meant to. It just surprised me, that’s all.”

“Of course.” The throbbing pain was worse.

It was a nice apartment, with inexpensive oak furniture and the kind of large overstuffed couch and matching chairs that you would buy on sale at Ikea or Home Club. A Sony television sat on a long white Formica table opposite the couch, along with a lot of plants and a portable CD player. A little forest of photographs stood between the plants and Mark Thurman was in most of the photographs. Many of the shots were duplicates of ones I had seen in Mark Thurman’s album but many were not. An enormous stuffed Garfield stood sentry by the dining room table and a half-dozen smaller stuffed animals rested on the couch. Everything was neat and clean and in its proper place. I said, “Why don’t you sit, and I’ll get something for us to drink, and then we can figure out what to do.”

She shook her head. “I’m not helpless. Besides, the activity is good. Would you like a diet Coke or a glass of wine? I’ve got a Pinot Grigio.”

“The Pinot.”

She said, “You sit, and I’ll be right back.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She smiled and went into the kitchen.

There was a pass-through between the kitchen and the living room so you could see from one into the other. I sat in the overstuffed chair at the far end of the living room and watched her get the wine. Jennifer Sheridan stood on her toes to reach two flute glasses out of her cupboard, then put them on the counter beside her sink. She opened the fridge, took out the bottle of Pinot, and worked out the cork. The Pinot had been opened earlier and was missing maybe a glass. She worked with her back to me. I watched the shape of her calves when she went up onto her toes and the line of her thighs and the way the oversized sweatshirt hung low over her bottom and draped from her shoulders. She didn’t look so young from the back and I had to turn away to make myself stop looking at her. Jesus Christ, Cole. Portrait of the detective as a lecher. I looked at the pictures on the white table instead. Mark Thurman. Watching me. I crossed my eyes and made a face at him. Screw you, Mark. I looked at the Garfield, instead. Maybe you shouldn’t drink a six-pack of Falstaff before you visit a client.

Jennifer Sheridan came out with the two glasses of wine, handed one of them to me, and went to the couch. She must’ve seen me looking at the Garfield. “Mark won that for me. Isn’t it cute?”

“How nice.” I smiled. “Tell me about Riggens and Pinkworth. Tell me everything they said. Don’t leave anything out.”

She shook her head. “The other guy didn’t say very much. He just stood by the door, and every once in a while said something like ‘You oughta listen to him’ or ‘We’re only trying to help.’ ”

“Okay. Then tell me about Floyd.”

She sipped her wine and thought about it, as if she wanted to be very careful and get it right. As she told me she picked up a stuffed lion from the couch and held it. “He told me that Mark didn’t know they were here, but that he was Mark’s partner and he said that someone had to straighten me out because I was going to get Mark killed. I asked him to tell me what was going on but he wouldn’t. He said that I didn’t love Mark and I said that I did. He said I had a funny way of showing it. I told him to get out, but he wouldn’t. He said that I never should have hired you because all you’re doing is making trouble.”

“Floyd and I had a run-in today.” I told her about the Farmer’s Market.

She blinked at me. “You hit him?”

“No. I kicked him.”

She said, “Kicked?”

“Yeah. Like Bruce Lee. You know.”

“You can get your foot up that high?”

I spread my hands. “I am a man of profound talents.”

She touched her left cheek between the ear and the eye. “He had a bruise right here.” Sort of awed.

I spread my hands again and she smiled, maybe thinking how he had grabbed her. When she smiled I wanted to drop one wing and run in a circle. Guess we aren’t so mature, after all.

I said, “You don’t get four active-duty REACT cops on your tail unless they’re very scared of what you’re doing. They didn’t want me to know that they were on me, and now they know that I do, and they didn’t want you to know that something is going on, and now Riggens has come here and threatened you. They’ve been trying to control the program but that isn’t working, and things are beginning to fall apart. The gloves are coming off.”

She nodded, and looked thoughtful, like maybe whatever she was thinking wasn’t easy to think about. She said, “Was Mark there? At the Market?”

“No.” I was watching her. The thing that was hard to think about was even harder to say.

“He said Mark was in trouble. He said that they’ve been trying to help Mark, but that I was messing everything up and Mark was going to be hurt. He started yelling. He said maybe somebody ought to show me what it was like. I got scared then, and that’s when he grabbed me.” She suddenly stopped speaking, went into the kitchen, and came back with the bottle of Pinot. She added more to her glass, then put the bottle on the table. “Do you think Mark knew that Floyd was coming here?”

“I don’t know. Probably not.” The detective answers a cry for support with a resounding maybe.

“I asked him why he was doing this. I asked him to tell me what had happened or what was going on. I told him I would help. He thought that was funny. He said that I didn’t want to know. He said that Mark had done bad things and now they were fucked. I said Mark wasn’t like that and he said I didn’t know anything about Mark.” She stopped as if someone had pulled her plug, and stared into the forest of photographs.

I said, “And you’re scared he’s right?”

She nodded.

“You’re scared that you don’t know anything about Mark, and that if you find out, you might not love him anymore.”

She pursed her lips and shook her head, then looked directly at me. “No. I will always love him. No matter what. If he did something, it’s because he believed he had to. If I can help him, then I will help him. I will love him even if he no longer loves me.” She blinked hard several times, and then took more wine. I watched her drink, and I wondered what it would be like to have someone love me with that commitment and that intensity, and, in that moment, I wished that it were me.

I said, “Jennifer, did Mark ever mention someone named Lewis Washington?”

“No.”

“It might’ve been three or four months ago.”

“Maybe he said the name in passing and I wasn’t paying attention, but I don’t think so.”