McBain, Ed - Killer's Wedge

"Would it be better to sacrifice every man in this roon, on Steve's altar?"

"Stop that talking over there," Virginia said.

"Get on the other side of the room, Lieutenant! You, Shorty, over here! And you get in the corner, Redhead."

The men split up. Angelica Gomez watched them with an amused smile on her face. She rose then, her skir sliding back over a ripe thigh as she did. Swiveling his;

Dodge sat chastely with her gun and her bottle of tr( glycerin. Hawes watched them.

He watched partially because he was mad as hell at the Skipper and he wanted to figure out a way of putting Virginia Dodge out of commission. But he watched, too, because the Puerto Rican girl was the most delicious-looking female he had seen in a dog's age.

In his own mind, he didn't know whether Angelica's buttocks interested him more than did the bottle of nitro on the desk. As he toyed with various plans for the bottle of nitro, he also toyed with various fantasies concerning the blonde's explosiveness, and as he fantasized he found that Angelica Gomez was more and more delightful to watch. The girl moved with contradictory economy and fluidity, slender ankle flowing into shapely calf and knee, hip grinding, flat simplicity of belly, firm rounded thrust of breast, sweeping curve of throat and jaw, aristocratic tilt of nose. She seemed absolutely at home within the specified confines of her body. It was a distinct pleasure to watch her. She was perhaps the most unselfconscious female he had ever met. At the same time, he reminded himself, she had slit a man's throat. A nice girl.

"Hey, ees that really a born'?" Angelica asked Virginia.

"Sit down and don't bother me," Virginia answered.

"Don't be so touchy. I only ask a question."

"It's a bottle of nitroglycerin, yes," Virginia said.

"You gon' essplode it?"

"If I have any trouble, yes."

"Why?"

"Oh, shut up. Stop asking stupid questions."

"You got a gun, too, hah?"

"I've got two guns," Virginia said.

"One in my hand, and another in my coat pocket.

And a desk drawer full of them right here."

She indicated the drawer to which she had earlier added Willis' gun.

"You minn business, I guess, hah?"

"I mean business."

"Hey, listen. Why you don' let me go, hah?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Why you don't let me walk out of here?

You run the put a wedge here, no? Okay. I walk out.

(Jkayr "You stay put, sweetie," Virginia said.

"Por que? What for?"

"Because if you walk out of here, you talk. And if you talk to the wrong person, all my careful planning is shot to hell."

"Who I'm gon' talk to, hah? I'm gon' talk to nobody. I'm gon' get the hell out the city.

Go back Puerto Rico maybe. Take a plane.

Hell, I slit a man's throat, you hear? All thees snotnose kids, they be after me now. I wake up dead one morning, no? So come on, Carmen, let me go."

"You stay," Virginia said.

"Carmen, don' be ..

"You stay!"

"Suppose I walk out, hah? Suppose I jus' do that?"

"You get what the cop got."

"Argh, you jus' mean," Angelica said, and she walked back to her chair and crossed her legs. She saw Hawes' eyes on her, smiled at him, and then immediately pulled her skirt lower.

Hawes was not really studying her legs.

Hawes had just had an idea. The idea was a two-parter, and the first part of the idea-if the plan was to be at all successful- had to be executed in the vicinity where the Puerto Rican girl was sitting. The idea had as its core the functioning of two mechanical appliances, one of which Hawes was reasonably certain would work immediately, the other of which he thought might take quite some time to work if it worked at all. The idea seemed stunning in concept to Hawes and, fascinated with it, he had stared captured into space and the focus of his stare had seemed to be Angelica's legs.

Now, taking advantage of the girl's presence near the first of the appliances, realizing that Virginia Dodge had to be diverted before he could execute the first part of his plan, he ambled over to where Angelica sat and took a package of cigarettes from his shirt pocket.

"Smoke?" he said.

Angelica took the proffered cigarette.

"Much as gracias," she said. She looked up into Hawes's face as he lighted the cigarette for her.

"You like the legs, bali, cop?" she said.

"Yeah, they're good legs," Hawes agreed.

"They dam' good legs, you bet," Angelica said.

"You don' see legs like thees too much. Muy bueno, my legs."

"Muy," Hawes agreed.

flatly, emotionlessly, Angelica Gomez said, "How you like to see the res' of me?"

If the phone rings, Hawes thought, Virginia will pick it up. She's listening in on conversations now, and she sure as hell won't let one get by her, not with the possibility that it might be Steve calling. And if her attention is diverted by a phone call, that'd be all the time I'd need to do what I have to do, to get this thing rolling so that the big chance can be prepared for later on.

Assuming she acts impulsively, the way people will when they're well, we're assuming a lot. Still, it's a chance. So come on, telephone, ring!

"I ask you a question," Angelica said.

"What was the question?"

"How you like to see the res' of me?"

"It might be nice," Hawes said.

His eyes were glued to the telephone. It seemed to him that during the course of the day, the telephone usually rang with malicious insistence every thirty seconds.

Someone was always calling in to report a mugging or a beating or a knifing or a robbery or a burglary or any one of a thousand offenses committed daily in the 87th. So why didn't it ring now? Who had declared the holiday on crime? We can't stand a holiday right now-not with Steve waiting to walk into a booby trap, not with Miscolo bleeding from a hole the size of my head, not with that bitch sitting with her bottle of nitro and her neat little .38.

"It be dam' nice," Angelica said, "an' that's no bull. You see my bosom?"

"I see it."

Come on, phone! He could hear Angelica's words, and they drummed in his ears, but his ears were straining for another sound, the shrill sound of the telephone, and the squad room seemed to be an empty vacuum waiting only for that single sound.

"Iss my real bosom," she said.

"No bra. I got no bra on. You believe it?"

"I believe it."

"I show you."

"You don't have to. I believe it."

"So how 'bout it?"

"How about what?"

"You talk to the others, you let me go.

Then you come see me later, hah?"

Hawes shook his head.

"No dice."

"Why not? Angelica some piece," Angelica said.

Hawes nodded.

"Angelica some piece," he agreed.

"So?"

"Number one. You see that lady sitting over there?"

"She's not letting anyone out of here, some piece or not. Understand?"

"Si. I mean when she iss gone."

"If she is ever gone," Hawes said.

"And then I couldn't let you go anyway because that man standing over there near the bulletin board is thee lieutenant in charge of this squad. And if I let you go, he might fire me or send me to prison-or even shoot me."

Angelica nodded.

"It be worth it," she said.

"Believe me. Angelica some stuff, believe me."

"I believe you," Hawes said.

He did not want to leave the girl because he had to be in her vicinity when the telephone rang, if it rang, wouldn't the damn thing ever ring? At the same time, he sensed that their conversation had reached a dead end, had come as far as it could possibly go. Stalling for time, he asked a timeless question.

"How'd you get to be a hooker, Angelica?"

"I no' hooker," she said.

"Really."

"Now, Angelica," he said chidingly.

"Well, sometimes," she said.