Patterson Array - NYPD Red

Fitzhugh stood up. “Gabe? The extra? The guy with the Kawasaki Ninja? Are you out of your mind? Do you really think you’re going to get away with this?”

The Chameleon had no choice. He pointed the Walther at Fitzhugh’s chest and squeezed the trigger.

“Shit, shit, shit, shit!” he bellowed as Fitzhugh fell backward onto the desk chair.

If Lexi had an ounce of composure left, it was gone. “Are you crazy?” she screamed. “People outside heard that. He gave you the money. Why did you shoot him?”

“You told him my name!” Gabe screamed back.

“No I didn’t. I swear.”

Gabriel grabbed the other two stacks of bills and shoved all three into the pocket of his windbreaker.

Then he yanked Lexi by the arm and dragged her to the door.

“Mask,” he shouted.

They each pulled off their ski masks and left the trailer.

They walked east toward Broadway. Ten minutes later they were sitting in the last car of the downtown D train.

“I’m sorry, Gabe. I’m sorry,” Lexi said, tears running down her cheeks.

“Do me a favor,” he said, barely parting his lips as he spoke. “Just shut the fuck up.”

There was a large coffee and a box of Krispy Kreme doughnuts sitting on my desk with a note taped to the top.

Sorry about Spence. He means well. Xxx, K-Mac

Kylie was sitting at her desk munching on the last few morsels of a glazed doughnut. “I took one,” she said, washing it down with coffee. “The other eleven are all yours.”

“I appreciate the gesture, but don’t you think that’s profiling? Cops and doughnuts?”

“For the record, I did not give Spence your number,” she said. “He found it in my cell.”

“Did he share his theory with you, or shall I?”

“He laid it on me this morning,” she said. “The powers that be in Los Angeles come up with a devious plan to cripple film production in New York.”

“Devious and dastardly,” I said. “The kind of scenario where you definitely expect to see Lex Luthor.”

“I know it’s off-the-wall,” she said, “but at least you have to give him points for creativity.”

“Creativity? No wonder I can’t crack this case. Like an idiot, I’ve been trying to connect the facts.”

“That’s the difference between police work and the television business,” Kylie said. “As far as TV people are concerned, reality is highly overrated. They would never let it get in the way of their thinking.”

“Yesterday was only our first day working together,” I said. “But now that I have some insight into your husband, I’m wondering how many times a week you had to buy doughnuts for your former partners.”

“Believe it or not, you’re the first one Spence ever called.”

“I’m flattered. Sleep-deprived, but flattered.”

“You know Spence. He’s always been fascinated with cops, and he loves that you get to combine cop stuff with show business. He told me last night that you have the coolest job, and he’d trade places with you if he could.”

Spence Harrington wants to trade places with me? I didn’t know how to begin to respond. I never got the chance.

“Zach! K-Mac!” Captain Cates was striding toward us, barking orders as she walked. “Robbery-homicide, West Sixty-two between Columbus and Amsterdam.”

I knew the area well. It was a pretty quiet neighborhood. “What’s there?” I said.

Cates stopped in front of us. She looked like she hadn’t slept much last night either. “A film production trailer,” she said. “And a line producer with a bullet in his chest.”

Gabe and Lexi crashed through the front door, knocking over the brass umbrella stand that she had picked up at a flea market for twelve bucks.

They hadn’t spoken the entire subway ride home. They had walked in silence to the apartment building, him fuming, her sobbing.

When they got to the lobby, she just stood there waiting for the elevator, shoulders slumped, eyes red, spirit broken.

Finally she spoke. “You’re never going to love me again, will you?”

She meant it. That’s how her mind worked. You fuck up; you get abandoned. Her parents had done that to her.

“Don’t be…” He swallowed the word stupid. “Don’t say things like that,” he said.

The elevator doors opened. She stepped in and stood in the corner, tears streaming down her cheeks, hands clenched at her sides.

“Lexi,” he said, following her into the elevator, “what happened, happened, and I’m a little freaked about it, but I love you. I’ll always love you.”

If he thought that would cheer her up, he was wrong. Her body shook as she tried to hold back the anguish.

He had never seen her so despondent, and it cut him to the marrow.

He softened. “It’s okay,” he said, enfolding her gently in his arms. He kissed her forehead, her eyes, her salt-stained cheek, trying his best to comfort her.

She tilted her head up, and he gently touched his lips to hers. She sighed, parted her mouth, and he found her tongue. He reached down and clenched her butt, and she responded by arching her pelvis and forcing it against his.

He hardened.

The elevator door opened, and they stumbled down the hall, banging into their front door till he finally fit the key in the lock.

She was peeling off her pants and panties before the door had even shut behind them. Then she grabbed his belt and expertly undid the buttons on his jeans while he ripped off his windbreaker and threw it on the floor.

The bedroom was too far, and she turned away from him, leaning over a chair, hands flat on the table. He grabbed her hips from behind and entered her hard.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she whispered with every thrust.

“Shhh, shhh. It’s okay. It’s okay,” he said. “Don’t talk.”

It was powerful, raw; it was pure, primal, postmurder adrenaline sex. It was what he needed. What they both needed.

Lexi’s orgasms had always had their own sound track, and he held back until he heard the first familiar muted moan. Her pitch grew louder and more frenzied, and he finally let go, stifling his own screams as he climaxed in waves.

Eyes glazed, she slumped into his arms, and he carried her to the bedroom. They stripped off the rest of their clothes and made love, slowly, gently, without apologies.

When it was over, Lexi clutched a pillow to her chest and curled up in a fetal position. Gabe wrapped his body around hers and pulled the sheet over them.

The money, he thought.

The wads of hundreds were still stuffed into the pocket of his windbreaker. He had no idea how much there was.

It could wait.

“Driving like a maniac isn’t going to make our murder victim any less dead,” Kylie said as I drove balls out through the Central Park-65th Street transverse.

“I know,” I said, not slowing down. “I think it’s like getting addicted to a bad soap opera. I want to know what happens in the next episode.”

“So do I, but not enough to die in crosstown traffic. And for the record, ‘bad soap opera’ is redundant.”

We made it to West 62nd in under five minutes. There was a squad car from the 20th Precinct parked alongside the production trailer. A uniformed cop, Frank Rankin, was waiting for us outside the trailer.

“My partner and I got here two minutes ago,” he said. “The permit on the trailer says they’re part of the movie company that’s shooting at Fordham. The victim, according to the guy who called it in, is Jimmy Fitzhugh.”

“Did you or your partner go inside the trailer?”

“I did, but not too far. I didn’t want to contaminate the scene, but I wanted to make sure he was dead.”