Ridley Pearson - The Angel Maker

She tried to pull her arm away, but it barely moved-ninety-five pounds of dead flesh. She felt too slow, too heavy to offer much resistance. She felt terrified. She felt marvelously content. She felt tired, incredibly relaxed. "You're going to be fine," he said in a fuzzy voice as if miles away.

Helpless. Powerless. Nothing she could do. Across the room she saw a shadow move along the floor and believed at first it was another effect of the drug, but realized all at once that it was her housemate and hoped that she might yet be rescued. Agnes came around the corner, her seventy-year-old blind eyes open wide in curiosity.

"Help!" Sharen forced out numbly. Loudly enough to be heard?

Had any sound come out at all?

The invasive warmth loosened every muscle. it felt like love. Pure and perfect love. Liquid love. Her eyes grew hot, and her lids fell like dark blue curtains. Agnes? Was Agnes out there? Anything but this, she thought. "Give me more," she felt like saying. "Sharon?" It was Agnes.

Sharon Shaffer struggled to open her eyes, but only managed one last fleeting glimpse of the woman's silver-blue hair and pale white skin. Someone was dragging her.

The last thing she heard was the doctor's angry whisper-like cracking ice-as he demanded of his accomplice: "Who the hell is that?"

Homicide Lieutenant Phil Shoswitz loved baseball. He arranged his working hours around Mariners' home games and captained the police softball team. One of his favorite and most overused jokes was that he was the only guy on the force who was a captain and a lieutenant at the same time. His office, which remained constantly cluttered with stacks of pending case files, since Boldt's last visit had become something of a combination baseball locker room/ museum. Its walls were crowded with autographed artifacts, photographs, and shelves of championship trophies.

As Boldt shut the door, one of the boys called outa warm greeting. You don't know how many friends you have, he thought, until you return to a place after a long absence. He hadn't realized how good how right-coming back here would feel. "Thanks for coming," Shoswitz said in his typically tense voice. "I know it's a Saturday, but this is important." He had a dark complexion, a long, thin face, and ever-vigilant eyes, not unlike the hardened criminals he dealt with so regularly. A high-strung type, he chose his clothes poorly and shaved too fast. Married once, he was a weekend father now-at least if he wasn't stuck with a Saturday rotation. He had been a fair detective but was a brilliant lieutenant. Some people were made for a position of authority and a series of endless meetings. "What are you and Matthews up to? First, she pays you a visit at The joke. Now I get some inquiry from a place called …" he checked a memo on his desk, "Bloodlines. A woman named Dundee is asking if we've got a cop named Boldt on our line-up. I in wondering: Do we?"

"What'd you tell her?" Shoswitz said, "That's not an answer to my question.,Is that why the stern face?"

"That's why."

"maybe we should get Daffy in here."

"maybe we shouldn't. She's a cop, Lou, but she's not an investigator. You're an investigator, but you're not a cop-not active anyway."

"Ergo: We make the perfect team," Boldt said sarcastically. "I decide the teams around here. I may manage from the dugout, Lou, but I manage. I don't need my players out on the field calling plays. Especially players who are sitting up in the stands, by choice."

"Foul ball," Boldt teased.

Shoswitz didn't appreciate it. "You learn to watch the foul balls. Sometimes they pull fair."

"Bloodlines was just a quick little question-and-answer session, Phil. If I hadn't said I was a cop … "What's Matthews working on, Lou?"

Boldt felt that sinking sensation of losing your balance when it's too late to do anything about it. He had committed to Daphne, but he didn't want that to be the same thing as committing to Phil Shoswitz. If he handled this incorrectly, he would end up back on the force but off Daphne's investigation-if she was even allowed to continue with the case. Shoswitz was a tough negotiator. Boldt gave him the details, starting with Cindy Chapman's appearance at the homeless shelter, up to and including the "coincidence" that four out of four names were in the Bloodlines' database. For now, he left out Dixie's matching tool markings, saving himself a trump card in case he needed it. He concluded, "You see why we were hesitant to bring this to you? We're a long way from any hard evidence. Bob Proctor wouldn't give me five minutes with what I've got." Proctor was the King County prosecuting attorney.

Shoswitz stared off blankly, deep in thought. He mumbled something about

"Matthew's responsibility to involve the department."

Boldt fired back, "You just said she doesn't qualify as an investigator-which is unfair, mind you, since she took highest honors at the academy." He suggested, "She only came to me because she knew I would listen objectively."

"Objectively?" he asked. "She doesn't want objectivity. She's into the overwork phase. She's going through 'mental pause." That incident with the knife set her way back. She's still not over it. You know how it goes: When you start to fight back you go too far. She's haunted by that incident. She wants to prove herself as a detective, wants to be more than a psychologist. She's itching to get out of the office and into the squad car. She tried to talk her way out of something and it didn't work, so now she wants it again, wants a chance to prove to herself that she's over it. I see what you're thinking," he added, heading Boldt off, "but it isn't that easy. I can't very well recommend her for another rotation when she's the only shrink on the force. That's her specialty-that's what we took her on for, even if she is qualified for investigations. Besides she hasn't asked for any kind of active duty., "What if she did? What if I signed back up on the condition that we be allowed to partner together on this harvester investigation? Fifty-fifty partners, no seniority on my part, but I would be there to help her out, maybe work her through this. At this Same time, she'd agree to continue to handle the more pressing aspects of her job as departmental psychologist. "You've thought this out, haven't you?" Shoswitz said. "I know you, Phil. If I sign back up, You'll yank me over to some murder-one ticket, and I'll never see this thing again."

What thing? You're the one pointing out the of evidence in this thing.lac@ Give me the manpower and authority to run with this. Give me a few weeks to come up with something to convince Proctor we have a case. If I can't, I'm yours-I'll see out my twenty."

"One week, no more."

"He's stealing organs, Phil. At least three kids are dead. The deaths are a direct result of his work, and that makes it multiple manslaughter, at least. How many more are there? I thought that was the point of Homicide. Three weeks."

"So it's hardball, is it?"

"Is it?"

"I want you back. That's no secret. I suppose that's half the problem," he said, allowing a rare smile. "But I'm not going to deal like this."

Boldt interrupted. "What a crock! You make deals like this every waking hour."

Shoswitz's face turned red and his nostrils flared. "Two weeks and that's final. Is this the new you?"

"Maybe it is," Boldt admitted. "I'm not feeling real 'new' at the moment, actually. Babies tend to make you feel ancient."

"You don't even have a formal complaint, do you? Is this on the books as a crime?" "I'm complaining," Boldt said, carefully avoiding the second answer. "The problem with you is you only see your side of things," Shoswitz said in a frustrated voice. "Now you're sounding like Liz."

This elicited a smile from the lieutenant, and Boldt could feel he had won. Shoswitz glanced over Boldt's shoulder. Boldt saw a flicker of distraction in the lieutenant's eye and knew before turning that it would be Daffy. He turned to see her coming at them like a freight train-no stopping her. A beautiful freight train at that. A nice engine. She opened the door without knocking. In a desperate voice she said, "A friend of mine's been kidnapped. I need your help." Pamela Chase climbed into her car, having decided on a drive because it was raining again and she couldn't stand it another minute inside her apartment alone. The occasional round-trip flight to Vancouver airport that she performed for Tegg did little to assuage her overall feeling of emptiness. Begrudgingly, she lived alone. Alone with her weight problem-with what she had come to think of as her ugliness.