Robert Crais: The sentry

"Businessman."

"Of course."

Pike expected her to ask what kind of business, but she returned his license. If she noticed a bulge where one of the two pistols he carried was hidden, she ignored it.

"Guess Mr. Smith is lucky it was you who happened by."

She gave him a business card.

"The detectives will probably call you, but this is my card. You think of anything in the meantime, call."

Pike took the card, and Hydeck left to join McIntosh at their radio car. Dru Rayne was with her uncle as the paramedics opened their vehicle. She clutched his hand as she spoke to him, and seemed very intent. Then she stepped away and the paramedics slid the gurney into their truck. Hydeck and McIntosh climbed into the radio car, flipped on their lights, and stopped traffic to let the ambulance leave. The paramedics headed toward the hospital. Hydeck and McIntosh turned in the opposite direction, already rolling to another call.

Dru Rayne watched the ambulance. She stared after it until the ambulance was gone, then hurried back to the shop. Pike didn't like the way she hurried. It looked like she was running for cover.

Pike said, "Why is he lying?"

She startled, making a little jump.

"You scared me."

Pike nodded, then thought he should probably apologize.

"Sorry."

She gave him another grateful smile, then went behind the counter.

"It's me. I'm jumpy, I guess. I have to go to the hospital."

"Why is he lying?"

"Why do you think? He's scared they'll come back."

"They've been here before?"

She turned off the deep fryers and put lids on metal condiment containers, speaking as she worked. Wilson sounded like a New Yorker, but her accent was softer, maybe because she was a woman.

"They live here, we live here, so we have to think about these things. People like that, they always come back."

"If you think they'll come back, you should tell the police. Hydeck knows what she's doing."

She cocked her head.

"I thought you were the police."

"No."

"You look like a policeman. Kinda."

"Just passing by."

She smiled again, then offered her hand across the counter.

"Dru Rayne. You can call me Dru."

"Joe Pike."

"Then that was extra nice, what you did, helping like that, Mr. Pike. Thank you."

They shook, then Dru Rayne turned back to her work, speaking over her shoulder.

"Now, I don't want to be rude or anything, but I have to get this place locked up so I can get to the hospital."

Pike nodded, thinking there was no reason he shouldn't leave, but he didn't. He clocked her hand. No wedding ring.

"Would you like me to take you?"

"That's all right, no. But thank you for offering."

Pike tried to think of something else to say.

"Talk to the police."

"We'll be fine. You don't know my uncle. He probably called them names."

She flashed a warm smile, but Pike knew she wasn't going to tell the police any more than her uncle.

She stacked the metal containers, then carried the stack into the back room. When she disappeared, Pike wrote his name and cell number on an order pad he found by the cash register. He wrote his personal cell number, not the business number he gave the police.

"I'm leaving my number. You need me, call."

She was still in the back.

"Okay. Thanks again."

Pike returned to his Jeep, but did not leave the scene. He found the service alley that ran behind Wilson's sandwich shop, and waited at the far end. A few minutes later, Dru Rayne came out, locked the door, and hurried to a silver Tercel. It was an older model with paint scraped from the rear bumper, and it needed a wash. Pike thought she looked worried.

He sat in the Jeep for a while, then got out and walked the length of the block, first in the alley, then on the sidewalk. He took in the people on the sidewalks and in the stores, and the rooflines of the surrounding buildings. He studied the people behind the wheels of the passing cars, thinking about what she had said: They always come back.

Pike was across from the gas station when a maroon Monte Carlo slow-rolled past with the windows down. Two young men were in front, with a third in back, all three showing gang ink and jailhouse faces. They stared at Pike as they passed, so Pike stared back.

The man in the back seat made a gun of his hand, aimed, and pulled the trigger.

Pike watched them go, thinking how Dru Rayne had run for cover.

They always come back.

No, Pike thought. Not if they fear you.

Way it worked for anyone else, Officer Hydeck would inform her watch commander that the victim and suspect were en route to the hospital. Her watch commander would relay this information to the Detective Bureau duty officer, who would dispatch detectives to the hospital, where they would speak with Smith and Mendoza, and likely the paramedics. If Mendoza ID'd his accomplice, their case would be made. If Mendoza refused to cooperate, the detectives would call Pike to arrange an interview. They would ask to drop by his home or place of employment, or arrange to meet at a mutually agreeable location, everything low-key and friendly. This was the way it would work if Pike were anyone else, but Pike knew it would work differently for him. Someone would recognize his name, and what the investigators did and how they approached the case would be different.

Pike was correct.

Eight hours, twenty-seven minutes after Pike eyeballed the maroon Monte Carlo, he returned home to find two detectives in his parking lot. Pike lived in a gated condominium complex in Culver City, not far from the scene of the assault. The condos were bunched in four-unit quads, and laid out so two or three quads shared their own parking lot. Entry to the complex required a magnetic key card to open the drive-through gate, but here they were, a male and a female detective waiting in a predictable tan Crown Victoria.

They climbed out of their car as Pike pulled in, and were waiting with their badges when he stepped from the Jeep. The man was in his fifties, with a fleshy face, thinning red hair, and a blue summer-weight sport coat. The woman was fifteen years younger, with raven hair, black eyes, and a navy pants suit that hung as if she had recently lost weight. Her gun dimpled the coat at her waist, and she stood with her hand floating close as if she might have to draw. Nervous. Pike wondered what she had heard about him that left her so afraid.

The older detective nudged the woman, showing her an exhibit at the zoo.

"Joe Pike."

Then, louder, to Pike, as if Pike was an animal who had been oblivious to the nudge.

"When they said it was you, I thought, well now, if he doesn't shoot me, this one will make my day."

The way he said it made Pike look closer. He now seemed familiar, but Pike did not recognize him.

The man held his badge higher, making sure Pike saw.

"What, Pike, you don't remember me? Jerry Button, from Rampart. Out of Pacific Station now. This is Detective Futardo. We're here on the Smith assault, so no shooting, okay? Don't shoot us."

Rampart brought back the name, but this Jerry Button looked almost nothing like the sharp young officer Pike remembered. This Button was thirty pounds heavier, with blotchy skin and puffy eyes. That Jerry Button had gone through the Academy a couple of years ahead of Pike, and was a fast-track patrol officer in Rampart Division when Pike was a boot. They had been friendly, but not friends. Button had shunned him when Pike resigned, but most of his fellow officers had. Pike couldn't blame them.

Pike read their ID cards, more than a car-length away. Futardo was a D-1, which told Pike she was new to the Detective Bureau and fresh out of a car. Button was now a Detective-3, which was a senior grade usually held by supervisors. A D-3 was too much horsepower for a simple assault.