P Tracy - Play To Kill aka Shoot To Thrill

Annie closed her eyes.

'Don't, Annie,' Grace said quietly. 'You'll miss who she is.'

The woman sat curled on the pebbled surface of the parking lot, watching the knife swish back and forth, closer and closer to her neck, but by God she wasn't going to give this bastard the satisfaction of seeing her terror, and when the moment came, her cowboy-booted foot kicked out and connected between her assailant's legs, and with his squeal of pain a triumphant exhalation spilled out of her mouth.

'God DAMN you stupid smelly BITCH!'

And now Grace closed her eyes, because she'd already seen what came next. She'd already seen the flash of the knife at the woman's throat and the spill of blood that flooded her neck, and she didn't want to see it again. Ever.

The screen went black, and no one said anything for a long moment. Finally, Agent Smith turned away from Grace's station and walked back toward the table by the window that had become his place. 'I'll call Medford,' was all he said. He used the landline, and when someone answered, he put it on speaker. 'This is Special Agent Smith of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. I'd like to speak to the officer in charge.'

'You got him,' a gravelly voice replied. 'Chief Frost here, and – mister, I've got my hands full this morning. Can I get back to you?'

'I don't think so, Chief Frost. I'll fill you in on the back story later; for right now, I'm advising you of a homicide committed in your district last night at a place called Chesterfield's.'

There was silence on the other end of the line for a long moment. 'Who did you say you were?'

'Special Agent Smith of the-'

'I'm going to have to verify that with a callback to your office.'

Smith winced. 'I'm not actually in my office at the moment…'

'Uh-huh. Well, where are you now, Mr. Smith? Perhaps we could meet and have a little talk in person.'

Smith never lost his temper. You weren't allowed to do that in the Bureau, but this yahoo was wasting precious time…

'He thinks you're a nutcase,' Grace said.

'Or the killer,' Annie added.

Grace picked up the receiver on her phone. 'Chief Frost?

This is Grace McBride of Monkeewrench in Minneapolis. We sent you a copy of our software two days ago.'

'Oh, hey. Yeah. It was delivered yesterday. Thanks for that. But I'm a little confused here. First I'm talking to some guy claiming to be a Fed, now somehow you're on the line…'

'He is a Fed, Chief. He's in our office and we have you on speaker. We're working with the Bureau on some homicides with a Web connection, and we just finished watching a film of a murder in the parking lot of Chesterfield's.'

You just watched the film? You mean, like, a movie?'

'It's on the Internet.'

'Okay, sorry, but this is a little hard to believe…'

Grace closed her eyes. 'The woman was tied to the front bumper of a Ford Tempo and her throat was slashed.'

'Jesus.'

'Listen, Chief, we'll e-mail you the details as soon as we hang up, but right now you need to get your men out there to contain the murder scene while it's still fresh, and Agent Smith wants the local FBI in on the investigation.'

Chief Frost sighed and cleared his throat. 'I got no problem with the Feds joining in, but there's no murder. There was an attack, but the woman survived, at least so far. She's in ICU, hanging on by a thread – and I want a copy of that film right now.'

The downpour had finally stopped and the sun was peeking out between the lingering shreds of storm clouds by the time Gino got his return call from Ole Olssen. They started out the conversation by continuing their recipe argument, which didn't sound like it would end anytime soon, so Magozzi took the opportunity to get up and move his body.

He was almost to the front door of City Hall when Chelsea Thomas suddenly hurried in, carrying a laptop. She was wearing her hair down today, and there were streaks of platinum in it that he hadn't noticed yesterday when it had been coiled up in a bun. She caught sight of him and gave him a slight smile, but her eyes were troubled. 'Do you have a moment?' she asked without preamble.

'Of course.'

Her expression turned sheepish. 'First of all, I'm really sorry about last night…'

'I'm not.'

'I've never been able to hold my liquor. It's one of my many flaws.'

'Some men might consider that an asset.'

The smile flashed, then disappeared again. She was FBI this morning. 'Is there someplace private we could talk?'

'Would an empty interrogation room work?'

'Perfect.'

Gino was still talking to Ole Olssen as the pair passed through Homicide, and his brows shot up curiously when he saw Chelsea. 'The guy on the phone is my partner, Gino Rolseth.'

Chelsea gave him a little wave, and Gino beamed at her, the way he always did whenever he saw a pretty face. 'He needs to be in on this.'

Magozzi raised his brows, then pointed at Gino and jerked his thumb toward the interrogation room. Gino held up one finger and nodded. As they settled into chairs and waited for Gino, Magozzi said, 'I was actually going to call you. I assume you know that Monkeewrench found pre-posts on all five of your murders, plus our river bride and two more you don't have bodies for yet.'

She folded her lips together and glanced at the doorway. 'Things are changing fast, but I'd like to wait for your partner so we only have to do this once.'

Gino appeared in the doorway, approached Chelsea with his hand extended. 'Gino Rolseth. And you're FBI.'

Chelsea stood up and shook his hand, reminding Gino that he was older than she was, and that once there was a time when standing to greet an elder was a sign of respect. 'How did you know?'

'Gotta tell you, you don't look like a Fed, but the suit's a dead giveaway.'

She tipped her head and gave him a deadpan look. 'I have a python miniskirt at home.'

Gino's brows crept up a notch. 'A Fed with a python miniskirt. That kind of gives me reason to live.'

Magozzi cleared his throat in what he hoped was a very professional manner. He felt a little like he did when Charlie the Stupid Dog forgot he was there and jumped all over Gino to lick his face. It wasn't that he had any lustful intentions toward Chelsea Thomas, except for the kind any man would have unless he was dead; it was just that men, even best friends, were in constant competition, and it always seemed like he was losing.

Chelsea walked to the door and closed it, then started unpacking her laptop. 'I understand both of you saw the Cleveland film.'

Gino slumped into a chair and grunted. "Yeah, and we're still wishing we hadn't.'

She nodded. 'Agent Smith and I have agreed that you should see the rest of the films.'

'Oh, yippee.'

'We'd like a homicide detective's perspective on the scenes. A fresh eye. Also, Agent Smith said you'd all agreed to share information.'

Gino raised his brows 'Whoa. We thought he was kidding. Well, now that we're all warm and fuzzy and playing nice, here's something for you to take back to Smith. One of the pre-posts Monkeewrench found involved a possible homicide up north…'

'City of Big Water. That was the old one from January, right?'

'Right. I don't know if anyone's had a chance to look for posted film on that, but Grace asked us to check with the locals up there, see if we could match a body.' He flipped open his notebook. 'So I just got off the phone with my guy in Duluth and he said there were no homicides in January, just accidentals – a drunk snowmobiler decapitated himself on a barbed wire fence, a skier smacked into a tree, an ice fisherman fell into the drink and froze to death. Standard stuff, he said…'

Chelsea made a face. 'Decapitation by barbed wire is "standard stuff"?'