J. Konrath - Dirty Martini

“Is this the bottle of scotch he forgot?” I pointed to the Oban sitting on a wire rack.

“Yes. He brought that to me about an hour ago. Said he was sure he packed it the first time.”

Rogers spritzed the Oban and the vodka, and Hunt switched on the ALS and pointed the silver wand at the bottles, bathing them in green light. Nothing fluoresced.

“It’s at five fifty-five nanometers,” Hunt said.

“Nini is a picky lady,” Rogers said. “Try six hundred.”

Hunt dialed up the spectrum, and the light went from green to orange. It also brought out a dozen yellow prints on the Oban bottle, and three on the vodka.

Rogers looked at them through a loupe.

“Gloves on the vodka, at least seven different prints on the scotch.”

I took another bottle out of the top box, and a bottle out of the box beneath it. Then I went to the shelves and pulled a few random bottles. We did another spray and glow.

“All gloves on the new bottles, prints all over the old ones,” Rogers concluded.

“The distributor doesn’t wear gloves,” I said, “and he packs the liquor himself. These should have prints on them, unless they’ve been wiped down or switched.”

“But they don’t look like they’ve been opened.” Hunt pointed at the cap on the Perestroika. “The safety seal is still on.”

She was right. And the jet injector, powerful as it was, couldn’t shoot through glass. I placed three identical bottles of vodka on the floor and looked at the fill levels. All of them were uneven by a wee bit. But was that the Chemist’s doing, or were all liquor bottles slightly off?

I unscrewed the cap off of one.

“Lieutenant,” Hunt said, “if you’re thinking of taking a shot, that’s a poor way to test for toxins.”

Rogers raised his hand. “I’ll volunteer to try it.”

I squinted at the cap. There didn’t seem to be any signs of tampering. I took a tentative sniff. Smelled like vodka.

“Rogers, pass me that loupe.”

I held it to my eye and saw a tiny crystal winking up at me on the rim. I ran my pinky-my only finger currently lacking a decent fingernail-around the inside of the cap, and felt a bit of roughness.

“Unless the Perestroika master distillers use ground glass as a secret ingredient, I think we’ve found our toxic liquor. What else came with this shipment?” I asked Bob.

“Oh dear oh dear. A few cases of beer, and some pop. It’s all in the cooler.”

I ordered Rogers and Hunt to go with him, and I opened two more bottles, whiskey and rum. Each had overshot their recommended daily allowance of glass. I called the super.

“It looks like Bains is the target. It’s the liquor. I’m going to shut everything down here.”

“I’ll talk to your captain. We can let the reception go on anyway, bait a trap for the Chemist.”

“I was thinking about that, but it’s too dangerous. There might be other things tampered with, and I don’t think Bains wants to use his son’s wedding for a sting operation.”

“Agreed, Lieutenant. I’m glad I put you in charge of this case.”

I was going to remind her that I wasn’t her first pick, or even her tenth pick, but instead I said, “Thanks, but it isn’t over yet.”

I hung up and called the other team leaders to have them look for broken glass under bottle caps. Then it was huddle-time in the lobby for my team.

“We’ve found what we believe to be contaminated liquor bottles. Talk to me, Reynolds.”

“Perimeter is clear. No IEDs, no sightseers for a block in all directions.”

“Rogers?”

“Beer is bad. I looked at the bottle caps under high magnification, there are marks. Some two-liter bottles of soda have also been compromised.”

“What else have we got?” I asked.

A cop named Mathers said, “Nothing out of the ordinary in the kitchen. They had a few deliveries earlier today, nothing strange about them.”

Another named Parker added, “No strangers prowling around. Staff is spooked, but that’s to be expected. Everyone here knows everyone else, no newbies in the group. We did catch two Latinos trying to sneak out the back door, but that’s because they thought we were Immigration.”

“Okay, we’re still going to shut the place down. Mathers, I want you to-”

“You can’t close us!” This from the worrisome Bob, of course. “We’ve got two events today! These people have counted on us to make this the most important day of their lives!”

“Sorry, Bob. Can’t risk it.”

“But you said the kitchen was fine! It’s only the liquor shipment that came today!”

“We can’t take the chance.”

Bob began to cry, then fled the lobby with his hands over his face, but not before running headfirst into a plaster reproduction of Michelangelo’s David. It was more sad than funny. After thirty seconds of uncomfortable silence, I picked up where I left off.

“Mathers, get five guys to bag and tag the liquor bottles. We’re going to have to clean out the pantry, and the staff needs to be tested for BT as a precautionary-”

Bob came galloping back into the lobby, with a large pan full of linguini. Noodles hung from his mouth.

He yelled, “It’s fine!” or something similar. Hard to tell with all the food stuffed in his cheeks.

There were no heroic attempts on behalf of my people to tackle Bob and wrench the linguini from his starch hole. No one screamed, “Spit it out, you idiot!” We all just watched, silently, as Bob chewed, swallowed, and didn’t die. When he finished, he held out both arms in a silent ta-da ! No one applauded.

“I’m trying the soup next,” Bob said, and trotted off.

Captain Bains chose that opportune moment to call, spitting vitriol and threats before I said word one. When he paused to take a breath I cut in, explaining how everything went down.

“And what’s Bob doing right now?” Bains asked when I finished.

“He’s standing three feet away from me, eating a bowl of wedding ball soup.”

Bob nodded vigorously and gave me a thumbs-up.

“How does he look?”

“Crazed.”

“Sick? Poisoned?”

“Not so far.”

“Tell him if he tries everything on the menu and lives, we’ll go on as planned. And also tell him to run to Costco and pick up a truckload of liquor. My side of the family likes to drink.”

“I’ll let you tell him that. How was the ceremony?”

“The flowers look like shit. One of the big arrangements fell over during the vows, and the ring bearer is still screaming in fright. I’m going to hang the florist by his green thumbs and have everyone in my District take turns beating him with hoses.”

“I’m glad it went well.”

“I’m on my way there. Let me speak to Bob.”

I passed the phone over to the manager, and informed my team that we’d just confiscate the liquor and beverages for now. Then I conferred with Reynolds.

“Have you checked in with the SRTs at the other weddings?”

“They all seem to be clear.”

“Call them over here. I want a watch on the property, and I want two undercovers inside checking the guest list. It looks like Bains is going to jeopardize hundreds of lives to make his son happy.”

“Can’t blame the guy. The bond between a father and a child is a powerful thing.”

“Yeah,” I said, conjuring up the image of me and my father in Grant Park. “Nothing can break that bond.”

A few minutes later I had my phone back, Manager Bob was noshing on a Caesar salad with anchovies, and Bains arrived and in no uncertain terms told everyone to get the hell out. I might have put up a fight if it was anyone other than my boss, and I might have even put up a fight with my boss, but the double vision had returned and I was so tired I could fall asleep standing up.