Erica Spindler - Killer Takes All

“Bet she didn’t flunk out of grad school. Or have everyone she was supposed to be protecting get whacked, practically right under her nose?”

“If you want to go and talk about screwup, I’m your man. The one who only worked enough to get by. Who never considered the consequences. The one who thought it was all one big drunken frat party.”

“You? That’s not the man I know.”

“You’ve brought out the best in me, Stacy Killian. Made me see what I wanted to be. The kind of cop I wanted to be.”

“I’m not a cop anymore.”

“We both know you’re a cop in every way but one.”

She opened her mouth to argue; he stopped her. “You want to know the humiliating truth?” he asked softly. “I’m not ISD. I didn’t earn it. It was given to me.”

“For being such a screwup?”

“I’m baring my soul here, Killian. This is serious.”

Stacy fought a smile. “Sorry.”

“It was payola,” he continued. “To keep me from suing the department.”

She caught his hand, curved her fingers around his in silent support.

“I’d finally made detective. Way behind my brothers. And in all truth, partly because of them. My DIU superior set me up. Lifted a kitty of snitch money and made me the fall guy. Everybody bought into it because of my reputation.”

“Not everybody, I’ll bet. Not Tony. Not your family.”

“No, not them.” A smile touched his mouth. “Thank God.”

“What happened then?”

“Because of the few who stood behind me and wouldn’t give up, Lieutenant Moran was caught. I was reinstated. And given ISD so I wouldn’t make trouble for the department. I jumped at it.”

She was quiet for a long moment, thinking of the man he described himself as being and the one she had come to know. “Are you sorry?”

“That I was given ISD?”

“That it happened? If you could make it all go away, go back to who and what you were before, would you?”

He stared at her a moment, expression a curious combination of surprise and introspection. Then a slow smile curved his lips. “You know, I don’t believe I would.”

“Good.” She returned his smile. “Because I’m liking the man I’m looking at right now.”

He moved to kiss her, then stopped and swore. “I’m buzzing.” He drew away, unclipped the device and brought it to his ear. “Malone here. It’d better be good.

“Gone? When?” His expression tightened. “Dammit, Tony, how the hell did you-”

Concerned, Stacy sat up. Spencer held up a hand to hold off her questions. He paused to listen; when he spoke again, Stacy knew she hadn’t been mistaken about what she’d heard.

“This is worse news than you know, Pasta Man. Dunbar’s dead. And he may not have been the one.”

A moment later, he hung up. Stacy was already out of bed, straightening her clothes. “Alice is missing, isn’t she?”

“Yes.”

“How did that happen? What, did she just walk out?”

“Basically.” He climbed out of bed. “Earlier in the evening, Betty thought she heard Alice’s phone ring and the girl answer. She didn’t think anything about it. A while later, she decided to take a peek at the girl, make certain she was okay. She wasn’t there.”

“How long ago was this? She couldn’t have gotten far on foot.”

“A couple hours.”

“Damn. This is bad.”

Spencer frowned. “By the way, where do you think you’re going?”

“To find Alice.”

“I don’t think so.”

“The hell I’m no-”

“The game could still be in play. I want you to stay put. Understand?”

“But Alice-”

“Tony and I will find her. You stay. She may come here looking for you.”

Stacy opened her mouth to argue; he stopped her with a kiss. After a moment, he drew away. “I don’t want anything to happen to you. Promise me you won’t do anything stupid?”

She did, though as he left her apartment she acknowledged that her promise depended on his definition of stupid.

Sunday, March 20, 2005

7:30 a.m.

Stacy awakened. She’d had strange dreams, ones populated with characters out of Alice in Wonderland. Ones that had disturbed her sleep and left her feeling fatigued and edgy.

Spencer hadn’t called. Which meant they hadn’t found Alice.

She’d given them their chance.

Today she joined the hunt.

Resolve set, Stacy climbed out of bed and headed straight for the bathroom. After starting the coffee she showered and dressed.

The coffee had brewed. She filled a travel mug, added sweetener and cream, grabbed a granola bar and headed out.

Stacy intended to search the mansion and guest house. Check in at Café Noir. City Park. Gaming stores. Any place Alice might be hiding out.

As she neared her car, Stacy saw that someone had left a flyer under her windshield wiper.

No, she realized when she retrieved it, not an advertisement.

A zip-style storage bag. With a note card inside.

Carefully extracting the bag from under the wiper, she opened it and slid out the card.

Her knees went weak; her hands began to shake.

A drawing. Like the ones Leo had received. This one of Alice.

Hanging from the neck. Face engorged and bloated with death.

She swallowed hard, forced herself to open the card.

Game in play. Clock ticking.

She stared at the message, mouth dry. Danson had been telling the truth. He wasn’t the White Rabbit.

Think, Killian. Take a deep breath. Slow down. Put it together.

If the White Rabbit held to history, the card meant Alice was still alive. That the White Rabbit either had her in his sights-or worse, in his grasp.

Clock ticking. He was giving her the chance to save Alice’s life. Game was in play and it was her move.

Her cell phone sounded and she jumped. She unclipped the device and answered the call. “Killian here.”

“Hello, Killian.”

A man. Voice deliberately masked.

The White Rabbit.

“Where is she?” Stacy demanded. “Where’s Alice?”

“That’s for me to know and you to find out.”

“Cute. Let me speak to her.”

He laughed and she tightened her grip on the phone. Whoever he was, he was enjoying this immensely. Sick bastard.

“If you want to see Alice alive, you’ll do what I say. No cops. Understand?”

“Yes.”

“Take Carrollton Avenue uptown to River Road. There’s a bar at the corner of River Road and Carrollton Avenue. Cooter Brown’s. Go in. The bartender has an envelope for Florence Nightingale.”

“Let’s just cut to the chase here, shall we? What do you want?”

“To win the game, of course. Be the last man standing.”

“You think you’re good enough?”

“I know I am. You have thirty-five minutes. One minute late and it’s goodbye, baby.”

Esplanade to Carrollton Avenue at the river would take a good twenty-five minutes. Maybe more with traffic.

Which left her damn little leeway. She darted back into her apartment, retrieved her Glock and left the White Rabbit’s message on the kitchen counter for Spencer to find. Just in case.

Back outside, she grabbed her travel mug off the car’s hood, unlocked the door and slid inside. She started the vehicle, checked the side mirror and pulled into traffic.

The dash clock read 8:55.

Traffic heading uptown alternately sucked and sailed. She wheeled into Cooter Brown’s parking area in twenty-eight minutes. A mural on the side of the building boasted the bar was home to 450 different kinds of bottled beer. She slammed the SUV into Park and darted inside.

The interior was dark and smelled of cigarettes. A couple of biker types stood by the pool table, cues in hand. They stopped playing and watched her cross to the bar.