Radclyffe - Sheltering Dunes

“You’re kidding, right?”

“Yeah. You wouldn’t fit in down there any better than I do. If you weren’t working high-profile crimes, you’d be so miserable I’d probably never get laid.” Sandy grinned. “So what will you be doing all day while I’m riding around in a patrol car with my training officer, being lectured to and treated like I don’t have two brain cells to rub together?”

Dell stifled a laugh. Being a trainee sucked, but everyone had to do it, and part of the TO’s job was to bust on the trainees to make sure they didn’t get themselves or someone else killed the first time they went out on their own. Still, it was tough on the ego, and for someone as independent as Sandy, even harder. “After the briefing? The same thing I’ve been doing for the last six months—working the streets, talking up the CIs, trying to find a way back into Zamora’s operation. Ever since we took down their Eastern European pipeline, everything has gone dead quiet. We can’t get a handle on anything—girls, dope, guns. The lieutenant thinks there’s been a power shift, maybe with the Colombians or Salvadorans moving in. But if anybody knows, they’re not talking.”

“Something will break,” Sandy said. “The streets never stay quiet for long.”

Slowly running her fingers down Sandy’s back, Dell settled back for another minute of peace. Sandy was right. Something would pop, soon, and when it did, things would get real hot, real fast. She couldn’t wait.

Chapter Twelve

Philadelphia

“Fuck!” Hector rolled off the girl whimpering underneath him and pulled the cell phone from the back pocket of his pants. His jeans were halfway down his thighs, and he grabbed the bitch’s hand and wrapped it around his still-hard dick. He pressed the phone to his ear. “Yeah, what?”

“We got a lead off the cousin’s cell log,” Carmen said.

“Tell me you know where she is.” Hector squeezed the girl’s hand around his cock and dragged her fist up and down, showing her how he liked it.

“Not yet, but we got a good idea of where she was headed.”

“Where?” Hector pushed up in bed, slapped the girl’s hand off his softening cock, and shoved his junk into his jeans. Some girls you just couldn’t teach. They acted like they’d never seen a stiff cock before. He made a mental note to hand this bitch off to one of his lieutenants. She was a lousy fuck.

“Somewhere in Massachusetts.”

“What the fuck is she doing there? You sure?”

“She called her cousin a few times right after she took off. First time was New York City—maybe she took a bus or something. Then a couple more times, once in Connecticut and another time in Massachusetts. The last time pretty close to Cape Cod.”

“What the fuck is out there?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never been anywhere except to Jersey City on a run.”

“You got a town name or something?”

“Not yet—our guy at the phone company can tell general area, you know like area codes or some shit like that—but with cell phones, not cities necessarily.”

“How does that help us?”

Carmen grunted. “We know where to look, we reached out to a few friends up there. She can’t hide forever. She’s got no money, no friends, no family. We ask around, we’ll find her.”

“We need to get to her before she does something stupid and the cops pick her up. Besides, rules are rules.” The MS-13 had one fundamental rule, and everyone knew it—once in, you never left. Not unless you were dead. If you tried, you would be dead.

“Yo, boss, I hear you.”

“Good. We don’t want the members to think anybody can walk away from us, no matter who they are.” He didn’t want to do it, but the stupid bitch wasn’t leaving him any choice. Mia had been gone too long for him to keep it from the higher-ups, and he couldn’t have his troops thinking he couldn’t control his own woman. She needed to come back, one way or the other. And soon. “Find her. I don’t care who you have to hurt.”

*

Provincetown

“You care if I put on the ballgame?” Dave asked.

Flynn looked over from where she sat on the threadbare mustard-colored sofa in the squad ready room, reading a history of gravestone carvings in New England cemeteries. Old churches fascinated her. Her father and his father and his before him, as far back as the family tree could be traced, had been clergymen. She and her twin had grown up immersed in symbolism and lore. She’d spent hours in the myriad small cemeteries tucked away in wooded groves on country roads, behind abandoned gas stations, or nestled in the bends of meandering creeks—reading names, tracing family lineages, imagining the lives that had passed over the same ground she had just walked. Continuity, the connections between things past, present, and to come, gave her a sense of purpose and rendered some meaning to the enormity of existence. She tossed the book aside. She hadn’t really been concentrating well enough to read it anyhow. “Who’s playing?”

“The Sox and—”

“That’s enough for me. Sure.” Flynn welcomed the diversion. Usually she could lose herself in a book, and when history failed, the Scriptures usually provided enough questions to keep her mind focused. But not this afternoon. She kept thinking back to breakfast, and Mica. Mysteries intrigued her as much as history, and Mica was nothing if not a mystery. If Flynn judged by their conversations alone, she’d have to conclude Mica didn’t want anything to do with her. Mica sent out clear stay-away vibes, at least verbally, and Flynn wasn’t one to push where she wasn’t wanted. She had the feeling Mica had been pushed plenty in her life. No one ran away from a happy existence.

But people gave off other signals besides verbal, silent messages Flynn often paid more attention to than what was said. Too often, people said what they thought they should say, or hid their feelings behind anger or gallows humor or sexual innuendo. But people were often unaware of their body language, which made their feelings harder to hide.

Mica wasn’t an easy read. She was good at hiding what she felt, physically and in conversation, but Flynn was very good at discerning the little signs that others might miss. Her ability to hear the unspoken had been honed in a family where preserving the peace had been more important than dealing with hard truths, and those skills had been refined in the seminary. Other than administering the sacraments, a priest didn’t have a much more important function than to recognize the truth. If one couldn’t, how could one possibly preach? So she’d watched Mica while she was eating breakfast, when Mica wasn’t watching her. Mica had been constantly busy, serving tables that had filled rapidly after eight when tourists and townspeople alike began to venture out. Flynn took her time over her meal. She enjoyed watching Mica thread her way between tables, talking and occasionally laughing with customers. She moved quickly, confidently, sensuously. And every now and then when Mica had finished taking an order or while she was clearing a table, she’d glance in Flynn’s direction. Mica’d been aware of her, and that meant something.

When Flynn had gone to the register to pay her bill, Mica had passed by carrying a tray laden with dishes and glasses to be washed.

“I’ll see you later,” Flynn said.

Mica shot her a glance, as if she hadn’t expected her to be there, but she’d smiled, and the smile had been warm with a whisper of pleasure along the edges.

Yes, Mica had noticed her. And from a woman like Mica, that counted a lot.

“You okay?” Dave asked.

“Sure. Just got a lot on my mind.”

“Okay. You want to drive tonight?”