Max Collins - Fate of the Union

The pressure released but before he could either advance or retreat, a hand grabbed him by the upper right arm and hurled him into the darkness, as if he were a toy flung by a bored child. The door slammed shut and what little light there had been was gone — was the intruder gone as well? The only advantage Reeder had, as he slid to the floor, having hit the edge of Chris’s desk hard, was his knowledge of the office layout.

Then a shape he could more sense than see — the intruder, in black, still very much in the small office — was coming over to grab him and do God knew what, but Reeder kicked up and out, catching the ongoing shape between the legs with the hard toe of his right shod foot. Judging by the unmistakable yowl of kicked-in-the-balls pain, and the strength displayed by flinging Reeder across the room, the intruder was male.

Still sensing more than seeing, guided by his adversary’s labored breathing, Reeder lurched to his feet and, figuring the man would be bent over, swung a right hand into where his head should be. Somehow his adversary sensed this and, in pain or not, threw up an arm and blocked the blow, throwing a short but powerful jab into Reeder’s belly. Air whooshed from him, but Reeder struck out anyway, with a left that had less power than he’d have liked, but luckily caught the guy on his chin — the feel of flesh and bone on flesh and bone said the intruder wore no mask.

The attacker, upright now apparently, was wildly throwing lefts and rights in the darkness, swishing in front of Reeder, who had stepped back out of reach. Then the windmilling stopped and the guy growled and threw himself at Reeder in a mad tackle, sending him onto his back, hitting the floor hard.

Reeder lay there dazed for a moment, then the door opened and limited light came in to reveal the attacker already in the outer office. By the time Reeder got to his feet and staggered out there, it was too late — the black-clad man was gone.

So was the Nissan down the block.

Well, Reeder had the plate number, at least.

Something else was gone — any sliver of doubt that Chris Bryson had been murdered.

On her nightstand, Patti Rogers’s cell did the vibration dance.

On call 24/7, like all FBI agents, she despised being wakened by a ring or ringtone, and the vibrate setting always roused her sufficiently. Her eyelids rose like reluctant curtains on a terrible play and she saw the clock face: 5:04 a.m.

Was it just four minutes ago that she’d hit snooze?

The alarm would go off again at five fifteen. The vibrating stopped. She would check the call first thing and return it, if it proved worthy. For now, she settled in for another eleven glorious minutes of that blissful state before the second alarm.

Then the phone began its dance again, and she sat up, wide awake, grabbed it, checked the caller ID.

LUCAS HARDESY.

What the hell did he want? Couldn’t he wait till she came in to the office before being a pain in her ass?

“Yes?” she said to the phone.

“You may have been right,” he said, biting off each word.

“How so?” Did he need to sound so surprised?

“Your serial killer theory. A cop buddy texted me about a DB he caught about an hour ago.”

“Does the victim fit our profile?”

“We don’t really have a profile,” Hardesy reminded her. “But... yeah, the method at least. Two bullets to the head.”

“Double-tap again.”

“Yeah. Vic doesn’t fit, though. Drag queen name of Karma Sabich.”

“That’s a new wrinkle.”

“Yes it is. Somebody really wanted this motherfucker dead. Put him/her in the tub, popped her. Or him. Whatever.”

“Hate crime?”

“Maybe.” He took another beat. “Look, I know we sometimes, uh... grate on each other. But do you think you could trust my gut on this?”

“That all you have, your gut?”

“No. This kill has that professional touch we keep running into. Even though the vic doesn’t match the others, you know, not a middle-class professional? It’s just too... precise. Think you could come over and have a looky-loo?”

“Where?”

He gave her the address.

“Not far from me,” she said, mostly to herself. Her apartment building was on Joyce Street in Arlington. “Give me half an hour to rejoin the human race.”

“Appreciate this, boss.”

First time he’d called her that.

She showered, dried her hair, did her makeup, dressed, and stopped at the lobby Starbucks for a to-go coffee — all in seventeen minutes. Then it was a quick two-mile drive to the corner of Columbia Pike and Oakland.

The once swanky enclave was a rectangle of buildings set up to look like row houses with a parking lot in the middle. Slowly getting gentrified after years of neglect, the complex was, by neighborhood standards, a perfect example of what locals termed “shithouse chic,” where drug houses and hookers shared unlikely space with young executives and new families.

This morning, though, that center parking lot was alive with the blinking lights of an ambulance and police cars. Rogers parked to one side and got out into an ice cube of a morning, glad to be bundled in a gray Ann Taylor peacoat.

Despite the early hour, the neighbors were out to gawk. What primitive part of the human brain, she wondered, attracted the species to a scene of tragedy? If there was a one-car fatal accident in the Mojave Desert, hundreds of miles from supposed civilization, rubberneckers would still find their way to the side of the road.

The victim’s house was immediately recognizable by the police tape cordoning it off. A uniformed officer, who looked like he’d driven here from his academy graduation ceremony, stood just inside the yellow-and-black border keeping people back. But the crowd was growing and he would soon need a hand.

Rogers displayed her credentials and the young cop leaned in for a look, then gave her an impressed little smile as he raised the tape for her. He really was new — hadn’t learned to hate the dreaded “Fibbies” yet.

She rewarded his attitude, saying, “I’ll try to get you some help, officer.”

The rookie flashed a grateful smile. “Thanks, ma’am.”

He was so young and helpless looking, she could even forgive him the “ma’am.”

Up the sidewalk she found Hardesy waiting on the butcher-block front porch.

“In case you’re wondering,” he said, hands in the pockets of his dark-gray overcoat, breath pluming, rocking on his heels, “all these neighbors? Nobody saw shit. Nobody heard shit.”

“Sounds unanimous. You talk to them yourself?”

He shook his head. “Didn’t want to risk my amateur standing. Because I got a friend on the team, they’ve filled me in some.”

“And what do they have?”

“Bupkus.”

“How did your police pal happen to clue you in?”

“I’d told him, and a few other PD contacts, to be on the lookout for double-taps. You know, just in case.”

She nodded. “Nice work, Luke.”

He said nothing. Glanced away from her, uncomfortable with the compliment.

“So why are you changing your tune,” she asked him, “where the serial theory is concerned?”

“I’m not, exactly. To me, this is one guy doing hits, and I don’t consider that a serial. That’s more like taking care of business.”