lookin’. Tall, like you.”
He was giving her the hungry-eye look like he’d done earlier that morning. She would like nothing better than for him to vacate the area and the planet, but she was intrigued.
“Did you know her?”
“Met her at the last service awards luncheon or whatever they call it. Frank got an award for twenty-five years on the force. He introduced Frankie to me. Real stand-up guy, Frank. I called Frankie at her precinct, but she and I couldn’t find a time to connect.”
I wonder why.
“I hear she was pretty wild.”
Vining gave the woman credit for some discretion in her men. “We don’t know for sure it’s her. Whoever it is, that’s a hell of a way to talk about the dead. A little respect?”
“How is that being disrespectful? She knew she was a piece of ass and liked hearing it.”
Vining shook her head and stood. On her way to get coffee, Caspers answered his phone.
“Hey, peckerhead. You coming to the party tonight?”
She went to the coffee station on a table at the rear of the suite and pulled a Styrofoam cup from the stack. There was tension in the air. The calm before the storm. The investigation was in the works, but Vining was not privy to details. She was hanging around, waiting to be given something to do, as if it truly was her first day on the job. Kissick had returned and was busy on the phone. She knew he was waiting for Detective Schuyler to come up from Hollywood LAPD with materials from his missing person investigation. Ruiz was still with Frank Lynde off-site, waiting out the time until they had an official I.D. on the body.
She knew Lynde already suspected the worst. Adult women don’t disappear of their own volition.
“But we don’t run away.”
The notification would be a strange relief for Lynde. It would end his time in purgatory.
Vining thought of the calls made to her family after she had been attacked, that ringing phone dreaded by loved ones of police officers. Kissick had made them, calling Vining’s mother and her ex-husband, Wes.
“Nan’s been hurt on the job. She’s alive but her condition is serious.”
It was a white lie. Her condition had been critical.
Emily claimed to know the moment of Vining’s attack. She was reading by the pool at her father’s house when she felt coldness in her extremities and couldn’t breathe.
After Vining had been resuscitated, she’d lain in a coma for three days.
Vining believed she wasn’t T. B. Mann’s first victim. The belief had no basis in fact, but she couldn’t shake that deep-in-her-bones instinct. He had seemed so assured, intentionally coming close to getting caught. They had found a police radio scanner in the house on El Alisal Road. He had tracked her movements and the status of her backup. There had been a realtor’s open house in that location the weekend before Vining was attacked. Kissick, who had handled the investigation, speculated that Vining’s assailant entered the house then and unlocked a window through which he later entered. Vining had worked patrol in that neighborhood on Sundays for several weeks, picking up overtime. T. B. Mann couldn’t be positive that Vining would be the officer to respond to his call, but it was likely to be her. It was Vining’s theory that he had patiently stalked her, maybe for months, working out the timing, location, and circumstances until all the elements converged in that one brilliant and catastrophic moment.
Had he pressed the envelope farther with Lynde?
She couldn’t jump to conclusions. That sort of thinking made for a shoddy investigation. She had to keep her mind open. Otherwise, Kissick and Early would spot it and she would be working on residential burglaries.
During her long months of recuperation, Vining had researched female law enforcement officers in the United States who had been killed on duty. There had been twenty-six over the past ten years. Most deaths had occurred in major metropolitan areas. Made sense.
He was giving her the hungry-eye look like he’d done earlier that morning. She would like nothing better than for him to vacate the area and the planet, but she was intrigued.
“Did you know her?”
“Met her at the last service awards luncheon or whatever they call it. Frank got an award for twenty-five years on the force. He introduced Frankie to me. Real stand-up guy, Frank. I called Frankie at her precinct, but she and I couldn’t find a time to connect.”
I wonder why.
“I hear she was pretty wild.”
Vining gave the woman credit for some discretion in her men. “We don’t know for sure it’s her. Whoever it is, that’s a hell of a way to talk about the dead. A little respect?”
“How is that being disrespectful? She knew she was a piece of ass and liked hearing it.”
Vining shook her head and stood. On her way to get coffee, Caspers answered his phone.
“Hey, peckerhead. You coming to the party tonight?”
She went to the coffee station on a table at the rear of the suite and pulled a Styrofoam cup from the stack. There was tension in the air. The calm before the storm. The investigation was in the works, but Vining was not privy to details. She was hanging around, waiting to be given something to do, as if it truly was her first day on the job. Kissick had returned and was busy on the phone. She knew he was waiting for Detective Schuyler to come up from Hollywood LAPD with materials from his missing person investigation. Ruiz was still with Frank Lynde off-site, waiting out the time until they had an official I.D. on the body.
She knew Lynde already suspected the worst. Adult women don’t disappear of their own volition.
“But we don’t run away.”
The notification would be a strange relief for Lynde. It would end his time in purgatory.
Vining thought of the calls made to her family after she had been attacked, that ringing phone dreaded by loved ones of police officers. Kissick had made them, calling Vining’s mother and her ex-husband, Wes.
“Nan’s been hurt on the job. She’s alive but her condition is serious.”
It was a white lie. Her condition had been critical.
Emily claimed to know the moment of Vining’s attack. She was reading by the pool at her father’s house when she felt coldness in her extremities and couldn’t breathe.
After Vining had been resuscitated, she’d lain in a coma for three days.
Vining believed she wasn’t T. B. Mann’s first victim. The belief had no basis in fact, but she couldn’t shake that deep-in-her-bones instinct. He had seemed so assured, intentionally coming close to getting caught. They had found a police radio scanner in the house on El Alisal Road. He had tracked her movements and the status of her backup. There had been a realtor’s open house in that location the weekend before Vining was attacked. Kissick, who had handled the investigation, speculated that Vining’s assailant entered the house then and unlocked a window through which he later entered. Vining had worked patrol in that neighborhood on Sundays for several weeks, picking up overtime. T. B. Mann couldn’t be positive that Vining would be the officer to respond to his call, but it was likely to be her. It was Vining’s theory that he had patiently stalked her, maybe for months, working out the timing, location, and circumstances until all the elements converged in that one brilliant and catastrophic moment.
Had he pressed the envelope farther with Lynde?
She couldn’t jump to conclusions. That sort of thinking made for a shoddy investigation. She had to keep her mind open. Otherwise, Kissick and Early would spot it and she would be working on residential burglaries.
During her long months of recuperation, Vining had researched female law enforcement officers in the United States who had been killed on duty. There had been twenty-six over the past ten years. Most deaths had occurred in major metropolitan areas. Made sense.
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