messenger,â she said.
âI wonât. Just do notârepeat, do not!âput any more calls through from our movie star friend! Now, what do you want?â
â I donât want anything,â she sniffed, âexcept maybe a substantial raise for hazard duty. Mr. Grayson, on the other hand, wants you in his office.â
I took a few seconds to collect myself and then headed for Samâs office. As I walked in, he was just ending a phone call. âYes, Iâm well acquainted with the principle of two plus two,â he said. âThanks for the call.â He hung up his phone. He looked at me.
âWhatâs this I hear about you getting mugged?â
âOh, that.â
âYes, that! Right outside my apartment building! Why didnât you tell me?â
I dropped into a chair. âI wasnât hurt, so no harm done. The guyâs in custody, or in the hospital under guard. Iâm not sure which. Youâre busy. You donât need to worry about things that might have happened.â
He studied my face. âBut I do need to worry if one of my prosecutors is being stalked.â
âYouâve been talking to Annie.â
âSheâs only assigned to you, Claire. She works for me.â
I sighed and told Sam everything. Well ⦠almost everything. I left out the part where I got sick twice. He was silent after I finished. He leaned back in his chair and stared out the window. Finally, he said, âOf course youâre grateful that he saved your ass that nightâI sure as hell am!âbut my advice is to stay clear of him.â
âIâm trying to.â I had already explained about directing Hastings to the police and instructing Annie to block his calls.
âWe can always arrange some coverage for you.â
âAre you talking about police protection?â
âSomething less visible. See if heâs still following you.â
âI donât know ⦠itâs not like heâs dangerous. At least to me,â I added, remembering how efficiently Hastings had dealt with my assailant.
âDonât be so sure. Word is thereâs something strange about him. For a time, after the last girl disappeared in that old case, he was even a suspect. He was cleared, but not long after that, he resigned from the department and left town. He claimed heâd inherited some money.â
âThat was thirty years ago. How do you know all this?â
âLipinski was transferred to CID a year after Hastings. They knew each other, but Iâm not sure their relationship was that friendly.â
When I was relating my experiences to Sam, I had elected not to mention Hastingsâs assessment of Lipinskiâs professional deficits. Apparently the discussion was running ahead of me.
I leaned forward. âLipinskiâs been talking to you about Hastings, hasnât he?â
âThat was him on the phone.â
âWhy did Hastingsâs name even come up?â
âDetective Geiger attended the scene outside my building, remember?â
I made the connection. âRight. Lipinskiâs Man Friday.â
âThe fact that Hastings resurfaced in Gainesville the same week those two girls were found at Bronson has generated some talk in the squad room. Cops always say they donât believe in coincidences, and I have to say, Claire, neither do I.â
The old coincidence trap, I thought. Nobody ever bothers to break it down. There are different kinds of coincidences, and some of them are just thatâcoincidences, and nothing more. Others ⦠okay, maybe not.
And, in this case, I had to admitâ
Samâs phone rang. He answered, listened, and said, âPut him through.â He handed the receiver to me. âItâs Terry Snead, for you.â
âHi, Terry.â I listened to him for maybe thirty seconds without saying a word. For the last fifteen of those seconds, I had
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