Silent Victim - C. E. Lawrence [108]
“Something like that, I guess,” Lee said.
“I knew that woman was trouble,” Butts muttered.
“That’s enough, Detective,” Chuck said wearily. “Calm down, will you?”
“Oh, sure, I’ll calm down,” Butts replied, biting viciously on the end of an unlit cigar, decapitating it. Lee hadn’t seen him indulge in his cigar habit for a while—maybe it was an indication of how stressed he was.
“The question is, what are we gonna do about it?” he continued, flinging himself into the nearest chair.
“The first thing is to get straight exactly what we’re going to tell the media,” Chuck replied.
“Yeah, that’ll be a real circus,” Butts muttered. “Can’t wait for that.”
Lee looked at Chuck. Butts had made the mistake of not reading the warning signs of his mounting rage. Morton was naturally even tempered, and could take a lot—until he blew. And when he blew, look out. Lee had seen the signs—the gradual tightening of his voice, the tension in his shoulders, the flush spreading upward from the back of his neck.
Morton exploded, crashing his fist down on the desk with such force that Butts jumped backward, letting out a little yelp.
“You know, Detective, it would be nice to just wave a wand and make it all go away!” he bellowed, his face the color of raspberry pudding. “But that’s not going to happen, so why don’t you adjust your attitude?”
Butts stared at him, blinking rapidly, then fell back into his chair.
“Sorry,” he said. “You’re right.” He shoved the cigar back into his pocket. “What do we know?”
“We know she left the bar around two,” Chuck said, with a glance out the window, where a lone pigeon was scraping the sill with its beak in search of scraps.
“And that’s the last time she was seen?” Lee asked.
“Yeah.”
The door opened, and Sergeant Ruggles entered. As bad as Chuck Morton looked, the usually buoyant Ruggles looked even worse. He shuffled into the room like a sleepwalker and listlessly tossed some papers onto Morton’s desk. He avoided looking at any of them. If Lee had any doubt before, it was clear to him now that Ruggles was in love with Krieger. And he probably blamed Chuck Morton for her disappearance.
Chuck picked up one of the papers from his desk and thrust it at Lee. “This was sent via the NYPD website this morning.”
Lee took it and read it.
I guess I shouldn’t be poking my nose where it doesn’t belong. Bad, bad girl.
“Any chance of a trace?”
Morton shook his head. “It was sent from an Internet café in Chinatown. Paid for in cash—right, Ruggles?”
“Yes, sir,” he replied in a leaden monotone, as if all the joy had been squeezed from his vocal cords. “The Chinese man running the place spoke almost no English.”
There was a knock on the door.
“Yes?” Morton said.
When the door opened, Lee was startled to see the person who sauntered gracefully into the room, as much at home as if he owned the place.
There, standing in the office of the commander of the Bronx Major Cases Unit, was Diesel himself. As usual, he was dressed all in black, which seemed an odd choice for an August day. Yet he looked as cool and comfortable as he had last winter when Lee met him in the bar at McHale’s.
“Hello,” he said, taking them all in with a sweep of his massive head.
“Ah, yes, Mr.—” Chuck fumbled among the papers Ruggles had left on his desk.
“Just Diesel, if you don’t mind,” he answered, calm and dignified as always.
“Diesel, then. This is Detective Leonard Butts, Homicide.”
“How ya doin'?” Butts said, as Diesel gave him a polite nod.
“And Sergeant Ruggles,” Chuck said with a nod at his desk sergeant.
“How do you do?” Diesel bowed slightly, though he would have had to kneel to close the height gap between him and the diminutive sergeant.
“How d’you do, sir?” Ruggles replied, still visibly distracted. “Please excuse me, but I must get back …” He abandoned the thought midsentence, and left the room without looking at any of them.
Chuck continued the introductions. “And this is—” “Dr. Campbell and I are already acquainted,” Diesel replied.
Chuck’s eyebrows shot