Cavanaugh Justice: The Strong Silent Type Part 7

With a smile, she pulled out of the s.p.a.ce, her eyes glued to the rearview mirror, alert for any lit taillights. After several minutes, she was on the road, heading for home and rest.

Though she hated to admit it, she suddenly felt overwhelmingly tired and was secretly glad to be on her way home. As always, her stubbornness had caused her to overdo it. But they'd have to pry the admission from her cold, cold lips because she'd never readily own up to the fact that maybe her father was right and that she should have remained home an extra day.

When she saw the porch lights at her house, she sighed with relief.

The telephone rang at eight that evening, its shrill noise breaking into the silence that hovered around the house tonight. Andrew hadn't felt like turning on the TV or the radio. He was too afraid he might not hear the phone when it rang.

Before the first ring had died away, he had the receiver up and against his ear.

For all intents and purposes, he was alone here tonight. Teri had gone to bed after a light supper, for once listening to him about getting her rest. She'd looked ghastly pale this evening. It's what she got for being so stubborn.

For being his daughter, he'd thought, because he would have done exactly what she had and gotten back up on the horse that had thrown him. She was that determined to break a case, one that went beyond a single simple home invasion.

"h.e.l.lo?" His own voice sounded a little breathless to his ear. But he'd been waiting for this call. Waiting for it even before he'd left the crime lab.

"Andy, it's Claude."

Andrew could feel his pulse accelerating. He dispensed with his customary cheerful chitchat. There was only one thought on his mind. One thought that had been there all afternoon, stilling his brain activity to such an extent that he had exchanged perhaps ten sentences with Teri from the time she came home to the time she had gone to her room.

Not since Rose had first disappeared had he felt such a high level of antic.i.p.ation wrapped in dread. "Did they match?"

There was a long sigh on the other end of the line. Andrew braced himself for disappointment. "Had some trouble getting a clear print."

C'mon, c'mon, don't talk me to death, just tell me what I need to know. He knew how Wilkins worked. "But you did."

"I did. Finally."

Claude Wilkins was the best at what he did, none better. But the man was incredibly long-winded and given half an opportunity, could talk on for hours about virtually nothing. And this was far from nothing. This was his very future on the line.

"And?" Andrew urged, trying to curb his impatience and keep from snapping at the man he'd known for over thirty-five years.

"They match. Whose are they, Andy?"

He had refrained from telling the head technician his hopes on the matter. He knew what the others thought, how they felt. Pity was something he had no desire to encounter again. "They belong to someone I once knew."

"Long-lost friend?" Wilkins probed.

"Yeah." It was a safe enough answer, although she'd been more than a friend, more than a wife to him. Rose Gallagher Cavanaugh had been the other half of his soul, and he'd been incomplete ever since she'd disappeared. "Thanks, Claude, I owe you one."

He heard a soft chuckle on the other end of the time. "Prime rib dinner comes to mind."

Wilkins had wandered onto territory reserved for the other major love of his life after his family and police work. Cooking. "You got it. I'll be by for the spoon and book tomorrow." About to hang up, there was something in the other man's tone that stopped him.

"Oh, I think you should know. Teri came by this afternoon and asked if you'd left something for me to examine."

"What did you say?"

Wilkins was glib and open. "That I wasn't comfortable talking about it. Not a h.e.l.l of a whole lot I could have told her, anyway, Andy," he pointed out. "You never said who you thought the prints belonged to."

"No," Andrew said with finality, terminating this part of the conversation. "I didn't. Dinner sometime next week all right with you?"

If he felt he was being dealt with abruptly, Wilkins gave no indication of it in his voice. "You're on. Just call and tell me when. I'll bring my appet.i.te."

Saying something that pa.s.sed for appropriate, Andrew hung up. He'd barely heard Wilkins. Even thoughts of possibly being discovered by his daughter before he was ready to share this with them slipped into the far recesses of his mind.

He'd found her.

After all this time, he'd found her. He'd known it all along. Known that she was alive.

Tears gathered in his eyes.

Tears of joy.

And tears of sorrow, for everything Rose had missed over these last fifteen years.

"So, was it good for you?" Teri asked cheerfully as she walked into the squad room.

Her question was directed toward Hawk who was just hanging up the phone. His desk, including the keyboard he rarely used, was completely covered with notes he'd been poring over since early this morning. He looked up now and sent a dark look his partner's way.

"It was good for me," she told Hawk when he made no response.

When she'd woken up this morning, she'd felt as if her world was completely filled with suns.h.i.+ne. Never a sluggish riser, the way her younger sister, Rayne, was, this was still an unusual high even for her and she had nothing to pin it on-except perhaps that she had finally gotten Hawk to come to the Shannon. Success, no matter how minor, always felt good.

The look Hawk gave her was that much darker because her question had aroused a scenario in his head that had no place being there.

"Hey, you two talking about what I think you're talking about?" Mulrooney asked, lowering his voice even as his eyes darted from her to Hawk and then back again.

"Number one," Hawk began tersely, "I'm not talking, she is so there is no two' here. And number two, G.o.d only knows what Cavanaugh is babbling about this time."

"I'm in too good a mood to let your grumpiness affect me," she informed Hawk. Coming up behind Hawk's chair, she placed her hands on his shoulders as if he were a budding protege she was sponsoring for an exclusive club. "You weren't there, Dan, but Hawk here finally made it to the Shannon last night." She beamed down at him. G.o.d, but he had thick, black hair. The kind that tempted a woman to run her fingers through it. She leaned her face down to be level with his. "So, the next office barbecue, your place?"

Hawk purposely turned around in his chair, breaking the connection. Funny, he could almost still feel her hands on his shoulders. "If I'd known you'd act this crazy, I would have never said yes. What the h.e.l.l's gotten into you this morning?"

"I don't know," she said honestly. "Maybe I'm just glad to be alive."

Mulrooney laughed shortly. "Yeah," he agreed. "The alternative really stinks."

"All depends on your take on this life and the afterlife," his partner, Tom Ka.s.sidy, a man half his girth and almost half Mulrooney's height, piped up as he joined the forum.

Teri looked at her partner. "How about it, Hawk? Do you believe in an afterlife?"

Hawk looked at her pointedly. "Wouldn't know about that." He wrote something down on his small, worn pad before sticking it back into the pocket of his jacket. "I'm pretty sure about h.e.l.l on earth, though."

Mulrooney laughed as he crossed to the doorway. It was time to scrounge up his morning snack from the vending machine. "He's got you there, Cavanaugh."

Actually, Teri thought, looking at Hawk, the man had her in a lot of ways she didn't have time to dwell on right now.

"So," she began, just as cheerfully as she had before, settling in behind her desk, "we find anything new on the home invasions?" As far as she knew, Hawk didn't get any personal calls. He hadn't in the nine months they'd been together. Which meant that the call he'd just finished had to have something to do with work. With their case if they were lucky.

Hawk rose to his feet. "I'm going to check out something."

She stood in an instant, picking up the small shoulder purse she hadn't had time to put away yet. "Okay."

"Alone." The look he tossed over his shoulder was meant to glue her feet in place.

It didn't.

"Hey, we're partners, remember?" She fell into step beside him. "Where you go, I go-unless it's the men's room."

He paused, debating. He really did prefer doing things alone, especially when it came to seeing his contacts. But there was no reason he could give her that would make her stay in the office. "You can come, as long as you leave the suns.h.i.+ny att.i.tude behind."

She saluted, earning herself a deeper frown. "I'll do my best."

Without saying another word, he led the way out of the office. He had a feeling that her best was going to fall woefully short of his expectations.

Chapter Seven.

T he alleyway between the two crumbling buildings was enshrouded in darkness despite the suns.h.i.+ne that existed on the street just beyond the perimeter. It was as if nothing bright could be allowed to enter here-no suns.h.i.+ne, no hope.

The air was foul, filled with the smell of decay and rotting garbage the city had neglected to pick up. Pickup was sporadic.

Following behind Hawk, Teri glanced over her shoulder toward the curb where he'd left the car parked, wondering if they would find it in one piece when they were finished here.

Teri nearly tripped over what she thought was a mound of garbage, catching her balance just in time. The mound moved, drawing into itself. She sucked in her breath. Two eyes stared out at her from somewhere within the pile of filthy rags, then closed again into slits before disappearing altogether.

Adrenaline doing double time, she felt for her weapon as she hurried to keep up pace with Hawk. The phone call he'd received earlier had brought them here, to this unlikely place where people existed in the moment, hoping the next would not be as bad as the one they were in. He'd been typically uncommunicative, only saying that the call was from someone about a tip regarding the home invasions. She a.s.sumed it had to be one of his snitches.

She scanned the area. Beyond the person beneath the rags, there didn't seem to be anyone else around. Just who was he meeting? "Is this where you hang out when you're not working?"

He glanced in her direction, wis.h.i.+ng she was back in the office. He was at home here; she wasn't. "n.o.body asked you to come."

And the friendliness continues. "You're my partner," she emphasized. "I'm supposed to have your back, remember?"

He led the way to where four sagging buildings in various degrees of disrepair stood with their backs to one another, like feuding members of a family who had long since forgotten why they had gotten angry in the first place.

"Nothing'll happen to me here."

Hawk said the words with resignation rather than confidence. "Now who's being a superhero?" she asked.

His answer made the smile fade from her lips. "I grew up here." Pointing off toward what appeared to be an abandoned apartment building that had been dark and dreary long before it began to crumble, he said, "There. Third floor. In the back." His voice was completely devoid of any emotion.

She stared at the building that had only rats and the homeless for its tenants now. Sympathy flooded through her. "My G.o.d," she whispered.

Picking his way farther into the shadows, Hawk spared her a hint of a cynical smile. "No. He never came calling." Memories crowded into his head. Horrible memories he pushed back. "These were the people even He gave up on."

They stopped by the next alley. She stared at Hawk, not knowing what to say. The last thing he wanted was pity and it wasn't really pity she was feeling. Just a tremendous desire to comfort, to somehow erase that period of time from his mind. To help him pretend it never happened.

But before she could find the words she needed, she saw someone coming. Teri tensed as a dirty-looking man in even dirtier fatigues walked toward them.

Toward Hawk.

Seemingly oblivious to the weather, the man wasn't wearing a jacket. He was scratching at his arm as if trying to systematically tear away the flesh and get clear down to the bone.

This was who they'd come to meet.

The thought telegraphed itself through her brain. She looked at Hawk for a sign of recognition.

To her surprise, Hawk smiled. "Hey, Jocko, how's it going?"

The man shrugged paper-thin shoulders that echoed within a s.h.i.+rt that might have fit him once, but was now at least two sizes too large.

"Complaining ain't gonna do me no good." And then his red-rimmed, bloodshot eyes brightened. "But you look good, man."

"Thanks." Hawk hated seeing the man this way, hated it because he knew what Jack Armstrong had once looked like, had once been. But drugs and alcohol had long since destroyed that man, leaving behind only a sh.e.l.l that went through the motions of living. "You have something for me?" He saw Jocko's eyes dart toward his partner. "She's okay."

"She's more than okay, Jackie." The man smiled and Teri saw that he had more s.p.a.ces than teeth in his mouth. "She's fine." Jocko drew out the last word as if he was savoring it. As if he was remembering another time when women mattered in his life. "You got a name, pretty lady?"

There was something about the derelict that told her she had nothing to fear, even if Hawk hadn't been standing next to her. Even if she hadn't a loaded weapon at her disposal. She smiled at him. "Teri."

"Teri," the man repeated as if he was in love with the name.

Any second now Jocko's thoughts would wander, taking with it what he needed to know. He'd seen it happen before. Hawk laid a hand on the man's shoulder, hating the feel of his bones as they met his touch. "Jocko, what do you have to tell me?"

Jocko ran his tongue along his lips. His eyes looked a little crazed as he drew back into his life, retreating from the momentary respite he'd sought. He struggled to think.

"I do a little donation gathering' around Bancroft Avenue, you know, where all those restaurants are. Kind of upscale for me, but you know, man's gotta try." He shrugged. "One of the chefs there behind Angelino's, sometimes he gives me a little something to tide me over."

"Food?" Teri asked only to have Hawk give her a silencing look.

"For the soul, pretty lady. Food for the soul," Jocko told her with a wide grin. Hawk tapped his shoulder and he returned to his narrative. "I heard these two guys talking last night. They didn't see me there."

"What two guys?" Hawk pressed.

But his thoughts already appeared to be fading. Jocko frowned as he tried to think. "I dunno. Guys in uniforms."

"Soldiers?" Teri suggested.

"No." Jocko looked down at the fatigues he was wearing, then shook his head. "Not like this. Just something that made them look alike." He looked up at Hawk. "One guy was talking about maybe laying low for a while now that those two guys were caught for the home invasion. The other guy said that once the guys were out, they could maybe make a big score, then move on somewhere else, like before." He licked his lips again. "Did I do good, calling you?" And then he grinned again. "A cop. Who'd've thought it?"

Hawk stared into the other man's eyes, willing him to focus, to pull up this one incident from his jumbled brain. "Think, Jocko. What kind of uniforms?"

Jocko sighed, shaking his head helplessly.