Do or Die. Barbara Fradkin
shoved the cordless phone in his face.
“Sounds like Jules.”
Shaking sleep from his head, Green took the phone. The Chief of Detectives’ dry voice crackled through the wires, unusually urgent.
“Michael, something important has come up. Be in my office for a briefing in half an hour. Oh—and Michael, wear a decent suit.”
Green stared at the phone. Jules had hung up before he could even rally a protest. Decent! In the old days, Jules had never told him what to wear. Hinted, sometimes, when the media were going to be around, but never ordered.
“I don’t even have a decent suit,” he muttered to Sharon when he emerged from the shower five minutes later. “Both my court suits are at the cleaners.”
“Three nice suits wouldn’t exactly kill you,” she retorted without looking up. She was slumped on the bed, dark eyes haggard, giving Tony his bottle. “By forty most men own a few decent suits.”
No support from that end, he thought with more sympathy than annoyance. She’s all tapped out. In their early years, she’d found his fashion ineptitude endearing and would have been ready with a wise-crack retort, but now she couldn’t even muster a smile. A good jolt of Starbucks French Roast might help, but he didn’t have time to make it for either of them.
Instead he appeased her with a brief kiss on the head before turning his attention to his cramped corner of the closet. He did in fact have a few proper suits, the most promising being a mud-brown, double-breasted tweed that had served him well at funerals and weddings over the years. The cuffs were faded and the pants seat shone, but it still fit, if he could survive tweed in a June heat wave. He didn’t notice the odour of sweat until he had climbed into his car and headed across the canal to the station. Serves Jules right, expecting a decent suit on half an hour’s notice.
Jules’ clerk leaped to her feet as Green burst into the office. Despite the obvious gravity of the summons, she couldn’t suppress a smile but quickly wrestled it under control as she ushered him into Jules’ office.
To Green’s surprise, the Chief of Detectives was not alone. Seated with him at the small round conference table was a familiar, bull-necked figure in a too-tight suit. Jules rose to greet him, but Deputy Police Chief Doug Lynch did not.
Adam Jules was a tall, reed-thin, silver-haired man in a crisp cotton suit. His eyes flickered briefly, and his nostrils flared, but otherwise he betrayed no hint of reaction to his subordinate’s attire. He extended a manicured hand.
“Michael, thank you for joining us.”
Playing along with the formality, Green returned the handshake and then took the only remaining chair at the table. His pulse quickened. Something big was in the air. Maybe the answer to his prayers…
Belatedly Lynch shoved out a broad, callused hand. “Mike, good to see you.”
I’ll bet, Green thought to himself. I’m about as welcome a sight as a cockroach in the vichyssoise. Unless you want something from me.
And sure enough… “We’re hoping you’ll be able to help us with a very difficult case.”
Us? Green thought ironically. As in the force, or you and your buddy the Police Chief, who’s wily enough to let you play frontman for him? If you think that will get you into his shoes someday, you’re deluding yourself. There are no letters after your name, no useful friends in the wings. You’re his pit bull, nothing more.
Green raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”
Perhaps sensing trouble, Jules moved in. He took a thin file from his desk and held it out. “A student was stabbed in the University of Ottawa library last night. Young man by the name of Jonathan Blair.”
After fourteen years in Criminal Investigations, very little surprised Green any more, but murder in a university library was a first. The second eyebrow shot up before he could stop himself.
“Marianne Blair’s son,” Lynch cut in. “Name ring any bells?” Obviously it was supposed to, but it didn’t. And it was really too early in the morning to play one-upmanship with a pit bull. Especially before even one cup of coffee. Without much hope, Green glanced around Jules’ office. As usual, not a pencil out of place, not a hint of human habitation. And of course, no coffee.
“Should it?” he grumbled.
Lynch smirked, but Jules was faster. “Marianne Blair is the head of the Lindmar Foundation, a major funding organization that underwrites charities, research, the arts.”
Ah! Suddenly the fog began to lift. One of Chief Shea’s famous “connections”. The Police Chief had come to power the new, corporate way, attending management courses and cultivating connections that could serve him well on the way up. Now, at the apex of his career, he had a fair network of expectant friends. Among them, no doubt, the rich and generous Marianne Blair.
“Mrs. Blair is understandably very upset,” Jules was continuing in his dry monotone. “When she called this morning, I told her we would be assigning our best men.”
Green eyed Lynch warily. “Is there anything I should know?” Lynch held his gaze a moment then broke into a smile and leaned back in his chair, hitching his pants up. “I’m just an observer in this, Mike. This is Adam’s and your show. You know my policy on non-interference. But I just wanted to let you know who we’re dealing with here. This is a high profile case. The spotlight will be on the department. If we don’t deliver, Marianne Blair will make enough noise to be heard at City Hall, and I’m sure none of us wants that. I want you to know I have every confidence in you—that’s what we made you an inspector for, isn’t it? To handle tough cases. Hell, it’s the only thing you’re good at. I know you won’t let us down. And it goes without saying that you’ll have the full cooperation of the force. Anything you need, you let me know.”
Green fingered the file before him, trying to figure out the hidden agenda. He hated politics and had no talent for it, preferring to plough straight ahead like a bloodhound on the scent. Yet now he had the sense of waiting for some other shoe to drop. Lynch could have applied his pressure without having to meet him personally. Jules knew—in fact all the brass knew—that Green loved the thrill of the hunt. Unlike most managers, he preferred the trenches and when he took over a case, he drove himself and everyone else on the case to exhaustion till it was solved. This little pep talk wasn’t necessary. There must be something more at stake.
He sent out a feeler. “What does it look like so far?” “No idea,” Jules replied. “There were no eyewitnesses, no murder weapon, no known motive. The victim was twenty-four years old, single, lived with his mother. Just a hardworking graduate student, according to her.”
Lynch waved a casual hand as if to dismiss all other speculation. “My guess is it was some undesirable who went to the library to meet someone else, and the Blair kid was unlucky enough to get in the way. That’s where I’d start looking, Mike. And I’d cooperate with university security on this. They know the territory. I wouldn’t bother too much with the university staff.”
Green raised his head in surprise. “But I certainly have to—”
“Check it out, sure. I’m just saying be careful with the university types. Remember, this isn’t a back alley someplace. These are educated, liberal-minded people who know their rights. And their lawyers.”
Green chilled. “I’ll handle it the way I handle all cases. I’ll ask the questions that need to be asked.”
Lynch raised a soothing hand. “Of course you will. But I know your reputation for thoroughness, Mike. Some might say bull-headedness. Ask your questions. Just don’t ask questions you don’t need to ask. Don’t ruffle more feathers than you need to.”
Finally, Green thought he heard the echo of the other shoe. He feigned confusion. “You don’t want me asking too many questions of people at the university?”
The pit bull stiffened slightly. Beside him, Jules had turned a faint shade