Cold Blood by Blake Banner

Author:Blake Banner [Banner, Blake]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Mystery, Police Procedural, Suspense, Thriller, private investigator, Crime Fiction
Published: 2023-08-14T23:00:00+00:00

Twelve

“Detective Stone, can we go and talk, please?”

Dehan took my arm and led me away toward the Jaguar.

“So,” she said under her breath as we walked, “it’s okay for you to go in there and replace the hostages but not me?”

“It’s out of the question. I’m not even going to discuss it. No. That’s final.”

“It’s not your decision, Stone. Just like it wasn’t my decision when you offered yourself.”

We had reached the car, and I turned to face her. “Don’t try and reason with me, Carmen—”

“Oh, I’m Carmen now, John?”

“You are not going in there to replace those hostages, and that is final, Dehan. It is not going to happen. If I have to knock you unconscious and resign from the PD, you are not going in there.”

“But you are?”

“I don’t care. It is just not going to happen.”

Her face flushed with anger. “Why the hell not, Stone? What is this? The middle—”

“Because you are a woman!” She gaped. “And not only that, you are my woman! And I don’t give a damn how unacceptable or primitive or inappropriate that is! That’s how it is, and it is not going to change! If you go in there to replace those hostages, it will be over my dead body! And don’t think I am exaggerating. I am not. You can divorce me, you can leave me, you can report me to the damned Woke Commission! If that’s what it takes, so be it.” I raised my voice and pointed at the squat. “But you are not going into that building!”

I turned to walk away but then turned back.

“That bastard is not going to hurt the woman I love, even if that means I lose you. Also, he does what he does to women. Not to men.”

I walked back to Mike and the SWAT commander. I said, “He does what he does to women. Not to men. So a woman should not go in to replace the hostages. The object of this exercise is to get the women out of there, not put more women in. Especially women who arguably have a higher ransom value.”

Mike sneered. “So what are you going to do, Romeo?”

I stared at him for five long, slow seconds. When he swallowed and looked away, I called Pereira.

“So?”

“No can do. The political risk is too high. They lose a cop and nobody cares. You do to a female cop what you did to Zeta, and the political price to pay is off the chart.”

There was silence. Dehan was there staring into my eyes with no expression. Then Pereira’s voice, like sandpaper, “She had it coming. She earned that. You don’t—you d-d-d... You don’t fuckin’ divorce a guy when he’s in jail! You don’t—you don’t—You don’t fuckin’ tell him you’re pregnant with another guy’s fuckin’ baby! When he’s fuckin’ behind bars, man!”

I spoke without thinking. “Is that what brought you and Dave together?”

“What?”

“The stammer. Is that how you became friends?” His silence told me I’d nailed it. “Did he give you the idea, how you were going to kill her?”

His reply was quiet.

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