Cut to the Bone(20)

“Did I get everything?” she asked, feeling it run down her chest.

“Oh, yeah,” Marty said, back to his normal good humor. “Pat you dry, Ossifer?”

“I’d dearly love that,” Emily said, smiling through her annoyance at Marty’s affectionate twist on “Officer,” which he’d bestowed the first day they met. His uncharacteristic bite was probably the adrenaline flash and crash that was making them all cranky. “But duty calls.”

“I suppose you’re right,” he said, handing her a SWAT field towel. “Best to see what the scumbag has to say for himself. We’ll pick this up later.”

Emily nodded, and sky-hooked the towel into the garbage can.

Roaches scattered.





9:42 p.m.

“Who was on the phone?” Branch said.

“What phone?” Bloch said.

“The one you were talking on when we blew your doors.”

“You were spying on me?” Bloch said, indignant.

“Of course we were, Einstein. That’s what cops do with robbers.”

“That’s a total invasion of my personal privacy!”

“Must have taken law classes up there in Stillwater,” Annie said.

“When he wasn’t getting boned in the showers,” Branch said, snickering.

“Up yours,” Bloch said.

Branch leaned close. “That’s exactly what will happen if you don’t answer my question.”

“I forget what it was.”

“Who were you talking to on the phone?”

Bloch smirked. “Hookers.”

“You were contacting escort services?”

“Till you barged in,” Bloch said, settling back.

Enough dust had smeared away that Emily saw the crude tattoos adorning Bloch’s chest and belly. The largest incorporated “AB,” “666,” and a pale blue shamrock, indicating Bloch was Aryan Brotherhood, the main white gang in American prisons.

He caught her looking. “Wanna see this one?” he asked, grabbing his crotch.

“Shut up,” Branch said, bopping Bloch’s foot with the cane.

“That’s the best you can do, Festus?” Bloch sneered. “You wouldn’t last ten seconds in the showers with me, you limp-dick cripple-”

“I wouldn’t go there,” Marty said, plopping down next to him. “I was you.”

His arctic lack of emotion made Emily shiver. Marty used to infiltrate psycho biker gangs for a living. Violence didn’t bother him a whole lot.

Bloch sensed it, too, she knew, because he didn’t finish the insult. He kept up the sneer, though. For appearances.

Cops and robbers.

“So, did you find one?” Branch said.

“One what?”

“Someone to wax your wheels.”

“No,” Bloch said. “You interrupted my, ah, negotiations.”

“So it wasn’t an accomplice you were talking to?”

“Accomplice? To what?”

“We’ll get to that. Let’s finish your phone call first. When I check the dialing log, I’ll find nothing but escort services, right?”

“Couple pizza places, too.” He patted his crotch. “Rocket needs its fuel.”

Annie rolled her eyes.

“What made you start running?” Branch said, switching gears.

Bloch shrugged. “I saw a lump in the yard. Moved left when the trees moved right. Didn’t know it was cops, though.”

Annie’s scowl told Emily the team’s after-action debriefing would be noisy.

“Who’d you think we were?” Branch said. “Invaders from Mars?”

Bloch shrugged. “Friends.”

“You have friends that make you dive under attic insulation?”

“Why you think I’m out of prison, man? Good behavior?”

“He ratted out fellow inmates in exchange for parole,” Marty said. “And his friends haven’t forgotten.”

Bloch’s greasy smile said, Yup.

Branch dragged over a chair and sat in it backward, resting his arms on top. “All right,” he said, caning Bloch’s foot for emphasis. “Tell me about Zabrina Reynolds.”

Bloch’s eyes darted up and left. His body language said he was lying. “Never heard of her.”

“That’s funny. You murdered her this morning. Along with a sheriff’s deputy” - he inclined his head at Marty - “who was a close friend of my associate’s.”

“I didn’t whack anyone!” Bloch said, face flushing. “Who says I did?”

“Me.”

“Well, you’re wrong!”

“Prove it.”

Bloch turned his palms up. “Man, how I prove I didn’t kill anyone?”

“Better think of something,” Marty said, scooting closer, heightening Bloch’s discomfort. “You’re on parole. One call to Minnesota and you’re back in Stillwater, doing another dime. This time, with your Nazi pals knowing you sang like a canary. I’m sure they’d be happy to speak with you about that in the showers.”