THEY WENT UP the stairs to the porch, and Sam rang the doorbell.
Misty came to the door, looking like she hadn’t slept. Her eyes were red and swollen from crying. “Hi.”
“Hi, Misty. We were wondering if we might have a word with you, your mother and your sister?”
“Yeah, sure. I guess.”
“Is this a good time?”
She shrugged. “As good as any.” Stepping aside, she ushered them into the house.
It went against everything Sam believed in to turn her back on anyone while on the job, but she bent her rules out of deference to the girl’s obvious grief.
“They’re in the back.” Misty gestured for them to lead the way down a narrow hallway that led to a bright, sunny kitchen with yellow walls. The cheerful atmosphere was in stark contrast to the pervasive grief that clung to the people gathered around the table and standing against the counter. At quick glance, Sam counted ten people, including Danita and Tamara.
“Mama, Lieutenant Holland is here to see you,” Misty said.
Danita, who’d had her head in her hands, looked up at them, her face ravaged. She’d aged ten years overnight. “Have you found the person who shot my baby?”
“I’m afraid not,” Sam said. “But we’re working on it. I wondered if I might have a private word with you and your daughters.”
“Um, okay.” Danita glanced at the others and tipped her head, asking them to leave the room.
More than one of them took a good long look at Sam as they filed out. She recalled Nick’s goldfish analogy, which was a fitting way to describe how people looked at her these days. They felt like they knew her—and him. But in truth, they only knew what the media reported, which wasn’t much.
Sam took a seat at the table while Freddie remained standing.
“What do you want to know?” Danita took a tissue from a box on the table and blew her nose.
“Yesterday I asked if there was anything going on in any of your lives that could’ve led to Jamal being shot. Now that you’ve had some time to think about it, perhaps you may have something more to tell us.”
A flash of anger crossed Danita’s face. “We have nothing to tell you.”
Tamara and Misty looked down at their hands on the table, immediately rousing Sam’s suspicions. “Ladies, do you have anything you’d like to say? And I’ll remind you that withholding information from a homicide investigation is a crime.”
“I’d like you to leave my home now,” Danita said, glaring at Sam.
Following a hunch, Sam remained seated, her gaze firmly fixed on the two young women. After a minute or two of charged silence, Tamara began to cry.
“Just tell her,” Misty said.
“What’re you talking about?” Danita snapped at her daughter.
Misty looked at her sister.
“I-I’m so sorry, Mama,” Tamara said between sobs. “It’s all my fault that Jamal is dead.”
“What’ve you done?” Danita asked in a whisper.
Tamara cried so hard she couldn’t speak.
Danita looked to Misty. “Start talking. Right now.”
Misty swallowed hard. “She’s been seeing Trace—”
Danita slammed her hand on the table, startling everyone. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
Tamara wailed, sobs racking her petite body. “I’m so sorry, Mama. I never thought—”
Danita stood and looked down at her daughters with fire in her eyes. “I was very clear with you that he was off-limits, Tamara. And you,” she said to Misty, “you knew this and didn’t tell me?”
Sam cleared her throat. “Um, could someone please tell me who Trace is?”
“Trace Simmons is a gangbanger who grew up with my daughters. They were expressly forbidden to have anything to do with him.”
Sam glanced at Freddie and saw his eyes widen with shock. He too remembered Trace was an associate of Darius Gardner, the gangbanger who’d shot at them the week of Sam’s wedding. They’d been trying to talk to Gardner about a possible lead in Sam’s father’s case.
“I love him, Mama!”
Danita scoffed. “Like hell you love him. He’s a violent, drug-dealing piece of shit, and you can do better!”
Tamara clutched her chest, and Sam realized she was hyperventilating. She jumped up. “Get me a bag or something for her to breathe into.”
With shaking hands, Misty got up, opened a drawer and withdrew a brown lunch bag that Sam placed over Tamara’s face.
“Take some deep breaths,” Sam said, rubbing the girl’s back. “You have to calm down.”
Tamara did as Sam directed, blowing into the bag repeatedly until she began to breathe more regularly again.
Sam pulled some tissues from a box on the table and handed them to Tamara, who wiped her face and blew her nose.
“Can we get her some water?”
Misty saw to the request while Danita continued to glare at Tamara, her fury palpable.
“If you love him,” Danita said disdainfully, “why would he want to kill your brother?”
Sam had the same question and appreciated Danita asking it.
Tamara took a drink from the glass Misty gave her. “I...I told him... I said my mama didn’t want me to see him, and if she found out, I’d be in a lot of trouble. He... He said things, rude things about you...” Another sob choked her. “I told him he couldn’t talk about you that way, and he slapped me. He said no one tells him what to do. After that... I wouldn’t talk to him or take his calls. He told me I was going to be sorry for ignoring him. No one ignores him.”
“You stupid, stupid little girl,” Danita hissed. “Why do you think I told you to stay away from him? Any man who would hit you, disparage your mother and make threats doesn’t deserve five minutes of your time.”
“I know that now.”
“You knew it before! I told you this would happen!”
Sam glanced at Freddie, using her eyes to ask him to remove Danita from the room.
“Mrs. Jackson,” he said, “let’s get some air.”
Fortunately, she allowed Freddie to lead her from the room after shooting another disgusted glance at her daughters.
Both girls seemed to relax ever so slightly after she was gone.
“Let’s talk about Trace,” Sam said.
* * *
AN HOUR LATER, Sam and Freddie left the Jackson home with a new thread to pull.
“Get me the Gang Unit captain on the line. What’s his name again?”
“Harrison.”
Sam snapped her fingers. “That’s it! I couldn’t remember his name to save my life.”
“Just ask me, your seeing-eye partner. I have all the answers.”
“Yeah, yeah. Intense in there, huh?”
“I feel sorry for Danita,” Freddie said. “She’s done everything right with her kids, but when they become legal adults it’s harder to control their every move.”
“I feel sorry for Tamara. She grew up with Trace. Knew him before the gang got its hooks in him. She’s still looking for the boy she knew in the man he is now and hasn’t figured out that boy is long gone.”
“Brings it all back, that day with Gardner, his threats to Faith Miller, the rape charge that didn’t stick.”
“Until we nailed his ass to the wall,” Sam said, smirking.
“That we did. What do you want me to say to Harrison?”
“Ask him to have his team pick up Simmons for us and get him to HQ. Also, check to see if he or any of his known associates drives a black sedan.”
“On it.”
While Freddie made his call, she contacted Captain Malone to update him on the info they’d gotten from Tamara Jackson and to request a warrant to search Simmons’s place.
“I’ll get the warrant moving now. Good work, Lieutenant. This guy could be the key to the whole thing.”
“Let’s hope so. What’re you hearing on the search for the car?”
“Slow going. We’re going one by one to rule out every black sedan in the city. Did you know that black is a rather popular car color?”
“I’d heard that rumor. Keep me posted if anything pops.”
“You’ll be the first to know.”
As Sam ended her call, Freddie finished up with Harrison.
“What’d he say?” she asked.
“He blew out a low whistle when I mentioned Simmons’s name. He knows the guy well. Was more than happy to arrange for pickup and transport to HQ. And he’s hoping we’ve got something on him that’ll put him in jail for, and I quote, ‘the rest of this lifetime and the next.’”
“Good to know we have his full support.”
“We definitely do. I relayed what Tamara told us, and he said it fits Simmons’s usual MO when he thinks he’s been disrespected. He said he’s not sure about the black sedan, but he’ll have his people check on that.”
“I like the feel of this thread,” Sam said as she drove toward HQ, again thankful for the lack of traffic. “I like it a lot.”
“You know how I hate to be a buzzkiller...”
Sam rolled her eyes at him. “You love to kill my buzz. What’s it going to be this time?”
“It’s just that I can’t help but wonder if Trace wanted to get even with Tamara for disrespecting him, I can see him taking out Jamal. But why would he take out three other people? He’s already fully initiated, so it can’t be about that.”
“Maybe he was trying to make Jamal’s killing appear random?”
“That’s possible, but it seems like overkill. No pun intended.”
Sam had to agree with him, even if she didn’t want to. “You are indeed a buzzkiller, Detective Cruz.”
“At least I’m consistent.”
“That’s one of my lines, and it’s fully copyrighted. You’re not allowed to use it without prior written permission.”
“Did you make up your own rules to every game you played as a kid?”
She shot him a disdainful look. “What do you think?”
“That you’re lucky you survived childhood?”
Sam snorted out a laugh. “My sisters often wanted to kill me.” Her phone rang and she took the call from Nick. “Hey, babe.”
“Hey,” he said, sounding gruff and sleepy, as if he’d just woken up. She wished she was with him and not chasing down a killer. “You left without saying goodbye.”
“I did say goodbye. I even kissed you.”
“It doesn’t count if I’m not awake to enjoy it.”
“I’ll make it up to you later.”
Freddie put his hands over his ears, making Sam laugh. “Not in front of the children,” he said.
“What’s funny?”
“Freddie trying to hide from my side of this conversation. Maybe I should be specific about how I’m going to make it up to you.”
As Nick said, “Yes, please,” Freddie said, “Don’t you dare.”
Sam lost it laughing, thankful to them for the levity they provided at times when she needed it most. “Any sign of the boy child yet?”
“Nope,” Nick said. “He’s taking full advantage of his last day of vacation. I was thinking I would try to find something fun to do today. Maybe catch a Feds game if we can make it happen.”
“He’d love that. Wish I could join you.”
“Really?” he asked dryly.
“Well, not for the game so much as the company. Have you heard anything else about...the situation?”
“Nothing new. I’ll let you know if I do.”
“Please don’t. Henceforth, I’m operating on a need-to-know basis. If I don’t need to know or if you don’t need to tell me, don’t. I plan to keep my head as deeply planted in the sand as I possibly can for as long as I possibly can.”
“Good plan, babe. I’ll see you when you get home.”
“It’ll probably be late.”
“No worries. We’ll still let you in.”
Sam smiled at the witty reply. He was so cute and funny and sweet, and she loved him with a desperation that would’ve unnerved her before he showed her that it was okay to love so deeply. “Love you.”
“Love you too. Be careful out there.”
“I always am.”
“You two are so funny,” Freddie said after she ended the call.
“We are not.”
“You are, and it’s great that you can laugh and be normal with everything that’s happening.”
“We don’t know how to be any other way but normal.”
“That’s going to get you through whatever comes your way. You’ll be able to handle it because you have each other.”
“You’re very philosophical today, young Freddie.”
“You have no idea how much your friends admire both of you or how proud we are to be your friends. Elin and I were talking about it on the way home from the beach. She said how cool it was that we were hanging out with the vice president and his wife, and they’re just Sam and Nick, our friends.”
“That’s very nice of her—and you—to say. We try to keep it real. I can’t imagine either of us getting caught up in the nonsense that goes along with his job.”
“A lot of people would be caught up, and it’d change who they are.”
“I like who I am, and I particularly like who Nick is.”
He cracked up. “It’s admirable that you’re remaining true to yourselves and who you are underneath it all when everyone in the country—hell most of the world—knows who you are.”
Sam cringed. “Don’t remind me of that.”
“Sorry, but remember the upside. You’ll never have to work undercover again.”
“There is that, especially in light of the way my last undercover assignment ended.” She would never forget the shootout at the crack house that’d ended Quentin Johnson’s life.
“Do I need to remind you again that the blame for Quentin’s death belongs squarely with his drug-dealing scumbag father and not with you?”
“Nah, I got it. I still wish it hadn’t happened, though. He was a cute kid who had the supreme misfortune of being born to scumbags.”
“Very true.”
They arrived at HQ and used the morgue entrance to avoid the mob gathered out front.
“What’ll we do when they move their circus to this door?” Freddie asked.
“Bite your tongue. They know we’ll never talk to them anywhere but outside the main door. If they ever move their show over here, we’ll have to ask the department to get us a helicopter so we can land on the roof.”
“That’d be cool. I get to drive it.”
“As if.” Sam rolled her eyes at him and headed into HQ, making a beeline for the pit. “Who’s got something for me?”
“Nothing yet, LT,” Jeannie said from her cubicle. “Patrol is working its way through the owners of the black sedans, and I’m looking for retired sharpshooters in the area. I might have something on that, but I’m not quite there yet.”
“Keep me posted,” Sam said. “We need to keep up the pace. I’m not convinced their campaign was a one-night deal.”
“We’re moving as fast as we can,” Jeannie said.
Sam went into her office and read through the various reports that had come in while she was out. They revealed nothing particularly helpful, which left her feeling frustrated. Then she turned her attention to the reams of information they had on Trace Simmons, who’d been in and out of the system since he was fifteen on a series of escalating offenses. What had begun as shoplifting and simple assault as a teenager had led to multiple drug offenses, felony assault and domestic assault. The guy was a prince among men.
Archie popped his head into her office. “Hey, you got a minute?”
“Sure, come on in.”
“I was going through the various feeds from the shootings, and I was able to isolate one number on the plate.” He handed over a sheet of paper that showed the number 8 clearly visible as the last number. “You see how it looks blue? That means it’s a District plate. I took the liberty of running a list of black sedans with District plates that end in the number 8. There are seventeen of them.”
“Wow, that’s fantastic work. You just saved us hours.” She called for Jeannie.
“Yes, ma’am?”
Sam handed her the page that Archie had given her, and he handed off the list of cars. “Let’s get patrol to focus on these seventeen cars.”
“That narrows it down from hundreds to a few,” Jeannie said to Archie as he headed out of the office. “Thanks, Lieutenant.”
“Happy to help,” he said on the way out. “Let me know what you find.”
“I’ll get this info out to Patrol,” Jeannie said as she left the office.
Sam’s stomach growled, letting her know it was almost time for lunch, and then her cell phone rang. “Holland.”
“Lieutenant Holland,” a female voice said, “I’m calling on behalf of U.S. Attorney Tom Forrester. He would like to see you in his office tomorrow at two o’clock. Are you available?”
Sam’s stomach fell and hit the ground. “Um, yes, I can do that.”
“We’ll see you then.”
When the line went dead, Sam found the number for Nick’s friend Andy in her contacts.
“Hi there, Sam,” he said. “What’s going on?”
“Sorry to bother you on a holiday, but I got a call from Forrester. He wants to see me tomorrow at two. Can you and Kurt be there?” she asked of the criminal defense attorney from Andy’s office who’d attended her first meeting with Forrester about the Ramsey situation.
“We’ll be there.”
“Do I need to be worried?”
“It’s hard to say, but if I had to guess, there’s no way the grand jury is going to indict you in light of who you are to the city and the country.”
Sam clung to his assurances with everything she had. “Thanks for the optimism. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“We’ll be there.”
She put down the phone and dropped her head into her hands, thinking about the circle of life in her world. Stahl took her hostage and tormented her with razor wire and gasoline, and was looking for an Alford plea while she waited to find out whether she’d be indicted for punching Sergeant Ramsey for inferring that Stahl should’ve finished the job when he had the chance.
She could live without the whole mess coming to a head at the same time she had a shooter picking off innocent people in her city. Not to mention the goings-on in the White House and the possibility that... No. Don’t think about that. Do not think about that.
Her brain was going to melt out her ears at any moment.
Freddie came to the door. “Sam?”
She looked up at him. “Yeah?”
“What’s wrong?”
Everything? “Nothing. What’ve you got?”
He eyed her skeptically because he knew her too well. “The Gang Unit has delivered Simmons to Interview 2.”
Sam took a moment to get her head on straight, shaking off the call from Forrester’s office, her thoughts about Stahl and the proposed plea, the Nelson mess and everything else that would keep her from doing what needed to be done in this interrogation.
“You’re sure you’re okay?”
“Yep.” She made a spot decision to keep the info about Forrester to herself for now. No sense getting everyone wound up about that when she needed them focused on the case.
Taking the file on Simmons with her, she got up to follow Freddie to Interview 2.