“I think the sentiment is genuine,” Levi said.
“Yeah,” said Dominic. “This freak genuinely wants to kill me.”
He’d been pacing his small apartment for the past five minutes. Each step reverberated up his spine and pounded through his aching skull, but he couldn’t sit down or even stop moving. His stomach was a mass of angry, tangled knots.
“No.” Levi frowned at him. “They might be teasing you, trying to knock you off-balance a little, but I think they really are wishing you’ll ‘get well soon.’ The gift is sincere.”
Unlike Dominic, Levi had remained in one spot, photographing the basket with his phone and examining its contents with a careful eye. Dominic rejoined him, his hands in his pockets so he wouldn’t accidentally touch anything.
“What makes you say that?” he asked.
“I spoke to this person on the phone. It was only for a few minutes, and it wasn’t their real voice, but the things they said, the words they used . . . They obviously have a very black-and-white mentality. ‘Good’ versus ‘bad’, full stop. You’re not a bad person by their definition, so even if your investigation is annoying them, I don’t think they would hurt you. If anything, bounty hunting is a profession they’d admire.”
“You’re just guessing.”
Levi’s frown deepened into a scowl. “It’s an educated guess based on experience and a cop’s intuition, not a wild shot in the dark.”
“Still.” Dominic rambled back into the living room, collapsing on his couch and burying his face in his hands. “God, maybe I should move.”
That was a depressing prospect. He’d snagged this apartment before his gambling had gotten really bad. With his current rock-bottom credit, any decent building would toss his application right in the shredder. Plus, he’d hate to leave Carlos and Jasmine.
“Dominic.” Levi’s footsteps came closer, and when Dominic lifted his head, Levi was sitting in front of him on the edge of the sturdy oak coffee table. “If the Seven of Spades—fuck, now I’m saying it—if they wanted to kill you, I think you’d be dead already.”
“You don’t think I could hold my own?”
“I don’t think you’d get the chance,” Levi said. “All three victims were subdued without the slightest sign of a struggle. What does that say to you?”
“They didn’t expect an attack,” Dominic muttered. “The killer didn’t seem like a threat until it was way too late.”
“Exactly.” Levi reached out, paused to strip the glove off his right hand, and settled his hand on Dominic’s knee. “I’m sure you could defend yourself against an attack you saw coming, but that’s not how it would happen. And since all of your blood is still inside your arteries, I don’t think that’s the plan. There’s no need to panic.”
“Easy for you to say. You’re not being singled out by a serial killer.”
Levi raised his eyebrows. “No? The Seven of Spades contacted me with their offer—me specifically. They called me by name and mentioned my OIS.”
Sitting upright in surprise, Dominic said, “You didn’t tell me that last part.”
“It didn’t seem relevant at the time.”
Dominic started to speak, but he was distracted by Levi’s hand still resting on his knee, a comforting gesture that had gone on a shade longer than necessary. He glanced down. Levi cleared his throat and snatched his hand back.
“Think about it this way then,” Levi said. “Even if you do move, what’s to stop them from finding you again? They didn’t have any trouble the first time. Unless you’re planning to leave the city, what’s the point?”
That was logic Dominic could get behind. He of all people knew how difficult it was to hide from someone who was truly determined to track you down. Common-sense security precautions would serve him better than a panicked move to an unfamiliar environment.
Still . . .
“This is your approach to reassuring someone who’s freaking out?” Dominic asked. “‘If they wanted to kill you, you’d already be dead?’ ‘What’s to stop them from finding you again?’ Are you trying to make me feel better or give me a nervous breakdown?”
Levi glared, drawing himself up like an indignant cat. Dominic grinned and slapped the side of Levi’s knee.
“I’m kidding. Mostly.”
Levi’s cell phone dinged. He checked the text message and said, “My car is downstairs. Is it all right if I take the basket with me? I want the lab to go over it for trace evidence and—well, test the food items for ketamine, honestly. You never know.”
“Yeah, of course. Whatever you need to do.”
Putting his right glove back on, Levi returned to the kitchen and gathered up the basket, cellophane and ribbon and all. “Will you be able to get Rebel from next door? Is there anyone home there this time of day?”
Dominic nodded, then winced. Bad idea. “Carlos is recovering from surgery. I was actually planning to spend the day over there, if he’s up for it.”
“All right. Call me if the killer contacts you again.” Levi’s eyes crinkled at the corners. “Apparently, you have my number.”
Laughing, Dominic stood to show Levi out. Once he was alone in the apartment, however, all his amusement drained away.
Was the killer watching him right now? They’d left the gift basket outside, not in the apartment, but that didn’t necessarily mean they couldn’t get in. What if they’d planted cameras or bugs or something?
God, this was insane. All he wanted to do was curl up with Rebel, turn his brain off, and sleep for the rest of the day.
Before he left, he locked his gun in his safe. He hesitated for a moment, considering whether he should take it with him, but his concussion decided him against it. If the doctor didn’t think he should drive, he probably shouldn’t be shooting a gun either. It had been barely more than twelve hours since he’d been injured.
He paused with his hand on the dial of the safe. When he’d guessed that one of his sisters might have sent the gift basket, he’d thought it was a crazy fast response, and that was still the case. It seemed like the serial killer had some access to LVMPD information, so it wasn’t surprising they’d learned about the incident so quickly. But to deliver a gift basket early in the morning, so soon afterward? And there was the time it would have taken to mess with the deck of cards and rewrap the basket, which only the killer themselves could have done.
It couldn’t have been ordered online, nor dropped off by a regular delivery person. To be waiting on his doorstep by the time he got home, that basket had to have been bought locally.
In person.
“You can’t do this to me!”
The words were muffled but still audible, shouted from a conference room down the hall. Levi startled and looked up from his desk, as did everyone else in the bullpen.
There was some indistinct chatter, another yell—“This is bullshit!”—a banging like heavy furniture being thrown aside, and then the sound of scuffling. The other voices in the conference room rose in volume.
Tension crackled through the bullpen. Levi looked reflexively to Martine’s desk, but her chair was empty—she was interrogating the burglars he had arrested last night. They’d agreed that the men would be more receptive to her than the guy who’d knocked them out.
As the commotion in the conference room grew louder, Levi groaned, shoved his chair back, and headed down the hallway. The room in question had the blinds shut tight over the windows, and there was no sign up indicating what kind of meeting was taking place. He rapped on the door and opened it without waiting for a response.
All the people in the room were on their feet. They turned toward him—except for Keith Chapman, who was still ranting, and Natasha, who had a hand on his elbow and was speaking softly into his ear. Levi recognized two detectives from Internal Affairs, a police union rep, and Joe Alvarez, Keith’s lieutenant. The chair nearest Keith lay on its side, and there were papers scattered all over the floor.
His hearing obviously wasn’t going well.
“Everything all right in here?” Levi asked.
“Everything’s fine, Detective,” said Terence Freeman, one of the IA guys. The other one, Valeria Montoya, was a prim, stiff woman who rarely spoke but had eyes as intense and unsettling as a hawk’s.
“You can’t kick me off the force.” Though Keith was furiously upset, his face wasn’t flushed—in fact, he was alarmingly pale. His skin shone with sweat, his hair was matted and greasy, and his left eye spasmed repeatedly. “It’s not fair. He deserved it. He deserved it.”
“For God’s sake, Keith,” Alvarez said, looking embarrassed. “Pull yourself together.”
Natasha moved her hand from Keith’s elbow to his back, rubbing in circles. Levi noticed that Keith’s hands were trembling, but not in a way that signaled extremes of emotion—it looked more like a tremor spurred by illness.
Troubled, Levi said, “Maybe you should take him somewhere more private.” Like Alvarez, he hated seeing a fellow cop like this.
“Maybe you should mind your own business and let us do our jobs,” Freeman snapped.
Levi bristled, remembering that Freeman was on one of his lists; a couple of years ago, he’d been in a physical altercation with another officer. Though his actions had been ruled self-defense, they didn’t exactly improve Levi’s opinion of him.
Natasha intervened before the situation could deteriorate further. “Levi is right. Are we done here?”
“There’s paperwork—”
“I’m sure that can wait,” she said firmly.
Freeman seemed about to protest, but Natasha arched an eyebrow, and he backed down with a nod. Montoya remained silent, watching the exchange with an unreadable expression.
Natasha ushered a babbling, agitated Keith out of the room. Levi followed them. He didn’t want her to be alone with Keith while he was so distressed, and he especially wanted to make sure she wasn’t planning on taking Keith back to her tiny office, which had only one point of entry or exit and thus no easy escape routes.
“Here, come with me.” Levi took them down to one of the interrogation suites. It probably wasn’t the best choice for Keith’s composure, but the priority had to be Natasha’s safety. If Keith lost his shit in here, he’d at least be easier to subdue.
“It’s not fair,” Keith said again to Natasha, once the door had closed. He roamed around the room, every part of his body in constant motion; the tic in his eye was getting worse. “You know what he said to me, you know how he bragged about what he did to those kids. He was taunting me. What was I supposed to do?”
“Keith,” Natasha said, with an air of both sympathy and weariness. “Your reaction to the situation was wildly out of proportion. Being a cop doesn’t give you the right to—”
Keith whirled around, pointing a shaking, accusing finger at Levi. Levi took a step back and to the side, so that he stood at an angle to Keith rather than right in front of him.
“You beat the crap out of three guys just last night, and nothing happened to you! People are talking about it all over the substation. They’re impressed. Where’s your IA investigation, huh?”
“My life was in immediate danger,” said Levi. “And I incapacitated them without doing any lasting harm. You pinned a handcuffed man to the ground and pummeled his face until it looked like a burst jack-o’-lantern.”
“Well, at least I never killed anyone.”
Levi rocked back on his heels.
Natasha moved forward, her hands held out to either side. “Please, this isn’t helpful.”
“That piece of shit provoked me into attacking him, and now I’m out of a job.” Keith was breathing hard, almost hyperventilating. “Tina kicked me out of the house and won’t let me see my kids. What am I supposed to do now?”
“I’m going to call your sister to come get you.” Natasha positioned herself in Keith’s eyeline until he had no choice but to focus on her. “I’ll give Dr. Tran a call too, okay?”
She coaxed Keith into a seat at the metal table and pulled out her cell. Once she’d made her calls, she sat beside him and spoke to him in low, soothing tones while Levi stood as unobtrusively as possible in the corner, his disquiet mounting every moment.
Something was wrong with Keith, really wrong. He couldn’t stop moving—feet tapping, body shifting around in the chair, hands fluttering and trembling, face twitching. His skin had no color in it at all, and he’d sweated right through his suit jacket in big dark patches.
This went well beyond emotional distress. The only other time Levi had seen people look like this was when he was a beat cop, dealing with substance abusers strung out on drugs. Was Keith using?
Ten minutes later, Natasha had settled Keith down somewhat. She walked him out to the front of the building, Levi trailing behind, and handed him into the care of his worried sister with a few words too quiet for Levi to hear.
Levi waited until Keith and his sister were out of earshot before joining Natasha on the sidewalk. With her eyes still on Keith’s back, she said, “You didn’t have to stay with us the whole time. He wouldn’t hurt me.”
“You don’t know that,” Levi said. “You never know that.”
“I guess that’s true,” she said dispiritedly.
“What’s wrong with Keith? Physically, I mean. He seems . . . not well.”
Natasha turned, giving him her full attention. “You mean the akathisia? It’s an occasional side effect of antipsychotics—an uneasy restlessness and a compulsion to be in constant motion.”
“What?” Levi shook his head in disbelief. “Since when is Keith on antipsychotics?”
“You know I can’t tell you that.”
“You’ve already told me more than you’re supposed to,” he pointed out. “Besides, don’t you have a duty to warn?”
She gave him an arch look, unimpressed by his argument. “That doesn’t apply here. Keith hasn’t communicated any form of explicit threat to anyone. He’s not dangerous.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes,” she said. “Look, after the assault, Keith started having paranoid delusions, thinking everyone was working against him. The LVMPD, the legal system, the media—like there was some kind of conspiracy to discredit him and ruin his life. You saw yourself that he can’t accept responsibility for what happened. It’s so severe that he can’t function. Dr. Tran—his psychiatrist—started him on antipsychotics to address the delusions.”
Levi frowned. He’d known Keith for years, and though they hadn’t been friends, he’d never noticed any indication of paranoia. Had the stress of the incident really been enough to trigger full-blown delusions?
“The overwhelming majority of people with mental illness aren’t dangerous.” Natasha’s eyes were fierce and there was an angry edge to her voice he’d never heard before. “Even when they are, it’s primarily to themselves.”
“I know that—”
“The only reason I’m telling you any of this is because I see that look in your eyes—that cop look, like you’re assessing Keith as a threat and deciding what to do with him. But he’s just a human being who made a terrible mistake and is having trouble handling the consequences. It could happen to anyone.”
“Natasha, whoa.” Levi lifted his hands. “I’m worried about Keith, that’s all. I’m not planning to harass him. I promise.”
She studied his face, her eyes narrowed. Then she relaxed. “All right, I’m sorry. I just hate it when people make snap judgments about mental illness. I’ve been working against that my entire career.”
“I understand.”
Natasha looked back in the direction Keith had walked in, though he was long gone by now. Her teeth worried at her bottom lip.
“If he’s still this bad, are the antipsychotics even working?” Levi asked.
She shrugged. “It can take a while to settle on the right dosage and combination of medications for each patient. It is a little unusual that his side effects became so serious this soon, but I’m not a doctor. I can’t make decisions about medication, and Dr. Tran isn’t interested in anything I have to say anyway. She talks to me like I’m a kindergartner.”
“Still, Keith is lucky to have you on his side.”
“Thanks,” she said, smiling. “Speaking of which—when are you coming in for your next session?”
“Oh, look at the time,” said Levi, and turned toward the substation.
With a startled laugh, she caught his arm and pulled him back. “Seriously. You still have two sessions left. Do you want to schedule one later this week? Or over the weekend, maybe? I know you have a lot on your plate right now.”
“Can I let you know later? I haven’t even had a full day off since this serial killer got into full swing.”
“Sure. As long as that’s a genuine offer and not just an attempt to placate me.”
It had been, of course, but her calling him out on it made him feel guilty. “I’ll let you know by tomorrow.” He gestured to the front doors. “Are you going inside?”
“Actually, I think I’m going to head out for an early lunch,” said Natasha. “Decompress a little. That meeting was rough. And Levi? I could get in huge trouble for telling you all this—lose my job, even my license.”
“I know. It won’t go any further than me, I promise.” He rested his hand on her shoulder for a moment and then went inside, returning to his desk.
Martine hadn’t come back yet, so Levi picked his work back up where he’d left off. Only five minutes passed before he was interrupted again, this time by his cell phone.
“Hi, Mom,” he said as he lifted the phone to his ear.
“Levi, it’s your mother.”
He sighed.
“Me, too,” his father added.
“You know I love hearing from you guys, but why is it you always call me in the middle of a workday?”
“The last time we called you was Sunday,” Nancy said. “How were we supposed to know you’d be working on a Sunday?”
That was true, actually; Levi had forgotten. The long hours and stress of a top-priority case tended to blur days together for him.
“Anyway,” she went on, “we’ve been waiting to hear from you. With a happy announcement, maybe?”
“I don’t know what you mean.” He clicked open the ballistics report the lab had filed on one of the other homicides in his caseload.
“Well, after your young man spoke to us about his intentions . . .”
“What intentions?” he said, more than half his mind on the report.
There was a long, loaded pause. Any kind of silence from his parents was so unusual that Levi snapped to attention, and he abruptly realized what they meant.
“Oh, no. Please tell me Stanton didn’t call you to—to ask permission—”
“Not permission,” Saul said quickly. “Of course not. Just our blessing.”
Levi palmed his face with his free hand. Using the word blessing in place of permission was just semantics, trying to make a misogynist relic more palatable instead of leaving it in the past where it belonged. He’d always considered the custom bizarre and disrespectful to one’s partner, regardless of the genders involved. Even if Stanton disagreed—which he obviously did—he should know Levi better than this.
What made it worse was that he and Stanton weren’t anywhere near ready to get engaged. They could barely spend half an hour alone together without fighting these days. What could Stanton be thinking?
That a marriage proposal would patch things right up, probably. He’d always been a hopeless romantic—a trait Levi usually found endearing, but which sometimes prompted him to act irrationally.
“It’s long past time for you to settle down,” said Nancy. “Living in Nevada isn’t an excuse anymore, not since the Supreme Court woke up and brought America in line with the rest of the civilized world. And you know your father and I don’t mind you marrying a Gentile, as long as the mother of your children is Jewish.”
Levi made a squeaky noise of protest.
Oblivious to his discomfort, she said, “I already have information on a couple of agencies that specialize in Jewish egg donors—”
“Oh my God, Mom,” Levi interrupted. “Stop. Please. Stanton and I are not getting married.”
“Why not?”
Because I don’t want to marry him.
The thought sprang into Levi’s mind, pure in its simplicity, and stopped him in his tracks. He gazed blankly at his computer screen while his parents talked over one another, somehow managing to argue both with each other and with him simultaneously.
“You can’t rush these things—”
“Well, you can’t just sit around and wait for them to happen on their own, either—”
“I’m not ready to get married,” Levi said, which effectively shut them both up. “I’m sorry. I know that’s not what you want to hear.”
“What we want to hear is that you’re happy,” Nancy said. “Whatever that means for you.”
Saul hummed his agreement.
“Your poor young man is going to be heartbroken, though.”
“I’ll talk to him about it,” said Levi, though he had no intention of doing so unless he was completely backed into a corner. When it came to facing off against three gangbangers intending to kick his ass, he could stay calm and in control, but when it came to unpleasant relationship conversations, he was the worst of cowards.
He spoke to his parents a little longer before hanging up, steering clear of any sensitive topics. Once he’d set his phone down, he propped his elbows on the desk and put his face in his hands.
“What’s wrong?” Martine asked.
Levi lifted his head. Martine had to be at least as tired and stressed as he was, but it didn’t show—her hair was done in perfect, bouncy coils, her lipstick fresh, her gray pantsuit crisply pressed. He, on the other hand, had forgotten to shave that morning, and the last time he’d looked in the mirror, he’d actually winced at the dark circles under his eyes.
“Nothing important. You get anything out of them?”
“The first two were tough as nails, but the third guy had priors. He buckled under a little pressure.” She dropped into her chair and jogged her mouse to wake up her computer. “They’re ganged up with Los Avispones, just like you thought.”
So Dominic had been right. Levi wasn’t surprised—which was surprising in itself.
“The burglaries weren’t their idea, though—it’s not the usual way they get their ketamine. They were hired for those jobs.”
“Hired by whom?” he asked, his curiosity piqued.
“They don’t know.” Martine shrugged. “They were contacted by text each time, paid half in advance via dead drop, and paid the rest after completion the same way. The client specifically instructed them to take anything of value, but the only thing Los Avispones sent on was the ketamine. They’ve been mailing it to a box in a private mail service out in the suburbs.”
“I’m guessing the identity used to reserve the box is fake.”
“Haven’t checked yet. But Sergeant Wen sent a couple of uniforms out to take a look around the mailbox company. He’s thinking about setting a trap, mailing some ketamine like the job was completed and seeing if anyone takes the bait.”
Levi fiddled with a pen, tapping the end against his desk blotter. The serial killer knew that Dominic had been injured, so they almost certainly knew how, which meant they were aware the burglary had been unsuccessful. They’d also known about Dreyer’s fraud investigation, Goodwin skipping bail, even that Levi was one of the lead detectives on the case—either they were omniscient, or they had a source inside the LVMPD.
“That’s not going to work,” he said. “The Seven of Spades knows their little gang of thieves was blown. They’ll never go back to that mailbox.”
Martine gave him an odd sideways look across their desks.
“What?”
“You called them the Seven of Spades.”
He raked a weary hand through his hair. “Wen was right; it’s human nature to name things. I’ve already started thinking of them that way, and I’m too tired to push back against it right now just for the sake of principle.”
“All right. Well, we have to stake out the box whether or not we think the Seven of Spades will fall for it or not. You know that.”
He stared morosely at his computer, which had been idle so long it had logged him out and gone to the LVMPD screensaver. Every other lead they’d come up with so far had been a dead end. Why would this one be any different?
Ordinary murderers were easy to understand. Whether driven by passionate extremes of rage or jealousy or just cold, calculating greed, their motivations were simple to discern, their personal connection to the victim obvious. Sometimes they were a challenge to nail down, and every now and then one did elude justice due to a technicality or weakness of the available evidence. But Levi had never, ever felt hopeless in the face of a homicide investigation before—like nothing he did would ever be enough.
He’d never come up against a killer like this.
“Levi?” Martine snapped her fingers. “You still with me?”
He shook his head to clear it and refocused on her. “Yeah, sorry.”
“I gave the perps’ phones to Carmen for analysis. The texts were sent with one of those self-deletion apps, but they’re not a hundred percent reliable. She may be able to get something off them. In the meantime, I thought you and I could plot out the location of the dead drops, see if there’s any pattern?”
“Sure.” Levi tapped the space bar on his keyboard and entered his password when prompted.
He was a dedicated cop. He’d do his job, and he’d do it well, just as he always had.
In the back of his mind, however, a new thought repeated itself over and over: What’s the point?