Ambush (Michael Bennett #11)(44)

But I had to take care of something first. Clyde’s and my close encounter with Jimmy made me determined to know if the Alpha had actually put a tail on me. I rolled down the windows—the Land Cruiser didn’t have air-conditioning—then got back on the highway, heading away from work. Ten minutes later, I exited and detoured to a theme park in northern Denver known as Water World. At the entrance, I joined the line of cars filing into the immense parking lot. The place was packed with thrill seekers, but I drove to the outer edge of the lot and backed into a spot.

A steady stream of cars followed, packed to the gills with families or teenagers. Fifteen minutes after I’d parked, a brown sedan caught my eye. It drove up and down the lanes, passing multiple parking spots. When it drove directly past the Land Cruiser, I spotted two men in buzz cuts and polo shirts sitting in the front. The man in the passenger seat turned to look straight at me.

They drove past and parked a few spots down. The driver shut off the engine and lowered windows, while the passenger reached a hand over the seat and came back with a white McDonald’s bag. He pulled out four red boxes and handed two of them to the driver. They chatted and ate.

I got the message. Intimidation, not stealth, was the point of this game.

I considered marching over, telling them to get the hell away from me. But it felt too much like crushing cockroaches. I looked at my watch. Cohen should be on the ground by now. I keyed his number, but the call went straight to voice mail.

“Call me,” I said.

As the day’s heat seeped into my bones and the last of the adrenaline trickled out of me, I resisted the desire to put my seat back and take twenty. I didn’t know when I’d picked up the tail, or who would take over for these guys when their shift was over. I felt outmanned and probably outgunned.

I leaned over and pressed my face against Clyde’s warm back. He shifted until we were sitting forehead to forehead.

“Just one more day,” I told him. “One more day, and we’ll end this.”

Unless the Alpha ended it first.

I pushed myself upright. Clyde gave me a tongue-lolling grin and went back to people watching. His tail thumped as a squirrel bounded across the asphalt and ran up one of the handful of trees in the lot. He gave a happy, I’m-not-on-duty bark.

One thing about my partner—he made a rich life out of little things. And he didn’t sweat the big stuff. I should learn from him. For the moment, I’d make better progress if I focused on squirrels and ignored the wolves.

I started the engine.

The sedan followed us out of the parking lot. I watched as they tailed me onto the on-ramp, but once on the highway, they dropped back and let a few cars get between us. They didn’t seem overly concerned with keeping me in sight.

Interesting. My truck had been locked in Cohen’s garage while I was gone—safely stowed behind the guarded gates of Cherry Hills.

But the same could be said of Cohen’s home. And that hadn’t stopped them.

After a stop at Travelli’s Deli and fighting noontime traffic the entire way, I turned into the parking lot of Denver Pacific Continental headquarters. I waited. A few minutes later, the sedan drove past the DPC gate and parked half a block down on the public street.

I pulled into a spot between my boss’s new red pickup truck and a dark-blue BMW sedan that belonged to the new guy, Greg Heinrich. Heinrich was five months into the job and—in my humble opinion—lacked a certain commitment to the profession. Plus, I didn’t trust his car. Why would the kind of guy who could afford a Beamer take a job as a railroad cop? Was he just making time between gigs? Or lording it over us blue-collar trash?

Clyde and I got out. My faded tan Land Cruiser looked embarrassed to be next to such shining examples of modernity.

“It’s a muscle play,” I told my car. “You’ll give the fancy guys the shudders.”

When Clyde and I walked into the small office area that housed the railroad police, my boss was nowhere to be seen. But Heinrich sat at his desk, which faced mine, chatting into his Bluetooth. He looked up and waved when we walked in. I dropped into the chair at my desk and signaled for Clyde to sit. Judging by the slow thump of his tail, Clyde was happy to be back. A working dog is happiest on the job, squirrels be damned.

“I’m on it,” Heinrich was saying into the mouthpiece as he tilted back and stared at the ceiling. His face was red. “Yeah, yeah, it’s covered. Don’t worry. I got it. See you tonight.”

He finished his conversation and turned to me with a tired smile. The candle burning in his eyes didn’t match his haggard expression. Coffee or Red Bull, I figured. The rocket fuels of cops everywhere.

“What are you doing back?” he asked. “Not that I’m not happy to see you. But aren’t you supposed to still be on vacation? And what’s with the hair? And the shiner?”

I’d worked out my story ahead of time. “Took a fall by the pool and decided Mexico isn’t for me. I just came in to talk to Mauer and get the buzz on Jeremy Kane.”

“Kane. What a tragedy.” For a moment, Heinrich looked like he’d be sick. I offered him my trashcan, but he swallowed hard and gave me a weak smile. “I should never have looked at the recordings. I’m going to have nightmares for months.”

Wait until he got his first jumper. “Any news that’s not in the papers?”