Connections in Death (In Death #48)(37)

“The kid mattered to him. The kid’s mother.”

“Yeah. And doing the right thing mattered, too. He said if we busted them for this, it would come back on the kid, maybe the cousin, maybe the mom, too. But couldn’t I do something?”

“You did something.”

“This was back when Oberman still had Illegals in her pocket, so I had to do something on the down low. I had a lot more free time back then as our squad was basically Oberman’s cover, so I used it to watch the two Lyle identified. It didn’t even take long for me to catch them making a deal. Another minor, apparently their specialty. I didn’t bust them for the assault, but for possession, and intent to sell to a minor and within fifty feet of a school. That wrapped them.”

“He was grateful,” Eve prompted.

Strong looked back at the board, at Lyle. “He baked me cupcakes, fancy ones. Damn good, too. I took advantage of that, Lieutenant. I took advantage.”

“You did your job, Detective.”

“Ah fuck me.” After setting the coffee down, Strong pressed her fingers to her tired eyes. “The whole Oberman deal—I knew she was a dirty cop, worse than dirty. But I couldn’t do a damn thing. It stewed in me, and here I saw a way to do my job, like you said, and work around her. I never listed him as my CI. Never told her or anybody, not at first, I had a source. One I started milking. He was grateful,” she murmured. “He’d developed a genuine moral code, you could say. So he’d feed me bits—a lot he’d pick up from Duff. Mostly they turned out to be good bits, and I could use them. Small time, mostly, but we both felt good about it.”

“I think it probably helped him,” Peabody put in. “Gave him something, like his cooking. He was making restitution.”

“I guess. You know he was getting his gang tat removed. He’d show me the progress. Slow—it costs more to get them off than to ink them on. He introduced me to his sponsor, Matt Fenster.”

Strong let out another breath. “Ah, I’d better disclose Matt and I have sort of been seeing each other recently.”

“Okay.”

“I just want to be up front on that. Have you notified him?”

“Not yet.”

“Would you let me do that? I’d like to tell him in person. He’s going to take it hard, LT. He was really proud of Lyle, and they, well, they had a real connection.”

“Peabody, did you reach him?”

“Yes, sir. I asked if he could come in, and he said he’d be here before noon. I didn’t tell him why.”

“You take a few minutes with him, Detective.”

“Appreciate it.” Steadier, Strong picked up the coffee again. “After we took Oberman down, that bitch, and got the dirt out of the squad, I still kept Lyle on the DL for a while. I just wanted to get a good feel for the new LT, the transfers. I didn’t tell my boss about it until a few weeks ago when—between what I got from Lyle, what I was able to put together from pattern, from some buzz—I thought I hit on a fairly major illegals buy.

“We busted three Bangers, got a couple of flunkies buying up the junk for an asshole trust-fund baby on Long Island. Got him, too, but he got a deal.” On a scowl of disgust, Strong gestured with her mug. “Money talks.”

“I heard about that. Good bust. Isn’t the trust-fund asshole doing six months—minimum-security rehab palace, but six months in?”

“Yeah. The Bangers are doing a dime each, and he gets a knuckle rap. But it’s something. I thought I had enough shields up, Dallas, to cover Lyle, but if I didn’t . . .”

“He made a choice, a courageous one. Don’t take that from him.”

Strong turned her gaze to Eve. “I need to be in on this. He was mine. I need to be in on this.”

“I thought that was understood.”

Eve knew Strong to be tough, so the swirl of tears in her eyes brought some concern. “Okay, listen—”

But Strong waved a hand, battled back the tears. “I’ll copy you on all my files where he played a part. How they’d get to him?”

Eve ran it through, gave Strong a minute to absorb it.

“Yeah, yeah, he’d have let her in. It’s the first I know about her going to his place, going into his place. At least, he never told me she had. She’d hang outside the building, catching him coming or going to work. Sometimes she’d wait outside where he worked. Lately he didn’t see her as much, and he heard she started flopping with a Banger called Bolt.”

“Yeah, that sticks.”

“He’s a bad one, Dallas. Bolt, along with a female—not a Banger Bitch but a soldier—Tank, because she’s built like one, and Riot are lieutenants for a reason.”

Frowning, Strong studied her coffee before she drank. “It might be Duff hooked with Bolt to try to get more stable status with the gang. Can’t say for sure, but if she came around crying, asking for help, I see Lyle opening the door—even just to give her a couple bucks, get her gone.”

“You don’t see him being involved with her again?”

“Risk his parole, his job, the life he was building? Big no. He felt sorry for her on some levels. He saw her as caught in the same cycle he’d finally broken for himself. And they had a history, so he’d try to help her.”