A Chip and a Chair (Seven of Spades, #5)(19)
“Sorry. I hope that wasn’t expensive.”
Levi stepped forward. “Leila . . .”
She whirled on him. “How could you believe I was the Seven of Spades?”
“I didn’t want to!” Levi held both hands palm-up in a supplicating gesture. “But we had to take a hard look at everyone connected to me and the case, and you-”
“Just screamed serial killer?”
“It was more complicated than that. And I know now that it wasn’t you.”
She scoffed. “Because you found victims killed and buried in the desert while I was living in another state. Not because you changed your mind about me.”
Levi had no response for that. Dominic put a hand on his back, lending silent support as best he could. Rebel watched the confrontation anxiously-she’d been trained to regard Leila as a friend, but she must have sensed Leila’s hostility from the start, or she wouldn’t have barked to warn them.
“Honestly, I don’t care that you think I’m capable of murder,” said Leila. “What kills me is that you could think I’d torture you the way the Seven of Spades has.” She clenched her jaw, and when she spoke again, her voice cracked. “I know I’m not the kindest person in the world, or the most empathetic, but for you to believe that I’d stalk and harass and torment you, of all people? How could you have so little faith in me? In our friendship?”
Dominic stared. He’d never seen Leila display emotion like this; he thought he even caught the sheen of tears in her eyes before she blinked them away. The only emotions he’d seen her express before were boredom, irritation, and mild amusement-which, admittedly, had played a role in their suspicions. But there was no faking the deep hurt on her face.
Levi bowed his head. “I’m sorry. Whoever the Seven of Spades is, it’s probably someone I trust. I didn’t know what to do.”
Leila visibly reined herself in, inhaling through her nose and exhaling through her mouth, before she switched her focus to Dominic. “I know you two didn’t get warrants for any of this, which means most of it was illegal. From now on, both of you stay the hell away from me.”
She threw the bag at Levi’s face. He barely caught it in time.
“I mean it, Levi. You come near me again, and your boyfriend is going to jail.”
She stalked past them and down the path. Dominic and Levi stood in place, unmoving and unspeaking, until they heard a car start up.
Levi tilted his face toward the sky and closed his eyes. “Nailed it.”
“One of those days, huh, Detective?” said the corrections officer at the front desk of the CCDC. “I think we’ve had five of those Utopia creeps dragged in today alone.”
“Don’t get me started,” Levi grumbled as he signed out. Earlier, he’d responded to a hot call regarding a shooting outside Planned Parenthood, and had joined the hunt for the skinheads responsible. It had eaten up most of his afternoon, on a day when he already had to leave work early for an appointment with Dominic. “I’d like to know where they keep finding all these fresh recruits.”
The CO shrugged. “Well, outside the Valley, we’re surrounded on all sides by rural Nevada. And . . . you know how some people are these days.”
That was a diplomatic way of saying that a good chunk of the country had gone batshit insane. Levi just wished that the LVMPD’s other bureaus could handle their business, so that he wasn’t continually distracted from the Seven of Spades case by chasing radicalized white supremacists all over Las Vegas.
“Detective Abrams,” said a familiar, unwanted voice behind him.
Levi took a deep breath before he turned to face Jay Sawyer. He refused to notice Sawyer’s preppy, clean-cut good looks, focusing instead on the arrogant swagger that irritated him so much-though ever since their one-night-stand a couple of months ago, Sawyer seemed to rein in the worst of his smugness when he and Levi crossed paths.
“Sawyer,” he said evenly. “What are you doing here?”
“Visiting a client.” Sawyer signed out as well, flashing the CO a dazzling smile full of bright white teeth. “You know him, actually-Lonnie Hale?”
That was the man who’d spit in Levi’s face while being arrested. Levi grimaced and took a step back. “You’re representing Nazis now?”
“Sixth Amendment, Detective. All citizens have the constitutional right to counsel.” Sawyer paused, then added, “No matter how much said counsel might personally like to throw them out a window.”
Levi snorted, somewhat appeased. He’d never understood how defense attorneys could stomach their jobs, but somebody had to do it.
“How can a punk like that even afford you?” he asked. Sawyer’s time billed at a cool grand per hour. “Hatfield, Park, and McKenzie at least has the PR sense not to do pro bono work for white supremacists.”
“You know I can’t tell you that.” Sawyer moved out of the intrigued CO’s earshot and lowered his voice to a more intimate tone. “I heard about the bodies you found in the desert. Were they really left there by the Seven of Spades?”
They were indeed. Targeted preliminary lab tests of the most recent corpses had confirmed the presence of ketamine, though more extensive, in-depth testing was required. Still, the combination of ketamine with a slit throat was too unique an MO to be credited to anyone else.