Nothing Sacred (FBI Agent Dan Hammer Series Book 1) (6 page)

Almost home now. Alicia was out on the street. The local hooker. She waved as Dan turned the corner. “Hey, Alicia.” Except for her, the neighborhood was quiet. Not much activity. Alicia was probably feeling similar thoughts. The only thing going on with Dan was in his freaking head. Dan thought too damn much.

His cell phone went off. It never failed. Just when Dan was fantasizing a hot shower and an early night to bed, he gets a call. He pulled into a Krispy Crème parking lot.

“Hammer.”
Why didn’t they use the scanner?
Damn scanner had been silent all evening. Not even the usual bad static. Precinct used his cell phone when they didn’t want information leaking. Nosy reporters.

Dan listened. A situation over at the Medical University. They were expecting him. Police officers Rogers and Evans were keeping a man there for questioning. Dan ended the call and did a u-turn. He left a trail of blue smoke in the rearview mirror. One of the benefits of being a detective. Dan took the on ramp to I-26 at seventy miles an hour speeding toward Charleston. Toward wealth.  See how fast life can change?

Wasn’t he only moments ago on his way home for some well-deserved rest? Kick back and take in some
CSI.
Enjoy some of his own company… for a change. Yeah. Big laugh. Duty called. Just one of the rules. That and the fact that he actually loved his job. Really. He
loved
it!

Oh, there were some dislikes. Sometimes, Dan blamed himself for Wallace’s death. The “what if’s” tended to haunt him. The price he paid for packing a pistol. Being a detective. What if he’d been quicker? Known sooner? Taken the first shot? Would Wallace still be around? Dan wondered.

And then, the ultimate question…

What if Dan would have lost the toss?

1:36 AM

June 15, 2007

MUSC

6

“George, is that you?”

George was in deep shit! The minute he heard Edna’s
voice, he knew he was knee high in a pile of manure. “Edna? Honey?”

“Don’t you
honey
me?”

The line went dead.

Edna hung up on him.
Whadaya think about that?
George reached into his pants pocket for another couple of quarters. As God was his witness, this was his punishment. All those Thursday nights, dropping Edna off at that stupid church, watchin’ her waddle up those six cement steps. God will have no mercy on him this time.

George tried depositing the quarters into the pay phone, but his hands were shaking so badly, he dropped one. Damn thing. It rolled into the main lobby of the Emergency Room. George scrambled for it. He hunkered down on all fours, like an anteater, close to the floor. He retrieved the coin and walked back to try again. This time he stabilized his trembling hand so he wouldn’t drop it. He punched in the number and listened for the ring. Surprisingly enough, Edna picked up.

George started talking. Quickly. Rambling would be a better way to describe it. “Edna, now before you hang up on me, you just hear me out…”

Edna sighed. “George, I am so tired of listening to you.”

“Edna,” George pleaded, “listen to me, honey. Please.”

“Where are you, George?”

“I’m down at the hospital. The Medical University. In Charleston.”

“If you had any idea what kinda’ nightmare you put me through tonight…” Pause. “Where?”

Her tone changed. George could visualize her, standing by the wall phone, hand on her hip, just waiting to pick a fight. Then, slowly, slowly… dropping her arm down to her side.

“Downtown. At the Medical University,” he answered.

“Are you okay?”

George had scared her. She felt guilty. The tables had turned for a brief nanosecond. Take advantage of it. “I’m fine.”

“Then what are you doing there? What’s going on, George?”

“I’m being questioned…”

“Questioned? By who? For what?”

“Edna, I found a girl on Old Towne Road…”

“A girl? What in the devil were you doin’ out on Old Towne Road?”

George stumbled on this one.  What was he supposed to say? Well, Edna, I went to this pussy place and this girl, well honey, she sucked my dick. Just thinking about it gave him a tug from his pecker. “Passing time, Edna. Just waiting to come, I mean, waitin’ to pick you up. There was this white thing flitting around in the woods out there. You know, by the movie theater. The one we saw
Enchanted
at?”

“Yes, George.” She sounded like Wilma from the
Flintstones
. He hated it when she took that tone of voice. It made him want to have a friend like Barney. They didn’t have many friends.

“I saved a girl’s life tonight, Edna.”

“From what?”

“I don’t know. They’re taking me over to Lockwood precinct for some questioning.”

“You’re not in any trouble are you, George?”

“Edna, I saved a girl’s life tonight. I’m probably gonna be in the paper tomorrow. I’m a hero. I’m just waiting here until the detective arrives.”

“Well, what am I supposed to do while you’re being Superman, George? I haven’t eaten yet.”

That’s all she ever thought about. Food. Always thinking about her damn stomach. “I’ll be home as soon as I can, hon. Promise.”

“I’ve heard that before.”

“Edna, I promise.”

Long pause. Maybe Edna actually missed him. “Well, be careful, George. If you need anything, you call. I’m here.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll be fine. I’m just a little shook up.”

“Did I tell you that I had to wait an hour for that bus tonight… an hour! Then, the bus was full…”

There she goes.

“I had to stand. And you know, George, how nasty people can be sometimes. I try turning the other cheek, but they just sit there and stare, as uncomfortable as I am standing on that bus. With my bad leg and all…”

“I gotta go, sweetheart. I’ll see you later. ‘Bye.”

This time, George hung up.
Whew!
The questioning at the precinct would be a breeze compared to that.

George hurried back into the Emergency Room and took a seat. He looked around the reception area for the detective. What was his name? Detective… Hammond? No. Hammer. That’s it. Like Mike Hammer from the Mickey Spillane novels. He read a few of them when he was younger.

George picked up an outdated
People Magazine
from the table. A couple of cops stood outside smoking cigarettes. George was glad he was inside. He hated the smell of smoke.
C’mon Hammer, let’s get this show on the road.

June 15
, 2007

1:48 AM

MUSC

7

Curiosity always got the best of her. Thank God, she wasn’t a cat. She’d have been dead years ago! No, really, Janice had a relentless, aggressive nature, which tended to get her into trouble. A lot. It was a compulsion. Be first, be the best, get the scoop. Before anybody else. To rule. Some people jogged, Janice ran. Why waste time? She wasn’t the type to sit around and wait. She had to get there. As fast as she could. Before there was nothing left to get. Good thing she had an excuse.

She was an only child.

The Medical University was about twenty minutes from her apartment, unless she was in a hurry. Which she was, so it took about half the time. She should have brought Jake. He loved exercise. The more the better. She was positive the hospital staff wouldn’t appreciate a ninety pound dog running around their Emergency Room. Even if the dog was as adorable as Jake.

MUSC was enormous. A sprawling brick complex positioned smack-dab in the heart of downtown Charleston. Janice was out of breath as she ran by the front entrance of Roper Hospital (private, well-to-do), past the side entrance and around to the back, where the ER was located. Evans’s voice greeted her as she rounded the corner.

“You remembered to wear clothes for a change?” Evans snapped his fingers, loudly. “Damn the bad luck.”

Evans was a police officer friend of Donny. They palled around together, went out for pizza, bowled on the same league, played in the police softball team. Janice tagged along with “the guys” from time to time.
Men
. She ran up the cement steps two at a time. She neglected holding onto the steel banister. “That call was from you, wasn’t it?” She whispered into his ear. “I might have guessed.”

Evans looked around, then nodded. “Yours truly.”

Evans had been diligently trying to make a move on Janice since the first day she arrived in Charleston. Call it Southern hormones. Or plain old stubbornness. Janice didn’t have the heart to tell him he was barking up the wrong tree. She guessed Janine and Donny didn’t either, because Evans just kept right on coming, exerting a whole lot of exhausting effort in her direction.
Eveready
, she called him. She hoped he might run into Lisette and her out one night. It would certainly make things a hell of a lot easier. Besides, she hated the job of crushing another male’s ego. Southern gentlemen were so, so sensitive.
“Everybody’s Ashley.”
Then again, if it helped get her a story, hells bells, Janice could flirt and play and cajole with the best of them. And did. So, she was a whore at some level. Wasn’t everybody? She watched Evans flick his cigarette into the street.

“Thought you were giving it up?” Janice said, adding insult to injury. “Can’t expect me to be kissing you with your mouth tasting and smelling like an ashtray!” She was
so
bad. Tease. Flirt. Repeat.

Evans turned to his partner. Janice had embarrassed him. “This is Officer Rogers,” he interjected, changing the subject. “He’s new to the force. Janice Porter from the
Courier
.”

Janice shook his hand. Hard. She liked making strong first impressions. “Pleasure.”

“Nice hand shake.”

She looked through the windows of the Emergency Room. “So, what’s going on here? Where’s my
story of a lifetime?
”

Evans put his hands in his front pockets. Why did men always do that when they got nervous? “Old Hammerhead just arrived. He’s inside questioning the guy that brought the girl in. That’s about it so far.”

Janice pulled out her steno pad and started jotting down notes. “What’s his name? You know him?” She looked up at Evans. He
was
attractive. Buzz cut. Blue eyes. Crooked front teeth that overlapped.

“Madden. George Madden.”

“M-a-d-d-e-n?” She spelled it back to him. She would never misspell another name as long as she lived. She also always remembered to cross her “t’s” and dot her “i’s.”

Evans nodded. “Madden. He found the girl. We’re taking him back to the precinct for questioning, if Hammer ever gets his ass back downstairs.”

“Where’d he go?”
             

Offi
cer Rogers spoke up, out of nowhere, like a jack in the box, too long ignored. “The girl went into surgery. Been some time now. She’s supposedly on her way to Intensive Care.” He fished around in his front pocket for another Marlboro Red.

Evans interrupted, “… over two hours, I heard. Hey, pass me one.”

“Buy your own!” Instead, Rogers offered one to Janice.

“No thanks.” Janice never smoked, never did, and never would. Once an obsessive, always an obsessive. Her attention went back to Evans. “So Hammer’s upstairs waiting to talk to..?”

“The doctor. The admitting doctor. She did the surgery.”

“She?”

“Yeah.” Evans lit up the cig and took a deep drag, exhaling smoke rings into the damp, night air. Janice shook her head. Evans smiled. “I’ll brush my teeth.”

“Madden a suspect?”

“Ask him yourself. You’re the reporter.”

Janice walked past Evans and elbowed him in the stomach. “You’re a shit, you know it?” Evans flinched as Janice pushed the metal entry button. “Let me know if you spot Hammer. Knock on the window or something.”

“Will do, boss.”

The automatic door swooshed open. Inside, Janice blew Evans a kiss. A big one. Thanks for the tip, she mouthed. He understood. He appreciated her discretion. The last thing an officer needed was pressure from the brass for alerting the press. What did they think they were? Piranhas? Hell, Janice was trying to make a living just like everybody else. Okay, if she were to be totally honest… it was also to
get her name out there too.

Officers gave tips for personal reasons, like Evans. Or, they did it to get back at the Chief for some cockamamie injustice or another. There were probably a thousand different reasons. She didn’t really give a rat’s ass, as long as she was on the receiving end.

In the beginning, Janice couldn’t get arrested. No leads. Nothing. She was poison, except of course to Donny. And those leads were few and far between. It was almost expected that Donny would squeal, so anytime a story hit the press with Janice’s byline attached, the finger automatically pointed in Donny’s direction. It caused some grief at home and at work, and with Janine expecting a baby at the time, Janice stopped asking. A pushy broad she was, but she wasn’t out to make anybody’s life miserable. Or, get somebody fired, which is what they threatened to do to Donny. Bastards.

The Emergency Room buzzed with its own distinct order as Janice approached Madden. He was sitting down on one of those generic, orange plastic chairs. Janice called out his name and he jumped a bit. He wasn’t expecting to have a conversation with her, she guessed. A woman. After all, he was waiting for Hammer. The man.

“George Madden?”

“Yeah, that’s me.”

“May I have a few words with you? Is that okay?”

“Who are you?”

“Janice Porter. I’m from the
Post and Courier
.” Janice showed him her press card. Legit. Professional.

George looked at the ID and at her picture. He glanced for a second at Janice then back down to the floor again. “
Post and Courier
?”

“I’m wondering if you might be able to give me some information about the girl you found this evening.”

George took another long take at the photo before speaking. “What do you want to know?”

“What time did you find the girl? Where did you find her? How old is she, guessing that is? You know, the usual questions. You watch the same TV shows I do, don’t you?” Go for humor. Lighten him up a bit.

“This has never happened to me before.”

“I hope not.” She flipped to a fresh page in her steno book.

“I’m kinda nervous. My wife, Edna, she’s not here. She’s at home.”

Janice sat down beside him. Of course, he was nervous. Little dots of perspiration were beading up on his forehead. His thumbs were rotating in and out of each other like an overzealous water mill. She was getting dizzy just watching them.

Go for sweetness.

“I understand,” she said in her most syrupy of voices. She reached out and touched his wrist. Dry, pale skin with sporadic patches of thinning dark hair. She should be ashamed of herself, but she continued. She checked the time. She had to squeeze out this information before the Hammer got back. She looked outside. Evans and Rogers were still there. Still smoking. Still shooting the shit. They would let Janice know if Hammer was coming. Hammer was no saint. And, he hated reporters. On several occasions, he’d been known to throw the press out. Literally. Pick them up and boot them out the door. It was known. Don’t mess with Detective Dan Hammer. Particularly since his partner’s death. Everybody knew. Everybody abided. Charleston was a smallish community. Reputations spread quickly. Like swamp water.

“Have you talked with Detective Hammer yet?”

George cleared his throat. “Well, when the Detective first got here, he started askin’ me some questions, but then that nurse over there…” he pointed a crooked arthritic finger toward the ER where a nurse was talking on a telephone. “… called him over to the desk. After she stopped talkin’, well, he ran back there, to the elevator, I guess.”

“Did he say he’d be back?”

“Nope. But those cops outside there, well they arrived first, before the detective, and I overheard him telling them to wait until he finished upstairs. I guess they want to take me to the precinct.”

Story of a lifetime…

The phrase kept repeating in her head like a bad Barry Manilow melody. Janice smiled. Fucking fantastic. She was the first one on the case. The first to arrive at the scene. Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Evans. She glanced out at him. Broad shoulders. Thick neck. Hell, she might have sex with him after all. Call it a charity fuck! All right, young lady, compose yourself. Don’t go overboard. Get the details first. See if you
have
a story before getting all excited.

“George..?”

“Yes?” George prepared himself. He folded his hands in his lap like a choirboy and sat straight up in his chair.

Good boy, George, Georgie…

She began like a schoolteacher. A nice one. Like Lisette. The kind you brought an apple to. “I’m going to ask you some very important questions, George, and I want you to answer them as honestly as you can. Okay?”

“Yes, Ma’am.” He took a short pause, scanned the room, stretched his neck from side to side and then looked back at Janice. His expression was one of a child. An inquisitive child. A sweet, innocent child about to ask for a piece of candy. Then quietly, he spoke. “Will I be in the paper tomorrow? My wife, Edna, she wants to know.”

Janice watched the small hand of the generic wall clock yawn toward two. “Maybe George…” She smiled sheepishly, embarrassed by her indulgent self-involvement.

Story of a lifetime…

“… if all goes well, we both will.”