Internal Affairs (10 page)

She nodded. “We spent a lot of time there before we moved to St. Louis.”

“A rental?”

She shook her head. “No, it’s Oliver’s. He kept it in the divorce settlement. He’s pretty attached to the place. I think because it was the only time in our marriage that we were actually happy.”

“Scratch that idea, then.” He set the photo back down. Then he said, “You remember back in college, when we came out here for the weekend?”

She nodded, the pictures flooding her mind. “We stayed at your grandmother’s house.”

“That’s right. Grandma Natalie. That house is way too big for her now, and she’s all alone, so I’m sure she’d be happy to have the company.”

“I wouldn’t want to impose,” Lisa said.

He shook his head. “Don’t worry, I’m her favorite grandson. She’ll be more than happy to do me the favor.”

Lisa nodded again, thinking that if she could get Rafe alone in that big house, sharing a bit of quiet time as they’d had during that visit many years ago, she might be able to level with him. Tell him the truth about Chloe.

Assuming she could work up the nerve.

“All right,” she said. “We’ll start packing right away.”

“Good. I’ve been up all night, so I’m gonna go catch a quick nap and I’ll be back to pick you up early this evening. Will that work?”

“Of course.”

“And if Sloan shows up on your doorstep again, tell your housekeeper not to hesitate to pull the trigger this time.”

* * *

A
FEW MOMENTS LATER
, Rafe drove toward his apartment, but soon realized he was much too wired to take a nap.

As he had stood in Lisa’s house again, had knelt next to her beautiful little daughter, Undersheriff Macon’s demand kept running through his head.

It’s simple. We want you to turn her.

We want you to nurture the relationship and convince her to be our confidential informant.

Rafe could fully understand why they’d want to use Lisa to spy on Sloan, but he would never allow it. He’d never put her in a position of danger like that. His job was to protect people like Lisa, not throw them to the wolves.

It was one thing to bust a criminal and make him your confidential informant in exchange for leniency or a free pass. But Lisa was an innocent. A woman who had met the wrong guy and fallen for his ruse. It would be heartless to use that mistake against her, even if it meant bringing Sloan’s criminal enterprise to its knees.

And there was no guarantee of that. Sloan was dangerous enough to Lisa as it was. If he were to somehow find out that she was working with the Sheriff’s department, he might very well kill her.

Or keep his hands clean and have her killed.

So the thought that Rafe would ever try to turn Lisa was insulting and ridiculous, and it annoyed him that his sister Kate had asked him to take a couple days to think about it. Even the carrot she’d dangled—a promotion to Homicide—wouldn’t make him change his mind.

After seeing Lisa today, still as lovely and alluring as she had been in college, all thoughts of his career had abruptly vanished. Worrying about a promotion suddenly seemed so unimportant to him that he couldn’t believe he’d been fretting about it.

He couldn’t stop thinking about Lisa and his last days with her, that moment when he knew she was afraid to commit and was looking for a way out of their relationship.

He had made up all those stories about wanting to go to California and be a surf bum, because he was trying to let her off the hook. He’d pretended that he, too, wanted to explore options, but his only
real
desire had been for them to stay together. Instead he’d done what he thought would make her happy. Had even headed out West after graduation—a pointless exercise if there ever was one.

He had all but convinced himself that he’d never see her again—and that she had no desire to see
him
—until he walked into her living room.

It had been a struggle to maintain his distance. To remain professional. Yet despite the facade, he’d felt more attracted to her than ever. He’d even felt an instant and unexpected connection to her daughter, Chloe, who was, quite possibly, the cutest kid he’d ever seen.

Before he left, Chloe had carefully torn the page with the blue cat out of her coloring book and handed it to him. And in that moment, Rafe felt an inexplicable hitch in his throat. Something about the child had gotten to him, very quickly, and he was touched by her generosity.

She certainly hadn’t inherited this from her father.

Maybe what Rafe had felt was the power of his regret welling up on him. His failure to fight for Lisa rather than let her go. Her daughter, Chloe, was a kind of symbol of that regret. She was what
could have been.

Had he and Lisa stayed together, Chloe—or someone very much like her—could have been his child.

But fate has a way of throwing curveballs at you, and Rafe knew that what was done was done.

As he drove toward his apartment, however, a thought occurred to him. If he could get Lisa and Chloe squared away, if he could get a toxic presence like Sloan out of their lives forever...maybe he and Lisa could rediscover what they once had.

And maybe, just maybe, he could call that little girl his own.

Chapter Fourteen

Rafe had nearly reached his apartment house when he suddenly remembered something: the receipt he’d picked up in the Jaguar this morning. The one he’d found near the dead driver’s foot.

If, as Kate suspected, those two hits were the handiwork of Oliver Sloan, maybe Rafe could find a way to pin it on the guy and send him away forever.

Assuming the brass would let him.

Such a move might not topple an entire criminal network, but Rafe frankly wasn’t concerned about that. His only interest at this point was in helping Lisa. Though he’d already gotten himself into trouble with the department by going rogue this morning, he didn’t figure another trip off the rails could hurt him that much.

And he was more than happy to sacrifice his job to protect Lisa.

He had no idea if Kate and her crew had yet identified the dead Russians. But he had every intention of checking into it himself.

Suddenly energized, he dug into his jacket pocket and pulled out the receipt. According to the time stamp, the gas had been pumped at approximately 2:45 a.m. at a service station on Davis. There was no indication whether or not the customer had paid cash or used a credit card, but there was a way to find out.

It might amount to nothing, but he had to try.

Shifting his Mustang into gear, Rafe hit the accelerator, made a wide, squealing U-turn and headed across town.

* * *

T
HE
D
AVIS
S
TREET
service station was your typical low-end franchise that boasted nine pumps, a repair garage and snack shop about the size of Rafe’s living room.

The pumps looked as if they hadn’t been replaced or refurbished in ten years, but the gas was cheap and the snack shop served cherry super slushes.

So maybe the place wasn’t all that bad.

The guy behind the counter wasn’t a week past sixteen and carried the scruffy aura of a high school dropout. He glanced up nervously as Rafe, still in his uniform, stepped inside and dug the receipt out of his pocket.

“Your supervisor around?”

The kid was staring at the Glock holstered on Rafe’s hip. “Huh?”

“Your boss. Is he on the premises?”

“Uh, no, he only shows up for a couple hours in the morning. He’s gone for the day.”

Rafe had no idea if this kid would have the wherewithal to help him, but figured if there were any questions, he’d be a lot easier to manipulate than the guy who owned this franchise.

He put the receipt on the counter.

“I’m investigating a homicide,” he said. “The guy who was killed bought gas here this morning at 2:45.”

“No kidding?”

“No kidding,” Rafe said. “I need to know what he used to pay for the gas. Is there any way to check that?”

The kid hesitated. “Aren’t you supposed to have, like, a warrant or something?”

“I’m not asking for his hospital records,” Rafe said. “Just a simple gas purchase. Can you give me that?”

The kid scratched his head, a mop that looked as if it hadn’t been washed within the past week or so, and was undoubtedly full of lice, then gestured to the register in front of him, which was part calculator, part personal computer, complete with a flat-screen display.

“It should be in here,” he said. “If the thing didn’t crash, like it does every other transaction.”

Transaction
seemed like a big word for him, but he’d managed to get it out.

Rafe said, “Well, why don’t you take a look at that receipt, then do what you have to do to find out.”

“Okay...”

The kid picked up the piece of paper, squinted at it, then slowly began punching in a string of numbers on the register keyboard. After a moment, the computer bleeped and something came up on screen.

“It was paid for with a debit card by a guy named...Serge...” He squinted at the screen now, and Rafe could see he was having trouble trying to figure out how to pronounce the customer’s last name.

“Just spell it for me,” Rafe said.

The kid did as he was told and Rafe took one of the station’s business cards from a holder, then used a pen next to the register to write the name on the back.

Serge Azarov.

When he was done, he noticed the kid was looking at his Glock again. “You ever use that thing?”

“It’s been known to happen,” Rafe said.

“You ever kill anyone?”

“Once.”

The kid’s eyes lit up. “Yeah? Who?”

“A guy about your age, as a matter of fact.”

The kid swallowed. “Really? What’d he do?”

“He dropped out of high school,” Rafe said.

* * *

R
AFE ACCESSED
the LAWCOM database with his smartphone. The only Serge Azarov listed was a forty-two-year-old, two-time offender, who had been busted on a weapons charge four years ago, and had only recently been released from jail.

His photo matched the face of the dead driver.

Since his release, he’d taken up residence is a run-down apartment house in a notorious section of a city that was already considered by some to be one of the most dangerous in the world.

Rafe had seen a lot of violence in St. Louis, and the city certainly had its share of troubles, but statistics also had a way of skewing people’s perception of the world, and he thought much of that perception was colored by paranoia.

That didn’t keep him from remaining very alert as he entered the neighborhood Serge Azarov had called home. And because he had to assume that Kate and her partner might also be looking for this guy, Rafe had decided to park his Mustang a few blocks away, chuck his uniform into the trunk, and change into the jeans, T-shirt and hoodie he kept stored there.

The last thing he needed was nosy neighbors ratting him out to Eberhart and his sister.

He stuck his Glock in the waistband of his pants, near the small of his back, then put his hood up and walked to the apartment house, which was a ratty, ten-story walk-up with graffiti-stained, wrought-iron bars protecting the lobby door.

He punched a bunch of buttons on the security com until someone finally buzzed him in, then climbed two flights of stairs to a corridor dotted with doors. He could hear a couple screaming at each other at the far end of the hall, and a baby crying just two doors away.

Rafe found apartment 211, and rapped his knuckles against the door, hoping Azarov had lived alone.

The was no answer. A good sign. And after a couple more tries no one came to the door.

Rafe pulled out his wallet, and removed the slender lock picks he kept tucked inside it. He was about to lean forward and go to work, when a door down the hall flew open and an elderly woman in a bathrobe looked out at him.

“You look for Serge?” she said in thick Russian accent.

Rafe turned his head slightly, but didn’t look directly at her, hoping the hoodie would give him some protection. He didn’t need anyone seeing his face, just in case things went south. “Yes, ma’am. I’m a friend of his.”

“Serge no home,” she said. “He supposed to have breakfast with his aunt Luba, but he no show.”

Small wonder,
Rafe thought. “Do you have any idea when he’ll be back?”

She eyed him suspiciously. “What you want from him?”

Rafe took a chance. “He borrowed one of my tools and I need it to fix my car.”

“Here,” the woman said, then disappeared inside. She came back, holding a set of keys, then shuffled toward the doorway. “I let you in to get it.”

She shot Rafe a look as she approached and he backed up to give her room. He couldn’t avoid her gaze this time.

“I can trust you?” she said.

“Yes, ma’am, of course.”

“Not all Serge’s friends are good boys. Sometimes even Serge isn’t a good—”

A phone rang, the sound coming from her open doorway. The woman looked startled, then quickly handed Rafe the keys. “That might be him now,” she said. “You bring them back when you finish.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Rafe told her, and watched her shuffle off the way she came.

Letting out a breath, he found the right key, then opened the door and stepped inside, buffeted by the strong stench of cigarettes. He closed the door behind him and locked it, just in case the old woman came back.

The place was early dump, with a threadbare carpet and walls that featured tobacco-stained, flowered wallpaper that looked as if it had been installed sometime in the fifties. It was a one-bedroom unit, with a simple sofa, chair and television in the living room, with an attached kitchenette.

There was an abandoned, drying bowl of cereal on the coffee table, an ashtray full of Russian cigarette butts—the source of the stench—and a jacket draped over the couch. Rafe picked it up and rifled through the pockets but found nothing.

He wasn’t really quite sure what he was looking for. Something that might tell him who Azarov’s friends and associates were. But the guy didn’t seem to have lived here long, which made sense, considering he’d only recently been released from prison.