45
Serena parked in an empty lot underneath the soaring span of the Blatnik Bridge leading across Superior Bay to Wisconsin. Its concrete Y-shaped supports aligned like a row of soldiers marching from the city out into the water, following a trail of white lights. Every time a car sped by overhead, the steel highway bed became a tin drum and boomed. As Serena got out of her car, the ice sheet of the harbor was on her right. On the opposite side of the road, where it circled back to the city, were the dark fields leading to the silos of the port terminal. This was where the industry of the city was done during the warmer months, bustling with dozens of ore boats loading and offloading their bellies. The port was abandoned now, locked up with ice and awaiting the spring thaw.
Snow had begun, whipping through the bridge lights like a field of shooting stars. She blinked as the flakes assaulted her eyes. She had her Glock tightly in one hand and a duct-taped shoe box under her arm, heavy with hundred dollar bills. The road, the park, the frozen water, the port buildings, and the fields leading across the railroad tracks were all deserted. She wondered where he was.
Her heels were buried in six inches of wet snow, and her feet quickly grew numb and cold. She didn't have time to change after finding the note, only time to make the pick up at Dan's house and follow the freeway back to the harbor basin. Now, she wished she had kept spare boots in the car. She found an open area near the bridge tower where the snow was matted down and waited there. She danced impatiently, stamping her feet. The chill traveled up her body.
A wave of vibration rumbled through the concrete as a double-trailored semi streaked along the bridge out over the water directly above her. The thunder of the tin drum made her shudder, as if the bridge were falling around her.
Her cell phone rang, and she put the shoe box down in the snow so she could grab her phone with her free hand.
"Where are you?" Stride asked.
Serena took a cautious look around the empty lot. As the snow intensified, it was becoming hard to see. "I'm on a job. I can't talk."
"Is this about Dan's blackmail?"
She hesitated. "Yes."
"Get the hell out of there," he told her. "Brandt was being blackmailed, too. This guy knows all about the sex clubs and the alpha girls. He may be our perp."
"Then this is our chance to get him," Serena said.
"Not by yourself."
"I was a cop for ten years. I can take care of myself."
"You should have told me what was going on with Dan."
"I couldn't, you know that."
"Where the hell are you?"
She thought about not telling him, but she realized she was being stupid and stubborn. "I'm down in Rices Point under the bridge."
"Are you completely fucking crazy?"
"He picked the spot."
"Get out right now, he may be coming after you."
"He's coming after a box full of money. That's what he wants."
"I'm sending a car down there."
"Don't do that," Serena insisted. "You'll scare him off."
"Then I'll come myself."
Her phone beeped in her ear. Another call was coming in. She knew who it was.
"No, don't do that, Jonny. Not yet. Give me half an hour. If I don't call you back, send in the troops."
She hung up before he could answer. When she switched over to the other call, she heard the blackmailer's voice and realized there was something distantly familiar about it. She wished she knew why, but it was one of those memories that had to come in its own time and couldn't be rushed. The one thing she knew was that the memory carried something dark with it, and the vibration in her spine this time wasn't from the traffic on the bridge, but from a sudden fear.
"Did you have fun tonight?" he asked.
Serena was silent.
"I was picturing you inside," he went on. "Did you get naked like all the others?"
"Fuck off."
"Did all that sex make you wet? Did you play with yourself?"
"I'm leaving," Serena said. "With your money."
"No, you're not. You're staying right there."
"Watch me." Serena bent down to pick up the shoe box and hoped he could see her. She waited, wanting to see what he did next.
"Tell me what it's like," he said.
"It sounds like you know."
"Do you want to be an alpha girl?"
"No thanks."
"Too bad," he said. "You could be just like your friend Maggie. Or Katrina. They were alpha girls."
The implications of what he said made her whole body go rigid. She clutched her gun tighter and didn't reply.
"You're afraid of me now," he said.
"Why should I be?"
"You know what I did to them."
She stood there, frozen, letting the snow paint her body white. "Yes."
"I'm going to do the same thing to you. I just wanted you to know that now."
"You bastard."
"And much worse, Serena. Much, much worse."
She hung up the phone. Stumbling, falling, getting up, she began running back to her car. She peered over her shoulder, hair flying, and then spun, spying everywhere around her, certain that she would see him coming for her. The tin drum boomed again; she screamed and bit her tongue, quieting herself, and tasted blood. Snow swarmed down and followed her like bees roused from a hive.
As she ran, the box of money slipped from her grasp and tumbled away. She cursed and bent to retrieve it, and when she stood up, she was blinded by the glare of a white beacon bathing her body in light. A familiar siren shrieked and stopped. She saw twisting red lights rotating atop a Duluth city police car, and she had never been so grateful that Jonny hadn't listened to her.
Paralyzed in the light, feeling like a deer on the highway, she also realized she was holding a gun and a box filled with cash.
The cop saw it, too. He used a loudspeaker, and she heard a Southern accent. "Throw the gun away."
She did.
"Put the box down."
She did that, too.
"Lie down and keep your arms away from you."
Serena's arms were in the air. She went down on both knees and then laid her palms flat on the snow as she stretched out her body. She craned her neck to see, but the searchlight was in her eyes. She heard the door of the squad car open, and the cop shouted to her without the microphone.
"Don't move."
She was absolutely still, holding her breath.
"It's okay, officer," she said as he came closer. "My name is Serena Dial. I'm Lieutenant Stride's partner."
"Shut up."
He was angry, and under the anger was probably fear. She didn't say anything else, not wanting to rile him. She saw a silhouette of long, muscled legs, and in his hand, by his thigh, was his gun, pointed at her. He came around behind her. She lay there, not moving; it was like having a bear sniff around you as you played dead. He retrieved her gun where she had thrown it in the snow, removed the magazine, and deposited it in his pocket.
She grimaced as his knee landed in the center of her back. He took one of her wrists roughly, twisted it behind her, and latched her wrist in the loop of his handcuffs. He took her other arm, too, and secured her. He grabbed the scruff of her neck with thick fingers. She smelled his hands.
"Get up."
He hadn't holstered his gun yet. She came up to her knees as he pulled her, and she got to her feet carefully, not making any sudden movements.
"What's in the box?" he asked.
"Money. Look, call Stride. He knows what's going on."
"Get in the car."
He landed the heel of his palm on her neck and shoved her forward. He picked up the box as they headed for the police car. She walked a couple of paces ahead of him and listened to her senses, which were saying an odd word to her.
Fish.
In her nose, a stench of fish spoiled the fresh aroma of snow, and she realized it came from the cop, where his fingers had roughly grabbed her skin. His hands smelled like fish.