Whiplash

He looked very close to snarling. "I don't understand why it took you so long to get here. You should have been on my heels."

"I had to take a pain med, let it kick in, and there was Georgie. I'm okay now, really. Agent Lewis and Agent Tucker are right over there, standing against their car. They stuck with me all the way here. I'm not an idiot, Bowie, I wouldn't ever put Georgie in danger. Would you stop being pissed off and tell me what happened? Look at Chief Amos, he's coming this way. He looks pretty shaken."

Chief of Police Clifford Amos looked more than shaken, he looked like he'd been run over by a Mack truck. Two murders and a Hummer blowing up in his town in a matter of days. He'd followed Bowie out of the house, noticed him talking, of all things, to Erin Pulaski, his attempted murder victim. He was tired, and he was angry. "Here now," he called out, "what are you doing here? You're a civilian, you've gotta leave. You shouldn't even be able to walk, not after that Hummer of yours blew itself up all over one of my neighborhoods. You asking to get yourself killed?"

Bowie saw Erin was ready to smart-mouth the chief of police, and that was something he surely didn't need at the crack of dawn. He knew the chief was scared, as well as angry; he was scared himself. He said, "Sorry about this, Chief. I should have told you. I asked her to come. She's acting as a consultant for us. She and Agent Sherlock interviewed Mrs. Royal. We need her here."

Chief Amos wasn't happy to hear that, but he preferred standing here stripping the hide off this damned dance teacher to being back in that stomach-twisting blood-and-gore crime scene. At least Caskie Royal wasn't lying in the middle of those sheets anymore, his brains splattered on the washing machine. He felt bile rise in his throat just thinking of it. He hadn't puked when he'd seen that German guy, Helmut Blauvelt, naked, his face bludgeoned to bits, no fingers, just bloody stumps, but it was close, and he'd sure enough been off his feed for nearly a day. Now this. Seeing Caskie Royal was different because he'd known him. He was a snooty bastard, but now he was very dead, and his pretty wife was rocking back and forth on an antique chair in the living room, whimpering and crying, and nobody knew anything, including him. Why was this bloody nightmare happening in his town? The FBI had flown in here looking all smart and sharp in a black FBI helicopter and taken over, and their guy from New Haven had moved right into his police station, and what had they done? Big zero, that's what. That big guy Savich had played with his computer and the rest of them had just talked to people-talk, talk, talk, no action-and now there was another murder in his town.

And now this dance teacher was hanging around. Who would want to kill her? Nothing about anything made any sense. He said to himself more than to anyone else, "A female shouldn't drive a muscle car like that Hummer unless she can handle it, which you couldn't, now could you?"

Erin just looked at him. Thank God she didn't say anything. He was tired, knew he was tired, running off at the mouth like that, saying things that would get Loraine Briggs, one of his deputies, ratting him out to Corrine. That nearly made him shudder. It was time to apply himself, to get things straight, but he knew to his bones he didn't know how to deal with this case, didn't have a clue what to do next. He said to Agent Bowie Richards, his voice belligerent, "I suppose you're going to tell me this is your case too, aren't you?" He knew he sounded intimidating, tough as nails, like The Man in Charge. Maybe he'd sounded too intimidating and Richards would fold, which was the last thing he wanted Richards to do. He waited, saying a little prayer. What he wanted more than anything was to go home and crawl into his bed and sleep until Wheel of Fortune came on tonight and his wife made him his favorite pot roast with new potatoes. He wanted to think about all this, but from a distance.

Bowie knew exactly what the chief wanted him to say. It wasn't Amos's fault, he knew the best shot at cleaning this mess up was to keep it with the FBI. The last thing any of them needed was Chief Amos and his people blundering around. He said, "I'm sorry, Chief Amos, sincerely sorry, but I really must insist we handle Mr. Royal's murder. There were shots fired at our own agents. I know you don't want to let it go, but you must admit it all looks connected."

Chief Amos rocked back and forth on his heels, his hands tucked into his wide belt. "Well, I don't like it, but yeah, okay, maybe we can work together. But you gotta get this thing figured out, Agent Richards, and fast. My town's gonna shake to its foundations when it gets out that Caskie Royal was brutally murdered, and everybody's gonna start yelling-at me."