She found Detective Shelly Pointer in the ladies’ room. Pointer was an attractive, cafe-au-lait black woman of average height with a better-than-average body. “Hey, Shelly.”
“Hey, Willa.”
“You and I have got an assignment.”
“What, together?”
“Yeah.”
“What about my partner?”
“He’s on it, too.”
“What’s the assignment?”
“You ever heard of Devlin Daltry?”
“The sculptor?”
“Right.”
“Sure.”
“He’s suspected of persuading somebody to cut off a girl’s head. Bacchetti wants me to find out who he got to do it.”
“Do you have to fuck him?”
“I don’t think Bacchetti cares one way or the other, but if I do, I’m supposed to deny it. I’ll be wearing a wire, and I want you on the other end of it, not just a bunch of guys.”
“When do we start?”
“Right now. Let’s get on the Internet and see what we can find out about Daltry.”
“Lead the way.”
The two women headed toward Willa’s desk and her computer.
“Willa,” Pointer said, “are you going to fuck him?”
“Shelly, I don’t even know if he’s nice yet.”
50
Gus Castiglione sat quietly in his cell on Rikers Island, reading the Daily News sports section. Abell rang, and there was the sound of a hundred cells being electronically unlocked. What surprised Gus was that his cell door opened as well.
He had been in protective custody since arriving at Rikers, and his meals had been brought to him. He got an hour’s exercise daily in an empty yard, and he showered alone daily while a guard watched. He sat and stared at the open cell door, uncertain what to do.
A guard walked by. “Get your ass to lunch, Castiglione,” he said as he passed.
“But…” Gus started to say.
The guard banged his nightstick on the bars. “I said, get your ass to lunch!”
Gus sighed, folded his newspaper, tossed it on his bunk and joined the line of prisoners shuffling past his cell. It would make a nice change, having somebody to talk to over a meal. The line stopped moving while the barred door that led to the dining hall was opened. Gus heard a slight commotion behind him and started to turn to see what was happening. Before he could move he felt a searing pain in his back, near his spine. He managed to make half a turn, and he saw a small, wiry man he knew holding a bloody homemade shiv.
“Skinny?” he managed to say, before the man shoved the knife into his chest. His legs turned to water, and he hit the floor hard. Something warm and wet flowed past his cheek on the concrete floor. It got very noisy, then the sound went away.
Dierdre Monahan was in the chief deputy D.A.’s office when his phone rang and he picked it up. “It’s for you,” he said, handing her the receiver.