She unzipped his pants and reached in. “You like this?” she asked, moving her thumb in a circular motion.

“Jesus,” he hissed between his teeth. “Yes.”

CHAPTER THREE

Michael felt like shit. Hell, he was shit.

The first time with Cynthia had been an accident. Michael knew that was a lame excuse, it wasn’t like you could just trip and the next thing you know, you’re in somebody’s vagina, but he really did think of it along those lines. Phil had called long-distance from California one night, frantic with worry because he couldn’t reach Cynthia. The man traveled all the time, selling women’s hosiery to the big department stores and probably wetting his whistle along the way. Michael didn’t have proof, but he had worked Vice for three years and he knew the type of businessman who availed himself of the local talent whenever he was on the road. The constant phone calls checking on Cynthia were more like guilt calls, Phil’s way of keeping tabs on her when he couldn’t keep tabs on himself.

Gina had been working nights then, already pulling away from Michael when he reached out to her. Tim’s challenges were becoming more evident and her response had been to throw herself into work, doing double shifts because she couldn’t stand the thought of coming home and dealing with her damaged son. Michael was sick with grief, exhausted from crying himself to sleep at night and just plain damn lonely.

Cynthia was available, more than willing to take his mind off things. After the first time, he had told himself it wouldn’t happen again, and it hadn’t, not for a year at least. Michael had work and Tim, and that was all he thought about until one day last spring when Cynthia had mentioned to Gina that her sink was leaking.

“Go fix it for her,” Gina had told Michael. “Phil’s gone all the time. The poor thing doesn’t have anybody to look out for her.”

He wasn’t in love with Cynthia and Michael wasn’t stupid enough to think she had those kinds of feelings for him. At the ripe old age of forty, he had learned that a woman who was eager to go down on you every time she saw you wasn’t in love—she was looking for something. Maybe Cynthia liked the thrill of banging Michael in Phil’s bed. Maybe she liked the idea of seeing Gina out the kitchen window and knowing she was taking something that belonged to another woman. Michael couldn’t let himself consider her motivations. He knew his own well enough. For those fifteen or twenty minutes he spent next door, his mind went blank and he wasn’t thinking about paying the specialists or making the mortgage or the phone call from the credit card company asking when they could expect some money. Michael was just thinking about Cynthia’s perfect little mouth and his own pleasure.

She would want something someday, though. He wasn’t so stupid that he didn’t at least know that.

“Yo, Mike,” Leo called, rapping his knuckles on Michael’s desk. “Get your head out of your ass.”

“What’s going on?” Michael asked, sitting back in his chair. The station was empty but for the two of them, Greer locked behind his office door with the shades drawn.

Michael indicated the closed door. “He jerking off in there again?”

“Got some Lurch-looking freak from the GBI with him.”

“Why?” Michael asked, but he knew why. Last night, Greer had said he was going to call in help on this one, and the next step up the ladder was the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

“He don’t consult with me,” Leo said, sitting on the edge of Michael’s desk, scattering papers in the process. He did this all the time, no matter how many warnings Michael gave him.

Leo asked, “You get in trouble with the wife last night?”

“No,” Michael lied, letting his eyes travel around the squad room. The place was depressing and dark, the wall of windows looking out at the Home Depot across the street thick with grime that blocked out the morning sun. City Hall East was a twelve-story building, a onetime Sears department store, that sat at the base of a curve in Ponce de Leon Road and took up a whole city block. A railroad track separated the structure from an old Ford factory that had been turned into pricey lofts. The state had bought the abandoned Sears building years ago, turning it into various government offices. There were at least thirty different departments and over five hundred city employees. Michael had worked here for ten years but other than the overcrowded parking garage, he had only seen the three floors the Atlanta Police Department used and the morgue.

“Yo,” Leo repeated, banging the desk again.

Michael pushed his chair from the desk and away from Leo. Between the chain-smoking and constant nips Leo took from the bottle he kept in his locker, the guy had breath like a dog’s fart.

“You daydreaming about some pussy?”

“Shut up,” Michael snapped, thinking he’d hit too close to home. Leo always did—not because he was a good detective, but because he couldn’t keep his mouth shut.

“I was thinking about going to see Ken later on.” Leo took a tangerine out of his suit pocket and started peeling it. “How’s he doing?”

“Okay,” Michael told him, though the truth was he hadn’t talked to Ken in a week. They had been partners for a while, close as brothers, until Ken had clutched his arm one day and dropped to the ground. He had been talking to Michael about a gorgeous woman he’d met the night before, and for a split second, Michael thought the fall was some kind of joke. Then Ken had started to twitch. His mouth sagged open and he pissed himself right there on the squad room floor. Fifty-three years old and he’d stroked out like an old man. The whole right side of his body was gone now, his arm and leg useless as a wet newspaper. His mouth was permanently twisted so that dribble poured down his chin like he was a baby.

No one from the squad wanted to see him, to hear him try to talk. Ken was a reminder of what was just around the corner for most of them. Too much smoking, too much drinking, two or three failed marriages, all ending with your lonely last days spent catatonic in front of the tube, stuck at some crappy, state-run nursing home.

Greer’s door opened, and a lanky man in a three-piece suit came out. He was toting a leather briefcase that looked like a postage stamp in his large hand. Michael could see why Leo had called the guy Lurch. He was tall, maybe six-four or -five, and whippet thin. His dirty blond hair was cut tight to his head, parted on the side. His upper lip looked funny, too, like someone had cut it in half and put it back together crooked. As usual, Leo had gotten the show wrong. Put some knobs on either side of his neck and the guy could be on The Munsters.

“Ormewood,” Greer said, motioning him over. “This is Special Agent Will Trent from CAT.”

Leo showed his usual grace. “What the fuck is CAT?”

“Special Criminal Apprehension Team,” Greer clarified.

Michael could almost feel Leo straining not to point out that this actually spelled SCAT. Not much shut up his fellow detective, but Trent was standing close to Leo, looming over him by almost a foot. The state guy’s hands were huge, probably big enough to wrap around Leo’s head and crush his skull like a coconut.

Leo was an idiot, but he wasn’t stupid.

Trent said, “I’m part of a special division of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation set up to aid local law enforcement around the state in apprehending violent criminals. My role here is purely advisory.”