Con Game Read online

  “I’ve looked through every case, and they’re locked tight. Even the crossbows, which I don’t keep locked up, are all there.”

  “Thank you. If you don’t mind, Officer Bowers will want to ask you a few more questions.”

  As the mobile crime unit, or “dust-busters” as Delta referred to them, arrived to take prints, Jan pulled Delta aside.

  “He threw that at you?”

  “Yeah. Pretty ballsy, don’t you think? Rose up like a damned cobra and flung it at me. And let me tell you, that would have smarted like hell.”

  “I’ll say. Those tips look like little razors.”

  “And I’ll bet they cut like them, too.” Turning from Jan, Delta glanced over at a beautiful suit of armor standing regally in the corner. One arm lay quietly at the side, while the other was bent at the elbow palm up.

  “Great armor you have here, Mr. Ein,” Delta tossed the words over her shoulder, not taking her eyes off of the shiny relic. She loved knights and chivalry and tales of King Arthur. A teacher in junior high school turned her on to Medieval lore; one of her good reminiscences of her prepubescent days tangled in the web of her memory.

  “Twelfth or thirteenth century?” she asked, feeling Matt Ein move beside her.

  Drawing his hand up to his mouth, Matt Ein did not respond.

  “Mr. Ein?”

  Eyes wide, Matt Ein stared at the armor, transfixed. “He stole my ax. That bastard stole my ax.”

  Delta looked over at Jan, who shrugged. “The knight was holding an ax?”

  Slowly removing his hand from his mouth, Matt Ein shook his head, still staring at the armor. “Not just any ax. It was a double-bladed ax—a gift from my grandfather to go with the armor.” Plopping down in front of the armor, Mr. Ein laid his face in his hands and shook his head. “Anything. He could have swiped anything but the ax.”

  Delta knelt beside him and laid her hand on his shoulder. Empathy whirled through her as she thought about the silver I.D. bracelet her grandfather had given to her and how she felt when she thought she had lost it. There was something special about gifts from grandfathers.

  “You’ll get your ax back, Mr. Ein. Sooner or later, a relic like that will show up. Don’t you worry.”

  “I hope so. I took care of that axe as if the knight might use it any moment. I sharpened it when I first got it and I polished it once a week.”

  “I know how you feel. We’ll do everything we can to get it back.” Turning to leave, Delta said a few words to the dust-busters dusting the glass cases. Then, she jumped back into the driver’s seat of the patrol car and waited for Jan to finish with her notes before turning the key in the ignition. “A jeweled dagger, a ninja star, and an ancient ax—two lives taken, no money missing, and no motive. Curiouser and curiouser.”

  Jan raised her head from her report. “You think this is related to the murder of the druggist?”

  Delta shrugged. “Hard to tell, but there are some commonalities we can’t ignore.”

  Jan lightly touched Delta on the knee. “No, there are some commonalities that you can’t ignore. Face it, Del. You’re hooked.”

  Delta smiled. Yes, she was. “The report said that the dagger was inspected by a weapons expert who believes it came from some island near Greece.”

  “And?”

  “And now we have an ax ripped off.”

  “So, our weirdo is into creative weaponry. Why did he murder the pharmacist? And why did he leave such an obvious clue as the dagger?”

  Delta shook her head. She only had a few pieces of the puzzle, and Jan was jumping way ahead of the game. “I’m not sure. Not yet.”

  “Maybe you’re not sure, but by the look and feel of it, you have your heart set on finding out. But I’m curious. If he threw the star at you, where is the ax?”

  Delta opened her mouth to answer, but then stopped. Yes, where was the ax? The burglar didn’t have it with him when she was chasing him, yet it had been stolen. Had she caught him coming back for something else? Had he stashed the blade someplace? Maybe he had an accomplice. As usual in police work, there were way more questions than answers.

  A new crackle erupted from the radio. “S-10-12, we have a 51-50 at 717 Emerson. See the man.”

  Jan acknowledged the “nutcase on the loose” call and said they would be on their way shortly.

  “Just what we need. Another fruitcake,” Jan said.

  But Delta barely heard her. Not thinking about the 51-50 or the man they were going to meet at the scene, she focused instead on an ancient dagger, a murdered pharmacist, a dead dog, a stolen ax, and a ninja star.

  When she came through the back door of the station, Delta was not surprised to find Connie at the controls of her new computer game. The weeknight’s calls were tedious and slow compared to weekends, and Connie had finished her assigned work hours ago. On nights like these, when Connie finished perusing the inactive files for any leads or updates, when she was through gathering information for any number of detectives who would require her help, when she stopped inputting data from the day’s events, she would pull out a game and wait until someone needed her services.

  Connie called it staying sharp. Delta called it playing.

  “Hi,” Connie greeted her as Delta approached, but did not remove her eyes from the monitor.

  “Hi yourself.” Sitting next to Connie, Delta watched her maneuver a dwarf with long black hair around a castle. “Con, you’ve been playing these dumb games so long, they’re even beginning to look like you.”

  Connie smiled. “Isn’t that the truth. She does kind of look like me, doesn’t she? Only, I have bigger breasts.”

  Delta shook her head and decided to leave that one alone. “Graphics are better and better these days, aren’t they?” Delta asked, observing Connie’s dwarf dodging the wicked-looking ghosts and green goblins. The graphics were some of the best she’d ever seen. Leaning closer, Delta noticed tiny beads of sweat on Connie’s upper lip. She had seen Connie play hundreds of these games in the past, but never had Connie been this absorbed.

  Delta watched quietly as Connie instructed the dwarf to do things such as stab, read, kick, jump, and assorted commands that moved the character at Connie’s whim. It was fascinating to see the screen transform from one scene to the next as the dwarf made her way through the Land of the Night. Finally, when the little warrior was killed, Connie flicked off the screen, shaking her head in frustration.

  “Tough game?” asked Delta.

  Connie wiped her lip with the back of her hand. “Really hard. I’ve never played one this sophisticated.” Still staring at the blank monitor, Connie flipped her hair over her shoulder and turned to fully face Delta. “Maybe I’m losing my touch.”

  Delta smiled. “That, I’ll never believe.” Reaching into her bag, Delta carefully pulled out the star, still wrapped in her handkerchief, and set it on the table. With her thumb and index finger, she cautiously unwrapped it. “What can you tell me about this?”

  Connie leaned over for a closer look, but did not touch it. “It’s one of the weapons popularized by the ancient ninja assassins.”

  “Assassins?”

  Connie nodded, and Delta could tell her wheels were spinning. “Ninjas were an elite group of warriors who purportedly could steal through the night without being heard. There are scads of ninja tales throughout the Orient. Many of those center on the superstition that they can move through walls without anyone hearing. Excellent folk material. Where did you get it?”

  “It was thrown at me.”

  “Tonight?”

  “Yep.”

  “Did it get you?”

  Delta shook her head. “Fortunately not.”

  Connie rubbed her chin. “Did it stick when it landed?” Delta nodded. “Half-way in.”

  “Straight in?”

  “Straight in.”

  Connie studied the star for a moment. While training for her black belt in karate, Connie had also studied the weapons used by the Masters in
the Orient. Delta knew Connie’s mind was retrieving data just as a computer might.

  “These take some real skill to master,” Connie finally announced. “They’re not easy to throw. Whoever tossed it is likely highly trained in martial arts. Too many cops underestimate the powers of the martial artist. But anyone who can throw one of these with accuracy is just as dangerous as someone with a gun.”

  “You’re telling me.” Delta looked at Connie as she studied the star more carefully. Delta had once scoffed at the power of the martial arts expert, until she saw Connie take down the largest men in the department in a martial arts demonstration. After that, Delta became a believer in the power of advanced self-defense.

  “Con, would a martial arts expert also know how to wield a double-bladed ax?”

  Connie’s eyebrows shot up. “Don’t tell me someone threw one of those at you, too.”

  “Very funny. One was ripped off from a sporting goods store tonight. Probably by the same guy that chucked that little gem at my head.”

  “If a martial artist was well-versed in ancient weaponry, and many of them are, then yes, I imagine he could.”

  Delta sighed loudly. “I don’t need a crackpot, would-be ninja warrior running loose on my beat.”

  “Oh, he’s not a ninja,” Connie remarked. “If he was, he would have split your skull open. Unless, of course, it was just a warning shot.”

  “Great.”

  “What are you going to do with it?”

  “I suppose I should turn it over to the detectives and let them figure out what it all means.”

  Connie stared at Delta. “Why do I get the feeling that that’s exactly what you aren’t going to do?”

  This brought a sly grin to Delta’s face. “You can be so cynical sometimes.”

  “And you can be such a bullshitter. Do your job, Del, and go home. Remember what’s causing friction between you and Megan? Go home and let someone else unravel this mystery.”

  “What about you?” Delta jerked her head toward the lifeless monitor.

  “I just need to try one more time before I go home. I’m almost to the next level.”

  “Uh-huh. Just as I thought.” Standing to leave, Delta patted Connie on the shoulder. “Don’t let the dragons swallow your little fairy princess. Or whatever.” Carefully picking up the sharp star, Delta headed for the door.

  “Del?”

  Turning back, Delta waited. “Yeah?”

  “Let it go. Focus on your personal life right now.”

  “Right, chief.” Pushing through the heavy glass doors, Delta looked at the star one last time. An alarm rang like a church bell deep within her.

  Something told her she hadn’t seen the last of the mysterious, would-be assassin.

  “Did you turn the star over to Burglary?” Jan asked at the start of their shift.

  Delta did not take her eyes away from the alley she’d been staring down.

  “Yes.”

  “Delta?”

  “Shit, Jan, why doesn’t anyone trust me on this?”

  “You know damn well why. That look in your eye says you’re taking all of this a little too personally. Did you really turn that star over?”

  “Yes, damn it, I did. The dicks weren’t overly enthused by the whole thing. And Burglary and Homicide don’t communicate enough to figure out that the guy who used the dagger might be the same guy that threw the star at me.”

  “That’s because those guys don’t make the quantum leaps you do. You have absolutely no proof that these cases are remotely related.”

  “It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure it out though, does it?”

  Jan shook her head. “You’re impossible. You’ll think whatever your crazy little head wants to think. When you get this way, there’s no talking you out of it.”

  Delta pushed back her seat and didn’t bother to respond to Jan’s correct analysis of her character. She hated the thought of her beat being infested with some whacked out burglar or murderer or ninja wanna-be or whatever the hell he was. While her beat was one of the roughest in the city, Delta took pride in her close rapport with the merchants and people on the street. High visibility and her knowledge of the streets were aimed at keeping gutter mongrels to a minimum. If there was some nutcase running around with ancient weapons and breaking into people’s shops, it was her business, even if she wasn’t a detective. That’s what made her such a good cop.

  She cared.

  She cared that someone was killing people and animals and attacking her in the process. She cared that the people who paid her salary were being victimized by this night stalker. And if some crazy asshole was threatening that safety, it was up to her to stop him.

  What she found so odd was that the crimes had been committed in such close proximity. The pharmacy and the knife shop were less than five blocks apart. Whoever this guy was, he didn’t think anything about the risk involved in striking so soon after the last crime, and in the same neighborhood. And he obviously didn’t know the greater risk of attacking the cop whose job it was to protect that neighborhood and the people in it. That was Delta’s best advantage; he underestimated her.

  They cruised along for another fifteen minutes in relative silence, until Delta spied a teenager sauntering down the street with his hands in his pockets.

  “Pull over behind this kid,” Delta said, pointing to a tall, thin Mexican youth.

  But before Delta was out of the car, the boy, seemingly with eyes in the back of his head, sprinted away.

  “Damn it!” Delta yelled, taking off after him.

  As Delta chased him down the sidewalk and through a crowd waiting in line for the last showing at the movie theater, Jan swung the patrol car ahead to cut him off.

  “Julio, damn it, it’s me! Officer Stevens!”

  Just before jamming across the street, the kid came to a sudden halt and slowly turned around. “Whyn’t chu say so, man? You scared the shit right outta me.”

  Chest heaving as she reached him, Delta took a moment to catch her breath in front of the smiling eyes of the teenager. “¿Qué pasa, Julio?”

  The boy shrugged. His jacket was emblazoned with his gang’s colors, and they seemed to dance as he moved. “Not much.” Julio turned toward the wall and laid his hands and feet spread-eagle, as if he were going to be searched.

  “You got eyes in the back of your head, amigo?” Delta asked, always amazed at Julio’s street savvy.

  Julio turned to her, still keeping his hands on the wall, and grinned a charming smiled ornamented by a silver cap on his front tooth. “Call it a sick sense, man.” His face, though pock-marked, was soft and dark. He did not look like a boy who belonged to one of the toughest Latino gangs in the city.

  Moving up to him, Delta pretended to search him. It would be certain death if one of his brother gang members saw him talking to a cop, so he acted like he was being busted.

  “Whatcha need now?” Julio asked, turning back to face the wall. Delta had saved Julio’s girl one night from what would have been a horrible rape by rival members of another gang. In his own quiet way, Julio offered to be Delta’s eyes and ears about anything non-gang related. This wasn’t the first time she asked for his help, and she doubted it would be the last.

  “I need to know what you’ve heard about a martial arts expert prowling around my beat. You know the stuff—judo, karate, tae kwon do, shit like that.” Turning Julio completely around, Delta knew why he had run—he was stoned.

  “You talkin’ ’bout the dude that left an eight-inch knife in Friedman’s back?” Even stoned, Julio was a great source. “Word has it there’s a new man in town who doesn’t want to be fucked with.”

  “What’s he after?” Delta pulled her notepad from her pocket and pretended to be writing him up.

  Julio shrugged and stuck his hands in his pockets again. “Dunno. The line says he ain’t no gang member or nothin.’ Just works solo.”

  “Import?”

  “Don’t think so. Thin
gs have been pretty cool lately. ’Sides, you know us, man. We do our own. No one ’round here brings in guys to do the dirty shit unless it’s big. Ain’t nothin’ big happenin’.”

  Delta nodded. “Is that all?”

  “All I know. No one’s seen him, though. We only heard of him.” Julio wiped the glaze from his lips. “He piss you off, eh, Stevens?”

  Delta looked away. “I don’t like killers in our neighborhood, do you?”

  For a moment, Julio said nothing. “If I catch word anythin’ else, I’ll letcha know.”

  “You do that.” Tearing off a piece of paper, Delta handed it to him and walked away. “You do that, Julio.” Turning back around, Delta pointed a finger at him. “And lay off the dope, will you? It’ll only fry your brain cells.”

  She turned back to the patrol car and heard him mutter something about it being too late for that.

  “What was that all about?” Jan asked, as Delta sat back in the passenger seat.

  “Just hunting and pecking, that’s all.” Delta looked at her nails in feigned disinterest.

  “Delta Stevens.”

  Without looking at Jan, Delta shrugged. “Do me a favor and swing by Megan’s for a minute.”

  “More pecking?”

  Delta tried to hide the tiny grin on her face. “More pecking.”

  Megan swung the door open and grinned. “Hi there, handsome. What are you doing here looking so sexy in your uniform?” Sidling up to Delta and nuzzling her neck, Megan hugged her tightly. “You know how women in uniform drive me crazy.”

  “Women? Plural?”

  Megan smiled. “Singular. Make that particular.”

  Delta nodded. “That’s better.” Gently prying Megan’s arms from around her neck, Delta kissed her lightly on the mouth. “Isn’t that one of the main reasons we became involved?”

  “That, and the fact that you’re great in bed.”

  Delta blushed and then peered over her shoulder to make sure Jan couldn’t possibly hear them.

  “So, to what do I owe this honor, Officer Stevens?” Megan’s eyes twinkled as she held her hands out to be handcuffed.