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  “Didn’t Molly warn her so that she could take her medication?” Glancing around, Archie noticed that Chelsea’s service dog was missing. “Where’s Molly?”

  “She’s with Chelsea in the examination room,” Bogie said. “Molly did warn her, but I think Chelsea was too upset to notice.”

  “Upset about what?”

  Bogie sucked in a deep breath. “Violet went ape on her. Thought she was Robin.”

  “That’s the last thing Chelsea needs right now,” Archie said. “She’s already mad at David for getting married without knowing it. The last thing she needs is his crazy loon of a mother attacking her.”

  “I know.” Bogie nodded his head in the direction behind her. “Doc’s on his way now. I’ve been trying to think of where I know him from. He looks familiar.”

  Archie spun around on her heels to watch a huge man in green doctor’s scrubs making his way toward them. He was clearly as tall as Bogie with broad shoulders and a barrel chest. In contrast to his intimidating size, he had a welcoming smile that—even from down the hallway—made Archie feel at ease. As he approached them, he stuck out his hand to Bogie. “Deputy Chief Bogie, good to see you again.”

  Suddenly recognition filled the deputy chief’s face. “Blanchard! Seth Blanchard!” He turned to Archie. “That’s why I know him. Seth grew up in Spencer. Swept the science fair every year. His mother is chief of staff here at the hospital.” He turned back to Seth. “I thought you moved out of the area—thought you were working at Johns Hopkins?”

  “Now I’m back,” he explained. “Garrett Memorial made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. Head of ER.” He looked down at Archie. “You must be Chelsea’s friend Archie. She was worried about upsetting your schedule—something about a wedding?”

  “She’s getting married this weekend,” Archie said.

  “To David O’Callaghan.” Bogie told her, “Seth went to school with Chelsea and David and all of them.”

  “So Chelsea and David are finally getting married?” Seth mused. “She didn’t tell me she was marrying David … only …” His voice trailed off.

  “How is she, Doctor?” Archie asked.

  Seth paused before replying. “She’s resting right now. Grand mal seizures can really wipe you out. It’s best if she takes it easy.” Looking around, he asked, “Where’s the groom, by the way?”

  “He’s out of town,” Bogie said.

  “Investigating a murder. He’s the chief of police in Spencer. When can we take Chelsea home?”

  “I’d like to keep her overnight to run some tests. An MRI—”

  “But we have a wedding this weekend,” Archie objected. “Over two hundred guests.”

  “It wouldn’t be a very nice wedding if the bride collapsed in front of over two hundred guests, would it?” Seth asked with a slightly smug grin.

  Archie placed her hands on her hips. “When can we see Chelsea?”

  Seth gestured down the hallway. “Examination room one. I’ll go arrange for her to be checked into a room and join you shortly.”

  “This is not good,” Archie told Bogie. “First, David has to go to New York to divorce a wife he didn’t know he—” Watching the doctor make his way to the nurse’s station to check Chelsea in, she punched Bogie in the chest. “Did you see that?”

  Grabbing the gun he wore on his hip, Bogie whirled around to see the threat he assumed Archie had identified. “See what?”

  “That doctor!” She jerked her head in the direction of the nurse’s station. “Just now! Did you see the bounce in his step?” Grabbing Bogie by the front of his shirt, she hissed, “I think he’s interested in more than Chelsea’s medical condition.”

  Looking down the hallway to where Dr. Seth Blanchard was joking with two nurses while completing the necessary forms, Bogie said, “Oh, I wouldn’t doubt it.”

  Archie’s eyes widened. “Then I’m right?”

  “Seth always had a thing for Chelsea,” Bogie said. “Everyone knew about it.”

  “Then he’s keeping her here in the hospital so he can make a move on her while David’s out of town,” she said.

  “That’s what I’d do if I were in his shoes.”

  “Not on my watch!” Archie whipped out her cell phone.

  Chapter Fourteen

  With a growl, Mac tossed the poop-filled baggie into the garbage and yanked off the evidence gloves after it. “You better not have left them in Central Park this morning. You wouldn’t have. Would you have?”

  Innocence filled the German shepherd’s face. He cocked his head at Mac.

  “Look, Gnarly,” Mac whispered at him. “You only have two days left to cough—I mean, give them up.”

  Gnarly’s ears fell back. Hanging his head, he uttered a whine.

  Squatting down in front of him, Mac stroked the top of his head. “You can do it, buddy. I know you can. Not for me. For David and Chelsea and Molly … Do it for Molly. You like Molly.” Grinning, Mac nodded his head while picking up the leash. “Next one’s for Molly.” He held out his hand. “Deal?”

  Gnarly placed his paw into Mac’s palm to shake.

  Feeling the phone vibrate on his hip, Mac checked the caller ID on his cell before bringing it to his ear. “Hey, hon, what’s going on there?”

  “Everything’s falling apart,” Archie said. “David needs to get back ASAP.”

  Mac rose to his feet. “Why? What’s going on?”

  “Violet went ape on Chelsea, she had a seizure, and now she’s stuck in the hospital with Dr. Love, who’s planning to put the moves on her. So David’s got to get his butt on a plane and get back home, or there’s not going to be any bride for him to marry.”

  Lost, Mac asked, “What? Is Chelsea okay?”

  “No,” Archie said. “She’s in the emergency room, and Dr. Love is checking her in so he can lure her away from David and the wedding. Yvonne’s dead, right? That means David’s free to marry Chelsea. So get him on a plane and back down here to fight for the woman he loves—ASAP.”

  As if Archie were there in front of him, Mac held up his hand in a gesture for her to calm down. “Okay, I understand. David’s doing something for me right now, but he’s been cleared as a suspect. So as soon as he gets back to the hotel, we’ll check out and fly back home. We should be there by dinnertime.”

  “Good,” Archie said. “Tell him to hurry up. This doctor looks way too happy.”

  “He’s a nice guy,” Mac heard Bogie say in the background.

  “I don’t care,” Archie replied to Bogie. “Let him get his own girl!” Abruptly, her tone went up an octave. “Oh my God, he’s bringing her flowers!” Returning to her conversation with Mac, she hissed, “Tell that pilot to step on it!” As an afterthought, she added “I love you” before disconnecting the call.

  Stunned at how quickly everything had changed—it had only been one day—Mac looked down at Gnarly, who was gazing back up at him. “Maybe we’re not going to need those rings after all.”

  “Mac, what are you and Gnarly doing out there?” Ed Willingham called to them from the back door leading into the police station. “Never mind, I don’t want to know. You wanted information about that dead police officer? I’ve got someone who’ll talk to you. But not here.” He checked the time on his watch. “We’ve got five minutes to get there.” He gestured at Gnarly. “Are you through here?”

  Mac’s sigh was filled with exasperation. “Yeah, we’re done here.” He led Gnarly out of the alley to join Willingham at the curb, where the lawyer hailed a taxi.

  “Lucky for you, I know people,” Ed said once they were settled in the backseat of the cab with Gnarly sitting in between them.

  “I know you know people,” Mac said. “That’s why you’re my people.”

  “Person,” Ed corrected him.

  “Huh?”

  “I’m not a people,
” Ed said. “I’m a person. Singular. One people is a person, not people.”

  “I know that,” Mac said.

  “Then why did you call me your people?”

  “I was following—” Disgusted, Mac noted that the cab was pulling over in front of a corner diner. “Forget it. We’re here. Let’s go meet your person.”

  In Spencer, Maryland, a diner would find itself in the midst of a lull during the midmorning hours between breakfast and lunch. That was not the case at the midtown Manhattan diner and delicatessen. Customers shopping for fresh lunch meat, cheeses, and salads were lined up in front of the deli case, where two clerks were hurrying to fill their orders and dodging the two cooks preparing meals for patrons in the diner section of the establishment. Practically every table was filled with customers enjoying either late breakfasts or early lunches.

  When Mac, Ed, and Gnarly entered the diner, one of the servers who was carrying a tray filled with luncheon plates stopped when she saw Gnarly. Before she could chase them out, Mac said, “He’s a service dog.”

  “Where’s his vest?”

  “He was mugged,” Mac replied. “In the park … this morning. The guy had a poodle—it was awful.” He stroked Gnarly’s head.

  With his ears laid back flat on his head, Gnarly gazed up imploringly at the server.

  Seeing the server soften in response to the dog’s pleading eyes, Mac said, “He was totally traumatized.”

  “We just came from the police station,” Ed added.

  Without saying a word, she continued on her way to deliver her order.

  Ed led them back to a table in the far corner where a thin woman with ultrashort dark hair was drinking a cup of coffee. Ed quickly introduced her as Lieutenant Abby Gibbons. “She’s an investigator with internal affairs.”

  Even while he shook her hand, Mac felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up on end. Sensing the tension, Gnarly shot out from under the table where he’d just lain down between Mac and Abby.

  “Believe it or not, I’m on your side,” she said in response to seeing Mac almost back away from the table. “I know your background, Faraday. You were a good cop. But don’t tell me that during your career you never once encountered bad cops. It’s my department’s job to get rid of them. The way things are nowadays, one bad cop ruins the reputation—and threatens the lives—of thousands upon thousands of the good cops who go out every day to literally lay their lives on the line for the public, many of whom don’t appreciate it.”

  “I know exactly where you’re coming from,” Mac said. “It’s just been my experience that sometimes in internal affair’s quest to weed out the bad cops, the reputations of good cops get ruined along the way—”

  “And you never once accused someone of murder who ended up being innocent?” Lieutenant Gibbons shot back. “All we care about is getting at the truth—just like you.” With a shake of her head, she took a sip of her coffee. “The media never tells the public about the good white cop who took a bullet for a black mugging victim. That happened just last week. The officer survived but will be in the hospital for another week and in physical therapy for months. But let a journalist find out about a white cop who shot a black heroin addict choking his partner to death and refusing to let go, and suddenly the whole country hears about it, and we have riots and looting. Last year, we lost two good cops in an ambush in retaliation for one white cop who’d shot a black kid whose rap sheet for violence was as long as your arm.”

  “And I’m sure that the politicians and members of the media fanning the flames had nothing to do with those two cops being ambushed,” Mac said with heavy sarcasm.

  “I totally agree,” she replied. “Better for IA to keep a heavy finger on the pulse of the police to weed out the bad ones before things reach that point.”

  Mac could see by the set of her jaw as she took a sip of her coffee that she was bitterly angry. It was more than a matter of bad publicity. Many good officers had died in the line of duty without so much as an acknowledgment from the same media and politicians who jumped to politicize incidents that could be easily spun to serve their own agendas.

  Mac’s perception of her as the enemy shifted. Swallowing, he asked, “What can you tell me about the off-duty police officer who was killed a couple of blocks from the News Corp building last night?”

  Her forehead wrinkled when she furrowed her brow. “Why do you want to know?”

  “A friend of mine was attacked. She didn’t report it, because she got away. I’m suspicious because it was shortly after Yvonne Harding was murdered, and this friend of mine was a close associate of hers. I want to know if the attempted attack could be connected to Harding’s murder.”

  “Officer Warren Tate wasn’t an off-duty police officer,” she said. “He was on suspension for sexual harassment of female suspects and police brutality. His last victim was a prostitute who recorded him threatening to arrest her for solicitation unless she serviced him for free. On top of all that, units have made several domestic abuse calls to his home, but they’ve kept them off the books. After he was suspended, his wife got a restraining order.”

  “So he has a violent history,” Mac said. “Do you have any idea why he would try to mug a woman—or maybe worse?”

  He had half expected her to shrug her shoulders and answer that she didn’t. Instead, she looked directly across the table at him, studying him and apparently weighing her options.

  “Well?” Mac prodded her.

  “Off the record?” she asked Ed Willingham.

  “That’s why we’re meeting here instead of in your office, Abby,” Ed said.

  “Tate was one of a group of officers who have been on my radar for quite a while,” she said. “It started out as little things. A suspect would claim the officer roughed him up—that type of stuff. But then the incident reports involving these particular officers gradually became more serious. A defense attorney would tell me, off the record, that his client claimed he’d had twice as much cocaine on him as what was written in the arrest report. A couple of times, defendants swore evidence had been planted.”

  “Those claims always happen,” Mac said.

  “I know, but there’s something about these cases that makes me believe the suspects filing the claims,” she said. “When I put pressure on the detective in charge of the case where the defendant claimed the evidence had been planted, he found evidence proving the suspect was indeed innocent. The evidence against him had been planted and the only one who could have done it was Officer Warren Tate. Lately, cases like these always involved one or more of this particular group of officers, who I now refer to as the ‘Dirty Six.’ When I looked into their backgrounds, I found that they’d all originated from the same precinct in the Bronx. Found out that they all hung out together. Drank together at the same cop bar. One of them has a very expensive boat. Another one just put in a new swimming pool.” She sat back in her seat. “Warren Tate was one of the Dirty Six.”

  “What about the remaining five?” Ed asked. “Are they all still on the force?”

  “Yes, and I can’t get anything concrete to use to move on them,” she said. “Wish I could. In the last couple of years, they’ve become more organized.”

  “Wouldn’t that be normal?” Mac said. “If they’re going to pull off bigger stuff, they have to plan better.”

  Slowly, she shook her head. “I think someone realized what they were doing and decided to recruit them for bigger things. I suspect they now have a leader—one who’s not on my radar.”

  “What type of bigger things?”

  “Paid muscle, or maybe even worse,” she said. “Six months ago, a witness for a major murder case involving the son of a heavy hitter on Wall Street was killed in a home invasion. He, his wife, and two of their three children were killed. The murder case got tossed out of court. The witness’s teenaged daughter survived. She gave a d
escription of one of the men who broke into the house. When we got a suspect and put him in the police lineup, she didn’t pick him. She picked one of the officers standing in—Warren Tate. The witness swears up and down it was him. One hundred percent certainty. The prosecutor came to me, and I dug into Tate. Found that he was off duty that night, as were three other members of the Dirty Six. The victim says four men broke into the house.”

  “Why would cops kill a witness?” Ed asked with a catch in his throat.

  “That’s the thing,” she said. “They had no motive. But the defendant in our murder case comes from a family that believe firmly in bending, if not breaking, the rules. Their pockets are deep enough to pay for it.”

  “Cops moonlighting as paid assassins,” Mac said.

  “And I believe they have a ringleader within the police department,” Abby said. “Has to be someone on the inside. In spite of all the work I’ve done investigating them, digging into their stories, and interviewing them, every time I think I’m on the verge of nailing them, they slip away. None of the six is smart enough to do that. There’s another member of their group who I haven’t identified, and he’s leading them.”

  Mac sat back in his chair. “Then Warren Tate has to be involved in Yvonne Harding’s murder. With his police identification, he could have easily left the building even after the lockdown.”

  “In that case, we’re talking murder for hire,” Ed said.

  “Whoever hired him had Yvonne’s assistant on the list to make sure there were no loose ends.” Mac turned back to Abby. “What’s the estimated time and cause of death for Tate?”

  “His throat was slashed between eleven and midnight,” she replied.

  “Throat slashed?” Mac asked. “Are you sure about the time?”

  She nodded her head. “That’s what the preliminary autopsy report says. Why?”

  “Harding’s assistant says she was attacked shortly before eight o’clock, and she got away by jabbing him in the throat with ninja spikes.”