R achel agreed to make the call and left. I tried to give her a hug but got nothing more than a shoulder and the side of her face. Ah, sweet romance.
“The judge doesn’t like being kept in the dark,” Rodriguez said.
“Think so?”
The detective chuckled. “You must not keep much of a social life, Kelly. But, I guess that’s your problem. Can you pull all this off?”
“There’s a chance.”
A bottle of Powers Irish surfaced from the depths of a drawer. Rodriguez poured himself a dose and drank it in a single go. Then he stood up and leaned his face across the desk. Rodriguez could be a big man when he wanted to be.
“What was in the book?” he said.
I tasted the edges of my whiskey and leaned back in my chair. I was looking for a bit of leverage. If not in the Powers, at least in the geography of the moment.
“Let me deal with Kincaid. Then we go after the rest of it.”
“You sure his security chief’s not our killer?”
I nodded.
“This involves the Fifth Floor, doesn’t it?”
“How would you feel about that?” I said.
Rodriguez sat back down and turned his chair to look out the window. When he spoke, his voice came from somewhere down the street.
“Not fucking good, Kelly. Not good at all.”
“If it goes bad, I’ll take the weight.”
A smile flickered at the corner of the detective’s mouth. “Who the fuck made you the hero?” he said, reaching for the bottle without looking at it.
We both sat quiet. Drank and listened. For something beyond the sound of traffic. All we heard was our respective careers, and perhaps our lives, spiraling down the sewer hole that doubled as the feeding tube for Chicago politics and power.
“Now what about the other thing?” Rodriguez swung around in his chair and pulled close again.
“Johnny Woods’ murder?” I said.
“There’s that. And there’s Dan Masters. He’s taken off with Woods’ wife, hasn’t he?”
“He might be in over his head,” I said.
“Masters can take care of himself,” Rodriguez said. “Where do you think he is?”
“I don’t know, but he’ll surface soon enough.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Because the mom and daughter he’s with are gonna need some answers.”
“Answers you can provide?”
“Maybe, but I might need some help.”
“What kind of help?” the detective said.
“The kind that’s gonna tell us who pulled the trigger on Woods and why.”
I stood up and walked over to Robert Graves’ leather-bound translation of the Odyssey. Behind it was a. 38 Smith and Wesson snub.
“The gun that killed Johnny.” I slid the piece across the desk. Rodriguez didn’t touch it.
“You sure?”
“I know my own gun,” I said. “This was the piece I found beside Woods’ body. The piece that disappeared out of Evidence. I usually keep it behind the Iliad. Yesterday I found it three books down. Behind the Odyssey. Been fired three times.”
“And I assume you have no idea how it got there.”
“Actually, I think I know exactly how.”
“Should we order some pizza?” Rodriguez said.
“I’m okay with whiskey.”
“Yeah. Well, I’m not.”
So we ordered pizza. I told Rodriguez how my gun found its way from the Cook County Evidence lockup back into my bookcase. Then I told him what I needed and why. When I finished, the detective left. I put a call in to Big Bob’s Saloon and asked for the manager. The turtle races weren’t on, so he had a little time. We talked for a while. About Janet Woods and his daytime bartender. After I got off the phone, I sat up, drank some more whiskey, and watched the night grow old. I wondered where Dan Masters was sleeping. And who might be standing over his bed.