Page 139 of Long Way Down

He smirked. “Thought so.” Then grew more serious. He checked subtly over his shoulder for listeners and lowered his voice to a whisper. “Everything go okay last night? I heard about your apartment door.” He shook his head, and his expression saidwhat the fuck?“Pongo stayed with you, right?”

“We went to his place. I couldn’t stand the idea of staying after that.”

“Good. Don’t stay anywhere alone until we pin down the perp.”

For once, she didn’t feel the need to insist on her capability. She nodded. “Results in on the blood he used to write? It was…dripping.”

“Nah, lab’s still running it. They’ll let us know. But their initial look said it was human.”

She made a face, stomach souring, though she’d expected as much. “I’ll call the lab and have them check it against the DB Cole Morris brought in last night.”

“Was it” – he leaned in, whisper going even softer – “one of the working girls?”

“Pongo said yeah. April. The one we saw at the club.”

“Shit. And whoever dumped her was in Doug’s car, but it couldn’t have been Doug, ‘cause he was already at school.”

She nodded.

“How did Pongo know itwasDoug’s car?” he asked, brow furrowing.

She sipped her coffee. “The less you know about that, the better.”

~*~

Hauser’s had a usual afternoon crowd, and Pongo recognized several faces, though he didn’t know the names or stories behind them. He saw recognition flare in their eyes, too, a brief flash before they put their heads down and kept to their own business.

Denny’s manager was working the bar, a lanky, premature gray man with a Nordic name Pongo couldn’t remember and a congenial face. Pongo hailed him with a wave and got a nod toward the back corner – the deepest, and darkest, where he’d met Kat for the first time. Today’s lunchtime meeting was going to be very different from that one.

Pongo led the way through the maze of tables, Maverick following and Shepherd bringing up the rear. Toly wasn’t with them, back on Raven Blake duty, fortified by a breakfast of dreaded Hot Pockets. They passed through low conversations, rumbling murmurs of which only the occasional word broke through, some of them English, many of them not.

The table sat in a puddle of deep shadow, its Tiffany lamp turned off, a small, gas-look electric sconce on the wall the only source of light, so that Prince’s face peered from the corner like a skull lit from beneath.

“Dramatic,” Pongo said, as Kat melted out of the booth and stood to greet them. “I dig it. Kinda douchey, though.”

Kat, in his usual dark cap and black jacket, snorted, and motioned to the other side of the big, circular booth.

Pongo stepped back so Mav could slide in first, then him, then Shep on the end cap, with an empty gulf of worn leather between the two leaders at the center, so they could brace their elbows on the table and square off from one another.

Prince wore a perfectly tailored suit that looked the color of blood in the low, flickering light of the sconce, a monochromatic collection vial in matching waistcoat, shirt, tie, and pocket square. The rings on his fingers glinted as he reached for his drink, and shadows made themselves at home in the hollows of eyes, cheekbones, and jaw.

The difference between him and Mav was pronounced against the tufted leather back of the booth. A faultlessly groomed panther beside a scruffy mutt from the pound.

But the mutt was the one with the big guns, here.

Mav offered his hand, first. And his real name: “Anthony Ramsey.”

Silver rings winked as Prince returned the shake. “Peter Rydell.”

Good, Pongo thought. This was good.

Then, smiling, Mav said, “So it sounds like both our idiot kids got themselves caught on camera last night, waving guns around and everything.”

Shit.

Pongo darted a glance toward Kat in time to see his black brows draw together beneath the brim of his cap. “Hey, now,” he muttered, before he could catch himself.

Mav’s mouth twitched.

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