Page 39 of Lion & Lamb

“Didn’t make it,” Veena said.

Wednesday, January 26

Chapter34

3:13 a.m.

THE CELLphone on Cooper’s nightstand vibrated. Lupe gave a short, muffled bark—more of awoof—to alert his master. But his master was already on full alert. “Shhh,” he whispered. The pup immediately fell silent.

Cooper reached down and grabbed the shotgun he kept clipped to the underside of his bed. Cooper knew the easiest way to disorient a target in his home at night was to call him. While your target fumbles for the phone in the dark, you take your shot; it’s over before he’s even fully awake. Cooper refused to make that mistake.

Only with the Winchester SXP Defender pump-action shotgun in his hand did Cooper answer his cell.

“Honey,” he said calmly, “I told youneverto call me at work.”

The person on the other end of the line hesitated. Cooper heard a confused muttering before the caller finally snarled: “Walk away. That’s what Chef Boyardee should’ve done.”

Cooper said, “Red—is this you?”

Click.

Chapter35

EARLY MORNINGwas the best time to do a home search, in Detective Mickey Bernstein’s professional opinion.

Surprise ’em while they’re not fully awake and still in their pajamas. When you have a choice, serve that search warrant before the coffee machine drops its first drip.

In this case, however, Mickeydidn’thave a choice.

He’d left Dmitri’s around ten o’clock and pulled an all-nighter that involved the commissioner (already on board), his homicide captain (a pushover), a federal judge (an elderly political hack), and his counterpart at the Radnor Police Department (a nobody). Even with the dice loaded, for a while there Mickey wondered if it would actually work. Testimony from a lowlife named Crazy Percy wasn’t exactly the strongest piece of evidence. However, that piece was needed for all of the others—most important, the murder weapon in the Hugheses’ flower bed—to click into place.

It helped that the judge was a longtime pal of his father’s and was used to wild Bernstein hunches. The moment His Honor signed off on the search, Mickey mobilized his team but pretended that the Radnor PD was taking the lead.

They knocked at exactly 6:03 a.m.

Francine was up and looked almost as if she’d been expecting company.Nobody rolls out of bed this put together,Mickey thought,not even a multiple Grammy winner.She was breathtakingly gorgeous. She even smiled at him.

“Good morning, Detective.”

“Sincere apologies for the early-morning call, Ms. Hughes. I hope you understand that an investigation like this follows its own timeline.”

Mickey had rehearsed what he would say to Francine on the ride over; this was the best he could do on zero sleep and in his wrinkled clothes. She seemed to take it in stride.

“You’ve got quite a crew with you,” Francine said, looking over his shoulder at the small army of uniformed officers waiting for the signal to proceed. “I’d better put on more coffee.”

But even a super-gracious host like Francine couldn’t keep up with the sheer number of investigators examining every inch of her house. Little Maddie Hughes tried to pitch in, bringing the uniformed officers homemade chocolate chip cookies (“Our friend Maya helped us bake them last night”), organic lemonade, and helpful pieces of advice such as “Remember to check the bottom of the hall closet!” and “Don’t forget the safe room!”

Mickey floated around the house checking in with various teams who’d been assigned different parts of the sprawling mansion. “I’m sure the Oval Office is tucked away somewhere here,” grumbled one of the uniforms, who probably lived with a wife and three kids in a cramped Northeast Philly twin. Mickey shot him a look that told him he agreed butstow it right now.

Whenever he could, Mickey put eyes on Francine Pearl Hughes. She was eerily calm for a woman watching more than a dozen strangers examine every detail of her home. Calm for a woman suspected of murdering her husband.

Two developments threatened to break that calm. First, Archie’s $400,000 Patek Philippe watch, which was reported missing from his body the night of the crime, was found mixed in with Francine’s jewelry. How do you misplace nearly half a million bucks?

And second, ammo for a Glock was found in the garage, tucked behind gardening supplies. Not exactly hidden, but a weird place for live rounds.

“Keep searching,” Mickey told his men.

“Hey, Detective?” said a tech named DeNardo. Mickey couldn’t remember his first name for the life of him. Something like Dan or Drew? Whatever. He was the computer forensics guy working for the Radnor PD.

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