Dexter Is Dead (Dexter 8)

“And when were you going to tell me this exciting news?”

“In truth, I thought it would keep until breakfast,” Brian said. “I assumed that I was the target.”

“Apparently you were wrong,” I said.

“So it seems,” he said with great and completely unwarranted good cheer.

For just a moment I stood with my eyes closed, letting the waves of fatigue wash over me. “I need to get out of here,” I said. “And my car is not going anywhere. Can you come get me?”

“Weeeeeell,” he said. “That might not be the wisest course right now. I have to believe they’re watching you and hoping I do just th

at.”

It was true; no matter how selfish I thought it was, and how very contrary to all that was Decent for Dexter, I could not deny that it would be just a tiny bit stupid for him to come get me. Raul’s men were almost certainly watching. “I suppose you’re right,” I said.

“Yes,” Brian said. “But this is troubling. Somehow they found you first. Any idea how?”

“Brian,” I said. “I have just been bombed, perforated with glass slivers, slapped—and I was already exhausted. I’m not having ideas right now.”

“Of course not, you poor thing,” he said, oozing fake sympathy that still sounded much too happy. “Get some sleep. We’ll talk in the morning.” And he disconnected without waiting for me to say good-bye. Possibly he thought I would want to say a few other things first, of a more personal and antagonistic nature. After all, any reasonable person would have to say that this was all his fault. And possibly I would have said more—but he hung up, and even that small comfort was denied me.

I replaced the old phone in its antiquated cradle, marveling at how well it fit. Say what you will about modern technology; people back then knew how to build things that worked. And then, still looking at the phone, I thought, Kraunauer. I pulled his card from my pocket, carefully smoothing a small wrinkle. I picked up the phone again and dialed.

Kraunauer answered on the second ring, which was nice. But the way he answered took me by surprise. “¿Se hace?” he said in his wonderful Mexican-Spanish accent.

For just a second I wondered if this old telephone had made some kind of mistake and given him the wrong caller ID. But then I remembered that it was, after all, an antique—and Brian, too, had not known who was calling. “It’s Dexter Morgan,” I said. “I’m calling from a hotel lobby.”

For a moment he was speechless, which was a first in my dealings with him. “Oh, that’s…ah,” he said at last. “Well, then, I—And are you all right?”

“I’m a little rumpled,” I said. “Someone put a very large bomb in my car.”

“What?!” he said. “I take it you were not actually in the car when it went off?”

“I was not,” I said. “Or I would be considerably more rumpled.”

“Of course you would,” he said. For some reason he did not seem to be showing his usual eloquence. Perhaps it was the lateness of the hour. “Well, then, um, the police are there?”

“They are,” I told him. “And the FBI. Um—the police are represented by Detective Anderson?”

“Ah,” he said. “That’s the same officer who has been troubling you?”

“It is,” I said. “He accused me of bombing my own car, and he slapped me. Kind of hard, too.”

“Was there a witness?” he said, and his voice seemed suddenly sharper, more alert.

“Another cop,” I said. “A uniform. Officer Poux—Melanie Poux.”

“Well, crap,” he said. “We’ll never get her to testify against another cop.”

“She might,” I said. “She let the feds drag it out of her.”

“Did she!” he exclaimed. He sounded delighted. “Well, then. We may have something here. An FBI agent’s testimony is as good as it gets. We just might have something. Oh—they don’t think you blew up your own rental car, do they?”

“I don’t think so,” I said.

Kraunauer chuckled. “Good, good,” he said. “Well, believe it or not, this is actually a real break.”

“It doesn’t seem like it at the moment,” I said.