Blood Orchid (Holly Barker 3)

“You have a point.” He sniffed the air. “God, that smells good!”

“Of course it does. You ready to eat?”

“Try me.”

They ate.

An hour later, as Holly was dozing off on Grant’s shoulder, the phone rang.

“Chief?”

“Yes.”

“It’s Sally Worth, down at the station. We got a match on the thumbprint that Hurd asked for.”

“Tell me.”

“It belongs to a Trini Rodriguez. He has a record of arrests, more than a dozen of them, for arson, robbery, car theft, and attempted murder.”

“A jack-of-all-trades, huh? Any convictions?”

“None.”

“Thanks, Sally.” She hung up and turned back to Grant. “We got a match on the thumbprint; one Trini Rodriguez, whom I recently met.”

“You ought to call Harry.”

“Tomorrow morning will be good enough,” she said, kissing him.

“He’d like it if you called him at home; I’ve got the number.”

Holly rolled over and called Harry. “Harry? Sorry to disturb you at home, but I thought you ought to know that we pulled a print off the magazine of Carlos’s forty-caliber, and it belongs to Trini Rodriguez, the guy I told you about earlier today.”

“Good news,” Harry said. “I’m glad you called. I’ll have him picked up.”

“Not yet, Harry, please,” Holly said. “The people he works for might go to ground, and anyway, the evidence isn’t all that good.”

“You think we can’t get him for Carlos’s murder with that evidence?”

“No, I don’t think so. He can claim that he put the print on the gun when Carlos showed it to him at the shooting range. Also, the guy has a long arrest record but no convictions, which means he knows how to keep his mouth shut and lawyer up. Rodriguez is very cool, and I don’t think you’ll be able to get anything out of him that would help us at this stage. Let’s find out more about the Pellegrinos before we grab Trini.”

“Okay, that makes sense.”

“When are we going to have something from Washington about Pio and his daddy?”

“We got photographs of them arriving at the restaurant earlier this evening, and they’ve been transmitted to D.C. Depends on their case load; if it’s light, we’ll hear something soon.”

“Thank you, Harry.”

“Say hello to Grant,” Harry said.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Where else would you get my home number? It’s unlisted.”

“Good night, Harry.” She hung up. “Harry says hello

.”