“You were saying …”
“She called me, and I listened while somebody ordered two of Rain’s men to go to that meeting at Salsa Con Tarifa.”
“But you don’t know who gave the order?”
“No. She was trying to prove to me that she was really getting closer to the top.”
“You didn’t have her wearing a wire?”
“I will, now that I know she’s for real.”
“Go on, detective.”
“I went to Salsa Con Tarifa, checked the place out, but I got kicked out just when Rain’s guys got there.”
“That’s another reason why you should have brought me into this sooner.”
“Since you knew about it, why didn’t you just push your way in like you do everything else?”
“Not this time. This time, I thought that I’d let you do what you thought you had to do. You’d bring me in when you were ready, unless you thought you had
something to prove to me, then you wouldn’t.”
“Think you know me?”
“Told you, I know everything about you.”
“Anyway, she says that her guy is about ready to flip.”
“On Robinson?”
“No,” Bautista said hesitantly. “On somebody higher up the food chain than him.”
“I see,” Kirk said and took a sip of his coffee.
“Don’t look like that.”
“Like what? The coffee is cold.”
“You know … like you’re disappointed.”
“In what? That the coffee is cold?”
“That I don’t have Rain.”
“You said you had somebody higher up, right?”
“Yeah, but-” Bautista began excitedly.
“We’ll flip him and keep working our way up until we get her. But we’ll do it together,” Kirk said calmly. Her obsession with Rain Robinson amused him, mostly because it reminded him of himself and his obsession with Mike Black.
“We’ll get her together,” Bautista said.
Lieutenant Sanchez came out of his office and walked up to Kirk and Bautista’s desk.
“Lieutenant,” Kirk said as Sanchez looked around for a minute or two until he saw Detective Dawkins seated at a desk close by and waved her over.
“Kirk, Bautista,” Sanchez began.