The Murderers (Badge of Honor 6)

“For one thing, from what was coming over the wire before the lady knocked the mike off, we didn’t think the Lieutenant was quite ready to go home to his wife and kiddies, and for another, Matt’s wearing a hotel-maintenance uniform, and says he doesn’t think the Lieutenant knows him anyway.”

“Yeah, but what if he had?”

“He’s got it!” Lewis said.

He took the earphones from his head and held them out to Tony Harris.

Harris took them and put them on.

The sounds of sexual activity made Harris uncomfortable.

“I’ve been wondering if the fact that I find some of that rather exciting makes me a pervert,” Tiny said.

“We’re trying to catch him with one of the mobsters, not with his cock in some hooker’s mouth.”

“Unfortunately, at the moment, all we have is him and the lady. Maybe Martinez and Whatsisname will get lucky when they relieve us,” Tiny said, and then added: “He’s back inside.

I agree with you, that was crazy.”

“Your pal is crazy,” Harris said.

“I think he prefers to think of it as devotion to duty,” Tiny said. “You know, ‘Neither heat, nor rain, nor thirteen stories off the ground will deter this courier…’”

“Oh, shit,” Harris said, chuckling. “I’d never try something like that.”

“Neither would I. But I don’t want to be Police Commissioner before I’m forty.”

Harris looked at him and smiled.

“You think that’s what he wants? Really?”

“I don’t know. Sometimes I think he’s just playing cop…”

Harris snorted.

“Other times, I think he takes the job as seriously as my old man. You know, the thin blue line, protecting the citizens from the savages. We know he’s not doing it for the money.”

There was a knock at the door.

“What did he do? Run back?” Harris asked.

“Hay-zus, more likely,” Tiny said, and went to the door.

It was in fact Detective Jesus Martinez, a small—barely above departmental minimums for height and weight—olive-skinned man with a penchant for gold jewelry and sharply tailored suits from Krass Brothers.

“What’s up?” he said by way of greeting.

“X-rated audiotapes,” Tiny said.

“And your buddy’s been playing Supercop.”

There was no love lost between Detectives Payne and Martinez, and Tony Harris knew it.

“Where is he?”

“The last we saw him, he was on a ledge outside the love-nest,” Tony said.

“Doing what?”