Free Fall

  Copyright

  About

  Dedication

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29

  CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31

  CHAPTER 32

  CHAPTER 33

  CHAPTER 34

  CHAPTER 35

  CHAPTER 36

  CHAPTER 37

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Copyright

  * * *

  This book was

  copied right, in

  the dark, by

  Illuminati.

  About the

  e-Book:

  * * *

  TITLE: Free Fall

  AUTHOR: Crais, Robert

  ABEB Version: 2.6

  Hog Edition

  Dedication

  For my father,

  Robert Emmett Crais,

  called away before the show.

  A seat remains empty.

  FREE FALL

  Robert Crais

  CHAPTER 1

  Jennifer Sheridan stood in the door to my office as if she were Fay Wray and I was King Kong and a bunch of black guys in sagebrush tutus were going to tie her down so that I could have my way. It's a look I've seen before, on men as well as women. "I'm a detective, Ms. Sheridan. I'm not going to hurt you. You may even find that you like me." I gave her my best Dudley Do-Right smile. The one with the twinkle.

  Jennifer Sheridan said, "Is what we say privileged, Mr. Cole?"

  "As in attorney-client?" I was holding the door, but Jennifer Sheridan couldn't seem to make up her mind whether to come in or leave.

  "Yes."

  I shook my head. "No. My records and my testimony can be subpoenaed, and under California law, I must provide them."

  "Oh." She didn't like that.

  "But there is latitude. I sometimes forget things."

  "Oh." She liked that better, but she still wasn't convinced. I guess there's only so much you can do with the Dudley.

  Jennifer Sheridan said, "This isn't easy for me, Mr. Cole. I'm not sure I should be here and I don't have much time. I'm on my lunch hour."

  "We could talk over sandwiches, downstairs." There was a turkey and Swiss on a French baguette waiting for me in the deli on the ground floor. I had been thinking about it for most of the morning.

  "Thank you, no. I'm engaged."

  "That wasn't a sexual proposition, Ms. Sheridan. It was a simple offer to share lunch and perhaps more efficiently use both our times."

  "Oh." Jennifer Sheridan turned as red as a beating heart.

  "Also, Ms. Sheridan, I'm getting tired of holding the door."

  Jennifer Sheridan made up her mind and stepped past me into the office. She walked quickly and went to one of the two director's chairs across from my desk. There's a couch, but she didn't even consider it.

  Jennifer Sheridan had sounded young on the phone, but in person she looked younger, with a fresh-scrubbed face and clear healthy skin and dark auburn hair. Pretty. The kind of happy, innocent pretty that starts deep inside, and doesn't stop on the way out. That kind of pretty. She was wearing a light blue cotton skirt with a white blouse and a matching light blue bolero jacket and low-heeled navy pumps. The clothes were neat and fit well, and the cuts were stylish but not expensive. She would have to shop and she would have to look for bargains, but she had found them. I liked that. She carried a black imitation leather purse the size of a Buick, and when she sat, she sat with her knees and her feet together, and her hands clutching the purse on her lap. Proper. I liked that, too. I made her for twenty-three but she looked eighteen and she'd still be carded in bars when she was thirty. I wondered if I looked old to her. Nah. Thirty-nine isn't old.

  I closed the door, went to my desk, sat, and smiled at her. "What do you do, Ms. Sheridan?"

  "I'm a secretary for the law firm of Watkins, Okum, & Beale. We're in Beverly Hills."

  "Is that how you found me?" I work for Marty Beale, time to time. A little skip-tracing, a little missing persons. That kind of thing.

  "I peeked in Mr. Beale's reference file. He thinks highly of you."

  "You don't say."

  "They don't know that I'm here and I would appreciate it if you didn't say anything."

  I nodded. "On the phone you said something about your boyfriend."

  "My fiancé. I think that he's mixed up in some kind of criminal thing. I've asked him, and he denies it, but I know that something's going on. I think he's scared, and that worries me. My fiancé is not scared of very much."

  I nodded again and tucked that away. Fearless Fiancé. "Okay. What kind of crime are we talking about?"

  "I don't know."

  "Is he stealing cars?"

  "I don't think so."

  "Is he embezzling?"

  "No. It wouldn't be that."

  "How about fraud?"

  She shook her head.

  "We're running out of choices, Ms. Sheridan."

  She glanced into the big purse as if there were something inside it that she was hoping she wouldn't have to show me, as if the purse were somehow a point of no return, and if she opened it and let out whatever was inside, she would never be able to close it again or return the elements of her life to a comfortable or familiar order. Pandora's Purse. Maybe if I had a purse like that, I'd be careful of it, too.

  I said, "I know it's hard, Ms. Sheridan. If it was easy, you wouldn't need me. But if you don't tell me about him, or what you think he is up to, I can't help you. Do you see that?"

  She nodded and held the purse tighter.

  I took out a yellow legal pad, a black SenseMatic pencil, and made as if I were poised to copy the rush of information she was about to provide. I drew a couple of practice marks on the page. Subliminal prompting. "I'm ready. Fire away."

  She swallowed.

  "Anytime."

  She stared at the floor.

  I put the pad on the desk and the pencil on the pad. I put my fingertips together and looked at Jennifer Sheridan through the steeple, and then I looked at the Pinocchio clock that I've got on my wall. It has eyes that swing from side to side as it tocks, and it's always smiling. Happiness is contagious. It was twelve twenty-two, and if I could get down to the deli fast enough, the turkey would still be moist and the baguette would still be edible. I said, "Maybe you should go to the police, Ms. Sheridan. I don't think I can help you."

  She clutched the purse even tighter and gave miserable. "I can't do that."

  I spread my hands and stood up. "If your fiancé is in danger, it is better to get in trouble with the police than it is to be hurt or killed." Twelve twenty-three. "Try the police, Ms. Sheridan. The police can help you."

  "I can't do that, Mr. Cole." The misery turned into fear. "My fiancé is the police."

  "Oh." Now it was my turn. I sat down.

  Jennifer Sheridan opened the purse and took out a 3x5 color snapshot of herself and a tall good-looking kid in a navy blue LAPD summer-weight uniform leaning against a squad car. They were smiling. "His name is Mark Thurman. He doesn't work uniform anymore. Last year he was chosen for a plainclot
hes position at the Seventy-seventh Division in South Central Los Angeles."

  "What kind of plainclothes?"

  "They call it a REACT team. They monitor career criminals and try to stop them before they hurt people. It's an elite unit, and he was the youngest man chosen. He was very proud of that." She seemed proud of it, too. "Everything was fine for the first few months, but then he changed. It happened almost overnight."

  "What kind of change?" I was thinking Kevin McCarthy. Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

  "He became anxious and scared and secretive. We never keep secrets from each other and now there are things that he won't talk about with me."

  I looked closer at the picture. Thurman had long forearms and a ropey neck and a country boy's smile. He must've been fourteen inches taller than Jennifer Sheridan. I said, "I know a lot of police officers, Ms. Sheridan. Some of them are even my friends. It can be a hard job with unusual hours and you see too much of what's wrong with people. You don't want to go home and chat about it."

  She shook her head, telling me that I didn't get it. "It isn't just him not talking about the job. He was in uniform for three years and I know to expect that. It's the way he acts. We used to talk about getting married, and having children, but we don't anymore. I ask him what's wrong, he says nothing. I say tell me about your day, he says that there's nothing to say. He was never like that before. He's become irritable and snappish."

  "Irritable."

  "That's right."

  "He's irritable, and that's why you think he's involved in crime?"

  She gave me exasperated. "Well, it isn't just that."

  "Have you seen him perform a criminal act, or heard him speak of it, or seen the results of it?"

  "No."

  "Has he exhibited signs of an income other than his police salary?"

  "No."

  I tapped the desk. "Sounds like you think he's up to something because he's irritable."

  She gave me more of the impatience. "You don't understand. Mark and I have known each other since the seventh grade. We fell in love in the ninth grade. That's how long we've been going together. I love him and he loves me and I know him better than anyone else in all the world."

  "All right," I said. "Do you have any clues?"

  She frowned at me.

  "Clues," I said. "An overheard snatch of conversation. A subrosa glimpse of a secret bank account. Something that I can use in ascertaining the nature of the crime." I hadn't used ascertaining in three or four weeks.

  She said, "Are you making fun of me?"

  I was getting one of those headaches that you get when your blood sugar starts to drop. "No, I'm trying to make you consider what you want and why you want it. You claim that Mark Thurman is involved in criminal activity, but you have no direction in which to point me. That means that you're asking me to surveil an active-duty police officer. Police officers are paranoid by nature and they move around a lot. This will be expensive."

  She looked uncertain. "How expensive?"

  "Two thousand dollars. In advance."

  You could see her swallow. "Do you take Visa?"

  "I'm afraid not."

  She swallowed a second time. "That seems an awful lot."

  "Yes," I said. "It is."

  She put the photograph of Mark Thurman back in her purse and took out a red doeskin wallet. She dug in the wallet and got a faraway look like she was working with numbers. Then she pulled out two twenties and put them on my desk. "I can pay you forty dollars now, and forty dollars per month for forty-nine months."

  I said, "Jesus Christ, Ms. Sheridan."

  She clenched her jaw and brought out another ten. "All right. Fifty dollars."

  I raised my hands, got up, and went to the glass doors that lead out to the little balcony. The doors that came with the office were aluminum sliders, but a couple of years ago I had them changed to a nice set of double-glazed French doors with brass handles. I opened the doors, set them so that the breeze wouldn't blow them closed, and that's when I saw two guys sitting across the street in a brown unmarked sedan four stories below. A tall guy with shaggy, thick-cut hair sat behind the steering wheel and a shorter guy with a ragged face slouched in the passenger's side. The tall guy had long forearms and a ropey neck and looked a lot like Mark Thurman. Sonofagun. I turned away from the doors and looked at Jennifer Sheridan. Nope. She didn't know that they were out there. "Mark work today?"

  She looked surprised that I'd ask. "That's right. He works Monday through Friday, from eleven until six."

  "He let his hair grow since he went to REACT?"

  Jennifer Sheridan smiled, trying to figure me. "Why, yes. He had to, for the undercover work."

  Thurman, all right.

  I walked back to the desk and looked at her. You could see how much she loved him. You could see that she trusted him, and that she'd never think that maybe he was following her. I said, "Do you and Mark live together?"

  She made a tiny headshake and a bit of the red again touched her cheeks. "We've talked about it, but we decided to wait."

  "Uh-huh. So you believe that he's hiding something, and you want me to find out what."

  "Yes."

  "What if I find out that Mark Thurman isn't who you think he is? What if I look, and I find something that changes the way that you feel about him, and the way that he feels about you?"

  Jennifer Sheridan made a little move with her mouth, and then she cleared her throat. "Mark is a good man, Mr. Cole. If he's involved in something, I know it's not because he wants to be. I trust him in that, and I love him. If we find out that he is in trouble, we will help him." She had thought about these things. Probably lay awake with them.

  I went back to the doors and pretended to adjust them. Thurman and the other guy were still in the sedan. Thurman had been looking up, but ducked back when he realized that I had come back onto the balcony. Fast moves are bad. Another couple of years on the job and he'd know better. You just sort of casually look away. Shift the eyes without moving the head. Eye contact can kill you.

  I went back into the office and sat, and Jennifer Sheridan said, "Will you help me, Mr. Cole?"

  I said, "Why don't we do this? I'll nose around and see if there is anything worth pursuing. If there is, I will work for you and pursue it. If there isn't, I will return your money, and you won't owe me anything."

  Jennifer Sheridan said, "That will be fine," and then she smiled. Her tanned skin dimpled and her white teeth gleamed and there came a quality of warmth to the room as if a small sun had risen from beneath my desk. I found myself returning the smile. I wrote a receipt in her name for the amount of forty dollars, and noted that it was paid against a due balance of one thousand, nine hundred sixty dollars, payable in monthly installments. I gave back the extra ten with her receipt, then put the forty dollars into my wallet. My wallet didn't feel any fatter than it had without the forty. Maybe if I went down to the bank and had the forty changed to ones, it would feel like more.

  Jennifer Sheridan took a folded sheet of paper from the huge purse and handed it to me. "This is where Mark lives, and his home phone number, and his license plate, and his badge number. His partner's name is Floyd Riggens. I've met Floyd several times, but I don't like him. He's a mean-spirited man."

  "Okay." Riggens would be the other guy in the car.

  She took back the paper and scribbled something on the back. "This is where I live and this is my work number. It's a direct line to Mr. Beale's office, and I answer his phone, so I'll be the one who picks up when you call."

  "Fine."

  She stood, and I stood with her. She put out her hand. I took it. I think we were in a contest to see who could smile the most. She said, "Thank you, Mr. Cole. This is very important to me."

  "Elvis."

  "Elvis." She smiled even wider, and then she gathered her things and left. It was twelve forty-six, and I stopped smiling. I sat at my desk and looked at the paper that she had given me with the information about Mark
Thurman and herself, and then I put it into the desk's top right-hand drawer along with my copy of the receipt.

  I leaned back and I put my feet up, and I wondered why Mark Thurman and his mean-spirited partner Floyd Riggens were following Jennifer Sheridan while they were on duty. I didn't like the following, but I didn't have very long to wonder about it.

  At twelve fifty-two, Mark Thurman and Floyd Riggens came in.

  CHAPTER 2

  They didn't kick the door off its hinges and they didn't roll into the office with their guns out like Crockett and Tubbs used to do on Miami Vice, but they didn't bother to knock, either.

  The guy I figured for Floyd Riggens came in first. He was ten years older than Thurman and maybe six inches shorter, with a hard, squared-off build and weathered skin. He flashed his badge without looking at me and crossed to Joe Pike's office. I said, "It's empty." He didn't pay attention.

  Mark Thurman came in after him and went out onto the balcony, like maybe a couple of Colombian drug lords had ducked out only seconds ago and were hanging off the side of the building with grappling hooks and Thurman wanted to find them. He looked bigger in person than he had in the pictures, and he was wearing faded khaki fatigue pants and a red jersey that said LANCASTER HIGH VARSITY. Number 34. He looked younger, too, with a kind of rural innocence that you rarely find in cops, sort of like Dragnet as played by Ronnie Howard. He didn't look like a guy who'd be into crime, but then, what does a criminal look like? Boris Badenov?

  Riggens came out of Pike's office and scowled at me. His eyes were red and swollen and I could smell the scotch on his breath even though he was standing on the other side of the chairs. Hmm. Maybe he didn't have the weathered look, after all. Maybe he had the drunk look. Riggens said, "We need to talk about the girl."

  I gave him innocent. "Girl?"

  Riggens squinted like I'd spit on his shirt and grinned out the corner of his mouth. Mean-spirited. "Oh, I like it when jerks like you get stupid. It's why I stay on the job."

  "What are you drinking to get eyes like that – Aqua Velva?"