Bred to Kill Read Free Page A

twenty-two of them on the job, rushed up and furiously grabbed Sharko by the collar of his T-shirt.
    â€œWhat the
fuck
are you doing?”
    Sharko gently pushed the corpse’s head back inside the car. He looked at the victim’s bloodstained clothes, dead eyes, and pallid face.
    â€œI think I know this guy. Don’t you recognize him?”
    Manien was fuming. He jerked the inspector away, as if he were just some delinquent.
    â€œCorrect procedures mean anything to you? Are you shitting me?”
    â€œFrédéric Hurault . . . That’s it, Frédéric Hurault. He came through our place about ten years ago. I was the one who handled his case at the time, back when
you
were working for
me
. Don’t you remember?”
    â€œWhat I’m interested in right now is
you
.”
    Sharko glared at this boss with a lower rank than his. Since his voluntary reassignment to Homicide, he was no longer a chief inspector—other than in the nickname people sarcastically gave him: “How’s it going,
Chief Inspector
?” No, he was now just a simple police lieutenant. It was the price he’d had to pay to return to the grime of the streets, the slums, the filth of crimes committed for money, after several years in the pristine offices of the Violent Crimes Unit in Nanterre, Behavioral Analysis section. Sharko had asked for this reassignment, even if it meant working with an asswipe like Manien. His request had shocked all his former superiors: demotions were extremely rare in the French police system. As compensation, they’d offered to let him run his own group in Homicide. He’d refused. He wanted to end up the way he’d begun: hedgehopping, a gun in his fist, facing off with the shadows.
    â€œAnd do you remember why Hurault was convicted?” he said in a dry voice. “Because he killed two little girls who weren’t even ten years old. His own daughters.”
    Manien pulled out a cigarette, which he lit between two fingers with chewed nails. He was the thin, nervous type, with a face like rolling paper: pale, rough, and taut. He worked a lot, ate little, and laughed even less. A sleazebag for some, a real son of a bitch for others. For Sharko, he was both.
    Manien didn’t mince words: “You’ve really done it now. You’ve been pulling my chain since Day One, and I don’t need any loose cannons on my team. Something’s coming open with Bellanger—Fontès is moving to the islands at the end of the week. Clear out without making a fuss. It’ll be good for you and good for me.”
    Sharko nodded.
    â€œAmen.”
    Manien puffed greedily on his coffin nail, squinting behind a cloud of smoke that quickly dissipated.
    â€œTell me, when’s the last time you got any sleep? More than two hours a night, I mean?”
    Sharko rubbed his forehead. Three deep, perfectly parallel furrows appeared under the graying locks that spilled over his ears. He who, during his entire career as a cop, had always kept his hair short, hadn’t been to the barber in months.
    â€œHow should I know?”
    â€œYou know perfectly well. I didn’t think it was physically possible for anyone to last this long. I always thought you could die from lack of sleep. You’re falling off the deep end,
Chief Inspector
. You never should have left that desk in Nanterre. You can remember some guy you haven’t seen in ten years, but you’ve got no clue where you misplaced your weapon. So right now, you’re going home and you’re going to sleep like there’s no tomorrow. And wait for Bellanger’s call. Go on, now, beat it.”
    Manien walked away with those words. Firm step of a military man. A real bastard, and proud of it. He went off to greet the CSI techs and the procedural expert, who were just arriving with their equipment, paperwork, and serious faces. Always the same, thought Sharko: a bunch of carrion-eating