Magic Line Read Free Page B

Brook Drive. Zeb saw a flash, marveled that a patrolman would shoot through his own windshield, then realized he had not been shot and a second later knew he’d just been photographed. No sweat, he thought, a blurry photo of a running man, so what? What mattered was the black-and-white drove on.
    The scare did him a favor actually, made him realize running was conspicuous. As soon as he slowed to a walk he remembered the Lorcin was still in the waistband of his pants. He stuck it in his pocket and walked briskly into the parking lot of the Walmart Store, doing his best to look unarmed and harmless. Inside the sliding front doors of the store he stood still, feeling his sweat cool.
    His pockets yielded a few rumpled bills. He counted them carefully, tucked them in a safe pocket and found the men’s clothing section. He bought a T-shirt in size XL that said ‘Go Wildcats’ and looked like it would cover most of his tats, found a baseball cap with a Diamondbacks logo, and picked out the biggest pair of sunglasses on a rack.
    After he changed in the restroom he stuffed his sweat-soaked, many-pocketed Money Bag shirt into one of the Walmart bags and dropped it in the trash can near the door. Carrying a tall iced drink from a vending machine, he went outside and found a bench under a mesquite tree.
    Sipping his drink in the busy parking lot, he did what his mother had been urging him to do for some time. He thought hard about his situation.

TWO
    S arah Burke, driving home, heard the heads-up tone on her radio and felt her pulse jump. Out of long habit, Sarah’s muscles grew tight, her whole body getting ready to act.
    Seconds after the tone ended, the radio rattled with urgent orders to patrol cars. Something big was happening on the south end of town – ‘See the woman’ and reports of shooting at an address in the Midvale Park district.
    Forget it, she told herself. Urgent call-outs were not her problem anymore. Being a homicide detective was no cake walk, but at least she was no longer expected to turn on her siren and race to crime scenes. And she had earned the treat she was headed for – getting home to Bentley Street in plenty of time for dinner. She’d even left a little unfinished work on her desk and cut out early, because she’d been called to a crime scene at six that morning and the department was insisting that detectives avoid overtime whenever possible.
    Inside her front door she called hello and walked into her bedroom to lock her Glock and shield away. She hung up her work clothes, got into a soft old T-shirt and shorts. Stretching and yawning, she got comfortable, slowed down and began the transition to non-vigilent, slack-jawed civilian. ‘Releasing my inner slob,’ her buddy Kate Kerry called it. Kate was a shift commander now on the West Side, but they had gone through training together and remained close. ‘Coming down from cop mode used to be a tough transition,’ Kate boasted, ‘but these days, let me get barefoot in something with a stretch waistband – I can turn into a couch potato in under five minutes.’ Sarah wasn’t quite that down with it yet, but getting close.
    Hearing voices where her family was clustered, in the kitchen end of the house, Sarah walked toward them, saying, ‘Something smells good and I am so ready to stick a fork in it.’
    Will Dietz sat by a window in the old wooden rocker, a relic from the ranch of Sarah’s childhood that was becoming his favorite chair in this house. Only his feet and hands showed; the rest of him was buried in the morning paper. She touched his shoulder as she passed him and he made a small sound, ‘Mmff.’ This being Monday, he’d go back to work with his night detectives’ squad in a couple of hours. Monday through Thursday, they saw each other only in passing. He spent most of his afternoons puttering with shelves and closets, doorsills and moldings,