“Where are you?”
“Isn’t it a little early to be calling, hammering me with all these questions? It’s not even eight o’clock, and I’m not usually due in until nine.”
“Don’t use that pissed-off voice with me,” John said. “You’re up to something. I want to know what.”
“Hasn’t Clarence filled you in?”
From the background, the cop warbled, “I’m sorry, Mitch.”
“Save it. And why are we on speaker?”
“Because you’re tied up,” John said.
Mitch cursed under his breath.
“I didn’t want to rat on you,” Clarence said. “I didn’t want to get you in trouble, but—”
John interrupted him. “He didn’t want to betray your trust, but felt duty-bound to report what he did for you in the wee hours of this morning. You placed this officer in an impossible situation.”
“That officer could’ve talked to me about the impossibility of his situation before going to you.”
“I tried, Mitch,” Clarence said. “I went to your apartment on my way to work, hoping to talk to you in person, but you weren’t there. I thought I might be able to persuade you to stop stalking Dr. Reede.”
Dylan had been lying still, but Mitch had been aware that she was awake and listening. At the mention of her name, he saw out of the corner of his eye that she came up on her elbows.
Into the phone he said, “I’m not stalking Dr. Reede.”Fucking her till my balls are blue, but not stalking her.
“What would you call it?” John said. “Sending Clarence over to her house to see if she had company? That’s the definition of stalking. You’ve arrested men for less.”
“Has Dr. Reede herself accused me?”
John said, “After Clarence told me about this, I called her.”
“Oh? And?”
“Her service tried to reach her on her cell phone, but got her voice mail.”
“Hmm, interesting. Typically she returns calls in a timely fashion,” Mitch said.
“I’m not buying your innocent and dumb act, Mitch. I know you too well. You’re not at home. You’re not here. Where are you?”
“Uh.” He was sitting naked on John’s side of John and Beth’s bed. Dylan was reclined naked on Beth’s side of John and Beth’s bed. He said, “All good here, John.”
“I didn’t ask how you are. I asked where you are.”
“Okay,” he said, sounding put out. “You wanna know what I’m up to? I’ll tell you. I got stuck last night.”
“Stuck where?”
“In the gut.”
“In the… You mean stabbed?”
“Incised. I’ve got a red line running left to right across my belly like a thin smile.”
“Jesus. Clarence, did you know about this?”
“No, sir. Now I feel really terrible.”
