Page 116 of Dancing in the Dark

Not what Carson Slater will expect, either.

Once we tell him.

“It’s pissing me off that we know the who, what, when, where, and why.” Bristling with a bad mood, I glance across at Arch and the massive stack of red tape we can’t seem to crawl out from underneath. “This one was easy, but we can’t make an arrest until Markum releases the bay footage. He won’t release the bay footage until he’s satisfied his dick is bigger than ours.”

“I’m calling in sick every single time a body washes up at the bay from now until I’m dead.” He slams his pen onto the table and slumps in his chair, dropping his head back and running his hands through his hair. “Unless you stop being greedy and send Fifi back to his bed so he can feel like a man again, we’re never gonna close this bitch.”

“Would you sacrifice Mayet to make some other dude happy?”

He straightens in his chair and burns me with a fiery glare.

“That’s what I figured.” I scrub my hands over my face and groan. “So then we push through.” I stride to our wall and stab my finger into the center of Carson Slater’s photograph. “We know the who.” Then I point to the medical examiner’s report. “We know the how.”

“Not homicide.”

“Nope. Doesn’t mean we aren’t bringing him in, though.” I point toward the paperwork spilled across the massive table in the center of the room. “Can’t make an arrest until we see him dump her in the water. Can’t see that footage until Markum approves our applications. Can’t get approved applications without the revised reports he wants sighted and signed by Fabian.”

“Can’t get reports sighted and signed by Fabian quick enough to please Markum.” He flops forward and drapes his upper body over the table. “We fill them out, get them initialed, submit to Markum, Markum takes his sweet ass time reading and requesting amendments, make amendments, re-submit, Markum claims it’s all outdated and orders us to submit a fresh set.”

“Fill out a fresh set,” I sigh. “Put them on Fabian’s desk, force Fabian to sign, submit, wait for Markum to reject.”

“It’s a fuckin’ circle.” He exhales something that is both a whimper and a grunt. “It’s an exercise in insanity, and he gets away with it because no judge will ever call him out for being too thorough.”

“Fill them out. Sign. Submit. Wait. Reject. Fill them out.” I groan. “Sign. Submit. Kill myself.”

“All because you wanted to kiss the pretty girl.”

“Shut the fuck up! You fully supported me asking her out! You thought it was a great idea.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t have all the information back then!”

The desk phone trills and draws two sets of eyes. I look to Arch, then to the closed door at my back. Back to Arch… “I don’t wanna answer that. It’s gonna annoy us.”

“Can’t ignore it.” Irritation digs deep between his brows as he swings out and slaps the speaker button. “This is Malone.”

“Malone.” Lieutenant Fabian’s gruff voice comes through the line. “Fletcher?”

“Yes, sir. I’m here.” Don’t sigh. Don’t tell him to fuck himself. “We’re working on the bay case.”

“My office. Now.”

He doesn’t bother saying goodbye. Or please. He simply kills our call.

“I told you answering that was gonna annoy us. For fuck’s sake.” I snatch up my cell and check the screen—I have a text from Cato saying he dropped Mia off to Sera, a text from Sera saying she has Mia, and a text detailing another job I could do for a cool five grand cash.

Ignoring all three, I slip the device into my pocket and consider pouring a bucket of coffee to get me through this. But that’s the sort of shit twenty-year-old Fletch would pull. Thirty-year-old Fletch knows better than to drink caffeine at seven o’clock at night, because then he won’t sleep tonight, which will roll into tomorrow’s bad mood, which will end with more coffee to help him cope.

“You know people, right?” I whip the door open and glance back as Archer slowly climbs to his feet. “How much would it cost to have certain issues dealt with?”

He coughs out a tired chuckle and follows me through the door. “Depends on how you want it to go down. Ten grand on the lower end, a hundred grand for it to be neat. Oh, and your soul. If we’re lucky, he might step in front of a train during tomorrow’s morning commute and put us all out of our misery.”

“From your lips to God’s ears,” I grunt. Stopping in front of Fabian’s door, I lock eyes with my boss, his boss, and Anderson fucking Markum. “What’s wrong?” I meet the hard glare of a supremely pissed Captain Bower and gulp. “Sir?”

“We have a problem.” Fabian waves us in and stands on the other side of his desk, his face etched with furious intent. Bower stops beside him, and as Archer and I file in, Markum hesitates, not quite sure where he should go.

He’s not important enough to stand shoulder to shoulder with Bower, and not brave enough to stand with me and Arch.

I close the door and turn, folding my arms across my chest. Fuck sitting. Fuck pleasantries. “What’s our problem, Lieutenant?”