Egan had been swaying this way and that, as if he were on the deck of a ship, while he’d stared at her chest. “I’ve never sheen you sho dolled up.”
Uh-oh. He was loaded, all right. She’d heard right the first time; he was slurring his words.
“I’ve never sheen you sho attractive.”
You’ve never seen me piddle in public.
“You have great…,” he said. “I mean, I’ve alwaysh greatly admired you, Offisher Kashner.”
“Captain Egan, listen, I’ve gotta—”
His beefy hand rested on her shoulder. “Politicsh, Offisher Kashner. You are a fine offisher, and I have noted that. A hard, hard worker. Determined. But are you conshidering politicsh’s role in your career?” A spray of spittle went with the question.
“Oh, sure. Politics. I really—”
He’d moved to within inches of her, and his fingertips brushed her cheek. “Lishen, Pug—”
“I really don’t like to be called that, Captain.” She knew it was short for pugnacious, but she also thought some of her fellow officers might be referring to her turned-up nose. One of them had even said it wasn’t the kind of nose he expected to find on a girl named Kasner. She didn’t bother telling him her mother had been pure Irish. She’d instead elbowed him in the ribs, not smiling.
But Captain Egan had been smiling, and it was a smile Pearl had seen on too many men. “I happen to know the hotel manager and can get a room here for the night,” he said. “We are, I can shee, compatible. That ish to shay, we like each other. I can tell that. It would be in both our intereshst to think about a room.” He swayed nearer. “They all have bathrooms.”
“Not a good idea, Captain.”
“But I thought you had to…uh, go.” He winked. She realized he thought he was being charming.
“Not that bad, I don’t.” She moved back so his fingertips were no longer touching her face. The bastard actually thought he was getting away with something, making progress with her. It was pissing her off. If she didn’t have to go so bad…
“I’m your shuperior offisher, Pug.” His hand, suddenly free, dropped to her left breast and stayed there like Velcro. “If you sheriously object—”
He didn’t finish his sentence. Pearl did seriously object. She hit him hard in the jaw with her right fist, feeling a satisfying jolt travel down her arm into her shoulder. It was a good punch. It sent him staggering backward to sit slumped on the floor between two vacant bar stools.
He had fought his way up frantically, like a panicked non-swimmer who didn’t know he was in shallow water, flailing his arms and legs and knocking over a bar stool he tried to use for support. His broad face was twisted and ugly with anger.
He’d looked amazingly sober then. “Listen, Kasner!”
But Pearl had spun on her high heels and was striding toward the ladies’ room, where she knew he wouldn’t follow.
She understood immediately the gravity of what she’d done. Knew she’d screwed up. At least there were witnesses in the bar, a lineup of men and a few women, many of them grinning at her in the back-bar mirror as she passed. Hotel guests, most of them. Witnesses. She could locate them if she had to. Asshole Egan would have to know that.
“Kasner!”
Now she did turn. She balled her right fist and raised her voice. “You really want me to come back, Captain Egan?”
He flinched. He was in plain clothes, but he didn’t like his rank and name spoken so loudly. Not in these circumstances.
Maybe he knew what she was doing and suddenly realized his own vulnerability, because he seemed suddenly aware of the other lounge patrons and the two bartenders, all staring at him.
He dug out his wallet, threw some bills on the bar next to his empty glass, then stalked out.
Pearl continued to the ladies’ room.
When she emerged ten minutes later, calm but still angry, Egan was nowhere in sight.
As she walked swiftly through the bar toward the lobby, she heard applause.
The dinner date was disastrous. Pearl couldn’t stop thinking about Captain Egan and what had happened, what she’d done. She couldn’t stop blaming herself as well as Egan.
Anger, depression, stress. Pearl’s world.
Days had passed, and that world didn’t collapse in on Pearl. Word had gotten around, though, like a subterranean current.
Still, there had been no reprisals. Egan was married. There were witnesses to his altercation with Pearl, and he’d been close to falling-down drunk, while she’d been sober. Internal affairs was never involved. No official charges were ever filed. NYPD politics at work.
She, and everyone else, knew that Egan was patiently waiting for his opportunity. Pearl didn’t figure to have a long or distinguished career as a cop.
“Damn!” she said to her bedroom ceiling, and tried to think about something else. Her mind was a merry-go-round she couldn’t stop. Maybe she should get out of bed and paint.
Yeah, at eleven-thirty at night.
It was one of the few times in her life when Pearl wished she had something other than her work. But she’d had several disastrous romances and had lost her faith in men. Most men, anyway. No, all men. The entire fucking gender. None of them seemed to be for her.
Fedderman, being her partner, was the man she spent the most time with. A decent enough guy, married, three kids, overweight, overdeodorized, eighteen years older than Pearl, and more interested in pasta than sex.
Not much hope there.
The other men in her life, her fellow officers and men she encountered in other city jobs, sometimes made plays for her. None of them interested her. These guys were far more interested in sex than pasta, or anything else. Invariably, they talked a great game, but it was talk. The few guys she’d given a tumble couldn’t keep up with her in or out of the sack, and they tended to run off at the mouth. Pearl didn’t like that. Pearl figured the hell with them. When it came to what really mattered, they didn’t have it.
Maybe she picked them wrong. Or maybe that was just men.
She laced her fingers behind her head and closed her eyes. If she could only meet some guy who wasn’t all front. Who wasn’t shooting angles or afraid to care and act like he cared. Who wasn’t so dishonest with her.
Who knows how lonely I am.
Who isn’t so…
She fell asleep thinking about it.
Him.
Like she sometimes did on nights when she didn’t drink scotch or take a pill.
Lars Svenson wouldn’t let the woman sleep. Whenever he knew she was dozing off, he’d lay into her again with the whip. It was a short, supple whip, and about as big around as a shoelace, so it stung and left narrow but painful welts on the woman’s bare back.
She couldn’t avoid the lashes, because she was lying on her stomach on her bed, her hands tied to the headboard, her feet to the iron bed frame’s legs. She couldn’t cry out, because a rectangle of silver duct tape covered her mouth.
He lashed her again and she managed a fairly loud whimper.
Lars stood back and smiled down at her. Through the web of hair over her left eye, she stared up at him. He loved the pain in her dark gaze and the message it sent.
He gave her a few more, striking her just so, barely breaking the