Mitchell stiffened. Sandy.

“Mitchell, you with us?” Rebecca asked sharply.

Mitchell jerked upright. “Yes, ma’am.”

Rebecca gave her a hard stare. “Where do we stand on the inside action at Ziggies?”

Jason said, “Jasmine will take Mitch to the Troc tonight. Introduce him around. We should be good to go for him hitting Ziggies within a day or two.”

“Mitch? Who the hell is Mitch?” Watts barked. The mention of Jasmine set his teeth on edge.

“Friend of mine,” Mitchell replied evenly, meeting his gaze.

“Oh for fuck’s sake.” Watts appeared as if he wanted to say more but a deadly look from Rebecca had him coughing into his fist instead. “Right. Mitchie.”

Mitchell straightened in her seat, and she almost seemed to grow in size. Her alto voice resonated with warning. “That’s Mitch. Not Mitchie.”

For a second, Watts just stared. Then the corner of his mouth twitched and finally, he grinned. “Okay, kid. Okay. Don’t get your…balls…in an uproar.”

“Wouldn’t think of it, Detective. Sir.”

Rebecca rubbed the bridge of her nose. Christ. The two of them are like kids. But she recognized the camaraderie beneath the jibes, and that’s what made the team work. That’s what made someone put their life on the line without a second thought. “We’re looking for any information on the guy in the sex video who might work or have worked at Ziggies, and any information that the girls there might have about how the videos are getting made. Who organizes it, who picks the girls, when and where they’re shooting the flicks. Anything to point us to a location. Questions?”

No one had any.

“We’ll meet here at the usual time tonight. If anyone gets anything before then, I’ll expect a call. No one makes a move without my say so.”

As the group dispersed, Watts sidled up to Mitchell. In a voice too low for Rebecca to hear, he asked, “So, kid—what’s the deal? When you walked in this morning, you had that ‘just got laid last night’ look.”

“Yeah?” Mitchell replied curiously. “How can you remember, considering how long it must have been since you’ve looked that way?”

Watts shook his head remorsefully. He had a hard-assed female partner who outranked him, which was bad enough, but now he had a snot-nosed rookie giving him shit. He laughed out loud. Life is good.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Rebecca slumped into a chair and blew out a long breath. “Jesus, what a crew.”

“How are you doing?” Catherine pulled her own chair closer and rested her hand on Rebecca’s forearm.

“Okay.” Rebecca gave her a weary smile. “I feel a bit like I’m walking a tightrope without a net here, which I guess I am.” She rubbed her face. “I can’t believe it’s Henry. Or maybe I just don’t want to believe it.”

“Maybe it isn’t?”

Rebecca kissed Catherine, then drew away with a sigh. “I have to go. I’ve got a meet with a source.”

It’s a dangerous game you’re playing. Catherine said nothing, because this is the life her lover led, but it frightened her none the less. As she watched Rebecca walk away, Catherine wondered if she would ever get used to it.

“Do you really think it’s Henry?” Watts asked when Rebecca pulled away from the curb, heading the Vette south on 10th.

“I don’t know. He’s in the right place. It’s got to be someone with rank.”

“Yeah,” Watts agreed dispiritedly. “I hear you. Man, I hate to think it’s him, though. Not like I love the guy or anything, but still…”

“He’s one of us.”

“Yeah.” Watts looked out the window. “Where we goin’?”

“We’ve got a date with some girls.”

His eyebrows raised. His voice sounded hopeful. “Yeah?” At the look from Rebecca, he swallowed his grin. “That cute little whore come through for you?”

“Sandy,” Rebecca said very softly. “Her name is Sandy.”

The warning note that resonated in her voice made his gonads tighten, pull up, and run for cover. “Okay. So, she’s yours now. Got it. Sorry.”

“Sandy found us a girl. I don’t know if it’s the girl. We’re going to buy them breakfast and find out.”

“Workin’ girls and a double date. My favorite.”

Rebecca ground her teeth and pulled into an angled slot in front of the Melrose Diner. “You sit. I talk.”

“Sure, sure, Sarge.”

Once inside the crowded noisy diner, they found Sandy and a smooth-faced Asian girl who looked about fifteen seated on one side of a red vinyl-covered booth. Watts slid in first, then Rebecca. A waitress stopped with a coffee pot in hand and said, “What youse havin’?”

Both girls ordered meals that would give a truck driver pause. Watts and Rebecca ordered coffee.

“Hiya, Sandy,” Rebecca said softly, just a touch of menace in her tone. “This Lucy?”

“Yeah.” Sandy sounded sullen and did not look Rebecca in the eye. It was important for Sandy’s safety as well as her future credibility that she not appear to have a friendly relationship with the police. “So we’re here. You promised you’d pay.”

“Later. If we like what you have to say.” Rebecca was impressed that Sandy had gotten the girl to agree to a meet. “If we don’t, you miss dinner and I’ll be dropping around when you least expect it to ruin business for a while.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Sandy shifted on the seat, clearly unhappy. “So ask, then leave us alone.”

The girl with Sandy had kept her eyes on the tabletop the entire time. Rebecca slid Jason’s composite of the guy in the sex video into her line of view. “Know him?”

The girl shook her head no.

“You sure?”

Head nod.

“Ever seen him?” Watts grumbled.

The girl shrugged.

Rebecca’s pulse jumped. Good man. Rebecca slid a folded twenty across the table and under the photo. “Where?”

“Around the clubs,” the girl replied after a pause. She had no accent and her voice was soft, gentle. “He drives.”

“Drives?” Rebecca glanced at Sandy, who made an I don’t know gesture. “What does that mean?”

“He brings some of the girls to the clubs.”

“Some of the dancers?”

Head nod.

“Do they just dance? Or do they hook, too?”

“Maybe.”

“Where? Which clubs?”

A shrug.

Rebecca passed another twenty. She didn’t think the girl was holding out for more money. She was scared. “Which clubs?”

“I don’t know…I haven’t seen him in a while. Maybe the Blue Diamond—”

“The place on Delaware Avenue?” Watts asked.

She nodded.

“Where else?”

Shrug. “Ziggies once. I don’t know.”

“What’s his name?”

Negative head shake.

“Okay,” Rebecca said. She passed the photos of the two girls who had been in the video with him. “How about them?”

The young girl stiffened.

Bingo.

“Fifty dollars,” Rebecca whispered. Come on. Help me.

A trembling finger landed on the Asian girl’s photo. “She used to dance at the Blue Di. Maybe she still does.”

“Name?”

“I don’t know.” Her voice was almost transparent now. Her dark hair framed a face both guileless and world-weary. She raised liquid eyes to Rebecca’s. “Her stage name was Trudy.”

“What about the other one?”

“No.”

“No you don’t know her?”

“She just said that, Frye,” Sandy interjected, sensing Lucy was about to bolt. “Jesus. You got your money’s worth. Leave us alone so we can enjoy the food. You and Bluto there kinda spoil the appetite.”

Rebecca folded a fifty dollar bill around her card. As she slid that across the table under the rim of Lucy’s plate, she said quietly, “I can take you to a shelter where you can get a new name, a new start.”

A head shake. Definite. No.

“You need help—any kind of help, call me.” Rebecca gave Sandy a hard stare. “You—keep your nose clean. And keep your ass out of the alleys.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Sandy snorted with a kiss-my-ass attitude and turned her attention to her breakfast.

Rebecca and Watts left, handing the waitress money for the check on the way out the door.

“Did we just get anything?” Watts asked as he crammed himself into the Vette.

“I don’t know,” Rebecca mused, heading north out of South Philly towards Sloan’s. She looked at Watts speculatively. “Have you ever heard of prostitutes having escorts?”

“Nope—pimps might cruise around checking up on their stables, but they don’t drive the girls to work.”

“Sex videos, Internet porn rings, girls being shuttled around to sex clubs.” She shook her head. “What does that sound like to you?”

“Organized?”

“Definitely that and—” Her phone rang and she pulled it from her belt. “Yeah, Frye…okay, fine…on our way.”

“What’s up?” Watts asked.

“Sloan’s awake, and she wants to talk to me.”

“Huh. You gonna chew her ass?”

“The thought has crossed my mind.”

“Yeah, I’ll bet,” he said, laughing. “Can I watch?”

Rebecca eyed him flatly. “Gee, Bluto, I don’t know about that.”

CHAPTER TWENTY

When Sloan opened the door, Rebecca stood still on the threshold, taking stock. The security consultant looked like a different woman than a few hours before. Her eyes were clear and bore barely a hint of shadow.

“Thanks for coming.” Sloan stepped aside with a sweep of her arm, bidding entry. “Please.”

What caught Rebecca’s attention almost immediately was the exquisitely beautiful woman seated on the sofa in the central living area. Her classically elegant features were scarcely marred by the bruises and obvious swelling. There was pain swimming in her deep blue eyes, however, and it hurt Rebecca on some basic, instinctual level to see it.

“Detective Sergeant Frye, my partner, Michael Lassiter.”

“Rebecca,” Rebecca said, walking forward to offer her hand. “Hello.”

“I’m so happy to meet you,” Michael said, smiling into the arctic blue eyes.

“I’m glad to see that you’re better,” Rebecca replied.

“Yes, thank you.” Michael glanced at Sloan, who stood quietly to one side. “It was my idea that you come upstairs. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Not at all.” Rebecca smiled. “Is there something I can help you with?”

“Other than keeping my impetuous lover out of harm’s way?” Michael ignored a slight groan from Sloan’s direction, smiling softly. “You can accept an invitation from Sloan and me for you and Catherine to join us for dinner when I’m a bit more worthy of company.”

“I’d be delighted to accept for both of us.” Rebecca was surprised to realize that she’d have a hard time denying this woman anything. “As to Sloan, that’s another story. She’s a little independent.”

Michael nodded carefully. “I won’t argue. I won’t even mention extenuating circumstances of which you’re well aware. So, I’m going to leave you two to sort that out.”

Sloan moved forward quickly to help Michael rise. Slipping an arm around her lover’s waist, subtly supporting her, she glanced at Rebecca. “I’ll be right back.”

When Sloan rejoined her, Rebecca waited for Sloan to make the first move. It wasn’t what she expected.

“Sorry if that put you on the spot,” Sloan said quietly. “Michael is having trouble remembering things, and—”

“You don’t need to explain. Seeing her like that…it makes me want to put a gun to someone’s head.” Before Sloan could reply, Rebecca added, “But I won’t.”

“Neither will I.”

“You’re too close to this one. I knew it from the beginning and I let it slide. That was my mistake.” Rebecca fixed Sloan with an unyielding stare. “But you blew it last night. You should have called me as soo—”

“I know. I was wrong. I apologize.”

Rebecca nodded slightly, accepting the apology. “The fact remains, I don’t know that you won’t decide the investigation is moving too slowly and take matters into your own hands.”

“I won’t.” Sloan’s face tightened and a muscle in her jaw jumped. “I won’t because it would hurt Michael.”

Rebecca considered it. Considered what she had seen of Sloan’s condition when Michael had been injured. Considered the effect that love, no, not just love—bone-deep need—had had on her own life since meeting Catherine. She blew out a breath. “Your word on it.”

“Yes. Absolutely.”

“Watts will be deeply disappointed.”

Sloan raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”

“He was hoping for a royal ass-chewing.”

“You can always fake it,” Sloan suggested with a laugh.

“Nah. He’d enjoy it too much.”

When Rebecca and Sloan walked into the conference room together, Watts craned his neck and examined Sloan from head to toe. “I don’t see any bite marks.”

“They’re there,” Sloan said quietly in passing.

Watts smiled, satisfied.

Rebecca settled into a chair at the head of the table. “Okay, Sloan. It’s your show.”