Double Take Read Online Free PDF Page A

range…the death stare as she slinked limply to the floor, the blood from the scalp laceration pooling right there, where it was now—a dried, congealed mass.
    The credit card. The eighth was four days ago. The day Amy was killed. Had he left the conference in Dallas and flown to San Francisco? Why didn’t he remember doing that?
    Why did Russo tell him that Amy had gone into witness protection? How could both be true?
    He pulled out his phone, tried his best to compose himself, and dialed Russo. He answered on the third ring.
    “Ben, you had me worried. Cruz just stopped by your place, and he said you weren’t answering your door. I thought you were home, that you were—”
    “Loo, did I kill her? Give it to me straight, did I kill her?”
    “Who?”
    “Amy. Did I kill her?”
    Russo took a moment to answer. “I told you, Ben, she went into WITSEC, she had to leave—”
    “I know what you told me. I’m standing in David Gilbarco’s apartment in ’Frisco, I’m lookin’ at her blood, Loo, and…I, I know this place somehow. Like I been here before. I know where things are. I— There’s a charge on my Mastercard, Dallas to SFO on the eighth—”
    “Ben, Ben, listen to me. You listenin’?”
    “I killed her, Loo. Did I kill her?”
    “Ben, please—”
    “Oh, god, no…” Dyer pulled his SIG backup pistol from inside his jacket and pressed the cold housing against his temple. “How could you lie to me like that?”
    “Ben, I know what it looks like, but it ain’t that way. You hear? Come home and I’ll get straight with ya. You do that for me?”
    Just then, Dyer heard a noise behind him.
    “What the fuck?”
    It was Burden’s voice, in the kitchen entryway.
    Dyer didn’t turn. Instead, he pulled the trigger.
    THE PISTOL RECOILED AND SLAMMED him hard in the temple, but he was still alive.
    Russo yelled at him through the phone.
    Burden grabbed the gun and wrestled him to the ground.
    And Dyer let it all happen. Because three inches from his nose was Amy’s blood. Dried and crusted. Glazed over and cracked, like his sanity.

    “WHO IS THIS?” BURDEN YELLED into the phone.
    “NYPD Lieutenant Carmine Russo, who the hell’s this?”
    “Inspector Lance Burden, SFPD. This your boy I have here?”
    “It is, Inspector, thanks for helping out.”
    “I think I deserve more than ‘thanks for helping out.’ I just saw your detective put a goddamn gun to his head and pull the trigger. You mind telling me what’s going on?”
    “Detective Dyer’s in a bad way. His fiancé’s dead, he’s on medication, he’s takin’ it tough. Check with Captain Torrez, he’ll explain it. Meantime, handle Dyer with kid gloves. He ain’t well, you hear me?
    “No shit.”
    Russo ignored the dig. “I’ll be on the next flight out.”
    RUSSO DROVE THE RENTAL ALONG THE WINDING road to the top of Twin Peaks, the second highest point in the city. Below them, at the base of the mountain, stood the San Francisco Police Department Academy, where Dyer spent the night under the reluctant and watchful eye of Lance Burden.
    Muscular gusts of wind blew mercilessly into the face of Carmine Russo and Oliver Henry, who leaned against their rental car in the scenic overlook’s parking lot.
    Moments later, after Russo had consulted his watch for the fourth time, an unmarked Ford Taurus drove toward them and swung into a slot a few dozen feet away. The front doors opened and two men stepped out: SFPD Captain Harmon Torrez, and, Russo surmised, Inspector Lance Burden.
    Russo cursed under his breath. He had hoped for an uneventful handoff: no questions asked and no third parties. That was the agreement he’d had with Torrez. Apparently, things weren’t done in San Francisco the way they were done in New York.
    Russo took custody of Dyer, who was handcuffed behind his back, even though he’d been heavily sedated per a prescription Henry had called in to a nearby pharmacy. He passed Dyer to Henry, who steadied the detective