Kill the Messenger Read Online Free PDF Page B

Bradley. ” Parker emphasized the name, dragged it out, knowing Kyle hated it. He wanted to be called Kyle—or at the worst, Brad. Bradley was a name for an interior decorator or a hairstylist, not a kick-ass detective.
    Kyle glanced at him. “Who says it’s yours?”
    “My beat, my call, my murder,” Parker said, moving toward the younger detective.
    Kyle ignored him and squatted down to look at the apparent murder weapon—an old bowling trophy, now encrusted in blood and decorated with Lenny Lowell’s hair and a piece of his scalp.
    Kyle had been on his way up in Robbery-Homicide while Parker was being driven out. He was at the top of his game now and eating up the spotlight every time he got the chance, which was too often.
    He was a good-looking guy, good face for television, a tan so perfect it had to have been airbrushed on him. He had an athletic build, but he was on the slight side, and touchy about it. Made a point of telling people he was five eleven and a half, like he’d knock anyone on their ass for making something of it. Parker, who was himself a hair under six feet, figured Kyle for five nine and not a fraction more.
    Parker squatted down beside him. “What are you doing here?” he asked quietly. “What’s Robbery-Homicide doing cruising the murder of a low-rent mouthpiece like Lenny Lowell?”
    “We go where they send us. Isn’t that right, Moosie?” Kyle tossed a look at his partner. Moose grunted and kept on making notes.
    “What are you saying?” Parker asked. “Are you saying you’re taking this? Why? It won’t even make the paper. This guy’s clients were scumbags and dirtballs.”
    Kyle pretended not to have heard him, and stood up. Ruiz stood a scant few inches away from him. In her ridiculous heels she was almost at eye level with him.
    “Detective Kyle,” she purred in a hot phone-sex voice as she offered her hand. “Detective Renee Ruiz. I want your job.”
    This in the same tone she might have used to say “I want you inside me,” not that Parker had any desire to find out. He stood up and gave the dead eyes to his partner. “ Trainee Ruiz, have you finished diagramming the crime scene?”
    She huffed a petulant sigh at Parker, then tossed a sexy look at Kyle and walked away like a woman who knew a guy was watching her ass.
    “Forget it, Kyle,” Parker said. “She’d grind you up like lunch meat. Besides, she’s too tall for you.”
    “Excuse me, gentlemen.” Abby Lowell joined them. “If I might intrude on your little game of who has the biggest dick—” She offered her hand to Kyle, all business. “Abby Lowell. The victim is—was—my father.”
    “I’m sorry for your loss, Ms. Lowell.”
    “You’re with Robbery-Homicide,” she said. “I recognize you from the news.”
    “Yes.” Kyle looked as pleased as a second-rate dinner-theater actor thinking he was about to be asked for his autograph.
    Parker expected Abby Lowell to say “Thank God you’re here.” Instead, she looked Kyle square in the eyes and said: “Why are you here?”
    Kyle gave her the poker face. “Excuse me?”
    “Come on, Detective. I’ve been around my father’s business all my life. His clients and their accused crimes should be way below your radar. What do you think happened here? Do you know something I don’t?”
    “A man was murdered. We’re homicide cops. Do you know something I don’t? What do you think happened here?”
    Abby Lowell took in the mess as if seeing it for the first time since she had entered the room: the files and paperwork everywhere, the overturned chair, maybe from a struggle, maybe from a ransacking after the murder.
    Parker watched her carefully, thinking there was a whole lot stirring beneath the thin facade of calm. He could see it in her eyes, in the slight tremor of her lips. Fear, shock, the struggle to control her emotions. She kept her arms crossed tight, holding herself, keeping her hands from shaking. She was very careful not to look