The First Law Read Online Free PDF Page A

face lit up with an idea. “Hey, Manna Macaroons. That wouldn’t be a bad brand name. We could market them like Mrs. Fields. Abe’s Manna Macaroons. We could all get rich. . . .”
    Frannie spoke. “Somebody please stop him.”
    Glitsky jumped in. “It’s a good idea, Diz, but I couldn’t do it anyway. I’m going back to work next week. Monday.”
    Treya gave him a wary look. “You hope.”
    “All right,” he conceded, “I hope.”
    “Why wouldn’t you be?” Hardy asked. “How long’s it been, anyway?”
    “On Monday, it’ll have been thirteen months, two weeks and three days.”
    “Roughly,” Treya added pointedly. “Not that he’s been counting.”
    Glitsky was coming off a bad year, one that had begun with a point-blank gunshot wound to his abdomen. For the first month or so after the initial cleanup, he’d been recovering according to schedule—getting around in a wheelchair, taking things easy—when the first of several medical complications had developed. A secondary infection that finally got diagnosed as peritonitis put him back in the hospital, where he then developed pneumonia. The double whammy had nearly killed him for a second time, and left him weakened and depleted through Rachel’s birth last August until late in the fall. Then, suddenly the initial wound itself wouldn’t completely heal. It wasn’t until February of this year that he’d even been walking regularly at all, and a couple of months after that before he began trying to get back into shape. At the end of May, his doctors finally declared him fit to return to work, but Glitsky’s bosses had told him that homicide’s interim head—the lieutenant who’d taken Glitsky’s place—would need to be reassigned and there wasn’t an immediately suitable job befitting his rank and experience.
    So Glitsky had waited some more.
    Now they were in July and evidently something had finally materialized, but obviously with a wrinkle. “So what’s to hope about getting back on Monday?” Hardy asked. “How could it not happen? You walk in, say hi to your troops, go back to your desk and break out the peanuts.” The lieutenant’s desk in homicide was famous for its unending stash of goobers in the shell.
    Glitsky made a face.
    “Apparently,” Treya said, “it’s not that simple.”
    Hardy finished a macaroon, sipped some coffee. “What?” he asked. “Somebody from the office saw you in the apron? I bet that’s it. We can sue them for discrimination. You should be allowed to wear an apron if you want.”
    “Dismas, shut up,” Frannie said. “What, Abe?”
    “Well, the PD will of course welcome me back, but maybe at a different job.”
    “What job?” Hardy asked. “Maybe they’re promoting you.”
    “I didn’t get that impression. They’re talking payroll.”
    “Head of payroll’s a sergeant,” Hardy said. “Isn’t he?”
    “Used to be anyway.” Glitsky hesitated. “Seems there’s been some concern that I was excessively close to my work in homicide.”
    “Evidently this is a bad thing,” Treya added.
    “As opposed to what?” Frannie asked. “Bored with it?”
    “You haven’t even gone to work for a year,” Hardy said. “How does that put you excessively close to it?”
    Glitsky nodded. “I raised some of the same points myself.”
    “And?” Hardy asked.
    “And in the past few years, as we all know, my daughter was killed, I had a heart attack, and I got shot in the line of duty.”
    “One of which actually happened because of the job.” Treya was frowning deeply. “He also got married and had a baby, as if there’s some connection there, too.”
    Glitsky shrugged. “It’s just an excuse. It’s really because my extended disability made them put a new guy in homicide for the duration. . . .”
    “Gerson, right?” Hardy said.
    “That’s him. They probably told him it was his permanent gig when they moved him up. And now that I’ve had the bad grace to get better, they’re