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He punched the SPEAKERPHONE button on the phone base, then punched the button above the blinking light and said, “Commissioner Coughlin.”

“How’s my favorite small-town police chief?” a soft feminine voice inquired.

Coughlin’s face lit up and Payne smiled at the sound of the voice.

Coughlin then glanced beyond Payne. Across the room was his I Love Me wall, and there he saw the picture of him standing beside the diminutive Liz Justice. The photograph had been taken two years earlier, when the Philadelphia Executive Women’s League had given her their annual Benjamin Franklin Leader of the Year Award.

She was a petite thirty-five-year-old with a bright face and deeply intelligent dark eyes who wore her shoulder-length brunette hair parted on the right. In the picture she wore a navy blue woolen business suit with a double row of brass buttons down the front, navy silk stockings, black leather shoes with low heels-and a dazzling smile.

“How the hell are you, Liz?” Coughlin said, his voice also showing his pleasure.

“Plodding ahead in the never-ending war against crime, Denny.”

“Indeed. Welcome to the club.”

“I need a favor, Denny.”

“You got it.”

“I need some doors opened for a friend of mine.”

“They’re wide open, Liz. Who is he?”

“A Texas Ranger. The youngest one. Reminds me of Peter Wohl. Or maybe Matt Payne-”

Coughlin glanced at Payne, who was somewhat glowing in the praise.

“His name is Jim Byrth,” she went on. “He’s after a charming guy who likes to cut girls’ heads off. He heard the bastard’s in Philadelphia.”

“We sure as hell can do without any of that. This Byrth will be doing us a favor. When’s he coming?”

“He’ll be on the Continental flight arriving at three twenty-two.”

“He’ll be met. If he’s a friend of yours, I’ll meet him myself.”

“That would probably get the word out that the doors are open. He wants to nab this critter quietly.”

Liz Justice had been a chief inspector of the Philadelphia Police Department running Internal Affairs when the City Fathers of Houston, Texas, had decided that their troubled police department needed a new chief. One with lots of experience in internal affairs. To say that the Houston PD was having more than a little problem with corrupt cops was akin to calling the mafia a misunderstood boys’ club. “You can beat the rap, but you can’t beat the ride” had become such common knowledge it may as well have been painted on the fenders of every squad car. And everything they’d tried thus far had failed to effect any significant change.

When the search of the nation’s major police departments came up with Chief Inspector Justice’s name, the only thing against her was her gender.

But the mayor had solved that in genuine Texas fashion: “Who better to break up the Old Boy Network than a lady who’s a fourth-generation cop?”

Not only did Liz still have friends on Philly’s force, she still had family. Including a cousin in South Detectives, Lieutenant Daniel “Danny the Judge” Justice, Jr. He was reputedly the smallest and without question the most delicate-looking white shirt in all of the Philadelphia Police Department.

Two weeks after the Houston mayor made the decision to hire Chief Inspector Liz Justice, she had been sworn in as the United States’ first female chief of a major city police department. The historic news put her on the cover of Time magazine.

“I do appreciate it, Denny. Please give my love to your far better half.”

He chuckled. “Will do, Liz. Take care of yourself down there in the Wild West.”

She laughed appreciatively.

He punched the SPEAKERPHONE button, breaking the connection.

Coughlin looked at the I Love Me wall again. Payne could almost see the gears turning in his mind.

And Coughlin was indeed thinking.