Page 33

Dinah

Freddie’s backpack is a slim leather one with a half-dozen compartments, the top unzipped and gaping open as I pull it onto my lap. Inside is an apple, a protein bar, a mini bottle of Advil, and a leather portfolio that is almost identical to the one I use for my daily case files.

I pull out the portfolio and open it as my phone dings with another text from Freddie.

The left side of the portfolio has my internal case file, which I’ve never seen.

I pull out the stapled pages and start to skim through them.

Eleven years in the LAPD, all detailed here.

My initial field scores and aptitude tests.

My most recent psychological report. I flip to the shrink’s notes and read them in detail.

Struggling with the death of her partner. In denial of the level of her grief.

Doesn’t want another partner, likely because of the mental trauma from Oley Hugh’s passing.

Mentions her husband with excessive frequency. Is likely in a codependent relationship.

Highly intelligent and at risk of being bored in this role. Should look for advancement opportunities to provide to her. Will clash with personality types that are similar to her own.

All bullshit. I flip the page and see my stats.

Arrests made. Warrants issued. Investigations closed.

All above average. There’s a reason I was promoted to detective so quickly.

A reason I get my pick of precinct and assignments.

I’m one of the best detectives Los Angeles County has.

I’m told that over and over again, a compliment supported by my record. Yet Freddie was sent to spy on me. Why?

Next, an abbreviated list of cases; these must be the ones they found suspicious.

Some of them, I understand. The investigations were messy and disjointed.

Mistakes were made, clues were missed, evidence was lost. A few I am innocent of, but all in all, it’s a terrifying list, one that could mean the end of my career if they dig into all of them.

My phone dings, and I pick it up and scroll through the texts, all from Freddie.

Are you coming back? I’m at the end of the parking lot.

Dinah, seriously, we have to talk. You need to know something.

I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you, but I had a good reason.

He doesn’t need a good reason. He was conducting an investigation.

Deception is just part of that equation.

I understand that. Respect it. You need to know something.

Is it just a trap to keep me from finding his backpack and reading this folder?

Probably. Joe would know. If I told him all this, the background and all the details leading up to these texts, he would be able to say with absolute certainty whether or not Freddie was bullshitting me.

But I can’t ask Joe. Not without first confessing, and I’m not ready to do that.

I keep flipping pages, and the rest of it is all about Reese and Jessica Bishop. All the crime scene and lab reports are here, with Freddie’s handwritten notes in the margin. Most are about me—comments on what I did properly and anytime I missed something that he caught.

I look for what I am terrified of: Car-tracking data. My cell phone records. Anything on camera records or neighborhood sweeps. I am frantic, my finger skimming over the words, and I almost miss the section at the bottom of the final page.

IA investigation opened after a call received from Oley Hugh on September 25th. Follow-up meeting held on October 2nd. Oley is a cooperating resource in this investigation.

I stare at the paragraph, reading the lines over and over again until I have to blink rapidly just to keep my vision clear. The folder drops onto my lap, and I sit there for a moment, not moving, barely breathing, as I try to process this information.

A call to Internal Affairs, from Oley.

A follow-up meeting.

A cooperating resource in this investigation.

Shit. I begin to pant, tears welling, and I quickly press my fingers underneath my eyes, pinning them shut, and force myself to calm the fuck down and take a deep breath.

It can’t be right, yet there is no reason for this folder to lie.

I think of how often he came to the ranch.

The moments beside me in the car, driving while I spoke to Joe on the phone.

Eating lunch at Virgilo’s, his hand always reaching for the check.

His big goofy grin, which only dropped when we were at a crime scene or if the Padres were losing.

No one knows my secrets, save Joe—but Oley ... if anyone was going to figure them out, it would be him.

Did he?

The question is almost worse than the idea of an IA investigation, and the thought of telling Joe about either hits me in the face with the severity of a shovel.

I carefully pick the portfolio back up and consider what to do with it.

There’s a round trash can at the side of the dentist’s office.

I could junk it, but this isn’t 1990. There are digital files that back up every page in the binder.

Fifteen minutes and a dozen mouse clicks, and the file will be re-created.

Okay, so I’ll give it back to Freddie. Don’t let him know that I’ve read it. Finish the Jessica Bishop investigation 100 percent by the book and pray that it satisfies their curiosities and they go away.

After that, maybe I’ll retire and convince Joe to quit the clinic. We’ll find new hobbies to occupy our time.

It sounds miserable, but maybe that’s what life at a certain age becomes. I push the portfolio back into Freddie’s bag and return it to the passenger-side floorboard.

It takes me a moment before I can stomach the energy to put the car into drive and head back to the ice-cream shop. This feeling ... this sear of pain across my chest, the bitter taste in my mouth, the heave of my stomach ...

I thought that my first heartbreak had broken the organ so badly that it was permanently scarred over, impossible to reinjure in such traumatic fashion.

But this is almost worse. I’m not a kid; I’m a grown woman.

A homicide detective. I should be able to sniff out deceit, should be able to know my friends from my foes, and the saddest part is that Oley was just about the only friend I’ve ever had in my life.

Short of Joe, which is a different type of friendship entirely.

My one friend, and he did this to me. He suspected this of me and went behind my back to see if it was true.

Fuck him. Fuck him and fuck me for crying over his grave and for wasting years of my life thinking that I loved that man and he loved me.

I slam both fists on the steering wheel and let out a long, agonized scream of frustration. At myself. At Joe. And at Oley.