The Deadhouse Read Online Free Page A

me. That, and to get you off the premises pronto. If the
mayor says this is an accident, then there's no need to have an
assistant district attorney meddling in it."
    For the moment, we both ignored that point. "They never heard of
backup? What if Kralovic didn't trust the guys he hired in Jersey and
wanted a little security, some extra insurance, to make sure his plan
to kill Lola worked?"
    "I don't need convincing. City Hall does. The first day of Christmas
my true love gave to me, a shove in the back and a trip to the morgue,
right? The mayor doesn't want to add to the murder tally for the end of
the year. And he's getting additional pressure from the powers that be
at Columbia University."
    "But Lola didn't even work there anymore."
    "They farmed her out to a new, experimental school—King's College.
It's got an entirely separate administration, but it bought some of the
old Columbia buildings, so it's adjacent to the Columbia-Barnard
campus. Somebody up there's got a direct pipeline to the mayor's
office. The school officials don't want to open the whole can of worms
about the history of their own tortured relationship with Lola Dakota,
so they'd like this shoved under the carpet as well."
    "They're leaving out a great big stumbling block, in the oversize
form of the rotund, thick-skulled, and honorable Vinny Sinnelesi, the
Jersey prosecutor who put together this clever sting operation.
Battaglia thinks the entire plan was to snag some visibility to launch
Sinnelesi's bid for the gubernatorial race next year. Vinny had no
qualms about getting attention on the back of Ms. Dakota while she was
alive, so I doubt he'll lose a minute's sleep about doing it over her
dead body."
    Mike laughed at my description of Sinnelesi, and at my obvious state
of agitation. "Calm it, Coop."
    I was too wound up to stop. "Easy for him to sit tight in his own
little fiefdom and point his fat finger at us, calling this a
murder—whether it is or isn't—knowing he can't screw up
this
investigation
'cause it will be in Battaglia's jurisdiction."
    The front door of the building opened and, with the frigid air, in
walked Lieutenant Peterson. Chapman got up and his trademark grin
vanished in a flash. "I thought you'd gone home, Loo."
    Without breaking stride as he moved toward the elevator, Peterson
barked back, "I told you to get Ms. Cooper out of this building,
Chapman. She's got nothing further to do with this matter. This, this,
. . . accident."

    3

    I sat in Chapman's car, shivering against the chill of the night
air, which kept me wide-awake despite the late hour. Peterson's
unexpected reappearance in the lobby had been due to the arrival of the
detective who had been sent to the morgue to fetch Dakota's keys. The
two had crossed paths as Peterson was about to close his car door, so
the lieutenant doubled back to see whether they could gain entry to
Lola's fifteenth-floor apartment. Chapman knew that it wasn't
Peterson's style to examine the woman's home himself. He wasn't a
micromanager in that sense, and would rely on the intelligence of his
men—and the photographs they would bring back—to highlight any
information of significance. "Loo'll give it a once-over just to
satisfy himself, somebody'll snap some pictures, and then I'll come
down to get you," he said as he led me to his car and unlocked the
door. "Just slink down in the seat so he doesn't make you when he's
leaving— no heater, no radio. He'll be gone in twenty minutes."
    "You know he'll kill us if we get caught."
    "Can't happen, kid. It'll just be you, me, and George Zotos. Who's
gonna squeal?"
    Zotos was one of the guys on Mike's team in the squad, and I had
worked well with him over the years. "There's no downside to this for
you. Battaglia doesn't even know you're here, and Peterson gave orders
to me, not to you."
    Shortly before one-thirty in the morning, Peterson walked out on the
sidewalk and his driver swung around in front of the building to pick
him up. Ten minutes