Under the Surface Read Online Free

performance tonight.
    Delete.
    Matt reached for the distancing language of a police report to describe the bar’s interior, the possibility of alternate exits upstairs or in the back.
    â€œThe operation with the FBI and the DEA to get Lyle Murphy. He’s moving home and bringing bad news with him,” Sorenson said when it became apparent Matt wasn’t going to bother answering Carlucci.
    â€œWhat kind of bad news?”
    â€œThe Strykers.”
    As he reread the report, Matt heard Carlucci’s faint whistle. Much better. Calm, logical, focused on the case at hand. No mention of hair or legs or eyes, as if describing features could sum up the sheer femininity radiating from Eve Webber during a simple job interview. Ten minutes with her and he’d felt something. Still felt it thirty minutes later. Not desire. He understood desire, dealt with it. This was different, more visceral, deeply buried, long forgotten, and leading him to make two mistakes when the acceptable error rate was zero point zero.
    Lieutenant Ian Hawthorn walked down the aisle between the detectives’ desks. “Well?” he said to Matt.
    â€œI’ve got a trial shift tonight,” Matt said. “If she’s happy at the end of it, I’ve got the job.”
    Hawthorn folded his arms. “The FBI’s been running this operation for over a year, and getting nowhere until a couple of weeks ago, when Ms. Webber walked in off the street and said Murphy approached her about using her bar to launder the money they’re making in the region. She agreed to be an informant and help us get him. She’s the connection the Feds needed to get the whole chain, from the buy-and-busts on street corners right up to the top guys.”
    Carlucci whistled again.
    â€œThat’s the good news. The bad news is that somehow word got back to Murphy. McCormick was booking a Stryker when she walked in. Maybe he saw her, and reported back to Lyle Murphy. It doesn’t matter,” Hawthorn said. “She managed to talk her way out of the situation with Lyle but people who inform on the Strykers have a nasty habit of dying in a drive-by, or worse, disappearing off the face of the earth. So Detective Dorchester just got himself a job as Eye Candy’s newest bartender.”
    â€œThis is a big fucking deal. Shouldn’t we put in plainclothes officers?” Carlucci asked. “Hang out in the bar, keep an eye on the situation?”
    Sorenson shoved her keyboard tray under her desk and looked at Carlucci, her gaze flicking over the buzz cut, slacks, and suit jacket. “Even plainclothes cops look like cops. They walk and talk and think like cops, and a ten-year-old in that neighborhood can pick us out of a crowd. Matt, on the other hand, looks like the kind of guy who’d bounce from job to job, city to city. Just the right amount of bad boy,” she said consideringly. “No offense.”
    â€œNone taken,” Matt said. He knew exactly how he looked, how to make it work for him, how to switch things up when it wasn’t working. It worked for Eve Webber. Anyone with eyes could see that.
    â€œShe refused a police presence in her place of business,” Hawthorn said. “Which works in our favor. If she knows Matt’s a cop, she might make a mistake, tell someone, give the whole thing away before we even get started. Murphy would kill her without thinking twice about it. She doesn’t know exactly how high we’re aiming either. All she’s thinking about is the East Side, not bringing down the whole Strykers’ pipeline. If she makes a mistake, we lose the whole case and look like boneheads in front of the Feds.”
    Hawthorn wasn’t telling them everything, which didn’t surprise Matt. Hawthorn was the youngest member of the only LPD family with a longer history than Sorenson’s. He’d learned discretion at his father’s knee, grew up watching press