Slow Burn by Terrence McCauley Page B

fine form. Not a care in the world.”
    That didn’t help me much. The morning before last was the day he’d been kidnapped. At least I knew they hadn’t grabbed him here at his apartment. But then again, I didn’t think they had. Someone probably would’ve called it in if they’d seen something. “Mind if I go up and take a look at his place myself?”
    “I don’t know, mister. I wouldn’t…”
    “His father would be awfully grateful.”
    “Oh yeah?” She jerked her chins up at me again. “How grateful?”
    “You’ll find out after I find the kid. That’s a promise.” She laughed and was about to spit again, when I added, “If I have to go up there and kick the door in, you get nothing. That’s a promise, too.”
    She grumbled as she fished a key ring out of her housecoat, flipped through several keys until she found one and held it out to me. “Top of the stairs on the left.”
    She muttered about lousy goddamned coppers and spit again as I headed inside.

NOBODY’S SWEETHEART
    I TOOK my time walking up the stairs. Slow and steady, I did my best to keep the stairs from creaking. Since I didn’t know what I was walking into, the quieter the better. At the top of the stairs, I stopped and listened. There were five doors around the small hallway. All I heard was apartment building sounds. A man and woman talking. Running water. Dishes clinking. Some clown on a radio crooning, “Let’s Misbehave.”
    But not a sound from 3A.
    I pulled my .38 from my holster and walked toward the door. A foot away, a floorboard in the hallway creaked and the door swung in slowly on its own. I brought up my gun and aimed it at the space between the door and the doorframe.
    But there was nothing to aim at. No outline, no head. Nothing but sunlight pouring into the apartment through a pale yellow window shade.
    I stepped forward and pushed the door all the way open. It was a small apartment, just like Soames had said. A wall bed, lots of books bowing the bookshelves, and a kitchen.
    And a pale girl in a white dress curled into a ball on the kitchen floor.
    Her long, stringy black hair was splayed out on the yellow floor tile around her head. She was pale and thin, and shaking. I figured she either had the dry heaves or was well into one hell of a crying jag. Either way, she was alive, but barely.
    I tucked my gun away and heeled the door shut. The sound made the girl realize she was no longer alone. She began to scream as though I’d startled her out of a bad dream.
    She went wide-eyed and scrambled away from me with her elbows and bare feet until her back was flat against the wall. She would’ve pushed her way through the wall if she could’ve.
    She was still panting when I crouched to show her my badge. “You’re safe, honey. I’m not going to hurt you. I’m a policeman and I’m here to help you.”
    She stayed wide-eyed and panting as she looked back and forth between me and my badge. Her face was gaunt and streaked with tears and sweat.
    “P… please,” she whispered. “I… I… I didn’t know. I swear. Don’t hurt me.”
    “Just calm down, honey.” I put my badge away nice and slow. “You’re not in any kind of trouble at all. I’m here to help you, and I’m here to help Jack. Can you…”
    I heard the door crash open behind me just before I was yanked up off the floor and thrown back out into the hallway. The girl shrieked again.
    I slammed into the door across the hall, back first, but I landed with my legs beneath me. I looked up in time to see a large man with curly black hair bull-rush me from the apartment.
    He telegraphed a roundhouse right aimed at my head. I ducked to my left and slid the beavertail sap from the small of my back. The bastard’s hand hit the door where my head had been. My sap caught him flush on the right side of the ribs. Right on the liver.
    I’d learned a long time ago that a liver shot turns even the toughest guy to mush if you knew how to hit it just right. And I