“You get that NYPSD sweatshirt yet, Deputy?”
“I sure did.”
“Wear it proud. Here we go,” she said, and opened the door to Interview B. “Record on. Dallas, Lieutenant Eve, Banner, Deputy William, entering interview with James, Darryl Roy, regarding cases H-52310, H-52314, H-52318 and connectings. Mr. James, have you been informed of your rights?”
They’d cleaned him up, put some NuSkin on a cut above his left eyebrow, and dressed him in a prison jumpsuit. The virulent orange didn’t do much for him. Nor did the purpling bruise on his jawline.
“Where’s my Ella-Loo?”
“In custody, her ass in the fi
re, just like yours. Have you been informed of your rights?”
“I want to see her. I want to see her and make sure y’all didn’t hurt her.”
Eve sat across from him, the table between them. Set the file down. “You have the right to remain silent,” she began.
“They told me all that already. You want to bring Ella-Loo to me right now.”
“Then you’ve been informed of your rights?”
“I said so, didn’t I?” He banged a fist on the table, restraints rattling. “I don’t say nothing about nothing until I see Ella-Loo.”
“You don’t see Ella-Loo until you say something about everything.” Eve leaned back. “Those rights you heard? That’s all you get. The fact is, Darryl, I can make it so you never set eyes on her again.”
Rage rose up into his face in a red flood. “You can’t keep her from me. We’re meant. We’re true lifetime love.”
“You think? We’ll see how ‘true,’ how ‘lifetime,’ she figures when she realizes that lifetime’s going to be in an off-planet concrete cage.”
Now she leaned forward. “You’re going down and down hard, Darryl. Get that? Never going to see the true light of day again. This isn’t going to be a couple years in the Oklahoma State Pen, with conjugals and visiting rooms, time to read and take classes. This is multiple, consecutive life sentences, the hardest of hard time.”
“You don’t scare me. You come busting into our place —”
“Yours? Samuel Zed’s.”
Darryl’s look went sly. “Sure, good old Sammy. He said how we could stay there. He had to go on a trip for a bit, and we could stay there, keep an eye on the place for him.”
“Is that so?”
“Sure is.”
“Did that trip include spending time floating in the Hudson River, without his fucking fingers?”
“Don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Where’d you meet him?”
“Some bar or other.”
“What bar?”
Cocky, he smirked at her. “Hell, honey, you’ve got so many of them, who knows?”
“Did Ella-Loo wag her tits at him, honey, lure him in?”
The red flood rose again. “Don’t you talk about my girl that way.”
“Did she promise to fuck him, so he’d bring her home? Which one of you smashed his teeth in? Which one of you cut off his fingers?”