Free Vertical Coffin (2004) by Stephen - Scully 04 Cannell Page A

tipping in her chair, still watching me.
    "Be careful," I said. "I wouldn't want you to go over and hit your head, like I did."
    "Shut up, Shane."
    But I'd turned the corner, I could already hear a smile in her voice.
    "It was just bad luck. We didn't know they'd be in there."
    She heaved a sigh. "Look at me. Right in the eye." She leaned forward and started checking my pupils. "You're okay, I guess."
    She got up. I stood with her, but got a little dizzy when I did. To be honest, I might have picked up a mild concussion, but the less said here, the better.
    She kissed me without passion; still angry, but she was late. "Be home for dinner?" she asked.
    "I think so. I'm trying to wrap up the Paula Beck thing today. Once the D . A . files and Zack comes back from Miami, we can move on to something else. I'll be on the fourth floor. Lunch?"
    "I don't break bread with lawless brawlers," she said.
    "I was not brawling. I barely hit anybody."
    "Noon at the Peking Duck," she snapped.
    We left in separate cars. I drove my Acura, following her new blue Lexus until she sped up around the 10 Freeway and lost me in the heavy traffic.
    I spent most of the morning on the fourth floor at Parker Center wrapping up the Beck investigation. I didn't think I had come up with enough on Paula for the D . A . to file the double-H. Even though the case was tragic, it really was just involuntary manslaughter. The D . A . could try and run his bluff, but if her public defender wasn't a complete moron he'd know it was a stretch. I finished the investigation report and handed it in to Cal, who glanced it over, then smiled at me.
    "What happened at the Pew and Cue?" he said, his black, shiny, chrome-dome glinting purple in the overhead fluorescents.
    "I wasn't there," I said.
    "It's all over the department. Somebody said you got knocked cold." I kept my six-stitch lace-up turned from his view.
    "Me?" I said. "Wasn't there. Bum rumor."
    I had lunch with Alexa and we didn't say much. She picked at an avocado plate, which I could have told her was a bad menu choice at the Peking Duck. Stick to the Oriental dishes in that joint, the egg rolls and dim sum.
    The rest of the day went slowly. I searched through our files on predicate felons, looking for a new target Zack and I could work when he got back. By six I was getting ready to pack it in, when my phone rang. It was Sergeant Ellen Campbell, who works as Alexa's administrative assistant.
    "The skipper wants to see you," she said brightly. The skipper was Alexa.
    "On my way."
    I closed up my desk, logged off my computer, and rode the elevator up two flights to the sixth floor. I figured Alexa was going to suggest we make up over dinner. There was a Greek restaurant called Acropolis, in the Valley, she'd been wanting to try.
    I walked down the thick, sea-foam green carpet that covered the corridors of the command floor, entered Alexa's outer office, and found Ellen, a perennially happy, freckled blonde sitting behind her desk. Most lieutenants aren't staff rank officers and don't have private secretaries, but Alexa was an acting division commander, and head of Detective Services Group. She reported directly to the Office of Operations, which was right below the Chief, so she was way up on the department flowchart.
    DSG supervised all the detective bureaus, from Forgery and Missing Persons, to Special Crimes and Robbery-Homicide. Normally the head of DSG would be a captain or a commander, but Alexa had taken over the XO position a year ago as a lieutenant. She was made acting head by Chief Tony Filosiani after her boss, Captain Mark Shephard, had been shot and killed. Chief Filosiani liked her and was willing to leave her as acting head until she made captain, which, the way she was going, would probably be in another year.
    Ellen was facing her computer as I crossed the office. "Storms blowing. Wear your raincoat," she said without looking up.
    Alexa's digs were small. One window, no view. She had portable