Free Don't Close Your Eyes (Stephanie Chalice Thrillers Book 1) by Lawrence Kelter Page B

familiar with this color, although they have no idea what it looks like.
    I checked myself in the mirror. I work out every chance I can to stay taut and healthy. I then proceeded to cover up every inch of flesh possible. Of course, as I said before, a burlap bag would have been too revealing. So I’m a living contradiction; so what? The main reason behind my fanaticism for exercise is not the obvious. It’s my fear of the big D: diabetes. It feels as if there’s a ticking bomb inside me, genetically crafted and secreted within my pancreas. I can’t stand the thought of it. The very idea that I might someday be injecting myself with insulin turns my stomach. It’s really frustrating to know that two people as caring and warm as my parents had passed along this chromosomal nightmare. I have to beat it. I just have to, and if I need to exercise every day of my life to do it, I will.
    When I arrived at the station house, Lido looked like he needed a double espresso. He was cleanly shaven and groomed, but those red, bloodshot eyes told the whole story. “I got up at six-thirty,” I boasted, “worked out for an hour before I got here.”‘
    “I passed out about three,” Lido advised. I’m so glad he doesn’t feel the need to compete.
    “I hope she was worth it.” Lido smiled in a strange way, not quite the cat that ate the canary smile, but close. I don’t think Lido has any trouble getting women.
    He walked over to the coffee machine without answering. Station house coffee is absolutely dreadful. Lido filled one of those Styrofoam cups to the rim with the black swill. He swallowed it down in two gulps and made a face to demonstrate how offensive it was. Cute.
    Lido and I reviewed all that we knew about the case and talked about the wheels we had set in motion. The department’s research boys were looking for anyone with a record of having been trained or having worked on elevators, someone with an electronics background or anyone who could play havoc with an elevator in the way someone had last night.
    I had called Herbert Ambler sometime after midnight. He was up watching reruns of Mission Impossible, just as I expected. Ambler was one of those guys who could function perfectly on three or four hours of sleep. He promised to run our killer’s profile through the Bureau’s computers. He was going to tap NACIC as well. I promised to buy him a steak dinner when the case was solved, an offer I knew he would not let me get away with.
    We had put the word out on the street, but so far nothing had come back. Even Manhattan streets are pretty much deserted at half past three in the morning. We were going to question some of the girls at Scores. Wendell Johnson had reminded us that the club had let out shortly before the incident. Aside from a few street urchins, the Scores girls and a few of their diehard customers were probably the only ones who might have seen anyone run down off the tram station.
    We still hadn’t figured out how our perp had gotten into Samantha Harris’s building. Victor Alamento probably knew and was now passing his secret along to Saint Peter.
    The phone rang. It was Aaron Kurtz from the forensics lab. The forensics guy confirmed that the 9mm bullets that had killed superintendent Victor Alamento and tram conductor Teddy Balto were fired from the same weapon. I say weapon as opposed to gun because Kurtz made a point of telling me that the markings on the slugs, or rifflings, as they’re called, came from a long-barreled instrument and were definitely not made by a handgun. Having heard what Kurtz had to say, I tried repeatedly to get off the phone, but Kurtz just kept on talking. I like Kurtz but he’s a real motormouth.
    The coroner had confirmed that both women had been suffocated in an identical fashion: mouth gagged and nostrils pinched. As of yet, I hadn’t heard anything that I didn’t already know. Kurtz then added one last piece of information. He had found small bits of bright