An Ace and A Pair (Dead Cold Mystery #1)

by Blake Banner

The door was open, but I knocked anyway. The captain looked up from her desk. She was one of those women who should have been attractive. She had thick black hair and deep brown eyes, and olive skin that in her midforties looked like it was still in its twenties. She had all the right bits in all the right places, but she was somehow unlovable. Her eyes gave me that “what the hell do you want” look. Then I guess she remembered she’d called me, and gave something that should have been a smile but wasn’t. Captain Jennifer Cuevas was all about what should have been. “John, come in. Take a seat. Close the door, would you?” I closed the door and sat. She laid her pen very carefully in front of her, like everything would go wrong if it wasn’t perfectly aligned. “How long have you been with the NYPD, John?” “Twenty-eight years, Jennifer.” She glanced at me. It was okay for her to call me John, but I should call her Captain. I smiled nicely. “You just turned forty-eight.” “Last November.” She sighed, like it was

My definition of most modern professional women.

She stared at me hard. “Was there anything else?” “Yes.” “What?” She reached behind her and grabbed two boxes of files. She heaved them over and dumped them in front of me. She had to stand then, to be able to see me. I looked up at her. “What’s this?” “We are creating a cold-cases team. In view of your exceptional record, Detective Stone, you will be heading up the team. These here are the cold cases we’ve accumulated over the last thirty years. I’ll leave it up to you how you tackle them, but work your way through them, and close them.” I stared at her for a very long moment. “What about my current cases?” “They have been reassigned.” “Why?” “I just explained it to you, Detective.” She echoed my words from a little earlier. “Anything else?” I stood and picked up the boxes. At the door, I stopped. “You said I was heading up a team?” She’d sat down again and had a smug look all over her face. “Yes. Detective Carmen Dehan will be working with you. I think you two should make a fine team.” Dehan. I carried the boxes to the detectives’ room and dropped them on my desk. I wasn’t all that surprised by what had happened. Jennifer had been gunning for me for a couple of years. We had bad chemistry, and to be honest I didn’t care enough to make an effort to improve it. I was never good at kissing ass, and I wasn’t sure it would help much anyway. In her eyes, I was a dinosaur. The only people she wanted kissing her ass were the “New Bloods.” I was scowling at the boxes and wonderin...

These are or here are the the cold cases.,,