Against the Dark by Carolyn Crane Read Free Book Online Page A

room with a fireplace and stuffed chairs, something right out of an old fashioned novel, though Cole doubted any reading went on in the place. If you looked closely at the wrought iron chandelier, you could see cuffs from which people could be hung by their wrists or ankles.
    Borgola wasn’t there. They were to wait.
    The two of them walked around the bloodstain on the floor to stand in front of the man’s desk.
    Mapes slid his glance to Cole. “Perps must have gotten something.”
    “Who knows,” Cole said, though he doubted they got anything. Cole had gone through the trouble of smuggling in an Association consultant to try and crack the safe. Pops like a fucking Geiger counter, the consultant had said. You want to open a Fenton Furst? You need to blow it.
    And then some Bozos from the party had set off the bedroom safe alarm.
    The temperature in the library dropped ten degrees the second Borgola walked in. The man was lithe and fit, with a sinewy neck and overly built up jaw from the incessant grinding of teeth. And he was slime incarnate.
    Cole and Mapes waited impassively, standing strong. Borgola liked to imagine himself as some sort of commander, addressing the troops. He had been in the Marines as a youth, though he’d barely made it out of boot camp before he was court marshaled.
    “Here’s the situation—we’ve been hit,” Borgola said. “We’ve got five bags of diamonds hanging out there, and at least two thieves who were at the party or let in by a party guest. That’s confidential, by the way.”
    Cole could’ve fallen over. They’d actually gotten into the safe?
    “Needless to say, I won’t be using Sturnvaal’s services after this.” He nodded at the bloodstain on the carpet, eying both of them, back and forth, wanting the message to sink in.
    Cole was more interested in the fact that the thieves had breached a Fenton Furst.
    “I have my men scouring the grounds,” Borgola said. “But the two of you have the most investigative abilities. An ex-cop and an ex-P.I. So you two are investigating. Whoever comes up with the culprits gets to be my new security head.”
    Cole nodded. “We’ll look into this.” The Association had given him a whole fake P.I. background.
    “We’ll do our best, sir,” Mapes said, smiling at Cole.
    Borgola said, “I have Hensen and Smits dusting the area around the bedroom, but it doesn’t look like we’ll find much. You two will go out there, rip up all of fucking L.A. finding them, and you will kill them and dispose of the bodies. You will bring me their severed hands, and you will bring me the diamonds. And I need results very soon. I want you two to hit the streets, to chase down every pawn shop, everyone who deals in diamonds. I’m having all the crime scene info forwarded to you both. Fingerprints and so on. I want the diamonds, and I want the hands of whoever did this.”
    “Understood.” Cole kept his eyes on the floor, the walls. It didn’t do to look at Borgola while he was stung, and obviously the man was stung by this robbery. He’d been boasting about having the diamonds. They were something special, those stones.
    “I’ll run down known fences,” Mapes said.
    Cole knew Mapes wanted to beat him out and catch the guys first, but it was sloppy to skip the crime scene and go right to the fences. Mapes was banking on the fact that the kind of pros who pulled this job wouldn’t leave evidence behind. He could be right, but Cole preferred to do things methodically. He tried to look morose. “I’ll take the scene of the crime.”
    “I have Hensen and Smits on it,” Borgola said. “You’ll both share any information gleaned by them. I want you two beating the bushes.”
    It was dangerous to counter a Borgola request, but Cole had to see the scene—this robbery had suddenly gotten very interesting. And Hensen and Smits were far from forensics pros. “I do like to start at the scene,” Cole said. “Just the way I run.”
    “That works,