John Lescroart by The Hearing Read Free Book Online Page B

“Reilly” and a buzz cut of orange hair. Glitsky was six foot two, half black and all buffed. After his first three minutes with Reilly, Hardy thought it was amazing that they could look so much alike.
    Because whether he knew it or not, the desk sergeant was giving Hardy his Glitsky imitation and doing a hell of a good job at it. Yeah, he was pretty sure Cole Burgess had been processed in. No, he hadn’t heard about any heroin. Sorry, he hadn’t made it into the computer yet. He couldn’t say for sure where he was, even if he’d been taken to the sixth floor or to the hospital.
    Hardy took that runaround until it became obvious, then demanded to speak to Reilly’s superior. Reilly told Hardy that, well, darn, he really wasn’t sure whether anybody was in this time of evening. Deliberately pitching his voice so low that Reilly had to lean closer to hear it at all, Hardy whispered, “All right, Sergeant, then get me the watch commander, and if he’s not in, I’ll call Dan Boles”—the sheriff—“at home. Oh, and I almost forgot, your inmate Mr. Burgess is the brother-in-law of Jeff Elliot, who writes the ‘CityTalk’ column for the Chronicle .”
    Within two minutes, Reilly had located somebody who might know something. Big, black and beefy, the man appeared from a door behind the reception desk, made a show of spotting the man in the lawyer suit, pointed at Hardy and closed the space between them. “I’m Lieutenant Wayne Davies, Mr. . . . ?”
    Hardy said who he was, laid out the problem. Then: “This man needs detox. His medical evaluation hasn’t moved forward, not as far as I can tell. Your admitting sergeant tells me he’s not even in the computer yet.”
    â€œThen he’s probably not been processed. That’s when they do the med eval.” Davies had his arms crossed, his brow furrowed. Hardy was to understand that he was thinking hard about all this, trying to remember one in what must have been dozens of people brought to the jailtoday for processing. “And you’re his attorney?” he asked.
    The veneer of patience now transparently thin, Hardy nodded. “His sister retained me on his behalf. And he’s been in custody now for almost a full day.”
    â€œHmm . . . and you say Lieutenant Glitsky brought him down?”
    â€œLook, Lieutenant, I’m talking about Cole Burgess, the suspect in the Elaine Wager murder. He’s here. He’s in withdrawal and you’re responsible for him. What are you going to do?”
    Davies decided, although he dressed it up for Hardy’s benefit, pretending it had all just come back to him. “Elaine Wager. That guy? Yeah, he’s here, but I don’t know how far he’s gotten.”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œI mean processing him in. It was busy today, thirty admits. There might still be some delay.” Another elaborate shrug. “I don’t know.”
    Hardy had heard more than enough. “Okay, Lieutenant, let’s cut the bullshit. I demand to see my client now. If he’s not in detox immediately, you personally can probably look forward to being named in about a billion-dollar lawsuit against the city . . .”
    Davies held up an authoritative hand. “Keep your shorts on, Mr. Hardy. I’m sure he’s here. We’ll find him and get him checked out. He’ll be upstairs in jail or on his way to County Hospital. You can see him either place when we’re through, Mr. Hardy. But not before.”
    Â 
    Cole Burgess wanted to be dead.
    There was nothing but the pain and no way he could make it stop. Not here. Not without the god.
    When he was a boy—still active, still doing sports—he’d get cramps in his legs that woke him, screaming, from sound sleep in the middle of the night. The calf on his right leg, or a muscle somewhere under the tendons of one