Yesterday's Echo by Matt Coyle Page B

Moretti.” Hair slicked back hard, olive skin deeply tanned like a guy who spent his days at the beach or his nights under a sun lamp. He was hunched over a trash can clipping his fingernails. I guess the DB turned out to be an overdose. One less murder to solve for the busy boys at Robbery/Homicide.
    Dan pulled a chair from the empty cube next to his and offered it to me. My ribs and kidneys hurt as I lowered myself down into the chair. He opened with some preliminaries, name and address to get everything on the record if needed. Then he asked me to describe my day leading up to and through the assault.
    I gave him the rough and tumble at Muldoon’s and then the ambush. The rest was between Melody and me. Nothing about taking her home last night, nothing about looking for her at the motel. I didn’t even give him her name or what she looked like. Until I knew different, Melody didn’t want the cops involved and I certainly didn’t want to be involved with the cops.
    â€œAnd you don’t know the woman that these men were looking for?” He looked at me like “no” would be the wrong answer. I gave him a version of it, anyway.
    â€œLike I said, they were looking for a woman they claimed had dinner in Muldoon’s last night. I don’t necessarily see or remember every guest who comes into the restaurant.”
    I’d probably never see Melody again. If I did, I didn’t want it to be because I’d betrayed her trust.
    Dan stood up and looked down at me like I’d betrayed his. Sometimes in life you have to make hard choices.
    â€œAll right, Rick,” Dan said.
    He walked over to a file cabinet against the wall and grabbed two large three-ring binders, then came back and dropped them on the desk. They made a loud “clunk” that brought Moretti’s head over the cubicle wall. He gave me cop eyes and then disappeared below the partition.
    â€œLook through those mug books and let us know if you find the men who assaulted you.” He gave me the same look Moretti had. “I’m going to go grab our sketch artist in case the suspects aren’t in the books.”
    I flipped through the mugs and didn’t see anyone I recognized. I sat quietly and waited for Dan’s return. The quiet didn’t last long.
    â€œThose two hard boys seemed pretty certain you knew the woman they were after. Why do you think that is, Cahill?” Detective Moretti’s coal eyes bore into me over the top of the cubicle.
    He must have been listening while he worked on his manicure.
    â€œI don’t know.” I held his glare. “Maybe they didn’t like getting kicked out of the restaurant and decided to take it out on me.”
    â€œJust an innocent victim.” He hit each syllable hard like the drop of a guillotine blade. “Is that it, Cahill?”
    I’d never met this guy before and wished I hadn’t then. His contempt for me was boldly up front, even for a cop. I hadn’t faced such hatred since my last encounter with Colleen’s father.
    â€œI didn’t even want to press charges.” My voice had some hiss to it. “I came down here as a favor to Dan, so—”
    â€œYou’re a real sport, Cahill.” He smacked gum, loud and hard with an open mouth. “Doing the police a favor by reporting a crime that you seemed content to cover up. You could have saved us all a lot of time and trouble if you would have waited around for the uniforms. That’s what people with nothing to hide do.”
    â€œYeah, I can see you’re very busy. Not even enough time for a decent manicure.”
    Moretti sprang up from his chair to his full height, which would have been right at the police department minimum, if they still had one. He walked over and let his short-man frame tower over me as I stayed seated. I glanced at the chief’s office behind Moretti to the left. Parks’s eyes were on me and not his