LITMIR.BIZ

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Jack might be a bit of a prick, but he could handle the press as well as anyone. There had to be more to this than the boss was letting on. “What aren’t you telling me?”

      “Nothing.” Holcomb shrugged, his innocent expression making Gabe even more convinced the DA had a secret agenda. “You’re my best prosecutor. You’re taking this one. End of story.”

      Gabe picked up the file and stood. He knew when to press his luck and when to walk away. “No problem.”

      “I’m not done yet.” Holcomb motioned for Gabe to sit back down, so he did. “There’s another matter we have to discuss.”

      “Is there a problem?” Gabe’s frown deepened.

      “I understand you’re thinking about running for this position when I retire next year.”

      “Yes, sir.” Running for public office was the next logical step in Gabe’s career plan. First district attorney, then the state legislature and maybe even Congress. He figured he’d have to wait a few years before starting down that road. But Holcomb’s announcement that he wouldn’t run for a third term had sped up Gabe’s timeline a bit.

      “I expect you’ll want my endorsement.”

      “I was hoping.” Holcomb just admitted Gabe was his best prosecutor. That had to count for something.

      “You’re an excellent lawyer, Gabe. The youngest man ever to head Special Victims.” Holcomb tilted his chair back, and Gabe’s heart rate kicked up a notch. This was it. Holcomb was going to give him his thumbs up. And with his backing, Gabe would be the front runner for DA.

      “But I can’t endorse you.”

       Wait, what?

      The “thank you” he’d been about to utter stuck in his throat. Gabe barely suppressed a cough. “I don’t understand.”

      “There’s more to being district attorney than trying cases.” Holcomb crossed one ankle over his knee. “You’re the face of the division. The people’s representative.”

      “And you don’t think I’m ready for that?”

      Holcomb twisted the gold signet ring he always wore on his right pinkie finger. “I don’t think the people of Manhattan are ready for you.”

      “What’s that mean?” Gabe rubbed the back of his neck. He’d been crusading for justice ever since fourth grade, when he’d begged to be appointed hall monitor so he could help stop the bullying that went on behind the teachers’ backs. Now the feeling of his well-orchestrated future slipping away washed over him like fog. Cold. Damp. Foreboding.

      “Let me put it to you this way.” Holcomb tented his fingers under his chin. “Remember the grand opening of the Family Justice Center?”

      Gabe shuddered.

       As if he could forget it.

      The ceremony had been the one and only time Holcomb had asked Gabe to stand in for him. And it was a disaster from beginning to end. All his courtroom skills had deserted him. He’d flubbed the deputy mayor’s name, accidentally insulted the governor’s wife and dropped the cartoonishly large scissors trying to cut the damned ribbon.

      But that wasn’t even the worst of it. No, the worst came later, at the reception, where he had to mix and mingle. Make small talk. Be charming.

      He’d tried. But the harder he did, the more awkward the conversations became. He was about as charming as a cardboard box. He’d ended up leaving early, claiming he had to prepare for a trial the next day.

      He could face a panel of black-robed Supreme Court justices. A jury of his peers. But put him in a room and make him talk to strangers one-on-one?

      Crash and burn.

      “Stick to your comfort zone.” Holcomb spun his chair around to reach for something on the credenza behind him, dismissing Gabe. “Shaking hands and kissing babies isn’t your forte. And it’s a job requirement for district attorney.”

      “I can learn,” Gabe insisted. “Give me a chance.”

      Holcomb twirled back around to face him, considering him through narrowed eyes. “Tell you what. The Feast of San Gennaro is in a few weeks.”

      “Right.” Everyone knew that. The Italian street fair was one of New York City’s biggest and most popular events.

      “I make a point to attend every year. Come with me, prove you can fit in with the crowd, and I’ll reconsider.”

      “Fit in?”

      “Meet people. Talk to them. Show me you can convince them to vote for you.”

      “It’s a deal.”

      Gabe rose, and Holcomb followed suit, extending his hand. “Good luck.”

      “Thanks.” He was going to need it. Because he had less than a month to learn how to “fit in” with the masses who populated the festival. And no freaking clue how he was going to do it.

      * * *

      “NOT IN SERVICE my ass.” Devin punched the End Call button on her cell phone.

      Her boss and mentor, Leo Zambrano, looked up from the triceps he was tattooing and smirked. “You realize you’re talking to an automated message, right?”

      “That low-life, rat bastard PI’s disconnected his phone.” She circled her station at Ink the Heights, the Washington Heights tattoo parlor where she’d worked since she was eighteen and Leo had caught her camped out in the storeroom. Instead of the boot, he gave her an apprenticeship, and he put up with her even on days like today. It was a damned good thing her next customer was running late. In this mood, she might accidentally stab him with a needle.

      “The one Manny referred you to?” Leo wiped a spot of blood from his customer’s arm with a paper towel and studied his handiwork. The dark outline of a phoenix rising from the rubble of the Twin Towers stood out against Hector’s olive skin. “His cousin’s friend’s sister’s boyfriend, or something?”

      “Yep. The jackass totally screwed me. Took my thousand-dollar retainer, told me he was on the trail of a hot lead then disappeared.” She paced between her station and Leo’s, needing some way to work off her anxiety short of tipping over the autoclave and dumping sterile instruments all over the floor.

      “Can’t Manny track him down?” Their errand boy knew everything about everyone in the Heights.

      Devin shook her head. “He tried. Says the guy dumped his cousin’s friend’s whatever three days ago and hopped a plane to Miami. Probably his first stop on his way to San Juan. How am I going to find Victor now? All I hit on my own was dead ends. And I can’t afford to pay anyone else. Hell, it took me months to scrape up that thousand.”

      She balled her hands into fists. It wasn’t just the money that got to her, although losing a grand sucked big time. It was that for the first time in years she’d felt like she was getting close to finding her brother, only to have that hope snatched away, leaving her empty, depressed and mad as hell at the snatcher.

      Then there was the article she’d read a few weeks ago in the Times about a group home for mentally disabled adults in the Bronx that was shut down after reporters for one of the local news programs found residents being verbally abused, pushed, kicked, starved and even spat on. What if Victor was in a place like that? “I swear, if that little pissant shows his face in this neighborhood again I’ll...”

      “Kick him in the balls?” Leo smirked and went back to tattooing. “Like you did to Fast Fingers Freddie?”

      “Worse. More like rip them off and shove them down his lying throat.”

      “I could loan you—”

      “No.” She stopped pacing to stare him down. “I’m not taking your money. Haven’t

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