Storm's Cage by Mary Stone (uplifting novels .TXT) 📕

her attention back to the road. The sun had barely crested the horizon, and traffic was mercifully light.

Rather than the field office, her first stop of the day was the CPD building that had been home to Ian Strausbaugh. Before leaving her apartment, Amelia had called the murdered cop’s precinct’s captain to recite the phony reason for the FBI’s involvement in the investigation.

Well, the explanation was only partly phony.

She was part of the Bureau’s Organized Crime Division, and she was interested in reviewing the Strausbaugh murder for potential Leóne involvement.

She’d just left off the part where the victim—the detective—was the Leóne involvement.

During her late-night research session, Amelia had noticed that Ian and his partner had a disproportionate number of Leóne-related cases in their jackets. Her first thought was that the men might have been assigned to the Leónes like Amelia and Zane had been, but when she looked through the files a second time, a new pattern had emerged.

Whenever Ian and his partner took over a Leóne investigation, the outcome was almost always exoneration of the accused or failure to pursue criminal charges due to a lack of evidence. She might have written the dispositions off as incompetence or circumstance, but the two men had a high arrest and conviction rate otherwise.

Amelia didn’t have to stretch her imagination to picture the detectives as friends of the Leóne family.

However, if they were aligned with the Leónes, then there was enough to establish motive for a D’Amato lieutenant, like Gabriel, to execute one of them.

And right now, motive was the only part of the Strausbaugh case that made a lick of sense.

The alleged murder weapon, a Glock nine-millimeter, was the same handgun that had been used to kill Gerard Portelli in self-defense three years earlier. Alex’s lieutenant, Gabriel, had registered the handgun with the state of Illinois, and he’d obtained a permit to carry a concealed weapon.

It made no sense for Gabriel to use his own personal weapon to murder a Chicago Police detective. Not to mention, the Glock had been kept under lock and key in the CPD’s evidence locker.

Did they think Gabriel had pulled a James Bond and snuck into the precinct right under the noses of fifty or more detectives?

No. More than likely, the assumption was that a dirty cop had retrieved the nine-mil and returned it to Gabriel. However, Alex had said himself that the D’Amatos didn’t have many friends in the area around Strausbaugh’s precinct.

No matter how little sense the entire scenario made to Amelia, physical evidence was still king. Juries loved physical evidence, and she was sure a competent prosecutor could play down all the holes in the story.

Motive, ballistics, and Gabriel’s lack of an alibi would outshine circumstantial evidence on any day of the week.

Shaking off the contemplation, she pulled into a vacant parking stall beside a black and white police cruiser. Her thoughts had been so focused on Ian Strausbaugh’s murder that she could scarcely remember the drive.

Manila folder in one hand, paper cup of coffee in the other, she looked to where her smartphone rested in the cupholder. Glancing from the coffee to the folder, she elbowed the driver’s side door closed with a thud that reverberated through the parking garage.

No one would miss her for a couple hours. Plus, this way, she could completely ignore Joseph Larson while she was here.

As she set off for the stairwell, the faint echo of another person’s footsteps drew her attention to the adjacent row of parked cars.

Leopard print handbag slung over one shoulder, neat mini braids pulled back in a low ponytail, Natasha Reyman looked as put together as the first time Amelia had met her. All except for her eyes. Amelia recognized the tired and rundown pair of bags weighing Natasha’s expression down.

Amelia cleared her throat to get Reyman’s attention.

Recognition brightened Natasha’s face as her gaze fell on Amelia. “Agent…” she stopped short and tapped her temple, “Storm. Agent Storm, good morning. Sorry, it’s still early. It’s a little hard to remember names at this hour.”

Amelia couldn’t agree more. She fell into step, walking alongside the taller woman. “No worries. I expect that at quarter after seven.”

As Natasha pulled open the door to the stairs, she flashed Amelia a curious look. “Speaking of, what brings you out to our neck of the woods so early in the day?”

Amelia waited for the detective to step onto the landing before she replied. “Well, as luck would have it, I was actually here to talk to you about the case you’re working on. I called the precinct captain and explained the whole thing.”

“Oh.” Natasha blinked a couple times and shook her head as if she were clearing the early morning dust from her thoughts.

Amelia could relate. If she hadn’t been up since five drinking coffee and researching Ian and his partner, she’d be slogging through consciousness just like the CPD detective. “Sorry for the late notice. My…colleague and I were just working on an urgent investigation, so I didn’t have the time to give much forewarning.”

“Okay, right, sure.” Natasha chuckled. “Believe me, I know how that goes, especially lately. So, you’re here about the murder of Detective Strausbaugh? Why’s the FBI interested in that?”

When they reached the ground floor, Amelia pried open one of the glass doors. “I’m following up on it to look for any potential Leóne family involvement. After the Kankakee County farm, we’re keeping a closer eye on the Leónes and their activities.”

The more times Amelia recited the explanation, the more official her story sounded.

She had to remind herself that she wasn’t lying. If the Leónes were involved in Ian Strausbaugh’s murder, the case would go straight into the Bureau’s mounting RICO investigation.

One of Natasha’s eyebrows quirked up. “Leóne involvement? The prime suspect right now is a D’Amato lieutenant.”

Amelia reined in her expression, not wanting to give away her knowledge. “You’re a damn good detective, so you have to have realized that more than a few parts of the Strausbaugh case don’t make any