and staggered forward a few steps, as if trying to regain his balance. His awkward dance could have been a misstep, or it could have been designed to get him twenty feet closer to Nicole.
Whatever his intent, that was twenty feet too close.
Ryker killed his engine and got out of the car, not closing the driver’s-side door. He moved silently and quickly across the street and crept up behind the hooded guy.
The guy lifted his head. Had he noticed Ryker? He didn’t turn around. But he did take his hands out of his pockets, clench his fists and push himself to a quicker pace.
“Hey, lady,” he rasped, reaching out with one hand. “Lady, stop.”
Nicole’s shoulders tensed under the short-sleeved green top she wore. Her head turned slightly, acknowledging the guy’s voice.
“Lady, I just need to—”
Ryker didn’t wait to find out what he needed to do. He grabbed the back of the hoodie and jerked the lightweight sideways and threw him up against a chain-link fence.
Nicole spun around with a small cry.
The guy whooped and hollered in a squeaky voice. Ryker stuck his gun barrel just behind the guy’s ear. “Shut up and freeze!” he ordered him.
The guy’s legs collapsed underneath him and suddenly Ryker’s hand on the back of his shirt was the only thing holding him up.
“Stand up! Get your hands up.” Ryker jerked the hood down and pushed the side of his face against the fence. In the lights from the streetlamps, Ryker saw that he was a kid—eighteen or nineteen at the most.
“I didn’t do nothing,” the kid whined. “You’re hurting me.”
“Not yet I’m not. Shut up or I will. Spread your feet.”
The kid obeyed, nearly falling down in his haste to do what Ryker told him to. Without looking at her, Ryker spoke to Nicole. “You okay?”
“Yes.”
He quickly patted the kid down and found a wadded-up dollar bill and a few coins, a pack of cigarettes with a book of matches stuck inside the cellophane and—no surprise—a pipe. Probably a crack pipe. He fished it out.
“Turn around.”
The kid obliged, his gaze darting around, as if assessing the likelihood of an escape.
“Don’t even think about it. Look at me,” Ryker yelled. “And get your hands up.”
The kid raised his arms, but he had trouble keeping them up. He was fidgety, his face was pale and clammy and his nose was running. He lowered one arm and wiped his nose on his sleeve.
Ryker assessed the likelihood that he and the woman in the restaurant were in cahoots. By the contrast in their looks and dress, he doubted it, but he couldn’t afford to take a chance. The kid didn’t have a phone, but he could have ditched it.
“Who are you? Who sent you to follow her?”
“Who—? Nobody, man. Nobody sent me nowhere and I ain’t following nobody. I—” The kid giggled. “I don’t even know what street I’m on. I lost my car. I’m just trying to get home.”
The kid’s words were slurred and slow. Ryker peered at his face. His eyes never stopped moving. They were red-rimmed and teary. Sure enough, he’d been doing crack. He probably wasn’t lying when he said he had no idea where he was, much less where his car was. If he even had a car.
“Car? Where are your keys?”
“Oh, man.” The kid giggled again. “I musta lost ‘em.”
Ryker’s irritation ratcheted up a few notches. He got in the kid’s face. “Listen to me. If you don’t quit lying—” he doubled a fist “—I’ll fix it so you can’t talk at all. Got it?”
“Y-yes sir,” the kid stammered.
“What’s your name?”
“Duane.”
“What were you going to do, Duane? Rob her?”
“No, no man. I just wanted a couple bucks. You know, to catch the bus home.”
“Okay, Duane. Where’s your ID?”
Duane lowered his arms and pulled up his pants. “I left it at home,” he whined.
Ryker decided to believe him. For an instant he considered letting the scared kid go with a warning. But he decided he’d better do what he was supposed to do. He used his cell phone to call Central Dispatch and request a couple of Mandeville patrolmen to run the kid in and check for priors.
“Wait right here under this streetlight,” he told Nicole, then grabbed the kid by an arm and marched him over to his car. He pushed him against the car’s frame.
“Spread your feet,” he commanded.
“Aw, man. I ain’t never been arrested. Gimme a break.”
“Spread ‘em. You lost your chance at a break when you accosted the woman.” He pushed the kid’s head down against the back window. “Stay there.”
Reaching through the open driver’s-side door, he retrieved a flexible strap cuff and quickly secured the kid’s hands behind him. By the time he finished, a car marked St. Tammany Parish Sheriff’s Office pulled up and two uniformed deputies got out.
“Detective Ryker Delancey,” he said. “Got one for you.”
“Sweet,” the younger deputy said, while the older one groaned.
“Another hour and we’d be off duty. Now we got paperwork.”
“Sorry,” Ryker said, grinning. “He’s all yours.”
They marched the kid to the cruiser, settled him in the backseat and then drove away.
Ryker holstered his gun, locked his car and returned to Nicole’s side, ready to console and reassure her.
She glared at him. “You were following me?”
Ryker stared at her. “That’s what you got out of all this? Did you even notice that little jerk behind you? “
“Of course I did. But I’m less than fifty feet from my building.”
“Fifty feet?” Ryker laughed. “Might as well be fifty miles, if your throat is cut.”
Nicole’s head jerked slightly, probably at the image his words conjured.
“No.” She recovered and cut a hand through the air. “You’re just trying to distract me. You were following me. Have you done this for the whole past year?”
He shook his head.
“I don’t believe
