Don't Close Your Eyes (Stephanie Chalice Thrillers Book 1) by Lawrence Kelter

here.”
    “Good money?” Lido asked.
    “Great money!” she replied emphatically. She also gave us an affirming nod.
    “Were you working here Friday night?”
    “Uh huh.”
    “What time did you get off?” I asked.
    “About two. I wasn’t feeling well.” Katrina put her hand up to the side of her mouth partially covering it, and whispered to me as if Lido couldn’t hear what she was saying. “I got my period.”
    “Sorry,” I whispered back. Katrina didn’t know diddly. I was bracing myself for a long night. I was checking the carpet for telltale stains when someone knocked on the door. “Come!” I said come, not cum.
    Vincent opened the door. Paul Reynolds, one of the detectives on the squad, was with him. Paul had a duffle bag in his hand which he lifted and shook triumphantly.
    “We caught a break,” he announced. There was a huge grin on his face.
    Lido and I jumped to our feet. “Thanks,” I said to Katrina. “That’ll be all. Hope you’re feeling better.”
    Katrina cracked her gum. “I am. Thanks.” She got up and strode to the door. I couldn’t get over the way she walked. It was like her butt swiveled on ball bearings.
    Reynolds checked out her behind as she passed. “No, no. Don’t let me interrupt,” he pleaded.
    “You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” I said. Reynolds smiled. It was a typical guy’s caught in the act, shit-eating grin. I asked Vincent to give us ten minutes before he sent the next girl in. I turned back to Reynolds. “ Whatcha got?” I asked excitedly.
    “Our boys were cleaning up the basement of Samantha Harris’s building. Look what they stumbled on.” Reynolds reached into the shopping bag and pulled out a foot-long length of two-inch PVC plumbing pipe wrapped in a clear bag.
    “What the hell’s that?” Lido asked.
    “Check it out, Gus, it’s a homemade silencer. Our perp must have dropped it on the way out. It was the damnedest thing. They were kicking this thing all over the floor before someone took a good look at it. They thought it was a hunk of scrap just lying about.”
    Lido and I studied the device. As I said, it was about a foot long. Restricting caps with three-quarter-inch openings were screwed onto each end. “I shined my Maglite in there,” Reynolds said, “Looks like it’s filled with tennis balls.” Reynolds pointed to the end in Lido’s right hand. “The barrel of the gun was inserted in here. There’s scorch marks on the other end. Pretty damn clever if you ask me.”
    “That’s fabulous,” I said, “Nothing like a techno-fucking-homicidal-maniac to make things interesting. We’re looking for a guy like MacGyver with a few loose screws.”
    “This explains why the ME found bits of yellow fiber on the two gunshot victims,” I offered.
    “Good point,” Lido replied.
    “I’m going to rush this down to Aaron Kurtz in forensics. He’ll go crazy when he sees it. He’s into all this homemade weaponry shit,” Reynolds said.
    “I’ll take it. You know you want me to,” I said.
    “I’ll take it, Chalice,” Reynolds said in a totally unconvincing manner.
    I took the silencer out of Lido’s hands. “I don’t think I can take one more pair of enormous heaving breasts in my face. This is a man’s job. Besides, fair is fair.”
    “What do you mean, Chalice?” Lido asked.
    “You two can have at the bimbos. At least I’m leaving with something that’s long and hard.”
    Lido and Reynolds cackled and then smiled sheepishly. “Thanks, Chalice. We owe you big,” Reynolds said.
    I put the silencer into the duffle bag and headed for the door. “Just take it easy, you two. I’m going to dust the two of you for fingerprints in the morning.”

Chapter Thirteen
    I’m sure Lido wasn’t expecting me to knock on his door at midnight, but that’s exactly what I did. “Where’s the pipe? I want to see it … now!” He had that look on his face. You know the one I mean: What the hell are you doing here? There was fire in