A Body To Die For. G. A. McKevett

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СКАЧАТЬ curtain of Tammy’s stall and pulled it aside a few inches.

      A wet, sudsy Tammy whirled around, but Savannah pressed her finger against her lips in a silent “Sh-h-h,” then pointed to the plastic curtain that separated her shower stall from the one next to it.

      Tammy’s eyes widened, but she nodded.

      At least twenty thoughts and decisions processed in Savannah’s brain in the next few seconds, the major ones being: Weapon’s in my gym bag. Don’t pull it yet. Handcuffs in waistband. No time to call Dirk. Tammy’s wet and slippery. Won’t be much help.

      The most satisfying thought: Gotcha now, you dirt-sucking perv…

      And the uppermost thought any time she was getting ready to apprehend a perpetrator: Don’t get killed!

      A moment later, all conscious decision making was over, because an arm reached beneath the plastic curtain. And in its hand was an open cell phone.

      A video camera cell phone.

      And the user was pointing it up at them.

      Savannah felt, more than heard, Tammy’s sharp intake of breath as she instinctively moved back away from the camera and against the curtain on the other side of the stall.

      Stepping into the stream of the shower, Savannah reached down, grabbed the wrist, and yanked with all her might.

      Someone yelled.

      She felt him fall. Hard.

      But she hung on.

      The camera fell with a clatter, and Savannah was dimly aware of Tammy scooping it up and holding it to her bare chest.

      Savannah braced herself and gave the arm another jerk.

      Her illicit photographer came sliding, facedown, across the floor, under the curtain, and into their stall.

      Tammy squealed and tried to gather the curtain around her as Savannah twisted his arms behind him. A second later, she had him cuffed.

      “You got him!” Tammy shouted.

      Savannah flipped him over…and looked down into the frightened, youthful, pretty face of Dirk’s bimbo exercise companion.

      “And he’s a she!” Tammy added.

      When it came to stating the obvious, Tammy was gifted.

      Savannah loved her anyway.

      “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Savannah asked the girl, reaching up to turn off the shower, now that they were all three thoroughly drenched.

      “Nothing! I wasn’t doing anything!”

      “You were taking dirty pictures.”

      “I was not! I was calling my mom!”

      Savannah turned to Tammy, who was now cocooned in shower curtain. “Check that phone,” she told her. “Was the camera on?”

      Tammy nodded. “Still is.”

      “Turn it off and check to see what she got.”

      Good with techno gadgets, it didn’t take Tammy long to do as she was told. She squealed. “Oh, my gawd! She got my butt and from that angle, it looks as big as a bus!”

      “Don’t you dare delete it! That’s our evidence!” Savannah reached down and hauled the weeping girl to her feet. “What are you doing, taking pictures of women’s naughty bits? You’re not into girls; I saw you smooching Mr. Universe out there a few minutes ago. And you sure looked like you meant it.”

      “I…I…it isn’t that big a deal. I mean, it’s just some silly pictures and—”

      “Are you kidding me?” Savannah wished she had a bacon-greased skillet in her hand. “There’s a sixteen-year-old girl who’s afraid to leave her house now because you took some of your ‘silly’ pictures, posted them on the Web, and turned her into an overnight porn star.”

      The woman didn’t answer, just continued to sob.

      “She’s been downloaded thousands of times in the past few weeks. How do you think that makes her feel? How do you think her parents feel? I’ll warn you right now, girlie, her daddy wants a piece of you.”

      Tammy was holding the camera phone, watching her X-rated footage over and over again and shaking her head. “How can you do this to another woman…violate someone’s privacy like this?” she asked her. “Why?”

      “I didn’t want to,” she said, snuffling. “Really, I didn’t. He made me.”

      “Who made you?” Savannah asked, already knowing the answer.

      “Vittorio.”

      Savannah glanced over at Tammy and nodded toward the cell phone in her hand. Tammy caught her meaning and discreetly flipped on the phone’s camera, pointing it in their confessor’s direction.

      “Vittorio made you take pictures of naked women in public showers?” Savannah stated…for the record.

      “Yeah. He made me. Really he did.”

      “And how, exactly, did he force you to do this?”

      “He told me that if I didn’t do it, if I didn’t love him enough to do that one little thing for him, he’d break up with me.”

      Savannah gave her a long, steady, piercing look, until finally, the young woman broke eye contact and stared down at her wet shoes, shame and fear all over her face.

      “You think I’m disgusting,” she said, crying softly. “You think I’m worthless, total crap, giving in to a guy like that.”

      Savannah weighed the thoughts and emotions sweeping over her. “No,” she said, “I’m disgusted by what you did. I’m angry at you for hurting other women, but I don’t think you’re crap.” She sighed, removed one of the handcuff manacles from the girl’s wrist and attached it to the shower’s cold-water handle. “You’re the one who thinks you’re crap,” she said, “not me. Somewhere along the line somebody told you that you’re worthless, and you took it to heart. That’s the problem here. Otherwise, if you loved yourself, and some jackass like Vito suggested you do such a thing, you would’ve told him to turn those barbells of his into suppositories and then dive off the end of the city pier.”

      Savannah turned to Tammy. “Watch her till I get back.”

      “Sure.” Tammy nodded, as always, too eagerly. “And can I dry off and get dressed?”

      “No, you have to keep wearing that shower curtain until the CSI unit gets here and fingerprints it and swabs it for DNA.”

      Tammy’s big eyes widened and mouth opened and closed several times before she finally said, “You are kidding, right?”

      Savannah chuckled and shook her head as she walked away. She wouldn’t go back to being young СКАЧАТЬ