Read The Chill of Night for Free Online Page B

shouldn’t be. He didn’t call it in until today. About an hour ago.’
    ‘You call Fortier?’
    ‘Yeah. Told him what I just told you. He said he’d brief Shockley.’ Chief Shockley wanted to be kept up to the minute on any homicides. There weren’t many murders in Portland, and when they happened he hated to look dumb in front of reporters. Especially the one he was sleeping with.
    The knocker knocked again. ‘Just a damned minute,’ McCabe yelled at the door. Then he said into the phone, ‘Okay, Mag, I’ll be right there.’ He hit end call and exited the men’s room. The knocker gave McCabe what he figured was supposed to be a withering look. McCabe smiled back sweetly. ‘All yours.’ He threaded his way through the crowd and out the door. He called Kyra from the street.
    ‘Don’t tell me,’ she said. ‘I can guess. You’re not coming.’ She sounded more disappointed than angry.
    ‘No, I’m not, but not for the reason you think. I was on my way to the gallery when Maggie called. They found a dead body dumped on one of the piers.’
    ‘Murder?’
    ‘Looks that way.’
    ‘I’m sorry,’ she said.
    ‘Me, too. About everything. I want you to know that. And I want you to know I want to be there. How’s the turnout?’
    ‘Great, considering the weather.’
    ‘Any reaction from the other major Maine artists?’
    ‘Actually, Marta Einhorn’s being very gracious. The others haven’t said much. Oh, and Joe Kleinerman from the Press Herald –’
    ‘The arts critic?’
    ‘Yeah. He wants to do a piece about my work.’
    McCabe spotted a PPD black-and-white unit heading east on Congress. He stepped into the middle of the street and flagged it down. ‘That’s great. Listen, I’ve got to go now. I love you. I wanted you to know that as well.’
    ‘Yeah. Me, too.’
    McCabe hung up. A young Asian patrol officer pulled up. McCabe leaned in and flashed his shield in case the guy didn’t recognize him. It wasn’t necessary. The Lucas Kane case last year had made McCabe a minor celebrity, not just in the department but pretty much all over the city. He’d even gotten some press in New York. ‘Hiya, Sergeant. What do you need?’
    The cop’s name tag identified him as T. Ly. Probably the shortest last name in the history of the department. Cambodian, McCabe guessed. There were quite a few Cambodians living in Portland. Most resettled as refugees back in the nineties.
    ‘Ly?’ McCabe asked, pronouncing it Lee. ‘Right pronunciation?’
    The man nodded. ‘It’ll do.’
    ‘Can you get me to the Fish Pier? Like fast?’

Three
    McCabe squeezed into the front seat, space made tight by the unit’s onboard computer. Ly flipped on lights and siren, pulled a U-turn on Congress, and took off. It took less than two minutes to reach the Fish Pier. A sprawling waterfront complex off Commercial Street, the Portland Fish Pier was home to businesses serving the city’s working waterfront, especially its struggling groundfish industry. A PPD unit blocked their way. Ly cut the siren and rolled down the window. The wind was howling even louder than before. A cop leaned in. ‘Hiya, Sergeant. Go on down to the end of the pier.’ He pointed. ‘You’ll see a bunch of units pulled in by the Vessel Services building. Can’t miss ’em.’
    Ly followed the road that looped around to the end of the pier. On their left, McCabe noted the boxy silhouette of the Portland Fish Exchange. A few years ago it would have been lit up and busy. Tonight it loomed dark and empty. A once thriving auction market where trawlers working out of Portland and a handful of other Maine ports sold their catches, the exchange had fallen on hard times. Federal regulations aimed at replenishing fish stocks cut trawlers’ days at sea to a bare minimum. Catches and income were way down. Adding insult to injury, McCabe remembered reading, legislation backed by Maine’s powerful lobstermen’s lobby was keeping the fishermen from making a few