Uh-huh, he said. Thought it might be.

If it’s too much for you, come up with something else, I said. But I think it’s all we can do.

I could see him thinking it over. He knew I was baiting him, but there was just enough truth to what I had said, and enough pride or anger in him that he didn’t care.

Let’s have it, he said at last.

Oscar got away, I said.

Looks like it.

That only leaves one person we can be sure Dr. Danco might be interested in, I said, and I pointed right at his chest. You.

He didn’t actually flinch, but something twitched on his forehead and he forgot to breathe for a few seconds. Then he nodded slowly and took a deep breath. Slick motherfucker, he said.

Yes, I am, I admitted. But I’m right, too.

Doakes picked up the scanner radio and moved it to one side so he could sit on the open back gate of the van. All right, he said. Keep talking.

First, I’m betting he’ll get another scanner, I said, nodding at the one beside Doakes.

Uh-huh.

So if we know he’s listening, we can let him hear what we want him to hear. Which is, I said with my very best smile, who you are, and where you are.

And who am I? he said, and he didn’t seem impressed by my smile.

You are the guy who set him up to get taken by the Cubans, I said.

He studied me for a moment, then shook his head. You really putting my pecker on the chopping block, huh?

Absolutely, I said. But you’re not worried, are you?

He got Kyle, no trouble.

You’ll know he’s coming, I said. Kyle didn’t. Besides, aren’t you supposed to be just a little bit better than Kyle at this kind of thing?

It was shameless, totally transparent, but he went for it. Yes, I am, he said. You’re a good ass-kisser, too.

No ass-kissing at all, I said. Just the plain, simple truth.

Doakes looked at the scanner beside him. Then he looked up and away over the freeway. The streetlights made an orange flare off a drop of sweat that rolled across his forehead and down into one eye. He wiped at it unconsciously, still staring away over I-95. He had been staring at me without blinking for so long that it was a little bit unsettling to be in his presence and have him look somewhere else. It was almost like being invisible.

All right, he said as he looked back at me at last, and now the orange light was in his eyes. Let’s do it.

Dexter 2 – Dearly Devoted Dexter

CHAPTER 22