tricks Binder with vince

She got up, walked around the table, and seized Binder by his close-cut head. It didn't provide much of a grip, but she used it to shove his head roughly down to the top of the table. Then she took the key back from me, undid the other set of cuffs, and released him.
"Get out," she said quietly.
Binder stood up slowly, straightening his clothes. He leered at Murphy, winked, and said, "I'm a professional. So there's nothing personal, love. Maybe next time we can skip business and give pleasure a go."
"Maybe next time you'll get your neck broken resisting arrest," Murphy said. "Get out."
Binder smirked at Murphy, then at me, and then sauntered out of the room.
"Well?" I asked her.
She turned and held out her hand. Several short hairs, some dark and some grey, clung to her fingers. "Got it."
I grinned at her, and took the hairs, depositing them in a white envelope I'd taken from Rawlin's desk. "Give me about a minute and I'll have it up."
"Hubba hubba," Rawlins said through the intercom speaker. "I like this channel."
"This is a great way of chasing down the bad guy," Murphy said half an hour later. She gave me a pointed look from her chair at her desk. "Sit here and don't do anything."
I sat in a chair next to her desk, my hand extended palm down in front of me, holding a bit of leather thong that ended in a simple quartz crystal in a copper-wire setting. My arm was getting tired, and I had gripped it under my forearm with the other hand to support it. The crystal didn't hang like a plumb line. It leaned a bit to one side, as if being supported by a steady, silent puff of wind.
"Patience," I said. "Binder might not be a crispy cracker, but he's been in business for a couple of decades. He knows why you grabbed him by the hair. He's learned to shake off something like this."
Murphy gave me an unamused look. She glanced at Rawlins, who sat at his desk. The desks were set up back-to-back, so that they faced each other.
"Don't look at me," he said, without glancing up from his sudoku puzzle. "I don't run as fast as I used to. I could get used to chasing down bad guys like this."
The crystal abruptly dropped and began swinging back and forth freely.
"Ah!" I said. "There, there, you see?" I let them look for a second and then lowered my arm. I rubbed my sore muscles for a moment. "What did I tell you? He shook it off."
"Oh, good," Murphy said. "Now we have no clue where he is."
I put the crystal into my pocket and grabbed Murphy's desk phone. "Yet," I said. I punched in a number and found out that you had to dial nine to get out. I started over, added a nine to the beginning of the number, and it rang.
"Graver," Vince said.
"It's Dresden," I said. "Tell me what he just did, like thirty seconds ago."
"Be patient," Vince said, and hung up on me.
I blinked at the phone.
Murphy looked at me for a second and then smiled. "I just love it when I don't know part of the plan, and the guy who does is all smug and cryptic," she said. "Don't you?"
I glowered at her and put the phone down. "He'll call back."
"He who?"
"The PI who is following Binder," I said. "Guy named Vince Graver."
Murphy's eyebrows went up. "You're kidding."
Rawlins began to chortle, still working on his puzzle.
"What?" I said, looking back and forth between them.
"He was a vice cop in Joliet a couple of years ago," Murphy said. "He found out that someone was beating up some of the call girls down there. He looked into it. Word came down to tell him to back off, but he went and caught a Chicago city councilman who liked to pound on his women for foreplay. What's-his-name."
"Dornan," Rawlins supplied.
"Right, Ricardo Dornan," Murphy said.
"Huh," I said. "Took some guts."
"Hell, yeah," Rawlins said. "And some stupid."
"It's a fine line," Murphy said. "Anyway, he pissed off some people. Next thing he knows, he finds out he volunteered for a transfer to CPD."
"Three guesses where," Rawlins said.
"So he resigns," Murphy said.
"Yeah," Rawlins said. "Without even giving us a chance to meet him."
Murphy shook her head. "Went into private practice. There's a guy who is a glutton for punishment."
Rawlins grinned.
"He drives a Mercedes," I said. "Has his own house, too."
Rawlins put his pencil down and they both looked up at me.
I shrugged. "I'm just saying. He must be doing all right for himself."
"Hngh," Rawlins said. Then he picked up his pencil and went back to the puzzle. "Ain't no justice."
Murphy grunted with nigh-masculine skill.
A couple of minutes later, the phone rang, and Murphy answered it. She passed it to me.
"Your guy's a nut," Vince said.
"I know that," I told him. "What's he doing?"
"Took a cab to a motel on the highway north of town," Vince said. "Stopped at a convenience store on the way. Then he goes to his room, shaves himself bald, comes out in his skivvies, and jumps in the damn river. Goes back inside, takes a shower-"
"How do you know that?" I asked.
"I broke into his room while he was doing it," Vince said. "Maybe you could save your questions until the end of the presentation."
"Hard to imagine you not fitting in with the cops," I said.
Vince ignored the comment. "He takes a shower and calls another cab."
"Tell me you followed the cab," I said.
"Tell me your check cleared."
"I'm good for it."
"Yeah, I'm following the cab right now," Vince said. "But I don't need to. He's headed for the Hotel Sax."
"Who are you, the Amazing Kreskin?"
"Listened in on the cabbie's CB," he said. "ETA, eighteen minutes."

Turn Coat Chapter 31, Page 292-296


Murphy eyed me, after Vince left, and smiled. "The mighty Harry Dresden. Subcontracting detective work."
"They're expecting me to be all magicky and stuff," I said. "And I gave them what they expected to see. Binder wouldn't have been looking for someone like Vince."
"You're just annoyed because they pulled that trick on you," Murphy said. "And you're taking your vengeance."
I sniffed. "I like to think of it as symmetry."

Turn Coat Chapter 32, page 300