by Dale Mayer
“They didn’t,” he spat on the ground. “I woke up on a bench a few blocks away. But don’t worry. I know who is really responsible for this.”
“Not me,” Simon said mildly. He looked at him and said, “You’ve still got the gun, I see.”
“No,” he said. “It’s a second gun.”
“You went home and got your spare?” He thought about it and said, “That takes a certain amount of tenacity, especially if the rest of you looks anything like your face. I’m sure premeditation won’t be hard to prove.”
“You fucking cheated,” he roared.
“You’ve been cheating for months,” Simon said. “What makes you think you could get away with that forever?”
He stared at him. “I can’t go home,” he said. “You don’t understand. I can’t go home like this. My wife will kill me.”
It amazed Simon that these guys could face down all kinds of danger, even get their faces punched in, but the thought of going home and confessing to their wives what they’d been doing terrified them. Big strong men, shaking in their boots. “Yes, you can.” He turned and walked away.
“Wait,” the cheater called out.
Simon turned, looked at him, at the gun, and said, “If you shoot me, then you best make sure you kill me. If you’re after the money, most of it is gone already.”
The cheater stared in shock. Simon pulled out the bag to show him. At the sight of the much smaller pile, he looked like he would walk away. Simon shrugged and turned his back on him again.
A shot fired behind him.
Simon stood for a long moment, eyes closed in resignation, then turned to look. “Shit.”
Chapter 11
Friday Morning, Later
By the time she crashed in bed, Kate was so past exhausted, she didn’t have time for a shower. Waking up four hours later, she knew that was all the sleep she would get. She dragged herself from bed to stand under the hot water, as it sloshed over her shoulders. Her apartment still had boxes from when she’d moved in two years ago. It was the story of her life. She ate on the run, slept on the run, and everything else just came to a grinding halt.
She’d had a couple quick relationships over the last few years, but that was it. Now she didn’t even bother with those. Nobody understood her work; nobody understood her drive, and that was okay. She was who she was, and she’d be damned if she would give that up for anybody else anymore. She’d done that with her prior relationships, but she wouldn’t ever again.
She opened the fridge and found nothing to eat. She groaned. “I’ve got to get to a grocery store someday,” she murmured. Neither was there any more coffee. She rubbed her eyes, put on her holster and her jacket. Next, she put on her boots, which were looking more scuffed and well-worn than they should be, and headed out the door. She stopped at the first vendor and grabbed a pretzel, wondering how she was supposed to live on carbs alone. As she headed to the office and walked in, straight to the coffeepot, she noted she was the first one in.
She filled her big mug and sat back down and munched through the rest of the pretzel. The others all came in after her. They looked at her and groaned.
“Are you always so fucking early?” Owen asked.
“I couldn’t sleep,” she said. “What do you want me to do?”
“I don’t know. Roll over and try again?”
She shrugged. “It is what it is.”
“We don’t have anything to go on yet.”
“Maybe, but we do have to get somewhere on it.”
“Have you actually started working?”
“No,” she said, “too tired.”
“Great, you’re still human.”
She stared at him in surprise. “I’m pretty-damn sure that’s not what you were gonna say.”
“Yeah, it is,” he said. “You’re always first in, and you’re always last out. You’re always so damn perfect that you’re making the rest of us look like shit.”
She gave a startled laugh. “No,” she said, “I’m just doing my job so I get to keep it.”
He stopped at that, looked at her, and nodded. “That makes sense, and, by the way, I still could shoot you if you didn’t leave me any coffee.”
She was just so damn busy with all these cases now that she was eating, drinking, and sleeping them. She didn’t dare give herself a break because those kids hadn’t gotten one either. The last thing she wanted to be was a cop who was asleep at her job when yet another child was taken. She also knew she wasn’t to blame if it did happen, but the idea was pretty hard to live with.
By the time everybody was in, Colby stepped out into the bullpen area. “Report.”
“We could let her do that,” Owen said.
She stared at him. “You were the one who told me where to go.”
“To go where?” Colby asked. “What were you doing downtown anyway?”
“I was stalking Simon,” she said, a round of snide laughter came behind her. “The psychic,” she snapped. “With the info on the kids’ cases.”
Colby looked at her in surprise. She shrugged. “I followed him downtown, after talking to Jennifer in Missing Persons. They put a tail on him, so I went to join in on the fun. St. Laurant ended up in a private poker game and a couple oddities. We didn’t find Leonard, the missing seven-year-old boy, but I did find the toddler,” she said. She checked her watch. “And I checked the hospital this morning. I’m supposed to call at eight for an update.”
“But he was alive?” Lilliana asked from behind her.
Kate nodded. “Alive, bloodstained pants, but I don’t know if that was his blood or someone else’s. It broke my heart to hand him over though,” she said, staring at Colby. “I had just passed him over to the ambulance crew,” she said, “and was standing there, trying to regroup, when Owen called me to tell me they had found the little girl.”
“And how did that get called in?”
Owen looked at her; she looked back. “Simon St. Laurant.”
Colby’s eyebrows rose to the surface. “Him again?”
“Yeah, I warned him that he was a little too involved in my cases,” she said, “and either I would haul him in and see how he was involved, or he better get the hell out of my world.”
“Haul him in,” Colby said. “That is an order. We don’t want anybody with that kind of information walking around town.”
“I get it,” she said. “I talked to him last night. Well, way after midnight this morning.”
“And?”
“I’m not exactly sure,” she said. “I don’t think he had anything to do with it. He said that he just came upon her.”
“What, another psychic tip?”
“I suspect he’d say intuition more than anything.” Her phone rang just then. She looked down and frowned. “Jesus. It’s Simon.”
Colby said, “Answer and put it on Speaker.”
She groaned, hit Speaker, and said, “What do you want?” She knew the other detectives were startled at her response.
“I want to talk,” he said.
“That’s good, since my sergeant just ordered you brought in for questioning.”
“Oh, that’s nice,” he said. “Where do you want to meet?”
She looked over at Colby, and he pointed at his feet. “I’m not kidding,” she said. “Colby wants you in here for questioning.”
“Well, you tell Colby he can go fuck himself,” he said. “I just came from the hospital, and you’ve got another body here.”
“Did you kill this one?”
He gave a startled laugh. “No, I didn’t. He actually shot himself.”
“And why would he do that?” she said, slowly rising.
“Because he was at the game last night and lost everything.”
“And?” she asked. “There’s obviously more to that story.”
“Probably,” he said, and she heard the fatigue in his voice. “He accosted me on the street and accused me of cheating—which is projection, by the way. He was pretty de
sperate, and the rest of the group had beaten him up pretty good. He had a gun and held it on me. I kicked it out of his hand. He took off and came back later with a gun. I’d only manage to walk a couple of blocks. He pointed the gun at me, then decided that he would shoot himself instead. He pulled the trigger and blew his brains out all over the back alley.”
“Did you call it in?”
“I did,” he said. “It would have traced back to me anyway.”
“Yeah, it sure will,” she said. “So, if you’re at the ER, come straight down to the station, and we’ll take your statement.”
“As if,” he said. “I need coffee, and I need food. I haven’t slept, and my talk with the cheater was a little less than polite.”
“How less than polite?” she asked.
“The worst,” he said. “He shot at me first.” And, with that, he hung up the phone.
She looked over at Colby, but he was already swearing. He turned to the others. “Find out from the street cops what the hell the deal was with the cheater’s body last night. See where he was found, check out Simon’s statement to see if that’s correct, speak to the other poker players,” he said. “This guy is in the middle of way the hell too much. I want him either cleared, or I want him charged. You guys got that?”
She glared at him, picked up her coffee, threw back the rest of it, sucking up the last drop. Then she snatched her half-eaten pretzel and said, “I’m gone.” As she headed for the door, she heard a shout from behind her. She looked to see Rodney heading her way. “Colby wants me to go with you.”
She shrugged. “Whatever,” she said. “I’m calling Simon back to see where the hell he is.”
“Don’t you think he’s still at the ER?”
“Knowing him? No. He’s probably home.”
“Where is home?”
“Penthouse in False Creek North,” she said.
He whistled. “So this guy’s got money, huh?”
“He’s got money. What I don’t know,” she said, “is whether he got it legitimately or not.”
“But we can’t assume he did or he didn’t,” he said. “We have to look into this guy pretty closely.”
“Yeah,” she said, “he’s all over the place. Particularly considering he’s the one who found the dead little girl.”
“And he’s psychic?”
“Psychic is another word for charlatan, so maybe,” she said.
Rodney looked at her. “My grandmother had the sight,” he murmured in a calm, affable manner.
“Good for her, but she is still dead.”
A hard snort came from him on that. “You know, believe it or not,” he said, “death comes for all of us. You can do anything you want to avoid it, but death still has your name on its watch list.”
“I got no problem with death,” she said, “until it comes to people taking children’s lives, and then there is no forgiveness.”
“Got it,” he said. “But back to the psychic.”
“You mean charlatan. So what about him?”
“What if he is the real deal?” he said. “What if he actually can help us?”
“Oh. Well, he hasn’t helped us yet,” she said. “Why would he start now?”
“I don’t know,” he said, “but he called us on the little girl.”
“And she would have been called in within the hour anyway,” she said, the fatigue catching up with her. “I don’t know if this guy is for us or against us, and, like Colby, I would like to place him securely on one side or the other.”
“Not a problem,” Rodney said. “I’m here to help.”
And he gave her that big, affable overgrown-boy smile. She shrugged and not knowing what else to say, said, “Good. There’s lots to do. And someone I need you go pick up for questioning.”
*
Simon knew he would pay for his actions. “Everything had gone sideways,” he muttered over a glass of scotch, sitting on his couch, trying to enjoy the view from his penthouse. He slowly swirled the drink in his hand, as he thought about the repercussions of calling in the little girl’s location. Then the gambler’s suicide. It had been a hell of a night.
He had connections on all levels, and murmurs in the underbelly had reached him.
An underground group of pedophiles—who passed children between themselves—had alerted the others in the group, when the cops got too close. So far, locations of those bastards eluded Simon. As soon as he had his hands on one, he could break the chain, could share some concise information with the detective then, but finding the weakest link was so much harder now. They closed ranks to keep their little hobby going. They were depraved excuses of humanity.
He took a sip of his scotch and leaned his head back to let the hot liquid burn its way down his throat. He was cold; he was tired, and his mind kept going over and over the fact that she had been there.
The detective shouldn’t have been there, but he knew in his heart of hearts that, of course, she was there. She’d become his nemesis. At the same time, she’d also become that magnet he couldn’t resist. Like a moth to the flame, he knew he would get burned the closer he got, but he just couldn’t stop getting closer. In his mind, he could try to convince himself that it was all about the children, all about redemption for the past, but that wasn’t even working for him anymore.
Something was magnetic about her. Yet she was abrasive and didn’t suffer fools. More than didn’t suffer fools, he highly suspected she didn’t suffer very much at all in the way of human weakness. But everybody made mistakes, including her. His mind said that if he could find her mistakes, he could use it against her, but his heart told him not to. If it had been anyone else, he wouldn’t care.
He stared down at the scotch, remembering the promise he’d made to his grandmother to not head down the same direction a friend of hers had, supposedly a no-good drunk. Ne pas y aller. Simon had no recollection of him whatsoever. For that matter, Simon had no recollection of his birth mother either. Yet he vividly remembered his grandmother, who was with him for such a short time, following the abuse with his foster father, only to be yanked into that system again upon the death of his grandmother.
Leaving a ten-year-old boy alone in the world. Vulnerable. Innocent. A victim to be preyed upon. Again. Just like those other kids the detective tried to save.
Ne pas y aller. Simon’s promise to his grandmother had been easy to make at the age of eight, after suffering at the hands of his abusive foster father. Who knew that decades later, as Simon learned more and more, it was that much harder to separate right from wrong? And, for him, it was almost impossible anymore. The line had become such a knife-edge that he bled every day with the need to stand on that point. He did as much as he could on the right side to make up for every boy, like him, who had been wronged.
He leaned against the window and stared out at the bright morning. The city was stunning in its beauty, the sunrise scene absolutely glorious and rivaled any major city in the world, but, for him, this was home, the only place that felt right. He’d been home in the underbelly, and he was at home in the richness of the world above. The latter he’d worked long and hard to get to. And he had no intention of giving it up. Living behind bars was not for him either. Intriguing detective or not. One last flick of his wrist to toss back the last of the scotch in his glass, he prepared to get through the rest of his day.
*
He stared at the TV image of his China Doll. How had they found her so soon? He’d thought about a dumpster, and he’d thought about the water. Then he’d decided the back alley was probably better. He studied the school photo on the TV. She looked so happy and so young and innocent. He smiled. “She’d been such fun. But she hadn’t lasted. She’d been damaged,” he murmured, as he studied the blond curls. He gave a hard laugh at that. But still, there was the missing Leonard, and that little boy was fresh and young, might be a really good replacement for Jason. He’d love that.
They flashed a picture of Leonard up on the TV.
And his heart gave a happy sigh. “Now, all I have to do is find you, Leonard. I’m working on it.”
His group had made a pact a long time ago to share and to share alike, but they never actually had. It was like an open rule, where anyone would share, as long as you don’t ask to share. But, in this case, he wanted that little boy, and he had no intention of sharing. But he had to find him first. As he stared out the curtained window, he wondered which one of his so-called cohorts in crime had Leonard. And what would it take to buy Leonard.
He wanted him badly. Especially after missing out on the toddler. Why was there no news coverage for him? Was somebody else holding out on him? Because he hadn’t heard of Leonard being a guest with any of them.
And that made him angry. As he looked down at his fingers, clenched into balls, he was ready to punch a wall. He’d promised that he would keep the violence down, according to the landlord’s dictate that he’d have to leave if he couldn’t control himself. He should ask his sister for money again, so he could buy a small place, but she’d already told him no, that she had no money. Maybe that had been true before, but she was pulling in good money now.
At least he thought she was, just no way to tell. He didn’t get to go to her place, and she never came to his. That was also one of those unspoken rules. You’re part of my world, only as long as you stay outside of my world. That he was confined to his little apartment worked most of the time, and only now did he realize that he needed to reach out to grab what he wanted, and he didn’t have another place to do that. This was the one place he had that was safe. Sometimes he wished he had a playroom somewhere else. But that took money. At least for something fancier.
He sat down with a pad of paper and wrote down a bunch more thoughts and tidbits to feed his sister. It was important that he keep up their relationship. The only way he could do what he was doing and survive was that tenuous connection to her. Sure, they were blood, and they were connected by his deeds, but, more than that, it was by her curiosity. And he knew to keep feeding it. He’d been doing this for years, for decades, so it was easy to keep going on and on in circles, as if trying to confuse her.