by Elicia Hyder
“The Kings are no strangers to violence, but everyone should be extra cautious when making arrests concerning Kings’ Gold. Its markup is five hundred percent of their normal heroin, a price tag they won’t let go of without a fight,” Gregg warned.
“What junkie will be able to pay that kind of increase?” Legieza asked.
“One that’s promised this drug will reset their neuroreceptors. Hypnox supposedly offers something even better than the ‘first-time high’ habitual users have been chasing since they became junkies. Any more questions?”
Baker crossed his bulky arms and leaned back in his chair. “Where did the hypnox come from?”
Everyone shut up and listened. Me too, but for a wildly different reason.
Gregg shrugged. “We don’t know yet. It’s so rare that it hasn’t been seen since 1988.”
I wanted to disappear into the wall as Gregg used a remote to flip through some slides on the screen. She stopped on a blurry photo of a patch of black flowers almost as tall as the privacy fence behind it.
The picture was taken in the courtyard of my parents’ house.
“That looks like a poppy,” Rivera said.
Jones clapped. “Look at you, Martha Stewart.”
Gregg ignored them. “It is a member of the poppy family, and it’s harvested the same way as the opium poppy. The seed pods in this photo were scored to drain the hypnox.”
McCollum raised a hand. “Opium’s where we get morphine and heroin?”
“That’s correct,” Gregg answered. “The difference is the raw hypnox derived from these plants requires no refinement or production. It can be deadly straight from the pod in any amount. And whereas an opium poppy produces only drops per plant, the hypnox poppy can produce ounces of liquid per pod.”
“You think it’s growing here in Sapphire Lake?” Baker asked.
“We don’t know, but there is a chance.”
A bigger chance than she knew.
“Where was that?” I asked, pointing to the photo.
“This photo was taken right here in Sapphire Lake by an undercover officer. It’s the only known photo of the plant in existence.” Gregg’s gaze landed on me just long enough for me to notice. “To complicate matters, the press has learned that the same drug that killed those kids also killed Ryder Stone at the Drexler Resort.”
“Has there been any movement on the Stone case?” Jones asked.
“Not that I’m aware of. Any more questions?” Gregg asked. When no one replied, she turned toward Essex. “Do you have anything else?”
“If anyone is running low on gloves, masks, or Narcan, see me before you head out. Otherwise, everybody stay safe and vigilant tonight.” When everyone got up and started milling around, Essex faced me. “Meet you outside?”
“Yeah.”
Jones came up to us. “Sarge, I need another box of gloves.”
“You don’t need shit, Jonesy,” Rivera said, walking up behind him and grabbing both his shoulders. “Leave the real police work to the pros.”
“You’re such a dick, Rivera,” I said.
“Come on,” Essex said to Jones. “I’ll get you squared away.”
When they were gone, I stepped toward Rivera. “What’s your problem, man?”
“I’m just giving him shit, Nyx. Calm your tits.”
I wanted to punch him. “What were you and Baker gabbing about during the meeting?”
“I don’t know what you’re—”
“Don’t lie to me. You two hens were gossiping like a couple of mean girls. If you want to say something, man up and say it to my face.”
Rivera hooked his thumbs in his weapons belt. “I just heard you and Sarge were getting pretty cozy. Thought it was cute you two are patrolling together now.”
“You know what I heard?”
He lifted his brow in question.
“That you picked up a nasty case of crabs from a toothless hooker in Reno.”
His smirk went slack.
“But you don’t see me shoving my tongue down anyone’s ear to tell them about it during shift briefing, do ya?”
“Fuck you, Nyx.”
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” I called as he stormed out the door.
Baker filled the spot Rivera had vacated. “What the hell did you say to him?” he asked, smiling.
“I could ask you the same question. What were you two talking about?”
Guilt flashed in his eyes. “Nothing really. He heard from a chick at Sin City that you and Sarge were together.”
“The taco place?”
“Yeah.”
The memory of the night-shift manager’s boobs popped into my mind. “There’s nothing going on.”
“I know that. Hell, Rivera knows that too. Don’t let him get to you. What did admin want?” Together, we walked out into the hall.
“To tell me to go home. My paperwork says I can’t return to light duty until tomorrow.”
“That blows.”
“Yep. Be safe tonight, brother.”
“You too. See ya, Nyx.”
Essex came down the hall carrying a couple of boxes of latex gloves. He looked past me. “Is Rivera gone?”
“I hope so.”
He put the boxes on the table in the hallway as Gregg walked out of the briefing room. “Nyx, glad I caught you.”
For the first time ever, I was nervous to speak to her. “Hey. What’s up?”
“I’m questioning your mother tomorrow.”
I really wished people would stop calling her that. “So I heard. I’ll apologize in advance.”
“Think she’ll cooperate?”
“I wouldn’t pin too much hope on her. Helpful is not in Mal’s skillset.”
“Got any tips?”
“Yeah. Stock up on antacids, and make sure your Taser is charged.”
She and Essex both chuckled.
“Hey, I really appreciate you not putting a spotlight on me in there,” I said quietly to her.
“Don’t thank me. That was self-preservation. I don’t want you coming after my job once you make narcotics.” She winked one of her dark-brown eyes.
I smiled.
“Nice work today, by the way.”
“Thanks, but I literally did nothing. By the time we got there, the drugs were gone. Nobody else would have gotten hurt.”
“Maybe, but you freed up a lot of resources,” Essex said.
“And roped in another human who knows something about this shit,” Gregg added.
“Is Grumley cooperating?” I asked.
Gregg nodded. “Even told us she OD’d on the stuff a few days ago.”
“Really?” I lowered my voice. “What’d she say?”
She grinned like she knew what she was about to tell us would sound nuts. “She said she left her body.”
“Left her body,” Essex repeated slowly.
“Yep. Said she wandered the streets of Seneca Park. Even watched the sunset from the roof of the credit union.”
Essex let out a low whistle and swirled his finger around his ear. “Sounds like some good shit.”
My heart sank at his reaction.
Gregg laughed too. “Then she said some man dragged her home and forced her back into her body. When she woke up in a puddle of vomit and sweat, he was gone.”
“Did she say anything else about him?” I asked.
“Who?” Gregg asked, confused.
“The man who dragged her home.”
Gregg and Essex both looked at me like I was speaking another language. “Does it matter?” Gregg asked.
“She’s a junkie having hallucinations.” Essex’s voice had a “duh” quality to it that turned my stomach.
I looked away. “Yeah, you’re probably right.”
If I’d wondered at all how any kind of revelation about my new ability might go over, I would wonder no more. “Sarge, you ready to go?” I asked, steeling my face and my heart as I turned back toward them.
“Yeah. Thanks
for hanging around for briefing, Gregg,” Essex said, shaking her hand.
“Call me if you need to tonight. I’ll leave my phone on.”
I walked a few steps ahead of Essex on our way out. He jogged to catch up with me. “The stolen car they impounded from the Drexler is here. Wanna see it?”
“Sure.” I didn’t look at him.
“You OK?”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re pissed about something.”
I realized I could answer the charge without giving the real reason. “I found out Rivera is telling people there’s something going on with us.”
“What?”
I nodded. “Apparently, your busty girlfriend at Sin City Tacos has been running her mouth that we showed up there off duty together.”
“So?”
“So it makes us a talking point. I don’t need that right now.”
He used a fob on his keys to open the gate. “Since when do you give a shit about what anyone thinks?”
“About my job? Since always. Essex, my whole life has been an uphill battle with trying to be taken seriously.”
He held up his hands. “Whoa. Sorry I asked.”
Sure, I cared about the shit Rivera was trying to start, but not as much as I cared about the possibility that Essex wouldn’t believe me if I came clean about what I could do.
Or, even worse, if he did believe me, how it would change the way he looked at me.
He pulled on my arm to stop me. “Wait a second.”
Facing him, I folded my arms and waited.
“I’m sorry. Screw Rivera. Let him talk. You and I both know nothing’s going on here.” His eyes lowered enough to convey his disappointment about that.
“Right. Nothing’s going on.”
With a deep breath and a clenched jaw, he looked awkwardly around the lot. Neither of us spoke for a moment. Then he pointed at something.
I followed the direction of his finger to a dark-blue hatchback.
“I think that’s it,” he said.
Like a lot of cops, Essex was skilled at diverting away from painful personal subjects using work.
So was I.
I walked toward the car. It had a Nevada tag about to expire. “If the car was stolen, where’d the tag come from?”
“It was stolen too. Can’t remember the story behind it.”
Using my flashlight, I peered in the windows. Oddly, it was spotless. “Doesn’t look like it was driven much.”
“No. It was freshly detailed.”
“That’s weird.”
“Not if the driver was planning to use it to commit a crime.”
True. I walked all the way around the car, not seeing anything until I reached the passenger’s seat. In the floorboard was a sneaker.
A safety-yellow sneaker.
“Oh my god.”
“What?” Essex asked.
“I know who was in this car.” I looked at him. “Teek Fleming.”
Chapter Fifteen
“What do you think you’re doing?” Essex asked as I followed him out of the lot.
“I’m coming with you.”
“No, you’re not. Admin told you to go home.”
“You’re my boss. You can allow it.”
“And then we’ll both get written up.”
“Teek trusts me. You need to let me bring him in.”
Essex was torn. He stared past me.
I took a step closer. “You know I’m right.”
“Damn it, Nyx.” With a heavy sigh, he started walking again. “Come on.”
It was a twenty-minute drive past my neighborhood, down the mountain pass, to the Boro, where the Fleming family lived. I’d heard it was once the premier place to live—back before a psychic and her husband burned a cop to death.
Essex slowed as we neared Borg’s house. “If Borg is home, I’m calling another unit to come get Teek.”
Fair enough. I’d sworn to my doctor no fights.
I strained my eyes at the road up ahead. “Looks like Gramma T’s car in the driveway. I don’t see Borg’s truck.”
Essex pulled to the side of the road. “I’ll park here. Don’t want to risk him blocking us in.”
Smart.
The lights were on inside the mint-green single-wide. Essex studied the trailer. “You know what it means if Teek was in that car.”
“It means Kush is probably our John Doe.” I’d been trying not to think of it since we left the impound lot.
While Borg Fleming was notorious for smoking crystal meth and tearing up the neighborhood, his oldest son, Calvin “Kush” Fleming, was generally a harmless pothead. He had a record, like everyone else in his family, but he’d only been convicted of nonviolent crimes, like simple possession and loitering.
Teek and their grandmother would be lost without him.
We both got out, and I carefully checked the side yard as we approached the front door. Essex rang the doorbell, but it zapped his finger with electricity.
With a yelp, he jerked his hand back.
“You okay?” I asked, fighting to suppress a grin.
“No surprise they have this place booby-trapped,” he grumbled, pounding his fist against the door.
I doubted the doorbell hazard was intentional. The joints of the walls were rusted, and the railing around the small stoop was missing more spindles than it had.
The door opened with a loud creeeeeak, and Gramma T filled the opening and then some. With her wrinkled face and boxy mouth and chin, she always reminded me of a bulldog in a shaggy brown wig. Her stumpy legs and round body didn’t help.
Her brow furrowed. “Borg ain’t here.”
“Good evening, Tawny. We’re not here for Borg,” Essex said politely. “Is Teek home?”
“Depends. What’dya want with him?” She was staring at me, so I answered.
“We need to take him down to the station for some questioning. He isn’t in trouble.”
“Is that what you told him the other night when you hauled his ass to jail?”
“He held up a convenience store,” I said.
“With a cucumber!”
“Technically, a zucchini, but that’s beside the point. We need to ask him some questions about that night. Is Kush here?” I tried to look in over her shoulder, but she kept moving to block my view.
“I ain’t seen Kush in about a week. What’s this about?”
Next to Teek, Gramma T was the most passive of the Fleming bunch, but she wasn’t exactly cooperative. No matter what they’d done, looking out for her own was top priority.
“You haven’t seen him in a week? Did you report him missing?” Essex asked.
“No. Why would I? I don’t live here. Besides, I figured he’s been out burnin’ up the highways now that he’s got a car.”
The sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach plunged deeper and deeper. “Kush got a car?”
“Yeah. An old piece of shit if you ask me.”
“What kind is it?” Essex asked.
“I don’t know. Blue,” she said with a smirk.
Essex and I exchanged a look.
“Did you hear about the fire last week at the Drexler?” I asked.
“Of course. The news won’t shut up about it.”
“I believe our investigators found Kush’s car there. Teek’s missing sneaker was inside it,” I said gently.
Gramma T’s eyes narrowed, like she was trying to connect the dots but couldn’t.
I lowered my voice. “Tawny, it might’ve been Kush who died in the fire.”
She gripped the doorframe when her knees wobbled. Essex moved to help her, but she raised a hand to stop him.
“We don’t have any proof yet, but we need to talk to Teek,” Essex said. “Corporal Nyx found him down the road from the fire when it happened.”
She held her stomach and took a deep, shaky breath. Then she stared at me for a long and hard moment before looking over her shoulder. “Teek! Get in here!”
Down t
he narrow hallway to the left, I saw Teek’s head pop out of a doorway. Stretching on my toes, I waved.
He waved back. “Hi, Nyx.”
Gramma T pushed the door all the way open and motioned us inside. It had been a while since we’d visited Borg’s, but nothing had changed for the better. The brown shag carpet hadn’t been vacuumed, maybe ever. Water stains spotted the ceiling, and the wood paneling was pulling away from the walls. It smelled of bacon grease, dog piss, and stale cigarettes.
I wondered what Gramma T thought of the place. Her home up the road was old, but it was tidy.
“Teek, the cops wanna talk to you about Kush,” she said.
With a small skip, Teek started toward us. He wore red basketball shorts, an Iron Maiden shirt, and white socks.
“Have you seen your brother?” I asked.
“Sure!” Teek pointed to the only framed photo on the wall. A nineties throwback to when Teek and Kush were still toddlers, and to when Borg still had a wife and all his teeth. “There’s Kush.” He’d been a cute kid with an unfortunate bowl cut.
Now, in his midtwenties, Kush’s blond hair had grown long and straggly, giving him a Woodstock-era flair, appropriate for his love of all things marijuana. He had light skin, a slender face, and a chin dimple just like Teek’s.
“Have you seen Kush today, Teek?” Essex asked.
Teek shook his head.
“When was the last time you saw him?”
He pointed to the photo and laughed.
Frustrated, I tried a different angle. “Teek, do you remember the last time you saw me?”
Guilt lowered his eyes, and he nodded.
“Did Kush drive you to the Drexler that night?”
He nodded again.
“Why?” I asked.
“Kush told me to stay put, but he was gone a long time and I got hungry.”
“Was he visiting someone at the hotel?” Essex asked.
“His friend,” Teek answered. “I wasn’t allowed to go inside. Kush told me to stay in the car.”
“Have you seen Kush since that night?” I asked.
He thought for a moment, then shook his head. Gramma T covered her mouth.
I bent to look him in the eye. “Teek, do you mind coming down to the station to answer some questions for the detectives?”
“Sure, Nyx.” He turned around and put his hands behind his back.
With a smile, I touched his elbow. “Handcuffs aren’t necessary this time, buddy. Why don’t you get some shoes on?”