A Hope City Duet

by Kris Michaels

  His cell phone rang as he stood looking at the murder boards that stood as sentinels in the early morning quiet of the precinct. He palmed it without looking at the caller ID. “King.”

  “Hey, Brock, we’ve got the initial swabs back and were able to confirm my findings against Jonas’.” Brock had seen Sean’s partner working in the warehouse, but he hadn’t had a chance to talk to him after the atom bomb also known as Samuel Treyson had detonated.

  “What’s that mean to me? Was this the work of your arsonist?”

  “It was arson, but not our serial arsonist. This was amateur hour compared to the guy we are tracking. I’m sending off the accelerant, but I think it is primarily gasoline. I'll let you know if they come back with anything different.”

  “So, our killer is probably trying to get rid of evidence and the body with an inept arson attempt. Nukes the building but not the body." Inept was right.

  “Yeah, that is what we’re thinking.”

  “All right got it. Tell Jonas I said hey, and we really do need to get together.” He turned at the sound of someone else coming into the bullpen via the stairs. He dipped his chin and acknowledged another detective who headed into the break room.

  “We do. I’ll send what I get back on the accelerant. Be safe.”

  “You too.” He ended the call, dropped into his chair, and picked up the receiver on his desk phone. Punching the scratched plastic button that accessed an outside line, he punched the sequence of numbers he knew by heart.

  “Assistant District Attorney Clifford Sand’s office. This is Miranda, may I help you?” As it always did, the soft low voice of Cliff’s longtime secretary greeted him.

  “Hey Miranda, is he in?” He leaned back in his chair and propped his feet on his desk.

  “Oh, hey Brock, he’s just left for a meeting. Can I have him give you a call? I know he wants to talk to you.”

  “How do you know that?” He threw one of his many stress balls into the air and caught it as it came down. Somehow, he’d become a collector of the squishy toys.

  “Because he asked me to remind him to call you after his meeting.” The “duh” was implied.

  “Yeah, okay. I’ll be here at my desk for the foreseeable future.” He sighed the last comment. The stacks of paperwork on his desk that needed to be completed for the ongoing cases pretty much guaranteed that.

  “It’s called job security,” Miranda teased.

  “I’d gladly switch jobs if it meant dead bodies stopped popping up all over the place.”

  "Ain't that the truth, honey. He shouldn't be too long. Maybe thirty minutes or so."

  "Okay, say hi to Doug for me." Brock liked Miranda's husband and he was one hell of a mechanic. He owned a big shop, Alston Repair and Towing, on Belmont Avenue.

  Grabbing his coffee cup, he hit the stairwell and trudged down to the basement to retrieve Treyson’s cell phone and an assortment of random receipts and business cards from his wallet.

  “That was quick.” Sergeant Timmons, or “Pops” as he was known to the officers around the 13th, signed him into the evidence room by swiping his badge through the system.

  “Yeah. Needed to clear my plan of action with the lawyers before I stepped off. Where is the inventory for the case?” The evidence intake desk was pristine. Pops was one anal son of a bitch, but that was why he lived down here in the hole.

  “Processed and filed. What do you think I am, a slacker?” Pops called up the electronic version of the inventory with a few strokes of his fingers. “Tell me what you need, I’ll have it removed, get the chain of custody tags signed off and have it delivered to you.”

  “Fuck, I think I’m in love with you, Pops.” He grabbed an available mouse and ticked the boxes next to the evidence he wanted to go over with Jordan before the man was pulled away from him and the case.

  “Mrs. Timmons would be upset if I drifted from my lane.” The old guy gave him a wink.

  “Yeah but think of the fun.” He laughed at Pops’ horrified expression and elevated his badge, swiping himself out of the room. The door buzzed open, and he headed back up the six flights of stairs.

  After a pit stop at the break room for a warmup on his go-juice, heavy on the cream and sugar, he dropped his ass at his desk and leaned forward to grab the paper file compiled on the young prostitute. The cover snapped back, and he once again examined her sophomore high school picture, one of two pictures they had of Caitlyn Eliason, aka Star. His vision shifted to the whiteboard and fixed on the grainy, enhanced duplicate of her high school picture taped next to the crime scene photo of her corpse lying bloody and beaten in a filthy alley. Her pimp was the primary suspect, but as of now, several of his girls were covering for him. Jordan had been working last night with a couple of the guys from Vice trying to apply pressure. The working girls were terrified of Gino and with good reason. They didn’t want to end up dead like Star. “Being used, abused, and treated like shit is better than being dead.” Yeah, those words actually came out of the mouth of one of Gino’s working girls.

  Which reminded him. He grabbed the middle desk drawer and yanked it. Damn it. Nothing happened. He grabbed the right top desk drawer, violently strong-armed it, and then shoved it back in. The desk moved several inches away from Jordan’s, but it popped the middle drawer open. He reached back and patted around until he felt the stack of business cards he wanted and reloaded his jacket with the cards. Tara McBride, Sean’s sister, was a social worker. She didn’t necessarily handle prostitutes, but if he could get the women to call her, she could plug them into programs. It was better to try to help than to do nothing and admit defeat like the women who worked the streets. He shoved the remaining stack back into the drawer and closed it before he reached for the folder on the drive-by.

  His phone vibrated. He grabbed it and groaned. He thumbed the slide on the face of the phone. "Hi, Mom."

  "I saw you on the news this morning. You looked tired. You've lost weight. What's wrong? Have you been sick?" Hannah King's questions fired as rapidly as machine gun bullets.

  "I look tired because I was called out at midnight last night, and I was wearing a coat, so you can't tell if I've lost weight. Which I haven't."

  "Your face is thinner, and they say television puts ten pounds on you. If you had a woman in your life, you'd look more relaxed. I wouldn't have to worry that you look like a walking skeleton. What did you have for breakfast?"

  "Mom, please. I gotta get back to work." He scrubbed his neck and sent a furtive glance around to make sure no one was overhearing this conversation. Several detectives were staring at him with shit-eating grins. Fuck him standing. His mother, he loved her, but damn...

  "Fine, but I want to see you, in person, not on the television."

  "I'm coming over for dinner on Sunday."

  His mom tsked. "I've heard that before."

  "Mom, I'll be there as long as the case permits. If you've seen the news, then you know this one is going to be difficult." He leaned forward and stared at the coffee ring on his calendar, trying hard not to hear the snorts and chuckles around him.

  "I miss you, sweetheart. It's been forever since we've talked. I need to know you're okay. You may be my oldest, but you will always be my baby. Please come see me."

  God. He dropped his head to the desk. "I know, Mom. I'll try. It's the best I can do."

  "All right honey. Be safe. I love you."

  "Love you too, Mom." He hung up and dropped his phone, his head still on the desk.

  "Yo, King, you die over there? Should we call your mom?"

  His arm elevated over his head, and he flipped the detective across the pen the finger. The entire room erupted in laughter. Fucking bastards.

  He sat up and buried himself in the specifics of requesting a task force to go into The Desert to search for their shooter when his phone rang. He picked it up without looking at the caller ID. His mom had never struck twice in one day. “King.”

  “Miranda said you called?” Cliff’s
gravelly voice cut across the connection. His old Recon commander was the toughest son of a bitch he’d ever met. No, strike that, second toughest man he’d ever met. His dad had the first slot firmly cemented.

  “Yes, and she said you wanted to talk to me. How about you go first?” Brock closed his eyes and massaged the bridge of his nose. He needed more coffee.

  “I’ll get to that in a minute. What did you need?” Cliff’s demand was reminiscent of bygone days and barked orders that Brock followed without question.

  He exhaled a long stress-filled lungful of air. “I have a dead body. The vic’s name is Samuel Treyson. I want to use the information on his phone to determine why the man woke up dead. I went to his residence to speak with his wife but was met at his door by a concrete wall of lawyers. The press was swarming the crime scene. Although his name was never transmitted over the airwaves—we made sure of that—they showed up knowing Samuel Treyson was in that warehouse. I left the crime scene and drove straight to Briar Hills; it was damn early, and it’s a quick drive. There was a crowd of press outside Treyson's house. So, number one, I believe there is a leak on the force. Two, I need a warrant so anything I get from these emails and texts can be used in court and three, I need a judge not in the Treysons’ pocket. I think that may take a miracle.”

  Cliff was silent for several long moments. “You have to know the Treysons might have a couple cops in their pocket.”

  “Yep, figured that.” His father hadn’t seemed too surprised that Mrs. Treyson had deferred his visit. His father was a straight shooter. Crooked cops were his number one target. He ran a tight ship and had cleaned house when he took over as commissioner, but rats scurry and hide. Sooner or later the remaining vermin would expose themselves and his father would be waiting for them.

  “I can get you a warrant. Judge Scottsdale isn’t impressed with wealth as her husband is independently wealthy. However, if Mrs. Treyson’s lawyers can find justifiable grounds to contest the warrant, you are back at ground zero.”

  “What reasons could they possibly have to contest a warrant when all we want to do is solve his murder?”

  “They could use the grounds that the information in his emails or his texts is privileged because he owns and operates a business. They could claim proprietary information. I would if I was her lawyer.”

  Brock grabbed one of his foam balls and squeezed the ever loving shit out of it. “So you’re telling me that a judge would limit my ability to conduct a homicide investigation to protect proprietary business information.” Son of a bitch, just when he thought he’d seen it all.

  Cliff made a noise of agreement. “Look at it from another angle. What apps does he have on his phone? Don’t list them off. But seriously, take a look at all his apps including games and the software that comes standard on the phone. I can get you a warrant for all the apps. You can go through the emails and the texts and take note of anything in particular that may assist the investigation. Should you find anything, then we go for a strategic strike and request a specific warrant for a specific email on a specific date and time.”

  “That won’t fall under the doctrine of ‘fruit from the poisonous tree’?” Brock shoved the folder he was working on to the side and stared at the desk blotter. He picked up a pen and doodled around today's date.

  “If we were trying Samuel Treyson for crime, then yes it would. However, he’s the victim. We need to keep that in front of everybody’s eyes. The lawyers can dance to any tune they choose, but we do have a very powerful tool.”

  “Yeah, and what tool is that?” Brock looked up from his desk blotter and nodded at his partner, who was walking through the bullpen toward him. Jordan was dressed to impress even though he was coming back from a night shift spent with Vice interrogating suspects and looking for witnesses. The guy always turned heads, both male and female. That vibe his partner threw off was potent shit if the action he got was any indication.

  “We have the press, which is a huge motivator. People like the Treysons live their life in the court of public opinion. If that information was leaked to the press, it could taint the public’s view of this storied family. If we hit resistance, we can use a nondisclosure guarantee to entice them to release what we need."

  “You are one devious son of a bitch, Cliff.” Brock laughed as his partner sat down across from him.

  “I prefer the term tactical."

  "Okay, you are one tactical son of a bitch, Cliff."

  “Yes, yes, I am. Give me thirty minutes then list those apps and call Judge Scottsdale. She’ll approve the warrant.” Cliff paused for several moments before he cleared his throat.

  Even though his old commander couldn't see him, Brock rolled his eyes. Whatever Cliff wanted from him, he was having a difficult time putting it out there. “Just spit it out, man.”

  "It's coming up on two years. I was hoping you'd be able to come with Zack and me to the cemetery. I don't know if I'll be able to drive after." His friend’s voice broke with emotion. His love for his late wife was still as poignant and tangible as the day he’d watched the man bury his soul mate.

  Fuck. He glanced at his desk blotter. Less than two weeks. "You know it man. Just let me know when to be at the house." He'd be there for his former commander. The man had always been there for him.

  "I will. Look, I gotta..." His voice trailed off.

  "Right man, me too. But you know I'm here, right?"

  "Always. Go catch a killer." The line disconnected before he could respond. He returned the phone to the cradle and glanced at his partner, who was messing with his cell phone, pretending not to pay attention to his call. "Did you get anything from Vice?”

  Jordan smiled.

  He felt a smug slice of satisfaction. “What’d you get?”

  “Two of the women in Gino’s stable, Mystic and Magic, rolled on the slimy bastard. We got the ladies downstairs. They should be signing their statements about now. Gino is in the holding cell. He’s made his one call, so there’ll be a lawyer present, but we got him. Both Mystic and Magic claim to have watched him kill Star. They have knowledge of the injuries that we didn’t release, and get this, they can place his so-called witnesses on street corners at the time of the murder. Vice is pulling camera footage to corroborate their statements, but it looks like a slam dunk.” Jordan leaned back in his chair and tugged at his tie, loosening the knot.

  “Have you called the ADA assigned to the case?” He grabbed Star’s folder, not sure which ADA was assigned. Getting Gino off the streets would be a major coup for both them and Vice.

  “Not yet. We are waiting for the techs in Vice to get the footage that proves Gino’s alibi is for shit, and then I’m going down, and we'll make the call together. We wouldn’t have been able to advance on this case without Vice's contacts and help.” Jordan extended his hand for Star’s file. He gratefully handed it over. Any day they could close a murder investigation was a damn good day.

  “So, bring me up to speed on the case we caught last night.” Jordan reached for his coffee cup and nodded to the break room.

  He grabbed his empty coffee mug and followed his partner. “The name Samuel Treyson ring any bells?”

  Jordan stopped, his brow furrowed, and he nodded. “Yeah, he’s in charge of Treyson Industries, right? Big money, affluent, a couple of mansions over in Briar Hills. Why?”

  “Someone killed him last night. HCFD found him in the ass end of a warehouse. Based on the lake of blood the man was lying in, it looks like his throat was slit at that location. No defensive wounds that I could see, and no signs of a struggle; I'm really curious to see the toxicology report. Part of the warehouse went up in flames, but thankfully HCFD did their job before it got a chance to burn up our evidence—what little there is.”

  "What did the techs find?" Jordan fished around for a new notebook. They both started a new spiral notebook with each new case. Field notes, leads, interview notes, drawings, they all went in new, pristine notebooks. It was a lesson they lear
ned early and fast. Submitting case file notes with other information for other cases scribbled on the margins almost lost them a case as the defense tried to insinuate shit based on those scribbles. Now everything was segmented, and nothing went on their phones. Ever. Pictures were taken with digital cameras, not cell phones. The SD cards with those pictures were labeled and placed in evidence bags that were attached to the notebooks and filed with the case as evidence. Being a cop was all about crossing the 'T’s' and dotting the 'I’s'. More crimes were solved by following boring anomalies in evidence then by breaking down doors. He reached beside his desk and into his open duffle, rummaging through and snatching the notebook he’d started last night.

  He tossed his notebook to Jordan and continued to talk as the man thumbed through his notes, diagrams, and initial questions the scene had raised. "There wasn't shit not covered in soot or ash. They busted their balls to get what they could. I have a feeling any physical evidence is going to be thin, so we need a solid motive and a strong suspect for this case. We'll start with Samuel’s phone, his receipts, and the business cards I found in his wallet.

  Jordan looked up from his notebook. His brow furrowed, “Why wasn’t this assigned to Briar Hill?”

  “My exact question to my father not more than an hour ago. He said Briar Hill would be there to support us, but this is our baby. I need more coffee.” They continued to the break room and the coffee pot. He elbowed his way in front of his partner to fill his coffee cup.

  “So, the case is ours. If we need assistance from The Hill, Dad suggested we contact Jeremiah or Fisher.” They’d worked with those two detectives before, and it didn’t totally suck.

  “So, we hit Treyson’s evidence while I wait for Vice?”

  Brock nodded toward the bullpen. “Yeah, and we need to request the Lieutenant put together a task force to shake loose our shooter in The Desert.”