Code Four

by Colin Conway

  As Clint saw it now, he had two strong cards to play. If the Ocampo bullet matched the Talbott bullet, all the weight of all the circumstantial evidence reached a breaking point, at least for everything that happened in the aftermath of the Trotter shooting two years ago. And if he could find Earl Ellis and convince the man to become a cooperating witness, Ellis would provide sufficient evidence for much that had happened more recently.

  More recently? That seemed like a weak way to describe the murder of Gary Stone.

  He glanced up at the sound of motion nearby. One of the evening janitors was reaching for a trash can and dumping its contents into the larger container on her cart. Clint recognized the woman, who most of the detectives mistakenly thought was Russian. Clint knew better. She was from the Ukraine.

  Clint glanced at his own trash can, which was empty. Unlike some of his colleagues, he only used it for true garbage. Any scrap of paper from his official investigations went into the shred bin. Any Garrett paperwork he no longer needed, he burned himself.

  The janitor gave him a perfunctory smile as she drew near. “All empty still?” she asked, her accent thick but her words easily understood.

  He nodded.

  “Always. You are very clean man.” Her smile ticked up a notch and her eyes joined in.

  She has a nice smile.

  Stay on task. He gave her a professional nod and turned back to his file.

  Build the case.

  Get the Ocampo bullet match to the Talbott bullet, and that links Garrett. Test the drugs from Pomeroy’s suicide, which strengthens the case, along with Nona Henry’s identification and all the circumstantial evidence.

  That’s one.

  Ezekiel Hetzel murdered Sonya Meyer. Garrett found Hetzel’s dead body.

  That’s two.

  And three?

  Three was pretty straightforward, too, the more Clint looked at it. Leon Strayer had ambushed and killed Officer Gary Stone. Garrett had shot and killed Strayer immediately after that. To everyone who had investigated, including the hapless county homicide detectives, it looked like a clear-cut case of an officer returning fire after his partner was shot. To Clint, it looked like Garrett was following the first rule of assassinations.

  Kill the assassin.

  Because dead men don’t talk.

  So far, it had worked, like everything else Garrett had gotten away with. But Clint had seen Garrett meeting with Ellis, though he wasn’t able to get a photograph. He did get photographs of Ellis meeting with Strayer. Several of them on more than one occasion.

  All of it painted a clear picture to him, one very different from the public view of the situation. Of course, he had the advantage of knowing that Captain Farrell had foolishly taken Stone into his confidence regarding Garrett and his plan to trap the dirty officer.

  Farrell’s trap fared no better than Talbott and Pomeroy’s did. Clint didn’t know for sure how Garrett figured out that Stone was a mole inside the Anti-Crime Team. He suspected Stone simply told him, as the younger officer had come more and more under the sway of Garrett’s larger-than-life persona. Either way, Garrett made his decision, told Earl Ellis, and Ellis gave the task to Leon Strayer.

  Can you fucking prove it?

  Clint stared down at his work. Strayer was dead. Stone was dead. Only Ellis remained. Ellis could detail this murder-for-hire plot and put Garrett at the head of their new operation. He was the linchpin.

  Ellis.

  That’s three.

  Clint pushed the notepad away and rubbed his tired eyes. So many moving parts. So many places for a defense attorney to trip up the case.

  His stomach rumbled. He glanced at the clock and was surprised to see it was almost seven. He’d been at this for hours and had come to the same conclusion he always did. He needed just a little more, so that when he slapped the cuffs on Garrett, they stayed on. Anything less, and he risked not only a failed case, but increased scrutiny on him and Farrell for their off-book investigation. DOJ would feast on that.

  Clint rose and walked through the bullpen. Most of the desk lights were off and all the desks were empty. He listened and heard no movement or signs of anyone present. That decided it for him. He made his way to Marty Hill’s desk.

  When he reached it, he hesitated. He’d never broken into another detective’s desk before. The truth was, he’d never even slid open an unlocked drawer to borrow a pen. He respected private space since he expected others to do the same for him.

  Clint worked his jaw, considering for a moment. Then he realized there was no decision to make here. He’d come too far.

  There were a few files in a plastic file rack on the desktop, but he quickly determined that none were the Ocampo file. He tried the file drawer and discovered it was locked. He went back to his desk and returned a short time later with a thin tool that he inserted into the lock, making short work of the crude mechanism.

  Once inside, he flipped through the files. Hill appeared to sort his older files by report number, which also meant they were in reverse chronological order. It didn’t take long to find the Ocampo file. He pulled it out and set it on Hill’s desk, opening it. He leafed through the organized contents until he reached the lab reports. Turning to ballistics, he found the report he was looking for.

  He didn’t even have to read the official report. Hill had a small yellow sticky note in his own handwriting on it.

  Examined and entered—no match.

  Clint blinked at that. No match? He wanted to say that was impossible, but of course that wasn’t true. So what was possible? Logically, either he was wrong in his belief that Garrett had used the same gun, or…what?

  Or Liberty Lake hadn’t submitted their bullet for testing yet.

  Clint frowned. That hardly seemed likely. Maybe Garrett had used two different guns. Going even further away from his working theory, maybe someone other than Garrett had been responsible for one of the shootings.

  He shook his head. There was too much circumstantial evidence in support of Garrett’s involvement.

  That left Liberty Lake. Clint resolved to go to the neighboring department tomorrow to find out. It wasn’t his place, but he couldn’t let that stop him. He was the only one trying to bring about any semblance of justice here. If he had to violate a few points of protocol, so be it.

  Clint returned Hill’s file to its place and locked the drawer. Then he packed up his own notes, locked his desk, and went home for the night. But on the way, he drove past Aurelia Ellis’s house, just in case.

  Zielinski was watching the home, and there was no sign of Ellis.

  Clint drove home, weary to the bone.

  Chapter 26

  God damn DOJ. They’re going to blow everything.

  Tom Farrell sat at the dinner table, poking absently at his potato. The sound of Steve Curado’s patronizing voice still rang in his ears. Even worse, so did his own weak replies to the lawyer’s questions.

  He had to give them credit. They zeroed in on exactly what he had been most worried about. He knew the department was overwhelmingly clean, and if DOJ looked just about anywhere else, that’s what the investigation would show. But like a pack of bloodhounds, they smelled what was rotten. And even though the rot emanated from Tyler Garrett, Tom Farrell knew it had infected him now.

  This is going to get ugly before it’s over.

  “Tom? Did you hear me?”

  Farrell shook his head slightly and looked at his wife. “I’m sorry, what?”

  Karen Farrell frowned. “You haven’t heard anything I’ve said.”

  “Sure I did.”

  “Really? Then what’s your answer. Red or blue?”

  “Blue,” Farrell replied, picking what seemed like the safer color.

  Her frown deepened. “That’s interesting, because I asked if you thought we should replace the washer and dryer.”

  The sinking feeling in Farrell’s stomach got another ping. “I’m sorry. I’m a little distracted.”

  “No
kidding.” Karen took a deep breath and let it out. Then she reached out and touched Farrell’s forearm. “What is it?”

  He put down his fork. For the thousandth time, he wished he could just tell her everything, but the time for that had passed, and now wouldn’t come again until everything was finished. “It’s DOJ,” he said, not entirely untruthfully.

  Karen stared at him for a few moments, then stood suddenly. She picked up her plate, then grabbed his, and marched into the kitchen.

  “Hey!” Farrell said. “I wasn’t done.”

  “Well, I am,” she snapped back at him. He heard the dishes clatter into the sink. A moment later, Karen reemerged from the kitchen. “Do you think I’m a fool, Tom?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Then why do you talk to me like one?”

  Farrell looked at her, confused. “I…”

  “You’ve been distracted for months. You’ve been acting strangely for months. And you’ve clearly been stressed out to the max for months. So don’t try to tell me that all of this is because of DOJ’s arrival. They just got here.” She crossed her arms. “Tell me the truth, Tom.”

  Farrell didn’t answer. He closed his eyes, then rubbed his palms into them.

  “What is it?” Karen asked.

  “I can’t…”

  “You better,” she snapped. “This has gone past all of the bullshit of confidential information. If something is having this big of an impact on you, I need to know.”

  “It’s not that easy,” he said.

  “You think living with you like this is easy? Seeing whatever it is eat away at you?”

  “Karen…”

  “Tell me, Tom. Is it work?”

  “I told you. It’s DOJ.”

  She shook her head, her jaw set. “They may be adding to it, but you’ve been this way for too long. It’s something else.”

  “I told you what it was.”

  She hesitated. Then she said, “Maybe it isn’t work. A while ago I joked about you having a mistress, back when you were running the Anti-Crime Team. Do you remember?”

  “I remember.”

  “I’m starting to worry that I shouldn’t have made that joke. The way you’re not talking to me makes me wonder if that’s what it really is. An affair.”

  Farrell laughed, but it came out as a derisive bark. “That’s not it.”

  “Then tell me what it is. Maybe I can help.”

  If Wardell Clint can’t help with this, I don’t think you can.

  “Honey, I am telling you the truth. Yes, I have been stressed out. A lot has happened, and there is a lot of pressure on me. DOJ being here only amplifies that, but I’ve been dealing with all of the things that brought them here for a while now.”

  “Like what?”

  “I can’t tell you.”

  Karen stood in front of him, her arms crossed. She glared at him in sullen silence. Farrell felt like he should say something, but no words came. So he just returned her gaze, waiting.

  Finally, she spoke in a low voice. “In all the years we’ve been married, you’ve never told me that you can’t share something with me. Never. You tell me it’s confidential so that I know never to disclose it to anyone. And then you tell me, Tom. That’s what you’ve always done.”

  “This is different,” he said.

  She stared at him a little longer. Then she said, “That’s what worries me.”

  She left him there, at the dining room table. He heard her head upstairs and knew he wouldn’t see her for a while. Not that he blamed her.

  He was suddenly thirsty. He reached for his glass of water, but it was empty.

  Chapter 27

  The waitress arrived with their drinks. A Pendleton whiskey for Watson and a pale ale for Curado.

  “And your cabernet,” the waitress said. She placed a tall glass in front of Édelie Durand.

  The three of them nodded to the waitress and she moved off.

  They were again seated in the Peacock Room, although tonight they’d gotten a round table near a window. People of all types meandered by outside on the sidewalk. There were young couples holding hands, businessmen and women leaving their offices late, and the wandering homeless who always seemed to be mumbling to themselves.

  Durand’s thoughts were on her husband, Roland. She hadn’t been able to Skype with him before getting together with her team. He had texted to say that he was going to bed early. Unfortunately, Roland spent most of his life in bed now. What that text really meant was that he was going to sleep. She wouldn’t get to talk with him until tomorrow morning. That put her in a sour mood.

  “As I was saying,” Dani Watson said, “when I asked Baumgartner about Tyler Garrett’s ambush, he shit a brick.”

  Durand grimaced behind her wine glass.

  “How so?” Curado asked.

  “Want my honest opinion?”

  “No, I want you to lie to me,” Curado said. “Probably like you do to your boyfriend.”

  “Ouch,” Watson said, “but well played. Anyway, I think Baumgartner forgot about it.”

  “About an officer getting ambushed?” Curado leaned back in his seat. “I don’t buy it.”

  She waved off his disbelief. “He didn’t forget that Garrett was shot at. He’s not stupid. I’m saying he forgot that the shooters hadn’t been found. My question surprised him.”

  “Doesn’t he have someone investigating it?”

  Watson smiled. “After he phased out for a moment, he said it was still an open investigation.”

  “Two years later?” Curado glanced at Durand. “You would have thought they closed it by now.”

  “Exactly,” Watson said. “That’s my point, exactly.”

  Durand lifted her wine glass. She wasn’t wearing lipstick tonight so the only smudge on the rim was oil from her skin. There weren’t any left-behind kisses. Her mood soured further, and she shifted her gaze to Curado. “Anything about the Farrell interview surprise you?”

  He sipped his beer and thought for a moment. “He seemed sort of evasive.”

  She glanced at Watson before asking, “Sort of?”

  Curado smiled. “It was hard to tell if he was being so on purpose. He flipped the interview on me, you know? Started asking about me, my brother the cop, how I could do this job. That kind of stuff.”

  Watson nodded. “Classic avoidance.”

  Durand cupped her wine glass in both hands. “Go on.”

  “Avoidance,” Curado muttered as if reconsidering his thoughts on Farrell. “Right. Anyway, I gave him some rope and answered his questions. When I brought it back around, I asked about his relationship with Captain Hatcher. I thought it would be a simple question for us to ease back into the interview with, a softball, if you will, but then he stumbled all over himself. Stammered quite a bit just to assure me there was no problem between the two of them.”

  Durand set her wine glass on the table. “That’s not what Hatcher said.”

  “Yeah?” Watson said. “What did she say?”

  “She said she came up with the idea for the Anti-Crime Team.”

  Watson chuckled. “Like she invented directed enforcement teams. The woman sounds delusional.”

  “She claims she brought the idea to the table,” Durand said, “and then Farrell stole it.”

  Dani Watson’s face flattened. “Farrell stole it?”

  Durand nodded. “That’s what she said.”

  “The fucker,” Watson blurted.

  Durand didn’t bother to hide her displeasure of her subordinate’s cursing.

  “Farrell gave her credit,” Curado insisted. “He told me the chief assigned it to him, but he gave her full credit. No stammering with that part of his statement.”

  “Could they both be telling the truth?” Durand asked.

  Her subordinates glanced to the other then back to her. “Maybe,” Watson allowed, and Curado nodded his agreement.

  Durand lifted her glass for a sip then paused. Over the noise of the bar, she
heard a song she recognized. It was an old one that always brought a feeling of melancholy to her. As Eric Clapton sang “Tears in Heaven,” she fought back the sudden desire to go to her room, crawl into bed, and pull the sheets over her head. She faced the windows and did her best to ignore the music. Passersby did little to distract her from Clapton’s heartbreaking tune. When Dani Watson said something that caught her attention, she reengaged with the conversation.

  “What was that? What did you ask?”

  Watson was surprised at Durand’s forceful tone. She carefully repeated her question. “I asked if he thought maybe Farrell felt guilty for stealing Hatcher’s idea.”

  “But he didn’t steal it,” Curado said.

  Dani Watson frowned. “C’mon, you know what I mean. Does he feel guilty for it getting assigned to him?”

  Curado shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s possible. Does it matter?”

  Watson sipped her drink then pointed with the glass still in her hand. “It does if he got a man killed with an ill-gotten team. Can’t sit well.”

  “Do you think he lied?” Durand asked.

  The question stopped both of her subordinates and they watched her.

  “About what?”

  “About how he and Hatcher got along?”

  “No,” Curado said. “And if he did, it was a small one. Maybe to protect their positions. I think he was forthright with everything else. We talked about how he staffed the team, about each—”

  “Baumgartner,” Watson interrupted, “he told me he selected the team personnel. Both can’t be telling the truth.”

  Durand inhaled deeply as the music continued to bother her. “Baumgartner is the chief. Everything his people do are his ultimate responsibility. Perhaps he was taking the position that he would run interference for them. That’s not a lie.”

  “It’s not truthful,” she said.

  “It’s leadership,” Durand muttered.

  “You’d do that for us?” Watson asked.

  Édelie Durand glanced between her two subordinates then sipped her wine. The song was thankfully almost over.