by James Hunt
Hart floored the accelerator, and Cooper raised her weapon then moved her free hand to the door handle. She braced herself as Hart plowed into the front yard, smashing the fence, and slammed on the brakes just before they reached the front door. The SWAT team exploded out of the rear van doors, and Cooper quickly fell into line as they stormed the house.
The first two SWAT officers used the ram and knocked down the front door. Cooper hurried inside behind them, all of her energy focused on the sight at the end of her pistol. She hurried past the living room, where they had already subdued suspects. It was a mixture of women and men, most of them naked as they were handcuffed and pinned to the floor. Cooper pushed past the living room and into the hallway, which opened up into a back room that was encased in plastic.
Lab equipment sat on tables. Beakers, boilers, and test tubes were filled with liquid, some of the contents broken and spilled in the hasty retreat. Gunfire turned her attention to the door on the opposite side of the room, and she sprinted through the empty drug lab. She stopped at the doorway, checking the hallway before entering, and saw the backs of three SWAT officers crouched by a door further down the hall, gunshots filling the air.
Cooper joined them, approaching carefully. Bullets exited the open door and redecorated the hallway into a block of Swiss cheese. She smacked the SWAT member closest to her on the shoulder and hand signaled the approach inside. The rookie returned a nervous nod and positioned himself low at the corner. Cooper held up her hands and counted down. On zero the four of them burst inside.
A shotgun shell exploded to Cooper’s left, peppering the drywall with lead. Cooper returned fire, sending two bullets into the gunman’s chest, while the second gunman squeezed off a round into one of their own before being taken down. When Cooper looked back to the door, the young man who’d followed her inside lay unconscious on the floor, one his team members hovering over him, checking for a breath and pulse. “Stay with me, rookie!”
Cooper clutched her radio as she exited the room and continued down the hallway. “We have an officer down. We need the medical team inside.” Cooper clicked the radio off and missed the dispatcher’s response as she reached for another door handle at the end of the hall, only to discover that it was locked.
Two more officers appeared in the hallway, one of them carrying the steel ram that was used at the front door. Cooper summoned them to her. They paused at the door then thrust the heavy piece of metal into the wood. The doorframe splintered into toothpicks and Cooper burst inside the room, pistol first. Hands immediately shot up in the air, all belonging to women huddled in the corner. Cooper scanned the faces, but none of them were Beth. “Shit.” She lowered the weapon, and excited chatter flooded the radio.
“We have two suspects fleeing on foot out the back. I’m in pursuit.”
Cooper recognized Hart’s voice and sprinted toward the rear of the house. On the way she passed more rooms, each of them with suspects in cuffs or on the floor. When she burst into the backyard two dogs barked and lunged for her, but their leashes kept them tethered. She pumped her legs, feeling the burn in her muscles and lungs as she listened to the heightened panic of her partner’s voice on the radio followed by gunfire.
“Shots fired! Shots fired!”
Cooper skidded to a stop and shifted direction back to the main street. On the way her left calf cramped, and by the time she reached the road she was half running, half limping. The voice over the radio replied in out-of-breath gasps as she saw Hart walking back down the street with one of the SWAT members marching two men in handcuffs forward. “Suspects in custody. Is the house secure?”
“House secure.”
“Casualties?”
“Roterro is on his way to the hospital. It doesn’t look good.”
Hart and the SWAT member shoved the two men forward. Both suspects were dressed in wife beaters and had shaved heads and chains around their tattooed necks. “Did you see her inside?” Hart asked, keeping a tight grip on the suspect.
“No.” Cooper brushed away a few wild strands of hair that had broken free of her ponytail. By the time they returned to the house, everyone inside was cuffed and dumped into the living room. Cooper pulled a picture out of her back pocket and shoved it in every face she passed. “I’m looking for this woman.”
One of the men on the floor lifted his bald head, flashing the chrome and gold in his teeth. “Yo, fuck you, lady. We ain’t saying shit!”
Cooper eyed him, but the stare down did little to affront the gangbanger’s gaze. She tucked the picture back in her pocket and positioned herself right in front of him. She gripped his throat, her fingers digging into his soft flesh. The man choked, shaking his head, trying to free himself. “I don’t have the time for your small-dick-compensating backtalk. If you know something, speak up.” She leaned her ear closer, but the man only gargled and gasped from the pressure on his throat. “What was that?”
“I don’t…. know… her!”
Cooper grimaced then thrust the man’s head back. He hacked and coughed while she returned to her profiling the rest of the bodies in the room. She pulled the picture back out, lifting their chins up forcefully. “Look at her! Do you know where she is?” Heads shook back and forth in response, and she felt her cheeks flush hot. “Where is she?” Spit flew from her mouth, and the words left in a scream.
“Cooper.” A hand touched her shoulder, and Hart pulled her back. She felt herself hyperventilating and rushed out front into the open air. The lights from the squad cars flashed silently, and citizens had stepped from the safety of their homes to look at the raid in their neighborhood.
Cooper felt eyes on her, the SWAT team whispering to one another, whispering to themselves. That’s all anyone ever did around her. Whisper. She heard it on the streets, and she heard it within the precinct. The devil detective. She’d welcomed the title in her younger years, wearing it like a badge of honor. But as time passed that badge had hardened like a callus. She distanced herself from everyone: her co-workers, significant others, friends, and family. And now, with her sister in the hands of a psychopath, those whispers were all she had.
“Hey.” Hart stepped around her, breaking her train of thought. “Are you all right?”
Cooper wiped her sleeve under her nose. “I’m fine.” She looked back to the house, forcing herself to regain composure. “We need to get all of those people to the station, get them booked, check any aliases and co-conspirators they might be connected with.”
“You think one of them took Beth?” Hart asked.
“No. But the bank account that purchased those security locks was tied to this address. It means something. We just have to figure it out.”
Chapter 2
The ride back to the station dragged. Cooper rode shotgun and rubbed the dark circles under her eyes, trying to erase the story of her sleepless night. She’d worked these hours before, but for the first time in her twenty-one-year career she felt the hands of time catching up with her.
Hart remained quiet on the way back, and kept both hands on the steering wheel at a perfect two and ten. Her new partner had yet to loosen to her methods, though she’d been impressed by the way he’d handled things so far. She broke the silence, needing a distraction. “You did good today.”
“Thanks.” He sounded surprised, but grateful.
Cooper flexed her wounded hand, the scrapes over her knuckles from the fight with the wall earlier still cracked and bloodied. “How’s your wife doing?”
Hart cleared his throat. “Good. The hospital switched her to day shifts because of the pregnancy, so she’s enjoyed that. Though that hasn’t helped my sleeping pattern. She gets up to pee every thirty seconds.”
“How much longer?”
“Just a few weeks.” Hart smiled, beaming with pride over his young wife, but despite playing grown-up, the young detective looked like he was barely out of high school.
Cooper glanced down at her stomach, not realizing she’d done it until she fel
t Hart looking at her. She tugged at her seatbelt, pretending she was adjusting it and quickly changed the subject. “Stay with the booking officers when we get back to the precinct. Make sure we run background and alias checks on our meth lab techs.”
The rest of the trip was in silence, and when they arrived at the precinct Hart did as he was told and helped the returning SWAT team put their suspects through processing. Cooper cursed under her breath when she saw the news van stationed outside, and made it a point to avoid the front door on her way inside. But even when she made it inside, past the inquiry of the reporter, she still wasn’t free of a scathing.
“Cooper!” The usual disdain in Farne’s voice had thickened into a concoction more wicked than normal. “My office. Now!” The walls rattled when he slammed the door, and every eye in the precinct shifted to Cooper.
When she took her first step Hart fell in line beside her. “It’s all right.” She left Hart in the hallway, and braced herself for whatever shit storm the captain wanted to kick up this time.
Farnes stood next to his landline, the girth of his stomach resting on some of the desk space. His face was red, but whether that was from anger or having to stand up for a period longer than ten seconds she wasn’t sure. “Baltimore General just called. Roterro’s dead.” He tapped his foot impatiently. “It was his first raid.”
Though she remained rigid, Cooper felt a cold stream flood through her veins and her heart slowly sink into her stomach. The rookie’s blood-filled mouth and crimson-stained chest flashed in her mind. “Have we notified the family?”
Farnes slammed his fist on the table, the loud smack proceeded by rattling monitors and stationary. “It was your decision to put a team together to rush that house, and what did it get you? Do you have the killer in custody? Any new leads? No!”
The captain’s vigor wasn’t misplaced, but it was fueled by the hot anger already present in his view of her. And while Cooper felt the weight of the officer’s death, she wasn’t going to let Farnes use it against her. “It’s part of the job.”
“You really are a heartless bitch, aren’t you?” Spit flew from Farnes’s mouth. He left the crutch of his desk and steadied all his weight on his own steam, shuffling across the carpet. “The chief is being notified of Roterro’s death right now. What do you think he’ll do when he finds out another officer died because of your relentless pestering?”
“You can go fuck yourself. Captain.” Cooper swallowed the temptation to punch him and left the outburst at insubordination.
“This is all on you, Detective.” Farnes thrust his chubby finger and his accusations in her face. “The raid was based off of your evidence, your leads, despite my direct order for you to drop the case.”
“Which was before my sister was taken!” Cooper’s face and neck flushed a bright red, and the vein along her neck pulsed. “Every time we step outside it’s life or death, but I suppose that’s hard to tell since you don’t squeeze your fat ass past your desk.” Before Farnes had a chance to reply, she left and slammed the door shut on her way out, again rattling the precinct walls.
The door to Farnes’s office whooshed open, and the captain followed her into the heart of the bullpen, the officers at their desks stopping their work and turning their attention to the scene unfolding. “You won’t be able to hide behind that badge much longer, Cooper! It can’t handle the weight of two dead officers!”
The precinct went silent, and Cooper stood frozen, surrounded by the heated stares of her peers that meant to set her ablaze. Despite her reputation, the only thing she was ever guilty of was doing her job, and though she landed on the right side of the law, it was on the wrong side of the unwritten rules of police fraternity.
“For those of you who haven’t heard,” Farnes said, projecting his voice through the precinct, “Officer Roterro was killed today during a raid organized and planned by Detective Cooper.”
Cooper slowly turned, facing the unadulterated hate that was hot enough to melt the metal off her badge. The same look her fellow officers cast in her direction now were the same she’d seen on murderers she’d thrown in jail. It was a hate that dwelled in the bones, a primal vengeance only used against the unholy. And Farnes wasn’t afraid to stoke the fire.
“Officer Roterro leaves behind a wife and two-year-old son.” Farnes stepped between desks, officers rising when he passed. “Another valiant officer, cut down by a bitch who doesn’t know what she’s doing.”
Every officer stood now, and Cooper was surrounded by a sea of snarled lips, dead eyes, and flushed red cheeks. When she testified against her former partner she received death threats, and her office, car, and apartment were vandalized, but the aura in the precinct was different now. Empty threats were over. “I followed the best lead that I had.” Cooper’s voice was hoarse, and her body was so hot it felt like she would burst into flames. “Officer Roterro was a good officer—”
“Fuck you, bitch!”
While the voice remained hidden in the sea of faces toward the back, the words were sharp and poignant like a slap in the face. A wave of nods echoed their agreement, and a few more statements were tossed her way before Hart stepped by her side, pulling them both from the line of fire and into the safety of their office.
Hart locked the door, and Cooper pressed her back flush against the wall, her face and neck shiny with sweat. “You all right?” Hart asked.
“Hell of a first week for you.” Cooper spoke the words breathlessly and cleared her throat.
“Yeah,” Hart said, chuckling. “Nothing says sink or swim faster than getting paired with the most hated detective in Baltimore.” He twirled his wedding ring nervously. “I must have missed that portion on the detective’s exam.”
Cooper drew in a few deep breaths and regained her composure, looking at their evidence board to date. “Where are we at with the drug dealers we brought in?”
“Most are still in processing. We’re running background checks on all of them to check for aliases and known associates.” Hart peeked out the window, most of the officers still leering. “It shouldn’t take much longer.”
The whiteboard in their office had been cleared of everything save for the evidence they’d collected on their killer. Cooper reached for the picture of the bank account number associated with the house they’d raided. “So the killer uses the address of a meth lab to purchase a security system for an abandoned storage facility where he murders our first victim.”
Irene Marsh’s bloodied pictures rested on the outskirts of their evidence chain. Gaping holes and a mixture of muscle and bone crushed to a pulp had replaced her eyes, nose, and mouth. Her face had been beaten so harshly that they couldn’t even use dental records to identify the body.
A knock on the door caused both of them to jump. One of the booking officers poked his head inside. “Kate Wurstshed’s sister is here.” He ignored Cooper, choosing to address Hart.
“We’ll be out in a minute,” Hart said.
Kate Wurstshed’s picture rested on the board next to Irene’s. The crime scene photo depicted the blood splatter typical of suicides, along with the pistol she used on herself. Before she left the office Cooper turned back to the board and eyed one of the photos above Kate’s suicide that was taken of the walls in her basement, one of which was covered from floor to ceiling with scribbles of red crayon.
There were still a few harsh words muttered under breaths when Cooper weaved through the precinct halls to the front of the station, but for the most part everyone had returned their focus back to work. She tapped the back of the officer at the desk check-in, and he pointed to a middle-aged woman sitting by herself with her head down near the front door. “Mrs. Knoxen?”
The woman jerked her head up in surprise, and the physical features she shared with Kate Wurstshed were unmistakable. “Yes?” Her voice was weak, and she kept both hands clutched to the strap of her purse. Her nose was a bright red, which contrasted against the natural paleness of her cheeks.
&
nbsp; “I’m Detective Cooper, and this is my partner, Detective Hart.”
“Hello.” The woman remained guarded, keeping her distance. “I was told that you had some of Kate’s things?”
“We do. Will you come back with us for a moment?” Cooper smiled, but the welcome didn’t entice the woman to step forward.
“Look, I-I don’t know how this works.” She closed her eyes, taking in a breath. “I’ve already identified the body, and—” A light sob cut her off, and she buried her face in her hands.
Cooper placed her arm around the woman’s shoulders and guided her out of the public waiting room with Hart following close behind. Cooper led her to one of the interrogation rooms and instructed Hart to fetch a box of tissues. “Just have a seat right here.” Cooper helped her to the chair then sat on the edge of the table and placed a hand on her shoulder. “I know how hard this is for you.”
The woman jerked her shoulder away and looked up. Her cheeks had flushed red and were shiny with tears. “No, you don’t!” She caught her breath, nearly hyperventilating in the process before she continued. “I have reporters asking me questions, asking me if my sister killed that woman. If she helped the killer!” Her mouth quivered, and she buried her face back into her hands.
Cooper held back the impulse for a harsh response, egged on by the liquor from the night before, and paused before she spoke. “The killer that was responsible for Kate’s death… he now has my sister.”
The woman momentarily ceased her crying and looked up. She shook her head, embarrassed, stumbling over her words. “I-I’m sorry. I-I didn’t know.” She wiped her eyes and shook her head. “Is she… still alive?”
Cooper rubbed a finger over the mangled flesh of her right hand, drawing attention to the bloody knuckles. “I don’t know.” Hart returned with tissues, breaking the awkward silence, and after the woman composed herself Cooper continued. “Did you know your sister was involved with anyone, Mrs. Knoxen?”