by J. R. Ward
Sometimes strength rested not in resistance, but in the release of arms against a foe of one’s own creation.
chapter
46
Later that morning, Tom was sitting back at his desk in the fishbowl, drumming his fingers on reports he was supposed to read and sign off on, when someone came into the stationhouse.
Getting to his feet, he motioned for them to enter his office, and as his sister opened the door, he was embarrassed that she might have seen him staring off into space.
“Didn’t know you were coming over.” He nodded to the vacant chair on the far side of things. “You need a seat?”
“Yes, thanks.”
As Anne got settled, he studied her. “So Mom called me yesterday. She said you two had talked.”
It wasn’t a surprise when her eyes ducked his own and instead locked on all his disorganized paperwork. “I . . . ah, I might have been really unfair about her. To her. I think she had to deal with some things that I was unaware of. I also think our father might have been a monster under all that I’m-a-hero shit, but you and I can argue about that at a different time.”
“I’m done arguing.” When she looked up sharply, he put a hand out. “That sounds defensive, it isn’t. I am literally, for myself, tired of arguing with everybody.”
“Who are you and what have you done with my brother.”
“You know, I could say the same thing about you with Mom.”
“So we’ve both been taken over by aliens. Good to know—do we have to get new driver’s licenses?”
Tom smiled a little. “Yeah. Maybe we do. So what’s up? You need something?”
“I want to talk to you about Charles Ripkin.”
Leaning back in his old wooden chair, he crossed his leg, ankle to knee. “Don’t know the guy, really.”
“When he talked to you about this building”—she motioned around his work space and all the bright-and-shiny beyond it—“was he . . . did you ever feel like he was trying to buy us off? The fire department, I mean.”
“In exchange for what?”
“Whatever happened at his house with his daughter? Maybe those fires down at the warehouses?”
“No.” Tom crossed his arms and told himself now was the time to stick to his new leaf. Namaste and all that shit. “What are you insinuating? That I took a bribe or something? What for, we didn’t do anything wrong.”
“I agree. I’ve read all of our incident reports. I just . . . a man like that doesn’t do anything for a purpose that doesn’t advance his self-interests, right? I mean, his reputation is what it is for a reason. He’s ruthless and shady, and I’ve done extensive searches on him. Do you realize that this firehouse is the only philanthropic thing he’s ever done?”
“That’s not possible. All rich guys give to places. They get museum wings named after themselves, donate libraries and research centers.”
“Ripkin hasn’t. He gives to political candidates, but not nonprofits.”
Tom frowned. “What kind of politicians?”
“He’s a registered Republican, but he donates across the spectrum.”
“What about Mayor Mahoney. He give to her?”
“Yes. He’s topped out for this election.”
“What’s that mean?”
“He’s given Mahoney’s campaign up to the legal limit. I can show you the report if you’d like?”
“Nah. Not a surprise.” Tom shrugged, although whether that was to convince his sister or himself that he didn’t care, he wasn’t sure—and didn’t want to dwell on it. “He’s in deep with her on this wharf thing. I had a meeting with her the other night, and she and her lackey Perry had just met with Ripkin Development. Doing that area over is one of her election imperatives—or whatever they call them.”
As Anne grew quiet, he sat forward. “What’s going on.”
“Just trying to figure this all out.”
“Define ‘this.’ And before you tell me to mind my own business, I’d like to point out that in your entire professional career, you’ve never come to my office about anything. You must be here for a reason.”
There was a period of silence, and then Anne looked him directly in the eye. “I think Ripkin tried to kill his own daughter and make it look like an accident. And I believe he gave this building to our department and played the grateful parent to support the appearance that the fire at his mansion was a terrible accident and we were the heroes. I also think we’re screwed to try to implicate him. There’s no statute of limitations on arson in the Commonwealth, but all the physical evidence is gone. There’s nothing to reexamine.”
“What do you mean? Like, at the site?”
“No, as in, at all. I went into our storage facility to get the evidence box and it was gone. There’s the written report online, and a few photographs, but the actual samples and evidence have disappeared.”
“Was there much in it?”
“I don’t know. Samples were noted, but I don’t know how thorough the listing is.”
“Who was the investigator on your end?”
“Bob Burlington.”
“Wait, didn’t he die?”
“In a boating accident about three weeks into his investigation. His body washed up on shore in the bay. They said he’d had a heart attack, but the sharks got ahold of him so it was hard to know if he had any other pertinent injuries.”
A ripple of unease teased the nape of Tom’s neck. “What does this have to do with you, Sister.”
As her eyes swung back to his, she shook her head. “Nothing? Why?”
“Remember when you used to sneak out of the house at night after Dad died? Mom would ask us at breakfast if we’d walked around after bedtime—and you’d have this exact same expression on your face.”
* * *
Even though Danny had only had twenty-four hours off, he was back at the 499, and for once, it seemed like it was going to be a slow day. Then again, it wasn’t freezing cold, so people hadn’t gotten out their space heaters yet, and folks were no longer doing crazy stuff from the summer heat. Also, not a full moon, so bonus.
After running a drill on breathing apparatuses, he was doing laundry in the bay and thinking they needed a probie. And not just because if they had more crew members, they’d be able to get back to a more normal schedule—
“Oh, shit. Here we go.” As Duff spoke up from the Nautilus machine, the guy pointed out to the street. “Moose not make the bed this morning?”
Deandra got out of her BMW and marched across toward the stationhouse, her Chanel tote bag banging against her hip, her stilettos clipping over the pavement, her now-red hair flouncing in her wake like a war flag.
“Wasn’t she a blonde this past weekend?” Duff asked.
“I don’t keep up with it.” Danny hit the dryer button and started the tumbler. “I’ll go get him.”
“Is he even here? He was late.”
“From fighting with her, no doubt.”
After making sure the washer’s spin cycle was still going, Danny went inside to the rec area. Moose was sitting on the sofa, legs crossed on the beat-up coffee table, hands linked on his beer gut.
“You got a visitor, my man.”
The guy didn’t look away from the Dr. Phil episode on the TV. “No, I don’t. I told her not to come.”
“She doesn’t speak English when it comes to ‘no.’ Remember how much your wedding cost?”
Deandra marched right in and stopped short. “You are a fucking asshole.” When Moose refused to acknowledge her, she went over and blocked his view of the television. “You canceled my credit card.”
Moose tilted to the side. “Can you move.”
“You know you fucking did—”
“No, I fucking didn’t.” The guy burst up to his feet. “You ever hear of a credit limit? Like, you spend the amount they’re willing to float you and then you can’t spend no more? They cut you off, Deandra.”
“You did this.”
“That
bag did it.” He jabbed a finger at what was hanging off her shoulder. “How much was that? Huh? Two thousand dollars? Three? What the fuck, Deandra.”
“Stop saying my name like you’re my father or some shit.”
“Then be an adult and pay for your own crap.”
“You told me that you would make it good. That if I married you, you’d make it good. And here we are, living out in the sticks, and I can’t buy a Starbucks on the way to work because you—”
Danny stepped in between them. “Enough. You guys take this into the locker room if you have to, but you can’t do this here, okay? The rest of us don’t need—”
“He’s a better fuck than you, Moose.” Deandra smiled like a serial killer about to go to work. “He can make me come. You never have.”
Danny put his palms up and backed away. “I’m out. This is not my problem—”
“He’s been fucking me for the last month, Moose. And you know what I do, Moose, when you’re on shift? I put my hand on my pussy and I think of him—”
Moose went for her like he was going to snap her head off her spine, and Danny played human shield, jumping forward and taking the hit.
“Calm down, Moose—”
Moose suddenly focused on him. “You fucked my wife!”
All that rage got channeled at Danny, those meaty hands locking on his throat and shoving him backward.
“I did not fuck her—”
“And I love when he does!” Deandra yelled. “He fucks me better than you ever will and I can’t wait for him to—”
Danny grabbed Moose’s thick wrists and tried to free the guy’s brutal grip. “Shut up, Deandra!”
Duff and Doc came barreling in, and the two of them took hold of Moose’s arms and pulled. But even they got nowhere, the four of them advancing to the pong table until Moose had Danny laid out on the playing surface.
“You are a fucking whore!” Moose spat. “You’re a fucking—”
“I am not!” Deandra tossed back.
He’s not talking to you, bitch, Danny thought. “Moose—I didn’t fuck her!”
“Liar!” Red-faced and spitting, the man was trembling so badly his hair was flopping. “You fucked her—”
“Not since you got with her!” Holy shit, he couldn’t breathe. “Not since—”
“Like anyone can believe you? You don’t give a fuck who you hurt! It’s all about you—”
Deshaun threw his arm around Moose’s thick neck and took his wrist in his own hand. Yanking back on the chokehold, he pried the man free.
As Moose kicked and punched at thin air, Danny flopped flat, his arms rolling out to both sides as he brought his legs up to relieve the pressure on his spine. Taking deep breaths, he got his vision back from checkerboard-landia.
Captain Baker burst into the room. “What the hell is going on in here!”
chapter
47
You are a gentleman and a scholar. This is amazing.”
Anne put the receiver of her office phone between her ear and shoulder and went into her email, hitting refresh on her Outlook. When nothing came in, she hit it again. And a third time.
“Has the link come through?” her new buddy from the traffic office asked.
“Not yet—oh, here it is. And I got the log-in you set up for me. Thank you so much—I know you rushed this for me.”
“No problem. Call me if you need any other files because I’ve had to limit your access to your scope of inquiry per regulations. Sorry we don’t go back more than four weeks.”
“This is going to be a big help. Thanks again.”
Hanging up, she double-clicked the link, got to the log-in, and entered her ID and temporary password. The screen presented her with a table of video feeds marked with alphanumerical descriptors that matched the street addresses of the cameras around the most recent warehouse fire.
Opening the first one, she saw a black-and-white image of a dark street and a navigating panel at the bottom. Using the mouse, she ran time fast-forward starting at 12:01 a.m., watching what continued to be a mostly empty stretch of asphalt: only a couple of vagrants entered and left the camera field. Then the sun came up.
She stopped and took a map of the city out of her desk. Flattening it, she found where the camera was, orienting herself. Then she went back to the files and chose another location. According to the incident reports, the fire had started in the abandoned building sometime around nine thirty p.m.
Talk about watching paint dry.
Nothing changed but the shadows, the relentless shift of the sun broken up only by the occasional truck or car or ragged pedestrian. Night came at this angle. Now there was once again just the glow of the streetlight on the traffic-free corner. Nothing approached or entered the warehouse—until there was a sudden flash inside. Smoke. Then the fire engines and the rescue crew’s ambulance arrived.
She switched to another camera after she reoriented herself again. Now she was checking out the road that went along the side, and the process started all over again, the monitoring beginning at 12:01 a.m. and going through dawn to the following nightfall. Then the fire.
And again with the street camera on the other side. Dark. Dark. Light. Midday. Late afternoon. Nightfall. Flash. Evidence of smoke. Fire trucks. Ambulance.
Nothing out of place. No one showing up with a truck full of office equipment.
“Shit.”
Sitting back, she cracked her spine and rotated her shoulders. Soot was snoring softly in his crate, and it was almost lunchtime.
One more to go. Firing the last file up, she started the review again.
Frankly, it was amazing that there were any feeds at all given how deserted that part of town was. But the mayor’s office had set up cameras throughout that zip code as part of an initiative to encourage businesses to move down there and invest in renovation projects. With the amount of crime in that area, there had been some pushback on safety, and in a rare moment of loosening purse strings, the former mayor, Greenfield, had stepped in and identified the deterent monitoring as a priority.
But of course, God only knew what Ripkin had kitted his properties out with. Not that she expected to see anything from that information demand anytime soon. Sterling Broward was going to pump the brakes—
“What? Wait, what was that?” she muttered to herself.
Leaning in to her monitor, she reversed the feed and initiated the file at a slow speed.
Three thirty-two a.m. Dark street. Dark street. Empty—
The box trailer and truck rolled past the camera and then bumped up over the curb and continued across the scruffy lawn. It stopped. Someone got out and rolled up a bay door in the warehouse’s side wall, driving inside and closing themselves in.
Forty-six minutes later, at 4:18 a.m., the bay was re-opened, the truck came back out with its trailer, and then the driver shut everything up and drove off.
Unfortunately, the footage was so grainy, she couldn’t catch any license plates or markings on the trailer or truck, and the individual who’d gone inside had been wearing a dark hoodie, so identifying them was going to be tough.
But it proved that someone had gone in there.
“Gotcha,” she said with a smile.
As her cell phone started to ring, she absently shoved her hand into her purse and answered the call. “Hello?”
There was a pause. “Anne, it’s Moose. We gotta talk.”
* * *
Twenty minutes later, Anne was at Hereford Crossings, an outdoor shopping center that had cafés and locally owned restaurants along with stores that sold clothing for middle-aged women and shops that had pottery and handmade rugs in their windows.
It was the kind of place that her mother would have loved to check out, Anne thought as she walked along with the light crowd.
Moose was sitting on a bench in front of the Lunch Depot, his head lowered as he fiddled with something in his hands.
“Hey, Moose.”
He looked up. �
��Hey, Anne. Thanks for coming.”
But instead of getting up to go inside the restaurant, he just continued to run a thin gold necklace through his fingers.
“You ready to eat?” she asked.
When he shook his head, she sat down next to him and tried not to let her unease show. Not that he was looking at her.
“Danny’s been fucking Deandra.”
As he spoke the words, her first response was to laugh. That woman was nothing that Danny went for—
“She came to the stationhouse this morning. She said he was fucking her and he lied when he maintained they weren’t.”
With horrible clarity, she remembered going into Danny’s room that first night she went to see him and finding that lingerie on the floor of his bedroom.
But we weren’t together then, she told herself.
“Deandra said she couldn’t wait until he fucked her again.” Moose rubbed his face. “Look, I don’t know what the status of your relationship is with him, but you’ve got to understand about the two of them. He slept with her right before our wedding.”
Anne twisted so she could look right at the man. “What are you talking about?”
“He fucked her at the apartment. I found the two of them hooking up when I came back from the rehearsal dinner.” He cursed. “I love her so much. She’s all I’ve ever wanted—”
“Moose, I’m sorry but I’m not following.” Or maybe it was more like she didn’t want to hear it all. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“They were together having sex the night before we got married. It was after the rehearsal dinner. I wasn’t supposed to see her until we met at the altar the next day. I was staying at the honeymoon suite downtown at the Hyatt, you know? ’Cuz that’s where we were gonna be after the ceremony and reception for the wedding night. But I forgot my tux at the apartment.”
Anne’s heart started to beat hard. “So you went back for it?”
“Yup. Walked in and heard these noises. I thought the TV was on, but then a female voice sounded out loud and clear . . . I didn’t turn the lights on. I just had this feeling. I went down the hall . . . I could smell her perfume. Her dress was on the floor outside his room. I went far enough to hear her say his name and I left.”