Chasing Summer

by Nicola Claire

  My neck abruptly stopped burning, and ice ran down my spine.

  I stood up and turned in a slow circle. Two hundred metres down the road sat two identical Range Rovers. I stared at Big Wig’s cars and watched as they pulled out of their carpark and slowly drove past the police station without a care in the world. The windows were tinted to such a degree that I couldn’t see inside, but I would have bet Tia’s entire stock of donuts that Big Wig had decided to watch the fireworks, as Northland exploded, from the front seat.

  The Range Rovers kept driving, heading off down the road that led out to Ahipara. And I suddenly knew where Henry Jones and his boys must live.

  I scanned the parking lot for Danvers, but couldn’t see him. The supervising officers must have gone inside to fine-tune their approach to the scene. I couldn’t spot Constable Candy or Ihaia, either. And none of the local boys in blue was known to me.

  I pulled my cell phone out. My skull started thumping. The burn was back across my neck along with a hint of weed.

  My heart stuttered. My hands shook. I looked frantically around for someone to grab, but suddenly the carpark was empty. Danvers had left me by his ute and told me to stay put until they were ready. I thought perhaps the head cop in Kaitaia would have baulked at me being here and Danvers was trying to avoid that. That made storming the police station a bit awkward. For Danvers and me.

  I looked into the front of Danvers’ car and spotted his car keys still in the ignition.

  Either fate was lending a hand, or Detective Douche was entirely too trusting.

  I slipped into the driver’s side and hit the start button. The ute fired up, and I was reversing out of the carpark before I’d thought better of it. I put my cell phone on speaker and dialled Stan.

  “Hip, hip hooray,” he said in greeting, sounding alive and whole and not exactly happy, but not a monotone either. Relief that he’d survived his family’s intervention, and my part in it, stole through me. But I didn’t have time to bask in the feelings.

  “Henry Jones,” I said. “Was he on that list of criminals linked to farms?” I asked.

  “Let me check.” I could hear Stan tapping away in the background and then, “Yep. Out by Ninety Mile Beach.”

  “Let me guess: Ahipara?”

  “The one and the same.”

  “Send me the address, Stan?”

  “Sure thing.”

  I hesitated. It wasn’t always the best for Stan to ask about certain things. But I couldn’t help it; I needed to know he was OK. “How’s it going?”

  “Kylee’s here.” Kylee was Stan’s sister. Kylee and Kyle; I still got a kick out of that. “We’re playing Spyro. I’m beating her.”

  “Of course, you are,” I said, smiling.

  “She should be at work,” he told me.

  “Sometimes people get time off, Stan.”

  “Not Kylee.”

  I didn’t know what to say.

  “Gotta go,” he said, saving me from confessing my part in all of this. “Kylee’s made toasties.”

  “Cheese?”

  “Yep.”

  “Catch ya on the flip side, Stan,” I said softly. “And thanks.”

  “Hip, hip hooray for a hot summer day.”

  The line went dead.

  Stan was OK. Kylee was with him. And then in a blinding moment of clarity, I realised that the stalker was Big Wig. At Stan’s, I’d felt that chill of ice down my neck. And again here, at the Kaitaia Police Station, I’d felt the same thing, then spotted the Range Rovers.

  Big Wig, or at least one of his men, was the stalker.

  Danvers had been right. Big Wig had somehow known that I was contracted to the Mangonui Police and so had me followed. To see what I uncovered? To make sure I didn’t get in the way?

  If he followed me to the Mangonui Police Station this morning, then he saw us head out in riot gear. And he would have seen what was happening at Kaitaia Police Station, too. Finding out where we were about to go wouldn’t have been an issue for a man who had found out I was contracted to the Mangonui Police.

  He had Jonesy’s address and was heading there to meddle in things.

  But why? Because the Rikas were? The Rikas had stolen his meth recipe, I was sure. Jonesy hadn’t. But then, Jonesy’s men had been on the wharf. Intercepting Mikey, taking his place in the exchange. Getting murdered.

  Had the exchange been with Big Wig? Mikey with the stolen recipe in hand confronting the new drug lord and blackmailing him?

  To what end?

  I didn’t know, but right then the address for Henry Jones’ farm came through and I pulled over long enough to put it into my GPS.

  A faintly English accented woman’s voice sounded out over the device’s speakers and told me I still had several kilometres to go ’til my destination. I pressed my foot harder on the gas pedal and dialled Danvers.

  “Where are you and what have you done to my car?” he demanded as soon as the call connected.

  “While you lot fluffed your feathers and went over your plan for the hundredth time,” I said as calmly as my pulse would let me, “Big Wig drove past the police station and is now heading towards Ahipara. I’m following.”

  “Why are you following?” He sounded upset.

  “Because I’m a private investigator and you hired me to investigate.”

  “God damn it, Summer! You haven’t got any backup.”

  “Then shift your butt, Detective. Find a car and come get me.”

  I hung up before he could retaliate.

  The cell phone rang in ten seconds flat.

  “I’m driving, and you’re distracting me,” I said.

  “I’m in a car, and we’re on our way,” Danvers said. “Do not. I repeat, do not enter the property until we get there. Understand?”

  “I’m not foolhardy, Detective. I’ll keep an eye on things for you and let you know the lay of the land.”

  “Don’t get out of the ute.”

  “Now you’re just being silly.”

  “Wait at the end of the road until we get there.”

  “Got it.”

  “OK,” he said, not sounding in the slightest OK about anything.

  “Relax, Danvers,” I said. “You’re five minutes behind me. What could possibly go wrong in five minutes?”

  “With you, O’Dare, I dread to think.”

  The line disconnected and Ahipara came into sight. My lovely English lady directed me to take the left-hand road in a fork by the dairy, and soon I was passing by beachside houses with the roar of the west coast slamming in through my partially opened window. It occurred to me then, that Jonesy wasn’t on a farm, but at the beach.

  If the address Stan had given me was wrong, then Detective Danvers didn’t have to worry about a thing.

  And then I spotted the Harley Davidsons; in a line across the road, all facing toward something. Hands were on hips; guns rested within easy grasp. Darren Rika was standing out in front, shouting something. The Tasman Sea pounded against the dark sand drowning out all of his words.

  I parked the ute and got out, straining to hear what Darren was saying. While I approached, I scanned for Big Wig. A glint of sunshine reflected off something shiny up past the Harley Davidsons, but there were too many bodies and bikes between me and it to make out any details.

  “You’ve gone too far,” Darren was shouting.

  “You took something that was ours,” a gruff voice said in reply.

  “It was never yours,” Darren growled. “And it should never have been in Northland to start with.”

  “You think you can stop this, Rika? You think your kaumatua can stop progress?”

  “Leave Nana out of this!”

  “But she’s the one pulling Rika strings, isn’t she? You’re here because she told you to be here. You got no balls, Rika. Your old nana has more balls than you do.”

  Darren took a step forward, his hands clenched at his sides. Several of his men pulled weapons. Several of the men on the other sid
e did the same. They aimed at each other, like some Wild West standoff. A seagull laughed at the absurdity. My neck spasmed and then was coated in hot, thick blood.

  The burning didn’t even register as ice filled my veins.

  I was running before I thought better of it. Darren glanced to the side in time to see me leap. And then we were rolling across the asphalt, and a gun went off, the sound of the bullet passing too close for my liking. Darren let out a grunt as we hit the curb. His men scattered. Bullets were flying, and police sirens were screeching, and then I saw Big Wig.

  He stepped out of one of the Range Rovers farther up the road, lifted a hand and sighted down the barrel. For a second, I thought he was aiming at me. Then I thought it was Darren, who had his arms around my waist and was breathing too heavily.

  But then a man who had to be Henry Jones stood up with a baseball bat in one hand and sawn-off shotgun in the other. He screamed something; spittle flying everywhere. One of his men screamed something at him in return; adding to the spittle flying through the air. I was thinking the second scream was a warning. But Big Wig fired before Jonesy caught on.

  The Kaitaia crime boss went down like a thousand-year-old kauri tree. And then the police were there, and bikers were running, and Darren swore softly, as Danvers stood over our prone bodies.

  In the distance, I saw Big Wig casually slip his gun back in his suit pocket, and then slide into the rear of one of the Range Rovers.

  I rolled out of Darren’s grasp. Ignored Danvers’ angry words. And took aim.

  It was a long shot. And I wasn’t the best marksman out there. But my neck prickled on one side, urging me to change my aim slightly.

  The first bullet took out the front tyre. The second one hit the gas tank.

  Chapter 24

  Seagulls Swooped And Dogs Barked

  Despite what TV shows would have you believe, petrol tanks don’t always blow up when punctured.

  But they sure as heck make the occupants of the vehicle throw themselves out of harm’s way. Directly into the hands of the police.

  The quiet Ahipara street was not so quiet anymore. Police swarmed over the scene; bikers sat forlornly on the asphalt, constables standing guard over them, as the fire service secured the Range Rover and ensured it wouldn’t go boom and take us all out with it.

  I sat on the curb beside Danvers’ car, the threat of handcuffs to make me stay put a real thing.

  I’d avoided the cuffs. But I hadn’t avoided Danvers’ wrath.

  A few feet away, Rupert Carmichael was insisting on a lawyer, but his insistence didn’t stop him from spilling the beans.

  Arrogance had a way of making people believe they were untouchable.

  “This is an outrage,” he shouted.

  “You shot a man,” Danvers said quietly.

  “I prevented a war.”

  “And why was that, Mr Carmichael?”

  Big Wig shut up.

  “He didn’t know who stole his meth recipe,” I said from my perch on the ground.

  Both men looked toward me.

  “Am I right?” I asked.

  Big Wig scowled but said nothing.

  “The Rikas stole it,” I said. “I’m not sure yet how they’re connected to the courier driver - it could be as simple as he distributed their pot for them when delivering GPs’ meds to out of the way towns - but they used him, as well as Mikey on the spot, to get the recipe and then they arranged to meet with you on the Mangonui Wharf.”

  “You’re insane,” Big Wig said. Danvers just watched me.

  “They didn’t want meth in Northland,” I said. “In her own way, Nana Rika has a line she won’t cross, and that line is hard drugs like methamphetamine. They wanted to get you out of Northland, but they didn’t count on Henry Jones.”

  I looked across the road to where the dead Kaitaia drug boss lay covered in a white sheet.

  “Jonesy caught wind of the meth recipe,” I said. “He wanted in on that because pot wasn’t enough. Not when the Rikas had a firm hold on the Doubtless Bay region which was putting a severe kink in his expansion plans. So, he had his men intercept Mikey in Mangonui, then take his place at the wharf. They thought Mikey had the recipe on him, but Nana would never let the youngest Rika have that. So, Jonesy’s representative threatened your man on the wharf. Who took matters into his own hands and killed him.”

  “I don’t know where you get your information from, young lady, but you’re wrong,” Big Wig said.

  “Am I?” I asked. “You’ve been following me. Hoping I would lead you to whoever had stolen the recipe. You weren’t sure; otherwise, you wouldn’t have stayed around in Northland. You’re the type of man who needs to be in control and leaving your lackeys to deal with this mess was too great a risk. Besides, as soon as you knew there was a second gang involved, you couldn’t help yourself. Breaking into Northland suddenly became a bit of a challenge.”

  “I want a lawyer,” Big Wig said.

  “I’m not stopping you,” I replied calmly. “And then there’s the shearing shed,” I said. “I knew I was being followed then, too. But you didn’t show your hand until you’d figured some of it out. Mikey was being held by Jonesy, for blackmail purposes. Jonesy wanted that recipe, but Nana was stalling. You realised that Kaitaia didn’t have what you wanted but, that with the correct amount of pressure, you could lure out those who did. You shot and killed the two Kaitaia gang members and then skedaddled when an entire legion of Rikas turned up armed and dangerous.

  “You followed us back to Taipa, but when we took the turnoff to Peria, you realised you needed a better idea of what you faced. Or maybe a better location to play your final hand.”

  I waved at the scene around us. The Kaitaia cops were processing the bikers; both Kaitaia’s and Doubtless Bay’s. Big Wig’s men had been placed in custody, and the Range Rovers taped off. It looked like mayhem, but it was an organised type of chaos. It had always thrilled me to see the police in action like this.

  But I just felt exhausted today. I wasn’t sure how this was going to go for the Rikas, and I had no idea how it was going to go for Tia and me. My neck offered no answers, and my heart felt heavy.

  “What I don’t understand,” I said, “is why an engineering mogul who manufactures medical equipment ended up manufacturing meth as well.”

  “I can help with that,” a voice I recognised said, stepping out from behind the police vans and incidents trucks and paddy wagons.

  “Charlie,” I said, standing up.

  “What are you doing here?” Danvers demanded, one hand still holding onto Big Wig, the other resting above his firearm.

  “You’re not a surfer, are you?” I asked.

  “I surf, Summer. You saw me catch waves.”

  “But that’s not all you are,” I accused.

  He smiled at me and flicked his too-long fringe of shaggy, blond hair off his face.

  “I always knew you’d be the hardest to fool, O’Dare.”

  I narrowed my eyes at the duplicitous dude.

  “Who are you?” Danvers demanded.

  “Detective Charlie Roberts, Auckland CIB, Narcotics.” He let Danvers read his ID and badge, and then nodded towards Big Wig. “And I’m sorry, Detective Danvers, but I’ll be taking Carmichael from here.”

  “Like hell, you will,” Danvers retorted.

  “We’ve been working this case for a year, Danvers,” Charlie told him. “We’ve linked his engineering company to a pharmaceutical company, which found itself in a bit of a legal mess. Carmichael took advantage of their situation, used their chemists to write a recipe unlike any we’ve seen, and started cooking meth.”

  “A year?” I said. “About the same time Big Wig got the police involved in a suspected intellectual property theft up here?” The first round of cases had been bugging me. But now it all started to make sense.

  Charlie offered me a salute.

  “You got it, O’Dare. That investigation was tagged in CIB and led us to a few interest
ing discoveries about Rupert Carmichael. We started digging deeper, then.”

  “But what was taken a year ago?” Danvers asked.

  “Nothing,” I said, feeling the absence of any sensations on my neck as a solid weight on my mind. “Nana Rika somehow uncovered what Carmichael had planned, and tried to steal the recipe then.” I turned and looked at Darren, who was cuffed and leaning against a cop car well out of earshot. He watched the still chaotic scene with apparent disinterest, but his eyes darted everywhere. “She didn’t succeed,” I said. “Maybe the house in Stratford Drive was too far away. Maybe her boys didn’t have a wifi booster. So, this time, she had them try a different approach with the courier driver, right outside Big Wig’s door, and Mikey right on top of it.”

  “If ever you want to come and play with the big boys, Summer,” Charlie said, “there’ll be a job for you at Central.”

  “And give up the beach?”

  “Auckland’s got beaches.”

  “Not like ours it hasn’t.”

  Charlie chuckled and then directed a hard look at Carmichael. I’d never seen that look on my boarder before. This was the Charlie Roberts he’d hidden.

  “The definition of an idiot is someone who makes the same mistake twice and expects a different outcome,” he said. “You thought you could take on Northland, Carmichael. Twice, no less. But you didn’t count on locals like Summer O’Dare.”

  And the Rikas, I thought.

  Big Wig said something decidedly nasty back to Charlie and then spat in his face.

  “Nice,” Danvers muttered.

  Charlie just pulled a hankie from his pocket and wiped his cheek, as if he got spat at every day and it was nothing. He flicked a crooked grin at Danvers.

  “Don’t feel too bad, Detective,” he said. “I’m leaving you the rest of this mess to clean up.” He indicated the bikers, which included Darren Rika.