Punishment

by Scott J. Holliday

  Barnes tried CP-583427. This time there were hundreds of hits. The top one was for an Omaha hockey league. One of the in-game pictures had been labeled with the same serial code, automatic indexing from a camera. Barnes copied the website’s address and pasted it into the body of an e-mail.

  “After a while my mom checked out. I pretty much grew up on my own. I only saw my dad on the weekends. It was like they were divorced. He just played it cool until he was gone again. Why rock the boat, you know? We were like roommates. At eighteen, I split.”

  The next few search hits were pdf files of property tax records in Idaho. Barnes copied their addresses and pasted them into the same e-mail. He said, “Where’d you go?”

  “Here and there. California for a while, spent some time on the beach. Lived in Chicago for half a year, New Orleans, Charleston, Boston. I saved some money, and eventually I found my way back here. Seems nuts in hindsight, but there’s something about the hell of Detroit that makes a person proud, you know?”

  Barnes nodded.

  “I did my undergrad and got my teaching cert from Oakland, started out subbing in Redford, got my first job at Kenbrook just this new school year.” She smiled. “And then I met a handsome stranger who swept me off my feet.”

  Barnes had filled up a long e-mail with website addresses for anything that seemed like a lead, mentally noting a variety of matching serial codes for pianos and bar stools and cribs. But the deer-tick feeling never increased at what he found. He smirked at Jessica. “Who is he? I’ll kick his ass.”

  “Oh, he’s pretty tough. You might have trouble with that.”

  Half the fifth of Wild Turkey was gone. Barnes was buzzed. The pain in his body had subsided, but he still felt battered. His eyes burned from the computer screen, from fatigue. He sent himself the e-mail with all the website addresses, felt his cell phone vibrate to let him know it was received, and closed Jessica’s laptop.

  Jessica put down her tumbler and came over to him, tossed the laptop aside, straddled him, loosened his tie.

  The people inside Barnes’s head kicked open their drawers. They crawled out full of lust and longing. Chunk Philips quivered with desire, as did the rest of the boys, but Nancy Fulmer shoved them aside and took center stage.

  “Finally, the right body.”

  Their combined feelings brought a new kind of intensity to Barnes—an orgy of eyes and erogenous zones, of broken hearts in need of mending. Jessica’s weight was light on him, on them, but still painful to Barnes with all his damage. He smiled through the pain. “I’m as tough as they come.”

  She kissed him and bit his lower lip.

  Nancy Fulmer had an orgasm.

  30

  Barnes woke up in Jessica’s bed. He checked the clock on the nightstand: 5:00 a.m. He slid out from under the covers and found his clothing, his shoes. The people in his head had receded while he slept, though his body was still sore. He moved out into the living room and put on his clothes, his holster, his jacket. He checked his phone for text messages. There was one from dispatch.

  Nothing on the number so far. Still searching.

  He found a note on the inside of the apartment door, taped where he wouldn’t miss it when he left.

  Think I love you.

  He looked in on her, saw her sleeping peacefully, her hair a mess, her chest slowly expanding and contracting. One foot stuck out from beneath the covers. Damn this job. He could slide back in next to her right now, breathe in her scent, touch her warm skin, pull her close. He could never know another crime, never again be attached to the machine.

  “Stay.” Amanda Jones.

  “Shhh.”

  He went out to his car and drove to the hospital.

  A receptionist told Barnes visiting hours hadn’t yet begun. He showed her his badge. She frowned at it but let him pass. Franklin was awake, propped up by the adjustable bed, circles shaved into his temples. There was a plastic mug on the table by his bedside, a translucent bendy straw sticking out of it, drops of water stuck inside. The lights of the machinery around Franklin’s bed were red and green and orange. They blipped on and off like faraway stars. Barnes pulled up a chair and sat down.

  Franklin said, “Hey.”

  “How you doin’, big fella?”

  “Better than you, ya freakin’ zombie.”

  Barnes nodded to the accordion machine pumping over Franklin’s head, the one helping him breathe. “I doubt that.”

  Franklin pursed his lips beneath the oxygen tube that ran to his nose. “I saw his face at the cemetery.”

  “I know.”

  Franklin’s eyes narrowed to slits. “You’ve been on the machine.”

  Barnes nodded.

  “As me.”

  Barnes nodded.

  “Thought I was a goner, eh?”

  Barnes held his partner’s stare for what felt like ten minutes. Finally, he said, “Yes.”

  “Takes more than a knife in the back to kill Big Billy.” He smiled wide.

  “I’m glad for that.”

  “So give me the lowdown. Where we at?”

  “You killed him,” Barnes said.

  “Killed who?”

  “Tyrell Diggs. You shot him in the chest.”

  Franklin blinked, looked down at his hands. He stayed there a moment, and then looked up. “So what, you gonna arrest me?”

  “You have the right to remain silent.”

  “Shee-it,” Franklin said, “I waive that mothafuckin’ right.”

  “You’re full of shit, you know that?”

  “How’s that?”

  Barnes impersonated Franklin’s voice. “Ducks in a shooting gallery. They just pop back up. The barker is God.”

  “They do. He is.”

  Barnes sighed. “Someone has to knock the ducks down. Otherwise the bad guys multiply, and eventually they win.”

  Franklin began a reply but broke into a coughing fit. A nurse rushed in. She used a bowl to catch the coagulated blood he spat out. She helped him with some water.

  Once Franklin settled down, the nurse turned to Barnes. “He shouldn’t be talking. You shouldn’t be here.”

  “Oh, hell no.” Detective Franklin’s voice from inside.

  Barnes said, “I’ll do all the talking from here on out. Promise.”

  She shook her head disapprovingly and left.

  “Like hell you will,” Franklin said with a strained voice. His eyes were glassy from the coughing fit. “You listen to me. Tyrell Diggs got what was coming to him. The man was evil. He delivered pain and misery to the people on my block. It was a pleasure to snuff him out, but that don’t mean he wasn’t just replaced by the next evil bastard to come along.”

  “So what’s the point, then? Why kill him?”

  Franklin shrugged. “Hope?”

  “Come on.”

  “I don’t know, Barnes. I really don’t. I’m sitting here in this hospital bed, stabbed in the back by a dude, they tell me, who’s knocking off people because they never took the time to visit their dead relatives. You saying there’s a point behind all this?”

  “You’re the one selling hope.”

  “Here’s what I’m selling—you leave the world a better place than when you entered it. That’s all there is. For us it means we take down bad guys. For the dude who owns Lafayette it means serving the best goddamned coney dogs you’re ever gonna eat. For some Peace Corps sap it means putting rice in some poor kid’s bowl and swatting the flies off him. It doesn’t matter what you choose, it only matters what you can make stick.”

  “Remember Andy Kemp?”

  Franklin cocked his head, thought for a moment, and then nodded. “That high school kid. Kidnapped and murdered. Ten thousand in his pocket. Memory pull was empty. Unsolved.”

  “Not anymore. It was Dawson. Watkins saw it in the machine.”

  Franklin shook his head.

  Barnes looked off. “I never told you about my brother.”

  “Cap told me. Before you were put
on this case.”

  “Then you know.”

  “So? That doesn’t mean—”

  “He was just a kid,” Barnes said. “Never did nothing bad to anyone, and I killed him just the same as that train killed him, the same as Tyrell Diggs killed Marvin. Diggs wasn’t the one who stuck that homemade blade in Marvin, right? But it was his fault just the same. You understand that.”

  “You loved your brother. You didn’t want him to die.”

  “I didn’t stop it.”

  “Then forgive yourself, dickhead. Get some closure.”

  Barnes looked down. Somewhere in the conversation he’d reached into his jacket and pulled out the coin purse. The mouth was opening and closing in his hand, his fingers darting in to touch the quarters. He clenched the purse in his fist. “The only closure I deserve”—he lifted his available hand and made the motion of a lid falling down—“is from inside a casket.”

  “So that’s it, then? Your brother died in an accident, so you should die, too? You should subject yourself to the punishment of that machine until it tears you apart?”

  Barnes shook his head. He put the coin purse in his outer jacket pocket, touched the Ziploc bag of salt that was still there. He said, “CP583427.”

  “What’s that?”

  “That’s the big clue Reyes has been trying to make us see. Some serial number or code. Haven’t figured it out yet. Mean anything to you?”

  “Not off the top.”

  Barnes looked out the window. The sun was beginning its ascent. Red rays of light made Barnes squint his eyes. They reflected off a urine bag hanging from the side of Franklin’s bed. “They got a tube in your dick?”

  “Yeah, it’s long as hell. They had to fix two of them together for me.”

  Both detectives laughed. Their laughter crescendoed until Barnes repeatedly slapped his knee. The Franklin in Barnes’s head laughed to beat them both.

  Afterward, Barnes’s inner Franklin faded back into Barnes’s mind. The pain in Barnes’s body began to fall away. The real Franklin said, “What are you gonna do now?”

  “With you here in the hospital, I’ve gotta do my own desk work,” Barnes said. “I’ve got a list of websites that came up when I searched for that number. Going to comb through them and see what sticks.”

  31

  Barnes sat in the precinct parking lot. He read the text message on his phone for what felt like the tenth time. It had come from Jessica.

  Hello, lover. Why did you leave?

  He didn’t have an answer for her, wasn’t sure he wanted to give one. He had a partner in the hospital and was on a hot case. He assumed she understood that. He pocketed his phone, got out of the car, and headed into the station. He was stopped by Darrow on the way to his desk.

  “My office. Now.”

  Barnes followed Darrow into his office, plopped down in a chair. “Good news about Franklin, eh?”

  “I’m taking you off the case.”

  “What?”

  “Beckett is dead. You’ve run yourself ragged on this thing, and that little stunt you pulled with Flaherty has forced my hand.”

  Barnes sighed. His cell phone buzzed against his leg. He said, “Cap, no one knows this guy like I do. We’ve got an APB on his truck, and a BOLO on his description. I’ll find something in Beckett, plus this serial number—”

  “Which so far has amounted to jack.”

  “I’ve got the burr and the cedar leaf. It might not have come from the cemetery. Reyes might live out in the backwoods. Maybe Whitehall.” The Flamingo Farms trailer park flashed into Barnes’s mind. He mentally traveled past his old home and down to the river where he and Ricky used to play. Had there been burrs along the way? Burrs at the riverbank?

  “Whitehall is huge, Barnes. What do you suggest we do, go out there with some dogs? That’d take months. On a burr and a leaf, are you nuts?”

  “A chopper.”

  “And do what? Send in SWAT on every tent we find? It’s public property. We’d be disturbing every outdoor nut from here to Canada.”

  “Not all of it is public property,” Barnes said. “There’s private ownership at the edges and along the Rouge River. I grew up out there.”

  Darrow nodded. “We’ll look into the property records.”

  “We find this guy’s real name yet?”

  “Still waiting to hear back from the secretary of state. Goddamn morons.”

  Barnes’s cell phone buzzed again. “Hold up a sec,” he said, and then checked the phone. Two new text messages from Jessica.

  Come on, Barnes, get back here and fuck me.

  And then:

  You know you want to . . .

  Darrow said, “Put that away and pay attention.”

  Barnes put the phone away.

  “You’re off the case, and that’s final. Don’t fight me on it. Just go home, take a few days off. Jesus Christ, lay off the bottle and get some sleep.”

  “Who’s on it?”

  “None of your business.”

  “Bullshit. Who?”

  “Flaherty just passed his detective exam.”

  “Oh, you prick,” Barnes said. He stood up.

  “Watch that tone,” Darrow said.

  “You can’t put that asshole on my case. That’s salt in the wound.”

  “He’s already on it,” Darrow said. “Now walk away before I take your badge.”

  Barnes slammed the door behind him. The windows shook. Everyone looked up from their paperwork.

  Barnes went to Flaherty’s desk. The asshole wasn’t there. He went to the technical lab and peeked through the window. Warden was inside, tending to Flaherty on the bed, hooked up to Eddie. His body jerked in reaction to the punishment. Barnes’s cell phone buzzed again. Another text message from Jessica.

  Come visit me, Barnes. Come fuck me. Now!

  He felt sick. He replied.

  Can you please stop?

  “Barnes.”

  He looked up to find Martinez peeking around a hallway corner. She gestured with her head for Barnes to come over, her ponytail swayed with the movement. Barnes pocketed his phone and went over. “Darrow fire you?”

  “Flaherty figured out what really went down. Guess that makes him a detective, after all. They had someone watch me while I packed up my stuff, then they walked me out the door. I’m not supposed to be here, but I had to come back and let you know.”

  “Know what?”

  “Antonio Reyes,” she said. “He’s on the machine. He’s got memories in the central system.”

  “How?”

  “Former victim. Secretary of state was taking too long to get back, so Flaherty followed up with Rock Hill Management in Florida. Found out Reyes’s former name is Arturo Perez. They ran a background on him. I guess he survived a point-blank shotgun blast to the chest. Nothing short of a miracle.”

  “I was just in with Darrow. He didn’t mention it. Said the secretary of state was dragging their feet.”

  Martinez shrugged.

  Barnes looked back at the technical lab door. Flaherty was attached to Eddie, but a second machine was in there, too. He said, “Wait for me outside,” and went to the door.

  Warden looked up when Barnes entered the lab. The barrel mark on his forehead had grown into a bruise. Barnes pointed at the second machine. “I need it.”

  “You’re kidding, right?” Warden said. “I’m a second away from reporting you just for being in this room.”

  Barnes nodded toward Flaherty on the hospital bed. “Who’s he hooked into? Beckett?”

  “Go away, Barnes.”

  “I need Reyes. He was once a vic, name of Arturo Perez. I can catch him.”

  “I don’t care—” A wave of realization washed over Warden’s face. He blinked a few times. “Did you say Arturo Perez?”

  “Yes.”

  “Zero-zero-zero-zero-nine.”

  Barnes raised his eyebrows.

  “That was his file number. One of the first ever on the machine. Thir
d or fourth that I harvested.” He placed a hand on his chest. “He was blown open. No one thought he’d make it. Some drug-runner thing. The Fero brothers, I think.”

  “Please.”

  Warden shook his head. “No. Why should I help you? I can just as easily hook Flaherty to Perez and achieve the same result, only I won’t lose my job over it.”

  Barnes closed his eyes. For a moment he stood in darkness, in the silence of the room, above Flaherty’s murmurs and shakes. His mind’s eye saw his brother’s face, receding at the edges, his little smile being chipped away, his eyes fading. He said, “I have nothing to bargain with. I am no more than a drunk and a munky who nearly got his partner killed. I deserve no favors from you or anyone else, and I deserve no forgiveness.” He opened his eyes and found Warden. “But I’m asking anyway, because I believe I can catch this guy before he hurts anyone else, and if I believe it, maybe you’ll believe it, and maybe you’ll help me, and all this won’t have been a goddamn waste.”

  Warden smirked. “You practice that in the mirror?”

  “Help me,” Barnes said.

  Warden looked at the machine. He placed a hand on it, drummed his fingers. “Have it back in a half hour.”

  32

  Barnes wheeled the machine out the side door of the precinct. Martinez was kicking stones at the far end of the parking lot. He signaled for her to come over as he pushed the machine behind a dumpster. He took off his jacket, threw it down on the concrete, and set his handgun and phone in the folds. He rolled back a sleeve and booted aside a discarded coffee cup.

  Martinez came around the side of the dumpster. “How’s the battery?”

  “Good.”

  “We’ll need a Wi-Fi signal to tap into the server.”

  Barnes checked the signal-strength indicator on the machine. “We’re close enough to the building. It should work.” He put the suction cups on his own temples and slid down to his butt, back against the dumpster. He looked up at her.

  She started prepping the machine.

  “Zero-zero-zero-zero-nine,” Barnes said. “That’s his file number.”