by K Ryn
By dinner time, unable to pinpoint what was bothering him, he had decided that it was none of his business.
At ten he'd been in his car, headed back toward the motel, determined to get to the bottom of things. If that meant a head- to-head confrontation with Sandburg to pull the truth out of him, then that's what it would take.
Now it was almost midnight and he still hadn't made a move to approach the younger man. From the look of things, he had been wrong and he was back to being able to do nothing except offer his condolences.
Blair's hurting and that's a fact. No one could be that good an actor. And Ellison has been a royal jerk. I've seen that for myself. What ever possessed me to think that this was all some weird sleight-of-hand game? What would be the point?
He let his gaze drift across the lot, and caught a flicker of movement near Blair's car. The main sign had been turned off a few minutes ago, and the few working streetlights in the area didn't have enough power to penetrate the shadows around the front of the building. But he'd been sitting in the near dark long enough for his night-vision to identify the shape creeping stealthily toward the end unit.
Ellison... What the hell? How'd he find the kid?
Taggert watched as the ex-ranger paused outside of the ninth door. Joel was out of his car the moment the detective slipped inside. Reeling off a silent string of curses, the bigger man headed for the motel building. In a structure like this one, there would be a door in each room that allowed access to the adjoining unit.
He vetoed the idea of pounding on Blair's door in warning -- Ellison could move like lightning and the younger man could be dead before Joel's words were out of his mouth. Grimly, he pulled his own weapon and paused outside of the ninth room. He nudged the door open with his toe. There was no sign of Ellison, but there was a slim line of light emanating from the wall on his right, denoting the location of the door into the unit that Sandburg was occupying.
Sliding through the darkness with an agility that his larger bulk belied, Taggert strained to decipher the conversation he heard coming from Sandburg's room.
//"This is your own fault, you know,"// Ellison snarled. //"This has to be done... you haven't left me any choice."//
//"Damn it, Jim, let go. You're hurting me!"// Without waiting to hear any more, Joel threw open the door and charged forward. His eyes widened in horror when he saw that the ex-ranger had the anthropologist pinned down on the bed.
"FREEZE ELLISON!" he shouted, as he burst into the room.
Jim whirled around, automatically going for his own gun.
"Don't, Jim!" Taggert cautioned. "Don't even think about it."
Ellison slowly raised his hands.
"Move away from the bed," Joel ordered.
"Not until you put away your gun," Jim said softly. "You're making a mistake, Joel."
"The only mistake here, is that Simon didn't put you in lockup after you threatened Sandburg this morning," Taggert retorted harshly. "Now step away from him, or I swear I'll shoot you where you stand."
During their exchange, Blair had pulled himself to a sitting position. At Joel's warning, he launched himself off the bed and thrust himself in front of Ellison like a shield.
"He's right Joel... you're making a mistake... he was just checking out the bruise on my face and I wasn't cooperating... put the gun down... please," Sandburg urged.
"Blair..." Ellison tried to move around the younger man, but the anthropologist shifted with him, keeping himself between Jim and the weapon.
"Sandburg, get away from him," Taggert hissed.
The grad student shook his head. "Not until you put that thing away, Joel."
Something in the young man's steady gaze and the determination with which he stood protectively in front of Ellison, convinced Taggert. He kept a wary eye on the detective and holstered his gun.
Both Blair and Jim visibly relaxed.
"Why are you here, Joel?" Blair asked quietly. "No one was supposed to know where I was."
"I followed you... this morning... I was worried..." Joel admitted, still not taking his eyes off of Jim.
"Thank you. But why are you here... now?" Sandburg pressed.
Joel paused, taking one more long look at the two men before answering.
"Because no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't make myself believe that what was going on between the two of you was real."
To hold, as 'twere, the mirror up to nature; to show virtue her own feature, scorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time his form and pressure -- truths revealed.
To Joel's shocked surprise, Blair turned toward Jim and held out his hand, a delighted smile filling his face.
"Pay up, man. You owe me. Twenty bucks."
"No way, junior. He didn't figure it out. He came in here because he thought I was going to kill you," Jim smirked, leaning back against the wall and crossing his arms over his chest.
"No way!" Blair exclaimed, turning to face Taggert again. "You didn't, really... aw, come on, Joel! You know Jim better than that!"
Taggert's face suddenly paled. "Twenty bucks?" he asked weakly. "You're telling me this was all some sick practical joke to win a bet?"
Jim saw the anger blossom on the captain's face and stepped forward quickly. "Not a joke, Joel. A game. And the stakes are high."
"The ante's up to eight lives," Blair added solemnly.
Anger gave way to confusion and, finally, to understanding. "So this does have something to do with the arson/murder case the two of you have been working on," Joel murmured. Jim nodded in confirmation. "But I still don't understand. What purpose does sundering your partnership serve?"
Jim glanced at Blair, but the younger man's gaze was suddenly fixed on the floor. "Protection," the Sentinel answered softly.
"And who are you protecting?" Joel asked, his eyes shifting toward the anthropologist.
"Me," Blair admitted abruptly, looking up to meet Taggert's gaze. "And Jim, too. We have a lead on the killers, but we don't have enough to make the case -- nothing that would stand up in court, anyway. Jim's going to try to get inside the group we've identified. He can't do that with me hanging around. Not that I want to reinforce anything he said this morning, but in this situation I am a liability."
"I knew I was going to end up mortally regretting that comment," Jim muttered. "You are not a liability, Chief. You're my partner. If something goes wrong, I want you out of the line of fire. These men have already killed eight people without blinking an eye. They're not going to hesitate at offing an anthropologist even if he is an official police observer."
"You know who's behind this?" Joel interrupted. "From the ranting and raving around the office about dead ends, that's the last thing I expected to hear."
"Smoke and mirrors, Joel," Jim responded. "We had to make it look like weren't making any progress."
"An illusion... you want the people you're after to think they're safe," Taggert murmured, nodding his understanding. "And this group you're going to try to infiltrate... they're cops, aren't they."
Blair's eyes widened in surprise. "How did you figure that out?"
Joel grinned. "They don't give out captain's bars to just anyone, Sandburg. It's the only explanation that makes any sense. I take it you've been planning this for the past couple of weeks?"
"The delay has cost two more people their lives," Jim said grimly, "but we didn't have enough to move on until now."
"That delay might have also bought your safety, Jim." Blair's tone was tinged with anger. "I regret their deaths as much as you do, but I'd regret yours a lot more. We needed the time to make your change in attitude and behavior believable. If you had tried to get inside Jenson's group..."
"Jenson? Phil Jenson from Vice?" Joel's face reflected his shocked surprise.
Blair turned toward Jim, his eyes wide and filled with regret at his slip. Jim laid a hand on his shoulder and gave him a reassuring smile. "It's okay, Chief. We can trust Joel." The Sentinel glanced at Taggert, feeling slightl
y embarrassed. "We probably should have included you on this from the beginning, Joel. Phil Jenson is one of the six players that we've identified. We just don't know how many more there might be hiding in the wings. Because of the risk, we decided to keep this on an absolute need-to-know basis. I'm sorry you had to find out this way. "
"No apologies are necessary," the bigger man assured them. "From what little you've said, I can more than appreciate the need for secrecy. I'm assuming that Simon knows what's going on? "
"Knows all, hears all," Jim acknowledged, his gaze flickering toward the floor lamp.
"Bugs. Not enough here, so we had to import our own," Blair muttered in disgust.
The anthropologist crossed to the dresser, retrieving the water and food he'd left there earlier. Sandburg gestured for Joel to take a seat in one of the armchairs and gave Jim a gentle shove toward the other. "We might as well be comfortable." Blair gave Taggert one of the bottles, opened another with a flourish for Jim and planted the paper bag in his partner's lap.
"What's this?" Jim asked in surprise.
"Cholesterol on a bun," Blair grumbled. "I picked up a burger for you on my way back from campus. Eat."
"What about you?"
"I'm not hungry right now. I'll grab something later," the grad student answered smoothly. "Something healthy."
The Sentinel eyed his Guide dubiously. "When was the last time your stomach had more than its own lining to chew on, Sandburg?"
"Hey, I had a huge breakfast before our blow-out scene at the station this morning."
And probably lost it all as soon as it was over, too, Jim mused grimly as he opened the bag and extracted the foil wrapped hamburger.
Blair began filling Taggert in on the details while Jim ate. The Sentinel watched his Guide closely. The younger man's hands fluttered in accompaniment to his words and he paced while he talked. That in itself was not unusual -- Sandburg was the living, breathing embodiment of the term 'perpetual motion'.
But something was off. Blair's movements normally flowed with a graceful eloquence, a dance that was as expressive as his eyes. Now they were nervous, jerky -- like a marionette whose strings had been tangled.
Jim finished his sandwich and balled the wrapper in his fist, wishing he could crush Jenson and his gang just as easily. If it weren't for them, his Guide would be headed home tonight, not left alone and vulnerable in some strange, broken-down motel room.
Joel's soft voice broke Jim's reverie and brought him back to the conversation at hand.
"... Phil Jenson and his partner Archie Gordon, Martin Randolph and Rick Smithson from down at the West Precinct, Mark Harris and Jeff Rogers from East. You're certain about those six being involved?"
"We are," Jim answered.
"My God, Jim. Jenson and Rogers are regular speakers at the academy," Joel murmured in amazement. "And from what I hear, Randolph and Smithson have the best arrest record at West."
"Yeah, they're all pillars of the community," Blair grumbled.
"I know it's hard to believe, Joel, but we've managed to link them all together in this," Jim said quietly. "Once we figured out we were looking for cops, we went back and started reviewing all the evidence we had on the murders. All the victims were shot with a different gun. The ballistics reports at Central and West didn't give us anything, but we got lucky when we checked the records at East. The fourth victim was killed with a .38 that was supposedly in evidence lockup."
"How'd you get your hands on the records?"
"Let's just say it took some inventive keyboarding and leave it at that, Joel," Blair said softly.
Taggert raised one eyebrow in speculation.
"Turns out Harris and Rogers had handled a burglary case that the weapon was tied to," Jim continued. "We checked, and found that the gun had been cleaned recently. The logs showed that Harris had been in and out of evidence lockup the day before and the day after the murder."
Taggert looked even more surprised, but simply nodded. Jim was relieved that the captain didn't ask how they'd managed to get in and out of another precinct's evidence room without being questioned.
"We shadowed Harris and started digging into his personal accounts," Blair said, picking up the explanation. "He'd made several larger than usual payments on his mortgage, which had been seriously in arrears up to that point. We couldn't find any records to indicate a change in income, so we started trying to track the money trail."
"Since he and Rogers have been partnered for a while we looked into his background and activities as well," Jim added. "Blair's cousin, the one that's got some less than sterling references," he shot a quick grin at his partner, "told us that Rogers had been in pretty deep to one of the local loan sharks. Apparently he has an unhealthy attachment to the ponies. A week after the third murder, he bought back his marker."
"Following Harris and Rogers led us to Randolph and Smithson. We weren't sure about them at first," Blair explained. "We couldn't locate any evidence of the same kind of payoff going on. Fortunately we managed to find a connection through the arsons."
"Brown and Rafe had been running background checks on the ownership of the buildings in the neighborhood. The paper trail was pretty deep..."
Blair snorted at Jim's statement. "Yeah, from here to China and back again." "... but after following a pretty intricately laid circuit, we discovered that all four men had purchased property rights to several lots in the area. There were a dozen or more dummy corporations listed so it took some time to dig through the morass of forms and false leads. We finally came up with a link to an insurance firm that specialized in commercial coverages."
"Let me guess," Joel offered. "You found policies for each of the properties that they'd bought."
"Got it in one, Joel," Jim said, smiling. "Each with a higher than normal fire and accident coverage. Not really that unusual given the neighborhood and the age of the buildings, but enough to make us suspicious, given how providentially several of the units had suddenly gone up in smoke."
"The insurance angle led us to Gordon and Jenson," Blair interjected. "They hold the same types of policies on additional properties within the radius of where each of the fires took place. In fact, Jenson made a bundle on the first fire."
"Backtracking Jenson gave us another connection," Jim pointed out. "I called in a couple of favors out of some old friends at CIA and the army. Jenson was a Major and Gordon served several tours on his personal staff. At one point or another, the other four men either served under Jenson's command, or were quartered on the same base. We figure that he's the main man behind all of this."
"I assume that you've got this all documented?" Joel asked quietly.
"In triplicate," Blair muttered. He dug through his backpack and pulled out a stack of fat file folders. He stuffed all but three back into the bag and handed those to Joel.
Taggert hefted the pleated folders thoughtfully. Each was a good two inches thick. He looked inside one of them and pulled out two micro cassettes. "Tape too?"
Jim eyed his partner in surprise. Blair met his questioning gaze for a moment, then shrugged and looked away. "I figured we might need a verbal statement as well. Just in case..."
Just in case neither one of us makes it through this alive, Jim thought grimly.
"The two of you did all of this yourselves?" Joel asked quietly, still staring at the folders in amazement. "This represents the work of a full-time task force."
"Simon gave us whatever help he could," Jim said quietly. "But we couldn't risk involving anyone else. We've theorized that the murders are a sort of 'hazing ritual' to join Jenson's little club. Two weeks ago there were six dead, now there are eight. Unless one of the men we've identified so far has decided he likes killing, that means there are two members of the group unaccounted for."
Joel's eyes narrowed as he considered the implications.
"Everything we've got is in those folders, Joel. Still, most of it is guilt by association and some incriminating, but not substantiatin
g evidence. There's almost enough to build a case against the six we've targeted, but I want the rest of the slime as well," Jim stated grimly. "Jenson and his men have a stranglehold on the residents in that neighborhood. We think that in addition to the arson angle, that they've been hitting up the shopkeepers for protection money. Those that don't pay, end up as targets. We can't let them get away with it any longer. The people living there have it hard enough as it is... they deserve better protection than what Jenson and his buddies are offering."
The Sentinel felt the weight of his Guide's hand on his shoulder and looked up into the younger man's worried face. Jim manage a small smile of thanks for his partner's silent support and gesture of comfort.
"And to do that you're planning to get inside... find out who the players are first hand," Joel murmured. "What makes you think that Jenson's going to be interested in adding you to the group? You wouldn't appear to have the same kind of money problems that Harris and Rogers had -- or have you managed to falsify a few records?"
"Nah, Jim's credit report is a thing of beauty, Joel," Blair grinned. "No way to trash that in a short period of time. Not without arousing suspicions we don't want." He glanced at his partner and turned serious again. "Money, or the lack of it, doesn't appear to be the only motivating factor. Attitude plays a big part. Jenson and his pals may look like paragons of virtue on the surface, but underneath all the politically correct posturing, they're bigots. And they're into control and power, big time. Jim handles some pretty sensitive cases out of Major Crimes and he's got access to a lot of inside information. We figure that, plus his background, should do the trick. Especially now that we've sullied his sterling reputation."
Joel's expression grew grim and he looked the Sentinel squarely in the eyes. "Damn, Jim. If you're right about all of this, Jenson will kill you the second he figures out what you're up to."
Jim felt Blair's grip tighten on his shoulder and heard the anthropologist's heartbeat thunder in response to Taggert's words.