Broken Faith

by Lois Cloarec Hart

  Once they were parked in Lee's reserved spot, the women reluctantly released their hands and climbed out of the car to follow their friends to the stairwell.

  "We'll walk over to the headquarters from here," Lee advised. "I don't think it'll take us that long. You two should be on the road by one."

  "What about your truck?" Marika asked.

  "I'll get Dana to run me back to the industrial park to pick it up later." Lee shrugged. "I doubt anyone even noticed that it's there. I parked it behind a bunch of transport trucks."

  They ascended the stairs to the street level, and again Lee took a close look around as they headed in the direction of the police headquarters. Once there, they were immediately ushered into Marc Manion's office. Rhi watched with interest as the man, obviously an old friend of Lee's, greeted the big woman warmly and introduced her to another man in the office.

  "Lee, this is Keith Judson. He's with Major Crimes and is very interested in what's been going on. Keith, this is Lee Glenn and her partner, Dana Cochrane. I'm afraid I don't know these ladies?"

  Lee quickly made introductions, and they all settled into chairs as Marc leaned against the front of his desk. Speaking mostly to Lee, he said, "Pike and Eddie are still in Edmonton, but they'll be brought down by late this afternoon. I've told Keith everything you told me, but he'd like to go over it with you again."

  Nodding, Lee agreed and handed over the large envelope she'd brought from home. "Okay, here are the statements that I took from them last night. I'd like to get Marika and Rhi's parts over with so they can get out of here. They're going out of town for a few days."

  Keith took the lead then, questioning the women closely and in-depth on the previous evening's events as well as everything that had led up to the confrontation with Cass. When Marika faltered as she explained how she came to be involved with the psychotic woman, Rhi laid a supportive hand on her arm and was rewarded with a grateful look.

  Neither man was openly critical, regardless of what their thoughts might have been, but Keith was keenly interested in the Vancouver encounter.

  "Are you sure it was Sandra DeAndre, Ms. Havers? There's no doubt in your mind that the woman calling herself Cass-the woman who ordered your death last night-was unquestionably Sandra DeAndre?"

  "No doubt at all," Marika confirmed firmly. "The host was introduced to me as Palmer DeAndre, and he himself introduced me to his wife, Sandra. Trust me, when she dragged me off to the washroom, the gloves came off and she was all Cass."

  She shuddered at the memory as Keith smiled grimly.

  "I'm sorry that you had to go through all this, Ms. Havers, but you may have inadvertently given us the break we've been needing for a long time."

  When all the women looked at him curiously, he shook his head. "I'm sorry. I can't go into it any further at the moment, but I will tell you that your testimony may be vital in a major bust of snakeheads and drug smugglers."

  Startled, Marika and Rhi looked at each other, really conscious for the first time that there was much more involved here than simply a psycho scorned.

  "Marc, can you at least tell us if you've looked into Sandra's whereabouts?" Lee asked.

  The two men exchanged glances and Keith nodded.

  Marc answered, "We did make some preliminary inquiries. Mrs. DeAndre has been away in Montreal in connection with the DeAndre charitable foundation for the past week. Her secretary said she was expected back this weekend, however we also checked with the airport and a private jet registered with the DeAndre foundation flew into Calgary in the early evening, and departed for Vancouver after midnight."

  "That matches Cass' movements as far as we know them," Lee observed.

  "Yes, but..." Marc began.

  "But we're going to have to proceed very carefully," Keith finished. "The DeAndres are the cream of Vancouver society, and as such, they number some very powerful people within their circle."

  Lee snorted. "No doubt exactly why the bitch feels she can do whatever the hell she feels like with people's lives!"

  Dana laid a calming hand on her partner's knee. Addressing both men, she asked, "Are we done here then, gentlemen?"

  Marc ran a hand over his jaw and looked at his colleague for confirmation. "I think so. Nothing more we can do until the King brothers arrive. Lee, you want to be in on that, right?"

  Keith frowned as Lee nodded. Marc smiled. "Trust me, Keith. I know Lee's work. She's a skilled interrogator, and she has the advantage of knowing the brothers from way back. If anyone can, she'll have those two spilling their guts in no time flat."

  Reluctantly, Keith acquiesced. "It's your ballpark, Marc. If you feel she can help..."

  "I do," Marc said firmly. Turning back to Lee, he instructed, "Be back here by three and we'll go over our strategy."

  "Will do, Cap'n."

  Lee stood and the other women followed her lead. As they were leaving the office, Keith called, "Ms. Havers, will I be able to get in touch with you if I need to?"

  Turning, Lee looked at him sternly. "You can reach her and Rhi through me. Their whereabouts are on a need-to-know basis."

  Keith grunted. "And I suppose I don't need to know."

  "No," Lee agreed. "You don't."

  Motioning the others to wait, she returned to the office for a quick conference with her old commander. Rhi noticed him handing her something before she returned to the group by the door, and led her small band down the hallway to the elevator. Glancing up at a wall clock, Rhi noticed that they'd been in there for over an hour and that Lee's estimate was almost dead on. They would be on the highway heading west by one PM.

  On the way back to the garage, Lee placed a call on her cell phone and Rhi heard her issue instructions to bring the rental car around. By the time, they got to their parking spot, an inconspicuous, white, late-model Buick was idling in the spot beside the Taurus, a wiry, short-haired woman leaning against the trunk smoking as she waited.

  "Hey, Barb," Lee called as they approached. The other woman waved a hand in acknowledgement and walked over to meet them.

  "All taken care of, boss. It was right where you thought it'd be. I threw a couple of maps in the rental too."

  "Thanks, kiddo," Lee said with a smile. "You really are worth your weight in gold. Have fun."

  Barb shrugged nonchalantly, but Rhi could see the pleased look in her pale eyes before she ambled away to another blue Taurus, started it up and drove away.

  Dana unlocked the trunk of the Taurus and retrieved the bags. Setting them behind the Buick, she cautioned, "Now you two be very careful, you hear!"

  "Yeah," Lee added. "If you see anything at all suspicious, don't waste any time. Get to the nearest police station and explain what's going on."

  She pulled a card out of her pocket, and wrote something on it before handing it over. Rhi peered over Marika's arm to read it. It was one of Marc's, and Lee had jotted his home phone number on it.

  "That should be enough to convince any of the local constabulary that you're serious. If they need to call to confirm your story, Marc will back you up."

  The four women looked at each other and Dana was the first to step forward, pulling Marika into a fierce hug. She then did the same to Rhi as Lee and Marika embraced. The smaller woman heard the nurse whisper, "Take care of our Rika, Rhi."

  Rhi nodded and pulled back, only to be swept up in Lee's strong arms. "Love you, Lady Mouse. You take care of yourself now. Come back safely."

  Profoundly touched by the hoarsely affectionate admonition, Rhi watched in amazement as Lee wiped her eyes, gruffly warning, "Wait for at least five minutes after we've left before you take off. And if I don't hear from you by ten every night, I'm sending the cops to check on you!"

  Marika smiled warmly at her old friend. "Ten at night," she confirmed, "and I'll even call you in the mornings."

  "Good." Lee nodded her approval and then with the return of her customary twinkle, she added, "But you don't have to make it too early. I'm sure you won't be gettin
g up with the roosters."

  Dana grabbed her arm and propelled her away. Rhi could hear Lee protest, "What? I only meant that they'd be on holidays and would want to sleep in."

  She couldn't hear Dana's muttered rejoinder, but she did hear the big woman's booming laugh. Rhi glanced at Marika to find the lawyer shaking her head in amusement.

  "Guess we should get going," Rhi suggested.

  They got into the Buick and watched as Dana and Lee pulled out of their spot and drove off. Marika used the time to acquaint herself with the unfamiliar car and quickly peruse the maps, then they too departed.

  Within twenty minutes they were on the Trans-Canada, heading west on the four-lane highway towards the mountains. Their destination lay five hours away, through three national parks and some of the most spectacular mountainous terrain in the country, en route to one of British Columbia's primary tourist playgrounds.

  Even the circumstances of their trip couldn't dilute the exhilaration Rhi felt, and looking at her companion, she saw that her own grin was echoed on Marika's face. When gray eyes left the highway and met hers, both women broke out laughing for the sheer joy of being alive, being together, and getting away to a future that looked brighter with each kilometre they covered.

  * * *

  Gao couldn't remember the last time he'd felt this miserable. Lying on Perry's couch, he glared at the cast on his right hand. The bitch had hit him so hard that she'd broken three of his knuckles, not to mention his thumb and forefinger.

  He'd chanced going to a walk-in clinic the previous night, using a phony name and paying cash to get a disinterested and overworked nurse to set his hand and stitch the gash in his forehead. Now he could tell by the way his hand had swollen up and the horrendous pain in the slightest movement, that there was serious damage.

  The nurse had advised him to see his family doctor for a follow up, warning of a possible concussion, but Gao was subsisting on over the counter headache remedies to try to ease the constant ache. Gloomily he tried to find a position on the pillow that his head didn't hurt so.

  The slender Oriental felt like the blow that had split his forehead had also rattled his brains. He kept trying to make plans, but thoughts slipped in and out of his mind like wisps of wind, barely making an impression as they passed. The single concept Gao had been able to fixate on was the urgent need to find the women who had escaped from him.

  Barely able to drag himself off Perry's couch the previous night to use the washroom, Gao had dispatched the electronics whiz early that morning to see if they could ascertain the whereabouts of the lawyer and her small companion. They'd used the information they'd accumulated on their targets to narrow their focus. With the description he gotten from the man who had hauled him away from the industrial park the previous night, it wasn't difficult to determine who had hit him and thrown an wrench into his...and the Chameleon's...plans.

  Forced to flee, Gao had ended up as Perry's unwilling guest. Scowling, he surveyed the dismal apartment in which he'd taken refuge. Perry was as slovenly in his housekeeping as he was in his personal hygiene, and the fastidious Asian couldn't wait to leave his temporary haven. Even the air was pungent with a combination of rotting food and the cheap cigars the electronics expert favoured.

  His uninjured hand resting on the gun that lay on his stomach, Gao tried to plot his next move. The need to execute the two women was absolute. With each hour that he lay on this uncomfortable couch in this dreary apartment, Gao's anger grew-his emotions seething and roiling until he was obsessed by hatred for the two that had destroyed his organized, profitable life. He sought solace in imagining all the ways he could kill them, picturing their deaths over and over as he toyed with which one to kill first, how many bullets he'd use, and how long he could make them suffer before they died.

  For the first time since Gao had entered the Chameleon's organization, her orders and wishes were not paramount. Had she herself instructed him to abandon his pursuit of the lawyer and her companion, he could not have done so, whatever the cost. A part of his brain-a small, still rational part-fought to interject logic into his thinking, but the emotional tsunami that consumed him wouldn't allow for any other course of action. He would find his two nemeses, and he would kill them. It was as simple as that.

  The sound of someone at the door alerted him and he readied his gun. Perry entered, then yelped and threw up his hands when he saw what Gao was pointing at him.

  Gao shook his head in disgust and lowered the gun, beckoning the startled man inside. Without any preliminaries, he growled, "What did you find?"

  Perry nervously perched on the edge of a chair. "Um, well, you were right about them being at the Glenn woman's house. I saw them come out this morning."

  "Did they see you?"

  "Nope. One of their neighbours was away, so I borrowed their garage to keep watch."

  "Are they still there?"

  Perry shifted uncomfortably and wiped a hand across his face. "Not exactly."

  Gao narrowed his eyes. "What do you mean, not exactly?"

  "Well, I put a tracking bug on the car that was sittin' in the driveway. So when they came out and drove away, I was able to follow them downtown. They parked in the garage under Pearson Towers. I didn't want them to see me, so I parked over one street, figuring I could follow them with the tracker."

  "Did you not get out of your car to see where they went?" Gao asked with disarming softness, though his eyes glittered with a cold ferocity.

  "No, no, I did," Perry hastened to assure him. "I saw them come out of the garage and walk down the street. I followed them on the other side until I saw them go into the police headquarters. Hell, I wasn't going in there; so I walked around until they came out again. Took quite a while, but when they headed back to the garage, I hurried to my car so I could track them again."

  "And?" Gao could tell by the way Perry was fidgeting that he'd screwed up, and he was overwhelmed by disgust. He briefly contemplated simply killing the incompetent, but it would cause more trouble than the momentary satisfaction would be worth.

  "Jesus, how was I to know?" the nervous man whined. "I mean, I followed the tracker and I caught up to it on the highway north before I realized I was following the wrong car. Christ, it was the right model, right colour, but it only had one person in it and she wasn't one of the ones I'd seen back at the house. I don't know what went wrong!"

  Gao closed his eyes, feeling an upsurge of nausea. "They found your little toy, you fool. They put it on some other car to throw you off." Opening his eyes, he fixed on the anxiously defensive man. "What did you do once you made the brilliant observation that it wasn't the right car?"

  "I went right back to the Glenn house. Didn't see the blue Taurus out front, but there was a truck in front of the garage. I waited around for a few hours, but the only person that came out was Glenn. I followed her again, thinkin' maybe she'd lead me to wherever the others were, but she just went back to the police station. Parked right in a visitor spot, so I know that's where she was going. I didn't know what else you wanted me to do, so I came back here. I mean, I'm sorry, but I don't usually do this kinda work, you know?"

  Perry concluded his narrative and nervously ran his hand through his sparse hair. Gao stared at him, anger and frustration warring for dominance. Finally, inwardly acknowledging that he still needed the other man for the time being, he tamped down his emotions.

  "All right. It's clear that they've stashed them somewhere, and I have to figure out a way to find them. Bring me all the printouts you have from the surveillance on the lawyer's apartment. There has to be a clue in there somewhere."

  While Perry scrambled with alacrity to carry out his orders, Gao let himself relax back into the couch. Forcing himself to concentrate through the fog that clouded his thinking, he tried to consider various possibilities. Within moments though, he was drawn back into the enticing vision of the women kneeling before him, their eyes filled with terror as he pointed his gun at them.

&
nbsp; Savouring the delicious image, Gao barely noticed when Perry returned with a thick sheaf of printouts, setting them carefully on the scarred and burn-pocked coffee table. Sighing, he reluctantly pushed his mental meanderings aside for the more immediate business of analyzing the data and figuring out a way to find the lawyer and her companion. As he shuffled the sheets of paper awkwardly with his left hand, he consoled himself that it was simply a matter of time. It might take a while, but he would find them, and then...

  Perry shuddered at the cold smile that flitted across the Asian's face, wondering what his unwelcome guest was thinking, but quite sure he didn't want to know.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  AS LEE ENTERED Marc's office for the second time that day, she saw her friend and Keith Judson deep in conversation. Both men looked up and nodded at her.

  "Hi, Lee," Marc said, motioning her to pull up a chair. "Keith just got something very interesting faxed from Vancouver that I think might help loosen Pike and Eddie's tongues."

  Curious, Lee dragged a chair over and leaned her elbows on the desk, trying to see what they'd been looking at with such fascination. Marc pushed the faxes across the table, and she saw that they were crime scene photos.

  Picking them up to examine more closely, she gave a low whistle. "Jesus! Someone must've hated this guy." Her stomach turned and she forced herself to look away from the corpse's naked, mutilated body, but even looking at his face didn't quell her uneasiness. The stocky Asian man's face was frozen in a rictus of fear. She had no doubt that he had died fully aware of what was being done to him. "Who is he?"

  Keith answered. "His name is Chai Rhongji. He's Gao's cousin. He was executed sometime this morning and dumped where he'd be easily found. This was a clear message to someone, though we're not exactly sure what it means."

  "I suspect that it means Gao's boss is not happy about the way he botched his orders last night," Lee said, pushing the faxes back across the desk, knowing she wouldn't soon forget the look on the young man's face.