“Damn it, it’s not about money. It’s about your self-esteem. You used to care about so much, and now you care about nothing. Maybe you need to see....”
“A doctor? A mental health professional? An employment counsellor? Maybe a banis witchdoctor.”
He moved back as if to get away from my sarcastic tone. “Someone. Didn’t they offer you help when you left the force?”
“Sure. But they couldn’t help me get my job back and that’s the only help I need.” I stood and picked up my mug. “I’m going back to bed. I’ll sort out the laundry. Leave me a list if you want anything else. Housework, I can do.”
He reached out a hand but I moved away from him. “Javen.”
“Later, Yashi.”
~~~~~~~~
Of course I felt like a shit later, but Yashi’s kindness was more than I could stand. He hadn’t told me anything I didn’t already know, and hadn’t beaten myself up over a hundred times.
To make some kind of amends, I put away the laundry and scrounged around for other tasks that might need doing, then made a list of food items they were running short of, and did a run to the market for those. By now I vaguely felt like eating, and in the only routine I had these days, I headed for a small chai house in town that had several attractive features. It was quiet and private, and the chai and food acceptable without being so good as to attract non-locals. And most important of all—it was nowhere near any police station, court, or justice facility of any kind. This reduced my chance of running into anyone I knew to as close to zero as I could make it and still leave the house. Out of residual guilt, I even shaved, though I honestly wondered who would care or notice. My family would. I guessed that was enough reason.
I walked because it was good for my still tender back muscles, and I was out of shape after so long recovering from the shooting. I definitely didn’t want to end up a sad, lonely and overweight ex-cop. I tried not to resent the busy people going about their useful lives, or the weight of their emotions on my brain. Most of the time it felt a bit like wearing a too-tight hat, unless I sensed something more powerful, like extreme anger or hate. Then it was more like having a pick driven through my right eye. I’d have given a testicle to get rid of this ‘ability’ and the few banis I passed earned a scowl for the genetic contamination one of their people had perpetrated on my family.
That was how my parents put it anyway. Kelons and banis had intermarried a fair bit over two centuries of colonisation, but we’d always considered ourselves pure blood Kelon. Mum had hit the roof when she found her baby boy was walking proof someone in our past had crossed the racial divide. Why couldn’t I have inherited red hair from my banis ancestor, instead of this stupid ‘gift’? Empathy had wrecked my life.
As usual, thinking about this stuff put me in a foul mood, and as usual, the owner of the chai house ignored my temper, and took my order of spiced chai and egg dosa in silence. She didn’t need to cultivate customers. Her place was close enough to the business district to attract workers looking for cheap, decent refreshment, and in the evenings, local residents came down for inexpensive filling meals. If they didn’t like her manners, they could go somewhere else that cost more, same as I could.
I pulled up the media screen at the table and read the news, trying to avoid the crime reports, though my eyes kept going to them out of habit. I recognised names of fellow cops, areas I’d patrolled, regular problem makers, and crimes I’d worked hard all my career to solve and prevent. It was picking at the wound and yet I couldn’t stop myself. Maybe I should see someone. But I hated talking about any of it because it made it more real, took me back to that day in the hospital when the results of the Empathic Sensitivity test had confirmed my worst fears. Empaths couldn’t be cops. It wasn’t fair on the poor little criminals that I might have an advantage over them and know when they were lying their arses off, like justice was a bloody game and we all had to start with a level playing field. I shouldn’t scowl at the banis in the city. I should walk up to the nearest civil libertarian and kick him in the nuts.
The waitress brought my chai and food, and I had my first meal of the day. The dosa weren’t terrific, but they were edible, and I’d never been fussy about food. Used to drive Kirin crazy. He’d spend an hour titivating and spicing and arranging things just so, and put the plate before me only to have me eat it without comment. Food’s just food, you know? I was grateful he cooked, sure, but I’d have eaten it without all the messing around and he knew it. Still, much as my lack of culinary sensibilities annoyed him, it had taken my empathy to drive him away. Or have him stolen away.
“Javen?”
I jerked, my old lover’s voice in my head suddenly coming from outside it. I looked up and saw the handsome face that haunted my dreams. I stared, paralysed by unpleasant surprise, then shoved away from the table.
“Nice to see you, Kirin. Goodness, look at the time. Catch you round.” I grabbed my coat, and headed to the door, pushing my ex out of my way. The owner nodded slightly to me as I left but I ignored everything and everyone in my need to get the fuck away from the man who’d shredded my heart.
“Javen, wait!”
I walked faster. What in the name of sainted reason was he doing here? If Yashi sent him, I’d gut my brother with a rusty knife.
Running steps, and before I could pick up my pace, Kirin grabbed my arm. “Wait, please! I need to talk to you.”
I pulled away. “Too fucking bad.”
“Please. Javen, I need you.”
I glared at him narrow-eyed, wishing my empathy worked both ways so he would know just how angry I was. “Yeah? Bit late for that, friend. Devi’s your helpmate now. Go ask him.”
“Javen, please. Please listen to me. Damn it, it’s life or death!”
I made a rude noise. “Bullshit. Cut the dramatics, Kirin. They never impressed me.”
“I’m serious. I...Javen, you’re the only person who can help me.”
“Did Yashi send you here?”
“What? Of course not. I can’t talk to him about this.” He ran his hand through his thick, wavy hair. He looked good, damn his eyes. At least I’d shaved. “Look, ten minutes. Twenty maximum. Please.”
“Why? Why should I?”
“Because I’m desperate.”
“Yeah, right. Like I didn’t know that,” I said, tapping my forehead. “Another reason. You’re the one who gave me the excuse not to give a shit, remember?”
He bit his lip while I did my best to keep a mean expression on my face. Kirin’s puppy eyes were pretty damn impressive but I wouldn’t soften. He’d blown his chances with me.
“Javen, I’m staring at financial ruin. Not just for me, everyone in my lab. Twenty employees. Help them, if you won’t help me. Please?”
I sighed. “Fifteen minutes maximum. Back in the chai house, and don’t make a scene because I like that place and want to go back. For the record, you’re a prick for coming anywhere near me right now.”
He wrung his hands, and I wanted to tell him to stop the foppish gesture. But I didn’t. He wasn’t my business any more. “I know. I didn’t know anyone else to ask.”
“Always nice to be someone’s last option.”
He winced, chagrined. Sometimes he had no idea how he sounded. Better at food than people, was Kirin.
I led the way back to the chai house. The owner didn’t even lift an eyebrow at my sudden reappearance, taking my paycard without the slightest change in her emotions or expression as I ordered more chai.
I sat back and gave him my hardest glare. “Okay, talk—fast and calm, and keep the sob stories for someone who gives a fuck.”
He gulped, out of breath from being hysterical and walking fast. “Evidence has gone missing at the lab.”
“Missing as in stolen?” He nodded. “So call the cops. I’m not on the force, remember?”
“I can’t.” He twisted his hands like he was trying to wipe something nasty off them. “I’ll lose my contractor’s license, and th
e owner of the evidence and the client will both sue me. The insurance won’t cover it completely, and not at all if it’s staff theft. They’ll claim I colluded in it.”
I held up my hand. “Back up. What was stolen, who owns it, and what client? And who took it, do you have any idea?”
He lowered his voice. “A pendant belonging to Kajal Gemate, worth over a hundred thousand dolar. Her husband’s lawyers sent it for DNA analysis as part of their divorce case.”
I whistled quietly. “Man, you picked some nice people to piss off. What happened?”
He waited for the chai I’d ordered to be set in front of us, before continuing. “One of our technicians logged it out to begin work on it. It was still in the sealed evidence wallet, on his table, and he left it there—against all our regulations—while he attended to an urgent call for assistance from another employee. This was during the lunch break. When he returned, the wallet and pendant was gone.”
“Sloppy, Kirin. You questioned people?”
“Yes, and searched the lab thoroughly. No trace. If we don’t hand the pendant back with our results within ten days, I’ll have to admit what happened.”
“The chain of custody’s broken anyway.”
“Yes, but we’re testing for the presence of Shrimati Gemate’s alleged lover’s DNA. There’s no way we could have contaminated the item with that. We just need it back.”
I sipped my chai, pretending to think, but really taking time to get my feelings under control. I hadn’t seen Kirin in three months, and would have been glad not to have seen him for another three years. He really had a fucking nerve. Though I saw his problem. A lab losing an item that valuable and in such a high profile divorce suit? The police force would never use him again, and civilian clients would avoid him too because the opposition in any court case would have a wonderful time pointing out their chosen forensic laboratory was so careless.
“Suspects?”
“You have to understand, I know all these people very well. They’re friends.”
“And one of them’s a thief. How many?”
“Five people, not including me, were in the building. One of them is, um.”
“Um. You mean the little bitch?”
His face took on a pinched expression. “Devi, yes.”
“Well then. Look no further.”
“Javen, that’s unfair.”
“He stole you, he could steal a pendant. Case closed.”
“He didn’t steal me. I...left you.”
“You threw me out and three weeks later Devi boy was unpacking his underwear in our old home. Pardon me for not believing a bolt of lightning made you suddenly appreciate our dear, dear friend after so long.”
“I don’t want to talk about him. He didn’t do it.”
“Prove it.”
“I know him.”
“Uh huh.” He looked on the verge of tears. “The others?”
“All technicians. All people I trust completely. Javen, this has to be handled carefully. Any of them could cause a scandal.”
“And again it comes back to, why me? There are at least a dozen private investigators in Hegal. Go ask one of them.”
“I can’t trust them.”
“And I can’t trust you.”
“I’ll pay.”
“I don’t care.”
“Please, Javen? For old times’ sake?”
I rolled my eyes at him. “Oh man, that was the wrong line to take. No. Piss off. Fifteen minutes was up three minutes ago.”
He hung his head, and I drank my chai, trying very hard not to care, or pay attention to the misery and anxiety rolling off him. This wasn’t anything to do with me twice over. Kirin wasn’t my lover, and I wasn’t a cop. He had a hell of a nerve.
But the problem was, I still felt like a cop in my head, and the more I thought about it, the more it bugged me. I’d been in Kirin’s lab lots of times, both on and off duty. It was a pretty slick outfit, lots of impressive quality control and tracking procedures for evidence and material. I’d never heard of the chain of custody being broken at his place, and that was one of the reasons he got so much police work. The screw up he described didn’t fit at all.
“I still don’t know why me, Kirin. I’m a civilian. I can’t force anyone to talk to me, or search anyone without permission. If I had an investigator’s license, that’d be something, but I don’t.”
He gave me a brief hopeful smile. “I thought you could use that...thing. To tell if any of them were lying.”
My vision turned red from rage. “Do you actually want me to punch you on the fucking nose?” I spat. “That thing made you so afraid of me, disgusted you so much, you dumped me after three years together. And now you want to use it? Just go away. You make me sick. I mean it.”
The tears were back. “I’m sorry. About all of it. I know I was wrong to say what I did...and to ask you to leave.”
“Bit late now.”
He nodded. “Yes. I fucked it all up, I know that. And now I’ve fucked this up. You’re right. I’m sorry to...I’m just sorry.”
I didn’t watch him leave. I stayed where I was because I wasn’t sure I could walk on legs that had been cut out from under me. That miserable, selfish bastard. It wasn’t enough he had to rip my heart into bits, but now he wanted to make pâté out of it too? I’d always known he was self-centred but this? This was sociopathic.
I called Yashi at work. “Did you tell that shithead where to find me?”
“Good afternoon, Javen. Nice of you to call me. Which shithead are we talking about now?”
“Kirin. He’s just tried to drag me into a stupid fucking mess of his own making. Someone told him where to find me.”
“I might have mentioned a while ago where you liked to eat breakfast, but I had no idea...sorry, brother.” He sounded sincere. “You all right?”
“No.”
“That stupid bastard. I’d never send him to you. You didn’t need this. I know what that would do to you right now.”
“Yeah. Sorry I...never mind. Um, I did some grocery shopping for you guys, and fixed that leaking tap. Figured out what was causing it while I cleaned the bathroom.”
“Thank you. Javen, you don’t need to be our housekeeper. We love having you.”
“I know. I just want to...be part of the family. Have a real role. You know, not as a favour, but because you expect it. You’re entitled to expect it.”
“Oh. Well, okay. I’ll work out what you can help with, and put you into the routine. The babysitting’s a big thing for us, though. Hard to find people we trust, and the kids adore you.”
“I adore them back. Uh...better let you go.”
“Yeah. You could drop by the clinic if you like.”
“I might, sure. Later.”
I hung up and stared into space. Trust. Such a loaded word, and one Kirin had no right to use. He’d betrayed me. I’d needed him and he kicked me out. The first real test we’d faced and he failed it.
Like I’d just failed his test, though he had no business setting it. “For old times’ sake.” Give me a break. I didn’t owe him a thing.
But there was something I could get from this—proof that I was the bigger man. Proof that the ‘freak’, as he’d called me in a frightened rage, could do something he couldn’t. Proof that he’d traded down when he’d gone for that little lying weasel, and if Devi was guilty I would so enjoy proving that.
I thought about it some more, then called a number I was slightly surprised to find I hadn’t deleted. “Kirin? I’ll do it. I’ll come to the lab and you keep your mouth shut. Especially to fucking Devi, right?”
“Of course.”
“I mean it. He’s a suspect, same as the others. If you tell him what’s going down, I’ll walk.”
“I won’t say anything. Thank you, Javen. I can never repay you for this.”
“You got that right.”
I hung up. I really, really hoped Devi was the thief. It would make up for so much.
/> ~~~~~~~~
Kirin’s lab was in the heart of the legal district—a place I’d carefully avoided for months. I tried not to wince as I saw uniformed officers—people I recognised, though thankfully no one called to me. Man, I’d extract full price from Kirin’s hide for this.
He met me at the front desk as he’d done so many times before, but this time, it was as if we were strangers. The clerk, who knew me well, looked down at his work, avoiding both of us.
Kirin pointed to the door on the left. “Um, this way.”
“I know the drill.”
He bit his lip again. He was going to gnaw it through by the time this was done. “Come to my office first.”
The route avoided the main working areas, fortunately. A lot of his employees knew me, so as soon as I appeared, they’d realise something was up. Like Devi did, rushing up to Kirin and coming to a comically clumsy stop when he spotted me.
“Hello, cockface,” I said pleasantly.
“Javen. Um.” He radiated guilt and fear, and I smiled to myself. Oh yeah, guilty as fuck. “Kirin, I—”
“Not now, Devi. I’ve got business to deal with.”
“Sure.” The little turd gave me another hunted, suspicious look and scurried off.
“I don’t want you to insult him to his face, or in front of me,” Kirin said a little petulantly, but he wasn’t as pissed as I’d have been in his shoes. Interesting.
“Too bloody bad. But now he knows I’m around, we need to move fast. Come on.”
Behind the closed door of his office, I told him, “Your boyfriend is good for this. He’s spewing guilt all over the place.”
“You don’t know it’s over the pendant. Please, Javen. Set aside your prejudice—”
“Hah.”
He flushed. “This is a mistake,” he muttered.
“Yeah, it is. But I’m here now. I need the exact sequence of events and the work records of all the people who were in the building. Then I want to interview them all separately. Here, preferably.”
Different Senses Page 3