I stepped back. I hadn’t meant to. But the guy looked unhinged right then.
“Fucking little whore,” he growled low. “Time to earn your keep.”
I was so shocked when he reached into his drawstring shorts to pull out an admittedly limp cock that I hesitated. Pierce pulled his sidearm. But he wouldn’t have fired. Not in such an enclosed space. And not when we both realised this was not Joe Cawfield, CIB Detective.
But someone else entirely.
Shit, we’d got it wrong. Or right. It depended on how you looked at it. Cawfield was the CIB traitor, and he was heavily under Weston’s influence.
I lifted the pepper spray at the last second and depressed the nozzle.
Bitter, stringent smelling chemicals poured out, directly into Cawfield’s eyes at close range. He was so close that when he stumbled, he banged into me and the pepper spray went wide; painting a streak across the locker room.
Pierce shouted something. Cawfield screamed. I felt my eyes start to sting, but I refused to shut them.
And then the sound of fifty-thousand volts of electricity arced through the air and Cawfield’s body stiffened. He hit the floor with a crack while Pierce tried not to rub at the tears that streaked down his face from his red-rimmed eyes with his free hand.
The other gripped the taser too tightly.
“Pepper spray?” he demanded, spitting out the stuff in question as he cried blue tinted tears.
I slipped the offending article back in my handbag, out of sight.
“Hart’s got my gun,” I muttered and stared down at a now incapacitated Joe Cawfield.
Fuck my life.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“What Have You Got, Sport? Talk To Me. Dazzle Me With Your Detecting.”
Hart pushed into the observation room, but I didn’t take my eyes off Joe Cawfield sitting back straight, face a mask of fury, behind the desk in Interview Room One opposite Pierce as he interrogated him. Cawfield was still painted in blue from the pepper spray. The detective sergeant had cleaned himself up some. Both, though, had red-rimmed eyes.
Hart stopped beside me and watched the proceedings in silence.
“So far,” Pierce said over the tinny speakers, “we’ve determined you’ve been tracing Keen’s GPS signal for a week. But your… difficulties with the detective started a long time before that.”
“She’s not a detective anymore,” Cawfield muttered.
“Answer the question.”
“What question?”
“Why start tracing her GPS signal only a week ago?”
“I didn’t.”
“Explain.”
“It wasn’t me.”
“So, the dog ate your homework, that’s what you’re going with? Come on, Joe, you can do better than that.”
“Screw you, Sarge. Clearly, she’s said something that’s got you in a tizzy. Her word against mine, right?”
“Your login and password were used to access the GPS system.” Pierce pushed a printout across the desk. “You knew exactly where she was going when you needed to, didn’t you? How did you get Carl to Mellons Bay Cliffs before she got there?”
“What the fuck? I had nothing to do with Carl’s death!”
Pierce ignored him. “That’s how you knew she’d just left Rachel Myers’ house. That’s how you knew she hadn’t been there before. You knew it was a big step for Keen, so you knew to watch her closely. And when she turned the car around and started towards Howick, you knew exactly where she was going.”
Cawfield said nothing.
“Did you have Carl stashed somewhere in the eastern suburbs? Half Moon Bay? Howick itself? He was a big man. Subduing him and getting him under wraps without being seen would have been a tall task. Carl knew how to defend himself. Is that why you had him stashed somewhere close enough to Mellons Bay to get him there before Keen arrived?”
Cawfield shook his head. “I didn’t do this, Sarge.”
“But you just went off your rocker at Keen at Les Mills. Called her a whore. Told her you wanted to make her gag on your dick.”
Cawfield looked uncomfortable.
“You said you wanted to spank her until her skin was pink and she - and I quote here - ‘jizzed all over his precious HEAT truck.’ That’s what you said, Joe. ‘Jizzed all over his precious HEAT truck.’”
“Stop saying that,” he growled.
“But you said it. To Keen. In front of me. You even pulled your dick out as if you wanted to fuck her right then and there. In front of me.”
Cawfield turned sideways in his chair, staring at the wall. Pink washed his cheeks. He was sweating profusely.
Hart reached forward and switched the speakers off.
“What do you make of this, Detective?” he asked.
I didn’t have my badge or gun back. I thought perhaps the only thing holding Hart back from returning them to me was the fact I’d possibly use my gun to shoot Cawfield in the dick with it.
I shook my head.
“Not like you to not have an opinion,” he said gruffly.
“It’s a lot to take in, sir.”
“What does your gut say?”
“I’m not sure we can trust my gut, sir.”
“Because you thought it wasn’t him and it clearly is him?”
“Because I thought it was him all along and then it wasn’t him, and now it clearly is him.”
Hart said nothing.
“I don’t like it,” he finally muttered.
I didn’t either, because there was no denying that Cawfield had two personalities.
“Have you had him psych assessed?” I queried.
“Got someone from the hospital on their way over now.”
“Not Hennessey?”
“No. Not Hennessey. I think we can all assume that Andrew Hennessey is compromised.”
I stared through the one-way glass. Pierce was talking. Cawfield was scowling and saying nothing. He’d lawyer up before too much longer.
“It wasn’t him in the gym and yet it was him, sir,” I said, still looking at the scene through the glass.
“Go on.”
“How long have we known of Weston’s existence?”
“We’ve known for little more than a few months,” he said. “But HEAT has known for a lot longer.”
I sighed. Weston might have got to Cawfield back when I first dated Damon. A backup for if he needed to use me against Carole’s brother. Damon and I had gone our separate ways back then, though, so Cawfield had remained a sleeper cell for the time being.
Then Damon and I hooked up again, and Crazy Cawfield came out to play.
But we’d had a CIB traitor for a lot longer.
Kenny Tyndall was thought to be a simple mugger. Someone who took advantage of Carl’s isolation in the carpark overlooking Mellons Bay Cliffs that night. But I’d always suspected that he’d been put up to it. By the Crown Prosecutor maybe.
But how would he have known Carl was there unless he was able to get into the Central Police GPS system?
I turned to a terminal in the corner of the room and booted it up. Hart had switched the speakers back on when he finally realised I wasn’t going to answer his question. I could hear Cawfield denying all accusations and Pierce steadily chipping away at him with a sharply honed chisel in the background.
I logged into the GPS system and then entered the back door that took us to the permissions section. I scrolled back through the months until I found Carl’s last entry. The last time he’d signed out a police-issued sedan.
I stared at the tracking. At the login and password used to see where Carl would be that night. I stared at it for a long time.
It wasn’t Cawfield’s.
It was mine.
I looked up at the one-way mirror. Cawfield had lawyered up because Pierce was packing up his shit and making a move to exit the room. Cawfield was staring at the glass as if he could see me. His gaze was slightly off, but he knew I was there.
I hadn’t tracked
Carl once in the years that I’d partnered him in CIB. I hadn’t ever tracked anyone.
I looked back down at the computer screen.
My name. My rank. My ID and password.
What the fuck did that mean?
Pierce walked into the observation room. “He’s lawyered up,” he said immediately.
“What do you think?” Hart asked.
“Oh, he’s guilty. Guilty of something.”
“Having it in for a coworker?” Hart pressed.
“That and more. I’m placing my money on him being our traitor.”
Hart sighed. “All right then. Detective Keen, you’re reinstated. There’s no point keeping you out of CIB now. You can pick up your badge and gun from the watch officer. Welcome back.”
I nodded, feeling numb.
“Detective Sergeant, let’s keep this as quiet as we can for now,” Hart said. “Weston will know, but we don’t need a stampede inside the Bureau.”
“Understood, sir.”
“Charge him as soon as his lawyer shows up.” Hart moved toward the door. “This is a sad day for CIB.” He shook his head; his shoulders stooped slightly. He’d have superior officers to advise and placate somehow. I didn’t envy him his job in the slightest.
One of our own turning traitor. It was worse than one of our own going rogue. Thoughts of Carl pulled me full circle again.
Who would want to have Carl followed and killed other than the Crown Prosecutor?
One name stood out. Declan King. But Declan King was dead.
Who had stepped into the vacuum?
“Keen? You all right?” Pierce asked.
I switched the computer off.
“I’m worried about what Weston will do now,” I said.
“We’ll put pressure on Joe as soon as his lawyer turns up. You want in on the interview?”
I nodded.
“OK. Grab a bite to eat. It’ll take an hour or so for the legalities to get set in stone and then we’re on. Bring your A Game, Detective.”
Pierce exited the room. I stood and stared at the floor, trying to think.
I was missing something. And desperately in need of a whiteboard. There was one in Meeting Room C; it was hardly ever used. I’d set myself up there and get started.
I grabbed a Coke and a bag of chips from the vending machine in the hall and snuck into Meeting Room C. It smelled a bit musty, so I opened a window and let the harsh sounds of Auckland City soothe my jagged nerves.
I was missing something.
I started on the cases we had so far linked together, even if the links were tenuous for some of them. Hennessey being blackmailed. Stretch being abducted. Carl being killed. I drew a line down and to the side and placed Angelo being killed in a bubble and underlined Arson in capital letters. Then I wrote Joe Cawfield’s name on the board under the heading of manipulation.
Manipulation. Blackmail. Abduction. Murder.
Cawfield’s manipulation came first in the timeline, of course. Before he was even needed.
Hennessey was used to get me sidelined from CIB next. Why bother, though, if Weston had Cawfield? I pushed that errant thought aside.
Stretch was then taken when we’d organised HEAT to assist me.
And Carl was killed when I finally visited Rachel.
I stared at the board. What linked them other than our belief Weston was behind it all?
Not Damon. Not directly. But me.
I stepped back.
Weston wanted revenge on Damon; that was a given. Damon had taken Carole from him; Weston’s Achille’s heel. He wasn’t above using me to get to Damon. But the cases listed on the whiteboard before me were triggered by something other than the ongoing and long-held vengeance Weston wanted on Damon.
I went back to the beginning. The manipulation of Cawfield wasn’t used until just recently. A week ago he had started tracking my GPS signal. A week ago, I’d been doing what?
About to get suspended from CIB. But before that?
I’d eaten out at Angelo’s twice. Damon and I had spent every night together. Pierce had silently placed the sergeant’s exam admission papers on my desk in CIB. My father had been nominated for an award, and I’d not received an invitation to attend it. I’d been trying to connect Weston to something, anything that would lead to Carole Michaels and asking lots of questions on the streets. I’d been partnered with Trevor Jones for a B&E and spent half the time listening to him regale me about his beloved wife. I shared a drink with the boys at the Birdcage on the Thursday. And I saw Eagle on the Friday and asked him about the latest drugs to hit the street.
I remembered thinking maybe I shouldn’t. We’d been trying to get Eagle off whatever Weston had used to crack into his head; to manipulate him into Sweet Hell and the Irreverent Inferno. But we all needed some normality, and if Eagle had heard I’d asked anyone else, it could have sent him back weeks.
Eagle. I stepped forward and wrote his name on the board, and beside it, I wrote Trench Coat & Fedora Hat. Beside that, I wrote Eagle’s Alley, Mount Eden Prison, and Pitt Street Fire Station.
Eagle. Eagle was a nexus. Weston knew he could get to me through Eagle. And as we’d discovered, he was still able to manipulate Eagle even if Eagle was trying to break that hypnosis. Which meant, my asking about the drugs last week was important. I wrote that on the whiteboard and underlined it.
Things unravelled from there.
That’s why he got me suspended via Hennessey.
That’s why he activated Cawfield and had him track my GPS signal before the order came down. He was keeping an eye on me before he could get me out of CIB.
That’s why he had Carl killed, to incapacitate me; write me off in a quagmire of heartbreak and mental instability.
He took Stretch because I was still working on the case, and he needed me sidetracked. The halfway house was a distraction I didn’t fall for. That too went up on the whiteboard.
I looked at what I’d written.
Cawfield’s name kept leaping out at me.
Cawfield denied tracking me. And I sure as shit hadn’t tracked Carl.
I wrote Tracker up on the board.
The dots were there. Some of them connected. Some of them didn’t.
I sighed and leaned back against the table, trying to see the bigger picture.
Cawfield was the CIB traitor. He had to be. Manipulated by Weston, unaware of what he was doing, but still, the one who was letting Weston know everything we were doing before we were even doing it.
My eyes snagged on the word Tracker.
I hadn’t tracked Carl.
This didn’t make sense.
A throat clearing behind me caught my attention.
“Hey, Keen?” Trevor Jones said. “Pierce is lookin’ for you.”
“Oh, thanks,” I said, packing things up and turning the whiteboard around so it wouldn’t be obvious to anyone who peeked into the room quickly.
I walked out, and Trevor fell into step beside me.
“How’s the wife?” I asked.
“Oh, you know,” he said chewing his toothpick manically. “Tryin’ a new drug. Got high hopes for this one.”
I had no idea how he did it; kept up a cheerful façade; kept turning up for work day in and day out; kept forking over thousands of dollars for treatments that didn’t work.
“So, what’re you and Pierce workin’ on?” he asked.
“Weston,” I said.
“Thought you’d been suspended. Not that any of us agreed with Hart on that. Bureaucracy at its best, right, Keen?”
“You got that right.”
“So, you’re back?”
“Seems like it.”
“‘Bout time,” he muttered. Then tipped his hat. “Detective,” he said with a wink.
I smiled, and we parted ways; Trevor heading towards the lifts in the hall, and me crossing the bullpen towards the interview rooms.
My mind refused to let the whiteboard go — Cawfield’s login in the GPS system ne
xt to my login in the GPS system. Cawfield was a dick. A misogynistic, chauvinistic, fucked-in-the-head, limp-dick dick.
But was he the CIB traitor dick?
“There you are,” Pierce said when he caught sight of me outside the interview room. “Your timing is perfect as usual, Keen.”
I snorted. “It wouldn’t have been if you hadn’t thought ahead and sent Trevor to find me,” I told him.
He was looking down at his files when I said that. But he looked up sharply and stared at me, one eyebrow raised in query.
“I didn’t send Trevor to find you,” Pierce said slowly.
I turned and looked back toward the lifts, but I couldn’t see him. Trevor Jones had already exited the building.
I looked back at Pierce. He waited patiently. But the look on his face said everything.
What have you got, Sport? Talk to me. Dazzle me with your detecting.
“Son of a bitch,” I said.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
“Silence Is A Golden Prison Too Many People Willingly Walk Into.”
It’s a strange thing to be part of something bigger and yet still see the small pieces of what makes it whole at work. Hart locked down CIB. Simpson worked on tracing all of Trevor Jones’ movements over the past few weeks. Someone else checked over the evidence locker to confirm nothing had been tampered with. Another detective started going through Trevor’s open case files, including the halfway house and Stretch’s abduction. Cawfield was still locked away in an interview room with his lawyer. He hadn’t been charged yet, but we couldn’t be sure that Trevor was just a blackmail piece of Weston’s pattern puzzle and not manipulated.
Which would mean a manipulation puzzle piece was still needed and that could still be Cawfield.
I watched it all from my desk in the centre of the bullpen and tapped a pencil against my thigh as I contemplated things. We needed to confirm how Cawfield was tied up in all of this. My personal hatred of the man aside; he had clearly acted strangely at the gym. Was he just a patsy? I hadn’t tracked Carl that night, so was Cawfield telling the truth when he said he hadn’t tracked me?
A Lick Of Heat: H.E.A.T. Book Four Page 24