by Kate Flora
"I saw the driver toss them while I was chasing him, but I didn't register where he did it. I was too busy chasing him. I had to go over that whole damned neighborhood with a flashlight to find 'em."
He grinned. "Figured they might give us DNA. And if we're lucky, maybe some prints in case there aren't any in the car."
That was Stan Perry in a nutshell. Screwup upon screwup until they were ready to kick him to the curb, and then he'd pull a couple of big white rabbits out of his hat. Burgess still needed to sit the boy down and have a serious talk.
"Good job, Stan."
He shoved back his chair and went to the white board. "So, this is what we've got."
Grabbing a marker, he started listing all the people they knew of so far who had some connection to this case. The little mother and her baby. The Imam. Ismail, the man who wasn't there. The boy in the bushes, Ali Ibrahim. Their translator, Hussain Osman. Kimani Yates. Akiba Norton. The missing driver with the watch and ring. Butcher Flaherty. The as-yet unidentified owner of the mosque property. Kyle's informant. Jason Stetson.
He looked down at the list. "I'll take Jason. See if he saw anything that might be important. He should be at school today, but you never know."
He made a note and looked at Melia. "The guy from the car last night, Norton? We get anything else from him?"
"Nothing to put on paper. He lawyered up as soon as he got to the jail. Looks like he had someone just waiting for his call, that's what they reported to us. Asked to make his phone call and it was right to the lawyer. Dollars to donuts, though, he's not the one paying the bill. We've got the DA in the loop, making sure he doesn't get out."
"Speaking of people who aren't supposed to be out—"
"Kimani Yates," Melia said. He sounded as weary and frustrated as they all felt. "Captain Cote and the DA are both working on that one, trying to figure out what went wrong over there. Turns out he didn't escape. They were going to let him out early for good behavior. They just screwed up the paperwork and let him go sooner than they'd planned. Which might..." Melia let the "might" hang in the air a beat, "explain why they didn't notify us."
There were nods around the table. It might. It might not. "We're checking his usual hangouts. Friends. Family. We'll find him. Last night's actions definitely don't count as good behavior."
Burgess moved on. The clock was running. They needed to get back out on the street, start getting some answers. "Our mystery man. Rocky, have we got some stills from the surveillance video of that watch and that ring?"
"Not yet, Joe. By the end of the day. I promise. I've been kind of backed up."
Another part of Burgess's reputation. He was not only the meanest, he was the most impatient cop in Portland. It wasn't really true, but he had found, over the years, that a little well-placed anger and some similarly well-placed impatience meant he got results fast when he needed them. No one, it seemed, wanted to get on his bad side. Maybe he should try it at home.
"Our mystery girl. Any leads on who she might be?" No one said anything. "I'll go by the hospital when we're done, see how she's doing. If she continues to be unable... or unwilling... to talk to us, we may have to go to the media."
He looked at Melia. It would be Melia's call.
"Be better if we didn't have to, Joe," Melia said. "Let's give it a little longer. Check other jurisdictions' missing persons. It's the kind of story that goes national, and we don't want that kind of attention."
Burgess figured they'd get it anyway, because of the mosque, and the press that Maine's issues with integrating refugees had already gotten. But Melia was right, there was no sense in inviting it.
Melia's assistant came in with a pink message slip and set it down in front of her boss. He read it, then looked at Burgess. "ME's office called. They're doing the autopsy this afternoon. At one. I need you there, Joe."
Burgess nodded. He couldn't remember when he'd been to an autopsy on a baby that young. Wished he could send someone else in his place. "Lee doing it?"
Melia nodded. "Take Sage with you." He liked to have two detectives on a case, in case something happened to one of them, and they needed Kyle and Perry here in Portland, chasing down witnesses, following trails through the maze.
The autopsy was important, but it would take a minimum of three hours out of Burgess's day. The drive up to the ME's office in Augusta was forty-five minutes each way on a good day. Dr. Lee was fast, but these things took time. And without a name for the baby or the mother, any and all information became that much more important. At least he could take the handkerchief Ismail Ibrahim had used along and ask for a DNA profile, see if there was a match.
"Right, Vince," he said. "Terry, why don't you go with Stan to meet with our interpreter. If he doesn't show, see if you can track him down."
He copied the plate number Beck had given him from his notebook and gave it to Kyle. "This is the plate from the car that picked him up at the hospital last night. Then Stan, you work on the Apple angle, Ter, you see if you can learn anything more from your source. We can all touch base later and see where we are."
Everyone gathered their notes, pushed back, and headed for the door. Burgess would have followed, but Melia stopped him. "A moment, Joe," he said.
Burgess waited.
"Have you talked with Stan?" Melia asked. "Because—"
But they both knew the "because."
"Haven't had a chance yet, Vince. You know how it's been."
He sounded as defensive as Perry had, and didn't like it.
"Do it now," Melia said. "Get him under control or find someone else to work with you on this. We're going to have the media down our throats and I don't want to see pictures of that"—he waved his hands to indicate Stan Perry's disheveled appearance and bad attitude—"in the paper. I've practically got Captain Cote camped in my office, waiting for your reports."
Melia broke off. "Find him. Talk to him. And as soon as you get a chance, generate some reports for me." He squared his shoulders and straightened his tie. "Now go on. Go get me something."
Like Burgess was a magician who could conjure up facts from thin air when not one of the lowlifes they'd talked to would say word one. Like being a competent detective meant you could read minds, see through walls, leap tall buildings in a single bound. And you could always solve the case. But Melia knew all that. This was just process. The brass chews on him, he chews on Burgess, Burgess goes and chews on Stan Perry. When all any of them wanted to do was to chew on bad guys until they gave up what they knew.
"Can't do it, Vince," he said. "I'm taking a leave of absence. Going to charm school. I've got to do something different to get people to talk to me. Being big and mean just isn't working for me anymore."
"Waterboarding," Vince muttered. "A couple nights in a cell with Bubba. Or Butcher Flaherty. I think you can forget charm. It wouldn't take anyway."
"Depressed that you think so, Vince."
Melia made shooing motions with his hands. "Go find me something. And whack that kid upside the head before he screws things up for everyone. The gloves and the serial numbers are good. Very good. But he's like an idiot savant with the emphasis on idiot."
Burgess had places to go and people to see. But looking after your own people was a priority. If he didn't take care of his team, they couldn't do the job anyway.
He got another copy of their mystery girl's picture, and made arrangements with Sage Prentiss to go up to Augusta together. Then he checked the bay, but Perry had already left. He decided to swing by Perry's place and catch him there. He didn't want to hear some prepared speech about how Perry was sorry and would get it back under control. He wanted this to be spontaneous.
* * *
When Perry pulled the door open, he was still beaded with water and wearing hastily pulled on sweat pants that were inside out. He backed up to let Burgess in without a greeting or a smile. Pulled out a chair for himself and sat down at the kitchen table, leaving Burgess standing. Burgess sat down opposite him and
waited.
The apartment looked great. Perfectly neat. No fast-food clutter or unwashed dishes. There was even a flowering plant on the sill above the sink. All signs of a woman's touch.
"Vince made you come, didn't he?" Perry said.
Burgess nodded. "He's concerned about you. And about appearances. But I would have come anyway. The press is going to be all over this thing. We're going to need kid gloves, Stan, and you're wearing soot and stubble."
"I'm doing detective work. Thought that was our job."
"We don't operate in a void, Stan. Appearances matter. Behavior matters. Attitude matters. And like it or not, the food chain matters. If Melia says for you to come in, I convey that order, and then you do a disappearing act, like last night, it's not just your ass that's on the line."
"So you're here to cover your own ass?"
"I'm here to tell one of my detectives—a valued member of my team with a real talent for thinking outside the box—that following orders is also part of the deal. You let us know what's happening. You show up when you're supposed to. Or you're off the case. You know Sage has been angling for your spot. Is that what you want?"
Perry's sullen expression was so much like Dylan's that Burgess had to look away.
"Stan, you've got to decide. Is following your own instincts so important that you can blow off orders, blow me off? Do you think that knowing that a baby's body had been taken from the morgue, but not informing me about it because 'you forgot' is ever acceptable?"
He waited for Perry to say something. Got silence. "Where did you disappear to last night?"
"I had to take a phone call. Thought it would be a minute and it goddamned wasn't."
"Personal phone call?"
Perry nodded.
Burgess rubbed his forehead, where a dull headache was forming. "We're supposed to be a team. Working together. Watching each other's backs. Sharing what we know. That doesn't work if you decide to pursue your own agenda. If we're chasing a bad guy and you don't have our backs because you're making a phone call."
Enough of the lecture. It was time to talk about what was really bothering his detective. "Something's going on, Stan. Something you're not talking about. Something that's distracting you from the job and making you chronically pissed off. So what's up?"
There was the sound of quick feet on the stairs and a key in the lock. Then the door opened and a pretty, petite brunette lugging two heavy grocery bags walked into the room.
"What's going on, Joe?" Perry said. "She is."
Chapter 14
Burgess pushed back his chair and went to meet her, taking the two heavy bags and setting them on the kitchen counter. Mrs. Burgess didn't raise her boy to sit around while a woman struggled. He didn't know how Mrs. Perry had raised her boy, but it looked like sulking won out over manners or kindness. Evidently, Perry's mother hadn't whacked him upside the head often enough.
He turned back to her. "Joe Burgess," he said.
Her dark brown eyes shifted to Stan Perry and then back to him. It looked like she'd heard the name "Joe Burgess" and not always in a favorable context. But her mother had taught her manners, and she quickly held out a small hand. "Lily Leadbetter," she said.
His talk with Perry was going to have to wait for another time and place. At least he'd said what he came to say. Next time, he'd get Perry's response.
"Nice to meet you," he said.
She'd already moved past him to the counter and was taking things out of the bags.
"We'll talk this afternoon, Stan," he said. "When I get back from Augusta. Meanwhile, if anything significant turns up, text me."
"You bet, boss," Perry said.
He shoved back his chair and headed toward the bedroom. To dress, Burgess supposed, and to make sure that the conversation didn't continue. He left the two of them to their domestic affairs and headed over to the hospital.
* * *
Burgess stopped at the nurses' station on his mystery girl's floor, hoping someone he knew would be there and might be able to fill him in. He was in luck. The kindly nurse named Susan must have been working a double shift, because she was still there.
"Come to check up on your girl, Joe?" she said.
"I am. How's she doing?"
"About the same as yesterday. She's not in bad shape, considering, but she won't talk to anyone. Not in bad shape from the fire, I mean. She's a child, and a mother, and someone has been beating up on her. All that has really taken a toll. She's half-starved and exhausted."
She pulled out a chart and consulted it. "Looks like someone from psych is coming down later this morning. Maybe we'll know more then. Want me to call you when that's done?"
"I'd appreciate it. You have my number?"
She smiled. "I think I do. But you can give it to me again." He dictated cell and 109, and she wrote it down.
All the time they were talking, she was moving. Checking the chart. Making a note. Sorting some other papers and putting them into other files. Hospitals, like police departments, tended to be understaffed and overwhelmed with paper. Which reminded him that he really ought to be back at 109, creating some paperwork of his own.
"Just going to stick my head in," he said.
* * *
His mystery girl was curled on her side with her eyes closed, dark hair spread out on the pillow. Remy Aucoin was sitting beside her, reading her something. He looked up, embarrassed when he saw it was Burgess. "Just reading to her, Sergeant," he said.
"What book?"
Remy ducked his head. "The Hunger Games. I borrowed it from my little sister. I thought she might like it."
Burgess liked that. He also liked the fact that Remy could surprise him. It looked like Remy had read quite a lot of the book. "What time did you come in?" he asked.
"Seven. Dwyer was going off shift, so they sent me. She said if I let anything happen to 'her girl' I'd be sorry." Aucoin shook his head. "She was my girl first."
He set the book down and motioned Burgess outside the door. "I know she's listening," he said in a low voice. "What I don't know is whether she can't talk or she won't talk. But she likes the book. She likes you, too. When she heard your voice, I saw her eyelids flicker." Aucoin looked toward the girl on the bed and back at Burgess. "We getting anywhere with this, Sergeant?"
"It's a maze," Burgess admitted. "But we'll sort it out. It helps to know we don't have to worry about her while we're worrying about everything else."
"I'm trying," Aucoin said.
"All any of us can do. Someone's supposed to do a psych consult with her sometime today. No matter what they say to you—about privacy or confidentiality—you don't leave her, okay. They give you any trouble, you stay put and call Lieutenant Melia."
He hesitated, unused to sharing much with patrol except on a need-to-know basis, but Aucoin was deep into this, too. "Going up to Augusta this afternoon for the autopsy on her baby. Just as soon she didn't know about that, but you should. Who knows what we may learn."
He tried to remember what Chris had said about the book Aucoin was reading. He knew Nina had read it and that Chris had worried about that. "You sure that book isn't too violent, Remy?"
"After what she's been through? I thought it might be good for her. It's about someone who's a victim taking charge. And winning. That's not such a bad idea, is it, under the circumstances?"
"I guess not. I'm going to go catch bad guys. Call me if anything happens. If anything changes, okay?"
"You bet."
Remy was moving back into the room. Then he turned, "You should come in and say hello to her. Just let her know you're there for her. Who knows what matters, right?"
Burgess followed him back into the room. She was still curled on her side, and her eyes were still closed, but the hand he'd held the night before was outside the covers. He took it in his and gave it a little squeeze. "It's Joe Burgess," he said, though he couldn't remember if he'd told her his name before. "We're still here, trying to take care of you. Hoping some ti
me you'll open your eyes and look at me. And tell me your name. I'm not that scary."
Her hand moved in his. Just a tiny movement, but he knew she was trying. That was all he could ask.
"I'll see you later," he said. "And Remy is going to be right here to keep you safe."
* * *
Back in the truck, he checked his watch. Still time to catch up with Jason Stetson, if he could find him. He figured out which middle school was most likely, and gave the assistant principal, Lorraine Cormier, a call. He'd known her for years, and today he needed her discretion.
There was humor in her voice when she said, "Joe Burgess. So what has one of my students done this time?"
"Saved a life, for starters, Lorraine," he said. "I'm looking for Jason Stetson. I need to talk to him about a fire yesterday. But I don't want to flag him to others as a potential witness."
"He's coming along nicely, Joe, I'm pleased to say. Hold on and let me see if he's here today."
He heard a murmur of voices and then she was back on the phone. "He didn't come in today."
Burgess's heart sank. He was so afraid something might happen to Jason. And while Jason was coming along, he also sometimes had more bravado than sense.
Then she said, "Hold on." There was another murmur of voices, and she said, "Joe? Sorry about that. He's here. He just came in late. So you want to talk with Jason, but you don't want the other students to know he's talking to you?"
"Right."
"We're kind of a fishbowl, here in the office. Why don't you go to the nurse's office, and I'll send Jason there. You know where that is? In that silly little trailer we've got around back, looks like a wart on the wall?"
* * *
It did look like a wart on the wall, a tinny white wart. But it was away from the rest of the school, and had a back door he could drive right up to. He knew the nurse, too. God. Dylan was right. He was such a dinosaur he knew everybody. Did that mean he'd been at this too long, or did it just mean that this is what happened when you worked the same job in the same city for years?
