Aquarium

by Steven Henry

“You big, fancy detectives,” he sneered. “You think you’re better than me, just because somebody spray-painted your shields gold? What, you gonna pin this on me because I don’t have some big friend downtown? Or is it because I worked Vice? You ain’t any different. Yeah, you think I don’t know how a hot number like you makes detective? Who’d you screw to get that shiny shield, Detective O’Reilly?”

  “Watch it, asshole,” Vic snarled.

  “Easy, Vic,” Erin said out of the side of her mouth. “I’ve got this.”

  “You’ve got nothing,” Caldwell snapped. “And I still have a job to do. Get out of my office. You want to come back, come back with a court order. I have to go.”

  “You know something I’ve picked up in interrogations?” Erin asked. “Guilty guys always want to stop the conversation. They want you to shut up and go away. Innocent guys want to explain themselves. They want to clear their names. You want to clear your name, Barry?”

  “What’d you do, take psych classes at community college?” Caldwell said. “You got no idea what’s going on in my head. And I’m not telling you shit. What, you think I’m stupid? Suppose you’re right. Suppose I took a payoff from some rich asshole to cover for him. You think it’ll do me a bit of good to give you his name? He goes down for murder, I go down as an accessory. Even if I get off, I still lose my job, and good luck getting another.”

  “That would’ve been a good thing to think about before taking the money,” Erin said. “And I didn’t say anything about a rich asshole. What do you think, Vic?”

  “I think our guy Caldwell here is covering for one of his hotel’s guests,” Vic said. “And I think I can guess which one.”

  “Last one to see our victim alive?” Erin suggested.

  “That’s what I’m thinking, yeah.”

  “You think he’ll throw Barry here under the bus to try to save himself?”

  “It’s what I’d do in his place.”

  “And poor Barry can’t afford a fancy lawyer,” Erin said. “Maybe our rich asshole beats the rap and leaves Barry to take the heat.”

  “That’s cold,” Vic said. “But yeah, I could see it happening. What do you think, Barry?”

  “I think if you’re arresting me, go for it,” he said. “And if you are, I’m exercising my right to an attorney. If you’re not, shut up and get out. Either way, this conversation’s over.”

  Erin knew they didn’t have nearly enough to charge Caldwell with anything. But she also knew that if he was guilty, and she thought he was, they couldn’t leave him running the security office at the hotel. He’d be looking for ways to destroy any remaining evidence linking him to Sarah’s death. So they really didn’t have a choice.

  She pulled out her handcuffs. “Have it your way. Barry Caldwell, you’re under arrest as an accessory to murder after the fact in the killing of Sarah Devers. You have the right to remain silent…”

  “You’ll regret this, Detective,” was the only thing Caldwell said when she finished reading him his rights.

  “Wouldn’t be the first time,” Erin said.

  “Stone next?” Vic suggested.

  “Let’s do it,” she said.

  “I think we should have a hotel security guy with us,” he said. “For diplomatic reasons.”

  “Great idea,” she said. “Come on, Barry. Little detour before we go back to the Eight. You’re coming with us.”

  They loaded him into the elevator and rode up to the fifth floor. Caldwell stayed quiet. He was experienced enough to know that any protests or arguments were only likely to get him in more trouble. Rolf kept an eye on the handcuffed man. Just because he hadn’t needed a show of teeth didn’t mean it was out of the question.

  “I’m sure you’ve thought this through,” Vic said conversationally. “But we don’t have a warrant to search Stone’s room.”

  “Not yet,” Erin agreed.

  “You’re the Detective Second Grade,” he said. “I’m just along for the ride.”

  At Stone’s door, Erin paused to listen. She heard nothing. She rapped sharply with her knuckles.

  “Mr. Stone!” she called. “This is the NYPD. We need to talk to you again.”

  Silence answered her.

  She gave it a moment and tried once more. Nothing.

  “When I’m traveling,” Caldwell said, “I always stay in my hotel room in the middle of the afternoon instead of seeing the sights, visiting people, going to museums…”

  “Shut up,” Vic said. To Erin, he added unnecessarily, “I don’t think anyone’s home.”

  That made the visit upstairs a bust. They couldn’t go into the hotel room without a warrant, and Erin didn’t think having their security chief in handcuffs on an iffy accessory charge would put the rest of the hotel staff in a cooperative mood.

  “Let’s get this guy back to the Eightball,” she said. “We’ll sort out Stone soon enough.”

  On the way out of the hotel, as they were walking past the concierge’s desk, Erin had a thought. Signaling Vic to stay put with Caldwell, she and Rolf hurried over to the desk.

  “May I help you, ma’am?” the concierge asked.

  “I’m looking for Wendell Stone,” she said. “He’s up in 503.”

  “I’m sorry, ma’am,” he said. “Mr. Stone checked out just a little while ago. He’s no longer registered here.”

  Erin clenched her jaw and her fists. “Thank you,” she said through gritted teeth. He could be halfway to Boston by now, well out of the NYPD’s jurisdiction.

  “Just one question, O’Reilly,” Webb said. “Are you intending to arrest everybody involved with this case? Because if so, we’re going to need to call over to the Nine and borrow some space in their holding cells.”

  “Just one more, sir,” Erin said.

  “Who?” Webb looked from her to Vic. They hadn’t bothered putting Caldwell in an interrogation room. He’d lawyered up the second they stepped into the station, so they’d just stuffed him in lockup before coming upstairs to face their commanding officer.

  “Wendell Stone,” she said.

  “The Third,” Vic added.

  “That’ll make four suspects in custody,” Webb said. “They can’t all have killed Miss Devers.”

  “I think Stone killed her,” Erin said. “And he paid off Caldwell to help cover it up.”

  “And you know this how, exactly?”

  “Sergeant Brown says Caldwell was on the take when he worked Vice.”

  Webb stared at her. “And?”

  “And Stone needed someone to take down the cameras on the third floor. Along with maybe turning off the fire alarms or messing with the elevator cameras.”

  “That’s it? You arrested a former police officer for that?”

  Webb hadn’t raised his voice, but his tone grew harder as he ended the sentence.

  “This guy’s dirty, sir,” Vic said. “Erin’s right.”

  “Oh, good, both my detectives are in on this together,” Webb said. “I assume you have proof, not just a hunch?”

  “We’ll get the proof,” Erin said.

  “How reassuring.” Webb didn’t look reassured. “I assume Caldwell’s lawyer is on the way?”

  “First thing he asked for,” Vic said.

  “How do you know Stone killed Devers?”

  “I don’t, sir,” Erin said. “Not for certain. But I think he did.”

  “I’m sure the DA will be very pleased to hear that. What about the other two?”

  “Schilling and Polk?” Erin asked.

  Webb nodded.

  “We’ve got Schilling as a drug dealer and Polk for possession of an illegal drug and assaulting an officer,” she said. “It’s enough to charge both of them.”

  “I know about that already.” Webb twirled an unlit cigarette in his fingers and looked at it with dull, hopeless longing. “But you’re saying they’re not part of this case?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “You sure you don’t want to arrest anyone else?
”

  “I’d kind of like to get Feldspar,” Vic said.

  Webb actually laughed, a rare sound in Major Crimes. “I can’t wait to see your DD-5s. By the time you two are done, the number of people in this case you haven’t arrested will be smaller than the number you have. Why don’t you arrest that Latina housekeeper, whatever her name is, while you’re at it? The one who found the body? She’s probably in trouble with ICE if nothing else.”

  “I don’t work for Immigration,” Vic said stiffly.

  “Neither do I,” Erin chimed in. Both of them had soft spots for hardworking immigrants, whether their green cards were in order or not.

  “I was joking,” Webb said. “So, you want Feldspar on suspicion of hiding cameras in hotel rooms?”

  “That’s right, sir,” Vic said.

  “On the word of Polk,” Webb said. “A guy who’d sell his own mother to get out of trouble. You need more, if you want any of this to stick.”

  “What do you need from us, sir?” Erin asked.

  “Hard evidence. An eyewitness who saw Sarah Devers with one of these guys. A pill bottle in the hotel. DNA. Fingerprints. Something. Because right now, you’ve got a lot of supposition, assumptions, hunches, and hot air. God, I could use a smoke right now.”

  “We need to bring in Stone,” Erin said. “We can break him in interrogation. I’ll tell him Caldwell flipped on him.”

  “Long shot, O’Reilly,” Webb said, shaking his head. “If he calls your bluff, you’ve got nothing.”

  “You’re forgetting we don’t know where he is,” Vic said. “He’s probably not even in the state anymore. Good luck getting him extradited from Massachusetts on something this flimsy.”

  “Maybe he’s not there yet,” she said slowly. “He’s not flying and he’s not driving.”

  “What do you mean?” Webb asked.

  “He said he preferred to travel by rail,” she said. “He’d be going from Penn Station. Maybe he hasn’t left yet.”

  “Amtrak tends to run in the evenings,” Vic said, rushing over to his computer and bringing up the train schedule. He quickly scanned the timetables. “Looks like the next train to Boston isn’t until five o’ clock.”

  Erin checked the clock. They’d lost a lot of the afternoon going back and forth from the InterContinental and booking Caldwell. It was almost four thirty. “We don’t have much time,” she said. “Let’s go.”

  “You two go on,” Webb said. “I’d just slow you down. I’ll call the station and see if I can line up some uniforms to help.”

  “I always wanted to grab a perp in a train station,” Vic said as they jogged down the stairs to the parking garage. “You know that scene in The Untouchables? The shootout at Union Station?”

  “I didn’t know you wanted to be Kevin Costner,” Erin said, throwing open the door to the garage. Rolf was prancing beside her, tail whipping back and forth. He knew a chase when he saw one.

  “Not Costner,” Vic said. “Andy Garcia. That moment when he catches the baby carriage with one hand and shoots the guy with the other? Pure gold. I bet you wanted to be Sean Connery.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “He’s the Irish cop.”

  “Sean Connery is Scottish.” She pulled out her keys and opened the back compartment. Rolf leaped in.

  “But he’s playing an Irish guy. Same thing.” Vic slid into the passenger seat as Erin took her place behind the wheel.

  “It is not the same thing! It’s completely different!” She cranked the key in the Charger’s ignition. “How would you like to be mistaken for, I don’t know, a Ukrainian?”

  “Okay, fair point.”

  “And Vic? Try not to shoot anybody today.”

  “Hey, if he pulls a gun, all bets are off.”

  “Forget Rolf,” she said. “We ought to put a leash on you.”

  Chapter 11

  “Fifteen minutes to the train station, give or take,” Erin said.

  Vic glanced at the dashboard clock. “We’ve got less than thirty. Should I get out and push?”

  “If it’ll make you feel better.”

  Traffic wasn’t too bad by Manhattan standards. Erin turned on the lights and siren, which helped as long as there was room for the other cars to get out of the way. That got them as far as West Twenty-First Street, where they ran into hard gridlock.

  “Damn, damn, damn,” Erin muttered, craning her neck to try to see around the cars that blocked them.

  “I see some other flashers up there,” Vic said. “Looks like an accident at the light.”

  Erin sagged back in her seat. “Great.”

  “There’s always the sidewalk,” Vic suggested.

  “That’s one way to turn in your shield,” she said.

  “Hey, if you’re gonna go, go big,” he said. “Hang tight for a sec.”

  He unbuckled his seatbelt and stepped out onto the pavement. Giving her a nod, he ran on ahead, threading his way through the stalled traffic.

  “Well, here we are,” Erin told Rolf. “I didn’t think he’d actually get out.”

  Rolf thrust his nose through the hole next to Erin’s head and panted.

  The minutes ticked away. Erin pictured their guy, settled comfortably in a first-class Amtrak car, enjoying a leisurely getaway. And there wasn’t a damned thing she could do about it from here. They were boxed in behind and on both sides.

  Maybe she should call Webb, see if they could get some uniforms to grab Stone. She reached for her phone.

  The cars in front of her shifted slightly. Erin sat up and gripped the steering wheel more tightly.

  The jam was breaking up. As the path opened, like the Red Sea parting for the Israelites, Erin saw Vic waving cars down a garage ramp, windmilling his arm.

  Erin pulled alongside. Vic abandoned his spot on the blacktop and hopped in before the car had stopped rolling.

  “Hit it,” he said.

  She obliged. “And here I thought you didn’t want to be a traffic cop,” she said.

  He scowled. “Don’t you dare tell anyone back at the Eightball, or I’ll be pulling DayGlo vests out of my locker for months.”

  “How’d you swing it?” she asked.

  “That garage exits onto Twenty-First,” he explained. “I came to an understanding with the parking attendant.”

  “Those guys aren’t too understanding in my experience,” she said doubtfully. “You didn’t bribe him, did you?”

  “Nah. I might’ve implied we were trying to stop terrorists from blowing up the Empire State Building.”

  “Told him he’d be a big hero, et cetera?”

  “Something like that.”

  “You’re a terrible person, Vic.”

  “Terrible people get shit done.”

  “We ought to put that on our business cards.” Erin accelerated as much as she dared. They’d lost ten minutes. It’d be close.

  Erin came in hot, laying rubber on the street outside Penn Station. She slid into one of the police spots on Seventh Avenue. She, Vic, and Rolf were out and running before the pair of startled uniformed officers curbside could do more than gape. She held up her shield so they wouldn’t get tackled by some overzealous transit cop.

  They sprinted through the New Jersey Transit waiting area to the main concourse and the Amtrak ticketing. Erin was struck by the contrast. The NJ Transit hub was standing-room only, packed with commuters on their way home. The Amtrak area was at least as big and nearly deserted. In the space of a few running strides, the detectives went from rush hour to a practically empty hall where their shoes echoed hollowly on the tile.

  “Where’s the train to Boston?” she snapped at one of the bored-looking attendants at the counter.

  “There’s only the one track,” the clerk replied. “West Side Line.” He pointed with his thumb. “But they’re leaving any second.”

  She didn’t bother to answer. Vic was already moving. Rolf pranced impatiently. Erin raced to catch up, silently blessing all those earl
y-morning jogs in Central Park. Running through the empty station, she remembered the abandoned subway tunnel she and Vic had entered the previous year. That case had culminated in gunfire and explosions.

  They spilled out onto the boarding platform next to the sleek silver train. The deep thrum of the massive diesel engines made the concrete vibrate under their shoes. The carriages were beginning to move.

  “You wanted a movie moment,” she gasped to Vic.

  The big Russian put on an extra burst of speed and jumped, grabbing the handrail on the last car and pulling himself onto the step. He turned and reached back. Rolf, at her side, was running easily, not even breathing hard.

  “Rolf! Hupf!” she ordered. Without breaking stride, the Shepherd coiled his spine and jumped. Vic snagged the K-9’s vest by the handle just behind the collar and swung Rolf onto the train.

  Erin was right on his heels. The train was picking up speed. She put her head down and ran flat-out. Taking a deep breath, she leaped and reached.

  Vic’s hand closed around her forearm. She clamped her own grip on his wrist and let him reel her in. Then the three of them were together, crammed tight at the end of the passenger car.

  “You good?” Vic asked.

  “Yeah. You?”

  “I think I need to ease up on the weights at the gym,” he said. “And do some cardio.”

  “Good thing Webb didn’t come along, huh?” Erin said.

  “Yeah.” Vic snickered between breaths. “He’d have had a coronary right there on the platform.”

  “What the hell is going on?” a man demanded.

  Erin and Vic turned to face a conductor.

  “That’s dangerous, what you just did,” he went on. “You could’ve been badly hurt, or even killed.”

  “NYPD,” Erin said, holding up the shield she hadn’t bothered to clip back on her belt. “Where’s the first class section?”

  “Right behind the cabin, up front,” he said.

  “So, all the way at the other end,” Vic said. “Typical.”

  “You can’t go between cars while the train is in motion,” the conductor said. “Except in emergencies or…” Then he paused.

  “Or when directed by a police officer?” Erin inquired sweetly.