Seconds: A Salvation Society Novel

by Freya Barker

  “Right,” he confirms, but with a wink. “Before we look at that,” he points at the computer, “I should tell you I bumped into Jim Shaughnessy at the Main Street Diner this morning.”

  “Bumped into him?” I raise an eyebrow, knowing that he’s been trying to pin the man down for a few days now.

  “Fine, I cornered him in a booth,” he admits with a lopsided grin. “He wasn’t too pleased to see me and he really didn’t like when I sat down across from him. There were a couple of other cops sitting at the counter he was keeping an eye on, but he did talk. Said he was warning you because Walker has it in for me.”

  “But why?”

  I sit down in a chair and look up at him as he sits down on the edge of the table.

  “Get this; Shaughnessy says Walker had been seeing Krista.”

  “Well, isn’t that an interesting twist? So what? He’s pissed that you brought her back?” I wonder out loud.

  “Not a clue, but Mark is already digging into it. He’s good digging up all kinds of shit on the computer, he’ll find out.”

  I look at him sternly. “If you’re talking about hacking into stuff without a warrant, I don’t wanna know about it,” I warn him, and he grins.

  “Then I won’t tell you.”

  Cal

  “See that lamppost on the far side of the parking lot?”

  I point at the screen and Reagan leans in close, squinting her eyes.

  This is the worst quality surveillance footage I’ve ever seen. I can barely recognize myself. Of course, I’m only shown from behind and some of it looks pretty damning. You can see me ducking into the back seat and wrestling with someone. Damn Krista, she scooted all the way to the far side when I opened her door and started kicking at me. She fought me the whole time I tried to get her out of the truck and finally bit me. I should’ve pressed charges on her.

  “What am I looking at?”

  “See that box about two-thirds up that post? That’s another camera. Mark checked it out, he says there are at least three cameras aimed at that side of the parking lot.”

  “Then where are the tapes for those cameras?”

  “Fuck if I know, but I sure would like to.”

  “Hang on one sec,” Reagan says, darting out the door.

  A minute later she comes walking in with a phone to her ear.

  “Extension 213, please.”

  I listen in as she—unsuccessfully—attempts to get hold of Ed Shafer.

  “No luck,” I offer when she tosses her phone on the table with a frustrated growl.

  “He’s not available,” she grinds out. “We’re being stonewalled. No way we’ll hear anything before the pretrial hearing on Monday.”

  “I don’t get their issue with me, though,” I contemplate. “I’d never seen Shafer before the arraignment. Even if Shaughnessy is right, and Walker has it in for me, it doesn’t explain why the prosecutor’s office is so determined to see me go down.”

  Reagan shakes her head before getting up and grabbing her things off the table.

  “You busy right now?”

  “Nothing that can’t wait. Why?” I ask.

  “Because when we walk into court on Monday, I want to be able to at least discredit any evidence the prosecutor produces.”

  I follow her to her desk where she stuffs her laptop and a notepad in her briefcase.

  “Sally?” The woman turns to Reagan. “Where is that digital camera we used in the Collins case?”

  “Bottom drawer of the small filing cabinet.”

  “What are we doing?” I ask, enjoying the view as Reagan bends over in yet another tight pencil skirt. Her assistant catches me watching and snickers openly.

  “We are going to collect some evidence of our own to at least discredit what the prosecution brings to the table.” She turns to Sally holding up a nice-looking Nikon camera. “Is this charged?”

  “There’s an extra lithium battery pack in the bag.”

  “You know you can take pictures with your cell phone, right?” I suggest.

  “Snapshots, yes, but this baby date-stamps everything, has a powerful zoom, and gives me raw image files I can hand over to the judge on an SD card. Harder to tamper with and therefore much more reliable in terms of evidence.”

  I grin at her. It’s kind of a turn-on to see her in action.

  “I’m gone for the afternoon, Sally. Call me if anything urgent comes up.”

  “Will do.”

  I tip my imaginary hat at Sally as I follow Reagan out the door.

  “Can we take your truck?”

  “Sure.” I would’ve suggested it myself since I don’t feel like folding up like an origami crane to get into her toy car, but this works even better. “Let me grab my keys and tell Pooja I’m off.”

  When I come back outside, Reagan is already waiting by the passenger side door.

  “I take it we’re heading to the jail parking lot?” I guess when I back out of my parking spot.

  She looks at me and smiles big.

  “That’s the plan.”

  She has me park the truck in the same spot in front of the jail I stopped at the night I dropped off Krista. Then she proceeds to take stills and footage of the cameras I point out, and has me reenact my movements from that night. When a security guard comes out demanding to know what we’re doing, she sweet-talks him and gets him to confirm he could see us on all three camera feeds.

  She’s masterful, using her looks and her charm to hide her cunning intelligence and disarm the man into that admission. He doesn’t even look at me twice.

  I’m grinning when I settle behind the wheel, watching Reagan buckle up.

  “What?”

  “You. I knew you were smart, but I had no idea how slick you could be.”

  She shrugs her shoulders and presses her lips together to hide a smile.

  “Part of the job.”

  “Well, color me impressed. It’s hot as fuck seeing you in action.”

  I like seeing the familiar blush rising to her cheeks. It doesn’t seem to matter I had her riding my face last night—dirty talk softly flowing from those kissable lips as she ground herself down to completion with abandon—she still responds like an innocent and I love that about her.

  “Whatever,” she mumbles, turning her gaze out the window.

  “Where to next?”

  “Let’s go find Oliver Hardee.”

  I snap my head around. “Krista’s father?”

  “Yup. Let’s see what—if anything—he knows about Walker.”

  “I’m not so sure you’re gonna want me there,” I suggest. “Given I’m accused of sexually assaulting his daughter, he may not react too favorably to talking.”

  “On the contrary,” she disagrees, throwing a sly smile my way. “If I try to approach him by myself, he’ll likely brush me off. If he’s any kind of father, however, the sight of you will infuriate him. An angry man rarely uses discretion and won’t think about what he should or shouldn’t be saying.”

  I’m pretty sure my mouth is hanging half open as I look over at her.

  “Remind me never to get on the other side of a courtroom from you.”

  We finally caught up with the real estate mogul on the tenth hole at the golf course. It wasn’t a surprise to see a couple of councilmen as part of his foursome. He’s been known to wheel and deal permits and apparently isn’t shy about it.

  The moment he recognized me walking up behind Reagan, he reacted much as she had predicted. He marched toward us and his entire focus was on me, throwing accusations and barely noticing Reagan. She was able to interject some pointed questions, which he almost distractedly responded to before tearing back into me.

  By the end of it, I’d been used as a verbal punching bag, Reagan had needed to step in a time or two to keep fists from flying, but when we drove off we had the confirmation we were looking for. Not only that, but Hardee volunteered Walker had promised him he had connections in the prosecutor’s office and could make sur
e the charges would stick.

  “Listen to this.”

  We’ve just pulled up to Joe’s for a quick bite when Reagan produced her cell phone.

  “What am I listening to?”

  Instead of answering, she plays me recordings she apparently made of not only Hardee, but the security guard as well.

  “Holy shit. Those may not stand, though, you didn’t have consent,” I point out as I get out of the truck.

  “I won’t need it,” she says when I open the door for her. “In Virginia only one party to a conversation needs to consent for it to be a legal recording.” She grins at me widely. “And I consent.”

  I shake my head and smile back. “I’m firing Milt.”

  “Who’s Milt?”

  “Milt Arenberg, my soon-to-be former legal representation. I want you on retainer.”

  She laughs and I follow her to the entrance to the restaurant when the phone in her hand starts ringing.

  “Sally, what’s up?”

  She abruptly stops and I can see shock replace the smile she was sporting.

  “What do you mean there’s a fire?”

  Chapter Ten

  Reagan

  My heart is in my throat as Cal races toward the office.

  My God, my office, all my case files.

  I’m desperately trying to remember how long ago it was I asked Sally to upload all digital copies to the cloud.

  Sally. Oh my God, I didn’t even ask her if she was okay. I’d called her earlier to let her know I was going to grab a bite and wouldn’t be back until later. When I told her I needed to draw up a few motions for Monday, she offered to stay since Matt is with his father this weekend.

  I can see the dark smoke curling up when we’re still a few blocks away, and fire trucks are already in front of the building by the time we pull up along the curb. We can’t get in the parking lot, which is blocked off by police cruisers on either side.

  The moment the truck stops rolling I have the door open. Ignoring Cal’s, “Hold up,” I hop down and start jogging toward the office, hearing him curse behind me.

  “Ma’am.”

  I try to get by the young officer when I spot Sally sitting on the bumper of my Kia Soul with another cop crouching in front of her, but I’m hauled back with an arm around my middle. My legs turn to rubber.

  “Easy, Slick, let’s find out what’s going on first.”

  Cal pulls me in front of him, holding me firm around the waist and bracing the other one in across my chest as he turns us toward the officer.

  “That’s my building,” he explains to the younger man. “I’m the McGregor of McGregor Bail and Bonds, and Reagan here owns Cole law offices. Sally over there is her paralegal.” He tilts his chin in the direction of my assistant. “What happened?”

  “We’re trying to find that out, sir. The garbage bin was rolled up against the rear entrance and it appears the fire originated there.”

  “Arson,” I bite off, my eyes fixed on the orange glow I can see through the front window of my office.

  “That’s for the fire inspector to confirm, ma’am, but unless that dumpster is usually parked against the back door, I would say it sure looks like it.”

  “It’s not,” Cal confirms.

  A car door slams and I turn my head to see Mark jogging up.

  “What the fuck? I just left half an hour ago to grab some food,” he mumbles in passing, ignoring the protests of the police officer as he makes his way over to Sally.

  An hour and a half later, the four of us are sitting on the curb, waiting for the fire inspector to finish his walk-through with a detective from the SPD. Not Walker, but an older man who was known to Cal and Mark.

  The fire is out, and although it looks like most of the fire was to the back of the building, smoke and water damage is extensive. I’ll be surprised if we can salvage anything usable but we aren’t allowed in until the fire inspector is done.

  Cal already called the insurance company and I have a separate tenants’ policy, which covers everything inside my walls through the same place. He says we should be covered and I hope he’s right, but furniture is the least of my worries. There’s also the matter of my slashed tires.

  Mark was the one who noticed when he walked up to join Sally. I guess when a building is on fire it draws the focus. So yeah, all four tires, which of course begs the question, why would someone set the office on fire and slash the tires on my car. You’d think just one of those would be enough to send a message if that was the intent.

  I noticed Cal and Mark exchanging looks I can’t quite decipher, and to be honest, I’m reeling too hard to pay more than a passing attention to it. Sally’s hand is clasped in mine and I’m beyond grateful she wasn’t injured.

  She’d been in the kitchen, doing some dishes and making a pot of coffee while listening to her audio book. She can’t recall hearing anything—she was wearing earbuds—but remembers noticing the smell of smoke at some point. When the alarm started blaring, she immediately called 9-1-1 and made her way outside, where a passing patrol car had already noticed the smoke and was pulling in.

  All four of us rush to our feet when the two investigators come walking out of the building.

  “Mr. McGregor?”

  “That’s me,” Cal volunteers. “And this is Reagan Cole, my tenant.”

  The rotund fire inspector gives me a nod before focusing on him.

  “Definitely arson. The dumpster was rolled up to the back door, blocking it and both the door and the bin look to have been doused in an accelerant. As far as arsons go, it was a half-assed attempt. The bulk of the damage is to the back of the building, impacting the smaller of the two units. The roof in the rear was involved and sustained substantial damage.”

  “I don’t think the fire was necessary the ultimate objective,” the police detective suggests.

  “What do you mean?” I ask.

  “Well, as I understand it the Kia with the slashed tires is yours, correct?”

  “It is.”

  He flips through a small notebook before he adds, “But you were out with Mr. McGregor in his vehicle.”

  “Correct. I’m not sure—”

  “Bear with me please?” he asks with a kind smile. “Was your car in this condition when you left with Mr. McGregor?”

  I try to think back whether I noticed anything off. I didn’t, but I couldn’t swear to it.

  “It wasn’t,” Cal answers for me. “I would’ve noticed.”

  “Right. So unless you have two separate individuals who mean to get your attention at the very same time, I would say it’s safe to assume both the tires and the fire are at the same hands. Which…” he quickly adds when I open my mouth, “…leads me to conclude someone is not happy with you.”

  “Why both, though?” Sally pipes up. “I mean why bother with the tires? Unless…”

  “Ms. Cole,” the detective draws my attention. “Can you think of anyone who is angry with you?”

  I can’t help it, I snort.

  “Look, Detective…”

  “Melville.”

  “Detective Melville, I’m a criminal defense lawyer, having people upset with me comes with the territory. Besides, I wasn’t even here,” I offer, but my mind is already going over a list of possible suspects.

  “But your car was. The blinds were closed but the light was on. Someone might’ve concluded you were,” he counters. “Ms. Cole, I’d like you to make a list of people who might be unhappy with you as soon as possible, and call me so we can go over it.” He hands me a card he fishes from his pocket.

  “Can we go in?” Cal asks. “Collect equipment and files we can salvage?”

  “We’re done in there, but you may want to check with your insurance adjuster first.”

  We watch the men walk toward their respective vehicles and drive off. Then it’s just us outside the building.

  “Let’s do this,” Mark suggests.

  I nod but I have to force my feet to start movi
ng. I’d rather have a root canal without freezing than go in there and face the destruction of my office, but I don’t really have a choice.

  Halfway to the front door I feel a hand grabbing mine, giving it a reassuring squeeze.

  It helps.

  Cal

  The moment we step in the door at Reagan’s, she turns and does a face plant in my chest. My arms circle her instinctively.

  “You okay, Sweetheart?”

  I feel her shake her head against me and I bury my nose in her hair. She smells of smoke, like I’m sure I do too.

  We just spent a few hours grabbing anything worth rescuing and piled it in both my truck and Mark’s. My side of the building had little fire damage—only part of the ceiling in the back—but water and smoke damage was substantial. Nothing like Reagan’s side, though. That looked pretty bad. I’m going to meet with the insurance adjuster tomorrow morning but even if he cuts me a check right there and then, it’ll take weeks if not months to make the repairs necessary.

  Moe showed up before we left and was going to help Mark make sure the place will be as secure as possible overnight. Mark was first going to see Sally home safe, and then they’re taking what we pulled from the bail bonds office to my apartment downtown for the time being.

  Reagan’s stuff is in the back of my truck, I should get that inside somewhere in case it rains, but first I need to make sure she’s okay.

  “You reek of smoke,” she mumbles against my shirt.

  “I know. We both do. Let’s get you cleaned up.”

  She leans back and looks at me. “What about you?”

  “I’m first gonna get your stuff inside. Is your garage unlocked?”

  “You can just bring it in here.”

  “I was actually just going to pull the truck into the garage so we can worry about it tomorrow.”

  “Right.” She pulls from my arms and grabs her key ring from the hall table where she tossed them, selecting one. “This is the garage. You may have to move the lawnmower out of the way.”

  “I’ll go take care of that while you hop in the shower.”