Motive ; One Last Day ; Going Viral

by Dustin Stevens

  Tseng’s head rose as he smirked, trying to keep from laughing. “A suicide? Really?”

  The governor opened his mouth to respond, but Wong interjected a question first, drawing the attention of the other men in the room.

  “What makes you say it was a murder?”

  “Given the few minutes I had to examine the scene?” Tseng asked, cutting his gaze to Randle so there was no mistaking where his frustration was aimed.

  “See,” the governor snapped, waving dismissively at Tseng, “he already admits he’s had no time to review things. He has no idea what’s down there. That girl committed suicide, plain and simple.”

  Tseng pushed ahead without even acknowledging the statement.

  “Based on my preliminary assessment, she had to have been murdered somewhere else and the body dumped here.”

  “Reason being?” Wong asked again.

  “For starters, there’s no blood,” Tseng replied. “There are two vicious slashes to that girl, one across her throat and another across her abdomen. Those are two of the heaviest blood-flow areas in the body. Had those wounds been inflicted on site, blood would be flooding the floor around her.”

  “You don’t know those wounds were the cause of death,” Randle snapped. “She could have been a jumper.”

  Tseng rolled his eyes, letting the momentum of the movement carry his attention back to the governor.

  “Ignoring the fact that every possible route to the fifth floor is locked at this time of night? Save a possible broken leg, there are no signs of impact. A fall from five floors onto concrete would have split her head like a melon and snapped most of the bones in her body.

  “I’m sorry Governor, but this was a murder and needs to be treated as such.”

  Randle leaned back in his chair and stared across at Tseng, the anger receding from his features, taking a bit of the red hue with it. He rested his head against the chair and closed his eyes, shaking his head from side to side.

  Tseng watched him before shifting his attention to Wong. “It has nothing to do with politics. And why isn’t a crime scene unit on site yet?”

  “It has everything to do with politics,” Randle said from across the room without opening his eyes. “And there will be no tech unit. You have the next few hours to ascertain everything you can, and after that the scene will be scrubbed clean in time for a new day here at the capitol.”

  “What?” Tseng spat, not believing what he heard.

  When the governor made no movement of any kind, Tseng looked to Wong and then Hall and back again. “What do you mean there will be no processing the scene?”

  He added as much bitterness as he could to his voice, finally drawing Randle’s attention enough to open his eyes.

  “What you don’t seem to understand is that this is the state capitol building, in the middle of a legislative session, three months away from a very heated gubernatorial primary election.”

  Tseng’s eyes bulged. “You think what’s down there was done because it’s election season?”

  “Of course it was,” Randle said, his own voice rising. “You think it’s just coincidence that a pretty young blonde girl was found directly beneath my office? She’s there because somebody is trying to jumpstart a political scandal right before the polls open. And I’ll be damned if I let that happen.”

  Randle pushed himself up from his chair, putting his fists down on the desk. He leaned forward, staring at Tseng.

  “So here’s how this is going to go. You - and you alone - are going to go back downstairs and get everything you can from that scene. You can take notes, but I get copies of everything, and they are to be shared with nobody in HPD, FBI, CIA, anybody.”

  Tseng sighed and rolled his head to the side. The odds of that young girl being something that any of the alphabet agencies would be interested in was just one more example of Randle’s overestimation of his own importance.

  “And then what?” Tseng asked. “I wage a one-man investigation?”

  “No,” Randle said, his gaze boring down on Tseng. “You go back to doing exactly what you always do, but when you’re not on the clock, when nobody’s around, you monitor it. You keep close tabs on everything, and you report back to me.”

  Disbelief roiled through Tseng. His jaw dropped open as once more he examined each of the faces in the room, trying to make sense of the madness he was hearing.

  “Keep tabs on what?” he asked. “There’s no going over the scene, nobody on the force is allowed to know about this, I’m not allowed to touch it.”

  “We’ve got someone in mind for that,” Wong said, drawing Tseng’s attention to the side.

  “We’ll get to that,” Randle inserted, stemming the line of discussion before it went any further. “But first, we have to know you’re onboard with us. After you leave, this conversation never took place. Come morning, that girl was never here.”

  “You think you can just make this disappear?” Tseng asked. “A young girl was murdered downstairs. She had a life, a family. She deserves to be investigated. Her killer must be brought to justice.”

  “She will, and they will,” Randle said, his voice as even as if he were reporting the score of the previous night’s University of Hawaii baseball game. “But it will be done quietly and with discretion.”

  Tseng drew his mouth into a tight line to keep himself from snapping back.

  “And if I don’t? You realize I have reporters from KHNL and KHON on speed dial, right? I could have crews here in minutes, cameras rolling.”

  “But you won’t,” Randle said, same deadpan voice, now bearing a hint of condescension.

  “Why won’t I?” Tseng said. “What’s to stop me? You?”

  “No,” Randle said, shaking his head, “though I could.” He pressed himself up from the table and walked back over to his chair. He folded the robe across his midsection and sat down. “No, the person stopping you will be you.”

  “Me?” Tseng asked.

  “Yes, you,” Randle said. “Self-preservation will keep you from doing any of that, because if you did, I would have you removed from the Honolulu Police Department. No pension, no letter of recommendation. Good luck ever getting a job again after that.”

  Tseng’s face twisted in anger. “Are you threatening me?”

  “Not just you,” Randle said. “I know all about your wife, Sharon. Be awful hard for a school teacher to ever work again after an accusation of being a child molester. Or your son, Walt Jr. You must have been so proud when he got that scholarship to UH. Can you imagine how damaging it would be if it got rescinded?”

  Tseng took three quick steps across the room and slammed his hands down on the desk. “You lowdown son of a bitch.”

  From the corner, the security agent matched Tseng’s movements, coming to a stop just inches from the governor.

  Randle glanced over his shoulder at the backup and smirked. “Because of the situation, I will allow you one outburst, Chief Tseng, but you would be well served to remember where you are and who you’re talking to.”

  Tseng kept his hands against the desk for several seconds before pushing himself back, running a hand over his hair.

  “So you’ve got me over a barrel here. You’ve drawn me into something I had no part in, no choice on, and now I have to participate?”

  The guard returned back into the corner as Randle shook a hand at Tseng. “Oh, don’t be so dramatic, it’s not like this comes without benefit to you. Help me take care of this, and when we get through the election, the favor will be repaid in kind.”

  Tseng glared at the governor. “What?”

  Randle smiled. “Do you have any idea how much discretionary funding I have access to every year? How easy it is for me to pay out a bonus to a civil servant doing a good job? Provide scholarship monies for a student in need?”

  “You’re going to bribe me into being complicit?” Tseng said, his face contorted, the word tasting nasty on his tongue.

  “No, I’m not going t
o blackmail you into helping me,” Randle said. “I’m just going to pay you for your service so we both sleep better at night once it’s done.”

  Tseng could feel four sets of eyes watching him, but made no effort to let them press him before he was ready.

  It was clearly the most amoral, unethical thing he had ever heard of, let alone participated in. The mere thought of taking part made his stomach turn.

  At the same time, he thought of Sharon and how much she adored those children. Of Wally and the time he spent working in the library to maintain his grades.

  The truth was, there was no way he couldn’t go along with this scheme.

  And the worst part was, everybody in the room knew it.

  His face ashen and disgusted, he looked at each person in the room, letting them register his disapproval, before asking, “So who’s this investigator you have in mind?”

  Chapter Four

  Warm red blood poured from the open wound, spilling down Kalani Lewis’s chest.

  “Don’t look at it,” her partner Ben Jacobsen said to her, his body hovering above hers, his hand on her collarbone, holding her down against the pavement.

  “How bad?” Kalani managed, her voice ragged as she drew in shallow breaths. The right side of her body felt like it was on fire, like a hot iron poker had been jabbed into her chest. One at a time, she touched her thumb to each of her fingers, willing them to maintain sensation, forcing herself to stay in the present.

  “You’re going to be fine,” Ben said, looking down at her and trying to force a smile, the rest of his face betraying his worry. He held the glance for no more than a second before looking away, his right hand raising a two-way radio to his face.

  “Officer down! I repeat, officer down, on the corner of Kapiolani and Kapahulu,” Ben barked, strain evident in his voice.

  Using every bit of strength she could muster, Kalani forced herself to stay awake. She drew in as much air as possible and blinked her eyes repeatedly, not allowing herself to succumb to the darkness creeping in on the edges of her vision.

  “Where the hell is everybody?” Kalani gasped, trying to raise herself up only to be held down by Ben.

  “Stay down,” Ben said without looking at her, his head twisting to survey the street around them.

  Kalani watched as he started to raise the radio back to his mouth, only to drop it halfway there, letting it clatter to the pavement. The moment it hit, his hand found the standard issue Glock holstered on his hip and drew it.

  The pressure on Kalani’s collarbone disappeared as Ben released his grip on her and raised the gun with both hands, his arms fully extended in front of him.

  “Police!” Ben bellowed. “Free…”

  Kalani never heard him finish the word. The first bullet struck him in the stomach, pushing him back and forcing his head and shoulders forward. The second hit him square on the cheekbone, throwing his head backward, his entire body silhouetted in the streetlight as it arced away from her.

  For one brief moment he seemed suspended in air, his arms flailing in slow motion as the Glock slid from his fingers, falling away into the night. As he floated, the bullet punched through the back of his head, bits of bone and hair, blood and brain matter, all visible as it exited his skull.

  Kalani’s eyes grew large, air ceasing to find its way into her lungs as she watched, her body flat on the ground.

  It was the same place she woke up every time. Just before Ben hit the ground, not long before she, herself, lost consciousness.

  At the time, the trauma was too much to stay awake.

  Now, it was too much for her body to remain asleep.

  The satin sheets were slick with sweat as Kalani raised her hands and ran them over her forehead. Thick beads of perspiration peeled away from her skin, streaming back into her hair line. She could feel her pulse pounding through her temples and could see the sheet covering her body rising and falling in rapid succession.

  She rolled over onto a shoulder and stared wide-eyed at the clock. It was 7:30, just moments before the alarm was scheduled to go off. The idea of closing her eyes, of trying to catch a few more minutes, entered her mind but was dismissed just as fast.

  She had seen this situation play out enough times to know what was waiting for her behind closed eyelids. Ben - her partner, her confidante, her best friend - silhouetted against the streetlight, the bullet and his soul both passing from his body together.

  Instead, she again ran a hand over her sweat-soaked face and wiped it on the sheet beneath her. A groan passed from her lips as she pushed herself to a seated position, tan feet finding the floor beneath her.

  “Here we go again,” she muttered, rising and making her way to the bathroom.

  The harsh glow of the overhead light hurt her eyes as she went to the toilet and did her business before crossing over to the sink to wash her hands and face. When she was done, she stood back from the mirror and examined what she found, the corners of her mouth turning downward in a reflexive frown.

  The product of a father just one generation removed from the vineyards of Bordeaux, France, and a mother born on the windward coast of the island she now called home, her features were a combination of the two. Her last name, blue eyes and light complexion she drew from her father. The first name, thick dark hair and round face were gifts from her mother.

  In some places, the odd mix might have gotten her picked on as a child, might make her stand out, even now in her early-30s.

  On Oahu, it went almost completely unnoticed.

  The frown grew a little deeper as Kalani stared at herself in the mirror, noting the dark circles under her eyes. She rolled her shoulders forward to see if her collarbones were actually as prominent as they seemed. In a move practiced every morning since the shooting, she pulled the strap of her tank top aside to see the scar the bullet had made that night.

  The slug that was dug out of her was a 9mm, the resulting scar a little wider than a centimeter on her skin. The edges of it were raised just slightly, the wound sealed but still bright pink. The doctors had said she was lucky, the shot being a ricochet that imbedded itself in her flesh just short of doing any major damage.

  Kalani ran a pinkie across it, noting the smooth feel of the new skin beneath her fingertip. She leaned her body in close to examine it in the mirror, her daily inspection interrupted by the sound of knocking at the front door.

  The air slid from Kalani’s lungs as her heart pounded in her chest. She shuffled out of the bathroom and peeked through the curtain in her bedroom, trying to see who would be calling at such an hour, her first visitor in weeks, if not longer.

  Wincing at the early morning sun, she strained to see if a car was parked in her driveway, but could make out nothing.

  Letting the heavy fabric fall back into place, she scooped a long sleeve pullover up off the floor and tugged it on, walking to the nightstand as she did so. Pulling the top drawer open, she shoved aside a pile of tissues and magazines to find the holstered .38 Special revolver her father had given her when she joined the force almost a decade before.

  Sliding the leather case away from the weapon, she tossed it on the bed and waited as a second round of pounding erupted from the front door.

  Images of that night on the street swirled through Kalani’s mind as she crossed the hallway into the living room, gun raised by her ear. The house was shrouded in darkness, every shade drawn as low as it would go.

  Kalani took a deep breath and stepped up to the door, her bare feet silent on the floor. She looked through the peephole before recognition set in, and she stepped back, turning the heavy dead belt and wrenching the door open.

  There, standing on her doorstep, was a clearly exhausted Walter Tseng.

  Chapter Five

  Kalani’s sandals slapped against her feet, tossing sand up onto her ankles and calves as she walked. Most of the time she wouldn’t have bothered putting them on, letting the white sand sift between her toes, but given the circumstances, she tho
ught some kind of shoe might lend a little more formality to the occasion.

  The warmth of the coffee she carried passed through the beige ceramic mugs and into her hands. She could think of a dozen different reasons why Chief Tseng would show up at her front door so early in the morning, none of them good.

  In her 10 years on the force, she had known Tseng peripherally both before and during his tenure as chief. While never reporting directly to him, she knew some officers who did, all of them giving the same assessment of him.

  He was honest, fair, and loyal to those who deserved it. He also had a reputation as a teetotaler, a fact some on the force frowned upon, but Kalani never minded.

  In the limited interaction she had with him following the shooting, she found the summary to be pretty accurate.

  Kalani walked across the white sand that served as her front lawn toward a picnic table nestled at the base of a Banyon tree. Thick aerial roots hung down, making the trunk seem twice as wide as it really was.

  Tseng sat with his back to her as she approached, perched on one side of the table, leaning forward onto his elbows. Kalani could see his profile as she walked, his eyes looking out over the Pacific, pinched in thought. She considered sitting across from him before opting against it, sliding down on the opposite end of the bench.

  She set the coffee down and waited.

  It took almost a minute for Tseng to snap himself away from his thoughts, the smell of the brew wafting up and penetrating his consciousness. He gave a sheepish smile as he looked down at his mug and then at Kalani, reaching forward and wrapping his hands around it.

  “Sorry,” he said, “long night.”

  “No problem,” Kalani said, trying her best to sound casual, despite the deep-rooted nervousness that gripped her.

  She waited while Tseng took a long drink and set the cup back down, keeping his hands wrapped around it.

  “Nice place you’ve got here.”