by James Hunt
Grant fished out his keys and stepped around to the driver side of his sedan. “Want to make sure we have a case that sticks.” He climbed inside, but when he slid the key into the ignition, he didn’t turn it on.
Mocks noticed the pause as she clicked her seat buckle into place. “What’s wrong?”
Grant twisted the gold wedding band. “I saw them when that gangbanger was choking me.” He kept his eyes glued to the metal. It was cold to the touch and damp from the moisture outside. “I saw their faces clear as day.” He smiled. “Even my daughter’s.” When Mocks didn’t respond, Grant looked over and then he shook his head. “I know I sound like a crazy person.”
“You’re not crazy,” Mocks said, then after a pause, she added, “What did she look like?”
“Annie?” Grant asked.
“Yeah.”
Grant closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the seat rest. “She had red hair like Ellen. Her eyes were like mine.” He smiled. “Everything else was all Ellen though. Ears, nose, skin.” Grant opened his eyes. “Ellen always said that I was her anchor and that she was my ship. I always thought it was silly, but after she died, I realized what she meant. There were places that I could only go with her. And there were storms that she could only weather with me.” The smile faded from Grant’s face, and his voice grew very quiet. “The perfect pair.”
Mocks placed her hand on Grant’s shoulder. “It’s good to have those memories. And it’s good to be that close.” And then she dug into the meat of his shoulder with her nails. He winced and she leaned closer. “Do not chase that feeling again.”
Grant shook his head, confused. “What are you talking about?”
“I know what it’s like to have something make you feel good when there isn’t a whole lot to feel good about,” Mocks answered. “Heroin did that for me for a long time, and I’ve got the scars to prove it. But there are other highs in this world that are just as dangerous. And I don’t need you turning into an adrenaline junkie so you can chase visions of your wife and child. You’ve still got work to do.” She let go of his shoulder, and the pinpoint pressure from her nails left indentations in the jacket.
He understood what she meant, because the thought had crossed his mind more than once. He wanted to see his wife again. He wanted more time with the daughter that he never had the chance to hold. He wanted the life that he envisioned before the accident.
“We should head back to the precinct,” Grant said. “See what we’ve got from the AMBER Alerts while—”
“Unit thirty-five, please advise, Craig Johnson is out of surgery and stabilized. He has been cleared by the doctors for interview.”
Grant snatched the receiver that still lay on the floorboard after his outburst from earlier. “Copy that, Dispatch. Tell the hospital we are on our way.” He clicked his seatbelt into place and cranked the engine to life.
“I meant what I said,” Mocks said, shifting in her seat. “Chasing after it will only get you killed.”
“I know,” Grant said, putting on his seatbelt. “But there are worse things.”
***
The fluorescent lights reflected off the polished tile of the hospital, highlighting the white floors and walls. Nurses walked by with clipboards, their sneakers squeaking with every step. Grant tapped his finger impatiently at the nurses’ station while Mocks sat in one of the chairs in the waiting area.
“All right, Detective.” The nurse behind the desk returned his badge and a visitor’s sticker. “The patient is in room two-twelve.”
Grant slapped the sticker on his front jacket pocket and slipped his badge back around his neck. He walked around the station and Mocks followed. He spied the room guarded by an officer. It was standard protocol for someone like Johnson to have protection. Pedophiles weren’t popular with any group of people.
“Let me know if you need anything, Detective,” the officer said after Mocks stepped inside.
“Thank you,” Mocks said, and then shut the door.
Grant sidled up to the left side of the bed, and Mocks went to the right. Johnson slept, but there wasn’t anything peaceful about it. The bed sheet was pulled up to Craig’s waist. The hospital gown they put him in lay flat against his thin body. Wispy, lightly browned hair sprouted from the top of his head. His cheeks were hollow and curved into his mouth. His eyes were closed, and the machines hooked up to his body beeped in rhythmic intervals. Grant gave the bed a light rattle.
Craig’s eyes fluttered open, and when he saw Grant and Mocks hovering over him, the machine monitoring his heart rate beeped wildly. He pressed himself deeper into the mattress as if he could melt into the sheets and escape.
“W-what do you want?” Craig shifted his eyes between the detectives, his mouth ajar and running his tongue over his thin lips.
“We never formally met,” Mocks said, breaking the ice. “I’m Detective Mullocks, and this is my partner Detective Grant. We’re the ones who shot you.” She smiled, but Grant kept his expression stoic. Whenever Mocks took the lead, Grant played the strong, silent role.
“I-I want my lawyer,” Craig said, his tone lacking confidence. “I have a right to—”
“Not you,” Mocks said. “Kiddie rapists get a special exemption on lawyers.”
“The website,” Grant said. “Who told you about it?”
Craig Johnson burst into tears. “Please, I didn’t do anything to the boy. I promise you. I swear to god nothing happened.”
“But something was going to happen,” Mocks said. “Wasn’t it, Craig? That’s why you took the kid, why you wanted to shuffle him up north across state lines. We saw the passports. You must have spent a pretty penny on those.”
Grant leaned closer to Craig’s face, his shadow slowly covering Craig’s figure, blocking out the bright lights of the room. “Who told you about the site?”
Another wave of sobs erupted from Craig, tears bursting from his eyes as he mumbled unintelligible words through his blubbering.
“You’re gonna have to repeat that,” Mocks said. “I didn’t catch it.”
“I met him at the park I go to,” Craig said, regaining some ability for coherent speech.
“Where you abducted the boy,” Grant said, finishing the sentence.
Craig nodded. “He told me he could help give me what I wanted. He said no one would ever find out if I did exactly what he told me to do.” He shut his eyes, squeezing out a few more tears. “So that’s what I did.” He sniffled and opened his eyes, looking at Grant. “He never gave me a name. Just a card with the website information.”
“Where’s the card now?” Grant asked.
“I-I destroyed it,” Craig answered, shrinking deeper into his pillow. “He told me to.” His Adam’s apple bobbed up and down when he swallowed. “The man was… frightening.”
“What’d this guy look like?” Mocks asked.
“Older white guy. Grey hair. It was longer, down to his neck, but I only saw what wasn’t covered with his hat,” Craig said. “He wore sunglasses too.”
“What about scars, tattoos, birthmarks, anything like that?” Mocks asked.
“I can’t remember,” Craig answered.
Grant wrapped his hand around Craig’s throat, and the beeping skyrocketed. “We need something more than a geriatric who gave you a card to throw away.”
Craig thrashed in his bed, but weakly so, like a piece of prey that knew it was caught. He tried to speak, but Grant’s grip was too tight.
“What was that?” Grant asked.
“Spiders,” Craig said, his eyes wide. “Spiders on his hand. Three of them, crawling over a black web. They were all black.” Grant let him go, and Craig bawled.
Grant turned to leave and Mocks followed. She caught up to him halfway down the hall.
“Put out an APB for an older white male, grey hair, with three spiders over a black web,” Grant said. “We need to follow up with Sam, see what he has so far on the computer.”
“Hey,” Mocks said, blocking his path b
efore they reached the elevator. “Are you all right? That wasn’t your normal tough cop.”
Grant held up his watch, the timer ticking toward ten hours. She looked, then stepped out of his way, and he pressed the down button and they descended to the first floor.
“You don’t have to keep reminding me that this is urgent.” Mocks crossed her arms, staring straight ahead. “You don’t have a monopoly on wanting to successfully complete our cases. Last I checked, we were still partners.”
The elevator doors pinged opened, and Grant had a clear view to the automatic glass doors at the hospital’s entrance where a few members of the press had clustered, waiting for him outside. Grant sighed. “Great.”
“I’ll handle it,” Mocks said, stepping in front of Grant on their exit. The doors opened and the press immediately swarmed them.
“Detective! Do you have any leads on who could be behind these abductions?”
“Did the suspect survive the altercation at the house?”
“How many more children are at risk?”
Mocks held up her hands. “We’re currently following several leads in regards to the abductions. We don’t have any further information to provide you at this time. Thank you.”
The horde of reporters slowed their pace to a crawl, and Grant’s patience grew thinner. All of the frustration, fatigue, uncertainty, and stress of the past two days reached a tipping point.
One of the reporters veered from Mocks and thrust a microphone in his face. “Detective Grant, have you used some of the tactics on current suspects that you used during the altercation with Brian Dunston two years ago?”
The comment stopped Grant dead in his tracks, and Mocks turned to try and intercept, but she was two steps too slow. Grant smacked the microphone out of the reporter’s hand and shoved him hard in the chest, sending him to the pavement.
Camera lights flashed quickly and the rest of the reporters captured the moment with video and sound as Grant cocked his arm back and hardened his hand to a fist. Before he struck, Mocks stepped in his way.
She shoved him as hard as she could, throwing all of her five-foot, one-hundred pound frame into it that only moved Grant a few inches. Another round of camera flashes and questions polluted the air, but Mock’s sudden action was enough to snap Grant out of his rage.
The pair turned and hurried to the car, the reporters following, with Mocks stuck in the middle of it, waving her hand and saying that they weren’t taking any more questions and they didn’t have a comment.
The reporters pressed against the side of the car, and Grant reversed out of the parking spot as Mocks blocked her face from the cameras peering inside. Grant floored it out of the parking lot and, thankfully, they didn’t try and follow.
“What the hell was that?” Mocks asked, slapping the dash. “Do you have any idea what you just did?”
The rage receded from Grant’s mind, but the memories of the night from two years ago poured into his consciousness. Flashes of blood appeared on his knuckles. Brian Dunston’s blood. His screams. His pleas for mercy. His pleas for forgiveness.
“I’m sorry,” Grant said, his breaths quick and shallow. His heartbeat accelerated and his head spun. He slowed the car and pulled over to the side of the road, the rest of the traffic blaring their frustrations for the inconvenience. He shifted into park, but left the engine running. He kept his hands tight on the steering wheel. He needed to hold onto something. He couldn’t slip back into that madness again. Not now.
“They shouldn’t have asked you about that,” Mocks said, her tone softer. “That reporter deserved what he got and what he would have gotten. But that’s not how it’ll be spun on the six o’clock news. And that’s not how the captain will see it.”
Grant cursed under his breath and shut his eyes. “It was stupid. I know. It’s just…” He looked at Mocks. “I’ll never really know.”
Mocks shook her head, confused. “Know what?”
“What my daughter would have sounded like. Who she would have grown up to be. I’ll never know what kind of father I would have been. And it’s a question I’ll never be able to answer.”
There was a time when he’d thought he could find those answers when he transferred to Missing Persons. He wanted to believe that he could help ease his own pain by easing the pain of others. But he still felt the loss. It was as sharp today as it was two years ago.
“No,” Mocks answered. “You won’t.” She leaned closer. “And that’s the burden of the living, Grant. That’s what makes life hard, and dirty, and wonderful all at the same time. It’s that pain that gives us strength. It’s given you strength, and while you may not feel it in your own life, others have felt it. I’ve felt it. It’ll never leave you, I know. But don’t let the pain swallow you up.” Mocks laid her hand over his on the wheel. “The pain can’t define you, because then it controls you.”
Grant rested his forehead on the crest of the steering wheel and shut his eyes. His insides were on fire, and the sucking pain in his chest pulled him inward. He wanted to fight it, but he’d been fighting it for a long time. He was tired.
“We still have to find Annie Mauer,” Mock said. “She still needs us.”
Annie. Grant lifted his head. He glanced at his watch. The timer ticked away seconds with impunity, a steady reminder that time was the master of all.
Grant shifted into drive and pulled back out onto the road. “We’ll head back to the precinct. See what Sam was able to pull off the computer.” He just wasn’t sure how long he’d still have his badge when he arrived.
Chapter 10
The press had doubled around the precinct. Grant and Mocks parked in the back to avoid the circus. Grant lingered in the car after Mocks had gotten out. She knocked on the window, and he held up his hand.
Grant closed his eyes, took a deep breath, exhaled, and counted to three. There wouldn’t be anything pleasant waiting for him inside, but he had to face it. He stepped out of the car and followed Mocks inside. After three steps, the captain spotted them heading to Cyber.
“Grant! Mullocks!” Captain Hill’s cheeks wobbled in sync with his flabby neck, his skin flush red. “My office, now!”
“Captain,” Mocks said. “We’re—”
“I said now, damnit!” Captain Hill turned on his heel and marched back toward his office. The rest of the department had gone quiet, and it wasn’t until Grant and Mocks were halfway to his office that everyone resumed their activities.
Grant was the last to enter and he shut the door, sealing them inside. Lieutenant Furst was in the corner with his arms crossed. Hill had plopped in his chair and leaned forward.
“I received a call from the station manager at Channel Four news asking me if I had a comment about the assault that one of my detectives performed on one of his reporters,” Hill said.
“Sir,” Mocks said. “You have to know that—”
“Shut it, Mullocks!” Hill thrust a finger in her direction, then pivoted his aim toward Grant. “Every news camera in this city is looking for the inside scoop on these abductions, and the last thing this department needs is its officers losing their cool under pressure. Do you have any idea the scrutiny we’re under right now? No one feels safe. No one wants their kid to be taken, and every single person across the state is counting on us to end this.”
Hill leaned back in his chair, the rant taking the breath out of him as he sucked down a few gulps of air, his forehead dotted with beads of sweat.
“Captain, this is bigger than just the abductions that were reported,” Grant said. “We have reason to believe that a crime organization that calls itself The Web is involved in these abductions and the overall trafficking of sex workers through the entire West Coast.”
“I don’t give a shit if it’s the goddamn Illuminati,” Captain Hill said. “I want. Those kids. Back!” He slammed his fist on the desk and knocked the phone off.
Lieutenant Furst kept quiet. Grant waited for him to speak up, but it never came. Not t
hat he blamed the lieutenant. Grant was a dead man walking, so it didn’t matter what he did next.
“You don’t let me finish this case, and there’ll be more than just my assault on the six o’clock news,” Grant said.
Hill lowered his voice. “Watch your tone, Detective.”
Grant walked to Hill’s desk, getting in his face. “I’ll tell that reporter who asked me about Brian Dunston exactly what he wants to know. How you helped falsify the report of what happened that night. How you intimidated him to not press charges. And the best part of the story? It’s true.”
“You are way out of line!” Hill’s cheeks wiggled and reddened. Spit flew from his mouth.
“Let me finish this case,” Grant said. “You know that we’re still your best bet to find those kids.”
“Detective Grant,” Furst said. “This isn’t—”
“The only reason you’re pissed about that reporter is because it reflects badly on you, Captain,” Grant said. “You wouldn’t give a shit if I hadn’t been recorded. You only care when it disrupts your afternoon nap. So if you really want to save your ass, then let me and my partner do our job.”
It was bold, but it was Grant’s only play. He knew Hill would suspend him and an investigation would be ordered. Any superior officer would have done it under normal circumstances. But this wasn’t normal.
The captain calmed a bit, and Grant knew it had worked.
“You will have to answer to the charges filed against you,” Hill said. “I will keep the wolves off your back until this is done, but after, you turn in your badge. And if you fail, then all of this comes crashing down on your head.” He looked at Mocks. “Both of your heads.”
Grant turned on his heel and stepped out before any more stipulations were thrown their way. Grant got the time he needed. Now he had to deliver.
Mocks walked quickly by his side on their way back to Cyber. “You know they’re going to run that story in the news no matter what. Everything from that night will be made public.”
“I know,” Grant said. “But it’s like you said.” He looked down at her. “I can’t let it define me.”
