“How’s Jason?” she asked, hoping for good news.
“He’s in a coma. The doctors say they expect him to die before morning.”
“Damn,” she mumbled, remembering Jason’s pleas to save Marty, and to tell his friend he was sorry.
So am I kid, so am I.
Ken took his seat, and Baxter started recording again. “It looks as if this case will be upgraded to a homicide by morning, and you were found at the scene. If you don’t start telling me the truth about what happened, I’ll have to arrest you.”
She stared. “You can’t really think I did all that stuff to the kid.”
“Doesn’t matter what I think happened. I saw you strangling him, and I wasn’t the only one who did.”
“I was trying to wake him up.”
Ken shook his head. “I don’t believe you. I’ll tell you now, Chris, the way this thing is going, it’s a cinch you’ll go down for Jason’s murder.”
“He isn’t dead yet.”
“As good as. Now, are you going to start talking, or do I arrest you right now and send you down?”
She took a deep breath and nodded reluctantly. “I drove to Griffith Park and….”
She gave him an edited version of the story. She kept Stephen, Marie, and Ed completely out of it, and said Jason fell unconscious before he could say anything. She missed nothing out about her adventures on the roof or about her fight with Ryder. There was no need.
“…and used the upholstery to bind his wounds. I tried to wake him. I wanted to ask him what Ryder wanted, but he was deeply unconscious. That’s just about when you came in, Ken. I was still trying to wake him when you told me to drop him.”
The silence was palpable. Ken was frowning as if he thought she was holding back, and she was of course, but when had her skills at bluffing lost so much of their potency? Maybe Ken was just too perceptive. She hadn’t had any trouble bluffing Ed after all.
You weren’t bluffing with Ed.
Sure I was. I wouldn’t have let the vamps hurt him.
You can’t lie to me. You would have done whatever was necessary. As it should be.
She didn’t have time to think about that. Ken was hunting the truth, and she had to be careful not to contradict her own story.
“When you entered the planetarium,” Ken said, doodling on the folder’s cover. “You heard Ryder questioning the boy.”
“Right.”
“What was he saying?”
She frowned. “I don’t know.”
Ken cocked his head. “Shifters have excellent hearing. Isn’t that correct?”
“I suppose they do.”
“Then why couldn’t you tell what he was saying?”
She shrugged. “I could see that Ryder was saying something, but Jason was screaming too loudly for me to hear what. Ryder was flaying him, Ken. Jason was screaming the place down.”
“I see. When I came in, I found you throttling Jason—”
“I was trying to wake him, not kill him!”
“So you say. I came in, and I heard him say the word sanctuary. What did he mean by that?”
She hadn’t thought he had been close enough to hear that. She tried to look puzzled. “He was unconscious. He didn’t say anything.”
“I heard it distinctly.”
“You couldn’t have. I was right next to him, and I never heard it.”
Ken sighed and gathered up his papers. “This is going nowhere. Maybe you’ll be more talkative tomorrow after I arrest you for Jason’s murder. Record off, Dave.”
Ken got to his feet, preparing to leave.
“You don’t mean that,” she said pulling nervously on the chain holding her to the table. “I didn’t hurt him, it was Ryder.”
“Save it.”
“It was Ryder!” she shouted at Ken’s back as he reached the door. “The bastard was torturing the kid. I saved him. Do you hear me? I saved him!”
Ken didn’t look back as he left.
Baxter labelled the disk, put it in a case, and dropped it into his jacket pocket. “Better get a lawyer, Chris.”
“I haven’t done anything. You believe me, don’t you?”
Baxter shrugged.
“Don’t you?”
* * *
20 ~ The Slam
Baxter took Chris down to the holding area located beneath Central’s main complex. It consisted of two levels: the lower level containing the cells, and the upper level containing prisoner processing and the computer centre. It was quiet at this time of night. There was still some activity of course, suspects were brought in at all hours, but when she stepped out of the elevator, she was relieved to find only a few faces she knew logging prisoners in. If she had come down here during the day, this level of Central would be chaotic at best. There would have been suspects shouting and cursing, police officers logging in their prisoners, others collecting prisoners for questioning, or bail hearings, or release. The room was brightly lit and white-painted, had grey-tiled floors, and glow panels around the top and bottom of the walls. It always smelled of disinfectant, which (although it made her nose itch) was better than the smell of vomit.
Prisoner processing was comprised of two distinct areas: pre-processing, and post-processing (called the cage because it was secure behind steel bars). On this side of the cage, there was a short queue of officers waiting to log in their prisoners. Guards stood alertly around the room with hands close to their shock-lances. To her left as she stepped out of the elevator, doors led back up to the street outside. She looked at them longingly. Baxter noticed, and tightened his grip on her arm. He needn’t have bothered. She would need a code to get through those doors, and her permissions had long since been erased from the system.
Baxter led her toward the cage and joined the queue. “You don’t have to worry. You’ll be in Isolation.”
She laughed.
“What’s funny?”
“You putting me in a cage with a bunch of shifters for my safety. Don’t you think that’s funny?”
Baxter frowned. “No.”
It was strange, but she would be safer in the company of other monsters than she would in a cell full of humans. If Baxter had tried to put her anywhere but Isolation, she would have been yelling the place down. They would have had to drag her there. An ex-cop’s life wouldn’t be worth spit if they put her in with a bunch of humans. Shifters were remarkably unbiased in some ways. They wouldn’t care that she used to be a cop. All that would concern them was whether she was stronger than they were.
Strength is very important. It dictates our place in the pack.
“You want some advice?” Baxter asked as they waited their turn.
“Not particularly.”
“Get an attorney.”
She sighed. “You’re repeating yourself.”
“That’s because you don’t listen. Get an attorney. You need one.”
“I don’t need one. I’m not under arrest.”
Baxter glanced at her briefly then back to what was happening ahead. “Yet.” He pushed her forward another couple of steps as the queue slowly shortened. “You’ve been around long enough to know how things work, Chris. Don’t be stupid about this. Everyone down here needs an attorney, under arrest or not.”
“You know what I think of those bloodsuckers. I’ve spent years fighting to put away the scum on our streets, and they spend all their time trying to stop me.”
“That’s history. It’s gone. I’m talking about now. You need someone to look out for you. Ken is after your butt.”
“He’s just doing his job,” she said, and shuffled forward again.
“Yeah, and he’s made shifters his mission in life. You’re a shifter now.”
She shook her head. “He wouldn’t do that. He’s a good cop.”
“He’s still good at the job,” Baxter agreed. “But he’s changed since you went down. You saw him. Was that the man you knew?”
She remembered thinking how much Ken had changed, but tha
t much? Surely not. Ken would never compromise his ethics just to send shifters down. Never. She had taught him to let nothing but the evidence rule his decisions. If he was suddenly targeting shifters, he had a good reason. Baxter was just being paranoid.
What happens if he is not?
“Ken’s a friend. He was just doing his job.”
Baxter shook his head, not realising She was talking to Smoke. “Get a lawyer.”
But what happens if he is not?
She frowned uneasily. “I think I’ll make that call after all, Dave.”
“Now you’re talking. Come ’ere.” Baxter jerked her roughly out of the line.
“Watch it, numb-nuts!” she squawked as she staggered.
Baxter dragged her toward the row of link booths. “I’m not letting you put it off until later. You’ll make the call, with me listening, right now.”
“Since when did you go all fatherly?”
Baxter’s face reddened. “Since never. You bring it out in me, I guess.”
She rolled her eyes. She didn’t want to bring out latent parental instincts in him. She didn’t want to bring out latent anything in him! Seeing as her credit chip had been confiscated with the rest of her stuff, Baxter inserted his chip into the link and authorised its use with his thumbprint on the scanner.
She punched in the number from memory and hoped she had it right. It took a while for him to pick up; he had probably been asleep.
“Lephmann.”
“I need help.”
“Chris?”
“Yeah it’s me. I’m at Central, on my way to the cells.”
“Who did you kill?” Lephmann asked intently. “I’ll send Geoffrey to pay off the witnesses.”
She gaped. “Oh that’s nice. Assume I’m guilty, why don’t you?”
“Aren’t you?”
“Well, yes, but that’s not the point. And anyway, where do you get off bribing witnesses?”
Baxter paled and stepped away so he couldn’t overhear. What he didn’t know couldn’t get him fired.
“I do whatever it takes to help my people. We take care of own, and we punish them when the need arises. You should know that by now.”
She remembered the arena at the old airbase, and her fight with Janine in the desert. Punishment among shifters was severe. “Yeah, okay, but you can’t get away with bribing cops.”
Lephmann swore. “Are you telling me you killed someone in front of the police?”
“No.”
“Thank the goddess for that!”
She counted to ten under her breath. “I went after Ryder and caught him torturing Jason.”
“The missing Kirkwood boy?”
“Right. The thing is, Ryder got away just as the police turned up. They caught me with Jason. They think I did all that stuff to him.”
There was a brief silence, and then a whispered conversation in the background. She frowned intently, trying to make out the words, but she couldn’t pick up enough for it to make sense. The other voice sounded feminine and familiar. Maybe Lephmann and Ronnie had a thing.
“Okay. I’ll fix it,” Lephmann said, sounding confident.
“Just like that, eh?”
“Just like that. I’ll have you out by morning. Don’t kill or torture anyone else.”
“Hey…” She began indignantly, but Lephmann had already broken the connection. She looked at the handset in annoyance. “I hate it when people do that.”
Baxter retrieved his credit chip, and they got back in line. When their turn came, he quickly filled out the forms and handed Chris off to one of the custody officers.
She watched Baxter heading for the elevator, and then turned back to Officer Lucas. He indicated an empty seat next to a wide shouldered Hispanic guy. Chris nodded to him and sat.
There were six other people under guard sitting with her, and she amused herself by trying to link faces to crimes. The holding area was the first stop for suspects. They could be here for any number of reasons, but the selection was poor and she had no difficulty figuring them all out. She could tell she was the only shifter in the group, but she wasn’t the only woman. There was one other, a blond wearing a cutaway top and body paint, an almost non-existent skirt, and very high heels. A hooker. She would lose the heels before long—they could be used as a weapon and wouldn’t be allowed in the cells. The men were the usual run of gang bangers and drunks.
She sighed, already losing interest. “What’s taking so long?”
Officer Lucas glared. “We’re three short, now shut your hole.”
She sighed again. Three short. They must be shipping prisoners down to the cells in groups of ten to save on shoe leather. She leaned back to see past her neighbour, but she couldn’t tell what the hold up was.
“I’m Cyrus,” the Hispanic guy suddenly said.
She looked him over. “Chris.”
“Take a look at this.”
“Look at what?” she asked warily.
The man unbuttoned his shirt. “This,” he said, and pulled the shirt wide.
This happened to be a dragon tattoo. She had seen pictures of real dragons; this was nothing like them. She pretended to be interested as Cyrus explained its origin. About five minutes later, a pair of shifters joined their happy group. Both were women wearing scuffed leather jackets and tight leather pants—made for protection not for looking good. They were bikers, or at least, they rode motorbikes regularly enough to take it seriously. They bore a striking family resemblance to one another.
Cyrus was still talking. “…so I said I don’t want no damn dragon, man, I want a sea serpent. I got me some great tats on my back too. I’d show you, but I don’t think Officer Smile-a-lot would like that.”
Lucas pretended not to hear, but his deepening scowl gave him away.
Chris grinned. “Yeah, better not strip off in front of us fems. We might not be able to control ourselves.”
The hooker rolled her eyes.
Cyrus grinned. “You’re my kind of girl, Chris. Got anything you want to show me?”
“I like tattoos, but only on other people.”
“Damn shame.” He rolled up a sleeve and turned to show her another tattoo. “This would look good on you.”
It was a wolf’s head. It was beautiful work, obviously done by a true artist. She wondered if Cyrus knew what she was, but if he did he gave no sign of it.
“I’ve never seen better.”
Cyrus looked down at it. “You really think so, you ain’t just saying that?”
“I wouldn’t do that. It’s awesome.”
“I did it.”
“You did?”
Cyrus nodded. “Not the tattoo, but the design is mine. I do sketches in my spare time, and sell them when I can. I could do one for you if you like.”
“What the hell are you doing in here when you can create something like that? You should have your own gallery or something.”
Cyrus’ lips thinned. “It’s my wife. She was messing around, and she didn’t care who knew it. I finally said I’d had enough and was going to leave if she didn’t stop. She laughed at me and I… well, I sort of hit her. She called the cops and here I am.”
“Idiot.”
Cyrus looked down, shamefaced. “Yeah. Never happened before tonight, and never will again. I ain’t going back there when I get out… if I get out.”
“You will.”
His face brightened. “You think so?”
She nodded. “I know so. I’m not condoning what you did, but I’m not one of those women who think it’s always the husband’s fault either. You’ve never been in trouble before, and you were provoked. No way will you get more than a suspended sentence. Maybe not even that.”
“Christ I hope so,” he said prayerfully, and crossed himself.
That surprised her. She hadn’t met that many Christos. “You pray to the hanged god?”
Cyrus winced. “Jesus Christ is the son of God.”
He said god with a capital G, as if hi
s god was the only one. Christos were all like that; they could be very strict about some things. Their clerics insisted their god was the best one, more than that, they insisted he was the only one. Not that they could prove it of course, not when there were so many clerics of other gods and goddesses running around doing miracles too. Flint was a Christo. She always wore a heavy gold crucifix around her neck—a sure sign she was one.
“He wasn’t hanged, Chris, he was crucified for our sins.”
Bummer.
What is crucified?
It’s an old form of execution. They used to nail people to wooden crosses while they were still alive and leave them up there.
And Humans call us monsters, Smoke said, sounding disgusted.
“All right, enough chatter,” Officer Lucas said as another prisoner joined the group. “Ten’s your magic number. Everybody up.”
A guard opened the barred gate in the cage. Chris and her fellow prisoners shuffled through toward the elevator at the far end of the room. It was the only way down to the cells and was operated from topside. Once down there, there was no chance of escape. Chris was the last in; consequently, she was first out when the doors opened again.
The doors slid silently aside, to reveal a lot of blue-uniformed guards. A lot. Unlike those up top, these guys were not cops. They wore prison guard uniform, and were all armed like uniformed police officers on the street. The woman in charge of the guard detail was Simone Shipman. She had a bad reputation, or a good one, depending on which side of the bars you happened to be standing on.
Chris didn’t like her, and Shipman shared that feeling. She doubted Shipman would ever forgive her for instigating an official reprimand for overzealous use of force on one of her suspects. Shipman had been suspended during the investigation, and Chris had later proven the guy innocent of all charges against him.
The guards took one look at Chris and reached for their shock-lances. Maybe they recognised her, maybe it was the cuffs she wore. It didn’t matter. They knew she was a shifter.
She raised her cuffed hands. “Whoa, whoa, whoa! No need for that, I’m cuffed, see?”
Shipman’s eyes glittered. “Well, well, look who we have here. It’s Super Cop. You don’t look so high and mighty now.”
“Still on this side of the bars, Shiteman? I should have fixed that.”
Shifter Legacies Special Edition: Books 1-2 Page 79
