by Corey Brown
“Yeah, I know. You’re in. This is too big, even for me.
There is an unambiguous silence on the line. Cody knows Derek knows something. Cody swallows a knot that has formed in his throat.
“Derek?
Loud and clear, Derek draws a breath and says, “Yeah, I’m here.”
“What’s the matter?” Cody says.
More dead air.
“I…uh…don’t really want in,” Derek says, quietly.
Cody makes a face. “I don’t get it. You give me shit about keeping you in the dark and now you’re telling me you want to stay there. What gives?”
“Okay, I wanted to force your hand, but I was really hoping you’d just give it up, just forget all this crap about Harris.”
“Why would I do that?” Cody says.
“Cody, I’m not sure I can be involved anymore.”
“What’s going on, Derek?”
There is another long pause. Reflexively, Cody splits the slats on the window blinds and glances outside, looks for the two detectives.
“I spoke to Laroche,” Derek says.
Cody feels his insides clinch. “What? Why?”
“Well, I remembered something about my meeting with Harris, something I wanted to tell you. So, I tried calling your cell, but got your voicemail.” Derek sighs, the sound almost a confession. “Jesus, Cody, I went to the PD looking for you. When I couldn’t find you I went looking for Laroche. I wanted him to pass the information on.”
“Shit,” Cody says. “What did you tell him?”
Derek pauses, waits for a moment, then in a quiet voice says, “Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you tell me you’d been suspended?”
“I’m not suspended,” Cody said. “I’m on administrative leave.”
“Whatever. You should’ve told me and you know it.”
Cody leans against the wall and closes his eyes. He feels betrayed and at the same time is ashamed. He thinks about how to begin, how to make Derek understand.
“You’re right.” Cody says. “I’m sorry. But believe me, it wasn’t intentional. I did not purposely mislead you.”
“Seems like a pretty big thing to forget.”
“It’s not like that. Okay, my captain put me on leave this morning. But it’s only temporary and when you called….your call put my mind on Harris. I just wasn’t thinking about departmental bullshit anymore. Officially, I may be on leave, but I’m not letting go. They killed Nick and Julia, they tried to kill Jamie. You think I’m going to let this go?”
“I don’t care if you let it go or not,” Derek says, “This isn’t about what they did, it’s about what you did. You dragged me into this thing but held something back. You didn’t tell me about Laroche. Helping you work a case is one thing, but helping you work a case when you’re not a cop, even if that’s only temporary, is something else. My reputation is on the line, here.”
Cody’s shoulder starts to hurt again, the painkillers are wearing off and he sinks onto the bed. It strikes him that Jamie has not replaced the sheets since her cousin visited over a month ago. Cody can feel the stiff, quilted surface of the mattress through the bedspread. He leans forward, his elbows resting on his knees.
“Derek, I’m still a cop.”
“We both know that’s not the point.”
Neither man speaks for a moment then Cody says, “I understand, I can’t blame you, I’d be pissed, too. Look, you’re out. I won’t ask you to do anything else.”
“I’m not really pissed, Cody. I’m confused. If you’re not going be straight with me, I just can’t be involved. I’m too far up the Bureau’s ass, I can’t mess up my career. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it. I understand,” Cody says. “Listen, I need to know what you told Laroche and what he said to you.”
“Why?”
Cody hesitates then said, “Forget it. Hey, I gotta go.”
“Okay, okay.” Derek said. “The conversation was pretty short. I told him that we’d met about what happened Jamie and he told me that you’d been put on leave. That’s about it. He asked me not to work with you on anything. Cody, what happened, why’d Laroche take you out?”
Relieved, Cody breathes easier. Apparently, Derek does not know about the security tape.
“It’s a long story and I don’t want to talk about it right now,” Cody says. “Maybe some other time.”
“Cody, whatever it is you called me about, you have to tell your captain. If that shit Harris gave you is important, you have to tell Laroche about it. You just have to.”
“So, you’re out?”
There is a moment’s hesitation then Derek says, “Yeah, I’m out. I can’t…I’m sorry Cody.”
Cody hangs up and lies back on the bed, staring up at the ceiling.
Cody stayed that way for some time, lying on his back, hands behind his head, fingers laced together, considering all that had happened. And, as if the last twenty-four hours weren’t enough, now this movie had become part of the landscape.
At first, Cody had watched the video with disinterest, not expecting much, hardly paying attention. But then subtle parallels appeared between the movie and the story Harris told. As the movie played out those parallels became more than subtleties.
Surprised then stunned, Cody found himself mesmerized as the plot unfolded. It was bizarre, beyond the pale, that this movie could somehow be connected to Harris’s patients and that they could be linked to Nick and Julia’s deaths. But there was no doubt in Cody’s mind, it was all tied together. Somehow.
Laying there staring at the ceiling, Cody is sure something bad is in motion, but he cannot see how it all fits together. There are just bits and pieces spinning around in his head, like mist swirling in the early morning. So much is clear and at the same time he feels as though he has plunged into a strange kind of darkness. And without knowing why, Cody is certain this tape, the blockbuster movie The Destroyer, is the key.
For the second time in his life, Cody has no idea which way to turn. Over the years, first as a street cop then as a detective, he had faced situations that made him pause, made him wonder what he would do next. Like the few moments between telling his partner to go get back up and deciding to take out the Skulls on his own. But this is different. This is bigger, harder.
The first time was back in college. Cody thinks about his days at Northern Illinois University, of hanging out with Doug Kramer, and about how Doug wanted him to become a DeKalb police officer. Out there on a corn-country road, leaning against Doug’s 1978 black Trans-Am, listening to him go on about how great it would be if they both worked for the DeKalb PD, Cody had felt completely lost.
The feeling started while sitting in Huskie stadium, thinking about how his parents had abandoned him, how they had simply disappeared. But for some reason standing next to a lonely county farm field, listening to Doug, and thinking about home had nearly paralyzed Cody with indecision.
The phone rings and Cody sits bolt upright, no longer contemplating life at NIU or dead gangsters or how he cannot see past the mysterious shroud that has wrapped around his life. He looks at the LCD on the tap sensor, unconsciously expecting it to act as a caller ID device. Other than indicating a clean line, the display tells him nothing about the caller. Tentatively, Cody lifts the handset
“Morgan residence,” Cody says.
“Okay, goddamn it, I told you I wouldn’t let you twist in the wind and I’m not going to. But no more cloak and dagger, all right? From now on, I know what you know. Got it?”
Cody smiles crookedly. “Yeah, I got it,” he says. “But you don’t have to do this. I understand why you want out, and like I said, you don’t owe me anything. You never have.”
“Bullshit,” Derek says. “I’ll always owe you for Justin.”
“Hey, we did that together. It was no big deal. And don’t forget the boys in the Guard. We couldn’t have pulled it off without them.”
“I know, I know,” Derek says. “But Justin was my pro
blem, not yours. And the Coast Guard was already after the Cubans. You had no reason to go along. The only reason they let us fake his arrest was because of your connections.”
“He was your brother,” Cody says. What was I supposed to do?”
“I wouldn’t have even known about Justin without you. There I was, Mr. Special Fucking Agent for the FBI and I had no clue what my own brother was up to. I had no clue he----” Derek’s voice catches and he swallows his emotions. “Those goddamned Cubans…I didn’t know he was in so much trouble.”
“Well, it’s still no big thing,” Cody says, his voice low. “I certainly didn’t do it to keep you in my pocket. And I did have a reason, you’re my friend.”
“That’s just the point, Cody. You did it because I’m your friend. How can I do any less? I owe you because you’re my friend.” Derek pauses, then, in a quieter tone, says, “And here I am, worried about my goddamned job. I’m sorry, Cody. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
“Don’t sweat it. Believe me, I understand. Besides, you’d have done the same for me, if Todd was in trouble.”
“I’d like to think so,” Derek says, the words coming out in a sigh.
Cody can almost see the tension in Derek’s face. After six years, big brother still worries about reprisals. Would Justin ever be truly out? Would he ever really be safe?
“That was some night, huh?” Derek says. “I can’t believe those idiots blew up their own boat.”
Cody begins to pace the bedroom, walking the length of the phone cord and back again. It happened years ago, but now the memories begin to fill his mind. Midnight images like an Ansel Adams photograph, the two of them, Derek and Cody dressed in black, wearing camouflage makeup and flak jackets, carrying assault rifles. Under a brilliant, full moon the Cubans had anchored a few miles off shore. Their boat, aptly named Cut Throat, was a sleek blue and white Lürssen, more than seventy-five feet long.
Following an unexpected tip and weeks of coordination with the Coast Guard, the pair had set out to retrieve Justin Simmons from a band of pirates suspected of moving millions of dollars of weapons and liquor through Cuba into Louisiana. The idea had been simple enough: slip aboard and quietly immobilize everyone, call in the Coast Guard to collect the crew and spirit Justin away to safety. Calm waters and a little luck had made boarding the yacht easy enough. Getting off that boat, however, turned out to be a little more difficult.
“We were lucky, all those guys were shit-faced and asleep,” Cody says. “Otherwise, taking them on would’ve been a lot tougher.”
“True enough. But I tell you, swimming around the Gulf in the middle of the night wasn’t exactly what I had in mind when we started out.”
“How about it?” Cody says, with a chuckle. “Staying afloat wearing Kevlar and keeping track of everyone, now that was a trick.”
“Good thing the Coast Guard cutter was nearby.” Derek says. “Another five minutes and I’d have sunk like a rock. I still cannot believe they blew up their own boat. That just floors me.”
Cody stops pacing. It was the second time in just a few seconds Derek had mentioned the explosion. There is an unexpected pause in their conversation and Cody winces just as Derek speaks.
“Wait a minute,” Derek says. “You know something, don’t you? You know what happened.”
“What do you mean?”
“Don’t yank my chain, what happened?”
“It’s nothing, forget it.”
“Briggs….”
Cody sighs. “Look, it was an accident.”
“What was an accident?” Derek says.
“Let’s put it this way, I’m not quite the smooth operator you think I am.”
“Really? Why would I think you’re a smooth operator at all?”
“That night,” Cody says. “Remember how you boarded the boat first?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Well, just before I climbed on,” Cody pauses, he doesn’t want to say it. “I, uh, stuck a wad of C-4 to the hull.”
“Wait. You did what?”
“I had it rigged to a remote control. But I must’ve screwed something up. Well, obviously I did, the stupid thing went off by itself.”
“Wait,” Derek says. “You sank that ship?”
“Um….yeah, I guess.”
“Jesus Christ,” Derek says, laughing. “You’re the reason we wound up in the ocean?”
“Hey, I didn’t plan to sink it. It was supposed to be a diversion. No, not even that, it was more like an insurance policy, in case things got out of hand. You know, if we were in trouble, I’d blow a hole in back, maybe buy us some time. It wasn’t supposed to be an assault, the goddamned boat wasn’t supposed to sink.”
“A diversion?” Derek says, laughing harder. “Yeah, I guess sinking a million dollar yacht would qualify as a diversion.”
“I didn’t mean to sink it.”
“You said a wad, just how much C-4 makes a wad?”
“I don’t know,” Cody says. “Some, a couple of pounds.”
“A couple of pounds, what’s that? One? Ten? What?”
“One, maybe two.” Cody said, irritably. “But---”
“Holy shit. Did you say two pounds?”
“Hey, what do I know about C-4.” Cody protested. “It sure didn’t look like much.”
“Two pounds on a seventy-five foot boat?” Derek says. “That’s a helluva wad, you could’ve killed us. Why didn’t you tell me?” Before Cody can answer, Derek says, “What were you thinking?”
Cody swallows, says, “I don’t know.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“You can answer that for yourself,” Cody says. “We both know you would’ve nixed the idea.”
“It seems I would’ve been right.”
“Maybe.”
Outside, at the front of the house there is a muffled sound, as an engine cuts off, followed by an offset pair of dull thuds. Car doors. Cody spreads the window blinds and looks out. Immediately, he recognizes the black Mercedes parked in his driveway. It is the last car Cody wants to see right now and he feels an indefinable uneasiness start to build in his chest. It is Lucas Kelly and Cody is not interested in a parental confrontation right now. Then he catches sight of another vehicle down the block. Great, Slater and Hansen have returned.
“Cody,” Derek says. “I need to know why you were put on leave. What happened out there yesterday?”
“Look, can we talk about this later?” Cody says. “After we meet with Harris? I’m not trying to jack you around but Lucas just showed up with Todd. I gotta deal with this.”
“Of all the times for him to show up. Shit, okay, I’ll call you after I set it up with Harris. But then----”
Cody hears Todd’s voice. They are in the house. “Yeah,” he says, cutting Derek off. “We’ll talk.”
“Yes, we will. You gonna be all right?”
“Uh-huh. Call my cell when you set it up with Harris.”
Hastily, Cody hangs up, tosses the tap sensor and phone into the closet then, without making a sound, steps into the hallway.
“Maybe he’s out with Mom,” Todd is saying, moving past the kitchen. “I don’t think anyone’s home. It’s okay, c’mon in.”
“I’ll just wait here,” Lucas says. “I know Cody doesn’t want me walking around.”
“Hey Todd,” Cody says, emerging from the hallway. He nods at Lucas but says nothing.
“Hi Cody,” Lucas says. “What’s up?” His voice sounds almost friendly, slightly arrogant.
Cody wants to say something, wants to put the pretentious asshole in his place. But Cody looks at Todd and sees the boy’s face darken. Cody adjusts his attitude, shifts his demeanor back to cordial.
“Not much. What are you guys doing?”
A tight smile, Lucas shrugs. “We’re just picking up a few of Todd’s things. We’ll only be a minute.”
“Are you going over to Grandpa and Grandma’s house?” Cody says, looking at Todd.
“No,�
�� Lucas says. “Todd is staying with me for a few days.”
“Did you discuss this with your mom?” Cody says, ignoring Lucas.
“Not yet,” Lucas says. “But we’ll call Jamie after we leave.”
Cody stares at Lucas, wants to tell him to shut the hell up, wants to say ‘I’m talking to my son, dickhead’, but instead Cody says, “No, let’s call now.”
Todd is halfway to his bedroom when he wheels around, his expression stormy. Cody feels the needles of Todd’s contempt and suddenly has the sensation of being out of place.
“Can’t you leave me alone?” Todd says. “I’m not doing…” Todd lets the sentence hang. It drifts out, slips away. Cody looks at him, registers the unintended pause. “I’m just going to be with my dad for a while,” Todd says. “Mom doesn’t care.”
Cody sucks in a deep breath. He is well behind enemy lines and knows this path is dangerous. But that pause, Todd’s hesitation, and re-wording of what he started to say troubles Cody.
“Todd, what’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I just need to get my stuff.”
“Look, I’m sorry about yesterday,” Cody says. “I didn’t mean to ride you so hard, I was wrong. But something happened and we need to talk about it.”
“I don’t care, Cody,” Todd says. “Don’t you get it? I don’t wanna talk to you.”
“Cody,” Lucas says, his voice is calm, oily sounding. “Maybe, while Todd is collecting his things, we can work this out?”
Cody flashes an angry look at Lucas but when he turns back, Todd has vanished into his bedroom.
Although born and bred a Southerner, Lucas still bares the features of his Asian ancestry. Like Jamie, he is almost a decade younger than Cody and while the years have not worn away Lucas’s youthful face, they have added substantially to his waistline.
But Lucas has matured since the night he had left Jamie. His once long, dirty black hair is now trim and styled, touched with gray. Now, his six foot two inch frame, coupled with a tailored Balani suit, conceals his excess weight. Lucas stands, broad shoulders held back, hands in his trouser pockets, the image of confidence.
