“Roy? At your house? How would he know where you—”
“Cal. Does Roy pose a threat to Ellie?” She’s yelling at me now.
“A threat? To Ellie? No way. Roy would never hurt Ell—”
Then the elusive memory comes flooding back. The gang. One of them said something. The alpha male. What was it?
OH MY GOD!
She sees my face and screams, “What—”
“Fuck, Sam, I just remembered something.” My tone cuts her off. “At the end, just before I lost consciousness, I’m pretty sure the guy in charge said to me, Your kid’s next.’”
“What d’you mean? What guy? D’you mean Roy?”
The words come tumbling out. “No, not Roy. The people who beat me up. The drug gang. They’re bad news, Sam. They don’t come any worse than these guys…” I pause, summoning what little courage I have to help me continue. “They know my name and they know about Ellie; they threatened to hurt her.”
It takes maybe two and a half seconds for it to sink in then she’s on her feet, the chair squealing backwards on the linoleum floor.
“What did you say?”
I repeat it, word for word.
For a long time she is lost for words. She sways and grabs the back of the chair to keep her balance, her mouth opening and closing. I start to speak but realize it is just an excuse forming in my mind. I feel the disgust she must be experiencing.
“Cal, how could you,” she explodes. “Your irresponsible behaviour has put my child, our child, in real danger.” She processes some more. “Oh my God! I’ve got to…” she grabs her purse and hauls out her cellphone, stumbling as she rushes from the room.
Now the pain is not just physical.
I need to get well. I squeeze the control in my hand twice. No! NO! I must stay lucid. There has got to be something I can do. Something to protect Ellie and Sam. Maybe call Steve. Or what about that guy I used to know on the West Van force. What was his name? Dave? Don? Doug? Doug, that was it. Doug Bailey, a great guy…
I have to get out of here now.
I pull back the covers and start to struggle upright when the morphine hits and it’s too late. I fall backwards and find myself drifting into Ellie’s picture, leaving the rest of the world to deal with my mess.
26
Cal
I open my eyes to Tuesday morning and my former partner. The nurses uncoupled me from the morphine dispenser last night—doctor’s orders they said—and I am jittery again. The pain killer is wearing off and the throb in my side is sharpening up nicely, trying to outdo the headache from that final punch. Worst of all, the withdrawal which the morphine has held off might distract me from my goal for this meeting.
“Hey Cal. How y’doing?” Steve asks. It occurs to me that he has taken twenty four hours to get here. Back in the day, when I was a cop, he would have been here in a heartbeat. But things change, I guess. I look around and see that Stammo is not with him.
“Hi, Steve. Thanks for coming… alone too.” It feels awkward talking to him one-on-one. We worked so many cases together that we developed a flow of communication between us, but it’s no longer working.
He gives a half grin and nods. Despite the awkwardness, I’m glad he’s here.
He examines the mess that is my face. “Someone sure did a number on you.” The awkwardness is there for him too.
“You should see the other guy,” I joke. I want to talk to him about the danger that Ellie and Sam are in but first I need to rebuild some of the rapport that we used to have, if that’s even possible.
“Who was it?”
“A drug gang; seven of them.”
“You’re kidding.” He looks at me suspiciously. “What did you do to earn this?”
I realize how important it is to me to have the approval of this man. I’m too embarrassed to tell him the truth: that it was in retribution for my stealing from them. If that wasn’t bad enough, I can’t get out of my mind Arnold’s suggestion that the beating was somehow connected with my investigation of Kevin’s murder. Why would he say that?
Steve is scrutinizing me; I have taken too long to answer his question.
“Maybe they found out that I’m one of the cops who put their colleagues away,” I say. The half truth trips from my lips.
Steve can spot a lie a mile away. His eyes narrow. “Can’t be,” he says. “If it’s the same gang, they don’t kill cops. It’s one of their rules; the repercussions are too big.” He looks hard at me. “Come on Cal what was it really.”
“Steve, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I’m not a cop any longer. And I’m not technically dead either.”
He relents and smiles, “But you’re still a sarcastic SOB, eh.” Despite the humour, I still feel that I am under the microscope here. I resent the fact that I am no longer a trusted colleague and that he is treating me more like a suspect. But my resentment is born of the shame I feel at my transition from cop to junkie. Steve cannot be enjoying this any more than me. He deserves better from me; I need to level with him.
The smile fades as he sees the look on my face. “Steve, I need your help,” there is a catch in my voice. “Just before I passed out, one of them said to me, ‘Your kid’s next.’ I need to get protection for Ellie and for Sam, too. Could you phone Doug Bailey, our old buddy in the West Van force, and see if he can convince his colleagues to get off their fat asses and mount a protective surveillance on Sam’s house?”
“I was wondering when you’d get around to this.” Steve says drily. He already knows about Ellie! Now I feel like an idiot wasting time, joking with him, trying to build rapport. “It’s already done. Sam’s new husband is a well connected guy over there. Apparently, he spoke to the Mayor of West Van who kicked some ass himself and got them twenty-four hour protection. For a while, anyways.”
“Thank heavens for that.” I feel a flood of relief. “Oh and FYI, Steve, he’s not her husband… Yet.” Still, it’s nice to know that George has his uses. “How did you know?”
“I didn’t get Sarge’s message that you were in here until last night. Soon as I heard, I called Sam to see if she knew. She told me about the threat to Ellie and that her husband had pulled all the right strings to get protection from the West Van police; plus he’s hired a private security firm to provide bodyguards.”
Now I need to change the subject and I need to tread with care. I want to find out how much the cops know. I don’t think I care if Steve knows I’m doing a freelance investigation of Kevin’s murder but I don’t want him to know what I know. I need to be the one to solve this murder and then present all the evidence to him, and to the Department, on a platter.
But there’s nothing to stop me getting him to do a little legwork for me but I have to tread with care. Part of me wants to be completely honest with him but I need to protect Kevin’s reputation too. “Steve, there’s a rumour going around the downtown east side that there’s been a spate of deaths among heroin addicts and alcoholics. Have you heard anything about that?”
“No. Why do you ask?” His eyes are slits.
“Roy told me that a couple of his drinking buddies had died and someone else told me about some addicts that had died for no apparent reason. Seven people in the course of a week.”
“What the fuck’s going on Cal?” he says. “I can read you like a road sign. You’re not telling me something and I think you need to. And no bullshit this time.” I can read him like a road sign too and I know he’s mad.
“I can’t accept that Kevin’s death was a suicide. I have been investigating it as a murder.” He opens his mouth to speak. “I know, I know. I’m not a cop anymore. But Kevin Wallace did not commit suicide and, in the course of the investigation, I’ve discovered this rash of unexplained deaths.”
He looks a me, his face expressionless, until I can’t hold his gaze and turn away. “And you think these deaths are connected to Kevin’s?”
“They might be.”
He digests this before speaking
. “You know the stats as well as me, Cal. Deaths in that neighbourhood fluctuate all the time. It would take more than seven deaths to make a blip on the screen. I’ll ask around and see if anyone’s heard anything, if you like.”
“Thanks, man. I appreciate it.”
“So who d’you think killed your buddy?” he asks.
I hesitate. I’m worried that if I tell him too much he’ll investigate it himself and, with his greater resources, solve it before I do. I tell him this.
“Jeez, Cal. You think I’d take something like that away from you. We were partners, for Christ sake. I’m disappointed in you man. Anyway, the coroner has ruled it as a suicide so I can’t investigate it without authority. Anyway, I’ve got enough work on my plate right now, so fill your boots. If you can prove it was murder and who did it, go ahead. You were a great cop. Hell, you were the best I’ve ever worked with. If anyone can prove it, it’s you.” Despite these words, he is still irritated at me.
“Thanks Steve, that means a lot to me. I’m sorry, I should have told you right away.”
“Yeah, you should have.”
We sit silent for a while then he asks, “So who do you think did it?”
In my gut, I really don’t want to tell him what I know but after his last speech, I can’t hold back. “There’s a couple of suspects but the only one with a really strong motive, and with enough cunning to do it and stage it as a suicide, is Roy.”
“Roy?” he’s incredulous. “You mean our old snitch? That Roy?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, he’s cunning enough but what possible motive could he have?”
“I can’t tell you that, Steve.”
“Oh fuck you Rogan. Either you trust me or you don’t, but none of this ‘I can’t tell you’ shit.” He stands up and he is pissed right off.
“Wait a minute Steve, you talk about trust, maybe you should trust me on this.” He looks at me and shrugs but at least he doesn’t leave. “The reason I can’t tell you is that if I did tell you, and if it turns out I’m wrong, then a good man’s reputation would be destroyed and his family devastated. Let me just follow this up with Roy and I’ll let you know what I discover.”
“Sure. OK” he sits back down, looking a bit ashamed at his outburst. “Just keep me in the loop OK?”
“Yes, I will. Thanks for understanding.”
“So when you told Sarge you wanted to see me, what was it about? Not Kevin’s murder?”
Now the moment’s here, I’m scared to ask him the question I so desperately want to ask, afraid of what the answer might be. Maybe I should wait until I’ve solved Kevin’s murder. But that’s a rationalization; I’m just chicken.
So I lie. “To get protection for Ellie and Sam.”
He catches me in the lie with the same ease that I used to catch out the scum and lowlifes when I was a cop. “Bullshit. Sam told me you only remembered the threat to Ellie yesterday afternoon when she was visiting. But Sarge told me you asked to see me in the morning, when he came here to question you.”
He stands up and pulls on his coat. His face is bright red. “This is just like when you started using. Every other word out of your mouth was a lie. Now it’s every fucking word. I don’t know what to believe. Don’t waste my time, Cal.” He turns to go.
“Steve, wait. Please.”
He stops and turns back. Maybe it’s something in my voice.
“There’s something I really need to know.” Now that the moment’s here, I am frightened to put it into words in case I jinx it. Here goes. “Steve, if I could get clean and maybe solve Kevin’s murder, do you know if there’s any chance I could get back into the department?” I ask.
“C’mon, Cal. Don’t ask me that.”
“Please, Steve.”
He softens a hairsbreadth. He knows how much this means to me. “I don’t think so Cal. I can’t see them letting an addict, even an ex-addict, back in.” He sees in my face the devastation I feel. He sighs.
“But what do I know?” he relents. “Do you want me to ask someone, find out for sure?”
I nod.
After a while, he nods too. “Sure. No prob.”
I notice a slump in his shoulders and in this moment, I know that no matter what, Steve and I will never have the old relationship back. It has been damaged beyond repair and it took this encounter, in a stark room in St. Paul’s Hospital, for us both to realize it.
He turns and leaves me alone.
Alone. Alone with my thoughts. Alone with my fears. Alone with my increasing pain. I can’t tell if it is from the beating or from the onslaught of withdrawal. Either way I’ve got to get some more of that morphine. I press the button to summon the nurse.
As I wait, my eye falls upon Ellie’s picture. It is amazing. Despite the bright colours, there is a dark quality to it. But maybe that’s a reflection of the darkness in me, for now I see through a glass, darkly. I look at the tall building and this time I recognize it. It’s the Wall Centre, downtown. And those three slashes of colour: I know what they are and where I’ve seen them before. Then it hits home. One connection… another… then a great leap in the dark. The thoughts click into place like Lego blocks.
With stunning clarity, a whole new avenue of investigation opens up before me.
27
Cal
I’m on my way to see Ellie. I need to talk to her before I track down Roy. I want to ask her about her picture. Is what I suspect true? Or are my newly aroused cop instincts a phantasm? I have to know. If I am right it may add an interesting new line of questioning and even lead to a different theory of the crime.
They were mad when I checked myself out of St. Paul’s two days before they planned to let me go. They might have tried to keep me forcibly if I hadn’t been twelve inches taller and carrying fifty pounds more muscle than the hospital’s elderly, east Asian rent-a-cop. I am relieved to be out of there and pumped about continuing my investigation into Kevin’s murder, but I feel bad about using my size to intimidate an old guy who was just trying to do his job. Unlike some of my colleagues, I never did that as a cop; I would like to blame it on my burning need to get out of there and talk to Ellie, but I know it was just my burning need to get my hands on some heroin. Maybe I have a lot further to go than I thought.
I walked from the hospital to the West End, needing to avoid the downtown east side. I have to be extra vigilant from now on; I cannot risk my mission by having another run in with the gang.
It did not take me too long to find a West End dealer who would sell me a gram and all the fixings. I fixed up in an alley off Denman. I hated to do it in public but I needed it right away; I couldn’t even spare the time to find a coffee-shop restroom. This is the level to which I have degenerated. Yet I still want to be a cop again—go figure.
Another worry is the infection in my left arm. It is getting worse and making it even harder to find a vein. If it gets any worse, I am going to have to learn to shoot up left handed.
I bought myself a pay-as-you-go cellphone and spent a further two hundred bucks of the money from Kevin’s wallet in a budget clothing store. It feels good to be dressed in clean, new clothes, even if they are cheap. The clothes I was wearing when they brought me into the hospital, filthy, ripped and covered in my blood, are in a dumpster and my garbage bag of ‘good’ clothes, dropped in the alley, will be long gone: converted to cash, spent on crack and smoked in a pipe, all for a one minute high.
Although there is no reason why she should, I am praying that Sam will let me see Ellie, even if it is Tuesday. I decided not to phone first and risk a refusal, because I need to ask Ellie about her picture nestled in the inside pocket of my jacket. Yet even this is a source of guilt: the motivation for this trip comes from the cop who desperately needs to speak to a witness, not from the loving father who just wants to see his daughter. Will I always be torn like this?
Sam does a double take when she opens the door but recovers quickly.
“What are you doing here,
Cal?” Her tone is wary. She glances up the driveway and I know her well enough to recognize that it is fear I see in her eyes. Fear that I have been followed here, perhaps?
“I discharged myself from St. Paul’s. I thought that as I missed Saturday, I would drop by and see Ellie. I need to ask her something, something important. She’s home from school, right?” My voice is light, trying to alleviate her concern, but I sound far too casual. “I really need to see her Sam,” I say from my heart.
She looks at me for a moment, weighing the parameters of a decision, then starts to say something, catches herself and instead says, “OK, wait here.” Good.
She closes the door and I hear her speaking in Spanish to the maid: short, sharp orders, not at all like Sam. She reappears wearing a brown suede jacket. “Let’s go,” she says striding towards her Porsche SUV.
“Where are we going,” I ask but get no reply.
She is silent as we drive down to Marine Drive and turn east. We are past Dundarave before I ask, “Are we going to collect her from school?”
Nothing.
“A friend’s house?”
Nothing.
I look over at her. Her jaw muscles are rippling as she grinds her teeth. She doesn’t trust herself to speak. She keeps silent all through West Van. We pass Ambleside and Park Royal and she sweeps up on to the Lion’s Gate bridge, for once clear of traffic.
“Where are we going?” I ask, knowing the answer.
“Shut the fuck up, Cal.” Sam never swears. I shut the fuck up.
Silent along the causeway and Georgia Street; silent through a left turn onto Hamilton.
I am not going to be seeing Ellie today and I know that, despite my desire to know about her painting, I am longing to see her happy little face and hear her innocent laughter. I may or may not solve Kevin’s murder and I may or may not get back into the VPD but she will always be my little girl.
Cal Rogan Mysteries, Books 1, 2 & 3 (Box Set) Page 15
