by Jayne Blue
Nodding, I folded my hands back in my lap, though I kept my thumb over the gold band. “That’s good. You should. But I told you, that’s not why I’m here.”
“What is it?”
I took a breath and reached down where I’d set my messenger bag. I pulled out a single-page letter. It was badly creased from all the times I’d folded it, hoping the words it bore would change when I unfurled it again. I smoothed it out and handed it to Mitch. He didn’t read it. Not at first.
“Tell me,” he said.
I ran a hand through my hair. “In a million years I never thought I’d come back to Northpointe with the intention to stay. I got my master’s degree. It was hard after Brian died. You know, to stay focused. But I finally did it. Speech pathology.”
Mitch nodded but his face fell a little. “I had heard. Good for you, Stella. I’m proud of you. But you’re staying? I mean, you’ve been in town for a while?”
I tried to swallow my anxiety. Not telling Mitch when I came back to town a few months ago felt like a betrayal at worst, cowardice at best. But I needed to figure out some things for myself before I brought the past back in. At least, that had been the plan. That crumpled letter changed all of that.
“I worked in a nursing home for a while. Patients with brain injuries have aphasia a lot of the time. And I’ve worked part time at a private school near Traverse City. But nothing really good. Or permanent. My dream has always been to work with kids in a school.”
“I remember,” he said. The way his eyes flashed I thought he remembered something more. I tapped my fingers on the desk and pressed on.
“I got an offer with Northpointe Public Schools. Collingwood Elementary. Full time. Full benefits. Everything I’ve always wanted. I had a lot of reservations about coming back here, but … I don’t know … there have been a lot of signs pointing me in this direction lately. Anyway, I interviewed with them last week. It was just supposed to be a formality. I mean that’s literally what the principal said. I even got my picture taken for my ID and filled out all the tax forms.”
“What happened?”
I swallowed hard. I still felt the same shock and anger roiling through me even though twenty-four hours had passed since that letter came certified mail. The principal didn’t even have the guts to call me in person.
“Read it,” I said.
Mitch raised a brow and his eyes darted over the letter. His scowl deepened, making a dimple in his chin more pronounced.
“I failed a background check,” I said.
Mitch turned the letter over, searching the back of it for some explanation that wasn’t there. The same way I did the first time.
“They fingerprinted me,” I went on. “Sent a picture of my driver’s license and social security number to the State Police. Something came back.”
“What?”
I shrugged. “That’s the thing. I have no idea. The principal wouldn’t tell me the specifics. Obviously, I called him first right after I got that letter. He said he wasn’t at liberty to discuss it and that I should call a lawyer if I had a problem or more questions. He actually told me if I showed up on school grounds he’d have the liaison officer escort me out of the building. I mean, what the hell? I got the runaround when I tried to call State Police too.”
“I’ll just bet.” Mitch tossed the letter to the corner of his desk and ran a hand across his jaw. “Stella, I’ve got to ask you.”
I put a hand up. “I know. And the answer is no. Whatever the hell popped on that criminal background check, it’s got to be a mistake. My God, Mitch. I even drive like an old lady. I haven’t got so much as a parking ticket since I was in college. And I’m not asking you to fix it. I was just hoping you’d have access to the records or something. That you could look up whatever it is they found. I asked around. Everyone says this is kind of your area of expertise.”
“What, accessing confidential information that could cost me my job?”
He meant it as a joke, I think, but the air went out of my lungs and he must have seen the fear in my eyes. I’d tried to play strong, but inside, I was crumbling. I’d understood the tone in the Collingwood principal’s voice. He already believed the worst of me and even if I got this straightened out, there was a good chance it wouldn’t matter. The Northpointe rumor mill would ruin me before I got another shot.
“Identity theft. Or mistaken identity. Or falsification of records. I don’t know. Whatever this is. Help me file a report or something. Help me get my life back, Mitch. I know what this costs you having me sit here in front of you. It costs me too. I swear to God, if this wasn’t so important. If I thought there was anyone else I could go to, or that I trusted as much as you, I wouldn’t be here.”
Mitch moved quickly. He came around the desk and put his arms around me. Everything in me went stiff as if I could erect an invisible wall. This would cost me. His touch would make everything real again.
“Don’t worry, Stella. I’m on your side. I’ve always been on your side. We’ll figure this out.”
It was the exact thing I needed to hear and the exact thing I knew could tear us both apart all over again. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think. I just … couldn’t. I jerked out of his arms and grabbed my bag off the floor. Stumbling backward I rose and moved around him.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I thought this would be okay. Please, just forget it. I have to go.”
“Stella.” His voice was calm, even, and filled with purpose. He made a move toward me, his hands spread wide like he was approaching a cornered animal. That’s exactly what I felt like.
“I’ll see you around, Mitch. Take care of yourself.”
Then I half stumbled around the cubicle wall and headed for the elevators.
Chapter Three
Mitch
“You got your ears on?” I shouted into the tiny mic around my neck.
I heard a chorus of “Jesus” and “Fucks” in my earpiece from the SWAT guys stationed behind the hedges. Good. They were paying attention.
“This is a no-knock warrant,” I said. “Creep’s mother says he keeps his computer in the second-floor bedroom facing the street. He’s probably got it booby-trapped. He gets to it before I do, one click of a mouse and the thing’s a brick. Feel me? Do not even let him get as far as the stairs. If he pulls out a cell phone, if he does anything with his hands at all, you know what to do.”
My earpiece chirped. “Got it,” Sergeant Wiley answered. Adam Wiley was team leader today. A good guy. Salt of the earth. One of the few I trusted to get shit done properly in cases like this. I was more or less just busting his chops. He knew the drill. Still, this particular dirtbag had Hall of Fame potential as far as the shit he was into. Lonnie Detweiler. Another child predator. If I couldn’t get the evidence off his hard drive, we’d be dead in the water as far as sending him away. Unless of course he drew Judge Sheldon Fucking Pierce. The other shoe had yet to drop where he was concerned, but I knew it was only a matter of time.
“Good. And tell your guys, under no fucking circumstances is anyone allowed to touch that computer. Don’t cut the power. Nothing. Just get the asshole on the ground and in cuffs. That’s the main thing.”
“Got it, Gates. You just hang back and look pretty on this one for a sec. Let me get the house secured then you do you.”
“That’s what I like to hear.” Except it wasn’t. Hanging back fucking killed me. Adrenaline coursed through me as Wiley called out commands to his team. He’d stationed the first group around the perimeter of the house; they would move on his count through the hedges. His second team would come in from further down the street. I waited in the surveillance van about ready to explode as Wiley checked and double checked. They had eyes on the suspect through a first-floor window. He was currently watching TV with a bowl of cheese puffs resting on his pot belly. The radio calls squawked in my ear as Wiley got the go from each of his team members and he was ready to move. As much as my nerves frayed, Wiley wouldn’t rush it. Th
e guy was a fucking robot and just what this raid needed. No mistakes.
I missed it though. The street. The muscle. The action. I still saw some from time to time, but for the last eight years, I’d built Northpointe’s computer crimes division from the ground up. My captain, Stan Lewandowski, had said it was better for me that way. I think he was afraid I was on some kind of suicide mission for a while: maybe I was. He was now Chief Lewandowski and my unit was one of the department’s crown jewels. My stings not only worked to clean up predators in Northpointe, we’d worked with the FBI and law enforcement in the greater Detroit Metro area to bring down the worst of the worst. It was good work. Brutal. But it mattered.
“You still awake, Gates?” Wiley chirped in my ear.
“Yeah, you?”
“Just checking. Give me about three minutes and we’re good to go. Beta team is setting up across the street. We probably won’t need ’em, but you know I like a fail-safe. But I gotta good feeling about this.”
“Don’t say shit like that. That’s the worst thing you can say.”
Wiley chuckled. “Relax. You’re jumpy. What’s the matter, girl trouble?”
Here we go. We’d gone almost five minutes without any ball busting. That might be a new record with this squad.
“I heard through the grapevine you had a visitor yesterday that turned some heads downstairs. Long legs. Big tits. Dressed professional. Not your usual type, Gates. Desk sergeant said she asked for you special.”
My blood ran cold. I wondered when Stella’s visit would make its way through the whole building. I dug a fist into my thigh and did a ten count in my head. I couldn’t think about her right now. It had taken everything in me not to run after her when she got spooked. The truth was, she spooked me too. She looked just the same. Curvier. Wiser. But everything about her dredged up shit I didn’t need to think about. Having her and Huck in the same room again did a number on me. I barely slept last night thinking about her. And those thoughts always led to Brian and the last night I saw him. Fuck.
“Gates? You gonna give me the details?”
“What the fuck is this? Loveline?”
A few laughs made their way to my ear. Wiley was having a good old time at my expense. The rest of the team was listening in. I gritted my teeth.
“Just keep your shit straight,” I said. “It was Stella Terry, okay?” I hadn’t wanted to let that get out. But I knew it was the only thing that would shut Wiley up.
The line went stone-cold silent until I heard Wiley exhale. “Shit. Macavoy’s wife?”
“Fiancé. But yeah.”
“She okay? She came in about the memorial? Fuck. Sorry, Gates. I’m an ass.”
“Yeah. No big deal. And your three minutes are up. We good?”
“Yeah.” Wiley sighed. “We good. Just do what I said. Sit tight, Gates. We’ve got this.”
“You’d better.”
“On my count,” Wiley said. I edged forward in my seat and grabbed the van door handle. God, it was killing me to wait.
“Go!” Wiley shouted.
“That’s not a fucking number, Wiley,” I muttered. But the team moved. They went through a side service door making a hell of a racket. I ran in right behind them, fuck hanging back. We were only mostly sure Lonnie was alone today. If there was even the slightest chance he had someone else upstairs, I needed to get to that damn hard drive.
But everything went flawlessly that day. Lonnie was half asleep and mostly stoned, sitting in a recliner on the main floor. He jerked awake and spilled his cheese puffs all over himself and the floor. I followed two of Wiley’s guys up the stairs and Lonnie’s computer was right where his mama said it would be. We were in and out in less than an hour. It would be a day or two before I knew if I’d hit the jackpot I needed to put Lonnie away for life, but this was a good outcome. Fucking fantastic, actually.
And it was exactly what I needed.
When I made it back to the Public Safety Building I got a few looks from the uniform guys on the first floor. I might have shut down the gossip between Wiley and his crew, but not everyone else. Most of them were young with less than ten years on. They knew Brian Macavoy by legend and reputation; his picture hung on the wall they passed by every day along with the twenty-five other Northpointe cops killed in the line of duty since the department’s creation in 1897. Below it, someone had framed the front page of the Northpointe Gazette from the day of Brian’s funeral. Stella’s shock of strawberry-blonde hair pulled back in a bun, her face in profile, pale and severe. Brian Sr. had his arm wrapped around her but I knew in reality she was doing more to hold him upright than the other way around.
“Hey, Gates!” Joel O’Banion called from down the hall. “Good work today!” Joel was one of the new guys I’d brought into computer crimes. There were six of us now. When we started, I’d been a one-man band. He wasn’t great at the detective work, but he made up for it in computer skills. I was afraid if I hadn’t plucked him from the sex-crimes unit, he might have thrown in the towel and branched out as a hacker. Well, he was a hacker now, but he used his powers for good. Or at least for me.
I gave Joel a thumbs up as I headed toward him. Joel put a hand up and shook his head.
“You better get up to the seventh floor, man. Like yesterday.”
“What?” The seventh floor was where the top brass kept their offices. Word about the raid must have traveled fast. Shit. I didn’t have time for a debriefing now. Until Joel and I ran forensics on Lonnie’s phone and hard drive, I wasn’t going to start celebrating.
“Chief wants to see you,” Joel answered. “Haven’t you checked your phone? He sounded hopping mad. What the hell did you do?”
I put my hands up in surrender. “Fuck if I know. And no, I don’t keep my damn phone on in the middle of a raid, Joel. Did you at least tell him that’s where I was?”
Joel nodded but his expression wasn’t reassuring. I checked the wall clock. I might be able to catch the chief before he left for lunch. Great. It meant he’d be hungry and pissed. This should go well.
Chief Lewandowski’s secretary didn’t do anything else to put my mind at ease when I made it up to the seventh floor. She gave me a lemon-sucking scowl as she waved toward Lewandowski’s door. Whatever was going on, he deemed it important enough to interrupt him the minute I stepped off the elevators.
Stan Lewandowski had a corner office overlooking downtown Northpointe. It still wasn’t much of a view. Northpointe had a certain rough charm with a minor league baseball stadium to the north, the smokestacks from an abandoned oil refinery to the east, and the Detroit River running through the center. The taller skyscrapers lined the river to the south. The Northpointe Bridge was the prettiest thing out there. A long suspension bridge with fiber optic lighting along the girders. Come nighttime, it lit up like a Christmas tree.
Stan stood with his hands on his hips. He wore a short-sleeved blue dress shirt and black pants. He ran a hand over his bald head as he turned to face me. He was short, stocky with a large mole on his cheek that earned him the nickname John-Boy with the old timers. Most everyone else called him Chief Lew. His face reddened as I took a seat in front of his desk. He leaned down, planting his palms wide over stacks of paper.
“Are you trying to fuck yourself over, or are you just hoping I’ll put you out of your misery before you can finish the job?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. You tell me. What did I do this time?” Except I already knew. The other shoe was just about to drop.
Stan straightened. He paced behind his desk and ran a hand across his jaw. “Unbelievable. You mean to tell me you have zero clue why I might have gotten a call from Judge Pierce this morning?”
My spine turned to ice. I had to blink back the image of Sheldon Fucking Pierce’s smug face when I questioned him about Melissa Sweeney’s case.
“What’s his story?”
“Don’t,” Stan said. He stepped around his chair, tugged at his pants, and sat down hard. “Just tell me. Di
d you actually fucking threaten a judge? In his chambers, for God’s sake?”
“Well, we were in the john. And threaten? No. We had a little chat, that’s all.”
“Yeah? Well that little chat has prompted him to call for your fucking badge, Mitch.”
“And who’s going to call for his fucking gavel, Chief? You hear what he did with that scumbag who raped Melissa Sweeney? Gave him six months and probation. Did you read his opinion? It amounted to ‘she asked for it.’ Said since it was non-violent, a lighter sentence was justified. That’s like saying the crime wasn’t rapey enough. Jesus. We’re talking about a fourteen-year-old victim. You ask me, that man needs to have his head caved in. Pierce was bought and paid for by Lachlan’s family on that case. Someone needs to hold his ass accountable.”
“Shut up! Dammit, Mitch. Your fucking temper is the problem here. Yeah. We all know Pierce is a Grade-A shit stick. But enough people saw you go in to the bathroom with him. Did you know that?”
“Well, they weren’t in the bathroom, were they? We had words. I’m not going to deny that. And I’m not going to take them back.”
“Cut the crap, Gates. Did you lay hands on him?”
I swallowed hard. My intake of breath was enough to give Stan the answer he needed.
“Jesus Christ. You’re going to fix this. You got me? You’re going to start by apologizing to that asshole.”
“Not a chance.”
Stan pounded his fist on the table. “Do you realize the crap I’ve had to do to keep this quiet? Pierce wants to go to the press. Hell, he wants to press charges for menacing and assault. I don’t need that right now. The department doesn’t need that right now.”
“Uh huh. You think I’m worried about the public outcry? Once word gets out about what he did? I’ll be a hero.”
“Maybe. But you’ll also be unemployed.” Stan dropped his shoulders and took a breath. “Look. I get it. You know I get it. But I just got this department back on its feet. Got rid of some dirty cops at the command level. I need things to stay quiet. I don’t need any vigilante cops with anger management problems turning over the apple cart.”
