by Sean Slater
‘You’ve been a great help,’ he said to Campetti. ‘We’ll be in touch.’
A nervous expression still covered the jeweller’s face. He stood up as they opened the door. ‘If you need anything, just call.’
Striker said he would, then closed the door behind them. Once in the hall, Felicia cocked an eyebrow at him.
‘St Paul’s Hospital?’ she asked.
Striker nodded. ‘Time for a doctor’s appointment.’
Fourteen
‘Run her,’ was the first thing Striker said when they got back to the car.
Know who you’re dealing with: it was a standard rule he always went by – one learned from his first sergeant, once mentor, and now best friend Mike Rothschild.
Information was the key; it opened new doors.
Felicia ran the name Sharise Owens through the database. A few seconds later, the laptop beeped and the feed came back. On the screen was a list of names. There were three entities for Sharise Owens. Two of them lived in the City of Vancouver, and one resided in Squamish.
Felicia clicked on the first entity, saw a date of birth that equalled eighty-six years of age, and ruled the woman out. She then clicked on the second name – age forty-two – and the entity popped up on the screen. Felicia pointed at the information in the Particulars section. ‘Look what it says right there. Trauma Surgeon. St Paul’s Hospital.’
‘Check if there are any tattoos listed.’
Felicia did. Frowned.
‘None,’ she said.
Striker wrote down all the listed telephone numbers. While Felicia read through the rest of the documented history, Striker began calling.
The first number, listed as Cell, was no longer in use. The second number, listed as Home, rang three times and went straight to voicemail. Striker left a long message. The third number, labelled Work, was the number for St Paul’s Hospital. Striker called it, and was soon transferred to the nurses’ station.
‘It’s Detective Striker,’ he explained, ‘with the Vancouver Police Department’s Homicide Unit. I need to speak to Dr Sharise Owens. She’s a trauma surgeon there.’
The nurse’s tone gave away her weariness. ‘One second, Detective.’
For a moment, the line clicked and Striker was stuck listening to pop music. John Secada or Marc Antony – he wasn’t sure. Then the line clicked again and the nurse returned. ‘I’m sorry. But Dr Owens isn’t in just yet.’
‘When does she get in?’
‘Her shift starts at eleven.’
Striker looked at his watch. An hour and a half. ‘Do you have another number I can reach her at?’ When the nurse made an uncomfortable sound, Striker read off the numbers he already had. ‘Are there any others?’
‘No, those are the same ones we have here.’
‘Does she hang out with any of the other doctors or nurses?’
The woman made a doubtful sound. ‘Dr Owens doesn’t really socialize with anyone – she’s a very private person . . . but I’ll ask around for you.’
‘I’ll wait.’
‘Just give me a minute, Detective.’ After another long moment, the nurse came back on the line. ‘I’m sorry, but no one has seen her. And the only emergency contact we have is her cell phone number.’
Striker found that odd. ‘No family or friends?’
‘None.’
He let out a long breath, debated in his mind. ‘I need her to call me the moment she arrives. The moment. Understand?’
‘Yes, yes of course.’
He gave the nurse his cell number, hung up, and then turned to Felicia.
‘I’m shooting zeroes here. Anything on your end?’
She looked up from the laptop. ‘No. Same here, I’m afraid. The woman has no known associates. Not even one family member. From what I can tell, she’s the only daughter of deceased parents . . . I say we flag her.’
Striker agreed. Flagging was the equivalent of an All Points Bulletin. If any emergency response worker came into contact with Dr Sharise Owens, Striker and Felicia would be notified immediately.
He called up CPIC, the Canadian Police Information Centre, and got Dr Sharise Owens flagged on the system as a Missing Person and a Person in Danger. While he did this, Felicia called Sue Rhaemer at Dispatch and got her to notify the hospitals, ferries, airports and borders once more.
After a long moment, she hung up.
‘Done,’ she said.
Striker said nothing. He just put the car into Drive and got going.
Sharise Owens’ home address was just two miles away.
Fifteen
Striker and Felicia headed just around the bend for Beach Avenue, where Sharise Owens lived in an apartment overlooking the sandy stretch of English Bay.
They made it there in five minutes and took the elevator up to the twenty-second floor. The doors opened into the hallway, directly across from the suite, and Striker wasted no time. He took up his position at the side of the apartment door, waited for Felicia to parallel him, and then knocked three times. When no one answered, he looked down the hallway at the neighbouring suite.
‘Maybe there’s an onsite manager,’ he said.
Felicia shook her head. ‘I already checked. These are privately owned suites, and the concierge is offsite. We’ll have to call him.’
Striker frowned at that. They had reason to believe the woman was in danger. She wasn’t at work. She wasn’t answering her cell. She wasn’t answering her home phone.
‘I’m kicking it in.’
‘We should at least try to get the concierge.’
‘Just be ready.’
‘Jacob—’
Striker leaned forward and gave the door a solid kick. The entire structure bowed inwards, but held. A good lock, a better frame. Seeing that, he turned around and gave the door three solid donkey kicks, landing the heel of his shoe between the door handle and frame. On his third attempt, the entire structure burst inwards and the shrill cry of an alarm filled the air.
‘Security system works fine,’ he said, and drew his pistol.
Felicia swore in frustration but did the same.
They made entry and began clearing the suite. As they worked from room to room, two things became immediately obvious. One, Sharise Owens was a wealthy woman. Everything was top end, from the imported Kuppersbusch appliances to the genuine Persian carpets and teak floors.
The second obvious detail was that, if Sharise had been kidnapped, no struggle had taken place here. The woman clearly took pride in her home, keeping everything in its place, from the fanned-out Oprah magazines on the coffee table to the folded laundry in her closets.
Everything was immaculate.
By the time they finished clearing the residence, the alarm had stopped blasting. Felicia holstered her piece. ‘This is a dead end.’
‘So far it is,’ Striker responded, his ears still ringing. ‘Let’s do a detailed search – see if we can find anything relevant.’
‘Fine. I’ll start with the kitchen.’
Striker nodded. That left him with the bedroom and the office area. He got right to work, searching through drawers and scavenging through the closets. But in the end, the bedroom yielded nothing. He grabbed the phone and hit the callback feature to see what number had last called the Owens residence. It was him. He hit redial to see the last number dialled. It was St Paul’s Hospital.
The time of the call was late last night.
No leads there.
Felicia called out from the other room. ‘No evidence in the kitchen or living room. I’ll search through the den.’
Striker yelled back okay and went into the office. On the shelf, in two long rows, were a series of micro-tapes and compact discs. Striker examined them. Each tape and disc said ‘copy’ on the cover, and was followed by a description:
Arlington, Jonas – fractured pelvis, Motor Vehicle Accident.
Booth, Amy – punctured lung, Workplace Accident.
Chavez, Ricardo – appendix removal,
Cause Unknown.
The list went on.
There were many tapes and discs, all appearing to be audio files of past surgeries Dr Owens had performed. Eleven years’ worth. Striker was impressed. Most doctors kept reports, but it appeared that Dr Owens went a step further.
The woman was meticulous.
He put back the tapes and finished his search. When he approached the computer, he saw that the screen was black. He moved the mouse and a password request appeared. Having little personal knowledge of the woman, he didn’t even hazard a guess. Instead, he sat down, opened the drawers, and started rifling through the files.
Most of it was ordinary bills with some tax information slips and the odd photocopy of a medical certificate or diploma. An old address book was relatively unused. It had the numbers of two other doctors listed in it, but nothing else. Striker called them both, but neither of them had seen or heard from Dr Owens in weeks.
After a long moment of searching, the alarm went off again. Striker gave up and returned to the living room. Already two of the neighbours – both middle-aged women, both cupping their hands over their ears – had come to investigate the alarm. Normally, they would have appeared nervous, even timid, but standing with them was a patrol cop – a tall Slavic-looking guy Striker had never seen.
Striker took out his badge and showed the cop and the neighbours. ‘Detectives Striker and Santos.’ He asked the women if they’d seen Dr Owens lately. Both ladies began chirping like a pair of overexcited hens, but in the end the result was the same. Neither woman had seen Sharise Owens since yesterday morning.
It was no good.
Felicia exited the den and joined them. She looked at the two women, then at the patrol cop, and then at Striker. She shook her head and spoke above the high-pitched alarm. ‘You find anything?’
‘Yeah. Another zero. You?’
‘Zero plus zero equals zilch.’
Striker frowned. The lack of progress and the alarm was getting to him. He moved into the hall, away from the drone, and pulled out his phone. He tried calling Dr Owens’ cell one more time, and was yet again directed to voicemail. He hung up.
Before leaving, he explained to the patrol cop what was going on with Dr Owens, then asked him to guard the suite until members of the City Maintenance Crew arrived to fix the door, or until Owens returned. The constable agreed, and Striker and Felicia left the scene under his care.
Back in the car, Striker scoured his notebook, hoping to see something they had missed. But the more he went over things, the more he ended up back where they had started.
‘We need to know how Owens’ bracelet got down by the docks,’ he said. ‘Even if she turns up okay, it’s too coincidental.’
Felicia shrugged. ‘For all we know someone stole it.’
Striker hadn’t thought of that. ‘Any history of thefts or robberies in PRIME?’
Felicia did a search. ‘No . . . but this is interesting – she was arrested once.’
Striker closed his notebook and looked at her, surprised. ‘Really? For what?’
‘For refusing to leave an anti-abortion rally.’ Felicia read through the report. ‘Interesting. She was fighting with the protesters.’
‘I guess that makes her pro-choice.’
Felicia nodded. ‘Look here. She was also arrested a few more times. At different rallies. Who knows? Maybe this entire call could be a pro-choice thing.’
Striker let out a groan. ‘Abortion activists? That’s the last thing we need. It would be a political nightmare.’
He leaned closer to Felicia to read the screen and smelled her musky perfume and perspiration. She smelled good and, like always, her scent calmed him a little. He focused on the computer, on the entity known as Dr Sharise Owens, then spoke.
‘We need to learn more about this doctor,’ he said. ‘So we got two options here – we can either wait at St Paul’s until she shows up for work, or we can hightail it back to HQ and start searching the databases.’
The choice for Felicia was simple. ‘I’ve had enough of hospitals to last me a lifetime.’
‘Good. Because there’s no guarantee she’ll show up there at all.’
The moment Striker spoke the words, he regretted them. It was as if they were taboo. The fact that Sharise Owens might already be dead was a sobering thought. But there it was – the cold hard reality of it all.
Welcome to Homicide.
Sixteen
The clock read 09:45 when Striker logged onto his work computer at Homicide headquarters and waited for the Versadex program to initiate. It was a standard Wednesday, midweek hustle, and the office was half-filled with weary investigators. As always, the building echoed with a mechanical thunder from the prehistoric air conditioner that rattled sometimes, clanked others, but almost always blew out warm air – especially on hot summer days.
While Striker waited for the program to load, he walked to the kitchen area and poured himself a cup of the sludge the office brass called coffee. Normally he drank it black, but this brew required chemical creamer and sugar to smooth out the burned taste.
For the next five minutes, he sipped his coffee, checked his voicemail for messages from Courtney, and found that there were still none. He tried calling her twice himself, but to no avail. In the end, he called up the airlines and was told that the plane had landed without problem.
The information soothed and angered him all at once.
‘Damn kid,’ he said.
He scanned the office. All around him, rows and rows of makeshift cubicles were set up, each one a carbon copy of his own work station – a desk, a chair, a pin-up board, and an archaic crappy computer that was one generation away from being a Commodore 64. Hell, the monitors weren’t even widescreen.
On Striker’s pin-up board were two pictures. One of his daughter Courtney standing with her friend, Raine; and the other of his parents, who had died two decades ago in a motor vehicle accident, leaving him as the sole provider for his three younger siblings. He stared at the photos for a long time. When the program finally started, it was an emotional relief.
Immediately, he sat down and typed:
Surname: Owens. Given 1: Sharise. Given 2: Chandelle.
Then he entered her date of birth.
Before hitting send, he added in a request for information from LEIP – the Law Enforcement Information Portal – and also from PIRS – the Police Information Retrieval System. Both were older databases, used by municipalities that had not yet transferred over to PRIME.
The results came back almost instantly.
‘Desktop system’s fast today,’ he said. ‘Look at this.’
Felicia was seated in her own cubicle behind him, trying to get a hold of weapons expert Jay Kolt. Having no luck, she hung up, swivelled about and looked over his shoulder at the screen. ‘What you got?’
‘Same pro-choice arrest you had for Sharise Owens. But look at this – there was also a death threat made against Sharise. And it’s a Vancouver file.’
‘Vancouver? That’s strange . . . I never saw it in PRIME.’
Striker nodded. ‘Of course you didn’t. This file is eight years old. PRIME didn’t exist back then. We’re not reading the actual report – this is an electronic summary.’
Felicia cursed, and Striker echoed it. Retrieving information could be extremely frustrating in the world of policing. Older cases often existed only on paper. Some were reintroduced to the system as electronic summaries, but they were few, and they almost always lacked vital information.
Striker let out a heavy breath. ‘We’re lucky this call even had an electronic summary; otherwise we wouldn’t have known it existed at all. The original report should be filed away somewhere.’
‘In Archives?’
‘It’s a Vancouver file. So, yeah, hopefully.’
Striker read the summary. It was about as bare bones as it gets – critically lacking for something as serious as a death threat. The suspect in the file was a male named Chad Ko
da. In the remarks column was one word:
Unfounded.
Felicia pointed at the entity. ‘Chad Koda . . . is he a pro-lifer?’
‘Apparently.’ Striker looked at the last line of the summary. ‘Says Koda had a “relationship” with Owens, but it doesn’t specify what kind of relationship. Looks more and more like this was a domestic someone didn’t feel like writing up properly, so they changed it to an Unfounded Threat call.’
Striker ran the name Koda, but nothing else came up. He looked at the name for a long moment, knowing he had heard it somewhere before. Then he made the connection. ‘Wait a second . . . Chad Koda . . . isn’t he that high-end realtor you see on all the billboard ads? The self-proclaimed multimillionaire?’
‘Oh yeah. That’s right. The guy who colours his beard.’
Striker raised an eyebrow. ‘Colours his beard? If you say so.’
‘It’s obvious, Jacob – to a woman.’
‘Remind me of that when I go grey.’
‘So, tomorrow then?’
Striker just shot her a wry look.
He picked up the desk phone and called Archives. The woman who answered had a smoker-rough voice and Striker was familiar with her. He gave her the file number and year, then waited when she put him on hold. When she finally picked up again, almost ten minutes later, her one-word answer bothered him.
‘Purged.’
‘Purged?’ It was all Striker could do not to swear. ‘But this was a violent call.’
The clerk made a weary sound – like she’d given this explanation one too many times and was growing tired of it. ‘I wish I could say it was unusual, Detective, but the department purged a lot of stuff back then. Especially the year the basement flooded and all the records had to be moved.’
Striker felt his blood pressure rising. ‘Try one more for me. See what you got on a guy named Chad Koda.’
‘Hold on.’ After a few seconds, she came back to the phone and her response was the same. ‘You’re batting zero today, Detective. I wouldn’t bother buying any lottery tickets if I were you.’
