by Jonas Saul
“Assaulting a peace officer and resisting arrest to name a few. Now turn around.”
“I didn’t know I was being arrested until just now and how was I supposed to know they were police officers, dressed in civilian clothes and eating here like the rest of us?”
“Yeah,” the bearded man said. He had his cell phone aimed at Barry. “I’m sick of police brutality in Kelowna. You’re on tape and I’ll be posting to YouTube as soon as we’re done here. Unless you want to arrest me and confiscate my phone, you’re going to be famous.”
Things had devolved quickly. Barry was at the losing end. His choice was simple: make a play for her or walk away.
His jaw muscles flexed. Then he raised his gun in the air and aimed it at the ceiling.
“Okay, okay, true, no one identified themselves.” He slipped his gun away.
“I want to press charges,” Sarah said loud enough for everyone to hear. “These two men grabbed me and forcefully tried to drag me into the back room. I have no idea why they did that, but I want them arrested for attempting to abduct me.”
Barry slid out of the booth and bent over to help one of the men up. Before reaching for the other man, he turned to Sarah. “Don’t push me. Not now. Not here.”
Low enough that only he could hear, she whispered, “You have no idea what I have in store for you. The end is near and I’m the judge, jury and executioner. You’re through in Kelowna and I’m the only one who can authorize your transfer … to jail.”
Chapter 6
When Barry had helped his colleagues to the restaurant’s bathroom to rinse their faces, Sarah thanked the bearded man for filming the event and ran out the back door. She ran through an alley and detoured down a side street until she felt safe from police harassment. Barry had been acting independent of the RCMP except for his friends, who likely came as a favor to him. He probably wasn’t intending to arrest her, just get her outside, alone, where he would press her for more details.
She needed to clear the area, regroup, then decide how to come back at him. She had parked her bike by the beach. The sun had dropped farther during her time inside the Twisted Tomato, but it was still very warm out this summer evening. It surprised her that Barry would try to take her in public. He was more desperate than she thought, willing to take risks.
The scene he made at the restaurant motivated her to do more to antagonize Barry one-on-one. It had to be when he didn’t have backup, when he was alone.
Keeping the fact that she was his neighbor from him would work to her advantage. Tonight, when he got home and their lights went out for the evening, she would affix the GPS tracker to his vehicle and tomorrow she would follow him with her cell phone. Learning what Barry spent his days doing could prove pivotal in discerning his illegal activities.
She located her bike without incident, revved the engine, merged into traffic and headed home. So far Barry hadn’t gotten a good look at her bike so she didn’t need to worry about him recognizing it in her driveway. Even so, she would park it by the fence between the two properties, keeping it mostly out of sight.
As she passed the Twisted Tomato on Bernard Avenue, a Castanet van was parked out front.
Holy shit, are they everywhere?
It appeared Barry Ashford would be on the news twice in two days.
Which was a good thing. It would rattle him more.
When Sarah got home, she would find out where they would likely take Lesley for her suicide watch and see if she could figure a way to gain access. It was imperative to discover Lesley’s connection to Barry. After talking to Lesley, maybe an Internet search would turn up something. Perhaps Castanet would have old news about Barry or his arrests.
Up ahead, someone had pushed the crosswalk button. The lights flickered on and off. A man started across the street.
Sarah slowed the bike, then lowered her leg to rest on an angle until the pedestrian cleared the road. In her mirror a black Cadillac pulled up behind her.
The pedestrian got to the sidewalk.
She revved the bike and accelerated to the speed of traffic. The Caddy stayed close. At Glenmore, she stayed in the right lane, even though she needed to turn left. At the last moment, as the light changed to yellow, she swung a hard left, dipping the bike low, and raced through the intersection, blocking any chance for the Cadillac to follow.
Heading north on Glenmore, she glanced in her mirror. The Caddy must have performed a U-turn because he was behind her and gaining.
She increased her speed, trying to keep some kind of distance between her and the Cadillac, which wasn’t a police-issued vehicle.
Who knew she was in Kelowna? Who would be following her? More of Barry’s friends? If so, she couldn’t lead them to her house.
She came upon a small strip mall with a pub at the end. She parked in the farthest spot, jumped off the bike and removed her helmet. The Caddy was just entering the parking lot by the time she set her helmet on the bike’s seat. She had no weapons after leaving the dog spray at the Twisted Tomato.
The driver didn’t falter or turn around after having been made. He had continued to follow her and even pulled up and parked beside her bike. The driver appeared to be alone, but she couldn’t see through the tinted back window.
Sarah ran along the side of the Cadillac and glanced in at the empty backseat. The car shut off and the door clicked open. Sarah rested a hand on the door’s glass as she looked inside to make sure he didn’t have a weapon.
“Who are you and why are you following me?” she asked, the door sitting open an inch.
“I’m not the enemy. I’m here to help.”
“I’ll decide that. Don’t try to get out of the car. Name first?”
“Greg Wright. I’m Lesley’s brother. I’m here to help. She told me to meet you tonight, but that asshole cop beat me to you.”
Sarah let go of the door, and Greg stepped out. He was a tall man, in his early twenties and extremely fit. His arms were cut as if molded from marble and his chest was so solid it almost looked like he wore two armored plates over his pectorals.
“What do you know about Barry Ashford?” Sarah asked. She’d wanted to say, “Work out much?”
“Everything.”
“Then let’s go have a drink in this pub. You can tell me all about him.”
Chapter 7
They settled in the pub, Greg with a coffee and Sarah with an herbal tea.
“Why follow me?” Sarah asked. “That’s risky. There’s easier ways to catch my attention. You were parked by the beach. You saw me get on my bike. Why not get my attention there?”
“I needed to make sure Barry wasn’t tailing you or had someone else watching you.”
“I like caution.” She pulled the tea bag, set it on the side and wrapped her hands around the mug. “What can you tell me?” she asked.
He turned in his seat to see if anyone was paying attention to them. “Barry is into drugs.”
Drugs? Vivian, you sent me here to deal with narcotics?
“What kind of drugs?”
“Heroin.”
“Okay. Why tell me? Why not go to the police?”
“He is the police. And my sister got the impression that you and I knew one another.”
Sarah let go of her mug and leaned back. “She must’ve gotten that impression from me at the beach.”
“She thinks you can make it all go away.”
“Whatever it is, I’m pretty sure I can.”
“How?”
“That’s my business.” She looked around the pub and then met his eyes. “Before I’m done in Kelowna, Barry Ashford will pay for what he has done.”
“That’s why I’m here. Lesley said I could trust you, but I don’t know you.”
“You can trust me. You followed me, remember. You had already decided to trust me. So talk to me.”
“Barry calls it flash blooding.”
“Calls what?”
“His heroin game.”
Greg slu
rped his coffee and looked around again, his eyes darting back and forth nervously.
“Go on.”
“I don’t know a lot about how it got started or who is involved, but I know my sister and I are. He’s got us in tight. We have to do what he says or he’ll lock us up.”
“How? For what? He’s not God. He doesn’t own Kelowna. He’s just a man with a badge.”
“He’s got something on us that won’t go away.”
“What is it?”
He looked down at the table as he fidgeted with a napkin. “Maybe later.”
There was a moment of silent tension. Sarah waited.
“The local cops have their hands in different businesses.” He tapped his foot on the base of the table. His hands tapped the table in rhythm with his foot. “Everyone on the street knows Barry owns some of the girls at the Garden of Eden Massage studio in town. He supplies the drugs and the girls stay happy. When raids are scheduled, the girls get a heads up. Nothing ever comes of it and the public are mollified.”
“Wow, Barry sounds like a busy man.”
“Barry got into the drug scene too much a few years ago and started flash blooding with a small group of people.”
“Wait,” Sarah held up a hand. “How do you know so much about the girls he owns at this massage studio and his drug group? Are you a part of it? Is that what he has on you?”
Greg checked the pub out again as if he was afraid Barry himself would enter through the back door with SWAT, guns ready to execute him.
“My sister was down on her luck a few years ago. She thought she’d spend a summer doing massages. When she started at the Garden of Eden, she had no idea that it was a full-service massage studio.” He stopped tapping his hand and leaned across the table. “Anything goes. The rates they charge there are based on what the customer is looking for. On her second day, she was ready to quit. There’s no money in just doing massages. Then she met Barry. He told her he was a cop and that he would protect her. He handed her a thousand bucks and a little smack to take the edge off. Then he warned her. Leave the massage parlor and get arrested for prostitution and a whole slew of charges.” Greg wiped his eyes. “So my sister stayed that summer.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.” Sarah leaned across the table and touched his forearm for a second, happy Aaron wasn’t here. Aaron’s sister had been murdered at a strip club in Toronto. If he was here, he would probably kill Barry Ashford with his bare hands. Sarah let go of Greg’s arm and whispered just loud enough for him to hear, “Barry needs to be hurt. Bad.”
Greg nodded. He sipped his coffee, took a deep breath, let it out and collected himself.
“He filled her with drugs and kept her high that whole summer while …” he trailed off. Then said, “While he raped her repeatedly. She’ll never be the same.”
Sarah tightened her hand into a fist. Only swear words came to mind, but she kept her mouth closed. Greg needed comfort, not anger. The only way to rehabilitate men like Barry was to kill them. Then they’d learn. Once they were dead, they’d understand what they had done and how they had hurt others. At least that was what Sarah told herself to justify Barry’s murder.
“That’s how flash blooding works,” Greg said.
“I think I’m lost. Explain how it works again.”
He lowered his head and leaned in conspiratorially. “Barry shoots smack directly into one of the girl’s veins and then after five seconds when the initial hit takes over, he withdraws her blood, laced with heroin, and injects that blood into the other girls so they get high, too. A cost effective way to share the drug without all the girls getting their own.”
“They share blood laced with that shit? And the other girls get high as well? Just from the blood?”
Greg nodded. “Then he rapes them when they’re high and spaced out. He calls it flash blooding and he also calls it his private H.O. — Heroin Orgies. The few girls at the parlor that participate don’t want the sex but they can’t say no to the free heroin. They’re having sex with multiple men all day anyway, so why not bed their boss down as long as the heroin doesn’t dry up. They’re all addicted now. The only way out is rehab or what Lesley tried to do on the bridge yesterday.”
“Are you saying Lesley still does this with Barry?”
Greg stopped tapping his foot under the table. His fingers fidgeted with themselves. “Yes, but at first she got out. Called me last summer scared. Told me everything. I threatened to blow the whole thing sky-high. Tell the papers, tell the public. I got Lesley into rehab. Then a rash of break and enters happened across Kelowna, my head office included.”
“ReadyMaid House Cleaning?”
A look of surprise crossed his face.“How did you know?”
“I met Derek earlier today and hired ReadyMaid to come to my house. What happened with the break-ins?”
“I can’t prove this, but I think Barry targeted my office and then broke into homes on my client list. He focused on those homes—”
Sarah held up a hand for him to stop. “He broke into the homes that didn’t have an alarm. Those people who left a key outside for the cleaner to enter when they were at work or away.”
His eyebrows lowered and connected above the bridge of his nose. “How did you know that?”
“Derek gave my house a walk through. He asked questions about my alarm system and would I be willing to leave a key outside. It wasn’t a stretch to put it together.”
Greg shook his head as if he had to clear it. “Okay, well, Barry targeted these houses. The break-ins were never solved as there was no forced entry. They suspected me, but Barry offered a weak alibi for me. If I say anything negative about him, he will recant the alibi. Barry made sure I knew everything and that he would pin the whole thing on me and my company. I was told that my company, that I had built over the past ten years, would be shut down and I would lose everything and eventually go to jail. And that wasn’t the worst part.”
“Really? What else is there?” Sarah sipped her tea, which had grown cold.
“Maxine Freeman went missing eight months ago. She was part of the flash blooders. One day she was there, complaining about Barry and the next day she had skipped town. I found it suspicious, but I didn’t see a missing persons report in the newspaper or anything. Then, two weeks later, I bumped into her brother at the mall and he said she was missing as in disappeared. Last seen getting into Barry’s car. When Maxine’s brother called the police, Officer Ashford said he knew her and that she said she was heading to Halifax. Apparently he had driven her to the bus station himself. No one has heard from Maxine since. My sister and I think she’s dead.”
Sarah leaned back in her chair. “This only gets worse.”
“Barry told Lesley that if she didn’t come back to the Garden and rejoin the party, she would have to go to ‘Halifax’ like Maxine.” He used air quotes on Halifax. “Lesley is so scared … well, you saw what she tried to do yesterday.”
Greg shuddered. His other leg bounced up and down now. He hadn’t drunk much of his coffee.
“I’m so sorry,” Sarah said.
The pub’s front door opened. Two uniformed officers entered.
“Don’t look now but two cops just came in. Probably unrelated. Looks like they’re heading to a table to sit and eat.”
“I gotta go,” Greg said, panic in his voice. “I can’t be seen with you.”
“Why not? We’re just a man and a woman having a drink.”
“If it gets back to Barry that we talked, Lesley’s dead, and if he doesn’t kill me, he’ll ruin my life, which will kill me.”
“Is he still breaking into homes?”
“Not that I know of. But he says he planted evidence in some of the homes. It’s something he can pull out later if he needs to.” Greg glanced over his shoulder. “Look, I gotta go. Can you help us?” Fear sparked in his eyes.
“Yes,” she said, not sure how, but she trusted Vivian.
That one word calmed him visibly.
He slid out of his chair and stood. “Thanks. I’m sure we’ll be in touch. You know where to find me.”
He walked past her and headed for the side door so he didn’t have to walk by the cops.
After a moment, Sarah paid the bill and walked out to her bike.
Officer Ashford had to be held accountable for his disgusting crimes, and there was only one way Sarah could think of nailing him.
She would watch him for twenty-four hours using her GPS tracking device. Then she would abduct him and force him to confess on the pain of torture.
