Progeny
Page 20
“What time are we supposed to be out there?” Hank asked.
I checked the time. “An hour or so.”
Hank leaned back in his chair. “Is she actually going to talk to us or give us some crazy-person ramblings?”
“Your guess is as good as mine.”
“What are they going to do with her?”
I tapped the top of my desk. “Put her into some kind of secured mental-health facility until she goes to trial. Then, who knows. I can’t really see them sticking her in a regular prison.”
“Yeah. She obviously needs some help. But for what she did, she deserves to be in a padded cell for the rest of her life.”
“Probably not too far off from what will happen,” I said.
Hank stretched. “So she said yes, huh?”
I smiled. “The ring is on her finger.”
“Good. I was starting to think you were never going to do it.”
“I’m patient.”
“No, you’re not,” Hank said. “So what’s up with that house?”
“Having an inspection this week. We’ll see how that goes.”
“Callie knows that Karen and I are going to move in with you guys, right? I mean, you’ll have the extra space and all.”
“Funny,” I said.
Bostok banged on the glass behind my head.
“Guess he wants us,” I said.
Hank and I headed next door and walked into the captain’s office.
“What’s up, Cap?” I asked.
“Sit,” he said.
Hank and I did.
“I just talked to Rick. We have a couple things.”
“Okay,” I said.
“The main thing. Angel White is, in fact, Carmen Simms’s daughter.”
“How?” I asked. “I thought Cynthia Redding was her mother.”
“No clue on the specifics, but it’s undeniable. One of the boxes we took from Angel White’s house had a bunch of old paperwork belonging to Carmen Simms. The guys dug through it and found a birth certificate for an Angel Redding.”
“Is it legit?” I asked. “I mean, it could have just been something she had made up to show Angel when she arrived, claiming to be her mother.”
“It wasn’t, though. It was real and recently confirmed. Rick took a DNA swab from Carmen Simms’s body when he went back with the coroners to the Pinellas medical examiner’s office. When he heard about the birth certificate yesterday, he took a trip over to Tampa General and got a swab from Angel White. He came back and ran a mitochondrial DNA test from the samples he took. It was a match.”
“Hmm. Like mother, like daughter, I guess,” Hank said.
“And father,” I added.
“Well, two are dead, and one will never see the light of day again.”
“You said that was the main thing. Did we get anything else?”
“Just working on a few things to give us a complete picture—bank and cell records from Angel White. With those, hopefully we can place them at each scene, including the out-of-state ones. We’ll work with those jurisdictions and coordinate with everything we get,” Bostok said.
I nodded. “Did we contact Braird and let him know he can return home?” I asked.
“He was informed he could leave yesterday.”
“Good,” I said.
“That’s about it as far as where we are with everything. What about you two? What’s on the agenda?” Bostok asked.
“Paperwork and heading over to try to speak with Angel White at the hospital in a little bit here,” I said.
“She’s still there?”
“Until they transfer her, they are keeping her there, under guard.”
“When are you guys leaving?”
“We’re supposed to be there in an hour,” I said.
“Good. On a different topic, I just talked with the major. He seemed to like my recommendation for captain. I’m pretty sure that’s going to grow some legs. I’d suggest you brush up on your public speaking for the oral boards. Your track record will get you most of the way, but you’ll need to instill confidence in the panel that you can handle the position.”
“How long do I have to get prepped?” I asked.
“Three weeks.”
I nodded. I’d been through the oral boards a number of times. Trying to convince my peers I was a good cop was never fun, but it was part of advancing.
“Appreciate the recommendation, Cap,” I said.
“I can’t think of a better candidate. Rawlings, like I said, if Kane gets my desk, you should probably be prepared for the Lieutenant’s test.”
Hank smiled and nodded.
“That’s all I wanted to talk to you guys about—just a heads up. Now, go get back to work.”
I smiled, stood, and started for the door.
“Kane, one second,” Bostok said.
Hank left the captain’s office.
I turned back toward the captain. “Yeah?”
“What have you got going on next weekend?”
“Nothing that I know of.”
“We should get together. I have a little insight for you on the oral boards and what they’re looking for.”
“Okay,” I said. “Obviously, I’ll do the same for Hank if it gets that far.”
Bostok nodded. “Congrats on the engagement as well. Rawlings told me earlier.”
“Thanks, Cap.”
“We’ll talk later in the week and get something set for the weekend. Pop back in after you talk with Angel White.”
“Will do.”
I headed back to my office and got back to the paperwork. A knock came on my office door a couple minutes later.
“Come in,” I said.
The door opened.
A tall man in a black suit walked through the doorway. He had short black hair with a little gray mixed in. His normal graying goatee was a full beard. Agent Faust carried a folder under his arm, and his face said the visit wasn’t social.
“Faust. How’s it going? How was the vacation?” I asked.
“Good, as far as vacations go. I got something here that I want you to take a look at, though. That’s the reason for my visit.”
“Sure. Grab a seat.”
He slid out a chair opposite me at my desk, took a seat, and scooted forward. He opened the file he was carrying, pulled a photo from inside, and slid it over to me.
“This landed on my desk this morning,” he said.
I turned the photo around and looked at it. It appeared to have been captured by a security camera. It showed a large bald man carrying a briefcase.
I was confused. I didn’t know what I was supposed to be looking at or how it related to me. “What’s this?” I asked.
“Look closer.”
I stared at the photo. I was still at a loss.
I slid the photo back toward him. Faust slid it back and slammed his fingertip down on the man’s wrist. “Tattoos,” he said.
“Okay. So?”
“That’s Andrei Azarov.”
“What?” I looked at the photo more closely. It had been captured from the side and above. The guy looked to be about the size that Ray was, but Ray was dead, and the grainy photo showing some tattoos wasn’t going to convince me otherwise.
“Ray is dead, Faust. No way could he have survived what happened to him.”
“Well, he did. And that’s him. He shaved his head, but I assure you that it is one-hundred-percent Andrei Azarov.”
As I stared down at the photograph, an uneasy feeling came over me. “How are you so certain? Where did this photo come from?”
“We have some people working on something. Our agents met with this guy face to face to broker a deal.” Faust tapped on the photo. “The agents said that his face was all scarred up. Anyway, they exchanged some merchandise. We took prints from the goods that traded hands. Our guys ran the prints.”
“Azarov,” I said.
Faust nodded. “I figured you should know. We’ll be meeting with him again in
a few days.”
“I want in,” I said.
“We’ll see what we can do. Just keep your eyes open for the time being.”
“When and where was this photo taken?” I asked.
“Here in Tampa. Yesterday.”
The End
Thank you!
Thanks for reading Progeny, Book 5 in The Cases of Lieutenant Kane Series. I hope you enjoyed it!
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Have a look at the entire Lieutenant Kane Series. The six books in the series (listed in order) are: Malevolent, Requite, Determinant, Perilous, Progeny, and Denouement. I hope you enjoy them all!
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Table of Contents
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Table of Contents
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40