by Warren Court
“Just him?”
“It’s too late at night to discuss our different cultures, Mr. Temple. I’m sure there are things in wonderful Canadian society that would shock me.”
Temple said, “The man who was brought in—was it Ravinder Nair?”
“No, it was not. I don’t have it in front of me but it was not him. The man was a taxi driver.”
“Any other details you can tell me?”
“I will re-read the file tomorrow and call you. What time do you go to bed? I’ll want to call then,” the man said.
Temple laughed. “Fair enough, but I haven’t been getting a lot of sleep lately.”
“We have more in common than you might think, Detective.”
“Largest street gang in the world,” Temple said.
“what’s that?”
“Cops. We’re the largest street gang in the world.”
“I’ve never heard that expression before but I like it,” Krishnan said.
Temple bid his brother in blue on the other side of the world a good night.
34
Temple found himself pushing the traffic laws harder than normal, running lights that had gone way past yellow to red, not even slowing down for stop signs. The more he thought about Mendoza wanting to talk only to him, the more he felt the need to get down to the hospital as quickly as possible. Mendoza might be afraid to tell anyone else who the shooter was. That meant that he was afraid of someone getting to him. And the only people other than his family who would be around him in the hospital would be cops. Wozniak, Kindness, Moonshine, the chief. And the Mayor.
Temple was on Queen and ran into some traffic five blocks from the hospital and he gripped the steering wheel hard. Take it easy, he told himself. Mendoza was keeping whatever he had to say to himself. A streetcar had broken down and traffic was slowly snaking by. He heard the sounds of sirens and lowered his window. Police sirens, coming from behind. Temple saw the strobes in his side mirror. He couldn’t inch over any more and he was five cars away from getting past the streetcar. The cop cars pulled out into the opposing lane. The lead one got parallel with his car then had to stop and wait for his siren to blast a hole through the traffic. The oncoming cars were pulling over to the curb as best they could but there was no room for the cops to get through. Temple looked over and saw a uniform he recognized, a sergeant out of 52 Division. The sergeant was in the passenger seat with his window down and was yelling at the opposing traffic to move over.
“Hey buddy,” Temple said. He said it again, louder, and he caught the cop’s attention.
“What?” the cop said, then recognition kicked in. “Detective. Sorry.”
“What’s up?” Temple shouted over the sirens.
“Homicide at Bathurst and Queen. Got two units on scene. We’re heading there for crowd control.”
“A blonde, female, mid-forties?” Temple said without thinking.
“Yeah. You hear it on the radio?”
“Yeah,” Temple said. Inside his brain was a racing tornado of guilt and anger. He had let Zurawska die: he hadn’t warned her. Of course she was on the list.
“Come on, fucking move!” the cop next to the sergeant yelled.
“Hey, take that alley. Cuts down to Richmond,” Temple shouted and pointed to a thin alley the cops had ignored. The cop spoke to his friend behind the wheel and had just a second to turn back to Temple, smile, and wave a thank-you before his buddy cranked the wheel and spun off down the alley. The other car followed after him, their sirens creating a terrifying howl in the enclosed space of the alley.
Temple was next in line to clear the broken-down streetcar and the snarl of traffic it was causing. There was no point in going to the Zurawska murder scene. Whoever was working it would tell him to leave. If Wozniak was there, he’d tear a strip off him in front of everyone. What could Temple say? That he could have saved the woman but didn’t bother? Temple pounded the wheel once and turned up Bay towards the hospital. Absently, he patted his damp armpit where his Glock should be hanging. It wasn’t there. The bulge in his pocket for his badge was also gone. He couldn’t determine which absence made him feel more vulnerable.
He parked in a lot across from the hospital and went through the double swing doors of the emergency room. He knew where he was going and he nodded to attendants, nurses, and a couple of paramedics like he belonged there. There was no one outside of Mendoza’s room. That was odd. There should have been a cop there to keep reporters from shoving their snouts into the room. Temple pushed the door open slowly. Mendoza was where Temple had left him. The only difference was that he had fewer hoses coming out of him now. The large bandage on his partner’s neck was a sickly, stained yellow. Flowers and cards, even teddy bears, covered every available flat surface. Temple wondered what would happen to all that junk when Mendoza finally recovered enough to tell them to get rid of it. Temple knew his partner wasn’t a flowers and teddy bear kind of guy.
“Hey, bud,” Temple said. Mendoza opened his eyes. “You still humping the dog?” Mendoza smiled weakly. “Heard you were awake. I’ve been by a couple of times, but you were zonked out. They kept you sedated cause of the neck wound.” Temple pointed at his own neck, not sure how much Mendoza was taking in. Mendoza tried to speak. Temple thought he said water. On the bedside table was a plastic cup with a straw coming out, and Temple grabbed it. Mendoza shook his head slightly when Temple tried to put the straw in his mouth. He motioned with his hand.
“Shooter,” he said, his voice a raspy whisper.
“Yeah,” Temple said. “You got shot. Sorry about that. I didn’t get the guy.” Again Mendoza shook his head. He was getting annoyed, not at Temple but at his inability to speak clearly. Temple bent back down to hear.
“Shooter,” Mendoza said again. Evidently he could only get out one word at a time.
“You knew who it was?” Temple asked.
Mendoza nodded. His eyes went wide. He gritted his teeth and Temple leaned down to his mouth again to catch the name.
“What the hell is this? We ordered no one but police in here.”
Temple knew the voice. He stood up and saw Karen Kindness at the doorway. Behind her were two uniforms, big beefy types he knew Care and Kindness liked to have around.
“Hey, Karen. Here to keep a lid on things?”
“Guys, escort this man out. Police and family only.”
“I am police. I can be here,” Temple said. He went stiff, ready to take on the two uniforms as they approached. He wouldn’t stand a chance, he knew. Even with the rush of emotions he was feeling now to add fuel to his fighting ability, he would be smoked by these two guys. Then he remembered where he was. He couldn’t throw down with these punks in Mendoza’s room.
“Only active cops. Ones who aren’t under investigation. Ones who aren’t suspended,” Kindness said.
“I’m his partner.”
“I don’t care. We have orders and, unlike you, I follow them. Get him out of here,” she shouted.
Temple looked back down at Mendoza and moved to lean back down to him. A beefy hand gripped his arm. Mendoza shook his head slightly. He looked frightened. Temple turned and looked at the cop who had hold of him, at the bulging muscles rippling under his uniform. One of Kindness’s attack dogs.
“What’s the matter, Kindness? You don’t want me finding out what’s going on? More than what I already know?”
Kindness scoffed.
“I’m going,” Temple said. The cop took his hand off Temple’s arm and stepped back.
“Good,” Kindness said. “I won’t have to file any more paperwork on you this week.”
35
Temple checked his car, including the underside, for any bombs before he left the hospital. He felt his paranoia was justified. If Mendoza was afraid to tell anyone but Temple who the shooter was, then it must be someone with the power to strike out again at him. Fuck this not having a gun, he thought uneasily.
He was half a dozen blocks from the hospit
al when he spotted the unmarked car behind him, a big Ford Impala with a monochrome paint job. He recognized the two guys in the front seat as cops; one was black and the other was white. Both were bald and looked hard. They weren’t tailing him—it was too sloppy a job. He pulled into a Walmart parking lot and drove to the far end where it was empty. The Impala came up beside him. The black guy in the passenger seat lowered his window.
“Yo, Temple...”
“Let’s see some ID,” Temple said. The black guy smirked and shook his head, quickly looked at his partner, and then moved his hand into his sport coat.
“Easy,” said Temple. He was unarmed but they might not know that.
“We’re taking it easy. You too, motherfucker,” the black guy said. He removed a wallet, not a gun. He let the leather flap flip down, exposing a silver badge. Ontario Provincial Police.
“What do you want?”
“My boss wants to talk to you.”
“Fuck that,” Temple said. “I’m off the job, on holiday.”
The white guy revved his car’s engine in frustration.
“Really,” the black guy said. “I’m on vacation, I go to Mexico or the Dominican. Phil here, he goes to Florida for the golf. You’re in deep shit, Temple. We’re going to try and help you out of it but hey, if you don’t want a helping hand...”
“From the OPP?”
“Yeah, that’s right. What you got against the OPP?”
“You’re shovel cops. You shovel up the dead bodies off the highway. Write tickets.”
“We’re also looking at you and your TPS buddies. Get in the fucking car, Temple.”
“Why don’t I just follow you? If I don’t like where you’re taking me, I’ll just leave.”
“You might get lost. Get in.”
Temple raised his window, turned his engine off, and got out of the Buick. The Impala smelt of vinyl and coffee. He got in the back. The seats were the smooth vinyl of a fleet vehicle.
“Where we going?”
“Somewhere safe. Out of this godforsaken city.”
“You sound like you live here,” Temple said to the black guy. The white guy hadn’t said a word yet.
“I used to. Moved up north. More chances for me to use my shovel,” the black guy said, and laughed. He turned around in the seat and extended his hand. “I’m Ferguson. Detective. This here is Reynolds.”
“Ferguson and Reynolds. Sounds like a cigarette company,” Temple said.
“Yeah, we’re dangerous to your health, motherfucker,” Ferguson said, and laughed a booming laugh that rattled the windows.
“What’s this all about?” Temple said.
“We can’t say,” Ferguson said, and he turned back to the front. Reynolds took the Impala up onto the 404 highway north out of the city. Into OPP territory. The Ontario Provincial Police managed all the Queen’s highways in the province and were responsible for policing most of the small towns that couldn’t afford their own force. They covered a huge geographical area, larger than France and Spain combined. If you joined the OPP you could choose two areas you’d want to be located to; chances were you wouldn’t get either of them. You could find yourself up close to the Arctic Circle writing speeding tickets for snowmobilers. Or, if you were lucky, you could wind up in one of the detachments further south that circled around the Greater Toronto Area, where the action was. The animosity the TPS and most city forces felt toward the OPP was mutual. Temple was tempted to ask if they knew his buddy Tony, the one who had put his job on the line to get him that information about Operation Carnivore.
They drove for an hour with the blue and red strobes built into the front grille of the car switched on to clear the highway in front of them, the needle buried at 160 for most of the ride. The car moved fast and nice over the smooth highway. Soon they were out of Toronto and up near the Muskoka’s. Cottage country.
“This is a long way to go,” Temple said. He was restless in the smooth vinyl confines of the unmarked car.
“Want to make sure none of your buddies are following us,” Ferguson said.
They drove through the small town of Standard, Ontario. There was one open business that Temple saw, a convenience store. The rest of the main street was a muted tapestry of closed-out businesses.
“Nice place,” Temple said.
“It’s quiet.”
They pulled into the back of a defunct grocery store. There were three other unmarked cop cars there, a gathering of OPP higher-ups. The doors on the parked cars opened when Temple and his new friends pulled in. Temple waited for Ferguson to open the door for him.
“What’s this Ferguson, bit of a party?” Temple asked.
“Just be cool, man,” Ferguson whispered.
Temple was surrounded by a gaggle of very serious-looking OPP detectives. The oldest one, a man with silver hair and a lantern jaw looking every bit like a hardcore drill instructor, spoke first.
“Detective Temple, I’m Captain Wilkins, OPP. My detectives and I want to thank you for coming out here for a talk.” No hands were offered to shake.
“It’s a long way. Are they going to drive me back?” Temple said with a large grin on his face. The cops chuckled.
“Sure.”
“Even if I don’t cooperate?”
“Let’s not get off on the wrong foot.”
“Go ahead. Let me hear it.”
“Wise-ass, huh? We heard that about you.”
“Wasting my time, Captain,” Temple said.
“You were suspended recently?” Wilkins said.
“Yesterday.”
“Why?”
“For doing my job.”
“That’s it? Doing your job?” Wilkins looked around curiously at his comrades. “We do our jobs, we don’t get suspended. We get promoted. We get salary bumps. You guys in TPS— they suspend you?” He focused back on Temple. “See, I can play the wise-ass game too, but we’re still going to be stuck here in this parking lot.”
“I was following a case. It has political implications. I was sticking my nose in where it doesn’t belong. Disobeyed orders. They pulled my badge.”
“And your gun,” Ferguson added.
“Yeah, that’s right. I’m a couple of pounds lighter.”
“Feels kind of naked, huh?” Wilkins asked.
Temple shifted uncomfortably.
“What If I say we can help get those things back for you?” Wilkins said.
“I’m listening.”
“You were suspended because you were getting too close to a criminal conspiracy.”
“I guess so.”
“A conspiracy within your police force and Toronto’s city hall.”
“Operation Carnivore,” Temple said.
Wilkins looked surprised and his gaze shifted to the other officers. “What’s that?” he said to Temple.
“An investigation by the OPP, the Feds, into the mayor of Toronto. And others,” Temple said.
“Wow,” Wilkins said. “Seems our boat might be as leaky as yours.”
Temple smiled. He had other cards to play, but for now that was the first one he was laying down.
“You’re no dummy, I’ll give you that. Yes, you tapped into something you shouldn’t have and the powers that be shut you down. We want to start you up. We want you to start working for us.”
“I’m suspended. What you’re talking about will end my career permanently.”
“Hasn’t stopped you so far. You don’t seem like the kind of guy to stop just because they took away your tin and gun.”
“Makes it harder, though.”
“Tell us what you know.”
“This a two-way street we’re on?”
“We’ll see.”
Temple ran down how things had started. The discovery of the Nairs. His suspicion that the older Nair girl had been turned out by the Villains motorcycle club and that the old man and his daughter had been taken out by those bikers. What he didn’t tell them was his renewed interest in the cousin or his cont
act with Sub-Inspector Krishnan over in India.
“And?” Wilkins asked. “What happened next?”
“I started looking for a dude, known associate of the older daughter. Guy named Coconis.”
“And you can’t find him?”
“I think he’s dead, got whacked out by the same person or persons committing all these other murders.”
“No, he isn’t dead.”
“How do you know? I can’t find him.”
“Because I’m Coconis,” said one of the other detectives standing off to Temple’s right. Temple looked at him and the man removed his dark glasses. The beard was gone, the hair cut short, but the eyes were the same. Yeah, that was Coconis.
“Cool. One last body I have to look for. You were inside the Villains’ club?”
“Yup.”
“You got too close?”
“We engineered his departure from the situation,” Wilkins said, retaking the lead over the discussion. “At the appropriate time Detective Graham here, one of our finest undercover operatives, will reappear, hopefully in a courtroom.”
Temple looked at Coconis/Graham again. The neck tattoo was gone. Temple pointed at his own throat.
“It was painted on,” Coconis said. “It fooled them good.”
“So did your role as pimp. You were seen with Sidduth Nair, the missing daughter, for the last time. You helped her into an SUV, you scared off a boyfriend with her. A young black kid. You remember that?” Temple said.
“Nope. There were a lot of girls. The Villains had a stable of about thirty of them. I couldn’t keep them straight.”
Temple looked at Wilkins. “Your man here did a hell of a good job ferrying women around to be basically raped all day and all night long. How is that going to play in a courtroom?”
Coconis took a step toward Temple and another officer put a hand on his shoulder.
“He did what he had to do to maintain his cover,” Wilkins said. “If the Villains were the purveyors of drugs or guns, he would have been involved with that too. As it was, their business was the flesh trade. All the more reason to bring them down, wouldn’t you say?”
