A Lick Of Heat: H.E.A.T. Book Four

by Claire, Nicola

  A minute or so later, an ambulance tore out of the station, lights on, siren off. At half past two in the morning, that was standard operating procedure.

  “You should get some sleep,” Damon said from the pullout couch across from me.

  I was sitting at his desk, a small reading light offering a soft glow to see by, shoes off, jacket over the back of the chair. My gun holster sat forlornly on a side table, sans gun. As soon as I spotted it, my right hand shifted to where my CIB badge should have been and found my belt bare.

  “Did I wake you?” I asked.

  “You know you didn’t, love.” The ambulance station.

  I sat back and attempted to look relaxed as I met Damon’s sleepy eyes. We’d stayed up discussing possible options for Weston’s true identity until midnight. Then it was uniformly decided that as we’d made no progress to speak of we’d all get some sleep - at least those not on shift patrolling the station property - and attack it again tomorrow with fresh eyes.

  I’d even gone so far as to lie down with Damon on his pullout. He’d fallen asleep within minutes of placing his head on the pillow, a trait I was sure every emergency services shift worker was capable of achieving. But although I’d often worked night shift, I usually stayed awake unless on call. And being on call as a detective was entirely different than being on night shift as a firemen out of the busiest station in Auckland.

  “We know where he’s been seen,” I said into the comfortable silence that had blossomed between us. “That isn’t a lie or a misdirect. We have a litany of crimes we can attribute to him. I’ve interacted with him personally.” Albeit while tied to a cross in a cult-like chamber as a former childhood neighbour contemplated killing me. “We can put a reasonably accurate profile together on what we do know,” I added.

  “But you still can’t work out who he could be,” Damon finished for me.

  I nodded my head and stared at the files again.

  “Four of these cases are from Wellington’s CIB. He could have been born there.”

  It was a stretch, and we both knew it. Wellington, like any large cosmopolitan city in any country throughout the world, attracted a criminal element from outside its borders as well as within them. They didn’t necessarily have to have originated from there.

  “Damn it,” I said. “I can’t work this out.”

  Damon was silent for a moment, and then he sat himself up and scrubbed his face. After he’d successfully rubbed the cobwebs away, he repositioned himself in a seated, semi-reclined position on the pullout and announced, “OK. Let’s try to puzzle this out together.”

  I smiled at him, but he was already inside his head going over what we did know about Weston.

  “What possible reasons could he have for messing with finance companies?” he asked.

  “He might be from a lower socio-economic background.”

  “Chip on his shoulder,” Damon agreed. “Is it enough?”

  “It depends how that poverty-stricken upbringing affected him.”

  “Maybe he lost a parent or loved-one due to their financial situation?”

  “Could be. I’ll mark it as a possible avenue to check.”

  “What else?” he muttered, the words for himself and not just me.

  Damon was tired and worried about his sister, and yet he took the time to help me. Not just because it might lead to finding Carole, but because he knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep without having worked something out that we could follow up on tomorrow.

  “Poor housing conditions,” I said, following the financial angle further. “Add in his fetish for fire.”

  “Fetish for fire?” Damon smirked at me.

  Outwardly I ignored him, but inside I was laughing.

  “So, maybe he lost a parent in a house fire,” I suggested.

  “It definitely would fit the profile,” Damon said.

  “But am I trying to make something out of nothing?”

  Damon stared at me for a moment.

  “It’s a possibility,” he finally said.

  “I want to catch him so badly that I’m starting to see dots that don’t exist.”

  “Don’t rule it out completely. But you of all people, Lara, know not to take something as a fact until it’s been proven to be so.”

  It’s hard to tell fact from fiction, Sport. Never make the mistake of believing something until you know it’s the truth.

  “You’re right,” I muttered. They both were. “In the morning we’ll get Investigation to check out his known haunts again. Prevention can try to spot him on the CCTV, and you and I will see if any of my informants have noticed Carole back on the party scene.”

  “You think he’d risk taking her out?”

  “I think he wants to lead us on a merry dance and if that means dangling your sister in front of us, then yes.” It was a hard thing for Damon to hear. “But his overconfidence could be the mistake on his part that we need.”

  That we desperately needed.

  This man was an enigma; even if we knew Weston was a psychopath with a penchant for burning things. Blackmail and manipulation were his go-to tactics. Hypnosis was his means of achieving much-needed control over others. We knew things about him; we just didn’t know who he actually was.

  He’d got into bed with Nathanial Marcroft. Maybe there was something in that partnership that would explain things. Was it simply an opportunity? Or something more calculated? Carole had attended Sweet Hell. She’d been on the altar in the Irreverent Inferno. And the guy who had… pleasured her to pass into the second circle of hell had been beaten to near death afterwards by none other than Weston himself.

  If Carole were controlled by Weston, then she would have been in Sweet Hell at his direction surely. And yet he’d punished the Irreverent Inferno Initiate for touching her. For touching what belonged to him.

  Why would he do that? Carole had clearly been sent into Sweet Hell to lure Damon in as well. Weston wanted revenge, that much we did know. The HEAT arsons. Damon being framed for Samantha Hayes’ murder. Damon’s character being besmirched so Cawfield could spread the rumours around.

  Had Weston used Carole as a lure and then regretted it? Or had he simply flipped out when he realised what had been done to her? To his possession? Was Carole his weakness? Could I use it?

  I looked across the room at Damon, but because I’d been lost in thought for so long, he’d closed his eyes again to get much-needed rest. He was gently snoring, still in a semi-reclined, semi-seated position. He looked comfortable enough, though, so I left him where he was.

  My mind tumbled and turned, testing theories and discarding them one after the other. We knew enough to be sure Weston was dangerous.

  We didn’t know nearly enough to catch the bastard.

  I was disgusted with my lack of progress so far.

  Standing up from Damon’s desk, I went to grab a coffee from the kitchen. There’d be a pot on for the Rescue guys who were on duty doing security sweeps of the property. I slipped my shoes back on because walking barefoot around HEAT just seemed too casual for my liking, and then eased out of the office, making sure I didn’t disturb Damon.

  He’d not been sleeping well for some time. Possibly for as long as he’d been back in my life. He had moments of relief, usually after we’d had an especially enthusiastic round in his bed or mine, but I knew the troubles with his sister were wearing him down.

  Just like Carl’s disappearance had worn me down, too, eventually.

  I thought I’d made significant progress with my former partner’s faked death. The fact that I didn’t think he was in a sound mental state of mind when he’d chosen to go into hiding instead of reaching out to me made it easier to accept. I’d spoken to Carl since his fall from that cliff. I’d looked into eyes that at one time had been familiar and were now shadowed in madness.

  He’d killed to protect me.

  I didn’t understand why he’d done it per se, but I understood he’d thought it was the right thing at the t
ime. He’d been chasing down leads on what was left of Declan King’s organisation. A criminal organisation which had caused all manner of mayhem throughout Auckland City.

  The leads had led to Auckland’s Crown Prosecutor who had then used Carl’s informants to chase me down as a possible leak. Carl hadn’t confided in me, though, but he had been about to when he was shot and fell off the cliff out near Howick.

  I stopped at the kitchen counter and stared at nothing. ASI had helped catch King in the end. They’d thwarted a few of his earlier crimes and then been involved in the final capture of the crime boss at the District Court building.

  Shaking my head, I dismissed contacting Anscombe in the morning to look more closely at that avenue of thought. Carl wasn’t my main concern right now. Weston was.

  But when I topped off my coffee with milk and leaned against the counter to look out the window towards Pitt Street, I realised that Carl was not done with me.

  Across the road, standing outside the now empty ambulance station, was a shadowed figure in a familiar fedora hat and long trench coat.

  The coffee cup met the bench with a thud, and I was running toward the stairs in a heartbeat. I didn’t bother to exit through the rear of the fire station to the carpark out back, but instead entered the Watch part of the building and made my way to the front door.

  It was shut and locked of course, but this was a working station. Egress was a given. Ingress was a bit tighter. I didn’t know the code to unlock the door to get back in, but I had no intention of getting back in until I’d confronted Carl.

  He was still standing across the street, staring at Pitt Street Fire Station. His eyes had undoubtedly found me, but it looked like he was a statue, so still and creepy.

  I walked out onto the short driveway that made up the front of the station. An area only big enough for the engines to reverse onto and be out of road traffic while they waited for the automated doors to the garage to open.

  My feet stopped at the curb.

  Carl slowly walked forward and stood on the opposite side of the road, matching me; feet to curb.

  We stared at each other.

  I couldn’t see his face; his hat was pulled down low. I thought perhaps he did that so none of the firemen or ambos would recognise him too quickly. The fedora and trench coat were only known to those immediately associated with him and his case.

  This man had killed people to protect me.

  A car passed between us, but neither of us looked away.

  Where was he staying? I had to follow up on his ex-girlfriends.

  Why was he here?

  I looked around, trying to spot the Rescue team member from HEAT who should have been watching the front of the fire station. I couldn’t see him, and as I was standing out the front of the fire station, he should have been visible to me.

  I considered the shadows, but what little cover there was down the side of the building leading to the carpark weren’t enough to hide them from me. I frowned. Then quickly looked back at where Carl had been standing.

  He was gone.

  My heart beat a little faster.

  I stared at the empty footpath in front of the ambulance station and then checked the shadows to the side between the station and its neighbouring buildings. There was nowhere for him to hide. I looked up and down the street. Where had he gone?

  The most obvious answer was he’d gone inside the ambulance station itself. Like the fire station, it was locked up tight. And like the fire station, there was a combination lock on the front door, so ambulance staff from other stations could get into Pitt Street when sent there to cover a shortfall.

  Carl could have known that combination lock.

  I wanted to cross the road and look in the windows; bang on the door and wake someone up. But Pitt Street Ambulance Station was the busiest in Auckland, and all the on-duty staff were out on calls.

  By the time I gained access, calling up Dispatch and getting them to contact St John’s, Carl would be gone. And racing around to the rear of the building would take too long. Either way, Carl was too good to get caught.

  I turned back to the fire station, my eyes scanning the driveway to the side where the Rescue member should have been. He still hadn’t returned. If they were doing a shift swap, it should have been completed by now.

  I took a step towards the driveway, and then another and another. Before long, I was running.

  No one was watching the front of the building. But the Rescue member - CeeGee they called him, for Curious George - who was meant to be watching the rear, and his partner out the front, was still there.

  Out cold and looking worse for wear.

  Blood dribbled down the side of his face from a blunt-force trauma wound on his temple; his breathing was shallow and uneven. I checked his airway and wounds to stem any life-threatening bleeding, but what was undoubtedly life-threatening was internal and not something I could prevent easily. So, I simply dug my cellphone out of my trouser pocket to call in more suitable help.

  I didn’t bother with Comms; I dialled 111 like a layperson and asked from an ambulance and not the cops. I may have been on suspension, but I was still a bloody cop. Then I dialled Damon. As Chief Investigator of HEAT, he was in charge of the entire division. Of every single man not just those in Investigation.

  But as Damon Michaels, CeeGee was his friend; part of his professional family.

  The lights came on inside the fire station, and then I heard Damon yelling at his men, waking them all up. They’d have a medic in Rescue. Not quite as good as the ambos, but certainly better than I was.

  Chaos ensued within minutes. But it was organised chaos as only highly trained and experienced emergency services workers could manage. Damon issued orders as the Rescue medic tended to their fallen man. Marc and Flack and Jude and Gus and Spence and Mal and Russel and Horse were all there. I ticked them all off inside my head until I came to a startling conclusion.

  One of HEAT was missing.

  “Where’s Stretch?” I said.

  Damon’s wide and clearly worried eyes snapped to me and then he was searching each member of HEAT.

  “Who was teamed up with CeeGee?” I asked.

  Everyone looked around at everyone else and then Damon swore sharply.

  “Stretch was,” he said, his voice rough.

  “In pairs,” I instructed loudly. “Scour the property. Look everywhere, inside and out.”

  They jumped to do my bidding, but I knew it was only because they wanted to find their missing man and not because I was in charge here. I might have been the only cop in attendance, but Damon was still their boss, and some even looked to him before heading out to search for Stretch’s body.

  I hoped it wasn’t a body we would find and that he would just be lying under some shrubs somewhere, unconscious. But still alive.

  And then I remembered Weston’s MO. Abduction. Blackmail. Manipulation. Murder.

  Hennessey was being blackmailed.

  Carole was being manipulated.

  Angelo had been murdered.

  We were missing the abduction if you didn’t count Carole Michaels in two of the four pattern pieces. And I didn’t think we should. I hadn’t yet decided where the CIB traitor fit into it all; manipulation or blackmail? Neither was a welcome thought. And the fact that I was sure the CIB traitor was linked to Weston as well meant that Weston wasn’t afraid to double up on his pattern.

  Or Carole was outside that now, a part of him that he couldn’t separate from, which meant maybe the CIB traitor was the manipulation piece of the pattern puzzle.

  I pushed that aside for now because I did know where Stretch fit into it all.

  Weston had abducted him.

  Is that why Carl was there across the street? To warn me? But he hadn’t warned me in time, had he?

  I pulled my cellphone out, held my thumb over Pierce’s number in the directory, and then thought of Inspector Hart’s instructions and searched for ASI instead.

  It
was the middle of the night, so I didn’t have to deal with Carmel.

  But I did get to deal with one of the tech geeks.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “Sure, Sport, Follow Your Gut, But Always Cover Your Arse With A Little Evidence.”

  Anscombe himself turned up, but Pierce appeared in his own vehicle. He wasn’t the only one from CIB to be assigned the case, though. Trevor Jones stepped out of his police-issued sedan a few minutes later and stuffed a toothpick in his mouth as he took in the scene.

  I watched on as he assessed each person in attendance, from the HEAT guys to Red Watch Fire to Pierce and Anscombe and then me. I’d always known Jones to be a laid back cowboy, but you didn’t have a longterm career in CIB as he had without meeting certain criteria.

  Jones was undoubtedly an observant cop.

  He crossed the carpark to me.

  “Patient gone already?” he asked.

  “Yeah,” I said. “George Beard, aka CeeGee.”

  “And the one that’s missing?”

  “Andrew McIntyre, we call him Stretch.”

  “Firemen and their cute nicknames,” he grumbled. It was the middle of the night, so I understood his less than enthusiastic attitude.

  “I gather you’ve been assigned the case,” I said.

  He looked back at me, a shadow of empathy crossing his features. “Heard about your troubles, Keen,” he said. “Don’t much believe what they’re sayin’.”

  I could just imagine what Cawfield was saying; I was thankful he hadn’t been assigned this case. Trevor Jones I could handle, but Joe Cawfield?

  “We’ll get some uniforms in to walk the scene,” Jones said. “I wanna ask a few questions of those on-station.” He looked at the number of HEAT members in attendance. “They having a party or something?”

  There were more here than there would normally be for three-thirty in the morning.

  “Something like that,” I said and patted him on the shoulder as I walked off towards Damon and Pierce.