Текст книги "The Survivor"

Автор книги: Sean Slater

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 12 (всего у книги 29 страниц)

Thirty-Three

The morning sun broke through the dirty yellow drapes and formed a thin gold line across Red Mask’s eyes. He lay flat on a small wooden mat. The pain told him he was still alive. It moved through his shoulder like a worm eating his tissue.

From somewhere down below, he could hear the angry words of a couple arguing. Someone had stolen something from someone, and someone was gonna pay. Through violence or sex or maybe both. The argument was nothing unusual for this place. After all, this was the Aster, one of the worst slums in Strathcona. Anyone living here was a junkie, a whore, or one of the endless crazies littering the Skids.

And anyone that mattered never set foot in this place.

Red Mask was unconcerned. The police would never locate him. His only known living quarters was his mailing address, and that was 533 Raymur Street. In the projects underneath the overpass. Down by the train tracks.

Where Father lives.

The thought came from nowhere. Left him empty.

He could not see Father again. Not after all that had happened. How could he ever tell him about Tran? He couldn’t. It was but one of the many sacrifices required to reach the Perfect Harmony.

A sad smile broke his lips. Harmony. It now seemed such an empty word.

He rolled off the mat and felt the jagged shrapnel of the bullet tear through his shoulder. He vomited, bringing up nothing but transparent fluid. When the spasms stopped, he forced himself to stand in the tilting, shifting room. With his good arm, he reached behind his back and felt the rubberised grip of the Glock.

He was armed. He was prepared.

Pain or no pain, infection or no infection, living or dying, he had to go. It was time to complete his orders. It was time to finish the mission.

Thirty-Four

Striker felt hazy as they drove for coffee. He blamed it on the lack of sleep, but knew there were deeper issues. He aimed the unmarked cruiser north and glanced east. Daylight was breaking across the sky, fighting through the thin wisps of cloud. The growing light made everything feel less harsh, almost pretty. Even in the Skids. It reminded him it was actually morning, and he called home to see if Courtney was up. She wasn’t. He wondered if she would’ve picked up anyway after reading the call display and seeing it was just dear ol’ Dad.

Probably not.

She was pissed at him. Again. Like she always was for anything he did. Whether it was because he wouldn’t let her go to a late-night party, or because he had two legs and breathed oxygen – it didn’t seem to matter. There was no logical explanation half the time, and no chance of avoiding her emotional outbursts. The fiasco with Felicia last night had only made everything worse. With Courtney at home. And with Felicia at work.

The memory fluttered through his brain, made his blood pressure rise. He pushed it away, drove the cruiser down to the Powell Street diversion and cut through the Starbucks drive-thru. He ordered an Americano for himself, black, and a lemon poppy-seed muffin. When he asked Felicia what she wanted, her response made him laugh.

‘Grande caramel latte, cream cheese muffin and a chocolate croissant.’

‘That’s all?’

‘It’s a start.’

He blinked. ‘You’re serious? You want that for breakfast?’

‘I need fat and sugar and carbs, Jacob, and I need them now.’

He made the order, got them through the drive-thru, and turned back down Powell Street towards the police station. He parked the cruiser in a Patrol Only parking spot on the south side of Cordova – where non-patrol cars were always parked, despite the nonstop email warnings – and headed for the 312 Annexe with Felicia at his side.

Once out of the elevator, they walked into Major Crimes. It was one large carpeted rectangle, divided by four rows of cubicles. Flanking the room were three soundproofed interview rooms, each one connected to a viewing room with cameras and recording equipment. Above the first door, a tiny white light was flashing.

Someone was in a session.

Striker cut down the aisle towards his desk. The work space he and Felicia shared was in the rear of the room, the northeast corner, which suited him just fine. It was away from the hustle and bustle of the front desk, and on the odd occasion when one of the white-shirts came down, he was far enough away to avoid them.

Their cubicles were on opposite sides of the walkway, his facing north and hers south, which made it easy for rehashing; all they had to do was turn around and talk.

Striker sat down, grabbed his muffin from the bag and took a bite. He handed Felicia the rest of the goods, and she immediately took out her chocolate croissant. He watched her devour it as if she had been fasting for days – and this was after she’d already crammed down the cream cheese muffin in the car. She took a long sip of her latte and let out a satisfied breath.

‘Good orgasm?’ he asked.

‘Sweet, sweet glucose.’

Striker picked up the phone and dialled the extension for the Forensic Video Unit. It was picked up on the second ring, and he immediately recognised the nasally whine of Ich.

‘You sound tired, tech-boy,’ Jacob said.

There was a pause. ‘Detective Striker?’

‘Got my audio?’

Ich made an uncomfortable sound. ‘Well, actually . . . no.’

‘No?’

‘It got pushed to the back of the line. When Deputy Laroche closed the file.’

Striker cursed so loud that other Detectives in the room looked over. He ignored them as Ich continued: ‘Laroche said Project Herald was top priority now, that I was to put all my resources on the wiretap.’

Striker closed his eyes, rubbed the bridge of his nose. Project Herald was one of the Deputy Chief’s babies, his own little addition to the war on proceeds of crimes involving organised gangs. The premise was simple – take away their toys and anything else that makes being a gangster fun. That way, the younglings would find the criminal life less appealing. Of course to take things away meant lots of wiretaps and surveillance, and that took resources. The project was a good thing. On a normal day, Striker would have had no problem with it.

But today was anything but normal.

Laroche had obviously changed the priority on the video tape yesterday, after believing the case was closed – but he had never reversed it. Now that they had found the dead body of Que Wong in the Fraser River, it left them with an unknown headless shooter back at the school. All bets were off. And Laroche should’ve reprioritised the Active Shooter call.

Striker tried not to get angry. ‘The file isn’t closed, Ich. It’s as hot today as it was yesterday. I need that audio, and I need it now.’

‘But Laroche—’

‘Fuck Laroche. Just get it going – I’ll take any heat for it.’

‘Your call, Detective.’

‘You’re damn right it is, and I say get it going. And Ich – I need it today.’

He hung up the phone and spotted Felicia out of the corner of his eye as she swivelled her chair to avoid his stare. For a moment he felt like getting into it with her, telling her about Laroche’s – her goddam mentor’s – latest actions, but he let it go. It was for the best.

He already had one angry female at home. He didn’t need another one at work.

‘I’ll work on the kids some more,’ she said over her shoulder.

‘Good idea,’ he said.

He called Noodles back to see if he’d had time to compare the blood samples of the stolen Civic and Raymond Leung yet, but the call went unanswered. Striker left a message for Noodles to call him back, then logged onto PRIME, the online Police Records Information Management Environment data-sharing system that every cop used to record and access information.

Meathead had given Striker the names of five individuals capable of crafting professional hidden compartments in the given time frame – Sheldon Clayfield, George Davis, Jason DeHorst, Sanjit Heer and Chris Simmons.

Striker ran them all through the system. Within a minute, all five came up as perfect scores, each one having been in and out of the system so many times they needed their own express lane.

The first two names, DeHorst and Davis, were eliminated quickly. The former was already incarcerated in Kent on robbery charges, and the latter was dead, stabbed to death in Pigeon Park nine months ago. The suspect of that homicide was still unknown, and Striker didn’t give a rat’s ass about it. It was just one less maggot infecting the meat of society. And two names off his list.

He read through the entries on the rest of the names, and it took some time. Heer was associated with the United Nations Gang, and his specialty was making Escalades and Beamers bullet-proof. He did the work legally, under the company name of Weldwood Enterprises, which Intel files disclosed as nothing more than a four-car garage operation, situated just off Maclure Road in Abbotsford. But Heer had no history with hidden compartments, and so Striker temporarily scratched his name off the list.

That left only two names: Chris Simmons and Sheldon Clayfield.

Both were good matches. Both had long criminal histories, both had been linked to different gangs – Simmons to the Angels, Clayfield to the Scorpions – and both had their own Autobody and Repair shops right here in the Lower Mainland. Simmons was further out, a two-hour drive to Mission. Because of this, Striker got a contact, Janet Jacobson, who worked for the Abbotsford Police, to check Simmons out. As for Clayfield, he was right here in the downtown core. Franklin Street; the 1500 block.

The location alone made Sheldon Clayfield Target One.

Striker signed onto CABS – the Criminal Automated Booking System – and punched in the name, bringing up Clayfield’s mug-shot. Staring back at him was a thin, pallid man, pushing well into his fifties. He had deep lines under his eyes and around his mouth that looked well earned by hard times. His dyed black hair was swept up on both sides like a pair of falcon wings – a ridiculous attempt to cover his bald spot.

‘Who’s that?’

Striker craned his neck and saw that Felicia had come up behind him.

‘Hopefully, he’s the man who rigged our stolen car.’ Striker rubbed his hands over his face, felt his blood pressure rising.

‘You okay?’ she asked.

‘There’s just . . . a lot.’

‘You need to relax.’

He laughed. ‘How can I? We got too many things going in too many directions. It’s like a bag of marbles someone dropped, each one rolling where it’s gonna roll.’

‘And we’ll work through them.’

Her calmness bugged him, and he wondered if maybe she didn’t see it all. He started counting off the problems on his fingers. ‘One, we got a headless gunman and we don’t even know his identity. Two, we got tattoos on White Mask we can’t define. Three, we got three kids we know were targeted more than the others, and we don’t know why. Four, we got someone out there who made a hidden compartment for these pricks, and we haven’t found him yet. And five, we still haven’t even heard the audio from the school feed yet because of goddam Laroche’s interfering. And all that doesn’t even include Red Mask. We have no idea where he is or when he’ll strike next.’

‘At this point, we still don’t know that Red Mask wasn’t Leung.’

‘Raymond Leung is not Red Mask, Feleesh. I know it.’

Felicia’s face relaxed for the first time that morning. She smiled and gently brushed her fingers through his hair.

‘It’s your second day back, Jacob.’

‘I know that.’

‘Relax. Or you’ll end up back on stress leave.’

He looked around the room and felt tired. Hard to believe this was only the beginning. ‘We’re falling deeper and deeper into a hole here, Felicia.’

‘It’s an investigation, remember? One thing at a time. And right now it’s ten o’ clock.’

‘So?’

‘So let’s get going,’ she said. She grabbed his arm and hauled him to his feet. ‘We got some parents to meet.’

The words hit Striker like a hammer.

Meeting with the parents – it was the last thing in the world he wanted to do. Talking to them was going to be as hard as the shootout with Red Mask.

Thirty-Five

They had to drive by the school, which was a bad idea as far as Striker was concerned. Too many memories were still raw, and there were too many questions to answer. As if to shove this fact in his face, a horde of camera crews sat outside the front of the school, like spiders lurking in their webs. They were filming the mass of flowers and cards and baskets spread out all over the front lawn, where a makeshift memorial had been set up to honour the dead. Streams of people were out front, most of them still looking around in numb disbelief.

Striker eyed them all with a dark foreboding. ‘You recognise any?’ he asked.

Felicia shook her head. ‘Nope.’

‘Good.’ He drove on by the crowds towards the Chow house. ‘How many of the parents we meeting?’

‘Two.’

‘Just two? Where are the rest?’

Felicia pulled out her notebook to get the names right. ‘Conrad MacMillan, the Grade Eight kid that was killed, his parents are Archibald and Margaret. Archie’s on his way back from Scotland as we speak. He was over there dealing with an ailing father when all this happened.’

‘Christ.’

‘Yeah, welcome home. So just Margaret’s coming down.’ She read on. ‘William and Stefana are Chantelle O’Riley’s parents. They were all prepared to meet with us till Stefana had a meltdown. William was already on his way over, but he turned around to deal with her. Called back and said it was too soon, said they needed some time. A day or two, at least.’

‘And what about Tina Chow’s parents?’ Striker said the words with unease. Courtney had known Tina and Conrad.

And so had he.

Felicia cleared her throat. ‘Parents are Stanley and Doris Chow. Stanley’s taken their youngest child away from all this, so we’re just meeting with Doris.’

‘Three dead kids, two parents. Christ.’

‘There were other kids shot too, Jacob. Twenty-two dead, and the injured count is still unreported. We can talk to their parents too, if need be.’

He shook his head. ‘Not at this point. The others were random. We’ll see what we can find here first.’

They drove quickly past the school, turned right at the next corner and cruised along Hemlock Glen. They soon spotted a white two-storey with a white picket fence to match. Out front were two black Mercedes. It was the Chow house. Two women stood beside the backyard gate. One was Asian, the other white. Both were standing there as still as lawn furniture. Not talking. Not really doing anything. Just staring off into space.

The Asian lady blinked out of her stupor and held up a hand.

‘That’s them,’ Felicia said.

Striker pulled over. The half-frozen gravel crunched beneath the car’s tires. He stopped, turned off the ignition, then looked at Felicia.

‘You go with Margaret MacMillan, I’ll take Doris Chow. We’ll compare notes later.’

She nodded her agreement. ‘Focus on the Debate Club.’

‘Debate Club?’

‘I know it sounds odd, but after talking to Caroline and some of the teachers, it’s the only link I can come up with. Chantelle O’Riley and Tina Chow were in Grade Ten, but by all accounts they never spoke to one another outside of class, and they hung out in completely different social circles. As for Conrad MacMillan, he was in Grade Eight and didn’t talk to any of them – except for in the Debate Club. Conrad and Chantelle and Tina all belonged to it: so far, it’s the only connection we have between the three.’

Striker thought this over as he undid his seatbelt. ‘You ready?’ he asked.

‘No, but when has that ever mattered?’ She opened up the door and got out.

Striker followed, feeling sick to his stomach. He had no idea what to say to the women.

While Felicia and Margaret MacMillan walked down the bark mulch path to the east side of the house, Striker steered Doris Chow southward into the garden. He had never met Tina’s mother before but could immediately see the resemblance.

Doris was small, five foot at best. Thin, too. But not a lightweight. She looked strong and wiry, in good shape for a forty-ish woman. Her hair was naturally black, though it had a burgundy tint. It was swept back into a ponytail, held in place by a lime green scrunchie that stuck out against her hair and purple jogging suit. She wore no make-up, so the lines under her eyes and around her mouth gave away her true age, but she got away with it because she was naturally good-looking.

They walked on, talked.

Striker took his time with her. They discussed the little things first. The unimportant matters: how long she had been married, when she’d immigrated to Canada, how big her family was, and so on. Through it all, Striker kept reflecting on what losing Courtney would have done to him, had she been one of the fallen.

It was a thought that left him feeling sick.

They reached the end of the garden where a row of bare thornbushes surrounded a lone cherry blossom tree. The tree was large, easily thirty feet tall. Oddly, it was still in bloom, with many of the blossoms having fallen to the ground, mottling the half-frozen grass and bark mulch in pink tones.

Doris stooped to pick one up. She rubbed the petals between her fingers and murmured, ‘This was her favourite, the cherry blossom.’

‘I can see why.’

As she stood there, looking at the beautiful pink flower in her hand, all of a sudden Striker saw the other side of her. There was frailness there. Like a piece of rubber band that was stretched too far and trembling from the pressure. It pained him to push her any further. But it was necessary.

He turned to face her. ‘Mrs Chow, have you thought about why? Why Tina?’

She looked up. ‘There is no reason. Just evil kids with guns. They were shooting everyone.’

Striker met her stare, shook his head. ‘There’s more to it, I’m afraid. I think Tina was targeted.’

Doris’s face paled. ‘Targeted?’

‘Yes. Would you have any idea why?’

‘But there were so many kids . . .’

‘A lot of kids were shot, Mrs Chow, yes, I know. But from the evidence I’ve seen, three of those kids were targeted specifically. Tina was one of them. So was Conrad MacMillan. And Chantelle O’Riley.’

Doris’s face twitched, but she managed to answer and maintain her composure.

‘But my daughter didn’t socialise with those kids. I’d never even met Margaret before this morning.’

‘I know that, and that’s why this investigation is so hard. There’s a common connection here somewhere, and we have to find it.’

Doris looked away towards the mountains. The soft fall wind blew her hair back, but the scrunchie kept all but a few hairs tucked in place. She stood there for a long moment, and Striker allowed her the silence. When she spoke again, she seemed flustered.

‘I’m sorry, my mind is racing. I can’t seem to take it all in.’

Striker helped her out. ‘I’ve heard Tina was part of a Debate Club?’

This seemed to give Doris a jolt. ‘The Debate Club. Oh, yes. She loved it so much! She excelled at using her mind, and she made friends through it. Had some wonderful experiences. They took a trip, you know, last September. All the kids went. Twelve of them, I think.’

‘Where did they go?’

‘Hong Kong. Tina was so excited, she talked about it for weeks.’ The memory brought a weak grin to the woman’s lips, and she laughed sadly. ‘If there was one thing my daughter was good at, it was talking.’

‘What did they debate, here and in Hong Kong?’

She shrugged. ‘Normally, they would debate anything that was pertinent. And hot – they liked hot topics. Abortion. The death penalty. Assisted suicide. When they went to Hong Kong, the topic was freedom and world religions. National sovereignty. The debate was on China’s rule over Tibet. It caused quite a stir – they had to cut the tournament short.’

‘Why?’

‘They didn’t say.’

Striker thought this over. ‘Did Tina speak on the subject?’

‘They all did, as far as I know.’

‘But you weren’t there?’

She shook her head. ‘No, only Principal Myers went.’

Striker wrote this down in his notebook.

‘Do you have any children, Detective Striker?’ Tina Chow suddenly asked.

Striker thought of how Courtney had known Tina, a small fact Doris was obviously unaware of. ‘A daughter, yes. She goes to Saint Patrick’s.’

This seemed to shock the woman. ‘She is . . . okay?’

‘She was skipping class yesterday.’

Doris smiled, as if this was funny. She let out a soft laugh, then suppressed another cry. The pink petal fell from her hand and blew away in the gentle breeze. Blew away as easily as Tina Chow’s life had blown away just twenty-four hours ago.

Striker saw her face quiver, saw how she was slowly losing the battle with her composure.

‘I’m sorry,’ he offered quietly.

Doris nodded and the tears finally came, running freely down her thin, pale cheeks. When she spoke, her voice was barely audible.

‘Enjoy every day with her, Detective,’ she said. ‘Every minute, every second. And appreciate her. Appreciate all the small things . . . you never know when they’ll be taken away.’