Behind the Badge (23 page)

“I made sure they were,” she said, rubbing her wrists.

“You think Paulson killed the DA?”

“I’d bet my badge on it,” Jill said. “He swears up and down he didn’t kill that preacher, though, and I’m not sure I believe him.”

“That wouldn’t make any sense.” Watson shrugged. “Why commit a murder in your own jurisdiction?”

“So you catch the case and steer the investigation away from yourself.” Jill matched Watson’s shrug with one of her own. “That’s what my father did.”

Paul’s execution and the revelation that he was in fact the monster everyone accused him of being did nothing to lessen the weight it put on Jill’s shoulders. The closure of it all offered her a small, strange measure of peace, but his memory was ever-present. The Devin Buckner case was no different, especially knowing Paul faced a similar case during his own career, with disastrous results.

Jill couldn’t help but wonder… did the disillusionment Paul experienced in the Carlos Grainger case make it that much easier for Gregor to lead him down the path he did? Was that the opening Gregor needed to corrupt the one cop in the city everyone thought was incorruptible?

Was Jill destined to suffer the same fate?

Detective Stevens joined the pair in front of one of the empty cells, his black cowboy boots announcing his presence long before he showed up. By the time he did, his face was red and he was struggling for breath. Grabbing a knee with his right hand, Stevens clutched a nearby bar with his left, gulping in oxygen as quickly as his lungs would allow.

“Uh, Earl?” Jill quirked a brow in Watson’s direction. “You alright?”

“Nope,” Stevens answered before gulping down another hit of oxygen and standing upright again. “And neither is Fuckwad. He apparently had a capsule in his damn mouth.”

Watson frowned. “Capsule?”

“Cyanide.” Stevens tossed a thumb over his shoulder. “Started foamin’ at the mouth, convulsin’, all that shit. Medics’re looking him over, but bastard’s long gone by now.”

Watson cursed under his breath before turning to Jill. “Why would he do something like that? Paulson doesn’t strike me as the fall-on-the-sword type.”

“Unless there’s someone pulling his strings,” Jill theorized, her mind instantly going to the previous night. “Someone who considered him a loose end once we had him in our custody.”

Stevens rolled his eyes. “Don’t tell me you mean who I think you mean.”

“Honestly, I have no idea.” Jill ran her fingers through her hair, glancing over Stevens’ shoulder to make sure they were alone. She needed to speak with Captain Richards, but she couldn’t do it dressed as the vigilante. “All I know is, ever since Gregor offered his ‘help,’ things have gotten even more out of hand. The Bishop got involved, the other vigilante showed up, and now a long-tenured detective is dead in our interrogation room, the day after his old buddy announces he’s back in town.”

“What are you gonna do?”

Jill nodded in Stevens’ direction. “Go to my locker, the code’s my birthday. A change of clothes and my badge are in there. Get me those so I can change before talking to Richards. Then, I want you to find anything you can on Sam Brady.”

Watson watched as Stevens left the Holding area. “This isn’t over, is it?”

“Nope. Not by a longshot.”

CHAPTER 54

The change of clothes in Jill’s locker wound up being a faded University of Maryland hoodie, an old pair of jeans, and a pair of Chucks she’d had since high school. The sole was coming off the right shoe and the white across the toes was smudged brown and gray and a couple other colors, but she loved those shoes as much anything else she had ever owned.

But as nice as it felt to get out of the tight leather and the bulky mesh armor, Jill had to admit that she was starting to feel more comfortable in that outfit than out of it. She wasn’t sure what that said about her, and to be frank, she didn’t wanna know.

“Paulson committed suicide,” she announced without greeting her captain.

Daniel Richards, to his credit, didn’t seem shocked. Then again, he probably had the precinct’s best poker face. Instead of reacting as many others would have, he simply set his pen down, folded his arms over his chest, and cocked his head to the side.

“Guilty conscience?”

“I think he was protecting someone.” Jill stood on the opposite end of the captain’s desk, her hands stuffed into the front pocket of her hoodie. “Far be it for me to mourn a racist waste of a badge, but… we still don’t know who killed Mitch’s grandfather, and we have no way of knowing whether or not Paulson was in any way connected to Devin’s killers.”

“Mitch’s grandfather isn’t your concern,” Richards pointed out. “That case belongs to another precinct.”

“That’s done jack shit with it!”

“You can’t save everyone in this city, Jill.”

“Someone has to,” she fought back with a shrug. “Someone in this city has to understand and appreciate what it means to carry a badge.”

“And you do just that.”

Jill sighed and shook her head. “And now I’m a target because of it.”

“Don’t let Downtown bother you,” Richards argued. “I’m the one who has to fend them off. That’s my job, not yours. You catch killers and put them behind bars.”

“Unless the killers have badges.” Jill shook her head. “Then they get away with it until some other vigilante shows up out of nowhere and tosses them into the bay.”

Turning to plop herself into the sofa across from Richards’ desk, Jill brushed her fingers through her hair. When she was Detective Andersen, she wore her hair in a tight ponytail, mostly for convenience sake and because it was a slightly more professional look. Her fingertips brushed the edge of the skin graft as she raked them through her hair, and Jill shook her head before looking up at her captain.

“Brady’s back in town, too,” she announced.

“Shit,” Richards muttered, taking off his glasses and tossing them onto the blotter atop his desk.

“Had a run-in with him,” Jill explained. “Well, more like he shot me in the face and then we threw down.”

Richards opened his mouth to say something, but closed it again before any words got out. His brow scrunched in something between confusion and revulsion, and the captain decided then and there that he probably didn’t want to know what Jill meant by
shot me in the face.

“Did Brady say what he wanted?”

“To spring his buddy.”

“Then I guess we can rule out Brady as the source for the cyanide pill.”

“I’m not discounting anything at this point,” Jill muttered with a shake of her head. “But… Dan, I don’t think I can do this anymore.”

Richards frowned. “Because of this one case?”

“It’s not
just
this case.” She shook her head again. “Ever since they fished Trent’s body out of the bay, I feel like I’m always looking over my shoulder. This morning, I got into it with some cops in riot gear cause they were trying to start something with a group of protestors.”

Richards pinched the bridge of his nose before wiping both hands over his face. He visibly shuddered at the mention of riot gear and everything that insinuated.

“An actual fight, Dan.” Jill’s lower lip quivered. “I knocked two cops unconscious and shattered another one’s elbow… but if I hadn’t, then who knows what we would’ve seen on the news tonight?”

“That’s not your fault,” Richards argued, emerging from behind his desk and kneeling in front of Jill, placing his hands on her shoulders.

“Maybe. I became Bounty to fight bad guys, not cops.”

The shame was, it was hard to tell when the cops
were
the bad guys anymore. There was entirely too much gray mixed in with the black-and-white, and Jill didn’t like knowing that some who were hailed as heroes were actually anything but. They were a disgrace to the profession and everything it entailed, but the fact that downtown appeared ambivalent most of the time was even more unacceptable… especially when that ambivalence meant those who gave a damn paid a price.

“It’s not fair to the rest of you to shoulder that burden,” Jill continued. “This is
my
battle. I can’t let you guys get dragged down with me anymore.”

“Don’t you think that’s our decision to make?”

“If I was
just
a cop, yeah.” Jill chewed on her lower lip, sucking in a deep breath to keep an oncoming wave of emotion at bay. “This precinct -- you all -- would be better off without me.”

“You can’t possibly believe that.”

“Really?” Jill forced herself to look her captain in the eye, before eventually pulling away her gaze to stare at her hands, which were now cradled in her lap. “Think about how much easier your lives were before you learned my secret.”

“An easy life is not necessarily a good life,” Richards reminded with a wry, sideways grin.

Jill, despite her inner turmoil, fought back a smirk. “But if the cops find me out and bring me down, all of you could be accessories.”

“And we accepted that risk when we decided to stand by you after we learned the truth.” Richards heaved a weary sigh and glanced down at the floor. “I hope you know what you're doing.”

Richards was every bit the surrogate father Jill had needed following Paul’s arrest -- ironic, considering Richards had been the one to arrest him -- and the skeptical look the captain was giving her at the moment was just like the same look Paul used to give her. Were Jill an uncertain teenager, bravado masking just how out of her element she was, the appraisal would make her wilt. Instead, she straightened her posture, taking a moment to reflect on the weight of the badge on her hip.

It represented so much of her life. As a child, that badge had been the only thing Jill wanted. It represented all of the best qualities of humanity, qualities her father exemplified every day. As a teenager, it had become a symbol of what she thought her hometown should be. Even then, Baltimore had started to decline in several different ways, ways in which the police were either incapable or unwilling to deal. Even when she was in Iraq, avoiding IEDs and volunteering for secret government experiments, she spent every moment fighting to get back home -- to get back to the Academy.

At the Academy, she put all of her focus on getting that badge to clear her dad's name. That was her focus when the physical pain was too much and it felt like she would drown in the sheer volume of red tape and department regulations. Even when it was clear she wouldn't be able to free her father, Jill clung to what the badge represented, determined to never let herself fall into the same pit her father had.

Now, it felt like a burden more than anything. What she once thought was a symbol of truth and bravery and all that was good reminded her of corruption and all of the worst traits of humanity. Over the past few days, she had stared into the eyes of those who used their solemn oath not to make people's lives better, but to act like high school bullies with personal vendettas. And those in charge simply looked the other way, while other cops throughout the city stood in line with the aggressors. Her own Homicide team aside, Jill was short on allies in the department.

That in and of itself didn't bother her -- Jill never did this job to gain the approval of others -- but knowing these were people who could make her life hell was another matter. Time was, Jill wondered why cops who knew of corruption or brutality kept quiet while the guilty went free, but now she understood. It was a measure of self-preservation: keeping one's mouth shut meant they stayed employed. Staying quiet meant professional advancement was still possible. Speaking out meant ostracizing, black-balling... maybe even outright firing.

If not something worse.

Colonel Downs was still recovering from his injuries. He had spoken up when no one else would, and four police officers made him pay for it. The message had been received, too, because the colonel hadn't said a word since the attempt on his life in the hospital. There was no telling how Colonel Downs would act once he returned to his job, but Jill understood she could probably no longer count on his support.

Ramona Parish, one of the city's most tireless defenders of truth and freedom, had been gunned down in front of a live television audience after having the audacity to hold four police officers accountable for their misconduct. She had stood up to corruption, she had made her stand, and she paid a swift and public price for it.

“For the first time since being given this badge,” she admitted, “I really don't.”

“Don't let them get to you. I can protect you.”

“No, you can't.” Jill shook her head. “They'll shut you out just like they'll do to me. The rest of our unit, too. I'm not gonna let them do that to Ramon and the others.”

Richards huffed a nervous laugh. “You underestimate me.”

“No, you underestimate them,” Jill countered. “What they did to Downs, what they did to the DA, threatening me at every turn... Cap, this job is hard enough. You don’t need more roadblocks. I'm radioactive at this point.”

“You are the best damn cop I've ever trained,” Richards said. “You're even better than your father. You know I have your back, just like everyone else on this team. Everyone could've turned you in when they learned your secret, but they didn't. Because they all know the same thing I know: you are a credit to the Baltimore Police Department, you are a hero to this city, and we
need
you.”

“I really wish it was that simple,” Jill muttered as tears built in her right eye. “Dan, I do more good as Bounty than I do here half the time.”

“That is bullshit,” Richards argued, “and you know it.”

“Do I?” Jill shrugged, slipping out of her captain's grasp and pacing back and forth. “My being a vigilante was the only reason we ever tracked down Dr. Roberts' killer. Bounty was the only thing that saved the Colonel's life. In this line of work, things are already ruined by the time a case gets to me. Someone's already dead, other people's lives already ruined.”

“You don't have to go on this crusade alone.”

“Yeah?” Jill cocked her head to the side. “And who's got my back? The rest of the force? The commissioner? The mayor? This other vigilante that's running around?”

“
We
have your back.” Richards placed his hands on Jill's shoulders again. “Ramon, Earl, Hi, Whitney... we stand with you and beside you no matter what.”

“And I appreciate that.” Jill slipped her arms around her captain's shoulders and closed her eyes when she felt his arms return the favor. “I really, really do... and I can't tell you how much I love you all. But...” She pulled out of the hug. “A handful of us against the entire city? Maybe even the state?”

“You act like it's a war.”

“Isn't it?” Jill shrugged. “Okay, maybe not in the strictest sense, but...”

Richards leaned against the edge of his desk, folding his arms over his chest. “Did you know the first time they wanted me to be captain, I turned it down?” He gave a rueful smile when Jill shook her head. “I didn't wanna deal with the politics and the bullshit. I'd heard all the stories, how captains spent more time in meetings downtown and pouring over spreadsheets than they did actually working with the cops they were in charge of.”

Jill arched a brow. “This the part where you tell me you were wrong?”

“No, I was a hundred percent right. But here's the thing... for all of the bullshit, this job still matters. I still make a difference in this city. Don't let the minutia and the battles you can't win blind you from the real, honest good you do. You got Devin'sfamily to believe in the system again. You showed her that there are still cops in this city who can be trusted. And look at Detective Gutierrez with Mitch.”

Jill shook her head and glanced down at her feet. As desperately as she wanted to believe in everything Richards was saying, as idealistic as she wished she still was, Jill couldn't fool herself anymore. She had seen too much over the past year-plus, and she had seen just how out of her element and useless she truly was. Her badge and gun only went but so far... and that was before Jill found herself staring back at other badges determined to make sure she couldn't do her job.

“I can never win,” she mumbled.

“This job's not about winning,” Richards countered. “This job is a constant battle. The day you stop fighting is the day you turn in your badge.”

Pursing her lips with a nod, Jill held out her hand. The badge rested in her palm, and she watched as her captain took in the sight of it before meeting her gaze. When he cocked his head to the side, a mixture of hurt and confusion contorting his softly wrinkled features, she drew a deep breath and forced herself to stand up a little straighter.