Only the Dead (16 page)

‘People go to prison for this sort of thing,’ he said.

Devereaux said, ‘Your word against mine. I fancy my chances.’

He opened the door, kept his back to it. He pulled the slide back and shook out the live round from the chamber, let it fall to the floor. A neat arc as it rolled outside. He freed the magazine and pocketed it, tossed the gun into McCarthy’s lap.

Devereaux stepped out and pulled the door shut behind him, walked away through the crowd to the exit.

T
UESDAY
, 14 F
EBRUARY
, 9.07
P.M
.

A
t least the station was close.

Devereaux went in through the garage entrance. He felt calmer than he thought he would. Maybe courage of convictions had a steadying effect.

He logged his car out and drove back down to the waterfront. An idling taxi had claimed the alley beside Stanton’s building, so he left the car on the kerb. The street door was still open. The fire escape was locked, as they’d left it. He considered a quick pick, but he’d had his share of breaking and entering for one night. He hit the intercom buzzer for Monique’s unit.

‘Who is it?’

‘Sean Devereaux.’

She didn’t reply. He remembered McCarthy had introduced him as his plus-one: the name meant nothing to her.

‘One of the policemen that was here earlier,’ he said.

‘The one here with Don?’

‘That’s right.’

No answer. The speaker held a light hiss.

‘Are you there?’ he said.

No answer.

He stabbed the button a couple of times. ‘Hey. Just listen a moment.’

‘What do you want?’

‘Just to come up and speak to you.’

‘What for?’

‘Just to talk. I can help you.’

‘You weren’t much help last time you were here.’

‘I know. I’m sorry.’

‘Who else is with you?’

He paused. A man entered the building. Eyes downcast as he key-carded the elevator, lest he see a plea for access.

‘Who else is with you?’ she said.

‘Nobody.’

‘You’re by yourself.’

‘I’m by myself.’

‘So how did you get in last time?’

‘McCarthy picked the lock.’

She was quiet a long time. He was watching the street door: pre-existing cautiousness, bolstered by the evening’s events.

‘I’ll come down and let you in,’ she said.

The elevator doors opened a minute later. She was leaning against one wall, arms folded, legs crossed.

‘Is Shane home?’ he said.

She shook her head. ‘He’s not back yet.’

He stepped inside the lift. The doors closed, and they rode up in silence. She used a key to unlock her door, held it for him as he stepped inside. The cardboard boxes hadn’t moved, but she’d cleaned the mess off the bathroom floor.

‘He shouldn’t have done that,’ Devereaux said.

The keys rang as she dropped them on the counter. ‘Yeah, no shit. You could have said that a little louder and a little sooner. Like, an hour ago when you were here.’

‘I know. I’m sorry.’

She smiled thinly. ‘Whose side are you on anyway?’

‘Not his.’

‘Where is he?’

‘Don? I don’t know.’

‘Where’s Shane?’

‘I’m not sure. He got roughed up a little.’

‘What? Shit.’ She looked panicked, hustled round in front of him. ‘Is he okay?’

‘Yeah. He’s okay. He’s fine. He took a fist in the gut, but he’s okay.’

‘Oh, my God.’ She nudged a path through the boxes and stood at the window, arms folded, not looking at him. ‘Where was this?’

‘In Pit.’

‘Oh, God. I knew I shouldn’t have said where he was. Shit.’

‘He’s okay. I’m sure he’s okay.’

‘So why isn’t he home yet?’

‘He knew we’d visited earlier, he probably wanted to stay clear.’

‘Does he need to go to hospital?’

‘No, he doesn’t need to go to hospital. I’m sure he’s fine.’

He fished in his pockets for a business card. He found one in his jacket and offered it to her, but she ignored it. He set it face-up on the counter. ‘I’m sure he’s fine, but if he doesn’t turn up in a couple of hours, you can give me a call. My mobile’s on there.’

She didn’t reply. Hopefully, he thought, because he was sounding rational. She gestured with one arm. ‘This stuff isn’t stolen,’ she said. ‘Case you were wondering.’

‘I wasn’t.’

‘But Don thought it was.’

‘I think he just wanted to scare you.’

She dipped her head, she touched away tears. ‘Will he send
people round to go through the house?’

‘I doubt it. He wanted information from you. He wasn’t looking for an arrest.’

She looked at him. ‘But could he arrest me, if he wanted to?’

‘I don’t know. You tell me.’

‘Nothing here is stolen.’

‘Well, okay then.’

Thin lips below a long stare. ‘What about, like, the drugs?’

‘I’d get rid of them, if I were you.’

‘They’re Shane’s, not mine.’

‘Whoever’s they are, they’re not the sort of thing you want around the house.’

‘This isn’t the sort of conversation I thought I’d be having with a cop.’

‘No … well, I think my continued employment’s in jeopardy.’

‘How come?’

‘Don’s got a lot of pull. And I pissed him off pretty bad.’

‘How?’

‘Thirty minutes ago I pointed a gun in his face. I don’t think it went down well.’

She pondered it. ‘You were helping Shane?’

‘Hopefully, I stopped punch number two. Other wise I just threw my job away for nothing.’

‘So you’ve lost your job?’

‘We’ll see.’

She looked away. Awkward with the quiet, teeth gritted gently. One of the boxes was open at the top, like slack lips. She waved the flap idly, revealed squat plastic tubs packed side by side. ‘Protein powder,’ she said. ‘I order it online, then on-sell. I used to have a couple of gyms I sold to, but I’m going to get a website-thing set up so people can just look me up and do orders. I’ve got to ring the guy next week.’

‘Good for you.’

She flicked a nail on a plastic lid, smiled shyly. ‘Thirty-four fifty if you’re that way inclined. Just add milk. Although you don’t look like you need it.’

He laughed. ‘I’ll take it as a compliment.’

Something boomed in the stairwell and she flinched, raked her hair one-handed to camouflage the motion. ‘You sure Don won’t send anyone to follow up?’

‘I wouldn’t worry about it.’

She didn’t look convinced. She moved around to the counter and picked up his card, delicate and two-handed. She inspected closely.

‘Let me know if he comes back,’ Devereaux said.

‘Who, Don?’

He nodded. ‘Or anyone with a badge.’

She didn’t reply. He let himself out and took the stairs down to ground.

He’d forgotten about the paperwork.

His pilfered files, courtesy of McCarthy’s cabinet, sitting in his own inbox, untended.

Shit.

He should have moved them sooner. Unopened and undeleted, they were a liability.

His phone rang. Caller ID told him it was Don McCarthy. Imagination offered a stern précis — he felt it wise not to pick up. He tossed the phone on the seat and sat quietly in the dark. Nobody had reason to check his computer. Unless The Don had already filed a complaint — in which case his computer contents rated low on the worry list. On the other hand, if he wanted to see what the documents contained, he might not get another chance.

Just do it
.

Devereaux smiled. He’d given himself that same advice before, and it hadn’t ended well. He started the car and cruised south uptown towards the station. He channel-hopped between patrol and CIB Comms frequencies. Just standard chatter: Sean Devereaux didn’t make the Be On Lookout alerts. He played it safe anyway, and left the car in the Civic parking building in favour of the station basement. He walked across Mayoral Drive and went in the main entrance, rode the lift to CIB.

Still in the clear: his desk hadn’t been red-taped. Nobody looked up as he arrived. Lloyd Bowen breezed straight past him, not even a nod. Devereaux claimed his seat, cleared his screen saver and brought up his emails. A page worth of unopened messages unfurled. He skimmed subject headings: nothing threatening. He found his illicit document cache, fifty-three pages all told. He couldn’t afford the time to read anything. Printing was off limits too: fifty-plus pages of usurped paperwork, Murphy’s Law guaranteed a computer breakdown followed by awkward questioning. Plus he couldn’t risk Bowen stealing a look over his shoulder.

He brought up Hotmail. He didn’t have an account, but surely it wasn’t hard to register. It proved more difficult than anticipated: [email protected] and sean_ [email protected] were both taken. He scored third time lucky with [email protected]. The time it took to supply the required information, maybe he should have just risked a full print.

He forwarded the scanned document to his newly minted Hotmail. Sluggish progress: PDF conversion had bulked out the file size. The upload would take a while. He ran a search on the name Leonard while he waited. The National Crime Information database offered up screeds. A litany of misdeeds
by people named Leonard unfurled: Male Assaults Female, theft, receiving stolen goods. He made a fast scroll-through. Nothing leapt out at him. Nobody stood out as likely to pursue stolen money. Or maybe they all did.

He picked up his phone and called Frank Briar. The purpose was two-fold: Briar had worked drugs, and might divulge Leonard-related info. More importantly, he wanted to know if Briar had heard about the gun incident. He needed to know how much time he had.

Briar let it ring a long time. He must have recognised the number: he answered and said, ‘What is it?’

‘That’s not a nice way to answer the telephone.’

‘It’s late.’

‘It’s called police work. We keep tough hours.’

‘What do you want?’

‘You used to work drugs.’

‘On and off. If you’re wanting to score cheap smack, you’ll have to grease someone else.’

‘Hilarious.’

‘What do you want?’

‘What do you know about a guy called Leonard?’

Briar laughed. ‘The drug guy?’

‘Yeah. The drug guy.’

‘It’s a pseudonym. Nobody knows anything about him.’

‘So how do you know it’s a pseudonym?’

Briar didn’t answer. Devereaux caught background TV noise. He said, ‘An informant told me a dealer named Leonard’s after the guys who did the bank and armoured van job.’

‘Is your informant reliable?’

‘I don’t know. I only met him once.’

‘Well. Whether he’s reliable or not, saying Leonard the dealer’s looking for someone means fuck-all, because nobody
knows anything about him. People have name-dropped him, but nobody can say what he looks like.’

Devereaux went quiet. Briar ramped up his TV noise: canned laughter came through loud and clear. He seemed bored, eager to brush him off. Devereaux’s gut feeling: Briar didn’t know about what had happened between him and The Don. Maybe he had more time than he thought. Maybe McCarthy would anoint it their little secret.

He said, ‘Thanks for your help.’

‘Whatever. How’ve you been sleeping lately, now you’ve got a dead man sitting on your conscience?’

Devereaux put the handset down gently and stood up. The computer had finished. Devereaux erased the original email, then shut down the machine. He passed McCarthy’s office on the way out: door closed, no light beneath. He was back across the street and in his car by ten o’clock.

Grayson’s address was south of central city, off Gillies Avenue, in an upmarket area west of the Southern Motorway. His home was the right mirror-half of a two-unit building, close to the street behind a high ivy-draped wall. Plush living on a young cop’s wage, especially given the young cop in question had a wife and two kids. Police station rumours spoke of a breathtaking mortgage.

Devereaux parked illegally on a yellow line, mindful of headlights waking sleeping children. He crossed the street and knocked on the front door. Grayson’s wife answered. She was still made-up, dressed formal as if she’d just got in.

‘Hello, Sean.’

‘Sarah. Hi.’

‘Sophie.’ She smiled. ‘Close.’

‘Sophie. That’s right. Is he in?’

He waited at the open door while she went to find her husband. Grayson himself appeared a moment later, noose of a tie round a stubbled throat.

‘Shit. Are we on call?’

A sing-song instruction from beyond to mind his language around the kids.

‘No. I just need to use your printer, if that’s okay.’

The question took a moment to register. Devereaux got the feeling a ‘no’ was tempting. Light and dinner smells ebbed out around him. An excuse formed on Grayson’s lips, but it never made it off the mark: ‘Yeah. Sure. Just brush your feet on the mat.’

They had a small home office down stairs at the rear of the house. A desktop PC and a boxy laser printer huddled on an L-shaped desk in one corner. A window above showed a neat rubbish bin line-up on a narrow backyard path.

‘You only just on your way home?’ Grayson said.

‘Yeah. Big day.’

‘What do you need to run off?’

Devereaux sat down at the desk and told him.

Grayson propped himself in the doorframe. He looked at the floor and thumbed more slack in his tie. ‘I thought that stuff was all off limits,’ he said.

‘It was. It is.’

‘So where did you get it?’

‘McCarthy’s office.’

A pause. ‘Was he in there at the time?’

‘Guess.’

‘Shit. You broke in?’

‘I’ll pay you back for the ink.’

A little girl about four or five wearing pink pyjamas appeared at the door. A bold T-shirt slogan proclaimed her
Miss Perfect
.
She reached up and tugged on Grayson’s trouser pocket. He got a start and glanced down. ‘Hey. You should have been in bed ages and
ages
ago, Miss
Naughty
.’

He got a shy giggle in reply. She eyed Devereaux, tilted her head back and cupped a stage whisper, one-handed, up at Grayson. ‘You have to brush my teeth and tuck me in.’

‘Mum already brushed them.’

‘Yeah. But I drank juice.’

‘You drank juice. Right. Well, go upstairs and hop into bed, and I’ll be up in a minute. Did you say hello to Sean?’

‘Hello, Sean.’

‘Hello, Miss Perfect.’

She giggled behind clenched fists and scurried off back down the corridor. Devereaux smiled, wondered briefly whether his own home would ever hold that same cheerful patter.

Grayson stepped inside the room and pushed the door closed quietly. He slipped his hands in his pockets. ‘I don’t know about this,’ he said.