Wasted Lives, a Detective Mike Bridger novel (28 page)

Joseph Kingi
junior was getting impatient, he had not heard from his father or
his father’s lawyer and he wanted to get on with it. That bitch in
the next room was on heat, he could smell her from where he was and
she would need to see to her to very soon, before the drugs really
took hold. If that happened then she would be no good to anyone,
just another strung-out whore and he could have as many of those as
he wanted. She was going to be his prize. He knew deep down that
his father’s attempt at being released was a long shot, the
desperate actions of a scared old man, someone who had lost control
and wanted out. There was no ‘out’ in their game, you were a dog
for life and that was that.

“
This is
a fucking waste of time.” He said aloud, looking around at his pack
of loyal dogs. Each one of them was supposedly loyal to him,
although he was not always sure that was true. One thing he did
know was true, they were definitely loyal to the patch they all
wore on their backs. Because of that patch, they followed the
rules. The Gang rules told them he was their king, the Alpha, the
leader, he was the top dog, and short of physically overthrowing
him, they could not do a damn thing about it. He could take all
comers; none of them frightened him in the least so he did not
really care about whether their loyalty was genuine or not. What he
did care about was his power. He had the authority to make
decisions, to do as he pleased, and he did not want things to
change. It would if his father got out of prison, he would go back
to being second fiddle. His taste had lasted far too long for that
to happen now. He had made his decision

“
We
don’t need to wait any longer… it’s time.”

Barking
erupted spontaneously from within the gathered mongrels, the sound
echoing off the bare concrete walls surrounding him with the
chilling call of the animals they were.

In the room
with no roof, off of what was left of the main living area, John
Mouller failed to register the sick animal cry for blood echoing
through the cavernous empty shell that served as his cell, and in
the room next to that Jo Williamson heard the lustful call of an
Alpha looking for his bitch. The drugs racing through her system
making it hard to quantify the fear she should have felt.

Back in the
main room Joseph Kingi junior stood in the middle of his pack,
circling slowly, head up, eyes closed, arms held sideways, soaking
up the fearful adulation like a rancid sponge.

And the dogs
kept barking.

“
Where’s
that bloody ambulance?” Bridger’s forearms were aching with the
pressure he was applying to the wound on Martin’s shoulder. Before
anyone could reply, two Ambulance Medics appeared from behind them
and crouched down beside him. They were an odd pair, one, an older
male with glasses and the look of importance, sweating slightly and
carrying a large green backpack and the other a younger female who
looked fresh out of school but who appeared to be in
charge.

“
We’ll
take it from here,” the young female medic said before issuing a
set of instructions to her colleague that went straight over
Bridger’s head. Her male colleague appeared to know exactly what he
was doing though as he produced a large white compression dressing
from the bag and placed it over Martins wound after unceremoniously
pushing Bridger’s hands away.

“
You’ve
done a good job so far, the bleeding has mostly been contained,” he
said by way of conciliation. “This young man is lucky you were
here”.

Bridger was
not so sure that what the male medic had said was right about being
lucky. He looked at the female medic who was busy preparing an IV
line to put into Martins arm to try to replace some of the fluids
he had lost. They were both calm and confident and seemed in no
real hurry. He took their words and actions as a good sign that
Martin would be okay. Not exactly what David McLaren had wanted but
it was as good as it was going to get in the circumstances.

He stood up;
feeling his own blood circulating back into his stiff legs then
looked at Gary and Ken. The look on Gary’s face said to him that he
had a few questions he would like answered. The look on Ken’s face
told him that he thought he should be dead right now and he felt
cheated somehow. He actually thought Ken could be right; he
deserved whatever Ken thought should have happened but then he did
not have time to dwell on the outcome. Feeling inside his jacket
pocket, he felt the paper sheet with his false confession on it. He
knew there where lawyers that expected this to be with them in the
next two hours but he needed to find Laura first.

Picking his
phone out of his pocket, he dialled the numbers he knew by heart.
The call rang through to answer phone again. “Shit…” He closed his
eyes and breathed deeply. His mind was working over every possible
scenario, each of them bad. Where are you Laura?

He started to
panic a little but then he forced himself to control his breathing,
helping to calm him and think more clearly. She would be at work,
unable to answer her phone or in a meeting, or she may be just
ignoring his call as a show of defiance. He knew in his heart what
call he should make next but felt like he would be betraying Laura
if he did.

Gary and Ken
had moved a short distance away and looked to be in deep
discussion. He knew it was protocol to stand Ken down pending an
investigation as it was with all Police shootings and that was
probably the discussion now that was played out on the street a
short distance from the ‘victim’. He took the opportunity to slip a
bit further away as he dialled Jane’s number; he was almost back at
his car when she picked up.

“
Hey
lover.” Her voice was husky and he could sense the smile in it, “I
was wondering if you would call.”

He was in no
mood to play along “Not now Jane, have you seen Laura today?” He
did not wait for an answer “Forget that, where did she go when she
left your office this morning.”

There was a
slight pause as Jane took a breath “She said she was meeting a
client…, how did you know we had an appointment Mike? It was a last
minute thing.”

“
Did you
see anyone hanging around that looked suspicious?”

“
Not
that I recall… what’s this about Mike?”

“
Nothing… If you hear from her, tell her to ring me.” He only
felt slightly guilty about not telling Jane the truth, but it was
more likely to be Laura that McLaren would target, he could not
know anything about his relationship with Jane.

“
I’m not
sure that’s a good idea Mike” Jane replied with a slight annoyance
in her voice “You don’t sound like you are in too good a mood. You
don’t want to say or do anything stupid; Laura wants to keep things
amicable, and those photo’s she showed me today… well, let’s just
say that’s not a good start.”

His thoughts
were falling over themselves inside his head while his brain
flipped from the image of his wife to that of his two colleagues,
never making any clear division between them. It was only his heart
pushing him towards Laura but he did care about his colleagues as
well. He did not hear what Jane had said about the photos. “Just
get her to call me.” He cut the connection and looked at his watch;
he needed to know who McLarens man was on the outside and he needed
to buy some time. Gary looked over in his direction, which sparked
an idea.

“
Gary,
we need to keep this out of the media and off of the main police
channels for as long as possible, I don’t want it known who has
been shot here.” He had no idea how far McLaren’s tentacles spread
but if he got wind of his son being shot then that would not be
good for anyone, he needed a complete lockdown on this
one.

Gary’s face
was incredulous “You don’t want much do you Mike. How do you think
I’m going to do that?”

Before he
could say anything in reply two young squad members came out of the
house behind them, their faces were pale and drawn. One of them was
Steve ‘the muscle’ Kirkland “We’ve got one inside, sitting in a
chair; he’s missing most of his head” Steve said, the look on his
face at complete odds with his powerful physique.

“
That
will be his step father” Bridger indicated Martins still unmoving
figure being worked on by the medics as he spoke “Apparently Martin
didn’t do it.” He got into his car without saying anything else and
shut the door, ignoring the looks he was receiving from his
colleagues and let the quietness of the cabin’s interior wash over
him, trying to make sense of what he was going to do
next.

Detective
Brian Johnson was only a couple of streets away at the pad; he was
always his sounding board in times of crisis. He had been there on
more than one occasion for him in the past. He knew he needed to
share the burden of his dilemma with someone, just to help him
think more clearly. His emotions were getting the better of him and
he could feel a deep desire for a drink, and that was not where he
wanted to go right now. He started the car and pressed heavily on
the accelerator spinning the wheels slightly as he drove away,
ignoring the looks on his colleagues’ faces.

Grant Wylie
entered the custody area of the Dunedin Central Police Station with
one thing on his mind, to get Baz Ropata to spill his guts. He had
spent the car journey from the pad to the police station holding
his temper in check. Baz had just sat quietly with an angry smirk
on his face staring out of the window. Grant had desperately wanted
to reach over and smack him in the face and force him to tell him
where the rest of the gang had his friends, but he knew that it
would not do any good. Baz would never talk to the police and he
certainly was not afraid of violence. He had to play this another
way, it would not pass muster in a court of law but that was not
the point, Baz was the only source of information they had and
these were extraordinary circumstances.

He had heard
that the armed offender’s squad had shot someone back up in
Corstaphine, the grapevine indicating Bridger had been involved
somehow. He must have surfaced finally but he was too busy to give
much thought as to what part he had played in all of this. This was
getting messier by the minute and they were no closer to finding
John and Jo. These were definitely extraordinary circumstances so
he had no issues whatsoever with what he was about to do.

He had spent
the last twenty minutes gathering as many unsolved cases from the
office that dealt with child abuse as he could, he added to that
the faxed copy of the DNA analysis indicating Kingi in the robbery
murder. A little modification to that form was all it took; Baz
Ropata was now looking at very serious charges backed up by DNA
evidence. He was sure Baz would not want to go down for crimes
against children, as tough as he thought he was he would not last
in prison with his temperament and that label around his neck. It
almost sounded fitting to Grant for him to turn the tables on Baz
for once, make him feel the fear he had instilled on so many people
in the past. Baz Ropata was a bad man and deserved everything that
was coming to him, even so, he knew it was only ever going to be
leverage, but he felt angry enough to pull it off and he would
still sleep easy.

“
Get a
fucking ambulance here now.” The urgent shout preceded the audible
panic alarm that started bleating its call, reverberating off the
concrete walls of the custody block. Grant threw his pile of files
on the desk in front of him and followed the custody officer who
had leapt off his chair like a startled rabbit and then run blindly
into the corridor of cells. The panic alarm usually meant an
officer was in trouble and needed urgent assistance.

Another bloody
incident is not what they needed right now they did not have time
for that. Grant was thinking that the day could not get much worse
when they reached the source of the alarm and saw what had
happened, he realised with growing fear that it already had.

He stood there
in the slightly chilled room, it was colder in here than outside in
the warm sun, but the sight which lay before him warmed him on the
inside so he did not mind. She was pathetically beautiful, lying
there with just her bra and panties covering her modesty. She was
so pale and porcelain like, she reminded him of the dolls his
mother collected when he was a child. They had been so lifelike; he
remembered the thoughts he used to have about the dolls. He
remembered how they would mock him with their eyes when he could
not control himself any longer. After his older sister had left
home and taken her friends with her, he only ever had the dolls. He
touched her skin with his sweaty fingers, running them along her
belly; she was much warmer than a doll. It was much like his sister
had been when he was younger; only this time he was the one in
control, not her, or her perverted friends.

He could feel
his arousal growing, a deep-seated feeling that only came to the
fore in circumstances like these, and he started to rub himself.
There hadn’t been many times like this but when they came his way
he needed them like a drug, and today this girly copper was the
needle in which it would be delivered. He felt it beginning.
Earlier he had found one of the other Patches trying it on with
her; he was a bitch for trying it on without his permission. Lucky
for the Patch, the other copper had interrupted him before it had
gone too far. If he had closed the deal with her, he would have had
to kill him and not just beat him as he had. No one was going to
sully his prize, the rest of them could do what they wanted with
her afterwards, but he was going to be first…