How high did the mistakes go? He knew the only way to find out was to investigate thoroughly.
Lieutenant Alan Hart fired up his computer. He opened his word processor program and began drafting a memorandum to send to the Chief.
He planned on getting to the bottom of things.
1113 hours
Chisolm set aside the newspaper after reading the article about Katie for a third time. The reporter rightfully made Katie out to be a hero, but he didn’t like the dig against Tower. He knew the detective did the best job he could. Hell, if anyone was at fault, it was Chisolm.
Once again, he’d failed to be where he was needed.
Just like Mai. The image of the young prostitute was burned into his mind. Despite stopping two assaults on her, he couldn’t save her in the end.
Hell, Bobby Ramirez, too. When a sniper took his best friend’s life, had he done anything to prevent it?
No. He’d failed.
And, of course, there was Officer Karl Winter. He was a good man who died alone on the dark asphalt of a River City street. No help from Chisolm.
Other faces danced in front of his eyes. That kid he and Ramirez had teased mercilessly from the day he arrived in the unit until the day he hit a trip wire in the jungle. A young mother and her baby, on the run from an insane husband. That husband eventually hurt that little baby, didn’t he?
Sylvia’s knowing eyes came next. The image hovered before him, growing even more vivid when he closed his eyes against it.
All my ghosts are here today.
Thomas Chisolm clutched at his coffee cup, squeezing the porcelain in an effort to avoid going to the fridge for a drink.
1222 hours
Crawford turned onto Reott’s street. He drove to the front of the captain’s house, easing the car to a stop.
“Thanks for lunch,” Reott said.
“My turn to buy,” Crawford replied easily.
“So it was. But thanks, anyway.”
“You’re welcome.”
Reott reached for the door.
“They’re releasing MacLeod today,” Crawford told him.
Reott paused. “Good. She’s all right?”
Crawford shrugged. “A few good cuts. Some hard knocks. But I think she’ll be fine.”
“Good.”
“Our rapist won’t be out for another month. Maybe two,” Crawford continued. “Tower already has his affidavit to the prosecutor. Hinote said he is going to charge him with all four rapes, plus the attacks on MacLeod. He doesn’t believe he can win them all, but he figures he’ll win enough of them to send the guy up for life, or close to it. And if he decides to plea instead, then he has plenty of charges to bargain away.”
“Good,” Reott repeated.
Crawford’s eyes narrowed with concern. “You okay, Mike?”
Reott nodded. “I’m fine. Where are you headed from here?”
Crawford scowled. “Oh, the wife has us going out searching for antiques or some such shit.” He eyed Reott more closely. “You sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah,” Reott answered. He slapped Crawford on the knee. “Thanks for lunch. And good work on this case.”
Crawford snorted. “Good work? Hell, we got luckier than a falling drunk on this one.”
Reott clenched his jaw, his penetrating gaze burning into Crawford’s eyes. “You think that’s luck? Him attacking one of our officers like that?”
Crawford returned his stare without faltering. “I don’t think what happened to MacLeod was lucky at all,” he said quietly. “All I’m saying is that we didn’t do anything to catch him. We got lucky.”
Reott took a deep breath and sighed. “Maybe so,” he said. Then he opened the door and got out of the car. “See you Monday,” he told Crawford as he closed the passenger door.
Crawford gave him a wave as he pulled away from the curb.
Reott made his way up his sidewalk, unlocked the door and went into the house. The slam of the door echoed throughout the emptiness of the home. Tossing his keys on the table, he walked directly into the kitchen and swung open a cupboard. Inside, two fancy bottles of seventeen year old Glengoyne single malt Scotch whisky stood waiting for him. He wrapped his fingers around the neck of one bottle and pulled it from the cupboard.
At the table, he poured himself a glass, neat. He stared down at the amber liquid for a while, then raised it to his lips and sipped. The burning smoothness coated his mouth and his throat, before emanating outward from his belly.
Lucky.
Crawford’s words burned in his ears. He didn’t believe in luck. He believed in choices. And it was a series of choices that brought things to a head. A series of choices that put one of his officers in the hospital.
His choices.
Captain Michael Reott took another sip of the whisky.
“Damn fine scotch,” he said aloud. He allowed himself a wry chuckle, remembering Crawford’s theories on pay scale.
Maybe the lieutenant had been right about that.
But lucky?
Reott was pretty sure that wasn’t a word he’d use.
1658 hours
Katie MacLeod glanced to her left. Kyle, the large, bespectacled man in the driver’s seat remained focused through the windshield wipers and the rain upon the road ahead.
“Thanks again for the ride,” she said, her voice still a little groggy.
“No problem,” the hospital security officer said. “It’s an honor.”
Katie looked away. She remembered what Stef had gone through after his gun battle with the Scarface robber. There’d been a mixture of hero worship and contempt from the different members of the department. She wasn’t entirely sure which he’d been more uncomfortable with, but she knew that he’d struggled with both. She didn’t particularly want to go through that.
I only did what I had to do.
An image of her gun sight trained on the back of the rapist’s head flashed through her mind.
“Is this it?” Kyle asked her, pointing as they rolled up the street.
Katie followed his gesture toward her familiar brick house. Somehow, in the windy, rainy darkness of the night, it didn’t seem as welcoming as it once had. Yellow crime scene tape still hung from the screen door, flapping in the wind.
Kyle put the car into park. “Here we are.”
Katie paused. Suddenly, she didn’t want to go inside. She knew that he wasn’t there. Neither was Phil, for that matter. Those demons might not be vanquished, but after talking with Julie Avery, she felt like maybe they would be eventually.
But not yet.
In the meantime, she wasn’t so sure she wanted to be alone. A strange need swept over her and she thought about calling Kopriva. Maybe he would understand.
“Are you okay?” Kyle asked.
Katie turned toward him. “Yes,” she answered. Then, “No. Not really.”
Kyle gave her a confused look.
“Can you take me to a pay phone?” Katie asked. “I think I want to go somewhere else instead.”
1704 hours
Stefan Kopriva sat at his kitchen table, staring down at his hands. His knuckles pressed against the cool bottle of beer in front of him. A small black and white television flickered on the table. The mindless jingle about car insurance did little to keep his attention.
He glanced up and around at the small downtown apartment. The already narrow walls seemed to close in on him. His tiny kitchen lay only a few feet from the living room, which doubled as a bedroom when he remembered to unfold the bed inside the couch. Right now, a twisted pile of blankets lay in the corner of the ratty couch. Empty beer bottles were strewn across the rickety, stained coffee table.
Brave, dead soldiers, he thought mockingly. They served their city well.
“Better than I did,” he muttered, and lifted the bottle of beer to his lips.
He wondered in passing if he ought to consider taking up smoking. A few cigarettes might prove an interesting way to make the time pass. But he rejected the idea. He had precious little in the way of money as it was, and he much preferred the beer. And, of course, the pills that the nice doctor at the free clinic gave him for his arm and his knee.