His heart pounding heavily, Boldt hurried to LaMoia’s cubicle and sat down. Twice the size of any other file, the task force book was easy to spot. Anderson’s was more elusive. He ran through the paperwork in plain sight but struck out. He pulled on the desk drawer and found it locked. At the same instant, two voices boomed from down the hall, the louder of which belonged to Leon Kreuter.
Sitting at his former desk, he suddenly realized that in the course of transition, he had handed the desk key over to LaMoia but not the duplicate key he had always kept in his wallet. He didn’t remember having ever disposed of the key. He dug into his wallet’s warm sticky leather and came up with it.
Kreuter’s voice moved toward him all of a sudden; the topic not cop talk but the performance of four-wheel-drive utility vehicles versus pickup trucks.
A detective’s desk area was off-limits. Chain of custody rules for active files required the signatures of both officers. Searching the contents of another officer’s desk-even a friend’s-was simply not done.
Worse, an Intelligence officer caught snooping around Homicide would sound alarms. As much as Boldt felt a part of this floor, his new posting cast him as an outsider even to members of his former squad.
While considering all this, he unlocked the desk.
Kreuter’s laughing voice drew closer.
Boldt slid the center drawer open: no files. Next drawer.
Anderson’s file had been placed on top of a Kleenex box. Boldt grabbed it and slid the drawer shut. He tried to turn the small key but it slipped out of his fingers and fell to the carpet.
Kreuter said clearly, “And she handles turns like a dream. You can’t believe the thing is four-wheel.”
Forced to leave the desk unlocked, Boldt fled toward the copy room, both files clutched tightly under his arm, his heart painful in his chest, his face stinging hot.
Homicide’s copy room looked like a paper warehouse, its walls adorned with dozens of Far Side cartoons, its shelves stacked with reams of paper products. The copier itself was the size of a freezer locker; it hummed loudly, green display lights lit up like a Christmas tree. The room was always a good fifteen degrees warmer than any other, making it a sweatshop. It smelled of paper, bleach and body odor. The door did not lock; nor was it ever seen closed, so Boldt left it open, feeling vulnerable. His back to the hall. He had never worked undercover. He didn’t know how people did it. A greater offense than lifting the files was to be caught copying them-cause for immediate internal review. Knowledge remained the key to Sarah’s chances.
He fed the copier groups of pages and it devoured them. The Anderson file took less than two minutes. He started in on the task force book, a formidable job.
A pair of voices approached from down the hallway. Boldt collected the paperwork in a rush of adrenaline, but then the voices faded past him, and again he returned to copying. He checked his watch as he fed another stack into the machine. Twenty minutes had lapsed since his entering Homicide. He bundled the photocopies into a stack and tucked it up under his shirt against his spine, held snug by the waist of his pants. His sport coat further hid it from view. He clamped the original folders under his arm and marched with purpose back down the hall.
All went well until he glanced over and spotted Doris Shotz keeping vigil in one of Homicide’s formed fiberglass chairs. Boldt stopped and stared, understanding this woman’s agony for the first time. Doris Shotz looked over at him, and Boldt felt her helplessness, her frustration and anger. They briefly met eyes.
“What is it?” she asked him from across the room, suddenly agitated, her hands worming in her lap. Her eyes dropped to the folders he was carrying, searching for answers.
Boldt shifted them to the opposing arm. As he did so, the strained voice of Lt. Peter Davidson said, “Inciting the natives?”
Davidson was an ex-football type with the chest and the attitude to prove it. His beer gut and spiderweb blood vessels spoke of his favorite pastime. “Don’t get her fired up,” he complained, “and don’t get her hopes up either. Just leave her alone.”
“She is alone,” Boldt said, understanding perfectly well. “That’s the problem.”
“What are you doing on this floor anyway?” He looked Boldt over, looked right at the files in Boldt’s hands. “Spying on us? Spying on your former squad?”
Boldt kept his arm to where it covered the tabs on the files. “Of course I am,” Boldt said sarcastically, tapping the files. “Spying on all of you.”
Davidson smiled. “Right. I thought so.”
Boldt headed directly to LaMoia’s desk, relieved to see Kreuter’s cubicle empty once again-some cops spent all their time between the coffee lounge and the men’s room. He returned both files to the drawer.
Finding his key proved more difficult. He looked where he expected it to be-beneath the desk-but didn’t see it. If LaMoia found his desk unlocked … that was unacceptable.
Boldt intentionally dropped his pen, toed it under the desk, and then kneeled to retrieve it. He didn’t see the key. He shoved aside the trash can, and there it was.
At the moment he retrieved the key, the door to Homicide buzzed and Boldt looked back to see a pair of ostrich cowboy boots approaching.
“While you’re at it, fella’, empty the trash,” LaMoia teased. “If you’re planting a bug, forget it. I’m onto you.”
With mention of the bug, Boldt bumped his head on the underside of the desk.
Boldt’s only chance to lock the desk was to put his body between LaMoia and the man’s desk. He backed out from under, stood and feigned a sudden loss of balance. Leaning onto the desk for support, he blindly attempted to fit the key into the lock, but couldn’t get it. He mumbled, “Stood a little too fast,” his fingers working furiously. The key slipped in the lock. He pocketed it.
“You okay?” a concerned LaMoia asked.
“Fine,” Boldt answered, wondering what kind of person deceived his closest friends. Wanting LaMoia’s thoughts elsewhere, he asked, “How’d the four o’clock go?” He felt so cheap. Desperate people take desperate measures, he recalled Daphne once saying.
“Hill wants you in her office,” LaMoia advised him.
“Me?”
LaMoia nodded and teased, “You’re not in trouble, are you, Sarge? Your boys been putting cameras in the girls’ locker room again?”
Had Hill found out about the wiretapping? Boldt felt the color drain from his face. Too much deceit to keep the lies straight. One day into it and he couldn’t keep himself together!
“Maybe you ought’a sit down,” LaMoia said.
“I’m fine,” Boldt lied.
By design, task force books did not necessarily duplicate one another. The copy of LaMoia’s was packed with evidence reports, SID workups, Daphne’s psychology profiles and Boldt’s Intelligence summaries. It contained the most recent SID forensics sweep of Anderson’s apartment and a short write-up on the backup disks. With Anderson their only palpable victim, Boldt read carefully, his tired eyes working down each sheet. LaMoia’s idea of organization differed from his; he found navigating the paperwork difficult.
Finally he reached the photocopies of the crime scene photographs, including two series from Anderson’s apartment. He scrutinized these. On his third pass he grinned. He picked up the phone and dialed Gaynes.