Date: 2019-03-22 04:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Suspense; Romance; Mystery; Crime; Contemporary; Adult
Description: "You’re close to breaking, Lara.” Words Detective Lara Keen never thought she’d hear spoken aloud. Let alone have them spoken to her by the Department shrink in his official capacity as her psychologist. Things start to unravel not long afterwards. The H.E.A.T. arsonist is still at large. Carole Michaels, Lara’s boyfriend’s sister, is still missing. And a shadowed figure dressed in a familiar fedora hat and trench coat keeps popping up when she least expects it. If that isn't bad enough, CIB still has a traitor in its midst and Lara’s determined to find out once and for all who it is. But the
Publisher: Nicola Claire Books
Rights: Copyright 2019 Nicola Claire. All rights reserved.

A Lick Of Heat

H.E.A.T. Book Four

Nicola Claire

Copyright © 2019, Nicola Claire

All Rights Reserved

This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer's imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organisations is entirely coincidental.

All rights are reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author.

ISBN: 978-0-473-47447-8

Created with Vellum

Contents

About the Author

Free Download

Also By Nicola Claire

Description

Foreword

1. “You’re Close To Breaking, Lara.”

2. “Death Is Undignified And Never Pretty.”

3. “Picture An Electrical Switch. And Flick It To Off When The Shit Hits The Fan.”

4. “Don’t Let The Bastards Get You Down.”

5. “Life Doesn’t Stop Just Because You Want It To, Lara. It Speeds Up. Because Life Is A Cunning Bastard.”

6. “Don’t Let Your Imagination Get Away From You, Sport. Tie It Up, Strap It Down, And Beat it With A Whip On Occasion.”

7. “Life Is Short. Live It Well. Live It Grandly. But Most Of All, Live It As Though At Any Moment It Could Vanish.”

8. “This Is The Price We Pay For The Good We Do, Sport. This Is What Happens When Good Cops Don’t Save Themselves First. Save Yourself, Lara.”

9. “If It Looks Like A Duck And Quacks Like A Duck Then You Can Bet Your Highly Trained Detective’s Arse It’s A Fucking Duck.”

10. “Trust Yourself, Lara. Above All Else Trust Yourself.”

11. “Even Scum Of The Earth Want To Smell Like Roses, Sport. They Might Wear Thorns, They Might Be Buried In A Pile Of Horse Crap, But Deep Down Inside They’re Just A Prize-Winning Flower Wanting To See The Sun.”

12. “Even The Absence Of Something Can Mean Everything.”

13. “It’s Hard To Tell Fact From Fiction, Sport. Never Make The Mistake Of Believing Something Until You Know It’s The Truth.”

14. “Sure, Sport, Follow Your Gut, But Always Cover Your Arse With A Little Evidence.”

15. “We All Have Our Limits. We All Have That Line In The Sand That If We Cross It, We’re Done For.”

16. “If You Feel Your Back Hit The Wall, Sport, You Better Get Moving.”

17. “It’s A Shit World Full Of Evil Shit And If You Don’t Get Your Shit Together Then You Get Mired In It.”

18. “Sometimes All It Takes Is A Gentle Shove In The Right Direction. Sometimes It Takes A Two-By-Four To The Head."

19. “Carl Always Said You Had A Stick Up Your Butt.”

20. “Where You Find One, You’ll Find Two. And Where You Find Two, There’s Always Another.”

21. “Life Sucks. Death Sucks Harder.”

22. “Pay Attention, Sport. Don't Fucking Fall Asleep On The Job.”

23. “If You Can’t See The Wood For The Trees, Then Get The Fuck Out Of The Forest.”

24. “You Can’t Live Life In A Vacuum, Keen. Otherwise You End Up Sucking At It.”

25. “We All Have Baggage, Sport. Some Of Us Just Require A Forklift To Carry It Around With Us All Day Long.”

26. “You Can Pray To A Higher Being All You Like. But If You Don’t Get Off Your Own Arse, They’re Sure As Hell Not Gonna Help.”

27. “What Have You Got, Sport? Talk To Me. Dazzle Me With Your Detecting.”

28. “Silence Is A Golden Prison Too Many People Willingly Walk Into.”

29. “To Catch A Thief, You Must First Think Like A Thief, Correct?”

30. “Keep Pushing And Pushing And Pushing, Sport. But The Moment You Hear Them Snap Back, Shut The Fuck Up And Watch Them Unravel.”

31. “Tricky Things Spiders. They Hunt With Patience. They Sit And Wait For Their Prey To Come To Them. You Should Try It, Keen. Sometimes You Can Catch The Spider As He Spins His Own Web.”

32. "Expect The Unexpected, Sport. Then They Can't Use Your Surprise Against You."

33. "Fear Is What Makes You A Good Detective. But Mindless Terror Kills."

34. “It’s A Shit World. And Shit Things Happen.”

Epilogue

Review Request

Free Download

More Bargain Books From Nicola Claire…

“Dystopian At Its Finest” & For Less Than The Cost Of A Cup of Coffee…

With Over 800 5-Star Reviews On Goodreads…

About the Author

Nicola Claire lives in beautiful Taupo, New Zealand with her husband and two young boys.

She's tried her hand at being a paramedic, bank teller and medical sales representative, (not all necessarily in that order), but her love of writing keeps calling her back.

She has a passion for all things suspenseful, spiced up with a good dollop of romance, as long as they include strong characters - alpha males and capable females - and worlds which although make-believe are really quite believable in the end.

There's nothing better than getting caught up in a compelling, intriguing and romantic book.

When she's not writing or reading, she's out on her family boat at Lake Taupo, teaching her young boys to fish, showing them the beauty that surrounds them in nature and catching some delicious trout for dinner.

Creating rich worlds with dynamic characters and unexpected twists that shock and awe has been pure bliss for this author. And just as well, because there's a lot more story yet to tell...

For more information:

www.nicolaclairebooks.com
nicola@nicolaclairebooks.com

Facebook

Twitter

Free Download

Sign up!

Get your free copy of Nicola Claire’s Starter Library!

Three free books to get you started!

Starter Library

* * *

Also By Nicola Claire

Kindred Series

Kindred

Blood Life Seeker

Forbidden Drink

Giver of Light

Dancing Dragon

Shadow's Light

Entwined With The Dark

Kiss Of The Dragon

Dreaming Of A Blood Red Christmas (Novella)

* * *

Mixed Blessing Mystery Series

Mixed Blessing

Dark Shadow

Rogue Vampire (Coming Soon)

* * *

Sweet Seduction Series

Sweet Seduction Sacrifice

Sweet Seduction Serenade

Sweet Seduction Shadow

Sweet Seduction Surrender

Sweet Seduction Shield

Sweet Seduction Sabotage

Sweet Seduction Stripped

Sweet Seduction Secrets

Sweet Seduction Sayonara

* * *

Elemental Awakening Series

The Tempting Touch Of Fire

The Soothing Scent Of Earth

The Chilling Change Of Air

The Tantalising Taste Of Water

The Eternal Edge Of Aether (Novella)

* * *

H.E.A.T. Series

A Flare Of Heat

A Touch Of Heat

A Twist Of Heat (Novella)

A Lick Of Heat

* * *

Citizen Saga

Elite

Cardinal

Citizen

Masked (Novella)

Wiped

* * *

Scarlet Suffragette Series

Fearless

Breathless

Heartless

* * *

Blood Enchanted Series

Blood Enchanted

Blood Entwined

Blood Enthralled

* * *

44 South Series

Southern Sunset

Southern Storm

Southern Strike (Coming Soon)

* * *

Lost Time Series

Losing Time

Making Time

Stitching Time (Coming Soon)

* * *

The Sector Fleet

Accelerating Universe

Apparent Brightness

Right Ascension

Zenith Point

* * *

The Summer O’Dare Mysteries

Chasing Summer

Sizzling Summer (Coming Soon)

Description

"You’re close to breaking, Lara.”

Words Detective Lara Keen never thought she’d hear spoken aloud. Let alone have them spoken to her by the Department shrink in his official capacity as her psychologist.

Things start to unravel not long afterwards.

The H.E.A.T. arsonist is still at large. Carole Michaels, Lara’s boyfriend’s sister, is still missing. And a shadowed figure dressed in a familiar fedora hat and trench coat keeps popping up when she least expects it. If that isn't bad enough, CIB still has a traitor in its midst and Lara’s determined to find out once and for all who it is.

But the enemy is not what he seems, and his reach is very far indeed.

With copycat crimes and explosive criminal acts mounting all around the city, Lara sets out to end the mayhem one way or another.

The clock is ticking.

People are dying.

Auckland City is set to burn.

Can Lara stop a madman before she loses everything? Or will the arsonist have the last word?

A sexy, sizzling crime-thriller sure to add a lick of heat to your night.

For:

All EMS workers everywhere.

And for those I left behind at Pitt Street.

Foreword

Hello, Readers!

H.E.A.T. or “Hauraki (Auckland, NZ area) Emergency Assistance Team,” overlaps the Sweet Seduction World with some of the characters from that series appearing in H.E.A.T. In particular, you'll see Detective Ryan Pierce of the Auckland CIB (Criminal Investigations Bureau) and Nick Anscombe of ASI (Anscombe Securities & Investigations).

It follows the lives of a CIB detective, Lara Keen, and her H.E.A.T. investigator love interest, Damon Michaels. And in particular concentrates on the grittier side of emergency services life; the fallout that can sometimes ensue from working in such a stressful environment.

This story is based on personal experience, furnished with a little of my imagination, and doctored to show the best, (and on occasion the worst), of what humanity goes through every single day; sometimes challenging, sometimes exciting, and at others a mix of mysterious and chilling.

But first and foremost it is a romance series, because I absolutely believe in that old adage: "love makes the world go 'round."

❤️ Nicola

Chapter One

“You’re Close To Breaking, Lara.”

The room smelled of lemon fresh pine cleaner, with a hint of desperation thrown in for good measure. The latter didn't originate from the nondescript man sitting opposite me, but rather permeated from the comfortable chairs, the box of, no doubt, well-used tissues on the low lying table between us, and the lone picture of Auckland's One Tree Hill on the far wall.

"What do you think, Doc?" I asked Andrew Hennessey. The Department's shrink and I had a somewhat strained relationship. The fact that this was my weekly personal visit and I was waylaying his psychoanalysing of me to obtain a criminal profile on the HEAT arsonist probably added to that strain a little.

"What have you concluded so far, Lara?" he threw back in a soft, non-confrontational voice, designed to belie the fact that he was lobbing the proverbial hot potato at your head in what some would call a death shot.

Andrew Hennessey, BPhil, MPsy, DClinPsy, tended to be spot on with his aim.

I looked down at the manila folder he'd left open on the table, knowing my personal involvement in this case was clouding my vision, but not giving a damn. Hennessey wouldn't judge, but he'd sure as hell take note of every word out of my mouth, every twitch of my eye. The file he had on me was probably thicker than the one I had on Rhys Kyle Weston.

“Weston has an axe to grind," I said steadily, returning my gaze to the soft blue of the doctor's. He sat statue still; rather like a benignly smiling mannequin. It was a little creepy. "He's on a power trip of vengeance. He lacks the ability to form true emotional attachments; instead, he considers his relationships in one of two categories: Useful or no longer relevant. Carole Michaels is still useful to him. But when she becomes 'no longer relevant' he'll dismiss her without a backward glance."

I waited for Hennessey to correct my assessment, but I could have been waiting for hell to freeze over for the good it would do me. The man was a gently smiling safety zone. No threat here! His patience was far greater than mine.

"He's a high functioning psychopath," I added, because silence is a good tool, but only if I'm the one wielding it.

Hennessey smiled that safe-zone smile at me, and I suddenly had the entirely inappropriate desire to pull my service weapon and aim it at his head. The visceral and extremely detailed image that formed in my mind shocked me so much that I grimaced.

You don’t grimace in front of Andrew Hennessey.

He shifted, ever so slightly forward in his seat.

The Department shrink was good. But I was, too — a damn fine cop. You're a damn good cop, Keen. But stick with me and I'll make you a superstar.

The grimace turned into a scowl.

Carl. Always present. Never lost. Even when I’d thought him lost to me forever.

“This is hard for you,” Hennessey said.

I wanted to close my eyes and pretend we weren’t having this conversation. I wanted to turn my head away and stare out the front window to his clinic and watch the leaves on the tree outside flutter in the wind. Maybe they’d blow away like I’d hoped my attachment to my former mentor would blow away eventually, too.

I stared the doctor down and offered my own form of a benign smile. I was sure he could see right through it.

“Weston got away,” I said. “After knocking me out with gas and tying me up on a cross for an old family friend to sacrifice. Yes, this is hard for me.”

Maybe admitting part of the truth would make Hennessey back off.

His gaze sharpened, his posture remained relaxed. It wouldn’t do to excite the patient with your own excitement, now would it?

“That’s good, Lara,” he said encouragingly. “Addressing what happened in Sweet Hell is a solid place to start a recovery from.”

I waved a hand dismissively. “I’m not concerned about that,” I told him. “I want to know what you think he’ll do next. Fire seems to be a favourite of his. He’s burned down sheds and hotrod cars, blown up livestock and created false bombs. I think he’ll do it again, but I can’t figure out if he’ll escalate or not. Taking Carole might be considered an escalation,” I went on, “but as he’s already done that once, I don’t think we can call it that. Perhaps it’s a pattern of behaviour. Perhaps I’m looking at this all wrong.”

I stopped and thought about that for a second and then realised that Hennessey wasn’t agreeing - or disagreeing - with me. He wasn’t doing anything I’d come to expect of Andrew Hennessey in fact. And for that reason, his silence was as loud as a klaxon going off. My eyes darted up to his face.

There was slightly more grey in the blond of his hair than I remembered. Small lines bracketed his mouth which I hadn’t noticed before. His clothes were bespoke and made of fine material. His loafers were buffed to a fine shine. And yet, I thought he looked a little world-weary.

“What?” I said, holding his solicitous gaze.

“Lara,” he began, which was never a good way to start a sentence. Not in that tone of voice, anyway. “You mustn’t get caught up in the minutiae. Sometimes we can’t see the forest for the trees. At the moment, this case is the trees and your health and wellbeing is the forest.”

I blinked at the man. He didn’t usually speak in metaphor.

“The devil’s in the details, Doc,” I said.

He leaned forward.

I almost leaned back.

“How long have we been seeing each other?” From anyone else, it might have sounded salacious. From Andrew Hennessey, it just seemed… wrong.

I cocked my head, thinking. “Six months, give or take.”

He nodded. “Half a year.” His voice was soft and careful. I could practically see the two-by-four as it swung towards my head. “I’m worried about you,” he said.

I stared at him, my heart thudding inside my chest. A fine sheen of sweat covered my brow; I wanted to rub at it. I remained sitting as still as my frayed nerves would allow; a deer caught in the sights of a hunter.

Not that I’d ever thought of Hennessey as a hunter before. But right then, the two-by-four had a long spiral-grooved barrel attached to it, and it was pointed right at my head.

What was going on here?

“Nothing’s changed,” I said, wanting desperately to lick my lips. I almost added, “I’m fine.” But that would have been pouring fuel on Hennessey’s fire. “I’m a bit bruised and battered, Doc,” I offered, trying for a lighter tone of voice. “But I’m not down yet.”

Hennessey sat back in his chair and stared out of the window. He’d never done that before either. His attention was always on his patient. At least, it had always been on me when I’d been in here.

“Are you all right?” I asked when he remained silent for a good minute.

He jerked in his seat as if I’d swung the two-by-four.

The world crystallised. Everything but this room, this man, this moment disappeared. I knew the next sentence out of his mouth would be far-reaching.

“I’m recommending you take a short hiatus from CIB.”

The words were formed and spoken in a neutral tone, delivered slightly faster than Hennessey usually spoke. But his face remained impassive, and his movements remained controlled. He looked up at me; made eye contact as if it were a test of some sort he had to complete.

“In all good conscience,” he said softly, “I can’t allow you to continue as you are.”

“As I am?” I whispered.

“You’re close to breaking, Lara. And if I let you walk out of here today and continue down this path you’ve chosen to take, then I’ll be directly responsible for your breakdown.”

“Breakdown?” I said more forcefully. “Who said anything about a breakdown?”

“I’m your doctor,” he went on as if I hadn’t even said a word. “It’s my responsibility…”

I stood up; manila folder clutched in my hand. I was momentarily surprised to see it wasn’t my gun. That I could feel nestled in its shoulder holster under my arm. I resolutely left it there. Pulling a firearm on the Department shrink when he was just about to certify you as incapable of performing your job wasn’t a solid work plan.

“How long have I got?” I asked. How long before he lodged his recommendation with NZ Police.

He blinked up at me, a small smile curving his lips. So small you could almost be mistaken for thinking it not there.

“These things usually take twenty-four to forty-eight hours to make it to the front line,” he told me.

And in doing so, he told me everything I needed to know right then.

I nodded my head and turned on my heel.

“Detective,” he called out after me.

I paused at the door, hand on the knob, and looked back at my shrink.

“Do be careful.”

I held his troubled gaze; saw what I’d blindly ignored for who knows how long. I had to think it hadn’t been weeks that I’d missed this change in Hennessey. I knew I was too caught up in Carl and this case and the rest of my fucked up world. But I was an observant person by nature, and I wouldn’t have missed the obvious for long.

I nodded my head to Hennessey and walked out the door.

Spring sunshine greeted me. The smell of new season flowers met my nose from a nearby bed of hyacinths under the old house’s bay windows. I stared across the suburban street and took stock of the vehicles parked there. Hennessey’s clinic was hidden inside an old restored villa. There was no obvious signage to say that mad people came here. It was all very discreet.

But there was no telling who was watching it now.

I strode across the small carpark and beeped the locks free on my police-issued sedan. With more care than I wanted to use right then, I slid into the front seat and placed the manila folder pertaining to Rhys Kyle Weston down on the passenger side. My knuckles were white when I gripped the steering wheel.

Carl would say this was the splash of blood at the murder scene that made you suck in a startled breath of air. The drop that told you a story the victim’s body refused to speak of. Something the murderer had overlooked, but I was afraid that Weston was too clever to overlook much.

Had he overlooked this? Andrew Hennessey speaking to me when he’d not said a thing other than condemn my career.

You didn’t take hiatuses from CIB without consequences. Harvey Stone had taken a hiatus from CIB. He was yet to be allowed back. And the longer it took, the less likely it was that he’d make it at all.

We all knew it. We just chose to ignore it. Pierce was the best at ignoring anything that would prove his former partner was doomed never to walk into CIB again. For an astute detective, Ryan Pierce could be pigheaded sometimes.

I wasn’t about to fall into that category.

I started my car, checked my mirrors and out of the window one last time, and then rolled the vehicle into late morning traffic on Greenlane East. I wasn’t followed that I could tell. But then, the damage had already been done. All Weston had to do was sit back and watch the chips fall where they may.

I had twenty-four to forty-eight hours to find out what Weston had on Hennessey to make him baulk. The doc was a professional. I’d not once thought of him as anything else. My fear of shrinks aside, Andrew Hennessey had been a great help to me. I was still standing; a testament to his abilities. I might still be fucked in the head, but I was a functioning fuckhead.

I took the off ramp that led into the CBD and wound my way towards Cook Street. If time wasn’t on my side, I had to use it wisely. In short order, I’d be locked out of CIB, and that meant locked out of the Wanganui computer; the NZ Police database. I needed to download as much information as I could on Weston, Hennessey and what tied them together.

It hadn’t occurred to me to argue the point with Hennessey. I’d only have placed him in a dangerous position. Until I could determine what Weston was holding over Hennessey’s head, I couldn’t form a plan of attack. I was sure I hadn’t misread the signs in the doctor’s consultation room, but I still bit my lip nervously as I found a parking space under Central Police.

What if I had got it wrong? What if Hennessey really did think I was close to a breakdown? It would be believable. I’d lost Carl only to find him again; killing people to protect me. I’d fallen back in love with a man I’d thought had betrayed me only to have our pasts blow up in our faces when his sister was abducted all over again. I’d been shot at, attacked, drugged, and strung up on a cross to be defiled in the ninth circle of hell. I hadn’t slept soundly in weeks.

Anyone would crack under that.

But I hadn’t. At least, I was pretty sure I hadn’t. Maybe this was all a hallucination, and I was comatose in a psych bed with dribble running down my chin.

I smiled a grim smile to myself as I walked across the underground carpark. Shadows bloomed and shifted in my periphery. The scent of petrol and burned rubber engulfed me. A door slammed in the distance, and my heart skipped a beat. I shook my head, rubbed at my chest, and double-timed it to the door that led to the elevators.

I was already jittery, and I was barely one hour into my countdown.

My first task was to get on a computer and get what information I could before I was locked out. My second was to find Pierce and feel him out. Could Weston have got to him too? To Inspector Hart? I doubted that, but coming clean to Hart was at the bottom of my list. Corrupted by Weston or not, the inspector was formidable. If he thought I was compromised, even so much as to be the target of wrath of a psychopath, then he’d sideline me for my own protection.

I couldn’t have that.

Carole was still missing. At the hands of Weston; said psychopath. If Weston had gone after Hennessey, who was only associated with me through therapy sessions, then who else would he target?

My father? His new girlfriend?

Pierce and his six-year-old daughter and wife?

I gritted my teeth and pushed through the door into the bullpen. Shouts and harried instructions rang out on the air. A phone trilled unanswered. Someone slammed the gun safe door shut and spun the wheel. I could smell ink and cigarette smoke, sweat and cologne. I could feel the disquiet — not exactly panic but an unsettled feeling that mixed with the anticipation of a hunt.

CIB was mobilising.

I spotted Joe Cawfield and Robbie Simpson. The former pushing exotic looking sunglasses up his gel covered and slicked-back head of hair. The latter dusting off sugar-coated fingers as he reattached a pager to his belt.

I automatically reached for my pager, but it hadn’t gone off.

I rechecked the room, but couldn’t spot Pierce. My eyes did land on someone else who I wasn’t afraid to approach, though. I sidled up to Trevor Jones, who had donned his cowboy hat and was in the process of spitting out a toothpick to replace with a fresh one.

“Keen,” he said when he saw me. “Can you believe it?” He shook his head, making his moustache flop around like a dying caterpillar. “Don’t make no sense.”

“What doesn’t?” I asked. What the hell was going on here?

He looked me in the eye and then sighed.

“You don’t know,” he said.

Clearly not. This didn’t have anything to do with my countdown, so I turned back to my desk.

By the time I’d logged onto the computer, the room was practically bare.

My eyes came up and scanned the bullpen again automatically, and found Trevor Jones still standing there.

He looked sad. He looked like he was in the last place he wanted to be about to impart the last thing he wanted to say.

Maybe this didn’t have anything to do with my countdown, but I had a sneaky suspicion it had everything to do with me.

Chapter Two

“Death Is Undignified And Never Pretty.”

I stood beside a silent Trevor Jones as I watched the fire service clear the building. Soot coated the immediate area. Glass shards littered the pavers. A formerly blue and gold awning lay charred and twisted on the ground, the firemen working around it.

Angelo’s was a police haunt. A place we all went for a quick bite to eat in between solving crimes.

It was gone.

Morose-looking detectives stood forlornly all around. We couldn’t get any closer until HEAT gave the all clear. I watched on as Damon emerged in full firefighting gear and crossed the short distance to us.

The fact that he was here when he was seconded to CIB working the Weston case with me spoke volumes.

Angelo’s might have been a police haunt, but Damon knew Angelo had been one of mine.

I didn’t have a lot of close friends. I knew I was prickly, which made getting to know me difficult for anyone who was stupid enough to try. But Angelo Berti was as close to a friend as I could call.

Discounting certain people. One of whom came to rest before me and took off his helmet and breathing mask.

Sweat dotted tanned skin, dark curly hair stuck to a strong neckline, broad shoulders hunched slightly as he prepared to deliver his news. Dark brown eyes dripping emotion connected with my stoic gaze.

We hadn’t been able to rouse Angelo on his cellphone.

“One body,” Damon said. “In the kitchen where the explosion originated.”

Trevor whistled. Other detectives had moved toward us to listen in and started to mutter amongst themselves — words of anger and disbelief and confusion. The heartache would come later. If at all. Ours was a harsh profession. You didn’t survive it by being emotional.

“Can I see him?” I asked.

“It’s still hot,” Damon said. Then when I opened my mouth to argue, he nodded toward a HEAT support truck. “You can suit up over there.”

“This isn’t your case, Keen,” Cawfield said; a sneer twisting his handsome features into a mask I was sure the devil would wear.

“Is it yours?” I demanded.

He shrugged. “First on the scene and not assigned to another case, so yeah, I reckon it is. Simpson and I call dibs.”

Great, I was surrounded by adolescents.

“Who says you were first?” Trevor asked. “Might be that I was. And I say Keen can take a gander if she wants.”

Territorial idiots.

“None of you has access to a HEAT investigator willing to bend the rules and suit you up,” I told them and walked away with Damon.

The feeling of smug superiority I would normally have felt at putting them all in their places was lost as I thought about the body lying in the charred remains of a once fine Italian restaurant.

It was Angelo. I knew it was. But until I could confirm it with my own eyes, there was doubt. Hope. A grey area I chose to live in for as long as I could.

“It’s not pretty,” Damon said softly beside me as he helped me into a heat resistant suit.

“‘Death is undignified and never pretty,’” I said.

“One of Carl’s?”

I nodded and picked up a helmet.

Damon led the way without another word. That’s one of the things I loved about this man. He didn’t try to dissuade me when I made up my mind. He’d offered his warning and knew I’d heard. I was a cop. The daughter of a cop. The granddaughter on one, too. He knew I was as prepared as a person could be.

But this was Angelo’s.

And death was never pretty.

I stared at the scorch marks and the ever-increasing area of destruction leading out from the kitchen at the rear of the building. The explosion definitely started in the back. Some of the wait staff had been injured, along with patrons in the restaurant at the time. But only Angelo was unaccounted for.

For a horrible moment, I resented that fact. I resented that another innocent who didn’t mean quite as much to me hadn’t been caught in the blast instead. It was a terrible thought, but I couldn’t seem to stop thinking it. And the more I thought it, the more agitated I got.

The smell was nearly debilitating. That certainly didn’t help. Burned plastics and melted metal and charred foodstuffs.

Pork. I always thought of pork when faced with a crispy critter.

A sound left my lips, but the creak and groan of the building thankfully hid it. A fireman stepped out from behind the burned and broken remains of the front counter. I couldn’t identify him, but Damon nodded a greeting and shielded me from view. A watch officer then. Not part of HEAT. Flack wouldn’t have given two hoots about me being in here before the scene was declared safe for the police.

I ducked my head and entered the kitchen. What was left of it. The roof was partially collapsed, and the back wall and window overlooking the rear alley behind the building were cracked and pock-marked. A gaping hole took up a good metre of space, allowing hazy light to filter in. Everything else was black, pitch black. As though the place had emerged from the pits of hell and crossed into the land of the living.

But Damon and I were the only living standing here.

He said nothing as I looked down at the broken and burned body of Angelo Berti.

Death is undignified and never pretty. You could add to that, that sometimes it cut like a fucking knife.

I couldn’t breathe.

My hands fisted. My eyes welled. I couldn’t dash them away; the mask protected me from fumes and smoke and the heat but didn’t allow me the solace of hiding my tears. I swallowed thickly and crouched down beside the body.

Beside Angelo.

I forgot Damon was standing there. I forgot the mass of detectives out front all clamouring for the right to investigate this mess. I forgot about Hennessey and my countdown and anything else. I stared at the charred remains of a gentle and caring man and thought about laughter and chicken sandwiches heavy on the mayo.

My eyes tracked the blast zone to the industrial-sized ovens at the back.

“Gas leak?“ I asked.

“It would appear so.”

Something in Damon’s voice had me turning around and peering up at him.

“But..?” I left the sentence open.

“The building was re-certified last month. Complete overhaul of the gas lines and fittings and equipment. This shouldn’t have happened.”

“Accidents happen,” I offered, playing devil’s advocate.

“I list only the facts, love,” he replied.

I turned back to the scene.

Angelo was alone in the kitchen. Not impossible, but improbable. It was just after one. Busy time for any restaurant. For a popular one down on the waterfront? I would have expected his sous-chef at least to have been here. I needed to chase him down for starters.

My eyes tracked the broken metal bench where Angelo dressed the plates. It was some distance away, but I didn’t think that was all on the blast. Angelo hadn’t been standing at it when the gas line exploded. Had he been investigating something? Sent his staff out to clear the restaurant perhaps while he checked up on an issue out of the norm?

I wouldn’t know until I canvassed the staff and most of those would have been taken to Auckland City Hospital already.

I rechecked the body, careful not to disturb its resting place, but couldn’t find any clues as to what Angelo had been doing all alone in the middle of the lunch rush in a kitchen that now looked like a war zone.

Was this war?

I stood up.

“I need to check on the survivors,” I told Damon. “Will you stay here?”

“Flack’s got this one.”

I nodded. He didn’t need to say more. He would follow me anywhere.

It was strangely comforting at a time that was becoming increasingly not.

We walked out of the remains of the building and Damon nodded his head at Flack. His 2IC looked grim, his eyes connecting briefly with mine, and then he turned to the nearest fireman and gave the instruction to pull back. He’d hand over to the police and investigate alongside them from here.

I walked across the pavement to Trevor and the others. Cawfield stared daggers, but I refused to let him get to me. I was fragile enough.

You’re close to breaking, Lara.

Trevor shifted the replacement toothpick in his mouth and lifted a finger to tip his cowboy hat up.

“Damn,” he said, taking in the expression on my face. For a second I wondered if he saw what Hennessey did. And then I realised I was scowling.

Rage, not madness. Good enough.

“It’s Angelo,” I said into the expectant silence. “Who’s been assigned?” Because sure as shit it wouldn’t be me. I was assigned the Weston case and everything else I’d been working on, including Carl, had been handed off. Hart wouldn’t allow me in on this one.

Didn’t mean I wasn’t going to investigate.

And then I remembered the countdown.

“We have,” Cawfield said, sealing the nail in my coffin even as I checked my watch. Three hours gone. And I hadn’t even logged into the Wanganui yet. “So take your very fine arse and bugger off.”

Damon took a step toward him. Simpson reached up and placed a hand on his chest, pushing him back.

“Can it, Joe,” he said over his shoulder to his partner.

“Idiot,” Trevor muttered, shaking his head.

“Looks like a gas leak,” I told Cawfield, doing my best to ignore the leer he was giving me. He was just trying to rile Damon up. Get him to swing a fist, get himself arrested, and thereby isolate me.

I wasn’t sure what Cawfield was yet. My money was still on the CIB traitor. But I couldn’t deny his penchant for trouble and sadistic means of achieving it didn’t necessarily mean he was a betrayer.

Joe Cawfield was a conundrum I could do without. But life wasn’t like that. It didn’t throw you challenges one at a time just to see how good you were at recovering between them. It lobbed the whole shitty lot at you at once to watch you succumb to a hail of well-aimed bullets.

Cawfield was just another bullet in life’s shitty gun.

“I’ll see for myself,” Joe spat. “Wouldn’t trust anything you said anyway,” he muttered; loud enough, though, to be heard.

“Check in with Flack,” Damon instructed, jaw clenched.

“I’ll do what I damn well like,” Cawfield growled.

“We,” Simpson said purposefully, “will follow procedure. Thank you for your assistance, Investigator Michaels.”

Damon’s gaze lingered on Cawfield for a suspended moment. A moment that held the potential to go either way. Fist to jaw. Or cold shoulder. Damon finally settled on the latter and nodded in answer to Simpson's olive branch.

“Good luck,” I said under my breath, the barb aimed at Cawfield, the words for Simpson. I had no idea how he put up with Joe, but Robbie had the patience of a saint and the hide of a rhino.

“We’ll figure it out, Keen,” he promised.

Cawfield had already walked away toward the charred building; Flack on an intercept course.

I smiled tightly and nodded to Trevor, and then headed toward my car.

“You got your truck with you?” I asked the shadow at my back.

“Yes,” Damon said, his voice quiet.

I glanced over at him.

“What’s on your mind?”

“Angelo,” he said, and I immediately felt wretched for thinking otherwise. But Damon wasn’t one to say things that intentionally hurt, so when he went on, I wasn’t entirely surprised. “He’s someone you care about.”

I stopped at the driver’s door to my car and stared back at the now only semi-chaotic scene. Rubberneckers stood off behind yellow police tape. Some filmed the charred remains of the restaurant; some filmed the firemen and cops. None of them looked like anything other than restaurant goers, or tourists, or people out for some light exercise in and around the Viaduct Basin.

I sucked in a clean breath of air and said, “I know.”

It was too much a coincidence not to be related. Hennessey being undoubtedly blackmailed to push for my suspension. And Angelo’s, a place I considered a safe harbour, a friend of sorts, dead. Right when the clock was ticking and time was running out for me in CIB.

I wanted to question the survivors — Angelo’s sous-chef. I needed to head back to CIB and download all the information I could while I still had access to the police computer.

My eyes met Damon’s across the roof of the car.

“This is personal,” I said.

“It might not be.”

“Coincidence? You know I don’t believe in that.”

“I’m just saying, it’s a little early to think along those lines.”

I closed my eyes and tilted my head to the sun.

“What else?” Damon asked. What else did I have to make me think this was personal.

I opened my eyes and stared at the only man who had ever truly got me. Sure, Carl thought he got me. He was my mentor. My idol. My coach. But he only moulded me into what he thought I should be. What he could make me. He didn’t truly see me for me.

Damon always saw through the bullshit right to the heart of the matter. Right to the centre of me.

“Hennessey’s being blackmailed,” I announced. “I have two days tops - more like one - before his recommendation for my suspension reaches Hart.”

Damon just stared at me and then he turned around and swore bloody murder.

Thankfully there were no civilians nearby, let alone children he could have corrupted with his potty mouth.

“I don’t have proof yet, but I know Andrew Hennessey,” I said, “and I also can’t quite believe I’ve gone right ‘round the bend and am having a breakdown finally.”

“You’re not,” Damon said with feeling.

“Thanks,” I offered wryly. Always good to have your mental stability confirmed by your lover. “It won’t stop Hart from acting on the doc’s word, though. Hennessey’s our go-to psych. He’s more respected than any other. That’s why I’m seeing him.”

Because Hart had organised it. Because Inspector David Hart got what he wanted when he wanted it, and he wanted the best for Carl’s partner. For Ethan Keen’s daughter. Police politics at its best.

“Your plan?” Damon asked after he took a moment to regain his even temper.

“Get into the Wanganui and try to find a connection between Weston and Hennessey, and now I guess, gas explosions in Italian restaurants.”

“You’re the connection.”

“That won’t be in the Wanganui.”

“Then what will be?”

“Prior cases that match. Weston’s been doing this for a while. He’ll have a pattern like any perpetrator does after a length of time. He’s done this before, even if he hasn’t been caught yet. Open cases. Cases where the collar was dirty or smudged. He won’t have baulked at making someone else pay for his crimes. I’m betting there’re innocent people locked up in Mount Eden Prison all because Rhys Kyle Weston had them take the fall for his crimes.”

“And the police computer will help you find them?”

“That’s the plan.”

Damon slowly nodded his head. “What do you want me to do?”

It was a simple question. Possibly a throw-away question. Damon didn’t realise what it meant to me, though. His support. His unfailing belief that I could solve this. Save my career, find justice for Angelo, and free Hennessey from whatever guillotine blade that hung over his head.

But it also meant one thing more.

I wasn’t alone. I had a partner. And just because time was running out for me at CIB didn’t mean I couldn’t be in two places at once.

“Head to the hospital before Cawfield does,” I instructed, “and try to get in to see Angelo’s sous-chef. I want to know if Angelo suspected something and warned him and that’s why he was outside the blast radius.”

“Or if he is somehow involved,” Damon finished for me.

I smiled. It was probably a little brittle and a hell of a lot sharp. Then before I slipped in through the now open door to my car, I said, “Just remember, Weston has a long arm. And Cawfield has a mean right hook.”

Damon offered me a cheeky grin back. It was a far better smile than mine. But this was Damon. He could still my heart with a wink. Stop the world from spinning with a smile. Save me with a simple touch.

“Sweetheart,” he said, and I rolled my eyes at him, “I can be sly when needed.”

“Don’t I know it,” I muttered and slipped into my car.

Damon leaned down and stared at me through the passenger window.

He didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to.

He loved me. And I loved him.

Shitty life bullets or not, we would survive this.

Even if Angelo Berti hadn’t.

Chapter Three

“Picture An Electrical Switch. And Flick It To Off When The Shit Hits The Fan.”

CIB was empty when I returned. The bullpen always appeared neglected and a little worn when there was no one in there to break up the monotony of untidy desks and weathered industrial carpet and stale coffee tainting the air. I zigzagged through the pens as if I was navigating a slalom course. The air-con sent a chill wash of air over my shoulders.

I shuddered and slumped down into my chair, staring absently at the one opposite; the one Carl always sat in when he wanted to bug the shit out of me at my desk. The chair creaked as I leaned back in it. I closed my eyes, breathed through my nose, and counted slowly inside my head.

It took more than a minute to still my rapid pulse and lower my respiration rate, but by the time I opened my eyes again, I was back on an even keel.

Angelo’s face flashed before me ruining all my hard work.

You’re close to breaking, Lara.

And Weston knew how to go about ensuring that.

I was dealing with a master manipulator. A criminal who could outthink a cop. He was devious and clever. Happy to stay in the shadows when it suited him. More than prepared to do the dirty work when no one else lived up to his exacting standards. He could work with others; Nathaniel Marcroft and Sweet Hell had been evidence of that. But if he was as experienced as I thought he was at this game, then this wasn’t his first rodeo.

Had he worked with others before? Where were they if he had? Dead? In prison? Weston used blackmail freely, but more than that, he was capable of finding a person’s weak spot; the one thing that they would do anything for. He’d twist that spot, turn it in on itself, and then use it against you.

Carole Michaels’ addictions had been used against her. Drugs, sex, her dependency on him. And she wasn’t the only one I knew of.

There was Eagle. My Karangahape Road informant. Eagle didn’t do drugs. He abhorred them. But that didn’t mean he didn’t have addictions. He was addicted to his line of work. Sex, if you will. And had been addicted to his love affair with another street worker. Dave hadn’t survived Sweet Hell; Weston and Marcroft had seen to that. But Eagle had.

With more addictions than he’d started with.

I stared at the telephone on my desk and muttered a curse under my breath. Eagle and cellphones didn’t mix. I’d have to visit his little alley on K Road if I wanted to check up on him. If he was even there. It wasn’t a given anymore. Eagle was more often than not in the wind.

I switched my computer back on and fired up the login screen for the Wanganui. The clock was ticking. Four hours down. One blackmailed. One dead. Was there a manipulation in there I couldn’t yet see? It would fit the haphazard pattern I’d created for Weston.

The Wanganui came up just as Ryan Pierce walked into CIB. I watched the detective sergeant out of the corner of my eye as he took in the empty bullpen, the disarray left by a fleeing mob of cops, and the sole occupant sitting in front of a bright computer screen.

He ran a hand over his face and said, “I’ve missed something, haven’t I?”

“Not invited to the party, Sarge?” I asked.

“Maybe I pissed someone off. What’s up?”

He crossed the space and took Carl’s seat. I didn’t feel the pinch in my chest at that move anymore. But I still called it Carl’s seat.

I sat back in my chair, ignoring the waiting cursor on the search bar on the Wanganui system and met Pierce’s inquisitive gaze.

My pager hadn’t gone off either.

Coincidence? I didn’t believe in them.

“Angelo Berti is dead,” I said matter of factly. I could switch off my emotions as well as the next cop.

Picture an electrical switch. And flick it to off when the shit hits the fan.

Has the shit hit the fan yet, Old Man?

“Jesus,” Pierce said in a stunned whisper. He reached for his pager and stared at the blank screen.

“You and me both,” I said.

His eyes came up to my face, and he studied me.

“That can’t be a glitch,” he said.

I shook my head.

“What aren’t you telling me?” he pressed.

I trusted few people in my life. Strangely, I trusted Inspector Hart. The man was an impenetrable fortress. If Weston got to him, Armageddon had started. I trusted Damon when for so long I had thought he had betrayed that trust.

I’d trusted Carl, which really fucked that entire line of thought up.

And I wanted to trust Pierce.

His pager hadn’t gone off.

I sighed and scrubbed a hand over my face. I needed coffee. And not the shit that coated the inside of the carafe we had in here.

“I saw Hennessey this morning,” I said quietly.

Pierce watched me closely. I couldn’t tell if he was looking for the cracks or if he was trying to decide where I was going with this. I didn’t usually bring the Department shrink up unless I was in front of a firing squad led by Inspector Hart.

I opened my mouth, but no words came out. The sound of my teeth clacking together was almost louder than the overworked air-con.

Pierce scratched at his goatee.

My eyes strayed to the search bar on my computer, and I started entering commands. Four hours down, closing in on five. Pierce said nothing while I worked. I was aware of him watching me; assessing me; maybe not judging me but putting all the clues together.

You’re close to breaking, Lara.

Did Pierce see it? Did he know?

“What are afraid to tell me, Keen?” Pierce finally said.

I wasn’t afraid to tell him. I was afraid to trust him.

“How’s Daisy?” I said instead of the myriad of other things I could have gone with. Finesse and a breakdown didn’t seem to go hand in hand. Go figure.

He blinked at me and then slowly smiled. “She’s great,” he said with all the love a man could have for a child. Daisy wasn’t his by birth, but Pierce loved that little girl as though she was a part of him.

This was not a man who was being blackmailed or manipulated by the likes of Weston.

I nodded my head. “Hennessey’s been bought.”

Pierce’s smile slowly fell.

“Pay off?” No question as to my assessment, just open acceptance of my words.

I felt a weight lift off my shoulders.

“Blackmail,” I said, which should have elicited emotions in direct contrast to the relief I was feeling right then.

Pierce scowled. “Evidence?”

“Not yet, but I’m working on it.”

“I take it this is Weston?”

“Doc’s recommending my suspension,” I told him.

Pierce stilled. I could see the doubt in his soft brown eyes clearly.

“Lara,” he said and knew he’d blown it as soon as I returned my attention to the computer screen.

Four hundred odd cases had been singled out in the parameter search I’d run. I didn’t have time to whittle them down, so I shunted them all off-site to a cloud I had access to, and the Department didn’t. I’d have to assess them later when I wasn’t being assessed by a supervising officer that is.

Five hours down.

“OK,” Pierce said. “Let’s say he’s being blackmailed. How long have you got?”

“Twenty-four to forty-eight hours.”

“That’s longer than I would have guessed.”

“He’s stalling. Hennessey,” I explained at Pierce’s confused look. “He was also making sure I knew he was being coerced.”

“That’s why,” he said as if to himself. That’s why I was sure Hennessey was being blackmailed. Not that I was having a breakdown and was trying to cover it up.

Even people you trusted needed more than just your word. Pierce was a good cop. He rarely let his emotions get in the way of solving a crime. Unless, of course, a woman was being hurt and then all bets were off. Detective Sergeant Ryan Pierce could be a heat-seeking missile when a woman was being hurt.

I wasn’t being hurt. Not in the way that punched Pierce’s buttons. But a woman could be hurt in that way and then Pierce, like Hennessey, like Carole and Eagle and who knew how many others, would be in the palm of Weston’s hand.

Ready to be manipulated.

“You need to move on protecting Marie and Daisy,” I said.

He blinked at me; a look I didn’t often see on Pierce’s face.

And I’d seen it twice in the past five minutes.

“Angelo Berti,” I said with meaning. “Andrew Hennessey. What do they have in common?”

“You,” he whispered.

“Pierce,” I pushed, leaning closer to deliver my next words. “This is personal.”

“Shit.” He fumbled for his phone and then swiped the screen. I expected him to address his wife, but a male voice answered and could clearly be heard through the cellphone’s tiny speakers.

“Pierce, you sly dog. Did you want to go another round already?”

“I need your help, Nick.”

Nick Anscombe. Of Anscombe Securities and Investigations. I bristled at the widening of my circle of truth. I didn’t want to open up my skeleton-filled closet to anyone, but I would if it meant protecting those I cared about. Which made me think of Eagle and then, bizarrely, of my dad. Eagle was already compromised, and there wasn’t much I could do for him other than check in every now and then. And my father was an experienced cop — a superintendent in Manukau Police.

He was also the last person I wanted to admit that I cared for.

But Nick Know-it-All Anscombe was definitely not on the list of people I trusted and would have chosen to bring in on this nightmare that had become my life.

I glared at Pierce, but Pierce was having his own mini-crisis and ignored the laser beams emitted from my eyeballs.

“I have reason to believe that Marie and Daisy could be used to get to me,” Pierce was saying. “I’m at CIB. Do you have anyone closer to their location? This is time sensitive.”

“Of course, it is,” Anscombe said with all due seriousness; not an ounce of the glib persona he so often wore. “Let me check. I’m entering Control as we speak.”

Control was the high tech room in the centre of Anscombe’s building, surrounded by video surveillance cameras and run by two extremely competent tech geeks. It was the eyes and ears and heart of ASI. And I was secretly jealous of it.

I scowled and crossed my arms over my chest, glaring daggers at an oblivious detective sergeant.

“Amber,” I heard Anscombe say. “Who’s north of the bridge?”

Pierce’s family lived up in Whangaparaoa Harbour. It would take at least an hour to get there from here off-peak. How he commuted on a daily basis was beyond me. But then, if I had a family that I adored like he did, maybe I would make some sacrifices to keep it too.

A light female voice said something in the background which I couldn’t quite catch, but then Nick was back, and I could hear everything.

“Jason Cain,” he said down the line. “He’s moving on them now. Is Daisy at school?”

“Yes,” Pierce clipped; sweat beaded his brow.

“Which first?” Nick asked with what seemed little emotion.

Pierce said nothing. Just blinked and breathed too quickly. How do you pick your wife over your kid? How did Pierce pick when his kid was a step-kid and not biologically his? This could fuck him up forever.

I reached out and took his cellphone from his clawed hand. He didn’t stop me.

“The school’s closer to the turnoff to Whangaparaoa,” I told Nick.

Silence and then, “Hello, Detective. Let me guess. This is all tied up with you.”

“Have you only got one man up there?” I said, ignoring the judgment I so clearly heard in Anscombe’s voice.

“Would I have sent only one man if I had more?” he snapped back.

“I don’t know, Anscombe. Would you?”

“Why is it,” he said through what sounded like clenched teeth, “that when the shit hits the fan, it always comes from your direction?”

Picture an electrical switch. And flick it to off when the shit hits the fan.

I laughed — that electrical switch front and centre inside my head.

“Could be I’m just special, Anscombe,” I drawled.

He sighed, and I could just imagine him closing his ice-blue eyes and pinching the bridge of his nose to still the oncoming migraine.

My smile turned genuine at that.

“Put Pierce back on,” he instructed.

I switched the cellphone to speaker and laid it on the desk between us.

“He’s on,” I said.

Silence.

“Nick?” Pierce asked. “I’m here. Has he got Daisy?”

“Standby,” Anscombe said as if this was some sort of military op.

I flicked a gaze around the bullpen to check that we were still in the clear and just about pissed myself when I spotted Inspector Hart watching from the open doorway to his office. How long had the old bugger been standing there? How much did he know?

Had Hennessey’s recommendation come through already?

I checked my watch — five hours and counting.

No. Hennessey had given me at least twenty-four. This was just Hart being Hart and being good at it.

His frosty gaze met mine, but he said nothing.

“Daisy is safe,” Nick said a few minutes later. “Cain’s moving on Marie’s office.”

Pierce abruptly stood up and started to pace. His eyes caught Hart, but he didn’t even flinch at the Detective Inspector being present. Pierce sometimes had a better poker face than me. Or he was too caught up in his loved-ones’ danger to care that Hart was privy to the unravelling of his sanity.

No one said a word as time stretched uncomfortably.

Then Nick announced. “All clear. Where do you want them?”

Pierce slumped down in his seat and hung his head between his legs and just breathed.

“You got a safe house?” I asked.

“Several,” came the curt reply. Nick Anscombe and I would never be friends.

“Take them to one, and we’ll be in touch.”

Silence.

“Thank you,” I forced myself to say when Anscombe remained mute.

“I expect a full debrief, Detective,” he said levelly.

“You don’t need one,” I said and disconnected the call.

Pierce would either tell him or not, and Nick Anscombe knew how these things worked. He wouldn’t push. But he would guard Marie and Daisy with his life, or, at least, with the life of his men.

The room filled up with unsaid words, and then Hart grumbled, “You best come in here before the others get back.”

He turned on his heel and left the door to his office open. I watched as he closed the blinds on the glass wall to his domain that would keep our meeting somewhat private.

“You gonna tell him?” Pierce asked quietly from across my desk.

I stared at the Wanganui system up on my computer and then logged out.

I didn’t have much choice in the matter. Inspector Hart was my boss.

He was also not above pulling fingernails to get answers when needed.

The next few minutes were going to suck.

Chapter Four

“Don’t Let The Bastards Get You Down.”

Six hours down and I felt like I’d been pulled through an industrial meat grinder backwards.

I still had my fingernails but not my pride. Hart knew everything I did. And probably had deduced a hell of a lot more. Pierce still looked shaken but was rallying. I sat immobile in one of Hart’s office chairs and tried to decide if I was still hallucinating or this was actually my life now.

Part of me wished for the madness. But only a small part.

I sighed. Hart moved from his head back, ankle to knee position of thought, and spun his chair to face me.

“We don’t have long,” he said. “Pull yourselves together, Detectives.”

Pierce sat up straighter in his chair. If I sat up any straighter, I’d be challenging the Sky Tower for height.

“As of this moment,” Hart said in his gravelly voice, ”this goes no further than this room. We already know we’ve got a traitor in our midst. Now we have the potential for many more.”

Because Weston could get to any one of our fellow detectives.

“Are you going to warn them?” Pierce asked.

“Not all of us have a Nick Anscombe to call on for a safe house,” Hart growled. I wasn’t sure how the inspector felt about Anscombe Securities and Investigations. ASI operated just outside the law, but often in conjunction with us.

Anscombe was one of those anomalies that appeared in any law enforcement system; semi-autonomous and entirely outside of the detective inspector’s hands.

But Hart would use him if he had to. He just couldn’t justify using him for the thirty-odd detectives in CIB.

“At least warn them,” Pierce insisted. “They can take their own precautions.”

“And who should I warn, Detective?” Hart snapped. “The CIB traitor who would report back to Weston and we’d lose the upper hand?”

“What upper hand?” Pierce demanded. Then added a reluctant, “Sir.”

“He’s right,” I said softly. Both men glared at me. My eyes met Pierce’s. “Weston’s been one step ahead of us the entire way because he has someone on the inside feeding him clues. We divulge that we’re aware of his blackmail of Hennessey and that I’m the connection and he’ll take several leaps at once. Right now, we know what he’s doing and why. If we lose him, then there’s no telling when we get a bead on him again.”

“And this helps the guys’ families out there, how?” Pierce said, waving an agitated hand toward the bullpen.

We stared at each other for a suspended moment. A moment thick with regret and guilt and frustration.

I was glad no one out there could see us in here, even if they could still hear a low sounding grumbling like a distant thunderstorm.

“Which one of them does Keen care about the most?” Hart asked, breaking the standoff.

An uncomfortable silence filled the detective inspector’s office after he’d spoken.

“Cawfield?” the old man pressed. “His partner in crime? Trevor Jones, who she’s only worked with a handful of times? Tell me, Pierce, how long did it take you to chip away at Keen’s hardened shell? A month? Six months? A year?”

“Six years,” Pierce said quietly.

“Six years,” Hart repeated, nodding his head.

No one met my eyes, which was just as well. I wasn’t sure if I would glare at them or burst into tears.

I stared at a spot on the far wall and counted to three slowly inside my head. Then repeated it again when I let out my breath.

“We know this has to do with Carole Michaels,” Hart went on. “In particular, with revenge on Damon Michaels for getting his sister free of Weston. That might have failed, and Weston has Carole in his possession again. But as we’ve established, that doesn’t mean he’s going to drop his need for revenge. This is a highly developed psychotic mind we’re dealing with. He fixates. He commits to the end. He’s got Carole back, but he hasn’t yet got back at Damon.”

Hart looked at me then.

“You’re Damon Michaels’ Achilles heel. If he can get to you, he can get to Damon.”

“Why doesn’t he just take Lara directly?” Pierce asked in a more level tone of voice than he’d used beforehand.

He was back in the game again. The frustration I’d seen before directed at me was gone. Pierce had an electrical switch he flicked too, I thought.

I stopped counting my breaths and turned my mind to the question.

“He’s tried that once, remember?” I said. “The cross. Sweet Hell.” Pierce grimaced. Hart nodded for me to continue. “It didn’t work, and he’s not in the habit of repeating the same mistake twice.”

“Well, that doesn’t help us much,” Pierce muttered.

“Just because he doesn’t make the same mistake twice,” I said, “doesn’t mean there’s no pattern.”

“Go on,” Hart said, turning his chair sideways and taking up his reclined, head back, ankle to knee position.

“It’s a game to him,” I said. “He derives satisfaction from winning it and outwitting us. He might have trouble expressing his emotions, but there has to be something in it for him to keep doing this. And he’s done it before; I’d stake my badge on it.”

“Your badge is about to pay the piper, Keen,” Pierce said, reminding us all of the ticking clock.

I checked my watch. Almost seven hours down now and I still hadn’t defined the pattern.

“We know he likes to manipulate people,” I said, ignoring the clock and Pierce’s words. “Twist their perceptions and break their minds. Carole Michaels is broken. Eagle is broken.” I swallowed thickly but forced myself to go on. “Hennessey is by no means broken; he warned me; gave me enough to go on to know he’s being coerced.”

“Which would suggest blackmail and not mind manipulation,” Pierce said.

I nodded. Hart steepled his fingers and said nothing.

“Manipulation and blackmail,” I repeated. ”Two parts to the pattern.”

“Mixed with abduction and death,” Pierce added. “Carole Michaels and Angelo Berti.”

I lowered my head and looked at my hands in my lap. At least I wasn’t wringing them.

“Carole was already in his pocket,” I said. “Maybe there’ll be another abduction. Maybe not. But manipulation, blackmail and murder. That’s definitely the pattern,” I said.

“He gets to challenge himself with all three. Possibly four,” Hart agreed, finally entering the discussion again. “All of them could be a compulsion. So, we look for that.”

I already was in a manner of speaking; I just hadn’t told the inspector that.

“Pierce,” Hart suddenly said, swinging his chair back around to face us. “I want you to discreetly look into what Weston could have over Hennessey’s head. We’ll start with the blackmail first.”

“On it.”

“Keen, we’ve got to be more careful with you. You, he’ll be watching. If he knows everything to date, then he knows you’re already on his case: Chasing down Carole Michaels.” He paused. “Where is your partner anyway?”

“Hopefully interviewing Angelo Berti’s sous-chef up at the hospital before Cawfield interrupts.”

Both men stared at me for a beat.

Then Pierce shook his head, and Hart sighed.

“You better hope Cawfield doesn’t get there in time to bust him,” Hart said.

“Damon knows what he’s doing,” I replied with not just a little defensiveness.

I cringed inside at the show of emotion but worked not to add to it.

“Does he know about Hennessey?” Hart asked, cutting straight to the crux of the matter. Or ‘heart’ of the matter if you were that way inclined.

His name really did suit him.

I wasn’t sure, though, if the inspector’s question was his way of seeing how I had been handling things. If I’d opened up to Damon, did that mean I was somewhat stable, willing to take help when available? Or did it mean I was crumbling and leaning on my boyfriend like a crutch?

Even I couldn’t work it out inside my head.

“Yes,” I said, thinking the truth might be the only option available to me in a closed-in space with Inspector David Hart, supervising officer of CIB, in attendance.

“Good,” was all the inspector said.

“What about the doc’s recommendation?” Pierce asked. He glanced at me with a hint of sympathy in his eyes.

“I can’t ignore it,” Hart declared. I doubted that. Hart knew what was what and could do whatever he damn well felt like in his own department.

But then that would send a message we didn’t want to send to Weston.

“So, I’m to be a sacrificial lamb again,” I said, sounding resigned.

“At least there’s no cross this time,” Hart grumbled as Pierce said, “At least you know it’s not real, and you’ll be back.”

Unlike Harvey, he meant.

I offered him a small smile. Pierce missed his best friend.

My eyes landed back on Hart.

“So, if I’m being watched, what do you want me to do?”

“We have to assume he thinks we haven’t connected Hennessey to him,” Hart said. “So, work the case without that. Pierce will cover the shrink. You get back on Weston. Known associates. Past haunts. Cross-reference with Carole Michaels’ history. Get your sidekick and start beating the feet. I want you both seen for the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours to be doing your job doggedly. Door knock. Rough up an informant or two. Do not interfere with Cawfield and Simpson on the Berti case. We’re going dark. If he thinks he can get one over on CIB, then let him think he has. We give this shithead nothing to go on other than what we want him to see. Got it?”

“Got it,” I mumbled as Pierce just nodded his head. “And when the recommendation comes through?” I pressed.

Hart sat back in his chair but didn’t turn it sideways. His fierce eyes bore into me.

“Then you hand in your badge and gun with as much decorum as you can manage and walk out of here.”

“That’s it?” I demanded.

Hart looked at Pierce. “How much can you lean on your friendship with Anscombe?”

“Oh, hell no,” I muttered.

Pierce grimaced. “Maybe not that much,” he admitted, not making eye contact with me.

“Then I’ll just have to remind the good private investigator that I know a thing or two about what he gets up to and where he gets his information from,” Hart said, offering up an evil smile that rivalled any movie villain in existence.

“You want me to work with Anscombe?” I said because I just had to remove all shadow of doubt.

As well as any hope I’d had that I’d misheard him.

“I want you to do your job, Detective. And if that means your hands are tied, and you have to rely on someone else to hold your weapon, then you’ll bloody well do it. Understand?”

“Understood.” A pause. “Sir.”

“Good. Then let’s get this party started.”

Hart turned his chair sideways and ignored us.

Pierce’s troubled gaze met mine. We both shrugged and left Hart’s office.

Seven hours down, and things were getting messy.

They got messier when Cawfield stepped into my line of sight, blocking my path back to my desk.

“Show us your arse then, Keen,” he said. “Got a chunk out of it you need kissing better?”

“Shove off, Cawfield.”

“Ooh,” the dickhead in question said. “Anyone would think you’re losing it a little.” He leaned forward in a blatant display of disregard for his wellbeing and whispered, “I can help you lose a bit more if you like. Or loosen up a little, take your pick.”

I shoulder charged him as I passed and swiped up my jacket and handbag from my desk.

“Not in a million years, arsehole,” I muttered.

“You’ll come around, Keen,” Cawfield shouted after me. “Not many can resist what I’ve got to offer.”

Split personality; that’s what Joe Cawfield had. One minute he was hurling insults at me, the next he was trying to get in my pants.

I shuddered as I waited for the lift to arrive. At least he hadn’t mentioned Damon, which meant either Damon beat him to the hospital and got to Angelo’s sous-chef first. Or my partner made a stealthy escape before he was spotted.

The lift doors opened, and I rushed inside before I checked it was empty.

Trevor Jones threw his hands up in a surrender position and barely managed to hold onto his toothpick.

“In a hurry, Keen?”

“Just trying to avoid Cawfield,” I muttered. “Sorry.”

“No need to apologise. We all try to avoid Cawfield every now and then. Even Simpson.”

I tried to smile, but Cawfield had a way of getting under my skin.

“Hey now,” Trevor said. “Don’t let the bastards get you down.”

I met his kind eyes and nodded my head. He tipped his hat to me and stepped off the lift. When the doors closed, I let out a long breath.

Cawfield might have been a dick, but there were still members of CIB who were nice.

I thumbed my cellphone screen on and dialled Damon.

“Where are you?” I said when he answered.

“HEAT,” he replied without missing a beat.

“See you in ten.”

“I’ll have the coffee waiting.”

Neither of us said another thing as I rang off. What was there left to say? Coffee meant everything.

Chapter Five

“Life Doesn’t Stop Just Because You Want It To, Lara. It Speeds Up. Because Life Is A Cunning Bastard.”

The Hauraki Emergency Assistance Team was located at Central Fire Station on Pitt Street. Upstairs, above the Watch. Lined up in a tidy and perfect row inside the garage itself were multiple pumping appliances. Or fire engines to the layperson. In addition to that and strategically parked for easy access were several specialist vehicles: ladders; rescue tenders; water tankers; hazardous materials response units; operational support and the like — all on a section of land no greater than half a city block.

I bypassed all the red and headed directly up the back stairs to HEAT itself.

I could hear the low rumble of male voices as I neared the top of the stairs. I didn’t bother announcing myself, just barged on into their inner sanctum and quickly took stock of who was on station at this late hour.

Damon stood beside the coffee making equipment and began to pour as soon as he saw me. Flack offered a greeting with the tip of his own near-empty mug, and Marc gave me a chin-lift. Which was enough to let me know just how much they considered me part of the furniture around here.

Two months back in Damon’s life and it was as if I’d never been away. CIB was my home, but HEAT was a kind of family.

“Gentlemen,” I said and took a seat. Damon placed a steaming cup of coffee down on the table before me and stepped back. I could feel his eyes on the side of my face. I could feel his need to reach out and touch me.

He wasn’t afraid to show tenderness in front of his two closest friends. But he was afraid I’d bite back. Damon gave me space even when I didn’t realise I needed it.

I took a sip of the coffee before anyone spoke. For rugged, testosterone-fuelled adrenaline junkies, they certainly were perceptive. All eyes watched me with varying degrees of intensity. Once I’d taken a fortifying sip and placed the cup down on the table, postures relaxed slightly, and Marc started the conversation rolling.

“Bit late for a house call, Keen,” he said.

“You just missed the watch dinner. Roast lamb and trifle with custard,” Flack added.

“Hopefully not all at once,” I said.

They both smiled at me. Damon sat down in the chair closest to mine, coffee cup in hand.

“How're things?” he asked.

The question covered more than just my wellbeing, although it covered that too. But it also encompassed the case - or cases - and where I was at with them as well as the mood in CIB. Damon could say a lot without saying anything really.

I let out a breath of air.

“That bad, huh?” Marc commented quietly.

I turned to look at Damon.

“Did you get in to see Angelo’s sous-chef?”

He shook his head. I must have scowled because he reached out and touched my hand beneath the table, squeezing slightly.

“But neither did Cawfield,” he said. “The chef was in surgery when I arrived. His condition is now stable, and he is expected to recover, but he won’t be conscious for quite some time.”

“ICU?”

“Yes.”

“Any of the wait staff available?”

“Cawfield already had them,” Damon admitted with a grimace. “Clearly he’d phoned ahead and new to go to ED rather than Resus like I did.”

That would have chafed. It certainly would have chafed me. Being reminded that Cawfield actually did have an ounce of intelligence underneath all that gelled-up exterior was never a pleasant experience.

“So, dead end,” I said, sipping my coffee.

“Dead end,” Damon agreed.

My eyes wandered across the table to Flack and Marc. Weston had already targeted these men. Marc had a burned out hotrod car to prove just that. So far, Flack had avoided an attack, but that didn’t mean he would remain untouched for long.

“What precautions are you taking?” I asked him.

His eyes flicked to Damon. And then back to me.

It was Damon who answered. “Flack’s sent his family on holiday to Australia. I doubt even Weston could reach them there.”

I slowly nodded my head, fingers tapping lightly on the table’s surface as I considered our next move.

My eyes flicked to my watch. Eight hours down and I was sitting around a fire station drinking coffee. Carl would be so disappointed in me.

Life doesn’t stop just because you want it to, Lara. It speeds up. Because life is a cunning bastard.

I’d started this day on little to no sleep, and it was highly likely I’d finish it on little to no sleep as well. The clock was ticking, and I could almost hear the second hand getting faster.

“Well,” I said standing up and taking my empty mug to the sink to be washed. “I’ve got people to bug and places to bust.”

It wasn’t so much that I could see their concerned glances out of the corner of my eye as I could feel the tension thicken the air. I felt like I was sailing blindly; unsure of what to do next. Hart had given me clear instructions, but my mind and body seemed to be stalling - for want of a better word.

He’d got to Hennessey. I hadn’t thought until that moment exactly how much that had affected me. Hennessey was my… shameful secret. But he was also largely responsible for keeping me on an even keel. Weston had struck a severe blow. More than he probably realised.

I turned around, and neither Flack nor Marc were looking at me. Purposefully averting their gazes?

Damon was, though.

“Where to next, love?” he asked. His coffee mug was already on the bench, and he stood with his jacket in hand, ready to go.

It kicked something in the arse inside me.

“K Road then south,” I said with sudden clarity. “We’ve got two potential targets to secure before time runs out.”

“Eagle,” Damon said and then looked directly at me. “And your father.”

The fact I’d included my dad in my circle of love was telling. Not one man present would rat me out on it though.

I offered a grim smile, said my farewells to Marc and Flack, then led the way out of the station.

Eagle had been targeted by Weston once already, of course. But even though I didn’t think the psychopath would make the same mistake twice, I wasn’t prepared to let Eagle slip through the cracks again. Weston had been somewhat successful in his manipulation of my informant and friend. Hell, he’d been 100% successful, we’d just managed to rescue Eagle before he’d been able to succumb completely. I was sure Weston’s goal had been death; either death by drugs or death by dependency on another. When Eagle’s boyfriend Dave had been found dead, Eagle had almost followed him.

But we’d caught it in time, which meant Weston had ultimately not succeeded. Like his attempts at revenge on Damon, though, I was sure Weston was capable of attempting to take Eagle from my life again.

I beeped the locks on my car and reached for the door handle on the driver’s side.

Hot breath washed over my neck, and I spun, one hand on my service weapon, one up ready to thrust fingers into eyes, a knee on a collision course with my supposed attacker’s gonads. Damon snatched the fingers from the air, gripped my wrist above my service weapon tightly, and blocked my knee with his thigh.

“Easy,” he murmured. “I was just moving in for a kiss. I can see the error of my ways, so please refrain from castrating me in my place of work.”

He was attempting to lighten the moment. It fell woefully short of the mark.

I closed my eyes and counted to three inside my head.

It’s called cognitive therapy, Lara, I could hear Hennessey say inside my mind. It will help.

The fact that I’d needed any kind of therapy at all had made me reluctant to try.

Now that Carl’s voice inside my head had been exposed for the imposter it was, counting my breaths to slow them was the only internal guidance I could rely on.

“It’s getting to me,” I whispered. “Hennessey,” I explained further.

“I know,” Damon said, releasing the hand that had been going for his eyes and wrapping his palm reassuringly around the nape of my neck. “Come here,” he said, still in that low tone of voice so as not to carry.

I didn’t bother to look around the carpark to see if we were being watched, which said more about my state of mind right then than my instant and visceral reaction to Damon’s breath on my neck. I simply followed the instruction as if it had been an order and stepped into the warmth of Damon’s body.

He wrapped me up in his arms and pressed my face into the crook of his neck, neither trying to kiss me nor push me, just simply hold me and stop me from falling apart.

We stood like that for a good five minutes.

Eight plus hours down and I was hugging my boyfriend in the dark.

I pulled back.

“Better?” Damon asked.

I nodded my head.

“Can I have that kiss now?”

I glared at him. He chuckled and shook his head.

“Get in the car, love,” he ordered, and that was an order that time.

I arched my brow at him, but as getting in the car was what I actually wanted to do, I did as he said.

His smug smile as he rounded the bonnet made my teeth clench.

The scent of him wrapping around me once he was seated at my side made all my muscles relax and my head spin.

Damon was a lethal weapon without even trying.

“I’m not sure if Eagle will be there,” I said. “But it’s all I’ve got to go on.”

I still didn’t know where Eagle laid down his head. You could hardly call what he did in his waking hours ‘sleeping’. Even if he slept with his johns for a living.

Damon said nothing, just buckled up. He knew, despite being unsure if Eagle was there, that I was still going to try to find him.

I parked the car on Mercury Lane, and we walked up to Karangahape Road past a darkened Starbucks on the corner. It was after eight and the red light district of Auckland City was gearing up for another hectic and debauched evening. Neon signs flashed ‘Pleasure Chest’ and ‘Erox’ and ‘XXX.’ Guys in tight shirts and fitted jeans accompanied girls in high heels and arse skimming minis. Transvestites prowled the foot traffic in platform heels and boy-short pants with bigger boobs and more hair than I had.

Damon had slipped his jacket on and looked the part of rich playboy out on the town. I didn’t bother to catalogue the ways I didn’t look like I fit in, adjusting my jacket to hide the bulge of my sidearm instead.

A cool breeze washed down K Road, but it failed to clean it. Litter gathered in the corners, complete with cigarette butts and lollipop sticks and packets of GHB labelled Cherry. A guy stumbled out of a strip joint, laughing raucously with his equally stoned friends. A couple were damn near having sex against the closed door to an adult shop; maybe taking inspiration from what could be found behind the painted over windows.

I walked through the throng of early adopters to K Road’s nightlife knowing that this was only the start of what would happen on Karangahape Road tonight. By ten o’clock, Team Policing would be patrolling this beat using their CPI training to prevent and manage potential crises. The party-goers would either accept their presence or push back against it. Tempers would rise, and bottles would be thrown. And despite their mandate to calm and safely manage only, there’d be several arrests made before midnight.

Central cells would fill with intoxicated misdemeanours. Paperwork would be filled out in triplicate and filed. Coffee would get consumed by the bucket load. Stress release cigarettes would be snuck in when the boss’s back was turned. And then it would all get rinsed and repeated tomorrow night.

It was a hive of activity — a throbbing heartbeat to a living and breathing city. And despite the tears and tantrums that would undoubtedly ensue, I loved it. I loved this pulsing, screaming, raging world I lived in. And the men and women who took it upon themselves to help the general public get through the heartache and rapture and make it to another day alive and well.

We weren’t always successful, but we gave it our all.

And men like Weston wanted nothing more than to tear it all down.

He was fucking with HEAT. He was fucking with CIB. The man had a death wish. Or he had absolutely no idea who and what he was up against. If Karangahape Road was the heart of Auckland City on a late night, HEAT and CIB were the white cells in its bloodstream; fighting the good fight.

Weston would not win this war; I was sure of it.

Even as I held my breath as I stepped into Eagle’s little alley unsure of what exactly I would find.

Damon followed behind; a silent wraith at my back. He didn’t like coming here and catching glimpses of what it is that Eagle provided. A service as old as time, but one that made any hot-blooded heterosexual avert his eyes. Damon understood Eagle’s need to do this; he’d even had front row seats to Eagle’s state of mind. But that didn’t mean he liked it.

Had Eagle been servicing a female, perhaps Damon would have felt differently. Perhaps not. I didn’t have unfettered access to Damon’s thoughts, even if sometimes I felt like I was completely in tune with the man inside.

But I didn’t need to know he felt uncomfortable as we rounded the end of the alley and heard Eagle moan out loud.

“That’s it,” he encouraged his mark. “Harder, baby. Yous know how I like it.”

The crack of a palm meeting flesh rang out on the night. I arched my brow. Damon stiffened beside me. I peeked around the edge of the rough brick siding I was using as cover and copped an eyeful of Eagle’s bare arse on display as he hung off the window ledge of a long ago closed up premises and presented his butt cheek for another round.

The john he was servicing - or was servicing him, I couldn’t tell - wore a trench coat and fedora hat. He had hunched shoulders and a somewhat skinny neck; any more, though, I couldn’t determine under the shapeless jacket. His back was to me; I couldn’t see his face. Even the colour of his hair was hard to make out. But I didn’t need to see anything else; he wore cologne which made my heart lurch.

Carl had always worn too much Old Spice.

I crouched down, not making a sound, and placed my back against the brickwork.

Damon crouched down beside me and placed his lips to my ear.

“You recognise his trick?” he asked in a barely-there whisper.

I nodded my head. Stunned.

Eagle moaned again after a particularly hard hand to skin hit.

“Fuck that’s good, son,” he said.

My fingers came up and pressed into my lips before I could laugh hysterically. Or start to cry out loud.

Carl was at least thirty years Eagle’s senior.

And as far as I knew, heterosexual through and through. My old CIB partner had had a few women on the go while I’d been working with him. One of which, I was pretty damn sure, was harbouring his risen from the dead arse right now.

Eagle made a sound, disturbing my desperate thoughts, that could not be mistaken for anything other than what it was. His cry of release echoed in the little courtyard he used to make his money. I forced myself to peer around the corner of the building again. But Carl had retreated to the shadows. If he got anything sexual out of his encounter with Eagle, I couldn’t tell.

My hand shifted of its own will to my weapon. I released the safety catch on the holster. Damon stiffened further at my tell.

Silence rang out and made my ears buzz.

Eagle’s panted breaths, and the sound of him pulling his baggy pants back up broke through the thumping beat of my heart.

“Yous gots what ya came for,” Eagle said.

“So did you,” Carl’s raspy voice replied.

“I’ll make sure she gets the message, right?”

“She already has.”

The shadows shifted, and in an instant, I knew Carl had gone.

I swung around the edge of the building; gun raised, heart in my mouth.

Eagle let out a surprised squawk. I crossed the courtyard, ignoring my informant, and checked the rear of the darkened space. A door hung open on a premises that I was sure should be locked up tight at this time of night.

I took a step towards it, intent on chasing Carl down when Eagle spoke.

“He knows how I likes it.”

The words were spoken softly, not in defiance or defence of what I had witnessed.

I stopped in my tracks and turned to look at the boy.

He lit a cigarette and puffed out a smoke ring.

“Evil wind blows, Keen,” he said.

I blinked at him; my heart rate reluctantly returning to normal. But Carl’s departure still pulled at my frame and equally pushed me away again. And Eagle’s soft voice held me immobile.

“Is that what he told you to tell me?” I demanded.

He shrugged. “Don’t much matter now, does it?” he said, stubbing out the half-smoked cigarette. “He ain’t who you thought he was.”

“Because he helped you to get off?”

Baby brown eyes stared at me, no longer looking guileless but rather a little wired. Eagle had taken a hit of something this evening. More than seeing my old partner and mentor slap the butt cheek of one of my informants to pay up on a task, seeing that change in Eagle’s eyes tore through me.

I sucked in a shaky breath of air and took a step closer.

Eagle stepped back into the shadows surrounding another door I was pretty sure was unlocked and would afford him an easy escape route. No one could say Eagle was stupid. Or that he trusted his marks.

“Not the first time, Keen,” he said, moving back another step as he spoke. “Won’t be the last. Carl and me is friends now.”

And then he was gone, and I was left shaking, my mind twisting and turning, my stomach flipping and threatening to expel any meagre stores it held.

Carl and Eagle were friends.

That was the message. But what the fuck did it mean? I had no idea.

Chapter Six

“Don’t Let Your Imagination Get Away From You, Sport. Tie It Up, Strap It Down, And Beat it With A Whip On Occasion.”

I slammed both hands down on the steering wheel almost making it bend with the force I used. What the hell was Carl playing at?

“What the hell is he playing at?” I said aloud because saying it inside my head wasn’t good enough.

I had to get it out of me.

Wisely, Damon didn’t reply.

“Why do this?” I mused a little less violently. “He knew I was there; knew I was watching. Jesus Christ, Carl,” I exclaimed. “What the fuck?”

Damon shifted in his seat and turned to face me. The careful silence was clearly about to be fractured.

“The message was seeing him with Eagle,” he said quietly.

“I know that,” I snapped. “But… what the fuck?” I repeated because it bore being repeated.

“You cannot attribute sane reasoning to anything Carl does,” Damon said levelly.

And in the process sucked all of the air out of the car.

I turned the key in the ignition and started the air-con up. Fresh air blew over my heated face. I would have wound down the window, but I was too scared of who might hear me lose it.

Carl was no longer sane.

“Damn,” I muttered, checking my mirrors reflexively. No one was sneaking up on the car. And when I looked out of the windows, I couldn’t spot anyone in Mercury Lane or further up on K Road watching us either.

Carl might have been mad as a hatter, but he knew when to make his escape.

“Eagle,” I said, letting out a pent up breath of air. “Eagle said they were friends now. Carl was always just my partner. Eagle dealt with only me. He knew about Carl. Heard things from his informants about him. But he never showed any inclination toward working with Carl over me.”

“That’s not why Carl’s doing this,” Damon said, staring blindly out of the windscreen.

“Then why?” I asked, but I had an inkling. It wasn’t something I wanted to face up to, because doing so would mean I was partly responsible for what had gone down in Eagle’s alley tonight.

“Carl’s looking out for him, so you don’t have to,” Damon said.

I closed my eyes and tipped my head back on the headrest. My hands gripped the steering wheel as if I was afraid I’d float away. As if by releasing my hold on something tangible, I would also be releasing my hold on something I could only sense in an abstract way.

And Damon said Carl was crazy.

“That is fucked up,” I murmured.

“Like I said,” Damon said carefully back, “nothing Carl does now is sane.”

I opened my eyes and turned my head to face him.

“He knows what Weston is doing,” I said.

“Yes.”

“He knows Eagle could still be targeted,” I added.

“Yes, it would seem so.”

“And this is how he chooses to deal with it?” I asked incredulously.

“Like I said…”

“I know, I know. I heard you the first two times. Please, if you ever wish to be kissed again, don’t repeat it.”

“My lips are hereby sealed, love.”

A small smile threatened to break my scowl in half. Damon smirked at me.

We stared at each other for a moment, and then I automatically checked my watch. Nine hours down. Closing in on ten. One blackmailed. One dead. And one manipulated being cared for by a crazy ex-detective.

Weston couldn’t have planned for this to have gone better. Because as much as I hated to admit it, I was compromised. I wasn’t focused, and I wasn’t attentive, and I was so far from being the superstar cop Carl wanted me to be it wasn’t funny.

To top that all off, I still had to advise my father of what was happening.

I pulled my cellphone from my jacket pocket and stared at the screen.

I wasn’t normally a coward, but when facing Ethan Keen, I needed my wits about me. I had neither the courage nor the wits right now. I dreaded to think what Hennessey would say about that.

But then, anything Hennessey said to me now was up for debate.

What did Weston have over the shrink?

I swiped the screen active and placed the call.

It went straight to voice mail. Part of me thought my father had his cellphone set up for that. When it recognised my number, it didn’t bother to ring, just simply shunted me off to an answer service. Cellphones weren’t that sophisticated. At least, the cellphones owned by cops didn’t seem to be. And my father was nothing if not the perfect image of the police.

I disconnected before leaving a message and then dialled again.

Same deal. Straight to voice mail.

Sighing, I considered the implications of leaving a message that could be heard by anyone with a little know-how and then pocketed the phone and started the car properly.

Within minutes, we were on the motorway, heading south.

Damon remained silent, which I was equal parts thankful for and angry about. I leaned forward and switched the radio on. And then promptly turned it off again when it only played adverts. Tapping my fingers on the steering wheel, I tried to picture the dots as I knew them inside my head.

There were too few to start connecting them.

I sighed again, and Damon turned his head to look at me.

“Do you want to do this alone?”

Face my father he meant.

There were certain things that had recently come to light regarding my father’s private life. Certain behavioural aspects that no daughter should ever be aware of in regards to their parent. My father had been cleared of any illegal activity, but that didn’t mean his dirty laundry hadn’t been aired in public during the Sweet Hell case. Hart had done his best to keep most of it out of the open case files.

But doing his best and succeeding where a bunch of nosy detectives with a penchant for digging up shit were concerned was quite a different thing.

I was sure Cawfield knew more than he should about Ethan Keen’s pastimes. Hell, he knew more than most, having been inducted into Sweet Hell along with Damon by Nathaniel Marcroft.

Two men in my life knew more about my father’s sex fiendish ways than I wanted. Damon’s knowledge I could just about handle.

But Cawfield? It didn’t bear thinking about.

I took the off ramp at Manukau on Redoubt Road and headed towards my father’s house. It was the same house I had grown up in. The same house he had lived in when first married to my mother. It was the same house we came back to after we buried her when I was five.

The same house he’d paraded a bevvy of beauties through every weekend while I grew old enough to understand what their intended purpose was.

I’d recently decided my father’s cool, standoffish demeanour was due to an inner rage he was attempting to control. He iced over and froze all emotions out. I’m sure he didn’t hide them all from everyone; I had to hope Haydee saw something that I didn’t. But to me, at least, he was ice personified.

That rage had almost cracked the ice during the Sweet Hell case.

Almost but not quite.

I hadn’t spoken to him since then.

I parked the car out the front. Dad’s car would be around the back. And if he had a visitor, I couldn’t see an extra vehicle about. Haydee lived on the North Shore. I’d looked her up after I’d met her. ‘Met’ might be a stretch. We’d been introduced. I’d talked. She hadn’t. Not much for conversation that one.

I shuddered.

The lights were on, including the outside light. So he either expected a visitor or had one that would leave sometime tonight.

Or he’d simply forgotten to switch it off.

I couldn’t picture my father doing that. But who knew what Haydee made him feel or do that I couldn’t even think of.

Damon slipped out of the car silently and padded up the stairs at my back. I realised I hadn’t answered his earlier question. He’d simply taken it upon himself to be at my side while I did this.

Sometimes Damon could read me like a book.

For a police detective, that wasn’t necessarily a welcome acknowledgement.

I considered knocking on the door. I didn’t live here anymore. But something had me pulling out my keys and locating an old disused one for the house’s front door. Stained-glass windows cast pretty coloured patterns across my pale hands as I slid the key in the lock and turned it.

The door promptly opened on well-oiled hinges.

I stood on the threshold and regretted my choice to enter unannounced.

The smell of candles burning wafted on the air. The lights were dim. I couldn’t hear anyone downstairs, but I knew my father was home. His coat hung on a coat rack to the side of the door; his keys were in a dish on the hall stand. I could scent his expensive whisky on the air.

I looked down at the hall table and noted the extra set of keys lying there and then looked back at the coat rack and picked out the well-tailored women’s jacket hanging beside my father’s familiar one.

I sighed, stepped back out of the doorway, and closed the house up again. And then I just stared at the stained glass.

“Are you going to press the doorbell?” Damon asked.

He’d watched the entire episode without passing judgement.

I had no idea what he thought of me right then — the daughter who wasn’t a daughter but sometimes forgot about that conveniently.

I reached up and pressed the doorbell, and the door opened.

My father stood before me in slacks and an open-necked shirt. Both were clean and pressed as if just pulled from the wardrobe. He wore slippers on his feet.

And no socks.

I smiled.

He glared at me.

“To what do I owe this pleasure, Lara-Marie?” he asked in that icy tone of voice.

Oh, I’d well and truly done it now; I’d interrupted his evening.

“I’m here in a semi-official capacity, sir,” I said.

I always wanted to grimace when I said ‘sir’ now. I held it together for both of our sakes.

“Very well,” he said, opening the door up further. “Wait for me in the study.”

I nodded and stepped past him; Damon followed without having been offered a greeting from my father at all. Ethan Keen could be polite when he chose to. He had manners. He knew what the correct etiquette was when greeting either the man sleeping with his daughter or the head of an emergency service.

He just chose to forgo etiquette right then in a show of pique.

I’d well and truly interrupted something.

He waited until we walked into the study before climbing the stairs again. I had a sudden vision of Haydee tied up up there which I had to forcefully push from my mind before I shuddered.

Damon paced across to the fireplace, which was lit and burning down to embers. He stoked it back up; the ancient house was quite cold. But all I could do was close my eyes and try not to think about whether my father’s evening had started in here for the fire to be going.

Thankfully there were no empty whisky tumblers to confirm that thought. I chose to go with this being a place he entered after work and nothing else.

I sat myself down in an armchair and crossed my legs, hands to knees, back straight. I was a good daughter. Damon watched me from his stand beside the fireplace.

It was a very quiet and long eight minutes later before my father entered the room. A lot can happen in eight minutes, I thought.

Stop it!

Don’t let your imagination get away from you, Sport. Tie it up, strap it down, and beat it with a whip on occasion.

Damnit, Carl.

“So,” my father said, rounding his big wooden desk and taking a seat behind it. I was used to a wall being erected between us. Right now it felt a mile high. “What is semi-official enough for you to turn up at my house after hours?”

Uninvited, I thought. He’d forgotten to say uninvited.

But when was the last time my father invited me home?

I held his frosty gaze and said, “Angelo Berti is dead.”

I half expected him to say “Who?” But that’s not my father. “Suspicious circumstances?” he asked instead.

“We believe so,” I said. “Andrew Hennessey is being blackmailed.” I wasn’t going to give him a second to regroup and attack.

If it was war that Weston was waging, it was a different type of battle I fought with my father.

He stared at me, tight-lipped. I couldn’t tell if the lip tightening was due to my delivery or the topic.

And then he said, “Your position at CIB is under threat.”

No one could say my father wasn’t a good policeman.

I looked at my watch. “I have less than a day, possibly two before my suspension.”

“And Hart won’t stop it.” It wasn’t a question. “He’s laying a trap.”

I said nothing. Damon had remained silent the entire time we’d been here.

“Blackmail and murder,” Ethan said. “What else?”

“Manipulation and abduction,” I finished for him. The pattern rounded out.

His eyes snapped to my face.

I could see the cogs turning. Ethan Keen was not a likely candidate for manipulating. It just wouldn’t be an easy thing to achieve with a man like my father.

But abduction?

“I’m the connection,” I said. “Damon is the target.”

My father flicked a glance at Damon, but his icy stare returned to me in the next heartbeat.

“Thank you for the warning,” he said.

That was it. That was all I was getting. He’d look after his own which in a way would help me. The most my father had done for me in years.

And only because the person immediately in danger was his pet.

I grimaced. Damon moved off to the doorway, expecting our hurried escape.

I didn’t blame him. I wanted out of there as much as he did and as fast as he did too at a guess.

But I stopped in the middle of my father’s study and turned to look at him.

Ethan Keen was a lot of things to me. And a lot of things he failed to be.

But he was still my father.

“Take care, Dad,” I said.

He blinked.

“Lara,” he whispered, but I left before he could complete whatever ill-advised thought he’d been about to speak.

Chapter Seven

“Life Is Short. Live It Well. Live It Grandly. But Most Of All, Live It As Though At Any Moment It Could Vanish.”

I was numb on the ride back to the city. Damon remained quiet beside me. A type of silence that wasn’t filled with unsaid words, but instead filled with a sense of companionship and solidarity. Most men would have littered the space with suggestions or platitudes. Damon had learned a long time ago that those things didn’t work with me.

Sometimes I wondered how he put up with my waspish ways.

Silence. That’s how he put up with me.

I let a little sound out which could have been mistaken for a sigh or a sob or simply a snort.

Damon took that as an invitation to open up a dialogue.

“Where to next?” he asked.

We’d passed the eleven-hour mark and were closing in on twelve. I’d secured, in a manner of speaking, two of my people. Damon had taken care of whoever was left to be targeted in HEAT. Cawfield and Simpson were on the Berti case. Pierce was looking into Hennessey. If either had found out anything of note, I’d have been notified indirectly or directly by Pierce.

I’d heard nothing, so I had to presume there was nothing to hear.

I flexed my fingers on the steering wheel. My stomach chose that moment to let out a resounding grumble.

“Here’s a suggestion,” Damon said conversationally. “I’ll order in pizza to your house, and we’ll go over the case files together.”

Unbidden tears threatened to ruin my she-bitch reputation. I cleared my throat and said, “Good idea.”

He didn’t look at me as he pulled his cellphone out and swiped the screen. In fact, he purposely stared out the passenger side window, allowing me a moment to wipe my eyes and piece the shell I wore back together. It was fragile. Prone to cracking. Carl had been the calcium carbonate that it had been created from. Hennessey had been the glue that held it together when my ex-partner had disappeared from my life without explanation.

I counted to three inside my head, but I wasn’t sure if it was working. How was I going to do this without the glue?

My street was deserted at this late hour thankfully. It made it easier to see if anything was out of the norm. There were no strange vehicles parked in the shadows. And although there were plenty of shadows for bodies to hide amongst, I didn’t get an itchy feeling between my shoulder blades. I led the way to the front door and let us inside, deactivating the alarm system after checking to make sure it hadn’t been tampered with.

Carl had already delivered his message tonight.

I crossed to the dining room table, switching on lights as I did, dumped my handbag and jacket, and then made my way to the kitchen. I pulled two beers from the fridge and uncapped them. Handing one to Damon, I took a swig. Damon, being Damon, reached for a glass and decanted his. I watched on with a smirk on my lips.

The doorbell ringing interrupted our smirk match. Damon went to pay for the pizza while I organised plates. In minutes my stomach was thanking me, and Damon had relaxed from uptight protector to satisfied partner.

Even Carl hadn’t looked after me like this.

And that was enough of that.

I switched my laptop on and waited for it to boot up.

“There are over four hundred case files to go through,” I said.

“What?” Damon uncharacteristically said. “That many?”

“I couldn’t narrow the search parameters,” I explained. “I was in a hurry.”

He rubbed a hand over his stubbled face.

“How do you want to do this, then?” he asked.

“Whittle it down somehow.”

“The pattern?”

“Yep. The four pieces to the pattern-puzzle cross-referenced with locations we know Weston to have operated in. Failing that, we’ll cut back to three pattern pieces.”

Damon made a sound of disquiet. It was hardly a foolproof plan. But other than Rhys Kyle Weston’s known aliases, which had been tried multiple times already in multiple different varieties, we didn’t have much else to go on. The man was a psychopath, but then so was approximately one percent of the population and a quarter of males who perpetrated crimes.

And don’t even get me started on those clever enough to goose the system.

Rhys Kyle Weston did not appear to be in any psychiatric database we could find. That didn’t mean he wasn’t. He just hadn’t been charged with a crime and had his records unsealed. A shrink and their patient’s relationship was sacrosanct. Until it wasn’t. Weston hadn’t crossed that all-important line.

Not any of his known aliases had.

If he had a history of psych evaluation and treatment, we didn’t know it. So, I hadn’t bothered to put that criterion in the search parameter.

Forty minutes later, two bottles of beer and one extra large pizza consumed, we had our list whittled down to twelve cases. Eight of which were local to Auckland. It sounded far easier than it had actually been.

Thirteen hours down, over halfway to the earliest I could be booted from CIB, and I had a potential lead to follow. Eight potential leads. I’d save those outside of Auckland for when the shit really did hit the fan.

It was better than I could have hoped for.

As it was midnight, and I couldn’t actually follow up on a damn thing without waking up half of Mt Eden Prison, I had to settle for some sleep. Reluctantly I followed Damon into my bedroom, wishing sleep was not a biological necessity.

I contemplated jumping Damon as soon as he hit the sheets, but by the time he’d brushed his teeth with the toothbrush he left in my ensuite and joined me under the covers, I was already counting sheep.

The fact that he didn’t wake me for some midnight nookie told me exactly how badly he wanted me to catch up on some sleep.

He did wake me at seven the next morning with hot kisses against my neck and a hand wrapped around my left breast, though. So I felt his masculinity hadn’t been in any way compromised.

“Again,” he instructed sometime later when my body was wrung out and limp as a noodle. “Once more, love,” he instructed, rolling me over, so I was chest first to the mattress, and his larger frame moulded down the back of my body. He pressed a knee between my thighs and spread my legs wide, then nestled his lower half between them. One hand was wrapped up in my bedhead messy hair, the other was beneath my pelvis, fingers finding purchase on sensitive nerve endings.

I bucked, and he slid his thick length into me from behind. I made a keening sound, and he tipped my head to the side and kissed the sound away with strong strokes of his tongue inside my mouth. I panted for breath as he struck up a rhythm to be proud of, every thrust of his hips pushing me further and further into the bed itself.

I shuddered my release as his fingers pinched my clitoris. And then he lost his steadfast rhythm and found his own release, a silent snarl crossing his lips, his spent body collapsing across my arse and back.

The bed felt like a cloud beneath us. Sweat slicked our bodies and made my skin tingle. I could feel the thumping of his heart against my left shoulder blade. His lips brushed against my neck, hot breath making me shiver delightfully. He sucked the skin in gently; not enough to leave a mark but enough to know he was marking me.

Even urbane and cultured men like Damon were Neanderthals when it came to their women and beds.

“It’s morning,” I said.

“So it is,” he said, not stopping his efforts in the slightest.

My eyes landed on the bedside clock.

“Twenty-one hours,” I said.

“What was that, love?” Damon asked distractedly.

“I’ve got three hours before I could get booted from CIB.”

Damon stopped kissing me, his body becoming rigid.

“You know it won’t be for long,” he murmured, sliding off my body and rolling onto his back. He kept contact through a hand on my butt, but the separation he’d created made the reality of the new day set in.

I pushed to a seating position and scrubbed at my face and then made my way to the bathroom and a shower without offering comment.

I knew, intellectually, that Inspector Hart was only playing Weston’s game. Pierce also knew that when the order came down, and I was suspended from CIB, it wasn’t real. But no one else would know.

I’d never thought myself particularly self-conscious. I didn’t care what I wore or how I looked, all that mattered was how I acted and what I achieved. Solving cases and catching the bad guys was all that truly mattered to me.

Or so I thought.

But picturing my fellow detectives aware of the supposed reason for my suspension left me feeling chilled to the bone and utterly desperate.

And they would know. They were damn fine detectives.

I did not like the sensation of desperation one little bit.

Damon joined me in the shower, but he didn’t try to start anything up again. I didn’t think it was because twice in the space of an hour had worn him out. Damon had proven on many occasions that he could literally go all night long. Instead, I was pretty sure, when he helped me wash with care, that he wanted to comfort and not distract me from what was in store.

I loved him more for that distinction than I could have thought.

We stepped out of my bedroom, dressed in clean clothes and looking respectable, having spent thirty minutes in domestic bliss. A type of bliss I had never thought possible but which Damon insisted on showing me time and again.

He was railroading me, I thought. Forcing me to face up to the fact that we worked well together. Not just in a professional manner, but in every possible way. We weren’t living together. And some nights we spent at his house instead of mine.

But we might as well have been.

I wasn’t sure how to take that. I knew what Carl would say, though. Life is short. Live it well. Live it grandly. But most of all, live it as though at any moment it could vanish.

He approved of Damon. He approved of the way Damon took care of me. The way he loved me.

I tried very hard not to let that negatively influence me in any way.

Damon strode towards the kitchen and the coffee machine. I strode towards the printout I’d made last night of the twelve cases, eight local, and names associated with them. Two of those local names were in Mount Eden Prison. One had insisted on his innocence right from the start. We’d begin there.

I wasn’t naive enough to believe a convict’s innocence just because it would force the puzzle piece I had in my hand into place. But if there was a chance that Weston had manipulated the evidence to force the false imprisonment of an innocent man, then I had to investigate.

I downed my coffee in several quick gulps, relieved that Damon had expected such behaviour and made the coffee cooler than normal. And bit into the slice of toast he’d prepared as I walked toward the front door. Damon took the time required to rinse the mugs out in the sink and then joined me on the front step.

My eyes scanned the street. It was after eight, so most of the residents had left for work already. There were a couple of kids walking off towards the local high school — a dog barking at them from behind a picket fence. And the smell of scrambled eggs and bacon mixed with coffee on the air.

But nothing else. If Carl was watching, I couldn’t tell. And if Weston was, he was too good for me.

“Everything all right?” Damon asked from beside me when I didn’t immediately move.

Twenty-one hours down, closing in on twenty-two. No, everything wasn’t all right.

“Fine,” I said and received a grunt of disapproval in return.

I led the way to my car and released the locks. Damon slid into the passenger side without another word. I took one last look around the neighbourhood and then threw myself into the driver’s seat. Switching the scanner on and activating my 10-3 or available status, I listened to North Comm dispatch vehicles to various routine type incidents and let out a breath of air.

Somehow the familiar sound of a busy police channel settled my nerves. Surely, if something devastating had happened or was about to happen, the radio would reflect it.

I shook my head and started the car, then reversed out of my driveway.

My pager went off before I’d even reached the end of my street.

I hadn’t even made twenty-two hours. Hennessey had lied. Two hours too soon. Twenty-six if you counted the outer limit he’d given me.

I stared at the words on the screen, blocking traffic in the middle of the road if there had been any. The car purred as it waited for me to release the foot brake. My leg was locked as my eyes locked on the small LCD screen.

AKX3/4A: CIB

“What is it?” Damon asked, bringing the rest of the world back into focus.

I checked the rearview mirror. Nothing had snuck up on me while I’d been otherwise out of it. I slipped my pager back into its rightful place and then moved off slowly. Carefully. One might say precisely; in the middle of the lane and not an inch out of it, as if I strayed I’d hit a landmine and blow up.

“Lara?”

“It’s happening,” I said, my voice merely a whisper of sound. I licked my lips. Forced some volume into it. “I’ve been called back to CIB for a meeting.”

“A meeting?”

“Or a course, but as I’m not scheduled for that, I’m going with a ‘4A’ meaning a meeting.”

“It could be something else,” Damon tried in an uncharacteristic attempt to soothe me with false platitudes.

I offered him a glare and gripped the steering wheel tightly.

“It came via pager,” I explained. “Hart’s way of giving me notice in private.” And a way for the CIB traitor to trace it.

“Ah,” Damon said, staring off out of the windscreen. He knew, being in the emergency services too, that if it had been a standard directive, the dispatcher would have used the comm as I’d marked my vehicle and thereby myself as available.

“I’ll drop you off at HEAT,” I said. It was on the way and delaying this any further would just make me antsy.

I was already antsy having had my countdown interrupted earlier than expected.

Expect the unexpected, Sport. Then they can't use your surprise against you.

I might have resented Carl’s voice inside my head, but that didn’t mean it had nothing of use to say.

Sorry, Old Man. I wasn’t listening.

It’s your arse not mine in the hot seat; I pictured him saying.

Only I was responsible for my discombobulated state.

Damon had stiffened in the seat beside me, but he didn’t counter my advisement of dropping him off at HEAT first. He’d want to be there for me, to offer moral support, or punch Inspector Hart in the face for mistreating me. We couldn’t have that, and he knew it. He also knew this was something I had to face alone.

With as much decorum as I could manage. Wasn’t that what Hart had ordered?

I wasn’t sure if I could do decorum, but I could channel Ethan Keen and encase myself in ice. If Damon accompanied me, that ice would crack, melt into a torrent of water. We couldn’t have that either.

So, I drove towards HEAT.

Chapter Eight

“This Is The Price We Pay For The Good We Do, Sport. This Is What Happens When Good Cops Don’t Save Themselves First. Save Yourself, Lara.”

Because life was a cunning bastard and liked to fuck with you daily, CIB was full of eager and bizarrely up-at-the-crack-of-dawn detectives. Not that nine in the morning was the crack of dawn for most people, but for detectives on call, it certainly could be seen that way.

I scanned the occupied desks, took in the hum of activity. It wasn’t chaotic. It wasn’t anticipatory either. It was the usual welcome buzz of good men at work.

Save one.

Cawfield was here… and I knew, then, that the stage had been set.

Hart was nothing if not an opportunist. The suspension order would have come through first thing, and he would have waited only long enough for Cawfield to be in attendance. The fact that Joe Cawfield was here at all before ten in the morning proved everything.

I pegged him for the traitor in an instant.

I’d waffled about it. But no more. This was too much a coincidence and outside his normal behavioural pattern.

I made a show of crossing the room to Hart’s door.

Pierce was already there. As my immediate supervising officer it made sense but wasn’t a requirement. The fact he was also a union representative sealed the deal, though. Any disciplinary action must be conducted with a union representative of choice in attendance.

Ryan Pierce had always been mine.

I entered Hart’s office and stood at parade rest.

“Close the door, Detective,” Hart said.

He hadn’t said it loudly. He hadn’t whispered it either. There was no doubt, though, that those closest to the door would have heard the business-like tone of his voice.

I turned to do as the inspector bid and spotted Cawfield by the water cooler, which happened to be near enough to Hart’s door to listen in.

It took everything in me not to arrest the bastard then and there. But charging Cawfield for rehydrating in my vicinity wouldn’t stick in a court of law, and I didn’t have any evidence yet that he was the traitor.

Just a gut feeling and six years of antagonism which had cultivated an extraordinary amount of hatred for the man.

I seethed as I turned back around to face the firing squad.

“Don’t look so mad, Keen,” Pierce said, his poor choice of words being lost on him. “You know this is only temporary.”

“And early,” I said.

“Yes,” Hart remarked. “I’ve had it on my desk for three hours already. I couldn’t delay any longer.”

Three hours. Which would mean Hennessey would have filed it at least four almost five hours earlier than he said he would. And that was using the shortest time frame he’d given me.

I looked at Pierce. “Why? Have you found anything on the doc?”

He shook his head. “He’s divorced. Never remarried. Has no kids. His ex-wife is living in England, her country of birth. His only sibling, a brother, works down in Christchurch as a professor of psychology at Canterbury University. He has a godchild, but the kid’s safe at boarding school in the Bay of Plenty. Everyone else of note has been accounted for.”

“Then what changed?”

“I don’t know,” Pierce reluctantly admitted.

“Pierce will keep digging,” Hart advised. “He’ll also officially take over the Carole Michaels case. Unofficially, you’ve still got it. But you two can’t be seen to be collaborating. You’ll do that through ASI.”

Nick Anscombe had already been called into the ruse and now knew all about my fall from grace.

I knew it was all an act. That I wasn’t really being suspended from CIB. But seeing Hennessey wasn’t an act. That was real. And now Nick Anscombe would be aware of the fact that I was seeing a Department shrink.

It didn’t sit well with me, but I used my father’s ice to detach from the embarrassment and shame of the moment and concentrated on my supervising officers instead.

Both men, undoubtedly, saw right through me.

“While you’re here,” Inspector Hart went on, ignoring my ice queen act completely, “bring us up to date with what you’ve found out so far regarding the Weston case.”

And there went that opportunist character trait trampling all over my suspension.

I forced myself to take the spare seat in front of the inspector’s desk and gave them both a rundown on the four hundred cases Damon and I had painstakingly whittled down to twelve nationally and eight locally. Like me, Hart thought the local cases were the safest place to start.

Getting into Mount Eden Prison without a badge would not be as easy as I’d have liked. But neither Hart nor Pierce offered any guidance on that. I was more than capable of working it out for myself. And I would have Nick Anscombe’s multitude of off-the-record skills to call on.

Yippee.

“Well, that’s that,” Hart said and started shuffling sheets of paper on his desk. It was unlike him to be so wishy-washy on his dismissal procedures. He was out of sorts about my suspension, too, I thought.

I couldn’t stand to see my senior officer operating below par, so I stood up, offered a police college parade ground salute, and then fished out my badge, placing it on the desk before him.

He stared at it as if it might jump out and bite him.

It wouldn’t, but the gun I unholstered, and cleared of the magazine and extra round, could have. I placed all the relevant pieces on the table beside my badge and turned on my heel and walked out.

Pierce followed me to the door but stopped on the threshold.

“Keen,” he called.

I stupidly let my guard down and turned to look at the detective sergeant.

“Take care of yourself.”

The general hubbub of the bullpen petered off to almost nothing and a sense of gobsmacked detective invaded the large room. I knew every eye in the place was on Pierce and me. Probably homing in on my minute facial twitches and the fisted state of my hands.

It was hard to fool a seasoned detective.

That’s why Pierce had done it.

Knowledge of that didn’t make it easier to accept.

“Whatever, Sarge,” I muttered and stomped across the room, glaring at whoever got in my way, to empty my desk.

I considered not bothering. What did I have on my desk that I couldn’t live without? Not a damn thing, that’s what. But this was a show, and Pierce had set the stage, and I was a mere actor reading my lines and following the direction of my inspector.

I stared down at my desk and almost froze. Taking my stapler would have set the wrong tone. I didn’t much care for the pathetic and struggling pot plant. Instead, I reached for the only thing left to me: a pen holder with the permanent marker written words ‘Superstar Cop’ scrawled across it.

I shoved it in my handbag. Picked up my jacket and shrugged into it, well aware that everyone had noted the absence of my gun. And then I made my way out of the bullpen with as much decorum as I could manage.

Which wasn’t much when Cawfield cornered me in the hallway leading to the elevators.

I’d heard Pierce shout out a warning to him, which in turn had warned me, but Cawfield being Cawfield had ignored him.

He whistled softly as he came to rest, shoulder to wall, beside the lift as I waited for my exit.

“Let me guess,” he said. “You sucked the wrong dick, and it came back to haunt you?”

“Fuck off, Joe,” I said.

“Joe is it? Shit, it must be bad. You need a shoulder to cry on, Keen? A new dick to suck perhaps?”

“Jesus, you’re a pig,” I muttered, hitting the elevator call button repeatedly.

“All jokes aside,” he said.

“I can’t overlook the size of your penis, sorry. It’s the best joke out there.”

“Funny. You’re a laugh a minute. How do you do it when you’ve hit rock bottom?”

“Who says I’ve hit rock bottom, arsehole?”

He laughed; it was knowing and judgemental and designed to fuck me up as much as possible.

It was working. I clenched my fists and stared the recalcitrant elevator door down.

Open up already.

“Listen,” he said just as the elevator gods heard my prayers. I slipped in before the doors had finished opening. Cawfield just placed a boot beside the closest door, to stop it from shutting him out again.

I could be grateful for small mercies, like the fact he hadn’t followed me onto the damn thing.

“It isn’t right you being sidelined,” he surprised me by saying. “If you need anything; you know, anything work-related, just drop me a line. Call Robbie if you can’t face me. But you’re not alone, Keen. Even if it feels like it.”

“Cawfield!” Ryan Pierce’s harsh voice broke my stunned-mullet look.

“All right, Sarge,” Joe said, stepping back and raising his hands as if he were about to be arrested. “Just trying to kiss Keen’s booboo better.”

I blinked at the man. Fuck him. Mercurial mood swings aside, the man was a bastard.

“Go screw yourself, Cawfield,” I growled.

“Like I said,” he drawled as the lift doors slowly crawled closed again, “any time you want to, baby.”

I shuddered and leaned back against the metallic wall as soon as the doors closed tightly between us.

Joe Cawfield was as much a psychopath as Rhys Weston. They suited each other. I just had to figure out how they connected.

Sure, we knew Cawfield had been approached and manipulated by Weston to enter the Irreverent Inferno part of Sweet Hell. He’d convinced him that Damon was a bad egg and needed further investigating. Just like Weston had manipulated the fragile mental state of Nathaniel Marcroft, the owner of Sweet Hell, to kill Samantha Hayes and then try to have me killed.

Weston wasn’t above manipulating people to do his bidding. I was expecting to find just such a case locked up in Mt Eden Prison.

But how Weston was getting Cawfield to turn on CIB, I didn’t know. There had to be skeletons in Cawfield’s closest. I intended to dig them out and dust them off and parade them in front of every detective who had just looked at me with disappointment and judgement in their eyes.

The lift door opened and I just stood there. Stepping out of it, meant stepping out of CIB proper.

News would travel fast. And then I realised as I finally forced my numb legs to move, that I couldn’t even take my police-issued sedan from the parking lot.

I stood in the underground part of Central Police and stared at my car across the smooth concrete. And then I turned and made my way to an emergency exit to the side of the automatic garage doors.

I pushed through into mid-morning sunlight. Twenty-four hours and I was suspended from CIB.

Hennessey had tried to keep up his end of the bargain. But for whatever reason, he’d been forced to speed things up; but only marginally. Twenty-four hours had passed, and I was out on the street; naked, empty. As though this was real.

An errant thought had me thinking of comfort food which in turn had me thinking of Angelo’s down in the Viaduct Basin.

I couldn’t go there.

I swiped a hand through my hair and started to walk towards Greys Ave; the fastest route up to HEAT.

My thoughts tumbled and turned for a bit, as I slogged up the incline, passing the refurbished council flats where I’d broken in to find a bound but not necessarily imprisoned Carole Michaels. Over my shoulder was a job I’d gone to in my first year off the beat; the victim had jumped, and I’d watched on as my senior officer failed to talk him down off the ledge of the building. To the east was another callout that had left its mark on me; blood and broken bottles and beat to shit bums trying to sleep on the streets. Up ahead was the ambulance station and an interview I’d conducted there with a paramedic who had been first on the scene of a horrific murder.

The cases and callouts tumbled and twisted and turned inside my mind, and left me breathing too quickly. I tried to count. I couldn’t remember the speed I was meant to say the numbers at. Sweat coated my brow when I realised I couldn’t talk this all out with Hennessey.

I’d let Hennessey in when I’d been determined not to. This was a man’s world I walked, and you didn’t show emotions or feelings. Attachments to anyone other than your partner, the club, could get you killed. Distractions of the heart were frowned upon. Unless it was a quick release post a bad job. Then it was simply ignored or celebrated at the police bar over a drink. I understood then, why so many turned to alcohol.

It wasn’t being suspended, even fake suspended, from CIB.

Even if it was a little bit.

It was everything.

The jumper. The bum. The ambo who brushed it off as though it were nothing and then quit the service a month or two later. The car crash on Queen Street. The shooting on Parnell Rise. The gang-related death on Fort Street. The 1X in his girlfriend’s garage in Ponsonby. The 1J at the cinema on Queen. The 2M in Albert Park by the dolphin fountain. The 2C at a protest march down on Customs Street.

Faces and names and places and codes. They swirled around and twisted up, until I couldn’t see a foot in front of me, let alone see through the quagmire of my thoughts.

This is the price we pay for the good we do, Sport. This is what happens when good cops don’t save themselves first. Save yourself, Lara.

Lara, save yourself!

I stopped just before I walked out in front of a speeding taxi as it careened down Greys Ave. It honked its horn angrily at me, and my heart rate didn’t even spike; not even a little.

I was too numb, and it was already going way too fast as it was.

Damn it, Carl. How am I supposed to save myself if I have no one to catch me when I fall?

An ambulance tore out of the station across Pitt Street. A fire engine lumbered out behind it from directly opposite; lights and sirens blazing. A cop car would be responding from Cook Street. Lights on, siren off, because we had to be stealthy even when racing to save somebody.

Save yourself, Lara.

OK.

I straightened my jacket, brushed a hand over the empty holster under my arm, and then pressed a palm to my belt where my badge should have been.

Just because I was suspended didn’t mean I wasn’t still a cop.

The daughter of a cop. The granddaughter of a cop.

Weston would have to try harder than this to stop me.

I walked onto the Pitt Street Fire Station’s property with purpose and rounded the back of the building to the door to HEAT.

I didn’t hesitate to bound up them.

I had more than just Carole Michaels to free.

Chapter Nine

“If It Looks Like A Duck And Quacks Like A Duck Then You Can Bet Your Highly Trained Detective’s Arse It’s A Fucking Duck.”

Rescue, Prevention and Investigation were all on station at HEAT. It made for a packed lunch room and a noise level that threatened the eardrums. Several heads turned towards me when I entered. I received chin-lifts and raised cups of coffee and the odd greeting. I returned most of them but made quick work of crossing the common area and heading down the hallway that led to Damon’s office.

I could hear raised voices behind his closed door. The fact the door was actually closed sent warning signals to my fight or flight receptors; Damon usually had an open door policy. To close himself away with what sounded like an irate Flack, an uptight Marc and an equally vocal Horse meant something serious had happened.

I didn’t waste time, just knocked on the door and then opened it.

Four pairs of eyes turned toward me with varying looks of incredulity. Damon may not have closed his door often, but when he did, his men knew not to barge on in there.

I wasn’t one of his men even if they more often than not made me feel welcome.

Not so much of a welcome now.

“Keen,” Marc snapped.

Flack shook his head and scowled at nothing.

Horse offered an uncharacteristic glare. The man was built like a brick outhouse even if he was normally a teddy bear. The head of Rescue was a jokester. But not today it seemed.

“Gentlemen,” I said in greeting, closing the door behind me.

“We were having a private meeting,” Marc said. So far he’d been the only one to talk.

“The door’s closed,” I told him and leaned back against it to make my point.

My eyes met Damon’s. Something had definitely happened.

I looked at Flack. He shook his head minutely and purposely looked across the room at Horse.

My eyes tracked to the big man, and I saw it. Weston had struck again.

“What happened?” I asked.

“Are you asking as a CIB detective?” Marc demanded. “Or as a friend to HEAT?”

I’m not sure why they insisted on dealing with this in-house. Maybe it was machoism. But they knew, though, that CIB was working as hard as we could to solve this case and get to Weston before he could strike again. The fact he obviously had struck again was unfortunate. But we’d already established that Damon and I were a team. And they trusted Damon. So why not trust CIB?

I offered a frosty glare to Marc; one I was sure could freeze any testosterone-fuelled male’s balls off in an instant. I liked Marc. Marc usually liked me. But tempers were frayed, and emotions were high. I wouldn’t hold his behaviour right now against him. But I also would not be kowtowed by a fireman.

“As I am no longer a detective in CIB,” I icily told him, “then this is strictly a personal visit.”

Silence. Then Damon was around the desk and approaching me.

“Lara,” he murmured, reaching out and wrapping me up in his arms. “I’m sorry, love.”

I let him hug me for a moment, returning the gesture briefly, and then I pushed free of his grasp and took several steps away from everybody.

“It’s temporary,” I said, but even I could hear the doubt in my voice.

You’re close to breaking, Lara.

Nobody wanted a broken cop on the police force.

“Shit,” Flack murmured.

Horse grunted something along the lines of sympathy. Marc just looked guilty and was struggling to come up with a suitable reply that wouldn’t paint him in a bad - or worse - light.

“What happened?” I repeated, saving him the trouble and getting us back on track again.

“During my start of shift checks,” Horse said, “I found sabotage to all but one of my rescue lines and abseiling gear.”

I turned and faced him.

“Just yours?”

“Yep.”

“How was it sabotaged?” I already thought I might have an idea.

“The ropes were burned enough to be noticeable on a full inspection only and to weaken their structure should they be used. The gear had been doused in a slow-acting acid.”

Acid. That was new but also fit with the whole ‘fire theme’ Weston had going on. Acid did burn.

“All but one,” I said, playing what Horse had carefully said over in my mind.

“The one rope not affected,” Damon offered, “was the rope used in the rescue that blew up.”

The rescue that blew up was a false callout to get to HEAT Rescue. They were dispatched to a trapped rock climber, only to abseil down the cliff and find a bomb instead. They barely got out before it exploded.

“Nice message,” I said, taking a seat beside Horse on the couch.

He grunted at my understatement and correct assessment of the situation; Weston wanted there to be no doubt as to who had got to them. Even as he played his cards with a type of patience and deliberateness that astounded me.

The gear could have been overlooked by anyone not focused. Thank God Horse was focused when he wasn’t joking around.

“Where was your gear?” I asked.

They shared a look, and then Marc said, “On station.”

“Here at Pitt Street,” I said. They nodded. “Any CCTV footage?”

“We don’t have any,” Damon admitted reluctantly. CCTV footage was expensive, and the Fire Service was a government funded department.

I pulled my cellphone out and dialled a number I hadn’t planned on dialling for some time yet. Hart had given me orders, and I would eventually have followed them. But I’d had no intention of following them the minute I got suspended from CIB.

The situation had changed though. HEAT was an extension of Damon and Damon was mine to protect. Even if he’d baulk at that and say I was his to protect instead. We constantly butted heads over who looked out for whom.

It was kind of amusing.

I wasn’t amused right now.

Carmel answered on the fourth ring; couldn’t rush to answer the telephone, she might chip a nail or something.

“Anscombe Securities and Investigations,” she said in her harpy’s voice down the line.

The ASI receptionist and I weren’t friendly.

“This is Lara Keen.” Not Detective. I wasn’t right now and claiming such only reminded me of how cut off from my life I had become. “May I please speak with Nick Anscombe?”

The men in Damon’s office all looked at me as if I’d grown two heads. I purposely avoided eye contact.

Carmel didn’t even reply. But she thankfully didn’t hang up on me either, so I was calling that progress.

The line hummed and then clicked, and then Nick Anscombe said, “So polite, Detective. I didn’t know you had it in you.”

I gripped my cellphone tighter and forced myself not to react to Nick’s greeting. Not much got past Nick Anscombe. He would have known already that I was no longer a detective and he still chose to use my former rank to throw me off balance.

“I’d like to hire your services,” I said, which all things considered was rather grown up of me.

“And what particular services would those be? You need a case solved?”

Still button pushing. Screw him.

“Electronic surveillance of Pitt Street Fire Station.”

Silence.

“That is unexpected,” he finally said.

It was also akin to closing the barn door after the horse had bolted. I wasn’t sure if Weston would even try to get at HEAT on station again. But HEAT was Damon and Damon was who he was ultimately after. I was a little annoyed at myself for not thinking of setting up a trap here earlier. But I pushed that superfluous emotion aside and concentrated on protecting the men I had come to call family.

HEAT was also where I would be setting up the base of my excommunicated operations.

I could have set it up at ASI in Newmarket. But the thought of dealing with both Carmel and Anscombe in person on a daily basis didn’t thrill me. We’d work from here or from my home as a backup.

“Can you do it?” I asked Nick.

“I can, but you’re talking about placing sensitive equipment in a government building. Do you have permission for this?”

Since when did Nick Anscombe need permission?

I looked at Damon. He nodded his head to me.

“I have permission,” I said succinctly.

“And who’s paying?” Nick asked.

I didn’t exactly earn a fortune as a detective. And now I was suspended, no doubt suspended-on-pay for the time being, I had to consider my future. I was also cut off from CIB’s operational fund, so any on-going costs would be coming from my own pocket. I’d get reimbursed if I were reinstated. But even though this was a charade, I had Hennessey’s words floating around inside my head, my self-doubt growing exponentially with every thud of my heartbeat, and Carl constantly jabbering away in the background.

If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then you can bet your highly trained detective’s arse it’s a fucking duck. He might not have been the first to say those words, but Carl had a way of making you remember them.

I was on suspension. It felt like I was on suspension. It looked like I was on suspension. Ergo I was on fucking suspension.

And not all suspended cops made it back to the fold.

“I am,” I said and Damon shook his head adamantly. “CIB is good for it,” I told him. If I said it as if I believed it then maybe I would actually make it back to CIB to be reimbursed.

“I hear you’re no longer part of CIB,” Nick said, thinking my spoken words had been for him and not Damon.

“Be careful who you listen to, Anscombe,” I told him, pushing the whole am-I-aren’t-I thoughts from my head. “There are a lot of liars around.”

“Or manipulators,” he said.

“What do you know of manipulators?” I asked.

“It seems to me that you’re being manipulated as we speak even though you probably don’t believe it.”

He wasn’t far off the truth. Everything we were doing was reactionary. Weston was making us chase our tails and scrabble to respond to his perceived threats. He probably had no intention of striking HEAT at Pitt Street again. And yet I was tying up resources, spending precious time Carole Michaels probably didn’t have, plugging a hole he had made especially for me.

“CCTV at Pitt Street Fire,” I told ASI’s owner. “Monitored 24/7 both from ASI and on site here. I also want the monitoring system at Pitt Street slaved to the Police’s CCTV network throughout the city. When can you get it done?”

Nick took his time answering. Probably deciding whether to accommodate my final demand or not. Finally, he said, “It’ll be done by five tonight.”

“Good.” I moved to disconnect the call.

“Keen,” Nick called out before I could hang up on the insufferable man. “You need anything else; don’t hesitate to call.”

I blinked, but couldn’t answer. He’d hung up on me first.

“What good is surveillance gonna do?” Horse asked.

I pocketed my cellphone and said, “This just became ground zero. We work from here. All of us. And not just on your normal day to day duties. I’m seconding you all to CIB.”

“You’re not in CIB anymore,” Marc carefully said, wincing when I glared at him.

“Once a cop always a cop,” I told him. “Besides, this is family. Weston is after revenge on a member of this family. Family stick together. Call everyone in who isn’t here. Make sure their loved ones are as safe as they can be. From here on in, we work, sleep, eat at HEAT. We look out for each other. And we get this job done.”

Flack, Marc and Horse looked at Damon.

Damon was looking at me.

“Ground zero,” he repeated slowly. I nodded. And then he nodded, sealing the deal.

“What do you want Rescue to do?” Horse asked, pulling himself up to full height. He took up space on the couch; he took up more space when he stood up from it.

“You guys are the most physical,” I said, receiving looks of pique in triplicate from Flack, Marc and Damon. I ignored them. Rescue was the musclebound heroes of HEAT. “I want you patrolling the grounds. You’re on-site security. Take it in shifts.”

Horse nodded and rubbed his hands together. “This should be fun.”

“And Prevention?” Marc asked.

“You guys are on the CCTV. Once ASI sets it up, you’re going to have access to the entire city. I want you looking for key players. It’ll be boring but essential work.”

Marc nodded; face serious, body tense. Prevention were perfect surveillance geeks.

“And Investigation?” Damon asked.

I looked toward him. “Investigating of course. You guys will be working with me, beating the feet. We’ve got cases to follow up — prisoners to question. Known haunts to check out. And past associates of Weston’s to follow up on.”

“You’re turning us into a mini-CIB,” Damon said.

“Not so mini and definitely not so CIB,” I told him. “We’re not doing this from behind the safety of the law. We’re also not doing anything overtly illegal either,” I rushed to tell them when they all bristled. “But we’re certainly not doing this with open permission from the police. I’ve been suspended. I’m officially out of CIB. Unofficially, I’ve been given my orders. And my orders are to find Weston and shut him down quickly.

“So far, we’ve been dancing to his tune. CIB for all the good it does is a lumbering giant. It’s stuck in its ways and mired in mud. It also harbours a traitor.”

Marc and Horse looked shocked. Flack didn’t. He already knew, but it was a strange relief to have it confirmed that he and Damon hadn’t brought anyone else in on it unnecessarily.

Some things were too close to the heart not to cut when revealed.

There was no point keeping it a secret from the men here in this room now, though. I was deputising the entire HEAT division. So they needed to know what they were up against.

“We can do more distanced from CIB than within it,” I added. Hart had probably known this all along, and that’s why my suspension appeared an easy thing for him to accept and action. I pushed the inspector and CIB from my mind and concentrated on the team before me. My team now.

“And on that note,” I said to them all. “This is where we’re at. Weston has Carole Michaels. He wants revenge on Damon. He’ll get it any way he can even if he does it through Damon’s loved ones. He’s a suspected undiagnosed psychopath. Certainly, one that hasn’t appeared in our system to date. But he’s also not inexperienced. He’s done this before. He uses fire as a preferred method of physical attack. But in all other aspects of his criminal behaviour, he is cunning.

“Fire is his brute force, but manipulation and blackmail, two parts of his behavioural pattern, are not as base. And those two mixed in with murder and abduction make for a very dangerous individual indeed.”

“He’s mad,” Flack said with disgust.

“Yes, but don’t let that fool you,” I said. “It’s an intelligent madness. He’s kept one step ahead of us the entire time. Mainly due to the mole in CIB. He’s also managed to attack almost every single person at HEAT. Even aware of what he’s done and could do, he still managed to infiltrate the station and carry out another attack on one of you without you suspecting a thing until it was done.”

Horse grunted out something that was definitely inappropriate for public consumption.

“So, mad but clever,” Marc said, ignoring his teammate’s crass language skills. “And revenge by targeting anyone Damon cares about.”

“Pretty much,” I said. “Using a pattern of behaviour we can track.”

“Murder, abduction, manipulation and blackmail,” Flack offered, ticking the pattern off one by one on his fingers.

I nodded my head.

“How do we track all of that?” Horse asked.

I fished into my pocket and pulled out a flash drive.

“With this,” I said, placing it down on Damon’s desk.

Twelve similar case files. Eight in Auckland. Two convicted in Mt Eden Prison.

“We’re going to do some good old fashioned policing,” I told them. “Welcome to the club.”

Chapter Ten

“Trust Yourself, Lara. Above All Else Trust Yourself.”

It was mid-afternoon before Damon, and I made our escape from HEAT. The place was a veritable hive of activity. Teams of two from Rescue patrolled the perimeter of the Fire Station property. Prevention, having decided they weren’t going to wait on ASI to complete installation of the monitoring system, were scouring newsfeeds and social media for hits on Weston’s known aliases and anything else that would give us a lead on where he had based himself this time. Investigation had split off into pairs as well, to look into locales around Auckland City that Weston had been seen frequenting in the past or Carole Michaels was known to haunt on occasion.

The activity had two distinct purposes. One, it kept everyone focused and busy, avoiding any buildup of frustration that could lead to mistakes and offer Weston an easy target. Keeping them working in two or more also meant everyone had backup should Weston strike again. I didn’t think he would so soon, but that was where the second distinct purpose of using HEAT as my support came in.

Rhys Kyle Weston would not be able to miss what was happening at HEAT’s headquarters.

I might not have thought to lay a trap for him before he struck at Horse this latest time, but I was certainly dangling the carrot in front of his nose now. I snorted softly to myself at that thought. Carrot. Horse.

“What’s so funny?” Damon asked.

“Wayward thoughts,” I told him.

He glanced at me from the driver’s side of his ute. “I wasn’t aware you had wayward thoughts during an active op.”

“Maybe the pressure’s getting to me.”

“Lara, love, you thrive on pressure.”

“I do not,” I said as I watched him navigate Mount Eden traffic. “You make it sound like I’m an adrenaline junkie.”

“What’s so wrong with that?”

I shook my head at him; he was only trying to distract me. Bring me out of myself. Or out of my thoughts.

“There,” I said, indicating a parking space a good walking distance from the prison itself. I didn’t feel like negotiating the multi-storied carpark attached to the prison proper.

I was beginning to feel like the walls were closing in on me. That could have been the impending visit to a maximum security corrections facility. Or it could have been something else.

“How easy will it be to get in without your badge?” Damon asked, hitting the nail on the head without even realising it.

“They know me,” I replied, shaking free of unwanted and phantom sensations, “so that might help. But otherwise, we’ll be heading in as general public. Afternoon visiting hours began ten minutes ago.”

“Don’t you normally have to book in to see a loved one in these places?”

“Yes,” was all I said, feeling the pressure to make this work mount.

I didn’t enjoy the feeling, so Damon was wrong on that count. I was not an adrenaline junkie.

Daman locked his HEAT truck up without a word. His silence was welcomed but also made me retreat inside my mind again. My mind wasn’t necessarily the best place to be right now.

I worked on focusing instead on the environment. Checking shadows and taking a mental note of cars parked in the general vicinity of the prison itself. Mount Eden Prison, or Prisons as it consisted of two separate facilities, had housed prisoners since 1888. Parts of the buildings were still very much ancient in structure and appearance. In 2008 it was modernised, but the old girl still held a certain Victorian charm. Externally at least.

Internally she was everything a modern day correctional facility should be.

The person we wanted to see was housed in the prison itself and not the corrections facility part of the set-up. Our inmate had been at Mount Eden for three years already and had another two to go before possible release. From what I’d been able to ascertain in his case files, though, before being locked out of the Wanganui, Gregg Arnold Mansfield wasn’t likely to get parole when it came time to apply for it. He’d got into more fights inside the prison than he’d been charged with outside of it.

But he’d also been charged with one count of abduction and two counts of blackmail. You can’t be charged with manipulation, but the court transcripts had noted he’d manipulated one of his employees in order to gain access to the female victim he had abducted. No one had been killed, so the fourth and final piece to Weston’s behavioural pattern was unaccounted for.

However, he had damn near killed an inmate once he’d reached the cells in Mount Eden.

He fit the search parameters enough to be flagged a possible copycat. The fact that he’d denied culpability the entire time he’d been on trial and after meant even if he was likely scum of the earth, he was possibly also Weston’s patsy.

Weston had done this before, and although I couldn’t see a connection between the victim and him from the case files, I also knew she was his type. Addictive personality, dependency issues, and a near match for physical likeness to Carole Michaels.

It was that last point that singled Gregg Arnold Mansfield out in my mind.

The second prisoner at Mount Eden had abducted a kid. For the search parameters I’d entered into the Wanganui, he still fit. In my head and heart, he didn’t.

Weston was a vile piece of work, but he was not a paedophile as far as I knew.

We approached the modern part of Mount Eden Prison, where there was a visitation centre and the main reception area to the correctional facility as a whole. Everyone who wasn’t a part of the prison system itself funnelled through here. It was open and airy and made of thick glass and blocky architecture. And it butted up against the military blockade looking, red brick façade of the old part of the prison like an unwanted, outrageous cousin at a family reunion.

We entered through the front doors without having passed through a security scanner once.

Behind the reception desk and into the visitation centre, though, was a whole other thing. But first, you had to get past the dragons at the desk.

I approached the reception, automatically going for my badge and finding my belt bare. My fingers twitched, but only for a second. I pulled my wallet out of my handbag and located my driver’s licence instead. It felt woefully inadequate as I handed it over.

“Who are you here to see?” the man behind the counter asked, reading my name and details on the small plastic card I’d handed over.

“Gregg Arnold Mansfield,” I said, checking the area for faces I might recognise. I recognised a woman whose partner I’d arrested ten months ago. Thankfully she wasn’t looking at me. And I caught sight of a prison worker I’d had dealings with on more than one occasion. Otherwise, the area was free of any faces that set off alarm bells.

It was always a singular experience when entering a prison proper. Standing here in the reception area next to the clean and sterile looking visitation centre didn’t elicit the same sensations of reluctant imprisonment that visiting the cells themselves did.

Damon handed over his licence and also his HEAT ID when the receptionist asked. Then whatever the chap had typed into the computer before him came up on his screen and he looked sharply at me.

“You’re a police detective,” he said. It was almost an accusation.

“Not today,” I offered.

He studied me and then glanced back at his computer screen again.

“There is nothing in the system for a visitation scheduled with that prisoner,” he said. “Did you apply?”

“Didn’t have time. Is Charlie about?”

The mention of his co-worker stumped him, but only momentarily.

“I’m not at liberty to say,” he offered.

This wasn’t exactly going how I’d expected, but the fact the guy was stonewalling me did make me feel the Department of Corrections was doing something right with its hiring policy.

“Look,” I said, leaning forward slightly, “I’m on a tight schedule here and talking to this prisoner could save another life. It’s simple really; get Charlie Moon here, and he can take the heat if there’s any. Save you the trouble, right?”

“You’re not here as a cop, Ms Keen,” the receptionist said, handing over my driver’s licence to me.

“But I am here as an investigator from HEAT,” Damon offered.

“What’s HEAT got to do with this prisoner?” the receptionist demanded.

“I’m not at liberty to say,” Damon offered with a thin-lipped smile, repeating the guy’s words back to him.

The receptionist stared at Damon and then slid his driver’s license and HEAT ID back across the desk, simultaneous pressing a button on his headset.

“Hey, can you get Charlie to come out here, please?” he said into the device. “He’s got a visitor.”

For the next few minutes, the receptionist completely ignored us. He also didn’t acknowledge anyone else waiting for access to the visitation centre. He sat with his head down and his eyes averted and pretended the world in front of his desk didn’t exist.

Oh, to have that luxury.

Charlie walked out eventually and looked toward him with a scowl on his face and then spotted me.

“Detective Keen,” he called out. “Are you my visitor?”

Several pairs of eyes turned to look at me, one of them shooting daggers. I ignored the partner of the criminal I’d put away and smiled at Charlie.

“Yes, I am,” I said in way of greeting. Charlie approached, and I lowered my voice so only he could hear me. “I need your help, Charlie. I need in to visit one of your inmates, and I don’t have a badge to demand entry.”

“No badge?” he said, looking from me to Damon and back again.

“It’s complicated,” I admitted and then nodded to Damon. “He’s here from HEAT in an official capacity if that helps.”

“It does,” Charlie agreed. “Come on,” he added and indicated we should follow him into the facility.

I let out a breath of air and took a surreptitious look around the reception area. The woman whose partner I’d arrested was glaring at me. Several others were giving me the typical stink-eye you get when you’re a cop in the midst of known criminal associates. And one was watching from the shadows in the corner, behind the rim of a fedora hat that hid his facial features, whilst dressed in a trench coat that was beginning to become way too familiar to me.

I hesitated, but only briefly. If Carl was here, it was to protect me. Or to make sure I was doing my job correctly. If he knew I’d been suspended from CIB, then it was logical he’d up his game to watch over me. It was a risk on his part but worth it no doubt to his fractured mind. Facing him now was pointless. The fact that I couldn’t exactly arrest him when I wasn’t exactly employed by the police anymore did factor into my decision to ignore his presence for now as well.

But mainly it was the fact that if I delayed entering the prison facility, Charlie might change his mind. It had already been far harder to get in than I had anticipated. Giving my only chance of entry enough time to second guess his acquiescence was not going to help.

I needed to tick this prisoner off my list. Find the dot and connect it to Weston. Carl, even though a surprise inside the facility itself, was a distraction and nothing else.

I followed behind Damon and Charlie and left the reception area not bothering to look back at my former CIB partner.

Charlie took us to a normal interrogation room after running us through the appropriate security scanners. It wasn’t exactly part of the visitation centre but close enough for it to be in the same large building. This was where I normally met inmates to question. It was familiar territory and considering who else could have been in the visitation area itself; it was a wise move on Charlie’s part.

But coming to this side of the barrier brought back all the feelings of reluctant imprisonment I usually felt when walking the halls of this place. Barred doors clanged shut behind us. Multiple levels of security had to be by-passed the further into the facility we went. It would mean bringing the prisoner to us could be done without logging a visitation. But it also meant getting out of here afterwards was wholly dependent on the correction facility staff.

Charlie, I felt I could trust. I’d worked with him many times and shared a joke or two while we waited for this inmate or that to be brought to the interrogation rooms for questioning. But without my badge, I felt naked. Defenceless. It wasn’t a weapon I needed to feel armed; it was my position as a detective.

Without it, I felt… exposed. It was not a feeling I coped with well.

In fact, I felt like the chemicals in my body were revolting. Or rioting considering where we currently were. Taking up arms against me and making my heart rate increase and my respiration rate skyrocket. Sweat beaded my brow, and a trembling started up in my fingertips. I struggled to count to three inside my head. The room spun. The lock closing on the door as Charlie exited to organise the retrieval of Mansfield for us sounded like a death knell inside my head.

“Lara,” I heard Damon say. “Love, it’s all right. Slow down. You’re breathing too quickly.”

Breathing. Beating. Thinking. Being. All of it was too quick, I thought as I bent over at the waist and tried frantically to still the spinning of the room. I felt off-kilter and adrift. Cut off from the Department and my teammates. CIB was gone. Carl was gone even if he was occasionally present. My badge was gone. Maybe permanently.

Only temporarily, I forcefully corrected myself.

Myself didn’t want to listen.

Intellectually I understood.

Physically and emotionally I was a mess.

My body betrayed my head. Chemicals ran rampant throughout my system. Skin prickled. Muscles twitched. My fight or flight reflexes kicked in, and I crossed to the locked door and attempted to open it.

Damon came up behind me and said in a low voice, not reaching out to hold me in any way, “Cardrona. I think that’s where I want to go on holiday.” Cardrona Alpine Ski Resort in the South Island of New Zealand. I hadn’t known Damon could ski. “The wide, open slopes; far better than Whakapapa’s. Have you skied before?” he asked.

I shook my head.

“I can teach you. You’d be great at it. And if you fall over, the snow on Cardrona is powder soft. We can make snow angels. Build snowmen.”

“Have a snowball fight,” I whispered.

“I’d beat you,” he said, laughing.

“Not a chance,” I replied, turning to face him.

“So, shall we?” he asked. “It’ll be open before we know it. Shall we take some leave and head down country and rent a chalet in Wanaka? Just the two of us.”

No Carl. No Carole. No CIB. No HEAT.

“I’d like that,” I said.

He smiled softly at me, reached up and tucked a loose strand of my hair behind my ear. We stared at each other and then a buzz sounded and the locks disengaged on the door.

Stepping away, we separated. But I felt as though a line connected Damon and me. Even when adrift, he could reach me.

My heart rate started to settle. The tingling eased in my fingertips. I still felt a little lightheaded, but the ground was firmly beneath my feet again.

You’re close to breaking, Lara.

Yeah, maybe I was. But maybe I didn’t need Hennessey’s glue to stay in one piece. I had Damon.

And I had Cardrona.

And I could do this.

I smiled, thinking of wide, open ski slopes and curling up in my lover’s arms in front of an open fire as Gregg Arnold Mansfield swaggered in.

I stared at the man I thought Weston had framed and forgot about too fast heartbeats and tingling extremities and spinning rooms when I felt trapped.

This was what I was good at. Facing a career criminal and digging through their dirt to find a dot.

The dots would connect. I just had to hold it together long enough to connect them.

Trust yourself, Lara. Above all else trust yourself.

I could do this.

Chapter Eleven

“Even Scum Of The Earth Want To Smell Like Roses, Sport. They Might Wear Thorns, They Might Be Buried In A Pile Of Horse Crap, But Deep Down Inside They’re Just A Prize-Winning Flower Wanting To See The Sun.”

Gregg Arnold Mansfield was a nasty piece of work. I was sure his appearance alone convicted him. I pitied the jury members when faced with convicting a man without bias who looked like a natural born axe murderer. One look would have been all it took for the hammer to fall on his fate.

I ignored the rough looking criminal sitting before me, using silence as a sharply honed blade, and studied the dates in the case file I’d printed out earlier trying to piece together a timeline for Weston to have acted.

Mansfield had been incarcerated here for three years. But that didn’t include his time in remand while on trial. So the crimes he was sentenced for happened nearly four years ago. I flicked a glance toward Damon, who sat beside me at the desk, facing off against the grossly over-bearded, scowling, scarred up, prison-tattooed man opposite him as if he were a piece of dirt.

I couldn’t blame Damon for thinking that. Mansfield looked the part perfectly. He also, I was quite sure, had no intention of assisting us willingly. To him, we represented authority. And it was people in positions of authority who had landed him in this mess.

If you believed his continued denials of guilt, that is.

Strangely, I did. But I had to be careful I wasn’t just trying to make this case fit.

Four years ago, Carole Michaels was a lovely, drug-free, outgoing, successful young adult starting her career in the finance sector. Not even on Weston’s radar.

I checked the career details of the victim Mansfield was charged with abducting and found a dot.

Finance. Private sector lending to be precise.

Carole had worked for a mainstream bank; it wasn’t a perfect match, but it was too damn coincidental to ignore.

I stared at Mansfield. He’d worked in money lending too. That’s how he connected to the victim. The victim, a Lisa Devon, had been having a relationship with one of Mansfield’s employees. Her boyfriend had been thoroughly investigated at the time and had come up squeaky clean. I was sure he wasn’t. Weston would have had something on him. But Lisa had even testified that her man had been duped by Mansfield. Not Rhys.

There was no denying that Mansfield was guilty of something, though. But was it manipulation by Weston? Or was it guilty of the entire thing?

“Are you gonna talk?” Mansfield finally asked. “Or are we just gonna stare at each other?”

I said nothing. Damon stared daggers at the man but thankfully took his lead from me.

“I mean, you’re nice on the eyes and all, but you’re clearly a cop. So, you can go fuck yourself, you know?”

“I’m not a cop,” I said, still watching my quarry.

“Then are you a booty call? ‘Cause I gotta say, it’s slim pickings in here.”

“She identified you,” I finally said. “Pointed a finger across a courtroom full of lawyers and cops and sent you down for a crime you say you didn’t commit. But here’s the thing, your DNA was on her, she fingered you for the crime, the location she escaped from was associated with you even if there was no evidence of you having visited there in the time she had been held captive. Both physical and circumstantial evidence: you didn’t stand a chance. Why deny it?”

He glared at me and said nothing.

“I have a theory,” I said. “You did abduct her. You are guilty of that. But you didn’t hold her captive in that shitty little backroom of your former workplace. You handed her off to someone else.”

A twitch of his right eyebrow but otherwise nothing else. The twitch could have been coincidental; the body betraying him at the wrong moment. Or it could have been a red flag to a raging bull.

“It would be easy to assume you were being blackmailed,” I said. “But you weren’t were you? You’re a loner — no loved ones to hold over your head. Your business was in the black; you were doing OK. But not enough to be blackmailed over it. You’d jumped from position to position over the past ten years prior to your arrest. Your lending company was the third business venture you’d started in a five year period; you weren’t attached to it. Threatening to take it away wouldn’t have made you break the law. You had no priors. The tattoos and beard and scars are all new. You wore slick suits and thin ties; this,” I said indicating his current look, “is new. A reaction to your situation, not an inherent character flaw.”

“I like the way I look.”

“I don’t doubt it. Does it keep you safe in here?”

“What would you know? You said you ain’t a cop.”

“You’re fairly well educated — no gaps in your schooling. You come from a middle to lower class, moderately successful family. This speech pattern is a ruse.”

“You’re a shrink. That’s what you are. Am I being assessed or something?”

The mention of a shrink almost had me stumbling, but I was better than that.

“It’s not blackmail,” I announced. “How did he do it?”

Mansfield stared at me, something flickering in his eyes. Something that looked desperately like hope and then was quashed in an instant. Not once had he mentioned Weston during the trial; or anyone at all who could have taken some of the heat for his crimes. There was a reason why he didn’t, and that reason still existed. But we all want to be seen for who we are, not for what people think we are.

Even scum of the earth want to smell like roses, Sport. They might wear thorns, they might be buried in a pile of horse crap, but deep down inside they’re just a prize-winning flower wanting to see the sun.

Mansfield wanted someone to know he’d been used, manipulated, even if he couldn’t confirm it.

He looked sane, if not a little overdone with the prison chic fashion accessories. He wasn’t drugged. Getting any drugs in here was a hard ask. If he’d been dependent at the time of his incarceration, he would have detoxed by now. And still, he would not mention Weston.

How did he do it?

It couldn’t be brainwashing. The classic military method of mind manipulation required time, separation from the known, a breakdown of beliefs and social structure, and most other forms of cognitive stimulation removed whilst the perpetrator of the mind manipulation enforced their will over the victim, humiliated and isolated their prey, and then rewarded them for good behaviour once their desired cooperation had been ingrained.

It didn’t fit any timeline I could attribute to this man and the crime he did commit.

He took Lisa Devon. There was no doubt about that. He abducted her, after manipulating her boyfriend in some way to gain access to her. It might not have been a manipulation of the boyfriend’s mind as I suspected Weston had manipulated Mansfield. But it was a manipulation of his character or situation that had allowed Mansfield to abduct the victim.

And then he handed her over to Weston.

Why? Because there was possibly something about the finance industry that called to Rhys Kyle Weston?

I pushed that tendril of thought aside for now and concentrated on the present dilemma.

It wasn’t brainwashing because the timeline didn’t fit. Which meant it couldn’t be conversion or propaganda either. And I didn’t think Weston had a position of power over Mansfield to influence him in that way. Mansfield was his own boss. Successful to a degree. He didn’t answer to anyone, and Weston was not in any way a celebrity, capable of exerting will over another by simply being in a perceived position of power.

It had to be something else; something that could be achieved in a relatively short timeframe but could also have lasting consequences.

We’d always wondered how he’d manipulated Carole and Eagle.

Looking at Gregg Arnold Mansfield now, I thought I might just understand how he did it.

Saying it aloud, however, would make most people fall down laughing at me. And I didn’t have Hennessey to turn to for a professional confirmation of my suspicion to back me up.

But I would bet my chance of returning to CIB on Mansfield having been hypnotised.

There’d be triggers. One would be his incarceration, tied in with his trial and what he was charged with — thereby making any mention of the abduction of Lisa Devon off limits.

How many times had he had this reinforced simply by being in the prison system?

I picked the file up again and flicked through it. He’d had a routine psych evaluation before being incarcerated, but it would have triggered his hypnosis immediately. It would take a skilled psychologist to uncover the truth, something I was not.

Could Hennessey have had some success? Possibly. And maybe that played a part in why Weston struck out at my shrink. Because he was the best shrink in the city, and the first one I would have turned to, to verify my suspicion.

I looked back up at Mansfield.

Even being here, in this interrogation room, sitting in a manner that represented authority over him, would be a trigger.

“Do you want to add anything?” I asked because not trying to reach him was out of the question.

He sat back in his seat, crossed his muscled arms over his broad chest - all hard worked for in the prison gym, I presumed - and smirked.

I wanted to ask him if he lent Weston any money. I wanted to ask him if that was how they met. I wanted to ask him a lot of things, but I knew now that I wouldn’t get any answers in return.

Still. I was here. I could be wrong. I had to try.

“Did he come in and apply for a loan?”

Mansfield continued to smirk.

“Was he investing in your business?”

Mansfield said nothing.

“Did you meet him at the pub?”

I was getting desperate.

“Where did you meet him?” The words were thrown out without thought or care; I was chucking the proverbial stick at the bear in the hopes it would somehow poke him.

“I met him here,” he said and promptly started convulsing.

I pushed back my chair, making it tumble over in my haste, and raced to the panic button on the wall beside the door. A klaxon went off when I hit it, and by the time I’d reached Damon, who was lying Mansfield down in the recovery position on the floor, Charlie and two other guards were storming into the room.

“What happened?” Charlie demanded.

“He started seizing without warning,” I said. “His file doesn’t indicate a history of epilepsy. Is it a new development?”

“Not that I’m aware of,” Charlie said, activating a button on his radio. “Med team to Interrogation Room 1. Medical emergency.”

Mansfield stopped fitting and lay unconscious on the floor. Charlie crouched beside him taking his vitals.

“He’s alive,” he said and looked over his shoulder at me. “What happened?” he repeated, this time a little more firmly.

“He answered a question,” I said levelly. “That’s what happened.”

“A question about his case?”

I nodded, staring at the unconscious form with spittle on its lips and chin.

“Well,” Charlie said, standing up. “That’s more than we’ve ever got out of him.”

“And has he ever seized before?” Damon asked.

“Not on my watch. And if he has at any other time, it would have been flagged in our daily briefing.”

The other guards shook their heads also.

Weston used triggers, then, and when his victims found a loophole in the hypnosis, he had a failsafe switch to call on.

Gregg Mansfield’s failsafe switch had just been flicked to the ‘on’ position.

Did Eagle have one? Did Carole Michaels?

It didn’t bear thinking about. But I had to consider it and the possible ramifications thereof.

It took another three hours to extricate ourselves from Mount Eden Prison. Statements were made. The NZ Fire Service was contacted to confirm Damon’s credentials and the reason why he was here. That was a tricky half hour, but thankfully, the powers that be in the Fire Service had the forethought to contact Flack, Damon’s 2IC, before offering a definitive answer. Flack clearly covered for Damon, and as I was simply a member of the public today, we were finally released from our reluctant imprisonment.

I shuddered as I walked out into the early evening fresh air. Sucking in lungfuls of the glorious stuff, I lifted my hair off my collar and fanned myself, wanting nothing more than to shower the experience of being in a prison, even voluntarily for part of it, away.

Mansfield had become a nasty piece of work, but it was Weston’s influence that really made me feel dirty.

“Who the hell is this man?” I said aloud.

Damon turned to look at me from where he’d been standing soaking in the sense of freedom being on this side of the doors felt like.

“I don’t know, love. But he’s far more dangerous than we realised.”

Which was saying something. Because he had Carole and he’d manipulated Eagle, and he was blackmailing Hennessey, and he’d played a part in Dave the street worker’s death. Not to mention his hold over Cawfield, and Angelo Berti’s explosive murder, and the various other arsons he’d performed along with the multitude of suspected assaults and blackmails he’d been tagged with since he’d come to our attention.

This man was more than just dangerous. Rhys Kyle Weston was a one-man force of war.

We now knew how he was doing it. We had a possible lead on what made him choose his abduction victims. If I could have asked Hennessey to profile him right now, I was sure the Department shrink would have said Weston derived pleasure out of torturing people. He chose his victims from a place of rage he couldn’t express like normal people would. Something about the finance industry set him off. It was a key piece to the puzzle.

Did he owe money? Did he come from a poor background? Had he been done over by a money lender? What was it?

Whatever it was Damon had been caught up in the fallout and by extension so had I and CIB.

Even if this was all about his rage and something that had caused it within the finance industry, Weston was muddying the waters with revenge on Damon.

Rage. Money. Revenge.

Abduction. Blackmail. Manipulation.

Means. Motive. Opportunity.

I had a lot, and I had nothing. Because I still had no idea where to find the man and he still had Carole Michaels.

Chapter Twelve

“Even The Absence Of Something Can Mean Everything.”

There was a black SUV parked at the rear of the Pitt Street Fire Station. A Porsche Cayenne and therefore completely out of place among with the Fords and Toyotas and Mitsubishis. I stared at the vehicle and took a quick look around the carpark, spotting two Rescue members as they patrolled the permitter of the station property.

Damon started heading toward the stairs up into HEAT itself after locking his vehicle, but I took off tangentially across the carpark towards the Rescue members. One was Andrew McIntyre, aka Stretch. I’d had dealings with Stretch. I also knew that he’d had a storage shed burned down by the then aptly named HEAT Arsonist.

We all knew who that was now.

Or did we?

I needed to check into Weston’s background more thoroughly. He had one, but we’d missed something. The finance angle should have been picked up already, and it hadn’t been.

Damon noticed I wasn’t behind him when he reached the station building proper. He spotted me instantly and changed his direction, approaching Stretch and his counterpart a few seconds after me.

“Hey,” I said as I made their position, offering the ubiquitous chin-lift that would set them at ease. I got two back in return immediately. “All quiet?”

“Yeah,” Stretch said, chin-lifting to Damon as soon as he arrived at my side. “Nothing to report.”

“And the black SUV?” I asked.

They both looked over, spotted it, and scowled.

“Didn’t see it arrive,” Stretch admitted slowly.

That’s what you got for hiring amateurs.

“So, you don’t know when it turned up, then?” I pressed.

“We’ve just completed a circuit,” Stretch said. “And it wasn’t there last time we came ‘round this way. So, it had to have arrived in the past ten minutes, I’d say.”

There was a distinct flaw in our security plan. I wanted the guys to stick to their patrolling pairs for safety, but we needed to make sure we covered every entrance and exit.

“OK,” I said, “We’ll adjust our strategy. Stay within line of sight of each other, but always have one covering the back and one covering the front of the property.” Because of the shape of the grounds the station was on, that was possible. It wouldn’t be comfortable; no one to talk to as you stood out here. But it was doable. And it meant I didn’t have to double up on the shifts.

“Yeah, OK,” Stretch said reluctantly.

“Don’t feel too bad,” I said, turning away. “The guy that drives that beast is a sneaky bastard.”

Damon fell into step beside me.

“Who’s is it?” he asked.

“You’ll see,” I mumbled as I took the stairs up to HEAT at a determined pace.

The place was fairly full, but some of the guys had clearly taken to the sleeping quarters down the hall by Damon’s office. Marc or Flack had arranged shifts to ensure they all got downtime, I guessed.

I spotted the Porsche Prick as soon as we entered. He was sitting at the table, drinking coffee and eating a donut hole, with none other than Ryan Pierce beside him. Pierce’s police-issued sedan had not been out in the carpark, and I realised now why Nick Anscombe was here.

Cover.

Weston might have already been aware of ASI and its connection to CIB. But it wasn’t a given, and it was the best Pierce could manage considering. Plus Inspector Hart had said we’d communicate through Anscombe Securities and Investigations, and Pierce was nothing if not a good little soldier following his superior’s orders to the letter.

When had I become the rebel in that analogy?

“Sarge,” I said in greeting, taking a seat. “Anscombe,” I added; spoken in a decidedly cooler tone of voice.

“Quite a set-up you’ve got here, Detective,” Anscombe said. “Busy little worker bees.”

I said nothing, just offered a cool stare back.

“Damon,” Nick said in greeting, possibly recognising the threat as Damon loomed over the table, directly at my back, staring daggers at him.

He soon returned his attention to me, however.

“You have a hole in your security,” he said.

“It’s been rectified,” I told him.

“I’m sure it has. I’d expect nothing less.” I wasn’t certain if that was a compliment or Anscombe’s version of sarcasm.

I ignored it.

“Why are you here?” I asked Pierce.

“Hart wants an update.”

“Not much to tell,” I told him as Marc placed a cup of coffee down in front of me and handed one to Damon with a look that spoke volumes. Damon finally took the hint and sat down.

I reached out and took one of Daisy’s donut holes and stuffed it in my mouth. Deciding it went well with the coffee Marc had just given me, I ate another one before giving Pierce and by extension Anscombe a rundown.

Every single man in the room watched me eat my donut holes with varying looks of bemusement on their faces. Clearly, they’d not worked with Ryan Pierce for any length of time. Sooner or later you caved to the donut holes.

Or to Daisy Pierce.

“Finance is the motive,” I said into the expectant silence; starting with the least likely to get me laughed at. Then I took a deep breath and added, “and hypnosis is the means.”

Anscombe arched his brow at me, but Pierce just scowled, thinking it all through. He absently reached out for a donut hole and chewed on it thoughtfully.

“Makes sense,” he finally said. “The hypnosis part.” Someone snorted in the background. I didn’t bother to check out who it might be; Pierce’s quick acceptance of my suspicions was not something I took lightly.

“Hypnosis?” Anscombe, though, said incredulously. I hadn’t expected him to agree to anything I said, so I wasn’t surprised by his reaction.

“Mansfield has never once mentioned Weston,” I explained. “And although unhelpful to the extreme, he knew exactly who I was talking about and exhibited subliminal signs of agreement. And when he tried to push back against the mind manipulation Weston had used on him, he seized.”

“Seized?” Pierce said, looking up sharply from where he’d been contemplating, head down, what I’d said.

“Full on grand mal for approximately a minute. He didn’t regain consciousness while we were there, but that’s not entirely unexpected with a grand mal seizure.”

“That is not good news,” Pierce said and made the fatal mistake of glancing at Damon.

Damon had been drinking his coffee and had even lowered his guard to the point that he’d picked up a donut hole and was about to shove it in his mouth. The coffee met the table with a thump, and the donut hole fell to the floor of the common room.

“You think Carole could end up like Mansfield?” he asked.

Damon was one of the most intelligent people I had ever met, but where his sister was concerned, he had a blind spot. He had woken up to some hard truths recently. After the Irreverent Inferno, he’d had no choice but to realise that to a certain extent Carole had chosen the path she walked on. Weston was largely to blame for some of her more outlandish behaviours, and he’d certainly taken advantage of her drug addictions. But we all came to believe that Carole had chosen him of her own volition in the beginning.

But as I sat there and tried to piece the timeline together, I had to acknowledge that it was possible Weston had introduced her to Class A narcotics in the first place. If finance was the key to Weston’s targets, then she hadn’t been chosen because she was part of the druggie scene.

Chicken and egg. Which came first?

I flicked open the case file I’d brought back with me pertaining to Mansfield and scanned it. Then I reached out and opened several others we’d created from the information dump I’d done on the Wanganui before leaving CIB. If Pierce was surprised to see the files when they shouldn’t have been outside of CIB, he didn’t comment.

In fact, no one was talking as I lined them all up on the HEAT kitchen table and stared at the dates on the top of each sheet.

Weston had been doing this for some time. Longer than Carole had been addicted to drugs. Mansfield’s case was four years old. But there were others dating back to ten years. Outside of Auckland but meeting the criteria.

I pulled the file we had on Weston closer and looked at the meagre information it presented. It listed date of birth, place of birth, parents and known family members. All had checked out and were squeaky clean. The list was perfunctory. It did what it was meant to do. It told us a story we expected to see.

At least, we expected to see this story with innocent people.

Weston was not innocent. Not by a long fucking shot.

Which meant…

“His background is false,” I said aloud.

“What do you mean?” Anscombe asked.

I tapped Weston’s Query sheet. “We tried to track down some of these people and only managed to get in touch with two. His parents are supposedly dead. His brother is overseas and only spoke to us over a telephone line. His cousin, who we did find here in Auckland, agreed to everything and offered no further insight.” I looked up at Ryan and said, “Query Person him again.”

He pulled his cellphone out and said, “Why?”

“Just do it. In particular his places of employment over the past ten years.”

Pierce looked at me for a moment and then placed the cellphone to his ear. I heard the North Comm dispatcher answer the call and then shunt Pierce off to one of the support staff in Dispatch. It took several minutes, but by the time Pierce hung up, another piece to the puzzle had been located.

Weston’s cousin worked in finance. And interestingly, had separated from his wife twelve months ago when, and this was quoted in the divorce proceedings, his behaviour had changed dramatically.

“I don’t get it,” Flack admitted, from where he’d been leaning against the kitchen bench listening.

“Weston got to him,” I said. “Everything the man has said confirming Weston’s background and history can’t be taken as credible.”

“There’s a chance he’s been hypnotised too,” Pierce concluded.

“Jesus,” Flack said, stunned. “Weston created a false background.”

“Because we were on to him,” I said. It was about a year ago that things went to shit for Carole and Damon started working on getting her out of the relationship with Weston and into rehab.

“So, who is he?” Anscombe asked.

“That’s the million dollar question, isn’t it?” I said. We had several aliases for the man, and I was betting; not one of them was his actual birth name.

“Motherfucker,” Pierce muttered. “He’s had us chasing our tails the entire time.”

“Probably laughing at us,” Nick agreed. “Arsehole,” he added for good measure.

“Fuckhead,” Pierce grumbled.

“What about Carole?” Damon said, interrupting the extraordinary show of machismo.

“We’re getting closer,” I said and regretted it immediately.

“Don’t,” Damon snapped, standing up from the table abruptly. “Not you, Lara. Don’t. Don’t give me platitudes.”

I watched him for a moment and then stood up to face him.

“All right,” I said. “She might have a trigger. Say she does, then what would it likely be? Mansfield’s had been finding a loophole in the hypnosis instructions. Defying Weston. Carole isn’t defying Weston, is she?”

“And when we find her?” he demanded. I was pleased he was still using ‘when’ and not ‘if.’

“When we find her, we have medical staff on standby, prepared to deal with any potential trigger fallout. And we tread very carefully.”

I’m sure he was relieved to hear about the medical staff being on standby, but I thought it was my promise of treading carefully that really broke through Damon’s panic.

“We’re getting closer,” I repeated, certain he could now hear those words without flipping out on me. “We know he hypnotises. We know he uses triggers. We know the information we have on his background is false.”

“How does that help us?” Damon pressed, but he was sounding more level headed again.

“‘Even the absence of something can mean everything.’”

“A Carlism,” Damon murmured.

I nodded and took a step closer to him. Closer to this man that meant so much to me. He’d been absent in my life, and I’d barely survived it. He’d threatened to leave again when I’d not been able to show him he was my everything. He’d made me feel when there was only ice to encase me.

He’d cracked it. He’d freed me.

This man who reached me when I was adrift and when no one else, not even Carl, could.

My hand slipped into his, and I stared up into dark brown eyes so rich and deep they called to me; momentarily losing myself in them. I loved him. Completely. And even if I were standing in the middle of HEAT with half a dozen testosterone-fuelled firemen milling about bearing witness, along with a superior officer I had the utmost respect for, and a pain-in-the-arse private dick I wasn’t sure if I despised or secretly admired yet, I stood up on the tip of my toes and cupped his cheek.

“We will find her,” I promised Damon. “And we will catch Weston or whoever he actually is.”

It was a promise I of all people knew I shouldn’t make.

But I couldn’t have not made it to save myself.

Weston would either fall at my hand, or I’d die trying. Not exactly a sane way to approach a criminal case. But then, I was near breaking according to my shrink.

I snorted softly to myself and fell back on my heels. Damon followed me down and rested his forehead against mine in a show of intimacy which wasn’t lost on a soul in that room right then.

Pierce cleared his throat sometime later and said, “Good work, Keen.”

I wasn’t sure if he was referring to what I’d deduced about Weston or how far I’d come in my personal relationships and self-discovery. For now, I chose not to look too closely at it. Hennessey might have warned I was close to breaking, but Hennessey was being blackmailed.

For all I knew, I was the sanest person here.

Tell yourself that, Sport. But we all know different, don’t we?

Fuck off, Carl.

I could hear my old partner laughing inside my head. It was only a memory. But it was a little creepy.

Carl was always there. And now I had taken to seeing him when I least expected it.

I pushed that thought away and concentrated on the here and now.

“There was one thing more,” I said, turning to look at Pierce.

“What?” he asked succinctly.

“Just before Mansfield seized, I asked him a question. The only question he bothered to answer.”

Anscombe sat forward in his seat; Pierce gave me a hurry up signal with his hand. Both men were well and truly sucked into the mystery.

“I asked him where did they meet?”

“What was his answer?” Pierce asked.

“‘I met him here.’”

We all knew that was impossible. Mansfeld was in a corrections facility and had had no visitors outside of the police and his legal team. There was a possibility Weston had got to his legal team. And what with CIB having a traitor there was a chance Weston had also got to one of the cops who visited Mansfield.

But in all reality, Mansfield’s answer had to have been a metaphor for something. I just couldn’t work it out.

I met him here. Here? As in prison? Auckland City? Hell? Where?

“Well,” Nick Anscombe said softly. “That is creepy.”

‘Creepy’ seemed to be occurring a lot more regularly than I would have liked right now.

‘Creepy’ made me feel uneasy. Very uneasy.

Weston was playing us, and I feared it was a game we were woefully ill-prepared for.

They don’t teach ‘Creepy’ at Police College.

Just as well I had Carl’s own version of creepiness to guide me.

Chapter Thirteen

“It’s Hard To Tell Fact From Fiction, Sport. Never Make The Mistake Of Believing Something Until You Know It’s The Truth.”

The files before me had started to blur. I jumped slightly when the priority alarm went off across the street at the ambulance station. It had a pitch to it that reached through the darkened hours and made it in through Damon’s closed office window. I dreaded to think what it sounded like for the ambulance crew working the night shift.

A minute or so later, an ambulance tore out of the station, lights on, siren off. At half past two in the morning, that was standard operating procedure.

“You should get some sleep,” Damon said from the pullout couch across from me.

I was sitting at his desk, a small reading light offering a soft glow to see by, shoes off, jacket over the back of the chair. My gun holster sat forlornly on a side table, sans gun. As soon as I spotted it, my right hand shifted to where my CIB badge should have been and found my belt bare.

“Did I wake you?” I asked.

“You know you didn’t, love.” The ambulance station.

I sat back and attempted to look relaxed as I met Damon’s sleepy eyes. We’d stayed up discussing possible options for Weston’s true identity until midnight. Then it was uniformly decided that as we’d made no progress to speak of we’d all get some sleep - at least those not on shift patrolling the station property - and attack it again tomorrow with fresh eyes.

I’d even gone so far as to lie down with Damon on his pullout. He’d fallen asleep within minutes of placing his head on the pillow, a trait I was sure every emergency services shift worker was capable of achieving. But although I’d often worked night shift, I usually stayed awake unless on call. And being on call as a detective was entirely different than being on night shift as a firemen out of the busiest station in Auckland.

“We know where he’s been seen,” I said into the comfortable silence that had blossomed between us. “That isn’t a lie or a misdirect. We have a litany of crimes we can attribute to him. I’ve interacted with him personally.” Albeit while tied to a cross in a cult-like chamber as a former childhood neighbour contemplated killing me. “We can put a reasonably accurate profile together on what we do know,” I added.

“But you still can’t work out who he could be,” Damon finished for me.

I nodded my head and stared at the files again.

“Four of these cases are from Wellington’s CIB. He could have been born there.”

It was a stretch, and we both knew it. Wellington, like any large cosmopolitan city in any country throughout the world, attracted a criminal element from outside its borders as well as within them. They didn’t necessarily have to have originated from there.

“Damn it,” I said. “I can’t work this out.”

Damon was silent for a moment, and then he sat himself up and scrubbed his face. After he’d successfully rubbed the cobwebs away, he repositioned himself in a seated, semi-reclined position on the pullout and announced, “OK. Let’s try to puzzle this out together.”

I smiled at him, but he was already inside his head going over what we did know about Weston.

“What possible reasons could he have for messing with finance companies?” he asked.

“He might be from a lower socio-economic background.”

“Chip on his shoulder,” Damon agreed. “Is it enough?”

“It depends how that poverty-stricken upbringing affected him.”

“Maybe he lost a parent or loved-one due to their financial situation?”

“Could be. I’ll mark it as a possible avenue to check.”

“What else?” he muttered, the words for himself and not just me.

Damon was tired and worried about his sister, and yet he took the time to help me. Not just because it might lead to finding Carole, but because he knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep without having worked something out that we could follow up on tomorrow.

“Poor housing conditions,” I said, following the financial angle further. “Add in his fetish for fire.”

“Fetish for fire?” Damon smirked at me.

Outwardly I ignored him, but inside I was laughing.

“So, maybe he lost a parent in a house fire,” I suggested.

“It definitely would fit the profile,” Damon said.

“But am I trying to make something out of nothing?”

Damon stared at me for a moment.

“It’s a possibility,” he finally said.

“I want to catch him so badly that I’m starting to see dots that don’t exist.”

“Don’t rule it out completely. But you of all people, Lara, know not to take something as a fact until it’s been proven to be so.”

It’s hard to tell fact from fiction, Sport. Never make the mistake of believing something until you know it’s the truth.

“You’re right,” I muttered. They both were. “In the morning we’ll get Investigation to check out his known haunts again. Prevention can try to spot him on the CCTV, and you and I will see if any of my informants have noticed Carole back on the party scene.”

“You think he’d risk taking her out?”

“I think he wants to lead us on a merry dance and if that means dangling your sister in front of us, then yes.” It was a hard thing for Damon to hear. “But his overconfidence could be the mistake on his part that we need.”

That we desperately needed.

This man was an enigma; even if we knew Weston was a psychopath with a penchant for burning things. Blackmail and manipulation were his go-to tactics. Hypnosis was his means of achieving much-needed control over others. We knew things about him; we just didn’t know who he actually was.

He’d got into bed with Nathanial Marcroft. Maybe there was something in that partnership that would explain things. Was it simply an opportunity? Or something more calculated? Carole had attended Sweet Hell. She’d been on the altar in the Irreverent Inferno. And the guy who had… pleasured her to pass into the second circle of hell had been beaten to near death afterwards by none other than Weston himself.

If Carole were controlled by Weston, then she would have been in Sweet Hell at his direction surely. And yet he’d punished the Irreverent Inferno Initiate for touching her. For touching what belonged to him.

Why would he do that? Carole had clearly been sent into Sweet Hell to lure Damon in as well. Weston wanted revenge, that much we did know. The HEAT arsons. Damon being framed for Samantha Hayes’ murder. Damon’s character being besmirched so Cawfield could spread the rumours around.

Had Weston used Carole as a lure and then regretted it? Or had he simply flipped out when he realised what had been done to her? To his possession? Was Carole his weakness? Could I use it?

I looked across the room at Damon, but because I’d been lost in thought for so long, he’d closed his eyes again to get much-needed rest. He was gently snoring, still in a semi-reclined, semi-seated position. He looked comfortable enough, though, so I left him where he was.

My mind tumbled and turned, testing theories and discarding them one after the other. We knew enough to be sure Weston was dangerous.

We didn’t know nearly enough to catch the bastard.

I was disgusted with my lack of progress so far.

Standing up from Damon’s desk, I went to grab a coffee from the kitchen. There’d be a pot on for the Rescue guys who were on duty doing security sweeps of the property. I slipped my shoes back on because walking barefoot around HEAT just seemed too casual for my liking, and then eased out of the office, making sure I didn’t disturb Damon.

He’d not been sleeping well for some time. Possibly for as long as he’d been back in my life. He had moments of relief, usually after we’d had an especially enthusiastic round in his bed or mine, but I knew the troubles with his sister were wearing him down.

Just like Carl’s disappearance had worn me down, too, eventually.

I thought I’d made significant progress with my former partner’s faked death. The fact that I didn’t think he was in a sound mental state of mind when he’d chosen to go into hiding instead of reaching out to me made it easier to accept. I’d spoken to Carl since his fall from that cliff. I’d looked into eyes that at one time had been familiar and were now shadowed in madness.

He’d killed to protect me.

I didn’t understand why he’d done it per se, but I understood he’d thought it was the right thing at the time. He’d been chasing down leads on what was left of Declan King’s organisation. A criminal organisation which had caused all manner of mayhem throughout Auckland City.

The leads had led to Auckland’s Crown Prosecutor who had then used Carl’s informants to chase me down as a possible leak. Carl hadn’t confided in me, though, but he had been about to when he was shot and fell off the cliff out near Howick.

I stopped at the kitchen counter and stared at nothing. ASI had helped catch King in the end. They’d thwarted a few of his earlier crimes and then been involved in the final capture of the crime boss at the District Court building.

Shaking my head, I dismissed contacting Anscombe in the morning to look more closely at that avenue of thought. Carl wasn’t my main concern right now. Weston was.

But when I topped off my coffee with milk and leaned against the counter to look out the window towards Pitt Street, I realised that Carl was not done with me.

Across the road, standing outside the now empty ambulance station, was a shadowed figure in a familiar fedora hat and long trench coat.

The coffee cup met the bench with a thud, and I was running toward the stairs in a heartbeat. I didn’t bother to exit through the rear of the fire station to the carpark out back, but instead entered the Watch part of the building and made my way to the front door.

It was shut and locked of course, but this was a working station. Egress was a given. Ingress was a bit tighter. I didn’t know the code to unlock the door to get back in, but I had no intention of getting back in until I’d confronted Carl.

He was still standing across the street, staring at Pitt Street Fire Station. His eyes had undoubtedly found me, but it looked like he was a statue, so still and creepy.

I walked out onto the short driveway that made up the front of the station. An area only big enough for the engines to reverse onto and be out of road traffic while they waited for the automated doors to the garage to open.

My feet stopped at the curb.

Carl slowly walked forward and stood on the opposite side of the road, matching me; feet to curb.

We stared at each other.

I couldn’t see his face; his hat was pulled down low. I thought perhaps he did that so none of the firemen or ambos would recognise him too quickly. The fedora and trench coat were only known to those immediately associated with him and his case.

This man had killed people to protect me.

A car passed between us, but neither of us looked away.

Where was he staying? I had to follow up on his ex-girlfriends.

Why was he here?

I looked around, trying to spot the Rescue team member from HEAT who should have been watching the front of the fire station. I couldn’t see him, and as I was standing out the front of the fire station, he should have been visible to me.

I considered the shadows, but what little cover there was down the side of the building leading to the carpark weren’t enough to hide them from me. I frowned. Then quickly looked back at where Carl had been standing.

He was gone.

My heart beat a little faster.

I stared at the empty footpath in front of the ambulance station and then checked the shadows to the side between the station and its neighbouring buildings. There was nowhere for him to hide. I looked up and down the street. Where had he gone?

The most obvious answer was he’d gone inside the ambulance station itself. Like the fire station, it was locked up tight. And like the fire station, there was a combination lock on the front door, so ambulance staff from other stations could get into Pitt Street when sent there to cover a shortfall.

Carl could have known that combination lock.

I wanted to cross the road and look in the windows; bang on the door and wake someone up. But Pitt Street Ambulance Station was the busiest in Auckland, and all the on-duty staff were out on calls.

By the time I gained access, calling up Dispatch and getting them to contact St John’s, Carl would be gone. And racing around to the rear of the building would take too long. Either way, Carl was too good to get caught.

I turned back to the fire station, my eyes scanning the driveway to the side where the Rescue member should have been. He still hadn’t returned. If they were doing a shift swap, it should have been completed by now.

I took a step towards the driveway, and then another and another. Before long, I was running.

No one was watching the front of the building. But the Rescue member - CeeGee they called him, for Curious George - who was meant to be watching the rear, and his partner out the front, was still there.

Out cold and looking worse for wear.

Blood dribbled down the side of his face from a blunt-force trauma wound on his temple; his breathing was shallow and uneven. I checked his airway and wounds to stem any life-threatening bleeding, but what was undoubtedly life-threatening was internal and not something I could prevent easily. So, I simply dug my cellphone out of my trouser pocket to call in more suitable help.

I didn’t bother with Comms; I dialled 111 like a layperson and asked from an ambulance and not the cops. I may have been on suspension, but I was still a bloody cop. Then I dialled Damon. As Chief Investigator of HEAT, he was in charge of the entire division. Of every single man not just those in Investigation.

But as Damon Michaels, CeeGee was his friend; part of his professional family.

The lights came on inside the fire station, and then I heard Damon yelling at his men, waking them all up. They’d have a medic in Rescue. Not quite as good as the ambos, but certainly better than I was.

Chaos ensued within minutes. But it was organised chaos as only highly trained and experienced emergency services workers could manage. Damon issued orders as the Rescue medic tended to their fallen man. Marc and Flack and Jude and Gus and Spence and Mal and Russel and Horse were all there. I ticked them all off inside my head until I came to a startling conclusion.

One of HEAT was missing.

“Where’s Stretch?” I said.

Damon’s wide and clearly worried eyes snapped to me and then he was searching each member of HEAT.

“Who was teamed up with CeeGee?” I asked.

Everyone looked around at everyone else and then Damon swore sharply.

“Stretch was,” he said, his voice rough.

“In pairs,” I instructed loudly. “Scour the property. Look everywhere, inside and out.”

They jumped to do my bidding, but I knew it was only because they wanted to find their missing man and not because I was in charge here. I might have been the only cop in attendance, but Damon was still their boss, and some even looked to him before heading out to search for Stretch’s body.

I hoped it wasn’t a body we would find and that he would just be lying under some shrubs somewhere, unconscious. But still alive.

And then I remembered Weston’s MO. Abduction. Blackmail. Manipulation. Murder.

Hennessey was being blackmailed.

Carole was being manipulated.

Angelo had been murdered.

We were missing the abduction if you didn’t count Carole Michaels in two of the four pattern pieces. And I didn’t think we should. I hadn’t yet decided where the CIB traitor fit into it all; manipulation or blackmail? Neither was a welcome thought. And the fact that I was sure the CIB traitor was linked to Weston as well meant that Weston wasn’t afraid to double up on his pattern.

Or Carole was outside that now, a part of him that he couldn’t separate from, which meant maybe the CIB traitor was the manipulation piece of the pattern puzzle.

I pushed that aside for now because I did know where Stretch fit into it all.

Weston had abducted him.

Is that why Carl was there across the street? To warn me? But he hadn’t warned me in time, had he?

I pulled my cellphone out, held my thumb over Pierce’s number in the directory, and then thought of Inspector Hart’s instructions and searched for ASI instead.

It was the middle of the night, so I didn’t have to deal with Carmel.

But I did get to deal with one of the tech geeks.

Chapter Fourteen

“Sure, Sport, Follow Your Gut, But Always Cover Your Arse With A Little Evidence.”

Anscombe himself turned up, but Pierce appeared in his own vehicle. He wasn’t the only one from CIB to be assigned the case, though. Trevor Jones stepped out of his police-issued sedan a few minutes later and stuffed a toothpick in his mouth as he took in the scene.

I watched on as he assessed each person in attendance, from the HEAT guys to Red Watch Fire to Pierce and Anscombe and then me. I’d always known Jones to be a laid back cowboy, but you didn’t have a longterm career in CIB as he had without meeting certain criteria.

Jones was undoubtedly an observant cop.

He crossed the carpark to me.

“Patient gone already?” he asked.

“Yeah,” I said. “George Beard, aka CeeGee.”

“And the one that’s missing?”

“Andrew McIntyre, we call him Stretch.”

“Firemen and their cute nicknames,” he grumbled. It was the middle of the night, so I understood his less than enthusiastic attitude.

“I gather you’ve been assigned the case,” I said.

He looked back at me, a shadow of empathy crossing his features. “Heard about your troubles, Keen,” he said. “Don’t much believe what they’re sayin’.”

I could just imagine what Cawfield was saying; I was thankful he hadn’t been assigned this case. Trevor Jones I could handle, but Joe Cawfield?

“We’ll get some uniforms in to walk the scene,” Jones said. “I wanna ask a few questions of those on-station.” He looked at the number of HEAT members in attendance. “They having a party or something?”

There were more here than there would normally be for three-thirty in the morning.

“Something like that,” I said and patted him on the shoulder as I walked off towards Damon and Pierce.

I noticed that Nick Anscombe had disappeared again. It wasn’t like him to vanish when there was excitement to be had. But his discreet exit did remind me that he was our ace up the sleeve and not something to be officially recorded in a detective’s case notes taken at the scene.

Trevor might have missed him, but I doubted it. I didn’t think it really mattered that Jones had seen our ASI sidekick. Had it been Cawfield, though…

“Sarge,” I said when I made it to Damon and Pierce. I looked at Damon though when I spoke next. “Impromptu gathering,” I whispered. “Spread the word before Jones starts asking why you’re all here.”

“You want to hide what we’re working on from him?” Damon queried.

It wasn’t Jones I was worried about, but any interviews and statements he took here would make it into the Wanganui and then the CIB traitor would have access.

“Best to keep it out of the system,” Pierce agreed quietly. “Jones was on night shift,” he told me. “It makes sense he’s been assigned.”

Even though we both thought Jones was just a good old boy cop and part of the furniture, we clearly still felt the need to cross our Ts and dot our Is on this one.

I nodded.

“Why Stretch?” Damon asked, as ESR - our forensics department - arrived, covered in white paper overalls, wearing crepe booties and toting large toolboxes on wheels behind them.

The uniformed officers Trevor had called in had started checking the property in a grid-like pattern, but Jones hadn’t started his interviews yet. Damon, though, had already caught Marc’s attention and had him spread the word with the men about their impromptu party to explain why they were all here for the record.

Why Stretch? I thought to myself as Pierce offered up a few suggestions that didn’t trigger any alarm bells for me. Abduction was part of Weston’s MO, we knew this, and if the cases we’d attributed to him but he’d not been charged for were anything to go by, not all of the abductees had been women. Carole certainly made you think this was sexual in nature, but I didn’t get the feeling that that was what made Weston tick.

Carole was in love with him and had presented him as her boyfriend to Damon back in the beginning. Of course, if Weston had manipulated her mind from the start, then there was no telling what the truth of the matter was.

Eagle, I thought, as the men shared quiet ideas in the background, was not an abduction as such, as he’d entered Sweet Hell following his boyfriend Dave willingly. But he was an indication that Weston didn’t shy away from anything sexual in nature or of the male persuasion. I thought, perhaps, the abductions and mind manipulations were closely related, but I wasn’t able to provide any solid evidence to back that up. It was all a gut feeling which was never a good way to work as a detective.

Sure, Sport, follow your gut, but always cover your arse with a little evidence.

The blackmails and murders, however, had been exclusively male. I shunted them off into a compartment of their own. It was the mind manipulation and abductions that really mattered. Weston had killed, definitely. But Angelo’s death could be considered collateral damage.

He hadn’t been the one to kill Samantha Hayes, so I didn’t count her in the number. But from the case files I’d downloaded, it wasn’t clear whether the murders he’d performed were intentional or not. Some I could say were opportunistic. Some could simply have been in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“What do you think, Lara?” Pierce asked, clearly wanting me to get out of my head and into the conversation.

I spared a glance around the carpark to ascertain where Jones was at. He’d moved on to interviewing the HEAT members, making it casual as only the cowboy could, leaning against a HEAT ute and sucking on his toothpick.

Trevor chewed toothpicks because he no longer smoked cigarettes. Ciggies were what were to blame for his wife’s illness. Cancer was a mean bitch.

“Why Stretch?” Damon asked. I think needlessly offering me a lifeline in front of my superior. I hadn’t missed what they were talking about; I’d just been internalising my thought process.

“It’ll mean something,” I said. “The victims of the mind manipulation and the abductions are carried out with care. He plans each one. He targets only those who mean something to him in the larger scheme of his life.”

“And the murders don’t?” Pierce asked.

I shook my head. “Some of them could have been accidents. Not what caused the situation that led to their deaths, he knew what he was doing when he set the scene for each one, but the fact the victims died instead of just being hurt or scared or maimed. That’s where the chance factor comes in.”

“Angelo could have been out the front of the restaurant where his sous chef was,” Pierce said. I nodded. “Talking of that,” Pierce went on. “Cawfield and Simpson got in to see him. The chef’s out of ICU and on a ward. He had nothing to say, really. Except to confirm that Angelo suspected something and sent them all out of the kitchen while he investigated.”

“He could still be alive today if he’d followed his own advice,” I muttered.

“Or more than Angelo could be dead. He saved them.”

It was a poor consolation for the loss of a vibrant life. But sometimes you had to take your wins where you could get them.

“Back to Stretch,” I said. “Did Weston target him specifically? Or did he target HEAT in general.”

“What difference does it make?” Damon asked.

“Everything,” I told him. “If Stretch was his target then Stretch is linked to Weston in some capacity.”

“Stretch is not a traitor,” Damon snapped. Not like the detective-turned-traitor we had in CIB.

“Keen’s not saying he is,” Pierce said placatingly; stepping in to shield me, no doubt. I didn’t need shielding from Damon.

“You know him better than me,” I said to Damon. “But I thought I knew the guys in CIB too.”

Damon scowled at me and then abruptly looked off into the distance. He couldn’t argue the point even if he strongly disagreed with it.

“Besides,” I said. “There’s a damn good chance that Weston just wanted someone, anyone, from HEAT.”

Damon looked back at me. “But to take them?” he said, shaking his head. “Tampering with Horse’s equipment is one thing, but abducting a member of my team just to get back at me?”

“What equipment?” Pierce asked. We both ignored him.

“What’s your next move?” I asked Damon.

“Go looking for the bastard,” he growled.

“Exactly,” I said. Both men stared at me.

“Oh,” Pierce said, the first to get it. “He’s setting a trap.”

“What’s different between taking Carole and taking Stretch?” Damon demanded. “I haven’t been able to locate him since he took my sister again, so why would I be able to locate him now?”

“Because he wants you to,” I said.

“You told me last night that he might use Carole on the party scene to reel me in. Now you think he’ll use Stretch instead?” He sounded doubtful.

“Why take Stretch?” I asked both of them. “He’s already got, Carole. Why take someone else?”

I thought I knew; I just wanted someone else to come to the same conclusion and help make my suspicions easier to swallow and then consequently easier to deal with.

“Because Carole’s more important than Stretch is,” Pierce finally said.

“Bingo,” I whispered. “Carole is the key. She always has been. Maybe he’s had keys before. Maybe he discards them eventually.”

I winced at the horrified look that crossed Damon’s face at those words. But I wouldn’t disrespect him by not addressing the facts as I saw them, even if the facts led him to a place he’d much rather not be.

“But right now,” I pressed on, “Carole is the key.”

Damon cleared his throat, working on keeping his demeanour neutral and steady. He knew what cops were like; one whiff of instability and you were cut out of the investigation. Look at me. Hennessey only had to suggest I was near breaking for the Department to move on suspending me. Shouldn’t there have been a little back and forth discussion beforehand? Highly educated and experienced shrink or not, I should have been able to defend myself at least.

But cops, aka the Police Force as a whole, were a bunch of intolerant arseholes when it came to emotional and mental instability. I thought perhaps most emergency services were to some degree. If you couldn’t handle it, you hid it. Like my father did. Shoving all the nasty things, that made you feel, in a mental drawer each night and throwing away the key.

Sweep it under a rug. Never speak of it to anyone. We don’t break down; we do our jobs. Can’t have the public thinking we’re fallible. We’re part of a community of saviours, but we can’t even save ourselves.

“What does being the key mean exactly?” Damon asked.

“She’s outside the pattern,” I said, refocusing. “Originally, she was the mind manipulation puzzle piece. Now, I think our CIB traitor might be.”

“Do you?” Pierce asked. I hadn’t shared my thoughts with him yet.

“Possibly,” I said.

“That’s convincing,” he muttered.

“Think about it,” I said. “Hennessey is definitely being blackmailed.” I looked sharply at Pierce then. “Any news on that, by the way?”

“Nada,” Pierce said. “We’re following up on his brother down in Christchurch right now as a possible angle. But I’m not holding my breath. Whatever Weston has on Hennessey, it’s been hidden for a long time.”

“The best blackmailing fodder usually is,” I said.

“Got that right,” Pierce grunted.

“So, Carole’s outside the pattern?” Damon pressed, getting us to focus on his sister again.

I couldn’t imagine how frustrating it would be for an outsider to watch us brainstorm. Detectives had varied and unusual thought processes making us come at things from dozens of different directions.

“Yeah,” I said, keeping tabs on the Environmental Science and Research guys, the interviews Trevor was still undertaking, and the sun as it started to rise. Sleep was a no-go for me. I’d be hitting the pavement running as soon as I managed to get a damn coffee. “Hennessey’s the blackmail. I’m placing my money on the CIB traitor being the one manipulated. Stretch has clearly filled the abduction role, and Angelo slotted into the murder piece. So, where does that leave Carole?” I answered for them. “Outside the pattern; that’s where. Which means,” I said, registering that Trevor was winding up on his last interview, “that she means something else to him.”

“I don’t like the sound of that,” Damon murmured, as Trevor approached us.

I didn’t like the sound of it either, because it meant that Weston was acting in a way we hadn’t yet been able to profile correctly. He might have had keys in the past, but we hadn’t been able to spot them. Which meant we didn’t know what happened to them. You could bet your arse, though, that they hadn’t returned to their lives unscathed.

If they’d escaped, we would have heard about it.

If they’d been found dead in a fashion outside of the murder victims we’d associated with Weston as part of the pattern; they would have set alarm bells ringing.

Part of me hoped he hadn’t had keys before. But if he hadn’t, then he was changing. Adapting or unravelling? I couldn’t say. But he was entering territory that was unpredictable. I snorted softly at that because really we hadn’t been able to predict squat about this man yet.

“What’s so funny, Keen?” Trevor asked as he made our sides finally.

“Your hat,” I said, staring up at the worn and dusty thing.

He ran a finger along the brim in a way that I was sure I’d seen John Wayne do in old flicks.

“Darlin’,” he drawled, “don’t diss the hat.”

I smiled up at him.

“Found somethin’,” he said, all business again.

The smile dropped. We’d done a preliminary search of the property before anyone had arrived. We’d found nothing.

“Down by where we think your Stretch might have been taken from,” Trevor said.

He handed over a small, sealed plastic bag. The type of bag used for evidence taken from a scene.

Inside was a card for a boarding house in Ponsonby. A halfway house, I thought, for ex-druggies.

“That could have been dropped on the street by anyone,” Damon said.

“True,” Trevor agreed amicably, switching his toothpick to the other side of his mouth. “But it looks in good order, not been weathered by time spent out of a wallet, and it was in the bushes beside the drive, right where we found scuff marks on the concrete.”

We’d spotted the scuff marks and left them for the forensic geeks; pretty sure that was where Stretch had been standing when he’d been jumped by Weston. But we’d not spotted the business card.

I didn’t take Weston as the sort to make a mistake like this; dropping a card that would lead us directly to him.

Unless, of course, he wanted to lead us directly to him.

I stared at the address on the business card. A boarding house in a suburb no more than ten minutes away. Could he have set up a base so close? He’d done it before with Carole, just ‘round the corner in Greys Ave. It matched his pattern of behaviour.

Carole calling me over the course of a couple of weeks worked to lure me in, why not a card with the address of a boarding house at the scene where he’d abducted his latest victim? A victim designed to lure out Damon specifically.

“Anyway,” Trevor said, stuffing the card back inside his jacket pocket, “we’ll look into it and let y’all know what we find out.”

“Do you want to take my statement?” Damon asked.

“Nah,” Trevor said, “just don’t leave town.” He laughed at his poor taste joke and saluted with his cowboy hat, sauntering off.

“Considering I’m his superior officer,” Pierce remarked, “you’d think he’d be more careful following the rules in front of me.”

“Maybe he thinks you can vouch for Damon,” I offered.

“I’m not writing up a fake statement if that’s what you mean.”

I looked back at Jones as he manoeuvred his car out of the carpark and onto Pitt Street. Why did he let Damon go without bugging him for at least a word or two to write down? Damon was head of HEAT. Was it a favour to me? And what would I owe him exactly?

I shook my head and pulled out my cellphone, entering a search for the boarding house.

“Halfway home,” I said, just as I’d suspected.

“Part of the health system?” Pierce asked, already on the same page as me.

“Privately owned and operated.”

“Perfect,” Pierce offered.

Yeah, because it meant anyone could stay there. They didn’t need a referral from the hospital.

It was an invitation to play. A spider’s web that you could clearly see but not avoid getting tangled up in. Stretch would be there. Carole wouldn’t.

But what the hell would happen when Damon accepted the invite?

“It’s a trap,” I muttered.

“Yep,” Pierce said.

Damon said nothing. Because we all knew he’d be going there. Carole was his sister by birth, but Stretch was his brother by choice. Nothing would stop Damon from going after him.

Not me. Not Pierce. And not a bloody big spider waiting in the wings to wrap him up and slowly eat him.

Chapter Fifteen

“We All Have Our Limits. We All Have That Line In The Sand That If We Cross It, We’re Done For.”

The coffee was good, but the company was a bit iffy. I sat on a stool in the heart of ASI and listened to Pierce and Anscombe hash out a plan for approaching the halfway house. Damon interjected every now and then and Eric, the ASI tech geek on duty right then, added his two cents worth.

Thankfully, Nick had ensured all his other operatives were AWOL for this. Enough people knew what was going on as it was and I only consented to the tech geek because we needed more professional eyes than those available to us at HEAT watching the CCTV footage in Ponsonby.

I sipped my coffee and contemplated the state we’d left Damon’s team in. Controlled chaos was too generous a term for it. There’d been barely little control and a hell of a lot of chaos.

Still, they were firemen, and when Damon issued an order, they all followed it. Hunker down and keep watch. Not much of a directive, but it kept them marginally busy.

This next stage of the operation required a little less emotional involvement and a hell of a lot more professional detachment. I studied Anscombe and his geek. I thought I had a relatively good handle on Nick Anscombe’s motives for involving ASI in this. His friendship with Pierce was one part of it. But Inspector Hart’s insinuation that he’d put pressure on the private eye was definitely another. Plus, I was pretty sure, Nick Anscombe liked a little chaos and a good mystery.

Eric Shaw, the tech geek, on the other hand, was a relatively unknown quantity. Sure, I knew all about his technical skills and his length of service and devotion to Anscombe and the PI company. But he had an ex-military air to him and an obvious limp. The man had been injured; I’d stake my money on him having been injured in the line of duty. Extrapolating on that and what I’d uncovered of Anscombe’s shadowy business to date, Shaw had hit rock bottom at some stage in his life, and Anscombe had dug him out of it.

Loyalty, intelligence, and a backbone that was wasted in this small room full of computer equipment and state of the art TV screens.

He had a wife. And that, there, was where I was uneasy. Anything we did now could be traced back to us by Weston. Either through the CIB traitor, if it got out at Central Police, or through whatever network of spies I suspected Weston of having.

Amber Shaw could be a liability.

It didn’t matter that she was also part of Nick Anscombe’s team: The second half of the tech geeks. She was no ex-military. She was ex-stripper. Exotic dancer, I believed. I was sure Anscombe and Shaw both had given her some self-defence lessons. But Amber Shaw was definitely a potential weak link.

This man we chased down was far more dangerous than any I had faced previously. He scared me. And not just because I could see Damon was losing it.

The pressure was getting to him. Worry over his sister mixed in with this new serving of worry over Stretch. He was close to snapping in two and half of him would come out guns blazing while the other half made him shoot a friendly.

I wanted to reassure him, offer some comfort. But I knew what that sort of thing did to someone so close to the edge. I’d been there for so long myself because of Carl. One wrong word or touch would have sent me over that cliff right along with my ex-partner.

“Pierce and I can place ourselves here and here,” Anscombe was saying. “Eric’ll have good line of sight on the front of the property.”

“It’s just the back that is our blind spot,” Pierce said.

“We could use a drone,” Shaw suggested.

“Weston would spot it,” Damon snapped. He’d been shooting down ideas as if he were at a clay pigeon shooting contest. I had money on him winning gold.

“Our drones fly at eight hundred feet,” Shaw said.

“Five hundred is the legal limit for NZ,” Pierce offered.

“Your point being?” Shaw said.

Pierce shook his head in a way that said he’d had these types of arguments before with these men and knew he’d only lose in the end so why bother.

“That might work,” Anscombe muttered, ignoring Pierce. “Set it up.”

“So, we’ve got eyes on the building,” I said. “Something that Weston will no doubt be expecting. What does that leave uncovered?”

“You and Damon,” Pierce replied. “If he doesn’t expect you to bring in Nick and me, that is.”

“He’ll know you’ve left HEAT on lockdown,” Anscombe offered, glancing at Damon. “He’s not aware of my team or me, though, so we can assume we’re an unknown factor.” He looked at Pierce now. “You, he’ll expect, so we should use you as a distraction.”

“Play his own tricks on him,” Pierce agreed.

Anscombe nodded. “Let’s move you to here,” he said, indicating a more visible location on the map they had up on the screen. “Still good cover, but not good enough for someone like him.”

Someone like him.

Who was this man? Weston had skills a layperson wouldn’t. His mind manipulation games were on a whole other level to what we were used to. Every psychopath out there manipulates the world and people around them to some extent. But Weston did something more. He took over minds completely. Intelligent minds. Carole was not uneducated. Eagle might be, but he had street smarts galore. Weston cut through both with ease.

And let’s not forget the CIB traitor. Cawfield might be a dick, but he was a highly trained detective dick. How had Weston got to him?

My thoughtful gaze snagged on movement under the main desk where Shaw was sitting. His hand methodically rubbed his thigh, just above his knee, as if to ease an ache there.

Ex-military. It was an angle we hadn’t considered.

Add in his mind manipulation ability, and it led you down a whole new path of discovery.

I’d thought it simply hypnosis, but what if it was hypnosis crossed with brainwashing? A type of brainwashing even standard military jocks weren’t aware of. One I hadn’t even thought possible.

Shit.

I looked back at Anscombe as he and Pierce finalised the plan with Damon running interference. Damon was going to be a problem. He was hot under the collar and fit to throw a monumental tantrum at any minute.

This was getting to him, and there was nothing I could do to help him other than getting on with this and catching Weston. Save his sister and fireman brother.

But Weston was more than we had bargained for; I was sure of it.

“You’ve got an ex-spook on your payroll, haven’t you?” I said to Anscombe; interrupting whatever useless planning they’d been discussing mid-sentence.

Anscombe narrowed his eyes at me. Pierce shook his head frantically as if my suggestion was an explosion waiting to go off. Damon just looked confused. And frustrated with the segue. And desperate to get on with things.

Yes, Damon was going to be a problem. A problem I was beginning to think I was going to have to address.

“I thought you wanted to keep this low key,” Anscombe said.

“Is your spook trustworthy?”

“Of course, she is. And stop calling her a spook; she’s likely to put a bullet in your head from one hundred metres.”

“Was she a good spook?” I said, ignoring the warning just to mess with him.

“I believe she was one of the best,” Anscombe ground out. “Why do you want her in on this?”

“Why are you throwing up walls at the suggestion?”

“I’m not throwing up anything! I’d just like to know why you’ve singled her out of all of my men.”

Anscombe had an eclectic bag of operatives. Ex-military, ex-exotic dancers, ex-mob affiliated and gang-raised daughter. And an ex-spook.

“Bring her in,” I said, not offering an explanation.

“Lara,” Pierce hissed, walking over to where I was sitting so he could speak without the others listening in. I was sure they were trying, but at least Anscombe had his cellphone out and was doing what I had asked. “What’s going on?”

I glanced at Damon, who was rechecking the map of Ponsonby and trying to stare daggers at it. Shaw was pretending to do something, God knows what, but I was fairly certain it involved eavesdropping on Pierce’s and my conversation.

Nothing said in this room would be private.

I looked up at Pierce and then purposefully looked back at Damon. Pierce followed my gaze and scowled.

“I wondered if you saw that,” he murmured. He’d noticed Damon’s unravelling as well. “Rather you than me telling him he’s out, though,” he muttered. Looking back at me, he said, “And the spook?”

“Stop calling her that!” Anscombe shouted.

Fuck, they had ears everywhere in here. Damon, thankfully, just looked alarmed and not irate at what Pierce and I had been discussing. So, at least, he hadn’t figured out what was what yet.

Anscombe, on the other hand, was probably gearing up for the fallout already.

I considered grabbing Pierce and exiting the room, but that was a laughable solution to our eavesdropping dilemma. This place was bugged up the wazoo. I just stared at Pierce as he stared back at me and said nothing.

Eventually, he got the message and dropped it, returning to the main screens and looking over the map with Damon.

“When are we going?” Damon asked him.

“We can’t just rush in; it’s a trap.”

“I know it’s a trap,” Damon snapped back. “But it’s the first chance we’ve really had to get him.”

The first chance since Sweet Hell that was. And look how that had ended up; a complete and utter clusterfuck. I shuddered as I remembered being tied to that cross and blindfolded.

“If we do this properly,” Pierce said, “without rushing in before we’re ready, then we might just get him and end this.”

Pierce didn’t believe that. Anscombe and Shaw didn’t believe it either. I certainly didn’t.

But Damon just nodded his head and returned his seething and desperate attention to the map of Ponsonby.

My heart lurched. We all have our limits. We all have that line in the sand that if we cross it, we’re done for. I’d come close to mine; Carl had seen to that.

You’re close to breaking, Lara.

I’d come close, but I hadn’t yet stepped over. Damon, though, I thought as I sat there while my heart was breaking, had crossed over it. He was on the other side of rationality now. He was a desperate man, close to breaking, if not already breaking apart, and he hadn’t even realised that this was the one thing too much that had sent him over.

It wasn’t insanity. It wasn’t any type of madness. It was a type of stress, a trauma of the mind and heart and soul, that meant continuing on the path you were on could be fatal.

Not that I thought Damon would want to end his life to end the pain he was feeling. But he wouldn’t hesitate to put his life in danger to end this once and for all.

He was out. Weston would expect him to go to the halfway house, but instead, he’d get me and, hopefully, a spook.

A spook that had just ridden into the underground carpark at ASI and was parking her matt black, lethally fast looking motorbike beside the Porsche Cayenne.

I watched as the woman in question took off her helmet, scanning the carpark in a split second glance that you wouldn’t have even noticed had you not been looking for it and knew what she was. What she formerly was, that is. She crossed the well-lit space, glancing up at the camera that was filming her; the one I was watching right then play out on a smaller screen to the side of Shaw.

She knew she was being watched. She probably knew she was being watched by more than just a tech geek or Anscombe who’d called her in. I’d overheard what Anscombe had said on his cellphone to her; it had given nothing away. But this woman, this ex-spook, knew there was more than just her coworker and boss waiting and watching.

She walked with purpose, sure steps and relaxed shoulders. I doubted, though, that she didn’t have weapons on her body readily accessible. She disappeared into the building itself and then came up on a new camera feed. I followed her progress as she approached the ASI control room.

“I hope you know what you’re doing,” Anscombe said.

“You make it sound like you can’t trust her,” I replied steadily.

“Oh, I can trust her,” he muttered and left the rest hanging. I guessed, not many others could trust this woman not to slit their throats if they ran counter to her objectives.

I arched my brow and met Pierce’s I-told-you-so gaze. It was almost enough to make me laugh out loud.

But then she was there, being allowed access into the inner sanctum, and one quick glance of her eyes across every screen, person, piece of equipment set out in readiness for the operation, and I knew she had been granted access into the op itself.

It left me feeling decidedly uneasy.

“Charlie Downes,” Anscombe said, “you know Pierce, and this is Detective Lara Keen from CIB and HEAT Chief Investigator Damon Michaels.”

She said nothing.

“This is your show, Keen,” Anscombe said with a dismissive wave of his hand, “by all means, clue us in on why Charlie is here.”

Her sharp, storm-coloured eyes swept across the room to land on me. She hadn’t sat. She hadn’t yet spoken. But she didn’t need to. I knew a predator when I saw one. A weapon considered lethal simply by existing.

“Does the name Rhys Kyle Weston mean anything to you?” I said.

You could have heard a pin drop, even over the hum of electronic equipment.

Charlie turned her eagle eyes on Anscombe, ignoring me completely. Or so it would seem.

“What have you got yourself into this time, Nick?” she asked.

She knew Weston. And she didn’t know him because Anscombe had let slip what he was working on with Pierce and me.

Charlie Downes, ex-spook, current private eye with Anscombe Securities and Investigations, knew Rhys Kyle Weston because he was an ex-spook, too.

Chapter Sixteen

“If You Feel Your Back Hit The Wall, Sport, You Better Get Moving.”

The shit hit the proverbial fan after that.

“Is he one of yours?” Pierce demanded.

“What the hell can he do?” Shaw asked.

“Who is he?” Damon growled.

“Is this sanctioned?” Nick queried.

The questions were fired rapidly, one after the other, and in some instances, spoken over each other. The tension in the room ratcheted up several notches, and it had already been sitting at a low simmer due to Damon’s stress levels.

I watched the spook as she stood in the face of the barrage; I watched as she didn’t even flinch at all and I knew one thing for certain.

“This changes things,” I said.

All eyes turned towards me, including the spy’s.

“Understatement of the year, Keen,” Anscombe snapped.

Charlie watched me with a hint of interest, but it was hard to tell. Those eyes were deadly, and it took effort to hold her gaze. I forced myself to because I thought this might have been a test. A simple one. An early one. But nonetheless a test. Charlie Downes wanted to know if I had a backbone and I was determined I’d bloody well prove it to her.

She smiled softly and then turned back to Nick.

It was surprising how good the full breath of air I sucked in felt right then.

“What is he involved in?” she asked.

“No,” Damon said, shaking his head. And then he repeated it as if it needed saying again. “No. You answer our questions before we answer yours.”

I thought perhaps that Damon hadn’t noticed the danger this woman presented. I glanced at Nick; his face said nothing. I had to hope he had her on some sort of leash, but I wouldn’t take the chance that he didn’t control her completely. Not where Damon was concerned, at least.

I stepped forward.

“CIB is investigating him in relation to a serious crime,” I announced, drawing her attention away from Damon.

“Lara,” Damon warned, sounding hurt that I might have betrayed him. I hadn’t yet. But he needed to be out of her crosshairs.

I placed myself front and centre.

“We believe he’s compromised one of our own,” I added.

“Keen!” Pierce all but yelled at me. I’d gone from having Damon’s wrath aimed at me to having Pierce’s.

I was happier with the current situation than I had been when Damon thought I was throwing HEAT and him under the bus. But we’d kept CIB’s traitor on a need-to-know basis for so long, that I did feel a little uncomfortable right then.

The bottom line, though, was that Downes recognised Weston’s alias immediately and hadn’t tried to cover her reaction. Which meant she either knew he was in town and wasn’t at all surprised or he was someone of interest to her for a previous unknown reason and she’d decided our cooperation was needed in order to do whatever she deemed necessary.

I had to assume the mind manipulation, his most telling and insidious skill, was to blame.

Which meant admitting we were aware of it. Enter the CIB traitor.

Pierce turned away in disgust. Damon thrummed in my peripheral vision as if a tuning fork recently struck. Shaw watched on in a way that made you think he was part of the furniture and not a threat. And Anscombe was a statue, waiting to act if needed.

In that suspended moment it was strangely Anscombe I trusted the most.

“Interesting,” Charlie said.

I snorted. This chick would give my father a run for his money. Ice Queen didn’t even cover it.

“What aren’t you telling me?” she pressed.

I studied her. She had dirty blonde hair, not too different in colour to mine; muscular arms and a trim figure. She was also about my height, so I thought that could be used as well if needed. She wore leathers and a figure-hugging t-shirt; her jacket hung open, but still, I couldn’t see the firearm I was certain was holstered beneath it. Her face would be considered attractive by most if not all men. And some women. Her voice was a little gravelly as if she smoked a packet a day. But I was fairly sure this woman was as fit as a woman in her thirties could be. Cigarettes would not have featured in her daily intake unless they served a purpose.

Everything she did had meaning; I just had to decipher what that meaning meant.

“How about you give me something first,” I said to her. “Quid pro quo.”

“I may not be at liberty to answer your questions.”

“Then he is a spook,” I mused.

Nick winced. Shaw shifted a hand slowly toward a button on his desk which I thought might have been a panic button of some description — probably designed to disorientate and give him and Anscombe a chance to escape the fallout.

I kept my eyes on Charlie.

“I am not at liberty to answer that,” she said, reconfirming her earlier statement.

“This could be a very short conversation, then,” I told her.

“No skin off my nose, Detective.”

“And your boss’s nose?” I asked, not looking at Anscombe even though I knew he wasn’t enjoying being brought up in the pissing contest Charlie and I were having.

“Nick and I have an understanding.”

“Maybe we can come to one too,” I said.

“You’re a cop; I doubt it.”

“Suspended cop and I think if you hadn’t wanted us to know you recognised Weston’s alias, you wouldn’t have said a thing.”

She smiled. It was a little creepy. Only because she looked so normal doing it and this woman was anything but normal.

“Very true,” she admitted. “If he has shown an interest in Auckland and CIB, then someone has a bullseye on his,” she looked at me sharply, “or her back. Who is it? You, Detective?”

And then she turned to look at Damon.

“Or you, Investigator?”

Damon’s behaviour alone would have singled him out, so I wasn’t surprised she’d come to that conclusion.

“Does it matter for the purposes of this conversation?” Pierce asked.

“Oh, I think it matters a great deal,” Charlie said.

“Just tell them what you can, Charlie,” Nick growled. “And stop playing with your dinner.”

She laughed. It was throaty and full-bodied and garnered the attention of every single male in the room.

I couldn’t decide if I liked or hated this woman. I worked on not showing either reaction right then.

“He was one of ours,” she admitted, moving to take a seat.

It seemed to signal something to Anscombe and Shaw because they immediately relaxed a little. Pierce was still wound up tighter than an industrial-strength spring, and Damon was… Well, Damon was still close to breaking.

I pushed those thoughts away and concentrated on the spook.

“More of a support operative than a field one,” she added.

“So not like you?” Shaw asked.

Charlie offered him a cold stare. “Not every agent is suited for the field,” she said icily.

My eyes met Damon’s. He arched his brow at me. His face right then said everything: This woman was scary, which made sense because Weston was pretty damn scary too.

I held Damon’s gaze a little longer than necessary because for that split moment he was my Damon again and not some bomb waiting to go off. He hadn’t broken yet. Just toeing that line like I did on occasion.

“What else can you tell us, Charlie?” Nick asked.

She sat back in her chair without a care in the world and said, “He was in charge of PSYOPS.”

The room immediately felt ten degrees warmer and a hell of a lot smaller. Anscombe stood up. Shaw slammed a hand down on the desk in front of him. Both men looked fit to kill the first poor bastard to make a move right then.

My whole body locked down on the threat of violence that hung in the air. My eyes found Pierce’s. His hand rested on his gun, under his jacket. He looked at me, a warning clear in his gaze. And then I remembered Damon’s fragile state and spun toward him.

But Damon is a fireman who’s faced down death a time or two in the form of uncontrolled flames. He knew a lethal situation when presented with one. He stood still, but loose. Ready to react; either defend himself or throw his body out of the way.

I could trust him, even though he was close to the edge, to look after himself. It made me feel ashamed that I’d been so sure he was a liability in the upcoming op. But looking and listening to the two ASI men fist their hands, and bunch their muscles, and growl under their breaths, I thought perhaps they were the loose canons in this scenario.

“He was the one?” Nick finally said.

“Yes,” Charlie replied but didn’t elaborate.

“And he’s still alive?” Nick asked incredulously.

“He is… slippery,” Charlie said. “Caleb and Ava have been hunting him, but have had little success.”

“And he’s been in Auckland all along?” Shaw murmured.

“We think he might have spent some time in Wellington prior to moving here,” I offered, mentally putting puzzle pieces together to form a picture I couldn’t identify. This was personal to both ASI men, but especially to Charlie.

I didn’t have all the facts, but I thought my best bet right then was just to listen.

“Oh, he was definitely in Wellington for a time,” Charlie said.

“Would you care to fill in the blanks?” Damon demanded, not feeling as circumspect as I was right then.

“This is Charlie’s story to tell,” Nick said.

We all looked at Charlie.

She turned and looked at me. “What haven’t you told me?”

I really didn’t want to tell this woman a thing. But she’d just divulged something that I didn’t think was trivial. At the very least, Charlie had a personal history with Weston which connected to two others; a Caleb and Ava. I couldn’t be certain, but I could take a guess. Caleb and Ava were spooks like Charlie had been. And PSYOPs was a part of their team’s makeup.

From what I knew of psychological operations, mind manipulation played a big part.

This all connected. And Charlie Downes was the best chance we had of figuring it all out. Of catching Weston. Freeing Carole. Saving Stretch. Releasing Hennessey from a blackmail’s guillotine.

Solving HEAT’s arsonist crimes. And convicting someone for Angelo’s murder.

This was it. The moment that could make all the difference.

But opening up the doors to our closet and showing this woman our skeletons was not an easy thing to digest.

I let a slow breath of air out and looked at Pierce.

“Go on,” he said as if it was a simple as that. I’d already dropped CIB in it, so what more could hurt the Criminal Investigations Bureau after that?

I glanced at Damon then. Like Nick had said about it being Charlie’s story to tell, this was really Damon’s closet to open.

“Do you want to or shall I?” I asked, giving him a chance to shut this down if he wanted.

I thought that would be a mistake. But I wouldn’t take the decision out of his hands until I’d given him a chance to do the right thing.

“What choice have I got?” he said. He waved a hand at me. “You’re better at this than me. Go ahead.”

It’s hard for some men to delegate. But Damon Michaels was not one of those types of men. HEAT was his family. He ran it like one. The respect he earned from his men was a given. Because Damon treated them like his brothers.

Better than a brother, I thought.

I looked back at Charlie. She sat patiently, watching the scene unfold, no doubt coming to conclusions by herself.

“Damon’s sister is being held by Weston.” The spook gave nothing away. “Initially, we thought Weston was the boyfriend who introduced her to Auckland’s drug scene. Damon got her out of it, into rehab. Weston retaliated. He took her back after seeking revenge on Damon and HEAT. A series of arsons and then targeting me.”

She did arch her brow at that, looking at me and then Damon, and putting two and two together to get romantic entanglement. I thought she was making more of a show of her reaction than she actually felt or the situation warranted. Charlie Downes had a sense of humour underneath all that lethality.

“It has since become apparent,” I went on, “that Weston has manipulated her mind rather than established a relationship with her. The drugs are undoubtedly a byproduct of whatever it is he does to control his victims. However, we believe Carole’s involvement in the finance sector brought her to his attention in the first place, but we can’t find a reason for his interest in money lending per se.”

“He’s been cut-off,” she said.

“But wouldn’t he have backup funds stashed away like I presume you did?” Nick asked.

“Caleb found them,” she said.

“Who is Caleb?” Damon asked.

“Another spook?” I said.

“You really do have a death wish, Keen,” Anscombe muttered.

“Yes,” Charlie said, either in agreement that Caleb was a spook like her or that I had a death wish. I chose the former explanation for the sanctity of my emotional - and physical - wellbeing.

“He’s blackmailed and manipulated and abducted and murdered his way around the city for the past five years or more,” I told her, getting us back on track and the spotlight off me. “We’ve linked several previous cases to him. Some of which were closed cases. We think the men sentenced for the crimes were also manipulated by him.”

“Quite possible.”

“How good is he?” I asked her.

“Very.”

“They have triggers,” I said and surprisingly saw her flinch.

Just slightly. Minutely even. But the spook flinched on the word ‘trigger.’

Fuck.

I looked at Nick. He was watching Charlie closely and didn’t even see my questioning gaze right then.

What were we dealing with here? PSYOPS, I had thought, were tactics intended to manipulate one’s enemies. What if they were tactics used on a spook herself? To control her. To make her do things she wouldn’t necessarily do.

Double fuck.

Had we opened a hornet's nest here and were woefully ill-prepared for the buzzing that would ensue?

“Whose trigger has been used?” she asked. It wasn’t so much that she’d taken long to answer, but there had definitely been a split second delay.

Spooks were good at what they did. But so were cops. My eyes met Pierce’s. He nodded his head to me. He’d seen her reaction too.

“One of the men,” I said, “currently serving time for a crime we believe Weston committed.”

Charlie looked at the far wall of the room and said nothing.

“We think Carole might have a trigger,” I added. Watching. Waiting. Nothing. “He also just took one of HEAT’s team members. So now there are two people in his immediate realm of influence. Not to mention the blackmail of a Department psychologist.”

“There’ll be more.”

“We’re aware of the traitor in the Bureau,” I said.

She smiled. “I doubt it,” she said.

“We know we have one,” I argued, bristling.

“I’m sure you do,” the spook agreed. “But have you correctly identified them?”

“The man at the top of our list has already been manipulated once by Weston,” Pierce said, “It makes sense…”

He was cut off. The spook abruptly stood.

“You can’t assume anything will make sense with this man. He is beyond your wildest comprehension.”

Everyone just stared at her. She’d spoken forcefully when until now she’d been almost blasé about everything. Her tone had changed the entire tone of the room.

To dread.

I stepped forward and met her steady grey gaze head-on.

“Then what do you suggest?”

She smiled.

“We need to bring in some help for this,” she said.

Fuck. So much for keeping this low-key and in-house. I could feel the entire operation getting away from me. And there wasn’t a blind thing I could do about it.

Because Weston had Carole and Stretch. And because even though Damon was still a badass chief investigator from HEAT, he was also close to breaking.

If you feel your back hit the wall, Sport, you better get moving.

It was time to get moving. As if I hadn’t been trying to, already.

Chapter Seventeen

“It’s A Shit World Full Of Evil Shit And If You Don’t Get Your Shit Together Then You Get Mired In It.”

There were now three motorbikes parked in the underground carpark at ASI. They didn’t match, and I wondered if that had more to do with their respective owners than chance or statistical probability. Charlie’s was almost utilitarian with a hint of menace. The one parked closest to hers was sleek and big and made a roar as it entered. It was also black, but this time shiny in a slightly showy way.

But nothing compared to the glitz and showmanship of the last motorbike. It was red and sleek and looked slightly exotic, much like the red leather-clad woman who had ridden in on it a mere ten minutes ago.

“Caleb is out,” the red woman said now. She flicked dark hair over her shoulder in a move that I thought was subconscious but was probably a ploy to garner the attention of every man in the room. “He sends his regards,” she added. “And a directive to kill the bastard.”

“I don’t need a directive from Caleb for that, Ava,” Charlie said.

“I know, darling,” the Ava spook crooned. “But you know Caleb; always throwing his weight around.” She looked at Nick. “Talking of muscles,” she purred. “How have you been, Nicky?”

“Enjoying a quiet life, Ava,” Nick said purposely.

“Oh, and I suppose you think I’m here to disrupt it.” She laughed. It wasn’t as good as Charlie’s, but it did the job nicely. Every male watched her. “It seems like you have more immediate problems than me.”

“Yes,” Nick said in forced agreement.

I watched the dynamic between them. There was a certain level of respect, but it was couched in fear. Not that the ASI bossman showed much of his fear. But I was used to assessing suspects and witnesses, and from what I was seeing, there was history in this room, and it came with a bucket load of baggage.

What was missing, though, was trust. Even trust between Charlie and Ava. They eyed each other up like hissing cobras. In contrast to that relationship, the final member of the motorbike club was definitely Team Charlie. And I recognised him from my extensive digging into ASI in the past.

Adam Savill. A longtime member of Nick Anscombe’s team. Not a spook. But definitely involved with Charlie.

He seemed normal enough and levelheaded, despite the rising tension in the room. And he also seemed comfortable letting Charlie call the shots. I was pretty sure that would have been something they established early on in their relationship.

I glanced across the room to Damon, expecting him to be absorbed in the interactions as well. Possibly even enamoured with Ava. But he was looking directly at me. He nodded his head toward the door to the meeting room we were all in and slipped out while Ava and Charlie continued to posture as Nick and Adam tried in vain to calm them.

I made my exit when another well-aimed barb was hurled in someone’s direction, aware that the spooks probably hadn’t missed either of our exits.

In fact, I was beginning to suspect they’d engineered it.

I shook my head in disgust. Mind manipulation was a scary thing. Being manipulated in any fashion by lethal assassins and spooks was just as unwelcome.

Damon had stopped some distance down the hallway, halfway between two camera domes on the ceiling. Control was just around the corner in one direction — the gym and firing range around the other. We’d be watched. But as Pierce had remained behind with Shaw in Control, I had to hope we wouldn’t be watched too closely.

“What do you think?” Damon asked me once I’d reached his side. He kept his voice low, but like me, he probably suspected it was futile.

“I’m not sure what she’ll bring to the table,” I said. “But we need the extra muscle.”

“If they don’t kill each other first,” he grumbled.

“Competitive industry, I suppose,” I said.

Damon shoved his hands in his pockets and stared at nothing.

“What’s on your mind, Michaels?” I asked.

He stared at me. “You haven’t called me that for a long time.”

“Sometimes it’s nice to remember how far we’ve come.”

“Ah, love,” he murmured. “I’d travel the distance with you all over again tomorrow if I could.”

“Would you? It’s not exactly been plain sailing.”

“I always did like a challenge,” he mused.

“I’m a challenge, am I?” I growled.

He laughed. It was the happiest I’d seen Damon in weeks. “I still know how to push all your buttons, love,” he whispered and reached up to tuck a strand of my hair away neatly.

He sighed. The world outside this bubble was waiting. God alone knew what Weston was doing to Carole or had done to Stretch.

“The longer this takes,” he said, “the less I believe we’ll see a successful outcome.”

“Don’t lose faith just yet,” I said. “We know more now than we’ve ever known. We know who he is.”

“That doesn’t reassure me, Lara. It frightens me. How the hell do we fight an ex-PSYOPS agent? I get the impression that the professionals have had little success chasing him down, so why should I believe we will?”

It was unlike Damon to sound so fatalistic. He’d never met an argument he couldn’t win. But this... this was big. How did you combat a sinister and malevolent man like Weston who had training most of us couldn’t even begin to fathom let alone counter?

“That’s why we need them,” I told him. “Ava and Charlie. I might not trust either of them, but they’re our best chance of catching this madman.”

“They have their own agenda.”

The triggers, he meant. If Carole had one, then they certainly did.

“I trust Nick Anscombe,” I said, unable to think of anything else to say to reassure him.

“Love,” Damon said with meaning, “he’s as wary of the spooks as anyone. More so, considering he knows more of Charle’s background than we do. I’m not sure we can count on him at our backs either.”

This fatalistic Damon was new to me, and I wasn’t sure how to combat it. I’m not one to offer platitudes or coddle people. You either get our shit together and play your part or you’re useless. But that was the cop in me. The one raised to hide her emotions and file away the crap that she sees on a daily basis.

That was the only woman in a club full of men trying to fit in when she really didn’t. Not to their testosterone-exacting standards anyway.

Hennessey would tell me it was my coping mechanism. And my mind’s way of handling the trauma of the job without fracturing. Being a hard-arse protected me from all the psychological and emotional hits.

Carl would say it’s a shit world full of evil shit and if you don’t get your shit together, then you get mired in it.

Both were right. But there was more to me than the parts that made up the whole. I might have been close to breaking on more than one occasion, but I also knew that what made me a good cop was the fact that I could still feel something at all.

I wouldn’t let the hardness I used to protect myself abandon Damon to his fate.

I stepped forward and reached up to cup his cheeks. Then I went up on my toes and kissed him.

He didn’t exactly resist, but he didn’t enthusiastically press me up against the wall and mould himself to my body. I’d been where he was; unable to let go in the face of such trauma. Unable to allow yourself to feel for fear of feeling too much.

The body gets numbed to the stress and heartache. The mind protects itself in various unhelpful ways. You do what you have to do to survive, but it’s not living. This emotionless void, this muted life; restricting your reactions; dulling all sensations.

I recognised myself in Damon, and it hurt my heart so deeply that this strong, capable, able-bodied man was being brought low by his own defences.

I kissed him softer not harder. Pushing him now wouldn’t reach him. I had to call him to me. He had to want to be there. To respond. To rise above the malaise.

I knew in his head he’d either be fighting or hiding. It didn’t matter which. He wasn’t here with me; not completely. I kissed him softly, poured myself into that single place where we touched. Then I added another sensation; I moaned into his mouth using everything I had.

He shifted closer. His tongue met mine in a tentative sweep. I sucked on it and then flicked mine back in greeting. He tasted like my Damon. He felt like my Damon. I wasn’t sure if he was still my Damon, but for that moment, I pretended he was and that everything was how it should be.

The kiss lasted aeons or maybe mere minutes. But eventually, I felt the wall at my back and Damon’s body pressing against mine, sandwiching me.

I knew the moment he felt it all; the moment the ice melted and he let me in; let himself out; let himself feel.

And then a throat cleared beside us, and we pulled back to see the highly amused eyes of my superior officer.

“Great timing, as usual, Pierce,” I muttered.

Damon chuckled; that purely male sound they make when satisfied with themselves. When the caveman rears his head, and he all but thumps his chest in pride.

Me man. You woman. She mine.

Men.

But a sweeter sound I had never heard because it meant Damon was present. Damon was with me. Even if he was a Neanderthal, in the end, he was here, now.

“If you two are done necking in the hallway of a highly secure facility with not one but two cameras focused on you then we need to talk,” Pierce deadpanned.

“What’s up?” I asked, ignoring the fact that he’d undoubtedly known what we were up to before he even stepped into the hallway to confront us. I forced myself not to glare up at Shaw in the ceiling camera lens and offer him a one-finger salute.

“We’ve had a development,” Pierce said without preamble. “We should bring the others in on it.”

He didn’t look like he wanted to do that.

“I don’t trust them either,” I murmured, keeping my voice low. “But we don’t stand a chance without them.”

“It’s not that, Keen,” he said.

I stared at him, aware that this had to be really bad for Ryan Pierce to hesitate to voice it.

“What is it, Sarge?” I pressed.

“Come on,” he said, leading the way back to Control and not answering my question. This was definitely going to be bad. “Shaw should be calling the others in.”

“I thought the whole idea of having the planning session in the meeting room was to keep the new spook out of Control,” I groused.

“Nick’s tired of the bickering,” Pierce said. “At least in Control, he can subdue us.”

“What? With panic buttons and a tech geek?”

Pierce looked at me and shook his head.

“Don’t underestimate the geek, Lara, and sure as hell don’t underestimate Control. Nick’d probably gas us all just to contain us and have Jason Cain extricate him and Eric, administering the antidote, and leaving our bodies to rot in that hell hole.”

“And you call the man a friend?” I said dryly.

“I never said it was an easy relationship.”

I snorted just as we reached Control. The door clicked open after Pierce waved at the camera. To my utter surprise, Charlie, Ava and Nick were already there.

There were ways to circumvent that hallway, and I did not like that I wasn’t aware of them.

Plus the fact that they all felt the need to circumvent it in the first place.

Which meant they all knew exactly what Damon and I had been doing.

I refused to feel embarrassed about that and Damon sure as hell wasn’t feeling the least bit concerned.

Men.

I glared at Pierce as he was the safest person to be mad at. He could have warned us, but he hadn’t. He offered a shrug of his shoulders and walked across the room to Shaw.

“Show them,” he said.

Shaw then pressed a few buttons on his keyboard, and the main screen changed to a view of the halfway house where Stretch was being held prisoner.

Clearly visible, in the shadows cast by a convenient tree, was none other than Joe Cawfield.

I took a step and then another until before I knew it, I was standing right in front of the screen.

“Hello, Joe,” I said.

“She’s good,” I heard Ava say over my shoulder. “Cool as a cucumber. I expected a rant at the very least.”

I turned to look at her.

“You know who he is,” I accused. And I didn’t mean his name and police ID number.

She knew he was our traitor. Or who we pegged for it, anyway.

“Do you honestly think I wouldn’t do my homework before I came here?” she asked.

I turned away, ignoring her rebuke and the fact that she wouldn’t have had time after Charlie contacted her to do any due diligence on any of this.

She’d been keeping tabs on Charlie.

Charlie for her part didn’t look surprised. She probably could have told us a few secrets about Ava. What a twisted world they both lived in.

I looked back at Cawfield on the screen.

“How long ago was this?” I asked.

“Twenty minutes; give or take,” Shaw said.

I reached over and manipulated the mouse he used to zoom in. I took in Cawfield’s stubbled jaw and red eyes. His crinkled shirt and fisted hands. The way he was checking over his shoulder as if he was being tailed.

I zoomed out and moved the image about, focusing on where Cawfield was looking in the photo.

“I gather this was taken from surveillance footage,” I said.

“You gather correctly,” Shaw replied.

“Can you play it back; slowly?”

Shaw nudged my hand away from the mouse and entered a command. The video started playing. He rewound it without asking. We watched Cawfield approach the halfway house along Ponsonby Road from the College Road end. He walked with purpose, but I knew Joe Cawfield. He was spooked.

I glanced at the spooks in the room with me, but returned my attention to Cawfield on the screen immediately; I didn’t want to miss a thing. The closer he got to the halfway house, the more ragged he looked. Shifty. Flitting from shadowed alcove to shadowed alcove. Pausing to check over his shoulder more than once.

“Slow it down,” I said, “Frame by frame if you have to.”

“Are we looking for anything in particular?” Anscombe asked

“Frame by frame will take us to midnight to view the entire sequence,” Shaw offered.

I said nothing to either man and just watched.

And then I saw it.

A fedora hat and long trench coat.

“Son of a bitch,” I growled and slammed my index finger down on the pause button. Shaw lifted his hands in surrender as I manipulated the frame.

Until a slightly grainy, shadowed image of Carl was enlarged in the centre of the screen.

“Damn it,” Pierce muttered.

The spooks said nothing.

Chapter Eighteen

“Sometimes All It Takes Is A Gentle Shove In The Right Direction. Sometimes It Takes A Two-By-Four To The Head."

Both Carl and Cawfield being at the crime scene we were about to bust in on was disturbing. Until now, I’d thought Carl was looking out for me. Protecting Eagle on K Road. Keeping tabs on me at Mount Eden Prison. And watching over me outside Pitt Street Fire Station. But I was beginning to question how he knew to be where he was when he needed to be.

It was a question I should have asked myself at the beginning.

Carl had been a damn good cop. He was the detective I’d modelled my own behaviour on. His close-rate was excellent. He’d been doing it for so long that I was sure he’d written the manual.

I’d looked up to him.

I’d idolised him.

And then he’d gone and faked his death (after the fact, but still) and killed people to protect me.

My world had turned inside out overnight, and afterwards, I’d shied away from any conclusive or in-depth investigative thoughts regarding my ex-partner.

But here he was on the footpath across the road from the halfway house where Stretch was being held by a madman in a bid to lure Damon into a trap.

How had he known to be here?

I needed to ask some questions that I’d, until now, thought unimportant.

Voices began to coalesce around me — Pierce growling. Nick poking the bear. Damon snapping. Shaw offering the odd bit of intel that didn’t really take us anywhere. The spooks watched on silently as Savill, ASI’s only other operative in the building, flicked through images on a spare computer terminal bringing himself up to speed on the op.

I saw Carl more than once as he swiped the screen. I saw Cawfield, too.

Were they working together? How had I missed that?

I shook my head and then reached out and picked up my handbag from where I’d stashed it and walked to the door of Control.

It was locked, of course. Eric handled ingress and egress completely. You didn’t get in or out of the room without him being aware of it and allowing or disallowing it. He was the master of his domain and right then it did not suit my purpose.

“Open the door,” I said, not raising my voice in the slightest.

Everyone stopped bickering.

“Keen?” Pierce called softly. “Where are you going?”

“To the ladies,” I said. “I need to pee, Sarge.”

I heard a soft snort from Ava and knew Charlie was watching me closely.

The men predictably looked embarrassed. There was something about women and peeing that had them looking the other way. Most men, anyway.

The door clicked, and I slipped out. I waited for it to shut behind me. And then I waited for a little longer to see who would follow me. When no one did, I headed toward the back door of the building that led out into customer parking and an additional exit to the property that spilt out eventually onto Remuera Road.

Pierce’s police-issued sedan was there as was Damon’s HEAT vehicle. I had a key to Damon’s truck for emergencies, but I’d also lifted Pierce’s keys from his jacket pocket as it hung neglected over the back of a chair by the door to Control.

The HEAT ute stood out. NZ Fire Service liked to paint their support vehicles with various forms of educational advice.

Keep an eye on what you fry.

Never underestimate the speed of fire.

Smoke alarms save lives.

All very helpful but not exactly low key. In comparison, the late model Holden Commodore was a popular street vehicle and blended in nicely in almost every neighbourhood.

It certainly would fit in sufficiently for my purposes.

I beeped the locks and slipped into the driver's side.

The back door to ASI burst open behind me. I looked up into the rear vision mirror and saw an extremely irate HEAT Chief Investigator storm across the parking lot towards me.

I rolled down my window, but he didn’t go there. He went directly to the passenger side and opened the door before I had time to press the internal locks again.

“There are cameras all over that building,” he said in a low and angry voice as he slid into the seat beside me. “Did you really think we wouldn’t see you going in the wrong direction to the toilets?”

I sighed.

“What’s Pierce doing?” I asked and started the vehicle.

“Working on the halfway house with Anscombe as I thought we would be.”

He sounded hurt. Damon was showing way more emotion than he usually did. And wasn’t that ironic? Because when you crossed that line in the desert, you usually felt nothing; you became numb. And yet Damon, unlike me, displayed emotions as if they were grains of sand.

Hennessey had called it a type of post-traumatic stress. But I’d refuted that saying I hadn’t been through anything that would constitute stress of a magnitude that could incapacitate someone. I was a cop. I saw horrible things on an almost daily basis. I watched my ex-partner get shot and fall off the side of a cliff right after I’d shot and killed someone myself.

In retrospect, it made complete sense. Hennessey was right. I was suffering from post-traumatic stress.

But Damon was suffering from something else altogether. Damon was suffering from a build-up of stress that threatened to make him explode.

The fact he showed more emotions than normal was understandable.

The fact I showed very little also made sense.

We weren’t two peas in a pod; we were an apple and an orange in a fruit basket — both fruit, but both tasting entirely different from each other.

I shook my head, trying to clear the unhelpful analogies from my mind, and negotiated traffic onto Broadway, heading toward the motorway and ultimately West Auckland.

Heading away from Newmarket and central Auckland… and Ponsonby. The halfway house.

“Where are we going, Lara?” Damon asked quietly.

“Approaching the halfway house now without being prepared is out,” I said. “Pierce will slow things down if Anscombe hasn’t already.”

“They already said something to that effect before I came after you.”

“Why didn’t Pierce?” Come after me, I meant.

“I told him to stay the fuck out.”

That was Damon. Standing between me and imminent peril.

I smiled thinly and merged with traffic. The North-Western motorway was packed. I could have flicked the lights and siren on, but the whole idea of taking Pierce’s car was to blend in. You never knew who would be watching. ASI certainly. Shaw would be following our progress via CCTV cams.

But if ASI could, so could Weston.

Maybe even Carl.

And if Carl knew where I was going before I got there, who knew what the bastard would do.

“I don’t know why Carl is turning up everywhere he shouldn’t,” I finally said.

Damon turned slightly in his seat and stared at me.

I gripped the steering wheel tighter.

“At first, I just thought he knew me so well that he could predict where I was going to be.” It made sense. But not enough sense. Not now. “Eagle is like a kid brother to me,” I said. “He knows that, and he knows Weston knows it, too. Hell, for all I know, Weston could be waiting to use Eagle against me. Just because Hennessey cleared the street rat doesn’t mean Eagle is actually clear of Weston’s influence.”

Because Hennessey wasn’t.

“Pitt Street still made a kind of sense,” I continued.

“Pitt Street?” Damon asked.

I flicked a glance at him and realised I hadn’t told anyone that Carl had been there. That that’s why I had been outside the station in the middle of the night while Damon snored softly on the pullout couch in his office.

I pushed the unwanted and uncomfortable sensation of having inadvertently hidden something from him away and said, “Carl was across the street last night.”

“Outside my station?”

“Yes,” I said, trying to sound relaxed and not at all guilty. I failed. It was disgusting for a cop.

“Why didn’t you say something?” he demanded, calling me on my bullshit.

“Stretch being taken made everything else pale into insignificance,” I said.

It was a low blow, but I needed him to back off. I was on the edge where Carl was concerned, and if I did this, something I had been putting off for months now, then I had to be on the right side of that edge.

Damon calling me out on my evasiveness over the past however many days only reinforced what I had been neglecting.

Namely Carl. And where Carl had been staying.

Someone had been helping him. I needed to know who now so I could understand just what Carl had become.

I knew he’d become a murderer. I knew he’d lost his mind and was a shadow of the intelligent, law-abiding man I’d once known and respected.

I knew he was ripe for the picking if Weston had got to him.

And even if Carl was damn good at hiding himself from me, could he have done the same with Weston? It was another question I needed to have answered.

So many damn questions, I was drowning in them.

“I’m sorry,” I muttered, almost under my breath.

“Why?” Damon hadn’t snapped it, but I felt the hit as if he had.

“I’ve missed something,” I said, instead of explaining why I was apologising. Damon had thick skin; the apology had been more for me than him.

“What have you missed, Lara?” he asked.

“Carl and Eagle,” I said.

Damon shifted uncomfortably.

“It wasn’t right.”

“Carl’s not right in the head, love.”

I nodded. But did his mental instability account for a scene that at one time would have set the heterosexual male off? Carl was not a bigot. But he was definitely not gay either.

He’d had women. Plural. Hanging out in the wings for when he wanted to call on them. Sally for a bit of light fun. Rachel for alcohol-fuelled debauchery. Margaret for comfort and companionship. Liz for eye-candy.

I hadn’t met them all, but that didn’t mean I didn’t know about them. Part of being in the men’s club meant dissecting your exploits afterwards. I hadn’t had any sexual exploits to speak of, so I hadn’t been forced to dissect them afterwards. Heaven forbid if Cawfield caught wind of me bragging about a liaison. But Carl was old school. He might have made up most of the details, but he shared the fantasy he created in the locker room with the boys each start of shift.

I’d accepted that aspect of Carl’s character. He drank too much whisky. He slept around. He kissed and told afterwards. It was just part of who he was.

But the Carl he had been was not the Carl he was now.

I still didn’t feel right about the scene with Eagle in that dark alley.

“It was staged,” I finally said.

“What was? Eagle and Carl?”

“Yes,” I said, feeling more and more certain.

“Carl was sending you a message,” Damon said carefully. “So, that might explain the staging.”

“No,” I whispered. Carl’s messages were clever but never cryptic. He didn’t have it in him to couch his words in subtlety.

That's it, Sport; softly, softly catchee criminal.

Focus, focus, focus. Or the bad guys win.

Life keeps chucking rocks at your head. Sooner or later you're gonna get hit.

Being honest with yourself is harder than hearing the truth.

Pay attention, Sport. Don't fucking fall asleep on the job.

I was paying attention now and nothing made sense.

“No,” I repeated. “Giving Eagle a spanking for payment to pass on a message while I was standing right fucking there? No. That wasn’t Carl.”

“Lara,” Damon said, sounding worried. “It was Carl. Just not the Carl you knew.”

He didn’t see it, which was why it was so well done.

Carl had cornered me at my home more than once now. He’d let himself in on one occasion and left behind a book that linked directly to the case I was working on. He’d dropped off pictures of Cawfield exposing his involvement in Sweet Hell. And he’d waited for me to come home and then confronted me on my doorstep; trying to get me to see the bigger picture when it was all going to hell.

He hadn’t run. Not like last night. Not like in the alley with Eagle.

I needed to see Eagle too, now.

There weren’t enough hours in the day. Weston still had Stretch and Carole. Cawfield was skulking about in places he should have known better than to be. There were spooks involved in this from the top to the bottom; it reeked of clandestine operations and shadowy kill squads. PSYOPS for crying out loud!

This was getting away on me. And I didn’t even have Hennessey or Hart to talk it out with.

But I had Damon. Right here beside me. Pierce could have insisted he follow me out of ASI. Anscombe could have sent Savill or Charlie after me. Any number of possibilities abounded.

But none of them was Damon Michaels. None of them loved me when more often than not I gave him no reason to keep hanging around.

“How do you put up with me?” I asked, sounding more than a little stunned.

“What do you mean? I love you.” Spoken so simply; so easily; so believably.

“Huh,” I said and took the off-ramp for Henderson Valley.

“Where are we going, love?” Damon asked again after watching me silently for a while.

“Carl had one woman in his life he turned to for more than just sex. Although I’m sure, Margaret gave him what he needed in that regard. They all loved him dearly.”

“All? How many did he have?”

“Four when he died.” I closed my eyes briefly. “When he was shot and fell off the cliff,” I corrected.

Damon ignored my slip. “Four? How did the old fart manage that? One’s enough.”

“Har-har.”

He smiled at me.

“So, we’re visiting this Margaret?” he pressed.

“Someone’s been helping him,” I said. “Someone’s been keeping him safe, offering unconditional support, while he’s evaded the police.”

Damon thought about that for a moment and then said, “And you think it’s this woman in particular?”

“Margaret was his conscience. His moral compass. When he’d been drinking too much or sexing too much, he’d go to Margaret to get back on an even keel.”

Damon looked out the window, a small frown creasing his brow.

“Then wouldn’t it be the woman who didn’t judge him that he’d turn to now?”

My fingers flexed on the steering wheel.

Damn it.

I swung a U-turn, disrupting traffic and making Damon cling to the oh-shit handle; heading the car towards Howick, across the other side of the fucking city, and to the one place that was closest to where this all started.

Mellons Bay Cliffs, where Carl had been shot and fell, where I’d killed someone in the line of duty, where my CIB partner had asked me to meet him after discovering something to do with Declan King, the drug lord, and Auckland’s Crown Prosecutor.

Where would Carl have gone when he uncovered a hornet’s nest like that?

To Margaret who would have given him solid guidance?

Or to Rachel who would have helped him to, if only briefly, forget?

I knew Carl. I knew him well.

He’d have got himself shitfaced before he’d have had to face the music and the inevitable fallout of discovering a mob boss had owned our legal system.

Just like he would have got himself shitfaced when he survived death so as to remind himself he was actually still alive.

Even Crazy Carl would have done that.

Just like Crazy Carl would not have spanked Eagle’s butt and helped my informant get-off while I watched.

My foot pressed down harder on the accelerator; despite the fact that I’d taken way too long to go back there by now. To trace our steps, this dance we’d been performing, right back to the beginning. Right back to the start.

Sometimes all it takes is a gentle shove in the right direction. Sometimes it takes a two-by-four to the head.

My head had definitely started to hurt. Just like my heart had been hurting for months now.

I’m so sorry, Carl.

Chapter Nineteen

“Carl Always Said You Had A Stick Up Your Butt.”

Rachel lived in Waterloo Street, right behind the main shopping drag. The drive in took us through Pakuranga and Highland Park and nowhere near Mellons Bay, or the cliffs I knew were just the other side of Howick. This was as close as I’d got to them since it all started.

I still remembered that night as if it were yesterday. I still remembered the salt on the breeze. The sound of the cicadas as they sang in the trees. I remembered thinking they were too loud and shouldn’t they have stopped by now; it was approaching ten in the evening. I remembered the heat on the sunbaked road through the soles of my boots; cooler at that time of day but no less powerful in my memory. The light that shone over the porch of a nearby house; a kid’s tricycle in the driveway. The smell of chilli someone had cooked that evening for their dinner.

I remembered it all.

I never needed to go back there to write my report or answer the copious amounts of questions asked of a police officer when they discharged their weapon. Or watched their partner get killed while I stood by and did practically nothing. And because I never needed to go back there to refresh my memory, I decided I never needed to go back there at all.

Once it was all over and my statement had been made, the shrink had cleared me for duty, and Hart had accepted my take on matters, I purposely chose jobs and cases that kept me in the city. Anything remotely to do with the eastern suburbs was conveniently ignored.

It was as if I’d chosen to forget Howick, and by extension, the cliffs in Mellons Bay had ever existed.

Driving back into the historic village now and turning onto Waterloo Street was surreal. Surreal and frightening.

It took Hennessey six weeks to crack the lid on Mellons Bay in my mind. Six weeks before I broke down and told him what I’d felt, what I’d seen, what had happened to me. He knew, of course; the reports I’d been forced to file had been sitting on his desk when I walked into that room the first time. But no one knew what I’d felt, what I’d been through, that night. Not really.

The officers who’d turned up first on the scene were met with a detective in charge, giving orders, assessing the crime scene, completely calm about the dead body lying on the grass and the warm gun that had made it a dead body still in her possession.

I’d crossed to the cliffs and looked down into the water expecting to see another dead body.

I’d seen only what the moon had shown me; white-capped waves and rocks aplenty.

I let out a pent up breath of air as I shook myself free of those morbid thoughts, and rolled the Commodore to a stop outside of a small, plain weatherboard house. The lawn needed mowing. The fence was crooked. The windows were flaking. There was a little rust on the tin roof. Despite its borderline neglected state, the house, being in Howick, would still be worth a penny.

But you can be asset rich and cash poor in this city.

Rachel was standing behind the kitchen sink, looking out the window at the police-issued sedan.

It would have looked exactly like the car Carl had driven.

I wondered if I was making a mistake; coming here and making her relive this. It was hard enough for me to be so near those cliffs. How was it for Rachel if she hadn’t been helping him?

But Damon was right. Carl would have wanted someone who didn’t judge him, who would keep his secrets, who would help him when they knew he wasn’t quite right in the head. And as long as the alcohol flowed and the party kept swinging, Rachel would be happy.

And Carl knew how to party with the best of them.

I climbed out of the vehicle and looked up at the house. Rachel had moved from the kitchen to the front porch. No stopping this now. She knew the car wasn’t Carl’s. She knew me.

She didn’t look at all surprised.

Shit.

I walked up the worn concrete path, Damon a silent wraith at my back. Neither of us was armed, but I didn’t think Rachel would shoot me. That wasn’t her style.

But so much of what I was doing right now was taking me over that line in the sand, that I wasn’t sure if I was assessing the dangers correctly.

“Lara,” she said in greeting.

“Rachel,” I managed. Then I cleared my throat and indicated Damon. “This is Damon Michaels.” I left off his position at HEAT. It meant nothing here. Just a man at my back offering moral support as I faced the woman I thought my ex-CIB partner had turned to after he’d been declared dead.

“I thought you’d come sooner,” she murmured.

“I’m sorry,” I said without thinking. I didn’t usually apologise; I was off my game completely.

“It’s all right. I understand.”

We stared at each other. I was beginning to think I’d got this wrong. He hadn’t turned to Rachel. If not Rachel then who? Not Margaret. Damon was right. Too strait-laced and judgemental. Liz was insubstantial. A pretty bit of fluff to wear on your arm when having to attend official functions. That left Sally. The light-hearted one. The one I thought he should have married.

But Carl abhorred the thought of being tied down. As much as he truly did love Sally, he kept her at a healthy distance. Had the head injury changed that? Had he turned to her at last?

The thought strangely made me happy. As if in death, he’d found what he couldn’t in life.

But that’s not how it goes. Or, at least, as far as I’ve seen of this world and its inhabitants. That’s not how life goes, is it?

I looked at Rachel and said, “Where is he?”

She offered a small smile and then turned, walking back into the house and expecting us to follow.

Damon stiffened beside me. I understood his concern. This had ‘trap’ written all over it, and we were unarmed — not even a pepper spray or taser between us. But I’d come this far after delaying for so long.

I had to know. I had to end this.

I stepped over the threshold and Damon followed behind me.

The house was cool and dark, despite Rachel’s decorating style being bright and eclectic. Sunflower yellow cushions on an electric blue suede couch. A yucca palm sat sentinel in the corner, and a CD rack towered high in the other. A large flat screen TV clung to the wall between them, which I was sure Carl had provided. Women’s lifestyle magazines mixed with dog-eared Reader’s Digests dotted the coffee table as did an empty coffee mug. A clay figurine of a horse stood beside a fluffy soft toy that could have been a mouse on a bookshelf. Fiction and non-fiction books were mixed up and displayed grouped by colour and not the more common subject, author, or genre.

The place was clean but cluttered. Rachel’s personality interspersed with Carl’s.

None of it was conclusive evidence that he’d been staying here. Hell, like me, Rachel could have simply been unable to let go of the past.

“Have a seat,” she said, taking the two-seater that had seen a lot of butts over its life — a bigger depression on one side than the other. Rachel took the shallower butt-worn side.

The other was Carl’s.

Again not conclusive. Carl had been seeing Rachel for years when he died. When this all started.

I perched on the three-seater. Damon sat down beside me, eyes scanning the room and exits. He made a good sidekick.

Damn you, Carl.

I looked at Rachel. She watched Damon for a moment and then flicked her eyes to mine.

No surprise. No judgement. No grief-stricken sadness.

This house was too much a mausoleum to Carl. If he were dead to her, she’d still be grieving.

“Where is he, Rachel?” I asked.

“I haven’t seen him,” she said. She was playing with me because this was Rachel. The trickster. The party princess. The good time gal.

But although she hadn’t qualified how long it had been since she’d seen Carl, she also hadn’t said, “He’s fucking dead, how dare you ask!”

I frowned.

“I’ve seen him,” I said.

She nodded.

It was such a simple move. A common motion. And yet it made the world stop.

“When did you last see him?” I heard Damon say from a mile away. Time had slowed and somehow still kept going.

I knew Carl was alive. CIB knew Carl was alive. But we sure as hell hadn’t told anyone who didn’t need to know that Carl was still alive. Rachel and Carl’s ex-girlfriends were all in the do-not-need-to-know category.

A small part of me thought perhaps the CIB traitor had a hand in this and Rachel hadn’t been harbouring him at all. That this was a set-up. Designed to get at me. To stab a dagger through my barely beating heart.

But the empty mug on the coffee table said ‘World’s Best Cop’ on it like those mugs that have ‘World’s Best Dad’ or ‘World’s Best Mum.’ Or like my pen holder with permanent marker scrawled across it saying ’Superstar Cop.’

My eyes met Rachel’s.

The room came into sharper focus.

“Stop playing games,” I said. “This isn’t a party.”

She laughed. “You know, Carl always said you had a stick up your butt.”

It hurt, but despite Carl being my mentor and my idolisation of him, I had also known Carl and I were two sides of a well-worn coin. Both good at what we did, but both from completely different backgrounds. We lived our lives on opposite ends of a spectrum. Carl drank and fucked his way through life. I toed the law-abiding line and remained celibate.

Damon was an aberration to my well trained and planned life. And even then, I kept him secret from most of the people in that life. But when I first met Carl, I was as straight as an arrow. It didn’t surprise me that he’d said something like this to Rachel at the beginning. He’d probably been pissed at the time. High on alcohol and sex and life. It didn’t mean anything.

And eventually, he got me. Like I got him. Carl and I worked well together because we respected the differences, not because we tried to change things about each other.

I studied the woman before me. She was angry. At me. I hadn’t seen it at first; I was too close to the edge. But she was angry, all right. Because I hadn’t come before now, looking for the man I thought had died.

“I’m sorry you had to do this on your own,” I said quietly. She blinked and showed the first sign of surprise since we’d arrived. “I’m sorry I didn’t come here sooner. I thought…” I stopped, took a deep breath, looked around the room that was as much a reflection of her as it was Carl. “It hurt too much,” I said, instead of what I’d started.

I thought he was dead.

I had thought he was dead and I’d filed away Howick and Mellons Bay and everything east of the CBD. My father would have been proud.

“He turned up three nights after they said he’d been shot and gone off that cliff,” she suddenly said, not looking at Damon or me, but staring off into the distance. Remembering that God-awful night. “He was incoherent and babbling, but when I tried to call for an ambulance he got so angry; I got a little frightened.”

Carl could bluster better than anyone, but he’d never have hurt a woman before that night.

I didn’t ask. Perhaps because I didn’t want to think that the man I had known and loved had struck his lover. In this, I was a coward. And it shamed me.

“I cleaned him up, dressed his wounds,” Rachel said. “I let him sleep it off, waking him every hour to check for a head injury. It took a fortnight of hand feeding him soup and cleaning up after him before he started to cope on his own.” She licked her lips. “And then he started wandering. Going away for hours at a time. But he always returned. Sometimes late in the night, sometimes when the birds started singing. But he always came home to me. Came home to our bed. Each night.”

Came home to me. Like they were partners. Not just hookups looking for a good time but something more. Something deeper. Something permanent.

This woman loved him and was prepared to share him; as I was fairly certain, Carl hadn’t kept his girlfriends secret from each other. But that didn’t mean that Rachel didn’t want him all for herself.

And she got him. After Mellons Bay Cliffs. She was the girlfriend who won the battle for his love.

But was what Carl was putting her through love?

“He asked you to keep his survival a secret, didn’t he?” I asked.

She nodded her head and bit her lip, still not meeting my eyes.

“I promised,” she said. “Forever,” she added. “’Til death do us part.”

Oh, Carl. How could you?

And then the words made it through the heartache.

I sat forward. Damon sat up straighter beside me; registering my change in posture; the change of direction to my thoughts.

“Where is he, Rachel?” I said, my heartbeat thundering inside my head.

’Til death do us part.

Rachel hadn’t told a soul that Carl was alive and kicking back at her house.

She’d kept her promise.

Until now.

It had nothing to do with who I was to Carl. It had nothing to do with me turning up finally when I should have visited and offered my condolences right at the start.

It had nothing to do with me. Or Carl’s resurrection. Or our intertwined lives.

It had everything to do with the other side of that existential coin.

“Rachel?” I pressed.

She lifted too-old and worried eyes to my face and said, “He hasn’t been home in a week.”

And then he started wandering. Going away for hours at a time. But he always returned. Sometimes late in the night, sometimes when the birds started singing. But he always came home to me. Came home to our bed. Each night.

Carl hadn’t come home for a week. Rachel thought he was dead. That’s why she was breaking her vow of silence.

Which meant the Carl I’d seen in Eagle’s alley and at Mount Eden Prison and outside Pitt Street Fire was not Carl at all.

“Shit,” I said, which about summed it all up, I thought.

Chapter Twenty

“Where You Find One, You’ll Find Two. And Where You Find Two, There’s Always Another.”

“He might not be dead,” I said as I started the car outside Rachel’s house.

“Of course not,” Damon replied, but I thought his words sounded hollow.

“Maybe Weston got to him somehow,” I suggested. I’d thought it a possibility, and it would explain the shocking change in behaviour I’d witnessed in Eagle’s alley. And I could see Weston manipulating Carl into staying away from those he loved, meaning Rachel.

Part of the mind manipulation process involved isolation. We believed Weston used hypnosis, but having discovered he was a former PSYOPS agent, I was more inclined to believe now that he would use a combination of methods. Including brainwashing; the ultimate military mind manipulation method.

And brainwashing included isolation.

It made sense when so much didn’t make any sense right now. I had to cling to something. Because the thought of Carl being dead - really, truly dead - just about did my head in.

My fingers wrapped tightly around the steering wheel until I was sure I was imprinting the shape of it into the palms of my hands permanently. I could feel my heart racing which was accompanied by an increase in the rate of my respirations. I tried to count to three slowly inside my head like Hennessey had taught me. I knew it wasn’t working because my chest hurt. My lips tingled. I blinked my eyes, trying to dry them. Sweat coated my skin, and when I glanced up into the mirror in the sun visor above me, my face was too pale, and my eyes looked like big, bright shining orbs in some sort of too-thin alien face.

I pulled the car over to the side of the road in Panmure; I couldn’t drive safely like this. The engine ticked as it cooled after I switched it off. Damon said nothing. Silence stretched.

Damon wasn’t one to fill the void with useless words. If he had something to say, he’d say it. But he wouldn’t rush to give platitudes or false reassurances.

His silence when I was so close to the edge, however, was unusual. Damon expressed emotions differently to me. He sometimes overflowed with them, when I could close down and appear unfeeling. It seemed ironic that right then he was the block of ice and I was the fire, crackling and spitting and roaring in defiance of what I was feeling.

He sucked in a deep breath of air and let it out slowly. Strangely, it helped to match my breathing to his. I didn’t think he was doing it on purpose; he was deep in thought. But it helped to watch him. To listen to the steady, slow breaths as he made them. To link that life-giving process to his.

“I don’t know how much more of this I can take,” he finally said.

It wasn’t what I expected him to say. But it also wasn’t a surprise either. We were both so close to the edge; we could have stepped over it together. In sync as now our breaths and heartbeats were in sync.

“This isn’t your fault,” I murmured, staring out of the window at the late afternoon sun as it reflected off the Panmure Basin.

“None of this would have happened if I hadn’t taken Carole from him.”

“That’s not true,” I told him. “Carl would still have been shot and fallen off that cliff. Weston is not Declan King.” Carl had found out something about King’s association with the Crown Prosecutor. That was what had caused his fall from the cliff.

So many killed at his hands to protect me.

So many hearts broken like Rachel’s.

“Weston’s not so different from King,” Damon said. “Perhaps he’s stepped into his shoes in his absence.”

It was a possibility; someone had to. Crime does not exist in a vacuum.

Where you find one, you’ll find two. And where you find two, there’s always another.

Carl had known that. Every cop knew it — especially cops who crossed that line and made the law a laser beam.

I wondered idly what Cawfield was up to. Was he still back on Ponsonby Road, watching the halfway house in that shifty way he’d adopted? Catching Carl-Not-Carl’s eyes from the shadows? Working with Weston?

I contemplated starting the vehicle again, but the sun was going down, and the tide was in, making the Basin look picture perfect.

We sat in silence for a while. Birds swooped. Runners jogged the perimeter of the Basin. The hotel that sat across the water looked like it was setting up for a wedding reception. Life went on all around us and yet it was possible my mentor was actually dead.

“If he’s not been manipulated,” I said into the somehow, considering what we were discussing, comfortable silence that enveloped us, “then he’ll be dead.”

“Weston abducts people,” Damon argued. “He took Stretch to get to me. He could have taken Carl to get to you. You’ve become a thorn in his side too, now, love.”

He’d want revenge on me and not just Damon now. It made sense.

Why did that sentence leave me feeling so antsy?

Abduction. Blackmail. Manipulation. Murder.

What if accidental murders, like Angelo's, didn’t count?

He planned his abductions and blackmails and manipulations. Why would he not plan his murders?

I started the car and headed towards the Panmure roundabout. I didn’t go straight over and on towards the city centre and Pitt Street Fire when the opportunity to merge with traffic arose. Instead, I flicked my indicator on and circumnavigated the roundabout, heading back towards Howick.

“What are you thinking?” Damon asked softly. It was as if we were both in some sort of cotton wool cloud. A bubble that kept our words carefully modulated and made everything seem distant somehow. He wasn’t quite as ice cold as he’d been. Nor was he displaying the emotions he normally would be. And I was neither of those things.

Numb. We were both so, so numb. How much more could we take? How much more could Weston do to us before we actually broke? Dashed against his jagged rocks and fracture into tiny pieces.

“I’m just checking something,” I said back in that same soft, modulated tone of voice.

You’re close to breaking, Lara.

Just one more day. Twenty-four hours. That’s all. Just give me long enough to see this through to the end.

We crossed the Panmure bridge. Passed Pakuranga Plaza. Saint Kents. Lloyd Elsmore Park came up on the right. The local College on the left. And then we were back in Howick.

I didn’t take the road that led to Rachel’s. I took the one on the left instead; that headed towards Mellons Bay and the coastline. Damon’s hands flexed where he had them resting on his thighs. He’d figured it out. He wanted to reach for me or to hold onto something for dear life; anything to stop this inexorable fall towards the rocks.

This was going to hurt.

I hadn’t been back here. No one in their right mind would after what had happened on that small stretch of grass. Most of the reserve had been given over to car parking. But there was a bench seat fixed into the grass and trees at the end near the cliffs. The view from the top of the cliffs was stunning at this time of the day, and there were a couple of cars parked in the parking spots. But no one was in them watching the sun set.

The smell of barbecued meat was on the air when I opened the door to the sedan. A house across the street was having a party. The cars would be their guests’. I could see three men standing around a grill with beers in hand and laughter on the wind.

There was no scent of chilli. The cicadas were long dead. The tar seal beneath my boots felt cold despite the sun still hanging low in the sky. I looked across the water to Motuihe Island. Its bigger brother, Waiheke, had started to light up with street and house lights.

I’d parked in the middle of the carpark when we both knew there was only one place to check.

I closed my door and beeped the locks. Damon walked around to my side of the car, and closer to the cliff end of the parking area. He reached out and took my hand in his without a word.

I was shaking. My palm was slick with sweat. He said nothing; just offered a squeeze of his fingers to bolster me and then we started to walk.

Kenny Tyndall had approached Carl under the trees at the south end. He’d backed my partner up to the edge of the cliffs. It had been a King Tide. High seas. The waves had been slamming against the rocks at the base of the cliffs. Those waves had saved Carl’s life when the bullet Tyndall had fired had failed to take it.

I’d been too late. Too slow. I’d fired my own weapon a split second after Tyndall had fired his. The sound of the bullets firing in near sync ricocheted around inside my head.

My hair blew into my face. I didn’t reach up and tame it. I kept my eyes on the small piece of grass at the end of the carpark where it had all begun.

Run, Lara. Run!

I wasn’t running anymore.

I took one step after the other until we crossed from tar seal to grass and we were there. Not quite to the edge of the cliffs but back in the nightmare.

Wind. Waves. Chilli. Cicadas. Bullets flying. Carl screaming. My heart fracturing. Tyndall dying.

The images and remembered sounds flickered like static behind my closed eyelids. I swayed. Damon wrapped an arm around me. My forehead met his chest. He was breathing too quickly.

Count, Damon, I said inside my head. One. Two. Three. Breathe.

I shook. Damon rubbed my back and said something soothing. It was nonsense words. The tone was all that mattered. The fact he was there with me and held me was what I clung to.

Run, Lara. Run!

I’m not running anymore, Carl. I’m here.

I pulled back from Damon and wiped my eyes; sucking in breath after breath that matched no count I could think of. I straightened my spine. Put my shoulders back. Rested a hand on my hip where my badge should have been.

I barely registered its absence.

And then I put one foot in front of the other.

Damon walked with me. The party across the street got louder. Beer bottles clinking. Sausages sizzling. Someone barked out a laugh that sounded like a sea lion.

My feet reached the end of the grass where a woefully inadequate chain fence and a small sign warned of the dangers of going any further. They hadn’t upgraded it since Carl’s death.

Since the first one, that is.

I looked out across the water, aware the longer I took, the harder it would be to see any details at the bottom of the cliff. I couldn’t look down. I couldn’t lower my face. My neck was stiff; solid; unyielding. My eyes watered making Waiheke Island waver.

I felt Damon stiffen beside me. He sucked in a minute amount of air as if he thought breathing right then would alarm me.

I looked at Waiheke Island and thought about life and death and right and wrong and Carl Forrester.

It wasn’t a King Tide tonight.

I looked down.

I made a sound.

And then the grass hit my knees, or my knees hit the grass and Damon was right there beside me.

I’d mourned my partner’s death. I’d mourned him badly, horrifically. I’d dealt with it the only way the daughter of Ethan Keen could. Badly. Horrifically. We don’t break down; we do our jobs.

The tears stung. My throat ached. My chest hurt; there was nothing left inside there now.

I’d mourned him, and then I’d discovered he’d been alive. The relief, the hope, the astounding elation had been tempered with the horrific truth. He was not my Carl. He was murdering people.

I’d mourned him, and then I’d faced reality; not well; not prettily. But I’d faced it. Accepted it.

Accepted that he was alive.

At the bottom of the cliff lay a crumpled body. No fedora hat. No trench coat. He was naked. Which out of all the indignities here affected me the most. Carl wasn’t modest; he’d get changed in the locker room in front of me. But in death, there should be some dignity.

But death is undignified. Death is never pretty.

I cried for my partner. I cried for my friend. I cried for Rachel and Sally and Liz and Margaret. I cried for me, and I cried for Damon who would pick up the pieces afterwards.

Then I packed it all away. Inch by excruciating inch, I clawed my way back to the surface. I filed the emotions in a mental drawer and locked it; then I tucked the key away because my father was wrong. You didn’t throw it away; you kept it. Because sooner or later, you had to open that drawer back up and face what you’d hidden inside of it.

For now, though, I needed to think. To operate. To function. And I could not function with so many wild and painful emotions swirling around inside me.

The drawer slid shut. The key turned in the lock. I sucked in a breath of air.

Then I pulled my cellphone out and dialled Ryan Pierce.

There is a chain of command in the police service. It isn’t the military, but there is order to these things. We need order at times like this. We need procedures to follow and rules to adhere to.

I clung to them.

Damon pulled his cellphone out and dialled Horse. HEAT had its procedures too. And Horse was head of Rescue.

Pierce answered on the first ring.

“Where the hell are you? And what have you done to my car?”

I stared across the waves - not a King Tide - at Waiheke.

“Sarge,” I said. “I need you.”

Silence and then, “Where?”

I closed my eyes and tried not to blink. Blinking made the tears sting more.

“Mellons Bay Cliffs,” I said.

He swore softly and then murmured, “Are you alone?”

“Damon’s here.”

“I’m on my way.”

The phone went dead, but I didn’t lower it. I stared at Waiheke Island and then made myself look down again.

Carl lay pale and broken at the base of the cliffs. We’d come full circle in the end.

This was what should have greeted me that night. I’d been cheated, and then I’d been given a reprieve of sorts. And now I’d been struck a lasting blow. It hurt.

It doesn’t matter if you’re ready for it. It doesn’t matter if you’ve felt it before; even if falsely.

None of that matters but the moment — the truth of it.

Carl Forrester was dead, and Rhys Kyle Weston had done it; I was sure. No fedora and no trench coat and no clothes, because Weston needed them to fool me.

He’d been playing a sick game at my expense. He’d known exactly where my pressure points were. Hell, Hennessey had probably been forced to tell him. The man knew me better than he knew Damon; his object of revenge. Because a shrink knows you better than your sibling ever could.

Carole didn’t know Damon like Hennessey knew me and Weston had used it.

He’d struck a blow. The mental set of drawers inside my head rattled, but the lock held firmly.

Thanks, Dad.

Weston thought he’d win with this.

He almost had.

Carl was dead.

And if I had anything to do with it, Weston would soon be following.

I slid my cellphone back inside my jacket pocket and turned towards the carpark. I needed to secure the scene.

And then I was catching a killer. God help him. Because nothing on this earth would.

Chapter Twenty-One

“Life Sucks. Death Sucks Harder.”

The thing about being suspended from CIB was that I was suspended from CIB. As soon as Pierce arrived, I was officially out; no longer in charge of the scene. He tried to include me in the logistics. He even deferred to me with regards to the placement of uniforms around the perimeter. He listened and nodded his head and then did what the officer in charge is supposed to do; he called it in.

And everything changed as soon as word got out and every detective from CIB turned up to see the body.

To see Carl’s body.

I was shunted off to the side. Not even Damon could keep me company. He wasn’t suspended, and HEAT was on site. As Chief Investigator and therefore Head of HEAT it was his job to oversee the Rescue.

Rescue, I thought as I leaned against Pierce’s sedan and watched the organised chaos play out, was a misnomer. There was no one left down there to rescue — just a body.

It took them an hour to abseil down and safely winch him back up to the top of the cliff. They couldn’t get the coastguard’s boat in close enough and traversing the rocks from the nearby beach was too dangerous while toting a body.

This was what Rescue was made for, though. To rescue people in difficult and dangerous positions. Or to retrieve bodies from the very same thing. Except the difficult and dangerous conditions were in reference to the rescuers and not the body.

Cawfield was here. Along with his sticky bun eating sidekick, Simpson. They stood huddled together with the rest of CIB watching as Carl’s body was lifted over the edge of the cliff on a secured stretcher.

I felt numb. I felt nothing. I watched as my former CIB partner who I had thought had been murdered in front of me and then came back to life to haunt me was hauled up in a stretcher deceased.

The fall might have killed him. He might have been dead before the fact. We wouldn’t definitively know until the Chief Pathologist did the autopsy. But ESR was on site, and the forensic team approached as soon as Rescue placed Carl’s body down on the small strip of grass, this side of the chain fence and pathetic warning.

Someone will have to upgrade that, I thought abstractly.

Everything felt a little abstract right then.

Trevor Jones approached, peeling himself away from the CIB Club. The club I was no longer a part of.

Not officially, Pierce would say.

To hell with that. I was standing on my own beside my former superior’s stolen sedan, and the rest of them were over by Carl comforting each other as only detectives could. A little bit of black humour, a little bit of manly shoulder slaps, and a little bit of silence punctuated with agreeable grunts and head nods.

“Hey, Keen,” Trevor said. “How you holdin’ up?”

“Fine,” I said because that’s what we’re taught to say. I’m fine. We’re fine. Everything is fucking fine. OK?

Trevor leaned back against Pierce’s car and watched the scene beside me. He said nothing more, just chewed on his toothpick and watched ESR crawl over Carl’s body and the edge of the cliff face, and Rescue tidy up all the ropes that hadn’t been compromised by Weston, and Pierce and Damon lead their men and organise the scene.

I felt removed from it all.

“Checked out that halfway house,” Trevor said suddenly. “Damn dump of a place but nothin’ out of the ordinary.”

I said nothing.

“Not sure where to go from there, but I was thinkin’ I might try locations that mean something to Michaels.”

Because Stretch was taken to get back at Damon.

“Can you suggest any?”

I didn’t want to talk or think or even breathe.

I shook my head.

“He’s gotta be holdin’ your man somewhere,” Trevor said.

Weston was meant to be holding him at that halfway house. Why else leave that business card on the scene? Unless the card was a coincidence and we’d been chasing the wrong trail of breadcrumbs.

The dots didn’t line up.

I felt nothing.

“All right,” he said, in that upbeat, good-old-boy way of his. “You know where to find me.” He patted me awkwardly on the shoulder. Manly shoulder thumps were for the men of CIB. Not the solitary woman in their midst.

I watched him swagger off to join the Club. Stretch wasn’t at the halfway house, but I was pretty sure he was meant to be. Had Trevor missed something? I doubted it; he was a good cop. Thorough, even if he did look a little rough around the edges. That roughness had got more pronounced lately as his wife’s recovery took a right turn at chemotherapy.

Life sucks. Death sucks harder.

I looked back at where Carl’s body lay.

What had led him to this? Last time it had been Declan King. This time was it Rhys Weston? Carl hadn’t been the one in Eagle’s alley that night, but had he caught up with my informant before then? Did Eagle know something?

Why are you here, Carl?

He didn’t answer me. He’d never answer me again.

This was final.

And still, I felt nothing.

Hennessey would say this was my PTSD rearing its ugly head again. I would say to that; it had never left me.

You’re close to breaking, Lara.

Screw you, Hennessey.

A car pulled up behind Pierce’s. I didn’t bother to turn around and see who had parked behind the cordon. It sounded like a Holden Commodore; it had to be a cop car and the only cop missing from the Club was Inspector David Hart of CIB.

The driver’s door slammed shut and shortly after I felt his presence beside me.

“Sir,” I said, without looking at him.

“How do you do that?” he asked.

I said nothing.

He shoved his hands into his coat pockets. It wasn’t a trench coat, but it was something similar. Carl’s coat was missing as was his fedora.

“We have an imposter,” I said.

He watched me. I knew he was, even if I wasn’t looking at him to see it.

“Tell me,” he instructed.

“Fedora hat and trench coat seen on K Road and at Mount Eden Prison and across from the fire station on Pitt Street.”

“Timeline?”

“Over the past forty-eight to seventy-two hours.”

Silence and then, “Carl’s been dead for two hours, tops.”

I turned to face him at that.

“ESR?”

“Preliminary evidence at the scene,” - he didn’t look at the scene, he was too busy watching me - “indicates he was alive two hours ago.”

Two hours ago when Damon and I were at Rachel’s.

This complicated things.

I turned back to look at the scene; to look at where Carl’s body lay on the stretcher, covered in a white sheet.

“It wasn’t him in Eagle’s alley,” I said.

“Tell me,” he repeated, with no less order in his tone which pleased me.

I didn’t need him going soft on me. I needed the bulldog, and I needed the distraction of worrying his bone free.

“He spanked him,” I said without inflection. “Got him off.”

“Not Carl’s MO,” Hart agreed. “What else?”

“Stood in the shadows. I never saw his face.”

“Did he speak?”

He had spoken in the alley, but his voice had been raspy; a hoarse whisper. I couldn’t be sure it had been him, but I also couldn’t be sure it hadn’t been either.

“Inconclusive,” I said.

Hart looked at the scene.

“This is a message,” he finally said.

“The location and timing.”

“Timing?”

“Damon and I had just been to visit Rachel Myers.”

He let out a long breath of air, aware of how hard that would have been.

“Eyes on her house,” he murmured.

“Or she told someone as soon as we left.”

“You think Weston got to her?”

“He got to Carl, didn’t he?”

Hart looked back at the scene.

“Carl was alive when he went over,” he told me. “But only barely. They suspect an overdose. The fall finished him off.”

That numbness enveloped me.

“This is a message,” Hart repeated.

“It’s a message,” I agreed.

“What does it tell us, Detective?”

My heart missed a beat. I was suspended from CIB. Officially.

Hart was saying ‘fuck that’ to me.

“That he can get to anyone,” I said.

“Already knew that. What else?”

I thought about it for a moment. It was the last pattern puzzle piece. Murder.

Abduction. Blackmail. Manipulation. Murder.

Weston hadn’t committed them in that order though. It should read: Manipulation. Blackmail. Abduction. Murder. I was fairly certain the CIB traitor was being manipulated, and he’d come first. His participation in all of this was too great just to be blackmail. And, as we’d established, Hennessey was the blackmail piece anyway. The abduction was Stretch, and the murder was Carl.

So, that was the order of things. Not that the order helped me.

What else?

“Murder is the final pattern puzzle piece,” I said, thinking aloud. I needed a whiteboard. There were dots, and they were starting to connect, but I couldn’t see the bigger picture clearly. “It’s a statement: shock and awe. The CIB traitor is a thorn in our side. Constantly scratching; irritating. Hennessey was the pothole in the road, upsetting things. And Stretch was a lure into a trap he set, and we failed to trigger. He expected us to respond to Stretch’s abduction without forethought; to rush in. We didn’t. So, he moved on to the showpiece.”

Hart just grunted. He hadn’t shot me down, so he thought I was onto something. But I wasn’t there yet. There was more, and he wouldn’t jump up and down with joy until I had it all. Not that Hart was the jump up and down sort of detective.

I tapped a finger against my thigh.

“He’s been playing a game,” I said. “He thinks he’s about to win it. Why else use your Queen unless you’re ready to checkmate the King?”

“You think Carl is his Queen?”

“I think killing Carl now when he could have continued to impersonate him and screw with me is the act of a man about to wrap things up permanently.”

“Has he tired of the game?” Hart asked.

I shook my head. “There’s always new games, but this one hasn’t gone the way he wanted. Maybe he’s tired; maybe he’s just pissed off and lashing out.”

“He doesn’t make mistakes.”

“No one’s perfect. Least of all Weston. He’s still holding onto Carole.”

“His Achilles heel.”

“Exactly.”

“How do we use it?”

I didn’t know and when you didn’t know something…

“Retrace our steps,” I said after some thought. It’s what Carl would have done. “Eagle. Mount Eden Prison. Pitt Street. They mean something.”

Hart grunted.

Not good enough. What did they mean? What did any of this mean?

Damon broke away from the Rescue guys and headed towards us. Pierce saw him and fell into step at his side. Carl’s body was being loaded into the back of the meat wagon; a term that I decided, right then and there, I’d never use again if I could help it. Cawfield was laughing it up black humour style with Simpson and Jones. The cowboy kept flicking his eyes towards Hart and me. Concern flashed across his face and in his eyes.

I looked away from the boys and drank in Damon. Even that simple connection made all the difference. I was still numb, but I could hear my heartbeat, feel my chest rise and fall, know I was at least still alive.

“Sir,” Pierce said in greeting. “Didn’t know you’d arrived.”

“You were busy. I didn’t see the need to interrupt. Anything new to report?”

Pierce flicked concerned eyes to me and then looked back at Hart. Pierce’s concern was much more familiar than Trevor’s.

Pierce shook his head. “Did you tell Keen?”

“Yes. She deserves to be kept abreast of this.”

She was standing right there, but I didn’t cause a scene. Which in and of itself was telling.

“You OK, Lara?” Pierce asked carefully. If I’d been a man, he wouldn’t have asked.

I suddenly burst out laughing. You can’t have it both ways, Sport. Either you’re one of us, or you’re one of them. And if you’re one of them, then you can cry all you like, and it won’t bother us.

From the day I walked into CIB, I wanted to be accepted. One of the boys. Part of the club. But being a woman in a man’s world takes something from us. Doing this job takes more.

We don’t break down; we do our jobs.

How many times had I lamented that? How many times did the failure to address our emotional and mental wellbeing make me mad? Disillusioned?

And here was a coworker addressing my mental and emotional wellbeing and all I could think was if I were one of the boys he wouldn’t have asked.

“What’s so funny, Keen?” Hart demanded.

I was. I was so fucking funny; I amused myself.

“Nothing, sir,” I said. I nodded to Pierce to let him know I acknowledged his care for me and his question.

But I sure as shit didn’t answer.

I was one of the boys. But unlike my father, I couldn’t lock every single emotion away in a mental filing drawer at the end of the day. That was him. This was me. I do feel, even if I try to wrap those feelings up in ice.

To do this job, sometimes you have to.

To be a human being, you have to also feel something.

Weston, on the other hand, was a psychotic sociopath incapable of feeling, with murderous tendencies and a high opinion of himself.

“The game is changing, gentlemen,” I said, pushing off from my lean against Pierce’s car. “The trap failed to spring, so’s he’s shifted tactics. Carl’s death is meant to cripple us, or at least cripple me. With me crippled, Damon will be careless.”

I looked at Damon. He looked back at me with pride and love and things that should have been hidden from the boys’ club.

I didn’t bristle, but I did look away quickly.

My eyes met Pierce’s. He was waiting for me to continue to speak.

The respect I saw in my senior sergeant’s eyes astounded me. And then I flicked a glance at Hart. It damn near knocked me off my feet.

These men respected me despite my failings, and I had some. I had plenty.

But they listened when I spoke. And they still considered me a detective when I wasn’t. If there was any club I wanted to be a part of, it was the club that consisted of Ryan Pierce and David Hart exclusively.

“We’re being watched,” I said, having to clear my throat slightly. “He knew when Damon and I left Rachel’s. He knew where we were going, and I don’t think that was by chance.”

“He could have assumed you would come here when you were upset,” Pierce offered.

“Could he? Would you have thought I’d come here?”

He slowly shook his head.

“I was driving your car,” I pointed out to him. “I took it from the public carpark at ASI. CCTV cameras all over Remuera Road and Broadway. He knew, and all he had to do was hack into the Police’s GPS system and trace the movements of Detective Sergeant Ryan Pierce’s assigned police vehicle.”

“He saw you head towards Mellons Bay,” Pierce said, stunned.

“Correction,” I said, “he saw me drive away from Carl’s girlfriend’s house as fast as my stolen police-issued sedan could carry me and then stop when I got to Panmure to have a mini breakdown beside the Basin. And then he saw me head back to Howick when I had found my courage again.”

“Son of a bitch,” Damon muttered.

“He’s clever,” I said. “But he’s not all-knowing. Someone was watching the GPS system at Central Police and told him what he needed to know.”

“Son of a fucking bitch,” Pierce growled.

“The GPS system wasn’t hacked,” Hart said gruffly. “It was logged into by a legitimate officer.”

“Son of a…” both Pierce and Damon started and then abruptly stopped when they realised what they were doing; in unison no less.

I smiled. It wasn’t pretty.

“We’ve just caught our traitor,” I announced.

Chapter Twenty-Two

“Pay Attention, Sport. Don't Fucking Fall Asleep On The Job.”

I was still suspended from CIB, and we had to assume that the traitor was watching, so I didn’t accompany Pierce and Hart back to the Bureau. I wasn’t too put-out about that. They’d look into the logs for the GPS system and find their answer. It was hardly impressive detective work.

I, on the other hand, had people to see.

Damon parked his HEAT ute down Mercury Lane; we’d let Pierce have his vehicle back; somehow it felt tainted. Damon’s company car was also tracked via GPS back at Fire Comms, but I didn’t think Weston would have a foothold there. It didn’t matter; Damon’s truck stood out all on its own what with its distinctive red and gold paintwork, not to mention the flame decals and helpful Get Firewise safety tips.

He beeped the locks closed, and we started up the incline to Karangahape Road and the nightlife that was well underway there. The scents of the city invaded my nose; petrol, tobacco, alcohol, concrete. So familiar and yet I still felt removed from the setting.

Carl was dead.

How many times had I thought that before he’d come back to life?

Too many.

I couldn’t stop seeing his broken body at the bottom of the cliffs and superimposing that image with the gunshot that sent him flying but didn’t kill him at the beginning of all of this. We’d come full circle. The mystery of Carl Forrester’s not-death-death was over. I could file it away and move on.

It should have been easy. Carl had been a problem I had been unable to fix. He’d killed people for me and more than once I’d let him go when I should have arrested him. Now, I didn’t need to hunt my former partner down like a common criminal. I just needed to find a way to mourn him properly.

Carl was dead.

We stepped into the throng of partying people up on the main nightclub drag in Auckland City and made our way towards Eagle’s alley. Drunks stumbled out of strip clubs; someone was chugging from a paper bag covered bottle of vodka. It was clichéd, and normally I would have had them on about it. But I was without a badge and without direction, so I walked past and pretended I didn’t smell the weed wafting out of their pocket.

Damon’s eyes tracked me, the people around us, and the entrance to Eagle’s alley.

I walked through it all as if I was a zombie.

I had to shake myself out of this. Carl would have been appalled at my behaviour. Hennessey would have been worried. I was better than this, I knew it.

But Carl was dead, and Weston was still out there.

I stopped and sucked in a breath of air to steady myself and then looked around at all the buildings. Anyone could have been watching us, but I was looking for something in particular: trench coat and fedora hat.

I knew Carl was dead. Weston knew Carl was dead. But wouldn’t seeing that again so soon after finding Carl’s body send me into a tailspin?

Not happening, I told myself, and straightened my spine, sucking in a deep cleansing breath.

“Everything all right?” Damon asked. He wasn’t asking about Carl, and that made it easier to nod my head.

I could lie to myself but could I lie to Damon?

Not anymore.

I met his deep brown eyes and offered a small smile.

“Lara,” he said softly.

The world moved around us, two rocks in the middle of a raging river. He stepped closer. I stood still. When this was over, we’d take a trip down to Cardrona. We’d ski and drink hot toddies beside a blazing fire while naked. We’d make love slowly, touching every part of each other. We’d forget about Carl and Carole and remember what it was to be just Lara and Damon.

When this was over, we could finally live our lives.

“Do you ever wonder,” I said, only loud enough for him to hear, “whether we can do normal?”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m a CIB detective. You’re a HEAT investigator. We’re not normal people.”

“I don’t see it like that, love. I see a woman who does her very best to help others. To put right the wrongs in this world. And then when the door to our home closes behind her at night, I see the woman I love. It’s that simple. We are not the sum of our parts nor are we the segmented parts of the whole. We are what we need to be when we need to be it.”

I shook my head.

“I love watching you work,” he continued, playing with a strand of my hair. “I love seeing into your very clever mind. I love when you lose yourself in a puzzle you can’t solve. And I love when you wrap yourself around me in our bed or in the bath and just let go. I love waking next to you and falling asleep with you in my arms. I love that you wake up with bed-messy hair and sleep in your eyes and suddenly have an epiphany about something that no one else could. I love the way you smell, the way you move, the way you talk, the way you think. I love every little thing about you; even those little things that you believe I shouldn’t or couldn’t possibly love.”

“Damon,” I whispered.

“I love that I’m not sure which Lara I’ll get when you answer my phone calls,” he went on, playing my hair through his fingers. He was determined to set me right, I thought bemusedly. “I love that you still surprise me. I love that you care, that you feel, that you’re not always sure you should and therefore hide those emotions and I have to go digging. I love that your job hasn’t broken you, but that you are human enough to be a little broken. We all are. I love that you love me; that despite what you see on a daily basis, you still have the capacity to love.”

He moved closer, ignored all the sights and sounds around us, and wrapped his arms around me. Leaning down, his forehead met mine, and he just breathed.

“Never stop being you, love,” he whispered. “CIB detective. Complex and clever human being. Beautiful and capable woman. Sometimes unsure, sometimes determined, sometimes infuriatingly calm and sometimes an emotional mess. Life is to be lived, Lara. It might not be easy. It might not be perfect. But it is life, and we’re meant to live it. There’s no rule book on how. It just is.”

He kissed my forehead and pulled back, looking down at me with deep, unfathomable, warm chocolate-coloured eyes.

“And I want to live it with you and no other.”

“Wow,” I finally whispered; my voice stolen by the sounds and vibrancy of the city. But he read my lips; he knew what I was feeling. He understood me.

He grinned; proud of himself.

I rolled my eyes and just like that I was back on an even keel.

Carl was dead. Yes. He was. But I was alive. Damon was alive. And if I wanted it to stay that way, I had to start moving, thinking, feeling. Outwitting a lunatic who was capable of manipulating the world around him.

Eagle. Carole. The CIB traitor. They’d all been manipulated by Weston to get at Damon, either directly or through me. Blackmail. Abduction. Murder. All of it had been designed to bring Damon to his knees.

But Weston hadn’t counted on Auckland Central CIB.

We’d not rushed into the halfway house, despite Jones checking it out; he wasn’t Damon or me. Weston would have ignored him. But by not rushing in, we were playing the game in a way Weston could not predict; using Stretch as bait to trap the spider in its own web. I wasn’t proud of it, but I was proud of Pierce and Hart and by extension CIB.

It was coming up on twenty-four hours since Stretch had been taken. The first twenty-four hours were the most crucial. I knew Damon knew that. I knew he was frantic to save his HEAT brother. And yet he’d let us lead; let me lead. And managed to contain himself enough to allow the hours to tick by without losing it completely.

He’d come close. But not quite crossed over.

He knew just how dangerous Weston was. Rushing into anything with the man could be suicidal.

I was proud of Damon, too.

And despite the delay, despite the danger, Damon could still love me; let me see how much he loved me. Damon could still open up and bare himself to me and pick me up off the ground where I’d stumbled and fallen to, bringing me back across that line to stand beside him in safety.

It was a realisation that rocked me.

But I am me, and he knows this, so when I spoke again, returning us to the business at hand and not spouting love letter type promises in return, he simply smiled benignly.

“Are you ready for this?” I asked as I looked toward Eagle’s alley.

“Isn’t that my line?” Damon queried.

“I think you’ve said enough, Casanova,” I told him, patting him on the chest.

“Clearly not quite enough if that’s all you’re going to give me.”

I winked at him. He huffed out a laugh.

“Think Cardrona,” I said, offering him a bone. “And using body heat to get warm after a vigorous day on the ski slopes.”

“Oh, now you’re talking,” he drawled, grinning widely.

How had I got so lucky? To find this man out of all the men in the city? To have fallen for him and have him fall for me? Stay with me? I was not an easy girlfriend, and yet Damon thrived on the challenge. I realised then that I’d have to challenge him daily for the rest of our lives to keep his interest.

Damon didn’t do easy. He was a fireman, for crying out loud. His career. His love life. All of it was not what you would call easy. And yet, Damon thrived on it. He came alive when faced with a challenge.

Weston hadn’t figured that out. It was a glaringly big hole in his profile of Damon. If only he’d realised that pitting himself against Damon was like pitting yourself against a brick wall. But not just any brick wall; a brick wall that rubbed its hands together and said ‘bring it.’

It was pockmarked, and parts had broken away, tumbling down into dust coated piles of mortar and bricks. But Damon was still standing, still ready to fight; stretched to his limit, yes. But still standing.

And I realised, so was I. We were fighters, Damon and I. We didn’t give up easily.

Weston had underestimated us completely.

I walked slowly into Eagle’s alley, keeping my wits about me. I felt more focused than I had for some time now. Carl was still in the back of my mind; but I didn’t push him away, I just let him be. I’d grieve properly when this was all over. I’d bury my mentor and be thankful that his pain had finally ended. The Carl I knew would not have wanted to be a murderer. Would not have wanted to be crazy.

So I let him be inside my mind, where his voice had gone ominously silent, and I kept my attention on my surroundings — looking up at the roofline for any shadows, looking into corners and tilting my head to listen for any sounds out of the ordinary.

Eagle was working; which made me feel both relieved and cautious. Who had the Carl imposter been? Weston?

I hadn’t got a good look at Weston since Sweet Hell. Not a single glimpse in a crowd full of faces. If he was behind the spanking scene in this alley, he could have been manipulating it from a distance.

Was he keeping his distance in all things?

We had no idea where he was, but he’d been watching us closely. He would know we’d called in Charlie’s spook friends. I was certain they were good at what they did but were they better than the PSYOPS agent who made them so clearly worried?

I wasn’t sure, so I kept my wits about me and silently made my way towards Eagle and his current john.

“That’s it, baby, let go,” he told him. “I gots ya.” At least he wasn’t the one receiving the pleasure this time. Somehow that one-eighty had made me uncomfortable. It was one thing for Eagle to make his tricks come; it was a whole other when the trick became the street worker.

His john, a male by the sounds of it, let out a groan that echoed in the alley and bounced off the high brick walls. I glanced up to the roofline again, but nothing shifted. I couldn’t help feeling, though, that we were being watched. Or Eagle was.

Coming here was a risk I had been prepared to take. But even so, I was on tenterhooks, waiting for something to happen.

All that happened was the john let go in a spectacular show of virility and Eagle took a pounding.

I peered around the corner and took in the scene in a split second glance. Eagle’s chest pressed against the wall of a premises, his head turned to the side as the large framed male behind him kissed him soundly. The trick had his pants down, his bare arse on display. Eagle’s boxers were tucked beneath his butt cheeks, his baggy pants around his ankles.

They were still connected, and I thought the john had started rocking his hips again, or maybe he hadn’t stopped yet.

“Yous only get one,” Eagle told him. “But it was a good one, baby.”

The words were spoken breathlessly, but I detected little feeling behind them. Eagle was going through the motions. It might have been good for the john, but for Eagle, it had been lacking. Not necessarily an unusual thing for this type of liaison. But Eagle had always enjoyed his work.

That was before Sweet Hell and Rhys Kyle Weston.

A part of me felt sad at that. And then I realised that a part of me was feeling again.

I glanced over my shoulder at Damon. He stood in the shadows at my side, keeping an eye on the entrance to the alley. Watching my back.

He watched my back in so many different ways; I could never express how much it meant to me.

This had to end. We needed our happily ever after.

The sound of clothes being righted and pleasantries being exchanged - the payment for services would have been settled prior to the commencement of activities - met my ears, and then Eagle’s latest customer sauntered out of the alley. He whistled a tuneless tune, walked ‘round the corner of the building, and found Damon and me waiting. He turned a bright shade of red.

“I ain’t done nothing wrong,” he said, raising his hands dramatically.

I might not be a cop right now, but clearly, I still looked like one.

“Keep walking,” I said.

“It’s not illegal to seek a little comfort,” the guy protested.

I looked toward the corner of the building and where I knew Eagle was. Where he hopefully still was. This guy was delaying things unnecessarily.

“Get out of here,” I ordered.

“No need to get all uppity ‘bout it,” the guy said.

“She needs a good fuck,” Eagle announced, appearing around the side of the building, cigarette hanging out of his mouth.

“She’s come to the right place, then,” the guy said, giving Eagle a five-star rating with his appreciative words and satiated grin. “But what’s the dude here for?”

“None of your business. Now, move along,” I said as Eagle flicked ash off his cigarette casually and murmured, “He gets off on watchin’.”

“Kinky,” the guy said. “How much to stay and watch, too?”

I stepped forward, placing my hand inside my jacket as if reaching for a gun.

“If you don’t move your sexed-up arse out of this alley in the next thirty seconds, I’ll throw it in the cells at Central.”

“Easy, Keen. I wouldn’t let him watch ya,” Eagle drawled. “Michaels would beat him to a pulp, and I’d lose business.”

The guy looked at Damon and saw something that suddenly made him desperately want to be somewhere else. He shot out of the alley as if his pants were on fire.

Eagle started laughing. “Best bit of entertainment all night.”

And I didn’t think he was lying. Eagle looked bored.

No. Not bored. Empty. Numb.

Oh, Eagle.

“How are you, Eagle?” I asked.

“Just got my butthole creamed, I’m doing fine, Keen. Yous? Had ya butthole creamed lately?”

Eagle could be crass, and he liked to press all my buttons, but this was a new low for him.

“When did you last see your shrink?” I asked carefully.

He turned on his heel and marched back into his ‘office’.

“Missed a couple of appointments,” he told me over his shoulder. Then he turned his attention to lighting a second cigarette. A distraction technique if ever I saw one.

The scent of tobacco wafted on the air, as swirls of smoke slowly rose above him.

“We had an agreement,” I said quietly.

“Yeah, well, life ain’t always goin’ the way ya wants it.”

Not for Eagle, that was for sure.

I decided to drop the caring routine; he was unreceptive. Eagle would be a slow moving and longterm project. And I could only really expect any success once Weston had been put away forever. I was fairly sure the bastard still had his claws in my informant.

Just how deep were they?

“Seen Carl lately?” I asked.

Eagle sucked in a deep draw of nicotine and then blew it out in rings that floated toward me.

“He ain’t who you thought he was,” he said, and I realised it was a repeat of his earlier words.

Words he’d spoken when I was last here, and he’d received a spanking.

Eagle had been warning me, the only way he could while the imposter was near.

Pay attention, Sport. Don't fucking fall asleep on the job.

I was finally waking up from a very long sleep.

I’m awake, Old Man. I’m awake.

But Carl was dead and didn’t answer.

Chapter Twenty-Three

“If You Can’t See The Wood For The Trees, Then Get The Fuck Out Of The Forest.”

“Can you tell me more?” I asked Eagle, forcing myself to lean against the brick wall opposite him and appear casual.

Damon had hung back by the corner of the building, so he could watch us and watch the little alley that led back onto K Road itself. As far as partners went, he was one of the best I’d ever had.

Barring Carl.

“Not much to tell,” Eagle said, puffing away on his cigarette.

His hands shook. Sweat clung to his hairline. The whites of his eyes were too big, and his pupils were too small; it wasn’t bright in Eagle’s ‘office.’ He was on something. We’d been working to get him off it, but it was an uphill battle for someone who worked the streets.

“Why do you say Carl’s not who I thought he was?” I pressed.

“Did I say that?” He seemed genuinely puzzled.

Was the message part of Weston’s hypnosis? Or was the hypnosis what made Eagle forget that he’d said it?

“You don’t remember saying that?” I asked.

He stared at me, head cocked to the side, eyes blinking rapidly.

“Yous on somfin’, Keen?”

It was a blow to the stomach that I actually felt physically. First Carl. Now, this. Damon was right; I wasn’t sure how much more I could take of this. But we were survivors, and I couldn’t help feeling we were making progress.

Not here. Not now. But with the halfway house and visiting Rachel. We’d forced Weston’s hand. Unfortunately, forcing his hand had led to Carl’s death.

I refused to feel guilty about that. Carl had been on borrowed time anyway. And it was better this way. For Rachel. For him. For all of us.

I shifted tactics. It was clear Eagle was not himself, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t get something out of him. His statement about Carl not being who I thought he was could have been a crack in Weston’s mind manipulation.

Or it could be a trap, but I was going with crack. I needed to follow up with the spooks and ask them if this PSYOPS shit could be counteracted. Eagle was a determined young man when he wanted to be; his will against Weston’s? Maybe.

But drugged? Probably not. I was clutching at straws.

Still, I had to try at least.

“When did you last see Carl, Eagle?” I asked.

“Carl? I sees him all the time; don’t I?”

“Do you? When did you last see him?”

“This mornin’,” he said, thinking hard. His cigarette had burned down, but he hadn’t replaced it. Eagle always smoked when speaking to me. One after the other after the other if our conversation went on too long.

“This morning,” I said. Carl hadn’t been home to Rachel for a week.

But had he been in Weston’s clutches already? Doing his bidding?

“What did you talk about?”

“Not much talkin’,” Eagle said, smirking. “Lots of heavy breathin’. If yous know what I mean.”

Not Carl then. I refused to believe that Carl, even Crazy Carl, would start spanking young men to get whatever it was he needed.

“How many times have you and Carl had these little get-togethers?” I asked.

“Come on, Keen. Yous can say it: Carl’s my daddy. He spanks me.”

“How many times?” I repeated, drawing on a little of my father’s chilliness to not show a reaction.

Eagle was unimpressed. He shrugged. “Seen him every day this week.”

Carl had not been home for a week.

“And before that?” I pressed.

Eagle finally pulled a cigarette out of his half-empty packet. His hands shook, and his movements seemed jerky, and when he lit it, he didn’t blow the obligatory smoke rings. I tilted my head to the side and studied him. This was a marionette, not the young man I knew.

“Been a while, eh?” he said, between rapid puffs.

Eagle was one of those slow smokers. Savour the moment. Blow a few rings. Entertain, distract, provide cover. This was a rapid inhale, followed by a rapid exhale, and it did nothing. The nicotine would hardly affect him; it was barely in his lungs long enough.

“Month or two,” he said, stubbing out the ciggie before it was finished.

I let out a slow breath of air and decided treading carefully would get me nowhere; whatever Weston had done, Eagle’s responses were triggered by what I was saying. If I said it fast enough, would it make a difference? Could the trigger keep up?

“So, when I saw you the other day, that wasn’t the first time?”

“Nope. Been spanking my butt for ages, see?”

“And when I saw you the week before last, on the Friday? You remember you’d just serviced that businessman and told him his tie was nice? Had it been going on long then?”

“Liked that tie. Fisted it like I fisted his bum.”

“Nice,” I muttered. “And Carl?”

“Never fisted his bum and he wouldn’t fist mine.”

“When did you ask him to do that?”

“When he suggested he could help me.”

“When was that?”

“Last week.”

And there it was — my Eagle. The cigarette slipped out of the packet with ease, the lighter flared, and he inhaled slowly. Smoke rings. One. Two. Three. Four. He rarely made it to five, but he kept trying.

“Last week,” I said quietly. “Thank you, Eagle.”

“Say what?”

I stepped forward and placed my hand on his shoulder, bending down slightly to look him in the eye.

“We’re going to get through this,” I said earnestly.

“Keen,” he drawled, blowing smoke in my eyes, “you so need a good fuck, don’t ya?”

“Not today, Eagle,” I told him, straightening up.

“I gots places to be, anyways,” he said, stubbing out the cigarette.

It hadn’t been finished, and his hands were shaking again.

“Take care, Eagle,” I said, stepping away.

But my Eagle was already gone. He wasn’t even listening to me.

I turned on my heel and marched out of the alley. Damon slipped into step beside me.

“Is it safe to leave him like that?” he asked quietly.

“If I move him, Weston will know I’m onto him. He thinks he’s managed to manipulate Eagle in a way I wouldn’t be able to detect.”

“Jesus, even I can see the kid’s been messed with.”

I grimaced. “Eagle’s fighting whatever Weston’s done, I’m sure of it. For now, it’s better if I don’t draw attention to that fact.”

“Fuck,” Damon muttered. He’d grown fond of my number one informant. Despite the history they shared, some of which at the hands of Weston, Damon felt rather protective of Eagle. I wouldn’t have put it past him to check up on my boy every now and then when I wasn’t watching.

I pushed that strangely unobjectionable thought away and climbed into the ute when Damon unlocked it.

Carl had only started servicing Eagle last week. Let’s say, one week ago, about the time Carl stopped coming home to Rachel. Could Carl have been twisted enough by Weston to actually do that to Eagle? And because of that twisting, hadn’t returned to the home he shared with his female lover?

I shook my head. I didn’t have an answer. But I knew where I could get one thing answered, so I directed Damon there.

We used the underground carpark at ASI this time. I knew if Weston was watching, he’d have seen us drive in from Broadway. But I was pretty damn sure that the back entrance via Remuera Road was monitored now, so hiding our approach was a waste of time. And I kind of wanted to send a message to Weston.

We know you’re watching and we don’t care.

Well, some of us didn’t.

“Could you have painted a bigger fucking bullseye on our backs?” Anscombe shouted when we made it past the dragonless reception area.

I knew my luck would have to run out eventually.

“What’s got your knickers in a twist, Anscombe?” I asked, walking across the kitchen to the coffee machine. For some reason, he’d brought us here. Not to Control where Eric or Amber Shaw would be hiding. Not to a meeting room, either. But here.

I poured him and Damon a coffee as well.

Anscombe snatched his up and took a fortifying sip.

“Damn spooks,” he muttered under his breath.

“Bad day?” I asked, sipping my cup of Joe.

He glared at me.

“Where is Charlie?” I asked, smiling sweetly.

“Here,” the woman in question said as she waltzed into the kitchen.

Ava swept in after her and Nick stiffened. He hadn’t stiffened when Charlie had entered; he’d been expecting her. But Ava?

Interesting.

Adam Savill made up the trio with his silent approach and brooding good looks and black leather motorbike jacket. They’d just arrived. I wondered briefly where they had been — looking for Weston?

We had a lot to catch up on.

I sat down at the table and waited for everyone to grab their coffees, and in the case of Savill, a plate of club sandwiches out of the fridge. It was covered in wrap and looked like it hadn’t yet been touched. It even had little bits of parsley pressed into crevices to make it look pretty.

Someone went to a lot of effort to feed these guys at night.

I couldn’t believe it was the dragon, but who else could it be?

I stared at Nick. He stared back at me. Adam shoved a whole club sandwich in his mouth in one go, garnering a raised eyebrow from Charlie. Ava painted her fingernails, and Damon sat rigidly beside me; he hadn’t even touched his coffee.

The tension was thick enough to cut with a knife.

And there were plenty of sharp knives in here, I was sure.

“OK,” I said, sitting forward. “Carl Forrester is dead.”

No one gasped. Pierce had been here.

“He hadn’t been home for a week,” I continued, “and about a week ago, he started turning up in places he shouldn’t have been, doing things he wouldn’t normally do.”

“Not unusual,” Anscombe said carefully. “He was a changed man.”

“Changed enough to change his sexuality?” I asked.

Anscombe and Savill frowned.

Ava said while concentrating on a blood red nail and not looking up, “I can make ‘em switch if I want to.”

“Switch?” Nick asked.

“Yeah, Nicky,” she crooned. “Girls. Boys. You name it. I can make ‘em switch sides if I have to.”

“High opinion of yourself, haven’t you?” Anscombe said curtly. There was no love lost between these two.

I liked the woman on principle because she was taking the heat off me. Nick’s mistrust of Ava was greater than his dislike of me; it seemed.

I smiled into my coffee cup.

“And what if they’re already heterosexual?” Anscombe pressed. “The men, I mean.”

Ava smirked at him. “I don’t always do the work, Nicky. It’s called delegation.”

“Hold on,” he said, sitting forward. “So, you have a stable of people to draw on to do the deed when you can’t be fagged getting off your arse or chip your nail polish?”

“Fagged. I like it,” Savill said, stuffing another sandwich in his mouth and making a show of chewing. I thought he might have been doing it on purpose, but to what effect, I wasn’t sure.

“If you’re chipping nail polish while you’re doing it, Nicky,” Ava said. “You’re doing it all wrong. What does your angel see in you?”

Nick pushed back his chair suddenly, making a thunderous crash which bounced off the walls. Savill was up and between his boss and the spook in a heartbeat. Shit, the guy could move. The sandwiches had been an act.

I was standing. Charlie was standing. We were all standing. No weapons had been drawn, but on the part of the spooks - and probably ASI - none were needed. I would have at least liked some pepper spray, but I did know Damon could throw a decent punch, so I wasn’t completely without options.

“Everyone,” I snapped. “Calm down.”

“You don’t get to make orders in here, Detective,” Nick snarled, emphasising my former title.

“It’s not as if ASI is sovereign ground, Anscombe,” I said dryly.

“You’re not a cop,” he growled.

“Do you really believe that?” I didn’t. Not anymore. Hart had made sure of that.

Nick finally looked away from Ava long enough to look at me.

“Fuck,” he said. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.”

“Eloquent as ever, boss,” Savill drawled.

“You!” Anscombe snapped, pointing at Ava. “Don’t ever mention my wife again. You!” he said, pointing at Charlie. “Control her. And you!” He looked at me. “What the fuck are you even doing here?”

I sat back down. Ava was the next to follow. Charlie and Savill slowly sank into their seats. But Damon and Nick had a pissing contest until I tugged Damon back into his chair and ended it.

I could not work in this place. I’d destroy it in under a week. Give me the Boys’ Club any day. I’d even put up with Cawfield and his innuendos to avoid this crap.

I looked at Charlie and ignored Anscombe completely.

“Can the manipulation be fought?” I asked, cutting to the chase quickly.

Ava paused painting her nails. Charlie remained icy, but a storm was brewing in those grey eyes. Nick and Savill had stiffened. It might be a dysfunctional business, but ASI looked after its own. And Charlie, if not Ava, was definitely one of ASI’s own.

“Possibly,” Charlie eventually said. Anscombe flicked her a look. If she saw it, she didn’t show a reaction.

Had Charlie fought her PSYOPS?

“Does it break down over time?” I pressed.

“Possibly,” she said again, a little quicker this time to offer up an answer. A repeated answer. But the tension in the room had lightened.

Time to test a theory.

“What would it take to break the PSYOPS brainwashing?”

Charlie studied me for a long while. Ava kept painting her nails. Anscombe and Savill were rocks. Damon sat quietly beside me, ready to jump up at a moment’s notice.

“It varies,” Charlie finally said. “But the current belief is that a connection to something or someone stronger than the PSYOPS directive can possibly break through the training.”

I stared at her. Had she broken through her training? My eyes flicked to the man sitting beside her. Savill had stopped using the sandwiches as a cover. His gaze met mine. There was a definite warning to back the fuck off there.

It didn’t matter. Their stories weren’t mine to uncover.

But Eagle and Carl?

“I think,” I said steadily, ”one of my informants, who we’ve confirmed has been manipulated by Weston previously, broke through the PSYOPS a couple of times to warn me.”

“How close are you to this informant?” Charlie asked.

“Close.” Eagle was my best. He was also like a little brother to me. I slipped him extra cash and checked up on him frequently, even if I didn’t need him for information. I just did it. I had hoped I’d meant something to him too. I was pretty sure, now, that I did.

“It is possible,” Charlie said.

All that was left was figuring out if Carl had switched sides before he had been captured.

He ain’t who you thought he was.

Was that because he suddenly liked to spank young men? Or was it because it wasn’t even Carl under that fedora and trench coat?

If you can’t see the wood for the trees, then get the fuck out of the forest.

Only this forest was all around me, and it went on for as far as I could see.

What else have you got, Old Man?

Carl didn’t answer, because Carl was dead.

I had to stop talking to myself.

Chapter Twenty-Four

“You Can’t Live Life In A Vacuum, Keen. Otherwise You End Up Sucking At It.”

It was late. I was tired. It had been a hell of a day; a hell of a week. But we weren’t done yet.

We left ASI and headed back into the CBD. We could have kept going to Central Police, but I was suspended so turning up there was out. We could have kept going past the station to my place and crashed there. But we didn’t.

We made it as far as Damon’s.

I thought perhaps Damon was exhausted, too, and the thought of negotiating central city traffic any longer was just too much. I didn’t blame him. Enough was enough.

He rolled his ute to a stop out the back of his terraced house and pressed the remote to open his garage door. Sitting inside was his private vehicle; the HEAT truck would have to weather the outdoors. I checked the shiny Audi out with its four overlapping rings on the grille and looked up at the Paddington styled building.

I always forgot that Damon came from Old Money. He didn’t act like he’d had a silver spoon in his mouth his entire life. He roughed it with firemen. He drove the HEAT ute more often than the Q7. He dressed in jeans and well-worn jackets, scuffed boots and soft leather belts with tarnished buckles. Damon was a man’s man, but more than that; he was an everyday man’s man.

But he was loaded.

He had top of the range stainless steel appliances in his gourmet kitchen. An expensive and complicated sound system piped throughout the house. Designer furniture and sought after artwork. A huge, in-your-face TV that spanned an entire wall. But opposite that was a bookshelf just as big and covered in well worn and equally well read books. Marble floors and granite bench tops abounded. A beautiful view out of the front windows across to the Domain park stole attention. And a sophisticated security system, that ASI would have salivated over, topped it all off.

I didn’t exactly feel uncomfortable at Damon’s place, but I certainly felt like I could kick off my boots and leave them wherever they fell at my place, whereas here, I lined them up against the wall; perfectly straight.

Damon smirked at me and made a show of leaving his boots slightly crooked. It was me who straightened them up as I walked past.

“Hungry?” he asked as he headed directly for the kitchen. “Or straight to bed?”

Sleep was desperately needed, but my stomach had been rumbling for the past hour. Even the club sandwich I’d managed to sneak in at ASI hadn’t quietened it.

“Food,” I told him. “Then shower and bed.”

“I like the way you think,” Damon said, pulling ingredients out of the fridge for an omelette.

I slid onto a stool at the bench and pulled out my cellphone. It was possible that Weston was tapping our calls somehow, but to do that, the CIB traitor would have had to expose himself before now. The fact that he might have with the GPS system was fortuitous.

And also a little out of the ordinary from what we’d come to know of our man.

I dialled Pierce as I watched Damon flit about the kitchen with practised ease. I could boil an egg. Possibly scramble something resembling a rubber mat. But omelettes were beyond me.

Damon had taken his jacket off and now wore a simple Henley t-shirt. The muscles across his back were obvious through the thin material of his top. I watched them shift and ripple. Maybe food, shower, sex then bed.

“Keen,” Pierce said over the line, disturbing my fantasy. “Thought you might be in touch.”

“You didn’t call with what you found out, Sarge,” I accused. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you’re trying to cut me out.”

“For your own good.”

I sighed. “It’s that bad? I promise I won’t flip. Who is it?”

“Can’t it wait until tomorrow? And by the way, it is half past eleven at night. Daisy’s in bed and so were we.”

“Did I interrupt anything?”

“At half-past eleven at night? Some of us have day jobs, Keen.”

“Marie does, but when has that ever stopped you, Sarge?”

“I prefer early morning,” he told me, and I actually blushed.

It was one thing to be one of the boys but a whole other to picture your, albeit quite ruggedly handsome, superior officer having sex first thing in the morning.

“Good for you,” I muttered.

He chuckled; that deep, manly, self-satisfied chuckle they use when they’ve just proven how much the man they are to anyone.

“So?” I said. “What did the log say?”

He swore softly. “You really want to go to sleep tonight knowing but unable to do anything about it?”

“Maybe I won’t be sleeping,” I said, trying for dirty humour and just not having the heart for it to do it right.

“Lara,” he said. “You can’t do anything about it tonight. Do you understand? That’s a directive straight from Hart.”

“He wants to sit on this?”

“Just for tonight.”

“Why?”

“Because we need to mourn Carl first.”

The punch hit me so hard I sucked in a breath of air. Damon spun around from the stove and raised an eyebrow at me. I let the breath out and nodded my head to indicate I was all right. I wasn’t.

Carl was dead.

“I’m sorry,” Pierce said tiredly. “It’s been a long day.”

It had been. And it’s not as though I’d forgotten about Carl; I’d just filed it. Perhaps the only time I had followed my father’s example and filed something in a mental drawer. I needed to see this through to the end. And then I would break down and mourn my former partner. If I let myself mourn now, I would be a liability.

And that was exactly what Weston wanted.

“I won’t act on anything tonight,” I promised Pierce. “But I also won’t be able to sleep knowing you’ve identified our traitor and I don’t know who it is. Tell me. Please,” I added for good measure.

Damon placed the completed omelette down before me and then fished out some utensils. He grabbed his own plate and slid onto the stool at my side. He dug in without waiting; clearly famished having not partaken of a thing at ASI.

I stared at the beautifully presented eggy meal, full of mushrooms and chives and bacon and tomato. It looked and smelled divine.

I knew very shortly I wouldn’t be able to stomach it, so I grabbed a fork and shovelled in a big mouthful. It wasn’t very ladylike, and I was sure Pierce could hear me masticating, but I needed something on my stomach before eating became a challenge I couldn’t battle tonight.

My money was on Cawfield. I was as ready as I’d ever be to hear if I was right.

“OK,” Pierce said. I could hear liquid sloshing into a glass down the line. He was pouring himself a beer or more likely, given the topic of conversation, a whisky. A stiff one. “Ready?”

“Come on,” I said between mouthfuls. “Spill it. The suspense is killing me.”

Damon grunted. Pierce sighed.

“It’s Joe,” he said, and I slowly stopped chewing.

Huh. I’d been right.

“Cat got your tongue?” Pierce asked.

“Just thinking.”

“Yeah, I’ve been doing a lot since I saw his login code and password earlier.”

“What did you come up with?”

“It’s too convenient.”

Dammit. I’d just been thinking the same thing.

“So, we ignore it?” I asked.

“Hell, no. Hart intends to question him officially tomorrow morning, but if he isn’t who we think he is, then we might just be walking into a trap.”

“Or tipping our hand.”

“Exactly.”

“So, where does Hart intend to question him?” Certainly not at CIB if he wanted to keep this from Weston.

Unless, of course, Joe Cawfield was our stooge and Weston didn’t give a shit about us finding out, hence Cawfield using his own login and password for the GPS system at Central Police.

God, I felt sick. I pushed my half eaten omelette away. Damon poured a glass of red and pushed it across the bench toward me, silently. It wasn’t whisky, but it might just dull the pain a little.

“We plan to corner him at his house in the morning.”

“Bad move,” I said, swirling the merlot about in the glass and watching it coat the sides. “Last time I cornered Joe at his house, it blew up.”

“Good point. Maybe I’ll get Hart to meet me at his gym. Cawfield goes there each morning at six.”

“He works out?”

“Don’t sound so surprised. He’s quite fit actually. Runs marathons.”

“He does not!”

“You really should get to know your coworkers, Keen. It’d make life go a lot smoother.”

I’d already got to know one coworker so well that when he faked his death, I still kept hearing him telling me how to live my life inside my head.

“Yeah,” I said, not sounding convinced.

“You can’t live life in a vacuum, Keen,” Pierce said sagely. “Otherwise you end up sucking at it.”

“You read that on the back of a cereal box or something?”

“Or something. Might have been Carl.”

I heard the ice clink in his glass as he no doubt lifted it in silent salute to our fallen comrade.

I held up my wine glass and then clinked it against Damon’s, whispering, “To Carl.”

Damon watched me closely as he took a sip in honour of my ex-partner.

I’d mourn my mentor after we caught Weston.

“So,” I said to Pierce. “Which gym?”

“Oh, no,” Pierce said fiercely. “You are not invited. Suspended from CIB, remember?”

“How could I forget?” I said dryly.

“Come on, Keen. You’re likely to shoot first and ask questions later. We need him alive if we have any chance of flipping this thing back on Weston.”

“But you’re not even sure it’s him, and besides, I don’t have a gun; Hart took it from me.”

“Taser. Just as lethal if used enough times.”

“Tasers need to recharge,” I told him.

“How many do you own exactly?”

I didn’t reply.

Pierce grunted.

“Look, Ryan,” I said.

“Oh, bringing out the big guns, are we?”

I smiled. “Maybe having me there would throw him off his game a little. Make him sweat enough that we can break through the hypnosis. The spooks at ASI said that if there’s a connection between the brainwashed and somebody, say the somebody present at his interrogation, it might be enough to break the PSYOPS. I think Eagle’s been trying to break through it to me.”

“The fedora hat and trench coat,” Pierce guessed.

“Yeah, but I just don’t know yet what Eagle’s been trying to tell me.”

“You’ll figure it out.”

Hopefully, before it was too late for Carole and Stretch.

“What do you think?” I asked instead of commenting on that. “About me being there. You can’t deny that Cawfield feels something for me. Even if it’s hatred, it might be enough for him to break the training.”

Pierce was silent for a while and then said, “OK. But you follow my lead. You glare at him all you like, but you let me ask the questions; I’m quite good at it actually.” Said dryly. “And for God’s sake, if we do end up arresting him, don’t you do it. A false arrest is just what this fucked up case needs.”

I smiled grimly. All these reminders that I was suspended were starting to get to me.

“You’re on,” I said. “What time?”

“He works out from six to seven-thirty, so let’s make it five-thirty at Les Mills in the city.” He muttered something under his breath. “It’s late,” he said; he must have been looking at his watch when he muttered incoherently at me just then. “Get some sleep.”

“You too.”

“I was. Thanks for that, by the way. Now I’ll be too knackered to wake up Marie early.”

I made a choking sound. “Too much info, Sarge.”

“What?” he said, innocently. “I’m married. I’m allowed to.”

“Yeah. Whatever,” I said and closed the call out. I stared at the blank screen. I could just imagine Pierce thinking he was clever getting me to end the call like that.

I waited for five minutes, while I helped Damon clean up the kitchen, and then texted Pierce just to be ornery.

You asleep yet?

Fuck off! came the immediate reply.

I grinned as I stepped into the shower.

Damon slipped in behind me and reached for the soap. He started lathering up my back, while I let the hot water soothe me.

“You don’t think it’s Cawfield,” he said softly, letting the sound of the water surround us. It was intimate, even if the topic wasn’t. But the slow stroke of his hands over my body and the constant rhythm of the water as it fell made the moment private.

I needed that privacy because it had been a hell of a day and tomorrow wasn’t looking any better.

“I’ve always thought it was him,” I admitted, turning when Damon indicated I should. He started on my front, not saying anything. “Cawfield is a chauvinistic pig. He hates my guts, and the feeling is mutual. He goes out of his way to get a rise out of me, and I go out of my way to avoid him. But this is too convenient. Too… easy. When nothing about this case or Weston has been easy.”

“You can say that again,” Damon muttered.

I looked at him, this larger than life man who took up too much space in the shower stall and yet his touch was so gentle, so caring, so soft. Water sluiced off his bronzed skin, ran in rivulets over his defined muscles. Firemen worked out, and just because Damon spent a great deal of his day in his office or the lab at HEAT didn’t mean he wasn’t still buff.

I loved his body. I reached for it now, returning the favour and carefully cleaning him.

“How’re you holding up?” I asked.

“I’m stretched pretty thin, love.”

I nodded. I understood.

“And you? Carl?”

I shook my head. “I can’t think about that right now.”

“Lara…”

“I know. I will need to. But if I stop now to mourn him properly, I’m not sure I’ll be a functioning human being by the morning.”

He reached forward and wrapped me up in his arms. We stood beneath the shower spray, water running down our bodies like tears from God. I closed my eyes and rested my cheek against his chest. He kissed my temple and hugged me tight. We held each other together, wrapped up in steam, wrapped up in our love.

Damon feared that he’d have to mourn his sister.

I feared that I couldn’t survive mourning Carl.

But together, we could hold on for a little longer; stay strong for just one more day; one more hour.

“Make love to me,” I whispered. “Help me to forget.”

He ducked down and looked me in the eye, and then he murmured as if a vow, “Whatever you need, love.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

“We All Have Baggage, Sport. Some Of Us Just Require A Forklift To Carry It Around With Us All Day Long.”

Damon made love with single-minded focus. The world could have been exploding outside his bedroom window, but he wouldn’t have cared; Earth’s end would not have had him lose his focus. He ran sure hands over my body, lighting off electric-like shocks of sensations across my skin. I arched my back in response, and he took advantage of the position to wrap his lips around a nipple.

His fingers dug into my hip on one side when I moaned my appreciation. He licked and sucked and then slipped a hand between my thighs, finding exactly the right spot to rub.

I came apart far easier than I had thought possible. With the day we’d had, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to let go so quickly. But Damon knew my body, he knew it intimately. He’d made a career out of making it hum. And he was determined to see me hum like a maestro.

A bite on my nipple, the scrape of teeth across flesh, a stroke of fingers through my moist folds and then a thrust as they entered me. My skin pebbled, the heat of his body seared me, hot breath coasted over sensitive flesh; I writhed and moaned as if I couldn’t get enough, wouldn’t survive another minute without another touch, another kiss, another stroke of a probing finger.

“Again,” he said when I started to crest that mighty mountain of euphoria for a second time in as many minutes. Damon could be very demanding in bed, and when he knew I was needy like I was right then, his will became inexorable to resist. “Again, love,” he rasped against my stomach.

His head dipped lower; my legs parted without hesitation. He ducked between them and licked me up the centre. I gasped. He thrust his fingers in a rhythm that matched the sucking of his mouth on my clit.

“Damon!” I cried.

“Yes,” he growled. “Now!”

I burst apart in a million tiny shards of light and heat and sizzling electrical pulses. I felt loose and relaxed and almost ready to roll over and sleep the best sleep I’d ever had. But Damon was having none of that.

“We’re not finished,” he murmured, positioning my legs over his shoulders as he looked down at me.

An Adonis hovered in the air above my sated body. Rippling muscles and shiny bronzed skin. His cock jutted out, weeping pre-come. I reached for him, and he hissed a breath through clenched teeth when we touched. Gripping him tightly, I stroked slowly, watching the tendons on the side of his neck tighten. I mercilessly teased him, knowing that it would probably come back and bite me in the butt.

His beautiful eyes closed and he hung his head low, savouring the moment.

Damon was the most magnificent sight to behold when luxuriating in sensual pleasure.

He quickly lowered my legs from his shoulders, surprising me. I was sure he was about to thrust in deep and take me hard the way I loved him taking me. But instead, he moved up my body, kissing the skin below each breast and then licking a line of heat up to one of my nipples. He sucked briefly but moved on before I could respond to that pull that went directly from my breast straight to my core.

And then he straddled my shoulders, his lower legs holding my arms in place, as he reached for his dick and stroked it above my face.

“Your touch is like a lick of heat,” he murmured. “It sets my body on fire. I’m addicted to you, Lara. I can’t get enough.”

He didn’t move from his position above me, and I couldn’t budge his legs from where my arms lay pinned down the side of my supine form.

I struggled because it is not in me to lie compliantly when so restrained. He grinned at me, his eyes heavily lidded as he watched me try and fail to buck him off.

“Damon,” I growled.

“No,” he said firmly. “You started this by touching me, teasing me. Now you’ll finish it.”

I narrowed my eyes at him, and then he leaned forward, loomed over me, tipped his cock down toward my mouth.

I turned my head away, smirking.

He gripped my hair gently, but meaningfully, and moved my lips back to his cock head.

“Lick it,” he said.

I glared up at him.

He smiled down at me. “You know I love it when you look at me like that.”

“Animal,” I huffed, knowing this was Damon playing; demanding but still playing.

“But I’m your animal, Lara. Lick it.”

I let out a huff, which parted my lips, and his cock pressed between them. I tasted pre-come immediately and stifled a groan; I wouldn’t let him see how turned on I was.

“That’s it. Take it,” he encouraged.

My tongue darted out, just a flash, just enough to lick the tip.

He growled and pressed himself farther between my lips.

“Suck it,” he instructed.

Bossy Damon was definitely Sexy Damon. His body was on fire. His skin shone like a bronzed statue above me. His heavy lids let me know just how turned on he was. Damon was not a one-position-between-the-sheets kind of man. He’d opened my sexual world up to so many possibilities. And he constantly surprised me.

I’d known for some time that he was a closet dominant. I’d seen how well he fitted into that world with such apparent ease. He reined it in for the most part. Not all of our sexual encounters were as electric as this; not as controlled; not as demanding and consequently freeing. I fought back; it’s in my nature. He dominated - just a little; it was in his.

And somehow it worked. I could only assume because in my day-to-day life I had to be so in control of my emotions. I had to put on a façade of cool, calm and collected to hoof it with the boys at CIB. But in our bed, when Damon sensed I needed it, when he could see I was responsive to it, he took over; he took control. He let me give myself up to someone else completely, and he took me to the very edge of sanity and back. Again and again.

I spread my lips wider. He slowly slipped between them. I watched his board chest rise and fall swiftly. Sweat glistened on his pecs, down his biceps. He shook ever so slightly. Having this sort of control over me in bed did something to Damon. Maybe because out of it, he didn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of dominating me.

I kept my eyes locked on his and sucked, hollowing my cheeks around his wide girth. He started a rhythm, panting slightly. He might be the one calling the shots, but I was the one making him unravel completely.

“Lara,” he rasped. “That’s it, love. Take all of me.”

The dominant mask was slipping. Even if it was still an instruction; when Damon called me ‘love’ there was no mistaking the meaning. He loved me and would never hurt me, in or out of bed.

It had taken a long time to accept that. It had taken too long. And now we played with fire, not just between the sheets, but out of them. If we couldn’t stop Weston, couldn’t get Carole and Stretch back, then our world could burn to cinders all around us.

“Lara!” he snapped. “Focus on me. On my cock. On the way I taste and feel. Focus on me.”

And not the turmoil of thoughts inside my head.

I scraped my teeth down his length.

He hissed and thrust himself back in a fraction too deeply. I made a slight gagging sound, and he pulled back immediately.

“You can take more,” he ordered.

I opened wider, tipped my head back at the right angle to take all of him; obeyed him without thinking.

And it was liberating. Freeing.

I made him lose all semblance of control and when I thought I had him; really, truly had him so close to that beautiful edge - face taut, skin flushed, breaths uneven - he pulled out, shifted down my body, lifted my legs back up over his shoulders and then buried himself inside.

The rest was a frantic dance of forward and back, in and out, thrust and withdraw. I came again. Spectacularly. He forced yet another out of me with the demanded word, “Again!” Until I was nothing but a humming, loose, exhausted puddle beneath him as he thrust one last time, burying himself as deeply as he possibly could, almost bending me back on myself, and groaned out his release in what had to be the sexiest sight of my entire life.

After a suspended moment, Damon collapse down my side, smoothing out my legs as he slipped out of my thoroughly well-used pussy. I couldn’t lift a muscle, but Damon carefully positioned me against his side, resting my head on his chest, and one of my legs over his thigh. I heard his heart beating too quickly. I felt his chest rise and fall faster than it would normally. I heard the sated sigh that slipped out between kiss-swollen lips.

“Cardrona,” he said. “I’ll make love to you every morning and night. I’ll work out your tired muscles from skiing on the slopes all day and make you hurt in a much more pleasurable way.”

“Every day and night,” I mumbled, almost asleep already.

“And maybe a quickie in the middle of the day as well,” he promised.

“You’re a machine,” I grumbled, snuggling in deeper to his furnace-like body.

“We’re parts of the same machine, love. You and I fit together as if we were made for each other.”

My eyelids fluttered, so I let them close. I was too tired to look at all that glorious skin any longer.

“Hmmm,” I hummed contently. “Even if I fight back?”

“Especially if you fight back,” Damon murmured, sounding just as sleepy as me.

“Sleep,” I mumbled.

“Sweet dreams,” he whispered.

I was almost there, almost asleep when I thought I heard Damon whisper, “And I’ll ask you to marry me.”

Thankfully I was too far gone down that slippery slope to slumbering that I didn’t fixate on what I thought I had heard.

I wasn’t the marrying type; Damon knew that.

But then I wasn’t the relationship type either, and here I was, blissfully cohabitating - even if in two different houses - with a man who could light my body on fire and promised to do it on a daily basis.

Suffice it to say, my dreams were of the sensual variety and not the nightmares I’d been having lately.

The scent of coffee woke me. I rolled over and stretched out my worn body, feeling aches I hadn’t felt in quite some time. Damon and I had a healthy sexual relationship, but last night was definitely one of the special ones. The ones that brought out the master in Damon; the ones I particularly liked.

I pushed the inherent embarrassment I felt at that thought aside and shuffled into the bathroom. By the time I was dressed and ready to face the day, Damon had finished preparing breakfast. We’d burned off quite a few calories last night, so I didn’t baulk at the eggs and bacon. I did restrain myself to just one strip of bacon, but I downed the entire juice glass before I savoured my coffee.

Sitting back in the chair at the dining room table, I watched as Damon brought himself up to speed on the morning news on his tablet.

“Anything interesting in there?” I asked.

“The usual,” he said, around a sip of his own coffee. “Tax rates are on the rise. Some bastard is up for life without parole, and the humanitarians are causing a fuss about it. The PM is on holiday. Again.”

I smiled into my cup.

“Do you want me with you?” he asked, pushing his tablet aside to focus on me.

I could see the lingering hunger from last night in his eyes. He was remembering everything.

I couldn’t forget.

Offering an arched brow, I placed my coffee down on the table between us and said, “You should follow up with HEAT.”

The fact of the matter was I didn’t want him anywhere near Cawfield. Damon despised misogynistic men. And especially despised them if they were using that prejudice against me. At one time, I thought perhaps Carole Michaels had been an indomitable woman.

And then Rhys Kyle Weston had happened.

We all have baggage, Sport. Some of us just require a forklift to carry it around with us all day long.

I would never begrudge Damon his baggage as I was sure he would never begrudge me mine.

“I see,” he said, steadily.

“Damon,” I started.

“I know, love; I’m likely to pummel the little shit into next week. You don’t need that kind of spotlight on you right now.”

God, I loved this man.

“But do me a favour?” he asked. I looked at him warily. “Even if he isn’t the CIB traitor… make him bleed.”

A slow smile spread my lips wide. Making me remember last night vividly. Which wasn’t a welcome thought when thinking of putting Joe Cawfield through the wringer.

“That’s a favour I can gladly give you,” I said.

“Oh, I have other favours to ask, but we’ll leave them for later.”

He smirked at me. My body flushed hot.

Leaning forward, he whispered, “You were perfect last night.”

So were you, I wanted to say, but my mouth had gone dry.

He reached up and ran his thumb over my lips and then replaced them with his; kissing me soundly.

“Call me,” he said, standing up and addressing the dishes.

I pushed up from my seat and went to help.

“Go, love. Or you’ll be late.”

I checked my watch. Damn, breakfast and flirting with Damon had taken too long; I was almost too late. And there was no way I wanted to be late to this particular party.

I slipped into my jacket, feeling the loss of my gun and badge keenly, and swiped up my handbag, which now conveniently held a taser and a bottle of pepper spray. It felt like cheating, but facing off against Cawfield had me feeling antsy.

Was he or wasn’t he? It was too convenient and yet I couldn’t help thinking that was his plan.

A stupid plan; make us think he’d done it, but the clues were too easy, so we question their veracity.

Joe Cawfield might not have been the brightest bulb in the lighting shop, but he was a damn good cop, I admitted reluctantly.

So, what the hell was going on?

Chapter Twenty-Six

“You Can Pray To A Higher Being All You Like. But If You Don’t Get Off Your Own Arse, They’re Sure As Hell Not Gonna Help.”

Pierce had two cups of takeaway coffee in his police-issued sedan when I arrived. I paid the taxi driver, slipped out of the cab and walked to his passenger side. Damon had said to take the Q7. And as there were other suitably impressive expensive cars in the carpark at Les Mills, it wouldn’t have stood out. But I was an independent woman.

Well, I was out of bed, that is.

I forced the visceral images of last night to the back of my mind and swiped up the coffee Pierce had waiting for me.

“Where’s Hart?” I asked between sips.

“Well, hello, Lara. Yes, I’m quite fine this morning. Thank you for asking. How are you?”

I glanced over at him and groaned.

“You got some, didn’t you?”

He grinned unrepentantly at me. “And if I’m not mistaken, by the look of the glow to your entire being right now, so did you.”

I cringed internally.

“Ever wonder why we can’t seem to keep our conversations out of the gutter?” I asked him.

“You started it,” he said and downed the last of his coffee.

“I blame my dad,” I said, drinking mine more slowly. Pierce said nothing. I didn’t speak about my father. Ever. If I could help it. “He might have been a block of ice,” I went on, because in for a penny, in for a pound as they say, “but he knew how to be one of the boys.”

“I would have thought he’d want you to stay above all of that,” Pierce mused.

“How can I be a good cop if I can’t hold my own with the best of them?”

He looked at me then. “You were always going to be a cop?”

“From the day I was born.”

“Sex didn’t matter?”

“That is at least one thing my father believed in that I could stomach; the fact that I was a girl was irrelevant. Only success mattered.”

“And what if you didn’t want to be a cop?”

I stared at him. “Thank God I did, right?”

I offered a smile, and he slowly returned it. We both knew I’d been groomed for it. We both knew I hadn’t stood a chance.

But I hadn’t been lying just then. Thank God I did want to be a cop.

You can pray to a higher being all you like. But if you don’t get off your own arse, they’re sure as hell not gonna help.

Carl hadn’t believed in guardian angels or an omnipotent being watching over all of us. He’d believed in results. Rather like my father, actually. Maybe that was why I put up with Carl’s crap so readily because I’d learned to put up with my father’s.

I snorted into my cup. “So, where’s Hart again?” I asked.

“Not coming. He decided his presence would send the wrong message.”

“What, that the head of Central CIB thinks Cawfield is a rat?”

“Something like that.”

“And Cawfield won’t know that when he sees us?”

“He’s likely to think we’re on a crusade. The less this looks like an organised sting, the more likely Weston is to believe we haven’t a decent bead on him yet.”

I snorted again. That was unlikely. Weston was everywhere. And nowhere. Where the hell was the guy?

I looked up at the CCTV cameras along Victoria Street West. Even now, he could be watching us.

“Is the GPS tracker still active?”

“Yes,” Pierce said. “If we switch it off now, he’ll know we’re on to him.”

“So, what the fuck are we doing in your assigned vehicle?”

“This is a pool car. It’s not been assigned to anyone.”

I felt my cheeks pink. Of course, Pierce would have thought of that. He was a detective sergeant.

“Sorry,” I muttered.

“Think nothing of it,” he said and opened his door.

The fact he’d let me off so easily told me he was unimpressed with my detecting skills.

I stifled the urge to groan and climbed out of the sedan. I needed to be switched on for what was coming next. Cawfield could be a slippery bastard when he wanted to. He could also be a shitty little sexist creep.

Either way, I had to do better.

I’m stretched pretty thin, love.

So was I, apparently.

We entered the gym with a couple of other people. Cawfield wasn’t here yet, but Pierce was pretty sure he’d stick to his usual routine. Neither of us was dressed for gyming it. But Pierce had at least brought a gym bag with him as if he intended to change in the locker room out back. We both paid for a single day membership and headed towards the lockers. Men were, of course, separated from women, but after Pierce cleared the male locker room, I slipped in and slid into a toilet stall.

Pierce placed himself by the door to the changing room and kept an eye on the gym itself every time the door was opened.

It wasn’t the best place to have it out with Cawfield. But at least in here, there were no cameras for Weston to hack into. Cawfield would be ours, in between the rush of men wanting to shower.

Fifteen minutes later, Joe Cawfield sauntered into the gym, acknowledging greetings, fist bumping fists when present with them, and offering the obligatory chin-lift men did in these sorts of circumstances. He pushed into the locker room to stow his gear, already dressed in workout clothes so not needing to change into them.

He spotted Pierce only when Pierce wanted him to spot him; at the precise moment Pierce placed an ‘Out of Order’ sign on the outside of the door and then locked it.

I stepped out of the toilet stall a second later and watched Cawfield’s hands fist. I didn’t think he was about to fist bump me.

“What the fuck is this?” he demanded.

“This,” Pierce said, “is a little meeting out of view of prying eyes.”

“What prying eyes?”

“Can the bullshit, Cawfield,” I said. “We know what you’ve been doing.”

He sneered at me. “Fucking your mother six ways to Sunday, Keen?” he drawled, smiling creepily at me.

For a CIB detective, he could be an idiot. It took more than words to get to me.

“Wouldn’t put it past you to be into necrophilia,” I muttered, leaning back against a locker and letting him see the disgust I was feeling.

“You fucking bitch,” he said, taking a step toward me.

Pierce stepped between us.

“Joe,” he snapped. “This is serious. We’ve got some questions we want you to answer.”

“What questions? Is Hart in on this? And I’m not answering a bloody thing with that bitch standing there.”

“Sit down, Joe. Now!” Pierce all but shouted.

Someone knocked on the door to the locker room.

“Use the ladies’,” Pierce called out.

Indistinct muttering could be heard, but they didn’t press the issue. We didn’t have long, though, before Management came to see what was happening, and they had a key to the door.

“It’s like this,” Pierce started. “We know you logged into the GPS system to trace Keen’s whereabouts. We want to know why.”

Pierce was going for the tried and true, shoot straight from the hip approach to interrogating your suspect. I preferred the more subtle approach; trip them up into confessing.

But Pierce’s way could also work, and we were short on time.

“What login?” Cawfield said, looking confused and not just a little worried. I narrowed my eyes. “And why would I want to trace Keen’s movements?”

“You know why, Joe,” Pierce said softly. “You’ve had a hard-on for Detective Keen since she started in CIB. We’ve seen the photos you’ve kept hidden in the back of your locker at work.”

I looked at Pierce sharply; I didn’t know a thing about any photos.

“Oh, those,” Cawfield said, laughing awkwardly. “Just a hobby.”

“There were over three dozen in there.”

What. The. Fuck?

Cawfield looked at me and then away again.

“So, I fancy her. It’s not a crime.”

It was also the first time Cawfield had ever admitted such, despite the fact he’d propositioned me on several occasions. Was it convenient to use that as an excuse now? Or was he crumbling under the photos accusation as any halfway decent cop would?

“And then there’s Sweet Hell,” Pierce went on.

Cawfield paled and sat down.

“It was damn convenient that you got in there without having to fork over the hefty admission fee.”

“I was sponsored.”

“By Weston.”

“I didn’t know it was him when he approached me.”

“You went after Damon Michaels like a heat-seeking missile,” Pierce accused.

“I was looking out for Keen.”

“The subject of your photography obsession.”

“I said I wanted to fuck her already.”

“I think the words you used were ‘fancied her’ but let’s not quibble.” Pierce sighed. “I’ve gotta be honest with you, Joe. You’ve not exactly acted like a man courting a woman.”

Cawfield wouldn’t look at me. “Keen’s not the courting type. She’s the fucking type. That’s what Michaels does, isn’t it, Keen?” He still wasn’t looking at me.

“He’s a hundred times the man you are, shithead,” I said steadily.

He offered me a glare and then remembered he wasn’t looking at me.

I stepped forward. Pierce met my gaze with a warning look of his own. I ignored him, the clock was ticking, and if Weston was manipulating Cawfield, we needed to find his trigger. At the very least, we needed to try to break the PSYOPS training.

“So, when you thought about fucking me, Joe,” I said softly. “How was it going to go? Hot and fast or slow and steady?”

“I said fuck not love, you dumb cunt.”

I could see Pierce fisting his hands, but he held back. I’d hit a button. Maybe not a trigger, but Cawfield had reacted. With crassness, but still… he’d reacted.

He was now looking directly at me.

“So, hard and heavy,” I said, moving closer. My hand was wrapped around the pepper spray inside my purse. I kept Cawfield’s eyes on my face by licking my lips suggestively. “In the locker room at CIB?”

He said nothing but didn’t look away again. “Over the hood of my car?”

Still nothing but I got a twitch above his eyebrow.

“Your car maybe?” Nothing. “No.” I circled him. “Definitely a car, though.” I stopped in front of him again. “What did he promise you? That he’d get rid of Damon and you could fuck me all you liked?”

“Who?”

“Maybe he promised you Damon’s HEAT truck. Did you want to fuck me on the back seat of Damon’s HEAT truck, Joe?”

He abruptly stood up and stepped towards me. I pulled the pepper spray out but held off using it for now.

“Weston uses hypnosis, Joe,” I whispered. “Did you know that?”

He blinked at me. The rest of the locker room was forgotten.

“Maybe you can’t help wanting to fuck me, but you really don’t want to so your mind is rebelling; fighting your body — what a quandary. You don’t know whether to fuck me or frame me for something. Get rid of me from CIB. I’m not one of the boys. Not really. Good for fucking but not for working with, is that it?”

“Daddy’s little girl,” he growled, glaring at me.

“You don’t want to fuck me, do you, Joe?” I said.

He stepped closer. Not too close, but close enough to make my heart beat faster. I noticed Pierce step closer too, in my periphery. But Cawfield didn’t. He was too focused on me. On this. This confrontation we should have had months ago.

“I want to stick it to you so badly, Keen,” he growled. “To wipe that smug look off your face when I make you swallow it all down. I want to rip your clothes off like the whore you are. I want to make you gag on it. I want to hold you down and fuck you in that fucker’s car. I want the smell of sex to permeate through the upholstery. I want him to find us. Me with my cock shoved down your throat. You with your skin pink from being spanked so hard you jizzed all over his precious little HEAT truck. I want him to know that I can take what’s his and he can do fuck all about it. I want to fuck with you both. How’d you like that, you fucking whore?”

I blinked. Pierce let out a muttered oath. And then Cawfield stepped back and said, “You’re a right bitch, you know that? Go fuck yourself, Detective.”

It seemed slightly out of whack with the reality we’d just witnessed. As if he were suddenly a different person.

I could feel my fingers shake around the pepper spray can. I could hear my breaths saw in and out of my mouth.

Cawfield was a dick. But this?

I looked at Pierce.

“Jesus fucking Christ, Joe,” he muttered. “What the fuck am I to do with that?”

“What?” Cawfield snapped. “You know she can be a bitch too, don’t deny it.”

“But, Joe? Rip her clothes off? Make her gag? In Michaels’ fucking ute? Jesus, I have to write this up, and you know it.”

“What are you talking about?” He looked confused. And worried. Like he’d looked confused and worried when we’d initially cornered him.

When he’d been ranting his fantasies to me, he hadn’t looked the slightest bit confused and worried.

I stepped forward. Cawfield watched me warily.

“You just told us what you wanted to do to me,” I said. “And it involved humiliation, rape, exhibitionism, and getting back at Damon for unknown reasons.”

“Why the fuck would I be concerned with that wanker?”

“That’s what you take from what Keen just said?” Pierce demanded.

“I didn’t say any of that other shit!” Cawfield shouted.

Pierce stilled. I stilled.

Someone banged on the door to the locker room.

“Go away!” Pierce shouted.

“This is Management. I’m opening up the door.”

The lock clicked, and a spotty faced teenager stared at us, shifting slightly from foot to foot.

“Girls aren’t allowed in here,” he mumbled.

Pierce flashed his badge. “CIB business. We won’t be long.” He closed the door in the kid’s face. “That was lucky,” he said. “Thought we’d have to deal with Conan the Barbarian or something.”

None of us smiled at the joke.

I stared at Cawfield.

“Joe,” I said. “What do you remember saying to me?”

“Fuck you, Keen.”

“It’s important.”

“Everything is fucking important to you — Hart’s little golden girl. Shit, Carl thought the sun shone out of your arse. No one got a look in when you turned up.”

“You failed the sergeant’s exam all on your own, Joe,” Pierce told him.

“Fuck you, too, Sarge.”

“What do you remember saying, Joe?” I pressed.

He stared at me. Something must have clicked in that thick skull of his.

“I…,” he said. He blinked. Shook his head. And then let out a snarl and fisted his hands again.

I stepped back. I hadn’t meant to. But the guy looked unhinged right then.

“Fucking little whore,” he growled low. “Time to earn your keep.”

I was so shocked when he reached into his drawstring shorts to pull out an admittedly limp cock that I hesitated. Pierce pulled his sidearm. But he wouldn’t have fired. Not in such an enclosed space. And not when we both realised this was not Joe Cawfield, CIB Detective.

But someone else entirely.

Shit, we’d got it wrong. Or right. It depended on how you looked at it. Cawfield was the CIB traitor, and he was heavily under Weston’s influence.

I lifted the pepper spray at the last second and depressed the nozzle.

Bitter, stringent smelling chemicals poured out, directly into Cawfield’s eyes at close range. He was so close that when he stumbled, he banged into me and the pepper spray went wide; painting a streak across the locker room.

Pierce shouted something. Cawfield screamed. I felt my eyes start to sting, but I refused to shut them.

And then the sound of fifty-thousand volts of electricity arced through the air and Cawfield’s body stiffened. He hit the floor with a crack while Pierce tried not to rub at the tears that streaked down his face from his red-rimmed eyes with his free hand.

The other gripped the taser too tightly.

“Pepper spray?” he demanded, spitting out the stuff in question as he cried blue tinted tears.

I slipped the offending article back in my handbag, out of sight.

“Hart’s got my gun,” I muttered and stared down at a now incapacitated Joe Cawfield.

Fuck my life.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

“What Have You Got, Sport? Talk To Me. Dazzle Me With Your Detecting.”

Hart pushed into the observation room, but I didn’t take my eyes off Joe Cawfield sitting back straight, face a mask of fury, behind the desk in Interview Room One opposite Pierce as he interrogated him. Cawfield was still painted in blue from the pepper spray. The detective sergeant had cleaned himself up some. Both, though, had red-rimmed eyes.

Hart stopped beside me and watched the proceedings in silence.

“So far,” Pierce said over the tinny speakers, “we’ve determined you’ve been tracing Keen’s GPS signal for a week. But your… difficulties with the detective started a long time before that.”

“She’s not a detective anymore,” Cawfield muttered.

“Answer the question.”

“What question?”

“Why start tracing her GPS signal only a week ago?”

“I didn’t.”

“Explain.”

“It wasn’t me.”

“So, the dog ate your homework, that’s what you’re going with? Come on, Joe, you can do better than that.”

“Screw you, Sarge. Clearly, she’s said something that’s got you in a tizzy. Her word against mine, right?”

“Your login and password were used to access the GPS system.” Pierce pushed a printout across the desk. “You knew exactly where she was going when you needed to, didn’t you? How did you get Carl to Mellons Bay Cliffs before she got there?”

“What the fuck? I had nothing to do with Carl’s death!”

Pierce ignored him. “That’s how you knew she’d just left Rachel Myers’ house. That’s how you knew she hadn’t been there before. You knew it was a big step for Keen, so you knew to watch her closely. And when she turned the car around and started towards Howick, you knew exactly where she was going.”

Cawfield said nothing.

“Did you have Carl stashed somewhere in the eastern suburbs? Half Moon Bay? Howick itself? He was a big man. Subduing him and getting him under wraps without being seen would have been a tall task. Carl knew how to defend himself. Is that why you had him stashed somewhere close enough to Mellons Bay to get him there before Keen arrived?”

Cawfield shook his head. “I didn’t do this, Sarge.”

“But you just went off your rocker at Keen at Les Mills. Called her a whore. Told her you wanted to make her gag on your dick.”

Cawfield looked uncomfortable.

“You said you wanted to spank her until her skin was pink and she - and I quote here - ‘jizzed all over his precious HEAT truck.’ That’s what you said, Joe. ‘Jizzed all over his precious HEAT truck.’”

“Stop saying that,” he growled.

“But you said it. To Keen. In front of me. You even pulled your dick out as if you wanted to fuck her right then and there. In front of me.”

Cawfield turned sideways in his chair, staring at the wall. Pink washed his cheeks. He was sweating profusely.

Hart reached forward and switched the speakers off.

“What do you make of this, Detective?” he asked.

I didn’t have my badge or gun back. I thought perhaps the only thing holding Hart back from returning them to me was the fact I’d possibly use my gun to shoot Cawfield in the dick with it.

I shook my head.

“Not like you to not have an opinion,” he said gruffly.

“It’s a lot to take in, sir.”

“What does your gut say?”

“I’m not sure we can trust my gut, sir.”

“Because you thought it wasn’t him and it clearly is him?”

“Because I thought it was him all along and then it wasn’t him, and now it clearly is him.”

Hart said nothing.

“I don’t like it,” he finally muttered.

I didn’t either, because there was no denying that Cawfield had two personalities.

“Have you had him psych assessed?” I queried.

“Got someone from the hospital on their way over now.”

“Not Hennessey?”

“No. Not Hennessey. I think we can all assume that Andrew Hennessey is compromised.”

I stared through the one-way glass. Pierce was talking. Cawfield was scowling and saying nothing. He’d lawyer up before too much longer.

“It wasn’t him in the gym and yet it was him, sir,” I said, still looking at the scene through the glass.

“Go on.”

“How long have we known of Weston’s existence?”

“We’ve known for little more than a few months,” he said. “But HEAT has known for a lot longer.”

I sighed. Weston might have got to Cawfield back when I first dated Damon. A backup for if he needed to use me against Carole’s brother. Damon and I had gone our separate ways back then, though, so Cawfield had remained a sleeper cell for the time being.

Then Damon and I hooked up again, and Crazy Cawfield came out to play.

But we’d had a CIB traitor for a lot longer.

Kenny Tyndall was thought to be a simple mugger. Someone who took advantage of Carl’s isolation in the carpark overlooking Mellons Bay Cliffs that night. But I’d always suspected that he’d been put up to it. By the Crown Prosecutor maybe.

But how would he have known Carl was there unless he was able to get into the Central Police GPS system?

I turned to a terminal in the corner of the room and booted it up. Hart had switched the speakers back on when he finally realised I wasn’t going to answer his question. I could hear Cawfield denying all accusations and Pierce steadily chipping away at him with a sharply honed chisel in the background.

I logged into the GPS system and then entered the back door that took us to the permissions section. I scrolled back through the months until I found Carl’s last entry. The last time he’d signed out a police-issued sedan.

I stared at the tracking. At the login and password used to see where Carl would be that night. I stared at it for a long time.

It wasn’t Cawfield’s.

It was mine.

I looked up at the one-way mirror. Cawfield had lawyered up because Pierce was packing up his shit and making a move to exit the room. Cawfield was staring at the glass as if he could see me. His gaze was slightly off, but he knew I was there.

I hadn’t tracked Carl once in the years that I’d partnered him in CIB. I hadn’t ever tracked anyone.

I looked back down at the computer screen.

My name. My rank. My ID and password.

What the fuck did that mean?

Pierce walked into the observation room. “He’s lawyered up,” he said immediately.

“What do you think?” Hart asked.

“Oh, he’s guilty. Guilty of something.”

“Having it in for a coworker?” Hart pressed.

“That and more. I’m placing my money on him being our traitor.”

Hart sighed. “All right then. Detective Keen, you’re reinstated. There’s no point keeping you out of CIB now. You can pick up your badge and gun from the watch officer. Welcome back.”

I nodded, feeling numb.

“Detective Sergeant, let’s keep this as quiet as we can for now,” Hart said. “Weston will know, but we don’t need a stampede inside the Bureau.”

“Understood, sir.”

“Charge him as soon as his lawyer shows up.” Hart moved toward the door. “This is a sad day for CIB.” He shook his head; his shoulders stooped slightly. He’d have superior officers to advise and placate somehow. I didn’t envy him his job in the slightest.

One of our own turning traitor. It was worse than one of our own going rogue. Thoughts of Carl pulled me full circle again.

Who would want to have Carl followed and killed other than the Crown Prosecutor?

One name stood out. Declan King. But Declan King was dead.

Who had stepped into the vacuum?

“Keen? You all right?” Pierce asked.

I switched the computer off.

“I’m worried about what Weston will do now,” I said.

“We’ll put pressure on Joe as soon as his lawyer turns up. You want in on the interview?”

I nodded.

“OK. Grab a bite to eat. It’ll take an hour or so for the legalities to get set in stone and then we’re on. Bring your A Game, Detective.”

Pierce exited the room. I stood and stared at the floor, trying to think.

I was missing something. And desperately in need of a whiteboard. There was one in Meeting Room C; it was hardly ever used. I’d set myself up there and get started.

I grabbed a Coke and a bag of chips from the vending machine in the hall and snuck into Meeting Room C. It smelled a bit musty, so I opened a window and let the harsh sounds of Auckland City soothe my jagged nerves.

I was missing something.

I started on the cases we had so far linked together, even if the links were tenuous for some of them. Hennessey being blackmailed. Stretch being abducted. Carl being killed. I drew a line down and to the side and placed Angelo being killed in a bubble and underlined Arson in capital letters. Then I wrote Joe Cawfield’s name on the board under the heading of manipulation.

Manipulation. Blackmail. Abduction. Murder.

Cawfield’s manipulation came first in the timeline, of course. Before he was even needed.

Hennessey was used to get me sidelined from CIB next. Why bother, though, if Weston had Cawfield? I pushed that errant thought aside.

Stretch was then taken when we’d organised HEAT to assist me.

And Carl was killed when I finally visited Rachel.

I stared at the board. What linked them other than our belief Weston was behind it all?

Not Damon. Not directly. But me.

I stepped back.

Weston wanted revenge on Damon; that was a given. Damon had taken Carole from him; Weston’s Achille’s heel. He wasn’t above using me to get to Damon. But the cases listed on the whiteboard before me were triggered by something other than the ongoing and long-held vengeance Weston wanted on Damon.

I went back to the beginning. The manipulation of Cawfield wasn’t used until just recently. A week ago he had started tracking my GPS signal. A week ago, I’d been doing what?

About to get suspended from CIB. But before that?

I’d eaten out at Angelo’s twice. Damon and I had spent every night together. Pierce had silently placed the sergeant’s exam admission papers on my desk in CIB. My father had been nominated for an award, and I’d not received an invitation to attend it. I’d been trying to connect Weston to something, anything that would lead to Carole Michaels and asking lots of questions on the streets. I’d been partnered with Trevor Jones for a B&E and spent half the time listening to him regale me about his beloved wife. I shared a drink with the boys at the Birdcage on the Thursday. And I saw Eagle on the Friday and asked him about the latest drugs to hit the street.

I remembered thinking maybe I shouldn’t. We’d been trying to get Eagle off whatever Weston had used to crack into his head; to manipulate him into Sweet Hell and the Irreverent Inferno. But we all needed some normality, and if Eagle had heard I’d asked anyone else, it could have sent him back weeks.

Eagle. I stepped forward and wrote his name on the board, and beside it, I wrote Trench Coat & Fedora Hat. Beside that, I wrote Eagle’s Alley, Mount Eden Prison, and Pitt Street Fire Station.

Eagle. Eagle was a nexus. Weston knew he could get to me through Eagle. And as we’d discovered, he was still able to manipulate Eagle even if Eagle was trying to break that hypnosis. Which meant, my asking about the drugs last week was important. I wrote that on the whiteboard and underlined it.

Things unravelled from there.

That’s why he got me suspended via Hennessey.

That’s why he activated Cawfield and had him track my GPS signal before the order came down. He was keeping an eye on me before he could get me out of CIB.

That’s why he had Carl killed, to incapacitate me; write me off in a quagmire of heartbreak and mental instability.

He took Stretch because I was still working on the case, and he needed me sidetracked. The halfway house was a distraction I didn’t fall for. That too went up on the whiteboard.

I looked at what I’d written.

Cawfield’s name kept leaping out at me.

Cawfield denied tracking me. And I sure as shit hadn’t tracked Carl.

I wrote Tracker up on the board.

The dots were there. Some of them connected. Some of them didn’t.

I sighed and leaned back against the table, trying to see the bigger picture.

Cawfield was the CIB traitor. He had to be. Manipulated by Weston, unaware of what he was doing, but still, the one who was letting Weston know everything we were doing before we were even doing it.

My eyes snagged on the word Tracker.

I hadn’t tracked Carl.

This didn’t make sense.

A throat clearing behind me caught my attention.

“Hey, Keen?” Trevor Jones said. “Pierce is lookin’ for you.”

“Oh, thanks,” I said, packing things up and turning the whiteboard around so it wouldn’t be obvious to anyone who peeked into the room quickly.

I walked out, and Trevor fell into step beside me.

“How’s the wife?” I asked.

“Oh, you know,” he said chewing his toothpick manically. “Tryin’ a new drug. Got high hopes for this one.”

I had no idea how he did it; kept up a cheerful façade; kept turning up for work day in and day out; kept forking over thousands of dollars for treatments that didn’t work.

“So, what’re you and Pierce workin’ on?” he asked.

“Weston,” I said.

“Thought you’d been suspended. Not that any of us agreed with Hart on that. Bureaucracy at its best, right, Keen?”

“You got that right.”

“So, you’re back?”

“Seems like it.”

“‘Bout time,” he muttered. Then tipped his hat. “Detective,” he said with a wink.

I smiled, and we parted ways; Trevor heading towards the lifts in the hall, and me crossing the bullpen towards the interview rooms.

My mind refused to let the whiteboard go — Cawfield’s login in the GPS system next to my login in the GPS system. Cawfield was a dick. A misogynistic, chauvinistic, fucked-in-the-head, limp-dick dick.

But was he the CIB traitor dick?

“There you are,” Pierce said when he caught sight of me outside the interview room. “Your timing is perfect as usual, Keen.”

I snorted. “It wouldn’t have been if you hadn’t thought ahead and sent Trevor to find me,” I told him.

He was looking down at his files when I said that. But he looked up sharply and stared at me, one eyebrow raised in query.

“I didn’t send Trevor to find you,” Pierce said slowly.

I turned and looked back toward the lifts, but I couldn’t see him. Trevor Jones had already exited the building.

I looked back at Pierce. He waited patiently. But the look on his face said everything.

What have you got, Sport? Talk to me. Dazzle me with your detecting.

“Son of a bitch,” I said.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

“Silence Is A Golden Prison Too Many People Willingly Walk Into.”

It’s a strange thing to be part of something bigger and yet still see the small pieces of what makes it whole at work. Hart locked down CIB. Simpson worked on tracing all of Trevor Jones’ movements over the past few weeks. Someone else checked over the evidence locker to confirm nothing had been tampered with. Another detective started going through Trevor’s open case files, including the halfway house and Stretch’s abduction. Cawfield was still locked away in an interview room with his lawyer. He hadn’t been charged yet, but we couldn’t be sure that Trevor was just a blackmail piece of Weston’s pattern puzzle and not manipulated.

Which would mean a manipulation puzzle piece was still needed and that could still be Cawfield.

I watched it all from my desk in the centre of the bullpen and tapped a pencil against my thigh as I contemplated things. We needed to confirm how Cawfield was tied up in all of this. My personal hatred of the man aside; he had clearly acted strangely at the gym. Was he just a patsy? I hadn’t tracked Carl that night, so was Cawfield telling the truth when he said he hadn’t tracked me?

Despite all of that, he had been a massive arsehole at Les Mills Gym. I mean, whipping out his pecker in front of Pierce. That was not normal, even for Joe Cawfield.

I reached forward and swiped my cellphone off my desk and dialled a now familiar number. I got the dragon on the second ring. Some indeterminate amount of time later, a few halfhearted barbs at each other which I think we were both well and truly sick and tired of by now, and I was talking to Nick.

“Detective,” he said in that smooth, deep voice of his. “To what do I owe this dubious pleasure?”

I smiled into the phone. Three things I could always rely on: death, taxes, and Nick Anscombe having a go at me.

“I need your spooks,” I said without preamble.

“They’re not my spooks,” he shot back. “And stop calling them spooks!”

“I need to know if one of our detectives has been PSYOPSed,” I said, ignoring his outburst. “And your spooks would be able to tell.”

“Jesus Christ, you’re a pain in the arse.”

I looked around the bullpen as detectives hurried to do Hart’s bidding; faces set in hard lines, heads down, not making eye contact. Having one member of the boys’ club under suspicion was bad enough. Having two? It was getting to them, and the sooner we got this sorted, the sooner we could all move forward with the investigation.

Jones would be in the wind. And finding him was imperative. Hart would have the guys in Computer Forensics scouring the CCTV footage across Auckland City. They were good at what they did. Very good. But were they Amber or Eric Shaw good?

“I also need your tech geeks’ assistance,” I said.

I half expected Anscombe to tell me to stop calling them geeks, but he remained silent.

“I need a detective found,” I told him.

“Fuck,” he muttered. “Does Hart know you’re asking me to do this?”

“No. Pierce doesn’t either.”

“Pierce is currently not taking my calls,” Nick said sullenly.

“Why do you want to talk to him?”

He sighed. “Somethings brewing on Radar.”

The radar was the underground network of informants that people like Anscombe used to stay ahead of the Police. You had to walk a little on the shady side of the legal line to be able to use it. There were some detectives in some Bureaus throughout New Zealand who could possibly get a foothold on the Radar and use it occasionally. But most, if not all, of Auckland Central CIB would be out.

The Radar had haunted Detective Inspector Hart for years.

“I see,” I said.

“Oh, don’t give me that holier-than-thou attitude, Keen. You know you’ve used my contacts in the past.”

“What you do with Pierce is your own deal. Keep me out of it.”

“And if your name came up on Radar?”

“Has it?”

“Carl’s has.”

Nick was baiting me. Stirring up shit the only way he knew how. Our relationship would never be a friendly one. He pushed. I pushed back harder.

“Can you send the spooks over?” I asked, purposely calling them ‘spooks’ and not by name. “And get the geeks to search for Trevor Jones.”

“Jones?” Nick sounded surprised. I didn’t blame him. Trevor Jones was way the hell out of left field. The good old boy cowboy cop. My heart hurt even thinking about it.

“Yeah. Looks like it.”

“Huh,” Anscombe muttered. “I thought it was a shadow, but maybe not.”

“What are you waffling about now?” I demanded.

“Radar.”

He was losing me.

I said nothing because silence is a golden prison too many people willingly walk into.

Nick said nothing. The silence stretched.

“Fucking hell,” he muttered, eventually making me grin. “You’re as bad as Pierce.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“So you should. OK. Charlie and Ava are on their way to CIB. Eric is on Jones. Amber’s on her day off, but I’ll call her in if I need to. And as for the shadow, it’s a hit on Radar that you don’t believe. One that’s so incongruent that it’s likely been used as a distraction technique.”

“Shit,” I said.

“Yeah. Your boy Jones was the shadow. Some shit about a drug exchange that seemed so out of the ordinary that I ignored it. I’ll look into it further and let you know.”

“Thanks,” I said, trying to think.

“And for God’s sake, tell Pierce to answer his fucking phone.”

The line went dead.

I pocketed my cellphone and rose to my feet. Hart was going to have kittens when he heard I’d invited two former spooks into CIB. Not that I was sure Ava was a former anything but Charlie, I thought, had moved on from that life.

I shook my head and knocked on the doorframe to Hart’s office. He’d kept his door open, which could mean anything from availability to watching us like hawks. His tie, though, was slightly crooked.

I swallowed nervously and walked in when he looked up.

“You have something for me, Detective?” he asked gruffly.

“Where are we with Cawfield?”

“He can stew for a bit. I want Jones back in here ASAP. We need to start showing some progress on this thing.”

He was getting pressured from above, and it was cracking his normally unflappable façade.

This was going to shake things up nicely.

“We don’t know whether Jones has been blackmailed or manipulated, sir. Which means we don’t know if Cawfield is the manipulation pattern piece. It could be important to make that distinction.”

Hart sat back in his chair and studied me.

“What did you have in mind?” he asked quietly.

“Weston is PSYOPS trained. He’s an ex-spook, sir. No one knows him better than another spook.”

“Tell me you didn’t contact that arsehole Anscombe and pull in Charlie Downes for this.”

“I contacted that arsehole Anscombe and pulled in not only Downes by someone called Ava who was definitely a spook at some stage and could quite possibly still be one now… Sir.”

He rubbed a hand over his face.

Then he pointed a finger directly at my head.

“This is on you, Detective. You meet them at the front door. You accompany them wherever they go in the building. You do not let them out of your sight, and you make damn sure they don’t get a glimpse of what we’re doing in here. No case files, no computer screens, no cellphone calls in their immediate vicinity. Do I make myself clear?”

“Crystal, sir.”

“Then get on it. And God help us if this blows up in our face. Fucking spooks! What’s the fucking world coming to? How the fuck did it come to this? Jesus fucking Christ!”

I left him shouting obscenities and walked back out into the bullpen.

Every single detective in the room stared at me in horror.

“What. Did. You. Do?” Pierce all but whisper-shouted at me.

“Return Anscombe’s calls,” I told him and walked out of the room.

The spooks were waiting for me at the main reception area to Central Police. The cop on the front desk was attempting to buzz me up in CIB. He looked a little flustered. I narrowed my eyes at the women.

“This way,” I said, directing them through the x-ray machine and into the heart of Central Police.

Neither of them set the machine off, but I wasn’t naive enough to think they weren’t armed in some fashion. Ava smiled sweetly at the desk jockey, but thankfully Charlie was all ice. I was strangely more comfortable with Charlie than Ava. Which might have explained the way Anscombe behaved around them, too.

As we traversed the corridors to the lifts, I could feel both of their eyes on me — a bullseye right between the shoulder blades. I refused to show any discomfort and leaned forward and pressed the button to call the lift without glancing back at them once.

“Could use some updated decor,” Ava said.

“We’re about to break ground on a new building,” I told her.

“How long have you been in this one?”

“Over fifty years.” It’d be a sad day when Central Police moved to College Hill. But I certainly wouldn’t miss the stained carpet and scuffed walls and extraordinarily slow elevators.

The doors to said elevators swung open on creaky wheels in dirty tracks. I stepped in and felt the box shudder. Ava delicately stepped over the track and looked around with a moue of distaste on her brightly painted lips. Charlie leaned casually against the wall; I guessed the leather of her jacket protected her some, but I still grimaced slightly.

Maybe we wouldn’t be too sad to leave Cook Street after all.

The lift began to rise.

“So, how are you, Detective?” Ava asked sweetly.

I stared at her. It had to be an act; this upbeat, sweet as pie, nothing wouldn’t melt in the mouth persona. She was a stone-cold killer; I was sure of it.

“Shit’s just hit the fan,” I said and saw Charlie smile out of the corner of my eye. “We’ve got one detective in lockup who we suspect has been manipulated by Weston and another on the run who could be simply a blackmail victim or another manipulation. We need to know what we’re dealing with.”

“And you want our opinion?” Ava asked.

“You’re the spooks.”

The air chilled several degrees, and yet the woman hadn’t stopped smiling sweetly. Alarm bells clanged inside my head and my primitive fight or flight reflexes kicked in big time. No. Not just a pretty face. Lethal. That’s what Ava the Spook was.

“You don’t like being called that?” I asked, doing my damnedest not to show any emotions. Thankfully, I’d been raised by the best. I might not have been PSYOPS trained and abused like these two had, but I’d had the King of Ice as my dad.

Ava slowly arched a brow and then laughed. “Just messing with you. Nicky responds with much more vigour than you do, Detective. You’re absolutely no fun at all.”

“You’ve been pulling his leg?” I asked.

“And it’s such a nice leg, too.”

I laughed. “Nice one.”

“But on a completely unrelated note,” Ava said. And suddenly I had a sharp composite blade against my throat. “Don’t underestimate me, Lara. It could be the very last thing you ever do.”

“How did you get that blade through the x-ray?” I said carefully.

The blade disappeared, and I didn’t even see where it went.

“What blade?”

Fuck me. I swallowed and rubbed at my neck. She hadn’t broken skin, but I couldn’t for the life of me stop myself from checking.

“You’re fucked in the head,” I whispered as the lift came to rest at our floor.

“We all are a little, aren’t we?”

She stepped off, and Charlie slowly followed. She patted me on the shoulder but said nothing to reassure me. Nick Anscombe might be a pain in the arse, but he was an astute pain in the arse. I’d never doubt his assessment on spook-related things ever again.

I pushed myself into motion and led the… ex-spies down the hallway to Interview Room Three, the only one you could access without entering the bullpen proper. I knocked twice on the door and pushed it open. Cawfield sat behind the desk looking tired, and his lawyer was pacing. The suit stopped in his tracks and scowled at me.

“Detective,” he snapped. “About time. My client has been waiting for hours. This is unacceptable treatment for one of your own.” His gaze landed on Ava and Charlie as they entered the room behind me. “Who are these two?” he demanded.

I closed the door behind the spooks before speaking.

“Joe,” I said. “How’re you doing?”

“Fuck you, Keen.”

“What is the meaning of this?” the lawyer asked.

I stepped to the side and waved a hand at Cawfield, looking at Ava and Charlie. “All yours,” I said.

“Now, hold on a minute!” the lawyer shouted. “If you have questions to ask my client, I want them on the record. Start the tapes.”

I did nothing.

“Who the hell are you people?” the lawyer snapped.

Charlie moved to the wall opposite Cawfield and leaned back. She looked like a lethal leather clad goddess. Ava pulled out a chair on our side of the table and sat, long legs crossed at the knees and red lacquered nails tapping on the table’s surface. The lawyer swallowed visibly.

“I want it on record that this is highly inappropriate,” he said. “Whatever is discussed in here has no legal standing. I will not allow my client to be abused in such a fashion.”

“Sit down,” Ava said, not taking her eyes off Cawfield who was already sitting. The softly spoken words had been for the lawyer. “And shut up.”

The lawyer did what she asked. I cocked an eyebrow.

“Joe, is it?” Ava asked.

“Who’s asking?” Cawfield drawled.

“My name is Ava.”

“Well, hello there, Ava,” Cawfield said smirking. His eyes darted to me and then back.

“Are you having fun?” she asked him sweetly.

“A hell of a lot more fun now,” he said and winked.

“What did you do to end up in here?”

“Fucked with the wrong detective.”

Ava offered a frown to show her dislike of his language.

“Sorry,” he muttered. Cawfield never apologised. I sniggered. “Fuck you, Keen!” he shouted.

Ava bit her lip. “Sit with me, Detective,” she said, pulling the chair beside her out and patting it.

Getting closer to the spook, and by extension, her composite blade, was not welcomed, but I did what she asked; she’d have a reason.

After making myself comfortable, I met Cawfield’s eyes. They blazed with anger. And not just a little desire. I felt dirty just being here.

“You like her,” Ava said.

“I can’t stand her guts,” Cawfield replied.

“But you want her,” Ava pushed.

“Who wouldn’t? She’s got a fine arse.”

“Just her arse?”

“I like her mouth too; get a hard-on just thinking about it.”

“Joe,” the lawyer cautioned.

Ava looked at the suit. “Nothing said in here is legally binding. You said so yourself. Relax, Mr Smithers. This will all be over very soon, and you can go home to your wife and son and dog. Poodle, I believe. Named Sophie?”

He stared at her, his mouth hanging open, sweat beading his brow.

I glanced at Charlie. She was ice. I looked back at the woman at my side. She smiled sweetly.

Fucking hell.

I did nothing because we needed this. In bed with a crazy spook who could slit our throats in a heartbeat and not break out in a sweat.

“Are you all like this?” I asked. “Like him?”

The smile turned sharp, almost brittle. “He created us, Detective. What do you think?”

I felt a little sick.

The smile turned sweet again as if a light switch had been flicked.

“Joe,” she said. “What else do you like about Detective Keen?”

Joe scowled at her, his eyes flicking briefly to me; a question there.

She’d lost him. The lawyer had derailed things. This could get messy.

Ava shot the lawyer a look of annoyance. Charlie moved to stand behind the suit silently. The lawyer looked like he was about to piss his pants. Charlie placed a hand on his shoulder and squeezed. It didn’t look hard, but the lawyer turned whiter than a sheet.

His silence was guaranteed from here on in.

My eyes met Cawfield’s.

“Nice friends you’ve got there, Keen,” he said.

“You don’t know the half of it, dickhead.”

Ava’s smiled twitched, and Joe predictably went off the deep end.

“God, you’re a bitch!” he snarled.

“But you like her,” Ava said in that sweet sing-song voice. “You want her.”

“I want her,” he said, suddenly looking like Crazy Cawfield again.

I couldn’t believe how quickly he transformed. Did all it take was me pushing back at him?

“What do you want to do to her, Joe?” Ava asked sweetly.

Cawfield leaned forward over the table and looked directly at me.

“I want to make her bleed.”

“A knife?” Ava pulled her blade from somewhere and placed it between us on the table.

I stilled. The lawyer whimpered. Cawfield looked at the blade as if he couldn’t make out what it was.

He looked back up at me. Then his hand slowly reached out and picked the blade up off the table top.

I stood up and pushed my chair back to give me space to manoeuvre.

“This could work,” he said, eyeing me evilly. “It’d be bigger than his dick in any case, eh, Keen?”

“Whose dick, Joe?” Ava asked, leaning back in her seat and checking her nail polish.

I glared at her. The lunatic had a knife and was clearly gearing up to use it.

I searched out Charlie. She stared back at me as cold as the Antarctic.

“His,” Joe snarled. “That fucker’s. The one who fucks her like she’s a whore.”

“She’s not a whore, Joe,” Ava said.

“Yes, she is. A fucking whore who needs a good fucking.”

“And you’re the one to give it to her?” Ava asked, moving onto her other fingernails for inspection.

“Yes. Dumb cunt won’t know what hits her.”

My eye caught Charlie’s. She nodded her head toward Cawfield in a gesture I could only take to mean I needed to engage him. But engaging him right now seemed suicidal.

“Lara,” Ava said, taking the bull by the horns. “Surely you’re not going to let him get away with that?”

“Chance would be a fine thing,” I muttered.

“Little whore wants it badly,” Cawfield said eerily.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” I said, snapping completely. This was way too bizarre to let continue.

“Nothing,” Cawfield spat, spittle flying everywhere. “Not once I teach you a lesson.”

He rounded the table. I stepped back against the far wall. Charlie kept her hand on the lawyer who was miraculously making a move to come to my aid. Ava looked up from her nails but didn’t stand.

“Why?” she said.

“Because I want him to know I can take what’s his and he can do fuck all about it.”

I stopped breathing. He’d said that exact same thing back in the gym when he’d gone off his rocker.

Like he was off his rocker now.

“Jesus,” I whispered and Cawfield launched himself at me.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

“To Catch A Thief, You Must First Think Like A Thief, Correct?”

The next sixty seconds were the longest in my life and also the craziest. And that was saying something. Ava moved. I mean, one second she was seated, the next she had Cawfield in a choke hold. She said something in Latin. But he kept fighting her, trying to reach me. She said something else, also in Latin. When that didn’t get the reaction she expected, she tried another sentence. And then another and another, until finally, she hit on one that seemed to do the trick.

Cawfield simply sucked in a breath of air and went limp in her arms.

“Fuck,” Charlie muttered, the first time she’d spoken since we’d walked in here. I looked over and noticed the lawyer was out cold, too.

“Did he faint?” I asked.

She looked at me as if I were an idiot. Ah, not faint, then. She’d incapacitated him so he wouldn’t see or hear what Ava was doing.

I looked back at the scariest woman I had ever met in my life and said nothing. Ava slowly lifted her head from gazing at Cawfield contemplatively and looked me in the eye.

“He has been through PSYOPS training similar to ours,” she declared. “He is not aware of what he’s doing or saying when provoked by you.”

I shook my head. “Cawfield and I have been at each other’s throats for years. This…” I indicated the room, him, everything that had just happened. “This is totally different.”

“Yes. There is a trigger.”

“What’s the trigger?”

“It’s… complicated,” she hedged.

“I’m somewhat intelligent; I’m sure I’ll keep up.”

She scowled at me; it seemed the most natural expression I’d seen so far. I still didn’t trust it. “It’s a combination of things. You calling him some derogatory name in conjunction with a certain topic of conversation.”

I stared at her.

“Any topic that includes being attracted to you,” Charlie explained, “and you shutting him down with disdainful and disparaging language.”

“Weston can do that?”

Ava stood up and dusted herself off. “He can do a lot of things.”

I rubbed my temples. “So, if Cawfield is the manipulated pattern puzzle piece, that means Jones is being blackmailed like Hennessey.”

“Why do you assume there is only one pattern?” Ava asked.

“Because it’s what he’s done before. He’s a creature of habit.”

“Oh, no, Detective. Weston, as you call him, is not a creature of habit. He’s a creature of deception. He’ll do whatever he needs to do to make you think what he wants you to think and then he’ll use it against you.”

“That complicates things,” I muttered. “But he’s used this pattern for years.”

“Time is irrelevant; success is all that matters.”

“Carole Michaels came into his life a year ago. His pattern of behaviour had been well established by then,” I argued.

“The pattern he allows the world at large to see may well have been,” Ava said calmly. “But those parts of the puzzle he keeps hidden are the key.”

“And what are they?” I asked.

She sat back in the chair at the table, ignoring the snoring men out cold on the floor at her feet. Charlie was leaning against a wall again, propping it up and saying nothing.

“You say Carole Michaels is the reason behind his revenge on her brother,” Ava said. “That this revenge is what motivates Weston and that’s why he has targeted you to get at Damon Michaels.”

I nodded. It hadn’t been a question, but I felt like she expected an acknowledgement of her assessment. I wasn’t surprised that she could sum up the situation in a couple of sentences, though. This woman was scary.

“What if it is not?” Ava said succinctly.

“Then we’re screwed,” I admitted. “Because I’ve got nothing.”

Ava looked at Charlie, who after a silent communication of sorts had been completed, nodded her head.

“Five years ago,” Ava said quietly, “Weston was ostracised from our department for an experiment that went wrong. He’d always been a loose cannon. He had sideline interests that although did not run counter to our directives could have caused us problems.”

“In Wellington,” I said.

“Yes,” she agreed.

We knew Weston could be linked to certain crimes in Wellington before he moved to Auckland. And we could also place him in Auckland as far back as four years ago when Gregg Arnold Mansfield was accused of abducting Lisa Devon. Had he moved here when things went bad for him in Spookville?

“How are abduction and murder not counter to your directives?” I asked.

“It’s complicated.”

“Then uncomplicate it for me,” I demanded.

“You do not have the clearance, so don’t ask me that again.”

I scowled at her.

She smiled sweetly.

“In any case,” she went on, “it was a severe blow to the Department.” I thought perhaps the D in Department had been a capital letter. “Without him, certain PSYOPS agents were left without adequate supervision. Those outside the immediate control of our director started to fracture. It soon became obvious which agents had received the standard PSYOPS training and which had received Weston’s experimental efforts.”

“He experimented on his own people?” I asked, disgusted.

“Indeed,” Ava said in agreement and with equal disgust. “One of those people was a man we had investigating underground activities in Auckland City. He went rogue.”

I stared at her, starting to see a bigger picture. But surely, that picture wasn’t right.

“Who was he?” I said, my words whisper quiet.

Ava looked at me without an ounce of shame and said, “You knew him as Declan King.”

Son of a bitch.

I turned away and started pacing.

“King was on the scene here in Auckland for years,” I told her.

“Yes.”

“You placed him here?”

“Our director did.”

“He was a criminal mastermind. A drug lord.”

“Yes.”

“He was responsible for the deaths of dozens of people over those years.”

“Yes.”

“Why?” I shouted at her. “What possible purpose would a criminal drug runner serve being in your stable?”

She cocked her head at me. “To catch a thief, you must first think like a thief, correct?”

“King didn’t catch anyone! He was the kingpin. The boss. No one was bigger than him to catch; you fucking freaks!”

“But how much smaller fish did he fry because he was in charge?”

“Pushing drugs in our city!”

I was almost screaming. Loud enough that someone heard the ruckus out in the bullpen. The lock on the door disengaged, and Pierce looked into the room.

“Everything all right in here?” His eyes scanned the space, landing first on Cawfield, then the lawyer, and then me.

Finally, he took in Charlie and Ava. He slipped into the room and shut the door at his back.

“Did I miss the party?” he asked.

“Ryan, darling,” Ava said all sweetness and light. “Where have you been?” She pouted at him as if she were put-out by his absence.

Pierce purposely ignored her and looked at me. “Lara?”

My first name, not my surname or my rank. He wanted to know if I was OK. If me, the person not the detective, was OK.

I wasn’t. Cawfield had been mind fucked. Jones might have been too, but at the very least had been blackmailed. And suddenly the expensive treatments for his wife’s cancer made sense.

Carl was dead, and Weston had created Declan King and let him loose in our city.

And now… now the bastard had stepped into Declan’s shoes. An easy transition when he’d been the one to create the drug lord in the first place and knew every little thing about his business. I couldn’t quite believe that King had been a spook puppet, but Ava had no reason to lie to me. She could have simply said nothing. And Charlie hadn’t batted an eyelid, so I had to assume she agreed with every word out of the lethally sweet spy’s mouth.

Nick Anscombe trusted Charlie Downes, and I strangely trusted Nick.

Which meant everything revealed here had an element of the truth to it.

Fuck.

“This just got big enough to drown in, Sarge,” I said.

He studied me and then pulled out a chair, completely ignoring Cawfield at his feet.

“Tell me,” he said, sitting down.

I went over everything that had happened and everything that I had deduced. Ava added a word here or there; Charlie remained mute. In the end, Pierce was scrubbing a hand over his goatee and muttering choice swearwords, and Cawfield was stirring, starting to wake up to this clusterfuck.

I disliked Joe Cawfield. I could even truthfully say I hated him. But the man was not wholly responsible for his actions in the past which made it all the more awkward. Sure, whatever Weston had done had only been recent, which meant Cawfield had been a dick a lot longer than the mind manipulation had made him into a mega dick. But still. Things had been said, had been attempted physically, and I would have to work with him.

He blinked open blurry eyes and stared up at Pierce and Charlie, who were on that side of the room; closest to him.

“Fuck, my head hurts,” he muttered. He spotted his lawyer. And then he spotted me. “You,” he said, narrowing his eyes.

What part of his behaviour was inherent and what part was the PSYOPS lie?

I didn’t have it in me to set him off again, so I didn’t answer. Instead, I looked at Charlie and asked, “Can it be reversed?”

“No,” she said. “But as we’ve discussed, it can be broken.”

“He doesn’t care enough about anyone to let them come between his programming and reality,” I told her.

She shrugged. That was all I was getting it seemed.

“Robbie could do it,” Pierce said.

“Come on, Sarge,” I countered. “Cawfield puts up with Simpson; he doesn’t love him.”

“What the fuck, Keen?” Cawfield spat.

“Don’t let your prejudice blind you, Detective,” Pierce offered quietly. “They’ve been partners for years.”

“It could work,” Ava said.

Cawfield pushed to his feet swaying. “Will someone tell me what the fuck’s going on?”

“Why were you on Ponsonby Road outside that halfway house?” Pierce asked, instead of answering him.

“Am I to be interrogated again, Sarge? My lawyer seems under the weather; I’d like to request a rain check.”

“Joe, Weston got to you. You’ve been fucked with. In the head.” Cawfield stared at Pierce as if he was mad. “Every piece of evidence you’ve ever gathered will be in question. Every crook you put away. Every case you closed. You could even drag Robbie down with you.”

On shaking legs, Cawfield took a step toward the table and then practically fell into a seat.

“But…” he managed. I almost felt sorry for the dick.

Shit. I did feel sorry for the dick.

Dammit.

“The halfway house?” Pierce pressed.

Cawfield licked his lips; probably because his throat was dry. There was no water in here, and I wasn’t about to move. If I moved, I might set the trigger off, and we’d have Crazy Cawfield again. The spook had said it was a combination of words and attraction that did it, but I couldn’t help feeling simply looking at me would lay the foundation for Round Three-Hundred-and-Whatever we were currently up to on last count.

“I found something,” he said. “When I checked the CCTV footage for the past forty-eight hours at Angelo’s before it blew up.” I tried not to flinch at the mention of my old Italian friend. “He had an argument with a guy. Twice. Both times right after Keen had been in the restaurant eating with Michaels.”

No one looked at me, least of all Cawfield, which was just as well, because I could feel myself paling, shaking. Just slightly. But enough.

“The angle wasn’t perfect; the guy knew that, I think. But he was the right height for Weston, so I dug deeper into the booking system at the restaurant and discovered he’d booked in for a meal two hours after Keen did. Both times. The phone number he’d used was for the halfway house. I was there to see if my hunch was correct.”

“You were tracking Weston, and you didn’t tell me?” Pierce asked. “Tell the detective inspector?”

“I couldn’t be certain and I…” He did look at me then and immediately glanced away. “I wanted to be the one to catch him.”

“Jesus Christ, Joe. That’s not how we work in CIB, and you know it.”

“Dammit, Sarge! She closes all the best ones.” He pointed an angry finger at me, not meeting my eyes. “She’s up for sergeant, isn’t she? I saw the application on her desk. The recommendation you’d attached to it. You didn’t attach a recommendation to mine, did you? I couldn’t let her get there before me. I couldn’t!”

Silence filled the room up and threatened to suffocate us.

I didn’t want to empathise with the dick, but I couldn’t help it. Cawfield had felt threatened by me from the start. The daughter of a cop. The granddaughter of a cop. My father holds a senior supervisory position in the South of Auckland. Cawfield saw me in CIB and him in charge of South Auckland Police and put two and two together to come up with ‘privileged.’

I’d worked damn hard to get into CIB on my own. I never traded on my father’s name or position. And he sure as shit wouldn’t have helped me either. Success is yours for the taking, Lara-Marie. But it means nothing if it is not you taking it.

I deserved my position in the boys’ club. Cawfield screwed his own career path all by himself. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t place some of the blame on me.

Pierce let out a prolonged sigh.

“OK,” he said. “OK. Weston used the halfway house as a base and hadn’t intended to lead us there.”

“But Trevor did,” I said, suddenly seeing things much more clearly. “He produced that business card out of nowhere at Pitt Street Fire Station.”

Pierce nodded slowly in agreement. He desperately wanted to believe Trevor was helping us too. That we hadn’t completely lost another of our colleagues to this madman. And it also backed up what Cawfield had uncovered.

“No trap,” Pierce concluded, “but Weston would know his base was compromised if he was watching. And I’m inclined to think he was watching very carefully. So, he scrambles. Moves. Flips out.”

“He is not the flipping out type,” Ava announced. “But I can see where you’re going with this.” She didn’t elaborate.

“Things pick up speed,” I offered, ignoring the spook. “He escalates to killing Carl.”

“Which was out of the ordinary for him, wouldn’t you say?” Pierce asked the spook.

She sat still and silent and then slowly inclined her head in agreement.

“I am surprised,” she said. “But I cannot argue your logic.”

“Something rattled him,” Pierce concluded. “On top of the halfway house being outed.”

“Keen going to Myers’ house?” Cawfield suggested.

“And her realising that the trench coat and fedora hat she’d been seeing everywhere wasn’t Carl,” Pierce concluded.

“So, why keep Carl any longer?” Cawfield said. “He’d served his purpose.”

“And killing him would get to Keen,” Pierce finished for him.

I said nothing; just let the words wash over me. Most of this I’d determined on my whiteboard in Meeting Room C. The dots were connecting, but where was Weston? What was Jones doing? Did it involve Stretch and Carole?

Time was running out.

“Jones left in a hurry,” I said. “As soon as he knew I’d been reinstated.”

“To report to Weston,” Pierce said.

“Did he take his police-issued sedan?” I asked.

Pierce and Cawfield stared at me.

“He wouldn’t be that stupid,” Pierce said.

“Unless he wants us to follow him,” I offered.

“The PSYOPS training may be fracturing,” Ava agreed.

“But who’s the person helping him fracture it?” Pierce demanded, then looked at me.

Who was Trevor connected to enough to crack the brainwashing?

It wasn’t me; I shook my head. Then stiffened. “Anyone seen his wife lately?”

“Shit,” Pierce said, pulling out his cellphone. “Sir,” he said into it when it was finally answered. “We need to check up on Mary Jones. Is she even still alive?”

I closed my eyes. Cawfield swore softly.

I wasn’t happy Joe was in on this brainstorming session, but there was no denying the guy was actually a decent cop. He’d spotted Weston at Angelo’s. He’d traced him to the halfway house. He’d tried - albeit alone - to catch him even when he’d been manipulated by the PSYOPS jerk.

I didn’t have to like it, but I could understand why he was still in CIB. He might not be sergeant material, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t good at beating the detective feet.

But not being able to pin the traitor pin on him was leaving me feeling antsy. I’d silently called him every name under the sun in the past and some of them out loud to Pierce and Hart and Damon. I felt a little ashamed about that.

Then I caught Joe’s eyes. He swept his gaze over my body lasciviously.

No. Not ashamed anymore. Dickhead.

We waited with bated breath while Inspector Hart followed up on Jones’ wife; something that was better done coming from the head of CIB. Pierce issued orders to someone outside the interview room, but his words were muffled, and I was feeling way too antsy to pay attention to them.

Would we find him in time?

There was no talk of letting Cawfield out, even though he was now helping us. He was still under Weston’s influence, and Pierce was not taking any chances. So he stayed hidden away as if a dirty secret.

I wanted this to end. I wanted it to all be over.

I didn’t like that a small - very small - part of me felt sorry for Joe.

I didn’t like waiting.

The wait finally ended and the answer came back; hitting like a champion boxer’s punch to the head.

Mary Jones had died late last Wednesday night; unbeknownst to any of us. Right before Cawfield went crazy and things started to heat up.

“Shit,” Pierce said softly, lowering his cellphone from his ear.

“He’s fighting the PSYOPS,” Ava said. “Good for him.”

But he wasn’t fighting it for Damon or me. Nor was he fighting it for Carole or Stretch either. And he wasn’t even fighting for CIB.

He was fighting it for his dead wife.

No wonder Weston had started making mistakes. The blackmail he’d undoubtedly had on Jones was as good as defunct without the wife, so he’d quickly moved to brainwash him. But Trevor was inherently a good man, a decent cop. He loved his wife. He loved his job. In that order. And now the PSYOPS was crumbling.

We’d missed our opportunity at the halfway house. Trevor had spoken, but we’d not been listening. Where would Weston have gone to now?

Somewhere close to Howick so when the time came, and I caved and visited Rachel, he could move Carl to that cliff before I got there.

A knock sounded on the door breaking into my thoughts, and Robbie Simpson peered into the room.

Cawfield smiled in welcome, his whole face lighting up at the sight of his partner. Simpson checked him out, from head to toe, to make sure he was in one piece. There was mutual respect and care for each other in that simple exchange. Nothing overtly mushy nor sexual; neither man went that way. But a connection was definitely there that had developed over years working as partners.

Just like my connection to Carl had become so strong that even after death I still turned to him for guidance.

“You were right, Sarge,” he said to Pierce. “He took his assigned vehicle. His sedan has just stopped at an address in Howick.”

Pierce looked at Ava. “He’s breaking the PSYOPS.”

She smiled sweetly and then stood up. “It seems our work here is done.” She turned to leave.

“Hold on a minute,” Pierce snapped. “What about Weston?”

She cocked her head to the side speculatively and said, “I don’t know anyone named Weston, Sergeant.”

And then walked out the door. Charlie followed silently and chillingly after her.

Chapter Thirty

“Keep Pushing And Pushing And Pushing, Sport. But The Moment You Hear Them Snap Back, Shut The Fuck Up And Watch Them Unravel.”

There wasn’t much time, so CIB moved into overdrive. Detectives loaded up on weapons and protection. Velcro ripped. Dome buttons snapped into position. The click-click of magazines being checked sounded. The stab-vest I donned was stiff and cumbersome, but we didn’t know what sort of resistance Weston would offer. Uniforms were brought in. Pierce had a map of Howick up on a large whiteboard. A diagram of the property in question was displayed with red marks and arrows for where we’d all approach from. He was giving directions and placing people where he wanted them.

We’d done operations like this in the past; usually with the Armed Offenders Squad in attendance. And today may end up no different, but you couldn’t rush the Bureau. We had to dot our Is and cross our Ts. That meant AOS had been put on standby, but only until we could get eyes on the scene. A plain clothed car was doing a drive-by in the next ten minutes.

However, I couldn’t help feeling using force would be a very bad thing.

He still had Stretch and Carole. Before this day was through, we’d have a hostage situation on our hands.

I stared at my cellphone and considered phoning Damon and giving him a heads up. I knew he had every right to be involved in this. Not just because his sister was being held by the lunatic we were about to confront and arrest. But also because he’d been working with me on this case almost from the beginning. And recently in an official capacity.

But Pierce didn’t mention him, and I thought Hart was remaining silent on purpose; hoping I’d be too caught up in the manic preparations to remember to advise my partner. I looked up at the board as Pierce repeated his orders for the third time and then tapped my cellphone screen, activating a call.

“Anscombe Securities and Investigations,” Carmel, the dragon, said on the second ring.

“Carmel, it’s Lara Keen. Can I speak to Nick, please?”

“Yeah, he’s expecting you,” she said, soberly. “Hold on.”

No ribbing. No snark. No snide comments or disconnection of the call.

I sat back in my chair and tried to breathe. The room was a swirl of colours around me, most of it the blue-black of the stab-vests. Voices distorted. The walls closed in. I felt my temperature rise as my heart started beating the blood around my body more frantically.

Nick picked up the call a few seconds later, but by then, I was already sweating.

“Hey,” he said.

I closed my eyes.

“What have you got?”

“Eric and Amber found him. Howick. But you already know that.”

I nodded even though he couldn’t see me. “We’re about to go in after a drive-by is completed,” I said.

“You’ll only see what he wants you to see.”

“What does that mean?”

“Lara.” He paused. “He was wearing a trench coat and fedora hat.”

“Carl’s,” I whispered.

“Yeah, but why now?” Why was he dressing up as Carl when we all knew Carl was dead.

I couldn’t think.

“There’s more,” Nick said. “Remember when I said something was brewing on Radar?”

“Yes.” I was sure I wasn’t going to like this.

“He’s reactivated old assets that as best as we can tell belonged to Declan King. He’s arming for war, and your drive-by won’t see it. From the moment my guys got eyes on the house, they slithered back into their cracks and disappeared. But they’re there, Keen. They are so fucking there. He wanted us to see.”

“It’s a trap.”

“A fucking big one.”

I tried to reason out what was happening.

“He wants us to bring in the AOS,” I said a few seconds later.

“Suicide by cop?”

“He’s not the self-sacrificing kind of guy. No,” I said, thinking. “He wants to cause as much damage as he can. Decimate us or at the very least put a huge dent in our psyche.”

“Possibly. The man does seem unhinged.”

What did Ava say?

I am surprised. But I cannot argue your logic.

Weston was acting out of the ordinary. Killing Carl had been a reaction to the situation not part of the plan. It had been a reaction to me. I rattled him.

I didn’t know why when nothing else had until now. I couldn’t connect the dots.

I shook my head and focused on the room around me. It would still be another half hour before CIB would mobilise. It seemed like too long a length of time; Weston could do anything in the interim. But even time-sensitive operations needed to be handled with cool, calm and level heads. Pierce was doing so admirably. But once he heard about King’s assets waiting for us in Howick, the Armed Offenders Squad would be mobilised and Auckland City would plummet into the type of war we hadn’t seen since Declan King.

Is that what Weston wanted? So he could make a clean getaway? A getaway with Carole Michaels?

“OK,” I said down the line. “Thank you for your information. We’ll take it from here.”

“What are you thinking, Detective?” Nick asked.

“One way or another, this ends today.”

“But how does it end?”

I didn’t answer. I swiped the call closed and rose to my feet. Officers dodged me. Detectives head-nodded to me. Pierce was too busy to see where I was going. I wove my way through the chaos of CIB gearing up for an assault and walked into Hart’s office, closing the door behind me.

He was on the phone. His hair was slightly messy as if he’d run a hand through the greying locks a few times already. Or pulled on them in frustration. But worse than that show of distress, he had removed his tie. Completely.

I stared at the piece of silk as it lay discarded on his desk and stood at parade rest waiting for him to finish his call.

It didn’t take long. From the moment I’d entered the office and closed the door behind me, locking out the rest of the CIB madness, his eyes hadn’t left my face, even as he wound up his heated conversation.

“Detective,” he said, placing the handset back in its cradle. “What have you got for me?”

“It’s a trap,” I said simply. “ASI’s picked up static on Radar that indicates Weston has reactivated Declan King assets and they’re lying in wait for when we get there.”

He said nothing for a long stretch of time. Then he turned his chair sideways, leaned his head back, crossed his legs; ankle to knee, and said, “What are you thinking?”

I walked forward and sat down in the chair opposite his desk.

“He wants to destroy us, or as much of us as he can, in one hit,” I suggested. “Or he simply wants a distraction so he can escape.”

“I agree. To both. Which means, he’s likely to take the Michaels girl with him and leave the HEAT member behind, possibly dead.”

I winced. “AOS will set the whole thing off like a bomb, sir.”

“Yes, but we have procedures, Detective. And any armed standoff, such as this, requires they attend and take overarching control.”

“Not if we get there first.”

He turned to look at me.

“I have to activate them as soon as you leave this room.”

“It’ll take them thirty minutes to respond and another twenty at least to get to Howick at this time of day.”

“Yes.”

“Anything could happen between now and then.”

“Not if I give you an order to stay out of this. You’re compromised, Keen.”

“I disagree. Sir. It’s me who set him off. I’m a key as much as Carole Michaels is.”

“Explain.”

“Carl.”

He stared at me. I pressed on.

“He killed Carl to get to me. Ava, the spook, agreed that was unexpected. Weston does nothing without thought, but killing Carl was a reaction only.”

“It served a strategic purpose; getting to you.”

“But I’m not Damon. I’m not the focus of the revenge.”

“Yet somehow, he’s started focusing on you,” Hart reluctantly agreed.

“Carl,” I said, beginning to see a picture of dots emerging. “He had Carl for days. Anything could have been said. You know how Carl could be. He’d wheedle and wheedle until he got a response and then he’d wheedle some more.”

Keep pushing and pushing and pushing, Sport. But the moment you hear them snap back, shut the fuck up and watch them unravel.

“Against a highly trained PSYOPS agent?”

“It’s possible,” I said with a shrug.

He stared at me.

“This could be disastrous,” he finally said.

“It already was a disaster, sir. Doing nothing would only make it worse. Stretch is as good as dead if we don’t act first.”

“I’m not talking about HEAT. I’m talking about you. If this goes south, it could mean your career.”

“If this goes south, sir, my career is the least of my worries.” I’d have Damon to worry about.

Losing his sister again would be bad enough, but we had to assume Weston would keep her alive, though. He’d done so for so long now; it was a good enough bet. But losing Stretch as well; his HEAT brother? It would send him over that line in the dirt. It would put him on the side of it that made his world crumble. That would break him into a million tiny pieces.

I would not abandon him there. CIB was my family. HEAT were my brothers-in-arms. But Damon?

Damon was my life, my love. My everything. It had taken me too long to realise that there was more outside of being a cop, the daughter of a cop, the granddaughter of one. But I knew it in my heart, in my soul now. I couldn’t stand by and do nothing — disaster or not. Career destroying or not. I had to try.

Hart started reaching toward his telephone. I stiffened.

“I’m calling this in as per procedure, Detective,” he announced clearly, as if he were being recorded, which I highly doubted he was. “The next words out of my mouth will be an order.”

He stared at me, handset to ear, finger hovering over the quick-dial buttons.

“Move your arse before I say them,” he grumbled.

I shot up out of the chair and burst out of his office, almost slamming the door behind me. I leaned back against it and tried to catch my breath. I’d made enough of a scene that detectives nearby stopped what they were doing and stared at me. My eyes met Pierce’s. He arched a brow at me.

I shook my head and made myself walk calmly to my desk to retrieve my jacket. I threw it on over top of the stab-vest; checked my weapons; grabbed my cellphone and wallet and stowed them. Then shoved my handbag in my top drawer and locked it. I wanted my hands free.

“Keen,” Pierce said, approaching me. “What was that all about?”

“Nothing, Sarge. But you should probably go in there and check in with him, though.”

He glanced at Hart’s office door, then back at me. “Lara?”

“Just give me five minutes,” I said. I needed a head start. I hadn’t been assigned a new vehicle, so I’d have to either take one belonging to someone else or better yet, grab one that hadn’t been assigned to anyone yet from the pool. It’d take me all of the five minutes to do that. And even then, I’d be pushing it to exit the underground carpark before the order came down to stop me.

“Five minutes?” Pierce growled. “What are you doing, Detective?”

“Do you trust me, Sarge?”

“With my life.”

I offered a small smile. I hadn’t wanted to let Ryan Pierce in. I’d lost Carl, and it had damn near crippled me. But he’d lost Harvey, his former CIB partner, and that had been enough for him to slip through the cracks of my icy façade; I understood his heartache. Harvey wasn’t dead. But he was out. Even if they hadn’t given the final ruling, we all knew Harvey Stone was not coming back to CIB.

Carl had come back, though; in a manner of speaking. And I had worked hard not let myself be in a position to be hurt again. But Carl was now dead-dead. And Ryan Pierce was someone I could honestly call a friend.

I reached out and touched his arm, giving it a reassuring squeeze.

“Five minutes. Longer if you can do it,” I said.

“You can talk to me, Lara,” Pierce said softly.

I blinked at him. “I know I can, Ryan,” I said simply. “But some things are better left unsaid.”

He shook his head at me, looking bemused.

“Five minutes,” he said.

I nodded my head, checked my gear again, and then jogged from the room.

The chaotic sound of CIB mobilising, like some giant behemoth lumbering up from a deep sleep, fell distant behind me. I didn’t bother with the slow crawling lifts; I smashed through the door to the emergency stairwell and took the steps two at a time down to the garage.

Five minutes wasn’t long in the scheme of things. But for Stretch and Carole, it could be a lifetime.

Carl had become crazy. But in a way, he had still been my Carl. He’d killed to protect me; his partner; the opposite side of his coin. I hadn’t understood it then, and I didn’t condone it now. But I think I got it. Buried deep beneath what had happened to him was the same guy I respected and loved. The same cop I looked up to — the same wise old man who had given me such sound advice over the years.

Carl hadn’t made me into the cop I was today; he couldn’t claim that sole responsibility. But he had helped mould me. Along with my father and my upbringing. Along with my own experiences and take on things. Part of the whole but not the whole of the thing.

I would mourn him properly if I survived this. He deserved that at the very least.

But for now, I would just put my faith in my former partner and hope he had laid the foundation for Weston’s demise. Captured, possibly tortured, and no doubt PSYOPS fucked with in the head, Carl Forrester would have still tried to protect me.

And put his trust in me doing what I was meant to do and joining the dots in the end.

Carl was dead; there was no going back from that.

But Carole and Stretch were still alive, and Weston was waiting.

He just thought I’d bring the cavalry with me because that’s what cops did. We had rules. We had procedures. Not following them, meant our jobs; our careers. I was the daughter of a cop. The granddaughter of a cop. Of course, I would follow them.

But I was also Lara Keen. Me. No one else.

And to protect the man I loved, I’d do anything.

Stretch could not die today. And if I had anything to say with it, Carole would not be taken from her brother again.

Rhys Kyle Weston had made a mistake. Not a reactionary one. But a strategic one.

Who said you couldn’t outwit a spy?

Well, no one. But that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to try.

Chapter Thirty-One

“Tricky Things Spiders. They Hunt With Patience. They Sit And Wait For Their Prey To Come To Them. You Should Try It, Keen. Sometimes You Can Catch The Spider As He Spins His Own Web.”

I made it with seconds to spare. I heard the phone ring shrilly in the garage just as I’d unlocked the door to a pool vehicle that hadn’t been assigned to anyone yet. The officer of the watch in charge of the pool cars answered the phone just as I drove out under the slowly rising gate at the entrance to the carpark.

I turned onto Cook Street and flicked on my beacons, then silently wove my way through traffic, parting them like the Red Sea, towards the motorway on-ramp.

There was no straight shot to Howick. The eastern suburbs were well away from any motorway off-ramp, but approaching through arterial roads would have taken too long. I took a big chunk out of the distance by screaming down the Southern Motorway and merging with slow-moving afternoon traffic on the South-Eastern Highway.

I kept the police radio off, but my pager gave a pathetic single attempt to contact me. Hart wasn’t trying very hard; just dotting his Is and crossing his Ts as per procedures. They knew where I was going, and they’d follow. At least I had backup on the way.

But by the time this was over, they’d be too late. Either Weston would be mine and Carole and Stretch would be safe, or…

It didn’t bear thinking about.

I parked the Commodore on Bleakhouse Road, a block away from Castleton Drive, where Trevor Jones’ vehicle had stopped moving. I checked my surroundings and then exited the vehicle, locking it behind me. Bleakhouse Road wasn’t a main thoroughfare, but it was a collector road, unlike Castleton. So traffic was flowing freely, and the police sedan was lost in amongst the high volume of parked cars.

One of which I completely overlooked until I was right alongside it.

I stared at the Audi Q7, which wasn’t entirely out of the ordinary for the suburb and then let out a slow breath of air and opened the passenger door, climbing up into the SUV itself. Damon was turned in his seat and waiting for me, a scowl on his face that spoke volumes.

“How did you beat me here?” I asked.

“Flack responded to a suspicious house fire from Pitt Street, and I slipped in behind him.”

I stared at him; that wasn’t a good enough explanation.

He sighed. “We might have assigned the Ladder to it as well.”

The Ladder was the largest specialist fire engine in the Fire Service. There were exactly three of them left in Auckland City. One of which was at Pitt Street Fire Station. It parted traffic like nothing else could. If you saw a great big red beast barrelling towards you in your rear vision mirror, you’d pull over, too, believe me. Damon would have tucked in behind it easily.

And it would have got here on the arterial routes and not the motorway because it couldn’t risk getting stuck in a fender bender and strangely big red vehicles on little streets seemed to work.

“Where’s the fire?” I asked.

He grinned at me. “Put out before we got there. False alarm.”

“Damon,” I said, sighing.

“You didn’t tell me. I had to hear it from Pierce.”

Pierce had given me backup the only way he could.

I forced myself to look Damon in the eyes.

“This could be a disaster in the making,” I told him.

“Why would you think I wouldn’t be there at your side?”

I shook my head. The clock was ticking.

“When do the AOS get here?” he pressed, reading me like a bloody book.

Dammit. I couldn’t protect him and save Stretch, free Carole, and end this.

“Are you armed?” I asked.

He pulled out a stun gun; a restricted weapon under the Arms Act of 1983. Being in possession of one could result in a four-year jail sentence or a $5,000 fine. Or both.

I said nothing. At least it wasn’t a Glock.

I checked that my Glock was in its holster and then nodded my head.

“OK, Dirty Harry, let’s do this.”

“You’ve got a plan?”

“Yeah. Get in, get the hostages, and get out again afterwards, preferably alive.”

“Lara, that’s not like you.”

“I didn’t have time to draw a fucking diagram,” I snapped, thinking of Pierce’s back in CIB. It did help to have a picture of the property’s layout in my mind, though. “But if it helps you sleep at night, there are two rooms at the rear of the house we believe he’ll hold Stretch and Carole in. We’ll approach from the rear of the property and see if we can go in by stealth.”

“He’ll expect that.”

“He’ll expect the AOS and a cordoned off street out front.”

“I hope you’re right,” he murmured and stepped out of the vehicle.

I followed suit, searching the nearby houses and cars. Nothing stood out; we were still far enough away to make this work. I had a mental map of the area in my mind and led us in the direction of the property that bordered the back of the one in question, accessed by Chilton Place; a cul-de-sac that ran off Castleton Drive. There was a risk Weston would have eyes on the length of Castleton, but Castleton was quite long and even with King’s assets reactivated, watching every stretch of the road would be quite a tall task. CCTV cameras weren’t as prevalent in suburbia, either.

I glanced up and thought I might have spotted something glint in the sky. Narrowing my eyes, I pulled my cellphone out and texted Nick at ASI.

Is that you in the sky?

Eight hundred feet and you spotted us?

Matt paint. Try it.

Fuck you. You’re clear, BTW.

Guards on property?

Across street, watching the front. Two round back. ? inside.

House at rear?

Clear.

That was all I needed to know.

“We’ve got two hostiles to deal with in the back,” I told Damon, pocketing my cellphone. “And an untold in the house, but he’s concentrating on the front of the property like we thought he would.”

“That seems shortsighted.”

We made it to Chilton Place and started to pick up speed now we were out of the more dangerous stretch of road.

“Like I said, he’s expecting the AOS. Which is mobilising as we speak, something I’m sure he is aware of.”

“Jones.”

“Yeah. Can’t keep a good cop off the secured police radio network.”

“I still don’t like this,” Damon muttered as we approached the house in question.

I didn’t reassure him. What was there to like about any of this? Our only advantage was getting in before the AOS. I had to hope that Trevor was fighting his PSYOPS and leading Weston to believe I wouldn’t break form. Until recently, it might have been the truth.

But Weston was an ex-spook. He wouldn’t be easy to fool, no matter what. We had to tread carefully.

I strolled up the footpath to the house that bordered the back of Weston’s property and knocked on the door. No one answered, which was a relief, but also a little too convenient. Sweat had started to coat my palms; I rubbed then dry on my trousers.

“Stick together, or split up?” Damon asked.

I didn’t want to let him out of my sight.

“You go left; I’ll go right. Meet at the back. Stay alert.”

“You too, love.” He offered me a smile; the smile he reserves for only me. And then we parted ways and circumnavigated the house.

My heart thundered in my chest; my ears rang with tension. I rolled my shoulders and counted to three inside my head. A bird sang in a nearby tree. Cars on Bleakhouse Road roared in the distance. A lawnmower started up. Someone shut a door too loudly. Everything sounded as it should sound in a somewhat sleepy Auckland suburb.

It wouldn’t be long before residents started returning home from a hard day at work.

It wouldn’t be long before the street was cordoned off and they were cut off from their houses.

One by one, the AOS would go door knocking, scaring the hell out of the occupants of each home. Black-clad men in black tactical vests with black Kevlar helmets; carrying either M4A3 carbines or Remmington 870 shotguns. Their Glock 17s in a thigh holster. It would be a frightful sight.

But it might just save their lives.

Declan King had raged a decade long war in Auckland using every available weapon he had to achieve his goals. Any assets he’d had wouldn’t be afraid to use lethal force. This neighbourhood could soon be a war zone.

But as I stepped out from behind the house I’d just rounded, nothing nefarious jumped out and shot me. Damon stepped out at the same time as me and scanned the backyard before meeting my eyes. I drank him in. Dark chocolate pools of intense fire. Broad shoulders and thick thighs. He was wearing jeans and sturdy boots, his obligatory long-sleeved Henley under a well-worn suit jacket. It shouldn’t have worked, but it did.

He was also not wearing a stab-vest. I felt overdressed. I felt a little panicked.

Damon cocked his head and studied me as I approached.

“What is it?” he whispered when I was close enough.

“I didn’t get you a vest,” I said, starting to take my jacket off. My vest wouldn’t have fitted him, so I have no idea what I was thinking.

“Stop, love,” he said, halting the removal of my jacket. “There isn’t time. I’ll be careful. I promise.”

I looked up at him and swallowed past a dry throat. I wasn’t above admitting that I was shit scared.

“Lara,” he said, emotion making his voice thick. “We can do this.”

We had to. Weston wouldn’t hesitate to kill Stretch if he hadn’t already. And the AOS would be on their way by now.

I checked my watch. Settled my breaths with even counting. And then nodded my head.

My eyes scanned the rear fence. It was six foot plus high, taller than Damon. And any means to scale it was on the other side. The fence belonged to Weston’s property, not this one. He’d chosen a base as secured as he could get in Howick.

It wasn’t far from here to Mellons Bay Cliffs. Once he’d known I was heading there, he could have killed Carl and simply taken a leisurely drive to the lookout. I clenched my fists; checked my surroundings again, and then crossed to the fence perpendicular to the behemoth I couldn’t quite scale without Damon giving me a leg up.

The side fence had cross beams which worked well as a ladder. Weston wasn’t fallible. I climbed up and peered over the six foot plus fence and spotted the two guards. They stood on either side of the back deck. Nearer the side fences than the rear of the property. I could shoot them, but handguns even from this distance were notoriously inaccurate. Not to mention loud as fuck and would set off house alarms, and Weston’s own alarms, in a heartbeat.

“We have to split up again,” I told Damon. “One down each side property and then over the fence in tandem.”

“OK.”

I looked down at him from where I was crouched halfway up the fence.

“Five minutes OK?”

“Three,” he replied, and I smiled.

Time was definitely not on our side.

He reached up and kissed me soundly, and then he was running across the rear of the property we were on and scaling the neighbour’s fence without pausing. In seconds he was out of sight.

I moved farther down my side fence, so I wouldn’t be seen by the two goons on Weston’s property, and climbed over, landing in a crouch on the other side.

They had a dog. Of course, they did. It barked. I reached down and picked up a chew toy that happened to be right where I needed it, and the threw it.

The dog scampered after it with wagging tail held high.

Letting out a breath of air, I considered our stealth approach might have been shot down in a hail of dog barks. Still, I took care scaling the rear fence, the dog watching me with chew toy in mouth and puppy dog eyes begging for another game, and landed in another crouch. This time no dog greeted me. But the residents were home, and a woman watched me from the kitchen window with her mouth hanging open.

I pulled my badge and held it up as I made my way to the fence that bordered Weston’s property. Once the woman nodded her head slowly and backed away from the window, I replaced my badge with a taser. I’d leave the gun for Weston himself.

I checked my watch. Thirty seconds seemed like hours.

And then I scaled the fence, using a pot plant the woman had conveniently beside the once again over-height fence, and landed on the other side right when Damon did.

Two bolts of fifty-thousand volts of electricity arced out and hit our respective guards in the chest. We raced up and caught them before they could thud to the ground on the hollow sounding deck. Once safely on their sides, we moved in tandem to the back door of the house.

I spotted cameras in the eaves. And a tripwire over the threshold of the rear entrance. I wouldn’t have put it past Weston to have had the windows wired to blow if tampered with. But the guards had to get in and out, so the tripwire was all that blocked our ingress.

It didn’t matter. He knew we were here.

I looked up into the nearest security lens and smiled.

Then I kicked down the back door and stormed inside.

Damon was right there with me. At my side. Covering my flank.

Walking into the spider’s web willingly.

Tricky things spiders. They hunt with patience. They sit and wait for their prey to come to them. You should try it, Keen. Sometimes you can catch the spider as he spins his own web.

The trap sprang closed behind us.

Chapter Thirty-Two

"Expect The Unexpected, Sport. Then They Can't Use Your Surprise Against You."

He used gas. Not triggered by the tripwire, but by the closing of the door at our backs. I tried to hold my breath, but my eyes stung, and the world became blurry and precious seconds ticked by as we felt around uselessly for doorways or obstacles or threats.

Eventually, I had to breathe; the hallway seemed to go on forever. The first lungful of smoke-filled air burned. The second sent me to my knees and then down to the wooden floor. I felt Damon’s hand on my shoulder; his fingers as they dug in trying to gain purchase on my jacket.

And then the weight of his body as he too succumbed to the inevitable and collapsed across my lower legs.

It had taken less than a minute.

I woke in small increments. Sounds came and went like some demented playground fair music on a warped merry-go-round. My lips felt cracked and dry. My throat parched. It couldn’t have been more than fifteen minutes before the AOS would have closed off that street and suburb when we breached Weston’s back door. But the state of my dehydration told me it had been longer.

Some of the dehydration could have been blamed on the gas Weston had used. But I was pretty sure he’d been waiting for us and simply had an escape plan ready to put into action.

He just didn’t leave anyone behind, including Damon and me.

I blinked open gritty eyes and worked through hazy vision to take in my surroundings. The ceiling was white. The walls were blue. The window of the room I was in was covered in chintz curtains. Light crept in through a gap between them. I stared at that gap, at the small glimpse of freedom it provided. And I thought perhaps that Weston hadn’t been as thorough as he should have been.

The gap also provided a glimpse into the prison, too.

I strained to hear sounds, other than the whacky music my mind was conjuring, but if the sea was nearby, I couldn’t hear it. Had we left the eastern suburbs?

Would the gap in the window coverings even matter?

I licked my lips and turned my head. I was on a bed. Strapped down. Damon was on another one, also restrained. And Stretch lay out beside him. A double or queen, by the looks of it. I half expected to see Carole beside me on mine, but I was alone on my bed, and Carole was sitting beside Stretch biting her lip, washcloth in hand, tears filling overlarge eyes.

“Carole,” I whispered, but my voice was weak.

She heard me, but other than flicking a glance my way, she didn’t react. All her attention was on Stretch and tending his wounds with that stained washcloth in her shaking hand.

He looked terrible. Weston hadn’t bothered to restrain him the way Damon and I were. Our ankles and wrists were tied tightly to each corner of the bed. But Stretch was in no fit state to fight back. His skin was mottled and bruised. Blood coated his face. His nose looked crooked. His eye sockets were swollen and blackening. The haematoma looked days old. Some newer ones on top of older ones. He’d been beaten and then beaten again — a rough and uncontrolled type of torture.

Had Weston lost his cool? Was it something I could use?

I looked down at my restraints and sighed.

Tugging on them did little other than chafe my skin. I rolled my shoulders, trying to feel my weapon in its holster. It wasn’t there. I’d been stripped of arms but at least left dressed for the occasion.

“Carole,” I tried again, my voice stronger. “Where’s Weston?”

She blinked at me and then bent down and continued tending Stretch’s injuries. She didn’t even seem to be aware that her brother was lying out cold beside them.

On that thought, Damon woke up with a start. He sucked in a lungful of air, trying to sit bolt upright but failing due to the restraints, and then started coughing.

“Damon,” I said as calmly as I could manage. “Slow and steady.”

He slowed his respirations down with apparent effort and then tugged on his restraints. His eyes darted around the room, finding me and relaxing marginally, and then landing on his sister as she hovered over an unconscious Stretch.

“Carole,” he said, sounding awful.

She ignored him completely.

“Stretch,” he tried and got nothing. “Shit,” he spat and then turned his head to look across the room to me. “Where’s Weston?”

“Not made an appearance as yet,” I said. “But I’ve only been awake a few minutes.”

“This isn’t the same house, is it?”

“No. I don’t think so.” No sea salt on the air. And the length of time that had to have past made me think we were somewhere other than where the AOS was.

I closed my eyes briefly and accepted that I’d walked us blindly into a trap. Weston might have been rattled by me, but he was still an ex-spook. I’d been stupid to think I could outwit him. He’d outwitted me.

Expect the unexpected, Sport. Then they can't use your surprise against you.

I was ashamed to admit I had been caught by surprise. But that didn’t mean I was down and out yet.

Lying here and waiting wouldn’t solve anything, and as much as I’d like to think I could have got myself out of my binds, that wasn’t happening either.

“Carole Michaels,” I said in as much of an authoritative voice as I could manage tied to a bed.

She stiffened but didn’t look up.

“Carole,” I said firmly. “Where is Andy?”

She’d called him Andy the last time I had seen her; in Sweet Hell. He’d been going by the name Andrew Falkner at the time. One of many aliases. In her fragile mental state, she wouldn’t recognise the name Rhys Kyle Weston.

“He’s coming,” she said and started to rock her body.

She’d done that too when I’d last tried to rescue her. It had been a trap on that occasion as well — fucking gas bombs.

“He’s coming,” she said again and again and again.

“Carole, it’s all right, Monkey,” Damon said softly. “It’s all right. We’ll get out of here.”

I appreciated the sentiment, but it wasn’t in the slightest accurate.

“He’s coming,” she murmured, whimpering now.

“Carole,” Damon breathed, sounding heartbroken.

I couldn’t imagine what it was like for him to see her like this and not be able to reach her.

“Damon,” I said carefully. He blinked his eyes but met my gaze.

“This is his stage,” I told him. “The only defence we have is our shell. Shore it up. Give him nothing. He feeds off emotions. Chaos. Destruction. Give him none of that. We won’t win by doing what he expects of us.”

Damon shook his head, battling demons only he could see and feel and hear. I waited for him to get himself under some form of control. And then I watched as he sucked in a steadying breath and pulled on the persona he used when battling a fire.

Fighting flames was rather like fighting an unpredictable opponent, I thought. There were rules, but if you lost concentration, for even a split second, there were dire consequences. When Damon suited up for a house fire, he wore protective clothes; masks, heat reflective jackets, helmets, gloves etc. But he also kept a firm eye on his surroundings, a solid grasp on the position of the fire in relation to his team members, an awareness that went beyond the next step, the next flash flame, or the next backdraft.

He pulled on that persona now as I felt ice thread through my veins.

“Ready?” I said a few seconds later.

“Fuck yes.”

I smiled. “RHYS KYLE WESTON!” I shouted. “SHOW YOURSELF.”

Carole whimpered and curled herself around Stretch’s body. I wondered briefly how long she’d been in this room with him. How long she’d been fixing him up after Weston had him beaten.

“YOUR FRIENDS AT THE DEPARTMENT MISS YOU, RHYS,” I shouted.

Nothing stirred if you didn’t count Carole’s trembling.

“RHYS!” I shouted, and the door suddenly opened.

Trevor Jones stood in the opening, and if I hadn’t been wearing my Ice Queen mask, I would have shown how much his presence hurt. I knew he wasn’t here of his own volition. I knew part of him was fighting it, but Weston’s control was still apparent. I knew he wasn’t the officer I respected, and it wasn’t his fault.

But still, it hurt.

“Keen,” he said. “Shut up.” There was no cowboy hat or toothpick. He was dressed in his familiar jeans and checked shirt, but that was where the resemblance ended. “If you don’t want to end up like him,” he nodded at Stretch, “then keep your mouth shut.”

“Where’s Weston, Trevor?” I asked.

He took a menacing step into the room.

My heart thumped. It ached. My throat burned. I swallowed past the pain and kept my eyes on Trevor.

“He’s coming,” he said, and it was so eerily similar to Carole’s statement that I almost flinched. But my father had taught me better than that.

I stared icily at Trevor and said, “I know about Mary.”

I didn’t offer an apology. I didn’t say I was sorry for his loss. Nothing I said would mean a thing to a man who had lost the love of his life and was now in debt to a psychopathic murderer.

He took three long strides into the room to reach the side of my bed and growled, “Don’t you say her name!”

I stared at him; refusing to show any weakness. Underneath the façade of fury he wore was a broken man. And I didn’t think he’d been broken entirely by Mary’s passing. Weston had done this.

“You’ll be out,” I said to him. “Out of the Force. There’s no going back from this, Jones.”

He bent down and slapped my face. It stung and brought tears to my eyes, but it hadn’t been at full force. And he hadn’t used a closed fist which I thought perhaps had been used repeatedly on Stretch.

Trevor was still in there.

He met my eyes, but there was no hidden message there. Perhaps this room had more cameras in it than I suspected.

“Where’s Weston?” I said with a small smirk. If he was watching, let him see me playing with his new toy.

Trevor punched me in the stomach.

I gasped for breath as Damon shouted something and Carole whimpered loudly. It took a good minute for me to catch my breath and blink the tears away but when I did, Trevor was still looming over me, a wild look to his eyes that I thought might be the end for all of us.

He was fighting it, I could tell. But it wasn’t working.

I panted through the residual pain and said the first thing I could think of, which happened to be a repeat of what Ava had used on Cawfield back at CIB. Latin is not my forte, and I might have got it wrong, so I said it again.

But when that didn’t work, I moved on to one of the other phrases Ava had used that hadn’t worked on Cawfield. I’d made it to the third one when the door swung open, and Weston entered.

I couldn’t tell if the third Latin phrase had worked because Weston walked over and shoved Trevor out of the way and reached down and wrapped his fingers around my throat.

He squeezed just enough to let me know my life was in his hands.

I stared up at the man we’d been chasing for what felt like an eternity. He didn’t look anything special. He wasn’t exotic like Ava or statuesque like Charlie. He was ordinary looking, but when he spoke, his voice was that of an angel.

“You should know better, Detective,” he said softly.

He leaned down, hovering his lips above my face, and let me see directly into his soul.

There was a coldness in his eyes that defied even my father’s. An iciness that seeped out of his pores and washed over my body. I felt my skin pebble in tiny goosebumps. I felt my heartbeat skitter. Fight and flight reflexes kicked in. He smiled, and I almost peed the bed.

Which, in a very inappropriate way, made me laugh.

He cocked his head at me and said, “I might keep you. I’ve tired of the other.”

My eyes flicked across the room to Carole. She was hugging Stretch as if he could somehow protect her in his unconscious state. For the first time, I saw genuine fear in her eyes.

Damon whispered something to her. Undoubtedly reassurance. But I couldn’t have Weston turning his attention to him, so I said, “You can go fuck yourself, Rhys.”

As far as taunts went, it wasn’t my best. But it did the trick. He squeezed my neck harder and watched me struggle for breath with a detached look.

And then Trevor hit him over the back with a stool.

For a brief second, I thought I was saved. But the lack of restriction on my windpipe was the only saving grace because Weston was a well trained special agent. And a stool to the back was nothing to the likes of him. He had Trevor knocked out and on the floor in a few swift, controlled, and precise movements that I could barely track through my tear-filled gaze.

He stood up to full height and straightened his clothes again.

“He has been trouble from the start,” he said conversationally.

“That’s what you get for fucking with police detective’s heads,” I told him in a rasping voice. I desperately wanted to rub my throat.

He smiled at me and picked up the stool Trevor had used to hit him, then brought it close enough to the side of my bed to make me feel threatened. He sat down and crossed his legs elegantly at the knee.

“There is a little known fact to the human condition, Detective,” he murmured. “It must never be devoid of heartache. We suffer with abandon. We willingly wrap ourselves around lost causes. We throw our hearts into love affairs doomed from the beginning. And we are never truly surprised when they fail.”

“OK,” I said slowly.

“His wife’s death was a foregone conclusion. He knew it. He just wanted to suffer for a little longer. Why? Because we thrive in the suffering. We live to be broken.”

“Are you broken, Rhys?”

He smiled. “I am their salvation.”

“What you’re doing is wrong,” I told him.

“Have you visited your psychologist lately, Detective?”

“What have you got on him?” I asked, wanting to keep him talking. I had no idea how it would help, but making the Crazy keep talking always worked in the movies and I was out of procedures to follow at this stage of the game.

“His brother and I crossed paths in Christchurch once. He’d inadvertently stepped into a messy situation. I got him out of it and made sure I had enough evidence to sink him when it became useful to my cause.”

Hennessey’s brother was a professor of psychology at Canterbury University according to the file we had on the police shrink. A position that carried a certain amount of responsibility and power. Had Hennessey agreed to whatever Weston asked to protect his brother’s standing?

“You’re lying,” I said. Hennessey was too good to fall for that. Even for his brother.

Weston threw back his head and laughed. It was uncomfortably sexy. A man confident in his own world. Aware of his sexuality. I could see how Carole Michaels could have been caught by this spider sitting before me. If he lavished even an ounce of that charm on her when she’d been vulnerable, she would have been lost to anything Damon could have said to possibly warn her off him.

“Too true,” Weston said, wiping his eyes as if his laughter had caused him to weep.

The man was incapable of weeping.

He sobered. “His brother is being watched by an associate of mine in Christchurch and will be killed, along with several of his students who meet with him for study sessions each weekday afternoon.”

A death threat. An oldie but a goodie.

“Hennessey could have just warned him,” I said.

“Boom.”

“The police…”

“Big boom. Do you not believe me, Detective? Let me prove it to you.”

He pulled a cellphone out of his jacket pocket and swiped to activate a call.

“Do it,” he said and disconnected.

He sat back and stared at me. I said nothing. Was this supposed to convince me of his god-like status?

I am their salvation.

Long minutes later, he pulled his cellphone out again and swiped it a few times, bringing up whatever he wanted me to see. He turned the device around and let me focus on the small screen.

Breaking News! scrolled in front of my eyes. Explosion in Christchurch; near university.

A chill went down my spine, and it had nothing to do with my upbringing.

“You see,” he said, pocketing the cellphone. “He wisely believed me. But his cooperation is no longer needed.” He shrugged.

How many people had he just killed to prove a point?

“You won’t get away with this,” I said, shaking. I felt sick to my stomach. He’d caused that explosion because of me. Because I’d pushed him. He hadn’t batted an eyelash. No emotion whatsoever.

This man was ice personified, and it chilled me.

“I already have, Detective. What’s another explosion when you’re already chasing your tails at the first?”

He meant Angelo’s. We hadn’t found any evidence to tie Weston to it. Just a pattern of behaviour and a gut feeling he’d been trying to incapacitate me.

I struggled against the ties and glared at the man before me. He was going for urbane, sophisticated and devil-may-care. But underneath it all, I saw the Crazy.

“You think it’ll end here?” I asked him. “You think you’ll get away with this? You don’t know CIB, Weston. You don’t know me at all.”

He smiled chillingly. “On the contrary, Detective. I know people quite well. And I know this city. It’s mine, you see? From its streets, to its prisons, to its police. It’s all mine and there’s not a thing you can do about it.”

I tugged uselessly on the restraints.

“Surely you saw my reach,” he continued. “Mansfield for instance? I am everywhere, Detective. Everywhere.”

Greg Arnold Mansfield in Mount Eden Prison had summed it up perfectly. ‘I met him here.’

‘Here’ being everywhere.

I felt momentarily defeated. I felt entirely out of my depth.

This man was so evil, so omnipotent. I was strapped to a bed staring madness in the eye and it stared back unrepentant.

What the hell had our government been thinking when they created a monster like him?

Weston stood. Straightened his clothes. And said, “And now we must tie up loose ends. Starting with the Michaels Family part of this debacle.”

“You won’t hurt Carole,” I told him; quite desperately. But part of me was sure she was still his Achille’s heel.

“Detective,” Weston said with a Cheshire cat smile, “have you not been paying attention?”

Pay attention, Sport. Don't fucking fall asleep on the job.

I had been. I had been paying attention. And Weston could posture and preen all he liked, but Carole Michaels meant something.

“Andy,” Carole said, trembling like a leaf. She held her hands up to ward him off. It damn near fractured the ice I was using to protect me. “Andy, please, baby. No.”

“Don’t you fucking touch her, you bastard!” Damon shouted. “I’ll kill you. I’ll fucking kill you if you touch her!”

I tested the restraints, but they held firm. I checked on Trevor, but he was still out cold. I scanned the room for something, anything that I could use. I saw nothing.

“I’m sure you believe that,” Weston said calmly, coolly to Damon; walking toward him and Carole and Stretch.

“Carole,” Damon said urgently. “Run, Monkey. Run. Get out of here. Run!”

“Andy?” Carole asked.

“Tsk, tsk,” the psychopath said. “Your work mate first, I think.”

He pulled a gun out and aimed it at Stretch.

“No!” Damon shouted.

“Weston,” I barked. “Lower your weapon!”

“Andy! No!”

Weston pulled the trigger right when Carole moved.

She threw herself at the gun, placing her body between the bullet and Stretch.

The sound of the pistol firing ricocheted around the room. Shouts and screaming ensued, but I thought I heard something else.

In amongst the chaos and heartache came the distant sound of shattering glass.

A physical manifestation of our broken hearts.

Chapter Thirty-Three

"Fear Is What Makes You A Good Detective. But Mindless Terror Kills."

The air in the room hung suspended as Carole Michaels slowly fell to the floor, blood blooming out of her chest. Damon was screaming; a heart-wrenching sound of distress and anger, rage and disbelief. I could barely think clearly for the shock of it. She’d thrown herself in front of the bullet to protect Stretch.

Had she broken her PSYOPS? Had Carl helped her? Had Stretch?

I looked at Weston, expecting to see some form of regret on his face. Carole was his Achille’s heel; I was sure of it. But he stood there, statue still, his features set in a mildly disinterested mask.

And then her body hit the floor.

Damon let out a cry of agony that will haunt me to the end of my days.

And Weston jerked.

His eyes traced over her body and a small frown marred his otherwise perfectly ordinary looks.

Sound rushed back in, and I heard gunfire in the rest of the house. It was hard to tell, though, if it was being answered in kind. If it was the AOS, they would have announced themselves. Procedures even when they didn’t help. But no one shouted. Just the odd gunshot and then a high-pitched swish followed by a thump as a body hit the floor.

“Weston,” I said, trying to get his attention. “You killed her.”

It pained me to say it because Damon was beside himself with grief; pulling on his restraints, calling Carole’s name, interspersed with the nickname he’d given her when they were kids. It was breaking my heart, but I had to take advantage of the situation. Of Weston’s momentary show of weakness.

“You shot her in the chest, Weston. You killed her.”

He started shaking his head.

“She’s bleeding out on your floor. Can’t you see all the blood?”

He took a shaking step toward her. Damon kept howling his heartache.

“This is the beginning of the end, Weston,” I told him. “Even her god can’t save her now.”

He fell to his knees beside Carole’s body, a shaking hand reached out but didn’t touch.

“She’s dead, Weston,” I repeated. ”You did this. Some salvation you are.”

He reached forward and scooped Carole up in his arms, holding her to his chest. He stared at her. He wasn’t crying. He didn’t look bereft. His face was set in stone as if he felt nothing. Nothing at all. But I thought otherwise. I thought perhaps this was as much as the emotionless spook could feel. He was as good as breaking down in front of me, and there was nothing I could do about it.

The gunshots were getting fewer and fewer out in the house. An eery silence was spreading throughout the dwelling. I pulled on my restraints and stifled a growl. Damon was calling Carole’s name again and again and again. My big, tough fireman had crossed that line, fallen from the edge he’d perch upon for so long now. I wanted to reach out to him; I could do nothing strapped to the fucking bed.

I scanned the room, taking in Weston’s still form as he cradled Carole Michaels. Then my eyes landed on Trevor Jones. He was waking up.

I let out a breath of air and stared hard at him, willing him to hurry the fuck up and take charge of things. He shook his head, held onto his temples. Whatever Weston had done to knock him out had been painful, but I thought perhaps there was more going on. He blinked his eyes, then lifted his face to the room.

He spotted Damon and Stretch. Carole and Weston. Anger and vengeance spread swiftly across his features.

“Trevor,” I called softly, hoping Weston was too deeply traumatised to hear me; he hadn’t responded to the gunshots in the house, which seemed to have ceased completely.

Trevor looked across the room to me and flinched. And then he staggered to his feet and made it to my side, producing a pocket knife from somewhere and sawing at the zip ties.

“Keen,” he said, and so much was said in that one word. Apology. Regret. Heartache. So much.

“Later,” I replied, rubbing my wrists as they came free. “Give me the knife and contain Weston.”

He nodded his head and handed me the blade, turning to approach the man who had taken so much from him.

Trevor Jones had lost his wife, his honour, his career in the span six months. I was surprised he was still functioning, actually. But Jones had always, until recently anyway, been a damn fine cop.

He took a step toward Weston just as I freed myself and rolled to a sitting position. I dashed across the room to Damon’s side. He was staring up at the ceiling, unseeing. He’d stopped calling for Carole.

My heart leapt into my throat as my stomach dropped to my toes.

“You son of a bitch,” Trevor growled throwing himself at Weston.

Weston dropped Carole like a sack of potatoes, uncaring of the damage he did to her body. Considering I thought she was dead, I wasn’t surprised. But still, the move had been unexpected. I slid the pocket knife’s blade under Damon’s first zip tie and cut. Then moved onto the next quickly. Trevor was going to need help, but for the life of me, I could not leave Damon tied to a bed.

He said nothing. He turned his face away from me and just stared at the wall.

My heart thudded painfully. Tears streaked down my cheeks unhindered. But I kept cutting the ties and kept an eye on Trevor and Weston as they faced off.

At some stage, Weston had dropped his firearm. I couldn’t see it, but the spook was well trained in hand to hand combat. Trevor was taking a beating, only managing to land one blow for every five he got.

Damon came free of the binds, and he sat up, immediately moving off the bed and practically crawling towards his sister. I gave Stretch a brief check with my eyes to confirm he was still breathing and then turned to help Trevor.

Weston had him at gunpoint.

I should have left Damon tied up and helped Jones. It was Carl all over again; letting him get away when I should have been arresting him. But Weston was not my former CIB partner, and this had to end. I slipped off the opposite side of the bed to Trevor and Weston and crept up behind the spook.

“I will shoot him, Detective,” he said without looking at me. “Stop where you are. Now.”

“It’s over Weston,” I said. “The AOS are here. Your guards are down.”

“I see no AOS here, Detective. You are mistaken.”

“Someone’s been taking your assets out one by one. You missed it, seeing as you were mourning Carole.”

He spun the muzzle of the gun toward me, keeping both Trevor and me in his sights.

“Don’t say her name.”

It was the most emotion I’d seen in him.

“You think you have more right than I do? Than her brother does?”

“I am her salvation. She is no longer the woman either of you knew.”

“No,” I agreed. “You fucked with her head. Like you fucked with Trevor Jones and Joe Cawfield. But look at Jones now, Weston. Is he yours? Or is he mine?”

“I can get him back in an instant, Detective. Don’t fool yourself.”

“Then why the gun?”

“Because I am… angry.”

“I don’t think that’s it,” I said, shaking my head. “Oh, you’re angry. You’re full of rage, aren’t you, Weston? It’s boiling up inside you, and it needs to come out. But I don’t think you can get Trevor back. Those words I said. That Latin. It was final, wasn’t it?”

He stared at me, the gun steady in his hands, aimed at my chest. I was still wearing my stab-vest. It wouldn’t stop a bullet at this distance, but it would slow it down. And if I threw myself to the side, it could deflect it. Maybe. Possibly. I hoped I wouldn’t have to find out.

But Weston was not leaving this room. I would make sure of it.

“It’s over, Rhys,” I said. “Cawfield’s been freed of your mind control. Eagle will be too in short order. Jones is standing there, his own man, facing off against you for what you’ve done to him; what you’ve made him do.”

Weston looked me in the eye and smiled. It was chilling. And not what I expected him to do. He had an ace up his sleeve, I was sure of it. Like that explosion down in Christchurch. I wracked my brain, trying to figure it out. He seemed so sure of himself. So superior.

“What’s so funny, Weston?” I asked.

“You are. You’re pathetic. Trying to hold your own in a man’s world. Trying to be something you are not. You crave acceptance, and yet you hold everyone at arm’s length; you don’t let them get close, no matter what. You’re a small, frightened little girl trying to live up to Daddy’s high ideals. But you can’t. You never will. He sees it. We all see it. You’re a pathetic waste of space, playing dress up with the men, lowering yourself to their gutter level in a failed attempt to fit in.”

I arched my brow at him.

“Is that right?” I murmured. He stared at me, his eyes searching my face.

I smiled. He almost scowled. Almost, but not quite.

“You can’t be the boy your father wanted,” he said. “You can’t replace the child he lost.” What? His smile broadened, it looked wrong; twisted. “Yes, you didn’t know, did you? Your mother was pregnant when she died. She was carrying someone to replace you. Perhaps a boy. One who could follow properly in Ethan Keen’s footsteps. Finally someone good enough to carry the Keen name.”

I said nothing, trying to decide if what he was saying was the truth. Had my mother been pregnant? I couldn’t remember. I had vague memories of her laughing and smiling up at my father as he leaned over and kissed her on the lips; his hand moulded to her stomach.

I staggered. My arm reached out for the bed to stop my fall.

Damon’s hand slipped into mine.

“Your father loves you,” he whispered. “He’s proud of you. He’s broken, we all are. He can’t show it, but it’s there. He’s so proud of you, love; like I am. Like we all are.”

I gripped his hand in mine and straightened my back.

“Oh, how sweet,” Weston said, slowly clapping his hands together, the gun hanging ineffectually in his fingers as if he didn’t really need it to keep us under his thrall. “You always needed someone to protect, didn’t you, Michaels? But you couldn’t protect your sister, so you turned all that misplaced care to something else; someone broken; someone you could mould into your perfect partner. Does she let you tie her up in bed? Does she let you spank her like I spanked Carole?”

Damon roared and threw himself at Weston. I tried to reach out and grab him; to stop him from doing exactly what Weston wanted.

Terror licked through me, making my skin cold and my heart burn. The world slowed down. My life crumpled into that single moment. I shook with dread. Alarm coursed through me. My heart rate skyrocketed.

Fear is what makes you a good detective. But mindless terror kills.

“Damon!” I yelled.

Weston raised his gun.

Everything slowed down.

I held my breath, fighting to control my terror.

I was too far away.

I was out of time.

Damon lost his sister this evening, and I would lose the man I loved.

I took a step. Damon was still flying through the air at Weston. Weston watched him with a crazed look of anticipation on his face. The more the world unravelled, the more he showed emotion. Because chaos reigned and chaos was what made Rhys Kyle Weston come alive.

I watched the man I loved, the man I had let closer than any other, the man who saw me for the capable woman I was and never judged, always trusted, just… loved.

And I couldn’t stop this.

I screamed. Jones started moving. He was too far away as well.

The gun went off. The sound of the bullet firing rattled around inside my head; shredded my heart. I stumbled. Trevor reached Weston. I saw the red of blood as it splattered across Trevor’s stomach.

I couldn’t make out what was happening. My vision was wavering as tears filled my eyes. I blinked them, but they still fell.

Like Weston did.

He fell down to the floor.

Trevor stood over him; blood splattered across his checked shirt. Damon flew past them both, missing his target and landing hard against the far wall. It had taken mere seconds.

I ran to him; somehow my legs able to carry me that distance by sheer force of will alone. My hands pressed to his stomach, his chest, his head, face, arms, sides.

“I’m fine,” he said. “I’m fine. It wasn’t me. He didn’t hit me.” His hands ran over my body in turn. “Are you hurt? Where did it get you? Where, Lara? Where?”

I shook with adrenaline and too much emotion. The ice had crumbled, and I was a melted mess. I couldn’t stop touching Damon’s body, making sure he wasn’t hiding an injury from me. He must have felt the same because he never stopped touching me either.

It was probably only minutes, but it felt like hours. But finally, we both realised the gunshot hadn't hit us.

I turned and looked at Trevor. He was still standing. Still covered in blood. But he was staring down at the crumpled form of Weston, who had an enormous exit wound on his back.

Which meant…

I crawled over and flipped him with more strength than I thought I possessed. A single small bullet hole had been punched through his chest, right above his heart. Trevor reached down and picked up the expelled bullet off the floor.

“Fuck me,” he said. “That could have gone right through my body as well.”

“Not likely, darling,” a voice said as Ava the Spook sauntered into the room, a sniper’s rifle over her shoulder. “I know what I’m doing,” she added.

“You killed him,” I said, looking down at the deceased form before me.

Ava looked at her fingernails.

“We had questions,” I told her. “He needed to pay for what he’s done.”

I glanced over at Carole. Damon was crouched beside her again.

“Is she…?” I started to ask.

He nodded his head. “She’s gone.”

Dammit.

“He needed to pay,” I repeated.

“And he has,” Ava said.

“All clear,” Charlie announced, entering the room.

She took in the scene, including Carole Michaels’ dead body, and for a second I thought I saw sadness. And then she hid it away behind a steely mask.

“You done?” she asked Ava. “Cops are almost here.”

“Well, that’s our cue to exit stage left,” Ava remarked.

“You can’t walk away from this,” I said, standing, my fists bunched.

“Detective,” Ava purred. “We were never here.” She reached forward and plucked the spent bullet out of Trevor’s hand and then bopped him on the nose with it. “Nice use of the Latin, by the way,” she murmured, looking at me. “We’ll let you keep that because Nick says you can be trusted. But betray us, and there will be a price to pay.”

“Who the fuck do you think you are?” I demanded, taking a step toward her. Jones reached out and held me back.

“Easy,” he said softly. “She’s the one fully armed; that’s who she is.” He had a point.

I seethed inside as Ava blew Trevor a kiss and then winked at me.

“Until next time,” she drawled.

“There better not be a fucking next time,” I snapped.

Ava’s laughter pealed through the air as the spooks exited stage left.

I turned and looked at Trevor.

“Keen,” he said. So much emotion. So much regret.

“Not now, Trevor,” I whispered, sounding exhausted. I walked across the room to the man I loved. The man I loved who was heartbroken.

I crouched down beside him and wrapped him up in my arms as he stared at the dead body of his sister.

Carole and been through so much. And it had looked like she might have made it out the other side in the end. We wouldn’t know until Stretch woke up - if he woke up - what had actually happened here in this house. But my money was on Carl helping her because that’s what my former partner did. He helped people. He would have fucked with Weston just enough for the ex-spook to trip up when push came to shove. He would have counselled Carole. Just enough so she tended to Stretch and started to break Weston’s hold on her mind.

Carl would have kept fighting for me so that I could join the dots.

I listened, Old Man. I heard. It just wasn’t enough.

Chapter Thirty-Four

“It’s A Shit World. And Shit Things Happen.”

The AOS came. So did Pierce and Hart. Ava and Charlie were long gone, and all that was left was a house full of dead King assets, and a dead Weston and Carole.

It was the latter that made everyone pause.

We don’t always catch the bad guys. And we certainly don’t always catch them before they do horrific things to the people who are loved. Today was one of those days, and we all felt it keenly.

I felt it like a knife to the gut.

Damon sat on the tail of Marc’s HEAT ute, a blanket wrapped around his hunched shoulders, surrounded by his HEAT brothers. Stretch had been taken out by ambulance through an honour guard of HEAT officers. I felt excluded from their club.

But I was surrounded by another type of club, one I’d wanted to be a part of for so very long now and thought I had let down beyond all measure tonight. Even though those CIB detectives that surrounded me offered me a chin-lift or shoulder slap, I felt I didn’t deserve it.

Carl was dead.

So was Carole.

And Weston wouldn’t pay for what he had done.

“What do you mean you have no idea who I’m talking about?” Hart yelled into his cellphone. “If you think you can hide behind that flimsy façade of a PI license, then you better think again, arsehole. I want to know who the hell the spook with the rifle was!”

I blinked up at Pierce. He grimaced. We couldn’t hear what Anscombe was saying, but it was no doubt colourful. Hart was going beet red the longer he listened to him in silence.

Trevor came out of the house, catching all of our attention, and wearing handcuffs. Hart cut off his call with ASI without saying a word. I was sure he did it on purpose, and Nick had still been speaking. The detective inspector ran a hand through his hair and then straightened his tie.

Trevor blanched.

“Take him away,” Hart said softly. Softly was not good coming from Detective Inspector Hart.

He spun back to look down at me, where I was leaning against Trevor’s car.

“There were minor injuries in Christchurch,” he said, not acknowledging the Trevor situation at all. “Hennessey managed to get word to his brother, and Professor Hennessey took precautions. Weston failed to tie up that loose end.”

I nodded. It was something at least. I would have expected little else from my shrink, though. Andrew Hennessey was an astute man. But like Trevor, his career would now be in tatters.

Weston needed to pay, and I’d let a spook kill him. He got off way too easy. My fists clenched and I scowled at the ground, taking my anger and rage and heartache out on my tormented thoughts.

“We can assume,” Hart went on in his gruff voice, “that whatever government funded department Charlie Downes and that other one belonged to is still active to some degree because the word has come down not to pursue that angle of enquiry.”

Despite the fact, he’d been pursuing that very thing with Anscombe not two minutes ago.

I nodded. I didn’t really have it in me to worry about some shadowy organisation that came and went without leaving much of a trail other than dead bodies.

“Anscombe did confirm one thing, though,” Hart went on. “Jones was trying to leave us breadcrumbs.”

He stared off at the sedan Trevor had been placed inside of. It hadn’t left the scene yet, because all the detectives were surrounding Hart and me.

I didn’t think it was just for the impromptu debrief Hart was giving. It was for support. For comfort. To heal a little of our black hearts.

“He tried to shine a light on the Declan King angle,” Hart said, “by being seen with his known associates in the drug world. All it did was confuse ASI and those who use Radar. But it’s something.”

It could be used in Trevor’s defence.

“Mount Eden Prison sent over their CCTV footage,” he added. “Compu Forensics have confirmed the person impersonating Carl was likely Weston. Same height and build.”

I nodded my head.

“We can also assume that Weston’s upbringing played a part in his desire to be financially independent,” Hart said as if he needed to get this all off his chest. “Add in his isolation from the Department and what you uncovered, Keen, of his inability to access his own funds, and we get the financial angle we needed to explain his targets.”

I said nothing. Hart stared at me for a beat.

“Gentlemen,” he finally said. “Leave us. You all have work to do and know what to do, so get on, and bloody well do it.”

“Yes, sir,” the detectives said and started to disperse. Several offered me another shoulder slap; some gave chin-lifts. All of them met my eyes before walking away at their superior’s behest.

Hart looked at Pierce.

“You too, Detective Sergeant.”

“Yes, sir.” Pierce looked at me and smiled. “We’ll catch up later, Keen,” he said.

I nodded.

Hart leaned back against the car at my side. We both watched the detectives and uniforms do their job. HEAT Prevention had cleared the house not long after their arrival. My eyes automatically tracked to where they were now surrounding Damon; as if offering a buffer against the world. Against his heartache.

“You did good, Keen,” Hart said softly.

“Sir,” I said, about to argue.

He held up a hand.

“It’s a shit world. And shit things happen. I believe Carl would have said something like that.”

“Yes, sir,” I said, quietly.

“You did the best you could with what you were given, Detective. You kept your head. You focused on the evidence. You followed the clues.” He turned to look at me. “Carole Michaels was not your fault.”

I looked across the space between Damon and me and thought perhaps it wasn’t that easy. To just say it and everything goes back to how it was. Nothing would ever go back to how it was again.

The HEAT guys chose that moment to pack up. Damon’s eyes met mine across the expanse of what felt like a million miles.

“You’ve got twenty-four hours to get your head on straight,” Hart said. “And then I expect you at work giving your statement and helping to wrap this case up for filing.”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

“It’s over, Keen. Weston is dead. All that’s left is the sweeping. And you’re not alone in cleaning up this mess.”

He stood up and slapped me on the shoulder, just like I was one of the boys.

“Go see to your man, Lara.” And then he walked off shouting orders at some poor uniform.

I shook my head. Damon was still watching me, even though it was quite evident that HEAT was about to pull out and take their brother with them.

Carole was dead.

I took a step toward him.

And my father’s police car pulled up.

I stared at it as he got out, dressed in a pressed uniform, hat placed immediately on his head. My steps faltered. I blinked at the incongruous sight before me. My father. Here.

“Lara-Marie,” he said.

“Yes, sir,” I immediately offered.

He strode towards me and then did the most illogical and unexpected thing; he reached out and pulled me into a hug.

My father. The Ice King. Hugged me.

And then he abruptly let go and stepped back, placing much-needed space between us.

He cleared his throat.

“You’re alive,” he said.

“Yes,” I replied, still stunned.

“That’s good,” he offered.

“Why are you here?”

“I, ah, I needed to see Hart.”

I let out a huff of breath, and then another, starting to laugh.

“I love you too, Dad,” I said.

He looked horrified. Then he just looked put-upon, as if my saying that was an inconvenience.

“Well, then,” he said. “Haydee would like to invite you to dinner.”

I waited. He didn’t elaborate.

“When?”

“When you’re through with this… this case.” I was sure he was about to call it something else but had caught himself. Possibly he was going to call it a mess. That would have fitted nicely.

“OK,” I said.

“Bring Michaels.”

I looked across the space to where the HEAT guys had been, but they and Damon were gone.

My heart clenched.

“Anyway,” my father said, straightening his tie much like Hart did. “Will you come? To dinner?”

“Yes,” I said because it was time to build bridges. But because I am also who I am and he is my father, I added, “Will Haydee talk?”

He glared at me; staring ice daggers as if they could make me see sense. “Don’t be such a child,” he admonished.

“It’s just that she didn’t say much, or anything at all actually, last time I met her.”

“Lara-Marie,” my father said, sounding aggrieved.

“It’s a fair question, Father,” I told him.

“Haydee,” he said carefully, “will talk.”

I stared at him. He stared back just as icily at me.

“What we do in the privacy of our own home,” he started.

I held up a hand and said, “Not listening. La-la-la-la!” Fingers went into ears, and I smirked. If he called me a child, I’d act like one. It was strangely liberating.

“You are the most irritating person I have ever had the displeasure of knowing.”

“Thanks, Dad,” I said cheerfully. “Chip off the old block of ice, eh?”

He stared at me. I blinked back up at him.

“See you at dinner,” he said and turned on his heel to go annoy Inspector Hart.

I stared after him and then stared around at the aftermath of a sting gone wrong and then stared at where the HEAT guys - and Damon - had disappeared from. And then I turned and went in search of Pierce’s car. I still had his key. I’d use it. He could catch a lift with someone else.

I walked in a numb kind of haze towards the police-issued sedan, not really seeing anything. I didn’t really want to look.

Carl was dead.

Carole was too.

But hey, at least I was mending bridges with my father.

I snorted to myself and tried to shore up my defences. Dad had come because he was worried about me. Damon had been right; he was a broken man who was unable to show he cared, but he did care. And maybe Haydee could help him rebuild some of his fractured self. She seemed sweet enough, even if she hadn’t talked. I actually was looking forward to hearing her speak. Maybe she’d surprise us all and have something worthwhile to say.

It was something to look forward to.

I stifled a sob.

Carl was dead.

So was Carole.

And Damon had left without saying a word.

I stopped at Pierce’s car and tried to tell myself it didn’t matter. I would survive this. I had survived worse. But no matter what I told myself, Carl’s death was nothing compared to losing Damon. To letting him down and getting Carole Michaels shot.

I had failed him, and he hadn’t been able to face me afterwards.

It hurt.

I beeped the locks on Pierce’s car, but they were already unlocked. It wasn’t like him to leave his police car unsecured. Some part of me must have still been acting the cop because I bent down to check it was safe to enter before I opened up the door.

Damon sat in the passenger seat, twisting Pierce’s spare key in his hand.

My heart jumped. My eyes stung with tears. I was such fucking mess, but Damon looked up and offered a small, understanding smile. He reached over and opened the driver’s side door.

“Do you want me to drive, love?” he asked.

Dear God, how did he do it? How did he stay so strong when the line was right there, and he’d crossed over it? How did he hold himself together? How did he do it?

“Lara?” he pressed. “It’s all right, love. Get in.”

I practically fell into the driver’s seat of the car.

He reached over and wrapped a hot palm around my nape and pulled me toward him. His lips pressed into mine and he kissed me as if he were drowning and I was his air. I kissed him back as if he were my very reason for living.

“Love,” he said between breaths and kisses. “Lara.”

“Damon,” I tried, but nothing else would come out. I had to apologise.

“It’s over,” he said. “Hush.”

“But I…”

“You were brilliant. You fought so hard. You risked your life to end this. It’s over. It’s done.”

“Carole,” I said, my voice a barely heard whisper. It cracked, like the crack in my heart.

He didn’t answer me.

Instead, he said, “Stretch has come to. The guys have gone to be with him up at the hospital.” He didn’t let me go, but it felt like he was pulling away from me even if he wasn’t. “Jesus, Lara,” he added on a heated breath of air. “She looked after him. He said she was fighting back.”

Tears fell down his cheeks, and I brushed desperately at them. I tasted my own tears as we silently cried for his sister. For the loss. He pulled back, sucking in air, gripping my hand and staring out the window. The scene might as well have not been there; I was sure he saw nothing. Or maybe, he just saw his sister. Tending to Stretch. Throwing herself in front of the bullet to protect him.

“She fought back,” he said. “She wasn’t Weston’s in the end.”

I didn’t know what to say. Anything I said would sound too small, too little. The heartache filled the car up until there was no air left.

“Maybe if we’d got there sooner,” he said quietly. “I don’t know. We’ll never know.”

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“So am I.”

My heart was breaking. I tried to pull my hand from his.

He held on tighter.

“But it’s over,” he said. “Stretch is going to be OK. It’ll take some time to heal all the wounds, but he said, Carl looked out for him, distracted Weston; took the brunt of his actions when he could and tried to fuck with the spook’s head when he couldn’t. I think it helped Carole as well.”

He looked at me then.

“It’s over.”

I nodded, but I wasn’t sure I was getting what he was trying to say.

“Do you understand, love?”

I shook my head.

“Life is for the living, Lara. It’s to be treasured. I will grieve Carole as you will grieve Carl, and we’ll help each other get through it. But I intend to live life to the fullest as of right now. To remember and not forget, but to move on. Can you do that, love? Can you move on? With me?”

I stared at him, this man who kept coming back to me. Who understood that sometimes I needed to hide behind an icy shell. That it was how I dealt with what this world threw at me time and again. I stared at him, this man who let me use that shell and then went digging; chipping away at it. This man who was so steady and strong, so caring and yet so demanding in bed. Who held my heart in the palm of his hands and didn’t crush it.

I stared at the man I loved more than I had loved any other. More than my idolisation of Carl. Or my longing to be part of the boys’ club in the Criminal Investigations Bureau.

He’d melted the Ice Queen, and I didn’t for a moment regret that he had.

I wanted to be melted. I wanted to be melted by him.

I stared at him, this beautiful man, this fiery soul.

“Yes,” I said, and it was the easiest thing I could have said. “I can do that.”

“Then we go home,” he whispered, kissing my cheek, my forehead, my nose, my lips. “We go home, and we start living. Cardrona in winter. Fiji in summer.”

“Fiji?” He hadn’t said anything about Fiji to me before.

“Or Northland, perhaps? A beach in any case. I want to see you in a bikini, love.”

“I don’t wear bikinis, Michaels.”

He chuckled. “You do in my dreams, Lara.”

“Pervert.”

“But I’m your pervert.”

“Whatever.”

He smiled at me. There was heartache there. There was sadness. But underneath it all, permeating it all, was hope, and love, and a future. Our future.

Carl was dead.

Carole was too.

But we would live on. We would love one another and support one another, and live life for ourselves and for those we loved.

For Carl and Carole. For us.

And we would do what we did best; help people; solve crimes. I might even sit my sergeant’s exam like Pierce kept hounding me to do.

And we would make love, with heat and passion; two parts that made up the whole of us.

A flare of heat. A touch of heat. A lick of heat. That was Damon and me together.

“Let’s go home,” I said.

“Where’s home, love?”

“Home is with you,” I told him.

He clasped my hand, lifted the back of it to his lips, and said, “My place has the bigger bath.”

I nodded my head. He smiled. There was something wicked behind that smile now.

I started the car and took us home. It was time to start living life.

Epilogue

“You seem in a hurry, Lara,” Hennessey said.

“I am in a hurry, Doc. I’ve got a plane to catch. Are we done here?”

“You’re going somewhere? Holiday?”

“Cardrona. Skiing.”

“I see. I didn’t take you for a daredevil.”

“Do you even know me? I am constantly a daredevil. I live life to dare the devil.”

“That’s not what the phrase means.”

I grinned at him.

He tried to not grin back at me.

“Are you going skiing alone?” he asked.

“Damon’s coming,” I said.

“A romantic getaway. Good. That’s very good, Lara.”

“I can be romantic when it’s required, Doc.”

“Is it required now, you think?”

“Absolutely.”

“Why’s that?”

I shifted in my seat.

Hennessey waited patiently.

“He’s got something planned,” I finally admitted.

“Planned? What has he got planned; do you think?”

I smiled to myself and then reached forward and plucked a tissue from the box on the table between us. I started wringing it in my hands.

Hennessey watched me.

I realised what I was doing and counted my breaths.

He smiled serenely.

“I think he might propose,” I mumbled.

Hennessey cocked his head.

“You think? And how do you feel about that?”

I arched my brow at him. “Really? ‘How do I feel?’ I thought we’d got past all of that.”

“I am still your psychologist, Lara.”

“Only because I refuse to see anyone else.”

“Well, there is that. And thank you, by the way.”

“You’re welcome, Doc.”

“Damon? How do you feel?”

“You won’t let me leave here until I answer, will you?”

“No.”

I scowled at him. He looked back at me serenely.

“I’m onto you, Doctor Hennessey”’ I said, pointing a snarled up tissue at the man.

“I don’t doubt it. But still… How do you feel about Damon proposing to you while on holiday at Cardrona.”

“It’s not exactly a surprise,” I muttered. “He’s not stopped hinting at it for weeks.”

“The man is wise,” he said.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You don’t handle surprises well, Lara. Especially personal ones.”

“I am perfectly fine with surprises.”

“Are you? How did that dinner with your father and his new girlfriend go last month?”

I narrowed my eyes at the man.

“Were you surprised he had asked her to move in with him?”

I crossed my arms over my chest and lifted my chin.

He said nothing. I eventually deflated.

“They’re so happy. She’s changing him.”

“How so?”

“His… his eyes laugh when he looks at her. The ice is thawing.”

“Does that scare you?”

“A little.”

“Why?”

I looked out the window at the naked tree. The leaves had long ago fallen, making way for winter.

“Because he’s different with her than he is with me.”

“You expect him to treat his daughter the same way as his lover?”

I grimaced. “Would be nice to have him laugh with me.”

“Give him time, Lara. Baby steps.”

I snorted.

“You, on the other hand, have taken leaps and bounds. This is our last Department mandated session together.”

I looked at the shrink who had dogged my steps for more than a year now. We’d been through a lot together, Hennessey and I. Carl’s death. My insecurities at work. The nightmare cases. My falsely thought failures. Trusting Damon. Opening up. Recovering from the loss of Carole. All of it.

Including my childhood.

My mother had been pregnant when she died. It explained so much. About my father. He’d not lost one person he’d loved that day; he’d lost two. Did it make it exponentially harder?

I thought for him it might have.

But he’d also, in a way, lost me, too.

We were working on it. Haydee was helping. Damon was too.

“I’m not ready to say goodbye,” I told my shrink.

“It’s not so much a goodbye, Lara, as a ‘so long for now.’ You know where to find me; if you ever think you might need to talk again.”

I nodded my head.

“It’s like letting the baby bird you’ve nurtured for months fly away from the nest at long last,” Hennessey said.

“Steady on, Doc, don’t get all poetic on me.”

He smiled. Then reached out to shake my hand.

“Good luck, Detective Sergeant Keen.”

“Thank you, Doctor Hennessey,” I said in return, the words meaning more than just a thank you for wishing me luck.

This man had helped save me. Had, at the very least, helped me find myself again.

We are all a little broken; I thought as I stepped out into the crisp winter breeze. And with what we see daily, we’re all a little cracked in the head as well. But the glue that binds us together can be found in the strangest of places. In a work colleague who offers friendship. In a lover who stays no matter what. In a professional who takes his job seriously and doesn’t give up even when you think you’ve had enough. In a senior officer who pushes for excellence but allows you to find your own feet and to fall occasionally. In a community of saviours who try their best even though sometimes their best isn’t enough.

Carl said it most accurately, I think. If you keep looking backwards, you'll eventually trip up and fall hard on your arse. I wasn’t looking backwards anymore. I was looking forwards. And the future looked rosy.

Filled with snow-capped mountains and roaring fires. Filled with hope and love and everything I always thought I’d never have. Too cool. Too icy. The Ice Queen.

I was an Ice Queen when I needed it. A firestorm of flickering flames when it suited me best. And a damn good cop at every opportunity.

There’d been losses. But there’d also been gains. Weston was gone. Declan King’s legacy was decimated. Harvey Stone and Trevor Jones might not have been returning to CIB, but we were still able to catch up, to share a beer together at the pub. Cawfield was on probation and handling it badly, but Pierce had a tight rein on him and was enjoying making him jump through hoops to prove himself.

I was a sergeant, and Damon was still in charge of HEAT, fighting fires and putting out blazes. Doing what he loved.

And if he occasionally got lost in a little heartache over Carole, I was there to hold him.

And when I needed someone to lean on, he was there to prop me up.

Working in this industry was not for the faint of heart, but then, neither of us were the fainting types, were we?

My father filed his bad days in a mental drawer at night.

I talked about them quietly when I was ready, and then let Damon take away the burden in the most sweetest of hells with his touch.

We both did what we had to do to get up the next day and do it all over again.

You go to bed each night and do what you gotta do to get up the next morning and do it all over again. Don't think about it; just do it. Know yourself, and you'll get through it in the end.

And I always had Carl. In my head. In my conscience. In my heart. All around me.

And that was OK. That was all right. Because doing this alone sucked, and I was determined to keep my friends close. And my loved ones even closer.

I walked into Damon’s house and saw our bags were packed and ready. The plane lifted off in just a couple of hours.

“I hope you didn’t pack a bikini in there,” I shouted.

“There is a spa pool at the resort,” came the muffled reply.

I followed the sound to this en suite bathroom.

“What are you doing?” I asked as he rummaged around in the bottom shelf of the cupboard.

“Looking for something. There. Got it.”

He stood up, hiding the ‘something’ behind his back.

“What’s that?” I asked.

“Just you wait and see.”

“Show me now,” I told him.

“Patience is a virtue, love.”

“I’m not the patient type, and you know it.”

“Try harder.”

“I want to know what it is. Show me.”

He spread his hands wide; they were empty.

“See? Nothing. Now, go grab your coat, or we’ll be late.”

I huffed and stomped my way to the dining room, throwing my coat on over my jacket and holster.

“Are you taking your gun, Lara?”

I huffed some more, threw my coat off, letting it fall to the floor by the dining table, and then stomped to the office and removed the jacket, holster and gun. Both gun and holster successfully locked away in the safe, I donned my jacket and stomped back out into the dining room.

Damon smirked at me. He’d also picked my coat up off the floor and carefully folded it, draping it over a dining room chair.

I almost dropped it back on the floor to be ornery.

“Ready for firelight and stars?” Damon asked.

“Did you really pack a bikini?”

He shook out my coat and held it up for me to put on.

“I might have.”

“Wishful thinking,” I told him, thrusting an arm in one sleeve of the coat and then following it up with the other. He settled the coat on my shoulders and ran his hand down my arms.

His lips brushed against my nape, just under my hairline, making me shiver with promise.

“You can always skinny dip in the tub,” he told me. “It’s private to the suite.”

“Now there’s an idea. Snow falling and we skinny dip in the hot tub out on the open deck. Where it’s snowing.”

He winked at me. “Under the stars and beside the brazier.”

“Will we actually get some skiing in, you think?”

“I have my doubts.”

“You do?” I stopped to stare at him as he picked up our suitcases and crossed to the stairs down into the garage.

“Come on,” he called. “We’ve got a flight to catch. Have you got your keys?”

I checked my coat pockets.

Something - not my keys - was in one.

I pulled it out and stared at it blankly.

Damon popped his head around the corner on the stairs and watched me.

“What do you think?” he asked. “Will we get any skiing in?”

I looked down at the velvet box in my hands and then looked back up at him.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“It might help if you opened it.”

I stared at him. I stared down at the box.

“Skiing?” he said silkily.

With a shaking hand, I lifted the lid on the velvet box. A sapphire and diamond ring glinted up at me. It wasn’t overly large or horrendously obnoxious. In fact, I was pretty sure I could wear it to work if I wanted; it wouldn’t have got in the way. I didn’t think it was overly expensive, either. Not ridiculously so, at any rate. Damon could certainly have spent a fortune and not batted an eyelash.

Which made it priceless.

It also complemented the engagement ring I kept in my jewellery box, one my father had given my mother many years ago. One I had never worn, but I could see sitting snuggly against this one if I ever decided to dress up for a special occasion.

Say, when I married the love of my life, for instance.

I looked up at Damon. He watched me carefully.

“I did warn you enough, didn’t I?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said, unable to say another thing.

“Then you’ll wear it?”

“Yes.”

“You’ll wear it down the aisle when I marry you?”

“Yes.”

“So, that’s a yes to marrying me?”

“Yes.”

“Lara, love, you’re worrying me.”

He stepped out of the stairwell and walked up to me. Reaching out he took hold of my upper arms and looked me in the eye.

“What are you thinking?” he asked soberly.

“That we won’t be skiing much.”

A grin slowly spread his lips, and then he was wrapping me up in his arms and kissing me.

My back hit the wall. His thigh slipped between my legs. I opened myself to him. He took what I offered with a frantic determination.

I sometimes wondered if I was a mountain Damon needed to climb and conquer.

And then he moaned against my lips, pressed himself against my body, and kissed away all other thoughts.

We missed our flight. There was no skiing.

But we didn’t forgo the firelight and stars, even if they were in Auckland and not Cardrona in the South Island of New Zealand.

And I might have, at some stage over the weekend, modelled a pair of bikinis for him, but I made him swear on pain of death that he’d never tell anyone.

Some things were better left unsaid. He agreed.

Review Request

If you enjoyed reading A Lick Of Heat please tell others about this book.

Share on Facebook.

Tweet on Twitter.

Write a Review.

It all helps, and I would be extremely grateful for the support.

A Lick Of Heat at Amazon (via website links)

A Lick Of Heat at Goodreads

Find out more about Nicola Claire books at:

nicolaclairebooks.com

* * *

Free Download

Sign up!

Get your free copy of Nicola Claire’s Starter Library!

Three free books to get you started!

Starter Library

* * *

More Bargain Books From Nicola Claire…

“The best vampire book I’ve read in a long time!” ★★★★★

In a world where vampires, shapeshifters, ghouls and magic users co-exist in relative harmony, one young woman finds herself the centre of all supernatural desires. Born to hunt them and destined to love them, Lucinda Monk must find the strength required to save them and hold them all dear. But can she trust any of them? And is she more than she appears?

Kindred is an Adult Urban Fantasy/Paranormal Romance Series set in modern-day Auckland, New Zealand.

At its heart, Kindred is a romance story, that just happens to feature sexy vampires, vampire hunters, and a kindred connection between the two never before seen.

Kindred - A sacred match, a suitable partner for a joining. To be a kindred there must exist a connection between the Nosferatu and their chosen; only those suitably compatible will be kindred to the other.

This series is complete and includes the following titles:

Kindred

Blood Life Seeker

Forbidden Drink

Giver of Light

Dancing Dragon

Shadow's Light

Entwined with the Dark

Kiss of the Dragon

Dreaming of a Blood Red Christmas (Michel's POV)

Download Your Copy Here

* * *

“Dystopian At Its Finest” & For Less Than The Cost Of A Cup of Coffee…

“ELITE.WAS.AWESOME! No joke, this book was freaking amazing.” ★★★★★

Selena Carstairs has been raised an Elite. She lives the life of privileged luxury, never wanting for anything. But her world is not what it seems... The island of Wánměi has a strict set of rules. Be a model Citizen and all will be rewarded. Disobey the law and the consequences are dire. For Selena, the urge to defy is in her blood. Out of boredom? Or something else?

The Citizen Saga is a Totalitarian Dystopia set in a mildly futuristic world, with hints of Cyberpunk, Romantic Suspense and heart palpitating adventure.

In a world where rules define model behaviour, and stepping outside the parameters set has drastic consequences, one woman inadvertently starts a war.

Have you been a model Citizen today? Citizen versus Elite. The battle has begun.

This series is complete and includes the following titles:

Elite

Cardinal

Citizen

Masked

Wiped

Download Your Copy Here

* * *

With Over 800 5-Star Reviews On Goodreads…

“I abso-freaking-lutely LOVED it!” ★★★★★

Genevieve Cain has just one dream in her life and she intends to do anything necessary to keep it. Sweet Seduction is her passion, her business and the most popular café/chocolatier/music store in town. But when her ex-boyfriend threatens her dream, she's forced to seek legal counsel. And the moment lawyer Dominic Anscombe walks into her life, things get complicated and very delicious indeed.

Sweet Seduction is an Adult Contemporary Romance/ Romantic Suspense Series set in modern-day Auckland, New Zealand.

The premise behind this series is foremost love at first sight. It does exist, I'm living proof of that. Mix in alpha males who know what they want and when they see it, set out to take it, claim it and possess it - completely - then add in danger, excitement and a dash of intrigue and you've got an adventurous, romantic, knock-your-socks off story.

Love at first sight has never been so dangerous and so very delicious at the same time.

This series is complete and includes the following titles:

Sweet Seduction Sacrifice

Sweet Seduction Serenade

Sweet Seduction Shadow

Sweet Seduction Surrender

Sweet Seduction Shield

Sweet Seduction Sabotage

Sweet Seduction Stripped

Sweet Seduction Secrets

Sweet Seduction Sayonara

Download Your Copy Here

* * *