Charged - Book One Page 3

  “The good news,” he continued, “is that I checked everything I could and I believe it’s still working. The bad news is that, if the owner knows it’s missing, he’s probably already replaced it or moved whatever this box unlocks.”

  He put the box back together and held it out to me, reluctant to let it go. I knew he was more than interested in something like this. I wanted to let him hold on to it, but I couldn’t. I was certain that it got Richie killed.

  “Thanks.” I grabbed the box and turned to leave.

  “Daddy, Daddy, wait for me,” Aaron said in a girly voice, holding up the Chihuahua and bouncing him in the air.

  I grabbed Zero, who was still trembling and I gave Aaron a look.

  “Hey, let me know if you find out anything else about the dead guy,” he said.

  He knew I wasn’t telling him everything. He always knew when someone wasn’t telling him something. But for some reason, he never pried for more information with me. I nodded my head and left.

  Zero and I walked along the pavement, him seeming uneasy in every step and my injury reminding me of my own limitations in every step.

  CHAPTER 6

  WHEN WE GOT BACK TO MY APARTMENT, we headed upstairs. As we reached the last step Zero started growling, which he almost never did. He stopped dead in his tracks and I looked down the hallway for anything unusual. The door to my apartment was busted open. I unsnapped my Magnum from its holster, lifted Zero up into my left arm and slowly walked into the apartment. Quickly, I searched all the rooms. It was empty.

  Whoever broke in could’ve turned the place upside down. If they had, I couldn’t tell that much. My piles of books were now just smaller piles in different places. The bedroom floor was still covered with clothes, but I wouldn’t have left all the dishes broken on the kitchen floor and I really wouldn’t have left the fridge open. The beer would get warm.

  After I bolted the door, I gave Zero some baloney and told him, “good dog.” The bolts were now the only parts still working. I set Zero and the baloney on my desk so he wouldn’t get glass in his paws.

  I wasn’t really that surprised to see the apartment had been ransacked. If you throw enough people in jail, eventually one of them is going to come back after they are released and show you, in one way or another, that they’re pissed. I was kind of shocked it hadn’t happened more. But the flat-screen wasn’t gone and my watch was still on the table. As much as I would’ve liked to believe it was someone from the past, it wasn’t. Someone was looking for the box. I sat down at my desk and thought about who could’ve possibly known I had the box, besides Aaron.

  It only took me a second to realize I’d made a mistake. Someone besides the cops had already searched Richie’s earlier this week and no one would’ve known I found anything if I’d patched the hole in the wall. I was getting rusty.

  I didn’t bother calling the cops; it would just be more paper work for them and nothing of value was taken as far as I could tell. I had all my guns on me. Plus, I could already hear the comments regarding my very small dog. Not worth it. I could’ve scooped up the multitude of shards of glass and had Aaron inspect them for prints, but my gut told me it would be useless.

  Then the cell in my pocket vibrated. I pulled it out and the screen showed Marie’s number.

  “Hello.”

  “Lewis, its Marie. You find anything?”

  It was obvious Marie knew more than she was letting on. There’s a huge difference, I thought, between the questions, “you find anything?” and “you find anything out?” She should have asked the latter.

  “Nothing,” I said.

  “Oh.”

  “How about you? The cops have any leads?”

  “No, nothing. You used to be a cop; don’t you keep in touch with the old buddies?”

  I was slightly irritated by the ‘used to be part.’ Like cops ever stop being cops. “Not recently,” I said, knowing this was a lie. I hadn’t seen any of my old buddies in years. “What was Richie last into?”

  “I couldn’t tell you, Lewis. We hadn’t spoken for a long time. But if you find anything, anything at all, please call me. I gotta go. Talk to you later.”

  She hung up quickly, like someone was rushing her to get off the phone. Red flag number two. She wasn’t going to answer any of my questions. A part of me wondered if it was her who had vandalized my place. It was too much of a coincidence that she would call right afterwards. Plus, if she hadn’t kept in contact with Richie, why did she go looking for him in the first place? And why did she sound scared? Scared for me, or for herself? Either way, it was doubtful her apartment looked like mine.

  I thought about all of this for too long. I came to the conclusion that I had to search Richie’s one more time. I proceeded to clean up the glass on the kitchen floor and would head back to Richie’s tomorrow.

  CHAPTER 7

  WHEN I RETURNED TO RICHIE’S, I was a little more cautious. I parked a couple blocks down from the laundromat. Since the cane was a dead giveaway to someone looking for me, I left it in the truck and tried not to limp. I also brought in a basket of old clothes and proceeded to put them through a cycle.

  The laundromat itself was dirty, not any place I’d actually wash anything. Two women were also there, washing clothes. When everything felt right, I headed outside, lit a smoke and slowly walked to the stairs around the outside of the building that led to Richie’s flat. As I reached the top of the stairs, I noticed I wasn’t alone and I quickly stubbed out my smoke.

  Standing in the center of Richie’s dinky living space was a beautiful woman, bending over the coffee table rifling through a stack of papers. The girlfriend? This made me pause as I peered through the door, which was only slightly open. After a moment, I noticed she was model-like, but not in a frail, bony way. Her face was perfectly symmetrical. There wasn’t a single line on it. But, at this point, she was a suspect. And now I was certain she wasn’t Richie’s girlfriend.

  I unsnapped my gun from its holster and tried to determine whether she was alone or not. I knocked the revolver on the door lightly and she turned around startled, dropping the few papers in her hand. I kept the gun on her as I stepped into the small room, motioning her to be silent and checked the bathroom and storage room to make sure we were alone. There was no way she was a new detective; she couldn’t have been more than twenty years old.

  “Mr. Kagen, I assure you I am the only one here,” she said, with what sounded like a sincere tone.

  “And you are?”

  “Kye,” she said, holding out her hand. Her body language was all business. And there was nothing in her voice or her stance that said she was twenty.

  Of course, she gave me no last name. Even though she appeared to be unarmed, I didn’t shake her hand. I approached her slowly, hoping the bad knee wouldn’t give, only to realize she must have been five-ten and with those heels, over six feet tall. Even so, I got six inches from her face and looked her right in the eyes. I knew she wasn’t a cop. I knew all the cops in this city, or at least I used to.

  “Kye, I don’t suppose you have a badge that would allow you to enter a crime scene?” Technically, it wasn’t the crime scene, but I knew if she was a new officer, she would’ve disclosed it the minute we met and she wouldn’t be alone. Plus, the door was already busted open the night prior, so she wasn’t exactly breaking any laws at this point.

  She seemed a little too calm now. Why wasn’t she scared? There was something off in her composure, but it wasn’t fear. It was something I couldn’t pinpoint, hidden under a blank expression. Something about the way her shoulders slumped for a moment. The moment faded and she straightened herself quickly, letting a small frown roll across her lips.

  “Mr. Kagen, the device you have is very important to us and we’re willing to pay for it.”

  She knew I had the box. I had to shove aside the fact that she was gorgeous and basically a kid. Her acquiescing stance could’ve been deliberate. Her long, straight, brown hair glistened und
er the dim light and her green eyes were mesmerizing like they were almost too green.

  Ignoring her statement, I patted her down and stepped back, putting the revolver back in its holster. In the dim light, I couldn’t shake the feeling that she different. It was as if she were too beautiful, too perfect.

  “Now, Kye, what is it that I have?”

  “A box. A little silver metal box. And whatever you do, don’t give it to Marie Stakes; it doesn’t belong to her.”

  Her voice was confident. There was nothing playful or childish in it. I wanted to correct her, telling her that the box wasn’t metal, but I didn’t. Looked like metal, felt like metal, but it wasn’t metal. Aaron made that clear.

  “So this box belongs to you?” I said this with sarcasm, to let her know I didn’t believe a word she was saying. Apparently, there were groups of people who wanted the box now. Or was Kye the one who broke into my place?

  “It belongs to me and others,” she said, pausing slightly, “I realize that me being here looks suspicious, but I needed to know if he had any—”

  She instantly stopped talking, becoming conscious that she was about to say too much. Unfortunately, I could’ve filled in the rest with about twenty different options.

  “We will contact you in twenty-four hours.” She gracefully maneuvered around me in the tiny apartment and hastily walked down the stairs.

  What was Kye doing here alone? I could’ve stopped her, handcuffed her and called the cops. I could’ve, but I didn’t. My gut was telling me she wasn’t the problem. I shouldn’t have pulled my gun on her, but with my place being wrecked and Richie being dead, I didn’t feel I had a choice. I looked around for a few minutes, but decided it wasn’t safe to stick around too long, so I snapped my holster and left with my now very wet clothes.

  There was no point in patching the wall now; plenty of people knew I took the box. If there was anything else at Richie’s, I’m sure it was gone. I wanted to follow Kye the minute she left, but my injury made that impossible and I was pretty sure she knew it. She wasn’t really Richie’s girlfriend, but the woman claiming to be. This, I was positive of.

  CHAPTER 8

  WHEN I GOT BACK, I searched the apartment and looked for Zero. He was still there and it appeared that there hadn’t been any unwanted visitors. I had to ice the knee for a couple hours because of the weight I’d put on it. It felt like a small knife was stuck in it and I still needed three more surgeries to get full movement back.

  After I’d thrown the clothes in the dryer, I fed Zero as I thought over my day. This was the busiest day I had in months, although it was starting to look more like a giant jigsaw puzzle in which I was missing more than a few pieces.

  I thought about Kye. It was a bad idea for her to be at Richie’s alone and unarmed. What was she thinking? And what else was she looking for in Richie’s apartment if she knew I already had the box? Had I missed something? I closed my eyes and scanned the women’s faces that I saw in the laundromat, but none of them looked like the type she would be working with. Plus, there was something off about Kye that I just couldn’t place. The way she moved, possibly.

  After a few hours of contemplating, I shoved the box inside of a half-eaten Chinese takeout box in the fridge, believing a little cold wouldn’t bother it. I also put a chair up under the front doorknob for extra security, in case someone wanted to visit me in the middle of the night. Finally, I put the revolver under the spare pillow next to mine — like I always did. I grabbed Zero, cradling him in my left arm and decided to tell Aaron everything in the morning.

  CHAPTER 9

  I DRAGGED MYSELF OUT OF BED AROUND SEVEN. I barely slept at all. It was just stupid that I stayed here. But no one had invaded the flat. All was safe, all was secure. The box was still in the fridge. After a half a pot of coffee and a shower, I grabbed the box and headed to Aaron’s shop, knowing he was open at seven every morning.

  When I got there, he locked up and we headed to Barney’s and I told him about my night.

  He listened attentively about my place being wrecked and meeting Kye. When I was finished, he sat back, taking in all the information and asked the waitress for another coffee.

  In order to figure out what the hell was going on, I knew I had to tell Aaron the whole truth. I needed his help. So I gave him the short version about Richie.

  “The victim was Richard Stakes. His sister asked me to look into his murder. Richie and I… we were friends when we were kids. Went to the same school, lived next door to each other. It’s the way he was killed that bothers me. Someone basically sliced his head open and tore out his brains and was smart enough not to leave any evidence. Richie wasn’t anyone important, a pot smoker who couldn’t see the difference between right and wrong on a petty-theft level.”

  Aaron raised his eyebrows for a second and let out a long sigh.

  “Do you think this is related to you somehow?” he said.

  “I can’t see any connection. I hadn’t spoken to Richie in twenty years, except for a few chance encounters.”

  “Do you believe Kye? That the box belongs to her?”

  “I don’t know, but she’s definitely hiding something.”

  “And Marie?”

  “She’s blatantly lying. I don’t think she even cares that Richie’s dead.”

  Aaron paused and rubbed his forehead for a minute.

  “Okay. We need to find out what it opens.”

  I was hoping he would say that. I slid the box across the table over to him.

  “I’ll give it a shot,” he said. “Oh, and I wouldn’t mind meeting this Kye,” he said, smiling.

  “She’s taken,” I said.

  “Yeah, right! I’m sure she was really charmed by the Elmer Keith revolver you shoved in her chest!”

  “What, this?” I said, pulling my jacket back a little, showing him my holster with the .357 Magnum in it. “This talks to women.”

  “Besides ‘freeze, turn around and put your hands up,’ what exactly does it say? I’m curious,” he said, smiling again.

  “Well, it says, ‘I’m here to protect you, assuming you don’t make any sudden movements.’”

  “Charming.” Aaron was shaking his head and laughing under his breath now.

  CHAPTER 10

  WHEN I GOT BACK TO THE APARTMENT, there was a man knocking on my front door as I entered the hallway. I was caught off guard and he saw me immediately.

  “Mr. Kagen?”

  Actually, I noticed he was just a kid, couldn’t have been more than sixteen.

  “I have a delivery for you,” he said, holding out a box that looked like it contained flowers.

  After a very long hesitation, which made even the delivery boy uncomfortable, I took the box, signed his sheet and watched him leave. I unbolted the door and laid the box on the kitchen counter. I made my quick search to make sure the place was empty and found Zero hiding in the shower stall, trembling.

  “Some guard dog you are.”

  The apartment was empty. I went back and bolted the front door and snapped my gun back in its holster. I figured if someone wanted to blow me up, I’d be dead by now. Plus, Kye said she’d be contacting me. I walked over and opened the box. It was a dozen of long-stem roses with a card that read, Tonight. Rusty’s at 8. It was a woman’s handwriting. Kye probably wrote it herself. I thought it was a little old-school, but it was just too easy to listen in on a cell phone.

  While I thought about Kye, I picked up and held Zero for a while just to see if for once he would stop trembling. He didn’t. His bulging little eyes were fixed on the box, so I walked toward it with him cradled in my arm and he started growling. This made me a little uneasy. I grabbed the note, flicked on the gas fireplace and tossed the note in. I didn’t need anyone knowing where I was going, should my place be vandalized again.

  I rubbed the dog’s head for a while, trying to come up with a plan. I could watch the restaurant till Kye showed, but she might not show if she didn’t see me. Plus, I had no
intentions of actually bringing the box. I needed to find out if it really belonged to her. Rusty’s was always a crowded place, so I decided I would just show up like a normal customer, except I would be packing both the revolver and my pistol.

  CHAPTER 11

  IT WAS APPROACHING SEVEN-THIRTY and I’d already showered, shaved and dressed. I picked out a black sweater and blue jeans with my brown leather coat to conceal the shoulder holster. I had the pistol in my ankle holster and took more than a couple ibuprofens for the pain in my knee.

  I knew Rusty’s. I’d been there a couple of times during my career, back when you could smoke in the place. Everything was nonsmoking now in Seattle. It was a small, yuppie café about a fifteen-minute drive from my place. You couldn’t miss it. The sign was bigger than the place itself and the coffee was good.

  On the way there, I thought about Kye. I knew I wouldn’t be taking her to Aaron’s and giving her the box. I wanted to believe her, but I didn’t. To make matters worse, this was theft and tampering with evidence. Even if I handed the box over to the Seattle police, there would still be charges against me. And now, Aaron was involved.

  Why had my feelings for a childhood friend allowed me to slip beyond all of my ethics? I tried to convince myself that it would turn out okay and my sentence would be reduced to a misdemeanor with no jail time. I knew I was the only one who cared about what happened to Richie. I attempted to push all this out of my head and continue with my plan.

  When I got to Rusty’s, I left the cane in the truck. I went in and ordered a strong black coffee. I knew once Kye opened the door, half of the men in the place not already with a woman would take a look at her. She was stunning.

  After forty-five minutes, I started to worry. She didn’t seem like the kind of person who would be late for anything, especially if it meant getting the box.