Daddy's Little Killer (12 page)

"Commissioner Hardy's office, how may I
direct your call?"  Her pause whispered confidentiality across
the space separating us.  "Yes, Commander.  I'll let him
know you're running ten minutes late.  Chief Lowe and Dr.
Eriksson just arrived now."

A grinding squeak was muffled behind Lowe's
clenching jaw.

"May I ask who is joining us?"

He glanced down at me and
pasted on another smile.  I felt the phantom pat on my head
that his eyes conveyed. 
Don't you
worry your pretty little head, ma'am.
  "Allow me to make the introductions," he
said.

"Tracy, we'll head into George's conference
room."

"He actually requested that you wait for him
in there, Chief Lowe, until Commander Darnell arrives.  He and
Chief Weber would like to meet with Dr. Eriksson privately in his
office for a few minutes first."

His charm took a decided turn toward a
slither.  "Then I won't have the pleasure of making the
introductions, Dr. Eriksson.  I believe I'll check in with my
detectives downstairs before we chat.  Pleasure meeting
you."

"This way, doctor."

I followed her down a wide hallway, past
several closed doors, all matching the mahogany of her desk, until
we reached one slightly ajar.  Tracy knocked lightly and
pushed the door open.  "Commissioner George Hardy, Chief
Donald Weber, this is Dr. Helen Eriksson."

Hardy looked very much like I had imagined
when he fell into bumpkin vernacular on the phone with me. 
Portly polar bear.  A shock of white hair was coiffed
neatly.  His suit was a little too tight in the belly. 
His jowls hung from a round, shiny face.

Weber's external appearance, I soon learned,
was a perfect match to his affectation.  He glided from one of
the wingback chairs in front of Hardy's desk and clasped my hand
for a sandwich shake.  "Dr. Eriksson, we are absolutely
delighted to meet you.  May I have Tracy bring you
anything?  Coffee?  Tea?"

"Coffee, black, thank you."

He wore a police uniform, bedecked with his
rank in bars on the collar and a finely polished badge that
designated his rank as police chief around the city seal.

"Won't you sit down, Dr. Eriksson?"

"Please, call me Helen," I sat in the other
wingback and stared at Hardy.  "Let's not mince words,
gentlemen.  Was Jerry Lowe aware that you requested I consult
on a few cases for Darkwater Bay prior to my arrival at a crime
scene last night?"

Hardy's jowls sagged.  "We're not
entirely sure, Helen.  May I ask why that's important?"

"I met him in the elevator on the way up to
your office.  The warmth he exuded after I introduced myself
was about two degrees shy of arctic."

Weber crossed his legs,
folded his hands in his lap.  "It is entirely possible that
Jerry heard rumors that we wanted to bring
someone
in from the outside. 
There were only three people aware of the identity of the one we
wanted, Helen.  George, me and someone you haven't met yet,
Commander Chris Darnell from the state police. Well, four if you
consider that Rodney Martin brought you to our attention in the
first place."

"Darnell heads a special task force for the
governor," Hardy said.  "OSI, or the Office of the Special
Investigator.  Governor Collangelo created it specifically for
Darkwater Bay."

"I see."

"Do you?" Weber asked.  "Because for an
outsider stepping into this city, it's generally a difficult
concept to grasp, that our city would require a special
investigative team through the state police to essentially police
the police."

"I was at a crime scene last night, Mr.
Weber.  I think I have an inkling that there are problems
here."

"The fight for jurisdiction," Hardy spoke to
Weber with disgust.  "We'd have had a hell of a worse fight on
our hands if Jerry'd been around."

"I believe the detectives from Central
Division mentioned that had Mr. Lowe been present, there would've
been no question regarding jurisdiction."

Tracy slipped back into the room and placed
a delicate china cup and saucer on Hardy's desk.  "If you need
anything else, let me know."

Hardy waited until she closed the
door.  "This seems a little cloak and dagger I'm sure. 
We've got our reasons."

Obviously.  I sipped the coffee. 
"One of the officers who assisted me at the crime scene last night,
Charlie Haverston, intimated that the timing of the Foster murder
seemed beyond coincidental.  He suggested that this old case
that was never closed to anyone's satisfaction might be the reason
you wanted my help."

"Charles is a good police officer," Weber
said. "Our uniformed officers have better instincts than –"

"Now Don, let's not scare her off," Hardy
beamed at me, but his weary eyes told another story.  Yes, he
was old and tired, but there was underlying fear. 

"If I may be direct."

"Please," George said.  "It's one of
the reasons your name came up in our conversations.  You made
quite an impression on a young Rodney Martin once upon a time, for
being a brilliant psychologist, but also for making your point
without much fuss."

"If there are so many problems in law
enforcement, specifically in Central Division, why don't you clean
house so to speak?"

"I'd love to share that information with
you, Helen, but until we've reached an agreement with you to work
in Darkwater Bay, I'm afraid I can't divulge many details," Hardy
said.

"Perhaps it would've been wise to secure a
contract prior to sending me to a crime scene."

"I hoped it would emphasize the seriousness
of our situation, doctor," Weber said.  "If you could see the
carnage and understand the dynamic within Central Division, perhaps
it would impress upon you the urgency we feel.  I promise you,
this case will not be closed if Central Division investigates."

"And I'm still unaware of any compelling
reason that you would retain detectives of the caliber of Flynn
Myre.  Rogers and Daltry weren't very impressive either."

"This is what I had in mind," Hardy's chest
puffed out a little bit.  "We'd do this on a temporary basis,
say a month on this new case that has the disturbing parallels to
the Bennett girl's murder.  At the end of that time, we can
reevaluate what you'd like to do, Helen."

"But?"

"We need assurances that whatever
information you may learn during the course of your investigation
aren't shared with your former colleagues at the FBI."

Nobody but me could see the orange glow on
the horizon from that burning bridge.  "Is that all?"

Hardy continued.  "We have a strong
tradition of cleaning up our own messes in Darkwater Bay."

"How does that gel with the governor's
special police force?"

"There are aspects of this situation that
Chris is aware of."

I looked at Weber.  He stared at his
hands.  "But not all of them."

His head rose, turned toward me.  "That
is correct, Dr. Eriksson.  We would prefer that if you learn
certain things about our police department that you will give us
the opportunity to manage them in house."

I snorted.  "You won't fire inept
detectives.  You don't –"

"Helen," Hardy interrupted softly. 
"You don't understand the scope of this mess.  It'll make more
sense when I can give you more details."

"Such as?"

Weber rose and started pacing.  "If we
knew who it was safe to fire without turning the city on its ear,
we'd do it."

"Exactly how damaging is it?"  My gaze
roved from one man to the other.  "That's the crux of your
hesitation, your complicity in letting the status quo have free
rein around here, isn't it?  Someone is blackmailing
you.  They aren't asking for money.  They simply like
things the way they are."

Weber crumpled to the point that I wondered
if his starched suit had assumed the role of his skeleton.  He
sat down hard.  "It's embarrassing more than anything
else.  But because there are moral turpitude clauses in both
my and George's contracts, it would mean that the first two people
out the door would be us."

"Affairs?"

"Horrifically compromising photographs,"
Weber's agony bled from his eyes.  "My family would be
devastated."

"Hell, honey, I just like my job," George
said.  "The last person who would be shocked by what this
sleazy li'l bastard's been holdin' over my head for ages is Mrs.
Hardy.  We sorta got one of them whatchacallems. 
Arrangements."

"This might be a leap, but I'm assuming that
Chief Lowe is unaware of this situation, since you've excluded him
from this part of my contract negotiation."

"Jerry Lowe," Weber sighed.

"Do you think he has a similar threat
hanging over his head?"

"I expect he could perpetrate such an
atrocity," Hardy muttered.

"Interesting."

Both men stared at me.

"Only from the perspective of the power
structure in your police department.  Several people have
mentioned him to me prior to our first meeting this morning."

"And?" Hardy's jaw quivered.

"It would seem that his
absence from last night's power struggle was unusual," I
said.  "In fact, it rather felt like Rogers and Daltry had
a
wait 'til daddy gets home
attitude when they were arguing with Detective
Briscoe.  What distressed me the most was that the crime scene
division wasn't allowed access while the debate raged."

"You observed a great deal, Helen," Hardy
said.  "What do you say?  We'll play this by ear. 
If it takes a month to close this case or a year, you're welcome to
stay on board for the duration –"

"Commissioner Hardy, I'm not sure you grasp
what it is that I do.  I'm not a police detective.  I
don't investigate crimes.  I look at evidence and try to
determine the type of person most likely to have committed the
crime.  Yes, I can review the Bennett case and give you an
impression as to whether or not I believe these murders are linked,
but I cannot do the jobs of your detectives."

"Perhaps you could keep them focused in the
right direction."

"Mr. Weber, I already directed four of your
uniformed officers at the crime scene last night.  As we
speak, they're talking to neighbors, verifying the alibi of the man
who found Ms. Foster's body and attempting to locate her next of
kin."

"That's exactly what we're talkin' about,
Helen.  If it were up to me –" I did a double take at his
choice of words, because as the commissioner, it was certainly up
to him, "– I'd just as soon leave these uniformed guys on the case
with you than turn it over to the detective squad."

In many police jurisdictions I encountered
in large cities, the police detectives didn't have the time to do
all of the legwork in a homicide investigation.  The manpower
required for that would've bankrupted the police departments. 
They relied on uniformed officers to canvass neighborhoods and
search for leads that detectives could in turn follow or delegate
back to the assigned officers.

"Of course we'd make things nice and
official on your part," Hardy continued.  He yanked open a
drawer and rifled through it.  "Detective badge just to make
things kosher, and a weapon too, if you think you'd need it."

That much was a deal breaker from my
perspective, the weapon.  "Of course I'd need a weapon. 
I'm simply not sure that I would qualify as a detective, should the
case close and the prosecutor would require my testimony."

"I doubt with your history at the FBI that
it would be questioned at all, Helen," Weber said.  "From that
perspective, you're overqualified to be a police detective."

Until some slick attorney started digging
into what I did for a living.  Hardy and Weber weren't
thinking far enough ahead.  There was the other matter
too.  Hardy knew Rick was dead.  He couldn't know the
black cloud on the horizon, one that threatened to follow me no
matter where I went.

It was full disclosure for me.  "You
should know before we get too serious about this discussion that my
ex-husband, Rick Hamilton was murdered recently."  My
reputation for leaving jaws gaping in my wake was intact. 
"You should also be aware of why I divorced him.  He was
arrested for money laundering for a notorious organized crime
family on the east coast."

"My God!"  Hardy gasped.  "I had
no idea when I called you."

"You can understand my decision to leave the
FBI a bit better now, I trust," I said.  Bitterness crept into
my voice, much as suspicion had invaded the minds of my former
peers.  "There are those in Washington who believe, despite
the fact that I immediately divorced my husband, that I wasn't
ignorant to his crimes."

"Were you?" Weber grew bold, possibly
because all three of us carried some sort of explosive secret we'd
just as soon stay buried.  They had barely scratched the
surface of mine.

"Of course."  It was the antithesis of
the low profile life that Wendell wisely hammered into my
brain.  I knew first hand the dangers of a two-criminal
household.  "I was a federal agent.  Had I known what he
was doing, I'd have arrested him myself."

Hardy nodded once, and I half expected a
string of drool to leak into the crack of his very canine jaw
line.  "It's good enough for me.  Hell, the sins of the
father are the same as the sins of the spouse.  They don't got
a thing to do with how you do your job.  So what do you say,
Helen?"

The irony of his remark
made a tiny smile creep over my face. 
Ah, simple George.  You have no idea what you're getting
yourself into here.
  "I think,
provided that the same level of confidentiality I'm offering you is
returned in kind, that we have an agreement."  Hell, I'd agree
for the sidearm alone at this point.  The thieving PI's still
weighed heavily on the scales of concern.