Tied Up in Knots Read online

  “We don’t have the gun ’cause it was transferred to the marshals by mistake,” he explained almost sheepishly.

  “Come again?” I asked, incredulous, beside myself.

  He cleared this throat. “My lieutenant—”

  “Who’s that now?”

  “Cortez.”

  “Okay, sorry, g’head.”

  “Yeah, so Cortez transferred three guns to your office because, like your guy said in the diner, lots of cases are being looked at by Justice right now, and lots of evidence is being reexamined. So our gun went back to evidence after ballistics and prints and DNA was run, but from there it was accidentally transferred to you.”

  “What does it matter? It was tested for prints, which you got, and you’ve got the sample of whoever’s DNA was on it, so just get Fiore’s sample and match it… or not. It’s done either way.”

  “It’s not that simple.”

  “Of course it is. The prints will compel the DNA sample.”

  He shook his head. “No.”

  “No? How the hell you figure no?”

  “The ASA assigned to the case—Sutter—she says that without the gun, it’s our word against Fiore’s that the prints were from the gun. She says they could’ve come off anything, and it could look like we’re trying to set him up. Fiore could make a case for tampering.”

  “Are you serious?” I asked, overwhelmed with the stupidity of all of this.

  “Yeah, I’m serious!” Cochran flared. “Without the goddamn gun, we can’t make Fiore give us a DNA sample.”

  If I thought about it logically, that made sense. No judge in their right mind would issue a court order to compel Fiore to give them a DNA sample if the item his DNA was supposed to be on was, in fact, missing. What if it was always missing? Never found? What did that say about the police department that they’d had the weapon in their possession but didn’t anymore? What if the prints in question had come from somewhere or something completely different, and Andreo Fiore had, in fact, never even been in the room where Joey Romelli was killed? It was a mess.

  “I get it,” I admitted. “You need the gun.”

  “Fuck, yeah, I need the gun, and that’s where you come in.”

  “How?” I could hear how icy and stilted I sounded, so no way Cochran was missing it.

  “Chain of custody says it’s in your property room.”

  “But?”

  “But your boss says the gun’s not there.”

  Now I was really lost. “Okay, wait. You’re telling me that you already questioned the chief deputy about the gun?”

  “Barreto and I did, yeah.”

  This finally felt like the gist of it. “And?”

  “And like I said, he told us that it’s not there.”

  “Then what the fuck, Norris? If he says it’s not there, it’s not there.”

  “But I think it is, and I think he’s lying.”

  “What?” My brain was ready to explode. “How dare you fucking—”

  “Calm the fuck down!”

  “Don’t tell me to calm down!” I roared, drilling two fingers into his collarbone. “You don’t know shit about Sam Kage because if you did you’d never—”

  “I think your boss is purposely hiding the whereabouts of that gun,” he yelled over me.

  “For what reason?” I shouted.

  “I have no idea.”

  “Does Sam Kage even know Andreo Fiore?”

  “Not that we can tell. There’s nothing at all that links them.”

  “Then why the hell would you think he would lose the gun?”

  Cochran cleared his throat. “You know, back in the day, his partner was dirty, and guess where that guy went—into WITSEC,” he said offhandedly.

  “What are you insinuating?” I asked, feeling my skin heat under my clothes, afraid of what I would do if the words actually came out of his mouth. Irritation, annoyance, all of it was gone, replaced solely by anger. How fucking dare he.

  “Dirty partner… you understand.”

  “I don’t think I do,” I said flatly, my vision tunneling down to him, lost on the edges, going black, my throat dry, my heart beating so fast I wondered how he couldn’t hear it.

  “C’mon, Miro, don’t be stupid.”

  “That was a long time before my boss was even a marshal,” I ground out.

  “Whatever. It’s not right and you know it.”

  “What isn’t?” He had to be clear. I couldn’t bury his career if he wasn’t.

  “Your boss is fuckin’ dirty.”

  It was worse than I thought it would be, hearing his words, having them out there, the accusation making my stomach churn.

  “Did you hear me?”

  The rage filled me up, made me see red, and fisted my hands at my sides. Only the thought of Kage, his disappointment if I surrendered to my base instincts, kept me still. “You don’t know him at all.” I bit off each word.

  “Like I said, I know of him. I know his partner was dirty and he—”

  “Well, I know him,” I spat out, my voice hoarse. “And he would never, ever, tamper with evidence, any evidence! If anyone is screwing with you, it’s your boss. Who the fuck transfers the wrong guns to the Justice Department?”

  “Cortez signed a piece of paper to transfer a crapton of evidence, not just one gun! Do you have any idea how many cases and reports and everything else Justice is going through? It’ll take years for them to get through it all.”

  “And then they can start looking into Homan Square,” I blasted.

  “Fuck you, Miro!” he yelled, shoving at me hard but barely moving me, as I was prepared for his reaction. I knew Norris Cochran; his fuse was far shorter than mine. “You know I never—”

  “I don’t give a shit that you never,” I roared, knocking him back several feet. “But don’t you dare come at me with some bullshit accusation about my boss covering up a crime by tampering with evidence. For all we know, the goddamn gun was never even there in the first place!”

  He threw a wild roundhouse punch that I ducked easily, and I would have tagged him right in the jaw, but someone grabbed me from behind and got my arms pinned behind me.

  As I struggled to free myself, Cochran caught me in the right eye, but I managed to twist hard enough to take the next one in the right shoulder instead of the side of the face, and the last one in the gut. He was ready to hit me again; I saw the fury all over him, knew he’d been waiting years, ever since we arrested Hartley the first time, to kick the shit out of me.

  Then we both heard a bellow of outrage. I was released instantly, and before I hit the gravel, I was in Kowalski’s arms.

  “You better fuckin’ run!” he thundered after them. “I’ll have both of your motherfucking badges for this!”

  “For crissakes, Jones,” Kohn grumbled as he reached us. “We can’t leave you alone for a second? Why didn’t you yell for us?”

  “I didn’t know he had backup. How is this my fault?” I railed.

  “Jesus,” he moaned, “lookit your face, man. I think we’re gonna have to get you to the hospital.”

  “Fuck that,” I groused, spitting out a mouthful of blood. “Nothing’s broken. Just take me home.”

  “We’ll call Kage on the way.”

  I couldn’t argue with that.

  Chapter 3

  KOHN EXPLAINED to our boss what had happened as I lay on my couch at home with an ice pack on my face. I got to hear it all and add in a few details of my own since he had Kage on speaker. The part about Cochran accusing him of being dirty he didn’t react to at all, but me getting hit while his partner held me—that he took issue with.

  “I’ll have them both brought up on charges.”

  I was not innocent in the whole exchange. “I shoved him.”

  “You defended yourself,” Kohn argued. “I saw the whole thing, so did Jer. We just missed his fuckin’ partner going out the back.”

  “Yeah, it would’ve been a fair fight,” I explained, trying
to sit up, but Kowalski snapped his fingers, shook his head, and went back to flipping channels on my TV. He had the volume down for the time being, but once the call was done, ESPN would be loud in my Greystone. Not that either of them would stay once my friend Aruna got there with her one-year-old and Ian’s dog—technically my dog now too—Chickie Baby.

  “Jones?”

  “Yessir,” I answered.

  “You realize,” he growled in that way he had where there was no confusion—even on the phone—that he was a great big scary man, “that you don’t have to defend my honor, right?”

  “Begging your pardon, sir,” I said, taking a breath and thinking of all the things my boss had personally done for me that no one else ever had. “No one is allowed to say anything derogatory about you in my presence.”

  It was quiet in my living room then.

  “That’s true,” Kohn concurred, his voice sounding loud in the silence.

  “Agreed,” Kowalski chimed in.

  After a moment Kage exhaled sharply. “They’ll be brought up on charges, Jones. Your old partner isn’t allowed to kick the shit out of you just because he’s frustrated over missing evidence.”

  “Kicking the shit out of me would imply it was one on one,” I pointed out defensively, certain that I could have defended myself if it had been just him. “That was not the case.”

  “I’ll be sure to put that in my report.”

  “Just me and Cochran, I would’ve killed him,” I added, wanting that on the record.

  “Duly noted,” he said, and I recognized the patronizing tone. “And by the way, do they actually have any evidence that the gun they’re looking for is even with us?”

  “I dunno.”

  “Do they have a signature of whoever it was that signed the gun into our property room?”

  “Cochran didn’t say.”

  “Well,” Kage sighed, “according to what I’m seeing here in the log, the only firearms that were signed into evidence within the last month are all Glocks from the Chicago PD that ballistics are being redone on for their open officer complaints.”

  “So the gun he’s looking for isn’t even with us.”

  “Not that I can tell.”

  “Well, that goes along with his story. He said that the gun is there, but we’re saying it’s not.”

  “He needs to realize that we’re saying it’s not, because it’s not.”

  “Of course.”

  “I almost wish we could let him and his partner into our property room so they could see that the gun’s not there,” Kohn snapped. “Almost.”

  “Never happen,” Kage said flatly. “So I need an official statement from start to finish of the incident, Jones. Don’t leave anything out, and I want it e-mailed within a couple of hours, tops.”

  “Yessir.”

  “Be ready to give your report to the department liaison, Chicago PD IAD, and OPR.”

  Office of Professional Responsibility. I so loved talking to those guys. They would go over everything with a fine-tooth comb. “Or we could just not report it at all.”

  “I’m sorry, Jones. They’re not allowed to think that hitting you is okay.”

  “Doesn’t Chicago PD have enough problems without me adding to the mix?”

  “Two hours, Jones, start typing.”

  Fuck. “Yessir.”

  “Kohn, Kowalski, you too, whatever you saw.”

  “I’m on it,” Kohn assured him.

  “Working on it now, sir,” Kowalski echoed.

  “Good,” he said, and I thought he was going to hang up, so I was surprised when he didn’t.

  “Sir?”

  “Are you sleeping, Jones?”

  Shit. “I will now that I’m home, sir.”

  “See that you do,” he commanded and then hung up.

  How did he get away with ordering me around in my personal life? “This is not how I saw my homecoming going,” I griped.

  “What homecoming?” Kohn asked as he got up to go to my kitchen to get me more ice. “Doyle’s not even here?”

  But his question was answered a moment later by a knock on the door, a jingle of a key in the lock, and one of my oldest friends, Aruna Duffy, coming through the door with her one-year-old daughter, Sajani, my dog, and her husband.

  “Ohmygod, Miro, who hit you?” she shrieked right before 150 pounds of werewolf came barreling across the room and landed on me.

  Chickie was very happy to see me, as evidenced by the whining and whimpering, the rolling on his back on top of me, and the tongue bath my face got, which hurt like hell.

  “Aruna!” I groused, trying to get Chickie off.

  “Jesus, it looks like he’s getting ready to eat you,” Kowalski said, clearly enjoying the show. “That hurts, huh?”

  I growled at him.

  “That’s disgusting,” Kohn choked out, the revulsion thick in his voice. “Dog slobber.”

  “Eat him, Chick,” I ordered, pointing at Kohn.

  “The hell, man,” Aruna’s husband, big and burly and blond built-like-a-tank Liam Duffy said as he strode over to the couch. One-handed, he moved Chickie and then sat me up to study my face. He was a fireman, not an EMT, but he knew first aid.

  “I think we need to get you to a hospital,” he concluded as he studied me, even as Chickie thunked his head down in my lap. “That’s a lot of bruising on your cheek and eye, buddy. You may have some broken bones.”

  I scratched the mutant dog’s ears, under his chin, and then stroked his head over and over, telling him what a good boy he was. His tail thumping the floor sounded like an outboard motor, as fast as it was going. “Nothing’s broken,” I promised. “Seriously. It might look bad because everything shows up on my skin, but I’m good.”

  “Miro Jones!” Aruna yelled. “Do not tell me you’re not hurt and blame it on your beautiful milky complexion with the fabulous rose undertones.”

  Silence. Both Kohn and Kowalski were staring at me like I’d grown another head.

  “She’s a journalist,” Liam explained. “Her business is specific words.”

  “Huh,” Kohn said.

  “I’m fine,” I assured her, smiling to try to get her to stop biting her bottom lip and not look at me like I was dying. “I promise. I just need more ice.”

  “Your lip’s split, your right eye’s black and blue, and—”

  “I swear to you I’m perfectly fine.”

  She caught her breath, shoved her daughter at her husband, and flung herself down into my arms. We both grunted seconds later as Chickie climbed on top of us, and Sajani clapped her hands from Liam’s arms.

  He was going to crush us.

  “Get the monster dog off me,” I begged Liam.

  After passing Sajani to Kohn, he hauled Chickie off and took him into the kitchen to find him a treat.

  I was going to reiterate that everything was okay when my phone rang. “Lookit,” I told Aruna. “It’s Janet.”

  Snatching the phone from me, turning so she was now in my lap, she answered it after putting it on speaker. “Dammit, Janet.”

  It was always the same, even after so many years. It was all our friend Min’s fault, since she was the one who dragged us all to the Rocky Horror Picture Show a hundred years ago when we were all still in college.

  “Why are you answering pretty boy’s phone?” Janet Powell asked, snickering as she said it.

  “You’re rude and mean,” I informed one of my oldest and dearest friends. “So what the hell do you want?”

  “Hold on,” she ordered, and then we heard buttons being pressed.

  “I just got in bed,” Min Kwon groused from the other end of the line. “Do you know what time it is here in LA? Why are you calling me so early in the goddamn morning?”

  “Hi, Min,” I singsonged to her, cackling.

  “Minnie, honey,” Aruna cooed. “Howya doin’?”

  “Miro?” She sounded exasperated and surprised at the same time. “Aruna?”

  “Why’re you
just gettin’ to bed?” I grilled her. “Been in poundtown with some guy all night?”

  “Shut. Up,” she snarled. “I’ve been going through discovery on a case since—”

  “Janet, what the hell?” Catherine Benton almost shrieked over what was now a party line. “How dare you lie and call me out of surgery to—”

  “I’m going to have a baby,” she announced breathlessly.

  Silence.

  “Oh my God.” Min was the first to speak, or cry, as it was, and I knew she was because I could hear the wobble in her voice, the unmistakable sound of brimming-over happiness.

  “You’ve been trying so hard,” I said, my voice cracking with the same emotion Min was feeling. “Awww, honey, you did it. You got yourself knocked up.”

  The dam broke then, and we were all talking at the same time, all congratulating her, sending love to her husband, and Catherine hit her with medical questions since she was a doctor and needed to know.

  Janet and her hubby had been trying for a couple of years with no success. We all teased her—because that was better than the sympathy her husband’s family doled out—and told her he was a sex maniac. But the truth was they had done all the things you had to do when chasing the dream of children through miscarriages and specialists. I had no idea how she stayed so strong and optimistic in the face of that kind of pain, but now, finally, she was being rewarded.

  “I’m so happy for you,” Aruna sighed. “Now we just need Catherine to have one.”

  There was coughing, like Catherine swallowed a bug or something, and then the click of disconnect.

  Tired and giddy, the rest of us couldn’t stop laughing.

  ARUNA AND Liam were gone an hour later, right after Aruna explained that she’d cooked to stock my refrigerator, and I got to hear Chickie’s latest tale of valor. Apparently Aruna was at the park with some other mothers, and a man came asking for money. He had a friend with him, and they inadvertently put themselves between the mothers and the children. Aruna got scared and called Chickie.

  Just fuckin’ called him.

  He was lying beside the small jungle gym Sajani was climbing on, and when he came… fast… the guys ran even more so. Everyone cheered, and Chickie was the belle of the ball for the rest of the day. None of the other mothers were afraid of him, even those with infants.