The Guilty

Smallsy laughed at that. He understood it well. ‘Fine, fine, fine. I only live in Kits. I’ll be right down.’

Harry was relieved. He waited on the south side of the property office – away from the main traffic of the report writing room.

Fifteen agonizing minutes later, Larry Smallsy buzzed himself through the back doors. He plodded down the hall, adjusting his John Le

‘I really appreciate this, Larry.’

Smallsy just unlocked the door and guided him inside. He walked down the corridor, in between the tall stacks of boxes that columned the passageway. When he reached the back end, he put his paper cup down on the counter and looked up at the array of binders that lined the shelves. ‘Which one do you need, Harry?’

‘There’s a few of them – burning records from a decade back. From Montreaux.’

‘Man, between you and Striker, you guys are bleeding me dry.’

Harry stiffened. ‘Striker?’

‘Yeah, he came in and took a bunch of these too. Five binders in all. He legally seized them.’

Harry felt ill. ‘Which years?’

Smallsy showed him the dates and then gestured to the top row, where a large portion of the shelf now sat empty. Harry saw this and fell slightly back against the counter.

Gone, he thought. Fucking seized.

‘Hey,’ Smallsy asked. ‘You okay?’

But Harry said nothing. He just turned around and left the property office without another word.

One Hundred and Thirty-Three

The audio recordings Dr Sharise Owens had made were on one single tape, yet it took three-quarters of an hour for the clerk to have it copied by the tech out back. When Striker complained about the lengthy delay, she shot back, ‘You’re lucky we can do this at all today – only one guy knows how to transfer the files and burn the disc, and he’s not normally in on Saturdays. You should count yourself lucky.’

Properly chastised, Striker sat back down and waited for the CD.

When the clerk finally returned, she held a single bubble-wrapped envelope. Striker signed the Medical Information Release form, stating that he was now in possession of the material, then took the envelope and left the hospital with Felicia by his side.

Once in the car, Striker removed the CD from the envelope and powered on the radio. He slid the disc into the tray and nothing happened. When the LCD mini-screen flashed the message ‘UNREADABLE FORMAT’ he swore.

‘What the hell now?’ he asked.

‘Wrong format,’ Felicia replied. ‘It’s probably an MP3 or a FLAC or something. This radio’s ancient. Plays only regular audio.’ She loaded the CD into the laptop and waited. Seconds later, the Windows Media Player initiated and the voice of Dr Sharise Owens came over the speakers.

At first it struck Striker odd to hear her voice, this woman whose disappearance and death had triggered the investigation. Over the cheap speakers of the laptop, she sounded eerily faraway and ti

‘This is Dr Sharise Owens, regarding file number 71139. My practitioner number is 15572 and the patient’s name is Archer Jeffery Davies, Medical Number 4050 030 9019.’ She then gave the date and location of the writing.

As they listened to the feed, Striker opened the written file. Together, they compared the written report with the audio. For the first twenty minutes, everything matched perfectly, and Striker was growing antsy. When the tape timeline hit 21 minutes, 42 seconds, everything changed.

Striker blinked, then looked at Felicia. ‘You get that?’

‘Get what?’

‘Roll back the feed.’

Felicia used the mouse to drag the cursor back a full minute. Dr Sharise Owens’ voice took over the air once more:

‘The bullet round is of the frangible type, which has caused an array of soft tissue complications, most pertinently in the nervous and cardiovascular systems. The entrance wound, a three-inch opening, has destroyed the spinous processes of the eighth and ninth thoracic vertebrae and the subsequent vertebral bodies; the bullet’s exit caused fracturing of the inferior third of the sternum and the subsequent splintering of the ninth and tenth ribs anteriorly . . . This is indicative of a high-calibre, high-velocity round.’

Felicia listened to the woman’s explanation, then nodded. ‘She’s telling us it was a high-velocity, high-calibre round.’

Striker’s eyes darkened. ‘It’s not the calibre or speed that concern me, it’s the type and direction.’ He pointed to the written report. ‘Carlos Chipotle was firing an AK-47. Full Metal Jacket rounds.’

Felicia made an oh-shit sound. ‘Non-frangible.’

Striker nodded. ‘The only guys there with frangible rounds were us – the cops.’

‘Which means Archer got tagged by one of our own guys.’

Striker nodded. ‘And where does the report list Archer Davies’ entrance wound?’

Felicia searched the report. ‘The sternum.’

‘Exactly. But given the size of the posterior gunshot wound, that would be impossible – the entrance wound is always smaller than the exit wound.’

Felicia suddenly looked ill. ‘But if the exit wound was on the front side of Archer’s body, then that would mean—’

Striker nodded numbly.

‘They shot him in the back.’

One Hundred and Thirty-Four

Striker wanted a list of every cop on scene at the Chipotle gun call where Archer Davies had been shot. To do this, he and Felicia stopped in at Main Street Headquarters to use one of the desktop computers. They were linked in to the mainframe and could bring up information that the mobile laptops could not.

Being Saturday, the office should have been busy with cops sorting out the Friday night files, but today it was almost empty.

Striker walked right down to his desk. He brought up the call, read for a bit, then leaned back in the chair and felt like he was going to get sick. He gave Felicia a dismal look.

‘What?’ she asked.

‘The bullet that struck Archer Davies entered through his mid-spine and came out his chest; that much is undeniable. Judging from the ballistics report, it’s also true that the bullet was fired from a police sniper rifle. In the report, there’s only one ERT sniper listed.’

She understood the significance of that.

‘Rothschild,’ she said.

Striker nodded. ‘Carlos Chipotle was all coked-out with an assault rifle in his possession. So containment was essential. If Chipotle managed to escape with a weapon like that, who knows what might have happened? There’s a school just four blocks down the road, and a Community Police Office a mile north of there.’

‘What’s your point?’

‘My point is this – in order to contain him properly, there should have been two snipers on the scene. Both in elevated positions. Was Rothschild the only one – or was there another?’

Striker focused back on the computer and began paging through the information. For a Man With a Gun call, it was surprisingly and disappointingly brief, but the information that was there offered clarity.

He read through it:

11:45: The call comes in. A witness reports a man with a machine gun down by the river.

11:51: The first Patrol unit arrives on scene.