Crawford returned his stare without faltering. “I don’t think what happened to MacLeod was lucky at all,” he said quietly. “All I’m saying is that we didn’t do anything to catch him. We got lucky.”
Reott took a deep breath and sighed. “Maybe so,” he said. Then he opened the door and got out of the car. “See you Monday,” he told Crawford as he closed the passenger door.
Crawford gave him a wave as he pulled away from the curb.
Reott made his way up his sidewalk, unlocked the door and went into the house. The slam of the door echoed throughout the emptiness of the home. Tossing his keys on the table, he walked directly into the kitchen and swung open a cupboard. Inside, two fancy bottles of seventeen year old Glengoyne single malt Scotch whisky stood waiting for him. He wrapped his fingers around the neck of one bottle and pulled it from the cupboard.
At the table, he poured himself a glass, neat. He stared down at the amber liquid for a while, then raised it to his lips and sipped. The burning smoothness coated his mouth and his throat, before emanating outward from his belly.
Lucky.
Crawford’s words burned in his ears. He didn’t believe in luck. He believed in choices. And it was a series of choices that brought things to a head. A series of choices that put one of his officers in the hospital.
His choices.
Captain Michael Reott took another sip of the whisky.
“Damn fine scotch,” he said aloud. He allowed himself a wry chuckle, remembering Crawford’s theories on pay scale.
Maybe the lieutenant had been right about that.
But lucky?
Reott was pretty sure that wasn’t a word he’d use.
1658 hours
Katie MacLeod glanced to her left. Kyle, the large, bespectacled man in the driver’s seat remained focused through the windshield wipers and the rain upon the road ahead.
“Thanks again for the ride,” she said, her voice still a little groggy.
“No problem,” the hospital security officer said. “It’s an honor.”
Katie looked away. She remembered what Stef had gone through after his gun battle with the Scarface robber. There’d been a mixture of hero worship and contempt from the different members of the department. She wasn’t entirely sure which he’d been more uncomfortable with, but she knew that he’d struggled with both. She didn’t particularly want to go through that.
I only did what I had to do.
An image of her gun sight trained on the back of the rapist’s head flashed through her mind.
“Is this it?” Kyle asked her, pointing as they rolled up the street.
Katie followed his gesture toward her familiar brick house. Somehow, in the windy, rainy darkness of the night, it didn’t seem as welcoming as it once had. Yellow crime scene tape still hung from the screen door, flapping in the wind.
Kyle put the car into park. “Here we are.”
Katie paused. Suddenly, she didn’t want to go inside. She knew that he wasn’t there. Neither was Phil, for that matter. Those demons might not be vanquished, but after talking with Julie Avery, she felt like maybe they would be eventually.
But not yet.
In the meantime, she wasn’t so sure she wanted to be alone. A strange need swept over her and she thought about calling Kopriva. Maybe he would understand.
“Are you okay?” Kyle asked.
Katie turned toward him. “Yes,” she answered. Then, “No. Not really.”
Kyle gave her a confused look.
“Can you take me to a pay phone?” Katie asked. “I think I want to go somewhere else instead.”
1704 hours
Stefan Kopriva sat at his kitchen table, staring down at his hands. His knuckles pressed against the cool bottle of beer in front of him. A small black and white television flickered on the table. The mindless jingle about car insurance did little to keep his attention.
He glanced up and around at the small downtown apartment. The already narrow walls seemed to close in on him. His tiny kitchen lay only a few feet from the living room, which doubled as a bedroom when he remembered to unfold the bed inside the couch. Right now, a twisted pile of blankets lay in the corner of the ratty couch. Empty beer bottles were strewn across the rickety, stained coffee table.
Brave, dead soldiers
, he thought mockingly.
They served their city well.
“Better than I did,” he muttered, and lifted the bottle of beer to his lips.
He wondered in passing if he ought to consider taking up smoking. A few cigarettes might prove an interesting way to make the time pass. But he rejected the idea. He had precious little in the way of money as it was, and he much preferred the beer. And, of course, the pills that the nice doctor at the free clinic gave him for his arm and his knee.
“Too bad he can’t prescribe something for my heart,” Kopriva told the woman on television who was hawking insurance in a bright red dress.
Sadness awash in self-pity flooded through him, coupled with some shame. The idea of sitting around his tiny apartment smoking cigarettes all day made him think of convicts in prison. The irony that he used to be the instrument that put men behind those walls was not lost upon him
He took another drink. An image of a child’s still body in a half-empty body bag flashed through his mind.
“Fuck,” he muttered. He took another drink and glanced at the cheap Casio watch on the table next to him. One hour and eleven minutes. He had one hour and eleven minutes before he was supposed to take another pain pill.
The commercial dropped off suddenly. In the pause between the advertisement and the broadcast show, the TV screen went black. Kopriva saw his own disheveled image on the dark glass.
“You look like shit,” he said, raising the beer in mock salute, then draining the bottle.
The screen lit up with the station’s logo, accompanied by intro music for the news. Kopriva rose and went to the small brown fridge that he was pretty sure the landlord had bought from a Motel 6 going-out-of-business sale. Inside, three more bottles of beer stood tall and ready.
“We need some reinforcements,” he said. “And we might just have to move to cans.” He removed one bottle and twisted off the cap. “But what the hell. Not everyone can be a Marine. Not everyone can be a hero.”
Especially me.
He stumbled back to the kitchen table and settled into the chair just as the music faded and the news anchor affected a serious expression.
“A reign of terror is over tonight in River City,” he said. “Police have the Rainy Day Rapist in custody. For more, we go to Shawna Matheson, live at Sacred Heart Medical Center. Shawna?”
The screen cut to the perfectly coifed Shawna Matheson. Kopriva’s lip curled at the sight of her. She’d been on the forefront of reporting the Amy Dugger story last year. Chronicling his mistake and the tragedy that followed.
“You bitch,” he muttered at the reporter.
“Thank you, Jack,” Shawna said in polished tones. “I’m here at Sacred Heart Hospital, where accused rapist Jeffrey Allen Goodkind is being treated for gunshot wounds he received yesterday during his apprehension.”
A small gust of wind pushed Shawna’s hair into her face. Without missing a beat, she raised her hand and brushed it aside, continuing. “Apparently police believe Mr. Goodkind is responsible for the recent spree of violent rapes to rock River City’s north side. Dubbed ‘The Rainy Day Rapist’ by this reporter over three weeks ago, this suspect is responsible for attacking four different women since March of this year. Now, he is in custody.”
The camera switched to a photograph of a police sketch.
“This is a sketch police released of the suspect,” Shawna said, “and this is Mr. Goodkind.”
The camera cut to a professional photograph of a man that closely resembled the sketch. Kopriva immediately knew the man was guilty, simply by the way the face in the picture bore a forced smile.
“Instincts are still good,” he mumbled, a little rueful.
“What’s most interesting about this story,” Shawna continued, “is how Mr. Goodkind was apprehended. Police almost caught him during a sting operation in April, but he was able to escape. Instead, he was captured tonight at the residence of the very same police decoy that he attacked during that sting operation.”
A picture of Katie MacLeod filled the screen.
Kopriva’s eyes flew open in surprise. He leaned forward, turning up the volume of the tiny television.
“Officer Kathleen MacLeod, a five year veteran of the River City Police department, was attacked in her home, allegedly by Mr. Goodkind. She was injured, though police sources say she is recovering from her wounds at a different hospital. Officer MacLeod shot the intruder several times before police arrived to take him into custody.”
“Jesus,” Kopriva breathed.
The broadcast returned to a very serious Shawna Matheson. “It is unclear what Mr. Goodkind’s intentions were when he allegedly assaulted Officer MacLeod. What is clear is that people in River City can rest a little easier tonight.” She paused a beat, then finished gravely, “For Channel 5 Action News, I’m Shawna Matheson.”
Kopriva leaned back in his chair and looked at the ceiling. He felt tears well up in his eyes and roll down his temples while he stared up at the low ceiling.
“I’m sorry, Katie,” he whispered huskily. “I’m a selfish bastard, and I’m sorry.”
He continued to stare up at the ceiling for a long while, his hand wrapped firmly around the cold bottle on the table in front of him.
1712 hours
Thomas Chisolm sat in his dark living room, staring at the photographs on the wall. He’d surrendered to his ghosts, letting them run free throughout his consciousness. They battered through his feeble defenses, trampling down any mild excuses he might have been working up that even he didn’t believe.
His first beer of the evening sat on the coffee table, half full.
Who would it be tonight?
Mai?… Bobby?… Karl?… Sylvia?
Or would someone else step up to remind him where and how he’d failed to save them? It wasn’t like the list wasn’t long enough.
As if on cue, his telephone rang. He considered not answering it, but the shrill tones annoyed him enough to pluck the receiver off the cradle and bark a hello into the mouthpiece.
“Tom?” a female voice came over the line, with vehicle traffic in the background.
“Yeah?” he answered.
“It’s Katie.”
Chisolm clenched his jaw and nodded. This was fitting. It was right. She should let him have it for not being there when she needed him.
“Tom?”
“I’m here,” he said evenly.
“Oh.” She paused. “Listen, I’m out of the hospital and...well, I really don’t want to go home just yet. I was wondering if I could come by your place?”
It was Chisolm’s turn to pause. Then he answered, “Of course.”
“Thanks,” Katie said, relief plain in her voice.
Chisolm gave her the address.
“All right,” she said. “I’m about five minutes away.”
Chisolm hung up the phone. He moved around the house, turning on several lights. Then he pulled some bedding from the hall closet and plopped it down on the couch. He stripped his own bed and re-made it with clean sheets. He was just tucking the top blanket into the foot of the mattress when he heard the knock at his front door.
Katie smiled tiredly at him when he swung open the door.
“Come on in,” he said.
“Thanks,” Katie said, stepping inside. She slid off her jacket and handed it to him. He noticed she moved a little woodenly, as if her entire body were sore and not just her direct wounds. In addition to the smell of rain, the unmistakable antiseptic odor of a hospital still clung to her, filling his nostrils as she passed by him.
“Please,” he said, motioning toward the couch, “have a seat.”
Katie lowered herself gratefully onto the cushion, letting out a sigh as she did so. “It feels so good to be out of the hospital.”
“I’ll bet.” Chisolm hung her coat and cleared his throat. “You want something to drink? A beer or...?”
“Some water would be great.”
Chisolm retrieved a few ice cubes from the freezer and filled a glass with tap water. In the living room, he set it in front of Katie. He sat down in the chair across from her. She smiled her gratitude, raised the glass and took a sip.
The two sat in silence for a few moments. Katie leaned back on the couch with another sigh. “I’m so tired,” she croaked in a drowsy tone, suppressing a yawn. “I feel like I’ve been up for a month of graveyard shifts.”
“You can have my bed,” Chisolm said, motioning toward the bedroom. “I changed the sheets for you.”
Katie reached out and took hold of one of the blankets on the couch with her hand. “Oh, this’ll be fine, Tom. Really.”
“You sure?”
Katie nodded tiredly, pulling the blanket toward her and kicking off her shoes.
Chisolm rose from his seat. He picked up one of the pillows and tucked it in the corner of the couch.
Katie smiled at him as she nestled her head into the pillow. “Mmmmm, thanks.”
Chisolm helped spread the blanket over the top of her. Once she was covered, he kissed her lightly on the top of her head.
“You did damn good, Katie,” his whispered into her ear.
“Thanks,” she replied, her voice already thick with sleep.
A lump rose in Chisolm’s throat. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you.”
Katie took in a deep breath and let out a peaceful sigh. “You’re here for me now, right?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s all I need, Tom. I just need you...” she yawned into her shoulder, then finished, “...I just need you to be a friend.”
Chisolm smiled slightly. “I can do that.”
“Then that’s all I need.”
He rose and turned off the living room lamp for her. Then he sat down in the chair across from her in the dim light of the living room. Outside, the heavy rain battered the windows of his house. He picked up his bottle of beer and took a sip, looking at her curled form on his couch. She wasn’t asking to be saved. Just for him to be her friend. To watch over her tonight.
I can do that.