Blood Passage (39 page)

“
I’m sorry,” Hank said. “You shouldn’t be taking the flak on this.”

“
Of course I should,” Martinez contradicted, “it’s my job to take it. That’s how this works. You know that.”

Hank said nothing.

“
Tommy Leung’s target number three, correct?”

Hank nodded. “I’d say so.”

“
Well, get out there and find him before Mah gets us all fired.”

“
We’ve been trying to,” Karen said. “He’s gone into a black hole.”

“
Find the goddamned black hole and pull him out of it. And find the fourth guy who was mixed up in this. Let’s close this damned thing and get rid of it for good.”

“
All right.” Hank stood up and returned his stool to the next table. “Sorry your evening out with your husband got messed up.”

“
Don’t worry about it. I love these sandwiches, and Ken left my ticket at the box office window.” She glanced at her wristwatch. “I’ll probably get there by half time.”

Hank smiled. “Intermission.”

“
Whatever. I’d much rather go to a Ravens game, but Ken has this thing for plays. Me, I prefer playoffs.”

Karen headed off to the front door but Hank stopped when Martinez put a hand on his arm.

“
Just a minute, Hank. Before you go.”

At the front door, Karen turned around to look at him.

“
Be right there,” Hank told her.

Karen nodded and went outside.

“
IAD has another file going on you,” Martinez said, glancing at the young woman at the front counter, who was staring at Karen out on the sidewalk. “I got the word from a trusted source I bumped into in the washroom.”

“
I understand,” Hank said.

“
The story is, someone’s getting too cozy with Chinatown, leaking information to the Triad. The Chief wanted to know if I was comfortable with you staying on this case. I said yessir, I am. It was either that or tell him to fuck off. Which was on the tip of my tongue, believe me.”

“
Either way,” Hank said, “you’re putting your ass on the line for me. I appreciate that.”

Martinez tried to smile. “We’ve been here before, haven’t we?”

He nodded. A decade before he’d been the subject of several IAD investigations. One had arisen from suspicion that he was accepting bribes from known criminal elements. The impetus of this investigation was a photograph showing Hank exchanging money with an elderly Asian man. In fact, it was a photo of Hank paying for a container of noodles (not in the picture) at an outdoor stand on Lexington Street during Chinese New Year celebrations. For more than six months he was followed, photographed, wiretapped and otherwise spied upon before it ran out of steam and was shelved.

However, it was another investigation a few months later that Hank knew Martinez had in mind. He was the supervisory lieutenant in Homicide at the time and still relatively fresh from his stint in the chief’s office, still the Hero Cop who’d saved the son of Mayor Post from his kidnappers. Still feeling aggrieved by Hank’s actions while working in the chief’s office, Myron Heidigger was determined to bring Hank down. Searching for leverage, he fastened on a series of glowing performance assessments Hank had written for a young detective just emerging as a rising star in the department.

Ann Martinez was a young hotshot at the time with a nose for evidence and a knack for closing cases. She was self-confident, brash and relentless, and Hank began to steer the higher-profile investigations her way. The media caught on and her face time shot through the roof. Heidigger and his circle resented the attention a minority female was receiving at the expense of what they considered to be more deserving senior investigators and they decided Hank must have an ulterior motive.

Thinking it was the leverage against Hank that he’d been searching for, Heidigger goaded his contacts in Internal Affairs into launching an exhaustive investigation of Hank’s personal life. His friends reported strange phone calls, high-pressure interviews and veiled threats that included possible charges of obstruction of justice and lying to police during the course of an investigation. Hank was questioned on multiple occasions by an investigator named Bloom, who turned up in washrooms, on street corners and in elevators to ask pointed, intrusive questions that led nowhere.

They had enough sense to avoid his mother entirely.

For her part, Martinez was engaged to be married and her fiancé became so upset that he broke off their relationship and took back his ring, not because of what the investigation turned up but because he didn’t like the scrutiny. It wasn’t what he’d signed up for when he’d asked Martinez to marry him.

Shortly afterward an interim report mysteriously landed on the desk of the Chief. He read it with dismay and ordered IAD to discontinue the investigation, worried about the negative publicity nightmare that might arise if the media heard the department was investigating two of its highest-profile personalities.

A year later, Martinez wrote her exams for sergeant and never looked back. For his part, Hank found himself exiled to Public Affairs as the political pendulum swung him out of favor. However, one of the first things Martinez did after becoming captain of Major Crimes was to engineer Hank’s transfer back to Homicide. She already had Jarvis as her supervisory lieutenant but found a way to fit Hank into her budget as a lieutenant assisting unpartnered detectives with their investigations.

“
This thing worries me,” she told Hank, picking up her purse. “Heidigger’s like a bad smell, he never goes away.”

He patted her on the shoulder. “Don’t sweat the small stuff, Ann.”

“
It’s not small stuff. Heidigger’s a relentless bastard. I wonder if he’s getting his information from Waverman.”

“
Not his style,” Hank shook his head. “He doesn’t use rookies.”

Martinez touched his arm. “Watch your back, for godsakes.”

He winked at her. “Always.”

On Monday morning a black Lexus rolled into the parking lot of the campus day care center. There were no available parking spots and so it carelessly stopped behind two parked cars. Benny Hu shifted into Park and killed the engine.

Peter turned to Grace Chan and tried to smile. “Just bring him out for a few minutes and then he can go back and rejoin his little friends. I just need to ask him a few questions.”

“
Michael won’t like it,” she said, upset.

Peter patted her wrist. “You know I want what’s best for him. I don’t want him agitated by all this business, but he may be able to tell me something that’ll end it for good. Then everything will be fine after that, I promise you.”

Grace hesitated, then nodded. “You want me to bring him out here?”

“
Yes. Then he can go back inside.”

“
All right.”

Grace got out of the car and went into the day care center. She was not as well known there as Michael, and so the manager of the center, Mrs. Miller, was called out. Grace explained that she needed to talk to her son privately for a minute about some important family business. They would be in the parking lot and she’d bring Taylor back in as soon as they were done. Mrs. Miller asked for identification, which Grace provided. When everyone’s resistance to this break from normal routine had been worn down, Grace was allowed to take Taylor outside. Mrs. Miller watched from the window as mother and son walked out to the parking lot and got into the back seat of the Lexus.

“
Hello, chum,” Peter said jovially as Taylor settled down on the seat between his uncle and his mother. “How are you today?”

“
Pretty good, Uncle Peter.”

Peter spent a few minutes chatting with the boy to set him at ease, and then got down to it. “Do you remember when you were Martin, Taylor?”

The boy lowered his eyes. “Mama doesn’t like me talking about it.”

Peter glanced at Grace, who was looking out the window. “I understand, Taylor. You have a new life to live now, and that’s what’s most important. But I need you to remember back to when you were Martin for just a moment. Can you do that for me?”

Taylor nodded.

“
Good boy,” Peter said, turning in his seat to face Taylor. “When you were Martin we took many rides in cars like this. Do you remember?”

Taylor nodded again, his face lighting up. “We went to the show, once. The Park Show.”

“
You mean Park’s Theater?”

“
Yes, we saw shadow plays. With puppets.”

Peter felt a chill go through his body. It was uncanny. This was indeed the spirit of his cousin Martin sitting next to him. About a year before Martin’s death they had gone down to Park’s Theater with a friend of Peter’s father, Ling Ting So, who was a professor of Asian Studies at State University. They watched a series of modern one-act plays based on stories from the Song Dynasty. Martin had devoured the performance and had asked Professor Ling a thousand questions. Peter suddenly felt very nervous. He felt a strong impulse to drop everything, to hurry the child out of his car, drive quickly away and never bother the boy again.

He remembered Ling Ting So explaining to them that puppets from the shadow plays were the source of much superstition among the players in ancient times. The heads of the puppets were kept separate from the bodies when not in use, so that the puppets would not come to life at night. Peter remembered the story now with dread. Was Taylor a puppet suddenly come back to life next to him, Martin’s head stuck onto a little boy’s body?

“
That was fun,” Taylor said.

“
Huh?” Peter was a little disoriented for a moment before he realized Taylor was saying that their night at the theater had been fun. “Yes. Yes, it was.”

“
Can we go again some time, Uncle Peter?”

“
We’ll see, Taylor. I want you to remember something else for me now.”

“
What is it, Uncle Peter?”

“
The men who hurt you. The men who sent your spirit out of your body as Martin and into this body as Taylor. The men who shot you and left you in the alley.”

The boy said nothing now, staring down at his hands.

“
I know it upsets you, Taylor. Just this once, and then I’ll never ask you about it again. I promise.”

The boy remained quiet.

“
I’ve found two of them. Shawn and Gary. One was ShonDale Gregg, the big black man. He’s dead now. The other was Gary Thatcher. He’s dead now, too.”

Grace exclaimed softly and began to cry.

“
I know Tommy was there. Your friend Tommy. He betrayed you, Martin, just as he betrayed all his
Hung
brothers. But you told the police there was another person. Another
gwailo
besides Gary. Who was he? Who was the fourth man?”

“
Please don’t,” Grace murmured, crying.

Taylor began to cry as well, not only because he was afraid of the question but also because his mother was crying.

Peter felt exasperation fill his chest and threaten to cut off his breath. “Think!” he hissed. “Who was Tommy’s partner?”

“
I don’t know!” Taylor bubbled through his tears.

“
Do you remember the alley? Do you remember where they left you to die?”

Taylor nodded.

“
Peter, please.” Grace pleaded.

“
But what about the other place? Where they first hurt you? Where the other man was?”

Taylor shook his head.

“
Damn!” Peter slammed his fist on the armrest.

“
Peter,” Grace begged, “let us go. You’re frightening him!”

“
Remember, Taylor! You must remember!”

Taylor buried his head in the crook of his mother’s arm and cried.

Peter was desperate. This wasn’t working, and he knew he would not get another chance with the boy. It was now or never. On impulse he thumped the back of Benny Hu’s seat.

“
Drive!”

Hank’s cell phone rang as he was handing Karen a cup of coffee at her desk in the Homicide detectives’ bullpen. He put down his own cup, took out the phone, looked at the display and thumbed the green button.

“
Donaghue.”

“
Hello, Lieutenant Donaghue, it’s Meredith Collier. I hope I’m not interrupting something.”

“
Not at all, Ms. Collier,” Hank said. “What can I do for you? Did Peter Mah contact you again?”

She laughed with embarrassment. “No, no, nothing like that. Ah, um, actually I’m calling just on impulse. Now I feel a little silly.”

“
Not at all,” Hank said.

“
Let me get on with it so I won’t keep you from your work. I was planning a dinner here this evening with a girlfriend of mine and she just cancelled. I have a very nice piece of fresh salmon I was going to grill, and I was wondering if you’d be willing to stand in for her. If you have nothing else planned, I mean.”

It took Hank a moment to react. Meredith stepped into the silence with a nervous laugh. “I thought of you right away because I’ve been feeling guilty for the way I treated you the other night. I was a little grouchy, and you must have thought I wasn’t very nice. I’d like to repay you for having been patient with me and for not having gotten grouchy back.”