Blue Rubicon (11 page)

We stopped at my local bank branch next, a long drive from
the south end. The trip hadn’t been well-planned. Twenty minutes later I walked
out with two thousand dollars in cash and our passports from the safe deposit
box. Fortune was smiling on me today. The idea to lock our passports away at
the bank was Kat’s idea, and now it seemed like the best idea she’d ever had.

I handed Kara two of the new plastic hundred dollar bills—a
long-lasting, unrippable brown polymer that made Canadian money look even
stranger to our neighbours to the south.

“What’s this for?”

“Your car stinks. Get it detailed.”

Another shot to the arm. Given our history, this qualified
as domestic abuse. And the provincial mandate was clear—technically, I had to
charge her.

“When I get back, I’m doing with you with two counts of
assault. Have to follow the rules. No discretion, remember.”

She slugged me again. “Make it three.”

Stores were starting to open, and there was an Old Navy not
far from the bank now that we were in the northwest end of the city. Almost
completely opposite the hospital. A thousand dollars later—VISA was going to
love me—I had enough clothing to last all of us for a week without washing
anything.

When Kara and I pulled up in front of the emergency room
doors, Kat and the kids were standing in the waiting room.

“Just in time,” Kat said as I walked in. “We just got
discharged.” She still looked beautiful, even in a hospital gown.

“Perfect,” I said. “Our flight leaves in ten hours.”

I handed Kat a shopping bag. “Hopefully you and Kasia like
what’s in there. At least the hospital had a shower you could use.”

Kat smiled. “You didn’t like the dirty look?”

“I’m not sure how to answer that one.”

Kat took Kasia by the hand and led her into the hospital’s
washroom while I, another shopping bag in my hand, took Link with me.

A few minutes later we met in the lobby once more, looking
normal again. The soot was gone, we were well-dressed and all signs of our
ordeal were gone. Or covered up, like Kat’s heavily bruised knees. She’d had to
faint.

“I’m hungry, daddy,” Kasia said.

“Me too.” A sentiment echoed by her brother and my own
rumbling stomach.

Kat looked at me. “Where to?”

“Anywhere you want, it’s on the insurance company.”

Kat smiled and I knew where she wanted to go. We went out to
the parking lot, to where Kara was waiting.

“Thanks for coming, Kara,” Kat said through the open window
as we approached.

Kara stuttered for a moment. “I’m glad you called me.”

Kasia tugged at my sleeve.

“Oh, right. Kasia and Link, this is Kara. She and I used to
work together.”

Link’s eyes lit up. “She’s a police officer, too?”

“Yep, and a really good one.”

I caught Kara blush just before she tried to hide her face.

Kat had an awkward look on her face, and the way she shifted
her weight from one leg to the other made me realize she was uncomfortable.

“Kara,” I said. “Thanks for all the help, but you may as
well head out now. We’ll rent a car and head to the airport.”

Kat spoke before Kara even had a chance to respond.
“Lincoln, she’s been up since three thanks to us. We’re going to grab some
lunch, do you want to come?”

If I had a mirror I could have confirmed it, but I had a
feeling the looks on Kara’s face and mine were identical. Pure, unbridled
shock.

“Umm…” Kara was like a deer in the headlights, frozen solid,
unable to respond. “I… I should probably get home.”

Kat leaned into the car and spoke to Kara in a hushed tone,
so low I couldn’t hear a word that was said. My curiosity was getting the
better of me, I wanted to know what was going on, what could possibly be
happening now.

“Okay,” Kara said, once Kat had backed out of the car. “Hop
in and let’s go.”

Kat climbed into the passenger seat beside Kara—something
else I never would have expected—and Link, Kasia and I crammed into the back
seat with me in the middle. I felt guilty without car seats for the kids but
they were old enough now to only need boosters. At least I knew Kara’s Prius
would keep us safe.

Kara drove us south once more, stopping at a steakhouse not
far from where my initial shopping spree had taken place. I glanced to my right
and left and saw the car filled with smiling faces. Maybe it was just me, but
my own morbidity kept me from delighting in flame-grilled meat. All I could
think of was how close we all came to looking like the steaks we were about to
have.

We found a table where I could sit with my back to the wall,
watching the entrance. It was commonplace amongst police, a hazard of doing the
job too well. I needed to know who was in the restaurant—who was coming and
going—and I wanted to be able to see them coming in before they spotted me. I
sat a few inches forward from the back cushion of the booth, giving myself more
than enough room to reach back and get my gun.

“That was kind of cool,” Link said, just after we’d ordered.

“What was?”

“The whole thing, Dad.” He was grinning. Young enough to not
fully understand death, pain and first degree burns. “The fire trucks were
awesome, the fire looked so cool when they were putting it out. And I got to
jump off the roof.”

“Yeah! Nice catch, Daddy.”

“Thanks, Kasia.”

Kat wasn’t smiling and neither was I. I’d put them in that
position and, while they were enjoying it now, it would terrify them later.

“So… is everything gone?”

“A lot of it, probably, Kasia,” Kat said. I knew we were
thinking of the same things, the family pictures, the heirlooms, the
irreplaceable things. “Everything can be replaced,” I lied.

“Shit.”

“Lincoln.”

“Sorry, Kat. I just remembered. I backed up the whole
computer just before…” I whispered, “Saunders.” My spirits had lifted. “I took
the backup into work so I could update that digital picture frame I had in my
office. I never brought the backup home. Worst case, we only lost a few months
worth of pictures.” I’d bought one of the first digital cameras that had come
out and had taken all of the old negatives in to be backed up onto CD.

Kat’s shoulders slumped, then she looked upward. “Thank
you,” she said. It was me that did it, why was He getting all the credit?

I wanted to say ‘you’re welcome’ but felt it wouldn’t make
Kat any happier.

“What do you guys want to do in Poland?” Kara was trying to
join the conversation.

Link was the first to speak up. “See
babcia
and
dziadzio
again. And go back to the Cupertidus place.”

I looked at Kat who was trying not to laugh while chewing a
mouthful of steak. Once she was done, she translated.

“The Copernicus Centre?”

“Yeah, that place.”

“And the zoo,” Kasia said.

“What’s the Copernicus Centre?” I was still lost.

“Like the Science Centre,” Kat said. “Remember all the
pictures Link showed you?”

“Oh, right. That place looked awesome. Just forgot what it
was called.”

“There’s an amazing planetarium as well, Lincoln.
Niebo
Kopernika
. The Heaven of Copernicus. Maybe we can all go before you have to
come home?”

“I’d like that,” I said. “You Poles sure like Copernicus.
It’s not like he did much.”

Kat smiled, my sarcastic voice was one she knew well. “The
architecture of it will blow your mind.”

Another thing she knew well. Astronomy and modern
architecture were two of my favourite interests, or at least they had been
years ago. A chance to revisit that would be nice. It would be a chance to find
some normalcy, even for a moment.

“Aren’t you guys going to miss school?” Kara asked.

“Nope,” Link said.

“A little, just my friends.” Kasia, my soon-to-be
six-year-old social butterfly. I wasn’t worried about the learning aspect,
they’d learn a lot more on vacation for a couple of weeks in Poland than they
would in school. I was amazed by how much of the language they’d picked up
after being there for a month in the summer. This would give them a chance to
practice.

And if I screwed things up even more and we had to flee the
country permanently, at least they could translate for me. The conversations
split with me sitting silent while the kids talked about what they were going
to do in Poland and who would get the window seat on the plane, and while Kat
and Kara chatted like old friends.

Kara looked less awkward about the situation, but I hadn’t
made it to that point yet. I didn’t know what to make of the situation—did Kat
have some nefarious scheme planned, or was she trying for sainthood? My wife
talking with my former—mistress I guess was the word—was a little much for me.

I listened to the conversation as much as possible,
occasionally stepping in with some observation or comment. Kat asked Kara how
she was doing since Saunders attacked her, and how she was liking her new
partner. I laughed to myself, unaware if Kara realized Kat was responsible for
Kara’s new partner. Maybe I was wrong, but no one else stood to benefit from me
being sent back to the street.

Except Carter.

Damn Chen and his idea of fate.

“I really need to thank you, Kara. After everything, you’re
still putting your life on the line for us, for me.”

“Kat, don’t worry about it. I’m sorry about the past, I
really am. It never should have happened, things were just…”

Kat nodded, but didn’t say anything. Just because she
understood didn’t make it okay. Forgive but never forget.

“But I just want to help. It’s not safe for you guys here
right now, and I want to change that.”

Kat nodded. “Thanks.”

Kara looked at me. “Kat was saying Chen is in town?”

“Aylmer. He’s on course for the next two weeks. Not armed
though, if that’s what you’re thinking. He’s already offered to help any way he
can. He figured he could maybe do some recce work.”

Kat stared at me.

“Recon. Reconnaissance. Sorry, technical jargon, I guess.
He’s not here, as far as he’s concerned. Only a few people from his detachment
even know he’s on a course.”

“And he’s far enough away, right?”

“Yeah. From what Carter had, everyone involved is in
southwestern Ontario.”

“Right,” Kara said. “I guess he’s an extra set of eyes if we
need him.”

“Kara, I hate to say it, but consider yourself in danger. We
have to assume they’re as good at surveillance and counter-surveillance as we
are. They probably already know you’re helping me, and they’ll probably know if
you start following anyone or looking into things.”

There was a look of fear in Kara’s eyes I hadn’t seen since
the night Saunders tried to kill her.

“I’ll be a couple of days in Poland, but my phone works
there. Keep the calls short though, it’ll cost me a fortune.”

“Right. Call for anything?”

“Anything at all. You figure something out, you let me know.
And don’t even think about the time zones, just call.”

We were almost done our meals and I was more than happy to
pick up the tab for Kara. She’d done a lot already and helping me was just
going to get harder.

I handed Kara another three hundred dollars in cash. “Best
if you don’t go home for a couple of nights, just in case. Find a hotel room
somewhere, pay cash and keep your debit and credit card use to a minimum. If
they want to track you, they will.”

Kat’s eyes were on me, she was petrified but she was hiding
it well. “This is like something out of a movie.”

“Yeah,” I said, a gentle look to try to settle her mind
somewhat. At least in the movies the good guys always win.

My watch chimed, marking the hour. I looked down. One in the
afternoon. We had to get going.

“Do you think you could drive us to a rental place?”

Kara looked at me, the wheels clearly turning.

“Take my car.” She handed me two bills back. “And you can
get it detailed.”

I laughed. She was right though, I could leave it at the
airport and come back to a clean, fresh smelling car.

“And,” Kara said, “not sure I’m comfortable driving it right
now. Everyone knows it’s mine. I’m going to call my dad, have him come get me.
He’s got a truck I can borrow for a few days.”

“What about work? They’ll see you in it.”

“I think I’m coming down with something,” she said, forcing
out a cough. “I may need to take a couple of days off, lay low for a bit.”

Smart girl.

“What are you going to do?”

“We’re stopping at CFS before the airport. I’ll drop off the
blood swabs and hopefully have the results when I get back.”

“And when you get back?”

“I’m going shopping.”

The grin on my face was enough to make anyone uncomfortable.
But Kat was right, this was like something out of a movie. And I’d seen more
than enough to know that a pistol wouldn’t be enough.

I needed an arsenal.

THE DRIVE TO TORONTO WAS slow, traffic on the 401 at its
usual level—far higher than I wanted to see. We had plenty of time, only
needing to check in for our flight three hours before departure. But the
airport was in Mississauga, on our side of Toronto, and the Centre for Forensic
Sciences was right in the heart of Toronto, the busiest city in Canada.

We hadn’t been on the road more than half an hour before
Link and Kasia were sound asleep in the backseat, sitting on the brand new
booster seats Kat had made me buy before we left the city. I couldn’t argue the
logic.

“They’re already asleep,” Kat said, her head turned around
staring at our two angels.

“It’s been a busy day,” I said. “I’m surprised they lasted
as long as they did.”

“I’m sorry, Lincoln.”

Unexpected.

“For what?”

“Getting you kicked out of homicide. I know you loved it in
there.”

“It’s fine, Kat.” The truth will set her free. “You had
every right to do it.”

“I was so jealous, so worried about our marriage, and, I
mean, rightly so. But I shouldn’t have messed with your job.”

“Please, you did what you thought was best for us, for
them.” I turned back to look at them, Link snoring and Kasia with her mouth
open. “And it was the right move.”

“None of this would have happened if I’d let it go.”

“None of this would have happened if I hadn’t cheated.”

Kat didn’t say anything. It was a valid point. We could go
back and forth with the blame game, each going further back to find something
we’d done wrong that had set everything in motion.

“I’m sorry, Kat. I never meant for that to happen. And
there’s no excuse for it.”

“You had so much on your plate, Saunders, your past, and I
wasn’t there for you. I was too worried about you killing someone, too worried
about what your father might have done. Now I think I was stupid. You did the
right thing as a kid, when you killed that pedophile, and you did the right
thing with Saunders. You saved lives.”

I was happy she was finally seeing it that way. I found no
pride or sense of accomplishment in having killed two people, but I had done it
for the right reasons. I’d saved my own life, my father’s life and the lives of
who knows how many children, and then I had saved the lives of at least two
women. It was hard to accept, a hard lesson to learn, but it was the truth.

Some people deserved to die.

And Kat had added one to the list. The firebomber, whoever
he was.

But I was done killing, I didn’t want to have to add another
notch to my belt. I wanted to watch them squirm, on the other side of the
courtroom, watching as their freedom hung in the balance.

I wanted to make them pay, and the longer it took the
better.

Some people deserved to die, others deserved to rot.

“She seems really nice.”

“Who?”

“Kara. I’d only met her that one time when she had us all
for dinner. She seems nice.”

I could tell she was upset, nervous.

“There’s nothing left, Kat. Nothing to worry about. She
meant a lot to me, as a partner, and then to almost lose her, to almost get
killed myself. The fear, the adrenaline, and then you and I fighting. It was
all too much, and it was all my fault.”

“I should have supported you more.”

“Kat, enough. It’s over now, it’s done. I don’t expect you
to forgive me, I just want us to move on, to stop dwelling on what we could
have done differently.”

Kat nodded. “I just…”

My eyes met hers and I saw tears in the corner of her
sapphire eyes.

“I just wish we could go back, change things for the
better.”

“I know. But, and I know Chen would agree, maybe this is all
happening for a reason. You said it yourself, if I was still on homicide this
wouldn’t have happened. Maybe—and I’m really not sure I believe this—maybe this
had to happen so that I’d be the one to find Carter, so that he wouldn’t die in
vain.”

Kat nodded. She could find solace in that thought, in the
idea of a grander plan. It was what she had been told all her life—God works in
mysterious ways.

“Do you think God wanted you to kill Saunders, and
Jeffries?”

“Kat, you know I don’t be—”

“I know. I just think, maybe it had to be you. Maybe you
were the only one strong enough to stop Jeffries, the only one willing to stop
Saunders the way you did. In the Old Testament, God was a lot more…” she
stopped to think on the right word, “…aggressive.”

“I don’t know, Kat. I understand the reason for it all, the
Ten Commandments, the stories in the Bible. It’s all moral control. But I don’t
think that, even if there is a God, I’ll be going to hell for killing the
people I did. If God exists, it has to be more rational than that.”

“He. Can we at least settle on that?”

Male, female, genderless, Flying Spaghetti Monster. I didn’t
see the importance.

“Sure, He it is.”

Kat leaned her head over and rested it on my shoulder, her
hand on my leg. She stayed there for a moment before jerking her hand away.

“Wait, where’s the gun?”

“Behind my back.”

“Oh, okay,” she said, putting her hand back on my thigh. She
still hated the things and I didn’t blame her.

“Are you really going gun shopping?”

I took my right hand off of the steering wheel and
maneuvered it past Kat’s head, placing my hand on her back.

“Yes,” I said, rubbing her back gently.

“What do you need?”

“A shotgun and a rifle, maybe another pistol if they won’t
make me wait for it.”

“Shit.”

Kat swore. I had to replay it in my head a few times. She
wasn’t yelling, she wasn’t mad at me. She swore in the midst of conversation.
Just when I thought things couldn’t get stranger.

“You really need all that?” She looked up, her eyes meeting
mine as I turned my head toward her.

“I sure as hell hope not. But, boy scout rules—always be
prepared.”

Kat rested her head back on my shoulder and I could feel the
muscles in her face tightening. Her eyes were closed, as if she was trying with
everything she had to force herself to think of something else.

* * *

Downtown Toronto was just as I’d expected it to be—crowded,
loud and bordering on insane. I’d grown up in Chatham, population still less
than sixty thousand. Kat’s eyes were aglow at the sights of the big city. It
was always her dream to live in Toronto, and it was something we’d considered.
But when the kids came along, we opted to stay put and live out our days in a
quieter, smaller city. Kat was used to big cities—Warsaw was up to almost two
million people, still almost a million shy of Toronto, but far more than the
three hundred and fifty thousand in London.

It also didn’t help that Toronto was ranked highest in
Canada in terms of cost of living. If only there was a way to move our house to
Toronto, something around the same price here would give us a third the size
and no yard to speak of.

After what seemed like hours of high-stakes driving, braving
multiple lanes of bumper-to-bumper traffic and making a couple of lane changes
that bordered on daredevil behavior, we were there. The Centre for Forensic
Sciences—Ontario’s Mecca for lab geeks. It was hard to hide my drool.

When Kara and I had last been here, I didn’t have a chance
to appreciate it. We were too focused on identifying our killer, finally having
caught a break with some blood evidence. Now, I had a chance to breathe it in,
to look at the building and marvel at what it held inside and how many crimes
had been solved thanks to the technology and skill of the resident scientists.

Kat and the kids, now stirring from their lengthy nap,
waited in the car, illegally parked with the four-ways on, while I ran inside,
hoping to be quick.

I flashed my badge at the security desk and asked to speak
to someone from the DNA lab. A few minutes later a familiar-looking man in a
white lab coat made his way into the lobby.

“Lincoln Munroe,” he said, causing a couple of heads to turn
in my direction. I stumbled for his name, trying to remember.

“Hank Collier,” he said. “Don’t worry, you had more than my
name to think about last time you were here. What have you got now?”

I ushered him over to a quiet corner and pulled out the
evidence bag with the bloody Q-tips.

“I’ve got a dirty cop, a bunch of them actually. One of our
constables was murdered in his cruiser, made to look like a suicide. I’m pretty
much the only one who knows the truth. Last night my house got firebombed. I
shot the guy, but he got away. This is his.”

“Oh,” he said, searching for the words.

“London is investigating the arson, they’ll be sending you
the blood if they haven’t already. But I don’t know who I can trust there. I
think the killer was a London cop. I don’t need this for court, their sample
will work for that. I need to know who did this, and I need to stop him.”

Hank looked at me, weighing the consequences of an
unauthorized project, and the consequences of giving me the information.

“If you think the culprit is a cop, we probably won’t have
anything on file.”

“I know, but it’s worth a shot. They don’t get samples from
us, just prints. Maybe he left DNA at another crime, maybe something from
before he got hired. Anything to help me out.”

He still looked uneasy. Ethics was a messy business,
integrity was different. Something could be done with integrity but still be
unethical. Like killing one person to save a million.

“The murdered cop, he was on to them. That’s why he got
killed. Now his son will never know his father, he’s only ten months old. And
whoever tried to kill me, threw a Molotov through my daughter’s bedroom window
while she was sleeping.”

Hank nodded. “I’ll do it. But if anyone asks…”

“I never spoke to you, you never did anything for me. Hell,
I was never here.”

“I’ll have the results for you as soon I can. It might be
hard, I’ll have to make sure the room is clear before I work on it.”

“Sure. I understand. Don’t take any risks, and if you change
your mind, it’s fine.”

I wrote my cell phone number on the back of one of my
business cards and handed it to Hank with the evidence bag. He quickly tucked
everything into one of the oversized pockets of his lab coat.

“I’m taking my wife and kids to her parents in Europe,
somewhere where they’ll be safe. I’ll be back in two days, but my phone will
work there. Call me as soon as you can, please?”

“Okay,” he said, then turned and walked away.

I hated getting other people caught up in this mess, hated
making them go against their own beliefs. It was integrity I was fighting for,
but I was asking people to go against their own values.

But if there was one thing I remembered from my only
university philosophy course, integrity can be maintained even if a person’s
value system changes, as long as you can account for, resolve, and, in my
opinion, rationalize the inconsistencies.

And there were becoming more and more inconsistencies.

Nothing was black and white anymore, it was all just shades
of grey.

* * *

A little over an hour later we were at the airport.
Everything we now owned fit into the two suitcases I had bought, with the
exception of the books and toys to keep the kids occupied on the flight. I
parked the car in one of the valet Park and Fly locations, preferring to not
have to search through aisle after aisle of cars to find it once I got back.

I left my gym bag in the trunk of the car and grabbed the handle
of one of the suitcases while Kat took the other. I’d bought the wheeled ones—lazy,
yes, but a lot easier with kids to worry about as well.

“Daddy, here comes the bus.”

Link was right, our shuttle was just pulling up. The
middle-aged male driver stepped out of the vehicle, his stomach breaching the
door long before the rest of his body. He took hold of our suitcases, one in
each hand and deftly secured them in the luggage racks in the shuttle. They
were nothing to him—despite the beer belly, the man had muscles. We were so far
the only ones on the shuttle, apparently not many people wanted to fly as late
as we were.

We stopped a couple of minutes later and picked up a family
wearing Mickey Mouse hats.

“I want to go to Disney,” Kasia said, an envious glare at
the little girl sitting across from her.

“You already have,” Kat said. “Two years ago, remember?”

“This is my third time.”

Shut up, little girl. You’re not helping.

“We’ll go in the spring, Kasia.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.” When all this was done, the kids were going to
need a vacation just as much as I would.

“We go every year.” She was cute, a lucky thing right now,
but still a precocious brat. The things I wanted to say as the parents looked
on with arrogant smirks on their faces.

“Yeah, well we’re going to Poland twice this year. We were
just there in the summer.”

Nicely said, Link. You show ‘em who’s boss.

“I want to go to Poland, mommy,” the little girl said,
tugging at her mother’s sleeve. The mother’s expression didn’t change and I
started to realize it wasn’t a smirk, it was the result of one too many nips
and tucks.

“You don’t even know where Poland is, honey.”

I had to stifle a laugh. The remainder of the shuttle ride
was spent in silence, an awkward gap between the families. There had been no
clear winner, but Link definitely received the MVP award for his performance.
We pulled up at one of the many entrances to Terminal 1—the five million square
feet of floor space made it the eleventh largest airport terminal in the world—and
got off the shuttle. Our burly driver handed the luggage to me like they were
shopping bags, and I had to strain to keep a straight face as I took them,
trying to appear stronger than I was.