Broken (11 page)

“Make sure you get all of them,” Berg said. “From what I can see of the shells, the weapon appears to be a nine mil—possibly the same gun that killed Feeny’s wife.”

Halwood nodded. “I’ll process them,” he said. “There’s not much else here, I’m sorry to say.”

“I know. Let’s hope the witnesses give us something. We don’t have any traffic cams out here, and I don’t see any parking lot surveillance.”

Arena wrapped up his preliminary interviews and joined them. “All we have is a dark SUV, no plates, with heavily tinted windows, automatic gunfire, dead girl, and that’s it. Really professional hit. They made no mistakes,” Arena said grimly.

“Where the fuck is Feeny?” Berg asked angrily. “Get with NYPD. I want that asshole back in Illinois and in a cell, now!”

“I’m betting he has an alibi. He was probably out in full view of the public, laughing, and having a great old time while his girlfriend was being murdered,” Arena replied.

“I don’t care. Arrest him and get him back here.” Berg watched as an older woman with shoulder length, dark brown hair, surrounded by her country club peers, glared at Arena with venom. “I’m guessing that’s your golf friend. I think your cover is blown,” she said, nodding toward the woman.

“Yeah,” Arena sighed. “Sad . . . she was fun. And a good meal ticket. She took me to almost every single five-star restaurant in the city this past week, on her dime. I never ate so well.”

“I’m sure you’ll find another rich cougar. Let’s go ask management if there’s any surveillance of this are—hey, is that smoke?” Berg pointed southeast over the golf course.

A plume of thick, black smoke was rising higher and higher into the still blue sky, the volume increasing exponentially until it resembled a column of angry storm clouds.

“Looks like it’s coming from a lane behind the course.” Arena was already running toward the sedan.

Berg drove the two minutes around the course to the lane while Arena called the fire department. Parking well north of the blaze, Berg climbed out and watched as a black SUV with heavily tinted windows went up in a furious ball of orange flames. Neither detective attempted to approach the vehicle—the accelerant-fueled flames burned far too hot.

“Goodbye, evidence,” Arena said. “Thank God there’s no foliage to catch.”

Berg quickly dialed her own cell as well. “Halwood?” she said, her voice rising over the surprisingly noisy crackling and popping of the flames. “The getaway vehicle is behind the course—follow the smoke. See if you can get anything from the car once the flames are out; there may be tire prints from the pickup vehicle.”

They watched as the flames reached a peak, then started to recede slowly. Eventually, they heard the whine of the fire department vehicles over the roar. Three engines screeched to a halt and the SUV was drenched in foam seconds later.

Berg looked through the canopy of bare trees. Even in late winter, the greens were immaculate—not an errant blade of grass or pile of snow marred their manicured perfection. The sand traps were raked, the paths between holes neat and crisp with just a hint of ice around the grassy edges. She wondered what other seedy business went on behind the scenes of the seemingly idyllic, coveted course.

Chapter Nine

I think you know that you are more than just

some fucked up piece of ass.

–George Michael, “Flawless (Go to the City)”

B
erg sped to Chicago’s south side without a single complaint from Arena.

The atmosphere simmered with tension as Berg rebuffed Arena’s stilted attempts at conversation. He eventually gave up and stared out the window.

Berg smiled slightly as she remembered similar silent drives with Jay. But unlike Arena, those drives always simmered with a different kind of tension.

After what seemed to be an interminable amount of time later, they pulled up to an apartment block in Clearing, parked on the street, and leapt from the car. They moved swiftly up the three flights of stairs to apartment 3D, checking their weapons on the way.

Berg rapped three swift knocks on the door. “Mr. Jon Buchanan?” she called loudly in an effort to be heard over the thunder of an overhead plane from the nearby Chicago Midway International Airport. “CPD! We’d like to ask you a few questions. Open up, please.”

The pair braced themselves, expecting violence.

Instead, they heard nothing for a moment then some shuffling headed toward the door.

Out of habit, the detectives moved away from the front of the door and listened intently for the sound of a weapon being cocked.

The door swung open and a medium-height, pale, thin young man with dirty brown hair that hung lankly across his eyes blinked back at them.

“Come in,” he mumbled, leaving the door open, and walked back over to his old Formica kitchen table to sit down in front of a state-of-the-art Apple laptop. He stared intently at the large screen.

Berg and Arena cautiously followed him into the studio apartment and watched as Buchanan played what looked like some kind of online fantasy game. He seemed completely unaware of what their presence meant.

Berg looked around the apartment. The computer was the only thing worth any money in the otherwise crappy and dilapidated space that smelled like unwashed laundry and body odor.

Buchanan had the one table and chair by way of furniture, and an old mattress lay in the corner covered with yellowing sheets. It was freezing in the tiny space, and there appeared to be no heating.

“Mr. Buchanan?” Berg repeated. “Could you turn that off so we can ask you a few questions?”

Buchanan shut the laptop and looked at them.

“Can you tell us where you were between the hours of six and eight the evening of February fifteenth?” she asked.

Buchanan looked off to his left and his eyes squinched up as he thought hard for a moment. “I rode on the train,” he said. “Did you know that Chicago has one of the oldest transport systems in the world?” he asked, looking animated for the first time since their arrival at his door.

Berg and Arena looked at each other in confusion before pressing on.

“After you rode on the train, did you follow a girl to her house?” Berg asked. She couldn’t work out if he was high on drugs, playing them, or had some kind of mental issue.

Buchanan scoffed. “Not a girl, the Orc Queen. She escaped Bleeding Nest. I had to best her to complete the quest and send her back to her own realm. She was a threat to the mortals.”

“You have the right to remain silent . . .” Arena’s voice rose as he repeated Buchanan’s Miranda rights.

Buchanan flinched at Arena’s hostile tone. “She couldn’t be allowed to stay in the mortal realm,” he repeated earnestly. “The Spirit Fairy will heal her. I look forward to besting her again in future quests.”

“What the fuck?” Arena whispered to Berg as he dragged Buchanan to his feet. “Hands behind your back, nutbag!”

Berg shrugged, unclipped a plastic tie from her belt, and asked Buchanan to turn around. “You’re under arrest for the rape and attempted murder of Emma Young. Your rights have been explained to you, do you understand these rights?” She secured his hands behind his back.

He didn’t resist—instead looking even more confused, like a lost puppy.

They walked him down to the sedan and put him in the backseat. He looked around the vehicle with interest, as if they were on a field trip.

“Well, that was anticlimactic,” Arena said dryly.

Buchanan was still in Interview Two later that afternoon, consulting with his appointed lawyer.

“His public defender’s insisting he’s not even competent to stand trial.” Illinois’s newest assistant state’s attorney, Carla Maroney, flung her long blond hair back over her jacket in irritation and folded her arms. “Thank God he has no money, so he can’t hire a decent lawyer or any experts to back up this crackpot defense. I’m sending in my own expert to see if the claim has any basis.”

“Hey, Maroney!” Cheney called as he wandered down the hallway. “Looking good, babe!”

Carla went from a pouting, petulant child to stunning flirt as she flashed him a bright smile.

Berg was furious, with the ASA and the situation. “Not competent? That’s bullshit. He’s clutching at straws because Buchanan gave us a full, voluntary confession! He may be a little slow, but all we have to prove is that he is able to distinguish right from wrong and can stand trial!”

“That’s the point the defender’s making. Buchanan apparently can’t distinguish between the real world and the online game,
Realm of Blood
. He really thinks that Emma Young was some kind of Orc Queen who escaped the confines of the game and was going to kill him and other mortals. He’s convinced she’ll be resurrected to fight again another day!” Carla argued.

“Great.” Berg sighed.

“Yeah, well, he also wants the charges downgraded to attempted murder because Emma Young’s still technically alive.”

“Not gonna happen. This is capital murder!” Arena replied.

“I agree. Brain death is considered legal death for our purposes, so I’m keeping the charge at capital murder. Let’s see how cooperative they become when the death penalty’s up for grabs. Has his DNA been collected?” Carla asked.

“Yep,” Arena replied, flashing a white smile at the pretty attorney. “Collected it myself. Lab will get back to us tomorrow. Patrol is out scouring the nearby dumpsters where the tipster said we’d find more evidence. We have enough to hold him until then, even without anything else. Maybe we could go out for a beer after and discuss strategy?”

Carla looked at Arena like he was some used bubblegum she had just sat in. “Not a chance,” she said to him before turning to Berg. “Keep me apprised. We can’t assume the confession will be admissible now.” She moved toward Jay. “Can I talk you for a moment, privately?” she asked, walking down the hall as if it was a given he would follow.

Berg and Arena watched as Carla and Jay chatted and occasionally laughed together.

When Carla put her hand lightly on Jay’s shirt, Berg felt a stab of what she assumed was jealousy and turned away. “What a fucking day. Any luck on the arrest warrant for Feeny?” she asked Arena.

“Nope. Judge says there’s no evidence to back up Lauren’s claims and now she’s dead . . . that bastard’s pulling out all his contacts to keep us on the run.”

“Fuck. He still in New York?”

“Yep. I have put in a request for him to come in for a voluntary interview only. Not holding my breath. The guy’s lawyered up to the eyeballs.”

“And now Lauren’s dead, she can’t testify against him, and we can’t use her statement. How convenient.” Berg sighed. “This is fucked. Two convictions in the bag at breakfast, none by dinner. I need a beer.”

“Want some company?”

“You’re kidding, right?”

Berg sat in the college bar on 59th clutching at her beer. The bar had been one of her regular haunts during her bad days—it was a surefire place to find willing, able young men and women—but she hadn’t been for a few months now.

She noted the crowd had changed, yet again, and it was full of groups of even younger looking students. Some of them looked barely legal. She figured it was a sign that she was getting too old to be visiting college bars. Her thirty-sixth birthday was looming, but she planned to ignore it, like she had all the others.