The Survivor (22 page)

Striker met her stare, shook his head. ‘There’s more to it, I’m afraid. I think Tina was targeted.’

Doris’s face paled. ‘Targeted?’

‘Yes. Would you have any idea why?’

‘But there were so many kids . . .’

‘A lot of kids were shot, Mrs Chow, yes, I know. But from the evidence I’ve seen, three of those kids were targeted specifically. Tina was one of them. So was Conrad MacMillan. And Chantelle O’Riley.’

Doris’s face twitched, but she managed to answer and maintain her composure.

‘But my daughter didn’t socialise with those kids. I’d never even met Margaret before this morning.’

‘I know that, and that’s why this investigation is so hard. There’s a common connection here somewhere, and we have to find it.’

Doris looked away towards the mountains. The soft fall wind blew her hair back, but the scrunchie kept all but a few hairs tucked in place. She stood there for a long moment, and Striker allowed her the silence. When she spoke again, she seemed flustered.

‘I’m sorry, my mind is racing. I can’t seem to take it all in.’

Striker helped her out. ‘I’ve heard Tina was part of a Debate Club?’

This seemed to give Doris a jolt. ‘The Debate Club. Oh, yes. She loved it so much! She excelled at using her mind, and she made friends through it. Had some wonderful experiences. They took a trip, you know, last September. All the kids went. Twelve of them, I think.’

‘Where did they go?’

‘Hong Kong. Tina was so excited, she talked about it for weeks.’ The memory brought a weak grin to the woman’s lips, and she laughed sadly. ‘If there was one thing my daughter was good at, it was talking.’

‘What did they debate, here and in Hong Kong?’

She shrugged. ‘Normally, they would debate anything that was pertinent. And hot – they liked hot topics. Abortion. The death penalty. Assisted suicide. When they went to Hong Kong, the topic was freedom and world religions. National sovereignty. The debate was on China’s rule over Tibet. It caused quite a stir – they had to cut the tournament short.’

‘Why?’

‘They didn’t say.’

Striker thought this over. ‘Did Tina speak on the subject?’

‘They all did, as far as I know.’

‘But you weren’t there?’

She shook her head. ‘No, only Principal Myers went.’

Striker wrote this down in his notebook.

‘Do you have any children, Detective Striker?’ Tina Chow suddenly asked.

Striker thought of how Courtney had known Tina, a small fact Doris was obviously unaware of. ‘A daughter, yes. She goes to Saint Patrick’s.’

This seemed to shock the woman. ‘She is . . . okay?’

‘She was skipping class yesterday.’

Doris smiled, as if this was funny. She let out a soft laugh, then suppressed another cry. The pink petal fell from her hand and blew away in the gentle breeze. Blew away as easily as Tina Chow’s life had blown away just twenty-four hours ago.

Striker saw her face quiver, saw how she was slowly losing the battle with her composure.

‘I’m sorry,’ he offered quietly.

Doris nodded and the tears finally came, running freely down her thin, pale cheeks. When she spoke, her voice was barely audible.

‘Enjoy every day with her, Detective,’ she said. ‘Every minute, every second. And appreciate her. Appreciate all the small things . . . you never know when they’ll be taken away.’

Thirty-Six

For the third time in ten minutes, the phone rang, and Courtney finally dragged herself out of bed to look at the call display. The bedroom drapes had blocked out the sun and kept everything dark, and the laminate floors were cold against the soft flesh of her feet as she lumbered down the hall into the living room.

She hoped the call was from Raine. Unlike everyone else, Raine understood her. How couldn’t she? They had a connection, a unique bond. Courtney had lost her mother just two years ago, and Raine had lost her dad last year when her parents broke up and he moved away to Hong Kong. It made their friendship like a kinship. Kind of.

Like sisters.

The living room was no warmer than the bedroom, though brighter with the sun pouring in. It smelled of woodsmoke and whisky and lemons. Courtney passed the coffee table where Dad and Felicia’s mugs still stood and picked up the phone. She stared at the small screen.

Missed call
.

She hit the missed calls button and saw
Dad Cell
spread across the screen. God, he was stubborn. She scrolled down and found the same listing three more times. Totally stubborn. Stubborn as hell.

She put the phone back on its cradle, then spotted her cell phone lying in the middle of the room, just in front of the fireplace. The phone was flipped open, the grey casing cracked down the side from where it had slammed into the wall. It made her angry all over again because she hadn’t even finished paying off the damn thing, and she would never have reacted like that, were it not for Felicia.

She picked up the cell, powered it on, and was happy to see it still worked. There were nine missed calls. All but two were from friends she had at school. No doubt they wanted to talk about the shootings.

Courtney erased every one of them from the phone’s memory. She had no interest in talking about the shootings. Not now, not ever.

All it did was remind her of Mom.

The last two calls were the only ones she cared about. Both were from Raine. The first had come in late last night, at two-fourteen a.m. The last one had come in about a half hour ago.

Courtney called back, got the answering machine: ‘Leave a message, but don’t
Raine
on my parade.’

That always made Courtney smile. ‘It’s the Court,’ she said. ‘I’m up. Gimme a call.’

She hung up, hoped her message sounded cool, hoped her tag name wasn’t getting lame, and she linked her cell to the charger. As she tried to think up a new nickname – something cooler than The Court – thoughts of breakfast ran through her mind. She decided to skip it. Her stomach wasn’t ready.

She turned on the TV, and saw the shootings on every channel. Police, paramedics, teachers – all running and screaming, some crying. There were quick flashes of blood with every scene.
Carnage
. The sight made her heart race, made her feel sick.

Looking away, she hit Input 2, so there was no chance of catching any more news channels. As far as she was concerned, it was time for avoidance and denial. She knelt down and opened the hutch, grabbing the disc she had left in the far back of the cabinet. It was the video from Christmas three years ago. The last one Mom was here for. And even though it hurt like hell to watch it, Courtney always did. Too many times to count. She was like a drug addict, always needing more.

The disc tray was already open. Courtney put in the disc, closed it, hit play, and the TV screen came to life, showing the Christmas tree all lit up with red and blue lights, and Mom sitting in the La-Z-Boy between the window and the crackling fire. Toby, their calico kitty, was in the picture too, jumping up on the chair and nestling in Mom’s lap. He had disappeared a week after Mom had died, as if he’d known his favourite person was never coming back. Courtney often wondered where he’d gone.

The thought saddened her, but she watched on, like she always did. She felt she had to. Like it was her duty as a daughter. To let go of the pain was to let go of Mom.

In the video, the camera bobbled slightly as Dad moved around the room, panning down on the presents, then finding her with the camera and zooming in.

‘Merry Christmas, Pumpkin,’ he said.

‘Merry Christmas, Dad.’

‘Go stand with your mother so I can get a shot.’

Mom waved her hand at Dad, almost spilling her glass of rum and eggnog. ‘Oh Jacob, put that thing away for once.’

There was a pause.

‘Come on, Amanda, just one shot.’

In the feed, Mom sighed and Dad chuckled, and then Courtney crossed the room and sat beside Mom, giving her a kiss on the cheek. She gestured to the rum and eggnog, gave a pleading look, and asked, ‘Can I have one of those?’

Her mother just gave her
the look
, and Courtney laughed. Then her mother frowned at the camera.

‘You got your shot, Jacob, now put it away. You’re always such a nuisance.’

‘Fine. Merry Killjoy,’ Dad said.

And the camera shut off.

Courtney grabbed the remote, hit stop, and closed her eyes. She could still feel the moment like it was yesterday. The fire’s warmth soothing her skin. The spicy smell of the rum in Mom’s drink. The eggnog of her own drink. And the pine-scented smoke that seeped out of the fireplace and hazed the room just a little bit.

It was all so wonderful. It made her cry.

And she hated Dad for that.

She hit play and watched the feed again. The shot was a bit dark, and there was a low humming noise in the audio. The video was anything but high-def, but it was the best movie she’d ever seen in her life.

Oh, Mom.

It wasn’t fair.

She missed her so much her stomach hurt and she wanted to keep crying forever. And the more she missed her, the more it bugged her how Dad just plain didn’t. Oh, he
said
he did. He said all the right things, especially when he caught her watching the videos which he never watched.

‘She loved you so much,’ he would say.

‘You made her life wonderful,’ he would say.

‘I miss her too, Pumpkin,’ he would say.

But that didn’t stop him from fucking that Spanish whore.

Courtney thought of Felicia, and Dad, and how Mom was no longer around, and it made her feel small. Alone. No one cared. No one knew how she felt. No one understood her.

Except Raine.

Raine knew because Raine had also gone through some horrible things. Like all the fights and the divorce and her dad leaving town.

With that in mind, Courtney picked up the phone and called Raine, but again, all she got was the message service. She thought about leaving another message – still wasn’t sure about using The Court for her tag – then just hung up. She watched the video two more times, and soon her grief mutated into anger.

Mom should never have died that night, she thought. Dad should have done something. Something, for Christ’s sake! He was the goddam cop, he should have acted. He should have damn well
cared
.

But he didn’t, did he?

And even though he said he missed Mom, and even though he’d said he was sorry a million times, it didn’t mean shit. Because Mom was gone. Forever. All because of what he didn’t do. Of what he chose
not
to do. In the end, there was only one way to view things.

It was Dad’s fault Mom had died.

Thirty-Seven

They were in the car, driving east, when Noodles finally called Striker back at quarter to twelve. His words were quick and direct, and they made Striker’s nerves fire. ‘The blood types of Raymond Leung and the blood in the car don’t match.’

Striker closed his eyes for a second. ‘I fuckin’ knew it.’

‘Raymond Leung is A-positive. The blood in the Civic is type O-negative.’

The information should have made Striker feel better, since it had proven him right, but it didn’t. It only brought him fear and dark premonitions.

Red Mask was still out there somewhere.

‘You tell Laroche?’ he asked Noodles.

‘He’s arguing it. Says we can’t prove that the blood in the car was actually Red Mask’s blood.’

‘I shot him myself.’

‘Hey, you’re preachin’ to the choir, Shipwreck. Either way, it’s what we’re dealing with.’

They talked a bit more before Noodles promised to relay anything else he heard, then Striker hung up and told Felicia the news.

‘Well, you were right,’ she finally conceded. ‘Congratulations, Jacob. Great news. The maniac’s still out there somewhere.’

He blinked. ‘I’m not gloating. All I’m saying is, we got to keep our feet to the fire. This thing isn’t done. Not by a long shot.’

He waited for a response from Felicia, but got none. So they drove in silence. Destination: East Vancouver. Franklin Street.

The industrial section of the city.

Almost fifteen minutes later, when the silence became burdensome, Striker turned the talk back to the investigation.

The meeting with the two mothers, Doris Chow and Margaret MacMillan, had turned up some interesting information. The Debate Club, the trip to Hong Kong, Free Tibet speeches, and a cancelled tournament – the timing seemed more than coincidental, but Striker could see no involvement. It was just one more piece for a jigsaw puzzle that already had too many.

His stomach rumbled, part from lunchtime hunger, part from emotional distress. It was going on twelve noon, and Courtney had yet to return his calls. No doubt she was up, and simply choosing to ignore him. In some ways she was just like her mother.

He drove east on Forty-First Avenue, past Arbutus, and cut into the McDonald’s drive-thru. There was nothing he could do about Courtney’s attitude, but his hunger was another matter. The breakfast menu had ended, so he ordered a Big Mac and a Filet-O-Fish, and two more coffees – his black, Felicia’s loaded with cream and sugar. The smell seemed to wake Felicia up a bit. She popped off the lid of her coffee, then looked towards the bag.

‘If I eat that, I’ll balloon.’

‘Oh come on, you eat two pastries and two fancy lattes every day, what could this hurt?’

She made a face, but reached for the bag.

As they continued down Broadway, Striker pulled out his cell and noticed he had a missed call from Janet Jacobson, the former Vancouver Vice cop who had now moved on to greener pastures. He called her back but the line was busy and he didn’t leave a message. They drove towards the industrial section where Triple A Autobody was located.

Sheldon Clayfield’s business.

Felicia pulled out the Filet-O-Fish. ‘So fill me in again, who is this Clayfield guy?’

Striker swallowed a mouthful, then wiped a smear of Big Mac sauce from his lips. ‘Clayfield is one of the five guys Meathead told us about. I’ve narrowed it down to two who work in the Lower Mainland that are even capable of making a hidden compartment like that. Clayfield’s got a history of it, and a long list of other shit for drug running. He made a real good compartment for a drug trafficker last year, and was caught by Drugs. They dropped the charge for information. And I got word of another one he made six months before that. It gives us leverage.’