Jack had only just returned to his desk when Hawkins called to tell him that Leo Ratcliffe was dead.
“Oh, shit,” Jack heard himself say. This has got to be a nightmare. Wake up!
“Yeah, my sentiments exactly.” Hawkins sounded morose. “I’ve never lost an informant before.”
“Do you think it happened before, during, or after the attack on Greg?”
“Connie Crane is here from I-HIT. She thinks it happened two or three hours ago.”
“Before Greg was attacked,” Jack noted.
“Yeah, if she’s right, they may’ve popped him, then gone after Greg next. There was no sign of forced entry, and the door was locked when I arrived.”
“But they shot Leo,” Jack stated, “and Greg was attacked with a pipe or a bat.”
“Yes, but according to Connie, the gun was a small calibre. Maybe a .22 or a .32. He lives in a basement and the landlord is at work all day. Not to mention, I saw freshly cut grass on the neighbour’s lawn. Good chance that nobody heard the gunshot. Greg would’ve been a different story.”
“They knew we would’ve been watching him,” Jack replied. “All they needed was to catch him out of our sight and make it quiet.”
“Exactly.” Hawkins paused. “We’re canvassing the neighbourhood for witnesses. I’ll get back to you if we learn anything.”
After telling Laura and Alicia what had happened, Jack was about to go and tell Rose when he received another call. He recognized the 416 area code for Toronto.
“Jack Taggart?” a man asked.
“Speaking.”
“This is Constable Mason Stone from Toronto Drugs. I’m about a block from Greg and Sally’s house and I’m about to tell her what happened. Is he still …” Mason’s voice was croaky, and Jack agonized for him and what he was about to do.
“He’s still in surgery.”
The sigh was audible. “That’s good, I guess.” Mason paused. “He and I’ve done a lot of UC operations together, and I was best man at their wedding two years ago. Now I wish he’d stayed single, like I did.” Mason paused again, then asked, “Can you give me some details?”
Jack relayed the gist of what had happened, his own role, and how serious the injuries to Greg’s head were.
“Christ, what do I tell her? I don’t want to give her false hope.”
“I’d be as matter-of-fact as you can. She’ll likely be in shock and it could take time to register, so hang in there with her.”
“That’s a given. Any progress on the arrests?”
“Not yet. I just found out that the informant who made the introduction was murdered shortly before Greg’s attack. They grabbed one of the suspects who instructed Greg to go the area where he was attacked, but he demanded a lawyer and was subsequently released. Special O had him under surveillance when the attack occurred, so there’s no chance that he did it himself.”
“But he could have arranged it.”
“Yes. His brother — another suspect who runs a security consulting business — was also under surveillance.”
“So he has a solid alibi, too. Sounds like these guys are real pros.”
“Which is why I stayed back and ordered only minimal communication.”
“I’d have done the same. Still, you must feel like shit.”
“Yeah, I do. Nothing compared to how Sally will feel, though. At least I can tell you that the brass have already okayed her to fly out here.”
“I’ll come with her. Don’t care if it’s on my own dollar.” Mason paused. “I’ve never been to Vancouver before. Greg’s mom lives in Burnaby, so I imagine Sally will want to break the news to her as soon as we arrive. Is that far from the hospital?”
“The hospital is in New Westminster, so depending where in Burnaby Greg’s mom is, it’s a fifteen- or twenty-minute drive.”
“Okay … I’ll rent a car when I get there. I suspect I’ll stay at his mom’s house, too.”
“Don’t worry about a rental. I’ll pick you up at the airport myself … providing Sally wants anything to do with me, that is.”
“I doubt she’ll blame you. She’ll take her cue from me. I’ve been doing UC for the last seven years. If I don’t blame you, she won’t either.” Mason exhaled loudly. “Gotta say, though, the thought of telling her is making my stomach crawl up my throat.”
Unfortunately, I know exactly how you feel. “Once you start talking to her, you’ll forget how you’re feeling.”
“Because I’ll be focused on her,” Mason replied.
Your own feelings won’t return until afterward. Feelings of sorrow, rage … and revenge.
* * *
At 10:20 a.m. the following morning, Jack spotted Mason and Sally in the arrivals area of the Vancouver International Airport. Neither looked like they’d gotten much sleep the night before.
Sally was a petite strawberry blond with mascara smudging her freckled cheeks. She was wearing a lightblue pantsuit and Jack guessed she was about thirty.
Mason, who was about the same age, wore blue jeans and a T-shirt. He was lanky, with a well-trimmed beard and dark-brown hair that hung to his collar. His eyes searched the crowd, then focused on Jack.
Jack approached and introduced himself. Mason was Jack’s height, and his grip was firm. Considerably younger, Mason’s face still had a youthfulness that Jack had long since lost.
He saw the anxiety on Sally’s face when she shook his hand. “The surgery lasted seventeen hours, but Greg made it through,” he said, knowing what was on her mind. “He’s currently in an induced coma, and on a ventilator.”
Sally nodded.
“I’m sorry, but I wasn’t given any indication of how long he’d be —”
“It’s okay. I understand,” she said softly. “I’m a registered nurse.”
“We’d like to go to the hospital immediately,” Mason stated, “but maybe it would be best to rent a car here at the airport. Then I can drop it off when I fly back.”
“I’m lending you mine,” Jack replied. “I can use a company car.”
“No, you don’t need to —”
“It’s not a problem. My wife has a car, as well. Plus a corporal on my unit lives close to me. She’ll meet us at the hospital to pick me up. No worries. Keep it for as long as you need. It’s got GPS, so you shouldn’t have any trouble getting around.”
Forty minutes later, they arrived at the Royal Columbian Hospital, where Jack introduced Laura to Mason and Sally. He left Mason with the keys, then returned with Laura to the office.
His first call was to Hawkins to let him know that Sally had arrived.
“I’ve got an update for you, too,” Hawkins said. “The dive team recovered a stolen .32 calibre Beretta from the river. We’ll need ballistics to confirm, but I’m betting it matches up with the slug in Leo Ratcliffe’s head.”
“Sounds like they brought it along as backup, but preferred not to use it because they knew we’d be close by. Afterward, they tossed it and whatever they used on Greg into the river.”
“That’s my guess. The dive team is still searching.”
“A .32 Beretta,” Jack mused. “I bought one of those for my wife years ago. Fits nicely into her purse should the occasion arise for her to carry it.”
“Interesting you say that. We found a witness who lives across the back alley from Leo Ratcliffe. She says she saw a woman enter Leo’s yard through the gate while a man waited by the fence. The woman was gone only a minute, then she returned and they both left.”
“Could she identify them?”
“Even if she could, we couldn’t use her in court. She’s senile and not sure if it happened yesterday or perhaps last week. She has no idea what they were wearing. All she remembers is that the woman was good-looking and had either black or maybe blond hair.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Wish I were.” Hawkins paused. “I’d wondered if the killer walked in through an unlocked door, or if it was someone Leo knew. Maybe neither. He might’ve simply opened the door for a pretty woman.”
“Any thoughts on how you’ll proceed?” Jack asked.
“We’ll keep digging and knocking on doors to look for witnesses. It’ll also take time for Forensics to do their thing.”
“I’ll be surprised if any prints or DNA are found,” Jack replied. “These people know what they’re doing.”
“I know. Both Derek and Peter’s cellphones have already been disconnected. It’s too bad. We never knew what was being said as the calls were encrypted, but at least we could record the numbers being called. Sometimes that gave us locations.”
“Send me a list of every person and telephone number you can connect to these guys, and I’ll see what we can do to find the leak.”
“Will do. As far as the encrypted calls go, they’ve been passed on to the techies, but I’m fairly certain it won’t help. I had another case recently with encrypted calls. Our people couldn’t crack the code and sent it on to some other government agency that does cryptologic work. But apparently the code can’t be deciphered.”
“That’d be the Communications Security Establishment. The CSE is our national cryptologic agency headquartered in Ottawa.” Jack paused. “If they could even come up with a location where the calls were made from, it would help.”
“Like your building or ours,” Hawkins said gravely. “It’ll be nice to talk to Greg when he comes out of the coma. Unfortunately, the doctors can’t say when that’ll be.”
“My priority will be finding out how they got burned,” Jack said firmly. “Send me everything you have.”
“Believe me, finding the leak would really make my day.”
Finding the leak … and plugging it would make my day.