The Children's Corner
Chapter 16
"The boys are settled for now," Kate announces, joining Rick and Julia. "They're both fascinated by the twinkle little star mobile. Julia, you want to sit with me while Rick finishes up the burgers?"
The young woman struggles to suppress the tremor in her voice. "Of course, Detective Beckett." She takes a chair opposite Kate at the table. "I guess you want to know about the shoplifting thing."
"You guess right."
"I didn't steal anything; I swear. I was in the dollar store with Adrian and Jeanie. They did a really good job cleaning their rooms, so my mother said they could spend a dollar each. Adrian wanted to look in the toy aisle, but Jeanie wanted a barrette. So I stayed with Adrian while she went to look for it. He couldn't figure out if he wanted a car or a robot, and while he was making up his mind, a bunch of other kids came in and started grabbing things and stuffing them in their pants.
"The clerk in the store didn't know who was who and called the cops on all of us. I didn't have anything on me, but a cop arrested me anyway, along with everyone else, including Adrian and Jeanie. They held us until a social worker showed up. She knew about the other kids. They'd been in trouble before. And she wanted to know why we'd been picked up too.
"Finally, the cops admitted that we didn't take anything and let us go. But we weren't cleared until the security video showed we were innocent. Adrian and Julie were minors, so their arrests were expunged. But since I'd just turned eighteen, mine is still on record. But you should be able to check. There's got to be a report about the video. As a cop, can't you get it?"
"While I'm on leave, I can't go digging through those files. But I can have someone get it for me. Do you remember the name of the cop who arrested you?"
Julia's hands clench. "I don't think I'll ever forget it. It was Officer Marcus, Richard Marcus."
"Pick-up Dick!" Rick calls from the kitchen. "Kate and I both know about him. He was so infamous for bad collars that I was thinking about basing a character on him. Didn't Montgomery get rid of him in the reduction of forces after that massive budget cut?"
"He did," Kate confirms. "I think he was one of the few cops no one was sad to see go."
"Then there's no reason that he should screw things up any further for Julia," Rick declares.
"I'll have Ryan pull whatever he can find for our own due diligence," Kate decides. "And if the paperwork confirms Julia's version, then her record is a dead issue. It should have been anyway. In New York, a case that gets a good result is supposed to be automatically sealed. And since it wasn't marked that way, she can apply for a correction. Unfortunately, the arrest will still be on her rap sheet, but sealing it will back up her story."
Tears sting Julia's eyes. "Does that mean I won't ever be able to get a teaching job?"
Kate reaches for her hand. "I won't lie to you. That arrest may make it more difficult. But if you explain what happened up front and have the documentation to prove it, no employer would have a legal reason to deny you. If what I get supports your story, I'll make sure you have a copy."
"Then that's settled," Rick declares. "And the burgers are done. I'll charm Lily away from proclaiming her latest lessons to her stuffed friends. Then let's eat before the twins get bored with twinkles."
Azra swipes through Jack's images. "So you're going to join us troglodytes. You know, our people are constantly surveilling the tunnels for threats against our installation. In places, there's practically another city down there. The temperature is pretty stable once you go down that far, so squatters don't have to worry about heat or cooling. It's a refuge for a lot of the homeless. They can have tents or little huts and be comfortable in a loose kind of society. And they can band together against hostile visitors.
"The old-style bootleggers are gone, but they've been replaced by the updated varieties. And if the Russians are running drugs from the maze, they may not be the only ones. There's a salable commodity that grows mainly in the dark. And for the amount of light needed, it's not hard to tap into electrical lines. That's not really a concern for our agency. And the operations aren't big enough to attract the DEA. There are other relatively minor smuggling enterprises as well. So you'll have to be prepared for anyone defending their livelihood. And you'll want to draw as little notice as possible when you do it."
"Meaning," Jack assumes, "nonlethal weaponry."
"If I were you," Azra suggests. "I'd use tranquilizer darts. They'd be silent and keep distractions out of your way until you finish your mission."
"An X-caliber RDD?" Jack questions.
"That would be an effective way to go."
Through the window of an unmarked unit, Ryan stares at the facility occupying much of a city block. "This place is huge."
"Bro, you're not gonna work on a semi in a backyard garage," Esposito points out.
"But with the cost per square foot in this part of Manhattan, the rent on this place must be sky-high. It would make more sense to put it in the warehouse districts in The Heights or The Bronx. Here, the owners would have to fix a sh*tload of trucks just to break even. I think something else is going on."
"If something else weren't going on, we wouldn't be here," Esposito retorts. "But according to the logistics operation that owns that truck, it spent more than a day here. This has to be where the drugs were off-loaded. And the ones coming in with MacIver's shipment can't be the only ones coming into the city. Not the way the bodies are stacking up."
"So we're going to wait and see who shows up?"
"You got a better idea?"
"No," Ryan admits. "But I hope the food trucks park around here somewhere. Jenny's on another one of her health kicks. All we had for breakfast this morning was oatmeal. And I couldn't even put brown sugar on it. It could be a long day."
"But if the Fiesta Wagon comes around, don't you go eating those bean burritos," Esposito warns. "I'm not sitting in a car full of poison gas."
"I was hoping for the Sign of the Shamrock. I could go for a good shepherd's pie. But if it's the Fiesta Wagon, I'll stick with the carne asada."
"If it shows up, we'll make that two."
"Oh, hold it a second, Partner. Give me the binoculars." Ryan fits his eyes to the lenses. "Yeah, that's what I thought. I was asking Jenny about clothes made in Kazakhstan, and she showed me some pictures. One of them was a jacket just like that."
"It looks like a hundred other jackets," Esposito protests.
"The shape of the collar is different."
Esposito grunts. "Sometimes I don't know about you, Man. Jenny has to understand that stuff for her job, but what's your excuse?"
"That it might come in handy for doing this one. Coat-guy is our connection to the killer drug. He's the one we have to track."