AN: Here is some more, I'd love to hear your thoughts.
The following day Voight organised for a stakeout of the place Erin called home, it wasn't the first time the house had been watched but it was the first time Voight volunteered to be part of the crew watching it.
"So what's the intel you have on this place?" his partner Detective Alvin Olinsky asked as he placed a pair of binoculars to his eyes.
"Just a hunch," Voight said, "I think I might know how to get someone on the inside but I need to see how the place works."
For one week they watched the house, recorded the movements, who came in, who came out, when, what they brought with them. Voight saw the girl leave with a boy in the morning and come back in the evening, the following day he watched them leave again but that night they didn't come home. He wanted to go out looking for them but unless they were reported missing there was no reason to think anything untoward had happened. Two days later the girl came back on her own. He wanted to approach her but as long as she stayed out of trouble he had no reason to approach. As the stakeout ended, Voight was forced to admit to his superiors that his hunch had been wrong; he didn't have a way in, at least not one that he could enact anytime soon.
As the days and weeks went by Voight tried not to think about the girl, he couldn't help her unless she asked for it. He began to think she'd be like the other kids he'd tried to help, he'd given out four business cards in his career and none of them had called.
...
September, Erin walked around the kitchen of the house opening every single cupboard, she was hungry but there was nothing to eat, over the last few weeks the adults in the house including her mom had been leaving. She didn't know where they were going or why, they never suggested she go with them. She didn't mind, she was used to looking after herself but now it was starting to become a problem. She didn't have any money and no one was around to buy groceries. She could steal some food, she knew how to but the arrest had spooked her, she knew if she got caught again they might not let her walk away from it. Instead she'd been working her way through the canned foods but she'd eaten the last can of baked beans for breakfast. She left the kitchen and walked to the living room, two of the adults were sitting there, only one of them she knew.
"You got any food?" she asked flopping into one of the lounge chairs.
"Who are you?" the man she didn't know asked.
"That's Bunny's kid," the other man said, "you know Bunny."
"Oh yeah," the first man said, "I know Bunny. What do you want kid?"
"Food," she said looking from one man to the other, "you got any?"
"Nah kid we ain't got no food," the first one said, "but you can have some of this," he gestured to the white powder set up on the table, "it'll make you forget about food real fast."
"No thanks," Erin said standing; she walked back to her room and grabbed her bag and jacket and left the house.
She caught a bus into the city and began walking to the food vans she knew about, the first one she made it to was closed and the second one had run out of food. She kept walking trying to remember where another one was but she was tired and hungry and sick of walking. She walked into the grocery store and began walking the aisles, she hadn't gone in there with the intention of stealing but that soon became her purpose. She picked a can of spaghetti off the shelf and slipped it into her bag, then she grabbed a bread roll. She thought she got away with it, the owner wasn't watching but another customer was.
"Hey, you going to pay for those?" the man yelled as she made a move for the door. She went to make a run for it but at that moment another customer came in the door and she got boxed in. She tried to run through them, she pushed them hard, they fell down; she tripped on their legs, and fell hard to the ground. The next thing she knew there was a knee in her back and her arms were being wrenched behind her, she tried to struggle free but she couldn't move. Minutes later the police arrived, they made the man stop kneeling on her, they let her stand. She was shaking all over and scared, she wanted to run but there was nowhere to get away. The lady she'd pushed over was saying her arm hurt, one of the men was yelling assault and calling her a shoplifter, one of the police officers was trying to get the adults to calm down, the other had a hand firmly on her shoulder. She was trying to follow the conversation but there were too many people talking at once.
"Alright!" the officer talking to the adults finally yelled, "come on kid you're coming with us."
They put handcuffs on her and led her away. She didn't say a word to them, not on the drive to the station and not on the walk to the interrogation room. In the room they took the handcuffs off, told her to take a seat and then left her. She took a seat and began trying to work out what she was going to do, they'd searched her bag but they hadn't taken it away. She found her wallet and pulled out the business card the detective had given her. She thought it was weird when he'd given it to her, she didn't think she'd ever use it but she hadn't thrown it away. Now she could see it might come in handy. When the officer finally came back she asked for a phone call.
"Here you go kid," the officer said, sitting her down in front of a telephone.
She pulled the business card out and slowly began dialing the numbers.
...
Voight was at home eating dinner with Camille when his phone started ringing. He recognised the number as coming from one of the police stations.
"Hello Detective Voight," he answered.
"Hello detective," when he heard the voice coming down the line was a child's he began to hold his breath, "it's me Erin. You gave me your business card. You said I could give you a call if I got in trouble. I think I'm in trouble, can you help me?"
"Of course kid," Voight said feeling his heart begin to flutter, finally someone called him, "what's the problem?"
"I'm at the police station, I've been arrested," her voice sounded so small coming down the line, he wanted to reach out and give her a hug.
"Okay kid, I'll be right there."
Voight hung up the phone and turned to his wife, "She called," he said smiling. Camille knew about Erin, she knew about all the kids Voight had handed cards to over the years, and she knew how much it pained him when they didn't call.
"Go help her," Camille said encouraging him out the door.
Voight tried to suppress his smile as he drove to the police station. He'd forgot to ask Erin what she'd been arrested for, she might have done something serious and him arriving smiling ear to ear wouldn't help her situation. He doubted she'd done anything too bad though, he still maintained his original assessment that she was a good kid.
He walked into the station and found the officers who'd brought her in. They had her for simple battery and retail theft. The officers said they really didn't want to bring her in, they could tell she was just a hungry kid and hadn't meant to hurt the lady but the people in the store had made it impossible for them to let her walk. They were looking for a reason to cut her lose and were happy to go along with Voight's suggestion.
...
Erin was bored and hungry and tired and feeling sorry for herself. She wanted to get out of the police station and go home but she was stuck there until this detective came to get her out. She wasn't sure how he was going to do that, she couldn't really deny what happened, too many people saw it and it was on camera. When the door finally opened and the detective walked in she felt relief run through her, he was smiling and carried with him a small pile of papers.
"Okay kid," he said sitting down opposite her, "I've got a way to get you out of this mess, but you're going to have to do something for me."
"What?" she asked, feeling like she was trading one bad situation in for another, she should have known trusting a cop was a bad idea.
"I want you to be my CI," he said and he began laying out the bits of paper.
"What's a CI?" she asked just knowing it was something bad.
"A confidential informant," he told her and she gulped.
"I don't want to be no informant," she said bulking at the idea, "I'm not a snitch."
"You don't have to be a snitch," Voight said trying to calm the girl, he was expecting her to react like this and he had his arguments ready, "just think of it as telling me about you. That house you live in, I want to know what's going on inside of it."
"Oh," she looked at him confused, "why do you care about that house?"
"You know why," he said looking straight at her, "you know what goes on in that house."
"It's just adults taking drugs and being stupid," she said still not understanding the significance.
"And," he said looking at her and she finally got what he was trying to suggest.
"I don't know what goes on in the basement," she said quickly covering herself, "they keep the doors locked and won't let me go down there."
"That's okay," he smiled at her, "we think we know what happens in the basement, I just need you to tell me about the rest of the house, who's there, what you see them do, that kind of thing."
"Okay," she said slowly processing what the detective was asking her to do. She didn't like it, she felt like she was being boxed into a corner, "if I don't do this, what happens?"
"I'll go home and the other officers will come back in. I don't know what they'll do." He felt bad kind of lying to her, he knew what the other officers were planning to do, if he walked away they'd let her go on good behaviour but he really wanted a reason for her to keep talking to him.
"And if I agree to this what else is in it for me?" she wasn't stupid, she could see the potential to get more out if this deal, "You seem to be getting the better deal here."
"Well," Voight smiled at her, she was smarter than he'd given her credit for. "If you agree, I'll get you out of here and we'll go get something to eat, you look hungry, and we can talk terms."
Erin thought about it for a minute before finally saying, "Okay," not because she really wanted to but because she didn't think she had any other choice.
"Smart girl," Voight smiled at her, he was relieved she'd said yes, he didn't know what he would have done if she'd said no, "we've just got to do some paperwork and then we'll get out of here."