Cujo III Reloaded – This Time It's Personal
Chapter 2
Here's the next. Hope you like it.
I didn't know Cujo had such loyal fans! Your response to the first chapter floored me. Thank you all so very much for your reviews, alerts and favorites. As always, what you think matters and helps shape the story. Would love to hear from you.
Disclaimer: If they were mine, writing fiction about them wouldn't be the only reason for staying up all night. Just sayin' . . .
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Lights, Camera, Zero Action
This time, the lights and cameras were already there. One quick-on-the-trigger reporter was standing microphone in hand as they strode up to the front door of the coffee shop.
"That's Kiki Kenworthy." said Danny as they approached the sleek brunette holding her microphone and looking so very earnestly into the TV camera held by a woman wearing a cap with the station's logo on it.
"I don't care who she is." growled McGarrett not pausing in his long strides toward the shop, "Get her away from here!"
Danny walked up to the reporter in the middle of her narration; making sure to block the shot of her no doubt superficially solemn expression meant to convey 'The Tragedy'.
"All right, pack up your gear and leave." ordered the detective as he stood between reporter and camera; Steve placing a large hand over the lens as he passed them.
"Hey! We're working on an exclusive here!" exclaimed the annoyed woman in the bright fuchsia blazer. Hearing her, McGarrett stopped mid-stride and spun toward her, coming a few steps back to stand shoulder to shoulder with Danny.
"Your next 'exclusive' is going to be an up-close and personal report from inside a jail cell if you don't leave right now." said McGarrett as he crossed his arms over his chest and gave her the stare that, on occasion, had actually made suspects wet their pants.
Not seeming the least intimidated, the already large eyes went larger, "Hey! Aren't you McGarrett and Williams of Five-0?" she exclaimed while running her gaze over the two men before her. "I must say, you look even better in person." Her voice had gone from annoyed to an almost purring sound.
Both men were a little startled at her observation. McGarrett recovering first growled "Leave now or you are going to be detained."
He turned on his heel and once again stalked toward the entrance to the shop.
As the ballsy reporter made to follow behind them McGarrett called over his shoulder to a uniformed officer who'd just arrived on scene, "Take Ms. Kenworthy into custody if she doesn't get the hell out of here right now!"
Danny had paused to turn toward the entirely too persistent reporter following so closely she almost bumped into him when he stopped. "You heard the man. Leave now or you're under arrest; you and your uhh . . . camera person."
"Okay, okay. Just doing my job. Talia and I are leaving." she put up her hands placatingly. "Just chill."
Danny only looked stonily back at her as she backed away two steps before turning to leave. The camerawoman just shrugged her surprisingly petite shoulders before following her.
There was only one patrolman visible when they entered. He was trying to calm a nearly hysterical girl on one side of the shop while a trail of bright blood crept across the floor from behind the counter on the other side of the room.
As before, this victim was a young woman wearing the trademark green apron. A single neat bullet hole was visible in the center of her forehead but, judging from the pool around her, the bullet had exited at the back of her head. Her, as yet, unclouded eyes stared upward; her face frozen in surprise.
"Why isn't this scene secured?" barked Steve to the harried looking patrolman as he flashed his badge to a kid he didn't recognize.
"Just got here." apologetically answered the young cop, "We received the call less than ten minutes ago. My partner's in the storeroom with the other body."
"Other body?" parroted Danny in dread.
"Yeah, there's two this time." then he added, mostly for the tall intimidating guy's information, "Other units are on the way." They heard sirens approaching then dying with comically abbreviated whoops as several units came to a halt outside.
"Go help make sure the area outside is secure" barked the commander, "We'll take it from here."
Steve nodded to Danny to stay with the young woman clutching a soggy wad of logo-emblazoned napkins in her hands while sitting at a table near the entrance.
"And" he added to the same officer, "If that reporter Kiki whatsername is still out there ", (knowing full-well she had to be), "detain her and her camerawoman too."
With that, he stepped past the body behind the counter toward the door indicated by the kid in uniform.
The officer already in the storeroom was closely inspecting the scene while being careful not to track through the blood pooled on the floor. The nametag affixed to his uniform just above his badge read 'Sgt. S. Ruggles'.
"Commander McGarrett." he greeted
"Tell me what you found when you got here Sam." Steve began without preamble, recognizing the sergeant from previous encounters at crime scenes.
Ruggles was familiar with the rather abrupt ways of the head of the Governor's Special Task Force. At first meeting, he thought the guy was an arrogant asshole but, over time, he'd come to respect the man immensely . . . even if he still thought Five-0's commander was a little nuts.
"Just got the call a few minutes ago. When we got here, door was open and there was a girl wearing one of their aprons standing outside and screaming her head off."
"Was that reporter out there as well?"
"Yeah. I saw their truck as I pulled up but they hadn't set up yet. Sorry about not keeping them out of here but there just wasn't time to deal with it."
"Don't worry about it." said McGarrett crouching to study the body lying face down on the concrete floor. Again, the method of demise was a neat hole almost obscured by the man's shaggy hair. Judging by the amount of blood and tissue decorating the room, he'd have to be identified by his fingerprints. They'd have to wait for the M.E. to roll him.
"You get any info on this guy?" inquired McGarrett
"Manager. His name's Haloa Ikeda." responded Ruggles. McGarrett noted with silent irony the name 'Haloa' translated as 'long life'.
"The girl out there says he always gets here about an hour early every morning to do paperwork and stuff before they open. She says he was always very punctual and was always telling his crew that hard work, not luck, made for success. Guess today wasn't his lucky day."
"Nor the girl's behind the counter." said McGarrett grimly
Just then, Danny walked in and propped open the self-closing door with a heavy trash receptacle. The crime scene people would be here any moment. Only taking a quick look around, he said, "Steve, you gotta come out here. There's something you're gonna want to hear."
…..
Doris McGarrett pushed open the door that had the large logo etched upon it.
Tall and lean like her son, she moved gracefully across the office toward the small breakroom at the end of the long hallway. She'd already spoken to Steve to tell him she'd be dropping by with lunch for everyone (and reassured him she didn't cook it herself). Though she had many talents unknown to most people and was as lethal as her son, cooking wasn't part of her skill set. Their Thanksgiving feast this year had been one purchased from a local market and only had to be taken out of the numerous foil containers and reheated. Steve hadn't told anyone how lucky they all were that such things were available.
She set the large take-out bag on the table and walked back toward her son's office where a fairly comfortable couch waited. She'd brought one of the latest Ludlum books with her and planned on settling in to wait. She knew though Steve had said they'd be back by 1400 and it was still only about 1345, their investigation could delay them for a while. Her heels clicked along the granite tile floor as she made her way to Steve's office. It was obviously empty; that is except for the small grey cat that sat staring at her from the middle of her son's desk.
She approached slowly. Though she didn't dislike them, she'd never really had time or patience for pets and Mary had pretty much been allergic to anything that lived so, much as John had wanted a dog, it never came about. Stevie had always been too frantically busy to fret about not having one. To keep him out of trouble, they'd made sure he was enrolled in activities to burn off the excess energy. He was a sweet kid but could 'get into things' if bored. Sometimes his quest for entertainment took the form of dismantling things to see how they worked. She was still pissed about the sewing machine. That her son had acquired a pet, a cat of all things, had surprised her.
The animal studied her warily. "Nice kitty" said Doris; slowly walking toward the small animal, (she'd heard the stories).
The two carefully sized each other up.
….
As he listened to KAEO's reporter, Steve learned that, this time, the murderer actually contacted the media to let them know another killing had just taken place. Someone with an electronically disguised voice had called the television reporter at her home number and given her the address where they now stood.
"The call woke me. It wasn't even dawn yet. It came in on my land line and I didn't recognize the number. The station doesn't even give out personal phone numbers." said Kiki Kenworthy; the last sentence spoken in a less clipped way, "I'll give it to you if you need it." she purred.
"Give that number to Officer Kalakaua along with your cell number before you leave" said Steve, gesturing toward Kono, not wanting to go there himself. "Was any of this recorded?"
"No, I picked up before it went to voice mail. It had to be something important for somebody to call at that hour. Good thing I got to bed early last night." Somehow, she made the statement sound suggestive. The woman continued to scrutinize him and Danny as though they were in the sale window at Macy's.
"Did you even bother to contact the police?" he asked in a more than brusque manner.
"The call was already out. I heard it on the scanner before I was even out the door." she defended.
"Uh huh" drawled McGarrett not bothering to hide his skepticism. He idly wondered if the woman slept in her make-up. Though she'd rushed here, she was mascaraed to the max and her hair hadn't a strand out of place. Actually, now that he had time to actually look at her, he did recognize the KAEO reporter.
Cath had once commented as they watched the evening news together, That woman's gotta be eighty percent silicone and whatever is left is cosmetics. At the time, he'd taken it as cattiness but maybe she was right?
"So," said the reporter, eyes roving almost predatorily over the man before her; pupils dilated until only a thin rim of sapphire colored irises was visible around them she asked. "We get an exclusive on this for cooperating?" She somehow seemed to breathe the question seductively as she fixed him with a look that telegraphed her intent.
Replied McGarrett with obvious lack of interest, "What did I say earlier about your exclusive." The woman's attempt at seduction only served to annoy the crap out of him.
Kiki was actually in the process of changing her opinion of the commander. Besides being a dick about the exclusive, he hadn't responded to her usually successful come hither moves. No matter how hot he is, he's an arrogant bastard. The other guy's okay though and really cute.
Danny stood smirking beside him. He well knew that Steve, having recently gotten his share of 'Barry White', was immune to the woman but he himself hadn't and wasn't. He'd also been subjected to the T.V. reporter's evaluation and, from what he could tell, had apparently passed inspection.
The haole detective would like to think it was because she had standards of some sort but she may only be 'interested' in any man who could further her livelihood by providing inside information. Whatever. Danny just knew she was barking up the wrong tree with Steve if only because the man's comely not-my-girlfriend would surely detach parts of his anatomy if she found out about it.
Be that as it may, as far as he himself was concerned, Gabby was still out of the country for the next two months and since there was still no understanding of exclusivity and they were free to date whomever, maybe . . .
"Dude." said a female voice beside him, "Don't even think about it. She'll eat you alive."
Turning in startled surprise, he locked eyes with the woman who smiled back with devilish amusement.
"Excuse me?" he said taken aback by the frank statement.
"I recognize the look. Sort of a cross between deer-in-the-headlights and Oh-boy!-Christmas-came-early- this-year." she laughed. "Just know that the islands are littered with the bodies of those who've made the mistake of taking her up on the offer."
She took off her backward facing baseball cap and revealed short glossy red hair that she brushed a hand through before setting the hat back on her head bill facing forward.
"I'll keep that in mind." he smiled back.
…
Other than the startling information from Ms. Kenworthy, there was nothing more to learn. As with the other murder scenes, the surveillance equipment had been disabled and the killer had left nothing traceable and no one had seen anything. So far, this investigation wasn't looking too promising.
Steve observed the KAEO reporter who had apparently given up trying to use her wiles on him and was now focusing on his partner. Steve made sure Kono got the reporter's home number and the number of the mystery caller along with the numbers of her camerawoman and the news director at the station. Since the caller had been so careful about disguising their voice, the phone would probably turn out to be a burner.
As the predatory reporter did everything but bat her eyelashes from behind a lace fan and swoon, McGarrett rolled his eyes and then gave Danny a warning glare. If Gabby doesn't get home soon . . . he was thinking as his partner looked back at him with mock innocence. A few days ago, someone had brought up the subject of getting Cujo 'fixed'. If Danny kept getting so distracted, maybe they could get a two- for-one deal.
Steve blew out a breath of annoyance and turned back toward the calmer but still sniffling girl at the entrance who dabbed at her eyes before noisily blowing her nose. Poor kid he thought sympathetically. They should probably check with her one more time so see if she remembered anything more. Chin and Kono were still canvassing bystanders and Danny was always so much better at talking to distraught witnesses. The commander liked to think it was because his partner had more practice from his years as a Jersey cop but as Danny so very often pointed out, (though Steve had yet to admit it), his mammal to mammal skills still needed some work. He motioned to Danny who reluctantly tore himself away from the coquettish reporter.
"Check with the girl one more time. Now that she's not so upset, maybe she'll be able to remember something."
Danny nodded and went to the front of the shop. Sitting in the chair opposite, once more, he began to gently interrogate the girl. Since the distraught young woman had come on scene after the murders to discover the bodies, they didn't expect to get anything useful from her.
Steve went to check with Max who'd just arrived with the death wagon. Maybe their M.E. could discover something to give them a break on the case but judging from the other murders it was unlikely. With this one, Denning would surely go ballistic. No one at Five-0, its leader in particular, was looking forward to giving him the update.
….
Lunch went surprisingly well. Doris behaved herself and didn't grill anyone or even call Steve 'Stevie' in front of his team. He'd already requested more than once that she not do that but Doris always somehow 'forgot'. It always made him cringe when she slipped.
He'd also warned his team that if anyone ever addressed him that way, he'd assign every shitty, boring, duty that came-up and even make up some of his own - possibly into the next century. The list would include stake-outs in overheated cars, searches through dumpsters, trips to the morgue and whatever else he could think of.
Not really sure their boss wasn't kidding, somehow, they all managed to control themselves – even Danny.
Steve, noticing Cujo wasn't around as usual when food was in the offing asked of the people gathered around the take-out containers on the breakroom table, "Anyone seen Cujo? He's usually around when we have food here."
As Danny, Chin and Kono all answered that they hadn't, Doris spoke up. "Oh, you mean the little cat?"
"Yeah, the only cat in the building Mom." answered Steve trying not to show his agitation. Doris already knew about the animal; he'd spoken of Cujo before. Right now, because she was temporarily staying with him, Cujo had been staying at the office. He didn't trust either one of them to not have 'issues' with the other and didn't want to witness what could be mutual annihilation.
"He was just here before you came back. Maybe he's in someone's office?" said Doris without blinking.
"As long as no one let him out." said her son studying Doris for any sign of deception.
"I didn't let him out. Don't worry." she smiled to the others, "Stevie's little kitty has to be around here somewhere."
Danny almost snorted a Mountain Dew through his nose but coughed to hide it as Steve directed the 'glare of death' toward him. The cousins already knew better, there wasn't a peep out of them though Kono did take that moment to say, "I'll go look for him boss" as she set down her plate and jumped up to stride quickly toward the hallway. Chin, always the epitome of calm in the storm, only looked on serenely as he took another bite of his spring roll.
Steve, now really cranky, left right after his mother said her goodbyes as his team thanked her for lunch. He told them he wanted to see if Max had come up with anything after examining the bodies. Though he knew it would only take a phone call to get the info; he wanted to get away from the office for a while. Danny was going to have a hard time letting the 'Stevie's little kitty' thing go. It was best to get out of earshot for the moment before he had to follow through on his threat or just fucking choke someone.
…
Someone had somehow accidentally locked him into the supply room.
After a brief search, Kono had discovered Cujo asleep on top of the big sack of cat chow they kept stored there. Either out of boredom or actual hunger, the cat had chewed his way through a corner of the bag and had apparently eaten himself into a kibble coma. There was also a very large hole chewed in the economy sized plastic bag of Meowie Wowie catnip. Bits of it were scattered over the floor among paperclips, staples, copy paper, ink cartridges, rubberbands, pens, pencils and threading through all of it was what seemed miles of unrolled toilet tissue.
"Just how high did you get?!" asked Kono in amazement at surveying the chaos as the little cat blinked at her sleepily. "I'd better let you out so you can get to your water dish. You must have an epic case of cotton mouth." It was hard to believe such a small animal could cause such a huge mess but with Cujo, it wasn't all that farfetched. Laughing, she released him from his rather comfy confinement.
An hour later Cujo cautiously peeked out from behind the water cooler. Seeing the coast was clear, the little feline strolled out as though he'd never run like his tail was on fire. The first skirmish hadn't ended in his favor. That tall woman was tough!
"So, you little wuss." began Danny as he spotted the furry figure trotting out to the middle of the office. "Looks like you finally came across someone you can't con or intimidate huh. How does it feel?"
The sleek animal eyed him carefully trying to decide if he should bother to show the loud man who rules the office in the tall man's absence. He knew his human wasn't around to stop him. It could be fun.
Danny, recognizing the look that might signal the evil little wolverine was going to do something he wouldn't like, began to back his way out of the room before walking to his office and quickly shutting the door behind him. He'd gotten as good at reading the cat's face as he was at reading his partner's. It was a survival skill.
It was good to have warning as to whether to duck, buckle-up, hang on for dear life or run like hell. The first three actions were usually triggered by his nut job of a partner, the last one much too regularly by the Spawn of Satan who now patrolled the hallway.
The detective, double checking to make sure the door was securely closed, decided he could wait for Steve to return. He had a lot of reports to write.
…..
It was easy to observe the personnel and layout at this location. It was on the corner of a very busy intersection and its walls were large panes of glass on three sides. It was one of the newer branches and very popular because it sat at the edge of a large business park.
Actually, it had been ridiculously easy to observe them all from close-up. One could easily blend in with the others in the long queue in front of the register. No one pays attention. The baristas smile and dispense their lattes and mochas. The patrons either leave immediately or sit with their laptops, tablets, I-phones and sometimes, though it was becoming more unusual as time went on, even actual books made of sheets of printed and bound paper. It wasn't a bad gig. The house roast was actually decent even if too expensive.
There would have to be more care taken with this one. The business park setting provided a bit of a challenge as there would be people about at almost any hour. It could be done though. Sometimes a challenge was fun.
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Next chapter should be posted within a week. Probably not in the next update but whump coming up soon for all you junkies out there.