The Thomas Blume Series

Chapter 5

Chapter Five

I followed Rey out of his office and we headed further down the hallway. I could tell by his posture that he was expecting a tense situation. Somewhere overhead a drill sounded; construction on one of the floors above. Apparently, the building wasn’t even finished yet. I tried not to let the noise bother me, but it did. With the turmoil of knowing that Roland Teach was somewhere in the building, my stomach was in knots. The rumble of the drill and the lingering effects of the booze only made it worse.

As we made our way through the station, we stopped by one of the administrative offices where Rey hooked me up with a visitor’s pass that had the word Consultant along the bottom. I slung it around my neck, feeling foolish. But hey, if it got me closer to Teach, I’d have worn a goddamned bunny suit and called myself Mary.

Finally, we came to the office that had once belonged to Captain Parks. His placard had been replaced with another one that read “CAPTAIN KINSEY.”

Call me an old reactionary, but I was ashamed of myself when I stepped into the office and found myself still shocked that Captain Kinsey was a woman. She looked to be in her mid-fifties and just from the paper-thin scowl on her face as we knocked on her already-open door, I could tell that she was the type of woman who would not take anyone’s s**t. She looked like a lioness with claws only half retracted and had a fierce appearance that might have fit equally as well prowling a cage at the Brooklyn Zoo.

“Hey, uh Captain,” Rey said. “Sorry to interrupt you, but this is Thomas Blume.”

The thin scowl retreated from her face, but she didn’t look much more cheerful. Still, she set down the case file she had been scanning and politely got to her feet before offering her hand.

“Mr. Blume. Sanchez told me you were coming into town. I’ve heard several stories about you.”

“Good ones, I hope.”

“Something like that,” Kinsey said, giving away nothing. She looked down at the clutter on her desk and started rifling through it. “I wish you’d visited at a less hectic time, though. It’s been very busy here the last two days, as you can see by the mound of files I’m collecting.”

“We were already busy enough,” Rey explained to me, “but then we got news of a terror threat from the FBI.”

“Potential terror threat, Detective Sanchez,” Kinsey chimed in. “At this point, unconfirmed. Although I do have the FBI breathing down my neck.”

“Right, potential terror threat,” Rey continued. “Plus the fact that Captain Kinsey came into this illustrious station with about three weeks of reports to file…”

“Ah,” I said. “The cornerstone of police work; bureaucracy.”

Kinsey glanced up from her task and threw me a scalding look but said nothing.

“Captain,” Rey said, “Blume would very much like to get a chance to speak with Roland Teach. Can we make that happen?”

The scowl seemed to intensify as she sat back down and regarded both of us with an icy glare. “We could…but it’s unlikely. You aren’t officially connected to this Teach case,” she told me flatly.

“Technically, no, I’m not.”

“There’s nothing technical about it,” she countered. “I am well aware of what you believe to be a personal connection to him, but the case he is currently being questioned about is of an entirely different matter.”

I again saw how easily she might fit behind the bars of a dangerous animal enclosure. “I understand that,” I said. “But, Captain…I gave you the tip and came all the way from London for this.”

She nodded and leaned forward. “Mr. Blume, I am very good at my job. I do my research. Oddly enough, I am one of those rare specimens who appreciate precise and organized information management. Bureaucracy you might call it. So when Sanchez told me he had a friend on the way into town who used to work here, I pulled your file. You have a stellar record. You also have all the reasons in the world to want to talk to Teach, particularly considering the crimes that were recently committed overseas that are linked to him. I understand all of this. But to let you speak with him, I’d be breaking rules. And as Captain, I have to follow the regulations. If I don’t my department goes to hell.”

The blowhard attitude from Kinsey was starting to grate. Maybe I should have expected nothing less from a police captain.

“I need to see Teach. Just five minutes.”

“What you need doesn’t concern me, Mr. Blume. I have a job to do.”

“He killed my goddam family!” I snapped.

“That remains to be seen,” Kinsey replied, throwing her pen to the desk, punctuating the statement.

The anger rose again. I forced it down.

Sensing my frustration, Rey intervened. “Captain, there must be something you can do?”

“I’m afraid police procedure is quite clear.”

I turned for the door, ready to storm out of the goddamned office and find a way to get to Teach myself. I had grabbed the handle when the Captain continued.

“However,” Kinsey said, finally opening a file in front of her. “I simply can’t ignore your record. And, as such, in this one case, I may be able to offer you a bargain.”

I turned, hesitantly. “I’m listening.”

“Well, my officers are stretched thin, the station still isn’t at full capacity, and this ‘terror threat’ is taking up more man hours than I can give out. I’d like to use your skills as a consultant to help us wrap up a case. A body we found.”

I’m pretty sure I did a poor job of hiding my reaction, an incredulous rolling of my eyes.

“With all due respect, I did not come all the way from London just to work for you.”

“And with that same degree of respect,” Kinsey said, unflinching, “things don’t operate here now the way they did when Captain Parks was in charge. So that’s your choice, Mr. Blume; a you-scratch-my-back-I’ll-scratch-yours deal is the best I can do.”

I knew her way was the easiest way to get what I wanted, one-on-one time with Teach. But I didn’t have to like it, and I wasn’t about to be bullied into what was essentially free labor.

“Think it over,” she said icily. “But keep in mind that we have to allow Teach bail in 72 hours.”

Stepping towards the door, I said: “I think I’ll be scratching my own back, thanks.”

“Very well,” she said, looking to her desk and starting in on the paperwork that had accumulated there. “But let me remind you that you are no longer an officer and that you have no jurisdiction in this city. Working on your own could be dangerous. I’d sure hate to have you arrested for acting as a vigilante.”

The anger surged through me like electric current and it took every ounce of will in my body to stop myself lashing out at her. Because after all…she had a point. Still, I wasn’t about to go down without a fight.

“So in other words, the only way I can do anything about the animal who murdered my family is to do you a favor?”

“We all have difficult choices to make in life.”

“Why me? You have plenty of detectives. You can dole out some overtime.”

“Well, I think you might be the best fit for this case.”

“Why?” I asked. Frustration battled with the anger that had been boiling from the moment I’d entered Kinsey’s office. Anger won, but frustration came home a close second. Defeat cantered in third, but hugged the rails and looked damned sorry for itself. “What possible reason could you need me for?”

Kinsey dropped the file on the desk in front of me.

“Because the body we found is your ex-girlfriend.”