A Touch Of Heat (H.E.A.T. Book 2) Read online

  “I need you,” he replied.

  My head shook. “You need whatever is necessary to find your sister and I just happen to be a fucking cop.”

  “Love…”

  “Don’t call me that! You lost the right to call me anything other than Detective Keen when you taped us having sex and shared the recording with other people.”

  “So, it’s the sharing that worries you? Neither men kept copies.”

  “Damon,” I said, exasperated. “Can’t you see it was wrong? You should have told me.”

  “And what? Have you deny me my only chance of getting back in that door and maybe finding my sister before she overdoses again.”

  Oh, God. This was awful. Wretched. A quagmire of utter emotional crap. I scratched at my face with both hands, trying to pry the ugliness of it all off my skin.

  “I would have said yes,” I finally whispered.

  Silence.

  I looked up over my hands and stared at him. He looked completely devastated.

  “I don’t believe you,” he whispered back, swallowing thickly. “I can’t,” he added and then turned away, giving me his back.

  His shoulders heaved; I could hear his ragged breaths above the wind in the nearby trees.

  “How can you not believe?” I said to his back.

  He didn’t answer. He just stood there staring at the ground sucking in oxygen which had only seconds ago been mine to take.

  “Say something,” I urged.

  His head came up as though he was looking for an answer in the clouds.

  But no words came out of his mouth.

  I stood there, looking at a man I thought I knew. I thought knew me. And I realised there was nothing more to say.

  Turning around and walking away was the hardest thing I’d ever done. I wanted to stop. I wanted to turn back and rail at him. Yell at him. Make him say something, anything, to make this right.

  But Damon was just as lost and alone as me. His sister had done this to him. Again and again she’d crashed into his ordered world and fucked it all up. And again and again he’d tried to save her. It was ingrained in him now.

  Just like Carl was ingrained in me.

  I stopped as I reached my car, a type of understanding settling in my soul. Was this how we’d always be? Moments of connection, disconnecting when our weaknesses interfered.

  My weakness was Carl. His was Carole.

  We all need someone to lean on, Sport. That’s why God gave us broad shoulders and strong arms.

  I was moving before I even realised it. Taking the same path back to the memorial wall, desperate to see him. I had no idea what I’d say when I got there, but something needed to be said, and one of us needed to be the first to say it.

  I’d do it. I’d open up and let him in. I’d lay my heart on the ground before him and take the chance. We were both fucked up, both twisting free on an unwanted breeze. Both lost, but maybe not alone. I needed him. He said he needed me.

  What more was there?

  I knew my limitations. I knew just how far I could go before I cracked. The fissures had started when Carl disappeared. They’d become chasms when I found out he was a murderer. One more disaster in my life would turn the cracks into canyons, and there’d be no hope of bridging the gaps.

  My one more disaster had arrived. I wasn’t blind. I could see the writing on the wall. My childhood come back to haunt me. My father. This case. I’d reached my limit. I could take no more.

  And the only way I could see to make it to the other side was Damon. And if that meant taking on Carole as well, then so be it.

  I came out by the memorial plaque wall and found it abandoned. He’d not been on the path I’d taken so his car must have been parked in one of the other parking areas in the cemetery grounds. I started in the direction of the largest when something caught my attention out of the corner of my eye. I instinctively slipped in behind a tall statue of an angel.

  And watched as fucking Joe Cawfield crept along behind Damon towards his car.

  A rush of air left my lungs and my hands fisted. All manner of questions roared inside my head.

  It was clear my colleague was following Damon as surreptitiously as he could. Lurking in the shadows, maintaining a suitable distance, using a fucking high powered lens to keep an eye on his mark.

  “What are you up to, Peacock?” I murmured under my breath.

  Both men moved far enough ahead to be lost from my sight. I crossed the open ground before me in a dead run, body crouched, eyes peeled for further flashes of clothing indicating Cawfield wasn’t doing this surveillance trick on his own. But none eventuated, and I made the corner of the path undetected, then peered around the side of a flowering cherry tree to a large carpark.

  Damon was slipping into his HEAT vehicle, Cawfield was harder to spot. But I found him, though. Hiding. Watching. Taking pictures with that bloody high powered lens.

  My stomach cramped. Just what images had he capture? And why?

  Damon’s truck started up and then he was moving out of the carpark, between a surprising number of cemetery visitor cars. Once he’d made the winding drive that led to the front gates of Purewa, Cawfield wove through the throng of vehicles and unlocked his own car. An unmarked Holden Commodore. There’s a reason why the Police Service uses this car as its vehicle of choice. There were at least two others in the carpark alone, and there’d be dozens more out on the main road.

  Damon wouldn’t think twice if he saw it in his rear vision mirror.

  Cawfield slowly followed the way Damon had gone, close enough to see his vehicle up ahead, but not so close as to cause alarm.

  I knew I’d lose them. My car was parked on the other side of the cemetery. For a moment I considered my options. And then I was running. Back down the path, passed the flowering cherry tree, through the angel statues, around the memorial wall, cellphone out in hand, thumb dialling. My voice was a panted breath of over exertion when the call connected.

  “Anscombe Securities & Investigations,” a woman said in my ear.

  “Nick Anscombe. Now!” I shouted down the line, my car unlocking with a press of a remote key, the jubilant beep almost drowning out the woman on the other end of the phone.

  “And who exactly may I say is calling?” the woman asked, no small measure of sass entering her tone.

  “Detective Lara Keen, Auckland CIB,” I said, slipping into my car and starting it up. “Put him on the phone now.”

  Silence. But not the silence of a phone call being connected. I could hear the woman breathing down the line.

  I let a long breath of air out myself, trying to calm the fuck down. I didn’t need this.

  “Look,” I said, closing my eyes and pinching the bridge of my nose. “He’s working a case with me and there’s been a development. It’s time sensitive. I need access to his system right now.”

  “Don’t get your knickers in a twist, Detective,” the woman announced most unprofessionally. “He’s just walked in the door. Guess it’s your lucky day.”

  Hardly.

  The phone became muffled, like she’d just put her hand over the mouthpiece, and then Nick Anscombe’s deep voice came down the line.

  “You upsetting my receptionist, Detective?” he said.

  “Gate keeper more like,” I shot back.

  “Carmel has her talents,” he agreed. “What can I do you for?”

  I looked out of the windscreen towards the exit. Even if I had a good line of sight from here, I knew I wouldn’t see either Damon’s or Cawfield’s car. They’d be long gone.

  But there was one way to catch up.

  “Do you still have access to Damon’s GPS signal from his HEAT truck?” I asked.

  Silence. Again. These people loved pertinent pauses.

  “OK,” he finally said. “You’ve piqued my interest.” Like I needed to in order to get his help. “I’m walking to control right now.”

  I put the car in gear and moved toward the exit. Cawfield was foll
owing Damon for a reason and I intended to find that reason out.

  Chapter 19

  “Never a good drop of whisky around when you need it. So always carry a little spare.”

  “He’s on Remuera Road, turning into Upland,” Nick said over the open line.

  “I’m still back at Purewa Cemetery,” I advised. “Give me a sec.”

  Silence. I was getting used to it.

  “Comms, AKX3,” I said over the radio in my car.

  “Go ahead, AKX3,” came the distorted voice down the line.

  “QV, Remuera Road.”

  “Receiving.”

  I scanned the cars passing me as I sat at the entrance to the cemetery and picked one at random.

  “Romeo-oscar-yankie-two-four-eight,” I said as a blue Honda whizzed by travelling too fast.

  “Stand-by.”

  “What are you up to, Detective?” Nick asked over the still open phone line.

  I flicked my beacons on, blasted my foghorn once, twice, and then silently merged into traffic, and overtook a steady line of cars. Making the time taken to reach the corner of Remuera and Upland Roads that much quicker.

  “Giving someone something else to focus on.” Cawfield would have seen me with Damon at the memorial wall. He’d also be listening in on the Police radio frequency. But he’d be on the lookout for my car in his rear vision window, as well. I was giving him the impression I was busy, pulling over a vehicle back on Remuera Road. Thereby lowering his guard.

  “That vehicle comes back registered to a Jason Marcus Milton. A blue, 1989 Honda Accord,” Northcom advised.

  “Copy,” I replied, turning my car onto Upland Road. I switched the beacons off and merged back into normal road traffic.

  “Now who would you want to think that, Detective?” Nick asked, amusement in his tone.

  “Never you mind, Mr Anscombe,” I shot back. “Where is he now?”

  “Still on Upland, skirting the Orakei Basin now.”

  I wasn’t far behind. In fact, I spotted Cawfield’s car as it turned at a roundabout up ahead. In the direction that Damon’s was going.

  “Gotcha,” I said under my breath. But modern cellphones have great microphones.

  “I hope I’m not offering you my advanced technological investigative services just so you can catch up with your boyfriend and have it out with him.”

  My turn to offer silence. Nick had seen and heard that recording. He knew more about me in that second than any other man besides Damon.

  Oh, and Nathaniel Marcroft.

  Anger made my knuckles turn white on the steering wheel. I forcibly relaxed them.

  “Crossing over onto Shore Road,” Nick advised. “You do realise that he’s heading towards ASI?” he asked, casually.

  Damn. It was getting late. Damon would want to head there and gear up for tonight’s events at Sweet Hell.

  I tapped my finger on the steering wheel, trying to decide what to do.

  “Pierce has just walked in, Detective,” Nick announced, making it become obvious that they’d arranged to meet at this time and Ryan had not advised me. “He’s listening in,” Nick added, in a show of consideration I hadn’t expected from the man.

  “Keen?” Pierce’s voice said. “What have you got?”

  The CIB traitor was a problem we were keeping in house. To voice my concerns now, over an unsecured line to ASI, with who knows how many people in the control room along with Nick, was not sound policing practice.

  “Just checking something out, Sarge,” I offered, using my abbreviated title for him, to show him it involved work.

  “OK,” he said slowly; I could practically hear the cogs turning inside his head.

  “Ayr Street,” Nick advised. “He’s getting close, Detective. Make your move now or you’ll be doing it at my back door.”

  Anscombe had figured it out. Not exactly what I was doing, but that it didn’t involve Damon directly. The man was more intelligent than I’d feared.

  I scanned the road ahead. Cawfield was still doggedly following Damon’s HEAT truck. Several cars behind, but well within sight. If he saw Damon go into ASI’s back parking lot, he’d connect the dots. He’d see Ryan’s car. He’d know Pierce was using ASI to bug Damon. He’d back off.

  I couldn’t have him backing off. He was doing this for a reason and if it related to betraying CIB in some way, I needed to know. Hart needed to know.

  “Someone phone Damon and get him to stop for something,” I suddenly said, speeding up and closing the distance when a gap in the traffic allowed.

  “Stop for what?” Pierce asked.

  “I don’t know,” I cried back, adrenaline making my voice rise uncharacteristically. “Milk. Fucking sugar. Anything that would seem normal for Damon to stop and buy.”

  “What the hell is going on, Keen?” Pierce demanded.

  “Just do it! There’s not much time.”

  “Nick’s phoning him now. So tell me. What… have you… got?”

  “Classified, Sarge.”

  “One of your cases?” he queried, cottoning on.

  “Yes, I think so.”

  “OK. Your plan?”

  “Distract, while Damon’s buying his tea making supplies, and then he can slip away and make it to you guys safely.”

  “Sound idea, but you’ll be showing your hand.”

  “He saw us together at Purewa Cemetery,” I pointed out. “It wouldn’t seem too unusual to see me again heading in the same direction as Damon.”

  “You and Michaels met up?” Pierce asked incredulously.

  “He’s pulling over on Parnell Road. Probably by the dairy there,” Nick advised.

  “Good,” I replied, turning onto Parnell Road myself.

  “What the fuck, Keen? Can’t you two spend one fucking day apart?” Pierce demanded.

  “Wasn’t my choice,” I snapped back.

  “If he saw you, someone else might have seen you, too,” he pointed out.

  “At a fucking cemetery?” I growled.

  “He’s got a cloak.” Fuck, Pierce was right. Cawfield had a cloak suspiciously like those worn at the Irreverent Inferno.

  “I’m getting out of the car,” I advised, opening my door. “Make sure Damon doesn’t leave until I’ve made my mark.”

  “Keep your line open,” Pierce said, voice clipped. He was pissed off. I couldn’t blame him. Everything seemed to be working against us right now.

  I spotted Cawfield sitting in his car a few ahead of mine. His eyes were locked on the dairy Damon had just entered. I strolled up, not bothering to hide myself, knowing he’d spot me in his wing mirror before I reached his driver’s side door. He’d either hope I moved on, or move on himself. I was betting he was going with the former.

  Cawfield always underestimated me. He probably thought I was here for Damon and had overlooked his vehicle completely.

  I tapped on the roof of his car. He let out a beleaguered sigh and wound down his window.

  “Just happened to passing by, huh, Keen?” he said, when I leaned down and looked inside. I made a point of scanning the back seat and his passenger side, checking out the surveillance equipment he hadn’t bothered to hide.

  “Didn’t know you were on a case here, Cawfield?” I said pleasantly. “Need a hand?”

  “You bored?” he asked. “Tired of being sidelined?”

  I shrugged, ignoring the pinch my heart felt at his jab. “Departmental cooperation.”

  “Since when have you ever cooperated with me?”

  “Come on, Cawfield,” I said, all mock smiles. “We’re on the same team. What’re you working on?”

  “Top secret,” he shot back. “Above your pay grade.” His pay grade was exactly the same pitiful level as mine.

  “Not even a hint?” I teased.

  “Not even a bone,” he said with meaning. Joe Cawfield thought I was a bitch.

  I laughed, genuinely amused. I had no idea if Damon had left the dairy yet; my back was to it. Cawfield kept his e
yes on me, but I was sure he was watching Damon’s car out of the corner of his eye.

  “I tell you what,” I said, making myself comfortable rubbing up against his car. “I’ll tell you mine, if you tell me yours.”

  “You got a secret, Keen?”

  “I’ve got a ton of them, Joe.”

  “Now, that is interesting,” he said, giving me what appeared his full attention; shifting his body in his seat to better face me. “A woman like you having secrets. I bet they’re juicy.”

  “Is yours?”

  “Nah-uh,” he said, with a shake of his head. “You first. Tell me something I don’t know, Lara?”

  He rarely called me Lara. It sounded foreign on his tongue.

  I stared at his stunning blue eyes. He stared unabashedly back. Oh, what secrets I could tell this man.

  I smiled. His lips quirked, matching mine. He really was a handsome bastard. Fucked in the head, but good looking at the same time.

  I held his gaze and considered my options. If he was the CIB traitor, then there’d be one thing he wanted most of all.

  Carl.

  “I get these phone calls,” I said, voice lowered, as though my secret was intimate.

  “I bet you do,” he said with a smirk.

  “No one talks in them, but I know.”

  “Know what?”

  “Who it is.”

  He leaned forward, close enough that I could smell whatever off the shelf cologne he wore. “Who is it, Lara?”

  “Who do you think?”

  A huff of amused laughter left him and he moved back in his seat, placing distance between us.

  “So, he’s not just simply disappeared into thin air.”

  “Oh, he’s still out there. Biding his time. Watching. Waiting.”

  “Waiting for what?”

  I shook my head. “Fucked if I know, but I wouldn’t put it past Carl to have a plan.”

  His eyes came up to meet mine.

  “You are one crazy woman,” he commented pleasantly, as though discussing the weather and not my sanity, or lack thereof. “You attract the most fucked up men I’ve ever met.”

  I raised an eyebrow at him.

  “Carl was a singularity.”

  “You think?”

  “I know.”

  “Sweetheart,” he drawled. “You don’t know nothin’.”