Thread of Hope (The Joe Tyler Series, #1) (14 page)

Bazer’s office was a small, square room, devoid of any personality.  Metal cabinets, a desk that housed a computer, a wire basket and not much else.  The smell of Lysol permeated the room.  He didn’t motion for me to sit in one of the two chairs opposite his desk, but I did so anyway.

Bazer shifted the papers on top of his desk.  “How are you, Joe?”

“I’m okay.”

“Have to say I’m surprised to see you.  Heard you were back but didn’t expect to hear from you.”

“I’m back just temporarily.”

He nodded like he understood that and I wondered why I’d felt compelled to say it.

“I’m helping out Chuck Winslow,” I said.

Bazer kept his hands on the papers, creating a neatened stack.  “He seems to be in need of help.  On a couple of things.”

I couldn’t tell whether it was a dig at Chuck or a statement of fact.  “I’m trying to help on both.”

Bazer leaned back in his chair.  “We’ve got it covered, Joe.”

“Who jumped him on the beach?”

The lieutenant studied me for a long time.  “What are you doing here, Joe?”

“I told you.  I’m trying to help Chuck.”

“And we’ve got guys on it.”

“I’m an investigator.  His attorney hired me to help.”

“I know Jane hired you,” he said, his tone measured.  “I’m aware of that.  But it doesn’t mean we’re going to include you in our investigation.  You wanna work around the edges, I’ll let you do that.”

“I don’t need your permission.”

Bazer took a long, deep breath and leaned forward, placing his hands flat on the desk.  “Are you here to fight with me, Joe?  Because if you are, it would save us both a lot of time if you would just say so.”

“I’m here to help a friend,” I said, telling him half the truth.  I probably did want to fight with him, but I wasn’t going to admit it.  “I was hired as an investigator...”

“And since you used to work for this department, you should have no trouble recalling our policy in working with investigators,” Bazer said, his calm demeanor cracking a bit as he pointed at me.  “So you should also know I’m willing to cut you a break to let you work around the edges.  Because if you were anybody else, I’d tell you to get off my island.  I don’t want anyone near my cases except my officers.”

“That your way of making things up to me?” I asked.

A humorless smile took residence on his face and he chuckled quietly, tapping his fingers on the desk.  “So you did come to fight with me.”

TWENTY-SEVEN

Elizabeth had been gone for exactly twenty days the last time I’d been in Bazer’s office.

I dropped a newspaper on his desk.  “What the fuck is this?”

Bazer ignored the paper and stared at me.  “Sit down, Joe.  You look exhausted.”

I was beyond exhausted.  I’d slept maybe twenty hours in the twenty days since Elizabeth had disappeared.  I’d barely been able to stomach food.  Showering had become a near impossible task.  I was fried and I knew it.

But that morning’s paper had lit a brand new fire under me.

I sat, my hands shaking.  “What the fuck is going on, Lieutenant?”

He scanned the newspaper and his mouth set in a firm line.  “I can’t control the media, Joe.”

“You didn’t deny that I’m a suspect in my daughter’s disappearance.” My voice cracked on the accusation, my throat dry and raw.  “You told me I wasn’t.  Did you lie to me?”

Bazer set the paper down and folded it in half, as if hiding the article would make it go away.  He could have set it on fire and eaten the ashes and I knew that I’d never forget that paper for the rest of my life.

Lauren and I had agreed–we wanted media coverage of Elizabeth’s disappearance.  We felt that the more people were talking about her, the more times her face was seen, the better the chance that we would see her again.  We also knew that doing so would open us up to scrutiny, but we were prepared for that.  We hadn’t done anything wrong and we just wanted our daughter back.

But that morning’s story had rattled me. 

“I told you,” Bazer said.  “You are not a suspect.  We know that you didn’t have anything to do with Elizabeth’s disappearance.”

I stood, slamming my fist on his desk so hard the floor rattled.  “Then why didn’t you say that?”

The paper had quoted Bazer as saying in direct response to a reporter’s question regarding my status: “The investigation is ongoing and no one has been ruled out as a suspect.”  The article reiterated that I was an officer in the Coronado PD and that Bazer, when pressed, declined further comment.

“You know how it works,” Bazer said, nudging the paper in my direction.

“Yeah, I do know how it works,” I said.  “And you didn’t clear me when you had the chance.  So what the hell is going on?”

Bazer rubbed at his chin, eyeing me.  “Sit down, Joe.”

“No.”

“That’s an order, Officer Tyler,” he said, his face icing over.  “Sit.”

I did.

“Have you given any more thought to what we talked about a couple of days ago?” he asked.

My mind was like a blender, a million things running through it at once and I couldn’t sort any of them.  “Any more thought to what?”

“To stepping down while we look for Elizabeth.”

“No.” 

“I need you to think about it, Joe, because...”

“I meant, no, I’m not taking a leave of absence, Lieutenant.”  I was adamant.

He’d approached me a week earlier, suggesting that I take some time off.  I’d immediately rejected the idea.  I’d gone ten straight days without working from the moment Elizabeth disappeared and I quickly learned that every free moment was an invitation to drag a razor across my wrists.  I’d flooded my mind with theories, second thoughts and nightmares and the last thing I needed was more idle time.

“Joe, I really think...”

“I’m fine, Lieutenant.  I don’t want time off.  I’m fine.”

“You know that I can make the decision myself, don’t you?” Bazer said, tilting his head, squinting at me like I was difficult to see.  “I can send you home right now and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it.”

“I’m fine.”  I knew I sounded like a broken record.

“If I suspend you, do you know what that will look like?” Bazer continued.  “Do you understand how that will look for you?”

I shifted in the chair, placing my hands on my thighs, willing them to stop shaking.  “I am fine, Lieutenant.”

“I’m trying to help you, Joe.”

I didn’t want to keep repeating myself, so I didn’t say anything.

Bazer blinked several times and rubbed harder at his chin.  “I saw you arguing with Elizabeth.”

The ticking clock on the wall suddenly intensified, sounding like a jackhammer.  “What?”

“Two weeks before she disappeared,” he said, watching me.  “At the beach.  I was driving by.  Early evening.”

I thought hard, mentally flipping through recent images of Elizabeth like there was a rolodex in my head.  I stopped on one and the muscles in my stomach clenched. 

She and I had gone down to the beach for a walk, waiting for Lauren to get home for dinner.  Elizabeth had run ahead of me, a little further than normal, then detoured into the surf.  I didn’t mind her stepping into the water, even in the colder months.  Like me, she loved the water and had a high tolerance for low temperatures.

What I did mind was that she went out further than she was allowed and had been immediately taken off her feet by a strong rip current. 

I sprinted down the beach, bounded into the water and fished her out before the current yanked her out into the bay.  I carried her up the sand to the sidewalk.  She was a shivering, crying mess and I should’ve waited to reprimand her.  But seeing her go down in the water had scared the shit out of me.  My adrenaline was up and I was mad at her for being so reckless.

I stood her up on the sidewalk and unloaded my anger, the water and her tears forming a  puddle on the concrete.

One more moment that I wished I could have back.

I pulled myself back to the present.  “What does that have to do with anything?”

“Papers get hold of that,” he said slowly.  “It’ll spin the focus toward you and the department and it’ll take the focus off of finding Elizabeth.”

My fingertips tingled and my body felt light, like I might float out of the chair.  “What the hell are you saying?”

“I’m saying I want you to take some time off.  It’ll be good for everyone.”

The ticking clock became a jet engine as I replayed our conversation in my head.  Then, the lightbulb went off.  “This isn’t about me, is it?  It’s about the department.”

He hesitated.  “I didn’t say that.”

“Yeah, you did,” I said, nodding.  “You don’t like the attention my daughter’s disappearance is bringing to your department.”

Bazer stayed quiet.

“And you tried to leverage me into stepping away by pointedly not clearing me as a suspect.”  My gut rolled and my fingers dug into thighs.  “And now you’re threatening me, not even fucking around.  I don’t leave, you tell some reporter that ‘an anonymous’ source saw me having it out with Elizabeth shortly before she disappeared.  Maybe spice it up a little, too?  Maybe I hit her?  Maybe throw that out there?”

If Bazer was moved by anything I’d said, he didn’t show it.  Just knotted his hands on top of his desk.  “I think a leave would be good for everyone.”

I unclipped the badge from my shirt and dropped it on the desk.  I unbuckled my belt and let it and my weapon fall to the floor.  “Fuck you, Lieutenant.”

I walked out of his office.

And the story about me screaming at my daughter before she vanished showed up in the next morning’s paper, anyway.

TWENTY-EIGHT

Bazer was right. 

I probably had come to fight, the anger that I’d had toward him only building over the years since I’d dropped my badge and gun in his office.  Seeing him in person was like adding gasoline to the fire.

But if I wanted to truly help Chuck, I needed to smother the flames.

“Chuck was jumped on the beach?”

Bazer nodded.  “Far as we can tell.”

“You’re connecting it to the Jordan case?”

“Not yet.  Keeping them separate as for right now.”

“They’re connected.”

Bazer shrugged.  “We’ll see.  We’ll do the legwork and we’ll see.”

Do the legwork.  It was an expression he used often.  He was methodical and he expected his department to be.  It was something I learned from him.  It was part of the reason I was a good cop and why I had become a good investigator.