5.01
Policemen surrounded me, flashlights sweeping over snow and tree until they fell on me. Haggard me, still bearing some small wounds from my previous outings.
They had to have been following me in the dark. A dozen officers, some wearing different clothes, implying different rank or duties. Crime scene guys, maybe? A local police chief, on top of regular officers?
I hadn’t seen the connections, but I hadn’t been looking for them. Not really.
Fuck.
Could I run? Yeah. Could I run and actually get away? I couldn’t imagine doing it without hurting someone along the way. There were too many cases where I might get shot.
And even if I did succeed, I couldn’t say for sure if whoever had tipped them off had given them my name, specifically. No use running if they could find me sleeping at home in a matter of hours.
Fuuuuck.
I slowly raised my hands over my head.
“Turn to face the rocks!”
I did.
“What do I do?” Evan asked me.
I glanced at him, pursing my lips, and shook my head a little. Couldn’t talk to him, not without raising more questions.
I heard the officers shuffling closer. The lights became brighter.
“Place your arms straight behind your back.”
“Yes sir,” I said. I spoke as clearly as I could, “Before I cooperate, I’d like to make it clear that I’m something of a specialized handyman by trade. I have one bladed tool at my left hip, and several small, sharp objects in my pockets. You may unwittingly hurt yourself if you aren’t careful. I can and will try to tell you what is where, given the chance, while you search my person.”
“Hands behind your back, now.”
I placed my arms straight behind me. “Was I understood?”
“You were heard.”
I felt cuffs settle in place around my wrists. They pulled off my gloves.
“I am presently arresting you on suspicion of the first degree murder of one Evan Matthieu.”
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
“You have the right to retain and instruct any counsel without delay. You also have the right to free and immediate legal advice from duty counsel, by making free telephone calls. We are presently outside of ordinary business hours, so the phone number you’d call would be…”
He rattled off a telephone number. I was in the midst of trying to commit it to memory when another officer stooped down not far from where I’d been crouched, and saw the body.
“Christ,” the man said. “Boy’s here.”
“Do you understand?” the arresting officer asked me.
“What was the number again?” I asked.
“Anyone in the Toronto PD can and will provide it on request, at any time from this point onward. Do you understand this and everything else I told you?”
“Yes,” I said.
I understand this has to be Laird fucking with me. Third time is a charm, and Laird may have won this round.
“Do you wish to call a lawyer?”
“Yes,” I said.
“Then we will provide a phone and phone book to call a lawyer at the nearest opportunity, as there’s no cell service here. Is this understood?”
“Yes.”
“You also have the right to apply for legal assistance through Ontario’s legal aid program. Do you understand?”
“Yeah,” I said. I felt like every question hammered a nail into this particular coffin.
“I’m going to give you this formal warning. You need not say anything. You have nothing to gain from any promise or favor and nothing to fear from any threat whether or not you say anything. Anything you say can be used as evidence. Do you understand?”
“I understand,” I said.
“I’m going to search you. You said there were needles?”
“No needles. At my left hip, there’s a decorated hatchet. The blade is uncovered and facing forward. If you raise my jacket and shirt, you’ll find it.”
He did, withdrawing June. “One concealed weapon.”
I bit my lip. Given a chance, I would have tried to argue the point, justify it… but speaking wouldn’t help me.
He handed it to someone I couldn’t see. I heard the rustle of a bag.
“In my right pocket, there’s a box-cutting knife with the blade retracted, and several loose hook cutting screws.”
“Another concealed weapon,” he said.
He took his time checking my pockets for the hook screws, pulling it inside out and letting one or two of the remaining ones fall into the snow.
“Aside from the keys in my left pocket, I think that’s the only thing that could cut or stab you,” I said.
Without a thank-you, he switched to a rougher form of frisking me. I bit my lip and stared up at the snow-covered branches above me, resisting the urge to flinch at or react to the rough contact. He relieved me of the pretty-much-empty jar of glamour, twine, a black magic marker, the locket that had been wound around my hand-
He popped the locket open, and my heart nearly stopped.
Between the gloom, with the flashlights being angled elsewhere, and the direction I was facing, I couldn’t see if the hair happened to fall out.