Page 64 of Veiled Justice
‘Ship has sunk!’ Loki chuckled.
‘Sailed,’ I corrected. ‘Hush now, I’m calling.’
Before an arrest or kill, I supposedly needed a green light from on high but most Inspectors applied for a kill order retroactively. Where possible, I tried to get mine in advance but sometimes events ran away from me. Today, however, I wasn’t applying for a kill order but one to arrest with a view to imprison.
When Thackeray answered, I dived right into it. ‘I need D9 arrest warrants for Cameron Quintos, Louisa Carnforth and Caspian Katz.’
There was a moment’s silence. ‘You’ve got to be kidding me.’ His tone was thick with disbelief.
‘No, sir, I’m not.’ As I laid out the case, I modified Einar’s involvement and extended his confession to point fully at Quintos and Carnforth. ‘Unfortunately,’ I said, my tone regretful, ‘the footagegot corrupted and only a portion of the confession remains.’
‘You can’t arrest them without that.’
‘I’m going to have more.’ I outlined my plans.
He grunted. ‘Get me more evidence and you’ll have your warrants.’
‘Thank you, sir.’ I paused. ‘But I already have enough to arrest Katz.’
He considered then said, ‘Okay. I agree. Get a statement drawn up and sent to the CPS for your D9.’ In the Common realm, the Crown Prosecution Service is the government body responsible for determining who is tried for what crimes. In the Other, things were simpler because we didn’t do juries and judges, just power-hungry Inspectors.
We still used the CPS as a small check and balance, though. They assessed our cases and gave us our warrants. They also assessed our judgement calls; if too many died who shouldn’t have, eventually we’d come under fire ourselves. It took a long time to get to that, though; even someone as senior as Inspector Stone had been questioned but he’d never faced charges.
It was when Inspectors chose to arrest rather than kill their guilty targets that the CPS stepped in. They checked our case was airtight and took over the battle if there were any appeals or recanted statements.
‘You have sixteen hours left, Wise,’ Thackeray grunted.
‘That’s all I’ll need,’ I said confidently.
After we rang off, I drafted a quick statement on my phone, e-signed it, attached the shortened clip of video evidence from Einar and fired it off to my favourite person at the CPS office who dealt exclusively with Other crimes.
Edith Bodsworth was older than dirt, though nobody knew quite how old she was; she’d been part of the CPS since before my dad had joined the Connection. Her face was lined and craggy, her hair was greying and always in a bun, but no matter her age she was still sharper than a dragon’s claw. She’d get me a warrant for Katz – I’d marked it urgent and asked for it to be expedited – and in the meantime I could talk informally with Katz.
I texted Channing.Get Katz in for a casual chat. And Verona too.
Yes, ma’am.
I smiled. Things were cooking. My phone rang. I grimaced at the screen. Rupert. ‘Hey, bro, how are you doing?’
‘How am I doing? How am I doing?! Exactlywhenwere you going to tell me that I’m a prime suspect?’
‘You’re not!’ I assured him. Frankly, I was surprised the thought hadn’t occurred to him earlier. I guess he was too involved to see things clearly. His solicitor’s analytical brain had taken a backseat to emotion; I could hardly blame him.
‘Well, that’s not what my boss thinks. I’ve been suspended! Effective immediately, pending charges!’
‘You’re not going to be charged,’ I promised evenly. ‘I’m on it, okay? Fuck your wanker boss. Go home, have a duvet day on his dime.’
‘I need you to solve this, Stacy,’ Rupert pleaded.
‘I’m on it. Trust me.’
‘I do, but I’m scared as hell.’ That hit me right in the gut.
My brother obviously felt that all this talk about feelings was too much because he recovered with, ‘I’m too pretty for prison.’ The joke was weak and, if anything, it made me feel worse.
‘Go home, Rupe. Everything will be okay. I promise.’
He hung up without saying goodbye. Krieg reached over and lightly squeezed my arm. ‘He’ll be okay.’
