You Get Full Credit For Being Alive

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Eleven

I managed to excuse myself from the proceedings the next day by explaining to Margot that I had a cover to retire, as well as promising to bring her back a bag of the smoked tea that she liked when I went to get groceries. It was funny; if she couldn't have espresso she went around the bend and stuck with tea, not bothering with coffee. I made sure to check in with Shawn before I left as well.

"Anything for you?" I asked. "Something you just can't live without? Jello, maybe?"

Shawn plucked pointedly at the scrubs he was still wearing. I'd looked in my closet for something for him, but I didn't own all that many clothes and everything I had was too big. "Right, clothes. Any particular style? Hipster, maybe?" Because damn, I would love to see him in some skinny jeans, but I knew they wouldn't really be appropriate for a guy who spent most of his time sitting. Loose and comfortable, that was key.

Shawn rolled his eyes then slowly typed a few words into the tablet Margot had given him. It was loaded with different programs to help with his therapy, including one that would read off complete sentences once he typed them in. "Can I have a beer?" The voice was a rather stern tenor, older than I imagined Shawn's own voice sounding.

"Not on your medications," Margot informed him pertly.

"Then no. Thank you."

"All right. I'll be back before long." I touched his shoulder briefly, then stood up and left the room, whistling for Della. Margot followed me out into the hall.

"You're not taking the sedan, are you?"

"No," I told her, stifling my own eye roll, because, really? Just because I was retired didn't mean I had forgotten everything about how to do the work. "I'm assuming the car is compromised. I figured I'd take your rental, actually; I'd rather not show up there in the truck either, just in case."

She stared at me, green eyes like lasers boring through my skull. "Just out and back for the sake of this identity. Do not stop and do something... distracting."

"Yes, Mother." I grabbed Reggie's cane and left, locking and rearming the door behind me as I did. After a brief stop in the garage for a briefcase I'd tucked under a tarp in the back, I put Della in the back seat of Margot's Mercedes, and she sneezed immediately.

"I know, it smells like plastic in here, huh?" I said sympathetically, pulling out of the driveway and heading down the hill. The sky was perfectly blue, not a cloud in sight, and as I got out of the trees I could even see the looming curve of Mt. Rainier. The mountain was out today, apparently. We didn't see it all that often, especially not during the winter, but we were well into spring at this point and starting to get beautiful days like this.

Too bad. It would make the other part of what I had to do while I was out a little more challenging, but I'd manage.

The first place I went was the hospital. I walked in light and cheerful like usual, nothing of skulking Jay left in me, and Carlos greeted me happily at the front desk. "Reggie! Good morning! It's earlier than we usually see you."

"Yeah, I know," I said with a rueful chuckle, running one hand through my short blond hair. Maybe Margot was right, maybe it really was too short. "I actually have to talk to Andy today," Andy the volunteer coordinator, "because I'm going to be gone for a while. My mom's sick back home in Ohio and I have to go take care of her."

"Oh no!" One of his hands flew to his mouth. "Is she gonna be okay?"

"It's hard to say," I sighed. "She's one of those people who never tells you the truth about what's going on, you know? Doesn't want to worry me, but I think it's pretty serious. Anyway, today is Della and mine's last for the foreseeable future, at least."

"Well, we're going to miss you," Carlos said, looking at me from under heavy lids. "We never did go out for coffee, you know."

"I know, I'm sorry." We sighed in unison— it was just one of those things, I could see him thinking. I was turning into Carlos' "one who got away." The fond memories would be all that was left, and that was fine. "I figured I'd head up to the ICU, start in there."

"Oh God, did you hear?" He looked at my expression of blank incomprehension and his eyes got wide. "You didn't! Shit, Reg, Shawn Bennett? You visited him, right?"

"Yeah, the cop with the head injury, Della loved him. He's not dead, is he?" I asked, putting some real anxiety into my voice.

"He was stolen out of the hospital! Some gangbanger was found in his room choked to death, and Shawn was gone! They think one of the cleaning staff was in on it."

"Oh God, poor guy. What do police think is behind it?" I frowned and snapped my fingers. "Wasn't Shawn dating another cop, too?"

"Yeah, Detective Janich. Oh man, you're lucky you weren't here yesterday, they were in and out and ordering people around, doing interviews with staff and cordoning shit off like they could just shut down the whole hospital while they investigated. Word is they don't really know what the hell is going on."

"Well, it definitely sounds confusing." Nicely done, me. "I guess I'll skip up there today. Jesus, I hope Shawn's okay."

"Me too." I started to head for the elevator when Carlos remembered something else. "Oh, Reggie! Detective Janich was asking for the names and phone numbers of everyone who had contact with Shawn, and Bertha put you down on the list. I just wanted you to know so you won't be surprised when you get a call from the police."

"Thanks for the warning."

That was a little wrinkle of complexity, but nothing I couldn't handle. Reggie and Jay shared no contact details in common, and neither of them had anything to do with the real me on paper either, so I was pretty well in the clear. I just had to answer the rote questions like the friendly, easy-going guy Reggie was and they'd get off his case soon enough.

I let Della bask in the love and affection for a while before saying my goodbyes, making sure I signed all the proper paperwork and gave Andy a dummy email address to get in touch with me if she needed to. Then I got back into my car, glanced at the spot on the map I'd circled— it might be the digital age but some aspects of the job were still stalwartly low-tech with me— and headed for a little condo on 151st Street.

Detective Janich lived in a building shaped like a rectangle, with all the personality of one of those boring parallelograms as well. The paint was a faded green, there was indifferent brickwork at the bottom and a few bushes out front that grew thanks more to the climate than any personal attention from a gardener. Janich had the end unit, which was nice if I needed to abruptly flee, but I already knew he wasn't going to be there. If he stuck to his schedule, which he tended to, then Janich was at the precinct doing paperwork. Not a glamorous part of the detective's job, but a necessary one. It was also one of many reasons I had never aspired to go legit. There was very little paper work in black ops and covert assassination.

I walked right in the front door— no bells, buzzers or alarms, for fuck's sake— and down to Janich's condo. Picking the lock was child's play, and once inside I opened up my briefcase, pulled out the things I needed and got to work. It was the work of ten minutes to set things up to spy on Janich and broadcast everything he did and said to my remote receiver. A little fiddling around with the charge cord for his phone and I'd be downloading all his texts when he plugged in at night as well.

"Thank you for being so cooperative, Detective," I murmured under my breath, then packed up my briefcase and headed back to my car, where Della was laying down in the Mercedes' back seat. I took off the latex gloves I'd slipped on and pitched them into the nearest garbage can, then made my way to the grocery store.