Troop 18 Page 3

  Andy checked her watch. Another ten minutes until her meeting with Finns. She headed to the staff room, hoping someone had started the coffee so she didn’t have to. She found a fresh canister, dark and hot. Andy filled her mug, scalding her tongue with her first sip, thinking about how many times she’d stopped in at Kate’s ER to bring her a hot coffee, knowing she never made it through one without it getting cold. She missed the way Kate’s whole body changed after her first coffee in the morning: transitioning from groggy and adorable to alert and moving, wanting to be three steps ahead, her brain always so many different places at once. Andy suppressed the sigh, took her mug of coffee back to her desk, then went in search of her boss.

  Staff Sergeant James Finns had been her supervisor for the last four years and Andy had a great deal of respect for the man. He was expected to announce his retirement any day, but Andy was in no hurry for this to happen. He had high expectations of Andy and kept a close eye on her, but he also let her work the way she needed to and trusted her with assignments normally given to more senior officers. It was easier to respect him than Superintendent Heath who seemed to value ambition, ass-kissing, and status above hard work.

  After bringing some much needed positive media to the RCMP last spring with the resolution in Seattle as well as her part in saving Heath’s eighteen-year-old granddaughter from a lovesick ex-boyfriend, Andy was in his good books. She had insisted over and over that Kate was the one who had resolved the tense situation, but Heath maintained she had done her part and would be rewarded accordingly. In the past, Heath had made it clear he couldn’t stand Andy and she was fairly certain her sexuality had something to do with it. So being on Heath’s good side wasn’t a bad place to be. She just had no intention of taking him up on his offer.

  Andy was surprised to see Finns’ door closed, but she checked her watch again. It was just before eight, so she knocked. He called out for her to enter, and she pushed open the wooden door. Her old mentor, Lincoln Henry sat across from Staff Sgt. Finns. He had more greying hair than Andy remembered, but his smile was still bright. He stood as soon as Andy entered, shaking her hand, thumping her on the back, and showing how happy he was to see her. Andy knew full well she owed a lot of her success in her career to Lincoln. They sat down across from Finns.

  “You’ve had a busy year, I hear, Sgt. Wyles,” Lincoln said.

  “Busy is one word to describe it.” She wanted to chat, but she couldn’t help but wonder what was going on. “How’s Henry?” Andy had brought Lincoln’s eldest son, a new member of the RCMP, out to Seattle, wanting someone she trusted who could keep an eye on Kate.

  “Henry’s posted up in Slave Lake, I think probably freezing his balls off right now. He’s working hard and having a good time. You know Henry.”

  “Tell him I said hi, next time you talk to him,” Andy said. She remembered Henry tying a bandage over Kate’s bloody, dripping arm. She let the impact hit, spread, and diffuse. Kate was fine. Scarred but fine. Absent forty-nine days, but fine.

  “He’d like that,” Lincoln was saying. “He thinks you’re a god, of course.”

  “Everyone could use a few of those when they’re starting out.” Henry was a good kid. Star struck by Andy or not, he’d more than proven himself on his first assignment out of Depot. “What brings you out here?” Andy said, still trying to figure out what was going on. “Last I heard, you and Anna had moved out to Regina so you could take a position out at the training academy.”

  “Running the show, more like it,” Staff Sgt. Finns said. “Say hello to Depot’s newest Chief Superintendent Training Officer.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes, really, Sgt. Wyles,” Lincoln said dryly. “Think I would joke about a four name position change? And keep it quiet. The official announcement’s not until next week.”

  “Congratulations,” Andy said, holding out her hand. Lincoln shook it firmly. “But it still doesn’t answer my question.”

  “Nothing’s changed, has it?” he said to Finns. “Still utterly single-minded, I see.”

  Andy shrugged, still waiting for an answer. If the two of them wanted to sit around and talk about her later, that was fine. She wanted to know what was going on.

  Lincoln shifted his weight in his chair. “I need your help with a situation.”

  “What kind of situation? Where? Here or Depot?”

  Lincoln held up a hand. “Let me give you the history. We’ve got forty-eight troops out at Depot right now. The most senior troop is coming up on their medal ceremony in a week and the most junior troop is so fresh they’re still tripping over their own feet in wheel formation every morning. It’s one of the middle troops, Troop 18, that’s the problem.” Lincoln stopped and rubbed his hand up and down his jaw in a gesture that took Andy back a few years. “Now, I’m new to this role, but even the most veteran instructors are telling me they’ve never seen anything like this troop before. To say they’re a tight knit group is a massive understatement. In the four months that this troop of sixteen has been together, they’ve formed a very tight bond.”

  “Why such a small troop?” Andy said. Troops were usually made up of thirty-two cadets, though there were always a few who couldn’t hack the physical and mental intensity of the RCMP’s national training academy. Andy’s own troop had started out at a full thirty-two. Twenty-four made it to graduation, a high number.

  “It started off as a small troop, just twenty-four cadets. I guess no one willingly comes to Regina in the winter,” he said wryly. “We almost didn’t run it, but we decided to go ahead. Anyway, two dropped out of their own accord in the first month and three more cadets couldn’t maintain the physical requirements of training and were gone within six weeks.” Lincoln ticked them off on his thick, rough fingers. “By week fourteen, the troop was really coming together. We weren’t sure if it was because they were such a small group to begin with or if they were just a really together troop. Whatever it was, they gelled quickly. But then twenty-four-year-old Justin Thibadeau, a young Acadian kid, had a heart attack during a training exercise. Just dropped to the ground in front of his troop. One minute he was there, and the next he was gone. Coroner said it was some kind of inherited heart condition.”

  Andy knew what kind of impact a death like that would have on a troop. It would be a shock to the system, a jarring absence, a reminder every morning at roll call that someone was missing.

  “How did the troop take it?” Finns said after the silence had stretched.

  “Rough. He was a good kid, well-liked. We suspended class, brought in a grief counsellor, gave them some time.” Lincoln stopped again, looked between Finns and Andy then shrugged. “Then we figured they had to get back at it, so we threw them back into drills and class and training.”

  Andy could tell by the way Lincoln now shifted in his seat that he was unsure they’d made the right decision. Andy hated that feeling, the awkwardness of second guessing yourself, of admitting that you were uncertain. “And how did they do? After you threw them back in, how did they adjust?”

  “At first? Fine. They pulled together even more so, really leaned on each other. You know how troops are. They’re so…” Lincoln struggled to find the word, his hands talking for him, forming a kind of ball in the air in front of him.

  “Insular,” Andy said.

  “Yes, insular. But Troop 18 took it to a whole other level. They kept to themselves, basically only interacted with each other. It was almost like they couldn’t relate to the troops around them or the instructors any more.”

  As Lincoln paused again, Andy quelled the restlessness inside her. She knew there was more to this. Almost as if Lincoln could read her mind, he looked up and met her gaze. “That makes six cadet absences accounted for,” Andy said quietly. “What about the last two?”

  “The last two just recently had their Cadet Training Agreement with the RCMP cancelled,” Lincoln said.

  “What for?”

  “They were caught with drugs and alcoho
l during inspection at their dorm.”

  Stupid, Andy thought to herself. Extremely stupid. There was absolutely no privacy in the dorm rooms with fifty cadets in tight quarters and only a thin partition separating your space from everyone else’s. Inspection was strict: leather gloves placed exactly so in the right drawer, every button done up on the uniform hanging in your closet, military corners on your bed. Attention to detail, organization, uniformity, and ability to follow orders precisely were all the hallmarks of Depot. It would take either a great deal of stupidity or an inflated sense of ego to think you could get away with anything out there.

  “What kind of drugs?” Andy said, needing this to make more sense.

  “Street grade marijuana, less than twenty dollars’ worth.”

  “That’s not much. Personal use then, not selling.”

  “Both passed the drug screen, though,” Lincoln said. “As did the rest of the troop. As did all the other troops.”

  “What else?”

  “Two weeks after those two were relieved of their contract, two hypodermic needles were found in a classroom recently vacated by Troop 18. They were clean, nothing on them. No one stepped forward, and punishment got us nowhere. We did a complete strip down search of both dorms, but we only found a few contraband items, mostly food infractions. However, two of the Troop 18 cadets had a large quantity of cash on them.”

  “Suspicious but not against the rules,” Andy said. She was trying very hard to build a case given this perplexing assortment of information. She lined up her questions, then shelved them. “What do you need from me?”

  Andy first looked at Lincoln, then followed his gaze to her supervisor. Finns cleared his throat before he spoke.

  “As I’m sure you are well aware, Sgt. Wyles, the RCMP has had its fair share of bad press recently. An entire troop being dismissed is not the kind of thing the COs are particularly interested in sharing with the media, particularly so soon after they lost a cadet. But it will be picked up and exploited, and we’ll spend the next year trying to defend our practices, traditions, and relevance in today’s national police force.”

  Andy understood. This situation would make the Commissioned Officers very nervous. Still, she waited. Lincoln picked up where Finns had left off.

  “I want you in there. I want you to come in and take the lead. No one’s been able to crack this group, not their drill instructor, not their classroom instructors, not the variety of counsellors we’ve brought in, and certainly not me. But something tells me that you can. I think we need to bring in an outsider, someone not responsible for their day to day instruction and inspection, someone they’re not answering to.”

  Andy’s instinct gave a kick. She glared at Finns though he only looked back at her impassively, giving her nothing. Andy turned back to her old mentor.

  “Why are you requesting me, Lincoln? There must be a couple dozen people who could do this job, and I’m sure none of them are two provinces over.”

  “I need a unique perspective. I don’t want this troop coddled, but I don’t want them manhandled either. It helps that you’ve got a high profile these days. A lot of the cadets and officers already feel like they know you from media reports and, well, you know how the family talks.”

  Andy let this fact shift her perspective, adding a certain kind of weight to his reasoning. She’d never craved this kind of attention, either from the media or from within, from ‘the family,’ as Lincoln put it. But Andy also had no intention of shying away from it. At best, if it helped her on an assignment, she’d use it. But something was still bothering her. Andy locked her gaze on Staff Sgt. James Finns.

  “Is this an offer or an order?”

  “An offer,” Finns said. “I can’t order you to Regina, but I can support you if you decide to go,” he told her, his voice neutral and his hands clasped on the desk in front of him.

  Andy scanned his face for signs of deception but found nothing. Still, she was suspicious.

  “Is this an offer because you don’t believe I’m fit for regular duty, sir?” Andy said, almost able to control the fear that made her voice sound angry. She wasn’t sure what she would do if he answered in the affirmative. Just the thought made shame well up in her, and she clamped down on it as she watched her supervisor’s face and waited for him to answer.

  Lincoln answered, his tone serious. “Once I realized we needed some kind of drastic outside support on this, I immediately thought of bringing you in. I did, Sgt. Wyles,” he said again, more firmly. “When I called Staff Sgt. Finns a few days ago to run it by him, he told me you were going through something personal, but you were fit to take on any task as always. He also made it clear it would be your choice, that we should respect your assessment of the assignment and your decision to take it on or not.”

  Andy considered that answer. It added up. She trusted it. There were still too many holes in the story, too many facts she needed to sort through, but the challenge of it tugged at her.

  “Give me two hours,” she said, looking first at Lincoln, then at Finns.

  “I’ll do you two better,” Lincoln said, grinning. She could tell he already knew she would take this on. “Let me buy you lunch.”

  Andy managed a smile. It really was good to see him.

  “Fine, lunch.” She nodded her exit to both men, stood and walked to the door, the muscles in her thighs protesting her run from two days ago.

  Andy sat at her desk, thumbing through messages on her phone without really absorbing any of the words, half-focused on her desk phone blinking its waiting messages. Normally, the waiting messages and unanswered calls would drive Andy crazy, but she’d kept her phone off and in the car over the weekend, a first for her. It had felt surprisingly good to be cut off, to not be constantly anticipating the next problem or request. Only a handful of people needed to know where she was. Finns had ordered her off-shift, Nic had known where she was, and Jack was used to Andy not answering his call for two days. He would just send a slew of texts until Andy grew tired of reading them and phoned him back. And Kate…well, Kate had asked for time.

  Andy shook her head, deciding to ignore the messages. Needing time without interruption, Andy escaped back down the stairs, reaching the street before anyone could intercept her. She headed toward Cambie Street, the closest Starbucks to the RCMP headquarters. Andy vaguely remembered taking this same route with Kate, but she didn’t stop to think about it. For once, she was too occupied to berate herself for recent failures. She focused not on the details of the troop’s transgressions or guilt, but the fact that Lincoln wanted to bring in an outsider, someone the troop wasn’t already familiar with, someone they didn’t already answer to. Did Lincoln mean it would help to have someone who didn’t know the cadet who had died, who could see them for the troop they were instead of the troop they’d started out as? Still, it sounded like the death of their troop mate had triggered something in the group. Something that required a secret to be kept.

  A thought began to form, the smallest germ of an idea. Andy ran with it, dealing with obstacles as they came up, weighing the advantages and disadvantages with as neutral a viewpoint as possible. It would take a lot of work, a lot of planning. And it would take some convincing. She needed to present Lincoln with a solid plan, and she had just a few hours to do it. By the time she was back at her desk, scalding coffee in her hand, Andy had convinced herself this was what needed to happen. But she needed to formalize the plan. Andy put down her coffee and picked up the phone.

  *

  “You want me to bring them here?”

  Lincoln looked up from the ten-page report Andy had handed him as they sat down at the restaurant for lunch. It was more of a café, with a dozen small tables and a modern-retro counter with stools taking up the long wall. It was busy and loud enough that you felt utterly cut off from everyone else.

  “It’s north of Kamloops,” Andy said. “A day’s drive from Regina.”

  “A long day,” Lincoln grunted, flipping t
hrough the pages of her report, his sandwich sitting untouched on his plate.

  Andy ate her soup, feeling an uncharacteristic bout of nerves. Having spent the last four hours on this, she wanted Lincoln to agree with the plan and let her run with it. It was a long shot, but she knew Lincoln trusted her opinion.

  Finally he closed the pages and picked up his sandwich. Andy let him think, waiting with a stillness that belied the turmoil rampant in her body.

  “I thought Kurtz had bought into a B&B up there, when did she branch out?”

  “Last year. She and Tara bought the acreage north of their property, including a series of rundown cabins from the forties. She’s spent the last year and a couple grand retrofitting the cabins—mostly environmental upgrades, solar power, that kind of thing. She’s hoping that they can open it for corporate retreats by next spring.”

  Sergeant Major Rosalie Kurtz, retired, known to all as simply Kurtz, had taken Andy under her wing in her first few years in E-division. Between Lincoln and Kurtz, Andy had been well taken care of. Kurtz had even helped Andy manoeuvre out of a difficult position with Dr. Mona Kellar, a twisted forensic pathologist who had targeted Kate just a few short months ago while they were on assignment up in Hidden Valley.

  “Smart move,” Lincoln said, making short work of his huge sandwich. “Positioned between Vancouver and Calgary. They’ll do well, though I’m not surprised. Kurtz was always ten steps ahead of everyone else.”

  Andy kept eating, waiting for some hint that Lincoln was taking her plan seriously.

  “So you think this place is ready for Troop 18, do you?”

  Andy heard the layers of questions, could tell instantly Lincoln was challenging her to present her case. She knew him well enough to know she had about three minutes to convince him.

  “There are seven fully operational cabins. That’s four cadets to a cabin plus three additional cabins for instructors. Bathrooms in each cabin, hot water available but limited. There’s a camp kitchen and a meeting hall that would easily do for a classroom.”