Storm Lines Read online

  Simms brought her an evidence box from a small pile stacked along one wall. Marley recognized the excitement in her belly. She was a community officer, spending most of her time in a cruiser, on the streets, or writing reports at her desk. She rarely had the chance to be part of an ongoing investigation.

  “Paper evidence from the house on Fleming Street. There wasn’t a lot of it, surprisingly. We’re finding more evidence stored on phones, tablets, and laptops these days.”

  Marley started to take the lid off the box but stopped when Simms slid a piece of paper, a pen, gloves, and a surgical type mask in front of her. Marley looked questioningly at Simms.

  “Drugs were rampant in that house,” Simms said. “And we’ve still got an unknown substance waiting to be identified. Anyone handling evidence from the site wears gloves and a mask.”

  Marley sighed but picked up the mask and slipped it over her face.

  “Didn’t tell me about wearing a mask before you asked me paper or computer files,” Marley grumbled. It already felt hot and moist.

  “Guess I failed to mention that part,” Simms said with a grin. He pointed at the paper. “Evidence log. You can input it into an e-document later.”

  A little of the excitement had died down now that Marley was facing the reality of sifting through evidence. But she lifted the lid of the box, after Simms had put on his own mask.

  “Am I looking for anything in particular?”

  “This is a combination of logging the individual pieces of evidence and labeling each one as a receipt, personal note, communication, or whatever. But we want you to keep an eye out for anything that stands out as significant, particularly around drug manufacturing.”

  “Chemical compositions, science notes, compounds, codes—that kind of thing?”

  “You got it.” Simms grabbed his laptop and headed to the door. “Evidence doesn’t leave the room, and the room is never left unlocked. No food or drink in here, either. Call me if you need me.”

  “Yeah, sure,” Marley said.

  Marley pulled the first piece of paper off the top of the pile. A crumpled receipt from Canadian Tire, the ubiquitous hardware store. Marley noted the relevant information on the evidence sheet as well as a list of items: garden hose, seven BBQ lighters, two X-ACTO knives, a tub of tile adhesive, and chocolate covered almonds. She bagged the receipt, labeled it with a marker, and grabbed the next piece of paper.

  Two hours in and Marley had filed twenty-seven pieces of evidence, including receipts, municipal garbage schedules, three-for-one pizza flyers with a series of numbers written in pen across the garlic bread section. She was feeling pretty good about the work, but her body was giving her signals she’d had enough. Her side was throbbing, and her back was stiff from trying to hold herself up without using her abdominal muscles. Marley thought about the painkiller she had in her pocket. Might not be a bad idea.

  She looked up at a tapping on the meeting room door. Simms leaned his head in, holding up a bottle of water.

  “Come on out. Take a quick break.”

  Marley eased her way to a standing position, satisfied her legs felt solid, even if the rest of her body felt like a disaster. She joined Simms out in the hall and gratefully took the offered water bottle.

  “Anything interesting?”

  “Mostly garbage, I think,” Marley said after she’d gulped some water. “I did notice a waste pick-up schedule and two receipts for the municipal landfill, though.”

  “How old are the receipts?”

  “One about six months ago, the other a few weeks. End of June, I think.”

  “Huh, yeah. We might try to follow up on that,” Simms said.

  “Tough place to find evidence,” Marley said as she pulled a pill out of her pocket and swallowed it with another gulp of water.

  “We’ll take any lead on evidence,” Simms said. He jerked his chin at Marley. “You’re good to keep going?”

  “No problem,” Marley said, her body already protesting her answer.

  “Good enough.”

  Marley launched her empty bottle at a nearby recycling container, then headed back in the room. She was glad she was alone in the room as she carefully lowered herself back into the chair. Another ten minutes and the pain meds would kick in.

  Masked and gloved, Marley reached into the box and pulled out three pieces of paper stapled together. Marley recognized Aimee’s handwriting even before she noticed the neatly printed name in the upper right hand corner. It looked like a school assignment, the life cycle of a frog, coloured and labeled with pencil crayons. Marley scanned each page for any other information, but the grade school assignment yielded nothing interesting for the investigation. Still, once Marley had documented the stats on the evidence log, she stared at Aimee’s handwriting.

  She thought about the conversation with Devon three days before. Marley had tried and failed not to feel the judgement in Devon’s worry. She tried not to admit it had doubled the burden of guilt she’d been carrying around, so afraid she was not doing right by these two vulnerable people. That, once again, Bridget Marlowe had taken a misstep and was charging headlong down the wrong path, all along believing she was doing right.

  It wouldn’t be the first time and certainly not the last, Marley thought, the voice in her head sounding like her mother.

  Marley shook her head and labeled the bag of evidence before reaching for the next paper.

  Over the next half hour, Marley found more of Aimee’s handwriting and schoolwork sprinkled amongst the receipts, flyers, and takeout menus. She wondered if the layers represented time. Marley desperately wanted to look up Aimee’s file to see if she could sort through the confusing timeline, but she knew the system would flag her. Still, she wished she knew how long Aimee had been with her father in this run-down drug lab of a house.

  An idea surfaced, and Marley pushed back on her wheelie chair until she could reach the phone. She stripped off her gloves and lowered her mask, punching in the extension for Simms once she’d navigated the internal directory.

  “Simms.”

  “Hey, it’s Marlowe.”

  “Find anything?” Marley couldn’t help but hear the hope in the constable’s voice.

  “Not yet. But I was wondering if I could have access to the scene photos?”

  She heard Simms typing on his laptop. “Yeah, I can do that. Any particular reason?”

  “I guess I’m getting a sense of where this information was picked up, how it relates to the scene.” She shrugged, even though the gesture was lost over the phone. But she felt foolish. “I don’t know, I thought maybe it could give some context.”

  “Works for me,” Simms said. “I’ve given you access, so you should be able to call it up in the meeting room now.”

  Marlowe hung up the phone and wheeled herself over to the beat-up laptop in the corner. She logged in and turned on the projector. As she sorted through the files, Marley wished she had more water. Or lunch. Or her bed. She was starting to sweat, even though the air conditioner kept the office cool.

  Huge images flashed up on the screen, and it took Marley a moment to orient herself to the layout of the two-story townhouse she’d only seen from outside. The walls were builder’s beige, shiny with unwashed handprints. A picture showed the front entrance, a pile of shoes with one pair of purple rain boots. Marley swallowed hard, her blood pressure pounding more with every image. A living room filled with video game consoles, overflowing ashtrays, and garbage. The kitchen was a lab, with one small table and a blue and green plastic chair covered in half-peeled stickers in the corner. Image after image. Marley’s nausea grew so intense, she thought she might throw up. Instead, she clicked off the slideshow, logged off the system, and sat with her eyes closed. She needed to get out.

  With effort, her hands betraying the lightest tremor, Marley signed and dated the evidence log sheet, filed away the logged and unlogged evidence, and left the room. She pulled the mask off her face with relief, the cool air on her
face making her feel the smallest bit better.

  Marley double-checked the room was locked, then she shuffled to her desk and grabbed her bag, waving away the concerned look of her colleagues. She texted her sister asking for a ride, then sent a short email to Simms saying where she’d left off and that she’d be back tomorrow.

  By the time Audrey arrived in her shiny Lexus SUV, Marley’s tremor was more like full body shakes.

  “No wonder you called me instead of Mom,” Audrey said, grabbing Marley’s elbow as they navigated the steps to the parking lot.

  “Might have pushed it a little,” Marley mumbled. She pulled herself into her sister’s car, felt the sun-warmed leather seats and the blasting air conditioner and thought vaguely that being at work on painkillers was not going to work.

  “Need to stop anywhere?” Audrey said, pulling back onto the street. “Or just home?”

  “Just home, please,” Marley said, her nausea spiking with the movement of the car. She really did not want to throw up in her sister’s car.

  Audrey was blessedly silent as she drove, and Marley focused on keeping her nausea at bay. Images flashed behind her eyelids: Aimee’s boots, Devon kneeling in the alley, a child’s drawing, Randolph West’s mug shot, rain soaking into her jeans, IV in her hand, a soft, reassuring voice.

  “We’re here.”

  Marley surfaced from her half dream. Audrey had pulled up outside her apartment.

  “Thanks, sis,” Marley said.

  “I can help you in,” Audrey said, opening the door.

  Marley waved her off. “No, I’m good. Really. Go back to work and tell Mom I’ll call her later for a lecture.”

  “You sure?” Audrey looked worried.

  Marley eased herself out of the car and turned to her sister. She was so tired of everyone looking worried.

  “Twenty-nine steps between me and my chair.” She smiled weakly. “I got this.”

  “Text me when you’re safely inside,” Audrey said, returning Marley’s strained smile with one of her own. “Or, you know, when you collapse in the stairwell. Either one.”

  Marley laughed and pushed the door closed and waved from the sidewalk as Audrey pulled away.

  There were so many steps into Marley’s apartment, into the bathroom and then the bedroom to change her clothes, the kitchen for a drink of water and a few crackers before collapsing into her chair, the soft blue blanket covering her shoulders. With her eyes once again closed, the tremors making quiet, disconcerting waves through her body, Marley focused on her breathing and finally slept.

  * * *

  Devon hadn’t heard from Marley in three days. She paced and fretted, worked out and chopped vegetables for salad while watching a cooking show. Nothing eased the feeling that something wasn’t quite right.

  She picked up her phone, but the only message was from her dad, asking if she had any strong feelings about brands of plumber’s glue. Devon put the phone back down, not prepared to deal with the minutiae of her leaky kitchen sink in the face of crisis.

  Not a crisis, Devon thought as she poured olive oil into an old jam jar and added some red wine vinegar. Not a crisis, not her job, not her decision. This was the same litany she’d laid out to her counselor yesterday, after giving a very general version of what had been happening the last week or so. Ash had nodded thoughtfully, following Devon’s agitated list spewing with a question.

  “What are you mad about?”

  “I’m not mad.”

  “Describe what you are.”

  Devon had needed to take a moment to pull air deep into her lungs and centre herself before she’d lashed out at her counselor and proven her right.

  “Tense, worried, stressed, anxious.” Devon started off with the easy ones. “Lost,” she added. She took a breath. “Attempting to dictate circumstances beyond my control.”

  “What’s fueling all that?”

  Blood-soaked cotton. Marley’s hurt grey eyes through a blur of rain. Evidence of bruises, on the surface and buried deep. Aimee’s silent chuckle, Carla’s guttural laugh.

  Devon’s shoulders had slumped. “I want to open myself up to all of it. I’ve got this deep drive to be there and just…”

  “And just…” Ash said, waiting. But Devon could only shake her head. “Just fix it?”

  “No, not fix it. Be there. Acknowledge what they’ve been through, what they’re going through. Leaving them alone with it feels so wrong.” She’d looked up at Ash then, as she’d registered how closely this fit with what had brought her to Ash in the first place, leaving front-line workers alone with the heaviness of what they faced every day. She hadn’t seen the burden shift until she’d fallen under its weight.

  “And absorb it,” Ash had added.

  “Yes. And I can’t. Not anymore.”

  “You’re wrong, Devon. You’re recovering from absorbing too much and losing yourself in the process. But you’re not broken.”

  Devon listened, trying not to be frustrated that she needed to hear this truth again and again.

  “Describe what you are doing. What is your job right now?”

  “Recover, refocus, relearn.” Those were the goals they’d come up with months ago when Devon had finally acknowledged she couldn’t do it anymore. She couldn’t go back to the hospital, not for one more day.

  Devon zoned back to the present as the oven beeped, declaring it had come to temperature. Sunlight broke through the clouds and slanted through the kitchen window, highlighting the flour particles in the air from the scones she was making.

  Devon scored the dough in front of her, making almost even triangles out of the sticky mass. Then she popped the baking sheet into the oven and set the timer.

  Relearn didn’t mean changing her life completely. It didn’t mean becoming a hermit, hiding herself from people, never engaging with hurt. It meant learning how to handle the emotions of others while recognizing her own vulnerability and treating it with equal care.

  She’d missed caring these last few months. Longer, if she thought about life outside of work, which had been her singular focus for so long now.

  Devon looked at her phone where it sat on the counter. She picked it up and sent Marley a text. Then she waited for her scones to rise, the weather to change, and Marley to respond.

  * * *

  Marley stared at her phone, blinked back tears, and wondered when she’d become such an emotional disaster. “I’m blaming the antibiotics. Gut rotting, life-saving motherfuckers,” she mumbled. Then she read the text from Devon again and wiped at the fresh tears on her face with the sleeve of her hoodie.

  It was only a few words. Simple, really.

  Checking in. Wondering how your heart is doing.

  No pressure for an answer, not even a real question. Just the gentlest reminder that she wasn’t alone. Pretty much exactly what she’d needed to hear when she’d woken from her body-drained nap to feel the full enormity of the last week.

  What had she done to deserve Devon in her life so unexpectedly?

  Thanks for check-in. Today you are a cherry-flavoured Life Saver.

  Marley scanned the text. It seemed flirty, though it was hard to tell since she wasn’t very good at flirty. She sent it anyway, followed by another text asking how Devon was doing.

  Restless but good, Devon replied.

  Marley tapped her phone against her thigh, wondering if asking Devon for another favour was too much.

  How do you feel about playing chauffeur? Great idea or terrible idea?

  Definitely a great idea.

  Marley smiled to herself. She texted back she needed time to shower, and then she eased her body out of her comfy chair. The nap had been a good idea. She wasn’t shaking anymore, just sore and a bit weak.

  Half an hour later, wet hair tucked behind her ears and half a sandwich in one hand, Marley answered the knock at her door.

  “Hey.”

  Marley had no idea why her body chose that moment to react to Devon’s presence. She w
as beautiful in her casual androgyny, simply dressed in grey denim and a fitted blue T-shirt. Her short, dark hair had curled a little in the heat. But Devon’s eyes and her sweet, almost uncertain smile had Marley’s stomach going into free fall.

  “Antibiotics,” Marley mumbled.

  “Sorry?”

  “Nothing. Come on in, let me grab my wallet and phone.”

  Devon stood inside the door as Marley collected what she needed.

  “You hungry?” Marley said, hearing her mother’s voice in her head admonishing her to offer her guest something to eat. “Want the other half of my sandwich?”

  Devon peered at the half-eaten sandwich in Marley’s hand.

  “What kind is it?”

  Marley hesitated. This felt like a critical moment in their friendship, beautiful eyes and butterflies or not.

  “Peanut butter, bacon, and lettuce.”

  Devon looked curious, and Marley felt a moment of hope. Curiosity was better than disgust, the typical reaction to her sandwich concoctions.

  “I’m not particularly hungry, but can I try a bite?”

  Marley handed over the other half of the sandwich and watched as Devon took a bite. Devon’s expression remained neutral at first. But then she saw the delicious sweet-salty combination of Marley’s favourite sandwich really hit home.

  “Good, right?” Marley said.

  Devon nodded as she chewed and swallowed. Marley wondered if it was weird that she found this moment sexier than any romance movie.

  “So good,” Devon said, brushing a crumb from her fingers after handing back the sandwich. “Amazing.”

  “Yeah,” Marley said. “Amazing.” She meant the heat in her belly, the tingle up her spine, and the insistent beat of her pulse.

  “Shall we go?”

  “Let’s go,” Marley said.

  They walked up the stairs and out onto the street. The day was still warm but grey, and a dry, chaotic wind pushed and pulled them to Devon’s car. Through the wind, Marley could hear the sky quietly rumble a petulant warning.

  “Looks like another storm,” Marley said as they climbed into Devon’s Subaru.