TIPPING POINT

Chapter 1

"Do I have to do this, Chief?"

Chief of Police Martinez allowed himself a brief smile at the obvious reluctance.

"It's just PR, Eric. There's always a bit, you know that."

At forty-five, Eric Delko was still a handsome man. His buzz-cut hair was gray, there were deep lines on his face, but the dark eyes were as bright and alert as ever. Martinez admitted to himself, he'd been wrong – the younger man had, after all, been an excellent choice to run the Crime Lab. He'd doubted he'd prove mature enough. If it hadn't been for a lack of other good candidates, and a strong recommendation from the man's predecessor, he wouldn't have made the promotion. Now, seven years on, he was well pleased.

"So what do you want me to say?"

"Oh, nothing deep. What it feels like to move to the new building. Bit of history of the existing place. How Forensics is expanding. You know the drill – make the public feel we're looking after them."

Eric sighed. "Okay, Chief."

"Are you sorry to be moving?"

"I suppose I am. I mean, we're packed in like sardines, but I've got a lot of history with this place. I've been here… seventeen… eighteen years. Man and boy, as they say."

"Is it that long?"

"Yep." There was an odd loaded silence.

Martinez broke it. "Do you ever hear from Horatio?"

A small look of pain crossed Eric's face. "No. I… don't even know where he is."

The Chief was tempted to comment further, but the expression on the other man's face stopped him. "Okay, Eric. That's all – the interview's arranged for three o'clock."

It had been seven years. There were few days when he didn't think about his former boss. It wasn't that he dwelt on it, but they had been so close, once. Apart from a natural affinity, they were also brothers-in-law. Horatio had been married to Eric's favorite sister, though not for long. His marrying her had put Marisol in the firing line – within days of the wedding she had been gunned down, dying in front of her new husband in hospital. Horatio's grief, heavily laced with guilt, had almost swallowed him up for a while. He and Horatio had gone on a search for vengeance… It had brought them even closer.

After that, they often hunted as a team in their quest for justice. Eric trusted him, loved him even, which made subsequent events so hard to bear, or understand.

There had been murmurings that Horatio was bending the rules, that he treated suspects with a brutality that had never been part of his make-up. Eric rarely saw anything he disapproved of, although he knew he'd justify Horatio's actions regardless. He had the same thirst for justice that his boss had. Some of the low-lifes they encountered would have tried the patience of a saint. If things got a bit 'physical', he had no objection. There had been a couple of complaints against him, but nothing had stuck, partly because Horatio was very very good. He had a superlative arrest and conviction record. He was a rare and talented combination of policeman and scientist, and no one in the department really wanted to think badly of him. So if lines were crossed, then interpretations were stretched to accommodate his behaviour.

But, inevitably, it came to a head. There was a call to a poor area in the city… He and Horatio were travelling separately that day. He couldn't now remember why, or what he'd been doing. He arrived at the shabby single-storied house within about ten minutes of the call. Horatio's Hummer, empty, was parked in front. An ambulance, back doors open but also empty, stood behind the Hummer. Eric ran inside.

There was a strong smell of blood. A young girl, almost naked, lay on the sofa, being attended by two paramedics. She was whimpering softly. On the floor, a man, middle-aged, he'd almost say elderly, with a spreading bloodstain on his shirt. He noted straggly gray hair, a moustache, an almost toothless mouth hanging open. His pants were round his ankles; it didn't much of a brain to work out what had been going on. Horatio was leaning against a wall, arms folded, virtually expressionless.

"You okay?" Eric's immediate question… as always.

He got an affirmative grunt.

"Is he dead?" He indicated the man.

A hint of a smile. "Oh yes."

"The girl?"

One of the paramedics replied. "She's stable enough to move. We'll take her to the hospital now, if that's okay, lieutenant."

"I'll follow you." Horatio roused himself. "Eric, wait for the ME, will you? And process the scene… Not that there's anything much to prove."

Eric watched them leave, then bent over the dead man. A shot to the heart had clearly been fatal. Horatio, a good shot, frequently preferred heart to head. Eric flipped back the shirt tail and caught his breath. The genitals were a mess of blood and flesh, the stain spreading out on the floor. Oh Horatio… no… He always remembered how the shock had hit him. He knew how attacks on children affected his boss, but even so… Would he really have delivered that shot? And before or after the other?

"Eric?" The medical examiner came in. "One for me?"

"Yes. Rapist - probable pedophile – they've just taken a young girl to hospital – Horatio shot him."

"Twice, by the look of it." Tom's voice didn't betray his thoughts.

"Tom…"

"I'm not judging, Eric. I'll stick with the facts."

"Can you tell… which shot was first?"

"Let me get him on my table… but, from the amount of blood, I'd surmise the… er… groin shot was first."

"I was afraid of that."

The ME looked about to say something, but stopped and shook his head briefly. He signalled to his assistant, and they quickly loaded the corpse into a body bag, then into the van.

With a sigh, Eric stood up and went about the routine processing of the small house. It stank of poor hygiene – a kitchen piled with dirty dishes, a bathroom that had never seen cleaning products. There were empty food cartons and discarded clothes strewn around. He collected blood and semen samples from the sofa, and took the sheet from the dirty unmade bed; a phial of Viagra from the bathroom; a notebook with cryptic notations in it; underwear – both men's and women's... well, a teenage girl's, more like. And a piece of iron, like a poker, with fresh blood on the end. Then he searched the house, thoroughly. It sparsely furnished. He uncovered boxes of pornographic photos, involving children and young teenagers, but there was no computer, no smart phone… No phone at all, in fact. An old-school pedo… More surprisingly, he found no weapons.

An old pick-up stood in the drive, still with a trace of heat in the engine. Eric made a call and arranged to have it removed to the crime lab. He locked the house and took what evidence he had back to the lab. He wanted to find Horatio, but knew, if he broke off to do that, the chain of evidence would be compromised. So he dutifully booked everything in, put DNA testing in motion, then headed for the hospital.

He found his boss in the waiting area outside the OR. Horatio sat with his head resting against the wall, his eyes closed.

Eric sat down beside him. "Boss..?"

Horatio sat forward and acknowledged him with a faint smile.

"How's the girl?"

"They think she'll recover, but she's got a lot of internal damage… They've had to operate." He sighed, running his hand through his hair. "Put it this way – she'll never be a mother."

"That's horrible."

"It is. And we don't even know who she is. Did you find anything interesting at the house?"

"Nothing you wouldn't expect." He hesitated. "No weapons…"

"He wasn't armed."

"Oh."

"Say it, Eric! Why did I shoot him?"

"If you thought it was necessary…"

Horatio was silent for a while, then said quietly, "I lost it, Eric. I heard the girl screaming, went in – he didn't hear me. He was in the middle of raping her. I grabbed him and virtually pulled him out of her." He looked down at his hands. "Sorry, that sounds… gross…"

"I imagine it was. Go on…"

"He was standing there, his dick in his hand – he still had an erection, for God's sake…"

"Viagra."

"Explains it. And he laughed, accused me of interrupting 'a tender moment'. And, I lost it." Horatio shrugged. "No excuses. That's what happened."

"I understand."

"IAB won't. Nor anyone else. Rightly so." He looked at the younger man's worried face. "I can't get out of this, Eric. I'm not going to lie."

"But, H, you can't go down for a scumbag rapist! The world's better without him."

"I broke the rules."

"There were no witnesses."

"There were no weapons."

"Horatio…" Eric said desperately. "If you thought he was armed…"

"I didn't. Anyway, that might excuse the kill-shot…"

Eric stared at him. "You know you'll go down. Unless we work something out…"

"Stop right there! No one is getting involved in this but me!"

"But…"

"No buts, Eric. My call – a bad one, as it happens – so I take the rap. Understood?"

TBC