Revealing the shadows a.., p.1
Revealing the Shadows: A thrilling detective story (Vanished Series Book 3), page 1
Revealing the Shadows
A Detective Story
D.J. Maughan
Hulyeseg Publishing
Copyright © 2023 by D.J. Maughan
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law. For permission requests, contact the author.
The story, all names, characters, and incidents portrayed in this production are fictitious. No identification with actual persons (living or deceased), places, buildings, and products is intended or should be inferred.
For you, Brookey. You believe in me even when I don't believe in myself. Your love and support means everything. I'll be forever grateful you said yes.
Chapter one
Peter
December 25, 2000 - Budapest
Peter opens his eyes to find rich, chocolate-colored saucers staring back at him.
“Good morning.” She says it without blinking, a slight upturn of her lips.
“Morning,” he says, covering his mouth. “How long have you been awake?”
“I don’t know.”
Peter turns away, checking the alarm clock on the nightstand. It tells him what he already knows. He’s slept too long and needs to hustle, or he’ll be late for work.
Rather than get up, he turns back to her. Like always, the allure of being close to her pulls at him. Just a couple minutes and he’ll get going. He hooks his arm under the pillow before putting his head back down. “You couldn’t sleep?”
She shrugs, more of a slight lift of one shoulder. Her eyes never leave his. They lay on their sides, gazing at each other.
“I did, for a few hours.”
This isn’t like Karen. From the time they had first married, Peter was the one who had trouble sleeping. Early in his career, he found his sleep correlated to his stress level at work. Karen, on the other hand, rarely, if ever, let life impact her sleep. He would tease her that she could win sleep competitions if there were such things.
A pang of worry strikes him. Had he done something? Was he the reason she wasn’t sleeping?
“Is something wrong?”
She doesn’t immediately answer. She’s aware of the words, but her eyes are distant. She’s somewhere else. After a few moments, her gaze focuses back on him. “What are you investigating right now?”
It’s not like her to avoid answering a question.
“Nothing, really, just a simple drug case.”
Early in their marriage, he would tell her details of the cases he was working. But, as time has passed, he’s intentionally been brief. Not because he has any reason not to trust her but because the case components were difficult for her to hear. She would worry and fret about his safety. He found the less she knew, the better.
“Why?”
There’s that look again. What’s going on in that beautiful mind?
She finally turns and lays the back of her head on her pillow, her chestnut hair cascading around her, framing her face. “I think I’m being followed.”
Peter leans up on one elbow to look into her eyes. “Followed? What do you mean?”
She shakes her head, still looking at the ceiling. “I don’t know…it’s mostly just a feeling. A man walked through the nurse’s station a few days ago. Nobody knew him. When another nurse asked him if he needed help, he said he was looking for a patient named Mitchell. We checked the logs and asked around, but we didn’t have any patients named Mitchell. When we told him, he walked away. Never asking for confirmation. It was odd. Like he already knew.” She turns her head to look into his eyes. “When I left work last night, I saw him in the parking lot. Watching me.”
“Really? Where?”
“Sitting in a car. When I looked at him, he looked down and wouldn’t look up. I think I surprised him.”
Peter frowns. “You’ve never seen the guy before?”
She shakes her head.
“Kare bear…seeing a guy twice in the same location doesn’t mean he was following you. For all you know, he double-checked the name and found the person.”
“I know. But it was more than that. Something felt wrong about him. He scared me. I decided to get a taxi home rather than ride the subway. He gave me the willies.”
“When you got here, did you notice him? Had he followed you?”
“No.”
Peter smiles. “I hate to tell you this, but every man looks at you. You just don’t always notice. You caught him checking you out, and he was embarrassed. I know I can’t look away whenever I look at you. He probably saw you in the hospital and couldn’t get you out of his mind. When he saw you in the parking lot, he admired you until you caught him. Any man would do the same.”
She laughs, picking up his pillow and hitting him with it. “Shut up. I’m serious.”
“So am I. I can’t blame him. I’m not even mad. I’d do the same thing if I were him.”
She sits up and presses her lips to his, wrapping her arms around his neck. He lets her push him back down to the mattress. He loves the feel of her body on his. After a long kiss, she pulls away and looks into his eyes.
“Let’s be truant today.”
“What?”
She slides her hand under his T-shirt and places it on his chest. “Let’s stay home. Spend the day together.”
Peter chuckles, looking back into her eyes.
“I’m serious.”
And he knows she is. Not a hint of a smile plays on her face. Why does she have to do this today? Yesterday, he caught a break in the case he’s investigating. A murder had been committed, and ballistics showed the murder weapon was a gun owned by a cop. The cop was put on leave while Internal Affairs investigated him, and Peter worked on the murder case. The cop claimed the gun had been stolen, and he hadn’t reported it, believing it wouldn’t matter. Internal Affairs believed him and gave him a slap-on-the-wrist probation. That didn’t sit right with him. After working several leads in the murder, Peter came up dry. He decided to turn his attention to the cop and began following him. After a few days, he caught a break. Peter witnessed a transaction that looked like a drug deal. The cop gave a rough-looking man a backpack and received a package in return. Peter knew he was close to breaking the case wide open. He believed the cop played a part in the murder, maybe even being the shooter. Today, he’d obtain a warrant for his and his wife’s financial records. Judge Clayton, his favorite judge, would only be available this morning. He had to get moving.
“I can’t. I have a judge waiting on me.”
Karen pouts and slides her hand down his chest. “Come on. Let’s spend the day together.”
Peter would love to but knows he shouldn’t.
“I can’t. But listen, let’s go somewhere this weekend. Maybe we could finally take that trip upstate. Leave Friday and head up to Niagara Falls.”
She frowns as he pulls away and looks at the clock again. He leans down and kisses her. “I’m sorry, babe. I want to. I can’t.”
Peter is roused from this memory by footsteps coming down the hallway. He rolls over on the dirty mattress. Two days ago, when walking up to Zsuzsa’s apartment, Detective Szabo had stepped out from beside the building and a couple uniformed officers had detained Peter, claiming he was under arrest for the murder of Detective Kovacs Lajos. Kovacs was the leader of the Human Trafficking Task Force of the Hungarian National Police and Peter’s boss. Peter was there when Kovacs died, and now he was blamed for it. Peter and Kovacs had been engaged in a secret meeting on Margit Bridge when a vehicle veered off the road and jumped the curb pinning Kovacs to the railing and cutting him in two. His body and the car were later recovered at the bottom of the river—but not the driver. Before the accident, Szabo didn’t like Peter and wasn’t quiet about it. With Kovacs’s death, Szabo was promoted to head of the task force.
Peter was arrested and still had no explanation from Szabo or anyone else. He had not seen a judge and had yet to be offered an attorney. He spent the two days alone. Feeling more like a convicted murderer than a suspect. But now, company was on the way.
The footsteps shuffle to a stop outside his cell as two guards stand on either side of another man. The man is not tall, maybe four inches shorter than Peter’s six-two frame. But he’s very muscular, especially in his shoulders and chest. He has a shaved head and dark beard, touched with the first signs of gray. One of the guards opens the cell gate, pushes the man inside, closes the gate, and locks it. The guards look at each other, chuckling as they walk away.
Peter stands and looks at the man.
The newcomer motions to the bunk beds. “The lower bunk is mine.”
Peter shrugs. “Fine with me. I’ll take the top bunk.”
He shakes his head. “That’s mine too.” The man’s goading him. “You can sleep on the floor.”
Peter stands, eyeing him.
“Do you have a problem with that?” The muscular man closes the distance between them. Peter isn’t sure if he’s got a weapon, but his intentions are clear.
Peter spits in his eye. The man falls back a step, crying out in surprise. Peter brings his elbow forward, striking the man in the nose. Too many people h
As the man kneels on the ground, doubled over, holding his face, Peter grabs his head and brings his knee forward, connecting with the man’s nose. Peter feels the softness of cartilage breaking. A tooth drops from the man’s mouth as blood begins to gush. He falls back in a heap, hitting the concrete floor. His eyes wobble but never close. Peter comes forward and presses his knee into the man’s sternum. Blood pours from his nose and mouth. Peter pushes his fist into the man’s chest, controlling his breathing capacity. He looks the man in the eye, waiting until he can focus.
“Who sent you?”
The man looks at him and says nothing; anger and hate are in his eyes. Peter presses his knee in harder glaring back at him. The man winces and mumbles something unintelligible. Peter lets off some pressure.
“I don’t know.” The man wheezes.
Again, Peter presses harder.
“A guard.” He coughs.
Peter pulls back his knee. “What did he say?”
“He wanted me to mess you up. He said if I did, he’d hook me up.”
“What kind of mess up? Why you?”
“Cause I volunteered. He asked a few of us. I heard you used to be a cop. I was hoping to kill you. I hate cops. But he wouldn’t let me. He said to only beat you up. Not kill you, scare you.”
Chapter two
Zsusza
I exit the empty subway, walk up the stairs, and approach the large glass building. Written on the exterior in big, bold letters is Hungarian National Police. Before this week, I never would have imagined I would ever come here. Especially on Christmas Day.
Two nights ago, I came after watching Peter’s arrest outside my apartment. I had to know more and knew they’d bring him here. A security guard stopped me when I walked through the big glass doors. He told me that I had to leave; visiting hours were over for the night. I wasn’t about to accept that. After a couple minutes of arguing, he could see I wasn’t going to leave quietly. Having no other choice, he told me to sit down and that somebody would come out and talk to me. I waited and waited. Thirty minutes later, a massive man came down the stairs. I recognized him as the guy who had arrested Peter.
“I’m Detective Szabo. You must be Zsuzsa?”
I was surprised when he knew my name, but I shouldn’t have been. After all, I was working undercover in the club and was kidnapped. Peter and Kovacs had come to Ukraine to save me. All the cops must know that story.
“If you know I’m Zsuzsa, you must know why I’m here.”
He looked at me like I was some kind of nuisance. Which only made me dig in my heels. He told me he could do nothing for me and that I would have to return tomorrow. I demanded to know why he had arrested Peter, but he wouldn’t tell me. To appease me, he promised I could see Peter if I returned in two days.
So here I am. I enter the front doors, and a new security guard stops me. He’s got his officer uniform on, and like most of them, it’s too tight.
“I’m here to see Detective Szabo,” I tell him.
He asks me to take off my jewelry and put my purse in a bin, then walk through a metal detector. It buzzes, and he asks me to spread my arms and legs while he waves a wand over my body. He and his partner let their eyes linger longer than necessary before he tells me I can sit down along a set of chairs by the wall. This time, Detective Szabo descends the stairs after only a few minutes.
“Zsuzsa, good to see you again.”
He extends his hand, and I hesitate before taking it. I’m not surprised when it engulfs mine. What’s even less surprising is it’s moist. After shaking it I wipe my palm against my leg.
“Peter was involved in an altercation.”
My eyes widen with surprise. Before I can ask, he holds up his hand.
“Don’t worry. He’s fine. It was the other guy who needed to be taken to the infirmary. Peter jacked him up pretty good.”
“Where’s Peter now?”
“He’s in a cell by himself. I’ll bring him to the greeting room. But it needs to be short. He’s not supposed to be talking to anyone.”
He tells me to follow him, and we walk through the interior glass doors. After crossing through a hallway and descending a flight of stairs, another group of guards stops us. Szabo shows them his credentials, and they wave us through. We go through another hallway when Szabo stops outside a door, knocks, opens it, and ushers me inside. It’s a small, plain room. Utterly void of pictures or furniture. A chair, counter, and telephone are on my side of the glass partition. The other side is furnished the same way.
“Have a seat. I’ll go get Peter.”
I sit at the counter, cross my legs, and feel my leg bouncing up and down. After five minutes, the door on the other side of the glass wall opens, and Peter steps inside. What hair he has left is tousled. He looks like he hasn’t slept in days; bags are under his bloodshot eyes. He’s wearing the same clothes I saw him in when they arrested him. I can see dried blood on the front of his shirt. When he sees me, he smiles, and my heart flutters. I need to help him. I want him out of here.
He sits down and picks up the phone, and I pick up mine.
He looks at me through the glass. “Szia.”
I look at him and don’t trust myself to speak. I put my hand to the glass. I wish I could touch him. “Szia,” I finally reply.
He smiles a crooked smile. “Sorry about our date. I tried to come.”
I see the pain in his eyes, the hurt. I know he must be scared. I’m afraid too, and I’m not locked up.
“I know. Why did they arrest you?”
“They say I killed Kovacs. Or at least, that’s why I’m here.”
“That’s ridiculous! How can they say that?”
He shakes his head and sighs. “I don’t know. They haven’t told me what evidence they have. Do you remember what you and Kata told me in the restaurant before you worked in the club? About Andras?”
I watch him closely and let my mind fade back. I remember he came to the restaurant and met with us. We talked about a few different things. Peter sees from my silence that I’m unsure.
“You told me you both knew he was working with someone.” A lightbulb goes on in my head, and he sees it in my expression. “A girl went missing in Újpest at the same time you were taken to Ukraine. I knew something was different about her. But if I’m in here, I can’t investigate.”
Somebody’s put him in here to prevent him from investigating. But who? He’s not saying, and I don’t think he wants me to ask. He’s being careful.
There's a clicking noise in the phone, and I swear I hear something that sounds like breathing. Peter’s eyes focus on the phone, then come back to me. When they do, his expression is changed. The warmth in his eyes has been replaced with frost. He’s shaking his head.
“Zsuzsa, it was nice of you to come, but don’t come again. I don’t want to see you anymore.”
The words cut through me. Is he serious? What did I do? His face is deadpan. Impassive. His tone is hard and mean.
“Peter?”
“I’m serious, Zsuzsa. I never felt anything for you. I love my wife and could never love anyone else. I used you. I knew about Andras and what he was doing and used you to get close to him. I used you again in the club. I don’t have any more use for you now. Go away, and don’t come back.”
He stands and hangs up the phone. He’s through the door before I can close my open mouth. I sit holding the phone. Too shocked to move. Alone in the empty room.
Chapter three
Detective Szabo
The door opens, and Zsuzsa walks out. Her head’s down, and with her hair covering, I can’t see her face.
“I’ll show you out,” I tell her putting a hand on her shoulder.
I glance in her direction several times as we walk through the hallway, past the guard station, and up the stairs. Her head remains down, her face covered. Finally, as we reach the main level, she looks ahead, giving me a view of her eyes. Tears brim her eyelids. Why does she care for him so much? She’s such a beautiful woman, and he’s a lying idiot. She deserves better.
