“Yes. You also played me well, ’cause he made it sound like a couple of the boys were running their own thing, outside of me and Cordell. I had to find out.”
“You and Cordell. Shiet.”
“I found something I’m real good at, Frankie, other than smokin’ up my life and getting paid nothin’ so that you and the police got everything and all I got was enough money to buy a day’s worth of rock.”
I don’t respond to that. Instead I ask, “Was there anyone else before Cordell that you got to through working with me or Al, or both of us when I was on the job partnered with Al?”
“No. Only Cordell.”
“Don’t forget Idris.”
“You set me up for that.”
“Does that matter? Shit, Darling.”
“You need to let me go or make a call, ’cause shit’s gonna start rollin’ the wrong way.”
“One more question. You know anything about the police that got shot on Twelfth or any other officer that got killed?”
“Of course not. You know I wouldn’t be a part of something like that. I only know what I get on the news.”
Should I mention Rule? Show her the photo?
“I don’t know what you’re capable of anymore,” I say. “And you know, Al got his window blown out in a drive-by.”
“Damn. He okay? You don’t think that has anything to do with me?”
“I hope not. And yeah, he’s okay. You don’t call him, though, and if he tries to call you, don’t pick up. I mean that. Also, I saw what looked like the SUV you’re driving parked on Al’s block. Before the shooting. It followed me when I left. Saw someone who looked a lot like you in front.” That part’s not true.
“That’s bullshit.”
“No, it’s not.”
“Well, you didn’t see me. It wasn’t my car. Might want to talk to your police buddies. I don’t have the only black SUV in this city.”
“Just go,” I say. “Call your man while walkin’.”
She opens the door, turns to me before getting out. “I’d never hurt Al, and—as much as I hate you right now—you, either.”
“I call. You answer,” I tell her.
“Like always, sweetie.”
“When the time comes, I’ll personally take you to meet with the detective from Internal Affairs. You play the CI bit, and it’ll all be good.”
She steps out.
“And you fucking be sure to find out why Tay was here that day,” I add.
She smiles at me, flicks her cigarette like spit to the ground, and walks away.
Sixty-Four
I don’t trust her and certainly don’t believe her. And damn, I hate being played. Played is a kind word for what she did. You can never trust a CI. I rarely have, but Tamie did win me over, and now that trust has been violated. Depending on how far she went with Al, or me when I was on the job, maybe it was even something criminal.
Before leaving to pick up Calvin, I call Millhoff on my cell, like I told Calvin I would.
“What’s up, Frankie?” he answers.
“Not a whole lot.” Shiet, right. “Quick question if you have a minute.”
“Go on.”
“About the Cordell Holm case.”
“Yeah.”
“Remember that dude, Playboy, I told you about?”
“Yeah, the guy you said was the driver.”
“You ever get him?”
“No. Why are you asking after all this time?”
“Because I saw someone who looks a little like him earlier and was wondering if you got him or identified him for a warrant yet.”
“Where’d you see him?”
“Don’t know for sure if it was him, but it was in PG County, walking out of the Burger King on Bladensburg and Fortieth.”
“Why didn’t you call?”
“Like I said, I wasn’t sure, and by the time I turned my car around so I could get a closer look, he was gone. Must have rolled out in a car. Didn’t see it.”
“Well, we don’t have anything on him. Just what you gave us, and the nickname. Prints were negative. Give me a description.”
“Wearing a Ravens jacket and black jeans. Really hasn’t changed much.”
“All right. You see him in your travels again, give a call. Nothing else, just call. How’s it going with Luna?”
“He’s a mess. Stands by his story, and I believe him.”
“In our prayers, man. Don’t want to see him go down like that. Be an awful shame.”
“It would be, brother. Everything good with you?”
“Same ol’, same ol’.”
“Appreciate you filling me in. You stay safe.”
That was a good story I came up with. I don’t believe Playboy has anything to worry about.
I call Calvin to let him know I’ll be there in about an hour. He doesn’t sound enthusiastic, but he never does so I don’t take it personally. I need to get with Luna first, tell him not to fight with Freudiger about meeting Darling. I know he’ll fight me, too. The fear of their relationship being revealed, on top of everything else, is more than enough motivation to fight it.
When I get to his house, I see the window is boarded up and the siding around the boarded-up window has been replaced. No more holes that I can see.
I knock on the door, smile to myself, but don’t feel anything this time. I’ll keep trying. It takes Al a couple minutes to get to the door. He’s wearing his old gray MPDC sweatpants and a faded blue T-shirt. Still clean-shaven. That’s promising. I smile again. Damn. This positive brain-feed crap doesn’t work for shit.
“Hey, Frankie.”
“Al. I met with Tamie again and thought it best to talk in person.”
“Oh yeah?” he says with reservation.
“No worries. You gonna let me in?”
“Sorry.”
He steps aside to allow me in, closes the door after I enter, and locks the doorknob and the dead bolt, checks it after.
I walk into the living room. Wall and ceiling areas where rounds were removed by Crime Scene are patched but not painted. The curtain is closed, hiding the boarded-up window.
“When’s the window coming in?”
“I hope in a couple days. It’s gonna be a nice window. Want a drink?”
“Good stuff?”
“Laphroaig 18.”
“Dude, you should take it easy on the expensive shit. Remember, you’re on leave without pay.”
“I broke into my scotch reserve.”
“I’ll just have some Jameson.”
“Fuck you,” he says, and grabs a clean glass that happened to be on the coffee table, like it was waiting for me, or someone else. He pours a nice double, hands it to me.
I take it and sit in the armchair. He sits on the sofa, picks up his glass and sips.
“What do you have, then?”
I’m not going to give it to him like that. I don’t think he can take it. For all I know, he’s suicidal right now, and what I learned about Tamie might throw him over the edge.
“First off, you have to stay away from her. I don’t give a shit how real you think the relationship might be.”
“Another fuck you.”
“I’m not kidding, Al. Let’s get you through all this crap first. Get your life back, and then you can make all the stupid relationship decisions you want. For now please listen to me and stay away, not even a phone call. I told her the same thing, and she won’t accept your calls.”
He takes a deep breath, long exhale, as if to calm himself. Takes another sip but says nothing.
“And I want you to know in advance that I’m going to take her to see Freudiger.”
“What? No, you’re not.”
“Al, you get served that subpoena and don’t comply, you’re fucked. Hear me?” I don’t let him respond. “She knows how to play the part, the special employee, confidential informant, and all that shit. She knows what will happen to her—and you—if she gives up anything else. I don’t know why, but I
believe she does like you.”
“Well, here’s to that.” He lifts his glass, finishes what’s left in one gulp, and then an “Ahh…”
I take my glass and do the same, but only because I need another drink.
“You with me on this, bro?”
“I’m with ya.”
“Okay. Just a quick visit because I gotta go,” I say while standing. “You need me to get you anything?”
“No, thanks.”
“You’ll get through this. Don’t let the department beat you down, ’cause that’s what they’re going to do and they’re not going to ease up.”
“I know that.”
“Lock up behind me.”
I open the door, but before I can leave, he says, “I do sincerely appreciate everything, Frank.”
I smile. Tingles in my brain. All righty, then.
Sixty-Five
Yeah. A little over an inch on the ground. People driving like it’s twelve inches. I grew up in this city, been through all the major blizzards, couple of the worst when I was on the department and a state of emergency was declared. We’d roll around answering dispatched calls in Humvees driven by DC National Guard, living on MREs. I miss those times, as stupid crazy as they were. But an inch on the ground, and the city goes crazy.
I don’t have Freudiger saved as a contact, so I can’t use Bluetooth to call him. I find an open space and park.
“This is Freudiger,” he answers.
“Frank Marr here, Johnny.”
“What can I do for you, Marr?”
“More like what I can do for you. I spoke with Luna’s SE, and she can meet with you this week. I’ll have to pick her up, though.”
“That’s great. I’m jammed this week. Can you bring her to the office Monday morning, say around eleven hundred?”
“I’m sure that’ll work for her. If you don’t hear back from me then it’s good.”
“All right. Appreciate the call.”
“Talk later.”
It was a priority, but now it’s like he wants to drag it out, wear Luna down in the process.
Tamie is my next call. Surprisingly, she answers right away.
“Give me a second,” she says. “I’ll be right back, babe. I gotta take this call,” she says to someone else, and sounds like she’s walking. “Okay, I can talk now.”
“I need to pick you up at ten thirty Monday morning to go meet with the detective I told you about.”
“I don’t know, Frank. I don’t know if that works for me right now. You almost broke my man’s jaw. You’re lucky he got himself up and left before the police came.”
“Well, I’m sure you gave him a good story.”
“Yes, I did.”
I don’t ask because I don’t want to know. Might make me mad.
“You have to meet with the detective on Monday at eleven a.m.”
“Maybe later. I don’t know if Monday works.”
“Make it work. We need to get this out of the way so it doesn’t look like Al’s hiding something.”
She laughs a short laugh and says, “Hiding somethin’?”
“You know what I mean.”
“Yes, babe, I know. By the way, you also put me in some shit giving me that pellet pistol instead of his real gun.”
“Oh, my bad.”
“No, seriously, Frank. I need his gun back. It makes me look bad here.”
“I’ll give it to you after you meet with the detective on Monday.”
“You swear to me now.”
“I’m not going to swear to shit. You’re in no position to make any demands, Darling.”
“Please bring it. You can pick me up at the same place on Kenyon.”
“Ten thirty in the a.m., Monday. I’ll see you then.”
“I’ll be there. And bring that—”
I disconnect.
Calvin is on the sidewalk waiting for me when I pull up. What little bit of snow has fallen has been shoveled off the stairs to his house and the stretch of sidewalk in front. He’s wearing a gray hoodie under his jacket and shouldering his backpack. Like a kid waiting for a school bus, but he’s in his twenties.
When he gets in the car and shuts the door, I say, “Sorry about being a bit late. Some last-minute shit happened.”
“Like you said, I’m on the clock, so waitin’ is easy money. Am I gonna learn somethin’ today?”
“Yeah, actually, go sit in the back. We’re going to set up on that house on Queen, conduct a little surveillance.”
His brows rise. I think he likes that idea.
He opens the door.
“You have something to drink, eat, and piss in?”
“Piss in?”
“You think we can break away from surveilling so you can go piss?”
“Never thought about that.”
“You just learned something new, then. You got a jar with a lid, or something like a Gatorade bottle in the house?”
“You serious, right?”
“Yes, I’m not playing you. Go get something.”
“A’right.”
He takes his backpack and walks up the stairs.
A couple minutes later he returns with a large glass orange juice bottle, shows it to me through the side window like he’s proud of it. He gets in the back, sitting behind the front passenger seat.
“Damn, that’s a big bottle. You piss that much?”
“All I could find on short notice.”
“Set it on your side of the floor, not my seat.”
“It’s clean.”
“I know, but put it on the floor anyway.”
I remember the gun in my backpack. I grab the backpack from the floor behind my seat and set it on the front passenger seat. I unzip an outside compartment and pull out the binos, hand them to Calvin.
“There you go. You’ll be the eyes.”
I pull out, notice him in the rearview mirror, looking through the front window with the binos.
“Put your seat belt on.”
“Who gonna know?”
“Me,” I tell him.
“It’s restricting, man.”
“Better that than being thrown into me or out the front windshield if I get in an accident.”
“Shiet, that ain’t likely.”
“I know. I have good driving skills, but all the same.”
“I meant me being thrown into you or out the window.”
“Just put your fucking seat belt on. My car, my rules.”
“Damn, you sounding like my uncle.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
Sixty-Six
Back to flurries, but melting when they hit the front windshield, which is good because I can’t turn the wipers on while on surveillance. We’ve been set up for more than an hour, and all is quiet. We can’t see anything inside the house. The shades are pulled down. Doesn’t look like anyone is home, or maybe they had a late night and are sleeping.
I do love the surveillance part of this job, despite these dull moments. I loved it even more when I was a cop, though. It’s like I had more control, leverage. It’s different not being sworn, having lost an impenetrable oath.
“Why you wear that suit? You don’t work in no office,” Calvin says from the back seat.
He catches me by surprise, and I say, “My suit?”
“Yeah. Seems like it’d be uncomfortable, restricting, even.”
“Like the seat belt, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Not if you’re wearing a nice suit.”
“But it seems that most of the work you do is in this car. I can understand if you at an office and behind some desk meeting with people.”
“This car is my office, and I do dress down on occasion. It’s just a matter of looking professional.”
Truth is, it’s more than that. Something like magical thinking. I sometimes feel vulnerable without it, like I used to feel when I first hit the street as an officer and had to wear that heavy Kevlar vest. I won’t tell hi
m that shit, though.
My cell vibrates.
“Frank Marr,” I answer.
“Hello, Marr. This is Rattan.”
“How are you doing, Detective?”
“Always working. We identified the guy your source says is Rule.”
“Yeah, you mentioned that before. What’s his full name?”
“Jonas Rule. He has a substantial record, so I obtained a current Live Scan photo of him. It looks a lot like the guy in the bodycam photo, but I’d like to get your source to look at the photo I have and confirm that it’s the same guy your source knows as Rule.”
I turn to Calvin. He’s peering through the binos.
“I can arrange that,” I say.
“And I can be there with you?”
“Yes. Where are you now?”
“At the office, but I can meet you.”
“How about the construction lot off Sherman?”
“Where the kid got shot?”
“It’s not a crime scene anymore, right?”
“It’s not.”
“I can be there in about an hour.”
“Okay, I’ll see you there.”
“All right.”
I disconnect and slip the cell back in my inner coat pocket, turn to Calvin, who is looking at me.
“What that about?” he asks.
“Detective Rattan. She identified a possible suspect based on who you said the guy in the bodycam photo was and needs you to look at an arrest photo of him to confirm.”
“They arrested Rule?”
“No. It’s an older arrest photo, but this is how the police work. It’s a part of the process.”
“So she gonna know I’m the guy who said it looked like Rule?”
“Yep.”
“I don’t want to get jammed up with that, possibly have to go to court or something.”
“I’ll keep you out of court.” Somehow. “You work with me now. And remember when I said it’s good to do certain things for the police?”
“Yeah, favors and shit like that.”
“Right.”
“When she asks how you know him—”
“I said I don’t know him,” he snaps back.
“I know, but she’ll probably ask, so tell her simply, you grew up in the Clifton area and know a lot of the boys that hang or live around there, but you don’t know Rule personally, just seen him around. Nothing more.”
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