Done in One (9781466857841)

by Jerkins, Grant; Thomas, Jan

  Suddenly the Energizer Bunny appeared on-screen, and Jill threw herself in front of the TV.

  “No! Not him! Not the bunny.”

  Jill grabbed the remote out of Jake’s hand and quickly found Martha Stewart.

  “You want to save the world? Shoot her.”

  Jacob smiled, worked the action again, though he kept the weapon pointed at the ceiling.

  “Honey, you’re downrange.”

  “What?”

  “You’re downrange.”

  She stared at him. Hands on hips.

  “I am not downrange, Jake. I’m in our living room. And aren’t you working later today? Isn’t that why you can’t make Brodie’s birthday party?”

  “Yep. Afternoon and evening.”

  “Look at you! You’re off duty and doing this! You’ve got me folding laundry in cadence. Stop it! Enjoy your morning off!”

  He sighed and lowered his weapon.

  “There’s no such thing as an off-duty cop. I’m just trying to stay sharp.”

  “I know you are, but Jesus! Does it have to consume your every waking moment? When do you relax?”

  “This is relaxing for me.”

  “No, honey. It’s training. I know it for what it is. I just don’t want you obsessing, unable to enjoy free time.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Please, please take some time off. Read a book, actually watch the TV, go visit Oz, look at this.”

  Jill raised her t-shirt over her head and flashed him. Jake laughed. Neither of them wanted things to get tense.

  “See? You need me to help get you out of that head of yours.”

  She walked toward him at the couch.

  “It’s just not safe to stay in there too long without a break, okay?”

  He grabbed her waist and hugged her as she tapped him on the head.

  “Okay?”

  “Okay. I get it. I think I’ll go visit Oz.”

  “Good idea. Does he know about Bryant?”

  “Yeah, I think maybe he does.”

  * * *

  Jacob found a grocery store in Hangtown and loaded up on goodies. He walked out with two bags full and a copy of the Sacramento Bee tucked under his arm. He put the bags on the passenger seat of his pickup truck, then sat behind the wheel and opened the paper to the classifieds. It took him a while, but he found a listing that looked perfect and circled it. He took out his cell phone and called the number in the ad. Once he was finished talking, Jacob started up his truck and drove away.

  He had to walk up several flights of stairs to get to Oz’s apartment. The elevator was out.

  Outside the door, Jacob could hear Bob Dylan’s forlorn voice pleading with his mother to take his guns away, because he just didn’t have the heart to shoot them anymore. He stood there and listened to the song. He was afraid to knock. Afraid of what he might find on the other side. He hated to watch Oz’s decline into a full-blown blue recluse, so he saw him less and less these days. It hurt too much. It hurt to see his mentor debase himself. But it also hurt to know that he could be looking at his own future. He’d thought the other day that the only way for Sesak to ever take his job was to outshoot him or kill him. But there was a third way. It was the way Jake himself had become primary sniper. His partner had gone 51–50. Lost his mind. If Jake went down the rabbit hole and never came back, then Sesak would become primary sniper. That was the third option.

  Cowell had said, “We’ve gotta see how these hits are affecting you,” and maybe the man was right. The psych appointment was just a week away, looming over him like test results at a cancer clinic. What would they find? What would they see when they examined his brain?

  Jacob knocked, but got no response. The Dylan record ended. There was a pause as the tone arm lifted, and a light crackle as the needle sat back down into the opening grooves. Then Mr. Robert Allen Zimmerman was asking his mama to take his badge away, that he just had no use for it anymore.

  This was bad. A Dylan 45 on repeat was a bad omen. Jake kept knocking. A long, authoritative cop knock. The kind of knock many of this building’s occupants would be familiar with. He could just imagine some of them flushing their drugs down the toilet right about now.

  Dylan was talking about a long, black cloud coming down when the needle was unceremoniously dragged across the record and the music stopped.

  Jacob saw a shadowy flicker behind the peephole. The door opened.

  Oswald didn’t say anything. He made bleary, brief eye contact, then turned and made room for Jacob to enter. Piss, B.O., Old Crow, and Hoppe’s. The usual odors.

  “Bob Dylan. Has it come to that?”

  “I’m afraid it has, Jake. I’m afraid it has. Nah, I just left it on in case Montezuma and Hay Seed showed back up. I’m fucking with their heads.”

  “Detectives Alejandro Cortez and Sayeed Hasan? They’re okay.”

  “Yeah, they are. But I gotta give ’em hell. That’s what crazy old fucks like me do. Give people hell.”

  “What else you got cued up? A little Johnny Cash? ‘Don’t Take Your Guns to Town’?”

  Oz smiled. “You know it. And then ‘Bang Bang,’ Sonny & Cher. ‘I Didn’t Know the Gun Was Loaded,’ the Andrews Sisters.”

  “The Andrews Sisters? And they call me old school. ‘I Shot the Sheriff’?”

  “‘I Don’t Like Mondays,’ Boomtown Rats.”

  “I don’t get that one.”

  “Sometimes you gotta dig deeper. That song was about Brenda Ann Spencer.”

  “The, uh, San Diego elementary school shootings? She was the shooter.”

  “Right. Reporter asked her why she did it, she said, ‘I don’t like Mondays.’”

  “In that case, good one. ‘Saturday Night Special,’ Lynyrd Skynyrd.”

  “A bit obvious after mine, but okay. ‘Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down),’ Nancy Sinatra.”

  “‘Hey Man, Nice Shot,’ Filter.”

  “‘Jeremy,’ Pearl Jam.”

  “Yep. Jeremy spoke in class today. What about you, Oz? Did you speak in class? Did you speak to Bryant?”

  “I’m saddened that you would ask me that. Truly, Jake. These days I’m less Pearl Jam and more Kiss. To wit: ‘Love Gun.’”

  “‘Love Gun’? Really?”

  “Really.”

  “You got a girl?” Jake smiled, delighted by the idea that Oswald was seeing someone.

  Oswald shrugged and said, “A companion, yes.”

  “Who’s the lucky recipient of your high-caliber lust?”

  “Why use names? A rose is a rose is a rose.”

  “You never were one to kiss and tell.”

  “My gun is quick, and my lips are sealed.”

  “I brought you some stuff,” Jake said and sat the grocery sacks on the kitchen counter.

  Oswald yawned and peeked into one of the bags. He dug to the bottom and pulled out a fifth of Johnnie Walker Red Label. He held it up and admired it.

  “I guess I’ve been on your mind. This is a step up from the usual rotgut you bring me.”

  “If you look closely, I think there’s some food in there, too.”

  Oz made a show of looking deeper and said, “Well, sure as shit.”

  He broke the seal on the whiskey and poured himself a quick shot into a jelly-jar glass. Downed it. Then poured another and offered it to Jacob.

  “Waker-upper?”

  “I generally try to wait till after 1700 hours.”

  Oswald shrugged and downed the shot himself.

  “Mama’s boy.”

  Jacob handed Oswald the newspaper folded open to the circled want ad. Oswald pretended to give it great attention, his mouth circled in an “O” of mock amazement.

  “‘Must have law enforcement experience.’”

  He handed the paper back to Jacob.

  “Well, I’ve certainly got that. Does it say ‘burnt-out borderline alcoholic psychos need not apply?’ It didn’t, did it? Well, shit, I might have a chance. In fact, I recently interviewe
d with law enforcement. Aren’t you proud? They showed a lot of interest in me.”

  “I just happened to see it, that’s all. Jill and I have banked at the Morgan City branch for years. I, uh, well, I went ahead and gave the manager a call. Talked to him about you. He’s interested. Call him.”

  “Maybe I will.”

  “You can use me as a reference. Cowell, too.”

  “Jesus. I really have been on your mind.”

  “Look, I’m not here because I think you shot Bryant. But I don’t think you’re the same man you used to be, either. And I think you know that. Do I think you’re off your rocker, scary, dangerous? No, I don’t. The reason I’m here is because I was on scene when Bryant took the hits. And I was shot at later the same day—”

  “Someone took a shot at you?”

  “Yeah. And I want your opinion. That’s all. I want to know what you think.”

  “I’d love to sit down and palaver with you, Jake. Thing is, I’m not alone here.”

  Jake glanced at the closed bedroom door.

  “She’s still here? That is serious.”

  Oswald shrugged. “Not serious. You know me, Jake. I subscribe to the four F’s school of dating. Find ’em, feed ’em, fuck ’em, and forget ’em. Though I don’t bother feeding ’em anymore.”

  Jacob crossed to the living room, to the television and the VCR that sat atop it and punched the eject button. VHS and 45s. Oz was definitely an analog guy. The machine made a good bit of mechanical noise before spitting out the tape. Jake looked at it.

  “Shane? You showed her Shane and played her your Dylan records? I’d call that serious.”

  Oswald hung his head.

  “What about the Kavanaugh poetry?” Jacob scanned the room and saw the book spread open facedown on the coffee table. “Yep, there—”

  That’s when Jake saw the brass shells set up like chess pieces on the coffee table.

  “You showed her your collection? I’ve been married twenty some odd years and I’ve never—”

  “How many is it for you now, Jake? Last I knew it was fourteen.”

  “I don’t drink myself into oblivion every night looking at them.”

  Oswald walked over and picked up one of the empty shells. Studied it.

  “And what will your last one be? Who will it be? This was my eighteenth, remember? My last.”

  Oswald moved the casing around in his hand, like a cardsharp manipulating a poker chip.

  “Guy had beaten his wife over and over again. And that one night it went too far. We were on the neighbor’s roof. Remember?”

  Jacob swept the shells off the table, scattering them.

  “It’s bullshit! Holding on to the past.”

  “Oh yeah, you remember all right.”

  Oswald went calmly about collecting the shells, bent over, his back to Jacob.

  Jacob headed for the door. He paused with his hand on the knob, his back to Oswald’s back.

  “It was nobody’s fault. You know that.”

  “Do I?”

  “You can’t blame Bryant. And you can’t blame me as your spotter. Once you’ve got the green, it’s on you. And you can’t blame yourself, either.”

  “Really? Bryant had no responsibility to know all the dynamics involved before giving a green?”

  “You could have spoken up.”

  “She was my goddamn neighbor! I wanted to save her.”

  “Oz—”

  “It’s different when it’s someone you know.”

  “It was still a good shot. No way to know the perp would squeeze the trigger when his brain short-circuited.”

  “No. The hostage died. That’s the definition of it not being a good shot.”

  “Take the security job, Oz. It’s time to put the past away.”

  Jacob closed the door on his way out.

  CHAPTER 18

  Family is so special.

  Jill thought this as she stacked birthday presents on the counter in the large eat-in kitchen. She was at her mom’s house for her nephew Brodie’s sixth birthday party.

  It had been only one day since Jake had come home hiding a secret, and while things were okay between them, the idea that he was holding something back remained in the margins of her mind. It was like waiting for the results of a blood test. You tried not to think about it too much, but the news was coming. She just didn’t know if it would be no-big-deal news or actual bad news. Life-altering, or just a bump in the road.

  Jill watched her mother rinse lettuce (for a salad the kids would never eat) in the kitchen sink. Kate Brenner was, at sixty-two, a tall, stately woman. Elegant, even. The way she was holding up boded well for Jill and her sister, Megan.

  Megan walked into the kitchen balancing two more presents wrapped in SpongeBob paper with a decorated birthday cake perched on top of the presents, and towing her eighteen-month-old toddler, Caitlyn. Miss Caitlyn had a blue pacifier parked securely between her lips, and cruised on in right behind her mom. Megan was also eight months pregnant and looked like she was about to tip over. Jill had to acknowledge that her sister was juggling all of this with grace. She had everything under control.

  Seeing what Megan had, the life she’d built, made Jill feel jealous. And Jill didn’t want to feel jealous. She hated herself for having that feeling and tore it down before it could get bigger. The closest she and Jake had gotten to having children was their two Saint Bernards, a male named Wyatt Morgan, and a female, Maggie Mae. They felt like real children to her and Jake. She remembered taking them out to parks and showing them off like a proud parent. Look what my kid can do. How people would come up to her and ask to pet them. They were big, imposing dogs, but kindness shone from their dark eyes. Jill could always tell how other people felt about Saint Bernards. If they called them “Beethoven dogs” they liked them. If she heard “Cujo,” then she knew to hold the dogs’ leashes tight.

  Maggie Mae and Wyatt Morgan were both dead now. Maggie died of a bone cancer that was hereditary in Saint Bernards. Wyatt went not long after, mourning for his companion. And Jill was still too brokenhearted to replace them.

  Caitlyn pulled at her mom’s hem, and when Megan turned to see what her daughter wanted, the birthday cake slid from the top of the boxes in her grasp. In turning back to right the cake before it crashed to the floor, she knocked Caitlyn off-balance. And then somehow managed to save the cake and the presents and swoop down to catch Caitlyn before she fell down and went boom. It was quite a feat.

  “I swear Jill, I don’t know how I’m going to manage a third one. It’s just not possible. We’re going to have to give one to you and Jacob. Seriously. Pick one. Any one.”

  It was a joke. But it hurt. And Jill wondered if Megan knew it hurt. Of course she knew.

  Family is so special.

  Jill followed her mom out to the dining room to help set the table. Kate Brenner dealt out the party plates, and Jill added spoons and forks.

  In a tone of voice that gave nothing away, Kate said, “So do we put out a plate for him or leave it blank as usual?”

  “Mom, I told you. He’s got a new partner and he has to spend extra time training her.”

  “A her? I didn’t know that. Well, Roger is an actual new partner. Lawyers have complex responsibilities, too. And he’s here.”

  “Brodie is Roger’s son. That’s different.”

  “That’s fine, but family is family.”

  “Whatevs, Mom.”

  “Don’t use that hippie talk with me.”

  “Mom, that is not hippie—”

  “Your father had an affair. I think. I’m pretty sure. An office girl at the lumberyard.”

  “Oh for God’s sake, he did not.”

  “I think he did. When men and women work that close and spend so much time together. Things happen. It’s human nature. They start leaving for work early and getting home late. They stop going to family functions. There’s special events at work. Daylong training sessions.”

  “That’s not Ja
ke. We’re different. What we have is different.”

  “Whatevs, Jill. Whatevs.”

  “This is just absurd. Am I being filmed? This can’t be real.”

  “And what it comes down to is they just act different. A woman can always tell when her man is different. You can tell. You can tell when they start hiding things. Secrets.”

  “Jake and I are different,” Jill said, and was surprised at how quiet her voice had become. It no longer had conviction.

  “Still, family is family. He should be here with you. It’s suspicious.”

  “I’m not stupid. You know that, right? I’m not a stupid woman. I’m a published novelist. Reviewed in the Washington Post.”

  “Maybe The Bee will review the next one. Then I can show my friends.”

  Jill scanned the room one final time for hidden cameras, but accepted that this in fact was not a put-on. It was real. This was her reality.

  Family is so special.

  “All I’m saying is that he should be here with you. That’s all.”

  Megan caught the tail end of the conversation as she brought in a stack of yellow Solo cups and a pitcher of lethal-looking red punch. She wasted no time getting in on the jump-on-Jill action. Tag team.

  “That’s right. And wasn’t he an only child? He doesn’t understand probably.”

  “She thinks he’s cheating on her, too.”

  “No, I do not think that. And ‘only child’ has nothing to do with him not being here. What he does is life or death. Lives depend on it. You know that.” Jill was glad to hear that conviction had returned to her voice.

  Brodie came running into the dining room with a squirt gun in each hand.

  “Auntie Jill! Did you bring me money?”

  “Brodester! Hey birthday boy! You’ll see later.”

  Jill scooped him up and covered his face with kisses.

  “Is Uncle Jake out chasing bad guys?”

  “He is indeed!”

  Not quite under her breath, Megan muttered, “He’s out chasing something.”

  Brodie showed Jill his squirt guns.

  “I hope he catches ’em.”

  Jill adjusted his baseball cap and sat the boy back down.

  “So do I.”

  Brodie ran out of the dining room, guns blazing.

  “Bang! Bang! No more bad guys!”