Middle of Nowhere

by Ridley Pearson

  “Maybe not everyone,” Shoswitz admitted, “but you’ve only yourself to blame for that. You mouthed off to the press about the absenteeism; you pointed fingers at people.”

  It was true. Boldt had been interviewed by a reporter, and the story had hit the national wires, painting a pretty ugly picture of the detectives who had joined the sickout in sympathy. If Shoswitz was telling him that the blue brick had been thrown through his window in response to that interview, then for Liz’s sake, his family’s sake, Boldt regretted giving that interview, even if what he said had to be said, which was how he felt about it. The politicians, in an effort to keep negotiations open, failed to express any feelings—rage, disappointment, anger—over the events of the past week, and Boldt felt such attitudes did more damage 64

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  than good, for they subtly condoned the walkout while taking a “hard-line stance” against it. He loved police work and was proud of the department; the Flu had damaged its reputation, perhaps forever.

  “I need access to your files, Phil,” Boldt repeated. He took Shoswitz’s concern for Liz as lip service. After nearly two decades of friendship, he saw his former lieutenant in a whole new light. If the man cared, he’d have already been on the telephone to his buddy Mac Krishevski, and would have demanded the names of those responsible for that brick. But he was mad at Boldt for talking to the press, mad at Boldt for continuing to carry the caseload dumped on him. Mad at life. Anger had consumed him, and if he didn’t watch out it would consume Boldt as well.

  Boldt asked, “What’s so complicated about your helping me get those files?”

  Shoswitz’s eyes flashed darkly and his nostrils flared. He stopped his pacing and stared at his former sergeant in an all-too-familiar angry glare. “Without the investigating officer or officers present, it would hardly be appropriate—”

  “They’re out sick,” Boldt pointed out.

  “My point, exactly!”

  “Their decision, not mine. Not yours! What are you suggesting, we delay all active investigations? We delay an investigation into the assault of a fellow officer in order to appease the Blue Fluers?”

  “Don’t use that term in this office.”

  “It’s a sickout, Phil. What’s the—”

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  “It’s more complicated than that,” Shoswitz complained, interrupting.

  “Not to me it isn’t,” Boldt argued. “I need someone to stand up for what happened to Liz and I need a look at your files. Explain how any of that’s complicated.”

  Shoswitz glared and returned to his aimless pacing, reminding Boldt of a pit bull in a cage. He pushed away his personal concerns over Liz and the blue brick—Shoswitz wasn’t going to help him there—and tried to stay focused on gaining access to the paperwork he deemed crucial to the Sanchez investigation. A burglary was handled by the uniform who responded to the call. Typically, he or she conducted a short interview, inspected the scene, and filled out a report, leaving the victim to deal with the insurance underwriter. Detectives in the Burglary unit shuffled these reports, looking for possible pattern crimes or anything of substance that might connect up with information from snitches or fences they’d squeezed. They did far less field work than their counterparts in Homicide, Special Assaults, or Organized Crime, because a single, unconnected burglary was not worth a detective’s time—the likelihood of recovering and returning the stolen property was infinitesimal. Boldt needed Shoswitz to access his unit’s case files. He would also need the man’s outright cooperation if he were to round up all the recent burglary reports from the three other precincts. Shoswitz could pull this off with a couple calls to the other houses. But his entire team had walked out with the Fluers, and he seemed bound and 66

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  determined to protect them. It didn’t come as a complete surprise to Boldt—Shoswitz was a guild player through and through, even though his rank of captain and the existing management contract prevented him from following the guild’s lead.

  “Is this for you or Matthews?” Shoswitz asked sarcastically. Any detective was practiced in the art of changing subjects, but Shoswitz had not been in the field in years. His attempt to derail Boldt succeeded only because it stabbed for the heart.

  Boldt knew not to get sucked into this, but his mouth betrayed him. “What the hell does that mean?”

  he fired off indignantly.

  “She’s lead on Sanchez, not you, right?”

  “So?”

  “So who’s here asking for favors?” Shoswitz asked rhetorically. “It means what it means.”

  “Which is?” Boldt asked.

  “Lou, do I have to spell it out?”

  “You have to spell it out,” Boldt assured him. His face burned. His mouth had gone dry. Phil Shoswitz had been a friend for years—and here he was questioning Boldt’s loyalty to his wife and family. Shoswitz continued working that sore elbow. “You two . . . you work well together,” he said, drawing out the statement and meeting eyes with Boldt, who felt a hollow sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. “She dumped that rich guy for good, I hear.”

  “There’s nothing there, Phil. Leave it alone.”

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  “Of course not.”

  “You’re pissing me off here, Phil.”

  “How do you think I feel—we all feel—about your current enthusiasm for the job?”

  Politics. It hit him like cold water down the back. He had not expected Shoswitz to be so blatant in his support for Krishevski. Boldt felt stunned. Another ally down, and this one still wearing the badge, still working in the office. A friend. How many others on the job felt similarly? he wondered. How much internal sabotage was taking place in support of the Flu? “You were guild secretary for five years. I understand that, Phil.” He tried to remind the man, “But you and I—we’re not only bound by a different contract, we’re bound by friendship. We’re not guild members. Not anymore. Are we still friends?”

  Shoswitz huffed. Half a laugh. Half a groan. “This new chief shouldn’t be playing games with people’s wallets. Big mistake. Look at us,” he said, indicating himself and Boldt. “Would we be here arguing like this if it wasn’t for him?”

  “He’s new.”

  “He’s a jerk. What does someone from Philadelphia know about this town?”

  “He’s one of the best in the country. We both know that.”

  “Strange way of showing it,” Shoswitz said. “Pulling overtime. Cutting out off-duty work. It’s asinine!”

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  look at Liz’s left forearm!” Boldt fired off. “They brought this into my house, Phil. They crossed a line.”

  “Agreed,” Shoswitz said quickly. “You have no argument from me there.”

  “Don’t I?”

  “Meaning?”

  Boldt said, “Tell Krishevski to bring forward whoever’s responsible.”

  “I’m forbidden from contacting Krishevski or anyone involved in the . . . absenteeism,” Shoswitz reminded him. “Another wonderful decision from our new chief.”

  “Krishevski will start a war, he keeps this up. Blue against Blue. What’s that about? That has no place on this job!”

  “No one wants that.”

  “Tell that to Liz. Or Sanchez. She’s got her head screwed down so she can’t move, Phil. She’s a pair of eyeballs at the moment. Have you been to visit her? Has anyone? Where the hell is everyone? What if it was me or you who’d taken that fall? What does it take to get people back on the job?”

  “Promises,” Shoswitz said. “That’s where Mac Krishevski comes in. He’s playing both sides of the fence, Lou. He has to.”

  “Yeah? Well he should keep the bricks on his side of the fence.”

  A hard silence settled between them along with the looks of betrayal f
rom both men.

  “These files,” Shoswitz cautioned. “Tread lightly. No M I D D L E O F N O W H E R E

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  one on this squad is going to want to hear that you’re nosing around in their files. It doesn’t look right, a Homicide Lieu stepping in and taking over a CAProp case.”

  “I can’t be worried about that.”

  “You need to be.”

  “No, I don’t. What I need is those files. You have the authority to round them up for me.” Boldt pressed,

  “I need you to do that. I need to see if the Sanchez assault fits into any kind of pattern your boys may have on the books.”

  “Why do you think we file in triplicate?” Shoswitz asked.

  The Public Safety Building housed administration for all of SPD. Boldt understood the message. “They’re here? Copies of all those reports are already here, regardless of precinct?”

  Shoswitz said, “Where else?”

  “You’ll request them for me?”

  “They’ll be on your desk in an hour,” Shoswitz said.

  “But this conversation never took place. You thought of this on your own. You pulled a favor from someone in the boneyard. You play this however you want, but my name doesn’t come up.”

  “Priorities,” Boldt said. “How long do you support a guy like Krishevski?”

  “To each their own,” added Phil Shoswitz.

  “Yeah, sure,” Boldt said in disgust. “Who are your own, Phil? These guys who walked off their beats? Or 70

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  Sanchez over there in the hospital doing staring contests with the ceiling tiles?”

  “Be careful, Lou. You say that kind of thing in the wrong company and you won’t be making any friends.”

  “Are you the wrong company, Phil?”

  “Get out of here before I change my mind about those files.”

  “I’m gone,” Boldt said. He didn’t add that he’d gotten what he came for, though he felt tempted to do so. He wanted the last word, but didn’t take it. He left Shoswitz with the illusion of control. He accepted the promise of the files, savoring an undeclared victory. M

  The last three weeks of reported burglaries arrived on Boldt’s desk ninety minutes later, most of them nothing more than the requisite property loss report—one hundred and fourteen in all. Boldt switched on his desk lamp, a cup of Earl Grey at the ready. If there had been a night shift it would have been just arriving, but the Flu had killed such shifts. Civilians still manned their desks, but with the detectives out “sick,” the place was a graveyard. He rubbed his eyes, cleaned his reading glasses with a long, slow breath and a piece of tissue, and examined the reports.

  Each report detailed a burglary represented by a numbered code. This was followed by name, address, time of day. First officer. Investigating detective, if any. List of stolen goods. A concise summary of events: re- turned home, broken window, missing stereo; awoke to a noise, M I D D L E O F N O W H E R E

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  entered the living room, suspect seen fleeing. Eyenumbing repetition. Uniformed patrol officers going through the routine of making the ripped-off public think someone cared. No one did but the insurance companies. They wanted a report filed and signed off on. Boldt studied those reports, fighting off drowsiness. He looked first to the list of stolen goods, separating out those that inventoried large-screen TVs, home computers, cell phones—all items believed stolen from Sanchez. A single TV didn’t count. A single computer didn’t interest him. With the exception of a cell phone, the items stolen from Sanchez each had retail values in excess of a grand. Picky. Exact. Kawamoto’s 37-inch TV

  had clearly been targeted; the VCR’s wire had not been coiled. Had it been too inexpensive to worry about? Or had Kawamoto’s interruption come before the burglar had enough time to examine it? TVs and stereos would normally be considered the domain of a junkie looking for his next fix, but junkies didn’t put white plastic ties around the electrical cords. Junkies didn’t trick home security systems by tying up the phone line. Boldt suspected that this particular rip-off artist sought out high-end electronics in enough quantity to justify the risk. A computer, a couple TVs and a cell phone to be cloned later might net him fifteen hundred from the right fence—not bad for a day’s work. Better than cop pay.

  Based on the list of stolen goods, Boldt narrowed his pile to twenty-three reports. Some of the forms had the small box checked off that indicated home security 72

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  systems, but not all. On two of these reports he noted that the officers made mention of the security systems being compromised. Boldt smelled a possible insurance fraud—homeowners arranging for the “theft” of their own electronics; they would then collect the insurance money, have the electronics returned, and pay out a percentage of the take to he who committed the “burglary.” The Stepford Thieves. Wouldn’t be the first white-collar crime investigated by SPD. Boldt flipped through the stack of pink, archived triplicate copies, wanting some other identifier. He read each of the twenty-three reports in more detail, taking the time to study the notes, wanting something to narrow these to a more manageable number. Twenty-three phone calls would take days, if not weeks, under the current caseload. Even shared with Daphne, he thought the job could take a week or more. Two or three weeks was not out of the question if they reached a bunch of answering machines. Shoswitz’s comments about his relationship with Daphne troubled him, stayed with him. He wanted to see it as exaggeration. Lies. He wanted to feel it in his heart as schoolhouse rumor, but it triggered fear instead—as if he’d been caught at something, and that bothered him most of all. His blunt concentration passed the time quickly. The tea went cold. His butt hurt. All the little pleasantries of police work. City traffic had slacked off outside. He heard a distant whine of tires, but not the up-closeand-personal street traffic with which he hummed along by day. The place smelled of janitor’s disinfectant, a M I D D L E O F N O W H E R E

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  chemical lime smell that had a hint of melting rubber to it. The janitor had passed through unnoticed. He glanced up at the clock—it was late; he owed Liz an apology. But before he picked up the phone to call her, he checked the clock a second time, recalling that Kawamoto had been hit in the daytime—extremely unusual. Sanchez had not, but for the moment he managed to separate the two cases and keep them that way. Back through his pile of reports he went. From the stack of twenty-three, he began pulling out reports, his heart racing as the new pile grew to six burglaries—the shared element: broad daylight.

  He went through all hundred-and-something files again. This time, a total of nine reports made up his pile. Nine burglaries. Nine violations of private property in broad daylight, all with thousands of dollars of highend electronics stolen. Big hits. Tricky hits. Some with home security devices apparently compromised. Wellorchestrated crimes. Practiced. Judging by Post-it notes and stapled attachments, Shoswitz’s detectives had apparently spotted some of these same similarities—these overlapping loose connections—had probably been developing leads when the Flu came along and sent them home to watch reruns. Now Boldt had them, and he suddenly felt like a runner being passed a baton. There was no mention of white plastic ties. No assaults. Just nine pink sheets on missing electronics and some attached notes from bone-weary detectives. Police work.

  The smell of burned coffee drifted down the hall. 74

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  The janitor had forgotten to turn off the pot. Boldt did so, stretching his legs, appreciating the moment away from the eyestrain and the tight back. He yawned. He washed out the coffeepot and shut the door to the lounge to keep the smell contained. All the while, he kept a weary eye over one shoulder. He kept thinking of that blue brick lying on his living-room floor, his wife in a sea of glass and her strained voice choking out, “I thought it was a bomb.” He thought of his kids, his responsibility, his promises. He recalled Shoswitz’s warning that his intrusion into Burglary’s tur
f and open cases would not be appreciated. But Sanchez’s eyes came back to haunt him.

  He would want to speak with all nine burglary victims; visit them in person, if possible. Daphne should accompany him, to read their answers. What they didn’t say, and how they didn’t say it, was often more important than what they put down for the record. He felt high, his spirits lifted by the discovery. Taken together, the reported crimes had been committed in broad daylight, in houses where the occupant had vacated the premises, in houses left locked, often with the home security system armed—with not one of the security systems announcing an intruder. Sanchez’s assault remained the anomaly—committed at nighttime, with the security system engaged, but the same high-end electronics stolen. Location was another possible tie—some of the burglaries had occurred in the North Precinct; others in the East or South, but always in white, uppermiddle-class neighborhoods. M I D D L E O F N O W H E R E

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  Boldt’s excitement grew as he sat back down. The cases looked damned good strung out in a line. Stacked in a pile. They made sense as a package. It was dark outside and nine o’clock. He had missed the family dinner at John and Kristin’s, had missed putting his kids to bed. Had worked through a date with his wife and family and friends. At 9:30 he called Liz and apologized. She sounded a little upset but said she missed him, which he reciprocated. He didn’t mention his partial victory on the case because it didn’t seem appropriate at the moment. Missing dinner was one thing in their family; missing the kids’ bedtimes another. He hated to disappoint Liz, even for a good cause. He and Liz had formed their courtship around jazz, films of every kind, and late-night dinners filled with stories and laughter. He had thought her too pretty for him; she’d feared even early on that he was too much of a workaholic. They had married young and for years had kept the marriage that way as well. Careers and the pressure to consider a family had briefly driven Liz to an affair, which in turn had encouraged Boldt to give in to temptation with Daphne Matthews for a single night. But that original connection between husband and wife had never been severed—it remained strong, if strained. They rarely made it to movies as a couple any longer—it was all Disney videos and the occasional Ice Capades musical. Boldt sometimes played Happy Hour jazz piano as a distraction, but Liz stayed home with the kids. The connection remained. Sometimes it took the form of a late-night movie or a rented video, 76