There were a million things Bo wanted to say right now, wished he could say, but words failed him. If he believed Kaitlin was wrong at least he could hold onto that, use it to galvanize himself against the long nights to come but he couldn’t. Because he knew Kaitlin was right and not even Bo could justify is actions any longer.
Bo opened the door, stood, and closed the car door softly behind him. She backed out of the driveway and onto the street. The lights of the car tracked across his body as she pulled onto Holly Drive and left him. Kaitlin didn’t look back, and she never said good-bye.
Chapter Forty Eight
The ops tempo in Southwest hadn’t decreased in the two weeks since the closing ceremonies. There was still a heavy tourist population, and the department hadn’t wanted to take their boot off the gangs’ throats just yet. Crime suppression sweeps continued around the clock. The city had even revived some old laws that allowed them to jail gang members without being charged with a crime. Anti-assembly, they called it. Was it harsh? Absolutely. Did it work? Absolutely. They’d been warned.
The sweeps were highly controversial and politically charged but eventually accepted as a necessary evil to ensure the safety of the Olympics. The chief drew heavy criticism for continuing the sweeps in the weeks following the Games. He argued the department couldn’t give up the territory they’d gained and wouldn’t just retreat and let the gangsters and the pushers swarm back into those neighborhoods the department had fought so hard to make safe.
To further complicate the situation, professional football started in a little over three weeks. In the two seasons they’d been in Los Angeles, the Raiders had become the unofficial mascot of South Central. The gangbangers embraced not only the team’s colors and insignia, but the team’s persona as well. Gangsters gravitated to the home games.
Mitchell rolled into the Southwest Station in a slick top CRASH prowler.
He’d partnered with Officer Sam Beck since his return from the very short detail to the Marlon Rolles investigation. His relationship with Ellison had deteriorated so much they avoided each other during shifts. Mitch couldn’t be sure that Ellison found out about his implicating Rolles to Lieutenant Zarcone and the Narcotics Division. But given the precipitous drop off in their relationship, it made sense. You sometimes needed to lie down with dogs in this business, but Mitch believed Ellison’s judgment in the matter was severely clouded.
Mitch exited the car and walked around the back to get his deployment bag, and he went inside. He stowed the gear and went to his table to check messages. Ellison was there, orbiting. Mitch walked over to the desk without introduction and picked up some loose paper, shuffling through it absently.
“Lieutenant wants to see you,” Ellison said.
“OK, thanks.” Mitch dropped the papers after a few seconds, none too fast, and made his way over to Zarcone’s office. He rapped his knuckles on the doorjamb.
“Hey, Boss. What’s up?”
Zarcone looked up from the report on this desk. “Mitch, come in. Have a seat.” The lieutenant continued when Mitch sank into the chair. “I knew this was coming after the Courtyard wrapped, so I can’t say as I’m surprised. But I didn’t think it’d be this soon.” Zarcone paused. “I just took a phone call from the Office of Operations. You’re going downtown.”
“For what?”
“You’ve been transferred to Organized Crime. Must have impressed somebody with that Rolles thing, even if it didn’t get any traction. I hate to see you go; you’re a hell of a detective.”
“Thank you, sir. That means a lot.”
“You might as well get used to calling me Tom. Congratulations, Lieutenant Gaffney. Your assignment also comes with a promotion.”
Lieutenant.
Lieutenant.
First time out. That was almost unheard of. Mitchell Gaffney would be one of the youngest lieutenants in the department. A wash of excitement welled up inside him.
And drained away just as fast.
This would not come without cost.
The department was an extremely political organization and it would simply be assumed that his promotion was due to political favor. Many of the existing lieutenants would resent him for coming up so quickly when they’d had it harder, waited longer and the sergeants who’d passed the exam but hadn’t made rank would resent him for moving up faster than them, for not paying his dues. And everyone would know that while Mitchell Gaffney was an exemplary officer, someone was pulling strings.
Mitchell competed in an all-conference track meet in college once. A sprinter from the University of Oregon, a guy that he’d battled with for three years, won their event with Mitch coming in a distant second. That is, until the officials realized that the Oregon sprinter jumped the gun by just a touch. He was disqualified from the race and Mitch was given credit for the victory but the distance between first and second was such that even without the gun jump, the other runner ran a faster time.
This felt a lot like that race.
Mitch also had to live with the knowledge that he’d never have gotten this without Bo Fochs. And while Rolles wasn’t exactly going free, he wasn’t exactly behind bars either and that had been the point.
“Your promotion isn’t effective until September, so don’t go holding it over Ellison just yet.”
Mitch stood and shook Zarcone’s hand. “Thanks, Tom,” he said naturally. “For everything. I appreciate you backing me on Rolles and on the Courtyard. I couldn’t have done it without your support.”
Zarcone waved it off. “Stay in touch, Mitch.” He let out a short laugh. “I’ll probably be working for you one of these days.”
Chapter Forty Nine
Kaitlin walked out to her balcony with a wineglass in her hand. She was never much of a wine drinker and this bottle she’d just grabbed at random at the grocery store because it was about what she wanted to pay. Beer made her think of Bo. She leaned against the railing to look at the ocean beyond the apartments and hotels, holding the stem of the glass in both hands and resting it on the iron bar. Afternoon light made the wine look like pale gold. The apartment wasn’t much and was way overpriced, but she had a nearly unobstructed view of the Pacific, and that was worth it. On the evenings she wasn’t reporting Kaitlin would sit out on the balcony with a drink and watch the sunset. When she was reporting and usually got home long after dark, she would just sit out here and listen to waves crashing on the shore.
She’d known that the play with the Rolles tape was a long shot but even she was surprised at how easily the station caved. When in the whole history of journalism did a news team side with the police? LAPD did a masterful job of painting Bo as a rogue detective with a consuming obsession about the case that got him thrown out of the department and, Kaitlin had to admit, there was some fair points to back that assertion up. Curiously, the department also said that Fochs manipulated her and strung her along with falsified information to garner her cooperation. Her news director only admonished her to be more careful with the sources she trusted in the future. It could have ended much, much worse for her if the department was really trying to bury this thing. Of course, there was also the phone call late this afternoon by a Captain Ed Adler who told her that he always valued a solid investigative reporter and could they open a dialogue, occasionally help each other out. Never hurt to have friends.
The station didn’t want the tape so Kaitlin kept it. She’d listened to it fifty times if she heard it once—you can clearly hear Marlon Rolles not only authorize the deal but order Jamaal Shabazz to open fire. This contradicted with the story that Shabazz was gunned down in an unrelated incident several miles away trying to recruit some gang members into the Next Chapter Foundation.
There was a hell of a lot of evidence on that tape she just needed to find the right avenue to make it public.
But for now, it would go in a safe deposit box until she knew what her next move would be. This information would be very valuable to someone, the question was, to whom. KN
BC didn’t want it because they were afraid of the political consequences and didn’t want to take the risk but they weren’t the only news organization in town.
Kaitlin took a sip of wine and fought to keep Bo from her conscious mind. When she realized that fighting it was the same as actually thinking about him, she just let it happen. She would miss him, when she’d gotten over being furious with him. But Bo made his choice—he could have walked away from Rolles or, even accepted defeat, and Kaitlin would have been fine with either. Then they could try to figure out what they had. Instead, Bo chose his ghosts.
It was only when Kaitlin recognized that the wine wasn’t supposed to be salty that she realized she was crying.
Not far from her, Bo sat on the sand of Zuma Beach watching the waves crash against the shore, wishing he were well enough to glide across them and wishing he could be anywhere but tied to the land. He’d actually tried to paddle out but the eruption of red pain sent shockwaves throughout his body and a dry scream to his lips. Bo didn’t even paddle to shore, he just lay on the board like a dead seal and let the waves carry him in.
This was prison.
Bo tried to call Kaitlin once more but she never returned it so he decided it was best that he respect her wishes. The silence was the worst. Bo felt that if she’d at least have told him to go to hell, said that she’d hated him and never wanted to see him again he could have some kind of closure. Instead, the silence, the simple lack of resolution left him empty. Bo understood loss but there was no closure with vacuum.
Fochs didn’t know if he loved Kaitlin. He knew now that he didn’t understand what that word meant. But he did know that the absence of her in his life left a hole. One he hadn’t realized was full until it wasn’t.
The Olympics had come and gone without incident. Bo ignored the games. The realization didn’t happen all at once, rather it was like the dawn in the winter, slow but steady. There was no gang war. The rip current of violence that flowed beneath the surface of the city appeared to have dissolved. The escalation of hostilities between the various Blood and Crip factions that started with the Courtyard Massacre somehow dissipated or at least, backed down to the levels it was usually at.
The night of the opening ceremonies, the entire city was electrified with excitement, and the eyes of the world were focused on LA.
Nothing happened.
The days that followed brought more nothing. Angelinos were even polite. The Olympics were every bit the world-class, safe event that Chief Gates had promised it would be. The gang war that had been building since the Courtyard Massacre didn’t just dissolve it disappeared. There wasn’t a single violent crime reported in the Olympic area. South LA had been on the verge of tearing itself apart for weeks. It was about to erupt into a conflagration not seen since Watts, but it simply blew out like a candle in a wet breeze. At the same time, the department aggressively shut down the investigation of Marlon Rolles and anyone associated with it. Being one of the few people with the knowledge of either side of that equation, Fochs couldn’t believe in coincidence. He knew.
They used Rolles to broker a truce. It was the only explanation. Rolles knew all of the players, had access to them and was one of the few who could get a sit down with all. He also had something he could dangle in front of them for cooperation.
That, apparently, was the price LAPD was willing to pay for short-term security.
The weekend before the opening ceremonies, a body turned up in the dirty trickle known as the LA River. They eventually identified him as Sterling Fremont. He’d died of a gunshot wound to the left eye, the way snitches go out. It didn’t even make the news.
But the hammer to the head for Fochs was the implacable knowledge that he’d gotten a man killed for nothing. Did it matter that the man was a criminal? No justice would be served, and no wrong righted.
Unlike Gaffney, there was no Officer Involved Shooting Board to tell Bo whether or not he’d been right. No union lawyer would tell him he’d had no other choice.
Fochs would have to wrestle with those questions alone.
Every move Bo had made and everything he traded was to expose Marlon Rolles for what he was. And he did but in the end, no one would know.
The Inglewood Police did contact Bo about his crash. They pressed him about what he was speeding away from, and he told them that he was a private investigator working for a reporter. She’d gotten a lead that a drug buy was going to go down and hired him to watch it and try to get pictures. Things must’ve gone south, Bo told them, because the place erupted into gunfire, and he took off before he got shot too. Must’ve lost the camera in the crash. Bo left Rolles name out of it. It would draw too many questions.
By then, Bo had learned the body of Jamaal Shabazz was found a block south of MLK, dead of multiple gunshot wounds. It was all over the news. A member of an anti-gang charity gunned down by the very people he was trying to help. Obviously, Rolles had needed to distance himself from the garage so he had someone dump Shabazz’ body and call it in. When he put all of that together, Bo thought that even Gaffney would find that cold blooded.
Shabazz was an instant hero of the black community.
Bo had to live with the knowledge that he owed his freedom to his enemy. If Marlon Rolles hadn’t covered his own tracks, Bo might well be cooling his heels in jail on a manslaughter charge.
As it was, there appeared to be no public or official knowledge of Bo’s involvement in this so as far as he knew, there was no liability for McLaren. Bo hoped that would be enough but it would be another five months before Bud was willing to talk to him again.
Rolles knew who Deacon was, but Fochs was unsure if they knew about him. If they didn’t, it would be a simple public records check to find out who totaled a 1969 Mustang GT-500 at the Centenela/Sepulveda intersection.
Would they come for him? Possibly.
But Bo Fochs would be alone. Deacon Blues was in the wind. The day after he got out of the hospital, Bo found an unsigned get well card and a gift wrapped box on his doorstep. Inside was a single line of text, “They got a name for the winners in the world.” The box contained Bo’s pistol.
He got a letter from LA General later that week informing him that his bill had been paid and that his benefactor wished to remain anonymous.
He passed his days dry-popping Codeine and watching the waves he could not surf until his body healed. This was what prison felt like.
Fochs was alone, but he was not unprepared.
He had an unregistered .45 and material knowledge of Marlon Rolles attempting to sell a half a million dollars’ worth of cocaine.
When they came for him, Fochs would be ready.
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Acknowledgements
This book would not have been possible without my wife, Lisa and her incredible, tireless and unending support. Thank you for giving me the space and the time to tell my story. I love you.
Thank you to my cover artist and lifelong friend, Randall Nelson. No one has ever been able to capture my words the way you can. Its so fitting that you designed the cover for this book. We’ve come a long way from writing comic books as kids on Irvin Avenue, my friend. You can check out Randall’s amazing artwork at randallnelson.com
About the Author
Dale M. Nelson grew up outside of Tampa, Florida. He graduated from the University of Florida’s College of Journalism and Communications in 1999 and then went on to serve as a United States Air Force Officer. Following his military service, Dale relocated to the Washington D.C. area where he worked in the defense, technology and telecommunications sectors before starting his writing career. He currently lives in Washington D.C. with his wife and daughters.
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