At Their Own Game

by Frank Zafiro

  Growing up in the Hillyard neighborhood, arguably the roughest part of Spokane, they used to tell us kids that we’d end up either cops or criminals. Our teenage years served as internships, where we got to decide which way we’d go. Or maybe it was decided for us. I don’t know.

  I do know that I avoided getting into any serious trouble. Yeah, I smoked a little weed and I stole some shit, but never got caught.

  Eventually, I got to not liking the kind of person I was becoming. I hung out with people who were drinking and smoking dope constantly and ripping each other off. I decided that wasn’t me. I wasn’t like that. Wasn’t a bad guy. I even got a little self-righteous about it, and maybe that’s what eventually caused my downfall. Karma is a bitch, and she doesn’t forget.

  So I became a cop. Maybe it was to prove I was different. And maybe for a while, I was. I didn’t know for sure. Truth be told, I still don’t.

  When I first came on the job, I was as full of piss and vinegar as any other rookie. I bought into that bullshit about honor and service. Hell, maybe it wasn’t bullshit. Maybe it was real, and it just turned into bullshit later.

  I remember riding around with my first training officer, a huge black man named Perry. He’d gone to Rogers High three years ahead of me, and played football. He was a brutal linebacker. One game, I watched him from the bleachers as he crushed the quarterback with a blind side sack, knocking him out of the game. The very next play, he sacked the backup quarterback, too. He didn’t knock the backup out of the game, but he must’ve put the fear of Perry into him, because that guy hurried his passes and threw air balls for the rest of the game.

  Perry played college ball and then he hung it up. I always thought he’d have a shot at the pros, but when I asked him about it, he snorted.

  “I’m not putting that kind of shit into my body,” was all he said, and I understood.

  Perry was smart. Not only street smart, but he took advantage of that full ride to WSU and got his degree in criminal justice. On top of all that, for a big man, he still moved fast.

  He showed me how to talk to people nice, and how to talk to them mean. He showed me how to chase bad guys and what to do when I caught them. He showed me how not to fuck up my paperwork, and not to trust the brass. Perry was good people, and a great cop.

  All of that, and yet the best advice he ever gave me was the one piece of his advice that I didn’t listen to.

  “Don’t ever,” he said, “ ever , sleep with another cop’s wife or girlfriend. Even if the man is fool enough to have one of each.”

  We were driving slowly down Regal, checking alleys at three in the morning, looking for car prowlers.

  I shrugged. “Okay.”

  “I mean this, Stank.” Perry had decided on our first night that Stankovic was too long and cops don’t call each other by their first names, so he gave me my first nickname. “This is important.”

  “I hear you.”

  “You wanna know why?”

  “I think it’s obvious why.”

  “Really? Okay, mister rookie who knows all the shit in the world. Tell me why.”

  I glanced over at him in the passenger seat. His training notepad was still wedged up between the support pillar and windshield. This didn’t sound like a canned training quiz, either, but I could tell he was serious.

  “Because it’s wrong,” I said simply.

  “No shit, Captain Obvious. Why is it wrong?”

  “It’s cheating. Infidelity.”

  “Are you married?”

  I shook my head. “You know I’m not.”

  “Got a girlfriend?”

  “Nothing steady. I’m focusing on my job right now.”

  “So if you ain’t got a wife or a girlfriend, how is it that you’re cheating?”

  “If she’s married or has a boyfriend, I’m part of it.”

  “Oh…I see. And that’s why you shouldn’t do it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Any other reason?”

  I thought about it for a minute. Then inspiration struck. “It violates the brotherhood.”

  “Do tell.”

  “Well, we’re out here on the front line, right? And we have to count on each other, sometimes for life and death. So we can’t betray each other. It breaks down the trust, the brotherhood.”

  We rode in silence for a few seconds. I shot a sideways glance over at him to see how I was doing.

  He was nodding slowly. “That’s probably all true,” he said. “And that shit would sound great on an oral board for new hire or getting promoted, so I’d keep it on file if I were you.”

  I blinked. “But…”

  “But this shit is as simple as the night is long,” Perry said. “Listen up. You don’t bang another cop’s wife or girlfriend for two simple reasons. Number one, who else you know that carries a gun twenty-four hours a day? And number two, cops are some no-forgetting motherfuckers. You add those two things together, and that is a serious problem.”

  I drove down Regal, amazed that this was tonight’s lesson.

  But Perry was right. And it only took me two years to realize it.

  I met her at the gym. Casual nods turned into chatting at the drinking fountain, turned into spotting each other on some lifts. The fact that she was married came up early. The fact that I had a girlfriend never did. By the time I found out who her husband was, we’d already cut several workouts short to slip off to my apartment for the tangled sheet tango.

  We were lying next to each other, just catching our breath, still sweaty, with the last of the slow, aching pleasure still fading when she said, “I’ve always had a thing for cops.”

  “Lucky me.”

  She rolled onto her side and toyed with the hair on my chest. “It just makes me feel safe.”

  “No safer place to be.”

  “Yeah? Safe from everything?”

  “Yep.”

  “Except other cops.”

  I rolled onto my side to face her. “What’s that mean?”

  So she told me. She was Mrs. Helen Falkner, wife to one Detective Kyle Falkner.

  Around the police department, Kyle Falkner was something less than a legend but more than just a guy. Most cops didn’t like him, but they respected him. The brass didn’t like him, either, but they grudgingly tolerated him, probably for the same reason cops respected him: he brought in cases. He was good. If you wanted a case solved, you gave it to him.

  He was something of an arrogant prick, the best I could tell. Of course, what did I know, what with my almost three years on the job, all in patrol? I was at that dangerous stage in a cop’s career. Just past rookie time, confident, competent, and way better at things in my own mind than I was in reality. In the few years of my career that followed, I saw almost every new guy travel the same overconfident path, almost without fail. Perry warned me about it. He probably had some kind of algorithm for it, too.

  So when I found out about Falkner, what I should have done was break it off, right there. Told Helen thanks for the fun, but I couldn’t violate the brotherhood, yada yada. Should’ve started a new round of being faithful to Michelle, too. Become a more honorable man. That kind of shit.

  What I did was keep fucking her. Hell, more often, if the truth be told. Pretty soon, we were sneaking around outside of the gym time, holing up at my apartment when I knew Michelle was working and wouldn’t drop by, or even grabbing a motel room a few times just to make it seem more illicit.

  When she asked me to come over to her house, I should have drawn the line. That was too dangerous, I should have said. That was too far.

  But I didn’t. I let my cock lead me right into that trap.

 
All the while, I never really stopped to think what was in this for her. Why was she running around on her husband? I was pretty sure I was the only one she was seeing, but who knew? And why did she pick me?

  I was still young, and those weren’t the kinds of things that I really needed answers to in order to forge ahead. She was indescribably hot, she fucked like it was going to be illegal tomorrow, and I guess it made me feel pretty superior to be sleeping with her right under Falkner’s nose. A little comeuppance for the great, lordly detective, right?

  Slowly, though, it became more than that. There was something about Helen. She had a smoky, seductive quality to her. A sexual ember that was always burning. But if that was all it was, I think maybe I could’ve broken away. I could have told myself that there were a thousand other women in Spokane with the same fire burning. Hell, there were a dozen at the same gym where I met Helen.

  She had something else, too.

  I’ve thought a lot about it since, and it’s been hard to pinpoint exactly how she affected me above and beyond everyone else. The closest I can come is to say that she made me feel like I could possess her, I could make her mine, and somehow find the answers to all the secrets of this world.

  Yeah, I know. Stupid.

  Either way, it was all great, until Falkner came home for lunch one day while I was there.

  I scrambled out of their bed and into my jeans, then was out the window with an armful of clothes and boots. I bolted across the yard –

  Who else do you know who carries a gun twenty-four hours a day?

  --and heard yelling behind me, but it was muffled enough to probably be coming from inside the house. I half-expected to hear a shot ring out, either inside the house or out in the yard, the bullet buzzing past me like a pissed off hornet. But it was just yelling, and that faded as I made it down the alley, hopping and pulling on one boot and then the other.

  My heart didn’t stop pounding until I fired up my car and drove out of the neighborhood, smiling crazily in spite of everything. Some of what I felt was relief, but some of it was…I don’t know. Excitement? A thrill?

  After that, Helen and I were far more careful, and banging her got more expensive in terms of motel rooms, at least until Michelle broke it off with me. Then Helen and I shacked up at my apartment.

  “I think he knows,” I said to her one afternoon.

  “Of course he does. He’s not stupid.”

  “No, I mean I think he knows it’s me .”

  She hesitated. “That could be dangerous.”

  “No shit.”

  “Why do you think he knows it’s you?”

  I shrugged. He’d never confronted me directly but I was sure he suspected. Every once in a while when we ended up on the same crime scene or at department training, I’d catch him staring at me with those cool, calculating eyes.

  “Just the way he looks at me,” I told Helen.

  “He looks that way at everyone.”

  “It’s more than that.”

  “You’re being paranoid.”

  “That doesn’t mean I’m wrong.”

  She thought about that, then asked, “Have you told anyone about us?”

  “Who am I going to tell?”

  “A friend. A drinking buddy. Someone.”

  The truth was, I didn’t have any friends on the department, only acquaintances. Except maybe for Perry, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to tell him I broke his number one rule.

  I shook my head. “I’ve haven’t told a soul.”

  “Then we’re safe,” she said.

  “Yeah, unless he fucking knows.”

  “He knows I’m having an affair. He just can’t prove it.”

  I smiled at that, in spite of everything. For a detective like him, that had to be maddening. “How’s he handling that?”

  “A lot of silence,” she answered. “Some yelling.”

  The silence I understood, but it was hard to imagine him yelling. If I hadn’t heard it myself while I was hurrying through his back yard and down the alley, I’d be hard pressed to believe it. Maybe it was just her that brought it out in him.

  Helen kissed my neck softly. “Don’t worry about it, baby.”

  “Okay,” I said, but not worrying about a guy like Falkner when I was banging his wife was a pretty difficult trick to pull off.

  Turned out, she left him about two years later. Left both of us, really. Michelle had come back to me, so our little meetings became less frequent. One Wednesday, we’d had an afternoon at the Holiday Inn Express just outside of downtown, and that was the last time I saw her. About a week later, I heard rumors about them splitting up. I tried calling her. She didn’t answer or return my calls. So I started watching the newspaper. A couple of weeks later, the announcement showed up in the public records section.

  She never said a word goodbye. That stung for a while, and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t moon for her. I was still a kid in some ways, and I’d never experienced a woman like Helen before.

  Or since, truth be told.

  I had no idea where she lit out to. Maybe she was seeing some traveling salesman on the side, and she took off with him.

  I do know that she took Falkner to the cleaners, though. Forced him to refinance their house and give her basically all of the proceeds in lieu of the rest of their community property. She also stung him for a hefty chunk of alimony for the full two years allowable under state law. And probably worst of all, she tapped into a percentage of his retirement. So every year he worked, he filled that pot of gold, and when he put in his papers someday at the end of a long career, she was going to get a cut.

  On top of that, she got a no contact order against him, which for a cop is a real slap in the face. An order like that might as well scream domestic violence to the world.

  Needless to say, she became the “divorce bitch” story of the year. But the truth was, hers was only one tale among many. More frequently, though, it was the cop who was banging someone on the side, not the other way around.

  But who knows? Maybe Falkner had an afternoon delight on the side. I didn’t follow him around to find out.

  Once his wife left him, and me, I figured we were quits. I tried to forget Helen, and hard as it was, I moved on.

  He didn’t.

  FIVE

  After six years on the job, I was just starting to get past the rookie mentality. I realized I wasn’t going to catch every crook out there, and that even if I did, the judges wouldn’t sentence them to any meaningful time. There wasn’t jail space for them all, anyway.

  I still believed in all the other bullshit, though. All the do-gooder, make a difference, help people pile of noble, patriotic propaganda that society sold us on. Or maybe I sold myself on it. Either way, I believed, and that kept me from becoming a burnout, which I was already starting to see in some of my academy mates.

  Maybe it helped that I wasn’t squeaky clean walking in. The fact that in high school, I shoplifted, got into fights, cut school, and even took a couple cars for a joyride gave me experience on that side of the line that many other cops never had. I had to think like a criminal for a while, even if I was a low grade, punk criminal at the time, not hardcore at all. Still, perspective helps, and it ultimately made me a better cop. And I didn’t have as far to fall with disillusionment.

  Of course, one of the mantras of the street is to mind your own business. I should have taken that lesson into law enforcement with me, even though that philosophy was completely at odds with being a cop.

  I was off duty one day in late spring. It was warmer than usual, so I decided to walk to the grocery store. As I rounded the corner, I saw a fight in the parking lot. Cop instincts kicked in. I ran t
oward the two men that were struggling, yelling for them to knock it off.

  They ignored me. Why would they listen? I was just some guy in a pair of jeans and a T-shirt, not a police officer in full uniform.

  When I reached the two of them, I stepped in between, pushing outward at them both. One guy, the smaller of the two, cast me a quick look and paused. The other guy lunged forward at him, brushing me aside.

  I grabbed his wrist as he slid past and slammed it into a wrist lock.

  He yelped in pained surprise.

  The smaller man stared at us both for a moment, then bolted.

  The bigger guy jerked his hand downward and out of my grasp. “You dumb shit!” he growled and took a swing at me.

  I side-stepped the punch and countered with a blow to his mid-section. He grunted but threw an elbow without breaking stride. The point of his elbow caught me in the temple and sent me reeling back several steps. Stars danced on a black field in front of my eyes.

  He plowed into me and we went to the ground. After we rolled over once or twice, I started to get my bearings back. I threw a couple of short punches while we were clinched, and landed one on something soft.

  He cursed and pushed me away. I rolled backward and then stood up.

  He slowly pushed himself to his feet, blood coursing out his nose, drenching the front of his shirt.

  “You fucking broke my nose!”

  I didn’t answer. I just stood and waited to see if he was finished.

  Tires chirped, and I turned to see a police car pull into the parking lot, its overhead lights flashing.

  I almost smiled.

  I turned back to him, and he was smiling, too. “You’re gonna get yours now, motherfucker,” he said.

  It took me a second to put it all together, and by then it was all too late. It was all over. The fight, my career, everything.

  Turned out the small guy had just committed a shoplifting. The big guy was security, with a limited police commission. He grabbed the thief out in the parking lot and that’s the struggle I saw.