Two of the bags in the center were empty. Bags he never would have seen if he hadn’t taken the bundle apart.
He looked at Aprille’s desk and cursed under his breath.
FALL
2. The leaves formed a canopy of crimson and gold over the back roads Frank navigated toward the police department. He massaged his knee as he drove, trying to rub away the throbbing ache deep within his reconstructed knee. He stopped using the cane a month before. The doctors said he could return to light duty. The doctors said he could walk with his full weight on it and the pain would be manageable with the proper medication.
He glanced at his watch. Just two hours since his last Percocet. He looked at his watch again, eager for another dose.
Officer Jim Iolaus came around the side of his patrol car, inspecting the bumpers. He made notes of all of the dents and scratches, checking off his list, absolving himself of responsibility for anything he found before the start of his shift. His uniform fit him tighter than spandex and the short sleeves of his shirt were tailored to be extra tight. Better to show off his biceps. Iolaus was one of the guys who shaved his forearms. It gave Frank the heebie-jeebies.
Iolaus looked up as Frank limped across the lot and said, “You back already?”
“Got tired of sitting around the house. You’d think my wife would have some sympathy for me, but her honey-do list tripled when she realized I was a captive.”
“How’s the leg?”
“Hurts like hell.”
“Sissy. You talked to Andi?”
“Not since Joe’s funeral. Has anybody here been keeping in touch with her?”
“Not really. I sent her some pictures of the car, but she never responded.” Iolaus pointed at the police vehicle away from the others, a large ornamental badge decal emblazoned on the hood. A thick black stripe ran through the center of the badge, and decorative banners both above and below it read In Memory of Sergeant Joseph Hector, Badge 214. “Looks good though, don’t it?” Iolaus said.
Frank looked at the car briefly, then looked away. “Sure does. Be safe out there.”
***
Photographs lined the walls outside of the office. One showed an old man with bushy white hair looking out over a horizon of flat top mountains, sitting atop a horse. Another showed him leaning up against a wooden fence in front of a herd of cattle. Frank looked up at the horseshoe hung over the Chief’s door and wondered if he was supposed to touch it.
Chief Midas smiled broadly from behind his enormous pedestal desk as Frank came to the door and saluted. He didn’t stand up to return the salute. “Come on in. How’s the leg?”
“It’s fine,” Frank said.
“What do they have you on?”
“A very small dosage of Percocet. Nothing I can’t handle though, and it will not affect my ability to do police work, Chief.”
The Chief shrugged and said, “I was popping them like candy last year when I broke my shoulder riding Patriot.” The Chief cocked his head at a picture of a horse sitting on his desk. “You should have asked them for OxyContin. That’s the good stuff.”
Frank looked at his watch. One hour and forty-five minutes until it was time for another pill. His stomach hurt. Sweat gathered around his brow and he quickly swiped it away. “So how have things been around here?”
The Chief held up a handful of legal documents. “That scumbag’s family is suing us. Can you believe that? He killed Heck and tried to blow your leg off and now his family is suing us in federal court. What a world.”
“Us?” Frank said. “Am I being sued too?”
The Chief went through the stack and pulled out a group of pages bound together by a thick clip. “Here’s your copy. The department is paying for both of our legal defenses, so you don’t have anything to worry about. Unless we lose, of course. Then they can come after us personally. But that probably won’t happen.”
“Jesus,” Frank said. His name was listed above everyone else’s as a defendant. Criminal Negligence, Gross Misconduct, and Improper Application of Force were written in parentheses beside his name. “What happens if we lose? I don’t have any money to begin with.”
“They can take your house and pension. Listen, when you shoot someone, they sue. If you kill them, their family sues. All of a sudden a high-school dropout with a six page rap sheet becomes a Mensa candidate who was about to devote his life to the seminary.” The Chief folded his hands behind his head and sat back, “I’ve got good news though. You are going into detectives for a little while.”
“I am?”
“Ever since Aprille went on leave, Vic’s been flying solo. He’s buried with work, so I need you to go downstairs and help him get caught up. It’s only temporary, but you know how things go. Christ, Vic’s been there in a ‘temporary’ capacity for over five years.”
The Chief’s smile stayed glued to his face even as Frank did not return it. “I was kind of looking forward to getting back on the street, Chief. Not that I don’t appreciate the offer.”
“Everybody’s afraid of something new, Frank.”
***
No one was standing at the urinal. Frank popped the door open to the toilet stall and walked around to double-check the cramped locker room area. He twisted the cap on the prescription bottle and shook two pills into the palm of his hand, swallowing them dry. It felt like they were stuck sideways in his throat. Even the station’s cold tap-water was warm and it stunk like sulfur but Frank scooped it into his mouth and gulped as much as he could. This dose was an hour and fifteen minutes ahead of schedule. I’ll readjust, he thought. I’ll skip the ones before bed. For real, this time.
Frank wiped his face off with a paper towel and straightened his tie. The ache in his leg faded. The bolts holding the shattered bones of his knee together and the itching knot of skin where the surgeon had plugged the bullet hole’s entry seemed to melt away.
The patrol room was empty. Frank made his way down the hallway toward the back steps and braced himself on the handrail to ease down them one by one. He took the long corridor back to the Detective office. It was narrow and lined with loose tiles that squished under his feet. They were underground and the only ventilation was from vents in the ceiling that appeared to be growing some new type of black fungus. The air was swampy. Unhealthy. Frank muttered in disgust as he came to the last door and stopped.
The lights were off inside and the sound of snoring emanated from within like a bear hibernating deep in his cave. Frank coughed into his hand and cleared his throat. The sound of snoring stopped abruptly. Frank pushed the door open slowly and knocked on it, standing in the hallway while Ajax rubbed his eyes and scowled at him. “Welcome back, Frank. Nice to see you. Close the door and go away.”
Frank flicked the light switch on and said, “Good morning, sunshine!”
The office was a small affair with two desks set side-by-side. Case files stuffed with paperwork were scattered across both of their desktops. Frank leaned on the spare one to take the weight off his knee. He looked around at the maps and thumbtacked photocopies of mug shots that covered the walls. There were bookshelves packed with medical and scientific research journals for everything from human anatomy to fingerprint classification manuals.
Framed awards and diplomas from specialized investigative schools decorated the wall behind Vic. The only thing displayed behind the empty desk was a single framed photo that showed Vic and a pretty young female squatting behind several kilos of cocaine. Both were smiling. The picture was covered in dust.
“For your information, I was out doing a trash pull at four o’clock this morning while you were snug in your jammies,” Vic said. “I’ve probably got to go back out tonight, so I was taking the time to get some rest, if that’s okay with you.”
“Yeah, I guess that’s okay with me,” Frank said. “Do I get to sleep too?”
“Is there something you need, Frank? You didn’t have to walk all the way down here. You just could have called my desk.”
“Very funny. Seriously, what do you need?”
“I’m totally serious.”
They locked eyes for a minute until Vic said, “Get up.”
“But I just limped all the way down here.”
“I’m going upstairs, and this office needs to be secured if I’m not in it. You can either come with me, or wait outside.”
***
Vic was ten years older than Frank, with a good forty pounds extra around the middle. The detective huffed as they went up the stairs, and Frank braced himself for the pain of walking back up, but the medication was flowing through him so much at that point that it barely registered. He followed Vic toward the Chief’s office, but Vic stopped him and said, “Stay here,” the walked in and shut the door behind him. .
Frank waited outside in the hallway for a moment, catching curious glances from the clerical staff at the front door. He looked up at the horseshoe and scowled. “Screw this,” he whispered and made his way back into the patrol room.
His old desk had a stack of unfinished reports sitting on it. They were the same ones he’d left there his last night on duty. Now they had a note:
Officer O’Ryan,
Upon returning to work, you are to complete these reports upon your returning to work.
Staff Sergeant Erinnyes
Frank shook his head as he read and re-read the note, then shrugged and yanked the desk drawer open to throw it inside. All of his pens were gone. The sticky notes, paper clips, and set of spare car keys to all of the patrol cars in the lot, were all missing. “You thieving pricks,” he shouted at the empty cubicles. He leaned back in his chair and took a deep breath. The radio speaker directly over his desk crackled with reports of dogs barking and parking complaints and alarms going off throughout the Township. His knee was starting to hurt. He looked at his watch again. How much longer?
He didn’t see Vic come up behind him until the detective said, “All right, let’s go.”
Frank turned around and looked up, “What if I don’t want to?”
“That would suit me just fine, but the old man said otherwise and it’s his PD, so get up.”
Frank didn’t move. “You are very mean to me, Vic. I can see why nobody wants to work with you.”
“People would give their left nut in this police department just to know what I do, let alone be a part of it. Everybody wants to work with me.”
“They wouldn’t if they knew how mean you were. I just got back from being shot on duty, and all you’ve done is yell at me and make me feel unwanted. It was a huge effort for me to even come in here today. The only thing I had to look forward to was starting a new adventure in criminal investigations.”
“Whatever,” Vic said. He waited a moment, looking Frank over. “You being serious?”
Frank shrugged and returned to his stack of reports. “What do you care, mean guy?”
Vic said, “Forget it. You’re an idiot. Stay here.”
“I’ll come down if you apologize.”
“When hell freezes over.”
Frank turned back to his desk peeled off reports from the stack that he scribbled his initials on and placed in a new stack. He looked at his watch again. Screw it, he thought. He opened the pill bottle and took two more pills. The bottle was already half gone and had only been filled the day before. I need to slow down, he thought. He closed his eyes and sat in his chair, feeling the stress dissolving into a chemical haze. The intercom on his phone buzzed. “I’m not really good at the whole apology thing. I didn’t mean to make you feel bad, though.”
“I guess that will suffice.”
“So are you coming down?”
“I guess. It shouldn’t take me too long to limp back down.”
“Good. Let’s get to work. And bring me a cup of coffee. Cream and two Sweet `N Lows.”
***
Frank stopped pouring coffee when he heard the breathing of a large mammal, like that of a walrus waddling behind him. He did not have to turn to know who it was. “Good morning, Staff Sergeant. Want some coffee?”
“Black and strong.”
“Just how you like your men?” Frank murmured.
Staff Sergeant Erinnyes put a mammoth hand on Frank’s shoulder and said, “I see you’re fitting into your house duties rather nicely. Glad to know you’re getting a head start on your new primary assignment.”
Frank laughed. He turned around and handed the Staff Sergeant his coffee. “Don’t I wish. I don’t know which is worse, making coffee, or having to work downstairs in defectives.”
Erinnyes looked down at the two coffees in Frank’s hand. “Come again?”
“This was my first official order from Detective Ajax.”
Erinnyes’s bald head reddened and he aimed a fat finger directly at Frank’s face, “You are assigned to patrol, which places you under my command, not in the basement with that trash-picker. Unless I assign you anywhere, you will sit at your desk and wait for me to decide what to do with you. Are we clear?”
Frank nodded and said, “Crystal clear, sir. Should I let the Chief know you gave me a different order than he did, or is it okay as it stands?”
A thick purple vein popped out of the Staff Sergeant’s forehead and the area around it darkened. He managed to keep his voice steady when he said, “I see. Apparently it’s more important to tell some dungeon dweller than the second-in-command of the police department. I will go and verify the specificities of your assignment, Officer. A word of advice. Watch your back. Ajax does not have a good track record with his partners. Always remember that he is not your friend.”
“The story I heard was Aprille went on maternity leave and never came back. You saying he’s gonna knock me up too? My wife’s on the pill. Maybe I can go on it with her.”
Erinnyes sneered, “Is that what you heard happened?”
Frank started for the hallway, keeping both coffees in front of himself. He managed to make it as far as the staircase before spilling any on his new shirt.
***
Vic took the coffee from Frank’s hand and said, “You feeling all right? Your knee bugging you?”
“I just saw the Staff Infection. I actually forgot how much I hated this place until I saw him.”
Vic grimaced like he had the taste of something rotten in his mouth. “I got into it one day with him about a burglary investigation. He insisted I do it his way, and when I asked him how many burglaries he’d ever worked, he said, ‘More than you!’ So I went and looked it up. I looked up all of the stats for his thirty year career here. Know what I found?”
“A sterling career of excitement and danger?”
“Twelve arrests. Six DUI’s. Three domestic violence arrests. Two for retail theft. One for simple assault.” Vic pointed to the case folders stacked on his desk, “I made twelve arrests this year already. All felonies. I’ve made over one hundred felony arrests in my ten years here.”
“Wow,” Frank said. “You must be some sort of hero. Do they sing folk songs about you in your native country?”
Vic’s eyes narrowed, “I looked you up too, smart ass. Do you know how many arrests you’ve made? You’ve made seven.”
“That’s not true. I’ve made more than that.”
“Felonies, Frank. I don’t count the other crap. We don’t write parking tickets down here. It’s real police work.”
Frank slumped into the chair at the small desk near the door and said, “You mean in between naps, right?”
Vic reached for an envelope that was on his desk and removed the folded letter inside of it. “I just got this in the mail from upstate. It was written by a thirteen year old girl and left for her foster mother to find.” He held up the page and started to read:
Dear Mama Rose,
Thank you for all you done for me. I am so sorry about the mess. I am also sorry if you get in trouble for this. It was not your fault.
When
I was seven years old my brother started coming into my room and forcing his thing into my mouth when I was sleep. I’d wake up not bein able to breathe. When I cried and tried to fight him off he told me to roll over an put his thing in my butt. I had trouble walking for days after, and just when it got better it would happen again.
He told his friend Sal, and Sal made me do the same things for him. I begged and begged for them to leave me alone, but they never did.
When I told my Mom she called me crazy and sent me to the doctor. I told the doctor I wanted to hurt myself and they put me in the hospital. When the bills became too much at the hospital, my Mom signed me over to the state and that’s how I wound up here.
I liked it here and wish I got to know you better. Thank you for being nice to me.
Love Always, Lyssa
Vic showed him the letter, pointing to the dark red stains splattered across the page’s surface. “Lyssa’s brother already confessed. He’s in a psychiatric hospital upstate. This kid Sal lives in our town. You got any little ones, Frank?”
Frank nodded, “Two little girls.”
“Imagine if one of them wrote this,” Vic said. He could see the pain in Frank’s face and lowered his voice, soothing him, saying, “What we do down here is deadly serious, and if you’re going to work with me, you’d better understand it. I don’t give a rat’s ass what the bosses or patrol thinks.” He held out the envelope to Frank and said, “You asked me what I do. I go after people who ruin innocent lives.”
Frank took the envelope and said, “So what are we going to do with this? The victim’s dead, right? How can we arrest somebody if there’s no evidence but a dead girl’s statement?”
“We’re not going to arrest Sal. I just want to have a little chat.”
3. The young man sat in the station lobby, texting on his cellphone. His baseball cap was cocked sideways and pulled down over the tops of his ears. The silver logo sticker was still on the brim. Next to him was a large, dark-skinned woman, her fake dragon-lady fingernails nervously tapping on her designer handbag. Frank looked at it again. It was an imitation.
Superbia (Book One of the Superbia Series) Page 2