The Underground Detective: A Novel of Chicago Streets

by Thomas Laird

  Yeah, there are reasons my daughter did (or still does) drugs and reasons why she refuses to eat enough for her to gain any real flesh on her bones and reasons why she’s been a sad young woman who has little to do with her father and yet more reasons why her self-esteem is in the mud.

  It doesn’t make it any easier to live with, knowing why she’s unhappy. Sometimes it hits me, in the darkest part of the night, when the sun is still hours from rising. The “dark nights of the soul,” somebody called them. I’ve done my share of the silent weeping. The waterworks just seem to start up on their own, but they end as abruptly as they begin, and fortunately they never start when I’m with other people, Kelly or anybody else.

  I’ve dated a few women over the past years, but none of it ever became serious. My hours are ridiculous, and I just don’t have the desire to really get close to another woman. I was never all that close to Mary. There was real heat between us in bed, but that’s where the intensity ended. We hardly knew each other, in the beginning, and when we cohabited, we figured out we didn’t like each other much. I mean, I loved Mary, and I think she loved me, romantically, but we didn’t have a damn thing in common, and it became pretty obvious to both of us somebody had to be the one to pack up and depart. So she did the packing and leaving.

  It still shocked me when I came home to find a babysitter watching Kelly. The babysitter had no clue that Mary wasn’t returning. But I found out when I opened the bedroom closet and saw that all her clothes were gone.

  Kelly sits at the kitchen table, and for the first time that I can remember, she’s got books spread in front of her. I feel like asking her if she’s all right, but I don’t do that anymore.

  The book she’s got is a library copy of the ACT prep.

  I stop at the table after I get a Diet Coke from the fridge.

  “I thought you already took the ACT,” I tell her.

  She looks up at me with the same sharp anger her mother would flash my way.

  “I’m just interested,” I apologize.

  “I’m re-taking it in the spring. My math score was too low.”

  Her ACT was 28, which told me and Sacred Heart that she’s been sand-bagging her way through high school with a C+ average when she’s a B or an A student inside. Sister Rachel mentioned that her grades had been rising, when I left from our interview. I was so fired up about talking to Sister Catherine that I almost forgot that bit of news.

  “Your score was pretty lofty. Why do you need to do it over again?”

  She gives me the smile she uses when she knows she’s being interrogated by her policeman old man.

  “I’m not grilling you, Kelly.”

  I have frequent urges to embrace my daughter, and I have frequent impulses to slap the shit out of her. But I refrain from both. I don’t smack women, and I don’t belt males without justifiable cause.

  “Sure feels like it, Dad.”

  “Why are you re-taking it?” I insist.

  “I need a higher score to offset my shitty GPA.”

  Her explanation is so logical that it stifles my impulse to ask her the question again.

  “You have a plan?”

  “Yes,” she says.

  The angry smile is withdrawn. She’s about to clam up on me.

  I sit down across from her at the kitchen table. It is a white, metallic square. It gleams from the overhead fixture because I’m pretty fanatical about cleanliness. It’s one of the good habits I retained from the military.

  “Why can’t I ask you anything, Kelly? Why is it always an intrusion?”

  “You can ask me.”

  “Why are you doing the test again? What’s the ultimate purpose? And I don’t mean the stuff about offsetting your shitty GPA.”

  “I want to study nursing at a state school. Maybe go to medical school, if things work out.”

  I feel a flush at my face.

  “What’s going on with you? Why all the sudden concern about school?”

  “You mean why am I concerned now that it’s almost too late?”

  She’s got the grim grimace of her mother’s aimed at me.

  “Why is everything I say or ask like a threat to you?”

  She has no reply.

  “Look. I have money saved for—“

  “I don’t want a damned dime from you. If I get in, I’m paying my own way. I’ve got a job lined up for this summer. Sister Catherine helped me find one at the school. I’m trying to find a second job to get the cash together. There are scholarships for kids with single parents, and there are grants for children whose parents are vets—“

  “I saved money to put you through! I’ve got sixty thousand in a savings account for you!”

  “I don’t want your goddamned blood money! I don’t want anything from you!”

  I feel my hand rise from the table. I feel my arm cocking itself for the blow. I feel the heat for release in my face.

  Then she smiles as if she’s beaten me at some damned game that I didn’t realize we were playing.

  I lay my hand back on the table.

  “You’re right,” I tell Kelly. “It was blood money.”

  She looks at me oddly, as if she didn’t expect that response.

  Then I get up from the table and march straight out our front door.

  “Dad—“

  But I don’t wait for the apology or the curse from her lips. I just keep right on going until I reach the car and the curb.

  “You look like a proper ho,” I tell Lila.

  She doesn’t look twenty, but she could pass for twenty-five, which is fourteen years her junior. I’m forty, and she’s thirty-nine. We were soldiers once, and a helluva lot younger, then.

  Carol Mabry, another Homicide, is in the backseat. We’re parked on Grand Avenue, here in the heart of Old Town. Lila and I don’t think using decoys will work on our hooded whore-killer, but we figure we have to give it a try.

  Carol is younger than Lila, and she looks even younger than her twenty-eight. She’s a rising superstar in Homicide—the youngest female detective in our division. She graduated the Academy at twenty-one, and just seven years later she’s in the elite corps in the CPD. Quite an accomplishment. And throw in the fact that she’s black, which makes her an even rarer commodity in our business.

  She’s quite the beauty, too. She’s gets double-takes every time she walks the halls in the Loop. I’m hoping her obvious charms will not go unnoticed by the asshole we’re stalking here in Old Town.

  It’s starkly cold outside the squad car. The wind, the Hawk, is howling out of the northeast, it’s usual direction to blow out of, and it’s flurrying lightly. Sort of gets us into the Christmas mode, even if it’s a bit early for the holly and the mistletoe sentiments.

  “You two hunks of pulchritude ready to take a walk?” I ask both women.

  The ebony babe in the back shows me a perfect set of choppers. She’s grinning theatrically, just for the two of us.

  Her .38 snub-nose is strapped to the small of her back, underneath her red plastic, thigh length coat. It’ll be tough to retrieve the piece, but she doesn’t want our boy to know she’s packing.

  Lila has her own .32 snub nose strapped to the back of her upper right thigh. It must be very uncomfortable, and neither girl is going to be capable of doing a fast draw because of the location of their weapons, but they can hardly use a shoulder rig or use an ankle holster if they’re going to show a lot of leg to a potential customer.

  I’m the one who’s doing the real security. I’ve got my non-department .45 automatic in my shoulder holster, and I’ve got a pump shotgun on the floor in the backseat. I also have a switchblade in my flight jacket’s front left pocket. Guns jam, but switchblades are very effective in close encounters on the street. They are also against department policy, but I figure I’ll argue with Internal Affairs after I slice this prick wide open. The Rangers taught us how to use knives very effectively and efficiently. We would have all made very professional butchers after the War
.

  “Ready, Freddy?” I grin at them both.

  They nod, but they’re not smiling, now. I clutch Lila’s hand, here in the front seat of the Ford squad car. Carol can’t see my grasp on my partner’s hand. No public display of affection, I’m thinking.

  They both get out of the car, and the cold wind sweeps inside and overpowers the heater in the vehicle, momentarily. They shut the doors and head down Grand Avenue.

  I turn off the engine. Even if it gets cold, I’ll be warmer than the girls will be out on that avenue.

  They walk about a half block down the street. They stay within my line of vision, but they’re not so close that my ride is in their area of operations. They stand outside the Rialto, an adult movie house that sports glaring bright colored lights. No one can miss the two of them while they’re in front of this porno parlor. Whores use the lighting to advertise themselves all the time, according to Al Parker, our consultant on this adventure. This is a high traffic avenue, even when the weather is rotten, as it is tonight.

  But it’s a Saturday night, and nothing much keeps horny pricks from doing their things.

  Occasionally, a gust of flurries obscures my sight, here in the ride, but it clears quickly and I can see Lila and Carol doing a little dance in front of the Rialto to try and keep themselves warm. I don’t know how they can take more than a half hour or an hour out there in this shit. I’m going to go fetch them in no more than sixty clicks. They can warm back up in here, and then try it for one more round. But two innings is all this game is going to go. They’ll both wind up with pneumonia if I don’t play umpire and call the contest after two frames.

  It’s about 11:40 P.M. Prime time if anything’s going to happen. The show’s still going on inside the Rialto because the perves haven’t piled out, yet. I think the next show starts at 12:15 A.M.

  A car pulls up to the curb about twenty yards away from Lila and Carol. The guy sits there and lets the engine run, and then finally he shuts off the headlights.

  It’s a dark blue Ford. Four doors.

  He doesn’t get out of the vehicle, however, so I don’t make a man with a hood. I’m figuring this is too quick, too easy. It’s probably some other walking hard-on, not our swinging stiff dick.

  The ladies take the cue and walk over to the navy blue ride. I see the window being rolled down on the driver’s side. I’m looking for a signal from either of them that I should join the party, but nothing happens.

  The lights from that car pop back on, and the blue four door pulls away from the curb and Carol and Lila.

  I see Lila shaking her head vigorously so that I’ll see there’s no sale. They walk back in front of the Rialto and resume their frigid little jig.

  I’ve brought a portable radio with me in case all this goes long, and stakeouts usually become extended. I find a classic rock station. I like classical music for long hauls, but it’s hard to find that brand on AM radio.

  When I hear “Gimme Shelter” by the Stones, I let it play. I’m in love with their backup singer on that tune, even though I’ve never seen her. Christ, this lady can sing.

  Twenty more minutes go by. The cold must be getting intolerable for the two detectives. I’m not going to let it continue much longer. Maybe real working girls can tolerate this shit, but my two partners aren’t going to for much longer. I’m still thinking this guy will move to virgin territories; he’s too smart to keep coming back.

  A dark green four door pulls up to the curb. He, too, lets his lights linger. He’s about thirty yards from Lila and Carol. They’re eyeballing him, also, I can see.

  Then the lights go out in the front, and the two undercover policewomen head toward the doors of this forest green Ford.

  7

  I’m watching Lila for an upturned palm, which means I’m out of the car and running toward her and Carol because there’s a bust imminent. This guy will have to make them an offer, but they’ve been told not to get into the car. They’re supposed to get him for soliciting, and then we’ll take him downtown for questioning. We’re not giving him the chance to hurt either of the girls or both of them. Once you’re moving, anything can happen.

  I call for our three backup squads. They’re a half block away, and I can hear them screeching away from the curbs, just south of me.

  Then the green car squeals away from its parking spot, and I see Carol and Lila lurch backward from the curb, and I watch as the guy in the four door screams down Grand, right toward the squads. Before my backups can block him off, he’s past them. I do a U turn away from the sidewalk, and my tires are smoking as I head at the fleeing vehicle. I see the lights from the squads twirl madly, behind me, as I give chase.

  We come to the intersection of Grand and Murray, and the man in the green ride blows through a red light, and I follow, a quarter block behind him. The squads are right behind me, and I make the call about our pursuit so someone ahead can be waiting for him.

  He’s heading west, toward the worst barrio in the city. He’s trying to lose us so he can ditch his car. I’m betting the green four door is stolen and that he’s heading toward his own, private ride. He’s parked it on the west side because he’s either nuts or he’s figured there are plenty of alleys to fly down in order to escape us. And he also knows that this side of town isn’t a favorite for the uniforms. They come here only when called. Which is why the crime rate soars on the west side.

  When we get into the hardest blocks in the city, he wheels left at the corner of 12th and Prairie. He swings to the left so hard that his ride goes up on two wheels on the driver’s side. He screeches down the block, and he’s got almost a city block in separation from me and the coppers with the strobing blue lights behind me. Two blocks onto Prairie Avenue, and I don’t see his taillights anymore. The squads that were supposed to head him off have never shown up to engage, yet.

  I jerk to a halt at 14th and Prairie. There’s nothing here except a few junkers parked on either side of the street. But no green four door. He’s turned into mist.

  He figured the streets would be deserted in this kind of weather, and that’s why he took a chance on surviving this hood. Whether his real ride is still in place is another question.

  I walk back to the squad cars behind me and tell them to search the environs for the green vehicle. I tell them I know he’s en route to the car he left planted for his escape route. The uniforms pull their two cars around and begin the pursuit, this time slowly. They turn off their strobes and head down Prairie. At 15th, one turns right and the other goes left. I get back in my unmarked car and head straight up the side street.

  When I pass 16th, I see the vacant lot. We used to call them “prairies” when we were kids. We played cowboys and Indians and World War II and Korea on those empty lots overgrown with weeds.

  I halt at the side of the open prairie. Even in the dark, I can see the matted down tire tracks. I pull up over the curb and my headlights confirm the depressions in the dying weeds that lead over to an adjacent alley. When I get to the concrete of the alley, I look left and then right. I see a dark shape off to my right, about seventy-five yards down.

  I turn off my lights. I should be calling the uniforms, but I feel the force of the moment, and it says I haven’t got time to make the call. It’s a bad decision, I’m thinking. The first rule is to always call for backup.

  Then I see the object looping toward the driver’s side of that same green car we’ve been running toward, and there’s a flame that leaves a bright tail behind whatever it is, and then I know what the object is. It’s a Molotov cocktail. And the driver’s window explodes with a burst of flame and I hit the pavement.

  Then I hear him running down the alley, away from me. So I get up and run after him, making a wide arc around the burning green car.

  He has a big lead on me, and I was never a great distance runner, but the military made us run marathons. It was part of Ranger training. I wasn’t the fastest, but I always finished.

  This guy seems to be a
distance runner. He has a nice burst, and then, into the next alley, I see the race is lost.

  I have to run back to my squad and make the call and hope the uniforms can run him down with their vehicles.

  The Fire Department arrives in fifteen minutes. They have the flames extinguished in about forty-five seconds.

  I figure he had the Molotov in the trunk for just such an occasion as this. You don’t find ready-made explosives lying around in an alley on a cold November night. You don’t find any crazyass white people running around here most any time of any day in the year. He had an escape plan, and he must have figured on getting rid of the automobile, and that all tells me there’s something in the vehicle he doesn’t want us to fuck with.

  When the fire is completely doused, one of the firemen pries open the trunk with a crowbar. He gags a bit and backs off.

  “Smells like burnt chicken. Every goddam time,” the fireman tells me.

  There are two bodies in the charcoaled trunk. Two females, it appears. They’re tied together, and their hands were duct taped behind each of them. There’s the same duct tape across their mouths.

  The eyes are popped open on both black females, and you can see the look of absolute, sheer terror on those eyes.

  He torched them and the car while I was chasing him down the alley. While I was in pursuit, they were being burned alive.

  “No way you could have known,” Lila tells me again, downtown. “No way.”

  Carol has already turned in her report to the captain, but we remain in my office.

  “They died of asphyxiation,” I tell her. “The ME says it could have occurred before he torched the car. He said there might not have been enough air in that trunk. Or it could possibly be carbon monoxide. The look on their eyes? I think the cocktail did it. Those fuckers burn so intensely that it might have sucked the air out of that trunk. The doctor said he’ll let us know cause of death as soon as he does.”

  “You could not have known.”

  “I know. I know that I could not have known.”