The Safety Expert

by Doug Richardson

  “I wouldn’t be surprised at all,” said Ben, his voice rising with a taste of incredulity.

  “Said he came here to apologize to you. Is that correct?”

  “I guess. Did he tell you what the apology was for? Or did he conveniently leave that part out?”

  “I read your statement,” said Grossman. “And for the record, however long ago it was, I’m sorry for your loss.”

  “Appreciated—”

  “That being said,” interrupted Phillips, “Mr. Raymo claims that, despite some of his misspent past, he doesn’t recall having anything to do with your family—”

  “To do with?” repeated Ben without much restraint. “He goddamn murdered them!”

  “So says you.”

  “Why then would he apologize?”

  “He claims that if he did so—he thought—you might refrain from harassing him.”

  “I’m harassing him?”

  “First things first. Did the man apologize? Yes or no?”

  “Yes. Here. In my office. But after that... after he said goodbye, he jumped me in the men’s room—”

  “What were you doing in the men’s room?”

  Ben shrugged at the question. As if to imply what men did in the restroom was obvious. Even if that wasn’t why he had been in the restroom.

  “Aside from having to pee?” said Ben. “I went in to gather my thoughts. The whole encounter really shook me.”

  “Why?”

  “I dunno. Maybe cuz the guy who killed my wife and baby girls suddenly shows up at my office. Unexpected, uninvited. Out of the goddamn blue. Asks me to excuse my assistant, then lays out this dumb Alcoholics Anonymous apology.”

  “My old man was in AA,” said Phillips. “Saved his life. Lotta cops, too, in the Program.”

  “Lotta cops,” added Grossman.

  “Not knocking it,” defended Ben. “Just giving you my state of mind. That’s what you were asking, right? My state of mind? Why I went into the men’s room?”

  “What’s your assistant’s name?” asked Grossman.

  “Josie Jones.”

  “Where is she?”

  “I sent her home.”

  “Contact information?”

  Ben found a pen and a Post-it. He wrote down Josie’s name and mobile phone number, then handed it to Detective Grossman.

  “You know, we checked with LAPD and Culver,” spoke Detective Phillips shifting his weight but keeping his back pressed against the door as if relieving a knot in his left trapezius. “This unsolved thing with your family? It’s been closed a long, long time, right?”

  Of course, it had been closed. Twelve years it had been closed. Ben felt flush.

  “Yes, it’s been closed. And I think maybe what happened here is a reason to reopen it? Do you?”

  “What my partner wants to know is if you have any new evidence,” said Grossman, “that points to Mr. Raymo.”

  “I have a recording,” said Ben.

  “A confession?” asked Grossman, inching forward in his chair.

  “A deathbed confession,” said Ben. “From some inmate who’d shared a cell with Stew Raymo.”

  “So,” said Phillips, not hiding his naturally cynical predisposition, “some dying inmate gives you a name and...”

  “And I did some checking through a private investigator.”

  “P.I. got a name?”

  “Woody Bell.”

  “Contact info?”

  Ben started scribbling Woody’s contact information on another Post-it.

  “Besides the recording, did the P.I. come up with anything incriminating Stew Raymo?” asked Grossman.

  “No.”

  “No,” repeated Phillips, directing his look to his partner, eyebrows raised.

  “Mr. Keller,” said Grossman. “It’s not difficult for me to understand your frustration or anger. How it can fester. We see it all the time. Marry that with this recording you received. Hire a detective. That detective does a little digging. Discovers Mr. Raymo has a criminal record.”

  “You saying it’s not him?”

  “Got proof that it was him?” asked Phillips.

  “Not saying it is or isn’t,” added Grossman. “I’m saying I—we—the two of us here—understand where you’re coming from. Your anger.”

  “Guy’s an alcoholic,” said Phillips. “Wanted to make an amends. Not necessarily an admission of guilt. AA guys will make amends to the mommy who abandoned them if it keeps ’em another day sober.”

  “Okay, fine,” said Ben. “Stew Raymo made his amends. He left. I went to the men’s room. He followed me. He attacked.”

  “Attacked you. But got the shit kicked out of him,” said Phillips. “You a fighter? Good in a throw-down?”

  Ben looked at his right hand. It appeared at last to have stopped bleeding. He could feel both detectives looking right through him. Men could sense it, thought Ben. Men could sense when another man hadn’t truly been in a fight. And until today, Ben had gone zero for zero in lifetime fisticuffs. Truth was, Ben had been fortunate beyond description in his first real act of defensive violence.

  “No,” answered Ben. “Hadn’t ever had to defend myself before today.”

  “Not even in grade school?” joked Phillips, feigning a fighter’s stance. “No schoolyard shit?”

  “Suppose I was lucky that way,” said Ben.

  Damn lucky.

  Ben understood luck. Understood it to his bones. Who didn’t? Be it good luck, bad luck, hard luck, dumb luck, or something as sticky sweet as a person being lucky in love. Luck was part of the human condition. Luck was part of life. Just don’t ask a self-respecting actuary to pencil luck into any kind of risk equation. Statistically speaking, luck wasn’t a factor in life. That’s because luck couldn’t truly be quantified. Throughout human history, mathematicians had tried and failed to make sense of luck, despite that they themselves as human beings knew in their calculating hearts that luck had to exist. That’s because they had experienced luck. Or seen it with their own damn eyes.

  For Ben, luck was like God. He knew God existed. He just couldn’t prove it.

  Grossman produced a small digital camera from his coat pocket. He switched on the power, then turned the small, one-and-a-half-by-two-inch screen toward Ben.

  “Want you to look at these, okay?” said Grossman, handing Ben the camera. “You advance it with that button there.”

  As Ben took possession of the camera, he was immediately struck with little square images of Stew seated on the rear bumper of a Burbank Fire Department’s paramedics’ van. Closer shots revealed Stew’s face riddled with contusions, scrapes, and swollen welts that nearly shut both the man’s eyes. Stew’s left ear was so bloody and mangled he looked as if he had been in a Dixie dogfight, hardly in one with a rookie like Ben Keller, the man who had never seen any action before.

  The photos were a sharp contrast to the mere scrapes on Ben’s right hand.

  “I remember this one time,” said Grossman. “Back when I was just in the Navy. San Diego. Bunch of us had been drinkin’ and hell if I didn’t get into it with a couple of jarries from Pendleton. One got me so mad I had to put him down. And I did. Wasn’t until later, after my pals pulled me off the guy and I got sobered up that they told me the way it really was. Dude was down, but hell if I didn’t stop. Kept beatin’ the dude silly until three guys got me wrapped up and out the door.”

  Ben listened to Grossman’s words. Heard the fullest intent of the speech. All the while, he kept moving forward and backward over the short set of eight digital photos. Soaking in the extent of the damage he had inflicted upon Stew. Something in Ben wanted to feel guilty. It was a conditioned response. After all, why else the speech from the detective?

  Guilt be damned.

  “It was self defense,” said Ben.

  “Maybe,” said Grossman. “Maybe he started it like you say. But there’s a line, you know. Because I pop you one in the mouth don’t necessarily give you the right to back up
over me with your car, know what I mean?”

  There was a soft knock. Phillips turned and cracked the door wide enough to receive a single faxed page. Ben’s eyes twisted to the document, quickly zeroing in on the small box in the lower right corner, containing a scribbled signature.

  “That a warrant?” asked Ben, his voice lowered an octave.

  “Part of a set. Goes with the signed complaint from Stew Raymo,” said Grossman, unfolding another piece of paper for Ben’s perusal.

  Ben gave the documents a cursory examination, lingering only on the obsessively neat signature at the bottom of the warrant. The judge’s name was Juan Albert Lemus. Ben free-associated a memory of a childhood pal named Juan Albert. But was his surname Lemus or Leonidas? His mind already muddy with the nature of his luck, Ben couldn’t recollect.

  Good luck could be defined as the moment Stew’s foot slipped on the bathroom floor. Otherwise, that digital camera might have been rich with photos of a badly beaten Ben—or worse.

  Bad luck could be characterized as the moment Ben was asked to stand and face the wall in order to be fitted with a pair of handcuffs.

  And if handcuffs were bad luck, what kind of luck was it when your beautiful wife and kids were murdered?

  Shit luck.

  Miranda rights were half-whispered into Ben’s right ear by Detective Grossman as Ben was efficiently escorted to the stairwell by two more uniformed officers. Phillips led the way, plunging the tight quintet down three flights to the garage where a pair of radio units was waiting to deliver Ben to the Burbank PD for booking. The official charge was aggravated assault and battery. Strangely, Ben wondered if his mug shot would be an improvement over the screwed-up expression captured on his California drivers license. And would it reflect badly on his case if he were photographed with a shit-assed grin, proud as hell that he pounded the prick who murdered Sara and the twins?

  A wide shaft of dusty light flooded into the crowded underground parking lot. The rear door of the nearest black-and-white unit was opened for Ben. He felt like Lee Harvey Oswald waiting for Jack Ruby—in the guise of Stew Raymo—to slip through the ranks, stick a revolver between his ribs, and pull the trigger.

  “Watch your head,” said Grossman, placing his hand atop Ben’s skull to guide him safely into the backseat.

  “Wait a minute!” echoed a voice from the street. A shadow appeared, large and limping, descending the ramp, followed by the smaller shadows of two EMTS.

  Stew appeared in a bloody dress shirt. He was bandaged, one side of his face packed and strapped with a wad of instant ice packs.

  “Said wait!” slurred Stew, trying to shout through his inflamed lips.

  Grossman shifted in front of Ben, his hand reaching back to touch the butt of the pistol snugly holstered inside his waistband.

  “Stay right there, Mr. Raymo,” barked Phillips. “Fight’s over.”

  Stew kept his distance at thirty feet, arms held wide in surrender.

  “Wanna drop the charges,” said Stew.

  “’Scuse me?” said Phillips.

  “Don’t wanna press charges,” repeated Stew. “But I got a condition.”

  “He on anything?” Phillips pointed to the EMTS for an answer.

  The chief paramedic shook his head.

  “Mr. Raymo, we got your complaint. We got us a warrant. Let us please do our job.”

  “Begging your pardon,” pleaded Stew. “Just let the man hear me then you can decide.”

  Grossman reached out and touched Phillips’ shoulder.

  “Okay,” said Phillips. “But the fight’s over. You can stay right there.”

  “Just as long as he can hear me,” said Stew. “Can you hear me, Ben?”

  “What do you want?” said Ben, somewhat emboldened inside the safety of the police vehicle.

  “Right here,” said Stew. “In front of everybody. I’m apologizing like I did when nobody was around. Making my amends. Taking care of my side the street.”

  “Okay...” said Ben, overcome by déjà vu. It wasn’t the scene in his office all over again. There was something else to it that he couldn’t place.

  “Accept my apology and I’ll tear up the complaint.”

  Grossman heard Ben suck in a lung-full of air, hold it, then exhale. He turned to Ben.

  “Strongly suggest you say yes to this,” said Grossman. “Save all of us a lot of paperwork. And save you some uncomfortable chitchat with your wife, knowhatImean?”

  “I’m supposed to forgive him for killing my wife and kids?”

  “I’m waiting, Benjy-man,” said Stew, louder, and as if were a time clock ticking on the offer.

  “Not forgive,” continued Grossman’s whisper to Ben. “Accept the apology then stay the fuck away from him for as long as you live.”

  Pressure built inside Ben’s skull. He squeezed his eyes shut and in a heartbeat, he was back in the men’s room prepared to vomit all over again.

  “He apologized,” whispered Grossman. “Just say you accept.”

  “Don’t you see what he’s doing?” asked Ben.

  “Versus what he can do to you if you don’t accept?”

  “Last chance,” said Stew. “I’m saying sorry. And I got witnesses—”

  “Alright,” shouted Ben. “Alright... I accept.”

  “Hallelujah,” said Stew. “And you all heard it. I made the amends. And he accepted.”

  “You can leave now,” said Phillips, still wary of Stew and his posture. This whole business made the detective very uncomfortable.

  “And you can tear up my complaint, okay?” reminded Stew.

  “We’ll do that,” said Phillips.

  Stew nodded with his chin and before pivoting back up the ramp, tilted his head upward in order to give Ben one last look through his almost-shuttered eyes. The gaze chilled Ben. Then it was over. Stew was gone. And Ben felt a key working the lock of his handcuffs.

  “That’s it?” asked Ben.

  “No complaint, no charge,” said Grossman. “Meant what I said, too. If I was you I’d keep my distance from that dude.”

  “What if I can’t? What if he comes for me again?”

  “You get into it with him again?” Grossman smirked and gave Ben a once-over. A mock assessment that acknowledged that whatever luck Ben had stumbled upon in the men’s room wasn’t likely to materialize again. At least not when it counted.

  “If the shit hits the fan?” finished Phillips. “Just make sure it doesn’t happen in Burbank.”

  “Lydia. It's me... Ben. I was just... He knows. He knows about me and was here. The sonofabitch showed up at my office...”

  Gonzo replayed the message Ben left on her cell phone. While she tried to measure the level of panic in his voice, she unconsciously wiped the thin veil of sweat that had broken out on her forehead, leaving a skid mark of chestnut colored foundation on her white linen sleeve.

  “Crap,” muttered Gonzo, loud enough to draw glances from a few of the thirty or so other Federal Air Marshal candidates.

  The disparate gathering of Southland cops was spread out across the mint-painted fourth-floor lobby of the Federal Transportation Safety offices in El Segundo. They were on a break from evaluation exams offered to a new crop of potential part-time air marshals. It was phase one of an experimental program to train cops in the art of defending against terrorist attacks at 36,000 feet. In exchange, the airlines would provide their peace-officers-in-the-sky with a stipend and two free round-trip tickets to any destination to where a cop was willing to carry a gun.

  Exhausted from listening to stories of every other school mom’s family holiday in paradise and concerned that young Travis would feel left out if he, too, didn’t return from school breaks with stories of Cabo or Sun Valley or Maui, Gonzo had set on a mission to show her boy the world. At first glance, the air marshal program seemed like a tidy fit for Gonzo and her boy. She merely needed to get past the initial evaluations. But now Ben was leaving creepy, panicked voicemails on her cell p
hone.

  She dialed Ben’s mobile phone and left what she hoped was a calming voicemail. Then she called his office, got a recording, and left a second message. With five minutes to go before she had to return to the classroom, Gonzo chose to make a quick dial to the Burbank Police Department in lieu of stepping outside for a cigarette. Though she knew a couple of guys on the BPD gang suppression detail, she chose to go the official route instead. She would dial the main number, identify herself as an LAPD detective checking on a disturbing voicemail left by a Simi Valley neighbor, and probably get pinballed from desk-to-desk until she either got some real intel or convinced somebody to send a unit over Ben’s office.

  What Gonzo got in return was a speedy transfer to the patrol desk and the watch sergeant who was quick to pepper her with questions.

  What is your relationship with Ben Keller?

  Can you tell us if Ben Keller has a history of violence?

  Do you know anything about a crime involving his family?

  What is the nature of his relationship with a Mr. Stewart Raymo?

  Gonzo politely answered the questions as quickly as she could, trying to be succinct, and sneaking in a question of her own when she could. But before she could receive any quantifiable answers, she saw her competitors shuffling from the lobby toward the classroom.

  “Sorry, but I have to go,” apologized Gonzo. “I really can’t talk anymore. By the way. You haven’t answered a single one of my questions.”

  “What would you like to know?” snipped the watch sergeant.

  “Is Mr. Keller okay?”

  “As far as I know, yes. It’s Mr. Raymo who may have been seriously injured.”

  “How seriously?” asked Gonzo, walking crisply toward the classroom with none of her classmates in sight.

  “Unknown.”

  “Can I call back?”

  “You’re welcome to. My name is Sergeant Dowd. D-O-W-D.”

  “Thanks.”

  Gonzo flipped her cell phone shut, rammed it into her pocket, then shoved the door to the classroom open. As if synchronized to a microsecond, every head in the room twisted to stare at her. This ballet included the redheaded instructor, a forty-year-old, pixie-like dynamo who, in Gonzo’s initial appraisal, wasn’t stout enough to pass the Los Angeles Police Academy’s simple grip-strength test. She had also pegged the woman as an L.I.D., or Lesbian In Denial.