RCC01 - Under a Raging Moon

by Frank Zafiro

  As she wrote, Katie glanced up and around every few seconds. While this vigilance may have seemed extreme to the civilian onlooker, it had become second nature for her. Inattention was the number one reason officers got killed. A bit of caution went a long way.

  Cautious like last night, Katie?

  She exhaled deeply. That had been scary, running through the darkness after a guy with a gun. Then hearing shots ring out, not knowing if he was shooting back at her. She remembered how frightened and detached she had been at the same time, and how the roof of her mouth had itched strangely.

  Katie took another deep breath. She filled in the Municipal Code for the red light violation and the fine. Images of the dark construction yard flashed through her mind. She shut them off and exited the car.

  At the offender’s vehicle, she stood behind the doorpost. The driver was leaning forward with his forehead resting on the steering wheel. He didn’t notice her presence.

  “Sir?”

  The driver sat up immediately and turned to face her. Her positioning forced him to look over his own shoulder.

  “Yes, officer?”

  “Sir, what I have for you here is a citation for failing to stop for a steady red light. I need you to sign here,” she pointed. “Your signature is not an admission of guilt, merely a promise to respond.”

  She handed him the pen and noticed his hand shook as he took it and signed his name.

  “I’m so, so sorry, officer,” he said as he handed the pen back.

  Katie nodded. “I can see that, sir. That’s why I didn’t arrest you for reckless driving.”

  “I appreciate that.”

  Katie tore off his copy of the ticket and handed it to him. “Instructions on how to respond are on the back. You have fifteen days. Do you have any questions?”

  The driver shook his head. “No, ma’am.”

  Katie gave him a nod and returned to her vehicle. Out of habit, she kept her eye on the offending vehicle as she did so. The driver signaled carefully and pulled back into traffic.

  As she reached her own vehicle, a man approached her from the sidewalk. She watched him carefully.

  “Can I help you, sir?”

  The man lifted the bill of his baseball cap and nodded. “Yeah. I was in the car that guy almost hit. I was wondering, does he have any insurance?”

  Katie paused. “Did he cause you to run into something?” She hadn’t seen any collision, but maybe she missed something.

  “No,” he said, shaking his head. “But he scared me half to death. Does he have insurance?”

  “He did,” Katie told him.

  “Can I get the policy number?”

  Katie struggled not to show her disbelief. “Sir, there was no accident. He ran a red light and was cited for that.”

  “He ran a red light and almost killed me is what happened!”

  Katie nodded her understanding. “And I will put exactly what happened in my report.”

  “You will?”

  “Absolutely.”

  The man gave a tug on his cap, considered a moment, then said in a subdued voice, “Well, okay then. But people like that shouldn’t have a license!”

  “You’re probably right.”

  He watched her for moment before shrugging. “All right then.”

  “Have a nice night.”

  The man paused again, looking at her. He tugged his cap, adjusted his belt-line, then turned and walked back toward his car.

  Katie wondered what she would find if she checked his license status. He was probably in suspended status. She cleared her traffic stop with the appropriate code and started thinking about a nice cold Pepsi.

  The convenience store at Monroe and Alvarado was considered officer-friendly. Katie pulled into the lot and backed her car into a parking place near the door. She turned her portable radio on as she got out of the car. Since she only planned on being a few minutes, she decided not to check out with radio. It was really none of their business that she needed a drink.

  Patrons stared as she entered the store. She could read their minds from the looks on their faces. A woman cop? After almost three years on the job, Katie had grown used to it. Some people were just surprised, others resentful, and some people found it amusing. She had been in several situations where a male suspect did not think she was serious about arresting him. He found out differently, even if it took baton strikes or pepper mace. The tools of her trade didn’t care which gender of hands applied them, as the suspect-now-arrestee discovered.

  From the cooler, Katie selected a large bottle of Pepsi and approached the counter.

  “Adam-114, Adam-116.”

  “Adam-114, Regal and Olympic.” Matt Westboard, a five-year veteran, answered with his location.

  Katie answered up, knowing now that everyone listening to the north side channel would know she was on portable and hadn’t checked out. Oh, well.

  The dispatcher continued with the call, “A D-V, 2711 N. Waterbury. Complainant lives next door. Says he hears a male and female voice yelling and it sounds violent. The house comes back to a Marc Elliot and Angie Phillips. Checking both names now. 2711 N. Waterbury.”

  Katie copied the transmission, set down the Pepsi and hurried to her car. She ignored the fascinated patrons who watched her go. She was only a few blocks away from the house. She knew Westboard was a ways off, but that shouldn’t matter. More frustrated NASCAR driver than cop, he’d make good time.

  Katie shot out of the lot with her lights flashing and cut onto a side street. At Howard, one block before Waterbury, she swung north and traveled parallel to the 2700 block. 2711 would be on the west side of the street, she knew, so she parked just west of Waterbury, out of sight.

  “Adam-116, on scene,” she told radio.

  Exiting the car, she slid her side-handle baton into its holder and walked south through the front yards. The mixed smells of a warm summer night swirled around her in the light wind—gasoline, barbeques and cut grass. When she reached 2711, the third house from the corner, she could hear frenzied yelling inside. The hair on the back of her neck stood up. The reassuring tap of her baton against the back of her leg and the comfortable weight of the gun on her right hip provided welcome reassurance.

  A huge tree stood off-center in the yard and Katie took up a position behind it. ‘Thank God for all the trees in River City,’she thought. Not only were they beautiful, but they made excellent cover and concealment.

  The screaming and yelling continued. Katie listened carefully but heard only words that she couldn’t make out and some crying. From the sound of things, nothing was being broken. It didn’t sound like an ongoing assault, either. Of course, she reminded herself, that didn’t mean it hadn’t already happened or wouldn’t still happen.

  “Adam-116 and -114, Marc Elliot is in with a misdemeanor warrant, which has been confirmed. He has an extensive record, including two convictions for Domestic Violence assault and several controlled substance entries.”

  So we’ll be arresting him no matter what, Katie thought pleasantly. The way he was screaming at her, he needed to go to jail.

  Katie listened for another long minute before she heard a female voice scream, “No, Marc, I’m sorry!” A cry of pain followed, though she heard no sound of strikes.

  She clenched her teeth and debated whether or not to go in alone. Westboard was probably less than a minute away. Still, a minute in a fight is an eternity. Hart’s admonition following her lone pursuit of the guy through the construction yard still rang in her ears.

  But if this woman’s been hurt . . .

  Her decision became moot as a dark figure burst out the front door and hurried down the steps. In the glaring porch light, she could see that his hands were covered in dark red. Blood splattered his face and shirt. Katie immediately spotted a long hunting knife in his right hand. She drew her weapon and pointed it at him.

  “Police, don’t move!”

  The man turned slowly to face her. His face seemed ask
ew and even at the distance of seven yards, she could see the craziness in his eyes.

  “Put the knife down!” she ordered. “Now!”

  He continued to stare at her.

  Katie keyed her shoulder mike with her left hand. “Adam-116, have him step it up.”

  “Copy. Adam-114, step it up. Adam-113?”

  “-13, responding.”

  “Adam-116.” Katie’s breathing quickened.

  “Go ahead.”

  “I’ve got the male half here at gunpoint. He’s bloody and armed with a large knife.”

  “Copy.”

  “I said put the weapon down!” Katie ordered again. She found herself wishing for that cold Pepsi.

  The man’s trance-like stare ended and his face slowly broke into a grin. “I am going to carve you up, bitch.” He took a step toward her.

  “Drop it!” she said, but her voice broke.

  He took another step. His smile widened.

  Oh God, she thought, I’m going to have to kill him.

  In all the fights she’d been in, she could never remember thinking that someone would die. Wrestled down, punched, kicked, pepper-maced, but not die. She felt a stab of fear in her stomach as adrenaline washed over her. The roof of her mouth itched and beads of sweat popped out on her brow. For a moment, she thought she could smell freshly cut lumber. In the distance, she heard a car door shut.

  Elliot took two more steps, reminding her of a lunatic Elmer Fudd.

  Be vewwy quiet. . .

  She almost gave into hysterical laughter at the thought.

  Concentrate, goddamn it!

  “Stop right there!” she screamed at him, injecting as much force into her voice as she could muster. “Drop your weapon or I will shoot!”

  The man slowed to a stop. She breathed a short sigh of relief, but then he chuckled and waved the knife. “Shoot, bitch,” he taunted. “Shoot, you fucking bitch. Shoot me. Shoot me. Shootme, shootme!”

  Katie stared at him, trying to gauge just how crazy he was. As if sensing her indecision, he tapped his chest with handle of the knife. “C’mon, you stinking gash! Shoot me! Fucking woman cop slit!”

  Katie barely heard the crude insults. She moved her finger from its indexed position into the trigger guard and onto the trigger. She was going to have to kill him.

  “Adam-116, an update,” crackled the dispatcher’s voice over her radio. Katie ignored the transmission. With a sure hand, she placed her front sight in the center of the man’s chest.

  “Come on, you whore,” he shouted. “Shoot me!”

  Could she?

  “I don’t want to shoot you,” she said gently, hoping to talk him down. “Just put the knife down.”

  He must have taken her tactic as a sign of weakness. His manic grin melted into a mean glare, his teeth gritting hard. He stepped towards her, raising the knife. “I am going to cut you up, bitch. I am going to stick this knife in your—”

  He stopped and flinched, waving the knife at his eye as if brushing away a fly. A small red dot was dancing in his eyes.

  “Over here.” The voice was flat and deadly.

  The suspect looked to his left. Katie followed his gaze and saw Matt Westboard behind a car, his pistol pointed at the suspect’s head.

  Westboard tickled his crazy eyes again with the laser sight then moved the small red dot down to his chest.

  “You take one more step, motherfucker,” Westboard told him, “and you are a dead man.”

  2226 hours

  Officer Stefan Kopriva swung the car around the corner as if it were on rails, the roar of the big-block engine loud enough to pierce the sound of his siren as he powered down Nevada Street.

  “Adam-116, an update.” The calm in the dispatcher’s voice contrasted with Katie’s adrenaline-laced transmission moments earlier.

  Kopriva whipped through the s-curves and cut the wheel hard to the right, turning onto Foothills Drive. He buried the accelerator.

  “Adam-116 or Adam-114, an update.”

  C’mon, Katie, Kopriva thought, his knuckles white, his forearms rigid as he approached Ruby.

  “Answer up,” he whispered. He slowed briefly for the flashing red light at Ruby, checking left for traffic. There were two cars. Both slowed and pulled to the side. He pushed his air horn and blasted through the intersection.

  “Adam-114, one in custody, code four.”

  “Copy. Code Four, one in custody at 2227 hours.”

  Kopriva shut off his siren and let loose a long sigh. He continued on to the scene in case they needed any help.

  As he drove, he flexed his fingers and his forearms, working out the tension.

  Three

  Monday, August 15th

  1124 hours

  James Mace rose sluggishly from the couch. His entire body felt itchy. The inside of his mouth felt like foul, dried leather. He scratched the side of his face. The stubble there had turned into a short beard. Sleep crust cascaded from his eyes as he rubbed them.

  He glanced at the easy chair. Leslie lay curled into a ball with a blanket tossed over her. Where was Andrea? He lumbered to his feet and poked his head in the bedroom, only a few short paces from the living room in their small apartment. He saw her dirty blonde hair splayed across the pillow. She wore no clothing and used no blankets. He admired the curve of her back and buttocks, but averted his eyes before his gaze reached the needle marks on the back of her knees.

  He plodded to the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. The wash of cold air from the fridge felt good against his bare chest. He stared at the wet, brownish leaves on a head of rotting lettuce. He wasn’t hungry, anyway, but you’d think with two women in the house, the place would be cleaner and there might be a few groceries in the cupboard.

  Mace chuckled, a rasping cough that sounded decades older than his twenty-seven years. If his Army buddies could see him now. They used to tease him about being a virgin until after he turned twenty-one. Well, he took care of that on their first trip overseas.

  They’d shut their faces now, wouldn’t they? He lived with two women and was balling both of them. And they both knew it. That had to top anything those guys ever did. Besides, they were squares for the most part, just drinking and women for them. They’d been afraid of the opium dens in Thailand. Mace hadn’t been.

  The goddamn Army, anyway. Since when did you give elite troops like the Rangers a piss test? They accepted his claim of having eaten poppy-seed cake at the first failure. After the second one, his CO ordered him not to eat poppy-seed cake ever again. His third failure resulted in a dishonorable discharge. They had offered him that or a court-martial. It wasn’t much of an offer, but Mace recognized a parachute when he saw one.

  So now what did he have for five years of service? No pension, his meager savings wiped out six months ago. His only trophy: a nice machete wound in the face, courtesy of a rebel in Panama.

  Mace slammed the fridge door. Leslie stirred in her sleep. He stared at her. She was attractive, or had been, but still no match for Andrea. At least, that was the case before Andrea went to hell.

  He needed a drink of water. Filling a plastic cup from Taco Bell with water, he allowed himself to gloat in his status as stud. How many men had two women? He did.

  The tap water had a coppery taste to it and after only a couple of swallows he felt nauseous. He dumped the rest.

  The couch beckoned to him. He flopped onto it and stared at the textured ceiling. He’d met Andrea before his hair even grew out after his discharge. She‘d proved to be the perfect medicine, accepting where others had rejected him. She soothed his pain over the Army, his family, everything. Definitely the best lay he’d ever had, and she knew where to find the good stuff.

  He remembered how firm and luscious her body had been the first time he’d had her. So supple and willing. Over the months, though, it had deteriorated rapidly. Her breasts sagged, her athletic frame shriveled, and sores broke out. And, of course, the track marks.

  They’d met L
eslie at a party. No one would sell them anything until he started dancing with Leslie and kissing her. Andrea hadn’t minded once he told her Leslie knew somebody who was holding.

  Leslie got the ‘H’ and they left. He remembered feeling excited about sex for the first time in months as they drove to the apartment. When they arrived and all three fell into the bed before shooting up, he could hardly believe his luck. What a wild night!

  So Leslie stayed. And for a while, it was great, but now, both of them were junkies. They couldn’t control their habit. Instead, it controlled them. Not him, though. He could thank the Army for one thing: discipline.

  Mace decided to take advantage of the fact that both women were sleeping. He went to the cabinet where he stored his works—and found the baggie empty beside the leather holder. He stared at it for a long moment, disbelieving, as if his gaze would cause the missing heroin to somehow materialize.

  Fucking bitches! They raided his shit.

  He flew across the room at Leslie, slapping her as hard as he could. The force of the blow knocked her from the chair to the floor where she lay, staring at him, blinking stupidly.

  “You stealing, worthless bitch!” he shouted, slapping and punching without mercy. She covered her head with her hands, absorbing the blows without a sound.

  Mace turned and headed for the bedroom. His rage subsided but his body had started to itch and shake. Nausea swept over him, even though he knew it was too soon for that. He had to get some more.

  He shouldered his way through the bedroom door. Andrea sat on the bed, staring at him, her breasts exposed, the small tuft of hair below her belly clearly visible. The vision held no interest for him.

  “Do you have any money left from your welfare check?” He asked her.

  She shook her head.

  “Any cash at all?”

  Another shake.

  No use asking Leslie, he thought. She wouldn’t have raided his shit if she had money.

  He studied Andrea and knew immediately she’d be no good, too strung out to help him. That was the way of it, lately. She wouldn’t help, couldn’t help, but she’d be there for her share when the goodies arrived.