Paw Enforcement 02 - Paw and Order (14 page)

After Brigit had easily yanked the hook and eye from the closet door a few weeks ago, Megan had added a sliding bolt just above the lever-style door handle. Though the dog's thoughts came in concepts rather than words, if translated to English they'd read:
Megan thinks she can stop me. How cute.

Though she wasn't sure exactly how the bolt worked, experience told her that if she pawed at it long enough, gave it a nudge or two with her nose and put her teeth into it, she would likely be successful.

Brigit knew she shouldn't chew up Megan's shoes. But she was a smart dog, an energetic dog, one who needed to live in a house with a big yard where she could run around and chase squirrels and dig rather than a tiny studio apartment with iffy plumbing, an outdated electrical system, and a minor mice infestation. If the dog behaved herself, she'd never convince Megan that it was time to move out of this tiny hellhole.

She set to work and in two minutes flat had slid the mechanism up and over, releasing it. A quick paw to the handle and the closet opened, revealing a veritable smorgasbord of shoes. She'd just begun to make her selection process when she heard footsteps outside the front door. She put her nose in the air and twitched it to capture the new scent.

Sausage rolls!

 

EIGHTEEN

LET'S MAKE A DEAL

Robin Hood

She didn't personally know any drug dealers. Though she'd been known to get shitfaced now and again (and again and again…), she limited her drug use to alcohol. She'd heard that drug dealers sometimes cut drugs with baking soda or powdered sweeteners and even mixed up batches of drugs in sinks or toilets. Though she enjoyed a good buzz as much as the next party girl, no way would she ingest a product manufactured with such a lack of quality control. She had standards, after all.

Despite her lack of personal contacts in the drug world, a quick Internet search with the key words
FORT WORTH, DRUG BUST
, and
APARTMENT
led her to identify three apartment complexes that seemed to house a fair share of potential dealers. She decided to aim for the one farthest away from her place, on the east side of town, a place called Eastside Arms. Just the name of it sounded skanky. She could only imagine the types of low-class losers who lived there.

She slid into a hoodie, a pair of jeans, and sneakers, and pulled her hair back into a low ponytail. Though she normally refused to venture outside without a full face of makeup and her hair meticulously styled, she figured there was no point fixing herself up for whatever assorted scumbag might buy the pills. It would be not only a waste of time, but a waste of her pricey cosmetics. With her Visa card out of commission, she needed her makeup to last as long as possible.

Fifteen minutes later, she was at a standstill in her car, stuck in heavy traffic on the street in front of a megachurch. Looked like most of the congregants chose to attend the late service. She crept forward, feeling no sense of guilt whatsoever. She knew the Bible said,
Thou shall not steal,
but it also said that the wealthy should share their worldly riches with the less fortunate, and that a camel could go through the eye of a needle easier than a rich man. Those words didn't seem to stop the so-called one percent from continuing to amass their wealth. Surely the commandments were not meant to be taken at black-and-white face value. Besides, why should she obey orders from a god she wasn't even sure existed? Just as Santa had failed to deliver, so had God, leaving her prayers unanswered. Rather than look to the heavens, she'd take her advice from a real flesh-and-blood man, a smart one who'd discovered electricity and whose face graced the hundred-dollar bill.
God helps those who help themselves.

So here she was.

Helping myself.

The traffic inched forward. After another minute or two, a police officer tweeted his whistle and raised his hand to wave her through an intersection.
Good to know local law enforcement is tied up this morning.
Fewer cops on patrol lowered her chances of being caught selling the Vicodin.

Four more turns and she pulled into the complex. A trio of outdated three-story stucco buildings formed a
U
-shaped perimeter around a small, murky swimming pool. The buildings were painted an odd shade of blue that would have been more appropriate on an ice cream stand, yet the narrow windows and flat roofs gave the place a prisonlike feel. The only saving grace was the bright yellow wicker furniture with sunflower print cushions that sat next to the pool.

Beater cars filled most of the parking spots, oil spots and flattened beer cans and cigarette butts filling the others. Given that it was not yet noon and also cold outside, few people were out and about at the complex. She backed into a spot at the end of the lot, next to one of those goofy-looking Smart Cars that, for some reason, had a pair of rubber truck nuts hanging from the back.
Talk about tacky.

She turned off her engine and waited. Surely someone would go out for diapers or a pack of cigarettes or meth at some point.

Movement at a window on the second floor of the middle building caught her eye. A huge, furry shepherd-mix dog stood at the glass, watching her intently. No matter. It wasn't like the dog could snitch on her. Besides, the dog probably belonged to a dealer who'd gotten the beast to protect his stash.

She had been sitting for only ten minutes when—
bingo!
—a grizzled white guy with greasy hair and a colorful neck tattoo emerged from a third-floor apartment wearing a pair of dirty, wrinkled jeans and a dingy T-shirt. Seemingly oblivious to the cold, he stepped to the railing, pulled a lighter and a pack of Marlboros from his pocket, and shook one loose.

Before he could light his cigarette, she unrolled her window just far enough to extend her hand and wave to him. When she had his attention, she motioned for him to come to her car.

Before coming down the steps, the man glanced first left, then right, as if looking for potential witnesses. Seeing none, he trotted down the staircase, making hardly a noise in his bare feet.

He came over to the car, crooked his fingers over the open window, and put his face to the open gap, instantly filling her nose with the odors of accumulated BO and sour beer breath. For the first time ever, she found herself wishing for the smell of her sisters' drugstore perfume.

The man smiled a stained-tooth smile and winked at her with a yellowed, bloodshot eye. “Hi, gorgeous.”

She fought down her revulsion.
Maybe this was a bad idea.

He raised a scraggly brow. “You looking to buy something?”

Then again, maybe not.

“Actually, I'm looking to sell.” She pulled the bottle of pills from her purse, holding them out of reach in case he pulled a fast one and tried to reach in and grab them from her.

“Whatcha got there?”

“Vicodin.”

“What strength?”

Her eyes scanned the bottle for the information. “Five milligrams.”

He chuffed. “That's the low dose. How many you got?”

“A hundred and nine.” She had carefully counted them on her bed last night, dividing them into small piles of ten pills each. After counting the pills, she'd done some research on the Internet. Though the online sources quoting prices for street drugs were of dubious origin and provided a wide range of prices depending on location, she estimated that here in Fort Worth the street value of the pills would be between $1 to $3 each, which meant the bottle was worth somewhere between $109 to $327. Of course she'd have to discount the price to give the dealer a profit margin when he resold them.

The guy's gaze went from her face to the bottle and back again. “How much you askin'?”

“Two hundred,” she said, essentially splitting the difference. “And you have to pay in cash.”

He laughed. “You're new at this, ain't ya?”

An embarrassed blush heated her cheeks. She supposed her reference to cash had been naïve and unnecessary. It's not like drug dealers used credit cards or personal checks in their transactions.

“I'll give you a hundred,” he countered.

She split the difference again. “One fifty.”

“Screw you, bitch,” the man spat, stepping back from the car. “You're out of your element, girl. Get your ass back to the suburbs.” He turned to walk away.

“Wait!” she cried. “I'll take the hundred.” Frankly, as brave as she liked to consider herself, this interaction had her spooked. She'd rather sell the pills now than risk going up against an even meaner, smellier dealer at another complex.

Looking left and right again, he pulled a wad of bills from the front pocket of his jeans. The bills were held together with a silver money clip engraved with a skull and crossbones. He peeled off five twenties and offered them through the window, clenching them tightly in his fingers until she had released the bottle of pills into his other hand.

“Got anything else you'd like to sell?” He looked down at her breasts, leering, before raising his eyes back to her face. He arched a lecherous brow.

The mere thought of this man's hands on her made her stomach squirm. “No!”

He chuckled and stood, backing away from the window. “Nice doing business with ya, sweet cheeks.”

Their transaction complete, she started her car, nearly running the man over in her haste to leave the complex. She pulled out of the lot, passing a blue muscle car with flames painted down the sides as it turned in.

Ew, Lord.
Three blocks later and she could still smell the man's stench. Despite the cold, she unrolled all of the windows to clear the car, then yanked the lemon air freshener from her rearview mirror, held it to her nose, and inhaled deeply.

Aaah. Much better.

 

NINETEEN

FAST TALK

Megan

As Seth pulled into the parking lot of my apartment complex, I noted one of my neighbors, a scuzzy parolee named Dwayne Donaldson, backing away from a small yellow boxy car. Dwayne had two prior convictions for selling meth and, from the looks of things, he was back in business.

With a squeal of tires, the car zipped past us at warp speed, the pretty young blonde at the wheel appearing both disgusted and panicked. I looked back just in time to catch the first letter of her license plate before she sped out of view.

T.

“What kind of car was that?” I asked Seth as he pulled into a spot. “Was it a Honda Fit? A Nissan Versa?”

He glanced in the direction the car had gone. “Some kind of Chevy, I think.”

I turned my attention back to Dwayne. By this time he'd scurried up to his apartment door and pulled it open.

I threw open the door to Seth's Nova and stepped out. “Dwayne!” I hollered.

The thug pretended not to hear me, closing his door with an emphatic slam. Given that nearly a quarter of the residents at my low-budget apartment complex were ex-cons or on probation for one offense or another, I got the same reaction from many of my neighbors. Brigit and I weren't exactly popular around here.

Seth and I went up to my apartment. “Wait here,” I told him as I rounded up Brigit and clipped her leash onto her collar. “I need to go talk to my neighbor.”

“That creep who ran up the stairs?”

“That's the one. He's had two convictions for dealing drugs. I think he may have just sold something to that girl who drove out of the lot.”

“I'm not letting you go alone.”

A small laugh escaped me. “You realize I do this kind of thing every day? It's how I make a living.”

“I know,” Seth said. “I try not to think about it too much.”

I hurried to my bathroom, slipped into a FWPD T-shirt, and strapped on my belt. Armed and in some semblance of a uniform now, I led Brigit down the stairs of my building, stopped to let her take a quick pee on a patch of dirt, and headed up the stairs to Dwayne's unit.

Knock-knock-knock.
There was no answer.

Brigit snuffled around the door, her nose twitching as she sniffed along the bottom and up the sides.

I knocked again, this time using the side of my fist instead of my knuckles.
Bam-bam-bam.

Still no answer. “Dwayne!” I hollered. “Open up. Fort Worth PD!”

Screeeee!

We turned to see Dwayne peeling out of the parking lot on his Kawasaki motorcycle, no helmet on his greasy head.

“Want to go after him?” Seth asked. “My Nova can do one-sixty.”

“And you know that how?” I raised an inquisitive brow.

He raised his palms. “I plead the fifth.”

Brigit finished her sniffing and sat, giving a passive alert on Dwayne's door.
So much for having the morning off.

I pulled my radio from my belt and asked dispatch to have officers keep a lookout for Dwayne. “Looks like he's dealing again.”

Meanwhile, I went down to the on-site manager's office to get a key.

Dale Grigsby answered his door wearing only a pair of too-long gray sweatpants that hugged his paunchy, pimply belly and puddled around his pasty ankles. He rubbed his bulbous nose. “What?”

“I need a key to apartment 33A.”

“Why?”

“Donaldson's dealing again.”

“How do you know?”

“My dog alerted on his door.” My partner might chew up my shoes and steal food off my plate when I wasn't looking, but her nose was never wrong.

Grigsby rolled his eyes, reached over into a cabinet, and pulled out a master set of keys. He fingered through them until he found the right one, eased it off the large ring, and handed it to me. “Bring it back when you're done.”

Seth waited outside on the walkway while Brigit and I searched the tiny efficiency apartment. Though she sniffed intently at the dresser drawers, the soiled mattress that lay directly on the floor, and the toilet tank cover, she gave no alert. I pulled open the refrigerator door to let her sniff inside. People were known to hide drugs inside things they thought might mask the scent and throw a dog off track. Coffee grounds. Pots of baked beans. Cans of tuna. Though Brigit failed to alert on anything in the fridge, she helped herself to a cold hot dog from an open package on the bottom shelf. I didn't bother to stop her. Heck, she was putting in overtime here, too, and deserved a treat.