Shadow Boys (9 page)

- CHAPTER FOURTEEN -

At the Iris Apartments, leaving Tremont’s unit, I was halfway down the stairs of Building Six when I heard the screams.

First floor. The breezeway. A woman’s voice, terrified.

The smart thing to do would be to keep going, head straight to the Lincoln and leave.

But I didn’t do the smart thing; I rarely do.

At the foot of the stairs, I stopped. Turned. Looked down the row of ground-floor units.

Two men in baggy shorts and T-shirts stood over a crumpled figure.

A woman in a black dress, crying, hair mussed.

Sawyer. Lysol Alvarez’s girlfriend.

Crap. Why did I look?

The larger of the pair, an overweight guy who looked like Fat Albert from the old Bill Cosby cartoon, smacked her face.

“Where’s the rest of the money, ho?”

Sawyer whimpered.

“We gonna take that Mercedes, then,” Fat Albert said. “Plus, you owe for the last eight-ball.”

“Noo!”
She held up one hand, pleading.

Fat Albert grabbed her fingers, bent them backward, an awkward, painful angle that would break bones if it went much further.

Sawyer screamed again.

The smaller thug laughed.

I stepped into the breezeway.

“Let her go.”

Fat Albert and his crony, Little Albert, looked up. Sawyer yanked her hand free.

“Move away from the woman.” I used my best cop voice. “Place your hands on top of your head.”

I headed toward the three individuals, walking with as much swagger as possible.

“Who the hell are you?” Fat Albert put his hands on his hips.

“DEA.” I held up my badge.

Little Albert pulled a gun from his waistband.

This was the point where a real DEA agent would draw his piece as well. But I was unarmed. So I kept walking.

“Bitch owes me two large,” Fat Albert said. “You gonna cover that, mister DEA agent?”

“Put the gun down and let her go.” I stopped about ten feet away.

“You ain’t the five-oh,” Little Albert said. “Where’s your piece? And your backup?”

Fat Albert lumbered toward me, fists clenched.

When he got close enough to touch, I said, “I have the money she owes. You don’t have to hurt her.”

Fat Albert stood between me and his partner, blocking Little Albert’s shot. He said, “Let me see the cash.”

I reached for my pocket with one hand and popped him in the eye with the other, using the tips of my fingers. Nothing takes the fight out of a man quite like getting hit dead center in the pupil.

Fat Albert screamed, pressed his hands to his face.

Little Albert tried to peer around his partner’s bulk to see what had happened while not getting too far away from Sawyer.

I kicked Fat Albert in the groin.

He screamed again and fell to the ground, landing on his side, his back to Little Albert. His shirt rode up, displaying a handgun wedged in the waistband.

I dropped to my knees and reached for the weapon.

Little Albert was holding a mouse gun, probably a .22 or .25 caliber. He gulped, trying to comprehend how things had gone downhill so fast.

Then he fired. And missed.

The bullet hit his partner in the buttocks.

Fat Albert was having a sucky day. I almost felt sorry for him. First his eye, then his nuts. Now he’d been shot in the ass.

Little Albert tried to fire again but the gun jammed.

I grabbed Fat Albert’s piece, an off-brand semiauto nine-millimeter. I racked the slide back to check the chamber.

The gun was empty.

I dropped the weapon, jumped up and charged. Head down, arms out. Tackled Little Albert.

He dropped his gun and tried to fight, but I elbowed his ear twice, rendering him immobile for the next few moments.

After a second to catch my breath, I stood, tried to keep my knees from shaking.

“Are you okay?” I looked down at Sawyer.

She was hyperventilating, arms crossed, face pale.

From the parking lot came the sound of people yelling. From Hampton Road, the blare of sirens.

“We gotta get out of here.” I pulled her up.

“You don’t understand.” She pointed to the nearest unit. “I need to go in there.”

Little Albert groaned. The sirens grew louder.

“We are in the hot zone,” I said. “We really nee—”

She opened the door and dashed inside.

At the far end of the breezeway, maybe fifty yards away, three police officers rounded the corner.

No choices left. I dashed in the unit after Sawyer, slammed the door shut. Hoped the cops didn’t see me.

The apartment was a drop house. The living room was empty except for a duffel bag full of foil pouches, a boom box, and a couple of video games.

Sawyer was on the floor, rooting through the duffel.

I grabbed her arm, shoved her toward the back. She reluctantly let herself be guided away from the living room, a handful of foil pouches clutched in her fingers.

“Lysol told you no coke, remember?” I opened the bathroom door, dragged her inside with me. There was a window over the tub that led to the parking lot.

“Please don’t tell Lysol what Sawyer did.” She shut the door. Slid her arm around my waist. Drew us close. “Please.”

Her breasts pressed against my chest, our faces inches apart.

“Sawyer will make it worth your while.” She licked her lips. “She promises.”

“Will Sawyer quit talking in the third person?”

“Huh?” She frowned. “Look, just don’t tell Lysol where you found me.”

I started to answer but the bathroom door burst open, and a uniformed officer aimed a pistol at my face.

“Don’t move,” he said. “Police.”

“Shit.” Sawyer slumped against the wall.

“Put your hands on your head,” the cop said. “Both of you.”

I did as requested.

Sawyer said, “I want my lawyer.”

- CHAPTER FIFTEEN -

Mason Burnett was running late.

He hated to be off schedule, but with the implementation of the chief’s new anti-crime initiative and his other activities, he had no choice. Plus, he’d had to spend a lot of time filling out forms about what had happened to the gangbanger at the boardinghouse in Oak Cliff.

Mason hated paperwork. But since the pantywaist Delgado had been there, he figured he’d better make sure his version of events was crystal clear.

He found a spot in the parking garage large enough for his Suburban. The nearby cars were expensive, Mercedes and Cadillacs and BMWs.

All the wealth the city had to offer seemed to be concentrated into this small area, a five- or six-block complex of office buildings and stores known as Preston Center.

He jogged across the street, caught the elevator just in time, and walked into the nondescript set of rooms, only seven minutes late for his appointment.

The woman with the sensible shoes was waiting in the reception area. She smiled at him.

“Sorry I’m late,” Mason said.

“You ready to begin?” She pointed to an inner office.

Mason nodded and followed her into a frilly sitting area, four white leather chairs around a coffee table. Two bottles of water rested on the table.

They sat in silence for a few moments. Mason opened a water, took a sip.

“How was your day?” She tapped a pencil on her knee.

Mason took several deep breaths, tried to compose himself.

The woman’s name was Corinne. She was a therapist under contract with the city of Dallas, among other law-enforcement agencies. She specialized in couples counseling as well as treating first responders for stress-related maladies.

Mason had been seeing her for six weeks.

Ever since the incident with the prostitute in the platinum wig.

“My day.” He put the water down. “It was fine. I had a good day.”

“Everything okay at work?”

More silence.

The woman with the platinum wig had been working a corner on Fort Worth Avenue, south of downtown. Mason’s people had been taking down a drug house a few blocks away. He had stopped at the curb to make a call when she’d approached him while he was still in his vehicle, offering him a date he’d never forget—round the world for only forty bucks.

Corinne cleared her throat, brought him back to the present.

“Work is fine,” Mason said.

“Good.” She nodded.

Mason looked around the room but didn’t say anything.

“You can talk about whatever you like.”

Mason nodded. Wondered what he should bring up today.

More silence. Then:

“You ever notice how brown this damn city is?” Mason asked.

“Excuse me?”

“Dallas used to just be coloreds and whites.” He paused. “Sorry, I mean African Americans and their white oppressors.”

Corinne stared at him like he’d taken a shit in the middle of her coffee table. Damn bleeding-heart bull dyke.

He continued. “Now half the billboards in town are in Spanish, and you can’t hardly turn on the TV without seeing some Mexican soap opera full of big-titted sluts named Maria or Consuela.”

Corinne scribbled furiously on her pad.

“We’re confidential here, right?” Mason smiled.

She looked up and nodded, clearly trying not to curl her lips into a sneer.

“Not that I mind big tits.” Mason winked. “You like a nice rack, too, dontcha, Corinne?”

She put her pen down. “What I like or don’t like is not why we’re here. Let’s talk about you. Or your job, which is what brought you to me in the first place.”

“Everything’s great at work.” Mason crossed his legs. “Except for the fact that the chief has me boxed in like a cow on the way to slaughter.”

Corinne started scribbling again. “What exactly do you mean?”

Mason explained briefly: the new SWAT team program foisted on him by the chief in response to the spike in crime. He neglected to mention the gangbanger and the window.

Corinne interjected occasionally but for the most part let him vent.

While he talked, Mason envisioned the prostitute with the platinum wig. The way she stood, the color of her hair, the halter top that barely contained her breasts. All of it reminded him of his stepmother.

“What the chief did.” Corinne tapped the pencil on her pad. “How does that make you feel?”

Mason chewed on his bottom lip for a moment, thinking.

“Fucked,” he said. “Is that a feeling?”

Corinne got a thoughtful look on her face. Then she nodded.

The hooker had nearly died, right there on the sidewalk by his official DPD vehicle, a few hundred feet from the drug house.

Mason hadn’t meant to strangle her, but the memories she stirred in him had been intense, a blinding spell of anger that he hadn’t known existed.

One of his men had stopped him.

When it was over, he’d looked at the bruises on her neck, amazed that he’d caused such damage. The entire experience had been like a different person inhabiting his body.

Because he was Captain Mason Burnett, a twenty-five-year decorated veteran of the Dallas Police Department, a man feared by rank and file as well as the command structure, Internal Affairs had recommended counseling.

“How are the dreams?” Corinne asked.

“They’re fine,” Mason lied.

“You’re sleeping okay?”

He nodded.

His father haunted his slumber. An angry, bitter man, full of whiskey and rage. Blue-collar and proud of it. No explanation why he married a woman who wanted more out of life than
Hee Haw
reruns and Sunday dinners at Luby’s.

Shirley, Mason’s stepmother.

A woman who fancied herself better than a two-room shack in Cockrell Hill. A woman who worked at an upscale French restaurant on Lovers Lane, serving rich men from North Dallas, sleeping with more than a few. Shirley with the golden hair and the breasts like melons, ripe and inviting.

“Are you taking the pills I prescribed?”

“Yes,” Mason lied again.

The meds dulled the edges of his existence, smoothed over the rough patches.

Mason didn’t like things smooth. As time went on, he realized how much he liked the anger, how comforting it felt.

“What are you thinking right now?” Corinne asked. “Your expression. You seem . . . upset.”

Mason unclenched his hands, unaware of when he’d balled his fingers into fists.

Corinne said, “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine.” Mason forced himself to smile.

She jotted something on her pad.

“My mind drifted. Where were we?”

Corinne put down her notes, crossed her arms tight. “Our time’s up.”

Mason stared at her for a moment, realizing that she was afraid. He chuckled and stood. “See you next time, counselor.”

- CHAPTER SIXTEEN -

Lew Sterrett Justice Center—the Dallas County jail.

I’d put who knows how many people in there over the years.

Now it was my turn.

My expired DEA badge earned me a private holding cell on the second floor, down the hall from a guy whacked out on angel dust or bath salts. Lysol Alvarez’s girlfriend Sawyer went wherever they took pretty young women who’d been caught holding a couple ounces of cocaine.

About an hour after they locked me up, Piper appeared outside my cell, a badge clipped to her waistband. Behind her stood a sheriff’s deputy.

“Impersonating a federal agent.” She clucked her tongue. “That’s a no-no.”

I’d called Piper, not anybody at the office. She could get me out quicker. And the office—i.e., Theo—didn’t need to know about this any sooner than necessary.

“Don’t forget the drugs,” I said. “There was a felony amount in the duffel bag.”

“Looks like that’s gonna get stuck on the two hoods. The one who got shot in the ass squealed on his partner.”

“Small mercies.” I stood and stretched.

Piper looked at the deputy. “Cut him loose.”

The deputy unlocked my cell. He said, “We hope you’ve had a nice stay.”

Piper opened the door.

“If you have access to the Internet,” the deputy said, “please consider rating our facility on Travelocity.”

“Everybody’s a comedian.” Piper steered me toward the exit while the deputy laughed.

We walked past the cell holding the duster. He was naked, huddled in the corner, arms outstretched as if warding off the attacks of creatures only he could see.

Piper opened a metal door at the end of the hall and we found ourselves by the intake area for the south tower.

“What about Sawyer?”

“What’s a ‘Sawyer,’ ” Piper said. “Is that some jailhouse slang you picked up in the last hour?”

“Sawyer was the woman arrested with me.” I lowered my voice. “She’s Lysol Alvarez’s girlfriend.”

“Lysol—my favorite sociopath.” Piper shook her head. “Why were you with his girlfriend?”

“I wasn’t
with
her. I was talking to Tremont’s grandmother and—look, it’s too long to get into right now.”

“It always is.” Piper used her badge to cut to the head of the line at the checkout station. She gave the jailer my intake number and got a manila envelope that contained my personal effects.

“What’s Sawyer’s last name?” she said.

I shook my head.

“Just run the first name then.” Piper spoke to the jailer. “Sawyer. Like Tom and Huck Finn.”

He tapped a keyboard and then looked up. “Nada.”

I remembered what Lysol had told me about a child molester arrested one week before. I leaned in front of the Plexiglas divider and said, “Can you do a search for people arrested last week on a specific date?”

The guy in line behind us, a biker the size of a Deepfreeze, told me to hurry the fuck up. Piper growled at him, literally.

The jailer looked at me over his reading glasses. “What do you think this is, a Holiday Inn?”

“How long would it take you—”

“C’mon, Dillinger.” Piper dragged me toward the elevator.

On the ground floor, we navigated our way through the throngs of people coming to visit relatives or friends. Then we left the building.

Outside, it was early evening. The sun was setting across the Trinity River. The clouds above the Calatrava Bridge were orange and purple, clean and refreshing after the grayness of the jail.

I sat on a bench a few yards from the jail entrance and opened the envelope. It was almost all there: money, keys, cell phone, pocketknife. But no DEA credentials.

“They took my badge.” I put everything in my pocket.

“You’re not an agent anymore.” Piper shook her head.

“I need you to look up somebody for me. A man who was arrested at the Iris Apartments a week ago.” I explained briefly what Lysol had told me.

She pulled her smartphone out, tapped on the keypad. “The mainframe’s down. Again.”

“How about something to eat. Maybe grab a bite at Sam Browne’s?”

“Can’t. Sorry.” Her voice was soft. “I, uh, have plans tonight.”

“Plans?”

“Yeah. That’s what people do. They make arrangements for an activity at a mutually-agreed-upon time.”

“You’ve got a date with Delgado, don’t you?”

“Jon.” She knelt in front of me. Put a hand on my leg. “You and I are not together anymore.”

I shoved her hand away. “What was last week then?”

A few beers at a Mexican food joint had led to dinner and then a hurried drive back to my place, where we’d shed our clothes and fallen into bed. Despite no longer being a couple, we somehow managed to follow this same pattern once a month or so.

She stood, looked across the Trinity River toward West Dallas.

“Why did you arrange a meeting with Delgado for me?” I said.

She didn’t reply.

“This kid, Tremont Washington, he wasn’t a loser,” I said. “He wasn’t a druggie either.”

“Delgado knew about you already,” she said. “He knew about us, too.”

At the curb, a black Suburban stopped, blocking traffic. It was clearly an unmarked police vehicle.

“He asked if you’d be good at something like this.” She paused. “I said yes. Then I set up the meet.”

“Somebody snatched Tremont,” I said.

“Or he looked sideways at the wrong gangbanger.” Piper put on a pair of sunglasses. “And now he’s dead in a ditch somewhere.”

I didn’t reply. She’d made the most probable assumption, but something bothered me about her scenario.

The driver’s door of the Suburban opened and, speak of the Devil, Deputy Chief Raul Delgado stepped out. He was wearing a different suit, navy with charcoal pinstriping. He saw us and waved.

“Going to the opera?” I said. “Or a charity fund-raiser?”

“Do you think I just want to be friends with benefits for the rest of my life?”

The air seemed to get thin.

“That’s what we are now, Jon. Two losers who bump uglies on occasion. Nothing more.”

Delgado headed toward us, maybe thirty feet away.

“I’m a cop now, back where I belong,” she said. “And you, you’re all corporate with the law firm and your Armani suits.”

“It’s Hugo Boss,” I said. “My sport coats. That’s who makes them.”

She smiled at Delgado and waved.

“I do have a couple of Zenga suits.”

“Whatever, mister
GQ.
” She spoke to me while looking at Delgado. “We decided this was for the best, remember? Time apart. Get to know ourselves. Yada yada.”

I remembered. While the Justice Department was trying to figure out who to charge with what, we’d gone to Colorado, searching for Piper’s mother and looking for a little peace and quiet. But tranquility was not part of our makeup, and trouble seemed to fill our lives like smoke in a pool hall.

Then the money ran out, and we headed back to familiar turf—Texas. She’d gotten the job with the Dallas police. Judge Clark had arranged for my position with the law firm, introducing me to Theo Goldberg, the managing partner.

Delgado approached, smiling magnanimously.

“I took care of things.” He looked at me. “You won’t be charged.”

“Gee, thanks.” I stood.

“Sorry you were arrested,” he said. “I was unaware until Piper told me.”

I didn’t reply. Piper stared off in the distance. An awkward silence descended upon our little group, or perhaps that was just my imagination.

Several uniformed officers, muscular white guys with buzz cuts, were walking toward the jail entrance. As they went, they stared at us, not exactly friendly looks.

Little-known fact: cops invented the evil eye, a scowl that could draw blood. These guys were masters. With my record at the DPD, I figured they were looking at me.

I ignored them, as was my custom.

Raul Delgado did not. He stared back, his look matching theirs in animosity. The officers maintained eye contact until it was long past polite, their heads turned sideways. Then they looked away.

“Friends of yours?” I asked.

“Nobody likes the brass,” he said. “Especially an uppity Mexican like me.”

“Leave it be.” Piper touched his arm. “They’re not worth the effort.”

Raul Delgado took several deep breaths, turned back to me.

“Your little adventure today,” he said. “What have you learned?”

“Lots of things,” I said. “Such as, you didn’t tell me Tremont had a job.”

Delgado crossed his arms. “I’m not familiar with every detail of the young man’s life.”

“Now would be a good time to tell me all the details you do know,” I said. “Especially why you’re so interested in him.”

“Piper and I have an engagement in a little while.” He looked at his watch. “A dinner gala.”

Piper shook her head, rolled her eyes. Delgado didn’t notice.

“A gala?” I glanced at my former lover. “How droll.”

“Raul’s giving a speech.” She gave me a venomous look. Then she mentioned the name of a charity dedicated to empowering women in third-world countries, the kind of organization most cops couldn’t even fathom existed.

“But there’s a slot in my schedule right now,” Raul said. “Perhaps we could go somewhere and talk.”

“Here’s to slots.” I headed toward the unmarked Suburban. “I’m riding shotgun.”

Ellis County, Texas

1987

Blood on his shirt.

The new Explorer uniform that Bobby bought him last week.

Raul Delgado tried to wipe away the stain, but the liquid just smeared, greasy and thick.

He was almost eighteen.

Six years since the last time blood coated his clothes, that of his brother, in the back of the squad car.

Now there was no vehicle in sight. There was nothing but the cottonwoods along the creek bank, their leaves rustling in the summer breeze.

Beyond the cottonwoods lay the gaunt expanse of Bobby’s ranch, acres of pastureland, flat like an ironing board and baked brown by the sun, scarred by lines of barbwire fencing.

Raul’s hands hurt.

He looked at his fingers.

They were swollen, knuckles bruised.

A few feet away lay Wayne, Junie’s boyfriend-who’s-just-a-friend.

Wayne was facedown in the mud at the edge of the water. He was shirtless. His pants were around his thighs.

As Raul watched, a trickle of blood seeped from Wayne’s face, staining the mud red.

Raul looked at his hands again. Flexed. The movement hurt.

He wished he could figure out what he was feeling right now but couldn’t. There was nothing inside him but emptiness. He tried to summon a mental picture of his brother, Carlos, someone he could talk to in his mind, try to explain what happened, but he couldn’t even do that.

From somewhere nearby came a keening sound, a soft wail that was almost lost to the wind and the quiet babble of the creek.

Raul wondered if he might be in shock. He knew the wail was important but he couldn’t stop looking at Wayne’s body and the flow of blood that was becoming thicker.

The wail grew louder.

He turned away from Wayne.

To his right, maybe ten feet away, sat Junie.

She was under a cottonwood. Her hair was tangled, one cheek smeared with mud. She was wearing what was left of her school uniform—a plaid skirt, saddle oxfords, and a white cotton blouse.

The buttons had been popped off the blouse, one sleeve torn away. The skirt was ripped. In the dirt a few feet away were what appeared to be her panties, a ball of white cotton.

After a few moments the disjointed events snapped together like Legos, and Raul relived what happened as if a grainy piece of film were unspooling in his mind’s eye.

Five minutes ago.

He arrived at the ranch in the old pickup, returning from the feed store with a couple of salt licks. Part of the chores he helped with around the ranch.

He parked by the barn. Got out.

Bobby was on duty for another hour. Junie was still at school. Or so he thought.

He saw Wayne’s Camaro behind the barn, out of sight from the house and driveway.

The T-tops were off. Inside there was an overflowing ashtray and two cans left over from a six-pack of Coors, the metal sweating in the heat. The upholstery had the faint tang of marijuana.

Raul was contemplating why Wayne’s Camaro was hidden when the screaming started.

Down by the water.

Junie’s voice. Scared.

A shriek that pierced something deep inside Raul.

He ran toward the sound, ran like his life depended on the speed of his feet.

Junie was Bobby’s child. He must protect her.

The screaming grew louder as Raul slid down the creek bank, the brush clawing at his skin and clothes.

A flash of white.

Wayne’s bare ass on top of Junie, his stupid mullet hair dangling over her terrified face.

The Explorers taught a one-afternoon lesson on hand-to-hand combat, how to wrestle a suspect to the ground and make an arrest.

The only thing Raul remembered from the lesson was that feet were very powerful, resting at the end of the largest group of muscles in the human body.

Raul used this information, deciding in an instant that he most definitely wanted to be powerful at this particular point.