Behind the Badge (4 page)

CHAPTER 8

“You know,” Juanita Gutierrez said as she painstakingly worked to extract the tweezers that she had embedded in what was left of the side of Devin Buckner's head, “it's a good thing everyone already knows about us. Otherwise, you hovering around in here watching me work on this body would be weird.”

Time was, the morgue was the last place Earl Stevens would ever willingly set foot in. But he had grown used to the constant stench of ammonia and decayed flesh -- it was a smell so strong that no amount of industrial-strength cleaner would ever completely mask it. But while the morgue had the dead bodies and the refrigerated jars holding God knew what, it was also where Juanita spent the majority of her time. And in the interest of expediency when it came to working cases, Stevens figured it was only right for him to be unofficially stationed at the morgue when she had updates to provide.

Or maybe he just liked the way she looked in her scrubs.

“Any weirder than the weight I've lost?” Stevens cracked. He had dropped a good twenty pounds in recent months, a concerted effort to stop hitting the drive-through every time he was on a long, stressful case. Fewer cheeseburgers and more bottles of water had Stevens in the best shape he had been since his football-playing days at Nebraska, and it had actually alleviated some of the pain in his knees. They still popped sometimes when he would bolt out of his chair, but he had better range of motion and more energy than he’d had in years.

“No, see, I
like
that,” Juanita quipped, grunting when she finally pulled the slug out of the viscera. Examining the bullet under the magnifying glass, she was amazed at how intact it was. Given the condition of Devin's head, she figured the bullet would've fragmented or warped enough to render testing ineffective. “Pulling slugs outta teenagers? Not so much.”

“Just think,” Stevens said, squeezing Juanita's shoulder, “that slug might tell us who the asswipes are that killed him.”

“Such a way with words.” Juanita stole a quick peck on Stevens' cheek before turning her attention back to the bullet. “Looks like a .380.”

Stevens leaned in, his chin resting on Juanita's shoulder. He smiled to himself, knowing she would be able to smell his aftershave. Normally, she would feign annoyance at that and playfully slap Stevens on the arm, but given a lot of the other smells in this dungeon of a lab, maybe his Old Spice was a welcome reprieve. “I'd say that's a good bet, Doc.”

“Only problem is,” Juanita added, dropping the blood-stained bullet into a nearby metal tin before placing said tin in a clear evidence bag, “there are more than a dozen firearms that can fire this kind of bullet.”

Stevens snorted. “Then I guess it's a good thing we've got a whole department that does nothing but figure out what bullets came outta what guns.”

“You know...” Juanita turned off the backlight attached to the magnifying glass before removing her protective goggles and peeling off her latex gloves. “I'm kinda jealous that you all get to go out there and bring down the people who do shit like this. I get blood and guts and sobbing relatives who come in to confirm ID... and...”

Stevens closed the distance, grabbing Juanita by her shoulders and pulling her into a hug. His chin rested on the top of her head as his broad arms wrapped around her and his hand started running up and down her back. “I know, J.”

“I'm not gonna be able to sleep for days,” she admitted, her voice muffled against Stevens' starch-white dress shirt. “All I'm gonna see is Devin's head.”

“That's how it is for all of us,” Stevens explained, giving Juanita a squeeze when her fingers curled against the fabric of his shirt. “It's different when it's a kid, you know? Even after we arrest whoever did this, it's gonna haunt us.”

“It's not fair,” she whispered.

“No, it ain't.” Stevens gently pulled out of the hug, keeping his hands on Juanita's shoulders. “I had my way, we'd slap the cuffs on those bastards, drag 'em in here, make 'em look at what they did, and then haul them off to spend the rest of their worthless lives in jail.”

“Just... promise me you'll get 'em.”

“J, look who you're talking to.” Stevens thrust a thumb over his shoulder. “Not just me, either. Hi is as hard-nosed as they come. Your brother's too goddamn decent a person to let something like this go... and don't forget we got our very own superhero on the team. Those four bags of puke who killed that boy? They're not long for this world.”

“Then what are you waiting for?” Juanita reached around to give Stevens a playful slap on his backside.

“Ballistics,” he shot back with a quick kiss.

CHAPTER 9

When Jill stepped into Captain Richards' office, shutting the door behind her, she noticed a man she had never seen before seated in the leather sofa across from the captain’s desk. He wore a navy blue three-piece suit that looked like it cost more than what she made in a month, and he had probably the best posture Jill had ever seen. The last time she saw a back that straight from a seated position, it was in a diagram they had shown her when she was in school.

“Sir?” Jill cocked her head in the direction of the mystery man; her best guess was he was paying a visit from downtown, and Jill braced herself for whatever bombshell the Bishop had sent this man to drop on them.

“Andersen, I want you to meet Colonel Jeff Downs,” Richards introduced, rising from his chair and emerging from behind his desk. “He's paying us a visit from downtown.”

Jill shook the man's hand when he stood, noting that he was four inches taller than her and as bald as they came. “Well, I don't mean any disrespect, Colonel, but visits from the Bishop aren't usually cause for good news.”

“Understood,” Downs said with a genial smile.

If nothing else, he didn't appear to be angry. Still, suits from the Bishop L. Robinson Sr. Police Administration Building didn’t normally poke their heads into individual precincts unless something major was going down. Briefly, the red block letters scrawled onto Jill's white board flashed into her brain again, and she wondered if this was going to confirm what she suspected. The last thing she wanted was for a case to pit her against someone else who wore the badge -- ethical dilemmas aside, that hit too close to home for her.

“I believe I have information that might help you with your case,” Downs began, returning to his seat and grabbing black leather briefcase. He pulled a series of video surveillance stills from the briefcase, handing them to Jill. “You're looking at one of the vans that used to be a part of our fleet. The rear compartment had been modified to allow for use in tactical situations.”

“Used to be,” Richards said, folding his arms over his chest.

“We took the vehicle out of BPD rotation a year ago after a series of expensive repairs,” Downs explained. “That van has been... well, there's no delicate way to put this, but... does the name Pedro Mendoza mean anything to you?”

Jill and her captain exchanged a look. Prior to Buckner, Pedro Mendoza had been the latest victim of the alleged
rough rides
that had been part of the city's lore over the years. Pedro had died two weeks after suffering spinal cord injuries in one of those rides, and his death had triggered a groundswell of protests and the already simmering unrest between the city's African-American population and the police came to a proverbial boil. It got so bad at one point that the Baltimore Orioles had two of their games at Camden Yards postponed, and they even played a game in front of a completely empty stadium. Nothing more surreal than a walkoff grand slam in front of an empty ballpark.

“You're saying this was the van used?” Richards asked.

“We believe so.” Downs pulled a pair of glasses from the inside pocket of his suit coat, carefully unfolding and placing them on the bridge of his nose. “We were never able to press charges because the investigation got caught up in apathy and red tape. The Ninth Precinct wasn't putting much effort into it and there was no pressure from higher up.”

“And why was that?” Jill asked with a quirked brow.

“The Commissioner's priority was quelling the protests,” Downs explained. “I tried to keep the wheels spinning, but once the uprisings caught everyone's attention... Detective Andersen, I trust you're familiar with the legend of Sisyphus?”

Now that Downs mentioned it, this did feel an awful lot like pushing a boulder up a mountain, only to have it fall back near the tipping point. She had more than her share of cases that felt like they would never be solved, and as much as she hoped this wouldn’t be one of them, her gut told her otherwise. Jill turned her attention back to the glossy photos in her hand. Other than the official BPD insignia on the sides and across the hood, it looked just like the van they had seen earlier that day on the surveillance video. “Please tell me there was a name to go with this van. A department, an officer in charge of maintenance...
something
.”

“As a matter of fact, there is.” Downs stood again, pulling a small index card from his pocket. “Nolan Carter, currently works Narcotics over at the Fourth.”

Richards removed his glasses. “Did we ever look into him?”

“Looked, yes.” Downs sighed. “Investigated, no. He's got over a decade on the force and his record is exemplary.”

“So we just looked the other way,” Jill muttered with a roll of her eyes.

“Despite my best efforts,” Downs said with a sheepish grin and a shrug of his shoulders. “My guess is, Carter has someone at the Bishop who makes sure his record’s squeaky clean. Makes him easy to gloss over when we hear rumors of stuff like this.”

Richards frowned. “Why would a Narcotics cop need a tactical van?”

“Best as our records indicate?” Another shrug from Downs. “Undercover work. Last year, Carter had spent six weeks working undercover at the Inner Harbor, trying to track several shipments of Colombian crack cocaine. We disrupted two shipments, but never could trace the source.”

Jill nodded, making a mental note to take a closer look at Carter and anyone else within the department who may have worked with him. Narcotics had the highest volume of cops on the take, from several different corrupt sources, and she was suspicious that Carter’s inability to find a source for the drugs was more likely a case of looking the other way.

She needed the proof, but in Jill’s experience, if there was enough anecdotal evidence that a cop was sticking his hand in a bunch of dirty pies… well, maybe there was something to it.

“Unfortunately, I have to get back to the Bishop. Meeting with the Commissioner in twenty.” The two men shook hands when Downs rose from his seat. “Daniel, always a pleasure.”

Turning to open the door to the captain's office, which overlooked the rest of the bullpen, Downs stopped and turned to Jill. “I sincerely hope everything Dan's told me about you is true, Detective.”

Jill turned to Dan with a furrowed brow as the door shut again. “What the hell was that?”

Richards gave a dismissive wave. “Don't mind Jeff. Guy's seen too much
NYPD Blue
.” He lowered himself into his chair again with a sigh, grabbing the navy blue mug at his desk and grimacing when he noticed it was empty.

“Cap.” Jill shook her head. “If this is the van...”

“I know. I'm right there with you.”

“So what do I do?”

“Your job.” Setting the mug back down, Richards paused to glance at the old photograph he still kept on his desk of himself and Paul, back when they were both still detectives. Paul's haircut was dreadful, and Richards looked like a damn kid clean-shaven like that, but they were happy. It was a reminder of when all was right in Daniel Richards' professional world. “Keep doing what you do best. I'll handle the jackals if it comes to that.”

CHAPTER 10

Hitori Watson had stared at the low-resolution video for so long that his eyes were starting to burn. Not even a lengthy coffee break and half a bottle of eye drops could make the redness go away, yet he persisted. Now that they had something resembling a lead, he was determined to chase it until it went somewhere. The fact that he was working without his partner, who had to recuse herself from the case because she was related to the victim, made him all the more determined. This wasn't just one cop looking out for another, or having a partner's back. Whitney Blankenship was Watson's best friend, and the best thing he could think to do for her right now was to help catch the scum who killed her nephew.

So far, nothing on the surveillance footage linked the van used in Devin Buckner's killing to the van Colonel Downs had alerted them to. But Watson had put in a call a half hour ago for traffic cam footage within a nine-block radius of the scene of the murder, expanding the search from the original three-block area. Their current footage didn't give a clear shot of the van's license plate; the hope was they would find a better view and be able to track it that way. Various complaints from motorists who had called to report the van could also be helpful in piecing together Devin Buckner’s final moments.

“Any luck?” Detective Stevens asked as soon as he stepped off the elevator.

“Not yet,” Watson said with a sigh, returning to his desk and grabbing the pen sitting atop a stack of papers that had been neglected for the better part of a week. “Waiting for more traffic cam footage. Where are we on the bullet?”

“It's a .380,” Stevens explained, plopping himself into the chair beside Watson's desk. A few months ago, the chair would've squeaked under Stevens' weight, but now it made no noise when he lowered himself into the seat. “Ballistics is goin' over it now, hope we get a gun match by the end of the day.”

“Fucking 17-year-old kid,” Watson muttered. He hardly ever cursed, unlike so many of his colleagues, but if any situation warranted an f-bomb...

Before Stevens could say anything, the phone on Watson's desk rang. He rolled his eyes before grabbing the receiver. “Watson.”

“
Good afternoon, Detective
,” a digitally-altered voice greeted.

Watson frowned, cradling the phone between his ear and shoulder before locking eyes on Stevens. The other detective bolted from the chair, rushing to his desk before grabbing his own phone to call for a trace on Watson's line. “Who is this?” Watson asked.

“
That would be telling
,” the voice mocked. “
What good is this voice distorter if I tell you who I am?
”

“Fair point,” Watson conceded. “What do you want?”

“
The van is a match, and I know where it is.
”

“That's good,” Watson said as he motioned in a circular pattern with his finger, signaling that he was trying to draw this out. “I trust, then, that you're calling to give us the location so we can check it out for ourselves?”

“
You will do nothing of the sort
,” the voice cautioned, an edge in its tone piercing through the digitization. “
You will not solve this murder
.”

Watson sat up a little straighter, grabbing the receiver again. He saw Stevens mouth the words
keep him talking
. “Is that a prediction or a threat?”

“
That little punk deserved what he got. And so will anyone else who meddles.
”

The line went dead with a
click
before Watson could respond. The receiver was still pressed against his ear when Stevens cursed under his breath and slammed his own phone down. They hadn't been able to get an accurate trace before the call disconnected, and Watson immediately bolted from his chair and approached the murder board, uncapping the red pen and jotting down the words
mystery caller - threat?

“Whoever that was better hope we don't find him,” Stevens warned as he approached the board. “Otherwise, I might hafta beat the guy with his own limbs.” As he said that, Stevens' mobile buzzed against his hip. Swiping the device from its holster, the detective gave a
tsk
noise before answering.

“Stevens... yeah?” His angry scowl morphed into a self-satisfied grin. “No shit? Thanks a lot, J. Drinks are on me when this is all over.”

As soon as Stevens hung up and pocketed his phone, he grabbed the marker from Watson and scribbled onto the dry-erase board in his own brand of chicken scratch. But whereas Stevens had to type his police reports on account of his illegible handwriting, what he jotted on the board this time needed no translation:
Sig Sauer P230.