Pipe Dream (24 page)

Clarisse looked up from the corner of the bed and stared across the cabin toward the door.

“So was it real?” she asked, interrupting him for the first time.

“The only thing that was real for me was that baby—if that makes any sense to you. So I stayed and I worked and I smiled and I played the happy father until my son was born. And that’s when everything fell apart for me. I had stopped goin’ to meetings a while back, and the same things that used to keep me up nights before started keepin’ me up even more, until one night I just went out to get a blast and I never came back. Two weeks later, my wife filed for divorce.”

Clarisse looked at Black. He chuckled. But there was no humor in the laugh, only pain.

“That was six months ago,” he said sadly. “The messed-up part about it was, I knew what would happen if I went out to get that blast. I knew I wasn’t gon’ be able to stop. I knew that, Clarisse. But you know what? I did it anyway. I did it anyway and it ain’t a day that goes by when I don’t think about it. I wonder what my son looks like now, what his first words were, if he’s walking yet. I wonder if he remembers what I look like. I wonder if he’ll hate me when he grows up. Some days it eat me up so bad I just wanna go ’head and take myself up outta here.”

He climbed down off the bunk and reached across the floor to pick up some of the rocks he had dropped there a few minutes ago. Then he took out his straight shooter and placed the rocks carefully in the stem.

“And the only thing that keep me from doin’ it,” he said, pulling out a matchbook and desperately tearing off two matches, “is this.”

Black lit the crack and pulled the smoke into his lungs, holding it there and looking at Clarisse. Then he released the smoke and watched it swirl in the space between them before it disappeared.

“You don’t want me, Clarisse,” he said as she watched him with something that looked almost like pity. “My mother don’t even want me. She tells everybody I’m dead.”

Black uncorked another cap with an intensity born of the desire to forget.

“I might as well be dead,” he said, pulling on the straight shooter and blowing more smoke into the air. “ ’Cause I’m about as real as that smoke. And I disappear just as fast.”

Chapter 18

T
he sergeant in charge of the dispatcher’s section of the Radio Room wasn’t one to buck authority. But when he received the call from the Park Avenue Mobile Command Center instructing him to put out a general radio message on two ranking police officers, he had to question it, because he’d never in his five years as a Radio Room supervisor been asked to do such a thing. And if he was going to do something that would ruin his career, he wanted to hear it from the top.

That’s what he was trying to explain to the detective on the other end of the line, but the message didn’t seem to be getting through.

“Look,” he told the detective. “I’m not trying to give you a hard time. I just need to get verification before I do something like that.”

“What do you mean you need verification? This is a direct order from the commissioner.”

“I just need to talk to the commissioner if he’s there.”

“Sounds to me like you’re refusing an order.”

“No disrespect to you, buddy. But I have no idea who you are, you’ve never been in the Radio Room, and I just need to hear this from Commissioner Nelson.”

“Hold on,” the detective said, grudgingly handing the phone to the commissioner.

“Nelson here.”

The sergeant hesitated when he heard the commissioner’s voice, hoping that he wouldn’t be disciplined for questioning the order.

“Sir, I understand you want us to put out a GRM indicating that Lieutenant Darren Morgan and Captain Irv Sheldon are wanted for investigation.”

“That’s correct, Sergeant.”

“Sir, I’m sure you understand my hesitation in doing something like that.”

“Hesitation?” Nelson said, making the word sound like something foreign. “Sergeant, haven’t you been trying to raise both of them on all bands for the last ten minutes?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And have either of them responded?”

“No, sir.”

“You’ve also sent cars to deliver messages to both their houses. Is that correct?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Did they respond?”

“No, sir.”

“Well, Sergeant, I’ve got some news for you. We have reason to believe that Lieutenant Morgan was involved in three shootings today. We also have reason to believe that Captain Sheldon may have conspired with Lieutenant Morgan and several other people to cause the death of city councilman Johnny Podres.”

Nelson stopped long enough to allow his words to sink in.

“Sergeant,” Nelson continued, “I want you to know that heads are going to roll when the Podres investigation is over, and I’m sure you don’t want to be on the list of people who are heading to the chopping block. Correct?”

“That’s correct, sir.”

“Then carry out my orders, Sergeant. Don’t question them. Don’t add or detract from them. Just carry them out. Can you do that, or do I need to personally come down there and see to it that you do?”

“That won’t be necessary, sir.”

“You have the GRM prepared?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Well, read it over the air, Sergeant. And keep reading it every five minutes until we find those two officers. Is that understood?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Do you need any more verification, Sergeant?”

“No, sir.”

Nelson hung up the phone and the sergeant walked over to the J band console and handed a sheaf of papers to the dispatcher.

“Read this over every band every five minutes until further notice,” he said, and walked back to his desk.

The dispatcher read over the GRM and looked at the sergeant, the shock etched on his face like the ridges on a relief map.

“Every five minutes starting when?” the dispatcher said, the puzzlement obvious in his voice.

“Starting now.”

The dispatcher hesitated. Then he flipped the switches that would allow the message to go out to every division, pulled down the lever that made the alert tone, and proceeded to read.

Ramirez stood over the body of the slain cameraman, drifting toward his own separate reality, his eyes glazed over as his mind lost itself between the dried rivulets of blood that ran along the man’s face. Ramirez thought that if he looked hard enough, the answer to it all would curl out from the bloodstained cheek and touch him. It would whisper in his ear and tell him why Podres had died. And then, somewhere beyond the blood of murdered reporters and the wisdom of old detectives and the deathbed claims of addicts, there would be peace.

The alert tone came over the radio and interrupted Ramirez’s thoughts. As the dispatcher began reading the GRM, Ramirez looked up from the cameraman’s bloody face and saw a detective from Southwest Division watching him. Their eyes locked, and the two of them exchanged a look that said they wanted the truth to be a lie.

“ . . . wanted for investigation in connection with three founded shootings at Abbottsford Hospital and Philadelphia International Airport—two males. Number-one male, Lieutenant Darren Morgan, Philadelphia police, Internal Affairs, is a white male, thirty-seven years, six feet tall, 215 pounds, brown hair, brown eyes, bushy mustache. He is wearing a black blazer, a tie, and gray slacks. He is driving an unmarked black Chrysler with a license tag of UJV-342. Number-two male, Captain Irv Sheldon, Philadelphia police, Homicide, is a white male, forty-eight years, five-eleven, 190 pounds, blond hair, blue eyes, clean-shaven. He was last seen wearing a Philadelphia police captain’s uniform, but may have changed clothes. Both males should be considered armed and dangerous. Please use extreme caution. This is KGF-587. The time is now 12:45
P.M.
”

For almost thirty seconds, there was complete silence. But after the silence, the facts poured through Ramirez’s mind like floodwater bursting through a ruptured dam of hope. And when it was over, he was shocked, and hurt, and angry. But finally, he was free to face the truth. The career he’d taken so seriously, the police department that he’d loved so much, was peppered with murderous leeches like Sheldon and Morgan.

It hadn’t been clear to him before, even as he and Hillman had stood before the commissioner and argued their case. But there it was: the department admitting its guilt, casting the net to catch two of its own, destroying the carefully built illusion of justice for all.

Ramirez didn’t speak. Instead, he retreated back into his private crystal ball—the one that lay between the streams of dried blood on the cameraman’s face. And as he stared at the dried and cracked maroon flow that had once run through the man’s veins, he wondered how much more blood would be shed before it was over.

Just then, a 16th District officer came over the air, breaking the radio silence that had reigned for almost a minute.

“1611.”

“1611, proceed,” the dispatcher said.

“Could you repeat the tag on that vehicle?”

“Certainly, sir. It’s UJV-342.”

“Radio, I’ve got that vehicle, unoccupied, outside 30th Street Station.”

“16A,” the sergeant chimed in, his siren wailing in the background. “I’m en route. And please advise Amtrak police that Morgan might be at that location.”

“Okay, sir.”

“I’ve got to go,” Ramirez said, then looked back over at the other detective. “Are you going to handle the scene here?”

“Sure, I can do that.”

As Ramirez jumped into his car and drove around the labyrinth that was the airport, he thought of Hillman. He knew that the old man would want him to bring Morgan to justice. And he was going to try to do just that. One way or the other.

Lieutenant Darren Morgan walked into 30th Street Station and headed straight for the locker where he had left his garment bag. When he got to the locker, he started searching through his pockets for the key, grinning to himself because the whole thing reminded him of the way he’d searched his pockets before he shot Jeanette Deveraux.

It wasn’t that Morgan thought shooting the reporter was some kind of joke. He didn’t really like to kill people. But starting a new life with a couple million after spending fifteen years scratching and clawing in the Philadelphia Police Department was enough to make almost anything funny. At least that’s the way Morgan looked at it.

He was still smiling when he found the key. But the smile faded when he realized that someone was standing behind him.

“Excuse me,” a female voice said.

Morgan almost pulled his gun. But he was able to regain his composure and turn around with what he hoped was a relaxed look on his face.

“Yes?”

“Can you tell me where the B platform is?”

Morgan took a deep breath and exhaled slowly.

“I don’t know, ma’am,” he said, the relief showing through in his voice. “But the information desk is right over there. You should ask that gentleman.”

“Thank you,” the woman said, and ambled slowly away.

When the woman left, Morgan turned around and leaned against the locker until his heartbeat slowed to its normal pace. Then he opened the locker, pulled out the garment bag, and walked down the steps to the trains.

When he stepped onto the platform, Morgan got on the first train he saw. He thought the sign said atlanta, but he couldn’t be sure. Not that it mattered. The train could be going anywhere, as long as it was leaving Philadelphia. He only wished he could catch a plane. There was no need to dwell on that, though, because the bodies of Deveraux and the cameraman weren’t even cold yet, and Morgan needed to avoid the airport at all costs.

“Can I help you, sir?” the conductor said, startling him.

“Huh?”

“Can I help you?” the conductor repeated. “You look kind of lost.”

“Oh,” Morgan said, flipping his badge. “I’m sorry. I’m a police officer on official business and I was just . . . is this the train to Atlanta?”

“Yes, sir, it is.”

“What time does it leave?”

“We were supposed to leave about a half hour ago, but we had some engine trouble,” the conductor said. “Fortunately, the mechanics were able to find the problem and we should be leaving in about ten minutes.”

Morgan looked across the platform at the other track.

“Are there any trains leaving sooner?” he said.

“Not to Atlanta.”

“How about someplace else?”

“No, sir. The next train doesn’t leave for a half hour, and that’s going to—”

“Thank you,” Morgan said, cutting him off. “I’ll just stay on this one.”

The conductor looked at him strangely, then shrugged and walked away. Morgan sat down and tried very hard to relax, but he couldn’t. The money in the garment bag wouldn’t let him. To make matters worse, there were some kids sitting across the aisle from him throwing cookies and screaming. Their mother was just sitting there, wearing the overwhelmed expression of a parent who has spent too much time in a closed-in area with her children.

Morgan knew that expression. He had worn it for the last fifteen years. It was the look of a prisoner, trapped in the closed-in cell of a dead-end life.

He watched the woman and the children for a few minutes more, then clutched absently at the garment bag, and hoped that money was enough to buy freedom.

Leroy and Pookie lay in the sleeper compartment, draped in the heavy rumble of Leroy’s breathing and the noisy whir of the train engines coming to life. Somewhere between those two sounds, Pookie’s mind was racing.

She thought of the car crash the night before, and how Leroy had held himself together long enough to get them out of it. She thought of the way his self-assurance had helped to quiet her fears. She thought of the way she’d told herself that she would be willing to follow him anywhere after that, and how right it had felt to make that promise.

But that was then. She wasn’t so sure about that promise anymore. Not with the two of them running for their lives, with no idea where they were going or what they would do once they got there. Not with the police chasing them, probably with every intention of settling the case their way, before it ever reached a courtroom.

She couldn’t be sure about promises or anything else. But then she looked at Leroy, lying there with his eyes closed, looking so very innocent, like a baby untouched by the world. Looking at him, she could be sure of one thing. She could be sure that she loved him. After all, it felt right when she wrapped herself around him, allowing him to take all that he wanted and giving back all that she could. It felt right when he held her, or when he stood up for her, or when he protected her. There was even something right about the way he scolded her. Of course, it didn’t feel as right as it felt when she cursed him out. But that would always feel better than listening to a man, she thought with a smile, no matter who the man happened to be.

For the most part, when she looked at Leroy, or thought of Leroy, she felt like everything was going to be all right. It wasn’t like she could ever actually tell him she felt that way. But then, she didn’t feel like she should have to tell him. He should have known. If it was right, he should have been able to feel everything that was going on inside her, just like she was able to feel everything that was going on inside him.

He should have been able to feel her uncertainty and her fear. He should have been able to feel how wrong she felt about running away from a murder she didn’t commit. As far as Pookie was concerned, just luring Podres into the house didn’t make her responsible for his murder. She had no way of knowing the man had a gun, and she had no way of knowing that somebody was going to be killed. All she knew was that the man had money. It hadn’t worked out like she planned it, though. And she would just have to accept that.

Pookie dismissed the thought of Podres and allowed her thoughts to wander, running unchecked until she heard Leroy grunt and mumble something in his sleep. She smiled and watched him turn over, and as she did so, everything Pookie had been thinking in the last five minutes disappeared from her mind like a puff of smoke. Because when Leroy turned over, his pants twisted around his waist and a wad of money rose up to the edge of his pocket. It was just sitting there, like a prize. All she had to do was reach out, and it would be hers.

Like clockwork, Pookie’s mind began to click. The same thoughts she’d had before came back in a jumbled mess, twisted and mangled into a mix of rationalism and insanity. She remembered the way Leroy had stuck up for her, but then she remembered the way he had called her everybody’s woman. She remembered that she was an accomplice to Podres’s murder, but then she remembered that she hadn’t actually pulled the trigger. She remembered that she loved Leroy, but then she remembered that he was trying really hard not to love her back. She remembered that she had nowhere to go, but then she remembered how money had always opened doors for her. She remembered how bad things always seemed to happen to her whenever she took somebody’s money, but then she remembered her favorite saying and said it aloud.