“Well,” I say, “when you want to know where all your shit is, you guys come see me. Good luck with that game this weekend. Y’all have a good day, now.”
Asshole.
23
Jackie and I do move back into our apartment, but only after we’ve installed a door brace and set up a surveillance security system with an alarm. I buy Jackie a nine-millimeter Beretta to keep at her bedside, and now we’re truly like every other normal gun-toting couple in Texas.
We hire Jimmy the super’s sister-in-law, who owns a cleaning service, to come in with two of her best workers—refugees from a struggling, waterlogged New Orleans—to erase the fingerprinting dust and the grime of cops and the Forensics team investigating every room. Maclin had ordered another extended sweep through the apartment in case, according to him, he’d missed something the first few times. I know, however, that even though the first search uncovered a few red hairs in the attic crawl space that were not mine, the additional search was in retaliation for my keeping silent after Tony’s interview. It was apparent from my reaction to the drawing of the wings and sword that I’d seen the image before. When pressed by Maclin and Tate, I simply kept repeating that I had no idea what the drawing meant, which was true. But it infuriated the both of them.
Maclin had warned me, “Detective, you need to think real hard about cooperating with us regarding any information you may have related to Lana’s killer.”
And I had responded, “You mean the way you cooperated with us when my team was trying to conduct a drug search in Bender’s house?”
The killer had left Ruiz’s head at my door in a box with my name on it. He had broken into my apartment where my girlfriend was still asleep in bed, leaving a hank of hair from a dead woman, and sent me a message through Tony Ha that was, more or less, Betty, go home. Nothing I had heard or seen subsequent to the shooting of William Bender regarding the related players indicated that the ensuing chaos was not drug-related. I had come to believe that two groups, the Mexican cartel and some as-yet-unknown homegrown illegal drug pushers, were fighting for distribution control, the drawing with the Bible verse referring to flashing swords and vengeance only strengthening that belief. I didn’t need Maclin’s help, or permission, to move forward. This was a personal challenge to me.
Uncle Benny, who would occasionally lapse into Polish to express or finesse some philosophical point regarding law enforcement, used to say, “If the beard were all, the goat might preach.” Broda nie czyni filozofa. Meaning that the brains of an operation do not lie in the symbols of power. I chose to translate it as “Just because you’ve got a beard and some balls doesn’t mean you’ve got the smarts.”
I soon went back to work with Ryan, who continued to pose undercover as the newly transferred high-school upperclassman. He went to the “kick-ass fiesta, for real”—held in a two-story luxury condo downtown—with the St. Borromeo girl, who stripped down to her bra and panties within five minutes of arriving. A dozen of her classmates had gathered for an eagerly anticipated mix of sex and drugs, Catholic-style. Meaning that the participants could get wasted and laid and then go to chapel the next day, where all would be forgiven. It seems there is nothing the Catholic Church won’t forgive a person for. Except being gay.
When the arresting officers gained entrance to the condo, the girl answering the door thought that the cops were male strippers, there to join the party. She giggled uncontrollably when the cuffs were put on, no doubt giving hard-ons to every male in the place.
When I walked in following the uniformed officers, one beefy high-school jock, wearing only his designer briefs, shouted to one of his friends, “Hey, Carlton, your mother is here.”
He fell all over himself laughing until I grabbed the little twenty-four-karat-gold ring piercing one privileged, rosebud nipple and let him know that the regulars at Lew Sterrett County Jail were just salivating to make his acquaintance.
The owners of the condo turned out to be the parents of one of the arrested youths, but both were in Budapest on business and could not be reached by phone for nearly two days. It took only twenty minutes of my questioning the apartment owners’ son for him to give up the name of his heroin dealer.
Of course, there will be no end to the stories of nearly naked adolescent girls throwing themselves at police officers; they’ll be told at every barbecue and late-night beer-and-bullshit session from now until doomsday. Great fun for everyone, except Ryan, who was traumatized by the aggressive sexual tactics of his date—she had her face in his lap at the time of the arrest—and who will forever be blackmailed by his fellow officers into doing shit duty or risk having his future wife told about the nature of the bust.
Jackie’s birthday was on the nineteenth of September, and we celebrated by going to the restaurant atop the Reunion Tower. We drank too much champagne and watched the Dallas streets slowly revolving below us, the suburbs stretching into the outlying flatness like an endless expanse of celestial dust, punctuated at intervals with neon-framed buildings.
For the occasion, I had paid a fortune for burgundy-red Doc Martens, which I wore with my decade-old, custom-made black leather pants and a new velvet blazer, cut tight and long, to the middle of my thighs. When Jackie saw me standing in front of a mirror pulling the length of my hair out from under the jacket collar, she clapped slowly, as though watching a curtain rising, and then kissed me and said, “You could pull all the saints down from the heavens looking the way you do.”
Jackie wore a sea-green silk blouse with a snug black skirt and skyrocket heels that stretched the calves of her legs taut as a ballerina’s when she walked.
At our table I gave her a box tied with a ribbon, her ninth bracelet of gold threaded with three hundred and sixty-five tiny wooden beads. It was too early for our anniversary, which is in November, but I told her I just couldn’t wait. I wanted her to know how much I loved her and appreciated her being my rock during the chaos of the Ruiz investigation.
Jackie showed our waitress the bracelet, and the woman smiled with genuine pleasure, her head tilting graciously as she examined it.
“Qué linda,” she said, her dark eyes glinting in the candlelight.
At the end of the evening we stood at the elevator banks with an elderly couple. The wife was stoop-shouldered with weak eyes and a tentative smile, and her husband was solidly portly, packed into an outdated dinner jacket and Western boots. There was a brief silence, and then he leaned in, tapped me on the arm, and asked, “Know what the secret to a long, successful relationship is?”
I shook my head, bracing for the lecture, but he simply pointed to Jackie and told me, “Always let her be right.”
24
On Mondays, the team meets early for breakfast at Norma’s Café, a fifties-style restaurant that opened in 1956, when Eisenhower was still president and Elvis was beginning to enter the charts. The reason I know this is that Craddock, the follower of All Things Elvis, tells me every time we eat here. Every single time.
Our usual waitress, Tammy Sue, brings us coffee before we even have a chance to settle into our red vinyl seats; our sunglasses and phones are scattered over the tabletop, which is plastered with advertising stickers from local businesses.
She gives me a nod, her dyed-blond hair lacquered into immobility. “Good morning, Betty, darlin’. You keepin’ these boys in line?”
She always asks this question, and my answer is always the same. “I give it my best effort, Tammy Sue.”
The bridge of her nose wrinkles in solidarity with my challenges, and she says wearily, “Uh-huh.”
She spins on her heel but walks away grinning, cracking her gum. There are five of us gathered: me, Craddock, Ryan, Hoskins, and Seth, who daily improves and will soon be cleared for active duty. It’s six thirty on a Monday morning, and the place is half full. Not like the weekends, when the line stretches out the door and down the block. Texans, I’ve found, will froth at the mouth when delayed thirty seconds at a red light but will wait a
n hour for three fried eggs and a minute steak.
Regardless of whatever else our department is working on, it’s a matter of professional pride now, and no small degree of belligerent curiosity, to find out who keeps leaving provocative and bloody clues at my door.
“I spoke to Taylor last night,” I tell them. “Here’s what he told me. We get one hour a day to pursue leads to identify the redheaded bastard who’s been tweaking our noses. He’s hoping, though, that our ghost will go back into whatever hole he crawled out of and leave me alone for a while.”
We bow our heads to look over the menu selections, featuring Tex-Mex-style migas with four-alarm-strength chilies, knowing full well that the Mex-Mexicans will never leave the green pastures of East Texas alone. There’s too much money to be made with crystal meth.
We place our orders with Tammy Sue, and while we wait for our food, I pull Sergei’s drawing out of my pocket and unfold it on the table. I recount to them my interview with Tony Ha and describe the image of the wings and the sword that the killer had given him, which, except for the Bible verse, was very similar to Sergei’s rendering.
While everyone passes around the piece of paper, studying the drawing, the oversize plates of food begin to arrive. Then I relay the story that Seth’s CI, Wayne, told us about the Roys and the Family. I pick at my bowl of oatmeal, absentmindedly crushing the lumps with my spoon, and listen to the quiet grunts of pleasure coming from my colleagues that only high-cholesterol foods stoked with butter and bacon fat can summon forth. I’m already regretting my renewed promise to Jackie that I would watch what I ate.
Hoskins waves his fork in a circular motion around one temple. “I’ll tell you what. This whole thing about ‘the Family’ sounds like creeper talk to me. A bugaboo to scare the civilians.”
Seth wipes at his mouth with a napkin. “Yeah, I gotta agree. I think Wayne’s telling the truth about what he’s heard. But it does sound like trailer-trash lore. I think the Family is just a catchall term for a loose confederation of meth dealers. They’re all family, when they’re not trying to slit each other’s throats.”
Craddock reaches across my arms to grab for the syrup bottle and pours a river of it over his short stack studded with pecans. “’Scuse me,” he mumbles, his mouth full of pancakes.
I abandon my spoon in the bowl. “Ryan, anything more on the Roys?”
Ryan has just speared a piece of breakfast sausage and he regards it thoughtfully. “I contacted the Smith County Sheriff’s Office in East Texas, and the case is officially closed. The fire that burned down the Roys’ house was attributed to arson, but whoever set the fire remains unknown. The three bodies were assumed to be Evangeline Roy and her two sons, but the detective in charge of the case at the time, Jasper Routh, was never completely convinced that it was the Roy family. He’s retired now, and the new guard wants it to just lie in a file drawer. I spoke to Detective Routh at his home, though, and he tells a different story about the Family. He believes they’re real, growing in number, and have their hands in just about everything, including law enforcement.”
I stare at the sign above the order counter, which reads LIFE IS SHORT…START WITH DESSERT. “Anything show up in the criminal records search on the Roys out of state?”
Ryan shakes his head, pushing his plate away. “I checked in all the states you suggested and nothing shows up for anyone matching the age and description of Tommy or Curtis Roy. Military is harder to check, but I’ve got some lines of inquiry started.”
Craddock points with his knife to a leftover sausage link on Ryan’s plate and asks, “You gonna finish that?”
Ryan says no, and Craddock crowds me, reaching across once again to stab at the sausage.
“Jesus,” I say, giving him a warning look. “You want to change seats, Craddock?”
He grins guiltily at me. “A boy’s gotta eat, Dee-tective.”
Seth points to the drawing, one corner now darkened with someone’s dripped coffee. “So have we all agreed that these letters are A and B? If so, my vote goes to Aryan Brotherhood. That’s where we should be looking.”
Craddock and Hoskins nod; however, Ryan shrugs and says, “Maybe. Makes sense. But…”
He picks up the drawing and studies it intently.
Tammy Sue appears at the table and asks Seth, “More coffee, hon?” And then she proceeds to pour more coffee into all our cups, whether we want it or not.
“But what, Ryan? Spit it out,” Hoskins says, pulling his jacket off the back of his chair. “Look, I hate to break up the huddle, but I’ve got to get my daughter to volleyball practice.”
“You’ve got a daughter?” I ask, surprised.
“Yeah, I’ve got a daughter,” Hoskins says defensively. He stands, getting ready to leave.
“He talks about her all the time,” Craddock adds. “Just not in front of you is all.”
Hoskins makes a face. “I hate to leave before the real sharing begins, but I actually have work to do this morning. You got this one, right, Tom?”
Craddock sighs and pulls his wallet out of his pants pocket. “Crap. Guess it’s my turn to get the check.”
Hoskins waves cheerfully and grabs a toothpick from the counter as he leaves.
“Wow,” I say. “Hoskins with a daughter. That almost makes him a person. I don’t know whether to be alarmed or encouraged.”
Soon both Craddock and Seth say their good-byes, leaving me alone with Ryan, who’s still studying the drawing.
“Better get to the station,” I say, beginning to stand.
“I don’t think this first letter’s an A,” he tells me. “It doesn’t actually look like any English letter. More like a symbol.”
I sit back down. “A symbol for what?”
“I don’t know. Is the kid who drew it literate?”
“He’s a Russian immigrant, but if you mean can he read and write English, then, yeah, I think so. In theory he’s been going to school. Want to check it out?”
“Sure,” he says, using both arms to reach around for his jacket.
I notice for the first time that the shoulder that was wounded is now moving freely. “You’re out of the sling,” I say, putting the drawing back into my pocket.
He nods but doesn’t look cheerful about it. “You feeling okay?” I ask him.
“Yeah,” he says unconvincingly. “I’m just not sure I’m cut out for undercover.”
“What’s going on, Ryan?” I knew he’d been taking a lot of ribbing about the bust and the half-naked high-school girl who was his “date,” so I stop myself from following up the question with a provocative comment like Having those wet dreams again?
“It’s this drug thing,” he answers. “There’s no end to it. It’s just a big hole that gets bigger all the time. The drugs get more addictive, the cost gets cheaper. My fiancée’s already talking about having a kid, and all the kids I see, doesn’t matter if they’re poor, wealthy, white, brown—they’re all jumped up on something. Can’t get through the day without self-medicating. I mean, did you see those kids at the party? Throwing prescription pills into a bowl like candy for everyone to eat. Xanax, Vicodin, Percocet. They call it skittling. Where do they get their hands on all this stuff? They’ve got everything going for them. Smart, rich, beautiful, educated, and they’re pissing it all away to get high. And not just with pot, but with heroin. Fucking heroin…”
I watch Ryan keying himself up, speaking more and more rapidly with increasing volume until the people sitting at the table closest to us are staring at him. Swearing is something he doesn’t usually do.
“Hey, Ryan,” I say quietly, tapping him on the leg. “You need some time off?”
“Maybe,” he says. “I just don’t see me, or any of us, doing any good.”
I fold my hands together on the table and lean in closer to Ryan until I’m sure he’s looking me in the eyes. “You know what my uncle Benny used to say about facing a pointless task? He’d say, ‘All we can do is add our light to the sum of l
ight.’”
Ryan thinks about this for a second. Then he nods and says, “That’s actually…pretty wise.”
I sit back in my chair and snort. “Nah, Benny would never have said that. What he would have said was ‘Get up, go to work, go home, drink some potato vodka, and kiss your fiancée.’ Only he wouldn’t have said kiss, and in your case it would probably be a Miller Lite.”
Ryan smiles, ducking his head.
“If you want to stay sane, you can’t look at this job as an endgame. Ever. It’s a never-ending waterfall for one reason, and one reason only: People want drugs. So we don’t really get to change anything,” I say. “We just get to move the pieces around the board a little bit. Like a chess game being played by blind people on one side and crazy people on the other.”
“So, if I’m getting this analogy,” he says, “we do our jobs right and it lets the queen stand and fight a while longer.”
I grind a knuckle playfully into his right deltoid. “That’s right, smart boy. And every now and then, we knock a piece off the board. You’re a good detective, and I want you on the team, but you’ve got to let me know if you’re seriously thinking about leaving Narcotics.”
I pull my sunglasses and phone off the table, waiting for him to look at me again.
“Still want to check out the symbol on the drawing?” I prompt.
He nods.
“Good,” I say, standing. “Now get the fuck back to the station. You’re late.”
Tammy Sue waves as we walk out the door, scratching at her scalp with a pencil.
“Y’all go catch us some bad, y’hear?” she calls out from behind the pie counter.
25
When I walk into the station, the whole department seems to be milling around Sergeant Taylor’s office. The office door is open and they all turn to look at me at the same time with the same expressions they had when I walked into Bender’s house and Lana was lying in a river of her own blood on the kitchen floor: that curious blend of male copitude that exudes disappointment and disapproval and doesn’t change whether I rise to emotional detachment or decline into a loss of confidence.