Joseph Wambaugh - Hollywood Crows

When they got back out to their black-and-white, Gil driving and Cat riding shotgun, he said, “Why’re you being so nice to me? It’s not my birthday.”

“I’m always nice to everybody,” she said. “And you’re so close to finishing your probation, I thought we should celebrate. You won’t be a probie that we can kick around anymore.”

“You’ve been especially nice,” Gil said, driving west on Sunset Boulevard at 11 P.M.

“I hadn’t noticed,” Cat said, clearing from code 7 and, seeing their MDC blinking, hitting the message-received and display button.

She opened and acknowledged the message, then hit the en route key, and Gil looked at the message on the dashboard screen, saying, “Illegal parking. That’s near that nightclub, what’s it called? The Leopard Lounge?”

“It’s a titty bar masquerading as a fancy nightclub,” Cat said. “Somebody’s always complaining about the parking around there.”

When they were still a few minutes away, Gil said, “There wouldn’t be another reason why you’ve been treating me like you’re my-”

“If you say mommy, I’ll give you a shot of whup-ass spray,” Cat said, touching the canister on her Sam Browne.

“Big sister, I was gonna say.” Then Gil added, “Is it about the shooting?”

“You tell me, Gil,” Cat said. “I haven’t seen you crack a smile since that night in the Hollywood cemetery.”

“Well, it was scary with those FID investigators jacking me up. They aren’t gentle. The shrink was okay, but I just told him what I thought he wanted to hear.”

“Who cares about any of them?” Cat said. “I told you a minute after you shot that guy that you did good. That I woulda done the same.”

“I know, but, well…”

“Well what? You shoulda had ESP and known the tweaker was packing a starter pistol? Is that what?”

“I don’t know. I just feel…different now.”

“Sure, you do,” Cat said. “You’re supposed to. You took a life-through no fault of your own. He made the choice, not you. I was there, boy. I heard you yelling at him to put his hands on his head and get down and prone out. I heard it!”

Gil Ponce said, “I don’t like the other guys slapping me on the back and calling me a gunfighter. I don’t like that.”

“Screw them too!” Cat said. “Macho dipshits. None of them ever fired their weapons outside the pistol range. Those that have wouldn’t go around patting your ass over it.”

“Well, I wouldn’t want anyone else to know that you and me talked about this,” Gil said.

“That’s just your Hispanic machismo,” Cat said.

“I’m not really Hispanic,” he said.

“Let’s not go over that again,” she said. “Now, listen to me, partner, I don’t know how to dial you in except to keep saying you did exactly what any copper woulda done and shoulda done at that moment in that place. And I’d hate to think that my safety could be jeopardized from now on because you’re gun-shy.”

He said, “Cat, I don’t want you-”

“Lemme tell you a true story,” she said, interrupting him. “Five years ago, I had a partner for two months. A nice guy. We were working Watch three. He married a woman with four kids who was a peace activist, and pretty soon he decided to resign from the Department. Said he wanted to go into a line of work where he’d never have to use violence on anybody. And on the last day we worked together, he made a little confession to me. Because of his wife’s haranguing, he hadn’t loaded a round in his nine since before we started working together. It’s the closest I ever came to pulling my baton and beating another cop right into the ground.”

“Why’re you telling me this, Cat?” Gil asked.

“Did you clean your nine after the other night?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you reload it?”

“Of course.”

“Then I feel safe. Because this is all about me, not about you. I’ve got a two-year-old at home who needs his momma. I’ve got a good copper here with a loaded nine who’s got my back. So I feel safe. End of story. Any questions?”

After a moment of contemplation, Gil Ponce said, “Thanks, Cat.”

“For what?” she said.

Gil Ponce paused, then said, “For the Thai dinner, of course. It was great.”

“Don’t mention it,” Cat Song said.

There wasn’t any parking for blocks around the Leopard Lounge at 11:15 on a soft summer night like this one, when a Hollywood moon brought hordes of people out for revelry on the boulevards. Gil parked their black-and-white in a red zone on Sunset Boulevard and they walked south to the source of the call, a large apartment building with parking spaces in front.

The person reporting was a well-coiffed, well-dressed elderly woman who answered the door at the manager’s office and said with a Russian accent, “I’m Mrs. Vronsky. I’m the one who called.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Gil said.

“At this time of night I should be in bed, asleep,” she said, “but if I go to sleep, I’ll get woke up when my tenants come home and can’t park. A man just pulled into space number two, and when I yelled at him, he said something ugly to me. Then after I called for you, he drove away.”

“Then there’s nobody for us to cite at the moment,” Cat said. “Call us if it happens again.”

“Do you know Officer Ramstead?” Mrs. Vronsky said. “He’s a friend of mine.”

“Community Relations Office?” Cat said.

“Yes, that’s right,” Mrs. Vronsky said. “He often comes by in the daytime and helps me with the parking problems. It’s all because of the nightclub, you know.”

“Yes,” Cat said, “we sympathize.”

“Officer Ramstead is a very kind man and he likes my homemade piroshki,” the old woman said. “If I had some, I’d invite you in and pour you some tea, and you could taste it.”

“Some other time,” Cat said, giving Gil a look that said, Lonely old lady.

“Oh, look!” Mrs. Vronsky said. “Another one.”

Sure enough, a four-year-old white Corvette that had been cruising slowly along the street, looking for parking, had wheeled into one of the vacant spaces in front of the apartment building. The driver of the car turned out the headlights but did not get out.

“We’ll check this one,” Cat said, and both cops walked out to the front of the building.

“Come back when I have some piroshki!” Mrs. Vronsky called after them.

Gil Ponce was surprised to find a young woman sitting in the car when he walked up on the driver’s side. A beautiful young woman who looked to be of mixed race, with dark Asian eyes. She jumped when he tapped on her window with his flashlight.

She lowered the window and said, “Yes, Officer?” Then a beam shone along her dashboard and she saw Cat at the passenger window.

“Do you live here, ma’am?” Gil said.

“No, I don’t,” she said. “Is there a problem?”

“You’re parking on private property in a resident’s parking space,” Gil said, thinking that this girl was smokin’ hot!

She blinked, smiled, and said, “But Officer, I’m not parking. I just stopped here because there’s no place on the street. I’m waiting for a car to leave a parking space at the Leopard Lounge. I work there.”

“May I see your driver’s license and registration?”

Jasmine looked in her purse, retrieved her wallet, opened it, and said, “Oh, crap! Today I bought some underwear at Victoria’s Secret and paid by credit card. The girl asked for my driver’s license too. I must’ve left my license and my Visa!”

“How about your registration?”

She handed it to Gil Ponce, who shined his light on it and said, “Jasmine McVicker.”

“Yes,” she said, drumming nervously on the steering wheel, looking at her watch. It was 11:25 P.M.