David Putnam - The Disposables

“If you no longer have the felon then how can she be abetting?” My heart started to soar upward into the cloudless night.

“There’s-” Fong started to say.

Mack held up his hand to quiet him. “There’s the other charge.”

He yanked me back down to earth. I got up and walked around the front of the car, the headlights off. I wanted to see his eyes. He rolled down his window.

I put my hands on the ledge and got a little closer. All this time no one had mentioned the kids. They sat like the elephant in the room.

I said, “What other charge?” My throat went dry, my voice cracked.

He waited a long interminable minute. “You know, Bruno.”

“Say it.” I said, the bottom dropping out of my world. What did they have? Was it enough to hold her? Was it enough to hold me, and he was just going to let me walk because of what had happened between us? If so, I couldn’t let it go down that way. I would have to get back in the car, take the fall with her.

“What it’s always been about.” His pale blue eyes, sad.

“What? Say it. I want you to say it.”

“The kids.”

A large knot rose up in my chest. To deny it disrespected the man, someone I had grown to like. I tried to speak, my voice sandpaper at the back of my throat. “You guys don’t have a case.”

He didn’t move. My heart skipped. I watched his eyes.

“No, we don’t have a case.”

I stood and looked down the street as my eyes teared up, that old emotional man thing again. I said, “Then you’re going to release her?”

“The FBI is coming down in the morning to put a hold on her. They’re adopting the case.”

I rode that same roller coaster back down into the basement. “You could go in and blue sheet her tonight. You could do that.”

“It’d be my job.”

I wanted to tell him so much. Tell him about each child, the untenable environments, the sadistic physical abuse, and the system set up to protect them that put them right back into harm’s way. I couldn’t help it, I threw my trump card. I leaned back in, the tears heavy in my eyes, said, “You got a cigarette?”

Mack never looked away, “Man, I’m soaked in gasoline and you wanna smoke?” He smiled. “I got to get these things off. You take care of yourself.” When he put it in drive, the red brake lights lit up the dark street. He didn’t move.

He finally said, “You’re not going after Jumbo, are you?”

I shook my head.

He said, “I didn’t think so. Tell Wicks-tell him I’m the one that let the junkyard dog loose on his ass. You got about a two-hour lead, enough for me to do the paper on this case, then I’ll be right behind you.”

He hit the gas. The back tires screeched.

“What about my girl?”

He didn’t stop or even slow down. The purple-black night slammed down. It took my breath away. I started running.

In all the years on the street I learned one sure thing about the mind of a crook: how, when faced with adversity, a bold and brash act can pull your cookies out of the fire. I checked Wicks’s house in Rosemead, burned forty minutes of the two hours Mack doled out, and found it dark and cold. If time worked for me rather than against me, I would sit and wait. Instead, I chose bold and brash.

One cold night in Compton, I stood in the parking lot of Rosco’s Market sipping coffee under the eave, in the lee of the wind, along with Mark Hocks, a rookie deputy in possession of a mere six months on the street. He’d called the meet, bought the coffee, and found it difficult to ask the question, the true excuse for the get-together. He wanted to know the secret to being a good street cop, how to make not just good arrests but great arrests. Honored, I didn’t know how to respond. I told him to always be suspicious and not look for the crime, don’t wait for the probable cause, watch the behavior. Behavior will give it away every time. Someone looks like a crook, go up and have a chat with him. I told Mark all of this while we watched the street, the cars going by in the icy rain. A white Honda Accord pulled in and got gas just as I was about to leave. The car-I thought it the same car anyway-white Hondas in Southern California were the same as snowflakes in Aspen-had gone by on the street and now it came back to gas up.

I tossed the rest of the burnt coffee poured from the pot inside and, without telling Mark, walked over to talk to the driver. Both of our black-and-white cop cars sat in plain view to all. The driver of the white Honda got out, saw the uniform, and immediately looked around, a rabbit about to flee. I grabbed onto his open black leather jacket by the front and said, “Don’t. Don’t.” At the same time, I felt his waistband on the right side, found a.38. I pulled his gun, slammed him on the hood of the Honda, stuck his own gun in his ear, and told him not to breathe. Mark dropped his coffee, drew his gun, and ran over to help. The Honda was stolen. Jed Ashe also carried in his right shirt pocket a half ounce of rock cocaine. When asked by Mark what the hell he thought he was doing pulling into get gas with two cops standing in the parking lot, Jed said, “Didn’t think you’d tumble to me if I acted like nothin’ was wrong.”

I chose bold and brash. It didn’t work for Jed, but I wasn’t Jed. I drove my boosted car into the parking lot of Montclair Police Station, forty miles east of Los Angeles, another forty minutes gone. It left only forty minutes to get the information I needed and get back to Los Angeles.

The little burg of Montclair sat quiet in the dark night, light from the front window warm and inviting, as a soft invitation to Joe Citizen. I walked into the front lobby, a little bebop in my step that bespoke, “nothing wrong here.” I’m Joe Citizen making an inquiry. The lobby waiting area contained two gray Naugahyde couches, two glass cases with awards for the top cops, and pictures on the wall of the city council and mayor. On the other side of the counter, the blue-suited cop stood and came to the thick bulletproof Plexiglas. “Can I help you?” The sound came out metallic with some sort of audio boost.

“Yes. I would like to speak with Barbara White.”

Barbara kept her own last name, a professional consideration. Long ago at a barbecue, she confided she didn’t like the name Barbara Wicks not after being White all of her life.

“What’s this in reference to?”

“It’s a personal matter.”

“What’s your name?”

No way did I think the L.A. cops put out a BOLO for me, especially one that would reach this far out into the next county. Local maybe, not this far out. Still, I hesitated, “Can you just tell her Bruno is here to see her.”

“Bruno who?”

I didn’t answer.

“Have a seat.” He turned, picked up the phone, dialed a number, and he watched me as he spoke. The person on the other end said something, the cop turned to reply, as if I could read his lips. I fought the urge to bolt.

He put the phone down and stared at me. My heart raced. He came over to the counter, slowly moved his hand to the edge out of view. Behind me, over at the front door a solenoid bolt shot home. He’d locked me in.

The door that led to the back of the station opened. The woman in uniform did not smile. It took a long second to realize Barbara had aged a great deal since our last meeting. I tried to remember how long ago and knew not enough time had passed to warrant the quick degradation of youth. She’d lost weight. Where the curves on her hips used to beckon a man, they now showed too much bone, her uniform pants cinched up with a black basket weave belt. Gray sprouted in the part of her once lustrous brown hair.

“What are you doing here, Bruno?”