Ridley Pearson - Beyond Recognition

It was dusty and dank, spiderwebs and mildew. There was a ’57 Chevy on blocks, too much dust across its skin to discern a color. It was ensconced in a cocoon of sports equipment, storage boxes, and milk crates. There was barely enough room for the two of them to stand. There was a boy’s bike to her left, shiny and well-kept.

Daphne threw one arm around him, like a child seeking comfort. Her body was warm and it moved behind her heavy breathing.

With the shed door open an inch, they had a good view of the house. Light from a flashlight flickered in a window, but only briefly. Boldt heard an exchange between ERT and dispatch. His heart raced in anticipation.

“He’s in there,” Daphne said, sounding excited.

A shadow moved in the same window.

Nicholas Hall stood less than twenty yards away, his attention fixed on the back yard. Boldt whispered, “He senses us. This guy has good instincts.”

He felt her nod.

Hall’s shadow crossed the window. Boldt felt it as a cold breeze.

Daphne remained pressed close. Boldt wanted to push her away, but he didn’t. Instead he drank in her warmth, the feel of her breath against his neck, the gentle touch of her fingers on his waist. “Come on out,” she whispered, encouraging the suspect.

Boldt willed the man to find the money, knowing he wouldn’t have taken that much time if he had found it right away.

“If he comes out without the money?” Daphne asked quietly.

“We’ll have a mess,” Boldt answered. He didn’t need to elaborate further.

Daphne whispered, “Five hundred dollars is a fortune to him. He’ll find it.”

Boldt elbowed some distance between them. He couldn’t take her talking into his ear, even at a whisper. He couldn’t take her hands on him. His skin was hot and his pulse racing. She felt the elbow and held him all the harder.

Hall could be heard hurrying down the steps inside the house. Boldt worried that the man had given up. Disappointment surged through the sergeant. To bust him without the money on him was a simple B and E. The prosecuting attorney would laugh at Boldt. He had to make the call to arrest or return to surveillance.

The back door cracked open. Hall hesitated, unseen.

Reading Boldt’s thoughts as she so often did, Daphne said, “What about the bones? What about a suspicion of murder charge? Wouldn’t that hold him?”

Bingo! Boldt thought. “You’re worth your weight in gold,” he whispered. He handed her the flashlight and withdrew his handgun. “Ready?” he asked.

The suspect stepped out of the dark house and shut the door behind himself.

“On your count,” Daphne hissed.

Boldt clicked the walkie-talkie button three times.

He spun to face her and their lips brushed. He leaned back and held up his fingers. One … two … three …

He kicked open the shed door. Daphne snapped on the light.

“Police!” Boldt shouted. “On the ground now! ”

Hall dove to the earth, hands outstretched. The move surprised them.

“One thing about those military boys,” Daphne quipped. “They know how to follow orders!”

Daphne realized that she loved him but would never have him. Her mind was not on the suspect or the house or the attempted theft but on Boldt, the man, the sergeant, the lover, the friend. The unattainable. Her thoughts had been on the suspect, and they returned quickly to him, but for that brief instant of time between leaning against him and being asked if she was ready, her thoughts had strayed to encompass the idea of a life with him and the realization that any chance for such a thing had passed. It was a thought she had entertained and refuted an equal number of times, as she did once again, though she eased incredibly close to acceptance. Her move to Owen had felt like love but in truth had been little more than a late rebound, an attempt to shed the burden of Lou Boldt. The attempt had failed, something she had acknowledged within herself only over the past few weeks, something Owen had sensed immediately. She faced the reality that her personal life was once again a train wreck. Did she think too much and feel too little, or was it the other way around? If she listened to her friends, she was opinionated and stubborn, inflexible and bossy. These were the same friends who told her how much they loved her. If she listened to Owen, she was beautiful and brainy, ballsy and supportive. If she listened to her own heart, it said that what had once been respect for Lou Boldt had matured into unconditional love. She admired him for his musicianship, his leadership by example, his intelligence, and his humanism. He was flawed: full of self-doubt, misplaced compassion, and a tendency to hide inside his moods. He was an amazing father, a loyal husband, and she wanted him for her own. Liz be damned.

He stepped toward the suspect. There was enough ambient light to see shapes but not details.

She didn’t want any surprises. “Let’s wait for backup, shall we?”

Boldt never broke his concentration. He nodded. Then he called out to the man lying on the ground, “Nicholas Hall, you are under arrest. You have the right to remain silent ….”

He glanced over at her-only for an instant-and their eyes met. His were full of joy.

She cherished the moment. She tucked it away and saved it. Safe from harm. Hers always.

They took turns with him, as if working a punching bag. Nicholas Hall had been processed like a side of beef: his fingerprints inked, his possessions stored in lockup in a brown paper bag bearing his name and record number, his clothes replaced with the humiliating orange jumpsuit with CITY JAIL stenciled in huge white letters across the back. Boldt had requested “full jewelry”-handcuffs and ankle manacles. He wanted Hall to think about it.

The prisoner had not yet requested a court-appointed attorney, a privilege that had been offered him during three separate readings of the Miranda. They were taking no chances with Nicholas Hall. The lack of an attorney meant that Hall spent three consecutive two-hour shifts in Homicide’s eight-by-eight interrogation room A, the Box. He was given a twenty-minute break between sessions, escorted to the toilet, and offered food and water. Boldt took the first hour and the role of the heavy. Daphne took hour number two and played the friend. Boldt took hour three. By the fourth hour, Daphne had begun to loosen him up by pitting Boldt against her and telling him how the old guard, the hard-liners like Boldt, didn’t like a woman doing their job, didn’t like the suspects forming any kind of relationship with her.

“I put up with a lot of shit around here,” she informed him. Hall had rough hair and soft brown eyes. The left side of his lower neck was discolored-beet purple-a birthmark, not a burn. That hand hid in his lap, shackled to its partner. “They think of me in terms of my sex,” she said. “I’m all tits and ass to most of them, that’s all. I’m different,” she said, attempting to appeal to that hand of his, “so they don’t trust me.”

“I know all about that.”

In the three hours and twenty minutes they had worked on him, this was the fourth full sentence that Hall had spoken. Daphne felt a tingle of excitement in her belly. “The hand,” she said.

He nodded.

“People think you’re a freak.”

“You got that right.”

“Me,” she said, “I’m a freak around here because I don’t pee standing up.” She wanted to place as many images in his head about her as possible, hoping to mislead him into seeing her strictly as a woman, not as a cop but as opposing the cops, the same way Nicholas Hall felt at that moment.

He smiled.

She could tell a lot about him from that smile: considerate, kind, thoughtful. Not that she trusted it. “Do you have brothers or sisters?” she asked, knowing the answer.