Castillo Linda - Outsider

“Last month,” she says, “two people were killed in the course of a no-knock warrant. Happened in Franklinton. A couple. It’s been on the news.”

A memory licks at the back of my brain. “What happened?”

“One of the detectives wrote up a phony affidavit based on the word of a confidential informant by the name of Eddie Cysco. They got the warrant and went in, middle of the night no-knock. Vice unit raided the wrong house. The homeowner was armed—legally—and all hell broke loose. Everyone started shooting. The couple was shot to pieces. The vice unit covered it up. They planted drugs and no one was ever the wiser.”

“Were you there?”

“I was parked on the street. I heard it unfold. Saw the aftermath.” When she raises her gaze to mine, her eyes are haunted. “The Garners were good people. They worked. Led stable lives. Sandra Garner was six months pregnant. Looking forward to her first baby. Kate, I read the coroner’s report. Tox was negative. She’d been shot eighteen times.”

The words strike a blow, but I deflect it, look away. “Do you have proof of any of this?”

“I was working on it.” She sighs. “Until they came after me, anyway.” She raises a determined gaze to mine. “Here’s what I know: The real target couple—the couple whose house never got raided—had been told by the vice unit to stop selling heroin. Evidently, they were interfering with another dealer who’d been given preferential treatment by the unit.”

“How do you know?”

“I know because the informant they used to get the warrant is Eddie Cysco, my CI.” She taps her chest with her palm. “I recruited him. Two years ago. I brought him in. Groomed him. Got to know him. When I asked him about the raid, he denied knowing either couple. He has no connection to them and no reason to lie.”

She sniffs a runny nose, runs her sleeve across her face. “The affidavit was bogus. The warrant was bogus. The cops covered it up and rewrote history. They murdered two innocent people, ruined their reputations. That was the end of it for me. I had to get out.”

“What did you do?”

“I took everything I had to Deputy Chief Frank Monaghan,” she tells me. “I gave him names. Dates. Amounts. He seemed extremely concerned, supportive of me, and said he would look into it. Keep everything confidential. He asked me to lay low for a few days.” She looks toward the window, where snow and wind pound the glass. “I should have known it was too easy.” She meets my gaze. “I guess that brings us to the bad-news part of all this.”

The dread in my gut augments to something darker. I rub a hand over my face, shoring up, knowing she’s about to throw something terrible my way.

“I knew there would be consequences if they found out I’d turned on them,” she tells me. “I knew they’d find a way to protect themselves. Destroy my reputation. My career. Or kill me.”

A shudder moves through her, but she doesn’t seem to notice. “I had no idea how it would go down. Best-case scenario, they’d threaten me, tell me to keep my mouth shut. Get me to resign. Worst case, I’d the get the ‘shot in the line of duty’ treatment. Some convenient friendly-fire incident. In the end, it came in the form of a no-knock warrant last night.”

Wind hammers the window as she outlines in horrific detail the SWAT team descending on her house in Columbus at three o’clock this morning. “They thought they were going to catch me unaware, but I was ready for them. I had the pickup truck parked across the alley in my neighbor’s garage.”

I listen, my heart pounding. My hands and feet are cold and yet I’m sweating beneath my uniform shirt. “Was anyone hurt?”

“I don’t know. There was a lot of chaos. It happened fast.”

“What was the warrant for?”

“I don’t know.” Her eyes burn into mine. “Whatever the charge, it’s trumped up.”

I stare at her, a plethora of emotions boiling in my chest. Disbelief that she could become involved in something so reprehensible. Once upon a time, Gina was an idealistic young cop who would no more partake in corruption than cut her own throat. I feel betrayed, too. I’d once looked up to her, loved her like a sister, and trusted her with my life.

“What do you want from me?” I ask, trying not to notice the tightness in my throat.

“I need your help,” she says. “I can’t do this on my own.”

“Do what exactly?”

“Stop them. Save what’s left of my reputation. My life. Kate, I know this puts you in a precarious position, but you’re the only person I can trust.”

But can I trust you?

I don’t pose the question, but it hovers on the tip of my tongue. Doubt is the source of the turmoil in my chest. “If you’re wanted, if there’s an active warrant, I can’t aid and abet you. You know that.”

“I’m not asking you to put your career on the line. I wouldn’t do that. But I need some time to make this right.” When I say nothing, she adds, “Kate, I wasn’t supposed to survive that raid.”

The words hang, damning and unfathomable. The silence is punctuated by the crash of wind against the house, snow pattering the window, and the hiss of our elevated breathing.

After a moment, Gina leans over to set the empty mug on the table at the head of the cot. Her flannel shirt gapes and I notice the blood coming through the turtleneck beneath it just below her left shoulder. It’s bright red and wet and it’s sure as hell not from some sham nosebleed caused by the airbag.

“When were you going to tell me about the gunshot wound?” I ask.

Giving me a withering look, she settles back onto the cot and pulls the blankets up to her chin. “What are you going to do? Take me to the hospital? Turn me in?”

A thread of worry goes through me as she pulls back the blankets and I take in the full extent of the bleeding. A red-black stain that’s soaked her shirt all the way to the hem at her hip. “How bad is it?” I ask.

“I don’t know. Haven’t had a chance to look. Hurts like a son of a bitch.”

“There’s no way around your seeing a doctor, Gina.”

“You know I can’t do that.”

“Let’s get something straight right off the bat. You are not in charge and you are not calling the shots. Do you understand?”

She looks away, seems to sag more deeply into the mattress. For the first time, she looks defeated, as if she’s come to the realization that she’s fighting a battle that can’t be won.

I fish my cell from my pocket, glance down at the screen, drop it back in. Everything we’ve discussed spirals in my brain. Allegations of police corruption. A voluntary confession that she was part of it. All of it punctuated by the fact that I haven’t seen or spoken to her in ten years.

The most pressing issue, however, is the gunshot wound. Unlike the way those kinds of injuries are depicted on TV and in movies, even a flesh wound can become life-threatening without immediate treatment.

I think about my significant other, John Tomasetti—who’s an agent with the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation—and another layer of dread settles over me. I’m hesitant to involve him at this juncture, at least until I have more information and a better handle on what happened last night in Columbus. I won’t be able to put off calling him much longer.

“Gina, do you have proof of any of this?” I ask.

“I have some audio. On my cell. It’s not great. It’s not enough. But it’s a start.” She gestures toward her coat, hanging on a chair back. “If you want me to play it—”

I shake my head. “We need to get that bullet wound looked at first. Let me make a call.” I’m thinking about Tomasetti as I pull the notebook and pen from my pocket. “I need to know who is involved. I need names. All of them.”