Shift: Infected, #5, page 6
On the stairs, he heard the doorbell again, and Roan snapped, “Knock it off!” Dylan deserved the sleep. Besides, he still hadn’t figured out the whole Holden thing yet.
He opened the door to find Holden standing there with his hands on his hips, head cocked to the side, a slightly haughty look on his face. He was dressed very casually, in jeans, a blood-red T-shirt, and a black leather jacket, with his sunglasses already pushed up on his head. The only odd note was the fact that he was wearing hiking boots.
“Knock it off? Who’s a grumpy pants today?” Holden looked him up and down. “A grumpy pants in his underwear. Are those silk?”
“Satin. Get in here before someone snaps a photo of me.” He stood back, holding the door open, and Holden came in, now looking amused. He shoved the door shut and said, “Dylan’s sleeping, okay? I don’t want to wake him.”
“Ah. I thought you smelled like sex. Have you ever had a cycle this short? I was amazed. Think being in a coma helped?”
Roan sighed wearily, realizing he wasn’t up to Holden just yet. He walked to the kitchen and waved at the living room, hoping Holden would figure out for himself that was an invitation to sit. “I dunno. How’s the case going?”
“That’s what I came to see you about. I’m guessing you haven’t seen the paper today?”
He got a bottle of vanilla Frappuccino from the fridge and felt weariness settle on his shoulders like a wet cloak. His detective spidey sense was telling him bad news was incoming. “Is someone dead?”
“No, but not for lack of trying.” When Roan came back into the living room, Holden was holding up part of the paper, folded over to highlight the section of interest. The headline screamed “Local Sports Star Involved In Drive-By Shooting.”
“Holy shit,” Roan exclaimed, snatching the paper out of his hand and quickly skimming the article. “Grey? How is he?”
“Absolutely fine. He was just lucky I was there, and I am very calm, having been shot at before.”
Roan plopped on the sofa to read it. “Since when were you shot at?”
“Okay, not shot at per se, but I’ve been in the area when drive-bys have gone down and a drug deal went bad. I think that counts.” Holden sat on the edge of the sofa and said, “Last time I was here, Dylan offered me tea.”
“You want tea? Go make it yourself. You know where the kitchen is.”
“You’re a sparkling host.”
“I’m a grumpy pants, remember?”
“A grumpy pants in awesome underwear. I take it, from the red foil lipstick print, it was a Valentine’s Day gift.”
“Score one for you, Sherlock.” Although Roan was reading the article, he couldn’t help but note, out of the corner of his eye, that Holden seemed to be staring at him. Or at least studying his chest. Did Dylan leave a hickey? He glanced down to see. “What are you looking at?”
“That scar,” he said, and didn’t clarify. Which one? “Is that from a bullet wound?”
Roan shrugged. “Yeah.” Well, two were, so it was a decent guess. But if Holden meant the scar near his collarbone or the one near his left hip, no. But he wasn’t getting into his scars with Holden. He had no idea why he considered that a form of intimacy, the true story behind most of his scars, but it was just something he didn’t like to discuss. You could get past and get over your childhood, but some things just brought it all back a little too clearly. “Unidentified friend. Is that you?”
“It is. Luckily I knew the reporter who wrote the article. I told him to leave my name out, or his wife would discover what he was actually doing when he was supposedly working late on a story.”
“Oh no, not another closet case.”
“Nope, not this time. He’s straight, to the best of my knowledge. He just visits the S&M clubs. A lot. If they had a punch card, he’d be on his second free whipping by now.”
An S&M punch card? That brought up an amusing image that made Roan smirk. “You know, having dirt on a lot of people is a good way to get offed. It’s why Danny DeVito got killed in L.A. Confidential.”
“I try not to advertise the amount of dirt I have. I try and fly under the radar. Speaking of dirt: Carey Switzer. We really need to talk about him.”
The article said that the car was unidentified—apparently neither Grey nor Holden saw it—and the police were still looking for witnesses, as well as perusing tapes from nearby CCTV cameras to see if they’d caught anything. That told him the cops had pretty much nothing to go on. He wondered if Grey being a “local sports star” would encourage some witnesses to come forward. Roan folded up the paper and tossed it on the coffee table, enjoying a swig of sugary caffeinated goodness. “Okay, so you know Switzer.”
“He’s infamous on the East side. He’s one of those ones who wants freebies.”
That was seemingly cryptic, until you realized you were talking to a sex worker who used to hustle on street corners, and then its meaning was nauseatingly clear. “He extorted sex?”
Holden nodded, looking disgusted at the whole thing. “He’d deliberately pick up newbies, youngsters, mostly female, some male, some just street kids and not even prostitutes. He’d say he’d arrest them and bring them in, but he’d let them off if he got a freebie.”
“A fuck.”
“From the boys, a blow job. But yeah, that was the deal. If you turned down his oh so generous offer, he’d rough you up, take you in, and say you were beaten when he found you. One woman claimed he planted a rock on her.”
A rock being meth, of course. Roan rubbed his eyes and wondered if he should just track this motherfucker at home. Nowadays departments cracked down hard on this kind of shit, but bullies with a badge still existed, and when they did, they were horrendously foul little despots. They all deserved to be taken out and shot. “No one’s filed a complaint against him?”
“Not until Jasmine sued, no.”
“Shit.” There was motive. His little fiefdom was threatening to come crashing down, so he takes out the only witness brave enough to say something.
“And he really hated gays. Even if he got what he wanted from a boy, it wasn’t unusual for him to beat them up anyways. Once he beat one up and ran him in, said he resisted arrest, pulled a knife on him. I can’t imagine what he’d do to a transsexual.”
“Will any of these people be willing to testify against Switzer?”
Holden grimaced, his hands tightening like he wanted to make a fist but didn’t dare. “I don’t know. It would depend.”
“On what?”
“On how much protection they’d get.”
“They’re that scared of him?”
“He’s a complete fucking asshole.”
“Well, being a bully and a rapist will get you that reputation.” He sighed wearily and dry washed his face. “What about Michael Brand?”
Holden shook his head. “No one’s heard of him. Switzer generally works alone.”
Roan didn’t know how to ask it, so he decided to just try and brazen it out. “Were you victimized by Switzer?”
Holden tensed and gave him a sidelong look of disbelief. “I’ve never been a victim of anyone, Roan.”
“I’m willing to believe you’ve always been supernaturally canny, but you were a newbie kid once yourself. That couldn’t have been a great time.” And the way he’d tightened up, the thin filament of disgust in his voice when he talked about Switzer... something about that felt intensely personal.
Holden stared at him straight on, his eyes flinty and jaw taut. “These are my people, Ro. I may not be on the street anymore, but I still feel that these are my kids, and I don’t like anyone exploiting them. Especially not prick cops with a Napoleon complex.”
Was that really it? Part of it, but Roan was sure Holden was holding back on him. Still, if he didn’t feel like talking about it, who was he to press? He didn’t want to talk about his scars either. So Roan held up his hands as if in surrender and sat back against the sofa. “Fair enough. I’ll make some inquiries, see if I can find out if there’s anyone in the department who’s heard some gossip about Switzer. Cop shops are as gossipy as any other place where there are too many people with not enough to do.”
Holden relaxed in increments. “I can tell you Jasmine wasn’t a hooker. There’s rumors of a drug habit that I’ve been unable to concretely prove. Oh, and our helpful hockey client finally remembered Jasmine lived with a roommate who may still be living in the same apartment. Can we have him tested for brain damage?”
“Wait for the checks to clear first. He give you a name?”
“Brandon something or other.”
“Wow, that’s illuminating. I should have that pared down to a few thousand people by lunchtime.”
“Too late, it’s already lunchtime. Have you two been at it all morning or what?” The usual sparkle in Holden’s eyes returned, and it figured sex was the trigger.
“No.” Not all morning. He had stamina, but at a certain point, you needed sleep. And fluids.
“You know, if you want to do a three-way, I’m up for it. Couple of hot guys like you? That’s a freebie. I’m good in three-ways. A couple once hired me for an entire weekend.”
Oh, the sordid things you learned about people. “A gay couple?”
He scoffed. “Yeah. I don’t do women. I have nothing against them, but ever since that one time in high school, I don’t even attempt to sleep with them.”
“One time in high school? So you gave it a try?”
“I tried. It didn’t work. Nothing screams ‘gay boy’ like having a raging teenage hard-on twenty-three-and-a-half hours of the day, and then suddenly being unable to get it up around a naked woman.”
Ouch. “If you didn’t know you were gay before....”
“Yeah, that’s an eye-opener. I always felt I deserved credit for trying, but no one would give it to me. Certainly not my preacher dad. Apparently, if I prayed enough, I could’ve gotten wood.” He rolled his eyes in disgust.
“Is that how it works? No wonder I’m gay—I’m an atheist.”
“There you go. Damned from the start. What was my excuse? Oh yeah—according to my dad, my junkie mother. Gotta love hypocrites, don’t you?”
“Love wasn’t the word I would have chosen.”
“Please note the sarcasm.” There was a muted mechanical hum, and Holden reached into his jeans pocket, pulling out a very slim cell phone that Roan recognized as his “work” phone. Meaning the one only his clients used. Holden checked the number curiously before answering. “Ben, how is my guy today?” His voice had dropped to a sexy, slinky tone, and Roan had to suppress the urge to snicker.
He got up and walked back to the kitchen, mainly because he didn’t want to eavesdrop on this conversation, but also because he was starving. The Frappuccino just seemed to be pointing out to his stomach that there was a meat and starch quota not being filled here.
After a couple of minutes, during which it seemed Holden was negotiating both a meeting time and a price rate (what was Ben asking for? Oh God, he so didn’t want to know...), Roan had just pulled some croissants out of the microwave when Holden said to him, “Gotta roll. I’m meeting Ben at two. But I should be free by three thirty if you need me for anything.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
“Hey, you have a closeted cop friend, right?”
Roan was careful never to mention Kevin by name to anyone in a way that might shed light on his hidden sexuality. But apparently it was known that one of his police contacts was a mutual friend of Dorothy. “Yes. Why?”
“’Cause we should really conspire to hook him up with Ben. He’s a great guy, an IT nerd, a bit overweight and the beard does him no favors, but really sweet. Just lonely as all hell and a bit repressed. So your repressed guy and my repressed guy getting together could be dynamite.”
“I’m actually imagining the most awkward Starbucks meeting of all time.”
“Oh sure, Studly, you scoff, but not every guy is as hot or as confident as you. Some need a push. More like a shove.”
Studly? “This sounds more like a handcuffing.”
“Ben’s not into the kinky shit. Although he could probably be persuaded if you ply him with enough schnapps and weed.”
Roan just hadn’t had enough caffeine yet to deal with him right now. “Bye, Holden.”
That just made Holden grin, showing off his whitened teeth. Roan didn’t understand why anyone wanted to whiten their teeth until they looked like sun-bleached bones, but there was much about current trends he didn’t understand. It probably just meant he was old. “No need to throw me out. I got the message. Be seeing you.”
“Adios.”
Roan had bitten into a steaming hot croissant and was letting the pastry melt in his mouth when Holden paused and turned back. “Oh, one more thing. About the client? A bit obsessed with you.”
Roan almost choked. “What?”
“Not in a gay way, although I’m not a hundred percent certain about that. But he’s definitely fascinated by you. He asked about your scars, if you had a boyfriend, and when we were in the cop shop giving our statements, he asked if any of those cops knew you. He’s way into you.”
He didn’t know what to think about that. “Are you sure you’re not projecting here?”
“Nope. It’s your macho allure, I think. He’s in awe. And why not? You are Batman, after all.”
Roan glowered at him—Holden knew damn well he hated being called that and seemed to enjoy him getting pissed off about it—but he finally came up with a comeback. “Does that make you the Boy Wonder?”
Holden returned the glower. “I will be dead before you get me in elf shoes.”
It was nice to know Holden drew a line somewhere.
7
Helpless
ROAN was kind of surprised Shithead wasn’t Switzer’s middle name, because it should have been.
A little digging turned up a ton of maggots. Switzer was considered something of an asshole even within the Eastgate department, but according to Kevin (yes, he had called him, but he didn’t mention Holden’s idea about setting him up with his IT guy), Eastgate PD was known as a swaggering boys’ club, and the chief there, Charles Horne, was either a friend or relative of Switzer’s. (It wasn’t clear which; he’d heard different stories.) According to Kevin, the Eastgate PD was probably one of the more corrupt precincts in the entire state, but with a very high crime rate and a low budget, most people were content to look the other way. It was a perfect storm of ennui and bureaucratic clusterfucking. A lot of the cops who ended up at Eastgate had been bounced from other precincts, often as discipline problems.
As for his personal life, Switzer was in the middle of a messy divorce with his wife, April. She was claiming he was abusive and had been harassing her through the use of his cop friends; he was claiming she was a sex addict and a poor mother and wanted sole custody of their two kids, Zachary and Ashley (seven and five, respectively). What little he’d been able to turn up seemed ugly and awful. Roan was inclined to believe April, and Switzer wanting the kids? Pure power play and vindictiveness on his part. If he was a little despot, he’d want to control every fucking thing. Maybe he loved his kids, and Roan rather hoped he did, but possession of them would only be a tool to hurt his wife. He’d seen guys like Switzer too many times to think anything they did was ever as straightforward as it seemed.
Kevin knew someone at the Eastgate PD, and it was through her that he got word that Switzer was technically on leave from the department, mainly while investigation of his supposed use of other cops to stalk his wife was going on, but this same friend said it was known that Switzer was still hanging around on Carson Street, which was part of his old beat. It was also three blocks away from where Jasmine lived and was killed, which was a hell of a coincidence. So he got everything he could on this guy and prepared to track him down.
Roan felt like a good fight today.
He showered and dressed, going for a casual wardrobe of jeans and a T-shirt, leather jacket and leather boots. He grabbed his Vancouver Canucks baseball cap so he could hide his hair (that was the problem with having such a distinctive shade of reddish-brown) and found a pair of absurdly black sunglasses in his top drawer. Undercover wear, only he didn’t think he’d have to be too inconspicuous. He thought about it for a long minute before grabbing his Sig Sauer and his belt holster. He doubted he’d have to use it, but best be prepared. He was glad Dylan was still asleep and didn’t see him put it on or grab his gear bag containing his camera with the telephoto lens and the directional mike.
He decided to take the GTO and drove out toward the Eastgate precinct, wondering if the whole place could be rotten. If this was the ’60s or ’70s, maybe, but cop shops had gone a long way toward reform for a very good reason: nobody liked a bad image. And through allowing corruption, racism, sexism, and homophobia to run rampant, it diminished everyone and everything associated with law enforcement. They’d come a long way, but you had to be pretty naïve to think you still wouldn’t run into these types. Hell, wasn’t it one of those “bag a fag” stings that had caught Larry Craig? Taxpayer money spent on trying to catch consenting adults having sex while you had a less than fifty percent chance that the guy who broke into your house and stole your stuff would ever get caught. Fucking amazing, some people’s priorities.
He knew from Switzer’s DMV file (okay, so technically he shouldn’t have been able to see that...) that he was driving an ’09 Ford Ranger, and he’d just turned the corner on Carson Street when he saw a black Ranger pull out into the intersection up ahead. He confirmed two of the letters on the plate matched Switzer’s and decided just to follow him and see where he went.
