Mickey Finn Volume 2, page 24
“I appreciate your concern, but my mental health is already—”
“It’s too soon, Deputy Law,” said the Sheriff. “You’re a witness in the case…I will dispatch a detail to your house and that’s the best I can do…for now.”
Lucy raged, “We both know I can do more than just be a witness!”
The sheriff paused.
Lucy felt hot all over, realizing she’d just yelled at her superior.
He sniffed, “Lucinda Law, you just can’t. Not for this. And I don’t wanna hear any more about it. I’ll see you again in twenty-seven days. Unless you think you need more. No need for you to feel rushed.”
Lucy couldn’t believe it: The first-twenty-four-hour rule of law enforcement…rush, rush, rush!
This is no way to live, Lucy thought as she dropped Daphne off at Jackie’s that evening. Every thirty minutes a squad car had cruised past the duplex, yet no one had followed her to Jackie’s. It didn’t make her feel any better. Especially after she arrived at an empty parking lot. At nine o’clock on a Tuesday, Top Shot 24-hour Shooting Range was emptier than a bachelor’s pantry. The scruffy clerk sold Lucy a box of shells and gave her the lane closest to his register. Even dressed down in grey sweats, she could feel the wall-eyed clerk roaming her acreage. She ignored him by slipping on headphones and zeroed in on the target’s dark shape. Its shadowy hands gripped the wheel, its cowardly foot stomped the accelerator. She emptied the clip at its faceless head.
She called the target home and the clerk laughed, “Looks like you’re all over the place tonight, Miss Lucy.”
Lucy sneered—reloaded then unloaded and brought the new target back. Lucy showed it off, “Is this better?”
The clerk swallowed hard at the target’s gored groin. He spoke nervously, “That’s…um…more like it.”
The front door chimed and the clerk happily escaped Lucy’s withering glare—the same glare she’d give her son’s triggerman if ever given the chance. If only looks could kill. Lucy knew they couldn’t—but her bullets could and would. Now somewhat alone, she dumped the box of shells onto the little bench divider in front of her. One rolled off. Lucy bent to grab it. A shiny ostrich boot caught it on the first bounce.
A deep voice crooned, “Thought I’d find ya here.”
The familiar square jaw greeted her warmly. Lucy gritted her teeth, “They won’t let me work my son’s case, Red.”
“Can’t blame ’em, can ya?” Red Whitaker removed his hat, revealing his high and tight stubble of auburn hair. He brought the hat chest level, covering his Texas Ranger badge. “No telling what you’ll do once you catch the suspect.”
She bit her lip, “I’m his mother.”
Red Whitaker’s smile dipped, and he said, “Sorry I couldn’t make the funeral.”
Lucy looked away, reloading the two clips. “It’s okay,” she said flippantly. “The Rangers keeping you busy?”
“Like ya wouldn’t believe,” Red smiled and stroked her cheek, “Darlin’.”
Lucy noticed his bandaged hand, “How did you get that? Did you cut yourself shaving?”
Red shook his head, “House call. Followed a person of interest home and just as soon as I knocked—they started shooting. Can ya believe some people ain’t got good manners?”
“Lucky you didn’t get hit anywhere else,” Lucy inserted the full clip. “Or did you?”
“Buy me breakfast and ya can find out.”
Lucy rolled her eyes and fired into the far target. She didn’t aim as much as point. With Red present, she found it tough to focus her anger on the faceless shape.
“Speaking of luck,” Red unplugged his ears. “Guess whose lap my Captain dropped your boy’s file in?”
Lucy brightened, “You’ve got Jimmy’s case?”
“Before ya even ask—yes, I’m gonna let ya in on the investigation at every step.”
Lucy smiled for the first time in days.
Red pleaded wolfishly, “C’mon, Pretty Lady, let’s get out of here. I’ll buy the breakfast.”
Despite Red’s charming good looks and broad shoulders, and the fact that they hadn’t seen each other for months, their time spent together didn’t fill her void. In the dark, she hated him…hated his facelessness…his hands clutching her steering wheels. She hated her struggle to do more than just lie there while his tires vigorously spun. Maybe he felt it too as he peeled off and dressed. Red promised to call soon. Lucy painfully watched her man’s brake lights fade into the night. She rubbed her chin with the back of her hand, feeling Red’s beard-burn on her lips. Distance makes the heart grow fonder, she thought, thankful that she wasn’t expected to go through these motions more frequently.
The new neighborhood’s security lights spilled orange horizontal stripes through her windows, across the new carpet and onto her bare feet. She ran a bath. Steam rose from the white tub. Lucy stripped and dipped herself completely below the surface. Air bubbles rushed from her mouth as she finally purged herself of all noise. She screamed until stars popped behind her clinched eyes. She came up gasping for air and noticed the bathroom. Just like her, it still had that freshly scoured look. Together, their clean surfaces hid their business.
Red called two days later. There’d been some development.
Outside Dallas, a veterinarian had been found murdered at his office. Human blood discovered on an operating table didn’t match the vet’s. Two bloodied slugs had been found in a wastebasket.
“Nine-millimeter. Must’ve pulled ’em from the guy who killed him. Gonna request ya gun for a ballistics test.”
“Are you coming yourself to collect it?”
“No ma’am,” Red sighed. “But I’ll be back through in a couple of weeks. Got some loose ends I’m tying together. We can talk details over coffee…and I can buy ya that breakfast.”
“Or you can stay here, and I’ll make the breakfast,” Lucy said, holding back the feels.
“Sounds great,” Red said flatly. “Call ya soon.”
They hung up.
The next few weeks flew by, but their days expired slowly. If Red called back, Lucy never noticed because her phone never rang. The blistering Texas summer had decided to stick around for October. Lucy wanted to call Red, wanted answers, but she thought better of it. After all, her man was on the case. If there’d been anything new…she’d already know. During this long silence she wondered how she’d gotten lucky enough to have her boyfriend leading the investigation? Maybe Sheriff White had done it as a favor to her. After all, her relationship with Red was a poorly kept secret down at the station. Surely it wasn’t just dumb luck, like everything else. Then another thought gnawed at her. Maybe it was done on purpose…to shut her up. Keep her from investigating personally.
When Lucy’s paid leave ended, she found a crop of Academy graduates greeting her at the station. These new faces gave her seniority. It wasn’t a promotion, but she got first dibs on any extra duty and she took it. She wanted everyone to see that she couldn’t be intimidated. Unlike Jimmy’s killers, she wanted her face seen. If there was gonna be another hit on her, she wanted everyone to see her smile before hitting back. Newspapers could print her photogenic revenge all day, every day.
At Smith City’s Friday-night football game, she stood between the home stands and concessions. Sweat leaked onto the flak jacket under her uniform. Her eyes tracked these good country folks with suspicion. Maybe one of you was behind the wheel. Maybe one of you pulled the trigger. You want me…here I am, come and get me.
Her nerves edged closer to her days on patrol in Iraq, where every smiling face hid a bomb, every prayer call demanded death. Hunting for early morning speeders while parked under school-zone signs began to feel the same as waving traffic through checkpoints. Eyes peeled for any late-model rust buckets. She pulled them all over, regardless of speed, missing bullet holes, or her own knowledge of probable cause. She tossed their cars and reasoned that whoever had killed Jimmy was probably hiding in plain sight, thinking she was too dumb to find them. She’d find them and when she did…
It got to the point where people complained. Lucy found herself sitting across from the captain this time, not the sheriff. She hadn’t seen him or Red in weeks.
The captain wagged his finger—offered platitudes—threatened unpaid leave. “This department has zero room for vigilantes. Leave the investigation up to the detectives and go do your real job.”
Get back in the kitchen, Lucy heard, make us sandwiches. Kick off your shoes while you’re at it, and let the men handle everything.
Lucy apologized for overstepping her bounds but didn’t mean a word she said. She donned her Stetson and headed out for the lonely twelve-hour shift on Highway 269.
Lucy cringed when static broke over the radio and interrupted her daydream.
She’d just pulled over a lady in a tricked-out jeep—LED light bars, big chrome wheels, black running boards, the whole East Texas Truck Accessories catalog. The lady had Hottie bedazzled across her pink tank top; with a face like hers, Lucy knew why she needed to advertise. She’d been going ten over the posted limit. Sold Lucy a sob story a mile long. Something about a sick kid, blah, blah, blah. Lucy smiled as she printed the ticket, which the woman promptly merged with a wallet full of credit cards. Lucy wanted this Hottie to get nasty for the body cam, give Lucy’s nightstick an excuse to bust a tooth loose, but nothing happened.
Some gals have all the luck.
“—shots fired across Highway 269 near Ray’s Automotive—”
“Roger that,” Lucy said into the radio. She knew the place, on the hill next to a junkyard as you enter Smith City, less than a mile from where she sat. “On my way.”
A minute later she drove her patrol car up the ramped driveway and parked beside a wrecked Chevrolet S-10. Lucy heard a shot the moment she opened the car door. She pulled her new sidearm, a nickel-plated revolver, and hit the radio for back-up. Lucy said a prayer, took a breath, and approached the modest red-brick home overlooking the highway.
Ka-cow! Ka-cow!
Back-to-back shots echoed from the carport. A puff of smoke rose over the cab of a busted Dodge only ten yards away. Lucy crouched and called, “Sheriff’s Department! Cease fire!”
A head, balder than a baby’s bottom, popped into view, its pink face wrinkled, “Huh?”
She repeated, “Put down your weapon!”
More of the man emerged. At his ears, the head sloped onto a pair of immense, blistered shoulders. A hand pushed a pair of gold-rimmed glasses onto his nose, “Can I help you, ma’am?”
Lucy aimed her piece over the hood of a crinkled Toyota.
The man stood like a white-trash Mr. Universe way past his prime. Sweat poured from every pore, making each of his defined muscles glisten. At least, she prayed it was only sweat. The man moved around the front of the truck toward her, “Don’t tell me someone called the cops.”
The sight of it gave Lucy a shock.
At first, she didn’t even notice that he hadn’t dropped the weapon. Her eyes busied themselves on his naked and hairless torso. She caught sight of his shriveled and sad package and immediately averted her eyes. A multitude of valid questions ran through her confused mind.
Still the man approached, rifle in hand.
“Stay where you are!” Lucy yelled.
The gravel ceased crunching under his flip-flops. “Is this about me shooting hogs?”
Lucy kept her eyes just above his bald dome, “Drop your weapon, or so help me!”
“No need, ma’am, I’m setting it down.”
She commanded him to turn around and put his hands above his head. The man obliged. Lucy saw that the man’s sunburn extended from his neck to his ankles—no natural tan lines; this wasn’t his first rodeo outside in the buff. She quickly handcuffed him.
“There’s no need for all this,” cried the man. “I didn’t shoot nobody!”
“You can’t fire a gun across a highway,” Lucy said.
“I was shooting at hogs!” the man explained. “Over yonder—see them bastards!”
Lucy looked and saw the dark carcass of something large on the side of the road. “What if you’d missed and accidentally shot someone?” Lucy then added, “And you can’t be nude in public.”
“I ain’t in public—I’m on my own private property.”
The man went on and on, but at least he didn’t fight Lucy as she put him in her cruiser. She radioed in and paused before describing the situation in full.
“Can I at least put some pants on before ya haul me downtown?”
“Why weren’t you wearing them in the first place?”
The man scoffed, “That ain’t none of your concern!”
When the other deputies arrived, Lucy swore their laughter could be heard all the way into Dallas. Despite everything, Lucy blushed. She knew she’d be the butt of jokes for the next year. One of the deputies gallantly offered to help her save face and bring the man in himself. But Lucy’s pride refused. After all, it was her arrest. “No thanks, Spud, I’ve already cuffed him.”
This drew even lewder calls from the deputies.
“C’mon boys,” the naked man cried, “persuade her to let me get some pants on.”
More laughter.
One of the deputies crowed, “I think Deputy Law’s got you right where she wants you.”
“I swear I was just taking a shower,” the man cried, “when I saw them ole hogs across yonder, I grabbed my rifle and came out. I ain’t no pervert!”
Lucy opened the door and commanded the male deputies to take him inside and dress him. They complied, laughing the entire way.
Lucy didn’t watch him go, choosing to look out over the field of junked cars. She wondered how many of these accidents had been fatal. How many souls were still trapped inside these wrecked vehicles? She stopped wondering as one soulless car stood out. The gravel crushed under her boots as she neared the dented frontend. Her breath hitched.
Dumb luck, she thought. But what’s it doing here?
Lucy touched each of the bullet holes along the Buick’s driver side. Behind her she heard the screen door slam and the cackling deputies. She returned quickly to her cruiser as if nothing had happened.
“Put him back in,” Lucy commanded.
One of the deputies started a “That’s what she said,” but Lucy wasn’t having it. She scolded them and they obeyed before driving off with their tails tucked. As soon as they were alone again, Lucy grabbed the man by the ear and dragged him out. Her fist pounded his jaw and he squealed, “Police brutality!”
“You have no idea how brutal it’ll get, pal!” She pointed at the Buick. “What’s that junker doing here?”
Of course, the man denied all knowledge. Lucy’s right boot jogged his memory. He gurgled and whimpered, “A fella dropped it off a couple of weeks ago.”
“Why didn’t you report the bullet holes?”
“He said it was part of a shootin’ range. Asked me to sell it for parts.”
“What’s your cut?” Lucy grated.
“I get fifteen percent commission.”
The idea hit her with such force that she struck the man once more for good measure and led him indignantly inside the house. Once in the man’s kitchen, she held her gun at his temple. Told him what to say as he dialed the phone.
“Yes, sir…this is Ray down in Smith City. Just wanted to let you know I sold your car…well, since it was still running, I was able to get fifteen hundred…that’s right. I got the cash if’n you wanna come collect.”
The man nodded as if the voice could see him, then hung up.
Her mind raced, “How long will it take to get him here? Days?”
“No,” the man swallowed, “he’s here in Smith City now. Be about fifteen minutes.”
Her trap baited, Lucy strode outside to prime the spring.
Time ticked slowly. In the man’s living room, Lucy waited at the window, excited for her sudden good fortune. She chewed her lip as a car slowed at the driveway but kept going. She wondered if they could see her cruiser from where she’d hidden it in the junk yard. Another car passed by. Then another. Then a shiny new truck turned onto the gravel and drove up the drive.
It parked.
When the door opened, the driver got out. All of Lucy’s good senses fled. Her legs propelled her forward. She didn’t hear the screen door slam behind her. She didn’t hear the man screaming for help from the kitchen. She didn’t hear her own boots click on the carport.
Her heart and chin ached as she recognized the driver.
Red’s square jaw lifted a reflexive smile. An instant later it vanished. Lucy’s gun leveled. Her lips quivered. Red’s brow arched. A thousand valid questions ran tripping across his face. A puzzled Red showed her his palms. His words helped her connect the dots.
“Let me explain,” Red said. “Darlin’.”
Lucy had long ago realized that people don’t listen to one another, they just wait until the other person stops talking before taking their turn. Red’s words had as much impact on her as Texas wind rattling through pine needles.
Red pleaded his case. He’d gotten in over his head on his last investigation. He hadn’t meant to harm anyone. Not her. Not Jim.
He finally stopped pleading. Stopped talking. Stopped making any sound at all.
Lucy didn’t respond. Her gun did.
She watched her man’s face when realization hit him at the same time as the bullet. Lucy thought, Our justice system is black and white—a crime’s a crime.
She stood over the dying man and apologized for everything…for nothing.
When she realized what she had done, she clutched her chest in raw panic. Lucy saw the headlines. She saw herself pictured on the front page of every newspaper in the country, except she wasn’t smiling anymore. Everyone would know what had just happened. Everyone would know the awful truth. Intense guilt shuddered her with self-loathing. How could she have been so damn lucky?
