The best laid plans, Ben thought to himself as he parked in front
of Saint Paul’s Roman Catholic Church on Braddock Street. His hope of getting a
few extra hours of sleep after spending the last several nights out late on a
stakeout was shattered just a little after eight in the morning. The ringing of
the telephone entwined seamlessly with his dream of being a concert violinist
making his debut at Carnegie Hall. Something he could not in any way understand
because he couldn’t play any instrument, let alone the violin. It wasn’t until
the conductor in his dream started to tell him to leave his name and number
after the beep that he realized he was hearing his own voice on the message
answering machine.
With bleary eyes, he crossed out of
the bedroom and into the kitchen, grabbing the telephone just as Shirley, one
of the PCPD’s dispatchers, was about to hang up.
“Hello. Hello?” he answered, trying
to shake away the mental cobwebs.
“Hey, sweetie,” Shirley said with
her slight southern drawl. “Sorry to wake you.”
“I wasn’t…I mean, I…”
“It’s okay, sugar. I heard you and
Tommy were out late. But you got ‘em, so it’s all good.”
“Yeah. We did. What’s going on?”
“I’m afraid you’re going to have to
catch up on your sleep some other time, dumplin’. You need to get over to Saint
Paul’s. Patrol is reporting a break-in and Father Taylor was found D.O.A.”
That was all Ben needed to hear. The
words were like a shot of adrenaline straight to the heart. He showered,
skipped shaving–not that anyone would be able to tell with his baby face–and
headed out the door. Just as he was stepping out of the car in front of the
church, Tommy’s Bronco pulled up next to him.
Rolling down the window, from behind
a pair of what looked like extra dark sunglasses, Tommy asked, “Please tell me
I didn’t hear Shirley right?”
“A break-in and possible homicide?”
“Yeah.”
“You heard her right.”
“Dammit.”
Tommy did a quick U-turn and parked
across the street. Getting out of the truck, he fumbled around in the back
seat, finally pulling out a rumpled corduroy sport coat. Pulling it on over his
wrinkled shirt, he noticed his partner giving him the once over as he crossed
the road to meet him on the sidewalk.
“This is the best you’re gonna’ get
today,” Tommy said pulling his badge out of his pocket and clipping it to the
lapel of his jacket. “Hell, you’re lucky I put pants on. But I know how much
you like me to dress up for crime scenes.”
It was true, Ben was always wearing
a suit. He thought it helped to project a certain amount of authority while
working a case. Considering he only looked like he was barely in his twenties
when he was now thirty, it also helped him to look a little older. Truth be
told, Ben could be wearing ripped up jeans and a leather biker’s jacket and he
would still look like the boy next door. He was the poster child for what a
stand-up Boy Scout should look like.
Tommy, on the other hand, would love
to wear a leather jacket and jeans every day. He preferred comfort when it came
to his attire. The reverse of Ben was true for Tommy. Even if he would show up
wearing an expensive three-piece suit from a fancy story on New York’s Fifth
Avenue, he’d still come off as a bad boy. The kind of guy all the girls fell
for but would never take home to meet their mother. Mostly out of fear that
their mothers would also fall for him.
“Any other details?” Tommy asked as
he checked his Tom Selleck-style mustache in the side mirror of Ben’s car.
“I just got here myself.”
“I thought we were going to be able
to take it easy after we picked up that dipshit last night. I mean, come on. We
can’t even get a few hours of sleep!”
“Our burden is heavy,” Ben said,
wondering if his sarcasm got through.
“The only thing that could make this
morning any worse…”
“You mean other than finding the
dead body of a popular priest?”
“You know what I mean…” Tommy said putting his hands up in his defense, “…is if the responding officer is…dammit.”
Ben turned to see Officer Buck
LuCoco lumber out of the door to the church offices. A very large man, neither
Ben nor Tommy understood how LuCoco was still on patrol. The fact he’d been
with the department since the ‘50s and never been promoted beyond a patrol
officer didn’t surprise either of them. He was one of the PCPD’s old guard that
did absolutely as little as possible, while doing just enough to not be fired
for complete dereliction of duty. Tommy thought he was a lazy slob. Ben
couldn’t argue. The only thing LuCoco had going for him was his institutional
knowledge of the city. He’d been around long enough to know a little about
everyone and everything.
“Be nice,” Ben said to his partner
through gritted teeth as LuCoco waddled his way to them. “Good morning, Buck.”
The officer grunted a response as he
wiped his face with a handkerchief, finally saying, “It’s not a good morning
for Father Taylor.”
“There was a break-in?” Ben asked.
“Yeah. One of the secretaries got here about seven-forty-five. She found the front door unlocked and thought Taylor already opened up for the day. Then she found the door to the priest’s office smashed and him dead. Now, I’m no expert, but I’ve been around long enough to know what a robbery-gone-wrong looks like. Whoever broke in here musta gotten caught by Taylor then they offed him.
“Not
being an expert, what makes you think that?” Tommy asked, barely containing the
mockery.
“Well, there’s a pretty good hole in
the priest’s head that looks like it coulda been caused by the heavy
candlestick with blood on it lying next to him, smartass.”
“Alright,” Ben said in a tone that
let both men know they needed to cool it. “Where’s the secretary now?”
“She’s in with Thompson.”
Ben knew Tommy was thinking the same
thing he was. If Thompson had also responded, he’d have secured the scene using
the protocols they’d been trying to get all of the patrol officers to use. He
was one of the officers in the department who understood the importance of the
new techniques being employed at a crime scene, and therefore the need to
preserve a scene’s integrity. Unlike LuCoco and the guys who’d complained when
Ben and Tommy had been promoted who thought if you couldn’t see a clue with
your bare eyes, it wasn’t there.
“We’re going to head in and take a
look around. Buck, will you radio in and have them roll the Crime Scene Unit
and let the coroner know they have a pick-up?”
“Your wish is my command, Detective.”
“Hey. That’s Detective-Sergeant, remember,” Tommy corrected. “Remember, he outranks you in this department.”
Watching LuCoco head for his squad
car, Ben said, “You really don’t need to do that.”
“What?” Tommy asked innocently.
“Throw my rank around. Sometimes I
think you care more about it than I do.”
“Well, he needs to respect your
stripes,” Tommy said in his defense. “And…I just don’t like him. I’m always
afraid he’s going to have a heart attack and drop dead right in front of us.
Then we’ll have so much paperwork to fill out. Seriously? Do you think he even
knows what a salad is?”
Sometimes Ben needed to play the
role of a stern father. “Okay. I get it. You have very strong feelings about
him. But that’s enough now. If someone really did kill Roland Taylor, we’ve
already got a big problem on our hands. I don’t need you starting another one
with LuCoco.”
“Fine,” Tommy said, doing his best
impression of a petulant child. “I’ll behave myself. Your wish is my command, Detective-Sergeant.
1 comment:
Thanks so much for showcasing this very interesting sounding book!
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