The Reckless

by David Putnam

“But he said—”

  “I know what Ned just said. Here, look at me. You want me to be honest with you or do you want me to lie to you?”

  “No, no, I trust you.”

  “Okay, if Devon cooperates and helps us, I’ll do everything I can go get him probation. He ever been in trouble before?”

  Her hand wringing shifted into high gear. Her numerous bracelets rattled at a higher pitch. “Well, he went in ta juvie once … maybe twice.”

  “Ah, shit,” Ned said.

  “No, no, it wasn’t a big deal. He was only defendin’ hisself, dat’s all. And dat other time it wasn’t his gun; it was—”

  “Is he on probation?” I asked.

  She nodded.

  “Where can I find him and what’s his probation officer’s name?”

  “Dat’s jus’ it, he gone. He up and took off when his mama fount dat money and took it from him. You got to find him, Bruno.”

  “Yeah,” Ned said, “I think we know where to look for him.”

  “You do? Wait. Is it this Gadd fella? If he’s corruptin’ my nephew, you jus’ point him out ta me, and I’ll have the gangstas in the hood take care a his ass.”

  “No,” I said. “You stay out of it. Let me handle it. Get me the addresses of the friends he hangs out with and the name of his PO. You understand? Drop it off here. And you stay out of it.”

  “You sure?”

  “Yes. You have to trust me on this, okay?”

  Ned asked, “Does your cousin play basketball?”

  “He’s my nephew, and yes he plays wit’ his friends—”

  “Over in Jordan Downs?”

  “Dat’s right. How’d you know?”

  I said, “We’ll take care of it, I promise.”

  She hesitated, staring at me. “I know you won’t let me down, Bruno.”

  I guided her over to the front door and ushered her out. The wooden stoop creaked under her weight. “You goin’ out directly ta handle dis?”

  “I’m going out directly, yes.”

  She went down the two steps and headed off across the front yard. She hit the sidewalk and headed west. I stepped outside to see if she had a car. She kept walking westbound. I followed out to the sidewalk and watched. She kept walking, not headed to any car.

  “What the hell?” I whispered to no one.

  I came back in to find Ned folding up his bedding. “She’s not going to be happy if we arrest her nephew.”

  “Yeah, I know,” I said, with more anger than I should have. “This operation just got a lot more complicated.”

  “We gonna go after this kid Devon?”

  “No, until she gets us that information, I think our best bet right now is to stay with Gadd. We don’t want him corrupting any more children and putting them in harm’s way if we can help it. Gadd’s gotta be our priority. Besides, we stay on Gadd, he’ll eventually take us to Devon D’Arcy. Come on, let’s get outta here or we’re gonna be late.”

   CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  WE TOOK SEPARATE cars over to 117th Street and found no one there, not Gadd’s car or Coffman or Gibbs. We’d somehow missed them all. I found it difficult to concentrate on the problem at hand. Chelsea’s image, her walking out of my bedroom dressed in denim pants, cowboy boots, a worn tee shirt that hugged her curves, and her bra hanging from her back pocket, remained emblazoned forever on my memory. The heat of her kiss. The—

  Ned came up on the FBI radio in his FBI-issued black Nissan Pathfinder and asked Coffman for his location. Coffman came back and asked for a meet at Stops, a hot link joint not too far away on Imperial Highway across from Nickerson Garden’s housing project.

  We found Gibbs and Coffman in the parking lot of Stops eating hot link sandwiches and chili fries at six o’clock in the morning. Stops never closed. They both stood at the back of Coffman’s FBI Ford Taurus eating off the back deck of the trunk.

  Ned walked by them, said over his shoulder, “Bruno, what do you want me to get you?”

  “Whatever, it doesn’t matter.”

  Coffman spoke around a mouthful of hot link sandwich. “What the hell happened to you? You look ridden hard and put away wet. You get any sleep at all?”

  “No, not much. What happened to Gadd?”

  “Gadd got up and out before me and Gibbs here set up on him this mornin’. That big Lincoln of his was gone. You’re wearing the same shirt as yesterday.” He took another bite.

  I ignored the shirt comment. The shirt was the same kind as the one I wore the day before, khaki material with the same truck driver patch and fake name. I had six or eight of them in my closet. The one I wore yesterday, Chelsea tore the buttons off. I wasn’t going to tell him that part. He’d go ballistic.

  He pointed with his sandwich. “You talk to Ned? Did he stay at your place last night?”

  I squirmed a little. “I really think you should ask Ned about his personal life. I don’t want to get involved.”

  He glared at me a second.

  I asked, “What are we going to do about Gadd?”

  Coffman pointed his sandwich at me again. “You and Ned are late. I don’t like that, Bruno. When I give you a time to meet, I expect you to damn well be there.”

  “I know, I deserve the ass chewing, but something came up.”

  “I don’t give a damn what happened. You get to where you’re supposed to be at the designated time.” He took a step closer, his face going pale instead of red like it should’ve. Gibbs stepped in between us and held out his paper tray of chili fries. “You want some, Bruno, until yours gets here?”

  I took one. When Gibbs offered his food as a diversion, his shirt sleeve pulled up a little revealing a partial tattoo, a fresh one still angry and red and slightly raised. I stuck the greasy ort in my mouth and pointed to Gibbs’ arm. “What’s that?”

  Gibbs smiled proudly and pulled up his right sleeve. On his upper arm in bold black ink were the letters: “BMF.” “Hey, you need to get one, too.”

  Ned returned before I could reply and put our food on the trunk deck.

  Gibbs continued, “It’s the violent crime team’s logo.”

  “Really? What does it stand for?”

  Ned said, “Brutal Mother Fuckers.”

  I stepped over to Ned and pulled up his right sleeve. He had the same fresh tattoo. I looked at Coffman, who took a bite of his sandwich and shrugged.

  Ned said to me, “You gotta get one too, Bruno.”

  “Are you kidding me? Gang members get tattoos to identify themselves as gang members. We’re not a gang. We don’t need the public to make that correlation, or we’re gonna look like a bunch of jack-booted thugs.”

  Ned had lost his smile as I spoke. “You don’t need to be an asshole about it.”

  I waved my hand. “I’m sorry. I guess I’m just a little sketchy.” I picked up my sandwich and took a bite. I needed something in my stomach. I also needed Coffman to get off my back.

  I asked Coffman, “You got a tattoo?”

  He pulled up his sleeve to display the faded tattoo of the Marine Corp emblem, the eagle perched on top of a globe with an anchor behind it. With the faded colors and his wrinkles, the globe looked more like a deflated basketball the bird had crapped out. “Got this when I was no more than a kid.”

  I wanted to ask him if he thought the BMF tattoo was a good idea but instead ate my sandwich in silence.

  Gibbs said, “Well, what are we going to do? We going to split up and sit on his other pads until we pick Gadd up again? Doin’ it that way is a major pain in the ass.”

  Ned gave us a smug smile. “I talked with Emma Wells yesterday, and she gave me his main pad.”

  Coffman lit up with excitement. “That the girlfriend of Gadd’s he tossed out of the car yesterday?”

  Ned smiled and nodded without guile.

  Coffman should have chastised Ned for going against orders. Yesterday, Coffman on the radio had told Ned to stay with the surveillance when the girl got tossed out, and Ned did exactly what Ne
d always did—which was whatever suited Ned best at the time.

  Instead, Coffman started gathering up his food. “Good job, Ned. Damn good job. Where is this place?”

  I tossed my food into a barrel in between our cars. You can’t eat a hot link and chili fries while driving, not without ruining your clothes.

  * * *

  We found Gadd’s Lincoln in the parking lot of some upscale condos in Marina Del Rey. I remembered the condos from an incident a few years earlier.

  After we took up positions to watch, Ned came up on the radio. “Bruno, you remember this place?”

  “I do.”

  He chuckled. “Those people had no right at all to kick us out of that party. I mean, I was just mindin’ my own business out there on the terrace. You know what I’m sayin’?”

  I smiled. “No, you’re right. They had no business kicking you out.”

  The radio went silent for a minute, then, “Hey, partner, it’d mean a lot if you got the BMF.”

  “I’ll think about it.” But I wouldn’t, and there was no way he or anyone else would change my mind, not ever.

  Coffman came up on the radio, “Watch your ten-thirty traffic.”

  He meant for us to keep the on-air conversation strictly business.

  At noon I got out of the car, left the door open, and did some push-ups on the hot asphalt, my palms burning. I needed a nice long run to clear my head, but the pushups would have to do.

  Crooks, physically, always held the advantage. They didn’t have schedules to follow or any responsibilities whatsoever. They could work out any time they pleased. Cops, especially cops chasing violent felons, sometimes tracked them for forty hours without letup and had little time to work at staying physically fit.

  At two o’clock, Coffman sent Gibbs to get us some food, boxes of fried chicken with biscuits and brown gravy. Not my first choice.

  At five thirty Gadd came out, got in his Lincoln, and we took off following him. He headed through Torrance and into Hawthorne. He pulled into a rent-by-the-week motel with a sleazy bar on the same property, the Harbor Town Pub.

  This time, before Ned could jump out of his car, Coffman came up on the radio. “Bruno, go in and see what he’s up to. Ned, goddamnit, you sit tight.”

  I parked three cars down from Gadd’s Lincoln, got out, stretched, and walked to the door. Before I went in, I double-checked to be sure my shirt covered the gun on my hip.

  Inside, the kind of darkness only found in a cave made it difficult to see anything except the patrons at the bar. An eclectic bunch with barflies, after-work groupies, and a couple of women of questionable employment who drank cheap beer and watered-down cocktails in highball glasses.

  Gadd sat next to one of the women talking quietly to her, his hand resting on her bare knee. I slid onto the empty stool right next to him, his back to me, and ordered a beer from the male bartender. The thought of the beer made my dry mouth even drier. I’d been sweating in that hot car all day with only one large Coke at lunchtime. The new relief bartender, a woman with red hair and who wore black pants, a white blouse, and black vest, set a tall draft in front of me. At the same time, she flashed a huge smile. I guess she liked truck drivers. She outclassed the joint by a lot and didn’t belong there. I took a long pull on the beer; the cool liquid and carbonation tasted heavenly.

  I leaned in a little, trying to hear the line of bullshit Gadd had to be feeding the woman next to him in his attempt to woo her into sex. He smelled of too much cologne and soap and something else I couldn’t place. He wore black denim pants, a blue chambray shirt, and a brown sports coat tight in the arms, the fabric pushed out with his overly developed biceps.

  His back suddenly went rigid, a primeval instinct warning him of something amiss. He looked up. He saw me in the mirror over the back of the bar. Stunned, I didn’t look away, couldn’t if I wanted to.

  The beer glass, slick with condensation, slipped from my hand and clunked down on the bar. Foam slopped everywhere as I flashed back to the alley four years before. In the photo from the FBI case file, his heavy black beard had thrown me off. But now I got a close look at his eyes. I’d never forget those eyes.

  I’d just sat down next to the Darkman.

   CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  I STARED IN the mirror at Leroy Gadd and him at me. His lips moved. His words like water cut around me, as if I were a big rock in a small stream. He repeated something. “Long haul or short haul? Hey, you okay, buddy? Ah, ah, Karl?”

  “Huh? What? Oh, I, ah, haul produce up from Calexico, mostly lettuce and melons. Seasonal kinda stuff. I half-starve in the winter.”

  “You deadhead back down there?”

  “Huh? Ah, yeah, not much call for produce trailers goin’ back.”

  I didn’t know what to do, how to react.

  The redheaded bartender worked a white towel on the bar sopping up the spilt draft beer, smiling at me. Gadd said to her, “Go ahead and get my man here another and put it on my tab.” He put his hand on my back.

  I flinched. “No!”

  Gadd startled at the abrupt objection to his kind offer. So did the bartender. The others down the way stopped drinking and looked. I couldn’t accept a beer from a cold stone killer, a man who killed two kids and their mother, snuffed out their lives in the most brutal way, with a gun to the back of their heads while they waited in agony, each in their turn waiting for it to happen.

  Four years of looking for him and here he sat right beside me. That same man who’d murdered now engaged in enticing more children to rob banks. My right hand shook as I fought the overwhelming desire to pull my gun and pistol-whip him across the head. Knock him to the floor and put the boot to him again and again and again, do it in the most wicked and violent way imaginable.

  This wasn’t me. I’d never fostered such thoughts before—going outside the law.

  But I had.

  A few years ago, on a hot summer night in the ghetto, I’d tracked a hit-and-run driver who’d run a small girl down in the crosswalk, killing her instantly. That night the law protected the offender as he stood in a safe zone on the other side of his threshold, the entry to his house. I couldn’t arrest him while he stood inside. So, in a fit of rage, I reached in through his screen door and yanked him out onto public ground. Robby Wicks had pulled me off the man, or no doubt, I would’ve kicked him to death.

  “Hey, pal,” Gadd said, “you feeling okay? You look like you’ve just seen a ghost or maybe an ex-wife.” He laughed and looked to the redheaded bartender to join him in his joke. She didn’t. Instead, she shot him a fake smile.

  “No, it’s cool,” I said. “I think I just ate a bad taco or something.”

  “I know how that is, believe me.” He smirked, taking the interpretation of my comment down into the gutter, to the vulgar and the profane.

  He spun further on his barstool to face me. He offered his hand to shake, his smile large and genuine, his eyes bright with a phony offer of friendship. “Jonathon Crum—spelled C-R-U-M, not the kind that you get when you eat a dry cookie.” He spoke his lie about his name with the confidence of a true grifter. I couldn’t take his hand. I couldn’t touch him, not without pulling back and smashing his face to pulp with my fist.

  But I had to, the job called for it. I gritted my teeth and took his hand. Oddly, it didn’t feel like crocodile skin or slimy like a wet snake, something you’d expect from a character of his ilk. He squeezed with a strength that reminded me that I needed to pay more attention or fall prey as an unsuspecting victim lulled into a false sense of security.

  At the same time, my mind spun a thousand miles an hour. Could I arrest him for the murder of that family four years back? I was a witness and could place him at the murder scene. Well, not exactly at the scene, but in the alley to the rear.

  Of course, that wasn’t enough. Not yet. The DA would never take a case to trial with one statement and no corroboration.

  But at least now I had a name I could take to Compton PD, an
d they could compare his fingerprints to those at the scene. They could insert his name into their equation, look for a motive, look for opportunity. If they got lucky, they could make Leroy Gadd for those murders and put him away forever. They’d just need a little more time to do it.

  Or maybe Gadd had been smart enough to cover his tracks, and even with this new information, this revelation, Compton PD might not be able to put the triple homicide on him.

  Would this information affect our operation? No, not if Compton was serious about the murders. They’d quietly go to work on it and not tip their hand until ready. All agencies became deadly serious when it came to murder, and this one was a triple. And if nothing else, clearing three murders with one suspect really softened up the stats. They’d be highly motivated. The smart play for them would be to let our violent crime team continue to follow him until they got the warrant for his arrest, maybe a few days, a week at the most. That was—if the evidence was even there for them to find?

  What if Compton tipped their hand and Gadd tumbled to the play? He’d go underground to wait it out. Or he’d flee the country, and there’d be nothing we could do about it but watch as he boarded a plane or drove across the border into Mexico.

  The redheaded bartender set another beer down in front of me, just as evil in its purest form slithered into my brain whispering with a superheated breath describing a morally corrupt option: I could tell no one. I could keep this new information to myself and when the time came, which it inevitably would—an opportunity would present itself. If we did our job following around a notorious bank robber, he would eventually take up a gun and then a shoot-don’t-shoot scenario would occur. If I didn’t hesitate, didn’t offer him the opportunity to drop his gun and just—

  No. No. That would be wrong on so many levels. Dad had taught me better. To do it that way would make me no better than the morally bankrupt criminal who now sat next to me.

  The beer roiled in my stomach and threatened to come up. No. No. I’d sworn an oath to uphold the law. I couldn’t do that, not in cold blood. The opportunity would have to come naturally, a gun in his hand with a warning to drop it—making it my life or his.