The Highway (A Benny Steel and Marisa Tulli Novel - Book 1)

by Steven Grosso

  “There goes my pal—what’s up, fuck-face?” Frankie said, followed by a smile that almost reached each earlobe.

  Steel laughed and thought Frankie looked crazier than ever. “My man, Frankie. What’s up, buddy?”

  Frankie analyzed him for a second. “What’d you get that haircut in the dark?”

  Steel laughed. “Breakin’ my balls already.”

  Frankie laughed as if he enjoyed gauging a reaction. “You playin’ in the softball league this year?”

  Steel shook his head. “Nah. That’s where I met you. I don’t wanna meet another crazy bastard like you.”

  Frankie laughed hard but got serious afterward. “So, you ready to knock one of these cases off the books. This shit’s crazy,” he twirled a finger, “that’s been going on lately.”

  “Yeah, hot summer. Tempers are flaring.”

  “It’s deeper than that—drugs, families are fucked up, unemployment, budget cuts in the city,” Frankie said and waved his hands in disgust.

  “What do we have on Knee’s friend? The one in custody?” Steel asked.

  “We had him in interrogation yesterday, six friggin’ hours. He gave us a rundown on half of Knee’s crew and their drug activity. We knew about most of it already; he just confirmed it. He said he has Knee tied to Hitchy, but the fucker wouldn’t tell us how. Said he wouldn’t tell us until we took Knee in, didn’t want Knee out on the streets if he told us. Probably afraid, but he wants to make a deal. He wants to rat them all out. But he’s not talking yet, until he sees his lawyer. I told him that’s fine because I got the judge to issue a warrant for Knee within two hours.”

  Frankie and Steel turned their heads as they heard a soft knock on the door.

  “Hey, Mary told me you were in here,” Marisa said, standing by the door.

  Frankie’s eyes grew and got wild as he waved her in.

  Steel pointed at Marisa. “Frank, this is my partner, Marisa Tulli. She’s on the case with me, new at the station. Matter’a fact, she’s new as a detective.”

  Frankie pushed himself out of his desk chair as it slid backward and extended his hand over the desk. “Pleasure to meet you, Marisa.”

  “Same here.”

  Steel rolled his arms in a circle, palms facing his chest. “We were just talking about the case, running over a few things.”

  Marisa scrunched up her lips to the side, nodded.

  “All right…listen,” Frankie said. He pointed at Steel with his skinny, crooked index finger. “You, me, Marisa, the SWAT team, and two uniformed officers are going to Knee’s for the arrest. He’s home; I got my men watching the house. I’ll drive in my car. You two go together. I’ll keep the uniformed officers a block away.”

  “Got it,” Steel said.

  “I’m gonna grab a cup of coffee and catch a smoke, then we’ll head out,” Frankie said. He stuck a toothpick deep into his mouth, and his eyeballs grew large again, shifting back and forth. His face read like a fisherman: focused and thrilled at the same time, ready to reel in a big one.

  Steel and Marisa followed him out and watched him head down the hallway.

  Marisa nudged Steel and snapped her head to the side so that he’d follow her into a private office. “Look, about last night,” she looked away, “I’m not usually like that, at all, but I just, I mean…”

  Steel smiled, more confident than usual. “Don’t worry about it, neither am I.”

  They laughed, stared into each other’s eyes, into their own little world, both enthralled by it.

  Steel stepped off to the side, dialed Venice, and waited through numerous rings until her voicemail played. Still no answer, he thought.

  He walked back to Marisa.

  It was the biggest day of the entire investigation, and he couldn’t get ahold of Venice. What was that all about?

  36

  Steel parked a block away from Knee’s house, and he and Marisa walked toward it. As they approached, Frankie paced outside, wearing a black suit two sizes too big for him, his shirt collar leaving several inches between the top button and his scrawny neck, the neck holding thick veins that popped from his skin like blue Twizzlers. He held a radio in his hand and clenched his teeth, zoning in on Knee’s home. Without turning his head, he caught the shadows of Marisa and Steel, their shoes hitting the street an earshot away. He waved them over and spoke just above a whisper, “We’re going in.”

  Steel noticed a police cruiser on each end of the street. The officer inside each focused intently on the actions of Frankie, Steel, Marisa, and the SWAT team. He figured the officer’s hand in each car probably rested on the button that activated the sirens, ready to press at any moment. A suspect as dangerous and unpredictable as Knee needed to be handled with extra caution; the risk was great.

  The SWAT team, standing in a single-file line, hunched over like soldiers about to surprise their enemies or a pride of lions stalking their prey. They waited for direction. Their body armor bulged from their black uniforms, the vests thick and helmets intact. SWAT, written in large letters, identified each member like a sports player’s name on the back of his jersey. Each held a Remington shotgun next to his or her chin. Just as Frankie nodded, they scattered themselves across each corner of the home—around back, in front, on the sides.

  Steel, Marisa, and Frankie headed for the house. They reached the porch, and Steel looked on with concern, scratched his hair. He didn’t notice any daring neighbors step foot from their homes and figured it was more out of fear of retaliation from Knee rather than from the police. Sweat seeped from his forehead and down and around his rib cage. His armpits moistened, soaking his undershirt. Why can’t I remain as cool in these moments as detectives on television do? he wondered. But he reminded himself that this was real life, with real danger. A stray bullet could strike him at any moment, and he would be dead—just like that—a tough reality to digest. His heart pounded as they got closer. He’d learned over the years to use his fear and adrenaline as motivation to act, and knew if he didn’t, it would freeze him. He despised the misconception that officers weren’t afraid and thought it was nonsense. Mark Twain had said it best: “Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear—not absence of fear.”

  Steel’s courage in life mostly came from battling his own self-imposed fears—mostly battles with his own demons. Real danger didn’t overwhelm him while he was in the moment, but the perceived danger tortured him beforehand.

  Frankie jerked his head sideways and ran his eyes across Marisa for a second, then Steel, and then turned back. Marisa and Steel sidestepped and slammed their backs against the brick wall next to the door. Each snatched their handgun and focused.

  Frankie balled his fist and pounded the door three times, each time knocking harder and louder. He waited another moment before punching three more times with so much force he checked his hand for blood, but nothing, no answer. He raised his radio to his mouth and said, “We’re going in.”

  Within seconds, half the SWAT team charged from either side of the home and formed two lines. Frankie stepped to the side and stopped next to Marisa, across from Steel. He whispered, “On three.”

  He flicked up one finger at a time and slowly counted without sound, with just his lips, and all eyes followed his right hand. As the third finger lowered back into his fist, the SWAT team barreled through the door like a defense in the NFL charging a quarterback.

  “Go! Go! Go!” Frankie shouted, eyes growing, his sharp yellow teeth pronounced with each holler. He waved his arms and stormed into the house. SWAT scattered throughout, and Frankie, Steel, and Marisa trailed, guns drawn and pointed, SWAT’s footsteps like a stampede of horses.

  “Arthur Anderson!” Frankie called out.

  A shout came from the second floor, “We got him!”

  Frankie, Marisa, and Steel sped up the stairs, leaping over two at a time.

  They heard shouting and cursing the whole way: “Get the fuck down!”

&n
bsp; The reply: “Fuck you!”

  A woman’s voice yelled, “Stop, what is this?”

  They reached the top, panting, still out of breath. A member of the SWAT team had Knee pinned face-down on the floor. His thick kneecap dug into the small of Knee’s back. Three other members pointed their shotguns directly at his head.

  Knee’s girlfriend stood in the room—well, at least Steel assumed that she was his girlfriend. The curvy African-American woman screamed and spread her hands over her mouth, tears streaming down her face. She wiggled her elbows, bounced her kneecaps, and darted her frightened eyes back and forth. She mumbled between deep sobbing, “No! No! Please! No. Why? What is this? Leave ‘em alone.” Spit sprayed from her lips, but she continued yelling, and the crying moistened her mouth back up from the lost saliva. She was hysterical. A SWAT member led her out and down the flight of stairs, but she kicked, sobbed, and hollered the entire time.

  Frankie listened until the girlfriend’s voice indicated she was out the door, stood over Knee, read him his rights, and then personally cuffed him. Knee didn’t say a word. His face was an image of stone like a statue from ancient Rome. Frankie led him down the stairs and out the door. Neighbors began peeking one eye through their blinds, and a few brave souls stood on their front steps, on their tippy-toes, stretching their necks, just to catch up on the latest neighborhood gossip.

  The sun covered half the street, and shade blanketed the other. Frankie passed Knee to Steel and looked both ways down the street. He waved the police cruisers toward himself, each hand fanning his face. Steel gripped Knee’s shoulder with his left hand and the cuffs with his right, holding him for patrol. Knee stared down at the street, and the sirens screamed and bounced blue, orange, and red lights off arched windows, on either side of the street. More neighbors stepped onto their front porches and fanned themselves from the oppressive heat, whispering to each other and pointing, trying to come up with the perfect gossip story.

  Frankie held up his hand at the police cruiser on the left side and yelled, “Stop there. We’ll come to you.”

  Steel led Knee, tightening the cuffs around his wrists, which pressed hard against his lower back, but Knee didn’t grimace; he barely reacted. Marisa and Frankie followed Steel and Knee. Frankie stepped up to Steel’s left and Marisa to Steel’s right, just a few feet behind him—like a triangle with Knee as the target at the tip. The officer pulled roughly thirty feet away and hooked the cruiser sideways. Their shoes tapped the city streets and mixed with neighbors’ voices circulating throughout the airwaves.

  Something popped then cracked through the air, sounded like a single firecracker left over from the holiday. Steel stopped and looked at Frankie. Knee raised his head for the first time and shot curious eyes at Steel.

  Then another pop—only much louder—as if a firecracker had exploded next to Steel’s eardrums. He flinched, ducked.

  Marisa moaned and shrieked, her voice like a power drill spinning into a wall. “Ahhhh! Ahhhh! Oh, my God! Oh, my God!” she yelled and lost total control over her body and collapsed. She smashed hard against the street, followed by an eerie sound of bones cracking. Steel’s stomach plummeted, watching her roll around, arms and legs flailing, tears pouring from her eyes. Blood leaked from her body, spilling onto the ground, and the maroon puddles spread in size in seconds. Her eyes rolled back and forward, back and forward.

  Frankie shook his radio and yelled a numerical dispatch code into it, then said, “Paramedic, now! Officer down! Now!”

  The SWAT team members, who’d already piled into their vans seconds earlier, leaped back out and sprinted down the street, guns pointed and ready to fire. Frankie circled a finger at the uniformed officers in the cruisers. “Search the area! Go!” Each vehicle peeled off, leaving thick tire marks. Bystanders and neighbors shouted and scurried around, mixing their words into unrecognizable, steady background chatter. Steel heard some locals shout in the background: “Lord Jesus! Oh my God!”

  Steel’s mind went haywire; all circuits fired off like a computer screen after clicking a mouse too many times. He couldn’t keep up and couldn’t believe what he was seeing. He couldn’t catch his breath as the air was sucked from his windpipe as though a vacuum were attached to it. His heart ached, felt like a brick inside his chest, at watching Marisa on the ground in so much pain. He shoved Knee to one of the SWAT members, dropped both knees into the street, and cradled Marisa’s head in his arms. She gasped for air with incoherent eyes and squirmed around. His heart hammered his ribcage as he breathed. He was losing her as she slipped in and out of consciousness. Sweat and blood soaked his hands and clothes.

  “Relax and stay still!” he repeated, but to no avail. He knew she was in bad shape, but he contorted his brow and mouth into a stone face for her sake. If it comforted her for even one second, it would’ve been worth it.

  Steel stared in her eyes, and the moment stood still, but much differently than it had the previous night—the previous night’s moment as a dream, this moment as a nightmare.

  An ambulance hooked a wild right turn onto the street, lights flashing, sirens exploding. In reality, they’d made it in less than five minutes, but it had seemed like a lifetime to Steel. He looked back and then down to Marisa’s neck in his arms, sweat pouring from his face. Two EMTs, a man and a woman, jumped from the ambulance’s back doors. Both wore navy blue pants and a navy blue t-shirt with blue medical gloves on each of their hands. They rushed over to Marisa, checked her vital signs, and prepped her for the ER.

  Frankie gripped Steel by the shoulders and pulled him back. Steel’s eyes froze, without blinking, frustrated and hurt that he couldn’t do anything but watch those two paramedics adjust and strap her to a stretcher right there on the street. Her blood seeped onto the white sheets as they lifted her. Steel’s stomach rolled over several times; vomit pressed hard against his esophagus. The EMTs wheeled her to the back of the vehicle and swung open the two doors. He stood right by her side and could tell her eyes weren’t registering what was happening. Tears fell sideways down her cheeks.

  “I wanna go! Let me go!” Steel shouted.

  The paramedics worked quickly and looked at Frankie, then Steel. “You can’t. We don’t have much time, sir!” one of them said.

  Frankie struggled with Steel, held him back. Eventually, Steel stopped, his face on the brink of tears, repeating, “You’ll be all right,” like it was a mantra.

  The doors slammed, with Marisa alone, fighting for her life. Steel turned and stared a hole through Knee. Knee’s head was craned toward the ground, so Steel just stared at his ear. Sweat soaked Steel’s scalp and dripped down his forehead. His wet hair fell to his eyebrows, and more sweat wrapped around his thighs and ankles. His body trembled. Air rapidly sucked in and out from his lungs and through his mouth. He couldn’t decide which emotion he’d address first. What the hell just happened? Am I daydreaming?

  The shock numbed him. He stood there and watched an ambulance rush his partner and new lover off in a condition he knew was fifty-fifty of surviving. He furiously dug his nails into his damp scalp and glanced down at Marisa’s blood on the street. His blood pressure soared at the sight—at the whole scene. He gritted his teeth so hard they almost crumbled from pressure. Thick blue veins popped from his skin in places he’d never seen before. He shook his fist, thought of striking Knee right there to relieve the rage exploding inside him. This would end now, whatever it was, and he would close the curtains.

  37

  Frankie’s and Steel’s cars and the SWAT van cut into the department’s parking lot, tires screeching, horns honking, sirens blinking. Each hooked into a space that resembled a parking spot, jumped out and jogged to the building.

  Reporters already had gotten word of the shooting and stormed toward them, shouting, chasing, and sticking and bouncing microphones and cameras in their faces. The media formed a wall just by the doors, but the officers penetrated it. Questions from reporters muffled, mixing into
incoherent voices, but Steel had his mind set only on one thing.

  He laid a hand on the revolving doors and entered the building. Officers had assembled in the lobby, discussing the shooting of one of their own, but stopped talking and stared at Steel and the others. Steel and Frankie bypassed them and power-walked to the elevators. Frankie directed the officer who had Knee cuffed by his side and told him to take him into an interrogation room and to get Knee’s boy into a separate room. Knee didn’t react.

  The elevator hummed, then opened. Steel and Frankie hurried inside, both men disheveled—blood-stained shirts, wild hair, and shocked faces, even for seasoned officers. The ride seemed to take forever as each stood, eyes straight, blinking limited, lost in their own thoughts. The cables shook to a stop, and the doors snapped open.

  Steel sprinted to his cubicle. He wrestled his suit jacket off and threw it onto the desktop, then quickly folded his sleeves halfway up his wrists. After picking up the phone, he dialed a number. He spun and dug the phone into the crook of his neck and secured it in between his ear and shoulder, ran a hand through his hair.

  One ring later, he asked, his voice raspy and desperate, “Mare…you hear anything from the hospital yet on Marisa?”

  “Yeah.”

  Mary paused, and his heart dropped. His skin warmed as though his pores expanded and leaked buckets of sweat.

  “They’re working on her now. Her family’s on their way. That’s all I have.”

  Steel sucked in a long breath. “Keep me posted…” he ran a hand across his mouth, “…and get in touch with patrol that Frankie sent to Knee’s house and tell them to keep searching the area for anything or anyone.”

  “You got it, Ben. Oh, and Ben…”