The Heartless

by David Putnam

  With one arm in a sling, I pulled her into a hug and held her there. I whispered, “Thank you.”

  “For what, big guy?”

  “For being here.”

  Even in the warm summer evening, her body heat transferred to mine, a comfort I needed at that moment.

  “You going to ask a girl in or are we just going to stand out here all night?”

  “Oh, sorry.” I tried to get my left hand into my right pocket to get my keys and fumbled the job. Nicky moved my hand out of the way, stuck her hand in, and pulled the keys out. She sorted through the keys until she found the one she thought would work. As she stuck it in the lock and twisted the knob, she stopped and said, “You know you’re supposed to still be in the hospital so tonight I’m only going to help you to bed and maybe make you some chicken soup.”

  “Huh? I never heard it called chicken soup before.”

  “What? Oh, my God, Bruno.”

  Her reaction made me smile. “You going to open the door?”

  She opened it and stepped aside. I turned on the lights. She closed the door and ducked under my good arm into another hug, my chin on top of her head.

  She whispered, “Bruno, you scared the hell out of me today. I thought that—”

  “Sssh. That’s all ancient history now.” Her words brought back the awful decision I’d made to quit the department, a decision that, if I didn’t act on soon, I’d gradually try and talk myself out of. And, in all likelihood, I’d succeed.

  “You going to show me to the bedroom?”

  “I need to make one phone call first, okay?”

  “Work?”

  “Yeah, and it’s okay if you want to listen.”

  I let her go and went to the phone. My body cooled without her touching me. I wanted that warm feeling back. I dialed Wicks’ desk phone. He picked up on the first ring. “Wicks.”

  I said, “You’re not going to catch Borkow sitting in the office eating apple fritters.”

  “Bruno? Where are you? You home? How you doing, buddy boy?”

  “I feel like ten pounds of ground round. You have any leads on Borkow?” I was stalling. I didn’t need to know about Borkow or anyone else, not with what I had to tell him.

  “We’re dead in the water, pal. We’ve run down every possible lead. Borkow just isn’t moving around. He’s gone to ground somewhere, and we’re just waiting for something to break, someone to spot him and call it in. You have an address for me, an address on that broad, Lizzette, so we can put up a tap? That anonymous informant of yours call you yet?”

  I squirmed a little out of guilt for what I was about to tell him. “You have to promise not to hit the place.”

  “No shit, you have an address? Come on, give.”

  “I doubt there’s going to be a phone there, but there might be, you never know. And it’s not Lizzette, it’s Twyla.”

  “I don’t give a crap, give it to me.”

  “16357 Atlantic Drive, right off Atlantic Boulevard.”

  “Excellent. I’ll get the tap up and call you. Then you can go talk to her and tickle the wire.”

  You tickled the wire by telling the target something that will spook them, in order to get them to call the real target. We’d used the ploy many times and it worked well.

  “I’m not going to be able do it this time.”

  “Ah, you’re fine. Don’t start whining like some kind of baby. You were hurt worse when you jumped up on the sideboard of that truck and that asshole—what was his name, Jack something?”

  “Boles.”

  “That’s right, Boles. I didn’t have the shot because you had to play John Wayne and jump on that truck. Boles took the first corner so fast you got flung off at thirty, forty miles an hour right into those rose bushes. Remember that one, partner? You were cut to shit.”

  “Yeah, I remember.”

  “Hell, I’ll drive you over there myself. All you have to do is go to the door and scare the shit out of this Twyla broad so she’ll call Borkow.”

  “She won’t be calling Borkow. She’ll be calling Lizzette, but it will have the same results.”

  “Whatever.”

  “I’m out.” I swallowed hard and looked at Nicky, locked onto her eyes. In saying those simple words, I felt like a coward running away from life, from what I’d been built to do.

  “What do you mean you’re out?” Wicks asked.

  “I’m out. I’m quitting the department.”

  “The hell you say. You’re just banged up a little. You took a couple hard knocks to the coconut and you’re not thinking straight. Don’t do anything stupid for a couple of days, you hear me?”

  Nicky didn’t move. Her expression didn’t change. She didn’t seem to have an opinion on my work status one way or another.

  “I’m stone-cold serious. There is nothing that’s going to change my mind. I’m out. I’m going to submit my letter of resignation tomorrow morning.”

  “Don’t do it, buddy boy. I’m telling you, it’s a big mistake, one you will regret the rest of your life. Besides, you can’t leave me hanging like this, not with Borkow still out there. Let’s take down Borkow; a little blood and bone will clear your head. It always does for me.”

  Had he already forgotten what happened at 10th and Slauson? Then at the restaurant called Mel’s? There had been enough blood and bone at those two locations to last me a good long while, maybe even a lifetime.

  “I’m out, Robby, I mean it.”

  “Wait, wait. Just do me one favor, one last favor for an old friend? I’ll get that wire up and running. Then you can go and talk to this Twyla broad, okay? Spook her good. Then you take two or three weeks off before you make that kind of decision about quitting, okay? What do you say?”

  “If she’s still there, and if you can get a warrant for the wire, I’ll go talk to her.”

  “Thanks, buddy. I’ll get back to you in a few hours, okay? You take it easy.”

  When I hung up, Nicky came toward me, slowly unbuttoning her blouse. I eased my arm out of the sling and let it hang at my side. She made it over to me in time for me to help her with the last button. With my good hand I eased her blouse off one shoulder and moved to do it to the other side.

  When someone knocked at the door.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

  NICKY PULLED HER blouse back up onto her shoulders and held the two unbuttoned sides together with one hand, her breasts still exposed at the top. “Who’s that?”

  I shrugged. “Can’t be good news, not at this hour.” I reached to the counter, picked up the Smith 9mm, and went to the door. “Who is it?”

  No answer.

  “Who is it?”

  The knock came again, more forceful this time. I opened the door.

  John Lau barged in, his eyes going wide with anger when he spotted Nicky in her state of semi-dress.

  Oh, this wasn’t good.

  She let go of her blouse. It parted, exposing black lace and tanned, uplifted breasts. Her hands turned to fists she held down at her sides. “What are you doing here?”

  “I knew it,” he said. “I knew it when they told me my gun was involved in that shooting. I knew you were banging this smoke.”

  “Hey, watch your mouth,” Nicky said.

  Nicky took a step toward him. “You followed me here? What the hell are you doing following me? We’re legally separated, John, as of this morning. You were served the court papers.”

  He pointed a finger at me. “I couldn’t find you, so I followed him, and look what I found, a slut spreading her legs for the likes of this son of a bitch.”

  “Now, I’m telling you watch your mouth, keep it civil.” I pulled the magazine out of the Smith, ejected the round in the chamber, and set the gun back on the counter. I’d been present at enough domestics to know loaded guns were a recipe for heartache and grief when emotions ran hot. This little squabble was right on the edge of going nuclear.

  Domestics were the most dangerous call a deputy could go on, and gun
s only made them worse.

  Something else on the counter caught my attention, but with all that was going on, I let it slide.

  John still wore his uniform pants and shoes. He’d taken off his uniform shirt and only had on his tee shirt, one size too small; form-fitting muscles rippled as he moved. He smelled of beer, lots of it, something that also reflected in his demeanor—his slow speech, his impaired motor skills, and bloodshot eyes.

  Nicky pointed. “Get out. Get out right now before I call the police.”

  He pounded his chest with his fist. “Go ahead. I am the police, baby cheeks. I’m a lieutenant with the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.”

  “You won’t be much longer if you don’t leave right now. I’ll get you busted back to patrol deputy. You’ll be driving a patrol car in Compton on graveyard.”

  His mouth opened into an O. He knew she spoke the truth. If he took this issue one step further and committed even a simple assault he would get busted back and have to start all over again from the bottom of the pile.

  “Is that right? If I’m going down, then so is he.” He took a step toward me ready to fight, ready to get revenge.

  I held up my hand. “Whoa, there. You won’t be hurting me, my friend. I’m resigning in the morning. You’ll be going down in flames all by yourself.”

  That stopped him.

  “John, if you don’t leave right now, I’m going to take out a temporary restraining order. With one of those pinned to your tail, you can’t carry a gun. They’ll put you on the rubber-gun squad for ninety days. How’s that going to play with your commander at SEB? A lieutenant on a SWAT team who can’t carry a gun?”

  Her words worked the same as a slow leak in a balloon. His shoulders sagged along with his expression. “Why, Nicky? Why are you doing this? I thought we had this all worked out. What happened?”

  “Don’t you dare give me that ‘Oh, poor me’ act. You know exactly what you did.”

  “I don’t, really I don’t. Whatever it is, I’m sorry.” He looked genuinely confused. “Tell me what I did wrong.”

  He almost had me convinced there’d been a terrible mistake somewhere along the way. Nicky hadn’t told him what she knew about how she’d tailed him to the hotel. She’d blindsided him that morning by serving him with papers.

  “We’ve been sleeping in separate rooms for the last six months, and you’re telling me you didn’t think there was something wrong? When I asked you to move out, you said you wanted the house. What exactly did you think was happening?”

  “I just thought we were going through a rough patch and that you’d change your mind. That’s why I didn’t want to move out. I love you.”

  “A rough patch? Are you kidding me? Change my mind? After what you did?”

  He held his hands out. “What’d I do?”

  “Really?” Nicky said, raising her voice. “Why don’t you tell me about your little tryst that started with a dinner at the North Woods Inn and ended across the street at the hotel?”

  His mouth dropped open again. “How did you—”

  “What, no denial? You just want to know how I found out? That’s classic John Lau.” Her chin started to quiver and her eyes filled with tears.

  I saw it in her expression—she still loved him. She’d inadvertently been using me as a salve to mask her emotional pain, using me for nothing more than a vehicle to move on. I’d lost her. With all that was happening, I didn’t know how I felt about it. Maybe after some sleep, I’d suffer a deeper sense of loss.

  “I am so sorry, baby,” he said. “That was a long time ago. I was a fool. I know that now. She meant nothing to me. You’re all I want. Please, please forgive me. I love you. I’ll do anything to get you back.”

  I no longer wanted to be standing there. It was my apartment, and I had nowhere to go. I felt a little ashamed and embarrassed for him. He’d turned from an angry brute to a weepy, vulnerable lump of clay begging for her to come back to him.

  “This is all my fault,” he said, tears brimming his eyes and rolling down his cheeks. “I was working hard for one goal. I was doing it for you, for us.” He reached into his pocket.

  “Don’t,” I said. I took a step toward him.

  He slowly pulled his hand from his pocket clutching something. He stepped closer to her, not taking his eyes off of hers. “I did it all for this. It’ll mean nothing if you’re not with me.” He turned his hand over and opened it.

  A sheriff captain’s badge.

  “They promoted me today. I’m sorry, baby. Please forgive me? I promise, it will be different. I won’t work as hard anymore. I’ll pay more attention to you. Please?”

  He stepped toward her, and she flung herself into his arms.

  “On your way out, could you please close and lock the door?” I turned and headed out of the room.

  Good for her. She deserved to be happy.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN

  I WALKED DOWN the hall into the bathroom and closed the door. I filled the sink with hot water and used a washcloth with soap to wipe the sweat and grime off my body. With the sutures in the knife wound and the shotgun pellets the doc had removed, I wasn’t supposed to take a shower for three days. I did the best I could using one arm. The bandages on my hands got wet and I unwrapped them. My palms were pink and sore to the touch. That had been foolish, picking up a hot toaster, but in the heat of the moment, logical thought took a back seat to survival. After I finished, I felt much better.

  Before I opened the bathroom door, I put my ear to it. I didn’t want to walk back out if they still stood in my living room kissing or doing something worse on my couch. It hurt bad enough to have lost Nicky so abruptly. I didn’t need to compound the loss with unwanted images.

  I hadn’t seen their reconciliation coming and should have. She’d been using our relationship as an emotional crutch to get over her husband. Only she couldn’t; she still loved him. Good for her.

  I peeked out. The living room was empty. In only my underwear, I walked through the apartment and made sure the door was locked. It wasn’t. I locked it and headed for my room for some well-deserved sleep, if I could sleep at all with Olivia so heavy on my mind. I picked up the Smith 9mm on the way, shoved the magazine in, and charged the chamber. I eased the hammer down and set it on the nightstand next to the bed. I stretched out and tried to relax.

  My body, now given the chance to catch up with all that had happened, began to complain in earnest. Everything ached or throbbed. The doctor had prescribed pain pills. I had the bottle in my pants pocket, the pants in a pile on the bathroom floor. I had never liked pain pills, the way they clogged the brain with cotton and smothered all logical thought. I tried to focus on the dark ceiling above and on my breathing. My mind began to relax and wander in and out, going over all that had happened that day, scene by scene, until I got to the garage at 16357 Atlantic Drive in Compton and the mock-up of the jail’s visiting windows. The way it looked exactly like the windows in the jail. The way the—

  I sat bolt upright in the bed. “No. No, no, no.”

  I sprang up on weak and shaky legs and opened the bedroom door. I walked down the hall to the counter that separated the kitchen from the living room, and where the phone hung on the wall beside it.

  Earlier, during the argument between Nicky and her husband, John, I’d dropped the magazine from the gun. I ejected the round from the chamber and set the gun down. At the same time, I’d seen something—an item on the counter. Now I stared at it, an innocuous and unassuming little tool, more a piece of a tool really. I picked up the ¾-inch socket.

  I grabbed for the phone and dialed. It rang and rang. I fought the urge to grab my clothes and run out, make the drive like a madman breaking all vehicle code laws. Finally, Dad picked up, his voice thick with sleep. “Johnson residence, this is Xander Johnson.”

  “Dad, it’s me. Is Olivia there?”

  “What? Come on, Son, we had this discussion. I’ll have her call you in the morning. Now go
to bed and get some sleep.” He started to hang up.

  I yelled. “Dad! Dad! Wait. Listen to me.”

  “What is it?” His tone took on an edge that I rarely heard.

  “Please, just go peek in the room and see if she’s there. Please?”

  “She’s there. I checked on her before I went to bed. Now go on and get some sleep.”

  “Just check for me right now. I promise I won’t bother you again until tomorrow.”

  “I suppose if I don’t, you’re just gonna drive on over here in the middle of the night and wake up God and who knows who else with your overheated paranoia. Just a minute, I’ll check.” He set the phone down.

  I closed my eyes tight and prayed. Seconds ticked by.

  He came back on the line. “I’m sorry, Son, I don’t know how she got by me. You know I’m a light sleeper. Don’t worry though, she’ll be back. She’s done this before. You know you used to—”

  “Stay there. I’m coming over.”

  I hung up and ran for my clothes. I took off my sling and tossed it. The sutures in my shoulder from the knife wound tugged and pulled as I dressed fast and headed for the door. I stopped and went back for the Smith and Wesson on my nightstand.

  Outside, I stood on the sidewalk, confused for a second. Where was my truck? Then I remembered. I’d parked it a few blocks away. I ran full out, my lungs burning. When I made it to the truck, I bent over and took two deep breaths to push away the light-headedness. That wasn’t enough. Didn’t matter. I got in and started up.

  I drove on the near-empty streets as fast as I dared. My right arm hurt each time I shifted the stick. I could only hope that she’d snuck out with Derek, that she’d gone with him to Lucy’s to sit on the picnic bench and talk like they did the last time, talk about what I’d done to poor Derek. It was a sad world when that scenario was better than the alternative. I hoped that I would pull up to Lucy’s and find them both safe sitting on the picnic bench.

  But I knew better. The cop instinct that had served me well through the years whispered in my ear that I had better be prepared for the worst, and that the worst was about to gut-punch me.