Random Revenge

by William Michaels

  “What makes people act like that?” asked Winter.

  “Insecurity. Making it clear she knows everything.”

  “Seems like that would make it worse, trying to pretend you’re someone you’re not.”

  “Not for everyone.”

  “If she’s good, then she shouldn’t need to remind everyone. If she isn’t, she should just learn, or accept it. I can’t sing, I don’t go around pretending I can. It’s a waste of energy.”

  “You’re right.”

  “You agree with me?”

  “You can’t sing.”

  Winter smiled both at the truth and at how well Beth still knew his moods, that he’d need this lift.

  “There’s another reason,” said Beth, indicating the supervisor. “She wants to point out supposed incompetence to disguise her own.”

  “How do you know she’s incompetent?”

  Beth turned to him. “If you had a rookie partner working with you and he didn’t know the ropes, would you treat him like that?”

  “God help me.”

  “That’s because you know what you are doing, and are secure about it. You don’t need to make a big show of what you know.”

  “I meant, god help me if I get a rookie.”

  Beth punched Winter on the arm. “Right.”

  “Speaking of partners, see if you can find Brooker, okay?”

  “Where are you going?”

  “To find out if I can keep that guy from being browbeaten to death in front of us.”

  “You can’t save them all, you know.”

  Winter shrugged. “But I can try.”

  “You think she’s going to assault him? Or he’s going to assault her?”

  “Actually, I was more worried about me. A few more minutes of watching this and I won’t be responsible for my actions.”

  At any other time, the sight of an unsmiling Winter approaching might have scared the Latino into racing out the door, but in his current state his eyes pleaded like a puppy that had managed to get its head stuck in a picket fence.

  The woman must have noticed the Latino’s change in demeanor, or felt Winter’s presence; she spun around. Winter got into her space, forcing her to shrink back. He jerked his head back toward the stage. “They don’t seem to know how to work the sound system. Do you?”

  The woman’s eyes flittered away. “Of course.”

  Which was what Winter suspected, she’d never admit she didn’t know anything. “They’re going to need it for the run through.”

  “I’ll take care of it,” she said, already glancing past Winter.

  “Good.”

  Winter waited for her to clear out before turning to the Latino. “Need some help?” he asked cheerfully, feeling better already.

  “I’m not too good at setting tables. I usually just move the chairs, carry stuff.”

  “I’m not good at it either. Come on, let’s just copy the other table settings.”

  Winter started to rearrange the silverware. It looked fine to him, even after seeing how the other tables were set. He couldn’t figure out what the supervisor had been in such a snit about. The Latino glanced at him a few times, then settled in to his work, quiet, like Winter.

  When they had finished the second table, the Latino said, “Excuse me, but I think that the sound system is broken. She won’t be able to fix it.”

  “I know. I’ve been here before. It hasn’t worked for years. It’s a piece of shit, no one could fix it.”

  “She’s not going to be too happy,” said the Latino, but he was smiling. “That she can’t get it working.”

  “Who’s she going to admit it to?”

  “Sometimes it is very hard working for bosses like that,” said the Latino carefully.

  “Tell me about it,” said Winter.

  Audrey Winter watched her father from across the room. He wasn’t with the group of cops in their dress blues near the dais, boisterous, in a good mood. No, he was in the far corner, working with one of the catering staff, setting the tables.

  That her father was also in his dress uniform didn’t connect him to the other cops any more than the distance between them. He was one of them, and yet a man alone, in one of the bluest collar of professions, yet still seeking out the common man, in this case, a slightly built dark skinned worker in a white hotel uniform.

  Audrey leaned into the doorway, suddenly very sad, wanting so much to go to her father, yet needing the separation. Seeing him reminded her of her mother, of their family, growing up, happy, or so she thought at the time. The truth hidden from her for so long that when her parents told her they were getting a divorce—both of them sitting down, serious, an adult conversation with a thirteen year old who was half girl, half woman—she didn’t believe it, it was a cruel joke from parents who never joked about important matters.

  She blamed herself, she blamed each of them, only learning later that the seeds of their discontent had been growing for years, and the end, when it came, was not rife with recriminations and anger and blame, but only sadness for everyone. When Audrey had learned later that they had stayed together as long as they did just for her, she blamed herself even more.

  And still not as much as when she’d learned that the only reason her parents had probably married was because her mother had become pregnant with Audrey, both her parents progeny of a time when doing the right thing meant getting married, true love not be damned, just not considered critical in the equation.

  As much as Audrey loved her father, it was hard to be with him now. He acted as if things were the same, as if they’d be going home to dinner, the three of them, even though in reality that rarely had ever happened with his job. And yet those were the memories she had retained, the three of them, eating pasta and meatballs, watching a baseball game, her mother an ardent fan.

  That was why she stayed away. Not because he was a cop now, but because he had been a cop then.

  Now, watching him, it all came back. She could just have well been leaning on a doorway in their little house here in Marburg, a house built by her grandfather, Winter’s father, a house he didn’t want to leave.

  A house Audrey hadn’t stepped inside in years. If she could barely stand the reminders just seeing her father, how would she be able to survive the crushing memories of the home she’d grown up in?

  And her father remembered everything, his mind an encyclopedia of their lives. He’d mention details about people Audrey vaguely remembered, about experiences she’d long forgotten.

  A wave of friendly laughter from the men, the shared intimacy of one of the most close knit of professions. Winter didn’t even look up, perhaps intent on his task, or because he was one of them, yet not one of them. Except for Brooker, his partner. It had taken Audrey a long time to warm to Brooker, not because he wasn’t nice, but because he shared a closeness with her father that she no longer did, that her mother no longer did, if either of them ever had.

  Neither the sharp uniforms or this room—old, yet still elegant—could mask the down and dirty nature of the cops, their bulk and brash confidence reeking of nights on patrol, hustling winos, settling arguments, causing others, their hands on their guns, wary, suspicious. In the thick of it, the garbage men of human depravity. Less so here than in Boston, but still dealing with what the elite barely took note of.

  That’s who Audrey worked with now, the old money of Boston, a junior investment manager with a bright future. So bright she’d been offered a promotion, yet not without its costs. Her firm had opened a satellite office in Virginia, and if she moved she’d jump two steps and a decade of paying her dues, since the wealthy in Boston wanted gray haired men as advisors, not raven haired young women.

  And Virginia was where her mother Sylvia lived.

  Winter had finished doing whatever he was doing and was now scanning the room. Audrey didn’t think he would be looking for her. She’d been inclined to stay away; after all, she’d heard about this award from her aunt Beth, not from her ow
n father. But of course he wouldn’t have asked her to come.

  She’d hung up the phone, one of her co-workers overhearing the conversation with Beth, curious. Cops got awards? For what, giving out the most tickets?

  The woman hadn’t even realized the implicit put down, simply assuming Audrey would think the same way, as all her friends no doubt did. And more than anything, that remark, that assumption, was why Audrey was here.

  An even more sharply dressed cop, this one wearing his hat, brushed by her. He headed toward the group of uniforms, the conversation toning down as he neared. The new arrival, who struck Audrey as being in charge, must have been querying them about something, as evidenced by their shrugs. One of the cops jerked his head toward the far wall, and the chief, or whatever he was, set off toward her father.

  Winter kept repeating uno, dos, tres, cuatro, cinco, seis, shit, what was seven? Luis, the caterer, had been reminding Winter how to count to ten in Spanish as they made sure there were enough place settings. Winter used to know how, a little Spanish was helpful on the street, but even though he’d just gone through the litany a few times he’d already forgotten. Probably just out of practice, he couldn’t remember the last time he’d tried to speak Spanish, it couldn’t have been that long ago. Brooker would know.

  Brooker.

  He looked up at an approaching uniform, definitely not Brooker, a hundred pounds lighter and looking ten years younger, even though Captain Logan probably wasn’t. Winter wondered how Logan’s uniform stayed so crisp even though he wore it all the time.

  “Where’s Brooker?” asked Logan. His dense dark eyebrows gave him the appearance of constant worry.

  “Probably around,” said Winter, immediately covering, it was what partners did. “Maybe struggling with his tie.”

  “Maybe if he lost a few pounds,” said Logan.

  “Yeah, I’ve been on his case.”

  “He won’t listen to me. You, he’ll listen to you.”

  “Not about this.”

  “Try harder. They’ll bounce him for it, you know.”

  Winter grinned. “After getting a big award?”

  “Don’t push it. I mean it.”

  “Having a hard time holding the wolves at bay?”

  Logan jerked his hand at a commotion near the stage, the press setting up their cameras. “That’s the problem. To those people, we are the wolves.”

  “Maybe you better go set some traps.”

  “Shit, I hate this stuff,” said Logan.

  “We could trade places,” suggested Winter. “I’ll handle the press, you can have my award.”

  “A tempting offer, believe me. And not because I want your award.”

  “That makes two of us,” said Winter. “Three, if you count Brooker.”

  “Find him,” said Logan.

  Logan ambled off, grumbling. Luis had finished the last table and looked up. “Is he a tough boss too?”

  Winter watched Logan stop halfway across the room, in the no man’s land between the younger cops and Winter.

  “Not really. He’s just kind of caught in the middle.”

  Winter, not especially worried about Brooker, decided to check the men’s room anyway. Maybe Brooker was having trouble with his tie. Not that he could help, but he’d sic Beth on him.

  The bathroom echoed, Winter taking the time to take a leak in the old fashioned floor standing urinals. They didn’t make them like they used to, where a guy could take a piss without worrying about splash back. Who said newer was better?

  Outside the bathroom he turned away from the ballroom, passing back through the lobby. Still no Brooker. He stepped outside, pulling out his cellphone; he hated when people made calls in a public space.

  Brooker’s phone jumped to voicemail, not his voice, but the prerecorded service greeting. Winter knew Brooker rarely checked his voicemail but left a message anyway. “The entire city of Marburg is here waiting for you,” he said. “If I have to pick up your award I’ll make you fill out my incident reports for the next six months. Come to think of it, I’ll tell Logan you are at a Sox game, and he’ll make you fill out the incident reports for the entire squad for six months.” That should do it, Brooker despised paperwork.

  Winter couldn’t face going back inside just yet, it would just make the whole event seem longer. He pulled his phone back out, he’d call Beth, ask her to come outside for a walk, they still had a few minutes. As he was trying to remember her number, Gracie, the detective department secretary, walked up the steps. She’d been with the department longer than even Brooker, she was more cop than some of the rookies, right down to the hard stare when she needed it.

  “Hey, Gracie, you see Brooker?”

  “Isn’t he here? I talked to him over an hour ago, I called to remind him to wear his blues. He said he was just about to walk out the door.” She laughed. “Although he said he’d rather be shoveling snow in January than come. Walking out the door, my ass. I swear if I hadn’t called he would have blown it off.”

  “Huh.” Brooker lived about twenty five minutes away, there shouldn’t be traffic this time of day.

  Maybe Brooker was going to skip out after all.

  “Ah, damn.” Winter tried Brooker again, still no answer.

  “Are you calling his cell or the house?”

  “Right.” Winter tried the house, the line was busy. He and Gracie chatted a few minutes, then he tried again. Still busy. Winter had never known Brooker to talk more than a minute on a call; Brooker hated phone calls as much as he did.

  “Starting soon,” said Gracie. “You better get in there.”

  Winter nodded. “You go ahead.”

  If Brooker had lived inside the Marburg limits Winter would have called the desk to send a squad to rustle Brooker, it would serve him right. But Brooker lived two towns over, grandfathered into the rules requiring cops to live in the city limits. Winter called the county sheriff.

  “It’s Winter. I’m over at this rah rah at the Lexington. Brooker didn’t show, you got a deputy out that way you can swing by his place?”

  “What am I, a taxi service?”

  “I’m not asking you to go personally.” Winter wasn’t upset, and neither was the sheriff, they went back a way, each helping the other over the years. “Logan is on my case, Brooker’s getting a big award.”

  “I hear you are too.”

  “Do me this favor and you can have mine. I’ll pin it on your ass.”

  “That’s the only way it would get there, I certainly can’t reach it. I’d like to help, but everyone is tied up with that drug bust down in the South End. I’d be there myself, except the press is all at your event.”

  Winter knew about the drug thing, he’d forgot. “Okay, no problem.”

  He hung up just as Gracie popped her head out the front door. “The Captain wants you. But he wants Brooker even more.”

  “Stall him,” said Winter, heading down the stairs for his car.

  “What? How?”

  Winter waved to her over his shoulder. “Think of something!”

  Winter tried Brooker twice more from the car, both times the home line still busy, the cell phone going to voicemail. No accident or heavy traffic on the way out of the city. After the second failed call Winter reached under the seat for the magnetized portable flasher, leaned out the window to snap it on the roof, and hit the siren. He was in his own car—he hated the rolling soft ride of the unmarked department cars, plus everyone recognized them anyway. A buddy had installed the siren in exchange for Winter doing a little background check on the guy’s daughter’s new boyfriend. The boyfriend had a sheet in Florida, the daughter, surprisingly, had listened to her father, and a possible disaster was avoided. Winter had a not so friendly chat with the boyfriend, suggesting that a return to Florida would be much healthier, and not just because of the weather.

  He flicked off the siren a few blocks from Brooker’s neighborhood, closely packed Craftsman bungalows harkening back to the days of factory wor
kers where kids still played stickball in the street. No need to alarm the entire neighborhood.

  Brooker’s old Ford was in the narrow driveway. Just walking out the door, Brooker had told Gracie. Winter parked on the street and headed for the side door.

  Winter rapped on the glass, looking around He’d been there a hundred times, nothing seemed amiss.

  Winter knocked again, louder. The house felt empty, a sensation Winter knew couldn’t be explained but was often correct. Not that he’d ever trust the feeling if he was going after a criminal. He tried the door, locked, which usually meant that Brooker wasn’t home. It was hard to see through the window, the late day sun glaring against the leaded glass.

  Maybe Brooker had gone to a Sox game after all, and was laughing in a beer right now.

  Winter cupped his hands around his eyes and peered into the window. He knew the layout, a small vestibule, the laundry room to the left, then a short hall leading to the kitchen and living room. Something on the floor in the hall . . .

  Winter squinted, it looked like the old princess wall phone, the cord’s coil stretched straight, leading up to the left, where it normally hung on the kitchen wall. That’s why the line was busy . . .

  Winter ran around back, his heart pounding. Now he was yelling Brooker’s name, something wasn’t right. The kitchen window was too high to see inside, Winter frantically searching for something to stand on. Two lawn chairs sat near a large oak at the far edge of the yard, Brooker often smoked cigars there. A dog barked next door, and then another and another, extolling Winter to go, go, go.

  Winter measured the distance to the chairs, they might be tall enough for him to reach the window, then thought, fuck it. He pulled out his pistol and used the bottom of the grip to break through one of the small panes in the door leading to the basement. He reached in and slid the latch, then broke another pane to unlock and twist the knob. His penlight got him down the stone stairs, through the obsessively neat basement, and up the wooden staircase which opened into the hall across from the kitchen, his gun still in his hand.