Cop Town: A Novel

by Karin Slaughter

  “Uh …” The blonde touched her trembling fingers to her neck. She was clearly on the verge of tears. Maggie was shocked she’d made it through the gauntlet. She looked like a light breeze could blow her right back out the door.

  Instead of asking the woman, Charlaine asked Maggie, “Who’s this?”

  Maggie shrugged. “I guess one of the new recruits.”

  “Shit, I forgot they were coming in today.” Charlaine sat down so she could load up her utility belt. “She obviously can’t sew.”

  Wanda suggested, “Maybe she thinks she’ll get arrested for altering her uniform.”

  They laughed. The new girl stared at them like a caged animal.

  Maggie turned to her locker and busied herself with her purse, checking the things that she already knew were in there. She’d endured the same kind of taunts when she’d first put on the uniform. It was part of the initiation. If you couldn’t make it in the women’s locker room, you sure as hell couldn’t make it out on the street. At least the jabs you got in here were only verbal. In her first month, Maggie had been spat on more times than she could count and punched in the face by the wife of the man she was arresting for domestic battery.

  “Where you from?” Wanda asked.

  The new girl obviously wasn’t sure if the question was meant for her.

  “Yeah, you,” Wanda said. “Where you from?”

  “Atlanta.” Her voice was like money, so it wasn’t surprising when she said, “Buckhead.”

  Wanda gave a low whistle. You didn’t find a lot of cops from the wealthiest section of town. “Hoity-toity.”

  Charlaine slapped Maggie’s leg for attention. She held out her hand, and Maggie helped leverage her up from the bench. Charlaine told them, “Y’all’ve got five minutes before the colored girls get the room.”

  The palaver of male voices filled the space as she cracked open the heavy door.

  Wanda kept her arms crossed, demanding of the new girl, “So, Hoity-Toity, what’re you doing slumming it here?”

  “Just …” The woman kept wringing her hands. “Working.”

  “Working.” Wanda had an ice pick for a tongue. She kept staring at the woman, obviously checking all the boxes that listed why she hated her. Tall, with strawberry blonde hair and a model-perfect face. Big blue eyes. High cheekbones. Even without lipstick, her lips were cherry red. She had a couple years on them all, but there was something fresher, younger, more feminine about her.

  Wanda asked, “You here to meet guys? ’Cause I can tell you right now, ain’t none of ’em worth knowing.”

  The woman said nothing, but her eyes told a story. She was going through her options, chief among them being to open the door and run away screaming.

  “Go on.” Wanda nodded toward the door. “You wouldn’t be the first gal to call it quits before roll call.”

  “I’m not quitting.” The blonde seemed to be speaking more to herself. “I’m not here to meet men. I’m here to do a job. And I’m not quitting.”

  Wanda grunted. “We’ll see about that, Hoity-Toity.”

  Her voice got stronger. “Yes, you will.”

  Maggie felt bad for the girl. She asked, “What’s your name?”

  “Kay—” She seemed to change her mind. “Kate Murphy.”

  “Kate Murphy?” Wanda echoed. “We got our own Irish Spring here—‘manly, but I like it, too!’ ”

  Maggie smiled at the joke. Wanda sounded just like the woman in the commercial.

  “I’m not—” Kate shifted, nearly losing her balance. Her shoes were too big. Her pants were coming unpinned. She was swallowed in a sea of navy-blue wool. Still, she said, “I need this job.”

  Maggie studied Kate Murphy. She was obviously scared, and there was no denying the desperation in her voice, but she deserved some credit for not backing down. Especially since Wanda was in her cop stance, which even Maggie found intimidating.

  Wanda seemed to notice this, too. She moderated her tone, but only slightly. “Don’t wear the dress socks they gave you. Franklin Simon has wool ones, two for a dollar, that’ll keep your feet in your shoes. Find a stapler for your pants. Those pins ain’t gonna hold, especially if you have to chase somebody, and believe me, you’re gonna have to chase somebody, or fight somebody off, and with that figure, it’ll probably be one of those monkeys on the other side of the door.”

  Kate looked at the door.

  “Eyes back this way.” Wanda wasn’t done. “There’s a tailor on Carver Street does alterations without copping a feel. He’s a Jew, but he’s reasonable.” She winked. “Just don’t stare at his horns. Makes him nervous.”

  Kate seemed even more terrified than before.

  “What, you’re afraid of Jews?” Wanda was giving her the business again. “You gotta problem with them?”

  Kate gave a slow half shrug. “As long as they keep their hooves covered.”

  Wanda huffed a laugh. She patted Kate on the shoulder as she headed for the door. “Good one, Hoity. If you’re still here by Friday, I’ll buy you a drink.”

  The door cracked open, Maggie saw a bunch of male faces trying to see if there was something interesting behind the door.

  She looked at her watch. “We’d better hurry before the colored girls get here.”

  Kate glanced at the curtain splitting the room in half. She seemed horrified. “It’s segregated?”

  “They change back there. They can’t wear their uniforms to work.”

  “Why?”

  Maggie felt her eyes narrow. She couldn’t tell if this doe-eyed look was an act or not. “You ever talk to a black person in Buckhead don’t have to come through the back door?”

  “Well, I—”

  “Cops aren’t welcome in the neighborhoods where they live, even if they’ve got the same color skin.”

  Kate looked back at the door. “Why don’t you have a curtain, too?”

  Now Maggie was certain she was playing some game. “Because they put one up first.” She felt the need to warn her. “Seriously, though, if you get caught back there, they’ll kick your ass. I mean it. They’re mean as hell. Even Wanda won’t mess with them.”

  “Oh—okay.”

  “Toilets are upstairs,” Maggie said. “It’s a tight squeeze, only two stalls. Don’t spray your hair in front of the mirror unless you wanna get knifed. I’m Maggie, by the way.”

  Kate said nothing. She just stood there gripping the strap of her purse like she wanted to strangle it. Or use it to strangle herself.

  Maggie asked, “You got a combination lock?”

  Kate shook her head.

  Maggie held open her locker. “Put your purse in here. Get a lock after work. There’s a sporting goods store on Central Ave. near the university. Wear your uniform and they’ll give you the lock for free. Actually, wear your uniform whenever you can. You’ll get free coffee, free food, free groceries.”

  Kate put her purse on top of Maggie’s. “Is that legal?”

  “Anything’s legal if you can get away with it.” Maggie slammed the locker closed. “Welcome to the Atlanta Police Department.”

  6

  Kate sat at the last table in the back of the squad room, wedged between the woman who was hateful to her and the woman who was only marginally less hateful.

  Maggie Lawson. She was about Kate’s height, with dark hair pinned into a bun on the top of her head, brown eyes, and a pretty face that would’ve been prettier without the uniform. Of course, the latter might be said for Kate, so she should probably be more generous. Maggie had been helpful in a begrudging way. Kate wondered if the next time she saw her purse, the wallet would be empty.

  Then there were Clack and Compton—the other two. Both short. One thick-waisted, the other thin as a rail. They bleached their short hair and wore heavy makeup, as if they were desperate to prove that they were still women. They hadn’t even bothered to introduce themselves. Kate had seen their last names engraved on the silver bars pinned to their uniforms.


  She had to think all the way back to junior high school to recall a time she’d felt so despised by a group of women. Kate had been an early bloomer. She’d had curves before anyone else. She’d developed breasts before anyone else. She’d got her period first of all her girlfriends. And then she didn’t have any girlfriends, and the boys wouldn’t stop staring at her.

  Which was pretty much what was happening now. Despite the fact that she was wearing the police equivalent of sackcloth, every man in the room found some excuse to turn around and look at her. Never in the history of civilization had so many pens been dropped so repeatedly.

  She ignored them all, even as she prayed that she would get partnered with one of them. The bigger and stupider, the better. Kate knew how to handle men. It was the women she was worried about. This job wasn’t a lark. A police officer had been killed this morning. If Kate got partnered with Lawson, Clack, or Compton, it was clear that she was on her own. And the vulgar woman who stood with her feet planted apart and had a gait like a horse leaving the barn would be proven right—Kate wouldn’t make it through the first week.

  She clasped her hands together so she would stop wringing them. There was the usual split-second panic when she didn’t feel her wedding ring. Two months ago had marked the second year since Patrick’s death. He had been gone longer than Kate had known him.

  She wondered what Patrick would make of her current situation. There were probably two answers to the question. The Patrick she had married was different from the Patrick who’d written her letters from the jungle. He was six weeks into his tour when he started sounding like a different, darker version of the boy she’d married. He was obsessed with the new guys who shifted in every week to replace the ones who were sent home in body bags. They called them FNGs, which took Kate some time to figure out because there was no scenario in which her husband was going to write the word “fuck” in a letter to his wife. As if she’d never listened to a Richard Pryor album.

  Fucking New Guys.

  Kate could never comprehend Patrick’s hatred of the FNGs. He excoriated them. He railed against the very idea of their existence. They came in with their fresh faces and sense of purpose and photos of their girls tucked inside of their helmets. No one wanted to know their names. Why bother when most of them wouldn’t survive the week?

  That was Kate. That was why they didn’t introduce themselves to her—the fucking new girl.

  She straightened her hat on the table, surreptitiously taking in her fellow female officers, the way they sat on the edge of their seats with their knees spread and elbows on the table. Kate felt like a prim schoolmarm with her legs crossed and her hands folded in her lap.

  She was one of eight white women in patrol uniforms. The other white women stood against the wall by the locker rooms. They smoked incessantly and wore tight miniskirts with skimpy tops that left nothing to the imagination. At first, Kate thought they had been arrested, or were waiting to be arrested, or perhaps looking for customers, but then she figured they must be undercover officers because, as bad as this place seemed, she doubted they let prostitutes stand around listening to the morning roll call.

  At the very least, she assumed prostitutes had better things to do.

  She turned her attention to the opposite side of the room. There were eight black patrolwomen across the aisle—the colored girls everyone was so worried about. The concern did not seem unfounded. There was something terrifying about the women, the way they stared straight ahead, shoulders squared, all business. As a group, they were intensely separate. This explained the curtain. They had walled themselves off from the world before anyone else could.

  In the front half of the room, the men were similarly segregated by skin color, though their ranks were higher in number—probably fifty altogether. Patrolmen sat with detectives in street clothes that would’ve been slightly more stylish ten years ago. Nearly all of them had long sideburns and shaggy mustaches. They wore their hats inside and held their cigarettes between their thumbs and forefingers. The smell they gave off was overwhelming. Sweat, tobacco, and far, far too much Old Spice.

  Kate tried not to think about what it had been like to walk among them. She’d been literally man-handled; her breasts, her bottom, even the back of her neck had been touched by some stranger. She’d never in her life been so roughly treated. Something about putting on the uniform had turned her from good girl to bad. It was as if they were telling her: come into our territory, play by our rules.

  One of the men a few tables away tried to catch Kate’s eye. She quickly looked down, gripping her hands tighter. She forced out a slow breath, trying not to choke on the cigarette smoke that permeated the air. No more daydreaming about Patrick. No more strolls down memory lane.

  She had to do this.

  A low murmur went through the room. A fat white man with a bulbous red nose took the podium. Captain Cal Vick. He had interviewed Kate this morning and warned her to keep her breasts strapped down so she didn’t give anybody a heart attack.

  Vick rapped his knuckles on the podium. “All right, settle. Everybody settle.” The noise wound down like a music box. “Let’s start this off with a prayer for Don Wesley, may he rest in peace.” Everyone bowed their heads. Kate averted her gaze to the floor.

  Don Wesley. She was driving to work when she heard about him on the radio. The fifth police officer murdered in the last three months. According to the news reporter, the Atlanta Shooter had struck again. There was a five-thousand-dollar reward. Listeners were urged to call the police department with any information.

  Kate had started to sweat while she navigated the downtown streets. She had wanted to pull over to the nearest pay phone and call her family to let them know that she was all right. Then she had realized how foolish that would be. They would hear the details the same as Kate and know that she was safe. The reporter had given the victim’s name, said that he was unmarried and had served with distinction in Vietnam.

  And still, Kate had fought the need to call her mother. Only when she considered how the conversation would go did Kate push herself to keep driving. The only reason to call her family was to tell them that she had changed her mind. That she couldn’t do this. That she wanted to move back home. They would be disappointed with her. Not that they would say it, and of course on some level they would be relieved, but they would be disappointed, which in some ways was worse than any “I told you so.”

  So Kate had not pulled over at the nearest phone booth. Instead, she had pulled into the marked lot by the police headquarters building. She had gotten out of the car. She had walked the three blocks up the street. And then she had reported to Cal Vick so that he could wonder aloud if Kate’s breasts were too large for her to safely run down the street.

  Vick said, “Amen,” and everyone chimed in. “We’ll get through roll call, then Sergeant Lawson will run down what’s the what.”

  Kate glanced at Maggie, guessing by her bare ring finger that Sergeant Lawson was a male relation.

  Vick continued, “Before I start, I wanna make sure every single one of you peckerheads is out there with his eyes open. Nobody goes out alone today. Nobody runs off trying to play cowboy. We get this dirtbag together. You hear?”

  None of the women answered, but all the men shouted, “Yes, sir.”

  “This ain’t gonna be a repeat of six months ago. Am I clear?”

  “Yes, sir,” they repeated.

  Kate glanced around. Everyone seemed to know what had happened six months ago except for her.

  Vick started the roll call. “Anderson?”

  There was a gruff “Here,” followed by another name, then another.

  Kate shifted in her chair, trying to keep her flashlight from stabbing into her side. She shifted again and the handle of the nightstick jammed into her thigh. Kate moved again, and several people turned to stare. Her new leather belt was creaking, announcing her every move.

  She looked at Maggie, then Clack, then Compton, and realized th
eir knees were apart to more evenly distribute the weight from the belts. Kate carefully uncrossed her legs. She inched her feet away from each other. Her face burned with embarrassment. She’d kept her knees together or legs crossed since she was old enough to sit up on her own. Maybe there was another way. Or maybe these women had something in them that Kate did not.

  She couldn’t think about that. If she admitted that she was different, she would have to admit that she wasn’t cut out for this. Frankly, she wasn’t cut out for much of anything. She hadn’t the patience for being stuck in a classroom full of children. She hadn’t the training to be a nurse. Her father had gotten her three different secretarial jobs in a row, but Kate had been unable to keep any of them. Her typing speed was laughable. Her dictation was atrocious. She could fetch coffee and look pretty, but there were plenty of younger girls who were willing to do that for a hell of a lot less money than a grown person could live on.

  The police force had to pay women the same salary as men. They had to give you benefits and a pension. They had to train you, such as it was. Perhaps most importantly of all, they had to let you do your job. Kate had worked her ass off at the academy. She’d studied more than she ever had in college. She’d practiced looking people directly in the eye. Raising her voice. Standing her ground. She’d worked on not apologizing when someone bumped into her, not explaining herself in restaurants when her order was wrong or asking for forgiveness before gently complaining to the dry cleaner that he’d ruined her favorite blouse.

  “Wake up.” Maggie bumped Kate’s elbow. Everyone had their spiral notebooks out. Kate’s was in her purse, which was in Maggie’s locker.

  Vick said, “Terry, you wanna take over?”

  Kate studied the new man behind the podium. White, as with everyone else in charge. He had a thick neck and squinty eyes that scanned the room. Sergeant Terry Lawson, she presumed.

  He unfolded a sheet of paper and read haltingly. “The suspect is a black male. Afro, long sideburns and mustache. Approximately twenty to twenty-five years of age. No distinguishing tattoos or birthmarks.” He looked up, making sure he was being followed. “Five-ten, maybe six foot. Dressed like a hippie. Levis and a red shirt. He wore gloves. Black gloves. The weapon was a Saturday night special.” Terry paused again as they all recorded the details into their notebooks. Even the blacks were taking notes. Suddenly, they’d all come together.