I spot her as I stand at the front of the restaurant waiting for the
hostess to seat me.

It’s a little hard to miss a six footer with a shock of gleaming silver
blonde hair even in a place as dimly lit as the Crack o’ Noon café at 2:30
in the afternoon.

I point her out to the hostess who smiles and bids me to follow her and the
entire way over I wonder how I am going to convince De Lorenzo to change
out seats with me; no way in hell can I sit in this place with my back to
the room and the entrance.

“You’re late, Sgt. Finn,” she says laconically, eyes perusing the menu
before lifting to my face. She blinks once, at the hair no doubt and I
perch tentatively on the edge of the burgundy leather seat, one knee
jiggling spastically.

“That would be why I didn’t want to meet you at the Division,” I tell
her. “And Cooper’s fine.”

“Okay. And I’m just CD. And I was just about to order. You need a minute
or two?” she gestures at the menu, brows lifted and I shake my head and
address the waiter who has replaced the hostess at the end of our gleaming
highly polished table.

“Heineken. Dark.” I tell him. “And be ready to bring me another soon.”

“Gotcha,” he says smoothly and then turns to De Lorenzo who orders a Cesar
salad and some pasta dish its good I’m not longing for, since I’d never be
able to pronounce it with my drawl and end up with what’s listed on the menu.

There must be something in my face when she glances at me because she
blinks and leans forward slightly.

“What?”

I clear my throat. “Could you trade seats with me?”

The fair brows pucker slightly and then lift. “No problem. Any specific
reason why?”

She’s already gathering up her hand bag and briefcase; I slide out and
dance behind her swiftly and relax when my back is against the leather seat
and my view of the room is unobstructed.

“Better?” she asks in amusement and I nod.

“Oh, yeah. And the reason why was probably just made obvious.”

“Yeah.”

“It doesn’t bother you to sit with your back to the room?”

She shrugs. “Depends on the place. But here? No. And as a general rule,
no. But then, I’ve never done an extended stint undercover. Makes a
difference. You feel comfortable enough to proceed?”

I wave a vague hand and nod and she leans forward, silent, lacing her
fingers together, gazing at me before speaking.

“I’m not real good at subterfuge; I’m one of those just right-to- it
people. So if I offend you or I ask something you consider off limits or
too personal then you should just tell me.”

“Alright.”

“And we don’t have the luxury of chit chat here, so if it’s alright with
you I’d prefer to just get started.”

She waits until I nod and then slides a notebook from her purse, uncaps a
pen, glances over her notes and then leans forward slightly, blue eyes
steady.

“Were you drunk when you hit that wall?”

I see the waiter’s hands pause; he’s just tilted the dark brown bottle up
for pouring into the frosty glass. He hesitates just slightly, blinking,
probably mulling the liability laws involved.

“You can pour,” I tell him, amused. “I took a taxi to get here and
anyway~~” I turn back to CD, “the answer is an adamant ‘no’. I was not.”

She nods and then produces a small tape recorder, brows lifted in question.

“I don’t have a problem with it, no. Go ahead,” I say and she nods, then
punches the small button down.

After reciting the date, time and location she asks my name.

“H. Cooper Finn. And why did you ask me if I was drunk before you turned
the tape recorder on?”

She blinks, shaking her head and clicks the machine off staring at me.

“Are you this self-destructive all the time? Or is this something that
just happened to you when you got out here?”

I frown, taking a hearty swallow of rich brown beer and sigh.

“Yes.”

There’s a second or two of silence before she sinks back in her seat,
eyeing me. “Right. Okay. Let’s get this straight before I turn the tape
back on, alright?”

She waits until I nod before she continues.

“Off the record, here? I believe you. On the record though we’ve got a
senior member of the San Francisco Police Department, a respected, if not
particularly wellliked officer saying you were intoxicated and that he
removed a bag of meth from the vehicle after the crash.”

“But we also have a blood test indicating I was clean,” I put in and she
hesitates, expression unreadable and I feel a cold knot begin to clench
tighter in my gut.

“We do have that, don’t we?” I ask, my voice only mildly shrill.

“We have one that says you were clean, yes. We have another that says
you’re not.”

“What?” I don’t even try to hide the jagged tremor in my throat.

She removes a folder from her briefcase, glancing over it before sliding it
across the table to me.

“The initial test done on your blood by Dr. Weaver indicates no evidence of
any alcohol or narcotics or controlled substances. However, Senator
Chandler demanded the remainder of your blood be tested by an objective
third party laboratory, claiming that Dr. Weaver had reason to protect you
and there was a conflict of interest there.”

“And the second one tested positive.”

I state it; but she nods anyway, expression serene.

I find myself nodding back and take a huge swallow of Heineken. When I
speak my voice is small and thready.

“So I’m fucked.”

The gleaming blonde head tilts to the side as she lifts one shoulder in a
lazy shrug.

“Maybe. Maybe not. The lab used for the second test wasn’t exactly an
objective third party seeing as it’s owned by a person who just happens to
play golf with both Massey and Chandler almost every week end. Of course,”
she adds, “they can always claim the first test just as suspect because of
your friendship with Weaver. If it goes to trial and they push it, both
pieces of evidence will probably get tossed.”

“So I’m fucked,” I repeat.

She doesn’t respond immediately and I drain the beer and slide the empty
bottle to the end of the table where the waiter sees it immediately and
replaces it.

“I’m fucked,” I repeat more emphatically in the silence and she sighs a
little and takes a sip of her tea.

“Tell me about the other officer who responded.”

I lean back against the seat and hold the cold bottle to my face, shaking
my head.

“Mennie? He come forward and given any sort of statement contrary to Van
Zandt’s?”

“No.”

“No,” I repeat, grinning mirthlessly. “He hasn’t and there’s two
conflicting blood test results and I’m fucked.”

“But Mennie also hasn’t turned in a signed statement of his own.”

I pause, searching her face. “Have you spoken to him yet?”

She shakes her head. “Not yet. I’ve left three separate messages
requesting he make contact with me.” She leans forward slightly, thumb
paused over the tape recorder’s buttons. “What’s he going to tell me, Sgt.
Finn?”

“Your guess is as good as mine. He knows. But he’s a rookie and his
partner is the one filing the case on me. The EMT that responded, the
female that took the blood to Weaver~~ she could testify~~”

“I’ve already spoken to her. And all she’s able to state is that she
didn’t smell any alcohol~~which they’ll say is because it was vodka which
is odorless~~and that you didn’t appear intoxicated to her.”

“Which isn’t going to mean anything compared to Van Zandt’s statement.” I
fall back against the seat again, sighing.

“Exactly. Not to mention Chandler’s even more influential position and the
fact that you assaulted a member of SFPD on live television and considering
your quite interesting and colorful past within your own Department.”

“So why are we here? What’s the point?”

The blue eyes are very calm and unblinking as she gazes at me.

“The point is I don’t believe you were intoxicated and I don’t believe you
were trekking around San Francisco with a bag of methamphetamines in your
rental car. And I intend to prove it. Now, before we begin recording
again, do you have anything dazzlingly sarcastic and stupid to get off your
chest?”

I snort. “No.”

“Good. Then let’s get started here. You know how this works. You tell me
exactly what happened in answer to the exact question I ask. Not any more;
not any less. Are you ready?”
 

The silence in the drab little motel room is deafening.

However gloomy and seedy it was before, it’s now nothing short of pathetic
and dreary. I can’t even paint it interesting or romantic from an edgy
paranoid eye; it’s just sad and dark and pitiably, wretchedly dismal.

It seems a little theatrical now to crawl into the corner fortress so I
scoop my laptop up, lean against the headboard and check to see if there is
new communication from S’Phear.

There’s a cold little knot of oh-shit terror when there is not.

Too long, the Hink Meter voice whispers. He’s run into complications he
hasn’t told you about because it’s all taking too long.

I make the IM to him short and what I hope is very clear.

“If there is something going on I need to know about, even if it is bad and
detrimental to our plan, you have to let me in on it. I haven’t been
around as much as I should have been to check in with you but I have to
know, S’Phear. Don’t leave me out thinking I can’t handle it.”

I send it off and stretch out on the bed again, watching a spider make its
way across the hills and valleys of the cheaply textured ceiling.

I’m startled at the knock on the door; I must have fallen asleep.

I come off the bed so fast I’m dizzy, automatically scooping the SIG up as
I roll off the foot and press myself against the wall, heart
hammering. I’m not even fully awake until the second knock and something
about the decisive and abrupt rap of it assures me it’s certainly not
someone trying to keep their presence a secret and definitely not any sort
of furtive operation to gain entrance to the room.

I unlock the door swiftly, throwing it open, fully expecting to see Avery
on the other side, lazily leaning on the door jamb, grinning at me.

Instead I am confronted by a very annoyed looking white-faced Weaver and a
calmly smiling Legaspi.

Weaver immediately crutches her way into the room looking about, her
expression furious, her shoulders stiff and the hand on the crutch
white-knuckled. Legaspi enters more slowly, brows lifted as blue eyes dart
about the room, lingering on the small fortress in the corner before they
slide to my no doubt red face and pause, expression carefully neutral.

“How the fuck did you find me?” I demand, my voice more weary than angry
and Angelo slides woefully around the corner and peeks up at me through
thick lashes.

“Oh great,” I say, laying the SIG down on the television’s top. “Enlist a
patient and weasel info out of him. Nice.”

“Hey,” Legaspi says easily. “Talk to Dr. CIA. She’d have done the whole
Gestapo routine with the bare light bulb if that’s what it took.”

Angelo timidly moves closer to me, expression regretful and contrite.

“Her hair is a very tenacious red,” he tells me remorsefully.

“No shit,” I say sourly, leaning back against the wall and glaring at the
three of them. “Want to tell me what you’re doing here? You know, other
than having your hub caps and stereo ripped off?”

The look Weaver turns on me is fierce.

“What are you thinking here, Cooper? ‘Someone tried to kill me so I think
I’ll go hang out in a crack motel to throw them off track? Why, they’ll
have to wait in line there!’” She pounds the crutch on the floor in
exasperation, glaring at me as she sinks gingerly down on the edge of the
bed, brows scrunched up as she eyes the coverlet distastefully.

“Hey,” I protest. “I’ll have you know heroin is the drug of choice in this
establishment.”

“What a relief,” she snaps, glowering at me. “Get your shit together. And
I mean that literally and figuratively.”

I return the scowl and cross my arms over my chest.

“And where is it you think I’m going?”

“You’re going to our house,” she informs me. “Where we have a newly
installed alarm system, motion detectors inside and out and a huge
slobbering Rottweiler named Murphy.”

I lift a brow at Legaspi.

She shakes her head. “Don’t ask.”

“Uh, huh. And this huge slobbering Murphy dog is going to defend himself
against a bullet, how?” I ask Weaver.

Her expression is cross and disgruntled. “With the assistance of the
motion detector lights. So he can see exactly where to drool.”

“They’d never get a clean shot in sliding around like that,” Legaspi puts
in blandly and I snort in amusement before catching myself and turning it
into a clearing of the throat and rearrange my face into a frown.

“I must be missing something here,” I tell them both. “Or actually maybe
y’all are. Did you both suffer head injuries recently? Remember the guy
in your house with a bat and a knife? With my name and your address on the
bat?”

“Do you think we would have acquired a Rottweiler if we had?” Weaver
demands. She shoves herself to her feet and waves a brusque hand at my
things. “Kim, grab that wad of…” she pauses, frowning, then shakes her
head. “~~whatever that is.” She leans and scoops my duffel up neatly,
slamming it onto the bed’s top side, sparing a withering glance at me.

“What the fuck did I do?” I ask her, my voice both furious and mystified.

I watch as two pair of dirty socks are tossed angrily into the open mouth
of my duffel.

She doesn’t answer me. Her mouth is a tight, incensed slash across her
face; the look she directs at me icy and enraged.

I glance at Legaspi who has taken up what I think is a black DPS tee shirt
and is folding it, meanwhile perusing my entire fortress lair with a
professionally curious eye. She glances up at me and for a full twenty
seconds I am rendered silent and blank by the sheer depth of empathy in her
face.

It staggers me as much as Weaver’s indignation.

I feel skinned alive, raw, peeled and boiled. There’s more said about me
there in that scant space of corners and shadows than could ever be listed
in a file.

“My mother is coming to get me from San Diego,” Angelo tells me, voice and
face soft. “She would like to meet you.”

I swallow; hard. “Okay,” I manage weakly.

He sees my discomfort and moves closer; one hand reaches for and tucks
around mine.

“She’s a very gentle ash brown,” he tells me, voice sweet and I nod and
squeeze his hand slightly and wonder why I’m not throwing things and
kicking the tantrum of my life to get them out.

“Because you don’t want to be here, really,” Angelo tells me gravely.

I search the dark eyes before sighing.

“I don’t?”

“No.” His voice is very gentle. “You’re just afraid.”

“Yeah,” I agree. “I’m afraid the bad guys that are after me are going to
hurt other people.”

The look he gives me is full of silent pity. He puts his head to one side
and regards me kindly, before lifting a hand to thread out the unruly bits
of hair above my forehead.

“You know it’s not.”

What I want is to be angry, furious with him, irate and livid that he has
led the two of them straight to me and my little fortress invaded, seen, no
doubt chronicled in some shrink archive by Legaspi.

But all I am is tired.

“He’s not going to leave you here, you know,” Legaspi says
conversationally, all the while still packing my meager belongings into my
duffel. She tentatively picks up the Ruger and hands it to me, nose
wrinkled in distaste. “Not any more than she is.”

The ‘she’ was clearly meant to indicate Weaver who is lifting the bed’s
coverlet with her crutch to remove whatever has strayed beneath.

I take the Ruger from Legaspi, heaving a mental sigh of relief that the
safety was on because she has handed it to me with the barrel pointed dead
center at my abdomen.

“You’re just going to have to deal with the fact that people care about
you. I realize it’s terrifying, but you’re just going to have to find some
way to come to terms with it.”

I blink as she sweeps a vague hand behind her at the conglomeration of
furniture which has made up my small corner fortress.

“And I couldn’t leave you in this place either. So it’s three to
one. Help us pack.”

In this place.

Her voice drops a touch lower on those words and I know she doesn’t mean
the motel room.

“Okay,” I say, my voice very small and I don’t even cringe when she smiles
and lifts a hand to pat my shoulder.


END OF 60