0317 hours
Jack bolted upright in bed, gasping for air, his heart hammering in his chest. He thought he had screamed himself awake, but Karen was still asleep beside him, undisturbed. Her blonde hair, tousled on the pillow, glowed softly in the scant illumination coming through the shutters from the street lights. He drew his knees up, resting his forearms on them as he waited for his heart to quiet and the remnants of the nightmare to fade into darkness.
“Fuck me,” he whispered, wiping sweat from his face, wincing as his fingers grazed the still tender scar. Maybe having the stitches removed yesterday had triggered the horrible dream. Jack had thought he was finally done with the nightmares, with seeing Sy’s blood night after night. Blood he could never stop from running between his fingers, stealing his friend’s life away.
“That’s enough, for fuck’s sake,” he quietly scolded himself. “Just fucking knock it off.”
3:17. In the waning aftermath of the nightmare, the clock’s red numbers looked like blood. Morning and his first day back at 51 were still a couple of hours away.
Knowing sleep was beyond him, Jack slipped quietly from the bed. The sweat on his chest and back cooled as he padded to the bathroom, then shut the door gently before turning on the light. He leaned on the counter, staring into the mirror. A troubled Jack stared back at him. He checked the scar running through his right eyebrow. It tugged down the corner of the eye, giving him a permanent squinty look. Manny had been right; it was one hell of a scar.
Jack was developing quite the collection. On his right shoulder, in the meat of the trapezius muscle, was a tiny puckered scar. He knew if he checked the back of his shoulder in the mirror, he would see the much larger scar left by the bullet’s exit.
Lucky. Twice. If the bullet had been lower or more to the left, it could have killed him. And he knew he was damned lucky not to have lost his eye.
“Yeah, lucky me.”
Jack turned on the tap, then leaned down to rinse his face. The cold water felt good on his skin. Refreshing. He straightened up without towelling off, head back, eyes shut. Just enjoying the feel of the water as it dribbled onto his chest. When the drops reached the top of his pyjama bottoms, he reached blindly for a towel. He dried his stomach and chest, then patted his face.
Better. Much better.
Jack opened his eyes and Sy was staring at him from the mirror, blood spurting from his opened throat, splashing against the glass surface. Jack screamed. Or tried to. The scream that wanted to rip from his lips drowned in his throat, in the blood spewing from his slashed throat, splattering the mirror in perfect harmony with Sy’s blood.
Jack staggered back, slamming into the bathroom door and clutching at his throat, but the blood wouldn’t stop. He was going to bleed to death forever.
“No,” he gurgled. “No, no —”
Jack bolted upright in bed. Again. Again he gasped for air as his heart hammered.
“Jack?” Karen reached for him and at her touch he screamed once more. “Jack! Jack, it’s okay. It was just a dream. Just a dream.”
Slowly, gently, Karen laid her fingers on his arm, the muscles trembling beneath her fingertips. When he didn’t pull away, she folded him into her arms and rocked him as she would a child. She smoothed his hair, her fingers tracing the fresh scar.
“It’s okay, Jack. It’s okay. Everything’s going to be okay.”
In the darkness, she rocked him. In the darkness, they held each other.
“I told you you’d have a kick-ass scar.”
“Nice to see you, too, Manny.”
“Dude, it’s good to have you back.” Manny pumped Jack’s hand, then pulled Jack in tight, pinning their clasped hands between their chests as he thumped Jack one-handed on the back. “Damn good to have you back. This is where you belong, man.”
“It feels like coming home.” Jack freed himself from Manny’s enthusiastic embrace and headed to his locker. The change room in 51’s basement was, like every other room and office in the old building, too small for its purpose. A long but not long enough rectangle, its walls and centre were lined with ancient lockers, the metal doors proudly bearing dents, gouges and, in the odd spot, bullet holes.
Heavy-metal music, cranked to a distorted volume, pounded from the attached weight room. The night shift coppers, getting dressed to go home, bragged and boasted about the night’s arrests and shit storms. The day shift coppers, donning the black uniform of Toronto’s finest, bitched about the long day ahead of them, the first of seven.
Jack dumped his gym bag onto one of the wood benches that ran the length of the room between the rows of lockers. Some of the benches had been supplied by the station, others had been built in some coppers’ garages. All of them were in the same condition as the lockers and splinters were a continual danger.
Jack thought back to the huge change room at 53. The pristine lockers, the ample room, the smooth benches, the peaceful atmosphere. Coppers chatting about family and kids, the tickets they’d given out. So pleasant, so civilized.
God, he was happy to be back.
“This your doing, Manny?” Jack pointed at his locker, only half a dozen down from Manny’s.
“We’re partners, man. Gotta stay close.”
“Next he’ll want to shower with you.”
“Hey, Paul, good to see you.”
Paul standing up was more of a giant than Paul sitting in a scout car. At six-five, he was almost the tallest cop in the station — Marcus Rull topped out at six-eight but was so skinny he looked like a mutant heron when he walked — and easily one of the biggest. His dark skin, midnight black, as he called it, was stretched tight over massive muscles, yet he moved like a man half his size. Paul was known to break up fights simply by getting out of the police car.
“Nice addition, Jack.” Paul tapped his right eyebrow. “Gives you a piratey look.”
“A souvenir from 53.” Jack touched the still tender scar. “And a permanent reminder to keep my eyes open.”
Jack hung up his leather jacket and was reaching for a uniform shirt when Manny stepped close and pointed at Jack’s left shoulder. “What’s that?”
“Had it done yesterday.” Jack lifted his T-shirt sleeve to reveal the tattoo.
Paul joined Manny, then whistled appreciatively.
Less than twenty-four hours old, the lines were sharp and somewhat raised, giving the tattoo a three-dimensional look. The ink was a deep, lustrous black. In a week or so, the tattoo would heal and settle into the skin, but until then the harsh rawness gave it that much more life and vitality.
“That is one pissed-off-looking angel.”
Jack grinned. Paul had nailed the essence of the tattoo. Capping his left shoulder, the angel glared out from beneath a furrowed brow, powerful wings arced aggressively over his naked and heavily muscled torso. The angel’s hands clasped the hilt of a mighty sword held point down and the blade faded into a banner unfurled beneath the heavenly warrior. Writ upon the banner in cursive script was Simon, Never Forgotten.
“That’s nice, man. Really nice.”
“Thanks. Sy said there was a line in the Bible about how, in order to fight evil, sometimes even angels have to do evil.”
A respectful hush fell as each man remembered a fallen brother.
But time stood still for no one, not even 51 coppers.
“Better hustle, man,” Manny warned, “or the new staff’ll do you for being late to parade.”
“The new staff? What happened to Rourke?”
“Quit, man. Went to work for a bank. Fraud investigations.” Manny sighed, sounding utterly disheartened.
Jack was shrugging into his shirt. “C’mon, Manny. Rourke was a good staff, but he wasn’t that good.”
“It’s not how good Rourke was, it’s how bad the new one is,” Paul informed Jack and there was muttered agreement from the cops within earshot.
“Staff Sergeant Greene,” Paul said stiffly. “Never just staff.”
“Oh, no. Never just staff,” Manny grumbled under his breath.
Jack looked questioningly at Paul.
Paul explained. “He’s old school, Jack. I mean old school.”
“He and Moses went to the same kindergarten,” another copper declared as he headed for the washroom.
“Hey, Jarjad,” Jack said. “How old school?” he asked Paul.
“How about stand-up parades? Old enough for you?”
“You’re kidding.” Jack was amazed. “I haven’t done a stand-up parade since the college.”
“Neither had we until a few weeks ago. And not just standing up when he enters the room, oh no.” Paul wagged his finger disapprovingly, then gruffed up his voice in imitation. “‘The platoon shall be in formation and at attention when I enter the room. Every officer will be thoroughly inspected.’”
“Wonderful.” A thought occurred to Jack. “What about permanent partners?”
“As long as both of you maintain your workload. If either of you drops below what he considers acceptable, you’re split up.” Paul grinned humourlessly. “Can you say ‘quota’?”
“Workload also affects time off.” Manny slammed his locker closed. “Those with higher numbers get first dibs on T.O. If Greene thinks you don’t deserve the T.O., you don’t get it.”
“Hang on, he can’t do that,” Jack complained. “If you have the hours in the book and there’s enough bodies on the road, then you should get the time off.”
Paul pointed a finger at him. “You know that. We know that. Try explaining that to him.”
“Wonderful,” Jack repeated as he settled his gun belt around his waist. “What else?”
“Hm, let’s see.” Paul ticked off the points. “Stand-up parades, no T.O., if you call in sick you’re weak and should be ashamed of yourself, if you put anything ahead of the job, like family, friends, your health, you aren’t a real cop. Anything else, Manny?”
“Don’t forget beards.”
“Right,” Paul said, nodding. “Facial hair, other than moustaches, is severely frowned upon, but since we’re allowed to have beards now he can’t do much about it. Legally, that is.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning you have a better chance of getting T.O. if you’re cleanshaven.” Manny looked as unhappy about it as he sounded.
Jack was beginning to understand Manny’s impassioned greeting. “He must hate you, then,” he said to Manny.
“He does,” Manny confirmed, stroking the pencil-thin line of hair along his jaw line that made his goatee a beard. Technically, at least. “He told me to shave it off and I said I wouldn’t.”
Jack groaned. He could just imagine how unpolitically correct Manny had been as he refused. Manny was a great guy, but he didn’t think before he spoke. Even when he was speaking to someone who could royally fuck him over.
“He said the only reason he wasn’t documenting me for it is that he’s seen guys on other shifts with similar beards. He’s going to bring it up at the next management meeting and push for all the staff sergeants to document anyone who doesn’t have a full beard.”
Jack was perplexed. “And his reasoning for all this?”
“I told you, man. He’s old school.” Paul, suited up, closed his locker. “If they did it that way when he was on the road, then that’s how we’ll do it.”
“How long does he have on the job, anyway?”
“Over forty,” Manny said. He was leaning against a locker, arms crossed, shoulders slumped. Jack had never seen Manny, the guy he once described as the world’s biggest puppy, so apathetic about the job. “He was in headquarters somewhere. We think he was transferred here as a hint to retire.”
“What about Johanson and Rose? I can’t see this sitting well with them.” The platoon’s two sergeants came from the same school of policing that many of the division’s senior guys belonged to. To them, old school meant you got the job done, didn’t take shit from anyone and at the end of the shift everyone went home safe and healthy.
“They don’t like it either,” Paul confirmed, “but in the end they’re the sergeants and Greene’s the boss. And Johanson has less than a year till he pulls the plug. Rose is in line for a spot in the CIB. She doesn’t want to fuck that up.”
“One day when Greene was coming in late —”
“Coming in late?” Jack interrupted Manny. “So he’s not perfect?”
“I wish,” Manny sighed. “He was coming from a funeral or something. He saw two of our guys checking out some dealers at Oak and River and when he got to the station he had Rose do them up for not wearing their hats.”
“Oh, fuck, he’s not one of those idiots, is he?”
“He is,” Paul confirmed. “The only reason for not wearing your hat is if it got knocked off in a fight. And as soon as the fight’s over, you’d better be putting it back on. He even wanted us to wear them in the parking lot to and from the scout cars and while parading prisoners.”
“And you didn’t think to mention any of this to me when I said I wanted to come back?” Jack accused Manny.
Manny shrugged. “Sorry, dude. We need you.”
“What about the senior guys on the shift?” Jack felt as if he was grasping at straws.
It was worse than straws. “There are no senior guys, Jack.” Manny looked morose. “Sy’s gone and we lost Trozzo, Woolcott and Emberley while you were in 53. Trozzo went upstairs to the Youth Bureau and Woolcott and Emberley both transferred.”
“How much time do you have on, Jack?” Paul asked.
“July will be seven years.” He had a very sudden, very unpleasant feeling in his gut.
Paul stood up and clapped Jack on the shoulder. “Congratula-tions, man. You’re senior man on the road.”
“Welcome fucking home,” Jack muttered.
“Officers Warren and Armsman? 5106, 1100 for lunch. Good to have you back on the platoon, Jack.” Sergeant Johanson looked up from his parade sheet and gave Jack a brief smile. For the grey-haired, stoic supervisor, it was a gushing display of emotion.
A few other people echoed the sergeant’s sentiments but briefly and quietly. The new staff sergeant did not take to unnecessary talking on parade. He glanced from his memo book at the unruly outburst but let it slide.
Too busy with his freaking notes. The man actually took notes about parade. Jack had never seen a supervisor, of any rank, make an entry about parade other than to say when it started and maybe when it ended. And the staff had spent long enough inspecting everyone. Jack hadn’t been given such a thorough going-over since his days at the police college down in Aylmer. Greene had done a sock check to make sure everyone was wearing black socks. A freaking sock check! Several officers, including Jack — no grace period for the platoon’s new addition — had been cautioned about the length of their hair. Jack wouldn’t have been surprised if the old bastard had taken out a ruler to measure the gap between hairline and collar.
Jack wondered when the basement room at 51 had last seen a stand-up parade. Its old, tired appearance certainly didn’t correspond with such formality. The once-white paint was a faded and dreary ivory. A feeble light grimed through the dirt-grey windows set high in one wall. The metal tables, in rows beneath the windows, were as battle weary and worn out as the assortment of salvaged chairs. No, formality did not belong here.
Jack was surprised when the platoon was allowed to sit as Johanson read out the day’s assignments and alerts. Greene seemed like the kind of prick who would keep everyone standing. Jack had no doubt Staff Sergeant Greene was indeed a prick of colossal magnitude.
Astonishingly, Greene was not a big man. Forty years on the job meant he had been hired in an era when a significant portion of the job interview was whether you had to duck or turn sideways to get through the door. Greene was neither tall nor wide. He was unimpressively average. Average in height. Average in width. His hair, mostly grey, was rigidly cut to regulation length. The only thing marring his remarkable unremarkableness was his iron-grey handlebar moustache. To Jack, nothing screamed “prick” louder than a handlebar moustache. Wax the ends and curl them up and the moustache screamed “colossal prick.” Greene’s moustache screamed colossally.
Johanson finished assigning the scout cars. “Anything to add, Staff Sergeant?”
Jack shook his head at the sad, absurd formality. The parade room felt empty with only five officers and the supervisors. Jack, Manny, Paul, Jenny and Boris were the day shift. Morris and Goldman, both with about four or five years on the job, were on the early half, having started an hour ago. The platoon’s strength wasn’t looking too good. Manpower had been a problem last summer but never this bad. Seven on the road plus two on annual training and another two on holidays put the platoon’s full strength at eleven and the three senior officers who had left the platoon while Jack was in 53 had created glaring holes in the platoon’s seniority. The shift’s essence, its strength, was broken. Parade should be the warm-up for the workday. Not quite a pre-game pep talk but close enough. This wasn’t a pep talk, it was a wake. And the corpse was the platoon’s spirit.
What had this prick done?
Jack was about to find out.
“Thank you, Sergeant.” Greene stood up as Johanson relinquished the podium, a wood pedestal atop the table just big enough for the sergeant’s clipboard. Jack noted Johanson grimace as he stepped aside. The situation must be bad if the sergeant grimaced. Legend had it that years ago Constable Johanson had ended a fight by putting a suspect’s face through a car window without so much as twitching an eyebrow.
Greene stood erect and surveyed his officers. Jack figured his gaze was meant to be steely and forceful, but he thought Greene appeared simply . . . well, prickish. At length, he spoke and his voice was as ordinary as the rest of him. Barring the prick screamer beneath his nose, of course.
“I was reviewing the platoon’s performance over the past cycle and was appalled to discover that you officers were last in every category.” He gripped the podium and leaned over it, as if he wanted to physically force his words onto the officers in front of him. “And not just last but abysmally last. Over the five weeks, your numbers in arrests, POTs and 208s continued to drop until the next platoon was substantially ahead of you. I will not tolerate such a shoddy work ethic!” He pounded the podium, hammering home his decree.
Jack was not surprised to hear workload was down. Why hunt up arrests outside of radio calls, write tickets or even fill out a 208 after investigating someone? To make this prick look good to his boss? Not bloody likely.
I wonder if he bothered to check what the numbers were like before he got here.
“This platoon is lacking,” Greene pronounced. “Lacking in integrity, teamwork and positive attitude.”
Can he toss in any more core-value buzzwords?
“Therefore, all time off, including that in relation to annual leave, is cancelled until I deem this platoon worthy of such reward.”
A chorus of unbelieving groans churned through the officers. Greene slammed his palm on the podium, silencing the insubordinate din.
“For those of you already planning to use sick time to circumvent my directive, be advised I will be assigning home visits to the road sergeant.”
This shocked even Johanson. His face was a dangerous thundercloud.
The beatings will continue until morale improves. That’s fucking brilliant.
But Greene wasn’t finished. “Constable Warren. I will see you in my office immediately following parade.”
The officers of B platoon filed out of the parade room glumly, their heads bowed, their footsteps heavy. Even the world’s biggest puppy dog was trudging beneath leaden thoughts.
“The fucking moron doesn’t see what he’s doing to them.”
As Greene had strode from the room, Johanson had signalled for Jack to hang back. Now the room was empty but for the two of them.
“He can’t be that blind.”
Johanson sighed and, for the first time Jack could recall, the solid sergeant looked his age. “He can and is. The fool actually thinks he was sent here to instill discipline.” Johanson nodded when Jack cocked an eyebrow. “He told Rose and me that on his first day here. Unbelievable.”
“Why was he sent here?”
Johanson shrugged. “Why does anyone like him ever get sent to 51?”
“He piss someone off?” Jack guessed.
“Either that or they thought he’d retire if he got kicked out of his comfy office at headquarters. Doesn’t really matter. We’re stuck with him.”
“Is there anything we can do?”
“Getting rid of a staff sergeant is a hard thing to do. Techni-cally, he hasn’t done anything he’s not allowed to.” Johanson shook his head. “He’s lucky he didn’t get sent here even ten years ago. If he’d tried this shit back then, he would’ve gotten punched out.”
“The good old days?”
Johanson snorted. “In some ways.”
“Is there something on your mind, Sarge?” Jack wanted to catch Jenny before he headed up to see Greene. They’d managed only a quick hello before parade.
“There is, Jack.” Johanson faced him, his eyes steady and, despite what the deep lines around them suggested, still strong. “I suppose you know with the others gone, you’re senior man on the road.” Jack nodded. “Because of that and what you went through with Sy and afterwards, the young guys on the shift will be looking to you for guidance.”
Jack laughed but not with humour. “You suggesting I punch out the staff?”
“No, not yet.” Johanson smiled to show he was kidding. Maybe. “A consistently low workload from the platoon will eventually be seen as a symptom of a greater problem, but it has to be across the board. A united front. There can’t be any exceptions.”
Jack knew what his sergeant was saying. “Borovski?”
“Borovski.”
Sean Borovski, known throughout the station as Boris — a nickname he hated — was a slug of a police officer. Lazy, fat and cowardly, he was everything Jack hated to see in a police officer. To Jack, Boris extracted revenge on society for a tormented childhood with his radar gun and ticket book. But if numbers impressed the new boss, then Boris must be burning through the tickets.
Jack thought about it. Boris had looked rather smug on parade, even with his multiple chins spilling over the shirt collar he had undoubtedly just started buttoning up. Appearance had never been his strength. Nor had teamwork.
“I know it’s a shitty homecoming.” Johanson clapped Jack on the back as he headed to the door. The sergeant was spilling over with emotion today. “But it’s good to have you back. Sy would be proud.”
The staff sergeant’s office was a tiny room crowded by two desks. Although technically it was an office, its chief function, unofficially, was to act as a shortcut from the back hall to the front desk. Except when Staff Sergeant Greene was in residence, that is. During his first day, in his first hour at 51, officers had learned that they were to enter the office only when summoned and were always to leave by way of the same door they had entered. There would be no inadvertent use of the office as a hallway.
Jack stood in the cramped office while Staff Sergeant Greene sat, back stiffly upright, behind his desk. Although, since the desks were butted face to face and Jack was standing to the side, the desk wasn’t quite an authoritative barrier. Greene, like everyone else, would have to learn to work with what the station provided.
The office was a squat rectangle with the doors in diagonal corners. Jack had entered from the back hall. Had he stopped when he entered, Greene would have been two desks away. Jack could have taken a casual approach and sat down at the empty desk, but instead he had stepped around it and placed himself beside Greene’s desk, forcing the staff to turn in his chair.
It was a petty tactic, but Greene was reminding Jack rather forcefully of his father-in-law: a man used to being obeyed, who had no time for the opinions of others unless those opinions complemented his own. Jack had made a critical error the first time he had allowed Karen’s dad to treat him the way he treated everyone else: as an inferior. Jack had assumed his attitude was a facade and would change once he realized his daughter’s new suitor was serious. It wasn’t a facade and it hadn’t changed. Jack had taken a lot of shit from Hawthorn; he wasn’t going to make the same mistake with Greene.
Greene was attempting to regain the upper hand by forcing Jack to wait as he took care of important staff sergeant stuff. Too bad all he had in front of him were the day’s parade sheets. There was only so much he could do with a list of officer names and their assigned cars, lunch hours and portable radios. Jack wondered when Greene would realize that the longer he looked over the sheet the dumber he appeared.
Pretty dumb, but Jack was tired of waiting.
“You wanted to see me, sir?” No way was Jack going to start by giving this waxed-moustache prick his full title. His training officer had taught him that rank had to be respected but that the person behind the rank had to earn it. And Greene had earned shit so far.
Greene gave the sheets a final check and set them aside before turning to Jack. He surveyed Jack from head to toe and back again, as if he hadn’t given him a thorough exam not half an hour ago. Jack was tempted to hoist his pant legs unasked in case Greene wanted another look at his socks.
“I understand you were stationed here once before,” he said by way of greeting.
“Yes, sir. Last summer.”
Greene’s right eye twitched. Jack figured it was because of the “sir.” “I also understand you were involved in some questionable activities.” His lips tightened as if tasting something unpleasant. “Nevertheless, you are the senior road man and as such I expect you to set an example for the officers beneath you.”
Jack held back a retort. If Greene thought length of service was the only factor that made a leader, then in his own mind he would be close to demigod status because of his forty plus years on the job. But if Borovski was one of his favourites, as Johanson had suggested, then Greene had absolutely no insight when it came to judging a copper’s worth.
“I will be looking to you to unite this platoon,” Greene said, unknowingly echoing Johanson’s words. Jack figured he meant unifying them under Greene’s control. “Any officer who cannot work toward what is best for this platoon —” What’s best for you, you mean. “— has no place here.” Greene fixed Jack with an authoritative stare. If the quivering tips of his moustache hadn’t kept distracting Jack, it would almost have been effective. “I will tolerate no rogue officers.”
I think I’ve just been told no more questionable activities. “All for one and one for all,” he said.
Greene appeared not to be a movie buff. “If that’s how you wish to view it.”
“Is that all, sir? I’d like to get out on the road.” Jack had had enough of the prick and his moustache.
“You may go when I’m finished with you,” Greene snapped. “I have an assignment for you, Officer Warren. As poor as the officers are on this shift, there is one among them who is rather prominent in his impertinence.”
Manny, what have you done?
“I have already formally cautioned Officer Armsman on several occasions about his appearance and disrespectful attitude to those superior to him in rank. If he cannot amend his ways, he will find himself disciplined or transferred. Or both. It is your job, Officer, to influence his behaviour and attitude before my patience runs dry. And I am not a patient man.”
Mentally, Jack was rolling his eyes. Manny was a good cop with a huge heart and a resolute, some would say stubborn, view of right and wrong. And there was no doubt that Greene’s manhandling of the platoon would fall well within his “wrong” category. His problem was that he vocalized his opinions. He felt everyone should be able to talk “off the record.” Sy had once warned Manny there was no such thing as off the record with a supervisor and it seemed Jack was going to have to remind him of that.
“He has one cycle, five weeks, to impress me, or I will rid myself and the platoon of a problem officer. Is that understood, Officer?”
Yeah, nice to meet you, too, prick. “Perfectly, sir. Is there anything else, sir?”
“As it is your first day with us, I realize you are unfamiliar with my supervising techniques.”
Oh, no. I’m not unfamiliar. I’ve run into pricks before.
“Supervisors are to be addressed by their full rank. I expect you to adhere to that rule from here on. Is that understood?”
Jack felt like snapping to attention and giving a sharp Jawohl! Instead, he said, “Absolutely, sir,” and turned to leave.
“Officer!”
Jack casually turned. “Sir?” There was no rule or regulation, as far as Jack knew, that said supervisors had to be addressed by full rank.
“Don’t try and fuck with me, Officer.” Greene’s face was blooming an angry purple.
“Wouldn’t dream of it.” Jack smiled. “Sir.”
The sky was clear and the sun was shining warmly for a March day. Kayne luxuriated in the feel of the sun’s touch soaking into his dark sweatshirt, heating his whole body. He leaned back against a piece of plywood, his legs stretched out comfortably, then dragged deeply on a joint before passing it to Jesse. He felt the heat of the smoke in his throat and sinuses as he let it leak slowly from his nose. Life was good.
They sat on the footbridge spanning the ravine just north of Bloor Street, a link between the wealthy of Rosedale and the less affluent of St. Jamestown. In all his years, Kayne had never been on this bridge, had not known it existed until an unsuspecting weed dealer brought Kayne and Jesse out here to conduct their business.
The ravine was big enough to be called a valley and a street bearing its name, Rosedale Valley Road, snaked along the valley’s bottom. Traffic passed in a mechanical hush far beneath them. The trees and brush to either side of the road were bare and lifeless, patches of defiant snow huddling within the ravine’s shadows and recesses.
“Bet this looks a shitload better when the trees are all green.”
“Huh?” Jesse gazed stupidly at Kayne, his unfocused eyes shifting from his friend to the trees stretching out below them. “What’s green?”
“Fuck, you’re a dumb shit.” Kayne snatched the joint from Jesse’s fingers. “You keep smoking this shit and you’ll end up as dumb as Lisa. Stupid green-haired bitch.” He crushed the last of the joint and tilted his face to the afternoon sun. It felt good to be warm; he’d been cold too often in prison. He knew it was only a matter of time before he went back, he always did, so he intended to enjoy his time outside and that meant sitting on this bridge, comfortably buzzed and soaking up some sun.
There was no need to hurry; they had the bridge to themselves since it was boarded off at either end because it was being repaired. The dealer they had run into in St. Jamestown had led them down to the bridge, squeezing behind loose boards in the wood barrier. A nice, private place for business, he’d said. Kayne couldn’t have agreed more.
They had left the dealer, unconscious, bleeding and bereft of his cash and merchandise, by the barrier and sat near the bridge’s midpoint, where a section of the chest-high metal railing was being replaced. The long gap in the railing was temporarily filled with plywood and it was against this that they rested. Kayne noted Jesse spent more time hunched over his knees than leaning back against the wood. Kayne knew Jesse was a coward and figured the feel of the wood flexing and bowing behind them had unnerved him.
Coward or not, Jesse was useful. He knew who sold the best rock, knew which dealers were least likely to have a gun or someone watching them. Kayne didn’t mind scrapping with a guy armed with a knife, but he hated guns, believed in his heart only cowards carried guns.
Jesse’s most useful function was listening to what was being said on the street.
And there was a lot being said. All of it about Kayne.
He thought there must be close to ten people out there — hard-asses, dealers, crackheads — who bore his mark and everywhere those people went, for the rest of their lives, they would spread Kayne’s name. Jesse told Kayne the police were looking for him and some of his victims were talking of settling the score themselves.
“Bring them on,” he whispered. He’d be ready for them. Next time he’d carve open the rest of their faces.
He reached into his sweatshirt’s belly pocket and reverently pulled out his talisman. It felt good to hold it even when he wasn’t using it. He loved the way its black surface gleamed in the sunlight, especially the sharp tip that had tasted so much blood since the day he had found it in the prison yard. Kayne had no idea how it had gotten there, but as soon as he had seen it he’d known it was to be his. That fuck Jeremiah had said so many fucking times that if Kayne looked to the Good Book he would find his way, find the talisman that would guide him through life. How right he had been. It was only fitting that Jeremiah had been the first to receive Kayne’s mark.
“Why do you do it, man? Cut them, I mean.” Jesse was staring at the talisman intently. “Why not just kill the fuckers?”
Kayne looked at Jesse disdainfully. “Because I’m Kayne,” he stated absolutely, as if it explained all.
Apparently it didn’t, not for Jesse. “I don’t get it.”
“Use your fucking head, you stupid shit.” Kayne smacked Jesse’s forehead. Jesse rubbed his brow and continued to smile stupidly at Kayne. Exasperated, Kayne shook his head. “Roll me another one and I’ll tell you.”
A minute later, fresh cigarette in hand, he began. “Last time I did time, I bunked with this nigger. Big fucking sonuvabitch. Always reading the Bible. Called himself Jeremiah.”
“Like the pancakes?” Jesse giggled.
“What? No, you stupid shit. That’s Aunt Jeremiah, you fuck.”
“Oh.”
“Now shut up.” Kayne glared at Jesse over the flaring tip of the joint as he sucked in another lungful. “Jeremiah was always reading to me, preaching about my evil ways.”
“What was he in for?”
Kayne laughed. “What else? Kiddy diddling, just like all those chest-thumping Christ preachers.”
“Fucking faggots,” Jesse added.
“Yeah, now shut up and let me talk.” Kayne passed the joint to Jesse to keep him quiet. He’d had enough; couldn’t get wasted when so many people were gunning for him. “The only part of that book I liked was the story about Cain. You know who Cain was?”
“Sure,” Jesse squeaked, fighting to keep the smoke in.
Kayne went on as if Jesse hadn’t spoken. “Yeah, well, Cain was the first murderer in history. He killed his brother. Can’t remember the fag’s name, but that’s the fucking point. Everybody remembers Cain. Every-fucking-body. And everybody will fucking remember me.”
“But . . . wouldn’t it be more . . . bigger if you killed them?” Jesse seemed to be having trouble following his friend’s logic.
“You are a stupid shit,” Kayne repeated. “If I kill them, they’ll just be dead. My way, they’ll have my mark on them for the rest of their fucking lives and everywhere they go people will ask, ‘Who did that?’ And they’ll say, ‘Kayne did.’ I mark them, just like God marked Cain so everyone would know he was a badass motherfucker. And everyone’ll know I’m the baddest fucker out here.”
Jesse grinned approvingly. “I get it. Fuck, that’s smart.”
“Fucking right it is. Jeremiah kept telling me to look to the book and when I heard my name I knew what to do. Found this,” he held up the talisman, “in the yard one day and carved my mark in Jeremiah’s head the day before I got out.”
“You found that in the yard? How’d it get there?” Jesse had done enough time to know that finding something that big and potentially dangerous on prison grounds was a fucking one-in-a-million win.
“Fuck if I know.” Kayne stroked his talisman lovingly. “Left over from repairs, fell off the roof. Fuck, it could have fallen off a fucking plane for all I care. I found it and that’s what fucking matters.”
“How’d you get that out, man? Don’t they, like, search you?”
Kayne smiled smugly. “They ain’t as careful searching you when you go out.”
Jesse snorted laughter and it wheezed loudly out of his broken nose.
Kayne tapped Jesse’s nose with the talisman. “Who the fuck did that to you?”
“Cops.” His euphoric mood dried up as he remembered. “This pig comes into the restaurant where I’m eating and sucker-punches me, man. Busts up my nose.”
“Hope you kicked his ass.” Or were you too busy crying?
“Got a few licks in,” Jesse admitted modestly. “But there was another cop there, his partner and they both jumped me. It was the first one, though, that broke my nose.”
A foggy silence settled between them for a few minutes. A car horn blared faintly in the valley and then their friendly dealer groaned from his end of the bridge. Kayne glanced his way: the dealer wasn’t moving much.
“Too bad that guy’s dead.”
“What guy?” Kayne asked absently, his thoughts on the beer they had back in the room. Just about time to head home. Maybe see if Lisa was up for a fuck.
“A dealer. Called his crack Black. Can’t remember his name.” Jesse shrugged.
Kayne nodded. “I heard about him while I was inside. What about him?”
“They say he was the toughest motherfucker ever, killed anybody who fucked with him.”
“So?”
Jesse shrugged again. “Dunno. I just hear people say ain’t never gonna be anyone tougher than him. Too bad he wasn’t still around. If you marked him, then everyone would know who was the baddest.”
That caught Kayne’s attention. “Yeah, but he ain’t here. He’s dead. If he was so tough, who did him?”
“Cop,” Jesse said simply.
“Figures. Fucking pigs always gang up on you,” Kayne declared.
Jesse was shaking his head emphatically. “Wasn’t no bunch of cops. Just one.” Now it was Jesse’s turn to tell a tale. “This guy killed the pig’s partner. Slit his throat wide open.” Kayne nodded approvingly. “Then when Charles —” Kayne failed to notice that Jesse’s memory had suddenly improved “— broke into the cop’s house, the cop fucking killed him.”
“He broke into the cop’s house?” Kayne asked disbelievingly.
“Yup. Was gonna fuck the cop’s wife, but the cop killed him.” Jesse paused, then added, “Beat him to death with his bare fucking hands.”
Kayne was impressed. “No shit?”
“No shit,” Jesse agreed. “Hey! If you did the cop who killed Charles, then that’d prove you’re the man.” He lowered his voice. “Fucking shit, marking a cop.”
Kayne nodded slowly, the substance of the idea hot and pleasing to him. “Fucking mark a cop. Yeah. You know which cop it was?”
Jesse smiled, a nasty little grin, and fingered the crooked mess that was his nose. “Yeah, I know which one it was.”
“Good.” Kayne sprang to his feet. “You find him for me.” He gazed lovingly at the talisman, still in his hand. “You find him for me and I’ll fucking mark him. I’ll cut his whole fucking face.”
“I’m an assignment?”
“Yup,” Jack replied smugly. “Oh, how the tide has turned, grasshopper.”
“How’s that?”
They were cruising Allan Gardens, the city-block-square park in the heart of 51. An oasis of normality just up the street from Seaton House, the city’s largest men’s shelter and a short drive to the constant trouble spots of the division: Regent Park, St. Jamestown and Moss Park. But then everywhere was a short drive in 51, the city’s smallest yet busiest division.
Allan Gardens boasted a world-class greenhouse at its centre and paved walkways, all wide enough for a scout car, crisscrossed the grounds in a loose spider’s web. The first buds of spring were showing on the trees, giant mature monoliths that would bestow cooling shade come the city’s humid summer. Manny kept the scout car on the walkways; the ground, just free of winter’s grip, was too soft and muddy to drive on. Once the earth greened and firmed up, the cops would be free to cruise the park as they desired.
The park was relatively empty. Some pedestrian commuters were using its paths to shorten the walk to work, but most visitors were of the four-legged variety. The morning’s regular complement of dog owners was out in full force and canines of every size and shape frolicked in the spring mud. Some owners frantically reached for leashes at the sight of the scout car; Jack and Manny waved them off. There were far more serious offences to worry about than a dog running loose. Unless you were a squirrel, of course. Besides, the untethered dogs tended to keep the drunks and crackheads to a minimum.
Allan Gardens had been Sy’s special project. According to Sy, in the time before Jack’s first interlude in 51, Allan Gardens was a haven for the streets’ unsavoury element: drunks, addicts, dealers and prostitutes plied their professions and habits in and around the greenhouse. The public washrooms in the greenhouse had become drug-laden whorehouses. Good people stayed away for fear of being hassled or robbed. Discarded needles, other drug paraphernalia and condoms littered the ground. It had taken a combined and prolonged effort by the community and police to pull the park into the light. Sy’s goal had been to keep it that way and Jack had no intention of letting his friend’s efforts be undone. Now that he was back in 51, Allan Gardens was his and he intended to keep it that way.
“Remember the first day we worked together?” Jack watched a huge Newfoundland, mud up to his belly, chase an equally muddy tennis ball. The owner, seeing Jack’s interest, pointed at the Newfie and held up his leash. Jack smiled and shook his head. The owner smiled in return and gave the coppers a thumbs up. “Staff Rourke told you to keep an eye on me, drive me around, keep me out of trouble.”
“Oh, yeah.” Manny nodded enthusiastically. “Hey, wasn’t that the day we were in that little restaurant over at Sherbourne and Dundas and you —”
Jack groaned theatrically, knowing what Manny was going to say.
“— smashed that guy’s face into his eggs?”
“Admittedly, not one of my prouder moments.”
“Dude, that was awesome!”
“Oh, yeah, really awesome. Losing my temper, assaulting someone —”
“Dude, that guy deserved it.”
“— in full view of witnesses, I might add,” Jack continued. “And I put you in an awkward position. I repeat, not one of my better moments.”
“Dude,” Manny protested earnestly. “That guy spat on Sy’s memory and then he spat on you. I think you showed remarkable restraint.”
Jack wouldn’t admit it, but driving that asshole’s face into his breakfast plate was one of the most satisfying feelings he had ever experienced. At the same time, though, he had a weird feeling, but he couldn’t nail it down. Something about the guy, a crackhead judging from his scrawny build. Jack couldn’t picture his face, but he remembered arms sleeved in skull tattoos.
He shrugged the weird feeling off. No big deal. “Getting back to my point. Our roles have been reversed. I’m the babysitter and you are the babysat.”
“Oh, mannnnn. . . .” Whining did not become Manny. “What did Greene say about me?”
“Surprisingly, it had something to do with your attitude, appearance and behaviour, if I recall correctly. I told you that goatee was going to get you in trouble.”
“It’s a beard,” Manny defended automatically. So automatically Jack wondered how many times and to how many supervisors he’d said it. “I’m not getting rid of it.” Manny protectively stroked the emaciated strip of hair running along his jaw line.
“The beard aside, what else have you done to piss him off?”
“Nothing! Dude, I swear —”
“Save it for the courtroom,” Jack scolded. “Come on, Manny. I know you and there’s no way you’d stay quiet about Greene.”
Manny stopped at the Gerrard Street edge of the park and avoided answering Jack by easing out into traffic. Pedestrians might have been light in the park, but in the still-wintry weather, rush hour was alive and bloated. Despite the heavy traffic, drivers in both directions were eager to stop to let the police car in. Drive around in a white police car and other drivers would needlessly yield the right of way so often it was almost irritating. But throw on the lights and siren and the police car became invisible. Go figure.
Manny slid into the street’s sluggish flow and Jack pounced on him.
“What did Sy tell you about talking with supervisors?”
Manny made a point of not looking at Jack. “Dude, I didn’t —”
“What did Sy tell you?”
“Dude, you gotta —”
“What did Sy tell you?”
Manny’s bald head drooped between his shoulders. “‘There’s no such thing as off the record with a supervisor,’” he quoted sheepishly.
“Very good, grasshopper. Now, what did you say off the record to our new glorious leader?”
“Not much, really.” Manny cast a quick look at Jack. “I just told him things were different now than back when he was on the road.”
“Uh-huh,” Jack snorted disbelievingly. “And did you happen to use any words like ancient, prehistoric, antiquated? Anything along those lines?”
Staring straight ahead, Manny confessed, “I may have said something about him being an outdated relic.”
“Fuck, Manny. You’re lucky he didn’t document you for insubordination. He said something about formally cautioning you?”
Manny nodded.
“More than once?”
Another nod.
“He told me he’s looking to document you or transfer you.” Jack let that sink in for a second or two. “Or both.”
“Dude, he can’t make me leave 51!” Manny protested.
“He can and he will. Greene strikes me as the type of guy who knows rules and regs inside out. So far he hasn’t done anything wrong, just stupid. He wants me to bring the platoon together as a team while he stomps on our morale.”
“You got any ideas, man?” Manny asked, looking hopefully at Jack. “Like what you did with the gloves? Dude, that was beautiful.”
“This is a little trickier than just tuning up any asshole you find wearing leather gloves.” Jack slumped in the passenger seat, chin propped in hand. It seemed everyone was expecting him to take on the mantle of leadership, whether he wanted to or not.
“All right, Manny, it’s four-thirty. Time to get out of the laneways.”
“Aw, c’mon, Jack. We’ve still got time.”
Jack levelled a steely glare at Manny, using his new scar to its best advantage. “Listen, you’ve been crawling around the laneways looking for trouble for the last half hour. Time’s up. You find anything and you’re doing the overtime on your own.”
Manny shuddered comically. “Dude, don’t do that. That scar makes you look all evil like.”
“Really?” Jack brightened. “What kind of evil? Dracula evil or Terminator unfeeling cyborg type?”
“Definitely Terminator, man. I’m jealous.”
Jack laughed. “Well, maybe if you’re lucky, you’ll screw up one day and get one of your own. Now, out of the alley. Don’t make me say it.” He gave Manny his best cyborg stare.
Manny giggled. “Do it, man. I gotta hear it.”
Doing his best Arnold impersonation, Jack slowly faced Manny and said, “Get. Out.”
Laughing, Manny manoeuvred the car through the laneway’s tight corner behind the beer store on Gerrard. He’d spent at least the last half hour cruising the division’s labyrinthine laneways hoping to stumble over something that would kill the time. The day had turned out to be on the slow side and instead of rushing to get the calls done before the end of shift they had found themselves clear with nothing on the pending screen. A crackhead smoking up, a whore blowing some guy, a hound sucking on a bottle. Anything to pass the time, but the laneways had been as quiet as the radio.
Manny turned north on Seaton Street and eased to a stop at Gerrard.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Jack grumbled. He nodded toward his window, then leaned back so Manny could see.
“That’s rude.”
Not ten feet away, on the thin stretch of grass between the sidewalk and the beer store’s west brick wall, a man stood, swaying gently, as he urinated in full view of the pedestrians, rush-hour drivers and police car. And it was a hell of a good piss, judging from the blissful expression on his face. Almost too blissful; he was coming awfully close to pissing on the twelve-pack Jack figured the guy had just bought.
“There you go, grasshopper. A quick ticket for pissing in public and then we head in.” Jack laughed at himself. Quoting movies, calling him grasshopper. I’m turning into Sy.
Jack advised the dispatcher and they got out of the car, Manny armed with his ticket book, as the man shook off the last few drops.
He noticed the cops as he was zipping up. “Thorry, offithers,” he slurred around a happy grin. “I hadda go.”
“Apparently. You know, you could have gone around the corner into the alley.”
The man, unkempt from his ripped runners to the tips of his greasy hair, nodded in solemn agreement with Manny.
Manny, standing in front of the man with his gun side bladed away, gestured to the busy street, its cars and pedestrians. “Do you think all these nice people on the way home from work needed to see you pissing on the sidewalk? Didn’t your mother raise you better?” Manny shook his head in disgust. “Let’s see some ID, bud.”
“I’m thorry,” the man repeated as he dug out a battered wallet.
As he dropped his head to dig through the wallet, he teetered forward. Manny reached out a gloved hand to gently set him upright. Jack, positioned on the man’s right and slightly behind so as to be out of sight, raised an anticipatory hand, but it wasn’t needed. The drunk wobbled but didn’t go down. Showing off his remaining teeth with a shit-eating grin, he proudly handed Manny his ID.
“A Seaton House card? This all you got —” Manny consulted the hostel’s card “— Eric?”
Eric nodded, big loopy nods, each one threatening to overbalance him.
Manny reached for his mitre, then looked at Jack. “Should I run him?”
“And if he comes back wanted on some chickenshit warrant?” Jack asked around Eric’s tilting shoulder.
“Right.” Manny tucked the radio in its carrier and flipped open his ticket book.
“You ain’t givin me a ticket, is you?” Eric suddenly perked up.
“’Course I am. Can’t have you pissing wherever you want, now, can we? What would my mother think if I let you walk away from this without suffering the appropriate consequences?”
“Fuck your mother!” Eric proclaimed defiantly and snatched his ID back.
Or tried to. Manny neatly stepped away and Eric reeled forward, saving himself from an embarrassing face-plant in his own urine by thrusting out an unsteady leg. Bent nearly horizontal with his legs stretched out beneath him, he swung blindly at Manny and once again almost dumped himself.
With an amused grin, Manny placed his hand on Eric’s head and pushed ever so gently. Pinwheeling his arms, Eric tottered backward. For the briefest of moments, he paused, his balance within reach, his arms and one leg thrust out like some fucked-up scarecrow. Then gravity, aided by brain cells stewed in cheap alcohol, won the contest and down Eric went. He fell on his ass, avoiding his steaming puddle but still making a decent splat! in the soggy ground.
“Sorry, dude.” Manny shrugged apologetically and snapped open his handcuff pouch.
Jack shook his head. By the time they got mumble-fuck to the station, searched, lodged and the paperwork done, it would probably be close to an hour of overtime. If they didn’t have to wait long to parade him, that was. Overtime on his first day back at 51. Jack, thinking of Karen, could hear the argument already.
They flipped Eric over in the mud to snap the cuffs on and then hauled him upright. At the car, they leaned him over the trunk for the search, more of a thorough patdown; the complete, smelly, disgusting strip search, one of the things they didn’t tell you about at the police college, would come later at the station.
“I’ve got this, Jack.” Manny quickly swapped his leather gloves for latex; Eric was muddy and damp and leather tended to absorb fluids.
“I want muh beer! Don’t you forget muh beer!” In his indignation, Eric’s alcohol-induced speech impediment had cleared up.
“Shut up,” Manny advised Eric. Finished with his lower half, Manny raised him off the trunk to search his threadbare lumber jacket. Jack stood by, his left hand clamped around Eric’s right arm.
“I want muh beer.” Eric turned to Jack, his face dripping soupy mud. With all the dogs in the neighbourhood, Jack wondered how much of the goop on Eric’s nose and chin wasn’t mud. “Go get my fuckin’ beer,” he ordered and jerked his head at Jack to emphasize his earnestness.
Jack turned his head, but mud still splatted onto his cheek and neck. It was cold and he could feel the slime trail as the mud slid to his collar. Jack let go of Eric and wiped his neck and face, flinging globbing muck to the sidewalk.
“I said, get muh fuckin’ beer.”
“That’s it, fuckhead.” Jack reached for Eric, murder in his eyes, but Eric was too drunk to notice.
“Jack, people are watching,” Manny cautioned fervently, his voice pitched so it wouldn’t carry to the small group of curious spectators.
Jack stopped, one hand on Eric, the other twitching at his side, eager to draw back and let fly the punishment. He looked at Manny, who shook his head ever so slightly.
“Witnesses, Jack.”
“Yeah, Jack. Wit-sees. Go get muh beer.” Eric grinned like the moron he was, too drunk, too stupid to know how close he had come to a trip to the hospital.
“You finished the search?” Jack asked through gritted teeth.
“Yup, all done.”
Jack yanked open the car’s rear door. “Get this shit out of my sight.”
They stuffed Eric into the back seat and Jack slammed the door on his demands for them to “get muh beer.” Jack reached into the front seat and grabbed some napkins from under the visor — there were always napkins under police car visors; cops were notoriously sloppy when it came to eating in cars they didn’t have to clean — and wiped the mud off his skin. And it’s only mud, he kept repeating until he was satisfied he was clean.
“Dude, that was close. You looked like you were going to kill him.”
Jack drew a deep breath, held it and blew the tension out with it. He balled up the napkins and tossed them onto the passenger floorboard — notoriously sloppy — before trusting himself to speak.
“Tell the truth, I felt like murdering him. I haven’t lost my temper like that since . . . I can’t remember when.”
Oh really? How about with Karen’s dad? Hm?
“If’n I was you, I’da slugged ’im one.”
The tiny crowd of onlookers, hoping for some real-life police brutality, had drifted away disappointed. But standing at the front of the scout car was an ancient black man bundled up in a thick parka despite the flush of spring in the air. At his feet was a small and equally ancient dog.
A grin banished the scowl from Jack’s face. “Phil. Good to see you.”
“I thought it was you, Officer Jack, but I wasn’ sure. Haven’ seen you aroun’ much these days.” A matching smile stretched the already taut skin around Phil’s mouth.
“They had me tucked away someplace safe and boring. How are you doing?” Jack took Phil’s hand gently, not wanting to cause the elderly gent any pain; his hands were misshapen lumps, the knuckles swollen grotesquely by arthritis. “Manny, this is Phil, we met last year.”
“I remember meeting this gentleman.” Manny shook Phil’s hand. “I came out to take the photos when you were assaulted.”
“Whatever happened to that prick?” Last year, while Jack was working with Sy — Was it the first day we worked together? — they had responded to an assault call at a rundown rooming house on George Street. Phil, eighty-odd years old, had been punched and knocked to the ground by a much younger and bigger resident for the crime of being black. The asshole had called him a nigger. Jack and Sy had taught the asshole a lesson in respect. Before dragging his ass off to jail.
Manny shrugged. “Pled guilty, far as I know.”
“Has he been around, Phil?”
The old man carefully shook his head. “Ain’t seen ’im since you and Officer Simon busted down ’is door. That was good t’see!” Phil laughed his way into a coughing fit. Jack and Manny waited patiently for the old guy to get his lungs under control. “Sorry ’bout that,” he apologized, wiping away a tear. Whether from laughing or coughing or both, Jack couldn’t tell. “Damn cig’rettes gonna kill me yet.”
“You kicked down his door?” Manny inquired innocently.
“He didn’t want to be arrested. Nothing big.” Jack knelt down. “And how is Bear?” Jack held out his hand to the little guy who was trying to hide behind his owner’s legs.
“Gettin’ old, like me, but he’s doin’ good. Go on, Bear. Say hello.”
Bear, a tiny Heinz 57 of a dog with a bit of a paunch, hesitantly stretched his nose out from between Phil’s legs to sniff at Jack’s offered hand. After a few investigative sniffs, Bear waddled stiffly out from hiding, his stub of a tail twitching happily. He butted his head into Jack’s palm, seeking an ear scratch.
“Damn if he don’ like you, Officer Jack. But then, he took to you that day, too.”
“Bear and I understand each other. Don’t we, Bear? And it’s just Jack, Phil. None of that officer crap.”
Bear, moving slowly and deliberately, eased down onto his belly, then tried to roll onto his back, but he lacked the flexibility. He settled for lying on his side and lifting his front leg while whining. Jack knew a tummy rub request when he saw it.
“I’ll be damned,” Phil wheezed as Bear’s tail thumped ecstatically on the sidewalk while Jack’s fingers scratched his belly. “You certainly got a way with ’im. Maybe I was meant to meet up wit’ you t’day.”
“Why’s that, Phil?” Jack looked up but didn’t stop the tummy rub. Bear’s back leg had joined his tail in a happy dance.
“Been seein’ this guy ’round. Got a pup with ’im. Beautiful shepherd, ’tis. And he beats ’im som’thin’ bad.”
Jack stood up. Bear lay where he was, his tail and leg slowly winding down, a dopey doggy grin on his face.
“What’s this guy look like? White, black, Asian?” Like most cops, Jack could endure violence against adults, at times even partake of it himself — Eric really didn’t know how lucky he was — but hurt a child or an animal and it got personal.
Phil nodded, seeing the change in Jack’s attitude and approving. “Little white guy. Red hair. Got a nose on ’im looks like it’s been busted up a few times.”
“Joey Horner,” Manny said without hesitation. “He’s a little shit. Hangs around the Seaton House. Didn’t know he had a dog, though.”
“We’ll keep an eye out for him, Phil. Thanks.”
A muffled cry came from the scout car. It might have been I want muh beer.
“Manny, go shut him up.”
“No problem.”
“Where you headed, Phil? You need a ride home? We can always make that mumblee ride in the trunk.”
Phil smiled his thanks but declined. “Jes’ ’eading to the beer store. Gonna pick me som’thin’ to sip on.”
Jack smiled as a very nasty idea came to mind. “Hang on a sec, Phil.” Still smiling, Jack stepped over to Eric’s twelve-pack, careful not to step in any puddles and scooped the beer up.
“That’s right, motherfucker! I better get muh beer back when I get out! Where the fuck you going?”
Jack waved at Eric before handing the beer to Phil. “There you go, Phil. Compliments of the Toronto police.”
Phil smiled and it was as evil as Jack’s. “Why, thank you, Officer. I really ’preciate that.”
“No problem, sir. You have a good night. You, too, Bear.”
The little dog had made it back to his feet. Jack stooped to give him a final ear scratch.
“That was nasty, dude. Nasty.” Manny beamed approval over the car roof.
“It was, wasn’t it?”
Inside the car, Eric’s scream was loud and long. Sometimes a trip to the hospital just wasn’t necessary.