Crystal Meth Cowboys (15 page)

Bell looked at Wes. Wes responded. "And what did he say?"

"'I'm the designated decoy!'"

"That's pretty funny," said Wes.

Bell tipped his head. "That's John Aubuchon's Jag right there," he said, then continued off Lyedecker's blank look. "The Prince of Darkness. The owner of the Department of Evil. This here's the big dog's poker game Florence told us about and I propose we sit here till Boss Hogg exits the premises and climbs behind the wheel in an inebriated state
at
which time we will bust his worthless butt." Bell looked toward the three-story house half a block away and added, "They're old farts, they won't play long," as if working late were the only objection Wes could have.

"Oh God," said Wes.

"Hey," said Bell, "We don't go near him unless he's staggering falling down shitfaced. You wouldn't want to stand idly by and let a citizen violate the law, would you officer?"

"Yes!" said Wes. "Absolutely! This isn't going to fool anyone. Florence Jillison is our friend. Busting her opponent ten days before the election isn't police work. It's political skullduggery!"

Bell popped out the door, leveled the binoculars and popped back in. A Volvo station wagon slowed to a complete stop before crossing the intersection. "Yo, Braintree, hear me out. This ain't Herr Halderman's ratfuckers planting phony stories in the press. This'll be a solid bust, against a man who's in bed with the drug lords. You heard what CJ said."

"I…uh…"

"He said Boss Hogg's trying to stonewall the investigation, remember?"

"Well, actually, I believe you said that, sir."

"All right, all right. But CJ agreed!"

"Actually, if memory serves, I believe CJ laughed and then coughed."

"12-2 requesting backup at…ah, 2-9-0-7 J-John Street."

Bell said, "There's three other units," though they both knew that at 9:51 the other swing shift units were probably parked and the graveyard crew was still pounding down coffee in the squad room. Bell turned away from Lyedecker's accusing look. "Renaldo sounds OK for now. If he starts screaming in Spanish, we'll roll."

They settled back to wait, Bell drumming his fingers on the steering wheel and Wes trying to arrange himself and his gunbelt on the seat. He couldn't get comfortable. "Sir, I…"

"Shut
up
, here he comes."

Wes peered through the wind-pocked windshield, stuck his head out the window for a clearer view. Two men, conversing loudly, ambled down the front walk of the Victorian, their path lit by mushroom lights. A street lamp bounced light off Mayor Krumrie's dome. The other man had silver hair. Neither man appeared to be staggering.

"Shit," said Bell. "He's with Aubuchon."

"Why is that a problem?" asked Wes none-too-innocently. Apparently even Bell was nervous about taking on the most powerful man in town.

Bell did not reply. He turned the police radio as low as it would go as he watched John Aubuchon walk to his pearly Jaguar sedan. Mayor Krumrie's Lincoln Town Car was parked further up the block. The Mayor took a long time finding his car key, tried opening the door without success. He stared at the key sadly, as if it had betrayed him. The Jaguar's lights snapped on.

"What are we waiting for?"

"Shut
up
," said Bell.

Wes felt strangely calm. Recent events had broadened his perspective. These were not heavily armed ampheads. Violent death was not imminent. Bell should lighten up.

"Go, go, go, go," said Bell to John Aubuchon. The Jaguar purred to life and pulled away from the curb. "Awright," said Bell.

The Jaguar stopped alongside the Lincoln. Aubuchon leaned over and called out to the Mayor.

"What'd he say?" whispered Bell.

"I think he offered him a ride home." They both watched the Mayor wave him off.

"He thinks he's got a get out of jail free card," said Bell. "Hyuk hyuk hyuk."

The Jaguar rolled on. The Mayor managed to insert a key in his car door. "If we're going to do this, we should get him now," said Wes. "We can nail him on 'drunk in car'.

"That's a bullshit misdeameanor!"

"Yes, but if we let him drive off in this condition we're responsible if he hits anything, or anyone."

"He's not going to get a block before we stop him. And nobody saw us waiting. We can say when we drove up he was already underway," said Bell, compulsively clicking a ball point pen.

Wes watched the Mayor roll himself into the Lincoln. He reached out to close the door and nearly tumbled to the pavement. Wes shook his head. "No we can't," he said.

Bell stopped clicking his pen and stared.

"I'm sorry, but I can't keep doing this."

"
What
?"

"Lying."

The Lincoln roared to life. After several seconds, the headlights came on. Bell said "Jesus H. Holy Hannah fuckin-a Kee-rist!" as he lit the headlights, the full light bar, goosed the hi-lo and tromped on the gas. He screeched to a halt at the Lincoln's rear door, killed the siren and banged open his door.

Wes climbed out of the unit to see a very befuddled Mayor Krumrie staring into the bright white of Officer Bell's Kel light. "Turn off your engine and and lower your window," barked Bell, turning an imaginary key and pushing his palm downward. "Sir, turn off your engine and…" The Town Car lurched away from the curb.

Bell jumped back, colliding with Wes Lyedecker who grabbed him under the armpits and held him up. The front door of the three-story Victorian swung open. Men clustered on the porch. The Lincoln bounced off the safety bumper of the Cadillac in front. The Mayor yanked the steering wheel to the right, threw the Lincoln into reverse and bounced off the curb. Bell and Lyedecker scrambled for their seats.

Mayor Krumrie cut the front wheels all the way to the left and stood on the accelerator. The right front bumper of the Town Car just skirted the Cadillac while the left rear panel sheared off the right front bumper and headlamp
of the squad car with a great gnashing of steel and glass. The Lincoln rocketed up the road.

The men on the porch were now crossing the lawn. Bell threw the Ford in drive and let the forward thrust slam his open door. Wes snugged up his safety belt. "Control, 12 Frank is Code 3 in pursuit of a possible 23-152 westbound on Kent Street," said Bell to the microphone.

The Lincoln took a wide right.

"Suspect is refusing to yield," said Bell and keyed off. Wes peered ahead intently, adjusting his eyes to the loss of the right headlight. If Bell was planning to turn he should have swung wide by now.

Bell pinned the wheel to the right. The LTD shuddered as the corner curb shaved rubber off its blackwalls. Bell straightened the unit out and closed distance on the speeding Lincoln. "Well shit," he said, sitting tall, grinning, visions of a felony resisting pinch dancing in his head. "This is working out just fine."

------

"Open the pod bay doors, Hal," said Bell. Their squad car idled in front of the rolled steel door to the sally port, a drive-in entrance to the holding cells located at the rear of the PD. Bell leaned out the car window and again punched the intercom button. "Hal? Open the pod bay doors."

Mayor Krumrie grunted restively in the back seat. The intercom speaker crackled on. "I'm sorry, Dave," came the chilling monotone response. "I can't do that."

The ribbed steel door clattered up as Bell positively honked with laughter. He eased the unit into the small space sealed by a matching steel door ahead. As the door rolled closed behind, Wes did have the feeling that they were inside the entry pod of some low budget space station, orbiting one of the lesser planets. A grinning mustachioed
face peered dark liquid eyeballs from the other side of a bullet-proof glass booth. "Open the door or we kick it, asshole," said Bell to the tray under the window. The man rubbed his nose with his middle finger.

Wes climbed out of the unit and trooped over to a bank of lock boxes to secure his weapon, it being a felony in the state of California to enter any detention facilty with a firearm. "Put it in here," said Bell, popping the trunk.

Wes stopped and looked a question at Bell.

"I'm at a major big deal call," said Bell. "
Surrounded
on all sides by hostile natives in all directions as far as the eye can see. I'm by myself, without backup, all alone. You with me so far? So I lean back on my right hand to feel the reassuring steely hardness of my Smith and Wesson and I almost fall over. It's gone! I left the muffah in the jail lock box and am now fucked big time six ways to Sunday. If it's in the trunk at least you can make a run for it."

Wes removed his weapon and placed it in the trunk. Bell walked to the driver's side of the unit and opened the back door. "Back out of there," said Bell to his prisoner, ducking his long neck downward. "Turn around and back on out."

Bell was using the departmentally approved method for dealing with violent suspects. They had dogged the Mayor's Lincoln eight blocks to his hilltop home, even pulling abreast and ordering him to pull over on the bawl-out. When Boss Hogg skidded up his front lawn and made a run for it the rookie snagged him before he reached his front door. There'd been the requisite wrestling, hysterical wife and 'don't you know who I am' threats before they got Boss Hogg hooked up and sitting on his hands in the back seat of the unit. Bell had been painstakingly polite throughout the call, as he always was when his pocket tape recorder was rolling.

The four-inch-thick steel door to the jail sprang open with a hydraulic whoosh. The Mayor scooched himself down
the backseat, still facing forward. "Turn
around
," repeated Bell. "I'm not gonna fuck ya."

The bright-eyed jailer stepped through the opened door. He was a handsome Latino stranded somewhere in middle age, yet trim and moustachioed as a matador. "That's my job," he said, grinning maniacally with piano key teeth.

The Mayor scuttled out of the squad car with his back turned. When Lester Krumrie stood up under the lights Ruben the jailer's grin got twitchy. Bell secured the prisoner by placing his right hand on the cuff chain between his wrists. Bell planted his other hand on the Mayor's shoulder and marched him up three concrete steps and into the hoosegow.

-----

Bell hated this problem. After recovering from the initial shock of recognition Ruben the jailer had processed and fingerprinted the Mayor like any other prisoner. When Ruben stood him up against the cinderblock for his mug shot the pie-eyed candidate responded to the photo op with a smile. Now it was time to collect the urine sample. The Chief required officer's to collect a urine sample in DUI arrests, he
said
, because it was more court sanctioned than a breathalyzer. But Bell believed the real reason was that the Emperor enjoyed fantasizing about his proud leather-clad centurions getting pissed on.

Bell escorted the Mayor down the narrow hall, below skylights protected by steel bars, the opaque glass smeared with thick streaks of black. Ruben the jailer had painted tar on the newly-installed skylights after he judged that the sunlight they permitted made his jail seem entirely too cheery. Bell opened the slamlock door to a holding cell and stood the Mayor against the concrete brick back wall. The Mayor wrinkled his nose at the strong industrial disinfectant. He looked longingly at the bunk. "All right,
here's the deal…" said Bell when a torrent of angry voices echoed down the narrow hall. Bell and Lydecker trotted out to see.

Renaldo and Cyril Reese turned into the hall from the sally port, holding a shrieking handcuffed writhing and bucking suspect - white male, 6 foot, 160 lbs., 30 to 35 - under each arm. His hair was stringy with sweat and he wore a scoop neck t-shirt drenched in blood. The man was shouting so fast and hard that Wes could only discern the words "motherfucker", "son of a bitch" and what sounded like "George Bush".

Ruben the jailer hurried to open a cell door while Reese and Renaldo locked up the suspect's shoulders, freeing him to kick up his legs like a kid on a swing. By the fact that the suspect was in the slam and not the hospital Bell knew that the blood on the t-shirt wasn't his. Neither of the arresting officers appeared wounded. Renaldo glanced at the out-of-control suspect, then looked a pointed look at Bell.

Bell held up a hand. He indicated the drooping Mayor to Wes Lyedecker with a nod. Wes ducked back into the cell. Bell curled his index finger. Wes led the Mayor out into the hall. Bell returned Renaldo's look and gestured toward his prisoner. Reese and Renaldo looked suitably impressed.

"Who's the victim?" said Bell.

"Victim-
s
," said Renaldo.

Reese drew a finger across his throat. Bell blanched.

"His two pet guinea pigs," said Renaldo. The bloody suspect gained his feet and said, "Eeeeaauuurrggghhhh!"

Renaldo uncuffed the suspect, Reese shoved him into a cell and Ruben the jailer slammed the slamlock door.

Bell led Boss Hogg back into the cell and stood him up against the concrete brick. Bell removed his arm and the Mayor melted halfway down the wall. Bell pulled him up and yanked down his zipper. He waved Wes over. "Pee in the cup, Mr. Mayor," said Bell in a patient voice. "Pee in the cup."

Wes held out the plastic cup hopefully. The Mayor blinked, drifting in and out like an FM signal on a mountain road. Bell pushed Boss Hogg's hand down to his crotch. The hand found the open tent flap and slipped inside. The Mayor's face slackened into a dopey grin. "Mr. Mayor," said Bell. "
Sir
!"

Hizzoner looked up.

"You can flog the dolphin right after we're done, I
promise
, but first we need you to pull out your penis and pee into the cup."

The Mayor fumbled inside his plaid pants and pulled out a tumescent uncircumsized cock. Wes Lyedecker stepped back. Bell twirled his arm at Wes as he purred, "That's it, attaboy," to Boss Hogg.

Wes extended his arms as far as they would go, presenting his cup to the Mayor's penis. He watched the purplish helmet shrink inside the foreskin like a mole backing into its burrow. "Give, Queenie, give!" said Bell in a W.C. Fields' rasp.