Fallen (7 page)

“I don’t recall anything. Nate … tried not to bring police work into our home life. It made me nervous.” Kristen shook her head sadly. “I was always afraid of something like this happening.”

Laughter erupted in the hall. Several uniforms conversed as they went out to the rear, fenced-in compound where the patrol units were parked, unaware that a grieving widow, one of their own, was within hearing range. Ryan waited for them to pass before speaking again. “There’s a scratch on Nate’s car. A pretty big one on the driver’s side. Do you know how long it’s been there?”

“I haven’t seen his car in days. I haven’t been down to the garage since …” She halted, her lower lip trembling. Ryan knew she had been the one to find Nate when he hadn’t come upstairs. Her hands fluttered nervously on the table as she composed herself. “I-I don’t recall a scratch, so it must’ve been recent. You know how Nate was about that car. He would’ve mentioned something like that. Does it have something to do with what happened?”

“We’re not sure.” Mike Perry hadn’t known about the scratch, either, leading Ryan to believe it had been made sometime just prior to Nate’s murder.

“You’re not treating this like an attempted robbery, are you, Ryan? You think someone was lying in wait for him in the parking garage. They took his
shield
. He was killed because of his job.”

Her eyes filled, and he reached for her hand.

“It’s a strong possibility, Kristen. We’re looking at every angle.” After he’d run through his remaining questions, not learning much else, he rose. “I really am sorry to have bothered you. Do you need a ride?”

“My sister’s waiting outside.” Wearily, she pushed herself up from the table. “I just want you to catch who did this. Nate always thought you were a good cop. He’d be glad it’s your case.”

The praise fell heavily inside him.

She paused, her expression reflective. “We were married almost twelve years. Our last words to each other … they weren’t good ones. Nate was always so busy, and I was angry because he was late to take me to a concert at Chastain Park. Josh Groban. I’d had tickets for weeks …”

She shook her head, her voice cracking. “That all seems so silly now. I really
did
love him.”

“I’m sure Nate knew that,” Ryan offered solemnly.

“I wish we’d had a child, you know? We talked about it for a long time, but neither of us was sure.”

As he held the door for her, she stopped and looked up into his face. Her bleary eyes searched his.

“How did you get through it?” she whispered. “Losing Tyler?”

Ryan swallowed, unsure of what to say. He recalled his lowest point, how bad things had been. Sometimes the feelings of self-recrimination were still enough to drag him under. But Kristen seemed to be grasping for some small piece of insight, of hope. Finally, he said, “You keep breathing and try not to die along with him. Nate would want you to keep living, Kristen. He’d want you to rebuild your life.”

He escorted her to the bullpen for the remainder of Nate’s things. The noise faded into silence as they appeared. Several of the detectives approached to offer their condolences.

Kristen wept when she saw the framed photo of herself on Nate’s desk.

*

It was early afternoon, a game day, and people were out on the streets surrounding Turner Field. Vendors sold Atlanta Braves souvenirs from folding card tables while scalpers brandished tickets as they loudly promoted their wares to the crowds headed into the stadium. On the sidewalks, men held cardboard signs advertising makeshift pay parking lots on nearby church and business properties.

“Giants are in town,” Ryan mentioned absently from the passenger side of the Chevy Impala. He was still thinking about Kristen Weisz.

“It’s sold-out. Should make the scalpers happy.” Mateo braked at a crosswalk to allow game-goers to pass. He added dryly, “I don’t suppose Quintavius might have air-conditioned box seats? We could talk to him here over a Guinness?”

Ryan gave a wan smile but kept his eyes on the road. “Wishful thinking.”

As they left the stadium area and went deeper into the outlying neighborhoods, he was aware of the increasing prevalence of gang tags. Spray-painted on the concrete walls of the underpass, on the sides of timeworn buildings and rusted metal Dumpsters, they were territorial markings meant to intimidate. The HB2s had more than a hundred in its ranks and pretty much ruled the area. Those who lived here kept quiet out of fear and also out of a distrust of police. Ryan peered at the urban scenery as it rushed past. Two gang members had shown up in Nate’s files as recent arrests, but one was still in lockup, unable to make bond, while the other had been remanded to state prison a week ago for breaking parole. While that meant neither was the shooter, the arrests might have been the catalyst for putting a target on Nate’s back, he rationalized.

Several minutes later, their car turned onto the mostly residential Purvis Street. Quintavius ran a legitimate business as a front, but everyone knew he still spent most of his time around his old neighborhood. Mateo decelerated as they neared a row of shotgun-style houses that were at least a century old. A mom-and-pop convenience store sat adjacent to the homes, and a young black male, probably no more than ten, leaned against its cinderblock wall. Seeing the sedan, he straightened and darted quickly across the street and into one of the houses.

“Pee Wee made us,” Ryan noted, using gang terminology for those too young for membership but who were still used as lookouts or runners to transport drugs. The kid had gone to warn whoever was in the house that the cops had arrived.

“Don’t look at me,” Mateo deadpanned as he parked against the curb and cut the Impala’s engine. “White boy like you probably sticks out in these parts.”

As they exited the car, Ryan scoped out their surroundings. They were here to talk, not serve an arrest warrant, but that didn’t mean they would be welcome. Opening the gate to the chain link fence that enclosed the house’s grass and dirt yard, they began traveling up the crumbling concrete walk to its raised porch. A wiry, dark-complexioned male in his mid-twenties came out before they reached it, however. A blue bandanna—the gang’s street color and an indicator of membership—was tied over his scalp. Ryan recognized him as Warren Rucker, also known as Pooch. The innocuous street name was deceiving as he had already served a stint in prison for armed assault.

Pooch recognized them, as well, because he crossed his arms over his chest and scowled. “Detectives Winter and Hernandez. Unless y’all got a warrant, you can stop right there.”

“Now don’t be like that, Pooch. We’re just here to see Quintavius.” Mateo squinted up at him through his sunglasses.

“Social visit, huh? Well, he ain’t here.”

“Then where is he?”

“Went down to Miami for a little R&R.”

Ryan wondered if that was true. Pooch was a hard-core member of the HB2s and rumored to be among the next in line for leadership should anything happen to Quintavius. He wouldn’t put it past the thug to attempt a coup at some point. “Then you’ll have to do. Want to come down off that porch?”

Pooch eyed them with a mix of animosity and suspicion, then took his time in joining them in the yard. Ryan noticed someone peeping out at them from the shotgun’s upstairs window.

“All right. Now what y’all want?”

“The HB2s still have a thing for keying cop cars?” Mateo asked.

Pooch nodded to the Impala. “Yours looks all right.”

“That one’s not the problem. It’s city issue. Thing is, we’ve got two dead cops, both of them with key scratches on their personal vehicles.”

The gang member made a scoffing noise. “So the
murder police
are here, asking if we did it?”

Ryan spoke. “Officer Watterson was killed a month and a half ago outside a package store, Detective Weisz on Friday night. He was off duty and in the garage of his own building.”

“Heard someone lit Weisz up.” Pooch smirked, his eyes cold. “Damn shame.”

“But you don’t know anything about it?”

“Nope.”

A dog barked inside the house—a big one, judging by the sound of it. Ryan shifted his stance, tamping down an urge to run Pooch into the precinct for the hell of it. He was pretty sure if they patted him down, they’d find something of interest. But instead he said, “I think you
do
know. Maybe you’ve got some recruits running around looking to earn their stripes—”

“Young bloods,” Pooch interjected, playing along.

“So they bag two cops and leave key scratches behind to mark them as gang hits. Something like that would boost your street cred and move you up the ranks fast,” Ryan wagered. “Maybe they saw an opportunity and even took an APD shield to flash around as a souvenir.”

Pooch gave a derisive snort. “You got some imagination, Detective.
Like I said
, I don’t know nothin’ about it. Your boys gettin’ smoked ain’t on us.”

“Then the scratches on both cars are purely coincidental,” Mateo clarified, sarcastic.

“Could be.” He shrugged and added, “Besides, if you had any real proof, you’d be makin’ arrests instead of just coming ’round here fishin’. Am I right?”

He paused as a delivery truck roared past. “You want my take, though? All right, here it is. Weisz pissed somebody off. He got into somebody’s fuckin’ business and got himself erased. That’s just part of the game, yo, and what they call a
teaching lesson
.”

He looked pointedly between the two detectives.

“It’s no game,” Ryan warned.

“Am I crying over Weisz, Detective Winter? The answer’s
hell no
. Couldn’t happen to a better pig. And I ain’t never heard of any Watterson, not that I give a rat’s ass about him, either. But I’ll say it again in case you’re hard of hearin’. It ain’t on us.”

The midday sun beat down, causing little shimmies of heat to float up from the street out front. Ryan’s eyes locked with Pooch’s. He’d had enough of his bravado. He took a step closer and lowered his voice. “A word of advice. Unless you want the heat turned up on your operation, if one of yours did this, you’d better turn him over.”

He felt Mateo’s subtle nudge. Ryan looked back up at the porch. Three more gang members, shirtless, their chests tattooed with
HB2
, had appeared at the door’s threshold. One of them held a snarling pit bull on a heavy chain leash. Several more bangers now peered at them from the windows. They were outnumbered.

“Tell Quintavius what I told you,” Ryan emphasized, pointing a finger before he and Mateo turned to walk away. “
He’s
a businessman, and it’s a business decision. He’ll know what to do.”

Pooch’s eyes narrowed, indicating he’d caught the slight.

Cops always kept a round in the chamber of their weapon while in the field. On guard, Ryan felt the weight of his gun in his shoulder holster as he and Mateo got back into their vehicle. In the distance, sirens wailed as police squad cars raced off to somewhere deeper inside the district.

“Well, that was fun,” Mateo muttered, starting the engine. He shook his head. “You got a death wish?”

Ryan merely grunted, falling silent as they pulled from the curb. It rankled him that he hadn’t been able to get a better read from Pooch. And he was far from the first punk who’d threatened him.

“So, what? You’re still thinking the shootings are gang related?”

“I don’t know. But right now it’s the best hunch we’ve got.”

They went past a community center, a beautiful old building that was still well cared for and looked out of place in the run-down neighborhood, nestled between a pawnshop and tenement homes. Mateo cranked up the Impala’s air conditioning, which was fighting a losing battle against the humidity.

“If you’re serious about turning up the heat, Narcotics might be able to come up with a warrant for that shotgun they use as a clubhouse.” He glanced over at Ryan, his eyes hidden behind the dark tint of his sunglasses. “But if we come back here, we do it with a freakin’ platoon.”

Ryan didn’t disagree. And in the meantime, they had others to look at with regard to Nate’s murder. Until they had something more concrete, he couldn’t afford to go down a rabbit hole with the key scratches, in case they really did mean nothing at all.

His cell phone rang. He retrieved it from his pocket and answered, rubbing his forehead with two fingers of his left hand as he listened to what the caller had to say. Once he’d disconnected the phone, he filled in Mateo.

“That was Hoyt. Leo Moore alibied for Friday night. He was at a church social with his girlfriend. The minister can vouch for him being there.”

“Moore in church.” Mateo gave a cynical shake of his head, acquainted with the ex-con’s history. “He’s damn lucky he wasn’t struck by lightning.”

Ryan wasn’t finished. “Ballistics are back, too. The striations on the bullets used in both homicides are a match.”

Impressions left on bullets fired by handguns were unique, like fingerprints. No two firearms’ were exactly alike, even if they were of the same make and model. Regardless of the car keyings, it was unarguable proof the two murders were connected. The same weapon had been used to kill both Nate and Watterson. Which meant it was either the same shooter, or the gun had been passed around.

Mateo frowned hard. “What Darnell said in the parking garage about it being open season on cops? I hope to hell he’s not right.”

Chapter Six